The Rise Of Ransom City Part 22

"No? You will, Professor, you will."

"This is kidnap, Mr. Gates. Let me go. Let her go."

"Don't be childish, Ransom. Now sign this."

What he put in front of me was a letter to the Jasper City Evening Post, announcing that I had taken employment with Mr. Baxter. Not a word about the man's death.

"Sign it."

"I will not."

"Sign it and get ready to speak to your admirers- there's a crowd of 'em outside the tower- sign it or we'll have to take other measures to get rid of 'em."

"Let me see Adela."

"Sign it and we'll see."

For five days after the death of Mr. Baxter, a crowd waited at the foot of the Tower. The last of my true believers- an odd bunch of people, by all accounts. They endured the late summer rain and occasional lightning with the calm patience of obsessives. Some of them were die-hard Jasper City patriots who were still sure I would deliver the Bomb that would ensure Jasper's freedom and preeminence once and for all. Some of them were paranoids with various kinds of delusions. Some of them were my friends my fellow inventors. I know that Mr. Lung was there- the soap-inventor, with whom I'd corresponded- and Mr. Bekman, another correspondent, the inventor of financial instruments- and Mr. Angel Langhorne, the rain-maker. Lung is short and round and round-faced while Bekman is tall and thin and stooped. Mr. Langhorne is of average height and build and in every other respect he is of average appearance, except that he shakes and he stutters and his red-black hair stands up on end like he is being electrified. The Amazing Amaryllis was there too, it touches me to say, in full stage finery and eager to talk to reporters. Together they must have made an odd picture!

Mr. Gates summoned his detectives from far and wide to scare them off but the crowd only grew. Mr. Carson wrote about them- he made a lot of comic business out of Mr. Lung's roundness of body and baldness of head and poor Mr. Angel Langhorne, who as Mr. Carson observed "can no more easily look you in the eye than I"-that is, Mr. Carson- "can stare at the sun."

The crowd grew. Some of them were there to demand my release, and some of them were there to demand that I come out of hiding and explain myself, and some of them were just there to see what would happen. The news of the fighting in the rest of the Territory had been bad all week and I think some of them were expecting the Tower to explode like a big rocket and wanted to be there to see it when it did.

The Tower was sealed. Linesmen came and went by motor-car through the big bra.s.s gates or by Heavier-Than-Air Vessel from the roof, but the clerks and secretaries were as much prisoners as I was. This was by order of the Linesman Mr. Watt, who meant by doing this to keep the news of Mr. Baxter's death a secret. Of course it only attracted more attention.

I do not know who first floated the rumor that Mr. Baxter was dead, but the way Mr. Carson wrote about it in his newspaper was that the crowd all moaned at once and looked up at the cloud-wreathed Tower like they expected it to fall over on them. Even the people who hated Mr. Baxter did not want to see him go- they could hardly imagine Jasper City without him. Some of them ran away like rats while others charged the gate. The ones who ran away commenced to trigger an immediate run on the Jasper City Bank that did more damage to the city than any Bomb yet known to science or sorcery. The ones who charged the gate accomplished nothing except that they provoked the guards into shooting. The Amazing Amaryllis- who I guess was with the gate-chargers though I cannot easily imagine it in a woman of her age- got shot. Subsequently she was carried to hospital by Mr. Lung, among others. Crowds do strange things to people.

The Jasper City Bank locked its doors and posted guards at the vault and on the ornately pedimented rooftop and it hunkered down to defend itself against the public, many of whom were on the verge of open riot. One by one bits of the machinery of Mr. Baxter's Trust failed. The Northern Lighting Corporation fired its workers. Half of the Yards shut down- the workers went home and the killing engines stopped and the cattle were left to starve in their pens. A significant percentage of the detectives deserted, and Mr. Baxter's closest loyalists on the Senate mostly left town or retreated to their mansions on the bluffs. "At this time of Crisis," the Evening Post said, "we are without leadership."

Well, nature abhors a vacuum and so does politics. Scarlet Jen moved to take over. In the first three days after the Jasper City Bank collapsed four Senators- the last of Baxter's loyalists- were murdered. Two died in their beds, one was shot while he gave a speech urging calm, a fourth died when his mansion burned down. On the fourth day Scarlet Jen appeared before a crowd of frightened and angry citizens in Tanager Square, on the steps out front of the Bank. She was wearing a red dress and some accounts have her wearing a hat with a red feather in it- anyhow Gentleman Jim Dark stood smiling at her side, and the Agent Rattlesnake Renner leaned his long thin body against one of the Bank's marble pillars, and scowled and toyed with a knife. I do not know how many other Agents were there.

