Authors: Christopher Priest
I read it anxiously, clinging to the hope that it might contain a clue as to what had
happened, but it merely said:
Lucy—
Would you kindly make up packages and cases of all my belongings, and have them delivered
as soon as possible to the Stage Door of the Strand Theatre.
Please be sure that everything is clearly labelled as being for myself, and I will arrange
collection.
I enclose an amount to cover the costs, and that which is left over you must keep for
yourself. If you require a reference for your next employment Mr Angier will of course
write it for you.
Thank you, &c
Olivia Svenson
I had to read this letter aloud to the poor girl, and to explain what she had to do with
the five-pound note Olivia had enclosed.
4th December 1898
I am currently engaged for a season of shows at the Plaza Theatre in Richmond, by the side
of the River Thames. This evening, I was relaxing in my dressing room between first and
second performances, just prior to going out to find a sandwich meal with Adam and
Gertrude. Someone knocked on the door.
It was Olivia. I let her into the room almost without thinking what I was doing. She
looked beautiful but tired, and told me she had been trying to locate me all day.
“Robbie, I have gotten you the information you want,” she said, and she held up a sealed
envelope for me to see. “I brought you this, even though you must understand that I'm not
going to be coming back to you. You have to promise me that your feud with Alfred will end
immediately. If you do, I'll let you have the envelope.”
I told her that as far as I was concerned the feud was already at an end.
“Then why do you still need his secret?”
“You surely know why,” I said.
“Only to continue the feud!”
I knew she was touching the truth, but I said, “I'm curious.”
She was in a hurry to depart, saying that already Borden would be suspicious of her long
absence. I did not remind her of the similar wait I had had to endure when this endeavour
began.
I asked her why she had written down the message, when she could as easily have told me in
words. She said it was too complicated, too intricately devised, and that she had copied
the information from Borden's own notes. Finally, she handed over the envelope.
Holding it, I said, “Is it really the end of the mystery for me?”
“I believe it is, yes.”
She turned to go and opened the door.
“Can I ask you something else, Olivia?”
“What is it?”
“Is Borden one man, or two?”
She smiled, and maddeningly I glimpsed the smile of a woman thinking of her lover. “He is
just one man, I do assure you.”
I followed her out into the corridor, where technical staff were loitering within earshot.
“Are you happy now?” I asked her.
“Yes, I am. I'm sorry if I've hurt you, Robbie.”
She left me then, without an embrace or even a smile or a touch of hands. I have hardened
myself against her in the last few weeks, but even so it was painful to be with her like
that.
I returned to the dressing room, closed the door and leant my weight upon it. I slit the
envelope at once. It contained one sheet of paper, and on it Olivia had written a single
word.
Tesla.
3rd July 1900
Somewhere in Illinois
We departed from Chicago Union Street Station at 9.00 promptly, and after a slow journey
through the industrial wasteland that surrounds that most vibrant and thrilling of cities
we have since been moving at a fair speed across the agricultural plains to the west.
I have a splendid sleeping berth, and a seat permanently reserved for me in the
first-class saloon. American trains are sumptuously fitted and magnificently comfortable
in which to travel. The meals, prepared in one of the carriages entirely devoted to being
a galley, are large, nutritious and attractively served. I have been travelling for five
weeks on American railroads, and I have rarely been happier or better fed. I dare not
weigh myself! I feel I am ensconced securely in the great American world of convenience,
plenty and courtesy, while the terrific American realm slips by beyond the windows.
My fellow travellers are all Americans, a mixed bunch in appearance, friendly towards me
and curious about me in equal measure. About a third of them, I hazard, are commercial
travellers of the superior kind, and several more appear to be employed in business in one
way or another. In addition, there are two professional gamblers, a presbyterian minister,
four young men returning to Denver from college in Chicago, several well-to-do farmers and
landowners, and one or two others I have not yet been able to pin down exactly. In the
American way we have all been on first-name terms from the moment of meeting. I have long
ago learned that the name Rupert attracts amused inquisitiveness, so while I am in the
United States I am always Rob or Robbie.
