The Warlock's Curse (13 page)

“And once you had both sets of data, you simply had to apply a Bayesean Linear Regression and
poof
!”

“Well, no.” Will admitted. He had no idea what a Bayesean Linear Regression even was.

“So how did you compare the data?”

“I didn’t.” Will shrugged. “Before I had a chance to, another one of my teachers—a planetary scientist, he’d heard what I was working on—pulled me aside in the hall and shared an early draft of an article he’d been asked to review for a journal. It showed how Röntgen rays from the sun are stopped by the atmosphere surrounding the earth. Some believe that a kind of magnetic field is involved.”

Jenny threw herself back in her seat, exasperated.

“Oh, now you’re just being horrible,” she growled. “I’ve heard of shaggy dog stories, but never shaggy engineer stories! So what are you telling me about Röntgen rays for, then?”

“I’m just trying to demonstrate to you that nothing in life is ever as easy as you think it’s going to be,” Will said loftily.

Jenny snorted. “Believe me, William Edwards, I don’t need
you
to tell me that. Now, are you going to tell me what you discovered, or just keep playing around?”

Will grinned. “I discovered that I was on the right track, but with the wrong ray. It was
cosmic
rays that I should have been looking at. We get about eight to ten solar flares every day that shower the earth with cosmic rays. They’re strong enough to disrupt a connection.”

“So ... what do you do about it?”

“I’ve managed to create a pretty effective shield using the principles of magnetism. What makes my Otherwhere Flume different from a regular old Otherwhere Conductor is that I’ve added an electro-magnetic field generator to deflect stray cosmic rays. It’s powered out of the Otherwhere itself, so the system is entirely self-sustaining. Which reminds me ...” Will wanted to check and see if Rudge’s experiments would have any impact on the strength of his electro-magnetic field generator. Circling around to the back of the car he opened the trunk and took a reading on a small dial. He was so absorbed in thought he didn’t notice that Jenny was standing next to him.

“That’s it?” she asked in astonishment. “It’s ... a cigar box!”

“That just houses the workings,” Will said. It was a good sturdy wooden box, and Will had liked the colors of the label. He had especially liked the picture on the inside of the box’s cover, and he realized suddenly that Jenny would probably like it too. Lifting the lid, he grinned as he showed it to her. She put a hand over her mouth and giggled.

“The Hero of Manila!” she read, examining the old picture of Admiral Dewey.

But the intricate workings of the device within quickly drew her attention away from the brightly colored image. She bent down to get a closer look.

“I would have guessed it to be much bigger!” Jenny said. “Your Mr. Waters sure must have been impressed.”

“He never actually saw the prototype,” said Will. “I just built it this past summer.” Will checked the thick silk-wrapped cord that connected the box to the Baker’s motor. He made sure the Flume was securely seated in the cradle he’d built for it, then closed the trunk. Jenny was scrutinizing him.

“But before you graduated, you showed him your schematics and all that, right?”

“No, I never drew anything up.” Will dusted off his hands. “Mr. Waters wanted me to, but I didn’t see the need. I knew how I was going to build it. He got the concept, just like you do. And his friend at Tesla Industries, the lead researcher who got me their data on cosmic rays—a man named Grigory Grigoriyev, one of their leading Otherwhere Engineers—he gets it too. He’s has asked to have me on his team special. I can’t wait to show him what I’ve done!”

Jenny’s eyes widened in horror.

“You’re not going to
show
it to him, are you?”

“Well of course I am!” Will’s eyebrows shot up. “What’s the good of building something this swell if you can’t share it?”

“What’s to keep them from stealing it from you?”

“Naw, that’s Edison you’re thinking of, and he’s in the moving-picture business now.” Will gestured at the billboard looming over their heads. He came back around to the front of the car and peered at the dials to see if the ampere gauge had come up at all. “Mr. Tesla is a straight shooter. Mr. Waters says so.”

“William Edwards!” Will turned at the sound of command in Jenny’s voice and found her planted right behind him. She was not physically imposing—he’d always been taller than her—but the ferocious intensity in her blue eyes was enough to make him want to draw back. Reaching up to seize his shoulders, she held him fast.

“Now listen,” said Jenny, in a firm, bell-clear tone. “I want you to make me a promise, right this very second, or our deal is off.”

“P-promise?” he stammered. “What do you want me to promise?”

“I want you to promise me that you will not share your invention with anyone at Tesla Industries until it’s protected by a United States patent. I will take care of it all—the filing, everything. I’ll get it patented for you.”

“Get it patented for me?” Will was incredulous. “Jenny, what do you know about patenting anything? You’re seventeen!”

“And you’re
eighteen
, and you’ve invented the most incredible thing I ever heard of in my entire life!” She countered. “I know that if you don’t protect your rights, you’ll lose them.” Jenny paused. “You’ve made a great discovery. Don’t you know how great?”

“Yeah, but—”

“Look, haven’t I done okay so far?” Jenny lowered her hands, and her voice became pleading. “Haven’t I got everything all planned? Haven’t I got us a crooked lawyer?”

Will didn’t say anything.

“You’re a genius, William,” she said softly. “And geniuses need people to protect them. Just promise me. Please?”

“All right, Jenny,” he said. “I promise.”

Jenny squealed with satisfaction. Raising herself up on her tiptoes, she pecked him on the cheek. “You’re going to make a perfectly wonderful husband.”

