Clockwork Killer (Steampunk Detectives: Book 1)

by Hall, Ian

  He’d almost gotten out of sight when I heard a rifle fire, then a few pistol cracks, and a single rifle shot again. I strained my eyes.

  Then after the sound of three steady rifle shots, a long silence.

  “Francis!” I tried to see what had happened, but the distance was too great, and there was no kick of dust because of the recent rain.

  I ran back to Spencer, who hadn’t moved. “How bad is it?” I asked, looking at the large patch of stained shirt and jacket.

  “It’s okay,” he lied.

  I quickly made my way down to Missus Ward, who immediately began to fuss with cries for bandages and water. When I got outside, my horse lay on its side, leaving me no option but to put a bullet immediately into his brain.

  The detectives stood, heads low. Out of the eleven of us, we’d not hit him once.

  “Do any of you have horses nearby?” I asked, but just received shakes of the head in return. They’d been left behind when the men had advanced on foot to surround the farm. The plan had fallen apart, and our man was on the run. “Get them!” I shouted. “Get trailing him as fast as you can!”

  I went back inside the house to see to Spencer, knowing I could leave my men doing the tracking, and catch them up later. Cursing the whole operation, I ascended the stairs slowly, but felt brightened by Spencer’s seemingly high spirits.

  Leaving him in Missus Ward’s hands, I strode from the house, and retraced my route back to Francis and Emily.

  I couldn’t have been more shocked as I neared them.

  The Noose Tightens

  Near Buxton House, Illinois

  27th April, 1867

  As we waited astride our horses, I checked the time on my pocket watch; 8.17, then replaced it into my hatband. In the distance, the two horsemen had stopped in the yard. “I can’t stay still,” I said, glancing at Emily. “My feet seem to have a will of their own to run that distance and take part.”

  “You can’t.” She smiled, her eyes never leaving the house. “We have to wait here.”

  Once the men dismounted, I couldn’t really make them out at all, so I sat in the saddle, just watching the area, wishing I’d brought a telescope.

  Then I heard two shots. “Gunfire,” I said softly.

  “That must mean they’ve found him.” Emily nodded.

  “Or someone’s found them.”

  Two more shots, then four in quick succession.

  After a moment, one of the horses started out towards us, obviously making a speedy exit. Two more shots. “He’s getting away, Emily!” I swung from the saddle, grabbing my rifle as I did so. The rider veered from our position, heading south-west. Then, as he turned to glance at us I saw his bald head.

  Leaning over the horse’s saddle, and taking some support from the firm leather, I levelled the rifle. Crack! It recoiled hard against my shoulder. I reloaded and took position to fire again. Crack! To my complete joy, he recoiled in the saddle, then leant over his horse as it slowed to a canter, holding his thigh.

  “You got him!” Emily clapped her hands together.

  I turned my head as I reloaded again, the lever throwing my spent cartridge over the horse’s saddle. I grinned up at her laughing face.

  Then I heard two answering shots.

  I felt a pain at the side of my head, and the whole world went a bit fuzzy. Somehow I knew I’d fallen to the grassy ground between the horses.

  Bang! A loud sound above me vied for importance as both pain and dizziness fought inside my head.

  Bang! A woman’s voice shouting as loud as she could. “Take that you bastard!” Bang!

  Then all went black.

  Francis.

  Yup, that was my name.

  Francis.

  I didn’t quite understand the panic in the voice. I felt quite good. Soft and fluffy.

  “Francis!” Emily’s voice. And my face being pulled against her tweed jacket. Pulled against her breast. Wonderful.

  I’m not quite sure when the pain started, but after a moment, it focused on my head. I gasped, then moaned, then tried to scream.

  “Francis!” she shrieked with me. “You’re alive!”

  I’m quite certain I tried to say, ‘of course I’m alive’, but it came out as the most witless of moans.

  “Oh my God!” she suddenly gasped. “Your head!”

  She touched my pain, and of course it doubled, forcing me to send forth another incomprehensible groan.

