The Cogspeare Conspiracy (The Cogspeare Chronicles Book 1) (23 page)

              The lab took up the entirety of the top floor of the house. It was made of more window than wall, with masses of steel turned into unusual columns that supported the massive structure. All throughout were long, granite-topped tables, all in various states of disorganization; another reason why Magnus avoided it.

              “Father?” he called out when he didn’t see him.

              Suddenly, a begoggled head popped up from behind a modified stove in the corner. Cornelius took off the goggles, unleashing his stiff hair and wiping his smeared hands on his apron.

              “There you are son!” he said, happily coming over and giving Magnus a happy slap on his back. If there were words that Magnus would use to describe his father, it would be jovially oblivious. “So, how are you doing?” asked the ever-optimistic chemist.

              Magnus could only sigh.

              “That bad, eh? Well, well, this too shall pass. Now, what do you think of this, my boy?” he walked proudly over to the stove that, on closer inspection, looked like it had been pulled inside and out, and topped with a cupcake made of copper.

              “Um…?”

              “Yes, it does leave one speechless. I’m trying to perfect it for the International conference in a few months. As the Americans would say, ‘it’ll knock their socks off,’ eh?” He gently stroked it, and in his exhausted state, Magnus would almost swear that the contraption gurgled back.

              “Father?”

              “Hum?”

              “I have to get going, more research you know. What did you want to see me about?”

              “Oh,” Cornelius deflated at Magnus’s lack of interest. But he then saw the circles under his eldest’s eyes and his own softened. He went over and put an arm around Magnus, pushing him gently over towards the steel-backed, dog-eared sofa near the back of the room and they settled down.

              “Despite popular opinion to the contrary, Magnus, I do see, know and feel what goes on in this house. I know that your mother likes to get into a spot of bother with the law over women’s rights, and that you helped her out of it the other day. I want you to know that I told her it was a hare-brained scheme.”

              “What do you mean?” Magnus was confused, and thought he had missed something.

              “Well, it was all her idea that if you had to rescue her from prison it would force you to come home, to look after her.” Magnus rolled his eyes.

              “It’s frightening what she’s capable of, isn’t it. And Miss McFlynt? Was she part of it?” he asked suddenly.

              “No, just one of your mother’s charity cases. But you, ah, like her, do you?”

              “Mother? Sometimes,” his son replied, being deliberately obtuse.

              “Sarcasm does not become you, Magnus, but your response shows just how much you do care. Alright. Now, what are you going to do about this case of yours?”

              “I don’t know,” he ran his fingers through his hair agitatedly. “At first I thought it would be a simple case, if not a particularly palatable one; just defend Clinton and be done with it. But now, with the disappearance of George Talliburn and then going to see the miners, it’s just so…”

              “Hard?” he nodded. “The cases that you’ve tried up until this point have perhaps tested your knowledge of the law, but I don’t think that they’ve tested your conviction of it. One of the things that your mother often tells me, just before she goes out on another protest, is that there are three types of people: those who break the law, those who uphold it, and those who try to change it. And if I’m not mistaken, you’re questioning where you are in that equation?”

              Magnus nodded, too weary for words.

              “I can see that you’re tired, son. But I want to tell you something that only one other person, Edwina, knows. When we were courting, she and I were out on a…walk, shall we say, when I saw a glittering red mineral in a cave. That is when I discovered this thing that we call spesium. I called it that because in Latin, “spes” means hope. I had hope, and still
do
hope, that this mineral will help propel society forward towards discoveries and inventions that will help mankind. Unfortunately, as I purposely did not patent the formula for its distillation, others will take advantage and use it for ill purposes. I have been deeply upset by this, but must resign myself to the fact that some people are selfish and we must do everything we can to keep them in check.”

              Magnus was spellbound by the longest monologue he had ever heard his father make. The first thing he picked up on was, “You were strolling…in a cave…with Mother?”

              Cornelius chuckled.

              “Well, you can’t expect me to divulge all of our secrets in one afternoon, now can you?

              “And you didn’t patent the mineral or its distillation process, but you did patent the best stoves and gear for it?” he added sceptically.

              “I might be idealistic, son, but not naïve” he smiled.

              “Why say this now?” Magnus finally asked.

“I was worried that you might resent me for discovering spesium, my part as the instigator in this series of sad events, and I want you to know that every time someone’s life is impacted by it, for better or worse, I feel it as if it happened to my own family. And the day that-” he lost his words, and merely reached out and stroked Magnus’s thick red hair above his damaged ear. For once, his son didn’t back away.

“I have to go back to work,” Magnus said finally, rather sadly.

“Yes. I should get back to the Everburn as well.”

“Everburn?” Magnus raised his eyebrows as they stood and began to walk towards the front of the room.

“I’m thinking that’s what I’ll call this stove model. Item 74-6 doesn’t have the same ring to it, does it?”

“What does it do?” Cornelius brightened.

“Glad you asked! In theory, it should use the coal syrup made from spesium more efficiently, making it go further and longer, thereby lowering the cost for people.”

“Clinton’s not going to like that one bit,” Magnus grumbled. “Just warn me to be out of the house when you test the thing.” He smiled and said adieu until Cornelius quickly called out.

“Since Edwina, Sebastian, Declan and I are going to the opera tonight; would you come home before eight? I would rather not leave Quintus and Minerva alone.”

“What about Amadeus?”

“I think he’s out looking for his other half.”

