London, 1900

 

HARLAND WALLACE stood at his second-floor bedroom window, watching as the coach pulled up in front of his Chelsea townhouse. The coachman jumped down to extend the footstep and open the door. The gentleman who stepped down was well turned-out and appeared young, though he moved with a certain stiffness, as though he suffered the effects of an accident or a childhood illness. He walked with the aid of a cane.

Harland waited until the man had been admitted to the house and Harland’s butler came upstairs to present his card. Mr. Luke Prescott.

The visitor had been shown to the sitting room, though he was still standing when Harland entered. He was indeed young, perhaps in his twenties, and extremely handsome—one might even say “beautiful.” He was very pale, with delicate features and a mouth as curved and sensual as a woman’s. His hair was flaxen blond, short and combed back from a high forehead, and the eyes he turned upon Harland were wide and a startlingly vivid sky blue.

“Mr. Wallace,” he said, smiling faintly and transferring his silk hat to the crook of his left arm, his left hand being occupied with the handle of his cane. He extended his gloved right hand and Harland moved to take it quickly, to avoid forcing the man to come to him. “I’m Mr. Luke Prescott.”

“Mr. Harland Wallace.”

“Please forgive the cane,” the man said. “My balance is poor.”

“Not at all. Shall we sit down?”

“Thank you, but I shan’t take much of your time.” There was something odd about the man’s face. As strikingly beautiful as it was—Harland was troubled by how mesmerized he was by the man’s features—his brief smile failed to move the rest of his face. No small crinkles about the eyes, no expansion of the cheeks. It was disturbingly still. “I am here on behalf of my employer, Dr. Mordecai Steward. He wishes to see you on an urgent matter, but I’m afraid he is unable to leave his house. He was hoping you might be persuaded to stop by.”

“Might I ask what this is pertaining to?”

“I’m afraid I’ve been instructed to direct all questions to my employer.”

“I am puzzled as to why the doctor should seek me out,” Harland said. He gestured at a display case in one corner of the room. It contained some of the more elaborate watches he’d designed, along with others he’d collected over the years, including some particularly beautiful pieces he’d found during his travels in Germany and Switzerland. “He is aware that I am a watchmaker?”

“Indeed. Dr. Steward spent a considerable amount of time inquiring about skilled members of your profession in Great Britain and the Continent before deciding to approach you. He is looking forward to making your acquaintance.”

Harland was flattered that Dr. Steward seemed to hold him in such high regard, but it also gave him pause. What could be so precious to the doctor that he would conduct such an exhaustive search? A family heirloom in need of repair, perhaps? Even that would hardly be deemed urgent. “I hope Dr. Steward finds me up to his expectations.”

“I’m sure he will.” Prescott withdrew another card from his waistcoat and extended it to Harland. “I’ve written our address on the back of his card. It’s not far from here.”

Harland took the card. The front was simple and elegant, with Dr. Steward’s name embossed in a clean, legible typeface. Harland turned it over and saw the handwritten address of a townhouse in South Kensington. “Very well, Mr. Prescott. I’m intrigued. Will tomorrow morning be convenient?”

Prescott nodded and gave him that odd smile. “Quite. We look forward to seeing you, Mr. Wallace.”

He took his leave, and Harland fretted for a few minutes about whether he should offer assistance. But though he relied upon the cane and walked stiffly, Prescott seemed able to navigate the hall and the front steps well enough. The coachman helped him up into the coach, and they drove away.

 

 

THE TOWNHOUSE of Dr. Steward was located in a block of nearly identical white-brick townhouses in a quiet neighborhood. Harland stepped down from the cab and paid the driver. The front door opened almost as soon as he’d knocked and a rather severe looking butler admitted him.

“Good morning,” Harland said, “I believe Dr. Steward is expecting me. I’m Mr. Wallace.”

“Yes, sir. Right this way, please.”

The butler took Harland’s coat and hat. Then he led the way to a side door and opened it, addressing someone inside the room. “Mr. Wallace has arrived, sir.”

“Show him in, please, Bradley.”

The parlor was dark, with walnut wainscoting and crimson wallpaper with a patterned silk trim, and a carpet of red and green. The chairs were of the same color scheme—dark walnut wood, upholstered in crimson. Though it was still light outside, the heavy curtains had been drawn and the gas lamps lit. A blazing fire made it extremely warm in the room, no doubt for the comfort of the gentleman seated near it, whose legs were covered in a knit shawl despite the fire.

Dr. Steward was quite elderly, his body seeming shrunken and withered with age. At one time, he might have been an imposing figure. He had a high forehead, now largely devoid of hair, and a strong patrician nose. The gray eyes that regarded Harland seemed to be sizing him up with a keen intelligence.

Mr. Prescott was standing beside Steward’s chair and said with a nod in his direction, “Mr. Wallace, permit me to introduce my employer, Dr. Mordecai Steward.”

“I’m honored to meet you, Doctor.”

“Mr. Wallace.” The doctor made a slight gesture toward Prescott. “You may leave us, Luke. Please wait outside until I call for you.”

An odd thing occurred when Prescott attempted to leave the room. The butler was still standing in the doorway, as if awaiting further instruction, and when Prescott approached, Bradley continued to look past him, as if he wasn’t there. He made no move to step aside, and Prescott was forced to turn sideways and slide past to go out into the hall.

The doctor frowned slightly at this but merely told the butler, “Bradley, will you please bring tea for our guest.”

“Of course, sir.”

The butler left, closing the door behind him.

“Please have a seat, Mr. Wallace. You may take one of the chairs away from the fire, if you wish. I realize not everyone enjoys roasting as much as I do these days.”

Harland took a chair and the doctor asked him, “So, what do you think of Mr. Prescott?”

Harland was so taken aback that he merely blinked at the man for a moment. “I’m sorry?”

“Forgive me for being blunt,” the doctor said, “but I dislike idle chitchat. I sent Luke to you so that you might observe him and see his condition.”

“Observe… his condition?” Harland had to force himself not to fidget with the hem of his waistcoat. “I’m sorry, Dr. Steward, but perhaps there’s been some sort of mistake. I’m not a doctor. I have no idea how to evaluate Mr. Prescott’s medical state.”

“I don’t expect you to know anything about medicine, Mr. Wallace. I mean, how does he appear to you? Does he seem like a normal man?”

“I’m afraid I don’t know how to answer that question.”

Fortunately, they were interrupted by the return of the butler and a chambermaid with their tea. But it was a short diversion. After Bradley had poured for each of them, and then departed, Dr. Steward said, “When I was very young, my father took me to see a friend who had assembled a fascinating collection of automata—toys that moved under their own power. There were animals and people, some very elaborate. I absolutely fell in love with them.”

“I felt the same way, the first time I saw a very elaborate German clock,” Harland volunteered.

Dr. Steward nodded. “Quite. But you see, I was disappointed by their imperfections. They moved so stiffly. So I began to design my own. I made it my life’s work, in fact, along with medicine.”

“That’s fascinating,” Harland said, though he didn’t really think so. But he felt one must indulge the elderly in their ramblings.

“My early experiments were crude, of course, but I soon surpassed the toys I’d been so taken with. As a schoolboy, I built a small dog that appeared quite lifelike. It ran about the house, navigating by means of lenses in the eyes, focused upon selenium wafers—are you familiar with the work of Charles Fitts, Mr. Wallace?”

“I’m afraid not.”

“Well, I shan’t bore you with all of the details of my experiments and inventions over the years. They made it necessary for me to acquire a considerable amount of knowledge in a wide variety of studies—electricity, hydraulics, pneumatics, physics, and of course mathematics….”

“Of course.”

Dr. Steward leaned forward and with excruciating slowness lifted his teacup to his lips. His hand shook so much that Harland worried he might spill the hot liquid in his lap. But he managed to take a sip and lower the cup back onto its saucer without mishap. “All of this leads to my purpose in bringing you here.”

“I had assumed,” Harland said, “that you had a watch in need of repair. But now I suspect it may have something to do with one of your inventions.”

“Quite so. As you’ve no doubt observed, my hands are no longer as steady as they were. My last attempt at repair work was a dismal failure. I merely damaged the mechanism further in my fumblings. So I began this lengthy search to find someone skilled in working with minute mechanical parts—a man at the top of his profession, and with an honest and discreet reputation. For reasons which will become clear to you, I do not wish this… invention… to be gossiped about. You must give me your word, Mr. Wallace, that you will discuss it with no one.”

Harland felt very uneasy making such a promise when had no idea what he was promising to keep secret. What could possibly warrant such a pledge? A toy dog? Some other innovative automaton? Was Dr. Steward afraid someone would lay claim to his invention? But surely he would have patented anything he felt it necessary to protect.

Still, Harland’s curiosity was piqued. He could hardly leave after all this buildup without seeing the invention. “I give you my word, Dr. Steward.”

“Excellent!” The doctor picked up a small handbell from the stand beside his chair and rang it. The door opened and Prescott entered. “Luke, would you be so good as to show Mr. Wallace your left hand?”

“Of course, sir.”

Harland felt immensely uncomfortable as Prescott stepped toward him, removing his glove at the same time. If the man was injured or possessed some deformity, there would be little reason for Harland to look at it. He was generally squeamish about such things. It took all his willpower to keep his outward appearance calm as the hand was brought close for his inspection.

What he saw was more horrifying than he could have imagined. Underneath torn flesh, there lay not muscle and ligament, but what appeared to be metal rods. When the ring finger flexed slightly, one of the rods seemed to contract, and Harland realized it was actually sliding into a slightly larger metal tube, while behind it, a complex assortment of incredibly tiny, interlocking brass gears whirled about for a moment. But there was clearly something wrong, for an ugly clicking sound came from the mechanism, faint enough to have been muffled by the glove, and the gears rocked as if jolted. The finger stopped flexing, as if it were unable to move any farther.

Speechless, Harland lifted his gaze to Prescott’s face. It must have been the cold chill of fear creeping into his brain that distorted his vision, for as his eyes beheld the man’s face, Harland imagined he saw the cold, inhuman mask of a life-size doll—porcelain or painted wax—just before he fainted.

 

 

HARLAND AWOKE to find himself lying on a sofa in a different drawing room than the one he’d had his conversation with Dr. Steward in, but there was little doubt it was in the same house. The Morris-style wallpaper wasn’t identical, but it was very similar. And the color scheme was still crimson and dark walnut. Again the curtains were drawn and the gas lamps were lit, but the fireplace was cold.

There was a damp cloth folded neatly upon his forehead, and Harland lifted a hand to remove it before tentatively sitting up.

“Mr. Wallace?” a voice said—that of Mr. Prescott. Harland was reluctant to look in the direction of the voice, in case the… hallucination… he’d had might turn out to be real after all. But he forced himself to turn his head.

Prescott sat as far away from him as the room permitted, in a chair by the door. He was sitting rather stiffly, his gloved hands in his lap. His face… well, from this distance, in the dim light of the gas lamps, his face appeared normal again. Quite handsome, in fact.

“Bradley and Dr. Steward’s valet carried you in here,” he said. “The doctor felt that you would be better off in a cooler room. I would not have felt it wise for me to… be the first thing you set eyes on when you woke. But Dr. Steward ordered me to come check on you.”

