Ghosts of Tsavo

by Vered Ehsani

Given that Jonas was the Steward’s only house help and he seldom came in farther than the kitchen, it was a jolly good thing we lived in a considerably more modest abode than the one in London. Given the constant influx of dust, we’d have needed several people just to keep up with it. Who would’ve guessed that a swamp could be so dusty?

  While the dust bothered Mrs. Steward to no end, Lilly was concerned with other matters, being a young and eligible woman of eighteen, eligible in all ways but financial backing and a proposal. As for a suitor, she’d pinned her hopes on catching the eye of one of the dashing young men who passed through the camp on the way to hunt big game. Thus far, that plan had failed miserably, but she was determined and desperate, a lethal combination.

  Bobby was another matter altogether, with the energy of three Lilly’s. When Mrs. Steward wasn’t paying attention, I’d chase the boy outside with instructions to see what Jonas was doing; the two of them would distract each other from any meaningful activity for hours on end.

  One morning, Bobby couldn’t be convinced to go outside or play dead. He followed me around the house as I finished unpacking the remaining few odds and ends. He waved a page from a newspaper in front of me.

  “Can we go? Can we? Please?” he nagged until out of sheer desperation to be rid of him, I ceased my unpacking to see what the fuss was.

  With two fingers, I plucked the article from him and suspended the page before me. A young man and his automaton stared back. They had been on tour through Europe and were now back home, which was Nairobi, of all places. The news clipping was from a London newspaper, the one I had read just before we’d left England. In fact, I recognized a blotch of cherry jam I had let fall on the paper while reading the article. Most curious, not to mention tasty. The jam, that is.

  “Where did you get this?” I asked. Perhaps I had used it while packing the chinaware.

  He shrugged his shoulders while bouncing up and down. “Found it. Let’s go.”

  “Well, if the unpacking isn’t done, we know who’s to blame,” I warned him.

  He shrugged his thin shoulders. “You, of course. It’s your and Mama’s job, not mine. Now hurry up. Maybe we can pick Cilla up on the way. She’s nice.”

  He stuck his tongue out at me, but despite the implication that she was nice while I wasn’t, he had a jolly good idea.

  Conveniently, Jonas knew where the inventor lived—there was only one in the whole region—and was as eager for an excuse to abandon work as I was. He hitched the ox to the wagon, and on the way, we swung down to the camp to find Cilla, who was keen for a distraction from reading, sewing, and other womanly pursuits.

  The inventor lived farther up the hill from us and deeper into the woods where you realized that Nairobi was indeed in a swamp. Damp air and mosquitos clung to us, but the shade was a relief from the heat.

  The man who opened the door to the mud-brick house wore a blindingly white lab coat, spotless and well pressed. He was tall, thin to the point of bony, and pale strawberry in coloring.

  That wasn’t just in reference to his straight hair but even his skin was the color of a bleached berry. It might have been the result of too much time outdoors while living so near the equator. I was certain the African sun wasn’t kind on the delicate complexion normally associated with one of his hair type.

  “Yes?” he asked, his eyes blinking rapidly at us, so rapidly I couldn’t discern their coloring, but they were pale, most likely a pale blue or gray. All in all, he was a dreadfully pale person.

  “We want to see the tin man,” Bobby demanded as he pushed in between Cilla and myself and held up the newspaper article.

  “What my charge means,” I said, placing my hands firmly on his shoulders, only barely avoiding his neck, and digging my nails in slightly, “is we would be most grateful if you would allow us to see your automaton. If it’s not too much bother.”

  “Oh,” the man said, his eye blinking increasing in speed. “Oh. Oh, yes, of course, of course, do come in.” He backed away from the door and waved us forward. “I’m Dr. Gregory Cricket. So pleased to meet you.”

  After introductions were made, we all stared at each other. Dr. Cricket frowned slightly at me. “Knight. That name is somewhat familiar but I can’t quite place from where I know it.”

  I gave him a bland smile. “It’s not an uncommon name.”

  “I suppose,” he said.

  In the ensuing silence, we gazed about the room in which we found ourselves. On every surface was a clutter and assortment of bits and pieces that bewildered the senses.

  “My, you have so many interesting items here, sir,” Cilla said, waving a paper fan before her face as she peered around, wide eyed.

  “Well, I like to think of it as my modest contribution to science,” Dr. Cricket said but not in a boastful way, simply as a statement of fact. “A mini-museum of sorts, you could say.”

  It certainly was, down to the lack of air and life. I glanced longingly at the sealed windows.

