Fiendish Schemes (22 page)

“I can . . . assure you,” I gasped as he brought my captured arm up behind my back, “that this is not . . . helping in that regard.”

“It will.” He continued relentless. “The more you know of this world and what it has become, and what it holds that it did not before, the less trepidation you will feel as you investigate its darker byways.”

The futility of arguing further had already been proven to me. Indeed, I found myself incapable of even closing my eyes to ward off the hideous spectacle. My companions’ previously expressed concerns about alerting others to our surreptitious presence were obviated by the deafening volume of the combined noises, the creaking and groaning of the structure’s bolts and girders now combined with the blasts of train-like steam whistles, the masculine creation’s basso groans answered by the higher-pitched shrieks issuing from its female counterpart. Stonebrake shouted something else into my ear, but I could no longer perceive his words.

But what appalled me more was my sudden realization that it was not the overwhelming volume of sound that shielded us from accidental detection, but rather the degree of absorption in their activities that was displayed by the creations below us. Just as dogs mating in the street cannot be interrupted by anything short of a bucket of cold water, so it was with the participants in this obscene, mechanized endeavour. And similarly to canine procreation, when breeders must at times assist with specimens too awkward and ungainly to accomplish the deed on their own, so now did the liveried attendants wait upon their master and mistress. The necessity for such numbers was explained by the sheer muscular force required to elevate the appropriate segment of the masculine creation, somewhat to the rear of its form, by the use of hinged levers swung out from its flanks. Footmen strained at their hand-holds, with others clasping them about their waists and struggling to draw them downward. At the same time, the transmogrified female’s immense form was urged backward by its attendants, beneath the ponderously rearing
inamorata
upon which its favours were being bestowed.

The scene entire summoned secondhand memories to me, of copperplate engravings in popular journals, adorning the writers’ descriptions of the aftermath of tragic collisions upon the railways, resulting in engines and carriages stacked in wild disarray, one atop another. But here there were no travelers’ corpses strewn about the bloodied fields on either side, but rather still more of the living throwing themselves into the struggle, their every effort directed toward facilitating this gargantuan conjugation.

I had not thought it possible, but the combined noise grew even louder, its invisible impacts reverberating through my chest as iron thrashed against iron. What I had initially judged to be one of the enormous pistons by which the masculine creation propelled its spoked wheels along the tracks, was now revealed to have an altogether different purpose, ruder in design than mere transportation. Wider than a brace of horses, the cylindrical apparatus drove itself into a reciprocally fashioned portal in the female’s latter bulk, revealed by a pair of her attendants drawing aside curved plates large enough to have roofed the nave of a village church. Other servants, relieved of the task of hoisting one machine above another, busied themselves with frantic haste, wielding mops dipped in barrels and slathering glistening oil upon the polished metal surfaces sliding back and forth. As the piston’s motion increased in both length and speed, the lubricating attendants found themselves outpaced; tendrils of dark smoke, thicker than men’s arms, insinuated through the roiling clouds of steam as friction heated the metal to a red-hot glow. . . .

Reader, let me reassure you that George Dower, originally of London’s Clerkenwell district, is not unacquainted with the more unseemly aspects of matters biological. Though I possess an Englishman’s proper reticence toward activities best done with the lantern extinguished and without an audience attending, I have nevertheless on occasion summoned the courage to
do my duty,
so to speak—once even sparing the world from total destruction thereby. I take more pride in having summoned the resolve to perform the untidy function, than in the salutary consequences achieved by having done so. Please bear in mind that I recount all this, however briefly, not in order to boast of my prowess, but merely to give evidence that I am not a blushing innocent when confronted with the carnal realm. And my knowledge is not confined to our own species; having resided for some time in a rural abode, surrounded by farms and all the beastly procreation committed on their premises, I frequently had my senses assaulted while on a meandering stroll, by the remarkably vigorous performances of various stallions and bulls in their fields, with their mates hardly less enthusiastic about the whole process.

