Clockwork Canada Page 6

  When she saw Henry, she said, “I want you to put in a short day today. Take a nap in the afternoon. You’re our new night watchman.” She handed him a familiar-looking nickel-plated revolver. “Pick up some ammunition for this. It probably needs a good cleaning, too. I don’t think that oaf took very good care of it.” She grinned. “If they keep dropping guns for us, we’ll have quite an arsenal soon.”

  He bought a pouch of lead bullets, some powder, and a box of percussion caps, and hiked to the outskirts of the city. He fired off half a dozen practice rounds, wincing at the noise the gun made, and reloaded. His aim was bad, the gun felt clumsy in his hand, and reloading took forever. Being on the edge of the forest reminded him of the life he had given up, and he was in a bleak mood by the time he returned home. The night was going to be cold, lonely, and dull. Until French Murphy’s men came back and finished him off.

  He wasn’t looking forward to it.

  * * *

  Three days later he was almost resigned to his new position. He was finally able to sleep during the day, so he no longer spent the nights yawning. The factory building had a roof, and there was a little wood stove big enough to keep the office at the end of the building warm. That took care of his creature comforts. He prowled the factory floor, looking for a cure to his boredom.

  He found a machine shop. There were lathes and bending machines and cutters, everything you would need to repair or create a tool for the mill’s machines. He strolled up and down, thinking of the possibilities, thinking about what a man could do if he’d didn’t like guns and couldn’t use a bow.

  When he arrived the next night, the stove was cold and there was a fire banked in the boiler. “Keep it warm, please,”

  Alice told him as she left. “We need the gears turning tomorrow while we set up the Ginny.”

  By midnight he was standing in a pile of brass shavings watching a steam-powered harpoon launcher take shape.

  Over the course of the next week he constructed his weapon. The first design, a brass tube with a hole down the centre for a harpoon, was a dismal failure. It would lob a three-foot wooden spear slightly farther than he could throw it, at which point the pressurized air in the cylinder was exhausted. He finally settled on a brass tank that he wore strapped to his back. The factory boiler had the power to compress air to the point where he feared the tank would explode. A rubber hose connected the tank to a hand-held launcher that fired a harpoon with enough force that the harpoon shattered when he fired it into the side of the boiler. The tank held enough pressure for a dozen good shots.

  He had some ideas for a backup launcher, a spring-powered device that he could reset by cranking. It would need to be reset after every shot, but it would never run out of air. Before he could work out the details, though, fate caught up with him in the form of another raid.

  The attack took place just after sunset. The target this time was a sawmill a couple of streets over. Henry heard shouts and screams in the distance, and he weighed his options, then ran to get his things. He had a dark coat, reinforced on the shoulders and elbows and along the forearms, and a cloth mask that covered his entire head. He strapped the tank to his back, shoved harpoons into the quivers on either side, and set off at a run.

  The mill was on fire by the time he arrived. There was a canal close by, and dark figures lurched back and forth near the water’s edge. Men cast giant shadows as they fought around the bulk of a pump beside the canal. Not satisfied with torching the building, the gang was trying to stop the gathering crowd from fighting the fire.

  The mob was smaller this time, but the quality seemed to be higher. There was no Archie, no cowardly wharf rats. Six or eight men, brawny figures with determination in every line of their bodies, formed a ring around the pump and held back a belligerent crowd of locals. One man kept the mob together – a tall, broad-shouldered figure in a long dark coat and a white mask. The mask glowed in the light of the burning mill, giving the man an unearthly look that lifted the hairs on the back of Henry’s neck.

  “French Murphy,” he muttered. “You bastard. It’s time for you to pay your tab.” He flexed the fingers of his mangled right hand and charged into the fray.

  The harpoon launcher, he was dismayed to learn, was impossible to use with a crowd of civilians in the way. He shoved his way through the crowd, and when he reached the front he used the launcher as a bludgeon, clubbing down the first masked thug he saw. He could see the bulk of French Murphy a dozen paces away, just one masked figure in the way, and Henry started toward him, lifting the harpoon launcher in his hands, snarling under his cloth hood.

