‘Is he dead?’ said Tig, but nobody was paying any attention to her.
She swallowed hard and followed them to the chemist shop.
Tig tugged at Mr Becker’s sleeve. ‘Is the professor…’ her voice cracked. ‘Is he dead?’
‘Heavens, no, child. Hurry now, we need to help them.’
* * *
Nelson and Faber were laid down to recover in the cool quiet of Mr Becker’s parlour, where Tig had never been allowed before. Nelson was propped up in a chair with his feet on a stool, and was soon alert and talking.
‘Hush, boy. Drink this.’ Mr Becker presented him with a small glass of something that looked like tar.
‘Ick.’ Nelson screwed up his face. ‘What is it?’
‘An expectorant,’ said Becker. ‘To help you cough up all that nasty soot in your lungs.’
‘You were very brave,’ said Eliza. She hadn’t spoken except to fuss over Nelson like a mother hen. She hadn’t said anything about the loss of her theatre, even though it was still burning not far away.
‘Here you go,’ said Matilde, handing Tig a cup.
‘I’m not hurt,’ she said. ‘I don’t need any medicine.’
‘It’s just strong tea,’ said Matilde. ‘For the shock.’
‘Thank you.’
Mr Becker and Eliza retreated into the next room to talk in hushed, serious tones while Matilde went out front to serve a customer in the chemist shop.
‘I’m sorry I got you hurt, again,’ said Tig. ‘I thought…’ She blinked away a tear, hoping Nelson hadn’t seen it. ‘I thought you wouldn’t make it out. Cold Annie tried to tell me you were in the basement but I was so desperate to escape…’
He reached out his good hand and squeezed hers.
‘I didn’t mean for any of this to happen.’ She squeezed back.
‘I know.’
‘I wanted to do the right thing but everything got so muddled up, I didn’t know what the right thing was any more.’
‘Me neither,’ said Nelson. ‘But you got all those people out of the mill. Two hundred lives saved.’
‘Or,’ said Tig with a sigh. ‘Perhaps they would never have been in danger, if not for me.’
‘I’m sorry we couldn’t save the theatre,’ said Nelson, his voice crackly and hoarse. ‘I wonder what will happen to us all now it’s gone.’
‘Right,’ said Eliza from the doorway. ‘Mr Becker has said that Nelson is well enough to go home, so I will walk you back myself. News of the fire will be everywhere soon, and I don’t want your dear grandmother worrying about you.’
Nelson got to his feet.
‘Can I come?’ asked Tig.
‘You stay here and rest, Miss Rabbit,’ called Mr Becker from the next room. ‘Sit with your professor in case he wakes and needs anything.’
‘Wait a second,’ she said. Jumping up from her seat she gathered Nelson into a big, long, hug which smelled of turpentine and wood smoke.
Faber didn’t stir for hours, though Mr Becker didn’t seem too concerned. Tig didn’t leave his side – he had saved her best friend, so she owed him that at least. When night fell, Matilde left Tig with a candle and a book to read, but she found she couldn’t concentrate on words.
‘Where am I?’ Faber sounded groggy.
‘You’re awake!’ said Tig. ‘Don’t try to sit up. You need to rest.’
‘What happened?’
‘You went back for Nelson, do you remember?’
Faber coughed, and Tig rushed to give him some water, helping him hold the cup. ‘Did I find him?’
‘You did. You saved him.’
‘And Euphonia?’
‘I’m sorry,’ said Tig. ‘She’s… gone.’
Faber closed his eyes. ‘My mouth tastes like charcoal.’
‘The doctor says you’re going to be fine.’
‘What time is it?’
‘Almost two in the morning,’ said Tig. ‘And you’re not dead. We managed to stop Euphonia’s prediction after all. We fought our fate,’ she said. ‘And maybe on this one thing, we won.’
The professor smiled and closed his eyes. ‘Did we?’ he said gently. ‘Or did we do exactly what we were fated to do all along?’
Finale
‘Everyone ready?’