I inform you of all this in order to allay any suspicion on the reader’s part that my reaction to the thundering consummation of steam-augmented lust upon the tracks was due more to ignorance than by the essentially horrific nature of the deed itself. The mingled shriek and groan of the partially human creations rose in a dizzying
crescendo,
sufficient to have drawn blood from our ears if it had continued for more than a minute. There was no mercy in the noise’s termination, however, as it was replaced by the seeming apocalypse of the ironclad forms reaching the percussive climax of their joint exertions. The female of the pair, with an idiot stare transfixed upon its open-mouthed face, somehow managed to heave itself upward from the rails beneath, sufficiently so as to throw its spent, gasping partner to one side, its weighty bulk toppling against the iron pillars. The impact shuddered the platform with force greater than any previous event; bolts and rivets sprang from their mountings, the small bits raining about our heads like a metallic hailstorm. I was flung backward against Miss Stromneth as the elevated perch on which we had been standing and watching, like voyeurs in some ghastly combination of steel foundry and
bordello,
was wrenched free of its supports. The riveted floor tilted precipitously; we both would have been cast to our deaths if I had not managed, through sheer desperate instinct, to encircle one arm around her
kimono
-clad waist and grasp with my other hand the curved rail of the spiraling staircase by which we had previously mounted to this height.

With that proverbial strength evoked by sudden terror, I drew both myself and Miss Stromneth onto the treads of the staircase, just as the platform we had abandoned fell with an echoing clatter onto the station platform below. Whether the rest of the surrounding structure would continue to disassemble itself and bury us beneath the wrack and clutter of its pieces, I had no idea at the moment.

The panicky course of my thoughts settled only a fraction as I found myself on top of Miss Stromneth, our position contorted by the rails and treads of the swaying staircase. Eyes widened, she gazed up at me—

And smiled.

“God in Heaven,” she said. “I
love
this business.”

A
S
they are,” mused Stonebrake aloud, “so shall we become.” He brought his gaze around from the brougham’s window and toward me. “Don’t you agree?”

His play on the venerable gravestone motto struck me as disagreeable. I shifted in the seat opposite him, arms folded across my chest to indicate the defensive mode of my thoughts.

“If by that,” I replied, “you mean to assert that the day is coming when I will consent to have great slabs of iron bolted all about me, and a monstrous steam engine replacing the fleshly aspects with which I was born, then I can state with the utmost confidence that it will never happen. Do as you wish, of course, but I fail to see the attraction. Particularly after what we have just witnessed.”

We continued our return journey through London’s nocturnal streets, moonlight silvering the clouds of steam that were ceaselessly emitted by the pipes winding amongst the buildings. Enough time had passed since our departure from Fex’s commercial premises, Miss Stromneth still clad in her silken
kimono,
somewhat dampened by the emissions of steam from beneath, and waving a cheery farewell to us from the building’s opulent doorway, that I had managed to regain the majority of my composure. A sufficiency of irritation still resided in my breast, the emotion directed toward my co-conspirator. Scarcely had I managed to rescue both myself and Miss Stromneth from the collapse of the elevated perch in her establishment’s
faux
rail station than I had discovered that the coward Stonebrake had fled before us and had already safely ensconced himself farther down the spiral staircase.

“Ah, yes . . .” He nodded slowly, still deep within his doubtlessly mercantile ruminations. “
What we have witnessed
— exactly so. Surely you must applaud the Stromneth woman’s employers, the genius MacDuff and his companion, for their perspicacity in founding such a business as Fex. They have seized upon an opportunity for great profits, well before others discerned the faintest outlines of so much that is to come. One could almost suspect that they possessed some preternatural capacity for envisioning the Future.”

“If so, whoever they might be, they are a burden upon Humanity. I have known others who could see the world that lies ahead, and you may trust me, nothing good came of their ability to do so. A merciful Providence blinds us to all but the present Time.” I unfolded my arms and pointed a single admonishing finger toward the other man’s chest. “Your enthusiasm for the Future, and its besieging horde of devices, is the indicator of a diseased mind.”

“Perhaps so.” His shrug indicated no great concern on his part. “But it is a disease that will soon infect all Mankind, and fortunately so. We shall be transformed in the twinkling of an eye, as is promised to us in Scripture, but without the necessity of waiting about for an insufferably tardy deity to take care of the job for us. Surely you were impressed with the
size,
the
force
—the every aspect!—of those beings we spied upon, back at Fex.”

“
Impressed
is scarcely the word,” I replied stiffly. “
Revolted
would be more like it. Such activities are unseemly enough when performed at a human scale—by which I mean that which we used to consider as human. When magnified in this way, wrapped about in iron and steam providing the motive impulse rather than the excited pulse of the participants—I find it even less endearing.”

