The Rise of the Automated Aristocrats (23 page)

DANGER! NO ENTRY!
Construction Work in Progress
The New East End!
Fully plumbed houses and tenements. Efficient sewer system.
Well-lighted streets.
Small parks and recreational areas.
Shops, offices, work yards and other business premises.
AN END TO POVERTY.
THE EMPIRE TAKES CARE OF ITS OWN.

In the mews at the back of 14 Montagu Place, there were two velocipedes, two rotorchairs, and one steam sphere. When Swinburne—de-feathered and well rested—arrived at ten o'clock, he and Burton took the rotorchairs and flew to Battersea Power Station.

Neither man made any mention of his previous life.

Gooch and Faraday, who were standing at a bench and examining Grumbles' dismantled head, looked up and greeted them. Faraday's hair was still sticking out, not having been brushed since yesterday.

“
Orpheus
?” Burton asked.

“In the quadrangle,” Gooch responded, referring to a large area behind the main workshop that was open to the air and surrounded on all four sides by the building. “Nathaniel is aboard, standing guard, though I've assured him that the vessel is perfectly secure there. They got what they wanted from it.”

“Which was?”

“The Mark Three babbage, the Nimtz generator, and the black diamonds. All removed. It also means they've got their hands on the Turing modules that were added to the ship's brain.”

“Looking on the bright side,” Swinburne said, “they're now exposed to the Mark Three's personality. That'll teach 'em.”

“Only if it's broken its silence,” Gooch noted.

Burton clicked his teeth together and rapped the end of his cane on the floor. “Bloody Babbage! It has to be!”

“My thought exactly,” Gooch agreed. He leaned forward over the bench, supporting himself with his mechanical arms while gesturing, with his natural hands, at the components spread across its top. “I checked the station records. It is normal procedure for clockwork men to be recalled on an annual basis for checks and fine-tuning. During the period between our departure for the future and Babbage's disappearance, he personally serviced a hundred and twenty-one machines. Your brother's device was one of them, as were all of those that worked here at the station. The remaining seventy-three are owned, presumably, by various organisations, politicians, and aristocrats—that is to say, by the people and places that can afford them—but the ownership certificates have been removed, so I can't tell you exactly who or where.”

“And the tampering?”

Gooch tapped Grumbles' head. “As I said before, I can't dig too deeply into it for fear of setting off the booby trap, but I was, at least, able to retrieve this.” He took a small metal fitting between finger and thumb and raised it. “Not so much a tampering, as an extending. I don't know exactly what it does, but at its heart, there's a granule of black diamond dust.”

Swinburne drummed his fingers on the bench top. “And what do we know about such gems? They can distort time. They can accentuate clairvoyant abilities. They can hold a human consciousness.”

The engineer shook his head. “No, a single grain of this size hasn't the capacity for any of that.”

Burton asked, “Might it employ the resonance that exists between all the diamonds and their fragments as a means for communication?”

Gooch looked astonished. “I say! Yes, it's very possible! Very possible indeed! What on earth made you think of that?”

Briefly, Burton told the engineer about the kidnapping of Raghavendra and Krishnamurthy.

“Phew!” Gooch exclaimed. “You're right. There must be intercommunication. It only makes sense if Grumbles, Sprocket, and the crew of the ornithopter were able to alert one another.” He straightened and stroked his chin with artificial fingers. “Hmm. The transmission the
Orpheus
received. I wonder—”

“Algy came to the same conclusion. A message from Babbage, perhaps? But how could he have known of our arrival? We hadn't announced ourselves. Even the clockwork men here in the station didn't know we'd returned until we were greeted by Fiddlesticks.”

“The sound of the ship landing?” Swinburne suggested.

Gooch made a gesture of negation. “Ships set down here day and night.” His brow creased. “I suppose Babbage could have been using the stones he took from the station to broadcast, via their resonance, a permanent signal, which the
Orpheus
responded to immediately upon reception of it. That way, he'd have known we were back before anyone else. He might have then ordered the ship to remain silent and to take off as soon as the station's clockwork men, following his directive, boarded it.”

