Charles Sheffield - The Amazing Dr. Darwin

“Naturally. I walked down to his house this morning and told him that, as a noted inventor from the Midlands, you would be devastated were you to visit Dorset and depart without an opportunity to see the famous calculating engine at work.”

“Was there hesitation on his part?”

“Not the slightest. He told me that he will be very busy for the next two weeks, exhibiting the engine, but at the moment he has time to breathe. He will be delighted to come here tonight after dinner, when he will show you the machine at work and allow you to propound your own mathematical questions. We can expect him, and his machine, within the hour. I freely admit to you, I do not share his delight at the prospect of his visiting Newlands. I am still convinced that he is doing my sister some terrible harm.”

“Whatever harm is being done here, I am not yet ready to blame Professor Riker.”

“Harm? Harm?” Jacob Pole, bustling in with his fingers and the tip of his nose a rosy pink, headed for the fireplace. He lifted the tail of his long coat, allowing the warmth from the blazing logs to irradiate his buttocks and the backs of his legs. “Welcome to Dorset, ’Rasmus. It’s a raw and foggy night out there. I’ll tell you one thing, if anyone comes to harm from all this it will be me. Tom can vouch for it, I’ve been out in all hours and all weathers, chilblains on my fingers and now scorch marks on my backside. I’m glad to be in for the night.”

Darwin glanced at Thomas Solborne and sat down at the side table for a predinner snack. It did not seem like the best moment to mention that Jacob, if Darwin’s plans held good, was likely to be outside again before the evening was out.

The calculating engine corresponded exactly to Helen Solborne’s drawing. Riker had requested that the demonstration begin as soon as possible after dinner, “Since I have business tonight in Abbotsbury that cannot easily be delayed.”

Two of the male staff of Newlands had carried the heavy rectangular box into one end of the dining room, grunting with effort, while Anton Riker hovered over them and told them twenty times that the engine must not under any circumstances be dropped.

Once the machine was in position, Riker called his audience’s attention to the main features. The top, two feet wide and three feet deep, was of smooth hardwood coated with black lacquer. Two separate sets of nine levers were hinged at the upper surface. One additional lever allowed the operator to define the desired operation. All the levers projected upwards to form handles, and also continued below the surface, where their articulated brass rods were visible through the transparent glass sides of the engine. Riker demonstrated the action, moving a lever to one of its ten possible settings. As he did so the corresponding brass arm, jointed in two places, pushed into the opaque base of the engine. The base was roughly one foot deep, and each arm penetrated smoothly into its own separate slit in its upper surface.

There was one more slit in the base of the engine. It was very narrow and about two inches wide, no more than six inches from the ground, and it held a strip of cardboard or stiff paper.

The operator stood, or sat on a low stool in front of the machine.

“For example, take this problem,” Riker said, after he had pointed out the different settings. He set the right hand lever of the upper set to the digit 2, and the right hand lever of the lower set to the digit 3. Finally he moved the operations lever to the setting that indicated multiplication. The actions of his skeletally thin fingers were deft and precise, and he hardly seemed to look at what he was doing. After a pause of about twenty seconds, long enough for his audience to become restive, there was a clicking noise from the engine’s base. The strip of cardboard advanced in its position from the side slot. Riker tore it off and held it out to the audience.

Jacob Pole took the stiff paper and stared at the single printed digit. “Six,” he said. “Two times three. Hmph.”

“Not impressed?” Riker raised dark eyebrows. “I agree. We could all do as well, could we not? But come here, please, and sit down.”

Pole, somewhat reluctantly, was installed on the stool.

“Now, enter a number with these.” Riker touched the upper row of levers. “Any number that you like, up to nine figures.”

The colonel, after a moment’s thought, moved the levers to indicate 4-3-2-1.

“Very good. And now, a number with the lower levers.”

“One-two-three-four. Is that all right?”

“Quite suitable. Go ahead. And now, specify an operation.”

“Multiply?”

“Certainly, if that is what you would like. Move the lever.”

There was a sound of metal on metal as the operation lever engaged. This time the silence lasted less than ten seconds. A series of clicks sounded from the base, and another cardboard strip emerged from the slot.

Riker indicated the base, without touching anything. “Tear it off.”

Pole did so, and frowned down at it.

“Read what it says, Colonel Pole.”

“It says, five-three-three-two-one-one-four. But how the devil am I supposed to know if that’s right?”

“It will be correct, Colonel, believe me.” Riker showed total self-confidence. He turned to Darwin. “Doctor, would you perhaps like to perform your own experiments?”

Darwin had been hovering close, like a child forbidden to touch a new toy. He nodded at once.

Pole gave up his seat and retreated to a corner of the room, frowning over the cardboard strip that he held. Darwin took Pole’s place, his broad rump overflowing the sides of the stool. He employed each feature of the engine systematically, one after another. He paid particular attention to the length of the pause that followed each problem, and he studied the printed output carefully as it emerged.

“It’s right!” Pole returned from the corner, where he had been scribbling on the slip of stiff paper. “Damme, I checked the answer by hand, and every digit is just as it should be. Professor, it’s amazing.”

“Would it not be stranger, Colonel Pole, if most were right and one was wrong?”

“But how the devil does it do it?”

Riker smiled indulgently. “That, sir, must remain my secret. Let me say that no clock maker in Europe—no, in all the world—is able to construct its like.” He turned to Darwin. “Your hosts have seen the engine in operation before, several times. Do you have questions?”

Darwin shook his head and hunched low on the stool.

“Then with your permission.” Riker addressed the waiting menservants. “Take the engine and place it on my gig—and carefully.” Then, to the Solbornes and their visitors, “I must be on my way to Abbotsbury, as soon as the calculating engine is safely housed. My apologies if I do not stay longer.”

The heavy machine was hauled downstairs and loaded carefully on board Riker’s waiting gig. The professor bade goodnight to Darwin, who had followed him downstairs, and drove off. Darwin frowned after the light carriage, listening to the fading sound of the horse’s hooves on the gravel. The fog of early evening had cleared, giving way to a faint and eerie sea-mist that came and went at random.

Solborne was waiting anxiously when he went back upstairs.

“Well?”

“Where is your sister?”

“She has retired to her rooms, probably for the night. She pleads fatigue. But what of Riker?”

“I agree with you. He is not at all what he pretends to be.”

“You mean, he is a—a—”

“I do not mean that he is a vampire. He is something much more ordinary, and possibly far more dangerous.”

“But my sister—when he was here, did you not see the change in her? She gazed at him steadily, and she did not speak one word.”