Chapter Eight
The Tides of War
Alice placed two fresh cups of coffee on the table and returned to her station behind the counter. The pair of young ladies at the other table, apparently suddenly aware of the time, got up and left the café. Gilbert Lavisham talked earnestly to Alistair Stewart at the back of the room. The latter occasionally barking out a loud laugh at something that was said.
“Alright Dickie, you have my full attention,” said Max, the new coffee yet untouched before him.
Dickie took a moment to scratch his thin black moustache with one long finger.
“All I wanted to communicate was that if you still desired to go up against Gilbert Lavisham... that is in other words to pursue Miss Harriet Leith... and I assume from your inclusion of Mr Rigg's Practical Treatise on the Steam Engine in your pile of books, that you do... then you should know a few more facts. Namely that Mr Lavisham junior seems to inhabit a dangerous double world. A world into which you would not be advised to readily accept an invitation.”
Max took a sip of his coffee.
Still good.
Dickie continued.
“I know this might all sound a little strange... especially coming from me. That is... me being a body of little consequence, a nobody.” Max was about to object to Dickie's overly harsh self-appraisal, but he was forestalled by a raised finger. “Don't get me wrong. I'm happy with the current situation. I'm not seeking any recognition or even to be particularly widely recognised. And thus I am able to offer you this gift; to be overlooked. To be disregarded and therefore to be practically unseen, but not, as it turns out, to be deaf.” Max failed to hide his confusion as he took another sip. Dickie replaced his own cup and went on. “Max, because I'm not regarded, seen as quaint and absorbed, you would say; eccentric, I am able to hear things. Things that speakers, who may just have a little too high regard for themselves, would wish to otherwise have remain unheard… certainly by listeners other than their intended.”
“You eavesdrop?” asked Max, but not unkindly.
“No. I sit here at this time every week. And I am unnoticed by Alistair Stewart who sits over there every week. Most weeks he is joined by Gilbert Lavisham, sometimes others. To them I'm as much a part of the place as that glass cake stand or the fruit salad plant in the window. In fact, I think they would be more alarmed if I wasn't here. But I sit, I drink my coffee and I read my books. I always face out the window. And they talk, and their words wash over me, and I hear things.”
Max nodded from within his cup.
“But let us depart,” announced Dickie. “As interesting as this is, we have a robot race in fifteen minutes. Not that I imagined you had forgotten that for a moment.”
Max felt a wave of relief wash over him. He stood, slightly too fast for polite company, for he had not for a moment forgotten about the race but worried that Dickie had.
Dickie gathered up their tray and deposited it on the counter, saving Alice the work. They took their leave of the pretty Bariste and sauntered back onto Blenheim Street. Mr Stewart and Mr Lavisham remained in deep conversation at the back of the café.
“So,” asked Max as they walked. “What have you heard from those two inside?”
Dickie clicked his tongue.
“You won't like this, but along with being a whaling boat blockader, Stewart is a first class taonga trader, an artefact smuggler."
Max felt his jaw clenching shut in response to this piece of news. Dickie was right, he didn't like it at all.
"Go on."
"There are good prices to be had for greenstone pieces, well-made adze, bone carvings and such like, back in Europe. This is, after all, the last landmass on the planet to be colonised. People are starting to look for trinkets which are a little different from all the usual Chinese, African and Arabic bits that have been floating around for years. ”
“What's Lavisham's deal?” asked Max, barely concealing the contempt in his voice. “I can't imagine that his accounts would need extra furnishing from such endeavours.”
“I quite agree. One wonders. Master Lavisham is London born, a London boy. And by all accounts he doesn't really want to be here, would be much happier back in the Mother Country. He has a very low view of the colonies, sees them as the ends of the earth, suitable destinations for criminals and those who are falling out the bottom of European society, certainly not a place for the likes of himself. You know the attitude. Obviously money can't be an issue. It's my theory that he has involved himself in... let’s call it 'the underground' as a way of transcending his normal, common, unremarkable life here on the backside of the world. It gives him a sense of the epic! I would bet money that he reads Von Tempsky.” Max ignored the gibe, less trivial things needed his attention. Dickie finished his analysis by saying; “Who knows how deeply he is involved with Stewart and his lot? Clearly enough to warrant a weekly meeting. I'd also wager that whenever one of his Father's railway projects ploughs though the middle of a Māori burial ground or some such, any treasures that are unearthed quickly make their way into the hold of the Elizabeth III and off to Europe.”