Harland attempted to laugh it off. “That’s quite all right. I don’t know what came over me.”

“One of the maids was tending you until I entered. I’m afraid none of the staff will remain alone in a room with me.”

Harland had been about to place the cloth in the small bowl of water he saw on the table near the sofa, but this made him hesitate, the cloth momentarily forgotten. Truth be told, he would prefer not to be alone with Mr. Prescott. But he told himself he was being cruel. What he’d seen a short time earlier…. Dr. Steward’s invention was no more than a mechanical hand, similar to those sometimes worn by men who’d suffered amputations in battle or other circumstances. Far more sophisticated than any Harland had ever seen, of course. But for people to avoid Prescott’s presence due to his affliction was terribly unfair, and Harland was ashamed of himself for fainting. “Please forgive me,” he said awkwardly. “It was… very warm in the drawing room. I feel like a complete fool.”

Prescott regarded him silently for a long time. Then he stood, slowly and stiffly, leaning heavily upon his cane. “I shall tell Dr. Steward you’ve recovered. Alas, his health requires that he be kept warm….”

“I understand,” Harland said. “Please permit me to join you. I feel fully recovered.”

He followed Prescott across the hall to the doctor’s drawing room. Once again, he felt the oppressive warmth of the fire as they entered, but he was certain he could endure it. The fire hadn’t been the cause of his distress.

“Ah, Mr. Wallace!” the doctor said happily upon his return. “How are you feeling?”

“Quite well, thank you. Though frightfully embarrassed.”

“Not at all.”

Harland attempted to put on a professional demeanor, clapping his hands together, as if he couldn’t wait to begin. “Now, then. Am I correct in assuming you’d like to engage my services in repairing Mr. Prescott’s damaged hand?”

“That and more,” Dr. Steward replied. “But perhaps we’ve all had enough excitement for the present. Might I suggest we go into the details tomorrow morning?”

Harland wanted to protest that he was completely recovered, but then it occurred to him that his host might be tiring. “Certainly, Doctor. Tomorrow would be fine.”

He took his leave and, Bradley being oddly absent, Prescott escorted him to the door. The man was unable to assist Harland with his coat, but it wasn’t difficult for Harland to manage on his own. As he retrieved his hat, Prescott surprised him by putting a gloved hand on his arm. Almost immediately, he withdrew it, as if realizing Harland might be bothered by the touch. Harland smiled at him in an attempt to undo some of the embarrassment he must have caused by his reaction earlier.

“Please come back, Mr. Wallace,” Prescott said earnestly. “I beg you. The… situation is becoming more urgent every day.”

Though his handsome face was still oddly impassive, he sounded distressed, and his startling blue eyes were pleading. Harland could not help but be moved. He told himself that what he felt was merely compassion. If the doctor had created a functional prosthesis to replace the hand Prescott lost, it would be agony to watch it fall into disrepair as its creator grew too decrepit to maintain it. What Christian man could turn his back on someone in this predicament if he had the power to help?

But too, Harland was disturbed by a resurgence of the old stirrings he’d felt in his youth—feelings he’d hoped he’d left behind in boys’ school. As much as Prescott disturbed him, he also intrigued him in a way that was perhaps better left unexplored. It was, at best, inappropriate to dwell upon the sensual curve of another man’s mouth. Harland forced the thought from his mind.

He smiled and gave Prescott a cheerful nod. “Rest assured, Mr. Prescott. With some guidance from the good doctor, I’m confident I can make the repairs. I will return tomorrow with the necessary tools for the job.”

 

 

HARLAND DID return the next morning, his leather tool case in hand. If anything, Bradley seemed even more dour than he’d been the day before as he led the way into the same drawing room, where Dr. Stewart and Mr. Prescott were conferring about some matter. But Harland quickly forgot about the servant as the doctor greeted him.

“Mr. Wallace! You’ve returned!”

Harland nodded, holding his tool case in his gloved hands. “As promised, Doctor.”

“Excellent. Please have a seat. Shall I ring for tea?” The butler had departed without a word.

Harland settled into a chair but shook his head. “Please don’t trouble yourself on my behalf,” he said. “I’m most anxious to learn more about the mechanism in Mr. Prescott’s prosthesis.”

Steward and Prescott exchanged a look that Harland couldn’t interpret, but then the doctor smiled and said, “Luke, would you please open the curtains so Mr. Wallace can have better light?”

While Prescott was attending to that, Harland made a gesture as if to lay his tools upon the inlaid top of the coffee table. “May I?”

“Of course.”

The leather of the case, when opened like a book, provided protection for the table so that none of the metal files or calipers would scratch it. Harland withdrew a monocle from its protective silk cloth and placed it in his right eye. “Would you mind sitting here, Mr. Prescott?” he said, waving a hand at the chair beside him, which would allow for the easiest access and the best light.

Prescott perched on the edge of chair, looking very stiff and formal. He removed the glove from his left hand and extended it.

For the first time, Harland took the hand in his own without gloves. The “skin” on the hand was disturbingly cool to the touch and felt a bit too much like human skin for his comfort. The effect was that the hand felt lifeless. When he turned it over to examine the palm, he saw that, although the major lines of the hand were present, giving it the appearance of a human hand at a glance, the tips of the fingers had strangely regular “fingerprints.” They were formed of small concentric ridges, similar to the fingerprints on Harland’s hand, but with no variation from finger to finger.

“Unfortunately,” Steward said, “there have been some areas in which I simply had to rely upon the expertise of others. The skin was one such area. It was designed for me many years ago by a dear friend who worked with chemicals, Parkesine, and rubber. It consists of layers of silk, in different weaves, each saturated in some sort of artificial resin.”

“It’s very soft for a resin,” Harland commented, prodding the palm of the hand with his fingers. Even Parkesine, he knew, was rather hard. This material flexed and bounced back into shape, just as a flesh and blood hand would do, and his poking caused the fingers to flex in a disturbingly realistic fashion.

“I’m afraid I don’t know the formula, and my friend is no longer with us.”

“Can it be repaired?”

The doctor shook his head. “Alas, no. It will have to be stitched together. I do have a small supply of it in my workroom, but we must be very conservative with it.”

Harland glanced up to find Prescott watching him intently. Once again, he was struck by the perfection in the man’s features, as if he were a life-size china doll, and part of Harland wondered if it were possible that Prescott’s face could be made of the same material as his hand. Fortunately, the thought did not produce the same embarrassing reaction it had the previous day, and Harland quickly put it out of his mind. He was being fanciful. Prescott merely had very attractive features, and it would not benefit anyone for Harland to dwell on them.

He turned the hand over again and peered closely at the mechanism underneath the skin.

 

 

“YOU HAVE exceeded my expectations, sir!” Steward exclaimed, obviously delighted, as Prescott flexed the mechanical hand, testing the range of motion of each finger.

It had been an exhausting couple of hours. The mechanism had proven to be ingenious and quite the most complex thing Harland had ever worked with. Though the doctor had offered guidance, much of it had been a journey of exploration, delving into the intricacies of the gears and springs and tiny pneumatics. It had been indescribably beautiful. Harland was awed by Steward’s genius. But his brain felt like a bread pudding—complete with brandy butter—and he wanted little at the moment but to sleep. “Thank you, Doctor. I feel honored to have had the opportunity.”

Prescott looked at him with a small, almost shy smile, his eyes lit up with delight. “Oh, Mr. Wallace…!” He seemed at a loss for words, but the childlike joy in his expression forced Harland to look away or risk blushing.

“A job well done,” Steward said. “But it is my hope, Mr. Wallace, that you will continue to assist us.”

“Certainly. If the prosthesis breaks again—”

Steward waved a hand dismissively. “You misunderstand me. Your services in the continued maintenance of Luke’s hand would be much appreciated. But surely you’ve noticed that he has difficulty walking?”

Harland glanced at Prescott, uncomfortable discussing his difficulties so openly in front of the man. “Forgive me, Mr. Prescott. I merely assumed an injury….”

“I’m afraid… both of my legs are mechanical, Mr. Wallace.” He sounded apologetic, as if he were sorry to embarrass Harland with these intimate details. It disturbed Harland that he found this endearing.

“Oh.” Harland looked away and busied himself packing up his tools. “Of course, I would be happy to help in any way that I can….”

“Perhaps later in the week?” the doctor persisted.

Harland did have a business to attend to. He couldn’t spend all his time here, as fascinating as it was to poke into the doctor’s inventions—and as much as part of him continued to be drawn to Prescott. But he did have time later in the week. “Would Friday morning be suitable?”

“That would do nicely,” Steward replied happily.

Once more, Prescott escorted him to the door. And again, he stopped him with a hand on his forearm. This time, he appeared to be less afraid of rebuke, for he left it there a moment longer and pulled it away without hurry. “The doctor doesn’t always think of these things…. His profession, of course. But I’m concerned that… in order for you to work on my hip…. Well, you understand….”

He gave Harland a pleading look, and then Harland did understand. In order for him to work on Prescott’s hip, Prescott would have to remove his trousers. Depending upon where the damage was, things might get quite intimate. The thought made Harland blush a bit, and he desperately hoped it wasn’t visible in the dim light of the hall.

“Of course, Mr. Prescott,” he said. “It can’t be helped. But we’re all professionals.” At least, he and the doctor were. And despite the fact that Harland had no medical expertise, Prescott was, in an odd sense, still his patient.

Prescott looked as though he had more to add, but after struggling with it for a bit, he merely smiled gratefully. “Thank you for understanding, Mr. Wallace. I look forward to seeing you.”

 

 

FRIDAY WAS a miserable day, gray and raining. If Harland hadn’t already given his word, he never would have gone visiting in this weather. Even traveling by coach, he arrived wet, dripping water from his coat and hat in Dr. Steward’s entryway. Bradley seemed even more disapproving than usual as he took Harland’s wet things.

“I’m sorry to say that Dr. Steward is under the weather this morning,” the butler said.

“Should I come back another day, then?”

“The doctor has asked that you be taken to the workroom, so you may attend to your work there.” Harland noticed that neither Prescott nor the nature of Harland’s work were mentioned. Was the butler uninformed? Or was this another manifestation of the aversion the staff appeared to have toward Prescott?

Harland followed Bradley down the hall to a room he hadn’t seen before. The butler opened the door and stepped back into the hall, telling him, “Here you are, sir. I shall send the maid with tea shortly. If you require anything else, please ring.”

And then he left, as if he wished to be away from the room as quickly as possible. Harland entered to find Prescott sitting as he always did, perched on the edge of his chair in an almost feminine posture, his hands in his lap. He was without a coat today, though he wore a paisley waistcoat in hunter green over his shirt, and he had dispensed with his gloves. The injured “skin” on his left hand had still, to Harland’s knowledge, not been repaired, but it was now discreetly covered by a bandage.

“Good morning, Mr. Prescott,” Harland said, closing the door behind him. He noted that the room had a table off to one side, large enough to accommodate a man lying down. It was upholstered in leather, with a padded headrest and a ridge at the other end. Above the table, four Welsbach mantle lamps adorned the wall, hopefully providing enough light for Harland to work by. Beside the table was a workbench with various tools, and vise grips to hold components steady.

