The Shadow Conspiracy II

by Phyllis Irene Radford

  “God Almighty!” breathed Croft. “What is it?”

  A monster with a mighty twisting horn lumbered up the mountain like something out of a nightmare. Two yellow eyes glowed at us, from a head like a great bronze and copper kettle. The slaves’ unnatural stillness broke and they scrambled in a body of shouts and rattling chains to get behind Emmett. Emmett snapped his gun closed. A terrier shouted, another screamed.

  I stared as if seeing a vision.

  “It’s a steam drill.”

  The metal monster came straight on, it’s treads churning the ground to red ruin. A man sat on its back proud and tall like some Indian Nabob. At least I took him to be a man. Beneath the goggles, helmet, and leather coat it was hard to tell just what that figure might be.

  The rider shouted something and the drill halted, breathing out a great whoosh of white steam. Then he pushed up his goggles, and leapt down from his high seat to stand before us.

  “Paul Baldwin.” He stripped off one of his big gauntlets and held out his hand.

  “Every ugly cuss in the mountains is comin’ down today,” breathed Croft.

  I nodded. I didn’t like the look of this one any better than I liked the look of Emmett. He was a short, skinny stick of a fellow with frizzled red hair under his bowler hat. His muddy blue eyes sloped large and liquid above high cheekbones. The summer sun had browned his smooth face and snub nose. But he clearly did all right at whatever trade he plied. A heavy gold stick pin held his collar closed.

  “I’ve heard you’re having trouble with a tunnel and I am here to offer my services, and that of my drill.” Baldwin swept his hand out toward the machine.

  There is a beauty to machinery that is like no other. It is the beauty of craftsmanship harnessing and channelling the very laws of the universe. The steam engine’s copper and brass fittings gleamed. The steel boring drill was like a narwhale’s horn made of silver, and its twin headlamps really did have the look of two unwinking eyes taking your measure.

  Not everyone was so enchanted with Baldwin’s unlikely steed, however.

  “Get away, Baldwin,” warned Emmett. “You been doggin’ me for weeks, but this job’s mine.”

  “Well now, well now, I imagine this gentleman has something to say about that.” Paul Baldwin turned to myself and Croft, who was as tense as a cat about to jump on a stove it wasn’t sure had gone cold. “My good sirs, this is a Mark V modern steam drill fitted with a genuine Babbage & Lovelace codex. She takes fifty different commands and can drill solid granite at the rate of fifteen feet per day! Needing only one engineer.” He placed his hand on his breast and bowed. “And just five men per shift as support, even if there is no water supply adjacent to the drill site. And because yours is such a prominent and respected project, I am willing to offer you the services of myself and Sharpie here for twenty-five dollars a week.” He clapped his hands together, and looked up at me as if wondering why I wasn’t already shaking his hand.

  Emmett chewed his tobacco a couple of times and spat a thick brown stream toward the drill’s treads. “Horsefeathers.”

  Baldwin didn’t even look at him. “And you never have to worry about a strike or a runaway...”

  “I ain’t never had a runaway on my gang,” growled Emmett. “My boys know what’s-what.”

  “In addition, you only have the expense of feeding one extra man rather than twenty. A demonstration perhaps, Sir?” I opened my mouth but Baldwin didn’t wait. “Sharpie!” he bawled. “Forward five yards! Lower drill!”

  Sharpie’s treads ground against the dirt so hard I jumped back to avoid being struck by the spewing rubble. It brought that narwhale horn of a drill down, aiming it straight into the mouth of our tunnel, where it stopped and blew out another cloud of steam.

  A couple of my terriers crossed themselves and a couple of the slaves made the sign against the Evil Eye. I put my hands in my pockets.

  “There you are, gentlemen!” cried Baldwin. “What do you make of that?”

  “Snake oil in a copper kettle,” announced Emmett. “I’ve seen these things at circus shows. They got a few tricks, wires and magnets and such, and then when nobody’s lookin’ they just fall right apart.”

  But Baldwin wasn't bothered in the least at this open skepticism. “Mr. Sheridan, I’ve a proposition for you.”

  “Oh?” I reeled in my thoughts, reminding myself I was a man with a job, not a child gawping in a toy store window.

