Arcadia Snips and the Steamwork Consortium (10 page)

"If you wish."

"Did you bring the new numbers?"

"Of course." Jeremiah drew the folded papers out from his coat, handing them over to Nigel. The dark-haired naturalist unfolded them, removing a pair of spectacles from his front coat pocket and perusing the mathematical formulas scrawled over its surface.

"I must admit," Nigel said, perusing over the equations,

"Your recent work has been magnificent. Some of the predictions your last set of equations made exceeded even my initiates'

superstitious expectations."

"Only a few of the equations are actually mine," Jeremiah said. "Abigail is responsible for the bulk of them."

"She has proven to be a far greater asset than I had originally thought," Nigel said.

"She's brilliant," Jeremiah said, and left it at that. "Shall we input the numbers...?"

"Yes, yes," Nigel said. "Let's." He rose from his chair, gesturing for Jeremiah to follow as he moved deeper into his home.

Jeremiah stepped inside the dimly lit interior of the chapter-house.

The chapter-house's drawing room was decorated with resplendent textiles; crimson curtains trimmed with gold lining smothered what little light entered through its windows, casting a filtered glow upon the furniture within. The shadows here had grown so thick that they seemed to possess a substance all of their own; Jeremiah could easily imagine that, given the right prompting, they would leap to the defense of the chapter-house's master.

"Your new home is rather disconcerting," Jeremiah confessed.

Nigel laughed, as if enjoying some delightful joke. "Do you know why we are afraid of the dark?"

"Because our imagination fills it with dreadful, wicked things," Jeremiah said.

"Yes," Nigel replied, "that is correct. But do you know why?"

"No, but I am sure you will tell me, eh?"

"Of course. Because the alternative is far more terrifying, Jeremiah. Because the alternative is this: that there is nothing there.

That, in fact, we are merely alone. Alone, in the dark."

"Funny," Jeremiah replied. "Maybe it's just me, but I've never been too frightened of getting my face eaten by an
empty
shadow."

Nigel laughed again. He lead Jeremiah down a set of spiraling stairs, down into the very belly of the chapter-house, beyond the realm of the uninitiated.

The basement where they had stored the latest probability engine was large in size, but nearly all the space was taken up by the engine itself. It dwarfed Jeremiah's previous designs; iron and steel had replaced the cheaper brass fittings, with Jeremiah's latest improvements—vacuum bulbs and batteries—providing a source of cleaner, quieter power.

It had been Abigail's idea to build the controls out of a church organ. Each key was labeled with a number or function, and after a bit of practice, inputting data became child's play. Nigel sat the documents on the nearby music stand, cracked his knuckles, and began typing in the values in a blur of finger strokes. "There is something else I wanted your opinion on, Jeremiah," he said as he worked. "Seize the electric torch to your left; use it to inspect the chalkboard over the corner there. I have scribbled down a few equations."

Jeremiah did as he was told, approaching the chalkboard with some consternation. As he lifted the torch up to inspect the numbers, his eyebrows knitted with confusion. The writing went far beyond the meager boundaries of the chalkboard—Nigel's dense, neat script extended over the chalkboard's frame and coated every inch of the wall. "Nigel, what is this?"

"A thought experiment."

"A thought experiment? This is an equation for the engine, Nigel. I recognize the functions—but I cannot make out what it is you are trying at, here."

"We have used the engine to avert small calamities with the foreknowledge it grants us," Nigel said, still inputting the numbers with focus and intent. "But what if we attempted to make something happen?"

Jeremiah raised a brow, looking back at Nigel. "We've done that. The rain—"

"A paltry parlor trick," Nigel said. "A clever act of chicanery, nothing more. No, what I was thinking was something far more grand."

"Were you not the one who warned us of frivolously using the engine?"

"Yes, yes, of course," Nigel replied. "But this idea is far from that."

"What is it you are proposing?"

"What if we made a person?"

Silence lingered. Jeremiah frowned.

"A person, Nigel?"

