Maddie Hatter and the Gilded Guage

by Jayne Barnard

  Only one block separated this rooftop from the delightful expanse of green that was Central Park. Who could have guessed, only two mornings ago, that she would reside close enough to walk in that park at will? For a few, brief moments in the golden sunshine of early autumn, with a gentle breeze kissing her cheeks and the hum of traffic far below, she almost hoped that making Emmeline safe took a very long time.

  Chapter Nine

  ALL TOO SOON that stifled wish seemed set to come true. The factory, when at last they arrived in a region of the city thick with smokestacks and their oily effluents, was a door closed and locked against her most pressing question.

  It did not appear that way at first. As the rocket-car ghosted in through the main gates, waved onward past three pairs of large guards, men in suits rushed toward it from the office wing. Foremen in bowler hats strode from the manufactory side. The car stopped before the welcoming party which, as the hatch lifted, stepped forward as one. Then, as Emmeline appeared, they stepped back, surprise visible on several faces.

  “Miss Emmeline,” said an elderly man, his bushy eyebrows creeping together in a slight frown. “We thought you were your father, returned early from his trip.”

  “I’m sorry to disappoint you.” Emmeline’s boots touched the cobblestones and she smiled around at the assembled workers. “Don’t let me keep any of you from your business.” With various hand-shakes and hat-tips, the men dispersed, leaving only Mr. Eyebrows. Before Maddie was out of the vehicle, though, a slender fellow ran from a nearby doorway, his lab coat flapping around his scrawny legs.

  “Miss Gatsby-Gauge. Smashing.” He pushed his thick, green goggles up to the top of his head. “Bide there to see what I’m working on. It’s a wee marvel, it is.”

  “MacIver!” The eyebrows frowned at the newcomer. “You know better than to discuss projects with outsiders. Miss Emmeline, ’tis a pleasure you are to these old eyes, but you know your father’s rules about bringing strangers to the plant.”

  “Miss Hatter, meet Mr. Gibbs, Papa’s first secretary, and Mr. MacIver, one of our most promising inventors. Miss Hatter is my new secretary. I wish her to become familiar with Papa’s holdings.”

  Mr. Gibbs reminded Maddie of her brothers’ oldest tutor, a stern and humourless fellow who truly believed any attempt to learn mathematics would overheat her feeble, feminine brain. She could not insist on her rights here as she had done in that classroom, but get round him she must. She settled her face into a bland smile and followed him indoors.

  In the main office, clerks punched numbers into calculating engines. Around the periphery, managers scribbled and dictated in glass-fronted offices. The whole end wall marked off Mr. G-G’s office suite, and to this Gibbs led them. Still frowning, he pulled out chart drawers and showed her, state by state, where the firm’s main clients were located. She asked innocuous questions at first, hoping to ease his disapproval and finally dared one more relevant: why not outsource the Gatsby gauge’s production rather than shipping the wonderful gauges and the firm’s technical troubleshooters such distances?

  Gibbs’ bushy eyebrows crawled together like giant caterpillars. “The gauge is only manufactured here, where security is most unbreakable. As Miss Emmeline should have told you.” He looked around, but Emmeline had wandered out and was chatting with a clerk. “I fail to see how that is your concern at all.”

  “I was just trying to get a complete picture,” Maddie said, and added disingenuously, “I suppose it’s not the only gauge of its kind in America. What other companies manufacture similar instruments?”

  The secretary gaped at her. “You will not get far with the family, young lady, if you do not understand that this gauge is absolutely unique in America. Even in the world. At this very moment, my employer is engaged on secret negotiations to spread it beyond the confines of this continent.”

  So even this highly confidential secretary could let things slip. “Oh, yes, on his airship trip. I am surprised he could leave you, his right-hand man, behind. Did you meet all the illustrious guests before their departure?”

  “Indeed I did.” Mr. Gibbs lifted his chin. “Most gentlemanly they are. But very business-like for all that.”

  “I wonder if I might know some of them from Europe.”

  This was a hint too far. He shook one ink-stained finger at her. “Do not try to winkle secrets from me, miss. All such information is confidential. Let me escort you back to Miss Emmeline.”

