Success, for the most part.

Success Sir Williard,

I am well pleased with today's events having just finished a truly exceptional dinner of pureed leek and garlic soup, grilled fork-tail (a bony but flavorful native fish) steak and kidney pie followed by a plum pudding in custard cream sauce for deserts. A man of your intellect most certainly must deduce from this fact that not only have I hired a cook, but we were able (with only a little difficulty) to get the house resonator working.

I do not know, Sir Williard, if you have ever seen a resonator. I certainly had not until this morning. On Earth, at least in the civilized sections of the Empire, nearly all of the aetherworks run on huge centrally located resonating generators. Here on Rajah-4 the company decided to invest in household models for all but the main city centers. I was most astonished to see the machine right here in the villa's basement. While small on the scale of city resonators, I was still struck by the size and complexity of the dusty contraption that filled its own room. The great brass fly-wheel was nearly six feet in diameter and the aetherducts attached to the resonator curled and arched like branches of a great oak into the floors above. A control panel of glass-faced meters and almost a dozen different dials, switches and levers had to be cleared of grime before we could proceed and most striking of all was the resonating crystal nearly the size of my fist that rested in a cage of copper wiring at the top of the generator.

I remember studying aether resonators in theory as an undergraduate in North Umbria University, but I would not have known where to start without my dark-toned manservant to guide me. Upon closer examination I could see the cylinder with the paladium compressor and the aetherducts that vented the cylinder. The source of all this power was of course the soma-brick and I watched with no small amount of trepidation when Andrews withdrew the brick from its drawer under the cylinder and weighed it thoughtfully in his hand. I wonder if you heard my sigh of relief all the way back on Earth when I saw him nod his head in satisfaction. I have (or so I am told) roughly a third of the brick still left and I should have enough power in that one shall piece of refined ore to run this household for the next several months. I watched in anticipation as Andrews carefully adjusted the knobs, levers and dials of at least half a dozen different functions before indicating that he was ready.

Andrew's gold lighter once again came into play as he lit the small burner under the soma drawer. He waited nearly a full minute before pulling experimentally on the flywheel. Through the glass window in the cylinder I saw the piston head lower slightly and then return to its original level. With that my great ebony Kenyan grasped the top of the flywheel and gave it a great downward pull, my heart raced with excitement when I saw the crystal flare brightly as the compressor began its cycle, but my joy faded as fast as the light because after just one or two turns the flywheel came to rest. We spent the next five minutes working on the generating resonator, Andrews and I, with me pulling the heavy fly-wheel over and over again while Andrews made adjustments to several of the ductwork vents and clockwork mechanisms that controlled the timing of the great machine. I was delighted when at last the compressor turned the flywheel on its own and the crystal pulsed slowly in time with the compressor piston as it rose and fell, but Andrews shook his head in silent frustration and went back to inspect the row of dials. He had to place his squinting eyes just inches from each dial in order to read and adjust it but eventually the flywheel spun too fast to see the individual spokes and instead of pulsing the aethercrystal maintained a steady glow as the resonance generator hummed smoothly.

Upstairs I saw two of the four aetherlamps in my library clearly lit even in the light of day, and in the kitchen both the oven range and cooler had blinking lights on their control panels. Satisfied that the resonator was working properly Andrews turned his attention to the utilities in the kitchen, checking the water pressure as well as the kettle that sat in a elaborate clockwork system. In almost no time at all we had boiling water for tea. Only one of the lights was working in the kitchen but I found a portable crystal lamp in the drawer by the coolerbox. When I adjusted the knob on the back, the tarnished brass tube cast a wide cone on white light for at least ten feet; further twisting of the wheel narrowed cone of light by clever application of lenses to a beam a foot in diameter that had no end that I could see.

With Andrews working in the kitchen, I climbed the central staircase and explored the six rooms upstairs. All were empty except for a thick layer of dust, but the largest of the rooms had a great view looking over the lawn and down onto the river. I had decided to make this my chambers even before I found the cleverly concealed door in the paneling that led to a private water closet complete with a marble sink and a large bath easily big enough for two to share. In the ceiling was yet another malfunctioning aetherlamp, an overhead fan on the other hand that worked perfectly and an aetherworks dryer that blew warm air from the ceiling when a lever next to the bath was depressed. The commode was concealed so cleverly behind yet another wall that it took me almost a minute to find. I have to say, Sir Williard, that I was most pleased by the discreet placement of this necessity. It indicated to me at least that some of the settlers of this planet maintained a proper sense of modesty.

I found Andrews in the central hall dressed to go out. He begged my pardon and asked if now would be a good time to see about retaining the cook and other staff. I waved him off and spent the next few hours exploring the grounds, I found a boat house along the river that unfortunately is locked, and what was once a small vegetable garden behind the kitchen. I took the liberty of removing my jacket because of the heat when I found an actual rosemary plant that was stubbornly fighting for its life despite being completely overrun by a native vine, it took me nearly ten minutes and several nasty scratches to free the plant, and another ten minutes to unpack my doctor's bag and sooth the the burning lacerations with a cleansing ointment. Luckily I had my shirt and waistcoat back on by the time Andrews returned escorting a silver-haired woman wearing a heavy woolen dress in spite of the heat and a copper-skinned Hindu who was carrying an assortment of garden tools on his back. Both greeted me politely, but quickly left to examine respectively the villa's kitchen and its grounds.

Shortly after that a cart drawn by a giant dog-like creature the size of a burro pulled up my driveway. Immediately two teen-aged girls jumped off the cart and approached me with respectful curtsies. Both wore modest dresses of grey, and each had a white apron tied neatly around their waists with matching white hats but that was where the similarity ended. One of the two had light skin, with strawberry blonde hair tied up under her hat; she was not fat, but a curvier woman I cannot remember seeing in quite some time. Her hips and bosom strained against the material of her uniform and when she dropped into her deep curtsy every bit of her jiggled and undulated like an experiment in gelatin gone off-kilter. Her companion moved with the grace and control of a dancer, she had the lithe build of a ballerina as well - slender with small breasts, boyish hips and an elegant neck. I recognized her immediately as being Asian, not Chinese with whom, as you know, I am familiar; most likely I decided at the time, from the Nippon Islands or perhaps one of the peninsulas off of Eastern China. Each of the young maids was charming in her own way and I remember having a flash of anger at Andrews for finding two lovely workers to tempt me. Then I remembered that in all the time I have spent her in New India, I had yet to see an unattractive person. This pair was at least modestly attired and properly respectful.

Before I could say a word Andrews appeared and directed the pair of girls into the house before turning his attention to the two burly men unloading a bed-frame and mattress from the cart. I must confess that I found retreat the wisest course of action and so spent the next three hours in my library allowing Andrews to officiate the chaos that engulfed the house outside the thick wooden door of my sanctuary. Once my door opened and the slender dark-haired Asian girl slid silently in and out of the room with a charming curtsies leaving behind a pot of tea and a plate of pastries on the small table by the great windows. Other than that one pleasant diversion I was left in peaceful solitude for the rest of the afternoon. I have one final note before I retire, that you may find amusing Sir Williard. This evening when Andrews appeared to announce dinner, he carried with him my dinner jacket freshly pressed and dusted so there could be no misunderstanding.