Chapter 6: A Game of Cards

An excerpt from the Machinist’s Guide, Unknown, first written around year 75

…A dirty machine is a dangerous machine and a rusty machine is a dying machine. Metal is alive. To move, it must be oiled, lest it fail and die. But unlike our friends the engineers, who may put as much paint and oil on their metal as they want, our metal moves. That is the nature of a machine. You must apply oil daily, or more often, to your machine. But you must also wipe it down, leaving only a residue. You must use a clean rag, that won’t leave strings that could entangle you. You must never wear loose clothes, lest your machine grab you and crush you. You must always protect your eyes. You must always believe your machine is turned on, lest it start while you are unaware.

This is the way of the Machinist: I will care for my machine as I care for myself. I will respect my machine as I respect life. I will love my machine as I love my children. My machine provides for me, and I care for it. As long as I live, my machine will live.

Will left the Roasted Quail a moment or two after Aunt Beth, only long enough to make sure the waiter picked up the beads. His aunt’s questions and statements about Gladys made him a little uneasy. He headed east; across the markets he passed earlier. Exactly how much did the librarian know concerning Gladys and the airplane? For that matter, how much did Will truly know? It was all fairy tales and impossible science to him.

The path jogged left, then right, over a dirty ditch and under a set of power lines. He stopped in at a seamstress shop he’d visited earlier in the week. The front of the building was covered in a sheet of brightly printed cotton weave, a giant’s bed sheets or table cloth, vibrant even despite ages of fading. Inside, a short, nimble woman greeted Will.

“Everything is on schedule, Mr. Farmer. I did have to farm out some of the work, as it was such a large order. But there are plenty of seamstresses in Cauls. And of course, I’ve had to hire some drivers to deliver it to the barn. I take it you’ll still need it tomorrow?”

Will nodded “Tomorrow evening at the latest. No trouble with the work, I take it?”

The textile tamer shook her head. “Oh no, the work is simple enough, there’s just plenty of it. Would you care to see one of the finished sheets?” She took pride in her craft.

He took a step toward the burlap curtain that served as her door, “I’d love to, ma’am, but I’m afraid I’m running late. I have a few more stops today. Besides, I wouldn’t know what I was looking at. I’m not the expert, just the go-between.” She made no protest, obviously busy. He stepped across the threshold. “I appreciate all your help.”

From the seamstress shop, he went down a street of mismatched shops, some wooden, some plastic, and some unidentifiable. He rounded a pair of corners, then took a straight shot to the east Ring Road. He turned right and walked along the line of larger, nicer shops that dominated the thoroughfare. In a moment the stores gave way to government buildings, and then he came to the gates of the Works. Two blocks east of the entrance, in the opening of the passage beneath East Hill, sat the drill press.

Between blasts of the chop saw, he could hear a crew singing a shanty as they hauled a chunk of steel toward the gigantic sheer. He had never heard this one before. They sang shanties on the farms around Pound, and even when they did not need to work as one, the farmers often sang as they worked. They sang happy songs, sad songs, cautionary tales, and the like. This song sounded different. From what he could hear, the lead hand called out an instruction and the crew responded with the chorus. He paused to listen. “Pull with me, pull for the years.”

The response came, twenty rough voices, perfectly in time, but not quite in tune. “Pull for the laughter, Pull for the tears,”

The lead hand went on. “Pull with me, just for today.” The saw drowned out the rest and Will went on his way to the drill press.

“Hey,” Will began shouting long before he stood any chance of being heard. “Hey, Fynn!” The big man on the platform of the press cleaned the cutting edge of the drill, gently rubbing a rag across it as a mother would a swaddling babe. The noise of the other machines in the Works didn’t seem to reach him. Will’s noise certainly wouldn’t.