  A rustle of movement behind him and a grunt of effort were the only warnings he got. Pain exploded through the back of his head, he felt cool grass against his hands, the world spun around him in a kaleidoscope of fractured colours, and then a blast of cold water snapped him back to full consciousness.

  Water filled his mouth and coughs shook his body as dirty water trickled into his lungs. He squirmed and thrashed, arms flailing, utterly disoriented. He was on his back, submerged in dirty water, the surface a pale curtain above him. He tried to rise, to turn, but the weight of the canister on his back held him pinned. His fingers, clumsy in the cold water, went to the straps across his chest.

  He couldn’t budge them.

  The urge to breathe was overwhelming. He pressed his lips together, fighting a rising panic, his whole body convulsing with the need to inhale. Then the surface exploded into ripples as something splashed into the water. He saw legs beside him, then a pair of strong brown arms. A moment later his head broke the surface.

  He was in the canal, with Typhoon standing over him, holding his head and shoulders above the surface. The water was barely past waist-deep, and Henry soon got his feet under him. With Typhoon’s help he trudged up the bank and onto dry ground.

  Crusher stood with steel hands planted on vast metal hips, watching the last of the mob disperse. A crowd of people worked the water pump while others played a hose over the wall of the mill. The fire was nearly out.

  “Come to Justice Wagon,” Typhoon murmured into Henry’s ear. “We need to talk.”

  * * *

  “That should do it,” Dan Carter said. Without the steam-powered suit he was an unassuming middle-aged man confined to a wheelchair. His body was strangely out of proportion, with broad shoulders and a thick chest that didn’t go with his withered, stick-like legs. “Now you’ve got something for close-range fighting.”

  Henry looked down at his hands. He wore black leather gloves with copper disks attached to the palms. There was a capacitor strapped over his heart, able to hold enough charge to knock a man off of his feet. He could insert a hand crank into the capacitor to recharge it.

  “I talked it over with Wu,” Carter said. Wu Lee was Typhoon’s real name. Or perhaps it was Lee Wu. Henry still didn’t have it quite straight.

  “We think now is the time to go after this French Murphy character you told us about.” He glanced out the window of his sprawling, extravagant house, where dawn was lightening the sky. “He’ll be in bed. Sound asleep, if we’re lucky. But honest citizens will be off of the street and out of harm’s way.” Carter stretched and yawned. “What do you think? Are you ready for another dust-up?”

  Henry flexed his fingers in the leather gloves and checked that the capacitor switch was open. It was safe to touch things until the switch was closed. “I’m ready,” he said. “God only knows what Murphy will get up to if we give him another day.”

  “Splendid.” Carter moved his hands to the wheels of the chair. “I’ll need you to help me into the suit. We can do it on the road. Wu will drive.”

  * * *

  They hit Murphy’s house at six in the morning. Henry’s job was to cover the back door, and he crouched in the garden with a harpoon gun in his hands, listening to the crash of wood as Crusher demolished the front door. Henry heard loud cries and sounds of breaking furniture, then a stealthy metallic rasp as a window on the
back of the house slid open. A freckled leg appeared on the sill, and a bulky form came sliding out. A dirty yellow nightshirt covered the man, and Henry smiled to himself as he took careful aim.

  The harpoon missed the inside of French Murphy’s leg by a couple of inches, punching through a loose flap of nightshirt between his thighs and sinking into the wall of the house. Murphy, in the middle of dropping out the window, had to clutch the windowsill and balance on one leg, the other leg resting on the shaft of the harpoon. He reached down to tear at the hem of his nightshirt.

  “I wouldn’t do that, Murph,” Henry said, making his voice low and gravelly to disguise it. “I have more harpoons.”

  The gangster gave him a red-faced glare over one beefy shoulder. The back door swung open, Typhoon stepped out, and Murphy grabbed the windowsill in both hands. His night-shirt tore as he sprang back into the house.