Max walked, an impotent rage building inside him at all he had just heard. Artefact smuggling, not unlike poaching, was a crime that in practice was ranked alongside cheating at cards or using cuss words in front of a lady. All wrong and immoral, but crimes that in a young colony struggling with more that it's fair share of murder, rape, theft and at times open banditry, where not punished. In short order smuggling was excusable.
Just not to Max. The practice was the bane of any earnest Archaeologist, and those who took part in it were nothing more than grave-robbers, mercenary transporters and baseless capitalists. Furthermore, smuggled cargoes seldom found their way into the safe hands of reputable museums. Rather they were hoarded by eccentric private collectors, to be produced at dinner parties and lied about to impressionable guests. In Max's best moments he viewed Archaeology as simply the physical extension of Anthropology, and that its gains be for the benefit of all people. That the British Museum was the greatest treasure house, not only in the Empire, but the entire world, was a fact that everybody, both within and beyond that Empire, could celebrate, surely. Even if, like him, most of them may never get to actually see it.
It all helped, of course, in building a picture of a Gilbert Lavisham that was easy to despise. Max didn't mind that. He tried again to recall what that old half-forgotten memory about Gilbert was, the scandal he had heard about while still at college. But again, he came up short, for although it was big news at the time, he hadn't had any reason to take particular notice.
"Dickie, I've got a vague idea... years ago... was Lavisham involved in... I mean did he have something to do with... a man's death?"
Dickie walked on, head down, deep in thought. Max wondered if he hadn't heard his question.
"A boy's," he finally confirmed. "A boy's murder."
That didn't sound familiar to Max, at all.
"Really? A boy? Murder? Are you sure?"
"Quite."
A few more steps in silence.
"What happened?"
Dickie sighed, and for a moment Max thought he might refuse to tell the tale.
"It was a couple of years ago, in Lavisham's first year at Victoria. A boy challenged him to a duel."
"Really?" said Max again, a little too quick. Dickie looked like he didn't want to be discussing this. Checking his interest Max asked; "Why?"
"Same as always. Over a point of honour. Lavisham purportedly said something insulting about the youngster's sister."
"And?"
Again the sigh.
"The boy was strong with a blade. So Lavisham, as the challenged, chose pistols. The boy naturally fired first but aimed the shot wide. Which in duelling is, I dare say you already know, a formal act of pardon. In return Gilbert shot him in the chest, dead."
Max was stunned to silence. Then after a time asked;
"Why do you refer to the victim as the boy?"
"Because, Max, he was fourteen years old."
* * *
If Professor Ivar McCormack had expected a quick, low-key rematch of the previous years botched robot race, before settling his students into a new year of earnest study, he had been sadly mistaken indeed.
Where December's race had been a rowdy affair involving maybe a third of the University's students, February’s was, without a doubt, a grand spectacle. It may have been quite possible that Peng Long Wang, who had returned to the Kaituna Gorge to help his Grandfather work his gold claim, was the only student not in attendance.
Nor was McCormack the only one taken off guard by the surge in interest. From Max's seat on the bleachers it was plain to see that many students were arriving too late to have a hope of seeing anything over the heads of their more prompt peers. Max and Dickie had arrived just in time themselves, grabbing a lost looking Wiremu from the quad-side and scrambling up the stands to some of the last remaining seats.
Once Dickie had been introduced to Wiremu the two fell into easy conversation about the whys and wherefores of the intended race. A still stunned Max was glad of the chance to just sit and think. The suggestion of Lavisham being a petty smuggler was comparatively easy to take after the story of the duel. Max found the tale, judging from what he knew of Lavisham's current life, hard to believe. Dickie had called the end of the event murder, clearly the courts hadn't.
