I find it strange that something as simple as a picture, a portrait of a small, frail, cagey, scowling old man accompanied by a little less than five-hundred words can so drastically change the course of events. Had I not been assigned to photograph the great inventor, Mr. Darius Tinker, I wouldn't have been present for the events that unfolded over the next few days. I would have ascertained no knowledge of the grave injustices being committed, and the men who do so. I would have been unable to play my small part in sparing the lives of countless innocents... but I get ahead of myself.

It was a sunny, late April morning that I quit my lodgings on Duchess, on the eastern end of the city, and took to the warm Toronto streets. The city was in its usual throes of chaotic business, exacerbated by the impending opening ceremonies for the New World Exhibition. Kodak camera in hand, I was unperturbed by the busyness--indeed, I revelled in it; the soothing hum of people going about their lives, punctuated by screeches of machinery, whinnying of horses or curses of derelicts.

An enchanting, heady haze dappled the city's rooftops. I decided to forgo a trip on the horseless streetcar--still quite a novelty among city folk, even though Toronto had been fully outfitted with the technology the previous summer--to enjoy a walk in the vibrant, intoxicating spring weather.

I made my way down bustling Adelaide, taking in the sight of small repairs being completed on the Grand Opera House, no doubt in anticipation of thousands seeking entertainment during the World's Fair, occasionally bidding a hearty "good day" to familiar neighbours. A shopkeeper and I chatted a moment, remarking on the Opera House's advertisements for the world-famous Lady Song's appearance next week, sure to be a sold-out run of performances and a boon to local businesses.

With such a novel piece of equipment under my arm and, as it's been described to me, my signature dazed sense of wonder, many took passing notice of me. As a youth of eighteen, even in a tailored sack coat and trousers, I managed to appear in a constant state of slight dishevelment, through no conscious design. Unlike my father, brother and many of my peers who, even when in their shirtsleeves or athletic dress, appeared wholly proper and on the edge of fashion, my more liberal sensibilities shone through preparations made in the morning.

My father had often remarked affectionately on my "bohemian" appearance, untamed hair, clothing slightly askew, a camera case strapped to my shoulder or a sketchbook wedged beneath my arm, my fingers stained with charcoal or graphite dust. I looked wholly an artist, as many observed. I chose to take that as a compliment, though many, including my father and brother--secretly and not, respectively--would not consider it such.

My aim was to be a great journalist and writer, though I'd been warned by multiple published authors that the profession was undervalued--not to mention woefully underpaid--and seen as ignoble. Ironic, as there seemed to be no small public interest in the humble scribblings of word mercenaries. I planned to couple the skill of setting ink to paper with some small talent for photography and join the growing rank of "photographic journalists."

The problem: I was an idle, moneyed boy with nary a journalistic credit to my name. One of the worst sorts to boot. I was a well-heeled child desperate to make a name for himself independent of his family fortune and reputation--while relying on those very things to do so.

My father had purchased my camera for my eighteenth birthday. My comfortable apartment in the city, my well-tailored wardrobe and my exceptional education were all the products of my parents' success. My father had even offered to put me in touch with members of the press in hopes that I would make something of myself, but I had politely declined. The only thing that was all my own was my ambition, whatever good that was worth.

To Lionell Hackerman, the Globe's editor, it was worth little enough.

"I've got no need of more writers, Quigley. The useless lot are thick on the ground here," Hackerman had put it bluntly when I had turned up at his office a day previous. He had barely glanced at my photographs and had completely ignored the few writing exercises I had prepared for the impromptu interview.

I'd been inquiring after a number of other publications, but had been politely and roundly rejected for lack of experience or reputation. The Globe was the only game left in town for me, and I had reluctantly included my pedigree when I called on the secretary of Mr. Hackerman. I had been unwilling to do so leading up to this interview, so with little choice, I figured the only thing that would get me into his office was my family name. I still hadn't counted on such an obstinate wall of a man hunched behind his desk.

"Perhaps I can offer my photographic expertise," I suggested, wincing. "I've made an extensive study of airship workers, and the working cla--"

He bristled at this. "What good are pictures of the downtrodden when all the world wants to see are photographs of this blasted carnival?" He punctuated the rhetoric with a dismissive wave of the hand. The editor returned to eviscerating a draft of writing on the desk before him, ignoring me as I gathered my samples off his desk. I was reaching for the doorknob when I heard an annoyed grunt behind me, and I turned for fresh rejection and abuse.