Tig and Nelson sat on the stairs in the lobby, and Eliza stood beside them. The auditorium and the dressing rooms had been destroyed in the fire, but the lobby with all its marble and stone was still intact. For the last four weeks they’d spent most of their days here, salvaging what they could from the building, and meeting with insurance men, architects and reporters. Faber had even used the lobby as a workshop.
‘Ready!’ said Nelson.
‘Ladies and gentlemen,’ said Faber. ‘Euphonia!’
He pulled off the cover with a showman’s flourish to reveal the machine, and they all applauded.
The wooden frame and the bellows had been completely consumed in the fire, and the rubber valves had melted. Once the embers of the mill were cool they had found the remains of her head and shoulders. She was tarnished, and a little dented, but with love and attention, Faber had returned her to her former glory. All except the face, of course, which had perished in the blaze. Faber said he would have to hire somebody to make a new one – it was a job for an artist, not an inventor.
As soon as the doctor declared him strong enough for work, he had dedicated all his hours to recreating the complex mechanisms that made her function. After spending all those years perfecting and obsessing over his creation, it turned out he was able to redraw most of his plans from memory.
‘She looks even better than before,’ said Tig.
‘And so do you, professor,’ said Eliza. ‘You’ve even got some colour in your cheeks.’
‘Ahem.’ Faber pretended to be very interested in a smudge on the woodwork, but Tig could see he was blushing.
‘You know,’ said Eliza. ‘I never really looked at her close up before.’
‘Isn’t she beautiful?’ said Nelson.
‘The eyes,’ said Eliza. ‘Why did you choose different-coloured eyes, professor?’
‘They were both blue, but one of them broke,’ he said.
‘And Tig replaced it with the brown one,’ added Nelson.
‘However did you get hold of a glass eye, pet?’
‘I found it under the stage. The ghost led me to it. Cold Annie. I think it must’ve been hers.’
Eliza stepped back suddenly. She clutched her chest and looked like she might swoon. ‘You found the eye? But… we looked everywhere. Why didn’t you tell me?’
‘I was going to, but…’ But Eliza had been cross and thought Tig was making up stories and causing trouble. That was over now, though, so instead Tig said, ‘Did you know her? When she was alive?’
‘Back when I first took over the Royale. There was an accident with the star trap. She was terribly hurt, poor thing, and her glass eye was lost.’ Eliza took herself over to the steps and sat down. Her voice was a little choked as she continued. ‘She died, a few days later, from her injuries. Those kinds of things… that’s how ghost stories start. I fancied I’d glimpsed her once or twice but I put that down to imagination.’
‘Did she really know when things were going to go wrong, like they say?’ asked Nelson, sitting at Eliza’s feet.
‘That’s right… they used to joke that the glass eye was magic – that it saw into the future.’ Eliza laughed at the memory. ‘I didn’t really know her, the play had only been running for a week when the accident happened. But I’ll never forget her.’ She put her fingers to her temples and closed her eyes. ‘Annie. Antigone Jones.’
Tig and Nelson gasped in one voice.
‘You said—’ Nelson jumped to his feet. ‘You said you were named after an aunty!’
‘And my mother had a relative in the theatre,’ said Tig. ‘I remember coming to see her when I was very small.’
‘And the eye!’ Nelson hopped up and down. ‘I said it was just
like yours, didn’t I? Look Eliza, look.’
Eliza got up and looked again at Euphonia’s face. She lifted Tig’s chin.
‘My goodness,’ she said.
‘You’re not surprised, are you?’ said Tig. ‘You already knew we were related.’
‘Your mother didn’t want you to know. When she sent you here clutching that letter, saying you had nowhere else to go if I didn’t find you a job, well… it was like fate. A chance to make up for my part in the accident.’
‘Your part?’
‘My theatre. My show. My stage. People had been saying for years those traps were dangerous…’
‘And that’s why you stopped Snell from firing me so many times.’
A moment of stillness fell over the Royale as each of them considered this revelation.
* * *
Snell. The name tasted rotten in Tig’s mouth.
‘Well then,’ said Faber at last. ‘I believe my time here has finished. I can’t thank you enough for your kindness. I hope Mr Snell doesn’t cause you any more bother.’
‘No need to worry about my brother,’ said Eliza. ‘Useless lump won’t dare show his face around here any more.’
