Willow Locke - Anarchist Detective

The Twin Lens

"We're set up," said Vaclav Cenek "Let's run it again—Locke, the camera."
Willow picked up the titanium water lens prototype Nikolai had created at Wardenclyffe. It was very light and perfectly machined. There were two paired glass cylinders filled with oil and water. The spheres of oil floated freely inside the glass cylinders, shifting with the motion of the camera.
One lens transmitted an image via a mirror to a flip up viewfinder, while the other projected the same image onto the film plane. The image in the viewfinder was a motile blur, shifting with the freely moving oil.
She opened the back and examined the film reels. Nikolai showed her how to load the film, feeding the black paper leader through the slot in the titanium spool and winding it with the crank until a pencil line Nikolai had drawn on the leader lined up with a notch on the film bed. She closed the back and rotated the wide knob to lock the film door.
The device was light and rigid, arresting in its intricate beauty—like a faberge egg. She turned it over in her hands, feeling its weight, the premonition of its function. The oil moved like living creatures—swimming through miniature cylindrical tanks. The movement was hypnotic—she let it pull her deeper into her dissociative state. Somehow the delicate movement kept her mind free from the pull of the darkness within her. Cenek and Nikolai hadn't said anything, but she knew that they knew. Perhaps giving her the miraculous camera was their way of soothing her. She hated their coldness, their utter detachment, but treasured the camera nonetheless.
"Go ahead," Nikolai smiled, "Turn it on, see how it works—you created it."
Tentatively, she flipped the switch—she felt a frisson of energy crawl over the camera. She could hear the tiny accelerating whine of the voltage. The oil stopped moving with the camera as the electrified water rigidly held it. They took on definite shape—now they looked like little glass pears. She flipped open the viewfinder—now displaying an image—and adjusted the three focus knobs. She watched the oil lenses change shape as she articulated the voltage. The shapes pulsed—silver cuttlefish flexing their mantles against the glass.
Nikolai danced over to the arc lights on their stands and flooded the hexagonal tessellation on its velvet backdrop. He took off his suit jacket and didn't seem to notice when it slid off the lab table onto the floor. He rolled up his sleeves, flexing his long fingers.
"The game is afoot," he said.
Willow mounted the camera on the low tripod and peered down into the viewer, adjusting the three voltage knobs to bring the hexagonal grid into sharp focus. The sharpness had a quality of unreality—she found she could tunnel her view forward without any limit. she examined the individual fibers of the paper the tessellation was printed on.
"The view—" she drew her breath.
"Yes," said Nikolai, "It is beyond any existing technology. The lenses can be tele, or wide depending on the voltage. The first knob will change the view. Manipulating the other two will change the shape of the back of the lens, altering the focus. The sharpness is beyond anything ever achieved using glass, and the wide angle can be shaped to be perfectly rigid, without any curvature in the image. The focal distance is infinite, and infinitely variable. Place the camera at any distance before the tessellation, even a millimeter away. Sharp focus can be achieved."
Willow centered the camera in front of the tessellation and brought it into focus in its entirety. She shaped the lenses until she removed the curvature from the image. She shot the entire roll of film using a cable release, carefully checking the focus as she worked. Then she rewound the film, opened the camera, and gave the roll to Nikolai.
"The entire grid was in the frame," she said. "The tessellation will be microscopic, and sharp."
"It's going to work this time," said Nikolai and walked to the dark room, shutting the door behind him.
"The other matter—" said James, walking over to Willow and holding her hand. Her blood ran cold. She wanted to withdraw but she clung to him instead.
"Yes," said Cenek "They should arrive any moment."
Willow heard the sequenced knock and Cenek ran to the door to unlock the cantilever.
Mrs. Whitcomb entered the room with an older woman and an elegantly dressed young man.
"Hello James," she said, embracing him. "Willow, this is Alva Belmont, your benefactor. She's the one financing your tuition. This is Joseph Rocka, our special agent."
"My sister-" the words choked her. This was 'the other matter.' Her life, her family, were just pieces in an intricate chess problem to the Anarkhos.
The image of Ayala burned in her mind. She could see her full, red lips, her pale skin streaked with dirt and tears, her cheekbones flushed red, the shadows around her eyes, her inky black hair cascading in waves over her shoulders. Willow sat down at the lab table and ran her fingertips over the surface of Nikolai's graphite boulder, the tactile sensation of its sharp ridges and pocked fissures calmed her, restored her voice. "My sister is missing. I need- I need your information."
