The Lightning Keeper (26 page)

Toma slept for most of the train journey from Beecher's Bridge to Washington. He was glad that he had the two seats to himself because he was coming down with a cold, the same one that had laid Olivia up in bed for three days with fevers and night sweats, so that she could not make the trip.

“You are going without me?”

“Yes. I must.”

“Send him a telegram. Ask him can't he wait two days.”

“The date is fixed; it cannot be changed. Mr. Coffin has important business in Panama.”

“Take care of yourself, then, like you took care of me. And don't you spend all that money.”

He was anxious about the time. He did not carry a pocket watch—did not own one—and he had been awakened by the train's squealing halt. Where was Truscott? The concourse of Union Station was illuminated, but the gas lamps were reduced to insignificance by the scale of this space and the dark vault of its roof, starless smoke-blackened coffers like a threatening sky.

The minutes passed, and he wandered from the center of the floor to the stalls of the curio sellers. He was turning over in his hands a plaster model of the Washington Monument, when he heard Truscott's voice.

“My apologies. We had a rough time of it this afternoon, or this evening rather, and only at the last minute did we reach agreement on
the wording of the bill in committee. Otherwise we were headed for a filibuster, and I might not have been able to meet you at all.”

Toma wondered at the word. “It is a curious system. I hope someday to understand it.”

“Oh, a clever fellow like you, it wouldn't take long. But now we are off to see Mr. Coffin.”

“Now? You said…”

“Yes, yes.” Truscott consulted his gold hunter. “But Mr. Coffin sent word this afternoon that his plans are changed, and he must leave at two
A.M.
Follow me.”

Truscott set off at a strong pace, not in the direction of the cab rank but back through the gate. At the far end of the platform, beyond the last marked track, several rough steps took them down to the level of the rails. The senator stumbled over a cross tie and steadied himself, with an oath, on Toma's shoulder. A gas light flared to life not twenty feet from them, illuminating the white collar and cuffs of a very black porter.

“Over here, Senator, over here.”

The porter helped them up the steps and into the car and they were greeted by a puckish gentleman of late middle age, dwarfed by his visitors in the confines of the vestibule.

“Well, Senator, how good of you to come to me on such short notice, and had I the sense to light the lamps in time, you would not have had to take the Lord's name in vain. And this is our guest who has traveled so far to meet with us? Come in, Mr. Peacock, I beg you. Do come in.”

Toma had never seen such a chamber as they now entered, never even imagined it. Here everything was compressed perfectly and effortlessly so that no motion or corner would be wasted. There was Mr. Coffin's desk, there the leather chairs and upholstered settee where they would sit. Portraits, to an appropriate scale, hung against the red damask; next to the settee, a vase of yellow roses; and on the opposite side a cabinet opened out flat against the wall to show the racks of bottles and glasses secure against any motion of the car. It seemed to Toma that he was looking through a lens into Mr. Coffin's dollhouse.

“Please do not judge me by the extravagance of my friend Mr. Huntington.” Coffin's voice was kindly and soft. He had read the expression on Toma's face. “I would have preferred something much
plainer, but Mr. Huntington was bound in the opposite direction, and what you see here had begun to seem shabby to him. I bought it as an act of friendship. But it has been a great convenience, a very great convenience. By noon tomorrow I shall be in Tampa, with the ship waiting for us, and in another thirty-six hours or so, Panama, and all without having to leave this car.”

“This car will go to Panama?”

“In the ship, yes.”

“Ah.”

“And do you see, when I am in Washington, or Panama City, I have no need of a hotel. The world comes to me, just as you and Senator Truscott have. Again, Fowler, thank you for your flexibility and your forbearance. The timetables of the Southern Railroad are beyond my control.”

“It is always a pleasure, Mr. Coffin, never an inconvenience.”

“You are kind. Now, William, would you show Mr. Peacock to the dressing room? I'm sure he has had a very long journey. And if he needs anything, of course…”

The porter led Toma down the narrow corridor to the second door.

“Please, sir.”