“Yours is a minority opinion.” He gestured to the brougham’s window and beyond, to the darkened windows of the buildings we passed. “Vast numbers of your countrymen dream as they sleep, of just such transformation being wrought upon themselves. And why shouldn’t they? Here in London, at least, they possess an advantage over you, of having become accustomed to a continual advent of wonders, one after another, and hastened by that power of Steam about which our hostess at Fex became so rhapsodic. In this, they anticipate the very near future of Britain entire, in which virtually everyone will be a complete feckhead—”

“I beg your pardon?” My interruption was prompted by the obvious vulgarity of the term just pronounced by Stonebrake, though I merely suspected its meaning. “What was that you said?”

“The near Future of Britain?”

“No, the other. The very last.”

“Feckhead?”
He further irritated me with a patronizing smile. “I forget, that your innocence colours your language—or rather, drains the colour from it. Surely the etymology of our modern cant is obvious. Once you admit the existence of something such as
fex
—not the business establishment, but the absorbing activity itself—the replacement of previous rude language follows as a matter of course. Thus the verb
to feck,
the process of
getting fecked,
the insult
Feck you!
—even the revised meaning of the word
feckless,
which now more specifically refers to the condition of not getting any fex at all. Which would seem, Dower, to describe your own status.”

“May a merciful deity grant that it remain such.”

“I’m in a slightly better position,” said Stonebrake, “to judge whether prayers are ever answered. In my previous employment, I heard enough of them—usually from Jacktars achieving a painful sobriety after a roistering night in port. They generally asked for divine Providence to keep the bottle far from their lips in the future
—
and that never happened, either. If wiser persons take it upon themselves to achieve their desires, I can only concur with a rationalist’s
Bravo; well done
. And if that fulfillment here on Earth runs toward the large and intimidating, to the degree that can be afforded, such is merely human nature. Granted, there might be some advantage to making a timepiece as small as possible—and certainly your crafty father excelled in that pursuit—so that one can slip it into one’s pocket rather than upon one’s shoulder, or in a cart following behind. But when it comes to base anatomy, no man seeking transformation wishes to be
smaller
upon the other side of the division from his former self. On the contrary; he wishes to be greater.”

“The one we witnessed was certainly that.”

“Rightly so.” Stonebrake’s shoulders lifted in a shrug. “That particular gentleman—discretion forbids my revealing his name— inherited an ancestral fortune, of such immensity that he possesses no thought other than how to spend some portion of it. With the impressive results that you saw.”

“It must make participating in the social calendar difficult.” Legions of difficulties presented themselves in my thoughts. “I find it hard to imagine him making an appearance at a fashionable ball, without his ironclad aspect being the subject of waspish commentary.”

“Scarcely an issue for them: these people travel in circles of which we have little if any comprehension.”

“And to which,” I observed, “you aspire.”

“If it should come to that. These recent sights which you evidently found so appalling, I found to be rather . . .
stimulating
.”

“Indeed.” This was not the first occasion on which I found myself speculating on the sanity of someone with whom my own fate had become entwined. “Perhaps it would be better if we concluded this topic of conversation, and moved on to more practical matters.”

“Such as?”

“The search for my father’s
Vox Universalis
device. Isn’t that the reason you have gone to such lengths to drag me about this modern London?”

He nodded. “To a large degree, such was my motivation.”

“I would have thought it was your entire motivation for doing so.”

“Well . . . there has been a certain . . . shall we say,
amusement
to be derived from observing your reaction to these things. However rapidly these changes have come about in our society, it nevertheless has been a gradual process, so the urbane population has had the opportunity to become accustomed to the new steam-driven world in which they find themselves. It’s a rare opportunity to come across someone such as yourself, possessed of both intelligence and innocence on such matters. It doesn’t speak well for rural life, that it allowed you to become so out of touch with Progress.”

“Speak of it as you will,” I replied with as much
hauteur
as I could summon. “But for myself, my feeling is that the sooner we achieve our ambitions and are enriched thereby, the sooner I will be able to return to that sanctuary. London and the rest of the world can then continue its plunge into the steam-filled abyss without any involvement on my part.”

“How sad for you. There is so much on which you will be missing out.”

“Of that, I am already bleakly convinced. Thus my renewed sense of urgency. Now that you’ve derived whatever merriment could be gained from my discomfiture at that loathsome establishment Fex, and inured me against whatever shock I might have sustained from witnessing other such spectacles, I’m interested in knowing just how we proceed from here. I can’t see how any of this has brought us closer to laying hands on the
Vox Universalis
— if it exists at all.”