  Emmeline was not in the offices. A clerk said she had been taken for interview by “that Badmin fellow.” Mr. Gibbs’ brows scrunched halfway down his nose. Mr. Badmin, he informed her, was the leg-man for the famous detective hired by Mr. Gatsby-Gauge to strengthen security around the factory.

  “Not the acclaimed Sneero Fawkes?”

  “The same,” said Gibbs. “Mr. Badmin appears more concerned with the security of the female staff. I will seek him out immediately lest he offer discourtesies to Miss Gatsby-Gauge.” He marched Maddie outside and put her in Bryson’s keeping. “See that she stays here,” he said. “Strangers wandering about the plant I will not permit.”

  Another dead end. How was Maddie to sort out suspects if nobody would answer her questions? W.Y. Knott would get answers, just because he was presumed a man. Fuming on the red-leather rear seat, she mentally composed Knott’s next paragraph:

  . . . Security is tight around the factory where the marvellous gauge is manufactured. This reporter was passed through by several sets of burly guards, and received by the Steamlord’s First Secretary, who remained tight-lipped on the marvellous gauge but confirmed rumours of delicate negotiations at that time being conducted between the inventor and several industrial gentlemen of international repute. Might one of the European firms concerned, or a rival American one, attempt to use the golden Gauge girl for leverage?

  EVENTUALLY EMMELINE CAME back, escorted by a grinning MacIver. Mounting into the passenger compartment, she settled back, a slender and smiling pink blossom against the ochre leather.

  “Did you meet Mr. Fawkes’s assistant today?” Maddie inquired as the vehicle drove out through the factory gates.

  “Reggie Badmin?” Emmeline grimaced. “What a caution he is.”

  “Did you know your father had hired Fawkes?”

  “No.” Catching Maddie’s disbelieving gaze, she added, “Truly, I did not. I’d have told you. I wonder, does Papa believe the gauge is in danger, or is the security to reassure the investors?”

  To that, Maddie had no answer. “What’s Mr. Badmin like?”

  “Dark-haired and smirking. I’m sure he thinks he’s the most charming man in town, but his obnoxious hair oil quite detracted from any impression he thought he was making. He didn’t believe at first that I had a perfect right to inspect my own father’s factory. Or he was just using that as an excuse to keep me. When I saw Mr. MacIver cross the doorway, I claimed a meeting with him and hurried out before Reggie could object.”

  “Did you glean anything that might be useful from him?”

  “I learned a great deal about Reggie’s high opinion of himself.” Emmeline pursed her lips. “According to him, he undertakes all the actual crime-solving while Mr. Fawkes pots his azaleas and takes all the credit. His boss, he says, never leaves the brownstone in which his home, office, and rooftop conservatory are located. Would you believe that creep intends to call upon me at home ‘if further questions arise’? I half expect to see him staking a claim on our doorstep before we arrive.”

  “I expect Woodrow is competent to deflect him.”

  Emmeline sighed. “At least I enjoyed my visit with Mr. MacIver. Did you learn what you needed to from Mr. Gibbs?”

  “He did not see fit to confide in me about the visiting investors, or much of anything else either. I will find another source, never fear. Those who want the gauge are the most likely suspects.”

  On reaching home, the young ladies were greeted not by the over-eager Reggie Badmin, but by Woodrow, who said ominously, “
Your mother requests the immediate pleasure of your attendance in the parlour, Miss.” They hurried across the hall. Mrs. G-G was pacing the grey marble floor, wringing a lace handkerchief between her fingers as she wound among the gilt-legged furnishings. She whirled as they entered.

  “Oh, my dear! Terrible news! Your father will be home tomorrow!”

  “Terrible? That’s wonderful.”

  “No, it’s terrible.” Mrs. G-G sank into a chair and buried her face in her hands. “He’s bringing three investors home to finish his discussions, and he wants me to entertain them!”

  While Emmeline patted her mother’s shoulder reassuringly, Maddie couldn’t stop a grin from stretching her cheeks. Just when she was at her wits’ end, the names would drop right into her lap.

  “I’ll help with every aspect of their visit,” she said. “What are their names and nationalities?”

  Mrs. G-G gazed up blankly. “I don’t know.”

  Chapter Ten

  “YOU DON’T KNOW?” Maddie stared.

