Madeline turned on her heel. Before she went back to her room as commanded, she said to the nurse, “You should speak with her. She will interfere with him, if she can.” And then shortly, she was gone.
A second nurse, an older woman in a billowing gray uniform that spoke of her rank, joined the first and said, “Anne, was there a problem with Madeline?”
“Not anymore,” she said, and then before Maria could offer her greetings she continued, “This is Maria, and she’s here to see about a job. I was only now going to speak with her, and see if we might have a position open. But we need to sit down and chat, and see what sort of employment might best suit her.”
The older woman cast Maria the same gaze she might’ve used to appraise a mule, and she said, “She’s got good height on her, and she looks sturdy. We’ll have to cover that better,” she gestured at Maria’s cleavage. “Some of the male patients can scarcely spot a knuckle without improper arousal and inappropriate behavior. This having been said, Anne, I trust you to assess her and assign her. I’m going to go make sure Madeline is where she ought to be. She’s a real pill, that one. You never can tell.”
“It’s a fact,” Anne murmured an agreement. “And thank you, Mrs. Hendricks. Come with me, Maria,” she said curtly. “We can have this conversation in the nurse’s sitting area, where it’s more private.”
Maria retrieved her bag and followed behind Anne, past the nurse’s station where the women gathered together and chattered like hens in their voluminous skirts and serious faces. They walked together past a laundry room where bundles of linens hung from the ceiling in bags as big as small boats, waiting to be emptied, sorted, and dried. Beyond the kitchen rooms they strolled, and around a final bend in the corridor until they’d reached a lounge that was empty except for a green-eyed cat who yawned, stretched, and ignored them.
Anne motioned for Maria to take a seat on the nearest padded bench, and then she positioned herself across from her, where she could lean in close and speak softly. She said, “You aren’t here to work with him, are you? You wouldn’t, I mean. Not for a man like that. Not against Danville, I don’t think.”
“You may safely assume it,” Maria told her. “Your accent, I can’t place it as precisely as I’d like, but I must guess you’re a native of Florida, or southern Georgia. Am I close?”
“Valdosta,” the blonde nurse said. “You’ve got an ear for it, don’t you?”
“So I’ve been told. And in the interest of utter honesty, I’m no longer acting in any official capacity on behalf of the Confederacy-which was not a decision of mine, I assure you. I’ve been cut loose and sent on my way, but my loyalties remain. And those loyalties bring me here, to a military scientist with a terrible project. This Ossian Steen is preparing to destroy my native land, and I wish to…” she searched for Madeline’s word and used it. “Interfere.”
Nurse Anne nodded hard and said, “Yes, good. Yes, I’d love to see it-and not only for myself, or for the Southern cause, or for any grand ethical pursuit.”
“Then why?”
“Because Steen is a wicked bastard. A fiend, and worse-but stronger language I’d shudder to deploy in front of the cat. He’s cruel and vile, and…”
Maria suggested, “Revolting? I understand he’s creating a weapon, applying his scientific prowess to ungodly research, and to the creation of a solar cannon that he intends to fire on our capital.”
“That’s true,” Anne said, “Though I think you’ve got him a bit confused, or doubled up. Steen isn’t a scientist, himself. He’s a bully and a thug, and a manipulator.”
“I don’t understand…?”
Anne hopped to her feet. “I’ll show you. Come with me. But don’t touch anything, and if any of the patients try to touch you, do your best to prevent them. They aren’t allowed to take liberties, though the prohibition doesn’t do much to stop them, sometimes.”
The nurse hastily led Maria down another hallway littered with medical detritus-bedpans, medicine trays, and assorted straps or other restraints. As they walked, Maria sought to clarify, “This is a hospital for the mentally afflicted, isn’t that right?”
“That’s right,” Anne said. “We’ve only been open for a year or two.”
“I thought perhaps this was only a cover for a weapons laboratory. Or so the intelligence I’d received implied as much.”
“That’s funny,” Anne said without any humor. “Down here.” She indicated a set of stairs leading down to the basement, and with a gentle lift of her skirts, she skipped down the steps to a door, which she opened.
She called out, “Doctor Smeeks? Doctor Smeeks, I’ve brought you a visitor.”
From within, they were answered by a thin voice stretched thinner still by exhaustion. It asked, “A visitor?”
“Yes, Doctor Smeeks. It’s me, Anne.” She motioned at Maria, drawing her down into the basement. “And this is Maria. She’s…she’s…” Unable to think of anything better or more concise, she finished, “She’s here to help.”
“Help?”
“Yes sir,” Maria said before she even saw the speaker. “Please, could I…” she looked to Anne for approval, and received it. “Could I speak with you?”
The nurse squeezed Maria’s elbow and whispered, “I beg you, be gentle.”
He crept around a table like a nervous rodent, eyeing Maria and Anne both with open suspicion. Doctor Smeeks was a white-haired man of an age past seventy, with loose-fitting clothes, a frazzled expression, and a pair of jeweler’s lenses strapped across his forehead. He said, “Hello?” and wrung his hands together. “Oh, Anne. You’re alone. Or rather, you’re not alone, but you’re not…you haven’t brought Steen. Or, or. Or the boy,” he added sadly.
“Sir,” Anne came forward to take his arm, leading him forward to meet Maria. “Sir, I’m so very sorry, but no. However, this is Maria-”
“And she’s here to help?”
“She’s here to help. Would you show her your work? She’s very interested in what you’re doing down here, and I promise you,” she added into his ear. “She is no friend of Steen’s.”
“No friend of…that man. What was his name again? Anne, I can’t remember his name.”
“Steen, sir. And it’s all right, don’t worry yourself. Just, could you show us your work?”
“My work?”
“Yes sir, your work. Will you give us a tour of your most recent piece? Remember it, sir? The one you’re building in order to bring back Edwin.” She patted his forearm and he nodded.
“For Edwin.” He glared up at Maria. “The army man. He took my assistant,” his lip trembled. “A fine assistant, and a nice boy. He took him away from me, and I do believe he intends to harm the child if I can’t…if I don’t…”
He twisted his fingers into knots.
“Please, come this way.” He led the women deeper into his laboratory-a dark place brightened by lanterns, lamps, and the few thin windows that ran the length of the wall’s eastern rim. Glass containers of a thousand shapes, sizes, and purposes were stacked and piled from table to table, and tubes made of copper, tin, and steel were bundled like sticks for a fire. The floor was coated with papers covered in tiny, scratchy handwritten notes; and from the ceiling hung models of projects that had been, and projects that were yet to come.
But in the back corner, underneath the longest stretch of skinny window with watery gray afternoon light spilling down into the basement, sat a device almost as massive as the Valkyrie’s primary engine. It had been constructed of pipes, pans, and a vast array of complicated lenses, and it looked like a cross between a microscope and a telescope, melded with the steel-framed corpse of a suspension bridge.