“Demonic half, more like,” they both chuckled. “Alright,” Magnus relented, “I’ll try to get away. Addison and I should be more or less done by then.”

“Good. It’ll do you good to have a quiet night at home.”

“There’s no such thing as a quiet night at
this
home.”

Chapter 52:

Despite spending the greater part of his life mining for the mineral that made rapid train travel possible, John Craggs had never been on a train. Clutching that day’s newspaper in one hand, and gingerly holding the third class ticket, bought with the remains of the coins in the milk jug in the other, he boarded the steaming beast.

              The third class carriage was nothing more than a glorified cattle car. Without insulation or springs, the box car was drafty, loud and bone-jarring. Craggs worked hard all the way to London to keep his teeth from chattering. His stomach was threatening to go from rebellion to outright, messy revolution all over the grimy panelled floor.

              But finally, finally, the train chugged into the London terminus, and Craggs wasted no time in getting off that horrible contraption. But then, looking around bewilderedly, he wondered how the hell he was going to find one man in the largest metropolis on earth. He took out Magnus’s business cylinder and looked at it, slowly and carefully reading the name of the firm.

              A small, rather sad light bulb went off in his head, and Craggs eagerly turned through the newspaper until he reached the article about the miners. Above it was a picture of the mob around the firm’s building. He squinted, and could just make out the street sign on the edge of the building, Crevice Crescent.

              He began by walking in the completely wrong direction, and it was only after three or four miles that he worked up the courage to ask someone for directions. He carefully chose the person, knowing that every other person in the city was a thief, beggar, charlatan or other personage of nefarious intentions. He spied a man dressed similarly to himself, in dirty trousers, collarless shirt and a cap, and was just about to approach him when the man shoved half a pie into his mouth. Craggs didn’t have the heart to disturb the man at his meal, and quickly turned away.

              “Can I help ya, love?” Craggs turned and felt, rather than saw, a woman press up against him. “Ya look lost.” He was utterly flustered and beginning to panic.

              “No. Um, that is, yes. Um, I’m not sure I’m in the right place, but you don’t need to, that is...”

              “That’ alright, dearie, Maggie here can see it’s yer first time, and I’ll throw in a discount fer ya, how’s that?” She smiled sweetly, pulling back garishly painted lips to reveal receding gums. She tossed her dirty hair over her bare shoulder. John Craggs might have just stepped off the train, but he knew that this woman did not spend most of her time vertically.

              But he couldn’t speak, and instead just held onto the cylinder.

              Maggie saw it and frowned, and pulled it out of his hand before he could protest.

              “Yer looking for these toffs, are ye?” He nodded.

              “Well, my love, yer’s in the wrong part o’t’town.” She sighed, and seeing his bewildered look, took pity and pointed him in the right direction. Nodding as she gave instructions, he turned to go, wanting to give her something, but he didn’t have a penny to his name. Instead he gently patted her shoulder, and Maggie truly blushed for the first time since Bob the butcher’s son kissed her all those years ago.

              John Craggs now knew that he was in the East End, and so he continued his quest back into the City. Just as he made it to Crevice Crescent, it began to drizzle. At first he didn’t mind the rain so much; after all, it was just a bit o’water. But then his face began to itch and his hands began to tingle, and he looked down to see them reddened and covered in minute, raindrop-sized blisters. In Port Prudence they never experienced spesium rain because no one could afford either the coal syrup or the special stove to burn it.

              The vicar was right! The city was full of godless atrocities, he thought. 

              If Craggs had not been trying to avoid getting burned by the rain, he might have taken the time to be intimidated by the façade of Grimsby and Associates. As it was, he quickly went up the front steps and rang the bell. No one answered, and fearing for the state of his clothes, if not his skin, he pushed open the door.

              The large hall was the grandest thing Craggs had ever seen. The floors were covered in stunning carpets that felt thick and soft under his thin-soled boots. He looked up as he took off his cap and was mesmerized by the floating chandelier made from dozens of vertical luminescence tubes. It was then that Craggs began to feel out of place, and even considered leaving.

              After all, nobody would notice him in the throng of people dashing about. It seemed to him, coming from a quiet village where people only ran in case of births or deaths, that there must be matters of life and death happening all around him behind closed doors. But really, Grimsby and Associates made it a point to hire hyperactive clerks to save time, which is money.

              “Come for a delivery, mate?” asked a very young clerk passing by with his arms stuffed full of scrolls. “Most of the stuff’s ‘round the back.”

              He began to lose his grip on the shiny tubes, but Craggs quickly stepped forward and helped him.

              “Thanks,” he gasped. “Mr. Tumly would have my head if this lot had been dented.”              

Craggs couldn’t help but see how the lad was about the same age as John Jr. was…had been. “I’m looking for Mr. Cogspeare. Where’s his office?”

              “Up the stairs and to the left. But you just missed him. You might be able to catch him on the way to the Monstrosity.”

              “The Monstrosity?” Craggs asked, thinking it must be some sideshow or event being held nearby.

              “Obviously new in town, eh?” said the wise city-boy. “The Cogspeares live in a mansion on Tungsten Square called the Monstrosity of Mayfair. You should go see it! It’s one brassy three-legged birdie, alright!” he laughed as he trotted off to deliver the scroll-filled tubes to the waiting Mr. Tumly.

              Craggs shook his head. He hadn’t understood half of what the lad had said. But he did pick up on one thing. Cogspeare obviously lived with his family in an unusual house in Tungsten Square, which sounded a great deal like an address to Craggs.