"I'll admit, having a Quigley could be useful, would drive the competitors mad," he admitted. I suppressed an urge to groan. Here I was trying to prove I could be more than just a name, yet that was all I was to the world. "I'll give you one chance and one chance only, and I don't expect you to succeed, no one else has."

He laid out my probationary assignment. Mave Teston, one of the founding inventors behind the Teston & Tinker workshop here in Toronto, had been documented widely in the lead-up to the World's Fair. She gave interviews freely and was well liked enough by the public, despite her feminine sensibilities listing toward "sturdiness" and "ungainliness."

Teston was a celebrity, sure, but the real public obsession was her elusive compatriot, Darius Tinker III. While his work in the venture was prodigious, he was rarely seen and was remembered as an eccentric, but not the entertaining kind--more an anti-social recluse. The inventor had eluded the public eye, to the annoyance of investors and the confoundment of the public. With no small amount of sneering, Mr. Hackerman admitted that a photograph of Darius Tinker coupled with a few hundred words about him would capture the imagination of the public.

"We've sent a hundred reporters before you to speak with this mad old codger, and they have yet to catch a glimpse of him," he growled, aggressively organizing a pile of papers in front of him. "I'm starting to believe the only tinkering in the enterprise is with the patience of those of us with a serious job to do.

"I've got no faith in you, Quigley," he repeated a third time. I only nodded but was secretly thrilled at the assignment. Even if I was unsuccessful in the endeavour, I could simply add this failure to the long list of ways I didn't live up to my family name.

I assured Mr. Hackerman that, indeed, the endeavour was futile--I had heard from a few other writers that pessimism in the face of existence always seemed to calm editors--although I pointed out that there'd be no shame in allowing myself to become the hundred-and-first reporter to fail to meet Mr. Tinker.

Begging "more important things to do than speak with a writer," with a few expletives thrown in for good measure, Mr. Hackerman shooed me away. "And don't come back without a ruddy photo."

This is how I found myself cutting through the city to the corner of Adelaide and Brock the next day, my destination now in sight. My fate as a journalist rested on doing the impossible, getting a picture of a world-famous inventor who had not been seen in decades.

Down on the corner of Brock and Adelaide, I could see that edifice of industrialism, the Teston & Tinker Workshop, looming above the garment factories, synagogues and such on the west end of town. The three-storey stone building assumed a more palatial front than the warehouses and factories surrounding it. Large windows adorned the sides of the building framed by dramatic arches; whimsical, cylindrical towers broke up rusticated walls. Above the main entrance was an enormous, elegant clock held in place by exquisitely wrought iron fretwork. Below the dial, shaped into the fretwork, read: ET IPSA SCIENTIA POTESTAS EST

Once within, I expressed my business to a young Ojibwe man in the vestibule who I (to my mortification) took to be a clerk or attendant. He peevishly waved me down a hallway before returning his attention to a section of an enormous clock--I had failed to notice he was sitting within the carriage-sized machinery. Flushed with embarrassment, I proceeded onwards, peering when I could into the dozen or so workshops. Only two were occupied; one by a Negro woman immersed up to her elbows in a large steam engine; the other by a boy of a swarthy complexion, no older than myself, snoring lightly, propped up at a desk, surrounded by cogs and switchboards of varying sizes. The other rooms, only affording a soft light diffused through heavily glazed transom windows, were mostly steeped in shadows. Outlines of various grand technologies loomed in the dark. Within one workshop a half-finished brass automaton turned to watch me pass.

I found myself at the designated room. Crude signs, the result of some small trickery, adorned the door frame that read "TOYMAKER" and "Enter at your own risk". Clutching my camera in both hands, I ventured into the workshop of Darius Tinker.

Upon entry, I was convinced the room must be uninhabitable. In fact, it was in such a state of complete disorganization, I assumed I had been given incorrect directions and had walked into the building waste depository. The workshop was a dark, cavernous room that occupied two floors of space. Semi-completed constructions piled upwards to the ceiling and occupied every inch of the room; brass parts, gears and springs jutted outwards dangerously, in no obvious arrangement. Through the detritus and gloom, I could make out two large loading doors on what was certainly the farthest end of the building. I took a few tentative steps into the gloom, unable to determine any sign of life.

