Harry, red-faced and impatient, looked over his desk and said to him, ‘Lad, time is money and I’m a busy man. You told Nancy down on Reception that you’ve got something I might like. Now stop fidgeting and look me in the face square like. If you’re another chancer wanting to bamboozle me I’ll have you down the Effing stairs^[14] before you know it.’

Dick stared soundlessly at Harry for a moment, then said, ‘Mister Sir King, I’ve made a machine that can carry people and goods just about everywhere and it don’t need ’orses and it’s run on water ’n’ coal. It’s my machine, I built it and I can make it even better if you can see your way clear to advance me some investment.’

Harry King reached into his pocket and pulled out a heavy gold watch. Dick couldn’t help but notice the famous gold rings that he had been told Sir Harry always wore, possibly as an ensemble of socially acceptable and extremely valuable knuckledusters.

‘Did I hear you right? It’s Mister Simnel, isn’t it? I’ll give you five minutes to catch my fancy and if I think you’re just another thimblerigger on the slant you’ll go out of here rather more quickly than you came in.’

‘My old mother always said seeing is believing, Mister King, and so I’ve come prepared. If you can give me some time to get t’lads and t’ ’orses …’ Dick coughed and continued, ‘I have to tell you, Mister Sir Harry, I took the liberty of parking them right outside your compound, ’cos I talked to people and they said that if Harry King wants something to start happening it ’as to ’appen fast.’ He hesitated. Was that a glint in Harry’s eye?

‘Well,’ the magnate grumbled rather theatrically. ‘Young man, even though time is money, talk is cheap. I’ll come out in five minutes and you’d better have something solid to show me.’

‘Thank you, Sir King, that’s very kind of you, sir, but we’ll have to get t’boiler warmed up first, sir, and so we’ll have ’er throbbing in no more than two hours, sir.’

Harry King took his cigar out of his mouth and said, ‘What?! Throbbing?’

Dick smiled nervously. ‘You’ll see, sir, you’ll see.’

Very shortly afterwards, and just in time, smoke and steam enveloped the compound and Harry King saw and, indeed, was amazed.

And Harry King really was amazed. There was something insect-like about the metallic contraption, bits of which were spinning incessantly while the whole thing was shrouded in a cloud of smoke and steam of its own making. Harry King saw purpose personified. Purpose, moreover, that would be unlikely ever to ask for a day off for its granny’s funeral.

Over the noise he shouted, ‘What did you say this thing is called, my lad?’

‘Iron Girder, sir. An engine that uses the expansion or rapid condensation of steam to generate power. Power for locomotion – that is to say, movement, sir. And if you’d allow us to lay down her rails, sir, we can really show you what she can do.’