  Three gunshots rang out. By the time Henry made it to the window it was over. French Murphy lay sprawled on his kitchen floor, a small hole in the fabric over his heart. There was a pistol in his hand and an expression of startled dismay on his face. His legs were twitching, and they went still as Henry watched.

  Typhoon stepped into the room. “What happen?”

  “He caught a bad ricochet,” Crusher said. “Damned fool. Let’s get out of here.”

  * * *

  When Henry showed up for work that evening he was expecting a quiet shift. Alice greeted him with a cheerful smile. “We may not need you much longer, Henry,” she said. “Things are changing in this town. Look, we’ve put in an alarm bell.” She gestured at the wall of the mill. “Haul on that rope if there’s any trouble.”

  Henry gave the rope a dubious glance. “All right…”

  “Don’t worry,” she said, “someone will come. Things are changing, I tell you. The mayor called an emergency meeting this morning. They’re putting together a task force to deal with these mobs. His Worship has decided that enough’s enough.” She grinned. “About time, too. We’ve been spreading the word in the neighbourhood. There’ll be a bell like this in every mill in Gastown by the end of the week. You ring it and half the neighbourhood will come running. And if you hear a bell from some other mill, wherever you are, you go running too. Right?”

  “Uh, right.”

  She clapped him on the shoulder. “Good man. There’s talk of incorporating Gastown as a city, and getting a proper police department. The mobs won’t be running things for much longer, you mark my words.”

  * * *

  He was tinkering with the capacitor weapon an hour later when a voice from outside the mill made him look up. Shadows moved on the wall in front of him, and he stiffened. Either a bird had flown in front of the nearest streetlight, or there was someone outside with a lantern.

  Henry ran to the window and peered outside. And swore.

  Torches flickered in the hands of a small crowd outside.

  He pulled on the long coat, strapped on the pressurized tank, and hurried for the door, pulling his mask on as he went. The capacitor, due to his tinkering, was discharged. He’d have to rely on harpoons and the strength of his arms. He thought about the bell. If he rang the thing, the Harpoonist would have to explain the absence of Henry McClane, night watchman.

  He shrugged. So be it. Shutting down the mob once and for all had to take priority.

  A kick sent the door flying open, and he stepped outside. And froze, superstitious terror sending icy fingers across his skin.

  It was French Murphy, surrounded by four of his hired thugs.

  “No…” Henry shook his head. What he was seeing wasn’t French Murphy. It was simply a big man with a white mask. There was no magic here, no wizardry. Just a bully who was about to get a bloody nose.

  He headed along the wall of the mill, and one of the torchbearers raised a pointing arm. All five men came toward him as Henry reached the bell. He hauled on the dangling rope, heard the bell peal loud across the dark neighbourhood, and then he let go of the rope and turned his attention to the harpoon launcher in his hands.

  The closest man was a dozen paces away when a thick wooden harpoon with a blunt end caught him in the pit of the stomach. He folded up with a hoarse grunt and Henry shoved another blunt-tipped missile into the launcher. The next man was no more than half a dozen paces away when Henry fired again. The man threw a hand up to protect himself, and the harpoon broke two of his fingers without slowing. The missile slammed into the man’s rib cage with an echoing sound that was as startling as it was horrible, and the man screamed as he doubled over.

  One man threw down his torch and ran. The remaining thug froze, and the big man in the white mask grabbed him by the shoulder of his coat. “Come on! We can finish this!”

  Henry, his eyes on the men, grabbled blindly for another harpoon. He could feel that this missile was smaller, a slender steel shaft with a barbed metal tip. He raised the launcher, took aim at the big man’s chest, then lowered the muzzle of the launcher and fired.

  The barb tore through the big man’s foot and pinned him to the ground. He screamed, and the thug beside him took off running. There were people gathering between the buildings, women with lanterns, men with cricket bats and hammers, and the running man circled wide around them, throwing down his torch.