  “A race.” Baldwin puffed his chest out. “My drill against any one of Mr. Emmett’s boys. The one who drills farthest in a day gets the job.”

  I looked to Emmett. He made a face like he’d just swallowed a whole lemon. “If it’ll get you off my back, Baldwin, I’ll take your little bet.”

  “Ha!” exclaimed Baldwin. “And which of your niggers will you pit against my drill, Mr. Emmett?”

  Before Emmett could answer, a voice called out. “I’ll do it.”

  The whole bunch of them stirred and parted, and the biggest, blackest buckra I had ever seen stepped forward. The girl must have unlocked him. He was at least six feet tall and could not have weighed less than two hundred and fifty pounds. He wore no shirt, just canvas trousers and leather bracers. A lifetime of labour had sculpted that black body the way water sculpts stone.

  “John Henry!” Emmett clapped the fellow on his shoulder and had to reach up to do it. “There’s my driller!” He cried, proud as if he’d built the boy himself. “What do you think of that, Mr. Sheridan?” He held up one massive black arm for me to inspect.

  I looked from the black man to the gleaming machine and I looked from the ugly overseer to the smooth-faced driver. For a moment the ticking of my watch in my pocket marking off the time I was losing was like the beating of my own heart. Time was on the mountain’s side. Time, and the unbending laws of stone and gravity. The terriers didn’t want to go in and face them, and I didn’t have money enough to keep bribing them all.

  “A word with you, Mr. Sheridan,” said Croft abruptly.

  I nodded and the pair of us retired to the tent.

  “I don’t like it,” said Croft as he let the front flap fall shut behind us. “I’ve heard about these Babbage & Lovelace machines. A lot of them have something wrong down in those...whaddayacall’ems...codexes.”

  I frowned. Archibald Croft was a solid, unimaginative man. His realm was the ledgers and schedules, order blanks and supply lists. “And just where have you heard this?”

  “It’s in all the papers. Besides, if we hire on either of these two, we’re going to need a lot fewer terriers than we do now, and you can bet O’Malley’s thinking about that, along with every one of his Paddies.”

  Ticktickticktick went my watch.

  “O’Malley’s making good money and now he’s got a bonus riding on us sticking to schedule. He’ll keep his men in line.”

  “Maybe O’Malley reads the papers too, and it ain’t just the machines they got runnin’ amok over there.”

  Croft was talking about the so-called Luddite riots. I’d noticed how our terriers had eyed “Sharpie” while Baldwin and Emmett were arguing. Croft was right, they did not look happy.

  I tucked my fingers into my vest pocket and rubbed the latest letter from Rosamund’s doctor.

  “Just this morning, I had O’Malley standing in front of me saying his men didn’t want to go back down the tunnel,” I said grimly. “If they won’t do the job, it’s either going to be Emmett’s blacks or Baldwin’s drill. This competition will give him time to think all that over.”

  I strode back out into the daylight. “It’s agreed,” I announced loud enough for the whole camp to hear. “John Henry against Baldwin’s steam drill. The one that’s drilled the farthest at the end of the day is the winner!”

  Baldwin bowed like the showman that he was. Emmett spat and nodded. Behind them, John Henry stood like an iron statue, and behind him all the terriers looked from the blacks to the drill. I caught O’Malley’s gaze and held it.

 
He lifted two fingers to his brow in mocking salute.

  You’re on.

  We decided the competition would start at eight the next morning. I didn’t want the terriers standing around idling, so I had O’Malley keep them at work, clearing rubble from the tunnel and smoothing down the track that led up to it. In the meantime, Emmett and his blacks set up their camp. Or rather, the blacks set up camp under his watchful eye.

  Mr. Baldwin had a tent too, a white canvas structure almost the size of my own. He unloaded it from the steam drill and set it up himself, piling in crates and camp furniture, clearly getting ready to stay.

