The Tinkerer's Daughter (7 page)

“I know, I know. But we’re going to need more than one hat. The one you’ve been wearing is good enough for winter, but what will happen when summer arrives? And what about the rest of those rags you wear? It won’t do to have you wearing my old clothes.” He made a great show of contemplating this problem, and then finally sighed. “Well, there is nothing else for it. I’m afraid we’ll have to go shopping.”

I felt a surge of conflicting emotions at those words. I truly and deeply wanted the new clothes of which he spoke, but the thought of returning to town terrified me. “I should wait here,” I said.

“Nonsense. If you’re to be in school every day, you might as well get used to the scrutiny. We’ll go tomorrow.”

That was the end of it.

Tinker fired up his steamwagon early the next morning and drove us straight to the mercantile. Analyn was shocked to see me. “Goodness, look how you’ve grown!” she exclaimed. “You’ve become a young woman.” I knew that any response would have taken our conversation into dangerous territory, so I just smiled politely.

“We need to see your catalog,” Tinker said. “Breeze needs a new wardrobe, and some new hats.”

“I see,” Analyn said. She went into the back room and returned with a thick leather-bound book. She gave me a knowing smile as she thumped it down on the counter. “Here we go, all the latest fashions, direct from Avenston.” She opened the book and started flipping through pages and pages of black and white sketches. “Ah, here’s the young ladies’ section.” She flipped the book around so I could see it. She shot Tinker a look. “How much are we wanting to spend?”

Tinker pulled at his collar uncomfortably. “Well, she’ll be needing school clothes, and hats. And something for home, too. She’s outgrown everything we have.”

“All right, then. Let’s get some measurements. Breeze, if you’ll follow me into the back room. Tinkerman, why don’t you go for a walk? Come back in an hour.”

Tinker sighed and disappeared through the front door. As promised, Analyn had me ready to go when he returned. She had a bill for Tinker. “I’ll get this order posted this afternoon,” she said. “It should be here by the end of the week. You won’t be disappointed; the tailors in Avenston do incredible work.”

“I hope they do,” Tinker said as he signed the bill. “I’m gonna have to do a lot of incredible work myself, if I’m going to pay for this.”

“Ah, but she’s worth it,” Analyn said with a twisted grin.

“That she is,” Tinker smiled. He rubbed my head as if I were still the little girl my father had left in his care.

“Well, it seems we have some time to fill,” Tinker said as we drove home. “Do you feel like starting another project?”

I glanced at him sideways. “What did you have in mind?”

He smiled, and nodded towards a hawk circling over the fields. I followed his gaze, and then shrugged. “I don’t understand.”

“What would you think of a machine that could do that?” he said.

My jaw dropped. “You want to build a machine that can fly like a bird? Is that possible?”

His grin widened. “Anything’s possible, if you try hard enough.”

I took a deep breath. I knew better than to second-guess Tinker. Regardless of how impossible the task appeared, if he thought it was possible, then it probably was. I watched the bird soaring on the breeze, paying special attention to the gentle movement of its wings. I wished I could observe more closely, but I could only guess as to most of what was going on.

“Do the wings work like a fan?” I said. Tinker didn’t answer. I turned to him and realized that he was lost in thought. He hadn’t even heard me. He was watching the bird.

Tinker spent the rest of the day in the barn. I could tell that his mind was in other places, so I just stayed out of his way. Later that evening I brought him some dinner, and stole a glance at his designs. I saw pages and pages of sketches scattered across his workbench. The general design seemed to be the same: two large wings attached to a long tail section. The details however, changed dramatically. The size and shape of the wings varied from a sharp triangular design to long, elegant bird-wing shapes.

Tinker also had pages and pages of calculations, probably regarding the weight of the wood in comparison with the size of the wings. I couldn’t imagine how math could solve such a problem, but I left it in the Tinker’s capable hands.

The next morning, he was ready to start. Tinker had put a lot of thought into the weight problem, and he had some interesting design ideas. Rather than carving the wings from solid wood, he wanted to build a frame that consisted of light wood reinforced with metal pipes. “Will it be strong enough?” I asked, as I saw the frame coming together.