“Alas,” said Stonebrake, “exactly so. I am a bit chastened thereby as well. Even though I was diverted just now by the company of the charming Miss Stromneth, the stoic maxim
Duty before pleasure
still came to mind.”

“A fool’s errand, then.”

“Perhaps. But in my defense, our visit to the establishment which she oversees was initially prompted by other productive intentions. I had hoped that we would encounter not just her, but that couple by which she is employed.”

“What manner of people are they? This MacDuff and his no doubt equally depraved consort?” I instinctively drew back, as if there were some chance they might suddenly appear inside the carriage, summoned by mere reference to them. “I found their chief employee alarming enough. Perhaps it was a stroke of good fortune that they were not present.”

“I’m certain you will find them merely eccentric rather than frightening, when the time comes. Many of their distinguished patrons are quite smitten with them.”

I kept a discreet silence. To myself, I imagined that the fondness displayed toward this mysterious pair by its clientele was due rather more to the accommodation provided to base desires than to engaging personalities.

“But as I indicated,” Stonebrake continued, “your acquaintance with them waits upon another occasion. At this moment, we must press forward without the assistance they might have provided to us.”

“What aid could they have possibly been?”

“Simple, my dear Dower.” He gestured in a manner both magnanimous and dismissive. “The establishment known as Fex is more important—and more vital to our concerns—than would be encompassed by that judgement you have so prudishly bestowed upon it. Past its doors, and beyond the spaces revealed by them, its proprietors would be able to grant us access to strata of society otherwise unavailable.”

“God in Heaven—” This time, I was unable to refrain from speaking up. “What good would it do for us to encounter even more such creatures, maddened by both sex and steam? If there are in fact, as you have said, great walled-off estates full of such transformed beings, surely they are but distractions from our pursuit. And as such, better left alone by us.”

“This also is where you are in error. And if I have misled you in this regard, you have my utmost apologies. For it is not just
carnal
desires that are accommodated through the services of Fex and its proprietors. There are other lusts that Mankind possesses, beyond those of the senses. Power, ambition, the thrill of dominion over one’s fellow human beings
—
indeed, one could assemble a veritable catalogue of such impulses, both from the pages of history and from the simple observance of everyday life.”

“Doubtless,” I replied. “But I fail to see how Fex and its legions of surgeons and pipe-fitters could aid in the fulfillment of those desires. Unless, of course, the iron rails at its business establishment were to be used not just for such monstrous assignations as the one which you forced me to witness, but also for tying sacrificial victims to the tracks and then allowing those transformed customers to run over them. And while I am sure that Miss Stromneth and her employers could find suitably hapless individuals amongst the city’s poor and kidnap them for such a purpose, nevertheless the legality of such a pursuit seems questionable, even in the wretched circumstances to which this world has fallen of late.”

“Ah, Dower; how I wish . . .” Stonebrake sadly shook his head. “How I wish I could speak with
her
kindly tones. I must seem like a cruel schoolmaster, dragging a reluctant pupil from one arduous lesson to another. Your education continues, even this night.”

I realized the import of his words: we were not returning to Featherwhite House and its hissing, clattering assembly of my father’s devices. Upon looking out the brougham’s window at my side, I saw that we had traveled elsewhere in the city, somewhat more central but closer to the Thames. The larger shapes of the buildings seemed familiar to me, but in the night’s darkness I was unable to establish immediate recognition of them.

“Is this absolutely necessary?” My voice rose in protest. “You might relish one enormous novelty piled on top of another, but the ordeal I have recently endured has brought me close to exhaustion.”

“Be a man,” Stonebrake curtly replied, “or at least make the attempt. But a moment ago, you were complaining of some dilatoriness in pursuing our aims. Very well, then. Let us seize this moment and push forward.”

“My suggestion was to persevere after appropriate—and much- needed—rest.”

“No time like the present.” His dismaying cheerfulness had surged to another high point. “Besides, we have already arrived at our destination. So you might as well summon whatever resources you have remaining, and bear up a while longer.”

I perceived that the brougham had left the street and, after passing through a tightly constricted gate, entered upon an even darker courtyard. The structures about us towered high enough to block out all but the vision of the stars directly above, as though we had found ourselves at the bottom of a well. I could hear iron creaking through rust as a stiff-hinged gate was dragged shut behind us.