Around the World in 100 Days

Harry’s parents had dismissed a valet because they considered him a bad influence on their son; unfortunately, they could do nothing about Harry’s choice of friends.

Gentlemen were expected to associate with others of their class. Johnny Shaugnessey was not even close. His mother was a naive farmgirl who came to London to better her lot. She married Michael Shaugnessey, an honest blacksmith who, for all his hard work, could barely keep them fed and clothed. Within a year, she died giving birth to his son. When Johnny was twelve, an Irish mob began demanding protection money from the artisans and merchants of York Court, most of whom were also Irish. Michael Shaugnessey refused to pay them, so they beat him brutally with his own hammer; he died a week later.

Even at that age, Johnny was as large and strong as most men. He found work with a friend of his father’s, a carriage maker, and was beginning to show some real promise as both a craftsman and a designer when an accident ended his career. One day a young gentleman arrived to pick up a fast phaeton that the firm had built to order for him. Johnny harnessed the customer’s high-strung bay mare to the carriage, then crouched down to check the whiffletree, which wasn’t moving as freely as it should. The horse lashed out with a rear hoof, catching Johnny on the top of the head, caving in his skull.

A surgeon at London Hospital Medical College managed to save the boy’s life by cutting away the broken bone and covering the resulting hole with a thin metal plate. But he could do nothing to repair the damage done to the brain. Though Johnny recovered most of his faculties to some degree, he never quite returned to normal.

At the same time, the accident left him with one ability he had not possessed before: He developed an uncanny rapport with all things mechanical, from clocks to steam engines. He seemed to understand instinctively not only how they worked but how they could be made to work better. It was as though, by virtue of the metal plate screwed into his skull, he had become part machine himself and spoke the language, as it were.

Johnny led a Spartan existence, sleeping in one corner of his father’s old shop, cooking his scanty meals on the forge. Despite his slow, sometimes sullen manner, his skill as a mechanic and blacksmith earned him a fair amount of business—more than he would have liked, actually. He did not deal well with people; he much preferred to spend his time in the rickety shed at the rear of the smithy, tinkering with machines. For the past year, most of his efforts had, like Harry’s, been focused on a single project, his most ambitious to date—a steam-driven motorcar.

When Harry arrived, direct from making his devil’s bargain with Phileas Fogg, he found Johnny sitting on the dirt floor of the shed, soldering copper pipe with an acetylene torch. Harry examined the right front fender of the Flash, the one he had caved in when he struck the beer wagon. Johnny had pounded it out so skillfully that the damage was barely visible. “Splendid work, my lad,” said Harry. Though Johnny was probably at least twenty, Harry always thought of him as being younger, and often spoke to him in an almost parental fashion. “What’s that you’re making?”

“A condenser? Oh, I see. For the steam. We’re going to catch it, cool it, and recirculate it, back into the water tank.” Heedless of the dirt, Harry sat on a packing crate. “Here, let me help.” He held one length of pipe while Johnny soldered another to it.

“With this, I figure ...” Johnny paused, as if he needed to work out the words in his head before he spoke them. “I figure she’ll go two hundred miles. Maybe more.”

“On one tank of water?” Harry whistled. “That’s impressive. I was just wondering what I’d do if I had to drive through a long stretch of country with no water. I was afraid I might have to relieve myself in the tank.”

Johnny gave him a crooked grin and shook his head. Then a suspicious look came over his slightly lopsided face. “Why would you?”

“Because what I have to say is staggering in its import.” He paused for dramatic effect. “I’ve entered the Flash in a race.”

“Oh, that. A mere twenty-five thousand miles. More or less.” Harry made a circular motion with his hand. “Around the world, actually.”

“What do you mean? Oh, I see. You mean that I didn’t consult you before making the wager. Well, I suppose I felt it was my decision to make, since it’s my money we’ve been using to build the Flash.” The reproachful look on Johnny’s face made Harry a bit ashamed. “I’m sorry, that was unfair; you’ve done the lion’s share of the work. She’s your motorcar as much as mine.” He shrugged. “Perhaps I should have asked you first. But I just assumed you’d want to race her. After all, think of what it will mean if we win, lad. It’ll prove to everyone once and for all what the motorcar is capable of!”

“Don’t know what? Oh, what she’s capable of.” Harry gave the fender of the Flash a confident pat. “Well, then, it looks as if we’ll find out, eh?”

Though Harry was known to exaggerate, when he had bragged that the Flash was a different sort of motorcar altogether, he was not overstating the case. Over the previous half-century, inventors had come up with a wide variety of self-propelled vehicles. But the steam-driven ones, with their huge boilers and heavy cast-iron engines, were too slow and ungainly to be practical. The newly developed internal combustion engine was far lighter, but also far less powerful, so “petro cars” tended to be small and rather flimsy, totally unsuited to high speeds or long distances.