  I suddenly found myself dropped onto the cool grass again, then as I was gathered up into her arms, it began to rain, sending splashes of water into my eyes. I blinked them to clear the liquid, then the flow focused on the source of my pain; the side of my head. Soothing cool water coursed from my head into the back of my shirt collar, falling in a cool flow down my back. I think there I fell asleep.

  And I have the feeling that I slept for a long time.

  A brightly lit white room welcomed me as I opened my eyes. Emily’s face floated above mine, her eyes red with crying, her lip trembling, tears flowing down her cheeks. “He’s awake.”

  From my eyes fighting the onslaught of the sunlight, and the tears above me dropping onto my face, and the tremendous pain on the side of my head, I’m not certain that I would have given my condition the status of ‘awake’, but it seemed to be a good thing, so I encouraged myself to keep my eyes open. “Hi.” I said at last, my lips actually making the word make sense.

  “Oh Francis!” kisses fell on my cheeks and lips, and to be honest, if it wasn’t for the incredible pain above my ear, I wouldn’t have minded a bit.

  Then a coolness descended on the region, and I detected a damp cloth against my head. A grey-haired lady pushed the cloth softly against me. “It’s okay, son. You’ll be fine.”

  Slowly the room came into full view. Emily hung over me, clutching my hand, tears still falling in rivulets. The old lady had turned into Missus Ward, the actor lady. And from somewhere a thick liquid was forced between my dry lips.

  Opium.

  I started to shake my head, then when the pain erupted again, I let everyone do what they wanted. The opiate passed my eager lips, the tears fell unabated, the cold compress got re-applied. I lay back, content with my lot.

  “I love you, Francis.” Sweet lips covered mine, and I could have died and gone to heaven quite happily right then. Of course, I didn’t and the pain above my ear throbbed like a son-of-a-bitch.

  “What happened?” I asked, still close enough to smell Emily’s breath on me.

  “You took a bullet to the head.” Chapman’s voice came from the bottom of the bed, and I slanted my eyes to see. He held up my timepiece, now mangled and obviously unrepairable. “He hit you right on the pocket watch! It probably saved your life.”

  “So he’s a crack shot?” I managed.

  Chapman shook his head. “He was probably shooting at Emily. You just got unlucky.”

  “You got him, Francis.” Emily squeezed my hand. “You shot him.”

  I seemed to remember. “I hit his thigh.”

  “Yes you did.” Chapman confirmed. “You were better than any of us, we all missed him totally.”

  “Did he get away?” I asked, attempting to sit up, but at least three hands pushed me back down onto the bedding.

  “For now,” Chapman said. “It’s only a matter of time. We’ll get posters done, he won’t last long.” He handed the pocket watch to me. Sure enough, a mark of a bullet ran from the center of the etched design to the winder. The shot from Whiteman had deflected upwards on contact with my pocket watch; I had indeed been saved, but I did have the mother and father of a headache.

  I stayed at Buxton House for two days, Emily in constant attention, giving me long looks into my eyes telling me that she loved me, without her lips actually saying the words again.

  I wrote a long letter to Margaret, in far greater detail than I’d ever done before, telling of our big adventure, but left the end open, just in case we returned to Chicago to find Whiteman behind b
ars. With details supplied by a reluctant Emily, I also wrote what happened after I’d fallen to the ground.

  Seemingly, on hitting me, Whiteman had changed course, coming towards us, probably to finish us off. Emily had dismounted, and seeing him approach, she grabbed the rifle, firing three shots at the now retreating horseman, obviously discouraging further engagement.

  As she told me, I flushed with pride at her courage.

  After the second day at Buxton House I felt sufficiently recovered to ride, so we thanked the Colonel and his wife for their hospitality, and made our leisurely way back to the Pinkerton Headquarters in Chicago.

  If I expected a bustle of activity, I felt saddened by finding only Chapman and Spencer in the office. Some of the blackboards had been wiped clean, and new clue bubbles written in bold lettering.