"You know me," she said.

I have spoken to men who were there. They say she spoke plainly. "You've always known me. This city's known me since before most of you were born. You've always known the score even if you pretended you didn't. You know who's who and who runs things. Well now the time for pretense is over. This city must take sides- us or them. The forces of the Line are coming- you know who I am and you know that I know what I'm talking about. They let Juniper slip from their grasp; they won't let Jasper go too. But they move slow- don't be afraid. We'll take care of you."

"They move slow," Dark said. "You have a week to be ready for them. Will you let them take your city from you? Are you cowards, to roll over like Gibson, or are you sporting men with a bit of fight in you?"

"It's all changed now," Jen said. "The old b.a.s.t.a.r.d's dead and everything's yours for the taking, if you have the b.a.l.l.s for it."

"First we take the Bank," Dark said. "Who's with us?"

Twelve died in the taking of the Jasper City Bank, but the operation succeeded. Coin and bullion were shared among the mob- notes and stock were already worthless. Later that day Dark led the same mob against the gates of Baxter's Tower, without success. Fifteen died. I have no doubt that for Mr. Dark it was all great good fun.

For sixty years there had been a kind of truce in the Territory between Line and Gun. The War was fought on the Rim and in the north but the Territory was spared. That had all begun to change months ago, when word of Liv and Creedmoor's secret weapon got out- and of my Process- oh, why not call it the Bomb. They were not the same thing exactly but I guess there was a lot of confusion on that point- anyhow the great powers of the world wanted both of them. In the scramble to be first to claim control of the weapon the Line broke the truce and seized Gibson City. Then there was the uprising at Juniper City, where Liv and Creedmoor's weapon was deployed for the first time- unless you count the Miracle at White Rock, which I did not, since I do not believe that the Process was the same thing as what Creedmoor and Liv found- anyhow it was at Juniper City that the Angelus Engine was destroyed.

With Baxter's death the Gun moved to consolidate their power in Jasper, and not long after that the Line moved to retake control. It didn't take a week.

The greater part of the Line's armies in the Territory were still camped all the way over by Juniper City, but the Line had been moving elements of its forces into Jasper all summer. On the evening of the second day after Scarlet Jen and Gentleman Jim Dark raided the Bank and handed out spoils to the mob, four Submersible Vessels surfaced out of the River Ja.s.s at the point where the Senate looked out over the sunset-reddened water. Each C.S.V. disgorged a dozen Linesmen, who jumped from the backs of their vehicles onto the Senate's private dock. Two policemen were shot. The Linesmen charged up from the dock and across the Senate's rear lawn and they smashed down the rear doors of the Senate building itself- they have a special device for smashing down doors, that I have never seen in operation and know only by a code-name. There was fighting in the corridors and a few more policemen were shot and the marble busts of who knows how many dead and venerable Senators were smashed in the crossfire before the C.S.V.s deployed the noise-making weapons and pacified the whole street. The Linesmen took down the Jasper City flags and they took the big bra.s.s bull down from the building's dome and they settled in to occupy the Senate. The next morning as flocks of Heavier-Than-Air Vessels flew back and forth between the Senate and Baxter's Tower an officer of the Line by the name of Mr. Lime stood on the Senate's steps and issued a statement, to the effect that the Line had been forced to act to protect its holdings in Jasper and to protect Jasper itself from any further slide into chaos.

Mr. Watt had by that time been shot, as punishment for letting Baxter die. He was replaced by a Mr. Nolt.

The city split three ways- I mean both ideologically and geographically. Some people sided with the Linesmen, some with Jen and Dark, some stood for Jasper against both sides. The Linesmen held Fenimore and Jen and Dark's mob held Hoo Lai and the bluffs and the neutrals held on wherever they could, I guess.

Mr. Nolt came to see me in my cell. He looked just like all the rest of them.

"I won't sign your d.a.m.n letter," I said.

He waved that away. "We're past that, now."