Prescott stood and came forward to greet him, walking with the aid of his cane. “Mr. Wallace. I apologize that the doctor cannot join us this morning. It was his hope that what you learned on Wednesday might enable you to work without his assistance.”

“I shall do my best.” He extended his hand to Prescott and was surprised at the feel of the man’s right hand. It seemed cool, not unlike the artificial left hand. But Harland released it after their handshake and suppressed the impulse to examine it more closely. “Before we begin”—and before they were both subjected to what promised to be a very awkward and distracting situation—“perhaps you could describe the injury to me.”

“It occurred when I fell on the front steps last December,” Prescott said. “There was no visible damage, but clearly something is damaged inside the mechanism.”

“Very well.” Harland fished around for something else to forestall the inevitable—something he realized he was dreading, not merely for the embarrassment it might cause him and Prescott, but for the stirrings in his groin that grew stronger every time he thought of Prescott disrobing. Of course, the man might be… damaged. That seemed likely, in fact. The injury that cost Prescott two legs—and a hand—must have been quite horrid. The transitions between flesh and prosthetics might not be pleasant to look upon. Harland would have to be very careful how he reacted, in order to spare Prescott further embarrassment.

They were distracted by a soft knock on the door and a woman’s voice saying, “Your tea, sir.”

Harland bade her come in, but there was no response. Puzzled, he went to the door and opened it to discover that a tray containing a teapot and a single cup and saucer—clearly Prescott had not been taken into account—and a small plate of cucumber sandwiches had been left on the hall carpet. “What the deuce…?”

“I’m truly sorry,” Prescott said as Harland carried the tray inside and set it upon a marble side table. “The staff will not enter a room with me in it unless the doctor is present.”

Harland was appalled that the mild-mannered Prescott had to endure such indignities in his own household. Certainly he had no intention of drinking tea while Prescott went without. He returned to the door and closed it. The key was in the lock, so he turned it. “Perhaps we should simply get down to business.”

“Of course.”

Harland felt like a lecher, watching Prescott undo the buttons of his trousers and drop them. He clearly had difficulty bending at the knees, so Harland felt compelled to remove his shoes for him and help him step out of the trousers, rather than force Prescott to struggle with them. That left him in his socks and drawers from the waist down. There was little reason to remove his socks, but his cotton drawers extended down to his ankles and clearly would be in the way. Prescott unbuttoned them and let them fall.

His shirt and waistcoat hung low enough to cover his manhood, but Harland was nonetheless embarrassed to be crouching in front of him, helping Prescott step out of the undergarment. It was incredibly clean, as if it had only recently been removed from the laundry. Though it was vulgar to even think about, it did seem odd to him that there were no stains or discolorations on the fabric.

When he stood, Prescott was watching him with his characteristic impassive expression, but the corners of his mouth quirked up in a shy smile.

“Do you…. Will you need assistance getting up on the table?” Harland asked.

“No. The doctor would never have been able to lift me onto it—not in recent years. The table tilts.”

And so it did. Harland found a lever that caused the end with the ridge to drop nearly to floor level. This enabled Prescott to step onto the ridge and lean back against the table. He handed Harland his cane. When Harland tilted the table back into a horizontal position, his “patient” was lying full-length upon it. “Clever,” he said with a smile.

Then he noticed the seams, and his smile faltered. As with his hand, Prescott’s leg prostheses were extremely lifelike. At a casual glance, they appeared no different than living human legs, albeit completely devoid of leg hair. However, there were several barely detectable seams in the artificial skin. It made sense, of course. It would have been impossible to effect repairs if the skin was one single sheath covering the entire leg. But it was unsettling, all the same. Harland would have to peel the skin away in order to get at the underlying mechanisms, and the thought made him squeamish.

“Where do you think the problem is located?” he asked.

“My right hip.”

“Roll over onto your left side, please,” Harland told Prescott. “Facing me.”

The man did as Harland asked, and of course it was impossible for his… anatomy… to remain in place when he did so. It wasn’t unusually large, but it still flopped obscenely against the back of Harland’s hand where it rested at the edge of the table, causing him to jerk back involuntarily.

“I’m sorry,” Prescott said, adjusting his shirt to cover himself.

“That’s quite all right. I was… startled.”

There was nothing Harland could do about the fact that he would have to touch Prescott’s hip, however. He placed his hand on it and was surprised to find it warm. For a moment, he wondered if he were touching actual flesh—Prescott’s body had to begin somewhere—but no. There was a seam just an inch above where his hand lay. Unable to stop himself, Harland slid his hand downward over the hip and onto the leg. He noticed that it grew cooler as he descended. He slid his hand back to the seam and traced it with a finger, until he encountered hair toward the front of Prescott’s body—pubic hair. With a start, Harland yanked his hand away again.

“The seam follows my inguinal ligament,” Prescott said.

“Your what?”

“That’s what the doctor calls it. The crease between my stomach and my pelvis.”

“Ah. Yes. I see that.” What was disturbing Harland more than the touch of pubic hair was the involuntary swelling it had caused in his own trousers. He’d never thought of himself as… that type of man. It was true that he’d avoided women, preferring to live as a bachelor. But that didn’t necessarily make him a mandrake, did it?

He had no choice but to return to his examination of the seam and hope he could prevent himself from becoming fully aroused. It would be impossible to hide that in the trousers he was wearing. But it wasn’t going to be easy. As he followed the seam around to the back, he saw that it cut down alongside Prescott’s buttocks and under them, following the crease there. Part of him was tempted to ask Prescott what the doctor’s name for that crease was, but he thought better of it. The mere thought of being that close to Prescott’s arse was making it difficult for him to breathe, and he felt his groin stiffening further.

“What’s the best way to open the seam without damaging it?” he asked, attempting to focus on his task. His voice sounded ragged with arousal to his ears, and he prayed that Prescott didn’t notice.

“It can be rolled down.”

He did so, wincing when a slight tug with his fingers popped the seam open, exposing a dark gray substance underneath. Prescott apparently felt nothing, because he lay calmly on the table, his head resting on the headrest. He would be unable to see much in that position, but his blue eyes watched Harland with interest, as if gauging his ability to do the job.

Harland continued to roll the artificial skin down over the thigh, accidentally brushing his fingers against Prescott’s scrotum in the process. A faint intake of breath made it apparent that Prescott had noticed, but both men pretended nothing had happened. When the skin was down to Prescott’s knee, Harland realized that the gray material underneath was some kind of rubber, molded into pieces that resembled muscles. They were easily removed, and the gears and hydraulics they’d been protecting were indeed very similar to those in Prescott’s hand. Harland felt reassured.

He also felt relieved that he could concentrate on something other than those tantalizing brushes against Prescott’s anatomy.

It took longer without the doctor’s guidance, but after what must have been hours of experimenting—asking Prescott to flex his leg and knee and foot, while observing the behavior of the mechanisms—Harland was finally able to determine what the primary cause of the problem was. One of the hydraulic pistons had a bent rod. Nothing more. Yet this had nearly crippled poor Prescott for months.

When he was certain he wouldn’t be causing irreparable damage, Harland removed the piston and asked Prescott, “Are there replacement parts available?”

“I believe so,” Prescott replied, “but I’m not certain where the doctor keeps them.”

Waking Dr. Steward was probably out for the moment, so Harland set about repairing the piston, if he could. He anchored it in one of the vise grips and, using a pair of pliers, managed to bend the rod until it was straight again and slid in and out of its cylinder smoothly. Then he replaced it, put all the rubber padding back in place, and unrolled the artificial skin to cover everything up again. As he smoothed out the seam, he couldn’t help but notice that Prescott’s member was swelling as much as his own.

He finished quickly and turned away, embarrassment causing his neck and cheeks to flush. “Why don’t we see if that does it? I’ll help you down.”

He didn’t need to tilt the table again. Prescott sat up and scooted forward until he dropped off onto his feet. Then the man took a brief walk around the room, still naked from the waist down. It was somewhat improper, but since he would simply have to remove the trousers again and climb back onto the table if something was still malfunctioning, there was little sense putting them back on for the moment. His shirt hung low enough to cover him, but there was some obvious tenting in the front. Harland’s manhood was likewise misbehaving, and Prescott had to have been aware of it. But they both pretended not to notice.

The leg repair appeared to be a complete success. Prescott walked a bit stiffly, but he assured Harland that he’d always walked that way, even when his legs had been at their peak performance. He positively beamed at the Harland as he moved around the room. “Thank you, Mr. Wallace!” he exclaimed. “You have no idea.”

Harland found his childlike giddiness endearing, but when Prescott executed a small jump and caused his shirttails to flap up and reveal more than was proper, Harland hurriedly retrieved the man’s trousers and undergarments.

“Let me help you dress,” he said, wishing for a glass of water. His mouth had suddenly gone dry.

Prescott needed little help with his clothes. He perched on the edge of one of the chairs in order to slip his underwear over his stocking feet and pull them up past his knees. Then he did the same with his trousers. Inching them up his thighs and over his buttocks—one garment at a time—by rocking back and forth was a more arduous process, and Harland felt he was witnessing something private that he really shouldn’t be watching. But Prescott seemed unselfconscious. When he had his trousers up at last, he stood and accepted Harland’s assistance fastening his suspenders. He smiled at Harland, looking at him intently with eyes full of emotion. “Mr. Wallace… may I count on you, in the future?”

Harland shook his hand and smiled back at him, meeting Prescott’s eyes as long as he dared. “You may, Mr. Prescott.”

“Thank you.”

Harland was exhausted, so he took his leave. Out in the hall, he encountered the butler, to his annoyance. His few encounters with Bradley had given him a dislike of the manservant. He allowed Bradley to retrieve his hat and coat, however, and responded politely to Bradley’s inquiry into whether he’d had a pleasant afternoon. To his surprise, the butler said, “It’s come to my attention, sir, that the maid who brought you tea left it on the carpet outside the door.”

Harland felt uncomfortable responding, but really he had little reason to cover for the woman. Her behavior had been appalling. “I’m afraid that’s correct.”

“I do apologize, sir. She has been reprimanded.”

“I see,” Harland said noncommittally.

“Unfortunately, some of the staff have a rather irrational fear of the… invention.”

Harland took his hat from Bradley and hesitated a moment. He knew he had no right to discipline another man’s household staff, but he was unable to stop himself from saying, “The invention, Bradley? Are you referring to the prosthetics Dr. Steward constructed for Mr. Prescott?”

“Somewhat, sir….” Bradley appeared to be holding something back.

“Mr. Prescott is to be pitied for his infirmity, Bradley—not feared.”

“‘Mr. Prescott,’ sir?” Bradley blinked at him, as if he couldn’t comprehend. “I was led to believe that sir examined it.”

“It?” Harland was extremely close to losing his temper.

“Forgive me, sir,” Bradley said. “But surely sir has noticed that this ‘Mr. Prescott’ is a machine?”

“Mr. Prescott has prostheses, Bradley, but it’s absurd to call him a ‘machine’! He is still quite human.”

“Ah. I believe I see where the miscommunication lies. I’m afraid, sir, that no part of the… I believe Dr. Steward prefers to call it an ‘automaton’… is human.”