  Mrs. G-G shook her head. “He didn’t tell me before he left, and he would never trust such information to the aethernet. Does it matter?”

  “It makes a difference whether we are entertaining British Steamlords or French Chevaliers de l’Industrie or even German Ritters von Dampfherstellung. Each nation has its particular style of honouring industrial peers, and how we address them in English will be slightly different.” As Mrs. G-G looked stricken all over again, she hurried to add, “But it will only take a moment to sort that out once we learn their names. You need only say something like, ‘So pleased to welcome you to my home,’ and ask Woodrow to see to their luggage.”

  “But what about meals? And what will we talk about? Should I have music in the evenings? I don’t know anyone to invite for cards.” Mrs. G-G returned to her circuit around the furnishings, enumerating all the things she did not know about entertaining foreign dignitaries.

  It was a long and trying evening.

  As Maddie slid between the bluebell-cotton sheets, something tapped. A hawk at the window? It came again, from the desk. She flew out of bed and turned the key in the lock. The flap dropped. TD stared up at her, his head twisted sideways, and uttered a disapproving chirrup.

  “Oh, dear little bird. I am so sorry.” Maddie put down her hand for him to walk on. “I haven’t had a moment to let you out all day. You may have my whole biscuit at morning tea to make up for this.”

  TD walked all the way up her arm, his little bronze claws scraping through the sleeve of her nightgown. He settled on her shoulder and stretched out his wings, one at a time, and then cocked his head to draw her attention to his day’s worth of dot-dashing. Maddie looked. He’d gone through half a bottle of ink detailing every grey-black image of the midnight duel, and one that seemed a close-up of an owl’s eye. She wished he could see better in the dark. She rubbed the sparrow’s beak free of dried ink, thankful the owl had only looked, and not snatched.

  The daytime images weren’t much better: sixteen shots of her dark blue parasol in various angles of attack. She fanned out the stack she’d just made. Bits of the abductors’ faces showed up in several. Enough to make a composite image of one or both men? Her fatigue forgotten, she picked up a pair of scissors and began snipping. Soon she had a passable image of each man pasted together, and TD blink his camera-eye over them for transmission to Obie when he returned. She gathered up all the chopped-up paper and, while TD dotted out two fair copies of the composite faces, burned the rest on the windowsill, coughing each time the smoke whirled back on her.

  Early the next morning, Emmeline entered and announced that Mrs. G-G had given herself a migraine through all her worrying yesterday. She was spending the morning in bed. “I need a break from her fretting. Shall we go dueling?”

  “Are you sure you wish to risk running across those abductors again?” If only there was time to send for Hiram to stand watch outside Madame Lavinia’s. But his aunt had no aethernet connection, and a human messenger would take two hours to reach him and bring him uptown. If Obie had returned, she could send the images and a message direct to TD’s twin, TC. Obie and Hiram could be in position in half the time, ready to intercept the would-be kidnappers if they appeared. But Obie wasn’t back yet. Maddie and TD were on their own. Well, and Emmeline too. The girl was unquestionably handy in a fight.

  “With you at my side,” said Emmeline, unconsciously echoing Maddie’s thought, “I do not fear them.”

  “If your assailants don’t come to us soon,” said Maddie, “we must go to them. I’ll dress up as Emmy Gat and walk around after dark to lure them out.”

  Emmeline turned horrified eyes to her. “You can’t! It’s too dangerous!”

  “My friend Oberon O’Reilly will be back any day now. He and Hiram—the friend who came to our midnight duel—can shadow me. If they capture one of those thugs, we might finally get some answers.”

  “Well . . . only if you’ll do one thing for me first.”

  Surprised at the easy agreement, Maddie nodded.

  “Come and meet some of Emmy’s little pals, so they can be watching too.” After a quick breakfast in the morning room, both girls hurried off to get their hats. When they met again in the hall, Emmeline carried a small case. The footman, carrying a large, covered basket redolent of apple pie, escorted them to the waiting rocket-car. Emmeline pushed the button for the driver. “To the orphanage, Bryson, and then the dueling academy.”

  “Orphanage?” Maddie asked.