I confess that I was frightened to hear him say that, and part of me wanted to plead No, I've changed my mind, I will come and work for you. I fought back that craven instinct and instead I said, "Where is she?"

He didn't answer. Instead he stood so close to me that I could smell the stale sweat on his collar.

"So you're the one," he said. "You don't look like much."

"Truth is, I don't feel like much right now."

"Well, we need you- I don't like it but we need you. So it's time to shave and shine your shoes and put on a big smile, Ransom. Or else."

"What is there to smile about? That's a question, Officer- what's going on out there?"

They had not been taking the trouble to keep me informed about politics, so I did not know.

"Fighting," he said. He began to pace. "It'll all be over soon. Only a matter of time. We'll take Jasper City- not that we want it, it's a f.u.c.king cesspit, it's squalid beyond belief- but we'll take it back because that's what we do. The fighting won't matter. We have numbers, production, history on our side. Understand? We'll turn this place into a Station within the year, the Engines will come and go. Now listen."

"Where's Adela?"

"What I don't like about you, Mr. Ransom, could fill a whole file. Understand? But the one big thing is that we need you. Numbers, ma.s.s-production, organization, ideology- that's what wins. Or it should be. Understand? Ever since that Creedmoor business last year we've been concerned with individuals. Like Creedmoor, like the General, like you with your stupid smile, Ransom. It's the Folk, that's what I think- but it doesn't matter, understand? What matters is we need you. We can take the City but it'll fight back, it'll keep fighting us, and we can't afford that- not with what's going on in Juniper, down in the Deltas, out on the Rim- all the wheels coming off- we need continuity here. A human face. Greasing the wheels, understand?"

"I don't understand, Officer. I guess I don't understand you any more than you understand me."

"I mean, and this comes by order of the Engines themselves, who have taken an interest in you, you poor stupid b.a.s.t.a.r.d, that before Mr. Baxter died of his long unfortunate illness he was so impressed by your pluck and ambition and your devotion to Jasper City that he buried your dispute and the old man personally chose you as his successor."

I had nothing to say to that. In fact I was so surprised that I do not think I could have spoken at all without choking.

"Quite a promotion, understand? Heir to the whole enterprise. Order restored. Everyone gets in line. Everyone pulls together to get over this unpleasantness. Understand? We'll get you dressed up. You speak to the Senate in two hours. You do understand, right, Ransom? d.a.m.n it, he looks like he's choking."

I know that I have been accused of being a collaborator, a sell-out, and other such things. I do not intend to plead my case here because what I have learned over the years is that people believe what they want to believe, and that is what makes the world go. Never apologize- keep moving. But I will say that I did not say yes until Mr. Nolt had threatened Adela and my sister May, and even after that I did not say yes until he observed that if I did not say yes the odds of a peaceful transition of power in Jasper City would be lowered by a significant percentage, and the odds of atrocity correspondingly increased. You cannot argue with mathematics.

My clothes were chosen for me and my speech was written for me and I was driven to the Senate in the middle of a military procession of motor-cars. All I had to do, as Mr. Nolt kept telling me, was smile. I read from a sheet of typed paper and I spoke without listening to what was coming out of my mouth. I was too busy trying to think of ways I might turn this sudden elevation to my advantage and against the Line. I was sure I would think of something.

I recall that I stumbled over some of my lines- something about the long history of partnership between the Baxter Trust and Jasper City- and I looked up. The Senate chamber was half-full, and most of the a.s.sembled Senators had a look about them that suggested they were not entirely a willing audience. I wondered what might happen if I tore up my speech and told them a few of the things I could tell them about Mr. Baxter and about the Line. I doubted I would be telling the Senators anything they did not already know, but there were reporters in the balcony, taking notes. I wondered what would happen if I told them to fight. I was not greatly experienced in making speeches of a martial character but I reckoned I could learn quickly.

Behind me Mr. Nolt coughed quietly, and I thought about Adela, wherever she was. The Senators were staring at their feet or at the walls, anywhere but at me.

Maybe there is another world where I diverted from my prepared remarks, and said what it was in my mind to say. Who knows how things in that world would have gone. One day maybe I will know, because sometimes when the Ransom Process gets up a good head of steam it seems it might burn a hole right through the world so that you can see how things might have been instead of the way they are. But I do not know now.

The silence became so heavy I could not stand it anymore.