I prepared to turn about and head back to make a nuisance of myself to one of the other inventors when a sparkle of light from a nearby pile caught my eye. There were two enormous glowing emerald orbs starring from the darkness. For a moment I could make out a faint and rapid ticking. The strange apparition blinked once and sprung to the ground, giving metallic clicks and pops as it moved.

I leapt back as the shadow creature approached my feet. However, a little light spilling in through the doorway behind me illuminated the thing; a mechanized approximation of a small cat. The feline machine brushed against my leg and glanced up at me with two shimmering emerald spheres. The ticking noise emanated from what was, I'm sure, a very complex system within, and the clicks and pops came from its segmented parts and intricate joints that allowed it to move like its flesh and bone analog. Despite the surprise of the creature's sudden appearance, and its hairless, skeletal look, the mechanized animal seemed quite harmless, even friendly.

"Tickertape, who are you bothering?" a thin, mumbling voice came from among the rubbish. The cat's eyes blinked once with a click, and it sped off, dodging around piles of debris, showing me a path. Emboldened by this discovery of life, or at least life-likeness in the clockwork cat and the voice of its master, I followed, taking care to avoid the labyrinthine jags of various machine piles and half-constructed clockwork creations.

I rounded what seemed to be the largest mountain of junk. This, I had to assume, was based around some sort of workbench. The small patches of space still visible on the surface were scattered with various canisters of chemicals, tools and scraps of paper scrawled with schematics and designs.

Finally, I found a small clearing in the chaos where a strange little man, dressed in dirtied shirtsleeves and trousers, hunched over something. He was small, thin and had light brown skin; pallid, it seemed to absorb, rather than glow, with the dim lamplight in the room. His coiling moon-white hair fell about his head in no attempt at order. Tickertape, no doubt the name of the clockwork cat, sat haughtily beside its master on a cleared surface studying my approach, its tail flicking side to side in interest. I cleared my throat, to no response. I did so again, louder, and still nothing. I could feel my face turn red as I uttered, "Mr. Tinker, I presume?"

The man turned and, with little more than a glance at me, returned his focus to his machine. "One moment, please. This work--very delicate."

"Of course," I replied in a whisper, barely daring to breathe should I disturb something, though I was sure my answer did not register as his attention was already on his work again. For a moment I watched as his hands, wrapped in bandages, administered quick and efficient to the machinery. I glanced around the small space lit not by electricity, like the rest of the building, but by a small, simple oil lamp on a nearby table. The table was otherwise clear apart from a pile of schematics and almost empty plates of food. A small cot, the sheets cast aside, was the only other piece of furniture not covered with mechanical parts, with a small pile of books and technical manuals pile, haphazard, beside it. On top was a beautiful, ponderous tome, Whitman's Leaves of Grass. Curious.

Lost in my observations, I hardly heard the man mumbling. "I beg your pardon?" I stuttered, not entirely sure he spoke to me as his attention seemed to be completely on his work.

"Your camera, may I see it?" He held out a free hand, each finger grease-covered and mummified in yellowing bandages. Fumbling, I deposited the device in his palm and he finally turned away from his work.

"Hmm, an Eastman Kodak box camera. One of the first models of its kind. Kept in good enough condition." He carelessly held the camera out. I grasped my dear device before it could fall from his hand to the floor and decline in condition. "Who are you?"

I attempted a regal pose with my camera, although he had already turned away and was indifferent. "Quigley, sir. Norwood Quigley. I--"

He continued grumbling to himself, "Quigley... That name sounds familiar..."

I swore inwardly; I hadn't meant to reveal the familial connection, but I couldn't lie to so eminent a person. "No doubt my father, Sir Hector Quigley, of Quigley Airships, the family business. We fly exclusively Teston & Tinker models."

He turned from the machine on the ground, his face shrouded in shadows by the light behind him, again studying me with caution. "I don't handle transportation business. You'll have to go to the administrative offices on the... second floor and speak to... well someone else."

I realized my error before he'd finished his directions. "My apologies, Mr. Tinker! I'm not here on my father's behalf. I'm not involved in the business end of things, really, though I do know my way around your airships. No, I'm here on behalf of the Globe." He stared blankly at me. "The newspaper." I held up my camera, as if an explanation. "For coverage of the New World Exhibition." His brow furrowed in consternation. "That's the... international festival of technological and cultural marvels?" Nothing. "I telephoned ahead yesterday... I was told you might pose for a picture..."

I recalled the amused female voice on the other end of the phone. "Oh, he might pose for a picture." I realized how loaded her words had been.

