Raising Steam (Discworld 40)

As if beset by unseen demons, Simnel said sombrely, ‘Well, it’s like this, Mister Lipwig. I were invited along to t’Guild of Cunning Artificers last week, to see Mister Pony, and do you know what? He told me I should get apprenticed to somebody! Me! The lads are coming on fine and should be my apprentices, but it turns out that I’m not a master and so ’ave to be indentured for four years to a real master and then I might just about make a journeyman after a little while. But I told them, I never had indentures, never ’ad a master, because, d’you know for why? I haven’t been an apprentice because there were no one to teach me all the stuff I know. I ’ad to work it out for meself!

‘And then I read about those old guys in Ephebe who once built a little steam engine which worked … and then exploded all over them, although nobody got ’urt, and any road, they were saved because their steam engine were a kind of boat and they all ended up in the water wi’ soggy togas. And then I thought to meself, well, those old guys must’ve known a trick or two and so I got another book about them from t’library in Sto Lat, and you know what, Mister Lipwig? All those old boys wi’ their togas and sandals, they also invented the sine and cosine, not to mention your tangent! All that mathematics, which I love. And then there’s your quaderatics. Can’t get anywhere without quaderatics, can you?

‘And any road, they looked like a bunch of old guys who you’d think would do nowt more than lie about arguing about philosophy and then it turns out that all along they knew just about everything about, well, everything and just wrote it all down. Can you believe it? They ’ad it in their ’ands. They could’ve built a proper steam engine, and steam boats that didn’t explode. That’s academics for you. All that knowing and they went back to discussing t’beauty and truth of numbers and missed the fact that they’d discovered summat reet important. Me? If I want beauty and truth I look at Iron Girder.’

Dick slapped his fist down on the metal carapace and said, ‘There’s beauty. There’s truth, right there. And they had all that knowing ’iding away. Look at ’er! My machine! I built her! Me! And I’m not even good enough to be an apprentice.’

He paused for breath and continued, ‘Now don’t get me wrong, Mister Moist, I know it’s just words but, you see, it’s come home to me that, since I’ve never done me indentures, I can never be a master because there’s nobody who knows more about what I’m doing than, well, me. I’ve looked in all t’manuals and read all t’books and you can’t be a master until all the other masters say you are a master.’

Simnel looked even more haunted while Moist stood with his mouth metaphorically open and listened to the meticulous Mr Simnel blaming himself for being a genius.

He continued, ‘The lads, as I call ’em, could never ’ope to be masters neither because they won’t have been taught engineering by a master! It’s flaming ridiculous!’

Moist burst out laughing and put his hands on Dick’s greasy forehead, carefully turning the lad’s head around to face the length of the compound and the huge ever-present queues for the train ride, and he said quietly, ‘They all know you’re a master and Iron Girder is your masterpiece. What boy would not wish to be you, Mister Simnel, a manmade masterpiece yourself. Do you understand?’

Simnel looked doubtful, possibly still hankering after letters after his name and a certificate for his old mother to hang on her wall.

‘Yes, but with all due respect, the people aren’t authorities on the taming of steam. I mean no offence, like, but what do they know?’

Moist snapped and said, ‘Dick, in some respects down there somewhere is the soul of the world, and they know everything. You’ll have heard of Leonard of Quirm. There are some masters who make themselves and you have, you’ve made yourself an engineer and everybody knows it.’

Simnel brightened and said, ‘I don’t intend on starting me own guild, if that’s what you’re thinking, but if some young lad comes to see me and wants to learn the way of the sliding rule then I’ll do him right. I’ll make ’im an apprentice the old-fashioned way and his hands’ll never be clean again. And I’ll give him indentures until they’re coming out of his flaming teeth, all writ down on vellum, if I can find any. That’s how it should go, and he’ll work for me until I reckon he’s done enough to be a journeyman. That’s how you do it. That’s how you make your trade.

‘When I saw you first, Mister Lipwig, I reckoned you were all mouth and no trousers. And I’ve watched you running around hither and yon and being the grease for the engine of the railway. You ain’t so bad, Mister Lipwig, ain’t so bad at all, but you’d look better with a flatter cap.’