He couldn't see Lavisham in the crowd. He did however catch sight of the pretty Chinese girl. She was across the far side and seemed to have done well in surrounding herself with a gaggle of attractive young lady friends. Max guessed she was something of a novelty. He certainly saw more than one other young man craning his neck to take a look at her, before pointing the sight out to his mates. She sat almost motionless, tilting her head to the side from time to time to listen to an observation from one of her excited peers. She would smile or laugh politely before returning to her own private observations.
Max joined her, in a sense, and likewise took the opportunity to once more study his peers en-mass. For a time he resisted the pull to focus exclusively on the only one in whom he had any actual interest. That was a pleasure he wanted to savour. Instead his eyes scanned the crowd, noting the different groups of students as he saw them. A collection of grim looking 'Goths' were again in attendance. The Army Observers were back, obvious in their black uniforms and forage caps. One even completing the image by adding a monocle and handlebar moustache. A brass band had set up and was busily playing though it's catalogue of upbeat tunes.
Down in the centre it appeared that McCormack had switched the tracks and timings, the finish line for the start. This time the machines would be running back toward where Max, Dickie and Wiremu were currently seated. The previously 'burnt out' Mechanical Engineers had not reappeared this year with any alternatively powered creations, so only three teams hunched over their constructs on the far side of the quadrangle. Max was aware that all around him bets where being placed on the outcome of the race, both spontaneously between twos and threes, and more systematically via self-appointed 'bookies.'
Harriet Leith. Max's eyes finally rested. She was working with the three other members of her team on their machine, to the left of the other two groups. Her lips were moving quickly as if issuing commands while she cranked a spanner on the side of her robot. Even if the band wasn't banging out a rousing rendition of 'Carve Dat Possum' there would have been no way for Max to hear what she was saying over the excited roar of the crowd. It didn't matter, he was content to watch. Another member of the team had his hands inside the robot where, Max assumed, he was doing some fine tuning. A number of keys lay on the concrete around about him.
Harriet was dressed similarly to the last time; the long brown leather jacket, the scandalous trousers, Max couldn't imagine what her respectable Father would say about those, leather boots, leather bodice over white shirt. This time however her red hair was not braided but flowed down her back from under a burgundy head scarf. The brown stove pipe top-hat still sat atop her head, bronze goggles in place. Max recalled that of these goggles Dickie had cryptically said something about her needing them for the riding of trains... on the outside.
Again, he was momentarily spell bound. While she looked like no one he had ever seen before, she looked beautiful. Once more he was surprised that every eye in the vicinity wasn't held captive by her.
As he watched, she quickly bashed the robot on the top of its dome with the spanner, before giving the young man with the keys a wink. He also appeared to be finishing his work. Standing they brushed themselves off and rejoined the other two who were studying a sheet of schematics.
Max was glad, after all, that he had seen Harriet at the Railway Hotel, for dressed like this she was not a young lady that he could introduce to his Mother. The thought gave him a smile. Although that was the least of his worries.
“Blast!” he spat all at once. Max's two companions turned from their talk to see what was troubling him.
“I left my library books back at the café!”
Dickie looked up at the big clock on the side of the Engineering Department, 4:15.
“Guess you will be missing the race then,” he stated matter-of-factly. But couldn't keep a smile from turning his mouth.
“I will not!” retorted Max. He hated forgetting things, missing appointments, failing to keep his word, it made him feel that he was out of control and couldn't be trusted, even by himself.
“Don't worry old man,” said Dickie. “Alice will keep them under the counter for you. You will be able to collect them later on.”
“That's good,” said Max, ignoring the other two's broad smiles and returning to watch the action in the quad below. He was sure Dickie would be telling Wiremu all about Harriet.