“It will be strong enough to fly,” Tinker answered. “It’s the landing that I’m worried about.”

I mused over this for a couple of days. I helped Tinker when I could, but unfortunately, much of the craftsmanship required was beyond my skills. Rather than injecting myself into an already complicated project, I mostly just busied myself fetching tools and supplies when he needed them. The thing was practically finished by the time I noticed the biggest problem of all.

“Tinker, where will you put the engine?”

He laughed. “This won’t have an engine. That would be far too heavy.”

“Then how will it fly?”

“We’re going to
kite
it,” he said.

“Kite?”

“Yes, like the toys they sell in the mercantile. We will tow it with the coach, until it catches wind. Then, perhaps it will fly.”

My reservations grew with every passing hour as I saw the project coming together. It was bad enough that Tinker wanted to build a flying machine. The dangers there were obvious. Then I saw the thin, light frame, and I knew what would happen if the thing ever crashed. When I learned that the flying machine would travel without power, I felt like crying. I knew something bad was going to happen this time. I could feel it.

The day of our first flight was a cool, frosty morning. Tinkerman was dressed in his leather pants and jacket. He was padded with extra clothing beneath. His theory was that if he crashed, the additional layers would help absorb the impact. I could only shake my head at this thinking.

We carried the machine down to the field at sunrise, and by nine a.m. Tinker was ready to fly. I tried desperately to convince him that this was a mistake, but he refused to listen. “You just get me in the air,” he said. “I’ll take it from there.”

I obediently took my place at the driver’s seat and watched him with my head twisted around. Tinker crawled on top of the thing and strapped himself into position. When he gave me the signal, I held my breath and gunned the engine.

As soon as we started to move, the glider’s tail lifted into the air and it leveled out. Suddenly I could see Tinker’s face. He was wearing his leather goggles, the ones that he had been wearing on the day we met, and his eyes were hidden behind the dark glass.

The glider bounced along on its metal wheels, and it looked rather painful. Then it bounced into the air and, to my surprise, did not come down. The glider lifted into the sky. I could feel it tugging against the steamwagon. Tinker disengaged the rope, and flew free.

I engaged the brakes and sat there watching him for at least fifteen minutes. Tinker flew down to the end of the field, and then made a slow arc across the river and headed west towards where we had started. I spun slowly on the seat, my attention riveted on Tinker’s virgin flight.

He came back in my direction and then made another broad circle. He did this several times. As I watched, I noted that he seemed to lose altitude fastest over the river, but he quickly regained it when he flew out across the fields.

Eventually, he came in for a landing and I took the wagon to go meet him. He gradually lost altitude, until his wheels were just inches off the ground. Then he set down. To my horror, the wings snapped. The glider spun sideways and then flipped, turning over three full times before it finally landed in a wrecked heap.

I sped across the field to the crash site and ran over to the debris. I located him off to the side, lying on his back, still strapped to a section of wing.

“Tinker! Tinker, can you hear me? Are you alive?” My heart thudded in my chest. I was terrified.

He raised his head and chuckled. “Did you see that flight?”

“I saw, Tinker. It almost got you killed.” I knelt down to help him get the straps off.

“Yes, but she flew, Breeze. Did you see? It was amazing. I could have stayed up there for hours. Until sunset, at least.”

“Yes, wonderful,” I said angrily. “Except that your glider is destroyed.”

He glanced around a the wreckage. “Ah, yes… slight miscalculation there. But I know how to fix it!”

I turned away and stomped angrily back towards the coach.

“Wait, Breeze. Wait!”

“What is it?”

“Umm. I don’t think I can walk. I think my leg’s broken.”

The doctor in town took a look at Tinker’s leg and proclaimed that it had, in fact, been broken. Just below his hip. Oddly, the treatment for this involved pulling it straight, which appeared to be ungodly painful, and then securing the leg to a long brace.

He gave me explicit instructions about keeping the leg straight, and not allowing Tinker to walk on it. I promised to do all I could, though I knew that the instructions wouldn’t sit well with Tinker. He was not the sort of man to spend a dozen weeks lying around the house.