  “Ah yes,” Dr. Cricket said as he noticed the direction of my gaze. “I must keep the windows closed at all times. So much dust here. And the flies! They would cause havoc with my work.”

  I smiled. “Mm. I suppose the absence of air is preferable to the alternative of a bit of dust in the ointment, so to speak. Breathing is so terribly overrated.”

  Cilla choked down a laugh while Dr. Cricket returned my smile uncertainly. “Ah, yes. You see the point. Now, perhaps I could interest you ladies in my latest invention.” He gestured to a contraption squatting in the corner of the room. He paid absolutely no attention to Bobby, who was pulling on the sleeve of his lab coat. “It’s cutting edge, really, the first of its kind, a significant advance in the science of hematology.”

  “Hemming what?” Cilla asked.

  “The study of blood,” I said, not overly impressed.

  “Yes, yes, precisely, Mrs. Knight,” Dr. Cricket said, beaming at me. “My instrument allows me to determine all sorts of information about a blood sample and the person who gave it.”

  As I wiped a bead of perspiration off my brow, I caught a glimmer of motion to one side. I huffed as Gideon floated toward me.

  “What’s he doing here?” he murmured, watching Dr. Cricket remove a delicate-looking instrument from Bobby’s grasping hands.

  “You know him?” I asked, assuming he meant the doctor and not the boy. It didn’t surprise me that he might have known Dr. Cricket. When alive, Gideon knew everyone in London, or so it had seemed.

  Gideon shrugged his near invisible shoulders.

  “More to the point, what’re you doing here?” I whispered through a rigid smile as Dr. Cricket turned and waved at me.

  “Same as you, I imagine,” he answered in his whispery voice. “Amusing myself for a few hours, escaping the boredom that reigns in our house…”

  “Miss Knight?” Dr. Cricket called out, somehow forgetting my title. I didn’t correct him, despite Gideon’s hiss of displeasure. Or maybe because of Gideon’s presence, I didn’t inform the doctor I was still Mrs. Knight. “Is there some question? I’d be happy to answer.”

  “Oh, yes. Is that your wife?” I asked, pointing to a portrait of a lovely woman standing in front of a flowerbed and holding a carnation. It was in a frame hanging on the same wall through which Gideon had walked.

  “Nice recovery,” Gideon snickered while I pretended he didn’t exist.

  “Yes, this was her favorite photo, taken in front of her beloved garden. She loved red carnations,” he said and then sighed. “But sadly, she passed on a short while ago.”

  While I’d never been in the habit of expressing pity for another’s plight, I did feel slightly moved by his sorrowful, blinking eyes. “I know it’s hard. I too am a widow.”

  He gasped. “Oh, and how brave of you to come here without a husband.”

  I suppressed a snort as I watched Gideon study various contraptions around the room. “Truth be told, I feel he’s still very much with me.”

&nbs
p; “I know exactly what you mean,” he said, nodding his reddish-blond head energetically.

  I smiled. Something else caught my eye.

  “A lovely bow,” I said, pointing to the only other item on the wall closest to us.

  Dr. Cricket beamed. “A fine eye you have, Miss Knight. That is indeed my best and favorite. Do you engage in archery then?”

  “Well, I fancy myself a bit of a toxophilite,” I admitted. “I adore archery.”

  “How marvelous,” he exclaimed, clapping his hands. “I do too. Something else we have in common. Fancy that.”

  “Oh,” I said, not wishing to commit myself to having too much in common with the man. He had a pleasant enough disposition, but it wouldn’t do to encourage too much connection between us. Not to mention his eyes were constantly twitching and blinking in the most unnerving manner.

  “Speaking of a fine eye,” he said, his own dipping shyly down, “I’ve never seen such a light hazel as yours. They’re almost golden. A most extraordinary eye color, if you’ll pardon my saying so.”

  I smiled. “All the better to see you with.”

  If he only knew how true my statement was…

  His confusion shifted into alarm as Bobby picked up some delicate and expensive-looking item, and the doctor hurried away with a mumbled apology.

  I was flattered he had commented on my eyes; most people didn’t, usually because they found the color disturbing, bordering on unnatural. But with no vanity intended, I believed they were my most distinguishing features. Mrs. Steward claimed they were uncivilized, but she said that about anything slightly outside her tightly defined sphere of normalcy.

  Gideon thought them stunning once upon a time.

  “Would you like to see my masterpiece?” Dr. Cricket asked in a low voice, glancing around as if asking if we wanted to join a conspiracy to overthrow the Queen.

  “Do you mean the automaton?” Cilla breathed out with equal delicacy. She hadn’t found the other items in the room terribly interesting.