A young gent with a barrow of coal moved among the teams, providing each with a supply of fuel for their robots. He finished next to McCormack and bent to shovel some into the smoking boiler-box below the Professor's whistle-top. The simple boiler-box whistle-top construction had served well last year in drawing the crowds attention. This was clearly McCormack's plan again today. When the fireman withdrew the Professor reached forward and gave the cord hanging from the golden whistle a quick pull. Two high notes sounded shrill and loud, and the noise of the crowd ebbed away for a moment. But nodding to the fireman Professor McCormack stepped back and clasping his hands behind his back waited. The noise built again.
Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.
Steam and smoke was rising from the three machines now. As the pressure in those small boilers built the excitement likewise intensified in the quad. Max felt his heart begin to beat faster. He studied the robots again. They were practically the same as last year and still reminded him of upturned tin coal buckets. But minor modifications could be noted if one looked closer. Harriet's team's machine seemed to be sporting a new box like protrusion on it's right-hand side and a higher than last time dome or helmet shape on top. Of the other two Max couldn't really remember, he suspected that there was a little more copper piping on the outside of each.
Max tried not to stare at the Goths, or at least be caught watching them. For some reason he doubted they would welcome his scrutiny. He found them strange, as elegant as they were stark and mysterious. They aroused his curiosity, and his eye was drawn back to where they sat any time that he felt Dickie was about to drill him for burning holes in Harriet.
Harriet. In his mind he had moved her to first name basis. In reality they had never even met, let alone spoken. She had a power over him, and it was a hold he welcomed. Seeing her again now, a sight he had waited nearly all holidays to behold, helped him recognise four things that he had been vaguely aware of. First; he was madly and stupidly infatuated, and he liked it. Second; he was not content for things to stay as they were. Third; nothing in the daily round of their two separate lives was likely to bring them together. Fourth; as much as it made him uncomfortable, if he wanted anything to change, he would have to act.
Not unlike the Chinese lady, the Five Māori Scholars were also drawing many guarded looks from the impatient spectators. They were certainly harder to miss, a line of stern brown faces amongst rows of white. Again, the one called Kingi was in the centre of the group and Max knew instinctively that he was in some way the leader. The earlier haka had suggested this and now the body language of the other four confirmed it. Watching them talking, leaning their heads to listen, speaking unconsciously with their hands, Max got the impression that the other four did not so much relate to each other directly, but more did so through Kingi. It was like he was the centre of their network, their Mother, or their Commander.
With a jolt Max swung his eyes away but kept his head still. From across the quad Kingi had been staring straight back at him! And it had taken his day dreaming mind a long moment to register.
He quickly refocused on Professor McCormack who seemed to be checking each team’s readiness. He hated being caught out observing another in this way. It gave him the same feeling as forgetting things or being late. He prided himself as being 'a watcher', an astute observer of people. At times like this he just felt uncouth, like he lacked any real skill... that maybe the spying should be left to Dickie after all.
But of course, Kingi wouldn't be studying Max, rather Wiremu seated next to him. It was Wiremu who had stood up to him that morning. Then again Max had been right there, swinging the purerehua.
He imagined that he could still feel the big Māori's eyes on him. He felt a kind of fear, again something he could only be imagining. But still he kept his gaze elsewhere. For a split second he flirted with the idea of turning and giving the group a big smile and a happy wave. Like it didn't matter.
How could it matter?
But he had the sense to recognise that his understanding of what had transpired in the quad earlier that day was very limited.
If he had been that little bit more aware he would have also noticed that since their arrival in the quad a fair number of the other first year students had also been talking behind their hands and throwing the occasional glance in his and Wiremu's direction. The pair had certainly used their first day at University to spectacularly draw the attention of their peers to themselves.
But now someone else caught Max's attention. Arriving down by the side of the quad was Benjamin Salasor, the infamous Editor of The Murderer's Bay Argus. With him came a photographer carrying a large wooden tripod. The pair had no sooner set up, the box camera safely perched atop it's tripod before they were joined by Michael Bricknee and his photographer from the Dominion Press. Max was about to turn to the others and remark that “it looks as if the race is going to be news” when the sound of the Professor's steam whistle pieced the air.
