In Pursuance of Zheva McGee - Chapter 1

         There had presumably been a sighting of my sister, Zheva, as far north as New York City.  This was according to the cable that was received by our father from one of his trusted contacts.  I had to look into this sighting, probable or not, as any news of her whereabouts could be true.  She had been missing a full month and my family was at its wits end.  We had no ransom request.  We had no letters from Zheva.  We had nothing.
         I hopped the train in Gold City and made the day's journey to New York.  I had never been to the north, or to such a bustling metropolis for that matter.  It made me dizzy, looking up at the smog-ringed buildings.  I stepped backward into a gentleman and heard him chuckle.
         "A bit overwhelmed, I see!  You must not be from here!" he smiled.  "Welcome to Manhattan Island!"
         I looked over a flood of people standing diligently before a mighty building, and followed their collective gaze upwards, forty stories or more.  One would have thought this to be a church, the way people waited so earnestly, staring up as if the building were something sacred.  Steam and soot poured from multiple large stacks atop the building, arranged like pipes from an organ.
         But, they played no music.  Instead, the pipes merely puffed away as the facade of the building did the work.  Across the building's front, a collection of brass plates glimmered, letters boldly inscribed in each.  Next to each plaque was a set of five wheels with numbers and decimal points inscribed around them.  A sixth wheel at the end had either a painted green arrow facing up, or a red downward facing one.  These wheels spun and clunked as men in suits and women in fine dresses eagerly checked their pocket watches, some howling in delight, others in disgust.  It reminded me of the horse races in Gold City.  This religion was nothing more than the worship of money.
         Finally, a steam whistle the size of a grown man arose from the top of building and blasted a great tone.  It was four o'clock and the numbers abruptly halted with one giant "clunk!".  A good portion of the arrows stopped on red; it had not been a good day.
         A large man in a blue suit with tails and a topper on his head came unglued.
         "Damn it all to Hell!  That's the last time I'll trade with that bastard, Conally!  He's lost my money for the third time this week!" he roared to anyone who might listen.  Nearby, another man whooped, apparently having better luck.
         I broke away from the crowd at continued my walk down Wall Street, several buggies and steam carriages whizzing past.  They bounced and puttered like nervous swarms of mechanical ants around the city.  There were carriages in Gold City, including the small throng owned by my family, but I had never seen so many in one place at one time.
         I climbed into a taxi carriage and rode it to the Hotel Astor at Times Square where I would be staying.  Another, rather extravagant carriage rumbled and puffed to a stop in front of mine.  It was longer than the others, with six wheels instead of four, the extra axle supporting the weight of the middle.  The body appeared to be mahogany with gilding swashed across various areas and the steam engine in shiny, polished brass.
         Out of the carriage was ushered a woman in a dress made of silk dupoini and organdy, with a sour face and uppity disposition.  Apparently, she was of great importance.  She strutted past me as if she was some sort of entitled queen, and I disliked her immensely.
         I followed her sycophants into the hotel and stood behind the chattering group of about twelve, quietly waiting for the clerk at the next window to acknowledge me.  I finally realized that he believed I was another part of the sour girl's cortege, so I approached him myself.  All I wanted were the keys to my room and a rest.  I'd been in New York less than a day, and
         "I beg your pardon!" shrieked the woman.  "How dare you step out of line!  Have they not trained you better?"
         I looked up and realized her ire was directed at me.
         "Ma'am?" I questioned.  Her minions looked just as baffled as I.
         "Have you no brains?  Get back to your post before I have you fired!"
         I took my walking stick in both hands, turned, and set the end squarely at the hem of my skirt.
         "Begging your pardon, ma'am.  You seem to have me confused with a member of your staff.  You'd do well to remember who your own people are, or else you may make another error and howl at the wrong person!"
         With that, the clerk handed me my key, trying desperately to stifle his laughter - doing a poor job of it, I may add.  The bellhop, head tipped down as he tried valiantly not to laugh, took my bags and whisked me past the crowd of people, and onto the elevator.
         "Third floor," I requested.
         "Third floor, going up!" repeated the operator.  He turned a key, pulled a lever and with a hiss, I felt the elevator jolt.  A faint "chug, chug, chug" was heard as we ascended.  Another, more distant hiss came as we reached our destination.  The bellhop carried my two bags to the room and set them down, moving to open the drapes.