  Myself, I still had the C&O board’s demand for updates to deal with. I sat down at my folding table and picked up their steam pigeon. It was a battered thing of leather, wire and intricate brass gears, more the size of a falcon than a pigeon. It was surprisingly light for its size and its twin lenses glittered in the faint light that filtered through the canvas. A delicate, complex cousin of the great drill outside, it would take my message and fly where I told it. No arguments, no demands. I thought about the automatons that were moving into the houses of the wealthy in place of the living servants, and about the air ships that some argued would render trains obsolete, and make throwing human lives under stone unnecessary.

  I thought about a line of Sharpies, running in and out of the Big Bend tunnel run by competent, educated men, not by thugs. The best of the best spreading civilization across the this rich wild land. We could harvest its resources to feed the cities where new, great works could be imagined and realized.

  I saw my distorted face in the lenses of the pigeon’s eyes, flushed from the magnitude of dreams in my mind.

  The C&O board, however, were not dreamers. They were driven men, and their imaginations were limited to one thing — how the world could be shaped to line their pockets. I set the pigeon aside, folding its legs so it rested on its breast plates. They could wait another day for their answer. I unrolled my blueprints, opened my notebook and tried to concentrate on refining the support structure for the tunnel.

  The muggy day wore on to sultry evening. Wilhelm, the camp’s German cook, brought me in a bowl of his beef and cabbage stew, which I ate with more appetite than I would have believed possible. My neck and back ached and I walked out into the twilight to stretch. The camp around me seemed peaceful enough. The terriers sat around their fire, and the blacks around theirs. For an idle moment, I watched the girl passing among the men boys with a bucket and a dipper. But my eyes were drawn to the silhouette of the steam drill where it loomed beside Baldwin’s broad white tent. As I watched, Baldwin emerged with a cup in his hand, to draw a little hot water from the boiler into a tin cup.

  I decided to stroll over. It had been a long time since I’d talked with anyone who understood what the new machines could mean for our growing country.

  “Good evening, Mr. Sheridan!” Baldwin cried as I approached. “And what can I do for you?”

  “Just coming to see you’re all right,” I said. “I can have Wilhelm bring you over some stew if you want it.” Whatever he had in that cup it didn’t smell any too appetizing.

  “Oh, we’ll get along fine, Sharpie and I.” He patted her curving copper side. He’d lit her lanterns. Their flames flickered against the reflectors, and I could fancy them as blinking eyes.

  “She’s fine, isn’t she?” Baldwin murmured.

  I nodded. “I’m looking forward to seeing what she can do tomorrow.”

  “And I look forward to showing you.”

  I’d thought to speak to him about my dreams, of a fleet of drills, of the harnessing of natural law and the beauty of the new machines. But as Baldwin looked up, polite and patient, stirring his strong smelling cup, an odd feeling came over me. I had thought to meet a comrade, but there was no feeling of comfort standing next to Baldwin. Something in his muddy-blue eyes, his smooth cheeks and his tapered, calloused fingers had me suddenly feeling as awkward as a school boy called to the front of the class.

  “Good night now, Mr. Sheridan,” said Baldwin and I thought I heard a trace of sympathy in this voice. “We’ll see you in the morning.”

  It was a plain dismissal. As odd as I was feeling then, I didn’t contest it. I just walked away. But I did look back, and I saw Mr. Baldwin caress Sharpie’s side once more. The gesture put me in mind of a man touching his wife’s cheek and for a moment, I felt a strange longing settle into my stomach.

  I fled into my tent.

  I stumbled inside. Croft was already asleep and snoring, for which I was grateful. I took off my boots, coat and collar, wrapped myself in my blanket and settled onto my cot. After awhile, though, it became plain sleep wasn’t coming for me. I tried reading a few pages of Shakespeare by the light of the dim lantern, but not even the nonsense of All’s Well that Ends Well could soothe my mind. I couldn’t stop thinking about the race, and about how this might just save me, if Baldwin, if Sharpie, performed as promised. I tried to put aside the awkwardness that had come over me, but it crept back and had to be forced away again.

  At last I laid my book aside, put my boots back on and went out into the dark.

  Although the fires had long since sunk to coals, there was more than enough light to see by. The full moon shone overhead and every star in God’s Heaven was on parade. The sleeping forms of men created a landscape of lumps and shifting hillocks between their fellows who still sat and talked softly around the banked fires, and the mountain looked down over it all.