The platform had no ladder. Will ascended the oily neck of the machine, like a fruit harvester up a young tree, to reach Fynn’s platform. He nearly didn’t make it, fighting for his footing with every slippery step. “Hey Fynn!” he shouted once he safely stood on his level. Fynn Bowman turned. From down on the ground, twenty feet below, Fynn looked big. Eye to eye and up close, the man towered like a brown rat on his hind paws.

“Will, how are you?” He tucked the rag into his leather overalls and wiped his tanned brow with the back of a gloved hand. He still wore his bushy black winter beard. “You ready to go?”

“Whenever you are. Don’t want to interrupt.” Will got the feeling that maybe Fynn needed another minute to finish up.

Fynn’s curly black hair swayed as he shook his head, revealing a white scar above his temple. “Just doing a little extra cleaning. Let’s go get my shirt.” He walked to the edge of the platform and began turning a wheel nearly three feet in diameter. The whole platform slowly descended, leaving the bit hanging above them.

When they neared the bottom Fynn hopped off and motioned Will to follow. They walked toward a low metal building in the midst of all the biggest machines in the works. “How did it go at the library?” Fynn walked through the low door and across to a wash basin.

“Nothing new, talked to the head of the explorers. He’s an odd duck. But all he really had to say was that the giants used to fly in airplanes, and there’s a lot of them still around.” Will rested his thin frame on a bench near the basin as the big machinist pulled off his thick leather gloves and then began to splash and scrub. The gritty soap smelled peculiar and harsh, nothing like the soft stuff they used back in Pound. “But Aunt Beth is well, and she bought me lunch, so that’s a plus.”

“And I’m sure you expect me to buy you dinner?! No doubt about it, you’re a true university student.” Fynn’s deep voice betrayed a hint of humor. He slung the water off his hands and then dried them on a stained towel. He walked to a foot locker and bent down, his bulk hiding the box from view. “What about the book?” He stood up, holding a white canvas shirt as big as a bed sheet. He set it aside and stooped again to dig through the locker.

Will Shrugged. “Beats me: what’s his name’s principle, thrust from some unmentioned place, forces in the air, nothing that made much sense. Maybe Gladys will understand it but I have no clue. Aunt Beth said she would have a copy of the key passages dropped off.” Will watched Fynn pull tools out of his pockets and drop them into a bucket inside his locker.

He pulled the shirt over his big arms, then squeezed his head through its hole. It looked to Will like he was staring through the wall. “Everything okay with you?” Will asked as Fynn tied the laces in the collar.

“Yeah, yeah. Things have slowed down a bit here, not as many orders as we used to have. There may be a few machinists looking for other work.” He let the lid on his looker slam, refastened the buckles on his overalls, and made his way toward the door.

Will followed him out, the light barely beginning to wane as the sun slipped from afternoon toward evening. “Won’t the guild get them work?” The Machinists Guild was a division of the Royal Order of Metalist. While supply and demand played a role in Fynn’s work, ultimately a royal decree required him to drill holes in steel.

“They’ll do what they can, but we can’t expect them to feed men when there’s no work to be done. Maybe they can move them to another branch of the Order, but they’re not much busier than us.” They walked west, to the Mills Street Gate of the Works.

The Works didn’t have a unanimous definition. The folks that worked there saw the grounds of the Royal Metal Works as the Works, while their families would say it included the homes and businesses the Order provided for the workers, immediately outside the gates. Folks not familiar with the craftsmen who toiled with the metal might call anything east of Main Street the Works. “They’ll have to leave the Works?” Will noticed the tight weave of the neighborhood at once. In that sense, the people reminded him of farmers.

“Yes, and if the Order can’t find them a spot, they’ll have to find another profession. I hear there are a lot of plastic works looking for apprentices, if you don’t mind the fumes.” They strolled down Mills Street, amongst a throng of workers headed home. Fynn steered them toward a storefront stand a block before their street.

“Fumes?” As they stood at the end of a short line, the smell of fresh food floated along on the breeze and teased Will’s nose.