Mr. Tinker's eyebrows knitted closer. "I'm afraid that is not my area of expertise. I'm a simple craftsman." He motioned awkwardly around, at the gatherings of such fantastic machines, including the clockwork cat that had leapt off the workbench and was brushing against his shin. "If you want to take a picture of someone, I would seek out Mave--Ms. Teston. She looks much better on film. I am... really far too busy."

He turned his attention to an intricate machine on a nearby table. It appeared to be the chest of a man in the dim light, although when Mr. Tinker removed a front plate, cogs and gears were revealed within. Our exchange seemed to be complete, but I remained where I was.

I crouched, reaching out my hand--as if to any household pet--and with a click of its eyes, the clockwork creature approached, causing soft metallic ticking with its paws on the stone floor. I allowed my fingers to find the crook between ear and skull, a favourite place to be scratched for most cats. "Interesting creature, this." I smiled down at the mechanical feline, pretending to speak to no one in particular. Mr. Tinker, I'm sure, feigned deafness, so I continued, "Beautiful, really. Nice kitty, Tape... Taper..."

"Tickertape," Mr. Tinker interjected gruffly. I apparently had his attention. I repeated the name, with some awe. "After the sound he makes, like a stock ticker," Tinker muttered as if explaining it to a simpleton.

"Of course," I replied. "Quite a complex machine, I'm sure. Much like the mechanical men around the city."

"Nothing like them," he grumbled. "Crude things, utilitarian."

I chuckled. "Teston & Tinker seem to be doing swift business with them. I hear there's to be a whole building devoted to them at the World's Fair, a fully automatic home."

Mr. Tinker scoffed. "Such mindless mechanical drudgery. I don't wish to denigrate the work of my peers, but the wonder these philistines have for automatons that sweep the sidewalk, and dust the fine china..."

I watched as Tickertape stretched, groans and pops coming from the metal he was fashioned with. "What would you propose in their place? Litters of mechanical kittens? Toronto is overrun by irritable toms as is."

At this Tickertape let out an annoyed, mechanical, "Miaow!" and Mr. Tinker turned away from his administrations again. "And why not? Oh, I know, people laugh at my work. 'Toymaker' isn't necessarily a respectful endearment," he continued in the same quiet grumble, though there was an edge to his voice. "Clockwork children's ponies, orchestrions, leisure flying machines for young people. Frivolity, they say. Little money to be made in a mechanical cat but for a novelty, a toy, they say. But where is the whimsy in the world? Where is the joy in our fantastic technologies? The artfulness? Will children grow up in a cold, automaton world?"

Tickertape and I watched as Mr. Tinker finished his quiet but impassioned speech, the cat's apparent clockwork stupor mirroring my own.

Mr. Tinker turned away from me, embarrassed. "My apologies. The ramblings of a daft old madman who wants nothing more than to build toy cats." He waved over his shoulder just as Tickertape dashed off into the shadows as if after something, perhaps a clockwork rat. "Mave's work, improving my designs, is beyond belief. She understands the necessities of the times. The industry, the military demands. The politics," he spat this word as if he'd ingested machine grease. "She's a genius, and deserves all the praise in our venture."

"Mr. Tinker," I said after a brief silence, "if I may, I feel the same way about my work."

He glanced over his shoulder and we made brief eye contact before he looked at the workbench beside me, pointing to a tool, which I promptly handed to him. "My father is one of the world's most successful businessmen. He was the son of a simple English sailor. Built Quigley Airships from the ground up, so to speak. Knighted for all of the work he's done in the New World, in the name of England. He's accomplished all these great things, travelled all over, and impressed his success on my older brother. He is the strongest, kindest, most generous and intelligent man I know.

"But," I continued, hoping I still had Mr. Tinker's attention, "he's a businessman. Like a lot of his peers, he finds those things beyond the scope of making money... frivolous, I suppose.

"He bought me one of the first Kodak cameras, thinking I could take some pictures of the airships, contribute something, anything, to the family business. He couldn't understand why I started taking portraits of the men who worked for him. The airmen, labourers, pilots. And beyond that; blackguards, thieves, immigrants, Catholics, homeless, the destitute, street urchins, sinners, all on the city streets."

