When the meal was over and everything was cleared away, Mrs Quilty let the staff watch the unveiling of the inventions. Doncia stood to one side with Isolde, Piri, Moni and the others. A row of tables along the courtyard side of the hall held all the inventions except the few so large they stood out on the floor.

Every invention was covered in a white sheet big enough to hide what it was, and the strange hidden shapes made Doncia wonder. Everyone hushed when the graf stood in his place at the table of honour. Near him was Mr Delgarde, the clergyman Rhan Caelis, and a frail old woman. Her skin was powdered as white as the sheets which hid the inventions, and her hair was died bright red and stood up like flames. It could only be Countess Sabra, on a rare excursion from her rooms.

‘Welcome everyone, to the inaugural Graf Gaeth von Clee invention competition,’ the graf said, and then paused for polite clapping. ‘As you know it is my seventy-fifth birthday.’ There was more clapping, and a cheer from a back table. ‘And I will hold a competition on each of my future birthdays. Now, because I just happen to have an entry in this competition myself, I won’t be judging, or taking part in any way at all other than as a competitor. So I’ll hand you over to Otto.’

Everyone clapped while Mr Delgarde wove his way between the tables to the open floor. He raised his hands to acknowledge and hush the applause. His deep voice boomed.

‘Here’s how it works—competitors had one hundred days to complete their inventions. Judging is by myself, Mr Paige, and Rhan Caelis. In fact, we have already made our decision.’ He held up an envelope. ‘We measured the merit in three categories—originality, worth, and manufacturability—that is whether the invention is new or just a rehash of something we all know, whether it will have an impact on our lives in Clee, and whether Mr Paige or I could make them in our factories, and, it must be said, turn a healthy profit.’

There was muted laughter. He tucked the envelope back into his jacket, and held up his hand.

‘But I’m not going to tell you the winner straight away—first I’ll invite the inventors, one by one in alphabetical order, to exhibit. First up is...’ he pulled a list from his jacket, '...Mr Graham Arnold, and his invention the electric bell-pull.'

An old man lumbered up to the tables with the aid of a cane, ushered by enthusiastic applause from his own table. He held up the cane to shush the crowd, and then lifted a tiny handkerchief sized cloth from something tiny on the table. He touched whatever it was, and a distant bell rang. In a croaky voice he explained his invention replaced the conventional rope and pulley bell-pull, and could be easily installed in any fine house so at the flick of a toggle, a bell rang in the distance to summon the staff. Apparently it was easier to install than ropes and pulleys. It did however mean the house had to be supplied with capacitors for electricity.

The electric bell-pull was acknowledged with polite clapping. Then there were a few similar inventions, replacing familiar items with different ways to achieve the same result, which was hardly inventing at all. Doncia was feeling a little disappointed.

Mr Delgarde hushed the crowd again with his deep clear voice.

‘And the next inventor is my own dear son, Otis. He calls his invention the racing automobile. It’s rather frivolous, if you ask me, but boys are boys.’

There was cheering and clapping for Otis as he strode out, bowed deeply, and with a theatrical wave of his arm tugged the sheet off the second largest item on the floor. The cloth snagged somewhere, and ripped in two, but the tearing only added to the spectacle.

It was a gleaming, metal-clad automobile, rounded and smooth at the front as if it was meant to fly like an airship, with oversized wheels and mirror-bright pipes running down the side from an engine in the long front end. On the side was painted a white circle with a black 5 in it, much like the numbers Doncia had seen on horses outfitted for racing.

‘I wanted to start it up,’ Otis said, ‘but the graf didn’t want me to scare you all away. You see, it is a motor vehicle built for speed, for racing. Of course you need at least two of them for that—but just imagine, a road set aside for the racing of automobiles, and the noise and excitement as different makers and drivers vie for the cup!’

He pulled on gloves and flying goggles, and climbed into the driver’s seat, then grabbed something from within and held it high with both hands—a winner’s trophy.

Doncia clapped and cheered with the others.

The next inventor was one of the technologicians Doncia had seen in the repair office when Maynard was fixing the robot. Mr Delgarde introduced him as Mr Alfred Duggins, with his invention the Airship Signaller. Mr Duggins unveiled what looked like a pair of boxes with little colourful metal flags poking out, just like those Doncia had seen alongside the railway lines. He called out for his assistant, the other technologician from the repair office, who took one of the pair to the far end of the room.

‘Mr Edwin will now send the signal for I am operating astern propulsion,’ said Mr Duggins, and raised a hand signal for his assistant, who adjusted the position of the flags on his box. Immediately the little flags on the close box mirrored the positions of the flags on the assistant’s box.

‘There are no wires or other connections between the signallers,’ Mr Duggins explained. ‘The signals are sent by way of tuned anrenn vibrations, and can operate over a distance of one hundred and thirty yards, in any weather. So we could easily send signals between airships, even at night or in the clouds where visibility is poor.’

She wouldn’t want to be in an airship that close to another in the dark and the clouds. There were mumbles and muted clapping.

Then followed a few more similarly dull inventions. Some were even more worrying, like the man who had made larger flags, controlled by a system of levers, that were supposed to direct horse-drawn and horseless carriages at an intersection so they did not crash into each other. It seemed very dangerous; if the drivers were looking at silly flags instead of where they were headed, surely they would crash.

‘And the next entrant,’ Mr Delgarde said, ‘is the Marquis Maynard von Clee, with his invention the Flying Horse.’ Maynard stepped out onto the floor, looking flustered.

‘It’s just a silly thing, really, and not very practical like an airship or a puka ornithopter,’ he said.

‘Just show them!’ Otis called out.

Maynard raised his hands as if in defeat, then stepped up to his invention, the largest on the floor, and carefully lifted the white sheet, first one corner and then the next, till he had it all neatly folded in the centre.

It didn’t look like a horse, but there were two seats like saddles, one behind the other, and two sets of short curved wings low on the body. There was a small engine at the front with a glossy wooden propeller, and a v-shaped tail at the back. The wings did not seem to be able to flap. Apart from the propeller, the whole thing was bright red. It stood on three legs, two under the main body and one at the tail, each with a short skid foot like a cut-off snow ski.

It really didn’t look like it should be able to fly, but it was such a sleek, evocative contraption that the crowd was totally silent. Or, Doncia wondered, was it because they thought he was crazy? Then she remembered the floating box she’d helped with, and it made sense.

‘Now, I’m not going to start the engine in here of course,’ Maynard said, ‘but there is something I can show you, something even better.’

He placed a foot in a step-hole and mounted the craft like a horse, then leaned forward to grasp control handles. A small motor whirred, and the thing leapt into the air like a horse bucking, with Maynard gripping tight. For a moment Doncia had her heart in her mouth—it would crash back to the floor!

But it didn’t. Her idea had obviously worked. She was so proud!

The silence broke—everyone applauded and cheered. Maynard made the flying horse take him higher into the hall, right up to the second floor, and then brought it gently back down, and climbed out of the saddle. He bowed to a delighted audience.

The cheers and applause went on and on, and eventually Mr Delgarde had to hold up his hands for quiet.

‘There is one final invention,’ he shouted over the remaining clapping and chatter. ‘I present to you Graf Gaeth von Clee, and his Warbot.’