Private Dicks (34 page)

He retires early that night.

*~*~*

Rising quite early, Jamie takes care with his shaving, ablutions and dress. The suit and coat he picks for himself is the best he owns, a smoke grey that he feels compliments him well. He'd picked a matching grey bowler hat that he preferred over the more stylish top hat.

Washed and well groomed to appear respectable, he checks the time before making his way slowly down the narrow stairs to the street. Hailing himself a carriage, he sets off to the College of Nature and Computative Science itself.

The college is made up of a collection of impressive stone buildings, beautiful and grand, but obviously new in contrast to the older buildings all around them. Jamie gets lost three times after alighting from his carriage, but arrives in time for his interview nonetheless. After knocking and receiving no answer, he hesitates a moment before letting himself in.

Jamie lowers himself onto the chair opposite the desk. The office is small, with bookshelves lining the walls, a large desk with papers neatly stacked to one side and a single chair facing it. He leans his crutches against the chair and waits.

Minutes tick by, and Jamie checks his pocket watch twice, then checks the letter his employer had sent him confirming the date and the time. He continues to wait, trying not to fidget as the room begins to feel oppressively warm and closed in. As time stretches on, Jamie begins to seriously consider leaving and returning to his lodging to think of another approach to this case.

Finally, nearly twenty minutes after his arrival, the door opens behind him and Jamie turns to see a very thin, elderly man step into the room.

"I must apologize," he begins rather stiffly, "but Professor Hallingsworth could not be roused from his laboratory this morning. Please follow me."

When he turns and heads back out of the door, Jamie stares at his retreating back for a moment in shock before clutching at his crutches and hoisting himself off the chair as quickly as possible.

The man waits as Jamie slowly follows him out of the office and through the corridor, down a flight of stone steps, which are wide with each step being unusually large, Jamie notes. The stairs look as if they had been designed to accommodate ramps, perhaps to facilitate the moving of large pieces of equipment. The doorways and halls that they pass all look quite wide too, not at all like the narrow doorways Jamie is used to navigating. It all further suggests Jamie's theory regarding moving large objects through the buildings, but for Jamie it is a piece of architectural good fortune.

They make their way down another corridor before eventually reaching a large, heavy door, which the elderly gentleman opens. Beyond it is a long, quite large stone room with a high ceiling consisting of a series of small domes.

The room is filled with numerous worktables strewn with papers, blueprints, books, gears and pieces of metal. What looks to be very small steam engine is propped against one table, with what Jamie can only guess is some complex form of clock sitting on another.

In roughly the center of the room seems to be a strange metal frame or scaffold of some sort, reaching about eight feet into the air. In the center of the scaffolding are large, thick metal disks threaded through rods and stacked to form huge, pillar-like structures. Each pillar is attached to a complex series of interlocking gears at the top and bottom of the whole machine.

"Professor Hallingsworth, your guest," the older man states dryly while Jamie tries not to gape too openly at it all.

A figure bending over a table covered in what looks to be blueprints and sketches straightens and turns. Professor Hallingsworth, Jamie sees, is rather young, not much older than Jamie himself. A little shorter than average height, with a wide, well-built frame and dark hair, he is an impressive figure.

"Thank you, Mr. Fielding," Hallingsworth says rather absently. Mr. Fielding wordlessly holds out his hands to Jamie for his hat and coat before leaving the laboratory.

"I'm sorry for the inconvenience, Mr.—"

"Hartgrove," Jamie reminds him smoothly, "James Hartgrove, sir."

"Yes, Mr. Hartgrove." Professor Hallingsworth smiles at him before turning back to the papers laid out on the table. "I do apologize for making you wait and bringing you out here to my workroom, but it really couldn't be helped. I am behind on these plans as it is." He trails off, frowning down at the papers on the table.

Jamie stands there awkwardly for a few moments until Professor Hallingsworth seems to suddenly realize he is still in the room.

"I'm very sorry, Mr. Hartgrove," Hallingsworth exclaims, rushing around the table and pushing several piles of books and papers off of a chair. Once cleared, he gestures for Jamie to take a seat.