 

 

IT WAS impossible. Harland had been attempting to dismiss Bradley’s ridiculous statement on the coach ride from South Kensington to Chelsea. But every time he’d convinced himself that it was nonsense, odd things came to mind—the fact that Harland had been unable to discern the difference between the artificial “skin” below the seam at Prescott’s hip and the supposedly real skin above it, the disturbing appearance of Prescott’s face, as if it were a mask….

Prescott’s face wasn’t completely immobile, of course. It moved around the mouth and eyes. The man’s eyebrows were part of what made his eyes so expressive. And Harland had spent little time examining the skin on Prescott’s hip, buttocks, and groin, because he’d found it too arousing to do so.

That brought up other things Harland found disturbing. He disliked thinking of himself as a mandrake. The very word disgusted him. But even the memory of trailing his fingers through the hair at Prescott’s groin was causing a stirring in his loins. Then again, wasn’t Prescott’s obvious reaction to Harland’s touch proof that he was a man? Never mind what it might say about his inclinations. Surely a machine could not….

And even if it were possible for a machine to appear human on the surface, how could it talk and appear to think, as Prescott did? The very idea was absurd!

It was all making Harland feel ill. At dinner that evening, he found himself without an appetite and ate so little that he had to feign a stomach ailment to avoid insulting the cook. It wasn’t far from the truth. He retired early—with a glass of hot barley water the cook foisted upon him—hoping sleep would soothe his troubled mind, but it eluded him. The image and feel of Prescott’s smooth, sensuous buttocks plagued him, until he was finally forced to take himself in hand. Afterward, he was disgusted—both by the thought of reacting this passionately to another man, and by the possibility that he was reacting not just to a man, but to a simulacrum of a man.

Spent, Harland was able to at last drift off to sleep, but his rest was disturbed by confused nightmares, none of which he could remember the next morning. He desperately wanted to question Dr. Steward. Had the man deceived him about Prescott’s… nature? Or had Bradley been passing along a bit of malicious gossip? Thinking back over the conversations he’d had with the doctor, Harland was unable to recall him ever referring to Prescott as a “man.” But of course one would assume that to be the case.

He waited as long as he could stand it before sending a messenger to the doctor’s house, inquiring if he was recovered enough to receive visitors. The reply was no, but the doctor would inform him when he was. There was little Harland could do but wait. He could hardly discuss the matter with Mr. Prescott.

It was three days before he received a message inviting him to South Kensington. Little had changed in that time. Harland was still eating little, and his staff had begun to nag him about seeing a doctor—something which amused him, even in his distracted state of mind. He’d also been tormented by thoughts of Prescott and visions of him naked and aroused, causing Harland to masturbate more often than he’d done since he was an adolescent. He hadn’t had a strict upbringing, so he felt less disgust about the physical deed than others might have, perhaps. But his thoughts during it were repugnant to him once he was spent. He wasn’t certain if learning the truth about Prescott would lessen or increase his distress.

He sent a message to the doctor, specifying a time of arrival—after luncheon, of course, and well before afternoon tea—and requesting that Mr. Prescott not be present. He felt a twinge of guilt, as if he were betraying the man after they’d had a rather pleasant day together, but then, that was the issue. When he arrived and Bradley had shown him in, Harland was pleased to find the doctor had complied with his wishes. Prescott was absent.

“Your work on Friday was excellent, Mr. Wallace,” Steward said congenially. He appeared even more frail than during their last conversation, and Harland hoped he wasn’t taxing the man unduly. But his questions could not wait.

“Thank you, sir.”

“The leg seems to be working perfectly. Luke was most pleased. Which reminds me—I’ve made certain he now knows where all the components I have on hand are located. It never occurred to me that he wouldn’t know, after all these years. But I suppose he was used to waiting while I fetched them….”

Harland listened patiently while the old man rambled on. But as he was uncertain about his continued involvement in Prescott’s… upkeep… he wasn’t convinced any of this information mattered now. Eventually, when Steward seemed to be finished, Harland said, “I’ve come to ask you about Mr. Prescott.”

“What about him?” the doctor asked. “Did he behave badly during your time with him?” It seemed an odd question to ask of an adult man. But then, Prescott appeared young enough to be Steward’s son, or perhaps even his grandson.

“Not exactly. But you see… in order for me to adjust his leg, I had to peel down the artificial skin on it.”

“Of course.”

“There was a seam following the contours of his hip. I naturally assumed that this would separate the artificial skin from his real skin. Truthfully, I had expected to find straps of some sort….” He looked at the doctor hopefully, as if he might volunteer the information he was looking for, but Steward merely watched him curiously. “I don’t wish to pry, but it seems like something I should know.”

“What?”

Harland sighed. “How do Mr. Prescott’s prostheses attach to his body, doctor?”

“I take it you didn’t ask Luke to undress completely?”

“Of course not. It was hardly necessary for him to remove all his clothes to provide me with access to his hip and leg.”

The doctor looked amused. “I suppose. But it would have answered your question.”

“Perhaps, but it didn’t seem appropriate at the time.”

“Why don’t I call Luke in here and have him undress for you?”

Good Lord! Harland felt himself turn scarlet. “No! Please. I see no reason to embarrass Mr. Prescott.”

“I doubt Luke would be embarrassed. He’s had to do that a great deal, as I’ve perfected his mechanisms over the years.”

“I’m afraid I would be. Please remember that I am not a doctor.”

Steward raised his eyebrows at him, as if he felt Harland was being unreasonable. “What you would have seen for yourself, had you asked him to undress, Mr. Wallace… is that Luke is flawless, apart from the seams you’ve observed.”

“How is that possible?” Harland asked, a feeling of dread filling his chest and making it difficult to breathe. “The artificial skin is lifelike in appearance, but… it isn’t skin. There must be places in which there are transitions from that to real skin….”

“No, Mr. Wallace, you’ve observed for yourself that the skin on both sides of the seams is the same.”

Harland was on the verge of panic. He realized he’d made a mistake in coming here. He no longer wanted his suspicions confirmed. He wanted the doctor to tell him this was all a miscommunication, that Prescott was as human as either of them. “Surely it cannot cover his entire body….”

“It does.”

Harland sat in silence for a very long time, and the doctor merely watched him without interrupting his swirling thoughts. At last, he asked, “Is there… any part of Mr. Prescott… that is flesh and blood, doctor?”

“No, Mr. Wallace,” Steward replied calmly. “I tried to tell you this on your first visit, but there was all that fainting business. Luke is an automaton. The most sophisticated one ever built.”

Harland felt like fainting again, but his stubborn brain wouldn’t cooperate this time. It left him awake to deal with the horror of what he’d just been told. He stared blankly at the garish green-and-crimson carpet and said, “He isn’t… alive….”

“Not in a strictly biological sense. But I maintain that biological life is not the essential aspect of a man. What makes a man is consciousness—awareness of his surroundings—and the ability to think and feel.”

Harland looked up at him slowly. “How can a machine do any of those things?”

“I confess I’m uncertain whether Luke is truly conscious. He exhibits behavior that suggests it. But feelings…. Those came first in my experiments. Feelings are, at their simplest, extrapolations of the pleasure and pain felt by the body, abstracted and applied to models we hold in our minds. Luke can ‘feel’ through myriad minute sensors placed throughout his body. They sense pain, pressure, temperature, balance….” Harland had encountered small disks on the surface of the mechanisms in several locations. They appeared to correlate with metallic spots on the underside of the “skin,” so he’d carefully worked around them. “I even gave him extra touch sensors in his sexual organs, to mimic the same functionality in the human body.”

Harland must have looked shocked, because the doctor chuckled and shook his head. “No, Mr. Wallace, I have never used Luke in that manner. I did once pay a young woman to spend time with him—to test that particular functionality. He reported that it all seemed to work correctly, but I don’t think he enjoyed it much. The woman’s body was too alien to him. I believe he found her a bit repulsive.”

Harland could no longer listen. His brain was screaming at him to get out of the house and run as far and as fast as he could to escape this madness. Fortunately, the doctor ended the conversation at that point.

“I’m very sorry,” the old man said as he leaned forward stiffly to pick up the bell from the table and ring it twice. “I’m not currently up to long conversations. These few words have already tired me. Might we take up our discussion again in a day or two?”

As Bradley entered in response to the doctor’s bell, Harland took his leave and slipped past the butler. He walked quickly to the door but stopped, his hand on the doorknob, when he heard Prescott say behind him, “Mr. Wallace? I wasn’t aware you were visiting.”

Harland stopped and turned around very slowly. Prescott was smiling and his eyes seemed lit up in delight. But Harland couldn’t bring himself to say anything to him—to this artificial mockery of a man. Something in his eyes must have given him away, because the light in Prescott’s eyes faded and he glanced away.

“I see,” he said.

Bradley had closed the door to the parlor and they were alone. Despite himself, Harland felt his heart aching in response to the sadness and loneliness that came over Prescott’s features. Involuntarily, he walked nearer, until they were standing eye to eye in the front hall. Then he cleared his throat and said quietly, “Mr. Prescott. Forgive me… but I should like to touch your face a moment.”

Prescott looked back at him, his eyes full of resignation. Silently, he nodded his assent.

Harland removed his glove and hesitantly lifted his hand until his fingers brushed against Prescott’s cheek. As he had feared, it was cold. The work he’d done on Prescott’s leg and hand had made him familiar with the feel of the synthetic “skin” covering those appendages, and that was what he felt now.

Prescott’s entire face was synthetic.

Harland slowly withdrew his hand as a cold chill crawled up his spine and made the hair on the back of his neck feel as if it were standing on end. He could not avoid looking into Prescott’s eyes, seeing the anxiety there.

“Please,” Prescott said. But he fell silent after that, as if he had no idea what to say next.

Without a word, Harland spun about and left the townhouse.

 

 

SEVERAL DAYS went by, during which Harland attended to work he’d put aside for far too long while caught up in Dr. Steward’s… project. During this time, he had horrifying dreams in which he saw Prescott standing in his bedroom, gazing out the window. He approached the man from behind and called his name, but there was no response. At last, he reached out to touch Prescott’s shoulder, and the man turned. But when he did, Harland saw that his face was nothing but a mass of brass gears and copper wires.

Or worse, he would dream that Prescott was lying on his bed, apparently naked, though his body was covered in a linen sheet. These dreams were always disturbingly erotic in nature, and Harland felt his breath quicken as he approached the bed. Prescott smiled up at him with his perfect, china doll face and lifted the sheet to welcome him. But what lay under the sheet wasn’t a beautiful male body. It was a hideous array of tubes and pistons, sparking and belching steam.

Harland frequently awoke screaming from these nightmares.

He could not get Prescott out of his mind. No matter how much he told himself the man was nothing more than a machine, it was impossible to think of him that way. He often found Prescott’s beautiful face coming to mind when his thoughts were idle, or the perfection of his “body,” of his… “manhood.” Harland felt he must surely be ill. A healthy man would never have these thoughts about another man, let alone a mockery of a man made from metal, rubber, and resins. In daylight, when his will was at its strongest, he banished his daydreams and concentrated on his work or forced himself to read a book. But at night, lying in bed and waiting for sleep to take him, he was powerless to keep his mind from turning to fantasies that shamed him in the light of morning.