“Melting plastic can get pretty nasty, or so they say.” Fynn reached in his pockets and pulled out a hand full of beads. “Here’s the deal, you carry my beer and I’ll buy you your dinner.” The line moved up as another worker walked away with his evening meal.

“That’s fair enough.” Will looked forward to a chance to try Cauls beer, he’d heard it tasted sweeter and lighter than the country beer they drank in Pound.

“How can we help you today, Fynn?” The man behind the rough-cut counter wore a white, tight-knit apron. Will didn’t envy him, rushing around in a hot, steamy kitchen while everyone else headed home.

Fynn didn’t hesitate, “Hi Al. Six boiled junes and a keg of beer, please. A loaf of sourdough, too.” He turned to Will, “The bread is my breakfast, keep your hands off.”

The food vendor plucked june bugs out of the big boiling pot. “How’s your mama?” One by one he dropped them into a cloth sack.

“She’s doing well, hopefully with the warmer weather she’ll be getting out a little more.” Al set the steaming bag on the counter and pulled down a loaf of dark brown bread while a teenage boy struggled with the bucket-sized beer keg.

“That’s two nickels, three brass, Fynn.” The machinist laid three metal lined beads on the counter, two shiny and silvery, a third close to the same color, but with a matte look. Each had an impression with the royal seal and a denomination, the number one on the pair and ½ on the single.

“Keep the change, Al, I’ll see you next time.” Fynn slipped the bread in with the bugs and motioned toward the keg. He and Will slipped into a comfortable pace up the block and around the corner. They passed the bathhouse and a grocer before coming to Fynn’s building.

“You handle that keg like a true university student.” Will recognized the backhanded compliment, but the walk had winded him too much to deliver a witty comeback. The buildings of the Order of Metalists were, to no one’s surprise, made of steel. What surprised Will was the care they took in maintaining it. From floor to roof, the exterior shined.

Fynn held the door for Will and they walked through an equally cared-for lobby. “When’s Gladys coming?” He asked as they crossed a shining floor to his apartment on the first floor. Will huffed.

“Right at dark’ is what she told me, but you know her, time is relative.” Will shifted the keg as the machinist produced his key, tiny in his hands, and opened the door.

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He called out ”Mom, I’m home. Will Farmer is here.” The Guild moved the Bowmans to the first floor a few years back, as Fynn’s mother began to suffer from climbing to the third floor. His father had been a machinist, a lead hand, and that afforded them a nice apartment, two bedrooms with a front room, a den, and a big kitchen.

“I’m in the kitchen,” came Mrs. Bowman’s response. Will never caught her first name, and she smiled when he called her Mrs. The walls were lined with old carpets, to keep out the cold. In the kitchen sat an older woman, not ancient but past middle age. She seemed tiny compared to her hulk of a son, but they shared the same deep-set, green eyes and the same thick wavy hair, though her locks were nearly silver.

Fynn stooped and kissed his mother’s cheek. She patted his arm and smiled up at Will. “Hello, William, good to see you.” Next to her sat a little stove, made of steel. A handful of embers glowed through the grate, keeping the room a little hotter than Will preferred. “Did you remember the bread, Fynn?”

Fynn pulled the loaf from the sack. “I did. And I have plenty of june bugs too.” He shook the sack so their hard shells clanked together softly.

“Good. William, would you mind setting the table while Fynn sets out the junes?” She stood and stretched, her legs obviously painful, then gingerly moved to the table. Will set the little keg on a metal counter, and then went about finding the plates and utensils. Fynn grabbed a big pan with a lid from under one of the cabinets and emptied the sack into it, then laid it on the table.

“Beer Mom?” he asked as he took three aluminum cups out from above the sink. She shook her head and pointed to a kettle on the stove.

“Just some chicory for me, please.” Fynn poured two beers, then filled his mother’s cup and slipped a little wooden handle around it so it wouldn’t burn her hands.