Jamie makes his way over to the seat and sits while Hallingsworth goes back to his papers. Propping his crutches against the chair, Jamie notes that Hallingsworth is in his shirtsleeves, spotting a jacket casually tossed across the table next to them.

Professor Hallingsworth's sleeves have been unbuttoned and rolled up to his elbows revealing strong forearms faintly dusted with light brown hair. Jamie's gaze travels to Hallingsworth's face, which is pleasantly wide, his hair dark and heavy before tapering into long side burns which run the length of his jaw, complimented by a small patch of a beard on his chin.

Hallingsworth glances up, and Jamie sees that he has wide, startlingly blue eyes. Jamie clears his throat, feeling ill at ease.

"You are looking for a research assistant, is that correct, Professor Hallingsworth?"

Hallingsworth nods, seemingly surprised, as if he'd completely forgotten the reason Jamie was there at all. "Yes, yes of course. I read your credentials, Mr. Hartgrove." Leaning against the table across from Jamie, Hallingsworth regards him intently while idly fiddling with his pocket watch and chain. "Do you have any knowledge of engineering, Mr. Hartgrove?"

"No," Jamie answers honestly, hoping Hallingsworth is not about to send him away on the spot.

"And your background in mathematics and the science?"

Jamie takes a quick breath. "I have no formal education in mathematics or science. I, however, have read fairly extensively into chemistry, botany, human and animal anatomy, and I am not a total stranger to mathematical theory, as well as having an interest in some of the newer sciences. I worked as a clerk to Professor Rolleston, who taught here, I believe. Although I was not officially his assistant, I did much coordinating and transcribing of his papers so I know a good deal about how to handle this kind of research. The time with him also gave me a working understanding of terminology, basic concepts and so on involved in mathematics, engineering and other sciences." He prays silently that is enough. It is something of a risk bringing up Professor Rolleston at all, made only slightly less so by the fact that Jamie had verified before traveling to the college that Professor Rolleston had gone to teach in rural India, obviously having not taken to retirement at all.

Hallingsworth raises his eyebrows while slowly twisting his watch chain around the fingers of his left hand. Jamie cannot discern if this is a favorable sign or not. "Most research assistants to professors at this college are students who themselves are striving to gain a higher understand of their field," Hallingsworth informs him, causing Jamie's hopes to plummet again. Hallingsworth gives him a surprisingly keen look before untwisting his watch chain from around his fingers and turning to face the metal scaffolding in the middle of the room. "What do you make of this, Mr. Hartgrove?"

"I have no idea, sir," Jamie answers honestly. This close, he can see there are series of numbers etched into the sides of each of the metal disks stacked at the center of the machine. "Is this the calculating machine housed here? Professor Rolleston spoke of it a few times."

"It is indeed, more or less." Hallingsworth walks over to it and pats one of the bars of the scaffolding. "It is a smaller model of the Computative Engine." He smiles up at the machine almost fondly. "I use it to run experiments on how to better stream-line the actual engine. I call this one Charles, after the founder of this college."

He turns back to Jamie, suddenly serious. Blinking, Jamie thinks that if he somehow does obtain this job, it might take him a while to learn to keep up with this man's rather eccentric moods.

"The work that we do here at the college," Hallingsworth gestures around himself to the cluttered workroom, "is some of the most important the world has ever known. It has the ability to build and destroy empires, to liberate the yearning masses from their desperate plight." He shakes his head and then looks hard at Jamie, as if trying to see inside of him to his very core. "It cannot be undertaken without a sense of wonder and true love for the work. It will be challenging, and I demand of all my associates that they think creatively in ways they may not be accustomed to."

Jamie nods his head, expression serious. "If I were to become your research assistant, professor, then I would do my best to live up to such a challenge."

Hallingsworth's smile is full of inner mirth. "I like that, Mr. Hartgrove; in fact, I fancy that I shall like you quite a bit."

With that, Professor Hallingsworth returns to the sketches and blueprints on the table. Jamie sits and waits for something to happen, feeling a little awkward. Minutes go by, and all that happens is Hallingsworth mutters to himself and pulls a pencil from his waistcoat pocket to jot something across the corners of one of the sketches. As Jamie continues to wait, Hallingsworth scribbles some more.