When two weeks had passed since he’d last visited Dr. Steward’s residence, a message was delivered to Harland’s townhouse. It read:

 

My Dear Mr. Wallace,

 

I hope this letter finds you well. I have grown concerned that so much time has passed since our last meeting. I would very much like to invite you to discuss our business arrangement at your earliest convenience.

 

Sincerely,

 

Dr. Mordecai Steward

 

Harland was tempted to go. It was absurd how much he longed to see Prescott again, even knowing what he did now. But his mind revolted at the thought. His fascination with Prescott had become a sick addiction. The best thing for him would be to stay away and never see that abomination again.

He sent a reply with the messenger, telling Dr. Steward that he was uncertain when he would be available. But of course, that would not resolve the problem, and he was unsurprised when another letter came from the doctor that afternoon, asking Harland to please contact him as soon as his schedule would permit a visit.

A week later, another message arrived, apologizing for the doctor’s impatience, but reminding Harland that his health was failing. Harland again put him off with vague excuses about his schedule. He had to wonder just how long he would keep up this game. Until the doctor tired of inquiring? Until the man succumbed to his illness? It made Harland uncomfortable to think part of him was hoping for that eventuality. The decent thing to do would be to tell the doctor plainly that he would no longer work with Prescott. Yet when he sat down to write a letter to this effect, Harland stopped halfway through and tore it up.

The matter was decided for him two days later. Steward’s message boy arrived panting, apparently having run most of the way. The letter he carried stated:

 

Dear Mr. Wallace,

 

Please forgive me for pressing the matter, but the situation has become urgent. Luke has been injured, and I am simply not capable of handling the matter myself. I beg you to come at once.

 

Most Sincerely,

 

Dr. Mordecai Steward

 

It was absurd that the words “Luke has been injured” should evoke such a strong feeling of fear in him—fear for Prescott—but he found himself telling the boy he would come at once.

 

 

WHEN HE arrived at Steward’s residence and Bradley took his coat, Harland could not escape the feeling that the butler was disappointed in him for responding to the doctor’s summons. There was nothing overt in his manner or the few words he spoke to Harland, but something in his eyes….

Harland found the doctor in his sitting room, as usual. The old man seemed to have grown smaller since the last time they’d met, and when he spoke, it was barely above a whisper. “Mr. Wallace, thank you so much for coming.”

Harland was still uncertain exactly why he had come, but he smiled politely and said, “Of course, Dr. Steward. I was sorry to hear the situation has grown so dire.”

“Forgive me,” Steward said, “but I am not up to conversation. Luke is waiting in the workshop. He can inform you of the details.”

“Of course, Doctor.”

Bradley told Steward, “The nurse will be in shortly, sir.” Then he escorted Harland to the workshop and left him there with little more than a curt bow. “Sir.”

Harland entered, part of him afraid to see for himself how serious Prescott’s injury was, and another part of him frightened by the prospect of seeing Prescott at all. But Prescott was sitting upon the workbench with his shirt off, looking as beautiful and perfect as he always had, and Harland felt the knot in the pit of his stomach unraveling itself. Then he mentally chastised himself. Why should I be relieved that he doesn’t appear seriously injured? He—it—is merely a machine!

It was difficult to remember that when Prescott smiled at him and said, “Mr. Wallace! I’m delighted to see you again.”

“Mr. Prescott. I understand….” He balked at saying “you,” as if that would grant the automaton some measure of humanity that wasn’t warranted, but it was simply impossible to avoid addressing Prescott directly. “…you’ve been injured.”

Prescott didn’t get off the table, which caused Harland to wonder if he’d done something to his leg again. But Prescott held out his left hand and said, “I grabbed a hot poker.”

Harland closed the door behind him and approached, holding his bag of horological tools. He set the bag upon the table and took Prescott’s hand in his, disturbed that the feel of Prescott’s cool synthetic skin still quickened his pulse. But the sight of Prescott’s palm made him cringe. It wasn’t blistered, as one would expect of human skin, nor reddened, but the skin had melted on either side of a horrible, blackened tear. There was a soft, gray rubbery pad underneath, like the thicker pads Harland had seen under the skin on Prescott’s leg. Thankfully, that wasn’t damaged, beyond a shallow imprint from the poker, and likewise the mechanisms in the hand were undamaged. But the skin was beyond repair.

“I’m afraid, Mr. Prescott—”

“Please,” Prescott interrupted. “I would like it if you called me Luke.”

Harland regarded him thoughtfully. Then he said, “How is it you can ‘like’ anything? I’ve seen how your physical mechanisms work. They are works of genius and immensely complex. I would have thought them impossible a few months ago. Yet I can see how they work and understand them to some degree. But to give the appearance of thought….”

The smile on Prescott’s face faltered, and he gently pulled his hand away from Harland’s grasp. He said nothing as he placed the hand in his lap and shifted his gaze to the Oriental carpet.

“The automatons Dr. Steward spoke of the last time we conversed,” Harland went on. “I’ve seen something similar. One used a cylinder like the one in a music box to guide its movements and give the appearance of autonomy. But that’s all it was—appearance. Like a magician’s trick. The automaton could not in actuality think. Yet you are so much more sophisticated than that. I still cannot fathom how you mimic human speech and actions so perfectly.”

Prescott continued to stare at the carpet as he responded, “The doctor told me once that my brain was composed of several thousand thin sheets of silk, hand-painted with gold circuits and embedded with silicon wafers so small that it would take a watchmaker to sort them all out.”

“I should like to see it,” Harland said.

A look of what could only be fear passed across Prescott’s face as he raised his eyes to Harland’s. “It’s all sealed together with resin. The layers cannot be peeled apart without destroying them.”

The look in his eyes cut through Harland like a knife. He was forced to place a reassuring hand on Prescott’s wrist. “I shall let it alone, then.”

Prescott’s soft sigh of relief disturbed him. Can he really feel? It’s impossible! Yet Harland was afraid to test his assumption.

“I suppose this… unique situation would make it acceptable for us to use first names,” he said. “I will call you Luke, if you will call me Harland.”

Luke smiled bashfully at that and glanced away. “Thank you, Harland.”

“Luke.” Harland returned the smile briefly, but then he frowned as he ran his thumb over the damaged skin of Luke’s palm. “I don’t know what I can do to repair this,” he said. “The mechanism isn’t damaged. Merely the skin.”

“I can show you where the replacements are kept,” Luke suggested.

“Very well.”

He helped Luke off the table, seeing little point in lowering the table with the lever when it was a mere few inches. Even so, he hadn’t anticipated how intimate it would feel to have Luke’s hands upon his shoulders, his hands on Luke’s hips, and his palms against Luke’s naked skin. He knew it wasn’t actually skin, of course, but he’d grown so used to the feel of it that his mind played a cruel trick on him and made it feel like naked skin under his hands. Far worse, his body responded to the touch in a highly inappropriate manner, and he prayed that Luke wouldn’t notice. Perhaps he shouldn’t care if an automaton observed him stiffening in his trousers, but he was nevertheless embarrassed and glad to break the contact when Luke’s feet touched the floor.

Luke led him across the room to a tall mahogany wardrobe against the far wall—one of four, placed side by side. It was locked, so Luke drew a ring of keys out of his pocket and selected one, saying, “There are only two sets of keys for the wardrobes—mine and the doctor’s. Perhaps we could have another set made for you.”

When he opened the doors wide, Harland could see instantly why the contents of the wardrobe would be so closely guarded. It was full of body parts. Luke’s body parts, to be more precise. Though just the skin—hands and feet laid out on display racks like empty gloves and stockings, two dress forms with sections of buttocks and male genitalia attached, and stacks of thin wooden drawers with labels such as “Upper Right Arm” and “Lower Left Leg.” The genitalia made Harland blush, but he found the face far more disturbing. There was only one, suspended on the back wall of the wardrobe, attached to a form that preserved its shape. Two similar forms were on the wall beside it, made of wood with several small metal nubs on their surface, but they weren’t covered in the artificial skin. The solitary face was identical to Luke’s but for one grisly feature—the eye sockets were empty. It looked as if a surgeon had removed the skin and mounted it, and it filled Harland with horror.

“I feel a bit lightheaded,” he said. There was a chair to one side of the wardrobe and he dropped into it, forcing himself to look elsewhere in the room, while he took slow breaths to calm himself.

Luke approached him, looking distressed. “Shall I fetch some water from the kitchen?”

Had he asked if he might ring for some water, Harland would have agreed. However, he realized Luke was unable to do that. None of the staff would respond to his summons. That thought forced Harland to rouse himself. He stood and said, “No, thank you. I’m fine.”

He approached the wardrobe again, determined not to show further signs of distress. He avoided looking directly at the face but turned his attention to the hands. They did appear very much like gloves, although the synthetic skin was a bit thicker than leather. Only one pair remained, with an additional left hand. Harland wondered what happened to the other right hand skin.

“I damaged my hand with a pot of boiling water seven years ago,” Luke observed, apparently sensing his curiosity. Then he added wistfully, “I must be very careful now.”

Harland nodded, and then a thought occurred to him. “What about that gash you received on the back of your right hand?”

Luke held up the hand in question, so that Harland could see that it still sported a bandage on the back of it. “It doesn’t seem worth using up the one I have left to replace it,” he said.

“I see.”

Harland lifted one of the left hand skins up gingerly and carried it over to the worktable, where the light was better. He set it off to one side and said to Luke, “Will you allow me to lift you back onto the table?”

“Of course.”

It was disconcertingly like going in for an embrace. Luke was looking directly into his eyes with a serious expression as he placed his hands upon Harland’s shoulders, and once more Harland felt as though he were holding a partially naked man as he placed his hands on Luke’s waist and lifted him into position. The heaviness of his breath afterward wasn’t entirely due to the strain.

Luke held out his left hand, and Harland saw the thin line of the seam between the hand and the forearm. He gently popped the seam open and separated it, folding the skin down as if he were removing a glove. He’d expected to be disturbed by the sight of the mechanical hand underneath, but he was not. In a way, it was very beautiful. Luke flexed the fingers slightly, and Harland watched the exquisitely smooth movement of the pistons and gears with fascination for a moment. Then he picked up the new molded hand skin and carefully stretched the wrist opening in order to slide it over the hand.

When it was done and the seam had sealed itself—the material along the seam adhered to itself somehow, without forming a permanent bond—the hand was nearly indistinguishable from a real human hand. Harland smoothed down the skin carefully, until he realized he’d been doing it for longer than necessary, and his touch was now more caressing than practical. He released Luke’s hand and asked, “How does it feel?”

Luke flexed it. “Very good.”

“How did you come to burn it?”

“I picked up a hot poker from the fireplace,” Luke responded, as though the answer should be obvious.

It was obvious, but that wasn’t quite what Harland had meant. “You didn’t know it was hot?”

“I knew,” Luke said. “That was the reason I picked it up.”

“I don’t understand.”

“I picked up the poker to burn my hand.”

Harland blinked at him in surprise. “Why on earth would you do that?”

“I hoped you would come if I was injured.” There was no hint of guile in his voice or in his expression when he said this. If anything, he seemed delighted. “And you did.”

It was true that Harland had needed something drastic to bring him back to this house, but he disliked being manipulated. And the smile on Luke’s face angered him. “According to the doctor, these skins cannot be replaced, and what we see in that cabinet is the last of them. You cannot afford to deliberately destroy one. What were you thinking?”