  “Where’s the tin man?” Bobby shouted.

  Dr. Cricket flinched and forced a smile. “Now, young man, he’s not made of tin. His skeleton is nothing less than the best quality steel with a covering of carefully preserved pigskin, which is very much like human skin in texture.”

  Cilla blanched; I stifled a yawn. It really was warm and stuffy in the mini-museum. Personally, I would’ve preferred a bit of dust to the lack of air.

  “I assure you,” Dr. Cricket enthused, “this is unlike any automaton you’ve previously seen. Those others are poor imitations of the human form. They’re rickety, wind-up toys at best, performing repetitive motions and nothing more. Mine looks nothing like a tin man. His face, arms and legs were constructed by the finest doll makers in Europe. And at a glance, you might believe you’re seeing a man, not a puppet.”

  Bobby rolled his eyes and would’ve kicked Dr. Cricket in the shin, had I not grabbed the boy by his skinny shoulders. Unaware of his close brush with pain, Dr. Cricket led the way, almost skipping as he did.

  Actually, he did skip.

  He skipped the way little girls do with a jump rope, his hands flapping around his shoulders, as if the anticipation of seeing our reaction was too much for his body to contain.

  Gideon snickered. Cilla smiled in the way one smiles when embarrassed on someone else’s behalf. Bobby mimicked our guide’s happy steps. I did my best to ignore all of them, as I didn’t feel inclined to mock, mimic, or be embarrassed for or about Dr. Cricket.

  At the back of the room, we halted in front of a tall, narrow cupboard made of heavy, dark wood and wrapped in chains.

  “Here,” he said in a reverent tone normally reserved for holy artifacts like a saint’s finger bone. “I keep him in here under lock and key. One cannot be too careful.”

  “Indeed,” Cilla murmured while I wondered who would steal anything in this place; where would a thief take it and for what purpose?

  He withdrew a pair of keys from one of his voluminous lab coat pockets and opened a padlock the size of my hand. The chain fell away with an echoing clank. In the silence, I could hear Dr. Cricket’s rattling breath, as if the excitement of the moment was simply too much to bear, as was the turn of the second key in the door’s keyhole.

  “Finally,” he breathed out as he slowly twisted the door handle. “Behold!”

  With a flourish, he swept the door open and stepped aside, watching us eagerly for our reactions, eyes blinking rapidly.

  Cilla gasped while Bobby jumped up and down. “Make it do something,” he shouted, clapping his hands.

  “It’s…” I stared into the face of the automaton. “It’s impressive. And so life-like.” Disturbingly so, I thought.

  “Beyond words,” Cilla breathed out.

  “Make it move,” Bobby demanded in that torturous tone of voice that only children can possibly master, all while tugging at Dr. Cricket’s coat sleeve. “Now!”

  Gideon said nothing, only floated closer, his gaze fixed on the automaton in the closet. It was clothed in a dark suit, white shirt and a red cravat. A sharp dresser, I noted, certainly better than its creator.

  Unlike other large automatons I’d seen, this one didn’t show any indication of its metal structure. Instead, its pigskin face, so delicate and intricately created, could almost pass for a real one, at least at a glance. A faint blush was painted on its cheeks and the lips were a tender rose as if ready for a first kiss. I wondered if the mouth would move when the limbs did. Certainly the eyelids, closed and lined with thick, dark eyelashes, looked like they would pop open at any moment.

  Dr. Cricket tenderly brushed black hair from its brow and gently pushed up an eyelid. “Glass eyes,” he whispered. “The best quality available in Europe.”

  “I can see that,” I said, for the dark-blue eye staring back at me glowed with reflected light, as if a life existed behind it. “Truly remarkable.”

  “Oh but you haven’t seen the best part,” Dr. Cricket enthused, rubbing his hands together. “Let me demonstrate.”

  He pushed himself into the closet and hugged the automaton. I glanced at Cilla and Bobby, certain they could hear Gideon’s raucous laughter. They were staring slack-jawed and mesmerized at the doctor’s efforts to enliven his metal man.

  “Just… one… moment…” Dr. Cricket said in puffs of breath as he worked on something we couldn’t see. A windup mechanism at the back, perhaps? That wouldn’t be novel for an automaton.

  Gideon floated closer, laughter replaced by an intent, searching expression that didn’t bode well. The last time I’d seen that countenance was just before he was murdered, and the expression and his murder were connected.

  “There!” Dr. Cricket stumbled backwards and almost knocked Cilla into a table in the process. But none of us paid attention to that, for the automaton had opened its eyes.