Jamie shifts a little in his seat. "Sir?"

Hallingsworth glances up, looking surprised that Jamie's still there. "Oh, don't worry, Mr. Hartgrove." Hallingsworth waves his hand dismissively. "You're hired."

Jamie blinks at him, and bites his tongue before he asks Hallingsworth why exactly he's been hired for a job he is barely qualified for.

"As for your salary," Hallingsworth continues, "I am given a rather generous allowance to spend on my work, so how does eight pounds monthly sound to you?"

Jamie just manages to keep from gasping. It's a lot of money, more than he has ever made or ever hoped to make. If this case does not go well, he thinks dryly, perhaps he should give up private investigation and take up being a research assistant instead. "It sounds more than generous," he states faintly.

"Yes, well …" Hallingsworth straightens, apparently somewhat embarrassed, and brushes his hands down the front of his waistcoat. "I'll show you to your room."

As Hallingsworth grabs his jacket, folding it over his arm and heading for the door, Jamie scrambles for his crutches and pushes himself up to follow. He barely has time to snag his own jacket and hat from the stand by the door before following.

Hallingsworth leads the way down the hall and back up the stone stairs, waiting at the top as Jamie ascends much more slowly. Hallingsworth pushes open a door that leads to a courtyard, striding across it through another door and then along yet another corridor. Even seeing relatively little of the college, Jamie is beginning to get a feel for its overall shape. The buildings are connected to each other via short, roved walkways to make several large, hollow square shapes with a wide open green space in the center of the squares. The workshops seemed to be at each of the corners of the squares, judging from the large, double doors much like the ones that lead into Hallingsworth's own work area.

Hallingsworth stops and unlocks a door at the end of the corridor. He pushes it open to reveal a little room containing a desk, chair, washbasin, wardrobe and bed. The room is small, but clean, and the little window next to the bed has been propped open to let in a breeze.

"This is your room," Hallingsworth informs him. "There is a bath and other necessary accommodations across the hall," he points, "which you will share with three other assistants."

Jamie examines the room before nodding. "It seems very generous. May I have my things moved down from London?" he asks, glancing up at the other man. "There is a steam-powered chair which allows me to move about a little more freely when I am inside."

Hallingsworth looks interested at that. "Steam-powered chair?" he mutters softly to himself, nodding a little. "Fascinating. Of course you may have your things shipped, especially this chair. If you need extra funds to do so, by all means tell me and I will make arrangements."

Jamie nods as Hallingsworth takes the room key from the key ring he carries and hands it to him.

"I will leave you to make your arrangements and fetch whatever you have brought with you." Hallingsworth takes out his pocket watch and consults the time. "I will expect you for supper at eight. You will be taking all of your meals with me." Hallingsworth turns, retreating without explanation as to why he would demand something so strange.

Jamie watches Hallingsworth retreat down the hall, not really sure what to make of him, then locks the door of his room to go in search of a carriage. Even from their short time together, there is no doubt Hallingsworth is an eccentric, but Jamie is far from convinced he is actually a dangerous one, as Mr. Burton had implied.

He eventually finds a carriage and travels back into town. Once there, he sends a telegram to Mrs. Stanton requesting that his chair and some of his books and possessions be shipped to Cambridge, then sends another to Percy explaining the situation. He also hires several young men to help gather the few bags he'd brought with him and move them out of his temporary lodging and to his new rooms at the College of Natural and Computative Science.

Jamie unpacks his bags and takes a few notes on his and Professor Hallingsworth's first meeting. The idea of supper with Hallingsworth stumps him slightly. He's still unsure why Hallingsworth wants them to take their meals together. It seems very strange to him, unlike any of the other working relationships he has had before, but Hallingsworth is a very eccentric man, so Jamie assumes this is one more of his quirks. He plans to bring up Professor Brown's death during the meal if at all possible and gauge Hallingsworth's reaction, perhaps find out some new facts regarding the relationship between Hallingsworth and Brown.