A pivotal piece required for everything else to click into place.
Charles, who sat on her other side, peered to glimpse the list of stolen patents holding her attention. “Oh, that reminds me.” He reached into his coat pocket, removing a paper. “Yesterday, between preparations for the gala, I thought to look over the patent applications in the records room for anything new attributed to J.Dawkins, and I found this one. Filed just two days ago.”
“Great gadgets!” Margaret snatched up the new patent application. The invention sketch drafted the design of acomplex music box that could house numerous polyphon discs at once and play through them in succession. But the sketch had a design flaw. The dimensions on the pressure bar were off by a slight, but problematic, margin. This flaw would result in the disc bouncing when the plectra attempted to engage with the comb. Her breath stalled as Papa’s voice echoed in her mind.“This is why I needed you, my girl. You’re the music-box expert.”
Relief coursed through Margaret like an electric charge, accelerating her heart rate and charging her mental powers of realization. Mr. Harrison had taken Papa, an inventor with a reputation for fixing unfixable machines, because he’d an incomplete machine in need of one final part to make it functional. A part Papa had acquiesced to invent, knowing Harrison would file for a patent on his design under the name J. Dawkins and thus catch the vigilant eye of the D.O.G.S.
Papa had used this device sketch to send a message only Margaret would understand—she need not overcomplicate a simple fix. Wherever Papa was being held by Harrison, he was in no danger. Instead of exerting energy trying to rescue Papa, a veteran of the Crimean War who could more than handle himself, Margaret needed to focus on solving the case.
She’d a mechanical puzzle to assemble, and Papa had just sent her the final piece.
“Margaret?” Charles asked. “Is something wrong?”
“Shhh, Noble! Her wheels are starting to turn. Let my dear one think.”
Grinning at Mama’s whispered reprimand, Margaret shut her eyes in an attempt to block out the superfluous noise and intensify her focus of the pertinent facts. While Mr. Harrison was certainly no genius, the man also wasn’t an idiot. From what she’d read in his newspaper interviews, Harrison started off in life as an orphaned newsie on the streets of London. To climb to his current heights in life would’ve requireda certain measure of intellectual savvy. A quickness to learn and adapt in order to survive. With this base, he’d then spent the last fifty years surrounding himself with brilliant minds. It stood to reason that Harrison would’ve eventually learned a bit of mechanics in that time. Perhaps enough to spark an original idea he needn’t pilfer.
The noises at night in the factory—Harrison was trying to build on his own!
Margaret gnawed on her lip. The escalation to kidnapping was a big, incongruous leap for Mr. Harrison. A huge risk. Which would indicate Harrison had grown impatient and desperate for some reason. Sudden desperation could imply an impending deadline on his machine’s completion. Like, perhaps, an impending gala celebrating Harrison’s legacy of innovation. A legacy he’d been trying to redeem by finally inventing something himself. Something in memorium of the Dodgers. Something that would ensure Mr. Harrison never ended up like them—forgotten in death.
A world-changing invention for the history books.
Margaret straightened as the tiny pieces started click-click-clicking into place to form a cohesive whole in her mind. To form a clear picture.
Camera lens, eyes. Piano strings, ligaments. Hinges, joints. Steam engine, heart and lungs.
Assembled within a bulletproof metal body and given a voice by a desperate, misguided man still grieving his old mates who’d died tragically young on a field of battle.
Like toy soldiers.
Chapter
37
September5, 1895
At any moment tonight, amid the gala festivities in Westminster Hall, Mr. Harrison was going to herald the attention of the large crowd and numerous members of the press in attendance to announce the latest innovation produced by AlvanT. Harrison, Incorporated—a man-sized automaton that would eliminate the need for human soldiers and thus put an end to casualties of war.
The very moment that announcement was made, the Daughters of Genius Society would make their move. In unveiling his machine, Mr. Harrison would present them with the means of his downfall—the automaton on which Margaret was trusting Papa had hidden his unique maker’s mark, which would concretely prove his abduction and compulsory labor at the hands of Mr. Harrison. Proof the D.O.G.S. would promptly confiscate, thus enabling the Widow to act from an undisclosed locale in the shadows, where she stood at the ready, awaiting word from Professor Quimby.
Tonight, Mr. Harrison would finally be held to account and brought to justice.
And most importantly, compelled to release Papa.
Dressed in coattails, Charles came to stand beside Margaret in front of the commemorative display of an invention on which she was pretending to jot notes for an article in theLondon Dispatch. “How are you holding up, Miss Knight?’
Physically, rather well for her, by the Lord’s mercy. “These last two weeks of preparatory bedrest have provided me with an optimal teaspoon count for tonight’s event.”
“And what of your emotional teaspoon count?”
That wasn’t quite as optimal. Margaret shifted in her wheelchair as the musicians Charles had hired played softly in the background while guests clad in evening attire chattered and clinked glass of champagne, blissfully unaware of the tension coiling in her shoulders. “I’m anxious to have the night over with, frankly.”
“Me too.” Charles slipped a hand into a trouser pocket, a sure sign he was attempting to conceal a tremor. “I’ve been reminding myself of something a rather brilliant woman once told me: ‘For only when we rely on God as our Sustainer is it possible to shake and yet not be shaken.’” He lowered his voice, speaking words meant for her alone. “Rest assured. With Him, we will make it through the night, Reverie.”
Margaret nodded, absorbing the truth in his words. They would make it through the night. Through this case. For not only did they have God and each other, they’d an entire sisterhood of lady inspectors and covert assets stationed throughout the elegantly attired assembly. She glanced up at Charles, needing the visual assurance of his presence.
Steady and sure as the great hall’s hammer-beam roof, Charles remained at her side. Inhaling to a count of four, holding for four, then exhaling to a count of six. Just as she’d taught him. A smile tugged at Margaret’s lips. Matching hisrhythm, she quieted her own anxious spirit with breath and prayer. Inhale.Sustain and steady us, Lord.Hold. Exhale.Though we shake, let us not be shaken.