"Our need is mutual, miss Locke," said Alva. "We don't have anything tangible, just rumors, implications of connections."
"I have something tangible." Willow replied. She pulled the typewritten vellum page from her pocket and unfolded it on the table.
"What is it?" asked Joseph.
"It's a list of names passed out to the gang of kids that live at the Adelaide Childs house of industry—the Dead Rabbits. The Rabbits get paid to shadow the people on this list and report their whereabouts to the director of the orphanage. You tell me. What do the names have in common?"
Joseph passed the paper to Alva, who put on a pair of pince nez and carefully scrutinized it. She gasped.
"All of the families on this list have central roles in different Unions. Your family, now prominent in the UA. These families, in my Union, United Garment Workers. These families, the Union of Electrical Engineers. They're all poor, they all live in the tenements."
"It's a coordinated attack," said Mrs. Whitcomb, twisting her watch chain between her fingers, "isolating the weakest, dismantling the Unions through subterfuge."
"Assassination?" asked Joseph
"There are other ways to ruin people that don't attract attention." said Alva.
"Who's behind it?" asked Willow, "Frick?"
"We don't know for sure, we need documentation," Alva answered.
"Frick is the major donor behind the orphanage. It's named after his wife," said Willow.
"I was a major donor to the Adelaide Childs house of Industry as well," Alva responded, "Our only weapon is sound journalism—we need credibility. Bad things happen in the tenements. Without evidence it will only be a mad rumor. It must be properly documented in the press if we hope to survive in court."
Was Alva's plan to write an article? To assemble a legal team? It was already too late—Ayala was gone. What would it matter if the whole city burned now?
"Where is my sister?" she hissed the words through clenched teeth and stood up suddenly, knocking over the lab stool. Her whole body was rigid, her hand shook.
"We don't know," said Mrs. Whitcomb.
"The Anarkhos- those who watch- what do you watch?" Willow ground her teeth.
"We need to locate Mandelbaum- they may have eloped," said Mrs. Whitcomb.
"My sister detests him."
"She was with him night before last," said Joseph. "I saw her with Yaakov Mandelbaum at the Orpheus Ascendant- she sat in the front row, they kissed during the entr'acte."
"Last night, Joseph, what about last night?" Willow's knuckles were white as she gripped the graphite boulder.
"We don't know. Zilpah told us that Ayala worked late last night. That's all we have."
"Blanck," Willow threw the boulder against the brick wall. It shattered into innumerable dark fragments. She wanted to shatter everything as easily.
"What in the name of the devil do you think you're doing, Locke?" Vaclav Cenek shouted from the other side of the lab where he was setting up the generator and electrical rigging for the graphene experiment.
"You're looking for evidence?" asked Willow. "Let's start with Max Blanck's office. I know the factory, I used to work there. Maybe I'll find some trace of Ayala."
"You can't take documents," said Joseph, "They'll notice they've been ransacked."
"I'm going to take photographs." said Willow, unscrewing the titanium twin lens from the tripod.
"You can't use lights, they'll be seen from the street," Joseph scowled with concern.
"I don't need lights, not with this." She rummaged in a drawer, producing a dozen rolls of film, which she stowed in her bag.
"I'm going now. You find Yaakov while I'm gone," she said to Joseph. She approached Cenek's table where he was threading copper wire along a wooden track.
"I need the lab key," she said "I'll be back later tonight and I need to use the darkroom."
His shadowed eyes glimmered and his brow was fret with concern. Willow saw his crooked teeth as he bit his lip nervously.
"Be careful, Locke. I promised your father I would keep you safe."
"It's too late for that," she said, taking the giant silver key from him.
"I'm coming with you!" James rummaged in the closet and emerged with two long coats made of black wool. He put one on and handed the other to Willow. She wore it over the blouse Ayala had given her; the skirt Ayala had made. She laced Ayala's boots tighter. She removed her heavy textbooks from her leather backpack and set them on the table. She could feel the weight of the automatic leverlock blade inside the leather bag. She found a pair of black leather gloves in the pocket of the overcoat and pulled them on. She picked up the titanium twin lens and slipped the strap over her shoulder.
"Let's go, Whitcomb," Willow looked around at the people gathered in the dim light of the lab.
"This is not a game, Locke," Cenek's dark eyes flashed, "Be careful."
She turned the cantilever lock and opened the door. She slipped out with James following her.