The doctor also gave us a small bottle of medicine. A teaspoon of it he said would kill Tinker’s pain. Tinker took a swig of it on the way home, and by the time we arrived, he was in a stupor. I didn’t have the strength to carry him up to the loft, so I tucked him into my bed and I slept in his.

As I drifted to sleep, it occurred to me that we had somehow switched roles. For months now Tinker had been looking out for me and protecting me. Now, strangely, I found myself acting as the responsible party. How had that happened? I was too exhausted to give it much thought. I told myself that in the morning everything would be back to normal, and went to sleep.

It must have been three a.m. when Tinker’s scream woke me from a dead sleep. I flew down the ladder and found him on the floor next to my bed. Apparently he had been tossing and turning, and managed to knock himself out of bed. I rushed to his side. “Shh, calm down. Take a deep breath, Tinker. What happened?”

He was sweating and his breath came in gasps. “My leg is on fire,” he said. “Something’s wrong.” He clenched his teeth as another spasm of pain racked his body, and a loud cry escaped from his lips. I put my hand on his forehead. He was burning up.

“You have a fever,” I said. “We’ve got to get you back into bed. Can you help me?”

He nodded, and I grabbed him by the shoulders. I had him halfway up before I realized it may have been a mistake. The pain was killing him. Unfortunately, by that time it was too late. I heaved again, and he pushed just enough to get his torso back up.

Slowly and delicately I lifted the broken leg back into place. He howled as the brace that should have been holding it straight came loose. “I’m going to get your medicine,” I said. “I’ll be right back.”

I returned a moment later with the bottle, and poured some of the foul smelling liquid down his throat. Tinker’s cries died away immediately, and he fell to moaning and panting while I sat there. I put a cool rag over his forehead.

“Tinker, I wish I knew what to do,” I said. “I wish I knew how to fix you.”

“Just do it,” he mumbled incoherently. I looked at him sideways.

“Just do what?”

His only response was a grunt. I thought about it, wondering what he’d meant. Was he talking about what I’d done with the sleigh? Was that what he wanted from me? To reach into his body with my mind, and try to mend him? I wasn’t even sure such a thing was possible. Still, it seemed worth a try. I would have done anything to relieve his pain.

I placed my hands on Tinker’s thigh and closed my eyes. Instantly I heard his heartbeat, and felt the rhythmic pulse of his blood. I expanded my awareness and felt rather than saw the tiny sparks of electricity shooting through his body. I saw the bones and the way the skeletal system lined up with the internal organs and the muscles. My mind drew the connections between these different systems and I saw how they worked together as one. There was magic there, I realized. More magic than I had ever seen or imagined.

I pulled my attention down to Tinker’s leg, and immediately discerned the problem. The bone had not only been separated, but fine fragments were now floating freely inside his body. I saw the gush of uncontained blood and fluids, and knew that this had already started to become infected. I started by directing my thoughts towards the bone.

I pulled with my hands, separating the bone and getting it into a proper alignment. Then I mentally urged the tiny fragments to dissolve. I watched them liquify, and guided Tinker’s body to absorb the calcium and other minerals, and then to utilize these materials in rebuilding the bone. I didn’t know of course that this was calcium, I simply
felt
what it was, and how it could be used.

I caused the bone to move and stretch in some places, just enough to build a solid bridge across the break, so that I could remove the pressure from my hands. Once this was done, I was able to give my full concentration to the healing process.

Tinker’s body knew what to do for the most part. It was up to me to urge it forward, to increase the speed of healing. During this process, I had to look to other sources for building supplies. The body needed energy, and it needed the building blocks of bone and sinew. I borrowed sparingly from the rest of his body, leaving the instructions that these areas should be rebuilt as soon as Tinker started ingesting food again.

The bone was not complete at the end of the process, but it was serviceable, and I knew it would be fully healed within a few weeks. Tinker still had the immediate issue of an infection, but I had removed the initial cause of the problem. It was now up to his body to clear the toxins from his bloodstream. There was nothing more that I could do.