4th July 1900
The train stopped last night in Galesburg, Illinois. Because today is American
Independence Day the railroad company gave all first-class passengers the choice of
staying aboard the train in our cabins or of spending the night in the town's largest
hotel. Since I have been sleeping in many trains in the last few weeks I opted for the
hotel.
I was able to take a brief tour of the town before turning in. It is an attractive place,
and possesses a large theatre. A play happens to be on this week, but I was told that
variety shows (“vaudeville”) are frequent and popular. Magic acts often appear. I left my
card with the manager, hoping for an engagement one day.
I must record that the theatre, the hotel and the streets of Galesburg are lit by
electricity. At the hotel I learned that most American towns and cities of any
significance are so equipping themselves. Alone in my hotel room I had the experience of
personally switching on and off the electric incandescent lamp in the centre of the
ceiling. I dare say as a novelty this would quickly pall and become commonplace, but the
light cast by electricity is bright, steady and cheerful. In addition to lighting I have
seen many different appliances on sale: ventilating fans, clothes irons, room heaters,
even an electrically driven hairbrush! As soon as I return to London I shall make
enquiries about having electrical current installed in my home.
5th July 1900
Crossing Iowa
I stare for long periods through the window of the carriage, hoping for a break in the
monotony, but the agricultural land stretches flat and wide in all directions. The sky is
a bright pale blue, and it hurts the eyes to look at it for more than a few seconds.
Clouds pile somewhere to the south of us, but they seem never to shift their position or
shape, no matter how far we travel.
A Mr Bob Tannhouse, a fellow passenger on the train, is by small coincidence the
vice-president of sales in a company that manufactures the sort of electrical appliances
that have caught my eye. He confirms that as we move towards the 20th century there is no
limit, no bound, to what we might expect electricity to do for our lives. He predicts that
men will sail the seas in electric ships, sleep in electric beds, fly in electric
heavier-than-air machines, eat electrically cooked food… even shave our beards with
electric razor blades! Bob is a fantasist and a salesman, but he fires me with a
tremendous hope. I believe that in this enthralling country, as a new century dawns,
anything really is possible, or it can be made possible. My present quest into the unknown
heart of this land will give me the secrets for which I hunger.
7th July 1900
Denver, Colorado
In spite of the luxuries of railroad travel, it is undoubtedly a blessing not to be
travelling. I plan to rest in this city for a day or two before continuing my journey.
This is the longest continuous break I have ever made from magic: no performances, no
practising, no conferences with my
ingénieur
, no auditions or rehearsals.
8th July 1900
Denver, Colorado
To the east of Denver lies the great plain, across part of which I came while travelling
from Chicago. I have seen enough of Nebraska to last me the rest of my lifetime; memories
of its dull scenery daunt me even yet. All day yesterday a wind blew from the southeast,
hot and dry and apparently laden with grit. The staff at the hotel complain that it is
from the arid neighbouring states, like Oklahoma, but no matter what its source it meant
that my explorations of the town were hot and unpleasant. I curtailed them and returned to
the hotel. However, before I did so, and when the haze finally cleared, I saw for myself
what lies immediately to the west of Denver: the great jagged wall of the Rocky Mountains.
Later in the day, when it was cooler, I went out to the balcony of my room and watched the
sun setting behind these stunning peaks. I estimate that twilight must last half an hour
longer here than elsewhere, because of the vast shadow thrown by the Rockies.
10th July 1900
Colorado Springs, Colorado
This town is about seventy miles to the south of Denver, but the journey has taken all day
in a horse-drawn omnibus. It made frequent stops to take on and put down passengers, to
change horses, to change drivers. I felt uncomfortable, prominent and travel-weary. My
appearance was probably ridiculous, to judge by the expressions on the faces of the
farming people who rode with me. However, I have arrived safe and sound, and am
immediately charmed by the place in which I find myself. It is not anywhere near as large
as Denver, but abundantly reveals the care and affection that Americans lavish on their
small towns.