He had been back to the theatre exactly once to collect what was left of his belongings after the fire. Eliza had helped him by throwing it all down the front stairs and onto the filthy street, while giving him a piece of her mind. Lawyers had been involved, and certain papers signed that gave Eliza full control of the Royale, in exchange for not informing the police of the thieving and kidnapping he had been party to. Gus was gone, too. He was ashamed of his part in the whole affair, and didn’t want to return – Eliza had called in a favour and got him an apprenticeship at the piano makers down on Deansgate.
‘And your beautiful theatre, I’m so sorry.’
‘Ah well,’ said Eliza. ‘My brother did do one good thing for me. Fire insurance. If I’d known how much it was worth I’d have burned the place down years ago.’
Tig must have look horrified at this, because Eliza added, ‘I’m kidding, Tig!’
‘I’m sure the new building will be excellent,’ said Faber.
‘Must you really go?’ Tig asked.
‘Of course he must, pet,’ said Eliza. ‘He can’t sit around and wait for us to reopen.’
‘I hope I’m not out of line for asking, but Miss Rabbit, I wondered if you would like to accompany me on my tour, as my assistant. If Eliza can spare you.’
‘Well, I suppose I there’s not much for her to do around here while the building work is happening. Is that what you want, dear?’
‘Can Nelson come too?’
Faber nodded. ‘If his family permit it.’
Nelson cheered, and Tig clapped her hands with joy.
‘Only for the season, mind,’ said Eliza. ‘I’ll need them back here when the theatre re-opens. Tig’s got a lot of learning to do if she’s going to be theatre manager one day.’
Tig threw her arms around Eliza who hugged her tightly. ‘I’ll miss you very much. And the Royale.’
‘I will understand if you don’t want to leave,’ said Faber, looking concerned.
‘I do,’ said Tig. ‘I want to go. And anyway, you’ll need our help if Euphonia starts talking on her own again.’
But she never did.
Author’s Note
In 1848, Tig’s Manchester was crowded, noisy, and expanding fast.
Vast mills worked day and night. Deafening and dangerous machinery spun raw cotton into threads and wove them into fabric to be sold all over the world. Less than a hundred years earlier, these jobs had been done by hand. Now huge steam powered contraptions were taking over, and people flocked to the cities in their thousands to find work in the mills.
The people of Manchester were compared to worker bees, swarming in and out of the mills, always busy, always working, tiny parts of a vast hive of industry. Look closely in Manchester today and you’ll find bees hidden everywhere – a symbol of Manchester’s proud and difficult industrial history.
As the mill owners got rich, the people who actually did the work had hard, short lives. Days were long, wages were low, and health and safety was non-existent. Poor people lived in awful conditions – whole families in a single room and whole streets sharing one outdoor toilet.
Factories were not the only places taking advantage of new inventions. Theatre machinery made actors fly above the stage and disappear through the floor. The introduction of gas lighting allowed them to make shows more spectacular than ever. The 1840s saw the beginning of magic shows and stage illusions. Inventors made amazing automata – complicated clockwork toys that could do difficult actions like walking, dancing or even writing.
It was against the backdrop of this world of magic and machinery that the real Joseph Faber and his incredible talking machine arrived in England. In our world of computers and AI, it’s hard to imagine how groundbreaking his invention was. Years before the first sound recordings were made, if you wanted to hear a song, you had to go to a show, or sing it yourself. Telephones were still decades away – no one had ever heard a voice from a machine before. Euphonia was incredibly sophisticated, and Faber had spent years perfecting her.
Unfortunately for Professor Faber, audiences hated her. Euphonia’s voice was flat and unnerving – one witness wrote that it sounded like a voice from the depths of a tomb. Her face was realistic, but only her lips and tongue moved, which audiences found creepy. Faber was a genius but not much of a performer. He was said to look untidy, even haunted, and to be completely obsessed with his invention.
Though Faber never got the credit he deserved, some people did recognize how special Euphonia was. One was American scientist Joseph Henry, who played a big part in inventing the telegraph (the first machine that could send electronic messages over long distances). He thought the two inventions could be combined, so a message sent by telegraph would be spoken by the talking machine at the other end.