After a moment of consideration, Burton addressed Faraday. “How was Babbage behaving in the days before he vanished?”

Faraday shrugged. “He was his usual self—you know, idiosyncratic. Obsessive. Short-tempered. Impatient. Er, things like that.”

“Nothing unusual? Unusual for him, I mean.”

“Not that I noticed.”

“Any new obsessions?”

Faraday patted his pockets, didn't find what he was looking for, peered at Burton, and said, “Pardon?”

The explorer repeated the question.

Faraday scratched his head. “Those doo-dahs. Round. What are they called? Circles. Children. You know.”

“Eh?”

“Er. Spinning tops. No, that's not right. Hoops. Yes, hoops. The ones the nippers play with, rolling them along the streets—the roads—the—er—streets. Babbage took umbrage to them, called them a public nuisance.”

“He's always hated the entertainments enjoyed by the common folk,” Gooch put in. “In fact, he'd be delighted if that whole class of people—
the mob
, as he refers to them—were removed from the face of the earth.”

“Oh, quite so, quite so,” Faraday agreed. “That's why he developed his clockwork men in the first place. He was furious when what's-his-name refused to allow their deployment in the—er—watchamacallits.”

“The who in the what?” Swinburne asked.

The scientist stared into space.

“Mr. Faraday?” Burton prompted.

“Hum? The who in the—? Ah, yes. The prime minister. Who is it? Disraeli! Old Babbage met with Disraeli last year and offered to replace all the—um—the labourers with his—you know—in the factories and workhouses.”

“Substitute them with his clockwork men?” Burton asked.

“That's right. Efficiency. No wages required. Of course, Disraeli put the mockers on the idea. Supplanting the working classes wouldn't make them disappear. Quite the opposite. If they weren't occupied, they'd be free to make whatsit all over the place.”

“Babies,” Swinburne said.

“Mischief.”

“I would have thought that objection rather obvious,” Gooch observed.

“Patently,” Faraday agreed. “But Babbage hadn't thought it through. He's always been funny like that.” He tapped a finger to the side of his head. “Lacking a few thingamabobs in the old—er—noggin.”

“Exactly when did he see Disraeli?” Burton asked.

“Um. October. No. August. Wait. Let me think. Ah, it was late in October. Yes, that's right. Without a doubt. October.”

“Shortly before he absconded, then?”

“Oh! Why, yes, I suppose it was.”

Gooch pursed his lips. “How might that relate to our spring-driven bandits?”

“I'm searching for the rationale behind yesterday's events,” Burton responded. “If Babbage is responsible, could he be independently pursuing the idea rejected by Disraeli, or some variant thereof?”

“I can perceive no logical connection between the thefts of yesterday and the desire to disenfranchise the lower classes,” the engineer said.

“Neither can I,” Burton agreed, “but I'd like to know what passed between Babbage and the prime minister at that meeting.” He indicated the metal part still in Gooch's hand. “If we're correct in thinking that Babbage is broadcasting orders to his devices, is there any way to trace the source of the signals?”

“Babbage is the only man I know of who might be able to create a method. It's a shame the Beetle has slipped away. He has—”

Burton and Swinburne both interrupted him with cries of surprise.

“Bismillah!” Burton said, slapping a hand to his head. “The Beetle! I forgot him. I forgot I'm an old man. Isabel. Trieste. 1890.”

“What? What? What?” Swinburne shrilled. “How could we—how am I—My hat! This isn't even our world!”

Faraday blinked in puzzlement. “Beetle? Not your—er—? How is it not?”

Gooch hastily explained to his colleague, “Disorientation caused by the transcendence of time. We encountered it frequently during our voyage. Would you mind leaving us, old fellow? I have to discuss matters that are classified as confidential by the government. You understand, of course?”

“Yes. Yes. Of course. I'll give you chaps your privacy.”

With a slightly awkward bow, Faraday backed away and shuffled off.

Gooch waited until the man was out of hearing range then said to Burton and Swinburne, “It's all right. Your new memories are obscuring the old. It's no surprise and nothing to worry about. I'd advise you not to resist it.”

