The Pinkerton Files Five-Book Bundle (32 page)

“The aircraft is the weapon, Allan.”

I might have guessed. Something is happening. The flyer is spinning
faster.

“The hull will expand now. It will get thinner and use its own momentum
to harden the outer shell.”

It is tilting toward the port at a sharp angle. What is he doing?

“Robert is using his counting device to aim.”

Aim at what? Mercy! The flyer has plunged into the canal channel. It
hit ground like a hatchet coming down on a butcher's block.

“If luck is with us, the hull will drive deep into the canal port.”

The flyer is swelling like a balloon filling with air.

“Steam chambers are engaged. Good. They will fill the space between
both halves of the hull.”

The aircraft looks as hard and round as a billiard ball now. It is many
times its initial size. Only a small portion of the sphere is visible above the
ground. It is turning the earth over like a till. Nearby buildings are falling
over. Port installations tip into the river. Still, the flyer expands. Spurts
of water from the canal are pushing through. They are bursting past the steel
sphere in jets. An enormous amount of pressure must be building.

“This is what Robert believed would happen. Pressure from the channel
will continue to build.”

An explosion. The shoreline has been obliterated. A column of water is
surging out of the channel. The canal port is gone. Robert's flyer has been
launched like a cannon shot. Water has arced up from the crater left behind.
The huge wave gets wider as it stretches over the city grid.

“We cannot save the whole city, Allan. However, that crater will pump
enough water to salvage some of it. Pressure inside the canal is doing the work
for us.”

Robert is in a freefall. The sphere is deflating fast.

“He will need to bring it under control in a hurry.”

His life depends on that counting device. He wagered everything on it.
I was wrong to say a person cannot feel betrayed by a machine. It is madness
but, should my son crash into the burning city, I will feel betrayed.

The two halves of the flyer are flattening again. The woven hull is
coming back together. Robert's descent is slowing. The one round wing is
fluttering like a flag in the wind. It catches hold of rising heat. The flyer
is motionless. Is it stalled? No. It falls then catches another gust. He is
climbing again, Thaddeus! The flyer is fluttering back to the Protocol. Is the
platform extended?

“Yes.”

I see. He is settling onto it. The flyer is spinning on the drawbridge.

“I will send a module around to collect you, Allan. I trust you will
want to see your son as soon as he docks.”

Yes, Thaddeus. Yes indeed.

Whatever lives are saved today will be thanks to Robert and that
device. What does it mean to thank a machine? I suppose I will find out.

*   *   *

Repository Note:

The letter I received from New Carthage was an expression of concern.
The man who invited me to visit his library so he could share his personal
archive of Pinkerton recordings wanted to be sure I was okay. Of all the things
that made me angry about Hirsch and the cops keeping that letter from me, this
stung the worst. A man I hardly knew had been the only one civilized enough to
have an honest worry for me and my colleagues. Police stole that from me. To be
fair, I could see why the rest of the letter interested them so much.

The man in New Carthage knew why the bombing took place. That much was
implied. He said I was the most recent victim of a mistake made a long time
ago. There were no other details but he obviously knew more. Hirsch asked if I
would be willing to press him for information. He told me that bigger issues
were starting to loom over the case. If the bomber was tied to New Carthage in
some way, the attack could aggravate tensions always simmering between America
and the former slave republic. If we didn't get some answers, speculation and
paranoia could spiral. There might end up being what Hirsch called an
incident
.

Hirsch also asked about a name cited near the end of the letter:
Pattmore. Who was that, Hirsch asked? I laughed. My guardian officer must not
have been a very good student in high school. Pattmore was the Congressman who
took charge in New York after the fire of 1861. Infamously, he was the one who
lobbied for slavery to be legalized throughout America. He claimed that was the
only way to end hostilities between north and south. He was murdered. It was
all quite famous.

But, wait. Wasn't Pattmore the man having an affair with Pinkerton's
client? Or his wife? Or something? I couldn't quite remember. Did Allan take
that case in the end? The audio record ends without making it clear. History
books claim that Pattmore was murdered because of his stand on slavery. The
letter from New Carthage talks about a mistake, something that happened a long
time ago and was connected to the bombing.

I told Hirsch to count me in. I am going back to New Carthage.

—Diane Larimer, Chief Archivist, United States Library of Congress

The Boatman and the Traitor © 2014 by David Luchuk
Published by Joe Books Inc.

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