         "No, thank you," I yawned.  "I'm going to have a rest."
         "Very good, ma'am," he replied with a slight bow.  I handed him a gold piece and he went on his way.  As I lay in the feather bed, I found myself thinking of my little sister, Zheva.  Where could she be?  Was she alone?  Did she leave on her own, or was she taken from us?  I'd suspected she had run off on her own, but couldn't be sure.  Had it not been for a day's worth of waking hours, those thoughts would have kept me awake.

         I roused after the sun had already begun to set, some time after 7:30, according to the little clock ticking away on my nightstand.  I opened the pocket watch my father had given me to confirm that time...
         Marvelous.  The pocket watch had stopped at exactly twenty-three minutes past one o'clock, and I had not noticed.  I stood and knocked the wrinkles from my dress and made my way to the elevator.  There, I asked the operator where I may find someone reliable to fix the watch.
         "There's a machinist down the block named Thadeus.  He's fixed mine a couple of times, as well as my wife's.  Good man.  Bit of a grump, though."
         I thanked the man as the elevator came to a loud, hissing stop in the lobby, then made my way out to the street.  Just as he had said, a machinist named Thadeus sat in a shop at the end of the block near an alleyway.  He was perched on a stool set on brass casters, tinkering with a machine.  There was a copper bowl at the base, attached to two brass arms and a wire whisk that should have spun from a device at the top, but instead sat motionless.  The mechanism simply growled at him.
         "It's an industrial egg beater," said Thadeus, as I stood there watching him.  "The people from the Waldorf brought it in.  A spring sprung on it and they're in a panic over it, so they asked me to fix it.  What can I do for you?"
         "My name is Vivian McGee.  I'm in town, looking for my sister, and my pocket watch has stopped.  I was hoping you could have a look."
         Thadeus was aware that I was carefully studying him as I spoke to him.  I knew this by the curl of his Imperial mustache, white as snow and stretching from one end of his round, ruddy face to the other.  He tugged himself across the wooden floor with a rumble of the stool to have a look at the trinket in my hand.
         "Yes!  Quite nice!  Let me take a closer look and I'll tell you the trouble."
         I walked away from the low front counter, to a velvet divan by the front window and perched myself upon it, watching Thadeus in fascination.  I marveled at the square, pudgy hands tinkering with the small, delicate bits of the watch,  His mustache flittered as he worked, as if its movements were an integral part of the repair process.  A glint of light from outside flashed across his goggles, but Thadeus never missed a beat.
         "You've had this watch for a while?" he croaked.
         "Not personally.  It's my father's.  He loaned it to me for good luck."
         "Luck for what?" he questioned, seemingly half interested.
         I cleared the knot from my throat.
         "As I said, I am here to find my sister, Zheva.  I arrived earlier today from Gold City in the Republic of Texas.  An acquaintance of my father claims to have seen here in New York."
         Thadeus stopped tinkering a moment and looked up at me fixedly, light gleaming from the goggles, eyes appearing buggish.
         "You're aware of the murders, then?"
         One of my eyebrows twitched.  Father's contact had not said anything about murders.  Thadeus quickly realized I was not aware, and went back to work on the watch, as if the conversation never happened.
         "What murders?" I pressed.
         "Two so far.  Both girls found pried open and their hearts removed.  Gruesome scenes, I'm told.  Some say the feller's a surgeon."
         After an awkward silence (I wasn't sure how to respond) he lifted the watch by its chain and gazed at it spinning, then moved his goggles to the top of his bald head.
         "Is it finished?" I questioned, throat tightened.
         "Yep.  Only thing wrong was a busted tooth on the main gear."
         "May I have the old gear?"
         Thadeus looked at me queerly.  I wasn't sure why I wanted it, either, but I did.
         "If it pleases you."
         "It does."
         I traded the watch and gear for a few gold coins.  At that very moment, we heard a blood curdling scream from the alleyway near the shop.  Thadeus looked at me, and I at him as we clamored for the door.  A large steam carriage chugged backwards toward the alleyway where a crowd of people had gathered.  They all stared down the alleyway and the woman who had screamed was being consoled by a man.  The carriage was painted a dark blue with a gold star emblazoned on the side, the word CORONER painted below.