“I needed to see you.”

“There was no need to see me. You were uninjured!”

His harsh tone caused Luke’s smile to fade. “Please don’t be angry. The doctor has been so ill lately… and I’ve been so lonely….”

“Lonely!” The feeling of horror Harland had barely been keeping at bay welled up within him. “You can’t be lonely! You can’t feel anything! You’re a machine!”

Luke stared at him open-mouthed for a long moment, and then he slowly crumpled, lowering his eyes and hunching over, his shoulders sagging. He placed his repaired hand in his lap and rubbed the back of it with the fingers of his other hand.

At last he said in a very small, quiet voice, “I’m sorry.”

Harland began to say something—something about talking to the doctor about this when he was feeling better—when he noticed Luke’s cheeks were wet. He was crying.

He can’t cry! It seemed impossible. What use could there be for an automaton to cry? Perhaps it’s merely a mechanism for lubricating the eye, so the lids can close smoothly, he told himself. And that seemed a likely explanation. But it didn’t matter. The sight of Luke crying was immensely disturbing. To all appearances, Luke was in his midtwenties and too old to be openly crying in front of another man. But he’d never been to school and had the lovely experience of being publicly humiliated for doing so.

“Please,” he said. “Don’t do that.”

“Don’t do what?”

“Cry.”

Luke attempted to wipe the tears off his cheeks, but that merely served to make him look more vulnerable. “I thought you liked me.”

He’s a machine! I can’t have hurt his feelings!

But even as Harland cursed himself for being a fool, he reached out and gently brushed Luke’s cheek with his index finger. “I’m sorry, Luke. I do like you. Please don’t cry.”

 

 

DESPITE THE fact that there was little reason for him to come to Steward’s townhouse if Luke was in good repair, Harland had been unable to escape without promising to return twice weekly—every Tuesday and every Friday. It wasn’t the doctor who’d exacted this promise, but Luke. No matter how often Harland reminded himself that Luke was an automaton, his mind persisted in the belief that he was… if not human, then at least conscious and feeling.

Worse, Harland could not quench his physical desire for Luke, even after seeing the complex arrangement of gears and pistons and circuitry that made up his body. Harland continued to have intensely erotic dreams about Luke, of lying with him naked on the Oriental carpet in the workroom. But the dreams frequently turned nightmarish, with Luke’s body falling into pieces like a china doll just as Harland climaxed. He awoke to find himself spilling his seed into the bed linens, at once aroused and confused and terrified, his heart pounding in his chest.

Still, he found himself enjoying the visits. He had the opportunity to speak briefly with Dr. Steward on his next visit about his concerns that simply keeping Luke company, when there was nothing in need of repair, seemed an abuse of their business arrangement. However, Steward dismissed this.

“I will pay you for your time, of course, Mr. Wallace.”

Harland suddenly felt very uncomfortable. “That is not my concern, doctor. Luke… the automaton doesn’t require anything from me at present—”

“He requires companionship,” the doctor stated flatly. “I’m afraid my failing health no longer allows me to spend much time with him.”

“I confess I’m having a difficult time with the concept of… the automaton… requiring anything so… emotional.”

Dr. Steward regarded him thoughtfully before lifting a glass of water with a shaking hand to take a sip. “Mr. Wallace, it would require days to describe the complex mechanisms underlying what motivates Luke—weeks. Suffice to say, he has the ability to feel pleasure and pain on a physical level, and he has the ability to model that in his mind. Once these physical sensations become abstracted to a certain degree, and associated with, say, another person in his mind, then they effectively become what you call ‘emotions.’ You do him—and me—a great disservice by insisting that he cannot feel lonely or need human companionship.”

The problem, Harland knew, was not that he couldn’t believe Luke had feelings, but that he was afraid to believe it. “Very well, Doctor. If you wish me to act as a companion, I will do so.”

Dr. Steward smiled. “Excellent! You may of course wish to take the opportunity to familiarize yourself with the contents of the other wardrobes. They contain replacement parts for all of Luke’s systems.”

Being a companion to Luke was far from a hardship. He was a pleasure to talk to. The doctor had apparently spent many long evenings giving him a rudimentary education in a number of fields of study, as well as the social niceties. He had little interest in politics, and Harland was unable to engage his enthusiasm on that topic, but he enjoyed hearing about the year Harland had spent traveling across the Continent. Luke longed to see the world outside London, since he’d never been permitted to leave the townhouse except for the shortest of errands, usually accompanied by the doctor. These excursions had all but vanished now that Steward was ill.

Luke was also fascinated by mythology, and many of their afternoons together were passed with Harland regaling him with the adventures of Hercules or Icarus or Persephone. Harland brought in the Mercier translation of Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea—his grasp of French was poor and Luke’s appeared to be nonexistent—so he could read it aloud on some afternoons. Luke listened intently, fascinated by such things as oceans and sharks and giant squids. Verne’s description of the Nautilus provided Harland with the opportunity to inform Luke on the history of submersibles, though he found that only mildly interesting. What interested him was exploration. Perhaps, Harland thought, when they finished this novel, they could move on to Verne’s Journey to the Center of the Earth.

 

 

HARLAND HAD learned, over the course of these visits, that Luke’s body—and mind, for that matter—was powered by rows of nickel-cadmium batteries stored in his arms and legs, as well as several locations in his torso. They required charging every night in order for Luke to function.

One morning, after Bradley had silently removed his coat and hat—the butler rarely spoke to him these days, unless Harland directly addressed him—Harland entered the workshop to find Luke sitting on the sofa… completely nude. Some mechanical monstrosity Harland had never noticed before was belching steam in the corner. Harland stood in the doorway in shock a moment, before he came to his senses and hurriedly closed the door behind him. He locked it for good measure.

Luke seemed to find his distress amusing, because he smiled broadly and said, “Good morning, Harland,” as if nothing were amiss.

“Good morning,” Harland replied. He took a few steps into the room. “Might I inquire as to why you’re naked?”

“I’m sorry. Is it upsetting you?”

What it was doing to Harland was arousing him, and that he found upsetting. “You haven’t answered my question.”

“The cable that charges my right leg must have been loose last night,” Luke said. “It was barely responsive when I awoke.” Luke did not “sleep” as a human would, Harland knew. But when his systems were charging, his body was largely dormant. “I reconnected it, and it appears to be charging now, but it will take several hours.”

There was a thick cable leading to the sofa from the steam-driven machine in the corner, which Harland surmised must be an electrical generator.

“Do you always remove your clothes when you charge?”

“Yes,” Luke answered matter-of-factly. “It’s easier to reach the connectors that way.”

As Harland drew near, he could see that Luke’s right leg had the skin rolled down slightly on the inner thigh, up near his groin. It would indeed be difficult to reach that spot with clothing on. His manhood was casually pushed aside to make room for the electrical connector, and Harland felt himself flush at the sight of it. He forced himself to look away.

“Shall we pick up where we left off?” he asked, holding up his copy of the Verne novel.

“Please.”

He read for perhaps an hour, doing his best to keep his eyes focused on the pages of the novel and avoid staring at Luke’s naked body. Despite the fact that the seams were now clearly visible, Harland was still enthralled by its perfection. The situation was made worse by the fact that both he and Luke were becoming aroused. While it was somewhat possible for him to disguise his own arousal by crossing his legs, he suspected Luke was nonetheless aware of it, and there was no hiding Luke’s arousal. If the young man—Harland had abandoned the conceit of referring to him as “it” or “the automaton”—seemed unconcerned about it, but Harland found it far too distracting. He eventually gave up his attempts to read and closed the book.

“Is something wrong, Harland?”

“Luke… I understand that you don’t feel embarrassment at being naked,” Harland said awkwardly, “but even in front of a doctor or in a sporting club… one doesn’t allow himself to….” If he hoped for Luke to fill in the obvious, he soon realized that wasn’t going to happen. Luke hadn’t the faintest idea what he was referring to. “It isn’t considered proper for a man to be obviously aroused in front of another man,” he finished.

Luke appeared to consider this. “Not even if we’d like to have coitus?”

Harland’s eyebrows nearly crawled up into his hairline. Is he propositioning me? It was possible, considering Luke’s lack of experience in these matters. Harland suddenly felt faint, and was glad that he was already seated. “That isn’t something two men… would generally do together….”

“The doctor explained that to me,” Luke said, “after my wretched experience with that woman.” He screwed up his nose as if he smelled something unpleasant. “It felt somewhat pleasant in my genitals, but I didn’t like the way she felt against my body and in my hands—too soft and… she didn’t hold her shape well.”

Harland found his description humorous, but Luke clearly did not, so he avoided smiling.

“I told the doctor that, if he wanted me to do it again, it would have to be with a man.”

“I assume he ruled out that possibility.”

To Harland’s surprise, Luke shook his head. “He simply said it would be more difficult to arrange and perhaps a bit dangerous.”

“One would think,” Harland said, though he really had no idea. The thought of propositioning a man in a back alley somewhere and possibly being beaten or knifed for his trouble—or arrested—terrified him. “Is that all he told you about it?”

“He said it was something only a few men enjoyed doing with other men. But you….”

He seemed to think he’d said too much, and he allowed his last sentence to trail off. But Harland’s heart was in his throat. Had Luke perceived something about him that even he was only vaguely aware of, that only haunted him in his dreams? “What about me, Luke?”

Luke stared hard at the carpet as he replied, “You become aroused when you touch me, and when I’m naked, you have difficulty looking away from my genitals.”

Harland swallowed hard, finding his throat incredibly dry. He wished desperately for a glass of water, but that would require him to ring for a servant, and the last thing he wanted was for another person to enter the room at this moment. Perhaps he should leave, tell Luke he was being absurd, order him to never speak of it again. But Luke deserved a better response than that. “I suppose I do. I’m very sorry.”

“If I’m likewise aroused by you,” Luke said, “doesn’t that mean we’re attracted to each other?”

“I suppose so.”

“Then why should you be sorry?”

Harland sighed and set the book down on the table beside him. “Society—other people—would not approve.”

Luke leaned forward and gazed earnestly into Harland’s eyes. “Harland… outside this door, everybody but the doctor hates me. I’ve overheard the servants talking about how I should be smashed into pieces and burned. What I do in this room… with you… won’t affect that.”

Harland felt nauseated by the thought of any harm coming to Luke. And perhaps that was what overrode his fears about what discovery could do to him and to the business he’d spent his life building. He glanced at the door, and then because he didn’t trust his memory, he got up and walked over to make certain it was locked. It was impossible to hide his arousal while he did this, but there seemed little point.

He went back to stand in front of Luke and asked him, “What would you like us to do?”

Luke gave him a delighted smile, like a boy being offered a present. “May I see you without your clothes? I’ve never seen anyone, apart from myself in the mirror.”

“You saw that woman,” Harland pointed out, though he began to remove his tie. It would be difficult to get his clothes back in order without his manservant to assist him. He worried that he might leave the workshop looking obviously… disheveled… and give the servants more to gossip about. But it was evident that Luke dressed himself daily, since none of the servants would assist him. Harland would simply have to depend upon him.