“But I’m not going to Detroit just to sit around!” he added plaintively. “I want to show everyone at Tesla Industries what I can do!”

Jenny shrugged indifferently as she climbed back into her seat and rearranged her duster. “I’m sure you can find plenty to show them that doesn’t involve giving away your best invention right out of the gate. You just have to play them along a little bit.”

Will looked at his watch. Old Rudge’s hour was over. He started the car and put the controller into reverse. Power whooshed through the Flume like a distant breeze.

Both of them lost in thought, they drove on in silence, Dreadnought Stanton’s brilliant green eyes following them blankly.

Chapter Three

For Better or Worse

S
tockton, located at the mouth of the San Joaquin Valley, was called “The Chicago of the West.” Will’s father had often sniffed at this appellation and observed that one could quite accurately gauge the intellectual smallness of any given city by the bigness of the city it compared itself to. Will, however, loved Stockton—and not because of its hotels or restaurants or shops or any of its other urban attractions. He loved it because it was the most industrialized city in California, a city of mills, factories, foundries and shipyards, all surrounding the mighty man-made channel that led to the Pacific Ocean. Things were
made
here.

Sometimes, Will would make Pask park out front of a factory just so he could watch the activity going on around it—the bustling hive of workers, the raw materials going in and finished products coming out.

Pask, however, never had much patience for these protracted observations. He and Will came to Stockton to whoop it up, not to watch the forward march of American industrial progress. He preferred cheap whiskey, moving picture theaters, dances and vaudeville.

Will and Pask had come down at the beginning of the summer, on Pask’s dime, to attend a big to-do—organized by the town’s business elite—celebrating the opening of the brand new Hotel Stockton. With his parents away in Europe, Pask had been invited to attend as the de la Guerra family representative. He and Will had had an excellent time swanking it up on the glassed-in rooftop garden, eating the boosters’ canapés and downing their liquor.

As Jenny and Will drove along Pacific Avenue, the town seemed to swell around them. They turned down El Dorado Street to Weber Avenue, navigating around horse-drawn carts laden with goods headed for the wharf. Will slowed the Baker as they passed the Hotel Stockton, thinking its newness might impress her, but Jenny didn’t give it a second look. She had her eyes peeled for the San Joaquin County Courthouse a couple of blocks down—a massive building of white stone with fat frondy palm trees planted out front and a heavy clock tower cupola that seemed much too large for it, like a very big hat on a very small man.

Will parked the Baker aslant the concrete curb. They climbed out and hastily shed their motoring overcoats. As he stuffed his under the seat, he was aware that Jenny was eyeing him critically.

“I told you to wear your best suit!”

“This
is
my best suit!” Will returned. That just seemed to alarm her further, so he added, “And it’s just about new!” This was also true; the suit had been obtained just a few months prior for his graduation exercises. However, it had been ordered from a catalog, so it didn’t really fit him properly. The trouser hems brushed his anklebones, revealing bright red home-knit socks, and the grease- marked cuffs of his blue twill workshirt jutted out beyond the jacket’s sleeves.

“Oh, it’ll just have to do.” Jenny fussed with his tie then took his arm. “Come on!”

Inside, the building smelled of varnish and marble and bureaucracy. The shield of the State of California was inlaid on the floor of the main foyer, lit by light from the cupola above. The ringing officialness of it all made Will suddenly nervous.

“Hey Jenny, I don’t suppose you’ve researched what happens if we’re caught?” He bent so he could speak low in her ear. “Getting a marriage license under false pretenses, I mean. It’s probably just a misdemeanor, right?”

“For me, anyway!” said Jenny, brightly. “For you, it could be a lot worse. Especially since you’re intending to take me across state lines. I’m sure you’ve heard of the Mann Act? I’d advise you to keep any immoral purposes to yourself.”

For not the first time, Will found that he wasn’t entirely comfortable with Jenny’s sense of humor. But he pressed his lips shut and watched as she corralled a cleaning lady for directions. He thought of Detroit. He needed to get to Detroit and this was going to get him there. That was all that mattered.

The county clerk’s office, they were informed, was on the second floor. Jenny’s heels clicked and echoed as they climbed the wide marble stairs. The building was mostly deserted this day after the Thanksgiving holiday, but as Jenny had predicted, most of the offices were open—not
enthusiastically
open, perhaps—but open.

The second floor, far less grandiose than the first, smelled of legal-sized paper and red ink and wooden filing cabinets. The walls above the half-paneling were painted the dull shade of green that municipal governments seemed to order by the hogshead. They walked down a hall lined with closed doors, pebbled glass windows gold-stenciled with the names of the departments within, finally entering the door marked “Licenses.”

The room was not large, and the dozens of tall wooden filing cabinets that lined the walls made it seem even smaller. Behind a counter that spanned the length of the room, a desk was centered, its in-box stacked high. And behind that desk, a clerk—his feet propped up, a cigarette in his mouth—deeply absorbed in the newest of the Dreadnought Stanton serials. Will was beginning to feel like the Sophos of the Stanton Institute was following him around.

“We’ve come for a marriage license,” said Will, his voice sounding too loud in the silence. “We’d like to get married, please.”

The clerk took them both in at a glance, but said nothing.

“I’m twenty-one,” Will volunteered, probably too quickly.

“And I’m eighteen,” Jenny added, with similar haste. The clerk ground out his cigarette and smiled at them both wearily. Reaching behind his desk, he pulled out a handful of forms.