  “So he got away?” I asked as Chapman turned to us, hoping he’d tell some story of his capture somewhere down the line.

  “I’m afraid so.” He didn’t look happy. “Into thin air.” He walked briskly to his desk, then held up a wanted poster. I almost shuddered with the remarkable likeness the artist had fashioned.

  Wanted for murder

  Frederick Whiteman

  Reward $500

  “That’s a tidy sum.” I said, taking the poster from Chapman’s hand. “Can I keep this one?”

  “Sure, we got hundreds printed.”

  “I’ll send it to Margaret.” I remembered the unfinished letter, which I could now sign and send. “What happens now?”

  “Not a lot.” Chapman looked across at the blackboards. “We must now assume he knows we’re hot on his trail, so he’d be stupid to continue his pattern, Wisconsin in October looks like a waste of time.”

  I frowned. “So what do we do?”

  “There’s not much we can do. He’ll fall into our hands sooner or later. We’ll put posters up, of course, we’ll warn every lawman in the territory, all the usual stuff, but in general, we’ll allow the system to bring him in.”

  That brought up my main dilemma. “What do I do? Us. Emily and I?”

  To my surprise he gave a shrug. “We’ve got other cases to work on. Perhaps it’s time to take Miss Emily back to her uncle in Harvard?”

  So, all our work of the last year had come to this moment in time. I had to make a decision that would affect my life forever. I had to decide if I wanted to be a detective or not, and to be honest, my recent fling with danger had steered me so far away from being a Pinkerton’s man, I’d hardly given that any thought.

  “I’m going home for a bit.” I said after a long pause. “I think I need to re-coup. The bullet, you know.” I tapped the side of my head absentmindedly.

  “Take some time off.” Chapman said, his face showing concern. “Have an easy summer. Come back in the Fall, tell me what’s going on.”

  I remember shaking Chapman’s hand, and the big hand that belonged to Spencer, but not much after that. The next thing I knew, I was standing in my digs, packing a set of saddlebags with all my belongings. I looked around the room, but saw little that I cared if I left behind; a few newspapers, a lamp I’d bought for reading, a small table I’d ‘borrowed’ from Chapman. Those I’d leave to the next guest.

  It was with a heavy heart that I handed my room key to the caretaker.

  “So where now?” Emily asked, and I turned round, startled.

  I found words hard to bring forth. “I don’t actually know.” I shrugged my shoulders as Chapman had done just a few minutes earlier. “What do you think I should do?”

  Her hand swept a wave of hair from my forehead, and I gave thanks for her gentle touch. “I don’t think you’re as well as you make out.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Well, a month of convalescence wouldn’t be out of place.” Her tone sounded insistent. “Why not take Margaret’s letter to her personally?”

  My thought processes seemed muddy, almost as if I were thinking in a bowl of molasses. “Yes. Why don’t we do that?”

  I’d love to report that I had a great journey home, that we conversed into the wee hours on the wonders of science, but I’d be lying. Even with my beloved Emily as a companion, I probably proved a dour one. But as we rode into the farm, along the avenues of apple trees, my spirits did improve.

  Margaret met us at the door, and as I sat in Father’s armchair Emily told our story.

  To the sound of her song-like voice, I fell fast asleep.

  Pinkerton National Detective Agency, Chicago

  May 2nd, 1867

  I watched Francis leave the office with considerable sadness. He shuffled more than walked, and seemed to be a shell of the vibrant teenager that had presented himself to me a year ago.

  But then, I felt I could not be the judge of his decisions, I mean, I had never been shot in the head.

  Emily’s arm did more than support him, it gave rise to her ownership of the young man, and I guessed with his recent injury and her ministrations, he would not continue further in his detective career.

  But soon that day, I had smaller, less depressing decisions to make; posters to distribute, an office to clean out, and a whole new career of my own to begin. With the stalling of the Whiteman case, I decided it was indeed time to hang up my own adventurous leanings and take Allan Pinkerton’s offer to my heart.