“I saw very little,” Luke said. “It had to be dark, so she wouldn’t see my seams.”

“I see.”

Harland removed his tie and set it on the sofa. Then he removed his jacket and set it beside it. As he unbuttoned his vest, he asked, “Do you know how to… pleasure yourself?” He mimicked the motion in front of his crotch, which was tenting in a way he would have found highly embarrassing mere moments earlier.

“Yes. Would you like me to do that?”

It was making Harland uncomfortable to be the only one doing anything. “Does it feel good when you do it?”

“Of course.”

“Then yes, I would like you to do that while I remove my clothing.”

Luke laughed and began to stroke himself while he watched Harland undress. It was positively the most lewd and indecent act Harland had ever witnessed, and he found himself panting heavily with desire. At that moment, it didn’t matter to him that he could see every seam in Luke’s artificial body, and that an exact duplicate of Luke’s beautiful face resided in a wardrobe not twenty feet from where Harland stood. It didn’t matter that Luke was a machine. Harland wanted him as he had never wanted another human being.

After he’d removed his vest and lowered his suspenders to remove his shirt and undershirt, Harland sat down on the sofa to remove his shoes and socks. He’d never been aware of just how many layers of clothing he wore until he was in a hurry to remove them. At last he was able to stand again and slip both his trousers and his undergarments off in one motion. His manhood jutted out before him like the prow of a ship, bobbing as he stepped out of his things.

“May I touch it?” Luke asked.

“Of course.” Harland stepped closer and allowed the young man to reach up and caress him. His touch was cool, as Harland had known it would be, but gentle and sensual enough to make Harland shudder. “You may do whatever you like,” he offered.

Luke leaned forward and pressed his cheek to Harland’s manhood, which throbbed at the touch. “I don’t know what else to do,” he said.

“Would you like me to teach you?” Harland was not overly experienced in such matters, but he had learned a thing or two from his fumblings in back rooms in boarding school.

Luke pulled away from him and looked up into his face. “Yes, please.”

There was one thing in particular that Harland wanted—needed—to do. He placed a gentle hand under Luke’s chin and leaned down until their mouths met in a kiss. Luke’s lips were warmer than he’d expected, and moist, but he didn’t move them under Harland’s lips. At least, not at first. Harland persisted in sliding his lips along Luke’s and nibbling at them gently, until Luke tentatively began to kiss back, mimicking his movements. When Harland pulled away, his entire body inflamed with by the touch of those lips, he asked breathlessly, “Did you like that? Or were you simply copying what I was doing?”

“Of course I copied you,” Luke said. “But I liked it. Can we do it again?”

Harland obliged him. The cable charging Luke’s leg was awkward, so he asked if it could be removed for a short time—Luke wouldn’t have to use that leg for what he had planned. Once that was out of the way and the skin folded back into place on Luke’s thigh, Harland climbed on top of him so that they could rub their bodies together and caress whatever was within reach of their hands and fingertips. Luke’s body was warm under his, because it was more difficult for heat to dissipate from his core than from his extremities. But the technical explanation no longer mattered to Harland, and truthfully, it wasn’t so different from the way heat was distributed in the human body. He simply chose to enjoy the sensation of it pressed against his flesh as they kissed.

When Luke moaned—a very human sound—Harland couldn’t resist breaking the kiss and asking him in a breathless whisper, “Does this feel good to you? Is it what you’d hoped for?”

He was very much afraid Luke was merely mimicking his own behavior, cold and calculating like a machine. But Luke smiled up at him, and the expression he wore seemed blissful. “Very much. Nobody—not even that woman—has ever touched me all over my body, for no other purpose than to make me feel good. I don’t ever want it to stop.”

“I confess, my motivations aren’t entirely selfless,” Harland admitted. “I rather like touching your body.”

Luke laughed. “Then please continue.”

Harland obeyed, exploring every inch of Luke’s body. He found himself doing things that would no doubt disturb him when he was less aroused—licking the seams that separated Luke’s appendages from his torso, for instance. He had no wish to pop them open, but instead felt the need to show Luke that he accepted them and all they symbolized. He also found himself exploring Luke’s fundament, inserting a finger to plumb its depths. He was disappointed to discover that it wasn’t very deep—certainly not deep enough for the base act that had flashed through his mind as his finger slid inside—and Luke reported no particular sensation associated with the penetration.

The same could not be said of himself. Harland’s explorations of Luke’s body had put him in a position which placed his private parts within Luke’s easy reach, and to his delight, Luke felt the need to explore as well. When he inserted his finger into Luke, the young man did the same to him. It hurt a bit, but the pleasure was far stronger, causing Harland to moan.

Luke laughed. “Yours is much deeper than mine,” he said, sliding his finger in as far as he could manage.

Harland gasped, disgusted with himself at the same time he wished Luke could go deeper. “Yes, it’s… very deep. Do you know what humans use it for?”

“Yes,” Luke replied. “Elimination. The doctor gave me some anatomy lessons.”

“It’s rather disgusting.”

“Not to me.”

“I’m glad of that.” It made Harland’s wanton desire for more than Luke’s finger a bit easier to accept, though he was still horribly embarrassed.

“The doctor told me about buggery,” Luke continued, shocking Harland with the crude term. “When I told him I would rather be with a man than a woman, he told me that some men might want me to bugger them. Would you like me to bugger you?”

Harland was silent for a very long time, while Luke’s finger continued to move gently inside him. He’d never done anything like that before, and though he could not deny that the sensations he was feeling now where nearly overwhelming his inhibitions, the disgust he felt whenever Luke used that filthy term was too strong. “I… I think not,” he said reluctantly. “Perhaps some other time.”

They returned to kissing, while Harland rubbed himself on Luke’s body. It wasn’t long before he was bucking his hips and panting heavily into Luke’s mouth. Luke lifted his pelvis and writhed underneath him, moaning in response. They spent at the same moment, or at least Harland spent, spilling his fluid between their bodies while giving out one last strangled cry. Luke appeared to reach climax as well, gasping into Harland’s mouth and clutching at his body for one endless moment, before collapsing into blissful exhaustion beneath him.

But when Harland lifted himself to examine the results of their lovemaking, he was surprised to discover that only his seed lay between them.

“Did you climax?” he asked.

“Yes,” Luke said sleepily, and there was little doubt in Harland’s mind that he was sated. Harland was a bit disappointed that he hadn’t spilled the way a human man would, but that would have made little sense. Tears may have had a practical value for Luke, but semen clearly would not.

“Did you enjoy it?” Harland asked.

“More than anything I’ve ever done before.”

Harland smiled. “I think I can say the same.”

But in the dark recesses of his mind, the joy he’d felt in Luke’s arms was tainted by feelings of disgust—that he could have done these things with a man, and furthermore with a “man” who was in fact not a man at all.

 

 

HARLAND AVOIDED going back to Steward’s townhouse for the next week. It wasn’t anything deliberate on his part—he was simply busy with other jobs. Although, if he were being honest, the thought of returning to the townhouse filled him with unease. He was perhaps easily distracted from his visits by things that might have been scheduled for another time. But he knew that, if he were to return, there would probably be a repeat of what had happened the last time. And the thought made him very uncomfortable.

He could no longer deny his desire for Luke. But outside the doors of the workshop, that desire seemed unhealthy and disturbing. He could not blame Luke. He had been created as a unique creature, and as such, he had no others like himself at which to direct his passions. But Harland was flesh and blood. There had to be something… twisted… diseased in his nature for him to be so strongly drawn to Luke.

It wasn’t his intention to stay away forever. He knew that Luke needed repairs now and then, and Harland had promised to look after him. But perhaps if he kept his distance for a short time, his inflamed passion would subside and he would be better able to perform his duty.

A letter arrived from the townhouse on the ninth day, when he’d failed to show up for the second time. To Harland’s surprise, it was not from the doctor, but from Luke. It read:

 

Dear Harland,

 

Your continued absence is beginning to worry me. Are you ill, perhaps? Please let me know that you are well, and when I might expect to see you again.

 

Your Dear Friend,

 

Luke

 

The desire to rush to Luke’s side was nearly overwhelming. But it was the sheer strength of his need that frightened Harland enough to resist. While the messenger waited, he penned the following response:

 

Dear Luke,

 

I am well, thank you, as I hope are you. Business has kept me away for a few days, but I shall see you soon. I promise. Please give my regards to the doctor.

 

Your Friend,

 

Harland

 

It was distant but not utterly cold. Harland simply needed more time to sort himself out. He would have to go back eventually, perhaps even later in the week. He sent his reply and prayed that Luke would not be hurt by it.

Three days later, however, another visitor arrived at his door—a solicitor by the name of Mr. Dargan. It was with some trepidation that Harland invited the man into his sitting room.

“I’m afraid I’m the bearer of bad tidings, Mr. Wallace,” Dargan said. He was a frail man, stooped and pale, with an agitated demeanor. He held an envelope in his hands that he continually rubbed and crinkled between his thumbs and forefingers.

“Would you like some tea, Mr. Dargan?” Harland offered.

“No, no thank you. I’ve come to tell you that an acquaintance of yours and a client of mine, Dr. Mordecai Steward, passed away a couple of days ago.”

Harland felt the blood drain from his face. “Oh. That is… dreadful news, Mr. Dargan.” He was thinking of Luke, however. Without the doctor, he would be lost. “Two days ago, did you say?”

“I’m afraid so.”

That would have been just after Luke sent the letter. Why hadn’t he sent another message with this news? Surely he hadn’t felt that Harland had completely abandoned him.

“I understand you were a good friend of the doctor’s,” Dargan was saying.

“I… had a business arrangement with him.”

Dargan looked surprised. “Oh? I was led to believe you were a close acquaintance.” He opened the envelope with slow, quivering fingers. “He left you a considerable sum of money, as well as the entire contents of his townhouse.” Dargan withdrew a stack of papers from the envelope, as well as another smaller envelope. This one was sealed. “The doctor met with me several weeks ago to draw up the paperwork. He also instructed me to give you this.”

Dargan extended the envelope.

The envelope contained a key ring with several keys, and a short note:

 

My Dear Mr. Wallace,

 

The contents of this envelope may come as a shock to you, as I don’t know whether I shall have time to discuss the matter of my will with you before my passing. In any event, please accept these keys to my townhouse and various cabinets contained within, of which you will know the purpose. I have made these arrangements in the hope that you will look after our mutual interests. Please, Mr. Wallace, I am depending upon you.

 

Yours,

 

Dr. Mordecai Steward

 

Harland fingered the key ring, while in the back of his mind a voice screamed, What has become of Luke? “Mr. Dargan,” he asked, “do you know anything about a young man named Luke Prescott?”

Dargan shook his head. “No, sir. I cannot say I do.”

“He wasn’t mentioned in Dr. Steward’s will?”

“No, sir.”

“Has anyone been to the townhouse since the doctor passed away?”

Dargan looked uncomfortable being put on the spot like this. “I understand that the butler made arrangements for the… doctor to be… removed. Then the staff appears to have vacated the premises.”

“The townhouse is empty?”

“It would seem so. I went to the house yesterday, but it was locked and nobody responded to the bell.”

Harland felt a cold hand creeping up the back of his neck, and his breathing was becoming labored. “Didn’t you have a key?”