  Then a red gleam caught my eye. I turned toward Big Bend and saw Sharpie snug up against the mountain, blocking the mouth of the tunnel.

  A wave of anger washed away all remembered awkwardness. What the hell are you playing at, Baldwin?

  I could have called Croft or one of the watchmen, but I didn’t. This had to be cleared up quietly. Emmett and O’Malley were certain to cry foul given even half a chance.

  But as I strode up, it wasn’t Baldwin’s voice I heard coming out of that tunnel.

  “You can’t do it, John Henry,” a woman whispered softly. “You’ll die for real.”

  “We’re in it now, Polly Anne, and there’s no getting out. I’ll do it.”

  There was a long pause, and I heard the scrape of shoes on stone. “We can call it off.”

  “No time, Polly. You said so yourself. You’re gonna start showing soon and once you do, it’s all up.”

  “Then swear to me you’ll hold back!”

  “Cain’t do that either, Polly.”

  “So just what good you gonna be doing your baby if you end up dead?”

  “It’s for Skinny Shake and the rest. To prove we’re still better than the machines.”

  “What, so’s they can keep us all slaves? Let the machine win! Let ’em break bronze backs ’stead of ours!”

  “You don’t mean that. You know when they find out that a machine can do all the work and don’ eat nothin’, or get sick never, or run away. They ain’t just gonna say ‘thank you, boys for all you done, here’s your free papers, you can be on your way now’.” His voice dropped so I could scarcely hear. “It’s bad now when at least some of ’em think we’re worth somethin’. How bad’s it gonna be when none of ’em think we’s worth anything at all?”

  Silence, thick and heavy stretched out between them. The weight of it and the ideas it set stirring were too much for me. I set my jaw. Whatever John Henry and the girl were up to, they could do it during daylight hours. I started forward, but as I did the drill’s dim lantern eyes flared and it let out a great hissing cloud of steam. I threw up my hand against the sudden glare, blinded.

  “Is there a problem, Mr. Sheridan?”

  I heard feet scrabbling on stone and blinked hard to clear my sight. Baldwin stood beside Sharpie. He hadn’t undressed for the night at all, but still wore his big leather coat over his checked suit, complete with high collar and bowler hat. He eyed me in the dark, calm as a cat in its own yard.

  For a wild moment I thought he must hav
e come out of the tunnel, but that couldn’t be, not with John Henry and his woman in there talking like they had been. He must have been behind the drill the whole time.

  “I’ll say there’s something the matter,” I growled, not daring to raise my voice. “What’s your drill doing here?”

  Baldwin didn’t even blink. “I wanted to get an accurate measure of the tunnel. I’ve got to carve some new codex cards for the race tomorrow. Perhaps you’d like to see?” He nodded toward his tent.

  I glanced toward the tunnel. John Henry and his girl were keeping very still in there. Well, it was none of my concern what they were up to, and with Baldwin right here, they couldn’t be harming the drill.

  “I would like that, thank you.”

  “Sharpie, home!”

  Sharpie’s treads ground against stone. Here and there in the dark, men’s heads popped up as the great machine described a semi-circle in the dirt and followed its master like the biggest dog in the world. I couldn’t see beyond the circle of its bright lamps now, so I don’t know what those woken up did next.

  Baldwin led me into the tent. He’d set up a folding table inside. On it lay a range of small needles, knives and awls, along with pens, paper and several sheets of copper.

  The awkwardness was back, and I found myself trying to keep my distance from him, even as I watched each movement as Baldwin took down the kerosene lantern, lit the wick and hung it back in place. I couldn’t relax even when I noted that Baldwin also kept The Complete Works of William Shakespeare beside his folding cot.

  “I thought codex cards were gold,” I dragged my gaze down to the table and gestured to the copper sheets before Baldwin could notice me staring.

  “They can be. The customers like it.” He kicked a stool in my direction so I could sit. “But if you’ve got to make a temporary card to expand the codex, copper’s your best friend.” He tossed his coat tails out behind as he sat on the remaining stool. “Now, here,” he drew a paper toward him, “Is the pattern for the expansion.” I looked and saw an ordered series of holes and lines described on a neat grid.