Another notable fan was Melville Bell, who studied how speech is produced and found Faber’s work inspiring. You may have heard of his son, Alexander Graham Bell, who invented the telephone. Lucky for us he did, or we might have mechanical talking heads in our living rooms instead…
More from the Author
The Vanishing Trick
Keep reading for a preview of
The Vanishing Trick
by
Jenni Spangler
1 The Fool: Beginnings, Fearlessness, Folly
It wasn’t a sin to steal if you only took forgotten things.
Leander had been watching the ugly mutton pie in the bakery window for hours. It was lopsided and slightly squashed. All day customers had ignored it in favour of plump loaves, golden apple pies and sugar-sprinkled shortbread. The pie was left alone, unwanted and forgotten.
Leander knew how that felt.
Lurking by the doorway, he breathed in hot, sweet air each time someone went inside and his stomach ached with emptiness. The evening grew dark and people rushed along the cobbles, pulling coats and shawls tight to keep out the chill. Nobody would buy the pie now.
Wastefulness was a sin, too, and Leander was so hungry.
He had tried to find work, but nobody wanted to hire a scruffy orphan with no schooling and no one to vouch for his character. Every now and then, he’d earn a few coppers for a day of labour. Last week he’d spent two days mucking out a pig shed – horrible, cold, smelly work – only for the woman to say his work wasn’t up to snuff, and short him half his money. Since then, nothing. People always thought he was up to no good – even when he wasn’t. So, if he wanted to eat, he usually had to steal. Honesty and hunger were in constant competition for his soul and today hunger was winning.
Peering through the steam-clouded glass, Leander waited for the wiry baker to turn his back, then darted in. He snatched the pie, shoved it into his pocket and ran.
‘Oi!’
The baker was after him. Leander sprinted up the high street, pushin
g between two men in top hats and dodging an old lady with a cane. He darted across the road, narrowly missing the wheels of a carriage.
‘Whoa there!’ shouted the driver.
‘Thief!’ the baker cried, still on Leander’s heels.
Leander scrambled over a wall and rounded a corner. If he was caught, he’d get a thrashing or worse – be taken before the law. He dashed into an alley, his panicked footsteps sending rats skittering from their hiding places in the shadows.
Up ahead, warm light spilled from low windows. The inn.
If he was fast and clever, he could lose his pursuer in the crowded alehouse. He shoved the door open, breathless, heart pounding.
‘Watch it, son—’ He almost collided with a man carrying tankards.
‘Sorry!’ Leander hopped over the legs of a sleeping drunk and squeezed between tables. Lucky he was so small and skinny for his age. The air was stuffy-warm, heavy with tobacco smoke and the stale scent of old beer. He ducked beneath a man’s arm and kicked an overturned chair out of his path.
The baker thundered in. The gaffer was fast.
Leander dropped to the sticky floor and crawled under tables, avoiding booted feet and puddles of drink. This was too close. He raced to the opposite corner and through the narrow black door that led to the adjoining coach house.
Cool night air washed over his flushed cheeks. The coach house was a cavernous room, with wooden beams and an earthy hay smell. The big barn doors were chained and bolted – no escape there. To his right was a row of horse stalls. Could he hide there? No, unsettled horses would give his location away.
Then he saw it. A pristine black carriage, empty and waiting patiently for its owner’s return. Perfect. He yanked open the door and jumped inside.
The smell came first, dry and sharp, sour and musty all at once, like last autumn’s rotten leaves after the snow melts, and old books, and pine tar, and spoiled meat.
Pots, pans and bundles of herbs hung from the ceiling, brushing against his ears. There was a bench on one side covered with dusty blankets and rugs. The other wall was fitted with dozens of wooden drawers and compartments, some gaping open, leaves and spoons and feathers poking out at all angles. Every other inch was covered with ramshackle shelves crammed with cards and papers and bottles of murky coloured liquids and – Leander leaned in to inspect the biggest jar – was that the skeleton of a rat? Why would anyone want such a thing?
The Incredible Talking Machine Page 18