The noise of the crowd died away to be replaced by McCormack's booming voice.
“Welcome ladies and gentlemen. As I'm sure you remember a second tedious race was forced upon us late last year...” The students jeered at this, but the Professor smiled good naturedly and went on. “So here we are, for the twin sakes of pride...” he glanced at Harriet “...and entertainment.” The crowd clapped. “And now I present to you, returned for a second time, last year's first year Steam Engineering students and their rather rudimentary pets.” The crowd ignored the Professor's scorn of the inventions and with many loud shouts and whistles and claps and much other noise made their approval known. The twelve budding engineers stood behind their smoking robots with their chins held high.
“Engineers,” McCormack looked to his students. “Your engines are primed? Your timings set?” The three team leaders, which included Harriet, quickly nodded their heads.
“Here we go,” said Max under his breath.
“Take your mark!”
The three leaders stepped forward to stand behind their team's robots.
“Get set!”
Once more three gloved hands hovered above activation buttons. There was no noise from the crowd.
“Go!”
The hands punched down and the robots were off! The noise from the crowd was deafening. Just like last time the three machines chugged away and all safely made the first turn, then the second. Max looked to Harriet. She of all the engineers stood still, her arms folded over her chest, watching. The others egged their inventions on with shouting and various desperate hand gestures such as clapping, slapping their thighs, and hugging themselves; followed by jumping on the spot and general helpless pacing about.
The third corner was made. To Max's dismay Harriet's machine was falling behind. Harriet however didn't look worried. Max even saw her and the Engineer with the keys exchange a knowing look. However, members of the crowd with money on the Leith machine were starting to voice their discomfort at what they were seeing.
Then all at once the trailing machine gave a blast of white steam and the box like shape on its right side popped right off, to land on the flag stones with a clatter. Initially those who had bet against the Leith machine roared with laughter and those who had placed money for it groaned out loud.
“Interesting,” said Dickie.
Then people began to see what was left in the fallen box's place. Mounted on the robot’s right hand side and previously hidden by the now forgotten box, was what appeared to be a steam piston... no, a steam ram, and at the end of its short ram rod had been affixed, almost comically... a red boxing glove! Now all the talk was confused and excited.
But the Leith machine didn't pause. With a burst of steam, it gained speed and left it's chalk line to close with the neighbouring racer. No one, other than Harriet and her team, really knew what was happening. Some of the crowd were shouting; at the scandal of it, at the approach of the Leith machine on their bid, others in support of the Leith machine, still others at the sheer joyous spectacle of it all. Some had fallen quiet, all their categories for the robot race suddenly broken. McCormack seemed to be shouting something, but he was ignored.
Then the two robots were together. The ram fired, the arm shot forward powerfully, the glove connected solidly... a long disbelieving silence accompanied the assaulted robot as it pitched sideways and over... to land on its side with a clang and a great hiss of steam. Water darkened the pavement like blood and its fire went out. All at once everyone was on their feet, shouting, pointing, clapping their friends on the back, exclaiming loudly at what had just happened.
“The clockwork inside that machine... for it to do that... must be amazing!” shouted Dickie. “Amazing!”
But nobody was listening. Harriet's machine was now moving in on the other racer as it blindly followed its chalk line to the letter. Max didn't care how it was doing it, just that it was doing it. He saw Harriet, amongst a storm of protests from the other engineers, arms still folded, nod her head, and give her offsider a satisfied wink.
Bang! A loud report sounded from the middle of the quad. Now the large dome had flown off the top of Harriet's machine to land a few feet away with a clang. When the steam had cleared everyone saw that a chain spun to a blur around the top of her robot. On the end of the chain was what could only be described as an axe head! People could hardly contain themselves; this wasn't what they had been expecting, but they were loving it.
Like a demented woodcutter Harriet's robot gained on the last machine. Max felt momentarily sorry for the bookkeepers who had collected bids in the expectation of a normal race just like all the other years. They would be in the small group of people who weren't enjoying themselves, along with Professor McCormack and the two other teams of Engineers.