  “Yes. The children of my old district are my especial cause, in both my guises.” Emmeline lapsed into silence as the vehicle sped southward, out of the neighbourhood of stately homes and Old World ambience, into a world of commerce such as might have been found anywhere in Europe. The streets here were filled with trams and horse-drays, bicyclists and darting errand boys, huge warehouses overshadowed by long cargo airships lowering their wares into rooftop loading bays.

  The rocket-car stopped at last before a run-down brick building that fairly thrummed with the voices of a hundred children. Emmeline led Maddie toward a small office beyond the bare, worn staircase, and knocked. “Mrs. Mayfair, are you in?”

  A matronly woman looked up from a ledger spread open in the dusty glow from a light-pipe. “Miss Gatsby-Gauge, how nice of you to call. And your friend?”

  “Miss Hatter.” Emmeline set the basket on the desk. “She’s my new social secretary. I’m showing her every aspect of my work.”

  “Every aspect?” Mrs. Mayfair’s grey eyes narrowed. “Are you sure?”

  Emmeline nodded and flipped the cover on the basket. “I’ve brought the girls’ underthings you asked for, and pies enough for today’s luncheon. You’ll leave one on the windowsill?”

  Mrs. Mayfair nodded. “You’ll be going there too? Taking her? Like that?”

  Mystified, Maddie looked from one to the other.

  “She’s seen worse.” As Mrs. Mayfair left with the basket, Emmeline added, “Shut the door, Maddie.” In the windowless office, she opened the small case and shook out Emmy Gat’s distinctive garments.

  Maddie stood by to hand over each item of clothing. “Shouldn’t I be disguised too?”

  Emmeline tucked her curls under the wig. “They’ll already have seen you staying at Mrs. Darling’s. I’m just letting them know you’re my pal—I mean, Emmy’s pal—so they’ll watch your back while you’re prowling. Believe me, we won’t be parading on the public street together for anyone else to make a connection. Emmy Gat’s an alley cat.” She grinned, her mouth a pink slash beneath the white half-mask. “There’s a verse in the song about that too, but it’s very rude.” As she wound the signature black cravat around her throat, she opened the office door just wide enough to slip out.

  Maddie heard the murmur of voices from the orphanage’s kitchen as she and Emmy stole past to an open rear door. They crept down the rickety steps and ducked under clotheslines pegged full of boys’ shirts and nightshirts. Emmy slithered sidew
ays through a gap in the fence and led the way down a narrow alley to a shabby stable. She gave a bird-like whistle and yanked at a small door. Hung askew from rusty hinges, it squealed and scraped the dusty earth.

  Maddie picked up her skirts and followed her friend into the gloom. At first glance, the place held only junk—a split saddle, pitchfork handle, a heap of mouldering hay—and an odd contraption that seemed equal parts motor-scooter and mystery machine. A red-velvet driver’s seat was the least unlikely portion. Behind it was mounted a brewer’s keg from which protruded a smokestack as well as several tubes and valves. On a pivot attached to the handlebars was a cylinder that resembled nothing so much as a Gatling gun. In between were brass pipes and steel brackets and at least one porcelain doorknob, incongruously painted with daisies.

  Overhead, dust motes trembled in a stray beam of weak sunlight. Something rustled in the hayloft. Childish heads leaned out. Down the stubby ladder swung a girl, younger than Emmy and slender as a greyhound, in baggy trousers and a much-mended boy’s shirt. Her ginger hair was tucked into a newsboy’s cap. She eyed Maddie with open suspicion.

  “’oo’s she, then?”

  “Me friend Mad. Miss Hatter, what Rabbit found for me.” The cadence was once again that of the raucous voice Maddie had heard at the midnight duel.

  Ginger laughed. “Mad Hatter? She’ll fit right in here. Come meet the Hatter, you lot.” A small boy’s eyes peered out of a keg. The other children scampered down the ladder, swung down ropes, and leapt into the mouldy hay. They clustered around, staring.

  “Mad, meet the party.” Emmy pointed to Ginger. “Cheshire here, she’s the boss. All teeth and claws.”

  Someone piped up proudly, “Ain’t nobody can disappear like our Cat. Nuffin’ left but ’er grin.”

  Cat showed gleaming teeth and drew forward a tiny girl in a faded pinafore. “Little’un is Muffet. She sits on a grocer’s stoop wailing for her big brother while we take on provisions. When we’re done and clear, Rabbit claims her.”