The big man looked over at Will, “Well Will, sit down, let’s eat.” Will took the seat across from Fynn. His hesitance must have shown, he hadn’t eaten many bugs before. Farmers usually left them alone. If they did catch them, they sent them into the city to be sold at market.

Mrs. Bowman looked over “William, would you bless the meal please?” Then she bowed her head and closed her eyes. Will followed suit and asked the Lord to bless their meal, and each of them in turn.

“Amen.” They began to eat their meal and slipped into the comfortable daily chit-chat of how your day went and who you saw along the way. A friend had paid Mrs. Bowman a visit and brought a bag of carrot slivers that Fynn retrieved from the cabinet and passed out, along with a refill.

Will’s hesitance quickly dissipated. The bugs pleased the palate, especially when paired with the carrots, and the beer refreshed parched lips. Fynn told a funny story about one of his coworkers falling into a barrel of grease. Then Mrs. Bowman turned to Will and asked, “That Gladys girl that’s been stopping by, is she your cousin?” Will nodded with his mouth full of carrots. Not again. She turned to Fynn. “Pastor Nash stopped by today, while Grace was here with her carrot wheel. He told me about a girl named Gladys Farmer, a young woman actually. Said she wasn’t allowed in Cauls anymore. He made it sound like she had something to do with that explosion a while back, over on East Hill.” Fynn drained his cup.

“Really, I’ll have to ask her about that.” Fynn managed to sound incredulous. Whether he truly felt that way or not, Will could not tell. The pastor, of course, told the truth, though most people did not know about that. Will had heard the story from his Uncle Eli, Gladys’ father. A few weeks back, she had built a working prototype airplane, one-fourth size. Well, working might be generous, Will thought as the bowl of carrots made another round of the table. The model had worked well, except for the part where it zoomed off course and exploded in midair.

Fynn stood and poured another beer, “She’ll be over later, I think. I’ll ask her then. Will, another?” Will declined, he felt full and the stuffy kitchen added to his discomfort.

“Well, you just be careful, Fynn. I don’t need you getting wrapped up in anything that explodes.” Mrs. Bowman stood and together they cleared and cleaned the dishes, while Will put away the carrots and set the remaining bugs back in their sack, hanging in the pantry.

“You want to play a game of cards?” Fynn asked as he dried the last spoon. His mother had already settled in near the fire and pulled out her knitting.

“Sure, how about poker?” Will grinned. He liked the idea of getting out of the hot kitchen and into the cooler front room, but he knew that suggesting gambling would get a rise out of Fynn.

Fynn topped off his beer and went through the door toward the front. “Poker? Do you have any money?” Fynn’s voice contorted as he asked, his emphasis on the last word. He pulled a deck of cards from off a shelf and motioned for Will to pull up a chair to the table.

“I will if you lend me some.” Will put on a playful grin. He felt far more at home here with Fynn and his mother than he did at the university.

A laugh escaped from under Fynn’s untrimmed beard, “And bet against myself coming and going? I don’t think so. We’ll just have to play for marks.” He grabbed an aluminum sheet, as big as a book, and a lump of charcoal. “Light the lamp, will you?” Will reached to the end table and grabbed an oil lamp, then struck a spark over it with the striker. It let off a tiny yellow glow. He set it on the table and adjusted the flame brighter. Fynn shuffled and began dealing. “Did you hear anything about that explosion Mom was talking about?” His big hands were busy with the cards but his eyes were locked on Will.

“Not much.” Will tried to sound unconcerned, but he motioned his head toward the kitchen, warning Fynn not to press the question. “Did it happen near here?”

“No, way up the hill, but I think everyone in town heard it.” Fynn folded his first hand and Will dealt the next. They played a few hands as the day slipped away. After an hour, Mrs. Bowman prepared her copper bed warmer, then said goodnight to both of them, giving Fynn a kiss on the forehead and Will a warm smile before shutting herself into the back bedroom.