  For a time there was a confused crowd jumbled together on the lawn and street in front of the mill. No one seemed to know quite what to do. A thug with a bandana over his mouth and nose rose gingerly from the grass, pressing a hand to his ribs. Henry stepped forward, raising the harpoon launcher like a club, and the man shrank back down.

  Alice pushed her way through the crowd, and order formed from chaos in her wake. She marched up to Henry, looked him up and down, then turned to the tall man in the white mask. He was moaning, stooped over, hands clutching his leg. It made him short enough that she could drag the mask from his face.

  The man was in his fifties, with white hair and a craggy face that looked aristocratic and severe through the pain. Henry had never seen him before, but Alice gasped. “Joseph Cottonwood! You miserable bastard! You mean that’s what all this has been about? You wanted to shut down your competition?”

  Beside Cottonwood a dark shape moved in the shadows, and Alice pounced. The man Henry had shot in the stomach was trying to crawl into the darkness, and Alice booted him in the ribs, then hauled him back by the collar and dumped him beside Cottonwood’s feet. “You’re not going anywhere.”

  A whistle blew in the distance, a sure sign that the constable was on his way, and Henry edged back from the crowd. He reached the wall of the mill and set off at a brisk pace, heading for the nearest corner and the chance to disappear.

  Alice caught up with him just around the corner. “Henry?” she said. “It’s you, isn’t it? What in Hell are you playing at?”

  “Keep it down,” he muttered. “And keep it to yourself.”

  She planted hands on her hips. “Are you barmy?”

  Henry shook his head. “So long as the mysterious masked Harpoonist is behind this, no one’s going to come after Henry McClane, or Alice O’Reilly.”

  She scowled up at him. “I can take care of myself.”

  “Sure,” he said. “And when they burn your boarding house down around your ears, and some of the people make it out alive, and some don’t?”

  The scowl slowly faded.

  “You don’t know who the Harpoonist is,” he said. “The Harpoonist did this, and then he faded into the night. Understand?”

  Slowly, reluctantly, she nodded.

  “Now boost me through a window,” he said. “I need to get out of this outfit.”

  When her fingers were laced together and he was scrabbling for the sill of a window she grunted and said, “Will you still work for the mill? Or will there be more of this masked crime fighter business?”

  He got the window open and hooked a leg over the sill, taking the weight off of her hands. “I don’t know,” he admitted. “Maybe when Gastown is a city there
won’t be any more need for people like me.” He thought of Crusher and Typhoon and their lonely crusade. “People like us.” He shook his head. “I’ve got a feeling, though, that crime will just get worse.”

  “It doesn’t mean you have to do something about it,” she pointed out.

  He looked down at his right hand, the scars hidden by the glove. It felt good to be the Harpoonist. To hold back a mob. To look past his bitterness and self-pity for a change. To do what was right. There was no way to tell Alice how he felt. What could he say? That he’d saved more than a mill tonight? That he’d saved himself? He didn’t need her laughing in his face.

  “I’d like to just work at the mill in peace,” he told her, and it was largely true. “But if the city needs me, I’ll answer the call.” And he dropped inside and closed the window.

  CREW 255

  CLAIRE HUMPHREY

  Emiliana’s first sight of Toronto was the crater. No longer smoking, ten days after the wreck, but ash still drifted like fine snow in the draft of the airship’s propellers. Emiliana saw the ghostly foundations of some of the buildings that had been – or maybe the curbs of streets – straight lines here and there laid bare amid the rubble and the windblown char.

  “Our boys on the ground have moved a thousand trainloads of brick already,” said the young man in the next seat over; he was called Manuel, unofficial leader of a dozen fellows from the same Azorean village. “I was worried they wouldn’t leave us any,” he added, and all his lads laughed and elbowed each other.

  They were squeezed onto narrow fold-down bench seats, butted right up against the inner curve of the airship’s passenger compartment, these dozen wide-shouldered lads, their heads ducked uncomfortably or hooked over each other’s shoulders like they were all puppies from the same litter. Emiliana, at the end of the row, looked down at all the heads of dark hair and all the square, tanned hands – not a single hook or grasper among them.