Miss Perkins in battle mode was a sight to behold.
Her cheeks pink, her eyes blazing like sapphires, her jaw firm and set, her little feet marching along to a military tattoo.
Every single man in the place was stealing glances at her and pounding metal, or pushing carts, that much faster, that much harder.
They were all trying to impress her.
Was that really why he’d brought her here?
Just so he could show her there was nothing small about his ambition... or himself?
Some primal display of manhood?
“And this is where the pattern-maker works to create the molds,” said Grafton.
Mari lifted one of the beeswax molds from the table. “Is this how you create your miniature engines as well, Your Grace?”
He nodded, showing her how the two halves of the beeswax mold fit together. “I make them first with sand and clay, and then I add metal overlay.”
“Grafton,” someone shouted from the other room.
Grafton bowed over Miss Perkins’s hand. “I’m needed elsewhere, I’ll let His Grace continue the tour.”
“Well? Are you going to show me your fire engine?” Miss Perkins asked Edgar.
He led her to the back room, where they were assembling the new prototype for the engine.
“So many locks,” she observed as he unfastened a series of locks to the large open room with windows set high in the walls and carriage doors leading out to the yard.
The noise of the foundry receded when he shut the door behind them.
“We maintain the utmost secrecy here,” he said. “We don’t want anyone stealing our design.”
He caught hold of the edge of a heavy canvas and dragged it away from the new engine.
Her eyes widened. “It’s massive.”
“Too massive. It’s still too heavy and needs more than one horse to pull it. I’m working on a design for a lightweight boiler system.”
She studied the engine, her hair catching fire in the sunlight.
“The coal will be fed here.” He indicated the copper vat. “And the steam will escape here.” He pointed to the black pipe sticking up on the side. “The delivery hose attaches here, and the water will run through the hose, powered by the steam pump, instead of by the parish fire brigade.”
“How high will the water go?”
“We will connect the engine to the water main and quickly raise steam pressure—we hope to shoot water out of the hose up to ninety feet in the air.”
“Ninety feet. My goodness.”
Finally. He’d impressed her.
“Power. Projection.” He lifted his arm and made a fist. Her gaze wandered to his bicep. “Enough water pumping to douse the deadliest blazes.”
“I do comprehend the magnitude of what you’re trying to accomplish. And I applaud it, and I’ll do my part to uphold the standards of your name.”
“That’s better then.”
“But—”