Another time, I told myself. There would be a better moment. If I bided my time there would be a better moment.

I wished that Mr. Carver was there to nod or shake his head or spit or curse and tell me what was right to do- or Liv- or anyone.

I coughed. Some of the Senators looked startled. I looked down and returned to my script.

After I had finished speaking, the Senators rose from their benches, slowly, as if prodded from behind, and gave me dutiful applause.

That evening my captors moved me from the bas.e.m.e.nt cell and installed me in Mr. Baxter's penthouse.

The Amazing Amaryllis died in a mission hospital in Hoo Lai operated by the sisters of the Silver City. I regret to say that her pa.s.sing did not make the newspapers- I know about it only because my friend the soap-inventor Mr. Lung was with her.

You may recall that Mr. Lung had helped her to the hospital in the first place, after the altercation at the foot of Baxter's Tower in which she got shot- in the leg as it happens- well anyhow he visited her a number of times after that. Love can blossom in the most unlikely circ.u.mstances. He sat by her bedside and they talked of his inventions and her growing fame and how they might leave Jasper and start over down south. When Jim Dark's mob took the hospital over as a headquarters and kicked out the Silver City sisters Amaryllis remained in her bed and Mr. Lung remained by her side. Dark's mob were the kind of men you would expect, recruited in haste from the city's worst sorts- it was because of laziness, not kind-heartedness, that Dark's mob did not evict the sick from their beds on the upstairs floors. They certainly did not bother to feed them. They occupied the lower floor and drank and schemed and boasted of how they'd win glory and take the city for themselves. They tormented the sick in their beds- thank fortune that Mr. Lung was there to protect Amaryllis. Food ran out, and medicine. Mr. Lung did not sleep. His spectacles were broken in a scuffle. Then as the forces of the Line closed in block-by-block around them the men of Dark's mob started to shoot themselves. In the end Amaryllis died of infection. Mr. Lung a.s.sures me she pa.s.sed in her sleep, and that he was there by her side- her last audience.

There is a story of heroism and suffering to be written about the mission hospital but that will have to be up to Mr. Lung. He is that story's hero, kind and patient and steadfast and strong and all that kind of thing. I was not there. I spent that week in the pent house apartment of Baxter's Tower. I paced and talked to myself, still scheming of ways to turn my new position to advantage. It took me some time to admit that I could not think of anything.

I was imprisoned, but I was imprisoned in circ.u.mstances of such luxury I cannot begin to describe them any better than I could describe the town of the Folk I once visited. A poor boy from East Conlan does not have the words in his head. The bathroom alone- not to mention the four-poster bed and the Dhravian carpets and the discreet bell-ropes everywhere and the bookcases . . . The windows were not barred but you could not climb down from that sky-sc.r.a.ping pent house, not even if you tied all the silk bedsheets together with all the bell-ropes and all the Dhravian carpets, and you may trust me when I say that I calculated and re-calculated that possibility to the last inch.

Mr. Lung escaped the city after Amaryllis died. Mr. Bekman, the inventor of financial instruments, perished in the fighting on the steps of the Bank; maybe he would have found that fitting. The rain-maker Mr. Angel Langhorne fled the city in advance of the Line's invasion. Later when I met him again I asked how he knew- he stuttered and looked at his feet and smiled and said that he had f-f-fine antennae for danger, it came from contemplating lightning and thunder-clouds all day.

Mr. Baxter's pent house was electric-lit, of course. Lamps hung from the high ceiling and hissed and buzzed and whispered like they were laughing at me. Of course the lamps were the work of the Northern Lighting Corporation. I could tell by their design and if I stood on a chair I could make out the letters nlc etched on them. On my fifth day in the penthouse I decided that I could not tolerate them. I had to stand on a chair and stretch and swing at them with one of the old man's walking-sticks but in the end I got every last one of them. I could not escape and I could not rescue Adela and I could not do anything about what was happening outside in Jasper City but d.a.m.n it I could show those lamps who was boss. Because of the demands of the fighting it was more than a week before they could be replaced.

Mr. Nolt, who had replaced Mr. Watt, was replaced in his turn by Mr. Lime. In the time I spent as chief executive of the Baxter Trust- subsequently re-named the Baxter-Ransom Trust- I met a number of others like them. They came and went, they were promoted and removed, I stopped noticing their faces or remembering their names. Mr. Nolt was shot for incompetence after his men raided the Floating World.