Toma eyed the expanse of marble and the gilded fixtures; William turned on the taps and held out the linen towels with Huntington's embroidered monogram. Through the half-open interior door Toma saw a carved bedstead and another splendid Turkey carpet. He wondered if his boots were clean enough for such finery.

“We haven't much time, sir, as Mr. Coffin will want to dine before ten.” He put a clean white shirt on the marble beside the towels. “If you'll give me your coat I'll see what can be done. And if you need anything else in the meantime, the bell cord is just there, beside the basin.”

Toma stripped to the waist and used the soap, the towels, and the brushes. The shirt was soft and fine and smelled faintly of lavender. The gilt and crystal bottle next to the soap dish contained a clear, stinging liquid of the same scent. Well, he thought, why not?

William reappeared just as Toma was fastening the last button of his trousers. The coat had been brushed; more than that, its wrinkles were gone. William held out a cravat of dark gray silk, and before Toma
had a chance to protest, he had slipped it deftly under a stiff white collar and fastened the collar to the studs in the shirt.

“Mr. Coffin is not a formal man, but…” When he had finished tying the cravat, William knelt and with his brushes transformed Toma's boots. “There. I think we are ready now.”

 

“…A MATTER OF TIME,
Fowler, but otherwise a foregone conclusion. Of course I speak from the vantage of Wall Street, more or less, and have not the broader view of your…Mr. Peacock, do sit down with us and have something to drink. We will eat in just a few minutes. William, some sherry, please. Or do you take liquor, Mr. Peacock?”

“No, sir. The sherry, please.” He saw that Coffin drank nothing and that Truscott had a tumbler of whisky with a tall glass of water beside it.

“I cannot tell you, Mr. Peacock, how intriguing I find your work, of which the senator has been kind enough to keep me informed. And in such unlikely circumstances, as I understand it. How is it, if I may ask, that you came to the idea of the several wheels yoked together? Fowler has not managed to clarify this for me.”

Toma glanced at Truscott, who seemed preoccupied with his tumbler of whisky. “Sir, the values there, the results on the multiple wheels, are…uncertain. I do not want you to think that…”

“Yes, yes, I know how you experimental fellows are, wanting to dot the
i
and cross the
t
. But from what I know, and simply from the schematics, that does seem the avenue of commercial application, and so…”

“Excuse me, sir, but have you seen the drawings?”

“Of course I have; why else do you think we are here?”

“Mr. Coffin, I am embarrassed to speak. Will you tell me what is your work?”

“My work?” Coffin was amused but courteous. “I can see that there has been a lapse in our communication. A glass of water, please, William.” Truscott cleared his throat and would have spoken, but Coffin cut him off.

“My job is that I am the chairman of the General Electric Corporation. And your job is to complete the work on your turbine, which, if
I am any judge of such matters, will have a lasting impact on our business, and perhaps upon the supply of domestic energy in the event of a prolonged conflict with Germany.”

“America is at peace, Mr. Coffin.” Toma seized upon the one part of Coffin's statement that he understood unequivocally.

“We have not yet declared war, that is true. But it is also my job to look ahead, on behalf of our shareholders and our employees at General Electric. We will be at war within a year, you may count on it.”

Toma felt foolish and also resentful of Truscott, who had never explained anything of this connection. He felt the cold coming upon him more strongly now. He fumbled in his pocket but found no handkerchief. He spoke intemperately.

“And am I one of your employees?”

“William, a handkerchief for our guest, please. No, Mr. Peacock, our connection has been informal to this point. But I assure you that we take your work very seriously.” Coffin sat back in his chair to look, without expression, at Fowler Truscott. “And William, when you can, some more liquor for Senator Truscott. Thank you.”

“I had meant to have a discussion with him before the meeting,” said Truscott, “but that was impossible, given the timing.”

“Yes. I have brought this on myself. Or rather on you, Mr. Peacock, and I apologize for the confusion. Perhaps, under the circumstances, I should ask if there is anything I can tell you that would speed the work, or clear the air?”

“Only this. What is the connection between my work and the war that you say is to come?”