“But—but—are we becoming different people?” Swinburne asked.

“No. Just different renditions of the same men—variations more suited to this particular time stream. Still the poet. Still the explorer.”

“It's happening so fast!”

“You've rather been thrown into the deep end, so to speak,” Gooch said. “None of us expected this turn. We thought you'd be eased, not plunged, into your new roles.” He lifted Grumbles' head. “This business has accelerated the process.”

“The closing of the circle,” Burton murmured. “The Beetle said events would occur with great rapidity.”

He drew a cheroot from his waistcoat pocket, lit and drew on it, then breathed out a plume of smoke, cleared it with an impatient wave, and dismissed at the same time the subject of identity. Somehow, it just didn't feel important.

“Let us focus on the matter at hand. The Beetle? What about him?”

“Ah, yes. I must retract my earlier comment. Babbage doesn't have all the black diamonds. There are eleven still implanted in the Beetle's head.”

“But aren't they the same ones that were taken from the Brunel machine?” Swinburne asked.

“They are. Each of them currently exists twice over in the same period of time. A very anomalous circumstance, though one that applies to a great many of the other diamonds as well, thanks to certain actions undertaken by your predecessors. If, as you suggest, Babbage is using the stones as a means of communication, I'm wondering whether our multiheaded friend might have heard his messages.”

“Do you know where the Beetle is?”

“He's in the past, perhaps. Or maybe he's gone sideways into a different iteration of the present.”

Burton opened his mouth to ask whether the Beetle was able to traverse time by willpower alone, but, before he could utter a sound, an inner affirmation rendered the question unnecessary.

Gooch went on, “He has to undertake a number of actions that, from a certain perspective, have already been done. It's very confusing. I'm under the impression we'll not see him for a while.”

The explorer grunted his agreement. “He said as much. I suppose we'll have to do without him. Let's start with Babbage's residence. We should search it.”

“You'll not find anything, I'm afraid. Prior to his disappearance, he lived here at the station. His old rooms are completely empty and scrubbed clean.”

Burton closed his eyes and pressed a hand to his forehead. “If the man I'm replacing possessed any talent for investigation then I wish I could acquire it from him a little more rapidly. I don't know where to look or what to do. Daniel, I must rely on your inventiveness. Please, find a means to trace the source of that transmission.”

Gooch waved his supplementary arms. “If, indeed, there was one. We may be on a hiding to nothing. I'll do what I can. Perhaps I could create something like the Field Amplifier that Babbage built last year. He took it with him, but I remember the principles of the device. It was designed to record the electrical patterns present in the diamonds. If this granule from Grumbles contains some vestige of the signal that we could analyse, it might tell us what we need to know.”

Burton picked up his cane. “We'll leave you to press on with it.” He drew again on his cigar and cast his eyes across the huge chamber, searching for a sense of unfamiliarity and not finding it. “As for Algy and me, I see but one path to follow, and it leads straight from here to number ten Downing Street.”

“The prime minister? I doubt he'll receive you unannounced.”

“I shall announce us myself. Let's see whether my position as king's agent can open the most important door in the empire.”

Picking up their hats, Burton and Swinburne bid their friend farewell, departed the station, and mounted their rotorchairs.

“Richard,” Swinburne said, as he placed goggles over his eyes, “I'm positive I should be stricken with the notion that I'm losing myself, but I feel the absolute opposite.”

Burton flicked the stub of his cheroot away, pushed his hat into the storage box beneath his seat, and slipped his cane into a holder. “Likewise, and thank goodness, else I think we'd both be lunatics by now.”

The poet grinned, gave a thumbs up, and squeezed the lever that started his machine's engine.

As they soared up and followed the course of the Thames northeastward, Burton noted that the chill air was filled with that variety of meteorological prescience that frequently portends a storm or heavy snowfall. The drizzle had petered out during the night, but the high, flat, featureless layer of cloud still obscured the sky. Pillars of smoke were rising vertically into it from thousands of chimneys, reminding him of the gigantic towers of 2203. It was as if the altitude of the capital was being established first in a gaseous form. Ghosts of things to come.