To propel the Flash, Johnny had built a boiler of thin-gauge steel wrapped with piano wire for strength; at ninety pounds, it weighed half as much as the standard boiler, yet could handle three times as much steam pressure. With the help of a machinist, he had designed and created an engine that weighed a mere fifty pounds but was more efficient than engines four times its size.

Since most of the mechanical parts were concealed beneath the seats or the floorboards, the Flash looked much like any other large carriage. The difference lay in how it performed. The ash-wood frame was strong and flexible yet lighter than steel, and the body was made of aluminum, so the motorcar weighed no more than a typical four-horse coach. But its steam engine had the power of twenty or thirty horses—theoretically, at least. How reliably it could deliver that power had yet to be seen.

There was no time to road test the car and make improvements or adjustments. Harry had promised to be ready in a week—just enough time to complete the tasks they already knew were necessary: hooking up the condenser, putting better lining on the brake shoes, replacing a faulty steam valve, getting the water gauge to work, adding a cyclometer to measure the miles, fashioning an extra set of wheels, and, of course, purchasing all the equipment and supplies Harry would need.

“Johnny, it was I who made the bet. You’re not obliged to help me. This trip won’t be any picnic, you know. There’s not much in the way of roads, and precious few hotels or pubs. I’ll be driving ten to fifteen hours a day and sleeping in the car, or in a tent, in all sorts of weather. It’ll be dirty and miserable and exhausting.”

Harry sat back on his heels and scratched his head. “You know, now that I think about it, it might not be a bad idea. She’s a fine car, but she’s bound to have problems sooner or later, and I may not always be able to fix them. The only thing is . . . I mean, do you think . . . that is, are you certain you’re up to it?”

“I’m certain!” shouted Johnny, so vehemently that Harry flinched. After a minute or two, he heard his friend murmur, “I’m sorry. You said she’s my motorcar, too. I should get to go.”

“No need to apologize. You’re quite right. You should get to go, and go you shall.” Harry got to his feet. “How much bully beef do you want?”

Before Johnny could reply, there was a knock at the door of the shed. “Who could that be?” Harry lifted the latch and swung the door open to find three gentlemen in morning coats and bowler hats, looking wholly out of place in these rather shabby surroundings. One was a stranger to Harry, a blond youth of about his size and age. The others were all too familiar. “Mr. Sullivan. Mr. Hardiman. What brings you to York Court?”

Sullivan the banker took a long Havana cigar from between his teeth and blew a ring of smoke. “We thought we’d have a look at this motorcar of yours.”

“Not at all,” said Hardiman irritably. “We merely wanted to make certain you’d be ready within the week, as agreed.”

“Oh, we’ll be ready. As for whether or not you may look her over, I’ll have to ask Mr. Shaugnessey.” He called to Johnny, “The men who made the wager are here. Is it all right if they examine the Flash?”

“You may look but not touch,” Harry told the visitors. The three slowly circled the vehicle, doing their best not to brush against the assorted parts that leaned against the walls or step on the tools and piles of oily rags that littered the floor.

“Mind you, I still don’t believe she’ll make it around the world. If you’re lucky, you might get across the United States. But you’d better take along a lot of spare parts.”

Hardiman shoved aside a pile of filthy rags with the polished tip of one shoe and approached Harry. “Good. I know machines, and I know what I’m talking about. Here’s another piece of advice. If you should by some miracle manage to reach Asia, take the shortest possible land route from there. If I were you, I’d catch a steamer to Hong Kong and go across southern China and northern India. That should cut nearly a thousand miles off your journey.”

“I see. But why are you telling me this, sir? I should think it would be in your best interest for us to take as long a route as possible.”

“Because,” put in Sullivan, “we want you to have every chance to succeed, so that when you lose, there will be no excuses, no crying foul.”

“There will not be, I assure you. Now, if you will excuse me, gentlemen, I am on my way to purchase equipment and supplies for the trip.”

Harry shook the blond youth’s hand cordially. “Pleased to make your acquaintance.” The boy’s handshake was limp and his palm felt cold against Harry’s.

“Likewise,” said Charles with a slight lisp, but without the least hint of pleasure. He withdrew his hand, glanced at it, then rubbed at his palm with a handkerchief.

“I’ve talked it over with your father,” said Julius Hardiman, “and we feel it would be best if you took along an impartial observer.”