         Two men carried a stretcher toward the open back of the carriage as steam poured from underneath.  A body lay on that stretcher, covered in a blood soaked sheet.  Even draped by the sheet, I could see the body was disfigured, as if the ribs were pulled open and standing outward.
         The victim's arm tumbled out from under the sheet and hung there, as the two uniformed men scrambled into the carriage.  I could at least be certain the body was not Zheva's, it was much too tall.  My young sister was but five feet tall.  Still, I thought of her... There had been multiple victims...

Why are people milling around my room? I thought, finally coming to.  Realizing I wasn't there myself, I struggled to get up and find out where I was.  I found that I was laid out on the boardwalk in front of the machine shop, my head set on someone's lap.  I felt strangely comforted by the smell of machine oil and pipe tobacco.  Thadeus himself was cradling me, talking to a man my age in a long coat with a coach gun, three separate barrels and dark gray in color, decorated with bronze and gold.  There was a badge pinned to his lapel.  Thadeus was explaining to the man that I may have fainted for fear the body belonged to my missing little sister.  The man in the long coat crouched down, looking at me quite tragically.
         "I'm Detective Inspector Oliver Dinges of the New York City homicide squad.  May I ask your name?"
         "Vivian McGee.  That woman is not my sister," I said, quite feebly.  The man furrowed his brow and adjusted his stance.
         "You're quite certain?"
         "Quite certain.  This was merely a shock, seeing the body brought out in... in that condition."
         I leaned up and struggled against my corset to get to my feet.  Mr. Dinges offered me a hand and I accepted, finally feeling strong enough to stand.  Thadeus helped me to steady myself, then went on his way as if nothing had happened.  Through the window, I could see him tinkering once more with the Waldorf's egg beater, carefully leading a new spring to it's latch.
         I looked back to my hand to see that Mr. Dinges still had a hold of it.  Politely as possible, I cleared my throat and turned my eyes up at him.
         "Oh!  My apologies, Miss McGee!" he gasped, promptly releasing me.  I heard a distinct southern accent as he spoke.  He cleared his throat in embarrassment, tugged at his lapel so as to compose himself, adding, "Thadeus tells me you're from Texas; what's this about your sister?"
         "She's been missing for a month.  I happen to believe she left on her own, but even so, she's a naïve young woman who cannot fend for herself in this country."
         "What brings you all the way here?"
         A medic approached for me, but Dinges waved him away, annoyed at the interruption.  The medic walked away, quite disappointed.
         "A cable came to my father from a trusted contact here, saying he had seen her."
         "I see," was his simple reply.
         A voice from the alleyway barked for Dinges.  The detective looked nervous, apologized while tipping his hat, and wished me luck in finding Zheva.  He dashed off, leaving me there. dumbfounded for a moment.  My curiosity got the better of me and I crept to the edge of the boardwalk to peer at the crime scene.  Dinges stood a few yards away, talking to an older man that appeared to be his superior.  In the glow of a full moon and several gas lanterns, I saw the older man hold up an object made of brass, covered in blood.
         "Looks like they go together," said the older man.  "He's getting sloppy."
         "Or, perhaps he was interrupted and scared off," suggested Dinges.  It made the other man think.
         "Well done, lad!  You may be on to something!  Round up any possible witnesses!  Let's not give him a seventh girl!"
         Men began scrambling in all directions, blurting out orders and talking to by-standers.  It was around this time that the steam carriage finally began to chug away, carrying the cadaver off to the morgue.
         I turned my eyes away from the carriage and looked back to the alley.  Dinges placed the tank into a clean, muslin sack and headed in my direction.  His mind turned quickly, like the propellers of an airship.  The propellers came to a screeching halt as he looked up to see me, a slight rosy hue staining his cheeks.
         "Are you mad?" he demanded.  There was a stern manner to his voice.  "Miss McGee, you should hurry back to your hotel!"
         The concern was flattering, but I had noted something about the object as Dinges put it into the sack.
         "First of all, Thadeus told me of two murders.  This young lady would make three.  Why then, Mr. Dinges, would your associate say not to let the killer have a seventh girl?"
         He clenched his jaw as the propeller started wildly in his brain again.  Just as he opened his mouth to answer me, I interrupted him.