I knew about the raid before it happened. Mr. Nolt came to me in the old man's pent house that morning, while I sat at the old man's writing-desk reading his old correspondence. That was on the third day of my confinement in the pent house, when I was thinking that maybe I might find something in the old man's secrets that could be turned to advantage. Mostly I was learning about old land deals that were of no use to anybody.

Mr. Nolt told me that his men were a.s.saulting the Floating World that night.

"Informing you, sir, in your capacity as chief executive. You see some of the men to be used in the a.s.sault are detectives in the employ of the- in your employ, now."

"What do I care? But if you're-"

"You see sir the b.i.t.c.h has holed up there- who can be sure how many men she has with her. There are tunnels under that place or else we'd use rockets, you see. Who can be sure what kind of awful things go on down there. It'll be b.l.o.o.d.y, that's for sure."

I stood. I seem to recall I was wearing one of the old man's white nightshirts, finely made in the fashion of bygone decades, faintly malodorous.

"I don't care about your men, Mr. what ever your d.a.m.n name is, but my sister Jess is up there. Down there. It's not her fault-"

"I know, Mr. Ransom, sir. We know very well where everyone is. Now I can't make any promises, this thing has to be done and it has to be done fast, but maybe we can make an effort to see she comes to no accidental harm- you see you can be sure we know what she looks like, you can be sure of that. But you see you'll have to be accommodating in return."

"I think I've been accommodating enough, Mr. Nolt."

"As you please, sir."

He turned to go. My nerve failed me.

"Wait-Nolt, wait."

He stopped in the doorway.

"Nolt-You'll see she comes to no harm?"

"Well," he said.

That is why I gave that speech at the premises of one Mr. Baxter's munitions factories- now my factories. I dressed up in a fine black suit and I stood among the idle machinery and I spoke to the workers. Normal business would be resumed very soon, I promised them. The crisis would soon pa.s.s and order would be restored. Things would get better and better forever thereafter. Those who remained loyal and law-abiding would receive raises. As soon as the crisis was resolved there would be work for every able-bodied man in Jasper, ma.s.s-manufacturing the Bomb. Applause, cheering, stamping, caps thrown in the air. I am good at giving speeches.

The a.s.sault took place that night. A dozen of the Vessels converged from all four corners of the city- I watched from the window of the old man's Tower as smoke trails criss-crossed the night sky. The Vessels climbed the bluffs and circled around and around the grounds of the Floating World, shooting at windows and gunning down whoever they saw in the rose-gardens or canoodling on the benches among the ivy- it was Mr. Nolt's opinion, he told me, that n.o.body in such a filthy place could be innocent.

I did not see the fighting but I heard about it, because I was permitted to wait in the Big Office in Mr. Baxter's Tower while the a.s.sault took place, and the reports that came in on the telegraph machines were translated for me.

By the Big Office I mean the place where I first met Mr. Baxter. That was what we called it. It was full of telegraphs and Linesmen in uniform. I was still wearing the black suit but I had loosened my neck-tie.

Initial reports were promising. The Vessels encircled the grounds, preventing escape. A group of two dozen detectives approached the premises. They offered a warrant before smashing down the door. Girls screamed, Senators threw themselves on the floor and begged for mercy. The detectives took names and confiscated weapons.

"You see," Mr. Nolt said, nodding as he scanned the reports that came in on the telegraphs. "You see."

"What about my sister, Nolt? You promised she'd be safe."

"I promised we'd try, Mr. Ransom, sir. We'll see, won't we?"

The detectives broke into the cellars and hauled sobbing women out of their hiding-places. They wrestled hand-to-hand with Jen's men in the tunnels. They beat them with sticks to the floor. They strapped them to chairs and questioned them. Jen could not be found.

"Well," Mr. Nolt said. "She thinks she can hide? Run? We'll see about that. We'll see."