  With his complete blessing, I moved most of the ‘old’ stuff from his office, and Anna and I filled many cardboard boxes, which we stored carefully.

  I spent the next week looking at the cases which my fifteen detectives were working on, and familiarizing myself with the details of each one. It took some time, but after a couple of days on each case, I transferred the data onto a blackboard, the way Emily had showed me. Each time I started a new board, I felt amazed at the clarity of the salient points. In each case I found new areas to examine, new clues to follow up on.

  But of course, as I studied each case, the lack of detective training also came to the fore; the men had simply lacked the teaching necessary to join the points together. I pulled out the Criminal Science curriculum that Emily and Francis had completed, and began to read.

  As I got further into the details behind each core topic, I started to realize the time and thought put into it. The kids had taken my basic notes and developed them to a full curriculum worthy of inclusion in any university in the country. They had taken the subject matter from the haughty levels of the science of Forensics to the basics of Report Writing, and a myriad in between.

  Since I now captained both the detective agency and the new college course, I promised to travel to the Northwestern University in Evanston, and introduce myself to the Dean. Even if I put five of my men through the course at a time, it would take a few years to get them all acquainted with the details. I even thought of a college graduate intake for the agency itself. Francis had been young, but he’d certainly been of college level when he’d joined Pinkertons. Perhaps other bright young men could be encouraged to consider Criminal Science as a career.

  The more notes I made, the more avenues they provided. The country was already far too big to be policed by one office, so I took a look at the map of the country, and envisaged at least three more offices, all smaller than mine, but linked by the telegraph, managed by professionals.

  I wrote a letter to Pinkerton himself, and detailed my plans for expansion, hoping that he’d receive it sometime in the next year.

  I heard a soft knock at the half open door. “Mister Chapman, sir?”

  “Yes, Missus Bainbridge?” I looked up smiling. I could tell she had something important to tell me.

  “It’s Mister Bannister, sir. Or should I say Agent Bannister.” She looked a little awkward, as if she’d actually thought she’d see Allan Pinkerton sitting at the desk. “Anyway, he’s brought back a box of evidence from Buxton House, sir.”

  “Tell him to bring it in, Missus Bainbridge.”

  “Yes, sir,” Again, she almost curtseyed.

  The only significant pi
ece of evidence in the box turned out to be the boots. They looked innocuous from the outside, but they had raised heels inside, giving our Frederick Whiteman a three inch lift. I tried them on, but they were just a little too small for me.

  I nodded, remembering his jump from the balcony at Buxton House; he hadn’t looked tall, but I hadn’t paid attention at the time.

  I went to the board and altered the height and shoe size to fit our new information.

  Then I gave instructions to return the box to the acting school.

  In Recovery

  Francis Smalling, Smalling Apple Farm, Sangamon County, Illinois

  May 7th 1867

  I think I spent three days at the farm, not doing much, before I realized I’d just gotten slack. I’d allowed my injury to cloud my thinking. I arose the next morning with renewed vigor, and roused Emily with a less than gentle shake from Margaret’s old bed.

  I could hardly believe a year had passed since our sister had been murdered, and now the killer seemed to be off the hook, and further from our grasp than ever.

  “Do you think he’ll come back here?” Margaret asked as we watched a low slung cart deliver twenty new apple trees. David, the foreman, closely examined every one. He’d been in our family business so long, I trusted him to recognize a sickly or infected tree when he saw it.

  The saplings were no more than three feet high, showing little leaf growth, and their roots tied in a damp hessian bag.

  “I don’t think so.” I said, offhandedly checking the number of trees, and their condition. “He’ll be far gone. I did put a hole in his leg, remember.”

  She hugged my shoulder affectionately. “Where’s Emily?”

  “Oh, she’s still probably getting dressed.” I looked back at the farmhouse, now seemingly our temporary home. “She’s still not really up to our early rises on the farm, she’s a city girl.”

  I nodded to David my acceptance of the delivery, and the wagon quickly left the yard.

  “Where are we putting these?” I asked him, raising my voice to carry the distance between us.