“A very fair question. Our committee on long-range planning, which has a very close connection to the National Research Council, projects a serious shortage in electrical generating capacity beginning about three months after the declaration of war.”

“I see. I am sorry, I do
not
see. How can you know this?”

“Do you know how gunpowder is made?”

“I do not.”

“Well, neither do I. But I do know that it cannot be done without an ample, cheap supply of nitrate. Senator, will you tell our guest where we obtain our nitrates?”

“We get them from Chile, from the offshore guano deposits.”

“Guano? What is guano?”

“Bird shit, Mr. Peacock,” said Coffin, taking delight in this scandalous phrase, “whole mountains of it. Is that not so, Fowler?”

“Indeed. It would seem that the pelagic fowl of that region have nested on the same islands for centuries, even millennia, and so…”

“And so the mountains of bird shit that constitute our cheap source of both fertilizer and explosives.”

“Yes. But…”

“But in the case of war with the Germans, given the strength of their ties to South America, our access to the guano is uncertain.”

“Then what?”

“Well, it would be very inconvenient to fight a war without ammunition, explosives, and so forth, and so we must find a way around.”

“An alternative source,” interjected Truscott.

“Now the Germans, it seems, have developed a sensible process for the fixing or conversion of atmospheric nitrogen: the Haber-Bosch method. But we do not have access to this information, which is very closely guarded. What we have is a different process.”

“And?”

“And that process requires an extraordinary amount of electrical energy. I'm afraid it is quite wasteful. Am I making any sense to you, Mr. Peacock?”

“Yes.”

“Good. And on the strength of that may I suggest we dine? George gets very cross with me if I am late to the table. We'll just go along into the next car.” Coffin rose stiffly to his feet. He seemed quite tired.

“It has been a long day for me, and I'm an old fellow. If I leave any questions unanswered, you can always ask Steinmetz. He's a great deal more competent in the technical area than I am.”

“I do not know Steinmetz.”

“Oh, but you will. I can assure you of that.”

 

A
T 9:45 THE FOLLOWING MORNING,
following Truscott's written instructions, Toma presented himself at the United States Patent Office and asked to see Mr. Frederick Flaten. The day had broken very clear
and fair, as Coffin had predicted, and Truscott's note was precise to the minute as to how long it would take to walk to the Commerce Department building from the hotel.

Frederick Flaten was a small man, youngish, with sandy hair and very bright cheeks. His effusive manner was surprising to Toma; from their preliminary correspondence on the patent application he had imagined a sober bureaucrat.

“Well, Mr. Peacock, I have been so anxious to meet you. One has no idea, does one? I mean from your letter…well, perhaps if I were an expert in handwriting I could have imagined you as you are.”

“As I am…yes. And from your letters I would be guessing that you are older, and perhaps more…more serious, if that is the right word.”

Flaten blushed and unrolled the drawing, anchoring it with his inkwell and other objects on his desk. “We are very solemn here. Rather like a funeral parlor, I'm afraid.” Flaten spread his arms deprecatingly so that Toma could appreciate the somber black of his coat and waistcoat, the subdued stripe of his trousers. He also saw the precision of cuff and collar, the arc of the watch chain interrupted by a buttonhole, and the discreet show of colored silk in the breast pocket. Flaten smiled reassuringly, as if to say that solemnity could not claim all of him.

“It is an honor to me that my turbine has come to the attention of an assistant primary examiner. Is this not so?”

“Yes, yes, the Applications Branch has done the proper thing in bringing this”—he tapped the drawing—“to Division Eight, and specifically to my desk. It's not so much an honor, you see, as proper procedure, and recognition of one's interests, that is to say my interests. I find your work utterly fascinating.” Flaten fixed his eyes on Toma's.

“But your letter…?”

“The first action, as we call it. Well, there are very few perfect patent applications, just as there are very few perfect human beings. There is usually some discussion, some back-and-forth, either to clarify the specifications or to modify what is claimed as novelty. It would have been better, perhaps, if you had consulted an experienced attorney in formulating the application. It is not necessary, strictly speaking, but I often advise applicants to do so.”