  With a jerky nod of its head, it stepped out of the closet, its dark-blue eyes gazing at each of us in turn. While I would never have mistaken it for a living person—there was no human energy, no real twinkle in the eyes apart from light reflecting off glass—still, it was an impressive piece of machinery. It reached out its hand toward Dr. Cricket, who eagerly shook it.

  “May I introduce Miss Knight,” the good doctor said to his creation. “Miss Knight, this is Liam, or Life Imitating Automaton Machine.” He chuckled at his clever acronym.

  “Pleased to meet you, Liam,” I said with a smile and took the proffered hand.

  The skin was soft, like a lady who always wore gloves and never worked. It was as Dr. Cricket had said: pigskin was remarkably human-like. Liam adjusted its—his?—grip to match my own.

  “Impressive,” I admitted again as I watched it politely greet Cilla and Bobby. It then extended a hand to Gideon.

  “Oops, no one there,” Dr. Cricket said with an embarrassed giggle as he pushed the arm down. “Well, there are a few little quirks to be worked out, I suppose.”

  “Do you read anything in it?�
� Gideon asked me in his whispery voice.

  I shook my head slightly. On closer inspection, I had found a small energy field inside Liam, but I assumed it was from whatever energy source the doctor had installed. Why, then, had the automaton detected Gideon when no one else could?

  Steam puffed out of its mouth with a sharp hiss.

  “Goodness,” Cilla said, jumping back to avoid the hot air.

  “Brilliant,” I said.

  Dr. Cricket’s smile widened, his eyelids twitching. It seemed the rapidity of their blink was linked to the intensity of emotion he was feeling. “Yes, this is one of the unique aspects of Liam. His engine is fueled by a steam engine. And he can refill the fuel chamber on his own, so he never runs out of steam, so to speak.”

  “Can it talk?” Bobby asked as he grabbed Liam’s arm and tugged at it. “Say something. Talk. Now.”

  Liam’s head slowly swiveled about, well past the point a normal person with an intact neck could manage. Its dark-blue eyes peered over its own shoulder, down at Bobby. The boy quickly pulled his hand back and reached for mine, and Cilla reached for my other arm. I could feel both of them shaking at the bizarre sight.

  “There is an audio device, but I haven’t yet programmed words into it,” Dr. Cricket enthused, completely oblivious to his guests’ discomfort.

  Gideon smirked at me and drifted until he was floating right in front of me. “Ask him how to program it,” he suggested.

  “Why?” I breathed softly.

  “Oh, I just haven’t had time,” Dr. Cricket explained, frowning at the oversight. “But I will, I will.”

  Gideon chuckled and whispered into my ear, “Because we’re both bored and curious. A deliciously dangerous combination, wouldn’t you agree?”

  I most certainly didn’t agree as I was too distracted by his voice floating through my head with a delightful promise held loosely in his tone.

  “So… um…” Goodness, I thought, pull yourself together, Bee. This is no time to get all weak around the knees.

  I cleared my throat and tried again. “How do you program it? Him?”

  Dr. Cricket waved a finger at me as if I were a naughty child asking for a sweetie before dinner. “Now, now, Miss Knight, an inventor must have a few secrets. Otherwise what would stop others from copying his work?”

  “Of course.” I smiled back, even though the last thing I wanted was another Liam wandering around. One was creepy enough.

  “I’m hungry,” Bobby whined. “This is boring.”

  “I could use a bite to eat too,” Cilla said as she waved her paper fan with increasing vigor.

  Clever girl, preparing herself with a fan, I thought. A stout walking stick and a bag of powdered cinnamon, while useful, weren’t much assistance in the stuffy warmth.

  As we murmured our goodbyes, I remembered the vial of lion blood.

  “Dr. Cricket, you’re a scientist, and I’m sure you have a number of clever devices at your disposal,” I said demurely, thinking of his blood testing invention. “Could I bother you greatly with a little favor?”

  “Of course, anything,” the man spluttered out.

  “I’m a bit of an amateur zoologist, and I’d be grateful if you could test this blood sample I collected.” I handed him the vial that had remained in my jacket pocket. “It’s dried up but hopefully still useful. I think it’s from a lion, but I’m not sure.”

  “Fascinating,” he breathed out. “I shall get on it immediately.”

  I smiled to encourage him further. “How very kind of you.”

  He escorted us to the door and sent us off with a courtly bow and a wave. Liam had followed us and stood behind its creator, its glass eyes fixed on Gideon. Or perhaps, I scolded myself, I was making up a story. For really, Gideon was invisible to all save me.

  Still, I couldn’t shake the idea.

  Chapter 14