         "And, about that object in the bag, there.  Do you know what it is or where it is from?"
         He turned his head back and looked at nothing in particular, an irritated smile on his face.
         "I can not disclose that information to you, you realize this," he chided.
         "And, you realize who my father is, don't you?  I'm a McGee... one of those McGees.  That tank you have in that sack is marked with my father's seal, I assure you.  You have six dead girls already, and one may well be my sister.  Have all of them been identified?"
         He hesitated still, protocol nagging him.
         "No."
         I sighed, not taking my eyes off him.  He was beginning to crack.
         "All I want..."
         "Look," he interrupted.  "Come tomorrow and I will let you view the unidentified girls so as to be certain none is your sister."
         I hesitated myself, but nodded slowly.
         "And?"
         "And," he continued, "we'll let you look at this tank and the device we believe it goes to.  We found the device before the coroner even got here.  I do indeed know who your father is.  Before I became a detective, I studied medicine.  Your father is renowned for his medical technology."
         I nodded again, a smile forcing its way across my lips.
         "Whether my sister is in your morgue or not, I want to stop this monster.  I'm willing to do all I can to help."
         "I'm glad."
         I simply stared at the man a moment, and he stared back.  He finally glanced in the direction of the senior detective, then back at me.
         "You'd better get back to your hotel.  I'll have an officer escort you."
         I barely slept that night.  Between my long nap the night before and the nagging idea that Zheva may actually be one of those girls at the morgue, my mind refused to stop.  I believe it was half-past-three before I even drifted off to slumber.

         Seeing that the clock said nearly 9 a.m., I sprang out of bed and scrambled to get ready.  I nearly scalded myself in the bath, tangled myself up in the lacings of my corset, and tripped over my own feet as I ran around in unbuckled boots.
         But, I finally managed to get myself together and off I scampered in search of a taxi carriage.  Within ten minutes of finding one, I was at the police station.  Dinges stood out front, checking his pocket watch and smoking a cigarillo.  The carriage sputtered and chugged away, nearly whisking me off with it.  I found my footing and approached the detective.
         "Are coachmen always so rude here!?" I squawked in exacerbation.
         "Unfortunately, that one wasn't the worst!" Dinges replied with a smile.  He stared at me for a moment, and I stared back, looking for strength.  The repetitive tweet, tweet, tweet and squeaking of metal joints from a nearby mechanical newspaper peddler filled the void of silence.  In it's little bronze arm, ticking back and forth, was a paper announcing the discovery of another body in Times Square.  The dome-shaped peddler was desperate as it frantically bounced and rolled from side to side, begging anyone to take a look.
         As Dinges led me into the building, I saw him look around, as if trying to avoid anyone else hearing what he was about to tell me.
         "I had a talk with Chief Inspector Wade.  He's actually pleased I arranged this little meeting, but we mustn't discuss it with anyone."
         "Understood."
         Offering me his arm, he led me through a swinging wooden door and into a dimly lit office marked INTERROGATION.  Inside stood a badger of a man with a gray china-man's mustache, wearing a matching gray flannel suit and looking rather grim.
         "Miss McGee, I am Chief Inspector Igor Wade."
         "A pleasure, all things considered," I said, lightly bowing my head to him.
         "Shall we?" he questioned, and I agreed.  There was no sense in dilly-dallying.
         On the table before us sat a device, slightly larger than a human torso, covered in a sheet.  Wade whipped the sheet away in dramatic fashion, his thin mustache whooshing up with the breeze.
         There it sat, steam valve bent, dial glass broken.  The oxygen tank, which Dinges had bagged the night prior was set next to it, close to where it should have been attached.  It was spattered with blood and dust, making it appear even more menacing. 
         It looked something like a scorpion with eight legs and two pincers. The tale of the scorpion was rigid, a handle to make the device mobile for emergency extractions.  There were flat, suede covered discs at the end of each leg.  At one time, a blade was attached to an arm on the belly that, with a turn of the crank handle, would drop down and slide from the front, back to the operator of the machine.  The blade was missing, broken away at some point.  Two curved plates would drop down as the operator turned the crank the other direction and pry the subject open.  The two pincers, clamps capped in rubber, would have extracted the heart and moved back to deliver its cargo into a glass chamber in the belly.
