The Lightning Keeper Read Free Page B

public conveyances—from New York horse cars in the old days to railroad carriages in Hong Kong and New Delhi—had given him the advantage in this competition, and while he could certainly manufacture the entire subway car, it was not practical given the constraints of time. Certainly he remembered the pleasant association with Bigelow over these many years, and he had never heard the slightest complaint about any of Bigelow’s products. Come to think of it, he had received a letter not long ago from the maintenance department of the Boston & Maine Railroad inquiring into the availability of certain items of renovation—brass fittings and upholstery—and commenting, parenthetically, on the durability and excellence of the wheels, even after so many years of service. Rolling stock, after all, was no better than its wheels, however fancy the hat racks and the paint job might be.
    â€œWhat an excellent fellow,” exclaimed Bigelow, relishing this paragraph of the letter. “I couldn’t have put it better myself.”
    That compliment delivered, Stephenson went on to say that he had already been in discussion with several foundries on the subject ofwheels, and so it would come down to the matters of price and specifications: it was not yet clear whether iron wheels—granting the excellence of the Bigelow product—would do, or whether he must turn to the steel available from the open-hearth operations in Pittsburgh. It was a complex decision, and he would be in touch when he had further information. There were, of course, other subcontracts to let: had the Bigelow works any experience in the manufacture of springs?
    Finally, all of this was on hold for now, as the commissioners—following a fatal derailment in the Steinway Tunnel and acrimonious debate in the city council—had announced that an entirely new list of specifications would be forthcoming to assure the safety of workers and passengers, to restore public confidence in the most extensive and modern metropolitan subway system in the world, embracing not only the island of Manhattan, but…etc. When they finally got down to brass tacks and issued the new specifications, the guessing would be over and the race would be on.
    The correspondence had been the occasion for Harriet’s sudden education, her real education, in the ways and workings of the Bigelow Iron Company, from the blast furnace itself and the foundry, where the metal would be cast, through to the forge and hammer shop, where the collars and bolts would be fashioned, and finally to the grinding and finishing operation. She knew things well beyond the payroll and expense ledgers that had been her original responsibility, knew things that her father certainly knew well enough in his bones from all those years of experience, but not well enough to express in writing, much less in discussion with so careful and expert a man as Stephenson. She knew the quantities of ore, charcoal, and limestone flux necessary to produce a ton of pig iron; she knew the temperature of the furnace and had studied the results of the chemical assay of its product; she knew how many revolutions per minute Horatio’s great waterwheel was capable of, and the cost of each abrasive grinder and lathe chuck in the finishing shop. And she knew that she could tell Mr. Stephenson, in the fewest possible words, what the Bigelow Iron Company could and could not deliver.
    She had been educated in unexpected ways as well, for the workmen were not accustomed to having a woman anywhere in the vicinity of the furnace or shops. Sometimes they didn’t know she was there; atother times, by force of habit, they let slip indecencies that they would never have uttered at home, but which must be, she thought, the common currency of that workplace. Horatio, whom she dealt with almost every day, had expressed his violent scorn upon reading Stephenson’s letter.
    â€œSprings!” he said,