Not a single one of the detectives died for the first forty-five minutes. After that they started dropping dead like it was their job to do so, each one shot without warning in the back, with no sign of the shooter- which was blamed in the reports that came back to the Big Office on the fact that it was dark in the Floating World, and all the women were in red and looked alike, and the flames in the fireplaces everywhere flickered and made strange shadows, and kept rising and rising and could not by any natural means be extinguished, until the surviving detectives were forced to retreat into the gardens. Fire leapt from the windows. The gra.s.s withered and the roses turned black and the statues cracked with the heat. Girls fled, their hair on fire. Updrafts of hot air and smoke made the Vessels unsteady- the rotary-wing Vessels shook like boats in a storm and three of them crashed. Canvas wings caught fire. n.o.body was exactly sure how Scarlet Jen escaped but one of the Vessels went missing. One of the detectives reported seeing her standing on the burning roof as the Vessels wobbled by- it's possible she stole it.

Mr. Nolt's face fell as he read the reports.

"I see," he said.

"What do you see? Look at me, Nolt. What about my sister? Nolt? What about my sister? You promised."

Mr. Nolt placed the reports in a neat pile and walked silently out of the Big Office.

That was the first time I stood in the Big Office while the Linesmen worked- not the last. Standing in the Big Office I learned all about Gentleman Jim Dark's various skirmishes with the occupying forces. By the time the Floating World burned Dark had organized a mob of several hundred men and in the days after the burning they put on a pretty good show, if that's the sort of show you like. Mostly they burned and looted. Dark was everywhere in the city, rallying the mob, laughing and making speeches and handing out ill-gotten loot with aplomb. He invariably wore a top hat and a vest in the purple and gold of the Jasper City flag and in his speeches he compared his mustache to the horns of the Jasper City Bull. If there was any kind of strategic purpose to his activities I don't know what it was, and neither did the officers of the Line. Later he told the newspapers that it was all only sport and maybe that is all it was to him. He was never caught but soon enough his mob shrank to nothing, while the number of Linesmen in the city only kept growing and growing.

I never saw Nolt again. After the fiasco of the raid on the Floating World he was replaced by a Mr. Lime, like I think I said. I guess they shot Nolt, or he shot himself, or he was sent to the front somewhere. I do not know. After the Floating World burned I guess you could say my spirit was broken. I was dead certain Jess was dead and that it was my fault. I had bargained and sold everything I had, I had given the Line everything they wanted, and I had not been able to do any good with it at all. I could not save anyone. I could not eat or sleep. I stopped asking about my sister and I stopped asking what they had done with Adela. I was scared to hear the answer. I remember that Mr. Lime came to me in the pent house and put papers in front of me to sign and I signed them just to make his face go away. Later they came to drive me somewhere to make a speech. I went with them without thinking twice. I did what I was told. It got easier every time. I stopped even day-dreaming of escape.

Two of the stagehands from the Ormolu died in the service of Jim Dark's merry band. I learned this later from reports filed.

Mr. Quantrill from the Ormolu died in a stampede of cattle on Swing Street.

I can tell you how a lot of what happened happened, but not everything. I don't know how come there was a stampede on Swing Street. All I know is that toward the end of the fighting somebody poisoned most of the cattle still penned in the Yards- I don't know who. I would say it was the work of Jim Dark's men but he always denied it. The Linesmen were baffled too. Most of the animals died. Some escaped their pens, maddened and frothing, charging through the city, and a few of them made it all the way to Swing Street, where Mr. Quantrill according to eye-witnesses stood in the street with his cigarette hanging out of the corner of his mouth, frozen as the big beasts rounded the corner and came crashing down the street, like he was an actor playing at being a statue.

There were roughly one hundred Folk slaves in the Yards before the fighting started. Some time in the middle of things they escaped, leaving no tracks. I hope they made it out.

Mr. Elmer Merrial Carson remained in the city until the last possible minute, recording what he saw for posterity. At the time I wondered why he bothered but now I understand. After the Evening Post's offices burned he moved into a house on the bluffs, from which he escaped by a back door when the detectives finally came for him. He fled the city by cover of night, taking only his typewriter in a suitcase. He has written about that better than I can.

I can tell you that it was the Agent Rattlesnake Renner who burned the Senate down. He was caught in the act and executed by hanging without delay. Of course his demon master could not be killed, the Linesmen not having either Liv's weapon or mine to hand- its vessel could be smashed, but the thing itself returned to the Lodge of the Guns, beneath the earth or up in the sky or out in the far unexplored west or wherever it is, if it is a place- returned to wait and brood until it was ready to take a new servant and return to the world.