"Yes. Imagine it—a person created through the probability engine. If we could distill the birth of a person to mere mathematics, could we not cause it to happen? Furthermore, what would occur? You and Abigail have theorized that events caused by the probability engine lead to all manner of strange coincidences and conflagrations of chance; would a person created in this way lead such a life as well? Could we, in fact, manufacture a living entity's very destiny?"

"It is... an interesting notion," Jeremiah admitted, "yet one best constrained to matters of theory."

"Of course, of course," Nigel said. He brought the cover down over the keys with a loud snap. "I would never think of actually putting the idea into
action
. Not, at least, without your and Abigail's permission."

"Of course," Jeremiah said, although he sounded unconvinced.

"I apologize, Jeremiah. Pardon my rudeness for keeping you so late; it sometimes grows lonely in this house. I have only fawning fools and ignorant believers to keep me company."

"Of course, of course," Jeremiah agreed. "No pardon is necessary. Think nothing of it."

"We will speak next week, then? After I have sent the latest results to you?" Nigel said, staring up at the monolith of a machine.

"Yes, of course," Jeremiah replied. "And, perhaps I will speak to Abigail of this theory of yours—we would never put it in practice, of course, but it might intrigue her—"

"I would rather you not, Jeremiah. She all ready thinks me a schemer; I would rather her opinion of me not grow darker."

"If... if you insist, Nigel."

"I do. Good night, Jeremiah. One of my men will show you out."

"Thank you. And, good night, Nigel."

~*~

~*~

Snips nearly walked right into Miss Primrose as she bolted out of Basil's workshop. The detective clutched a metal-rimmed flask filled to the lip with a frothing cyan chemical.

"Blue, Miss Snips!" she cried out. "It turned blue! Do you know what this means?!"

"You're expecting?"

Snips considered the error of her ways from the workshop's floor.

"Quite sorry, Miss Snips," Miss Primrose announced dryly, shifting her weight back to the tips of her toes. "My elbow seems to have slipped into your abdomen. Did you say something?"

Snips coughed and spluttered, dragging herself back to her feet. "Where did you learn to, ah, 'slip' like that?"

"Miss Muffet's Finishing School for Ladies," she said.

"Blue indicates the presence of an explosive agent."

"So he blew himself up," Snips said.

"He was ‘blown up‘. We do not know by whom. Did your interrogations bare any fruit?"

"Mr. Eddington mentioned checking out Basil's house to see if he left any blueprints for his current project. Otherwise, he's not aware precisely what Basil's experiments meant, except they involved electricity."

"Then I agree. As this is a simple task, I will entrust it to you, Miss Snips. See about securing the location of Mr. Copper's home at the front desk. Meanwhile, I will investigate the patent office to see if—"

"This sounds like something important," Watts said, suddenly appearing behind Miss Primrose. "Is this something important? Because if it‘s important, I should probably do it. I mean, after all, I am a very important person."

Miss Primrose instantly went pale. "Err—important, Mr. Watts? N-no, not at—"

"It is of great importance," Snips interrupted, her voice slipping through the conversation like a greased dagger. "In fact, it is of such immense importance that neither Miss Primrose nor myself can be trusted with it. To say that this matter is critical to the case would be an understatement of incredible proportions."

Miss Primrose glared at Snips; meanwhile, Detective Watts looked supremely interested. "Whatever could it be?"

Snips leaned in towards Detective Watts, glancing from side to side to ensure that no one else would overhear. And then, in the hushed tone often reserved for conspiracies of the utmost secrecy, she whispered: "Books, Detective Watts."

Watts gasped. Miss Primrose spluttered.

"Books?!" He asked, then dropped his voice. "Do you think that—"

Snips pressed a finger to her nose and shook her head.

Detective Watts immediately snapped his mouth shut and nodded, glancing around the room to eye any nearby books with nervous suspicion.

"Think about it," Snips murmured. "They're everywhere, aren't they? Always just sitting there. Full of
words
."

"Yes, yes," Watts nodded. "I've always said that books are full of words, haven't I, Miss Primrose?"

Snips cut in before the speechless Miss Primrose could reply. "This requires a more thorough investigation, don't you think?"

"Yes. Yes! I will get to the bottom of this matter immediately!"

"To the library," Snips cried.