They played on, with Fynn’s tally on the little marker board out pacing Will’s. Will waited for the explosion to come up again, but Fynn seemed to have forgotten and the conversation meandered from cards to food to university classes until finally there came a knock at the door. They put down their cards and Fynn went to the door while Will brought the lamp. The big man cracked it open and a wisp of a woman slid through, a long drab cloak wrapped around her, the corner peaked up to cover her head. As she pulled back the hood a frock of scarlet curls tumbled out. Fynn welcomed her, “Evening Gladys, did you have any trouble?”

She untangled herself from the robe and put it in Fynn’s outstretched hand. “None to speak of, it’s an easy walk if you know the right way. How are you Will?” She nodded to the host and gave her cousin a quick hug. “Having any luck with the Library?”

Will stood a foot taller than her and looked down at the top of her head when they hugged. “A copy of all the pertinent stuff should be on my doorstep by now. You can pick it up tonight if you have time.” They separated and Fynn ushered them to the padded seats in the corner of the room while he hung up Glady’s cloak. “I spoke to the seamstress too, we’re all set for delivery tomorrow.”

They sat next to one another “Good, we’ve almost got everything. Fynn, I brought a list for you…” she dug in her pocket, “but I don’t know where I put it.” Will looked up and saw Fynn holding his cup in one hand and a slip of paper in the other.

“Is this it? It fell out of your cloak.” He handed it to her. “Would you like a drink? There are some leftovers too if you’re hungry.” She handed the note back to him and nodded.

“Yes, yes on all accounts. That’s a list of what I need from you Fynn, and I’ll eat whatever’s handy, I’m guessing you have beer?” The list seemed to baffle Fynn but he looked up and nodded, then went off into the kitchen.

Will leaned toward her, “So what else do you need?” She paused until she could hear the machinist’s boot steps on the kitchen floor.

“Powder is the only thing missing, provided Fynn and your seamstress friend can both come through for us.” She leaned back and sighed. “We’ll need to stop and get those notes, and go scavenging for the powder tomorrow. Fynn can likely get those parts built in a day. Hopefully, he can get them dropped off tomorrow evening, but more likely the next morning.” She leaned forward again, tired but excited. “When is she dropping off the parachutes?”

Will held up his hands, “Whoa whoa, scavenging? You remember last time, right? Nearly eaten by a snake, shed collapsing all around us, spending a night in a tree, and then the scavenger tried to double his fee?” He counted off the calamities on his fingers. “No, we need to hire someone for that.” He held his hands out again, showing her his palms to emphasize his desire to be hands-off.

Gladys leaned in toward him now. “Will, he doubled his fee because he lost an eye! We have to go with them, or else they’ll bring back the first black dirt they find and charge double. We have to know that it still burns. I don’t intend to spend a gold on a sack full of mold.”

Will could see nothing but disaster in going out. “It’s too dangerous, we nearly got killed last time. We’d need an army to do it without risking our necks.” Will looked up and quit speaking as Fynn returned. The Machinist set down Gladys’ plate and two beers on the card table then scooped up the cards and score sheet, putting them in their place on the shelf.

“Thank you, Fynn.” Gladys stood up from the couch and gently touched his elbow. “It looks great.” She sat where he put the plate, flashing her big blue eyes and a perfect smile at him. Fynn pulled up another chair next to hers.

“My pleasure, I hope it tastes good.” He seemed to want to keep talking but instead took a short sip. He watched Will move from the cushioned seats to the card table. His face changed visibly as his thoughts shifted. He turned back to Gladys. “So, about this list.” He fished the paper out of the pocket on his overalls. “There have been a few questions lately about charging this to your father.”

She washed a mouthful of bug meat down with her beer. “He’s still paying, right?”

“He is, but the Society accountants are more and more reluctant to process it. That’s what I hear from the ladies in the office anyway.” Fynn took another sip. “I’m just letting you know, people are asking questions. That’s all.” Now his beard parted and he smiled at her. Her smile looked decidedly better, no contest.