         Intricate pumps were present in four places within the chamber.  With the turn of a lever on the right side, the brass door to that chamber would close and the contents of a second brass tank would fill the chamber.  The oxygen mixture would be regulated by the first tank activated by the operator initiating the steam pump connected to the tanks.  .
         "It's called a Scorpion Beater."
         "Seems like a god-awful waste of time and beautiful machinery to kill bugs with, even in Texas!" piped Ward.  My eyebrow twitched as I tried to be patient.
         "Scorpion refers to the appearance of the machine.  Beater refers to the job it does.  It extracts a human heart from someone who has just passed, then keeps it alive outside the body until it can be transplanted to a patient who needs it.  These pumps hook to the major veins and arteries to keep blood and oxygen moving through it.  Its intent is benevolent, but this one has not been used for its intended purpose."
         "Unfortunately," said Dinges.  "My question is how someone got a hold of it and furthermore, how they knew how to use it."
         "All of our victims have been found with their chests pried open, hearts neatly removed.  The Scorpion Beater was found last night.  As my colleague suggested, the killer may have dropped it in haste and fled," continued Ward.  There was a moment where we all became silent, feeling sickly over the idea that someone had used my father's device in such a way.  I collected myself and cleared my throat.
         "Gentleman, I hate to interrupt our lesson in the mechanics of my father's device, but I was also brought here to have a look at the bodies you have not yet identified, so that I might know whether one is my sister."
         Both men dropped their shoulders and nodded at one another.
         "Indeed," coughed Ward.  "My apologies, Miss McGee."
         I said nothing and, instead, followed Dinges as he led me down a hallway to a door painted glossy black with the same gold star as what was on the coroner's carriage the night before, the word MORGUE painted below it.  Behind it was a implicitly a mausoleum with two steel tables and clusters of gadgets, bottles and vials.  It was almost unbearably cold.  Along the back wall were multiple drawers, faced in wood with long brass handles and numbered brass plaques.
         Standing by the drawers was a small boulder of a man in a rubber smock, goggles suctioned to his pudgy face, rubber gloves up to his pudgy elbows.  He looked to Dinges, who gave an approving nod, then opened a drawer.
         Though the body was covered with a sheet to the chin, I could see it was distorted around the upper torso, where the killer had used my father's device.  I stepped closer, heart nearly beating out of my chest.
         She was young and quite pretty with strawberry hair and freckles.  She was not Zheva, but my heart ached for the girl and her family.  I shook my head and the boulder of a man covered her face and rolled her back into her tomb in the wall.
         He waddled to another drawer and pulled it open.  The same distortion appeared under this sheet as well.  He uncovered the victim's face and I peered at it.  The poor girl was emaciated, with dark hair and sunken cheeks.  I shook my head again and the boulder of a man covered her face and rolled her back into the tomb in the wall.
         He waddled to yet another drawer and pulled it open.  The blood seemed to drain from my body as he uncovered her face.
         "Is this the girl you were looking for?" queried the boulder in a flat, deep voice.  I shook my head, unable to even utter the word "no" for a moment.  My eyes were locked on the girl's face.
         "Miss McGee?" came Dinges's voice, as if he were somewhere in the distance.
         "It's... not Zheva... but.... I know who she is..." I barked, as if someone was trying to cork my throat.  And that's when I fainted.  Again.

         Never had I fainted in my life, let alone twice in a day's time; then again, I had never been faced with the task at hand.  As a vile of smelling salts wafted under my nose, I jolted out of the black haze.  I could hear whirring of fans that kept the morgue cold going from a dull hum to a full blast.  My vision corrected, too, and there I sat, on the floor again, this time laying against Mr. Dinges.
         "Miss McGee?" questioned the boulder.  As my sight returned, I noticed the kindness in the coroner's eyes.  His hair was soft and orange, and his eyes the most brilliant blue.  I immediately felt at ease.  He smiled and stood, taking off his glove to offer me a hand.  I took it and was pulled up in one quick swoop, glancing where the body had been before.  Apparently, they had the forethought to close up the vault with the young woman's body.
         "Miss McGee, you said you knew the young lady?" queried Mr. Dinges.
         I let out a heavy sigh and nodded my head.
         "She was a childhood friend.  Her father and my father studied medicine together.  Whenever my father traveled to America, I would go with him and