I paused. Noticing Mr. Tinker had ceased working momentarily, I pressed on, "Don't misunderstand me. He is a compassionate, loving man, working for the good of the world, but we differ in our feelings for these people. They live their lives much as we do, although with considerable more hardships, I suppose. 'We Quigleys must shape the world,' he often says. But I know, while he loves me, I'm not included in that assessment. I'd like to live up to my name, but despite my best efforts, I find it a challenge. Even with his success and genius, Father can't understand my creating something solely for myself, which becomes a piece of my life I'm able to share with others."

I ceased haranguing Mr. Tinker, prepared to be banished from his property, either politely or by force, but the older man stood, propped against the table before him. "I would," he almost whispered, "very much like to see some of your pictures sometime."

I couldn't suppress a grin. "I'd like that very much."

He remained where he was, as if in deep thought. I interrupted his rumination with what I hoped was a polite question. "Mr. Tinker, I'm curious. The Globe has two or three photographers and a dozen writers--the others being far more experienced, and technically able than I. None of them have ever even seen you before..."

Although still masked in the gloom, I could swear I noticed Mr. Tinker smirking a little. "They would always stick their head in the door and shout like there was a fire," he explained, the tone of his quiet voice bordering on amusement. "One of them tripped on an engine and cut open some vital artery a few years back--none of the lot really tried after that.

"I figured someone would persist hard enough eventually. Someone who wasn't a complete cretin. And I hoped that person would be quiet, thoughtful... bright. And kind."

Again, in the darkness, I couldn't tell, but I believed Mr. Tinker flushed at the implied compliment to me. I beamed once again and was returned with a smile that seemed to take a pained effort on the inventor's part. "Mr. Tinker, I would like very much to photograph you, and I would like to share it with everyone with a little something written about your wonderful workshop."

He seemed to think about this for a moment. "Yes, well, I suppose... some small public concession... Go ahead."

"Oh." I had been preparing to engage in shameless begging and found myself unprepared for this simpler outcome. "Good then!"

However, I realized the darkened environment would not work for a photograph, and I shook my head--both at my small victory and the small challenge. "Might we step outside into the sunlight? I'm afraid the camera would yield only darkness if used in here, even in the presence of the lamplight. You see, the sensitivity of the film to light is--"

But Mr. Tinker cut me off with further grumblings, "Yes, yes, of course, I understand the concept of photographic sensitivity. But... but I can't step outside."

I cocked my head in question. "I can't abide it," he continued.

I repeated the gesture, and Mr. Tinker flushed deeper, embarrassed. "That is to say I'm far too busy."

I inhaled for a breath, about to launch into shameless begging in my request of an outdoors portrait, but he held up a finger to silence me before rubbing his forehead with the other hand, deep in thought again.

Mr. Tinker began to move about the workshop in extreme agitation, from one pile to the next as a honey bee travels among a field of flowers. By this point, Tickertape had returned from the depths of the workshop to take stock of the sudden flurry of activity.

As the clockwork cat and I looked on, Mr. Tinker seemed to be cobbling together a crude device of some kind; a long cylinder topped with a shallow oval cup with some wire connected to a small switch. After disappearing from view for a moment, he returned to the bench beside me that was piled with chemicals. He took a generous helping of chalky white powder, placed it in the cup and offered the device to me. "This will provide some improvised light." After explaining how it worked, he took his place.

He patted the workbench, and lithe Tickertape leapt up beside his master. "When you are ready, Mr. Quigley."

I wish I could say I was, because when I pressed the button to release the shutter function, the small explosion that ensued in the cup of the device I held aloft inspired a less than masculine shriek from me. However, the resulting flash of light, simultaneous with the shutter's click, mimicked a window thrown open and closed again to temporarily let in light, as Mr. Tinker promised. When I had gained some composure, I couldn't help but wonder at the innovation. "A portable flash lighting device. Marvellous..."

"Perhaps a little liberal on magnesium, but the desired effect, no doubt," Mr. Tinker grumbled to himself, and I warranted that it was as I handed the device back to him, hoping my expression was more dignified and less abject surprise. He studied the device in his hands. "Quite a brilliant young man, George Eastman. I hope to meet him someday and discuss his innovations, maybe offer some consultation."

I laughed. "And I hope to someday take a photograph with a Teston & Tinker non-explosive flash-camera."

As I shook his hand, I realized I was no longer registering in Mr. Tinker's mind. Already I could see, as they say, the gears in his head turning. I scratched Tickertape's ear before a final wave goodbye, and let myself out of Tinker's wondrous workshop.