“No, sir. Not without opening the envelope with which the doctor entrusted me.”

 

 

HARLAND WENT to the townhouse alone, terrified of what he might find there. He opened the front door with one of the keys Mr. Dargan had given him and entered the front hall. The lighting was dim, so Harland couldn’t see it at first. Then his eyes adjusted and he nearly screamed, but his breath caught in his throat.

Scraps of clothing, torn into shreds and tossed about the hall. In and of themselves, they were little enough, but Harland recognized them as Luke’s. They appear to have been torn off and strewn about, but Luke wasn’t there.

“Luke!”

There was no answer, so Harland checked the sitting room, where the fireplace now lay cold and the heavy curtains kept out nearly all light. Harland crossed to one of the windows, his shoes crunching on a small porcelain figurine as he walked across the carpet. When he drew back the curtain, the light revealed that the room had been ransacked. Most items of value had been stolen—by the staff, Harland suspected, since he hadn’t yet discovered signs of a break-in. He satisfied himself that Luke wasn’t lying behind one of the sofas and went back out into the hall.

In the shadows at the far end of the hall, outside the workshop door, he discovered Luke.

He lay there completely motionless, collapsed in front of the door in a heap, like a horribly mutilated corpse. He was naked, apart from the torn remnants of some of his clothing, and covered in scuff marks from the boots that had obviously been kicking him as he attempted to crawl to safety. He was covered with spittle. His member had been torn off, leaving a gaping hole out of which rubber tubes jutted. But the worst was his face. Some wretched monster had taken a hot iron to it, leaving one entire side melted and scorched, and one of his beautiful sky blue eyes shattered from the heat.

Harland wanted to be sick. His stomach heaved, but somehow he willed himself not to vomit. Instead, he knelt down beside the pathetic ruin of Luke Prescott and reached out to touch him gingerly on the shoulder. “Luke,” he said in a voice that quaked with fear. “Please….”

There was no response.

Harland sat on the carpet beside him for a long while, stroking Luke’s hair, and trying to rouse himself to begin the long arduous task that lay before him.

But he could not stop crying.

 

 

THE SAVAGES who’d beaten, humiliated, burned, and mutilated Luke hadn’t found the key to the workshop. Harland would uncover it later in the remnants of Luke’s trousers. They had apparently not considered it worth their time to break down the heavy wooden door. Thank God, Harland thought, as he unlocked the door with one of the keys on the ring Mr. Dargan had given him and found the room untouched. He carried Luke’s still form into the room and laid him out on the worktable, and then removed the shreds of clothing that still clung to him—the waistband of his trousers, his tie, the cuffs of his shirt, his stockings….

His leg didn’t lie correctly on the table, confirming Harland’s suspicion that Luke had taken a tumble down the stairs—shoved, most likely. The image of Luke attempting to crawl away as his attackers unleashed their hatred upon him made Harland’s gorge rise, but he forced himself to focus on the job at hand.

He found a pot for water in the kitchen, along with some clean rags, so he could bathe Luke’s body and at least remove the saliva and scuff marks and… good God… there were teeth marks! The skin was strong and hadn’t been breached in many areas, but it took a lot of scrubbing to remove some of the scuff marks, and he had to be careful not to wear the skin down in those places.

He prayed that Luke was unresponsive because his batteries had completely discharged while he lay on the hall carpet for two days, unable to reach the haven of the workshop. The horrible image tormented him as he worked—decades later, it would still come to him in his nightmares—but he feared something might have been damaged in the fall, something he could not repair.

He removed all of Luke’s skin, so that he might work unhindered by it. Especially that melted, burnt face. He couldn’t bear to look upon it. The eye, he was relieved to discover, could be easily replaced by one he found in the wardrobes, and he did so. When he was finished, Luke lay before him, stripped of his illusion of humanity. There was no denying that this skeletal frame covered in pistons and hydraulics and gears was a machine. Yet something in Harland’s vision had changed. Luke looked beautiful to him, even like this. And Harland knew now that no one else would ever look as beautiful to him, not until the day he died.

There were several connectors for the recharging cable at various locations in Luke’s body. Harland found the one closest to the head and plugged it in. The other end was already connected to the steam-powered electrical generator in the corner of the room. When he lit the pilot, it took several minutes to heat the water in the generator’s reservoir, but eventually steam began to cause an internal rotor wrapped in coils of wire to spin.

Nothing happened. Harland should have known that it would take hours to charge the batteries he’d connected, and Luke would require several of these locations in his body to be charged before he could function, yet still he felt a wave of despair threaten to overwhelm him. Part of him had hoped Luke would immediately open his eyes and speak to him.

He pushed his feelings aside and settled down to work.

 

 

IT WAS an arduous undertaking. Luke’s knee had broken in the fall, and although the framework of his leg was intact, several components were bent or broken. Harland found some replacement parts in the wardrobes, but now that he desperately needed them, he could see just how few of them remained. He was forced to scavenge some parts from the broken knee he was replacing and bend others back into shape as best he could.

Other parts of Luke’s body were in better shape—some denting here and there from the blows he’d received, some jammed gears and flywheels—but there were so many repairs to be made, Harland despaired of ever completing the work. The day faded into night, and another day dawned.

He found tea and some bread in the kitchen—most of the food had been stolen—and that was his first meal since he’d arrived yesterday afternoon. He finally had to give in to his exhaustion and have a lie down on the sofa. How long he slept, he had no idea, but he woke to the sound of a human voice, speaking incoherently.

“Haaa-uuunnhhh….”

He bolted upright and looked around him. The sound was repeated, and he realized it was coming from Luke. He scrambled over the top of the sofa and rushed to the table, where he found Luke looking up at him with eyes that were lucid and focused. But when he tried to speak, his skeletal mouth was unable to form words.

“Don’t speak,” Harland told him. “Just a moment.”

He went to the wardrobe and delicately removed the last remaining skin of Luke’s face from its form. Then he carried it back to the worktable and told Luke, “Keep still.”

It wasn’t difficult to put the skin in place. It had been designed with tiny magnetic disks on its inside which lined up with similar disks of a reverse polarity embedded in Luke’s facial structure. It merely required Harland to line everything up carefully, and then the magnets latched on to one another.

“Harland,” Luke said softly.

Harland was unable to stop himself from kissing Luke tenderly on the mouth. Then he said, “I’m sorry, Luke. I’m sorry I wasn’t here. I should never have let this happen.” He saw a tear—his own tear—fall onto Luke’s perfect cheek.

“I knew you would come for me.”

“I don’t know how,” Harland responded, unable to prevent the tears from coming now. “I’ve been so horrible.”

“You said you liked me.”

“I do like you, Luke,” Harland said adamantly. “My God, when I thought I’d lost you…. I’ve been such a fool for denying how I feel about you. I love you. Society be damned! You’re the most important thing in the world to me.”

And then Luke began to cry too, but he was smiling.

 

 

IT WAS only possible to charge one of Luke’s systems at a time, and they’d all been thoroughly discharged, so it was a very long process to bring him back to “life.” They spent the time with Jules Verne, and only when that novel was finished was Luke willing to talk about what the servants had done to him as they left the townhouse for the last time.

It had happened more or less as Harland had pieced together. As soon as the doctor’s body had been removed, Mr. Bradley paid the staff their wages and told them their services would no longer be required. Then there was an argument about the amount being paid out to one of the kitchen staff, who felt she deserved more for her years of service, and someone brought up the possibility of “it” inheriting the doctor’s estate.

Luke had been attempting to remain out of sight in the sitting room during all of this, but a couple of the younger boys felt it necessary to drag him into the front hall. Luke tried to tell them they could deal with Mr. Bradley for any wage disputes, but when he tried to go upstairs, one of the boys ran up to the landing and shoved him backward. The tumble down the stairs shattered his knee.

When the others saw him on the floor, it unleashed something in them and they began to shove and kick at him, and finally their contempt for him “masquerading” as a man and “putting on airs” led to them tearing at the expensive clothes he was wearing. He was stripped naked and beaten while Mr. Bradley looked on, heedless of Luke’s pleas for help.

“I knew they hated me,” Luke went on quietly, “but I thought their respect for the doctor….” He trailed off, falling silent for a long time, before continuing. “I tried to reach the workshop, though I knew it was hopeless. One of the boys spread my legs and pulled at me with both hands… tore it off, while the others laughed. Then the housekeeper brought out one of her irons….” He seemed to notice the horror in Harland’s face and said, “I didn’t feel pain. I’m not designed to.”

He was lying, Harland knew. Dr. Steward had told him that Luke could feel pain. And the horror of it was almost too much to bear. But if Luke wanted to protect him, Harland would pretend to believe him. “Thank God!”

“But I was frightened,” Luke went on. “Terrified. If they had broken open my head… they could have utterly destroyed me.”

“Luke…. Luke…. Luke….” Harland couldn’t think of anything to say beyond that, so he merely held Luke’s hand and kissed it over and over again. Then at last, he said, “Nothing like that will ever happen to you again. I won’t allow it!”

“Don’t leave me here,” Luke said, fear in his eyes.

Harland thought of Luke alone in this large townhouse, and his insides clenched. What if someone had held onto a key? Would they come back to steal more and find Luke there defenseless? Even if he had the locks changed, Harland knew he would never feel comfortable leaving Luke alone.

He would have to find a way for them to live together. Always.

 

 

London, Five Years Later

 

THE PACKAGE arrived via messenger, addressed to Mr. Harland Wallace and sent from Munich, Germany. Luke accepted it and carried it inside, but once the delivery boy was out of sight, he gave up all pretense of being a proper butler, tossing the package onto an upholstered chair in the hall and giving Harland a kiss instead.

“That might be important,” Harland chided him, leaning over to retrieve the package.

“It is,” Luke said. “It’s the brass gears from Herr Baier.”

“Ah. So it is.” The elderly watchmaker was one of many contacts Harland had been reaching out to in Britain, the Continent, and the New World, in order to have custom parts made for Luke. The special skin was still a problem, but he had sent small samples to some chemists he’d located, in the hopes that they could find a way to reproduce it.

Luke really was a very poor butler. But then, he only needed to convince the occasional visitor and two women who came in for a few hours a day to clean and do the cooking. Harland had reduced his staff as much as possible, fearing that live-in servants would soon notice something odd about Luke. And if not something about Luke in particular, then the fact that Luke spent all his nights in Harland’s quarters.

Harland missed Flannagan, his old manservant—Luke wasn’t particularly skilled with a tie—but it was a small price to pay for the privacy he and Luke now enjoyed after Mrs. Carmichael went home in the evenings.

He kissed Luke again but broke off when he remembered dinner would be served in less than an hour. Fortunately, the cleaning lady came and left in the early morning. “It’s no good getting stirred up,” he said regretfully. “We’ll have to wait until evening.”

“As you wish, sir.”

Luke gave him a cheeky grin and slid a gloved hand up the back of his thigh to cup Harland’s buttocks. Luke had found several uses for that particular bit of Harland’s anatomy—uses which had made Harland a bit squeamish at first, but which he now enjoyed thoroughly.

He moaned slightly and gazed into those startling blue eyes. It was pointless telling himself that they were made of glass. He could see the desire in them and the love.

Luke was real in every way that mattered.