"To the library!" Detective Watts replied, then with a swoosh of his long coat, he ran off.

Miss Primrose stared after his retreating form for quite some while before turning to Snips. "How did you—"

"I'm fluent in crazy. Where should we meet once I search Copper's house?"

Miss Primrose withdrew a small plain card from her medical purse; on it was a neat and legible print. It said 'WATTS

AND SONS DETECTIVE AGENCY' at the top, and listed an address in the upper ward beneath it. "We will meet here in approximately four hours' time, Miss Snips."

"Right," Snips said, taking the card and tucking it in her coat. "Four hours."

~*~

Daffodil's workshop was a confused jumble of engine parts, diagrams, equations plastered to the walls, and old books on medieval knights. The young man looked more disheveled than ever, holding an ink-pen and scrawling down numbers at his desk.

He did not even look up as Mr. Eddington entered.

"Busy," Daffodil announced, eyes transfixed. Mr. Eddington had long learned that the man was absolutely unbendable when he was working on a sufficiently difficult problem. "Finishing up some final equations."

"I simply wanted to check in on you and insure that this

'Miss Snips' had not gleaned too much information from you, Mr. Daffodil."

"Didn't tell her much," he said, licking the tip of his pen and dipping it in the inkwell. "Favorite color."

For the second time that day, Mr. Eddington raised his eyebrow.

"Your... favorite color?"

"Green," William said, and then—quite to Mr. Eddington's surprise—he sat the pen down and looked up at him. "What do you know about women, sir?"

"Only that they are monstrous and inscrutable creatures, best avoided at every opportunity."

"I see, sir."

"Have a good night, Mr. Daffodil. Remember to lock your office up on your way out."

"Yes sir."

Eddington left. Shortly after the door closed, William glanced back down at the equations he had been furiously solving.

At their center lay Snips' name, which—so far—had resisted all attempts at subtraction, multiplication, or division.

Even by cat.

~*~

Smoke rolled up from the tip of the assassin's cigarette. His bronze nose winked and glimmered in the dim light of Dead Beat Alley's spluttering and outdated gas lamps.

People in Dead Beat Alley minded their own business; it was assumed by everyone that everyone else was a puppy-murdering sociopath and the less they had to do with them the better. This philosophy had turned out quite well, and had made it a haven for several depraved puppy-murdering organizations throughout the city.

He arrived at Snips' apartment—a fire-trap shoved in between two larger fire-traps soaked in grease and placed next to burning lamps. He pulled out his pistol and kicked the door down with a solid whump, striding in and taking aim.

Motes of dirt floated in sluggish whorls through the book-lined room. But there was no one present; no one downstairs, no one upstairs. Realizing that his quarry was not home, he decided to do a little research.

The assassin hummed to himself, glossing over the titles of several books. Most of them were concerned with some matter of science that applied to the art of breaking and entering.

Upstairs wasn't much different. He considered ransacking the place, but didn't want to leave any clues of his presence; it would probably be best to do a search, wait to see if she was coming back, then move on. As he was scanning the top of one bookshelf, he heard a tell-tale creak beneath the sole of his boot.

"Hn." The assassin crouched down and peered at the floorboard. It didn't take much to pull it up; among the dust and cobwebs that inhabited the niche below, he discovered a small wooden chest wrapped in linen. Sitting down on Snips's lumpy bed, the assassin brought the chest to his lap and opened it, carefully rifling through its contents.

A folded paper butterfly. A small locket with a picture inside of a woman—he assumed it was Snips's mother. Several old post-cards that contained little of interest. A dusty book about medieval knights. But at the very bottom of the chest was a faded yellow photograph that caught his eye.

On its front was a little six-year-old girl with long dark hair and an extravagant dress—likely Snips—and a tall, handsome gentleman in a coal-colored suit and vest. They stood in front of a large machine that had the appearance of a horse-drawn carriage, except without the horses. It had an assembly of contraptions weighing it down and what looked to be a steam-engine attached to its back.

He flipped the photograph over. It read: 'NIGEL AND

DAUGHTER'.

The assassin whistled low. He put the objects back in the box, returned it to its proper place, and then quietly made his way out.