Read Online The Adventures of Phineas Frakture by Joseph Gatch - Free Book Online Page A

better than to approach too closely during the evening hours or on weekends while the professor was home. One never knew when a stray Tesla bolt or an out-of-control automaton might escape the premises. On the walk, just outside the front gate, there was a permanent charred outline that resembled a person lying in repose. Some claimed it to be the remnants of a postman, others said it was a salesman, while the professor contended they were all daft and that the mark did not resemble a person, for they would have had to be lying on the walk for the discharge to leave such a mark. He offered to demonstrate, to clarify the matter; however, no volunteers were to be found to support or dismiss his hypothesis. And so, the debate raged on. Otherwise, it was a quiet neighborhood with the occasional horse-drawn carriage or mechanical hansom making its way down the cobblestone street.
    One giant oak stood in front of the home, obscuring most of the white Victorian and, not too far from that, rested a giant cog from a previous experiment which had been flung several hundred feet into the air and was now half-buried in the front yard. It seemed to have been a good place to plant a bed of violets, whose brilliant purple accented the cog’s sienna rust.
    This Saturday morning, William Patterson, friend, confidant, and errand boy to the professor, quickly strode up the walk to the front gate amidst glares from the neighbors who were out and about. Having endured their scrutiny before, he politely waved to them as if they were the best of friends. When he reached the front door, he noticed a whistle steadily increasing in volume and pitch. Not a stranger to the household, William let himself in and announced himself to the housekeeper, Mrs. Popkiss.
    “He’s in there,” she said without ceremony, indicating the lab at the back of the house.
    “Thank you, my dear,” he replied and swept up a piece of cake as he went through the kitchen.
    The whistle, now a scream, struck its apex and, amid a boom and a cloud of black smoke belching from the doorway, something shrieked past William’s head and embedded itself in the kitchen door jamb. He casually touched his cheek, which was slightly singed, and then examined the projectile. A small screw was half-buried in the wood, and he pried it out, juggling it in his hand until it cooled.
    Phineas stumbled out of his lab, blackened and coughing as he smeared soot from his goggles.
    “Did it work?” asked William.
    Phineas raised the goggles and then an eyebrow, giving his friend a scornful look. “What do you think?”
    William tossed him the screw. “ This might be the problem. You have a screw loose, but that is nothing you don’t know already.” He peered into the lab and waved away some smoke with a handkerchief. “You didn’t kill any of the neighbor’s cats with this one, did you?”
    “I could only hope…dreadful things…and the last one was not my doing, it died of a heart attack.” Phineas wiped the soot from his face with a hand towel as Mrs. Popkiss went by carrying a broom and dust bin, opening windows along the way. “What brings you here so early? Lunch isn’t for another two hours.”
    “I came to fetch you for our day out,” William said, munching on his cake.
    Phineas again raised his brow. “And what could we possibly be doing on this day out? I have much to do today.”
    “Yes, I can see that you are on the verge of a breakthrough,” William said dryly. “The World Exposition, my good man! All of the latest gadgets and gizmos and wondrous toys for you to marvel at. Things that will make you drool and proclaim ‘I want that!’”
    “Most built by imbeciles who are out to make a quick dollar rather than further science…and most of which I could build myself if I wanted to.”
    “Yes…but they wouldn’t do that ,” William said, indicating the smoke still pouring out of the lab. “Besides, I already have the tickets, and Abigail will be meeting us