I have found a modest but attractive hotel, suitable for my needs, and because I liked my
room on sight I have registered for a week's stay with an option to extend it if necessary.
From the window of my room I can see two of the three features of Colorado Springs that
have brought me here.
The whole town dances with electric lights after the sun has set; the streets have tall
lamps, every house has brightly illuminated windows, and in the “downtown” area, which I
can see from my room, many of the shops, businesses and restaurants have dazzling
advertising signs that glisten and flash in the warm night.
Beyond them, bulking against the night sky, is the black mass of the famous mountain that
stands beside the town: Pike's Peak, nearly 15,000 feet in height.
Tomorrow, I shall make my first ascent of the lower slopes of Pike's Peak, and seek out
the third singular feature that has brought me to this town.
12th July 1900
I was too weary to write in my diary yesterday evening, and I have perforce to spend today
alone here in the town, so I have plenty of opportunity to recount at leisure what
transpired.
I was awake at an early hour, took my breakfast in the hotel, and walked quickly to the
central square of the town where my carriage was supposed to be waiting for me. This was
something I had arranged by letter before leaving London, and although everything had been
confirmed at that time I had no way of knowing for sure that my man would be there for me.
To my astonishment, he was.
In the casual American manner we quickly became great friends. His name is Randall D.
Gilpin, a Colorado man born and bred. I call him Randy, and he calls me Robbie. He is
short and round, with a great circling of grey whiskers about his cheerful face. His eyes
are blue, his face is burned red ochre by the sun, and his hair, like the whiskers, is
steel-grey. He wears a hat made of leather, and the filthiest trousers I have ever seen in
my life. He has a finger missing from his left hand. He carries a rifle under the seat
from which he drives the horses, and he told me he keeps it loaded.
Though polite, and effusively friendly, Randy displayed a reserve about me that I was only
able to detect by having spent so many weeks in the USA. It took me most of the ride up
the Pike's Peak ascent for me to work out the probable cause.
It seemed to be a combination of things. From my letters he had assumed that I, like many
people who come to this region, was a prospector (from this I discovered that the mountain
has many rich seams of gold). As he became more talkative, though, he told me that when he
saw me crossing the square he guessed from my clothes and general demeanour that I was a
minister of the church. Gold he could understand, one of God's ministers he could also
accord a place in the scheme of things, but not a combination of two. That this weird
Briton should then direct him to drive to the notorious laboratory on the mountain only
compounded the mystery.
Thus arose Randy's caution about me. There was little I could do to assuage it, as my real
identity and purpose would probably have seemed just as incomprehensible!
The route to Nikola Tesla's laboratory is a steady climb of mixed gradients across the
eastern face of the great mountain, the land densely wooded for the first mile or so as
the lane wends its way out of the town, but soon thinning into rocky ground supporting
immensely tall and well-spaced firs. The views to the east were vast, but the landscape in
this region is so flat and uniformly used that there was virtually nothing scenic at which
to marvel.
After an hour and a half we came to a plateau, on the northeast face of the mountain, and
here no trees grew at all. I noticed many fresh stumps, indicating that what few trees had
actually once grown here had been recently felled.
In the centre of this small plateau, not nearly as large as I had been led to believe, was
Tesla's laboratory.
“You got business here, Robbie?” said Randy. “You watch how you go. It can get darn
dangerous up here, from what folks say.”
“I know the risks,” I averred. I negotiated with him briefly, unsure of what arrangements,
if any, Tesla himself had for descending to the town, and wanting to be sure that I could
later get back to my hotel without difficulty. Randy told me that he had business of his
own to attend to, but would return to the laboratory in the afternoon and wait for me
until I appeared.