Iron Girder let out a sudden hiss of steam, and the two men, laughing, turned to look at her. There was something new about the engine. Hang on, Moist thought, her shape has changed, hasn’t it? She looks … bigger. I know she’s the prototype and Simnel is forever tweaking things, but somehow I don’t think I ever see the same engine twice. She’s always bigger, better, sleeker.

As Moist was pondering the question he became aware of Simnel beside him shifting from foot to foot. At last Dick said hesitantly, ‘Mister Lipwig, you know that girl with the long blonde hair and pretty smile who sometimes comes into the compound? Who is she? She acts as if she owns the place.’

‘That,’ said Moist, ‘is Emily, Harry King’s favourite niece, not married yet.’

‘Oh,’ said Simnel. ‘The other day she brought me out tea – and a bun!’

Moist looked at the worried face of Dick Simnel, who was suddenly in a place where the sliding rule couldn’t go. No, this was a different kind of rule, and so he said, ‘Would you care to take a walk with her, Dick?’

Simnel blushed, if a blush could actually be seen under all the grease. ‘Aye, I really would, but she’s all smart and dandy as a daisy and I’m—’

‘Stop right there!’ said Moist. ‘If you’re going to say that you’re just a bloke in greasy dungarees I’d like to draw your attention to the fact that you own a very big slice of all the revenue the railway is ever going to make. So don’t go around saying “Oh dear me I’m t

oo poor to even think about making advances to a nice young lady,” because you’re the best catch that any young lady in Ankh-Morpork could ever find, and I imagine that even Harry, in the circumstances, wouldn’t throw you down the stairs as he did with the swains who were the suitors of his daughters. If you’d like to go walking out with Emily I’d say go to it and I’m sure her uncle and parents will be overjoyed.’

To himself, Moist thought: in fact, Harry would love it because it’d keep the money in the family. I know Harry King, oh, yes. ‘What’s more,’ he added, ‘she’s a lawyer in the making: understands the legalities of running a business. You should get on like a house on fire.’

In the voice of a man encountering new territory, Dick said carefully, ‘Thank you for the information and advice, Mister Lipwig. Mebbe one day when I’ve got meself clean I might get meself the courage to knock on ’er door.’

‘Well, don’t wait too long, Dick. There’s more to life than the sliding rule.’

The Grand Opening of the Ankh-Morpork and Sto Plains Hygienic Railway brought the international press out in droves.

Dick Simnel had always intended that the first serious public railway journey would start from Sto Lat, putting the old town on the map as it were. Sir Harry was somewhat dismayed by this:fn32 a true denizen of Ankh-Morpork, he tended to get a little disorientated when outside the city. Still, as Moist had pointed out, after an outward journey by road the guests would find the return rail trip with refreshments all the more impressive.

When their coaches eventually arrived at what the gold-edged invitation had described as the ‘Sto Lat terminus’, the journalists and other invited guests discovered that terminus apparently meant a work in progress: which is to say most of it wasn’t there yet (being full of workmen, human, troll and goblin, labouring at cross purposes just like on every big construction site anywhere) but nevertheless a sympathetic eye could arrive at the conclusion that something rather good was being built here.

The guests were ushered on to a long raised platform, standing above gleaming steel rails that ran off into the distance, the tracksides crowded with onlookers. In the other direction the rails led to a very large barn, where Dick’s apprentices, recently scrubbed, were lined up on either side of the closed doors, along with a brass band that could hardly be heard above the noise of the workmen.

Moist von Lipwig was, of course, master of ceremonies, there to welcome them with Harry King and Effie by his side. Lord Vetinari too was there, as holder of Ankh-Morpork’s guardian share in the railway, accompanied by Drumknott, who wouldn’t have missed the occasion for a big clock. And Queen Keli of Sto Latfn33 was present to give the occasion the royal seal of approval, with the Mayor by her side looking stunned by the circus that appeared to have taken over his town.

As always in these matters, everything had to wait until everything else was ready. That seemed to have been anticipated, judging by the door with a neat label WAITING ROOM, alongside the entrance to the platform.fn34