“I mean that Charles will be going with you, to make certain there are no . . . infractions, shall we say? No bending of the rules?”

“When your father made his famous wager, he also agreed to the terms. But apparently there was some question as to whether or not he lived up to them.”

“That’s true,” said Sullivan. “He did circle the globe in eighty calendar days. But only because he crossed the international date line and thus gained a day. The fact remains, the actual elapsed time was eighty-one days.”

Harry felt his fists clenching, and he thrust them in his pockets. “Well, you needn’t worry, sir, because I’ll be traveling west, so I’ll actually be losing a day.”

“That’s not such an important issue, here, since you have more time,” said Hardiman. “Our main concern is that the motorcar go the entire distance under its own power. To make certain of that, we need to have an observer aboard.”

Though Harry was seething, he managed to say, in a fairly civil tone, “Perhaps you should leave, now. We have a good deal of work to do, and you might get your fine clothing dirty.”

As Harry strode up the street toward Fortnum & Mason’s department store, he caught sight of another figure he thought he recognized. When he stopped and turned to make certain, the man disappeared down a side street. Harry went on, reciting under his breath a litany of ungentlemanly things he should have said to that lobster-faced midget, Hardiman, and his foppish son, and to that smirking money-grubber, Sullivan.

An hour later he returned, this time riding in a hackney and surrounded by crates and packages—a veritable cornucopia of tinned meats, soups, and milk, plus a variety of desiccated fruits and vegetables. Selecting these supplies would have taken most people an entire day; Harry had simply snatched up a bit of this and a bit of that. He had also bought a splendid sports knife that could be transformed into a variety of useful tools, including a screwdriver, a saw, scissors, an awl, a file, a corkscrew, and a drill.

Harry thrust his head out the cab window. Roiling clouds of black smoke were rising from the vicinity of the shop. “Drive on!” he ordered. “Quickly!” He had the door open and was leaping from the cab before it rolled to a stop. He dashed around to the rear of the shop to see one corner of the shed engulfed in flames. “Find a fire station or an alarm box!” he called to the cabdriver.

“Come on, then!” Harry yanked a handkerchief from his vest pocket. Covering his nose and mouth, he plunged into the smoky interior. Luckily, all the car’s wheels were currently attached. Harry began pushing the vehicle, only to jerk his hands away as the hot metal seared his skin. He put one shoulder against the car and heaved. For all their efforts to make the Flash as light as possible, it was no featherweight. Harry couldn’t budge it.

He glanced furtively at half a dozen metal cans filled with kerosene, which they’d been using for fuel. If the flames reached those, the shed and everything in it would be incinerated instantly. He seized one of the cans and flung it through the nearest window.

Johnny appeared beside him, a filthy rag pressed to his face. Together they tossed out the rest of the kerosene cans, then turned to the car. Just above their heads, the roof rafters were ablaze. “On three!” called Harry. “One! Two! Three!”

Harry groaned. He hadn’t checked to see whether the driving gear was engaged. He flung himself over the top of the passenger door and whacked the gear stick painfully with one hand until it disengaged. At once, the Flash began to roll.

Just as they got it through the doorway, part of the shed roof collapsed, so close behind them that sparks stung the back of Harry’s neck. “Keep going!” he cried. “Get her as far away as possible!” Ahead was a board fence that marked the edge of the adjoining property. They mowed it down and kept pushing until the front bumper rammed up against the neighbor’s privy.

The friends sank to the ground, drawing ragged breaths punctuated by racking coughs. Through his own wheezing, Harry heard the sound of a clanging bell. “The fire brigade,” he gasped.

“Too late.” Johnny nodded toward the shed. The remainder of the roof caved in, sending up an enormous billow of greasy smoke. The horse-drawn fire wagon drew up before the blacksmith shop; firemen scrambled to hook up the hand-operated pump and direct a jet of water onto the flames.

“Those can be replaced. We saved the Flash; that’s the important thing. And you, of course. Do you have any idea how it started?”

Harry stared at the smoldering ruin. “Wait a moment. I know who was smoking—Sullivan. When he arrived, he had a cigar. I don’t recall seeing it when he left.”

“There’s no way of knowing. He and Hardiman seemed surprised that the Flash was so well built; perhaps they realized we might actually win, and decided to destroy our chances by destroying the car. However ...” Harry paused to think. “It is possible that the culprit may have been someone else altogether. Did you see anyone skulking around after I left?”

“As I was heading up Baker Street earlier, I thought I caught a glimpse of someone I know. Or, more accurately, someone my father knows. Someone who hates my father—and by extension, our whole family—so much that I suspect he’d jump at any chance to strike back at us.”