The noise was at a fever pitch of excitement when... Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang! The spinning axe bit home on the final robot. The first hit did little, but the second, third and fourth all brought sparks and gouts of steam from the quickly ruptured shell. With pressure lost the smashed robot came to a halt. The Leith machine shunted it aside and began to prowl the race course in a big lazy circle, chain dragging behind, its work done.
Harriet Leith broke ranks with the other Engineering students then and strode confidently into the smoking carnage. When she reached her creation she paused a split second before stepping up to stand on top of it. With arms held wide she let it carry her around it's big circle. The crowd were on their feet and Max was sure that if they'd had flowers, they would have been raining them down on her now. The cheering was amazing, and for a moment or two Harriet gloried in it. Camera flashes from the newspaper men lit the quad. After a couple of stage bows and with a cheeky smile to the audience she sliced her hand down in a single movement. But unlike last year little happened and the cheering went on, Max loudest amongst it. Laughing with them she did another round. Her team joined her in the centre, and she tried again. This time the crowd let their noise fall away.
“What is the meaning of this?” boomed Professor McCormack into the new quiet. Harriet let the robot continue to carry her around as she stood with hands on hips. She tilted her head to one side as she looked at her Professor. Max laughed, as did any who remembered, when she finally spoke and threw McCormack's words, from the end of December's race, back at him.
“Call it the tides of war, if you will.”
The crowd cheered and whistled again but quieted themselves quickly. No one wanted to miss a word. Max imagined that McCormack actually looked mildly impressed. He certainly didn't come across as one who would be particularly shaken by such goings on. Max could recall Harriet's words from the last race. She had almost ranted at McCormack in response to his Tides of War statement saying “War? This is science not war, Mr McCormack! Do you want war?!”
“Not science then, Miss Leith?” the Professor called. He evidently remembered the previous dialogue also.
“Not this time Mr McCormack,” she responded as she came around again. Then turning she addressed the bleachers with raised voice. “This little race served us well as first years...” The students cheered “...as it will continue to do so for first year students in years to come.” Again, people clapped and whistled in agreement. All eyes were on her. She had them under her spell. “Now however we are no longer first years.” She let her voice drop. Then almost shouted “But we will have our entertainment!” The crowd responded in kind. It was almost a full circle of the robot before the cheering subsided enough for her to speak again. “Therefore, I have the great pleasure, along with some associates of mine, in announcing to you... the formation of... a new, twice yearly, robot league! A league open to all. Namely The Dominion League of Robot Wars!”
It was clear that no one doubted that this, whatever it was, was a grand idea. They had all been gripped by the last two races and now the news that they weren't ending had many punching the air in triumph and exclaiming loudly to their friends. When that round of cheering had died away Max saw that Harriet had been joined in the centre of the quad by a stocky man in a dark suit and bowler hat, carrying a large sheaf of papers. The papers he handed up to Harriet.
“This fine gentleman,” she went on. “As many of you will know, is Mr Lud Milligan. Mr Milligan and his firm Milligan & Co have agreed to administer the league, taking care of all the... how shall we say? More mundane aspects on behalf of the inventors, racers and spectators. The races, or more like duels, themselves will take place in the middle weekend of University Holidays. Everything else you will need to know is listed in these newssheets. One final thing, the races in The League of Robot Wars will have more in common with what you witnessed today, than with what took place last December. In other words, ladies and gentlemen, they truly shall be wars!”
With a final cheer the crowd rushed in on the quad. The papers were passed about to eager hands and for a short moment or two Harriet was lifted off the forgotten robot and paraded around the square.
“Amazing” said Dickie. “Here Max, Wiremu and I will go get a couple of those papers. You head back to the Revolution and collect your books. We'll meet you over at Central for the 5:15 home.”
“Sounds good,” said Max, almost in a daze. He took one last look at Harriet's brown top hat moving around in the crowd before following the other two off the bleachers.