She wiggled her button nose and showed her smile again, just to prove it. “Fynn, get me this order and I’ll have all the answers for them.” She took another bite but looked back up at him.

“I will, but it is you’re biggest yet. When do you need it?” He ran his hand through his curly black hair, then stopped halfway through to pull on it.

She didn’t do anything to soften the deadline. “Tomorrow night, at the latest.” Fynn made a noise like he’d stubbed his toe. “And Fynn, after you turn in the order tomorrow, I need you to take the day off and come with me.”

Will finally caught on to her plan, but he did not like it. “Hold on a minute, come with you where?” Her cousin protested. “You’re not thinking of going into the old town just the two of you. Are you?”

She barely glanced at Will. “Of course not, you’ll be with us.” She looked back at Fynn over her beer. “I need your help Fynn.” She took a sip while Will tried to formulate his next argument.

“Help with what?” Fynn cocked his head slowly like he had a crick in his neck, but Gladys moved on.

“I need a kilo of black powder, well, not literally a kilo, but as many grams as I can get. The only place to get it is in the abandoned old town. We’ll have to hire a scavenger, take my cart and find some. I need someone strong to help load it, and someone big to make sure the scavenger stays honest. Someone we can trust; trust not to steal from us and trust not to tell the whole world about our little project. Fynn, you’re that someone. Please, do you think you can get off tomorrow?” Gladys usually didn’t play the damsel card, but she could certainly do a good job of it.

Fynn surprised Will with his business-like response. “I’m not scheduled to work tomorrow, that’s not a problem. But which scavenger are you going with?” He raised his black brows as Gladys wiped her plate with a slice of the sourdough Fynn denied Will.

Will wisely chose not to pursue the bread issue at the moment. “No, Fynn, have you ever been out of the city? You can’t be talking about this, it’s…It won’t.” Will thought his argument was well formulated, but he lost the recipe mid-sentence. Gladys’ was spot on.

“Anyone but Patch McGuire.” She held her cup in the air as if toasting. “Do you know someone?” She drank a big gulp.

“Yes, but I’m not sure if he’ll be available.” Fynn looked at Will, still grasping for a reasonable protest, then back to Gladys. He got a goofy grin on his face, all the more comical for the hulk attached to it. “I can figure something out though. I’ll meet you at the docks at eight. On the west side, behind the wall. Sound good?”

“Sounds great!” She drained the beer and jumped up in one quick motion. “Thank you so much, Fynn.” She gave Fynn a quick hug, then hopped over to her cloak. “But I’ve got a ton to do before we meet in the morning. Thanks for the dinner, it was great.” She wrapped herself up in a flurry of movement. “You coming, Will?” Will lumbered to his feet as well.

“Fynn, you don’t have to let her talk you into this, we could hire someone.” Fynn stood too and he shook Will’s hand.

“I said I’d figure it out, don’t worry so much Will. We’ll get your cousin her magic powder and be back before lunch.” Will lacked his confidence, but Gladys already held the door open.

“We’ll see you tomorrow Fynn, thanks again, for everything.” She motioned Will out and Fynn watched them as they went out the main door. They walked in silence for a block toward the university. Then Will finally put enough words together with enough courage.

“It probably isn’t wise to fool with the affections of a man the size of Fynn Bowman. If he gets mad, he could throw you higher than any airplane.” They turned down a narrow footpath of an alley that would let them out on Valentina Street.

“That is false. My airplane will most certainly travel higher than Fynn could throw anything, especially me.” She teased him. “Besides, Fynn wouldn’t hurt a nat. He is a builder, it’s not in his nature to do harm. He wants to help.” The clock bells began to ring in the distance, ten o’clock. “And, it probably isn’t wise for Fynn to associate with a suspected witch, but that doesn’t stop him, so we may as well be unwise together.“ As the university came into sight, Will began to wonder if he misread the situation, for the fifth time since dinner.