Master Krest's Estate

         The sun rose rather quickly over the low rise of hills east of the Krest Estate.  I, being left alone to look after the house, stood with a freshly-prepared pipe and a cup of French-pressed coffee.  The master, Ernest G. Krest, Esquire, had gone to London to demonstrate his prowess at the craft of machinery and would return that day after nearly a fortnight away.
         My coffee finished, I wandered to the barn the master had converted into his laboratory.  Pipe in hand, I pushed open the small side door and slipped inside.  With practiced ease I reached over and raised the barn's electrical switch.  The lights were many and took some time to warm up, flickering to life one by one down the length of the wooden beams.
         “Good day, sir,” a brassy voice greeted me.
         Master Krest's automated butler, a wondrous creation of uniqueness not seen beyond England's green pastures, meandered about the barn, seeing to whatever tasks the master had left it. I made my way past it to the back of the barn where I kept my own stash of small projects.  It had been my hope to present to Master Krest the fruits of my own labor and the results of his fine tutelage.
         I could hear the hissing of the automaton's pistons and joints as it moved about the barn.  It was a strange sort of music to inspire me to my work: the whirring of the coil springs winding and unwinding, the release of air pressure, the dull thunk of rubber-soled metal feet always calmed the mundane cacophony of the outside world.  I set to work with the chemical apparatus. 
         I whistled quietly as I uncorked first one and then another of the chemicals.  It would be my hope that I would be able to create a viable solution to the outbreak of pox that had so troubled the countryside.  I read through my calculations and began to measure out appropriate samples of the  solutions. 
         I lit the candle beneath the tempered glass beaker.  Then, with much anticipation, my calculations being much studied and pored over but not physically tested until that moment, I picked up one of the containers and slowly began to pour it into the warmed glass.  I then followed it up with a mix of the second. 
         The compound began to boil and without warning the whole thing burst into flames.  In my distress I dropped both containers, the liquids being thus thrown into the fire and exacerbating the situation.  Before I could react quickly enough, the flames leapt to the barn wall and were quickly eating away at the aged wood.
         “Fire!”
         The master's automaton, versed in the dangers of an inventor's laboratory, was quick to rise to its feet.  I ran to the buckets by the front door of the bar and rushed outside.  To the well I went, running as quickly as I could, my age evident in the labored breaths I heaved upon stopping.
         “Fire!” I screamed again.
         The scullery maid and the houseman were the first to rush out of the back door. 
         I turned at the sound of a horrendous explosion and looked to see the back of the barn burst forth with flames into the morning air.  I fear that I screamed then.  With buckets in hand, I ran back to the barn, skirting its side to the back, there to deposit the water on the fire.  The water seemed to do little to staunch the flames, but continue I did. 
         The house erupted as the staff poured out to aid in what quickly could be seen as a losing battle.
         After the fourth or fifth trip to the barn, I stopped to see the master's automaton bearing a large chest and rucksack out of the barn to some hundred meters away.  He set it there and with all the haste of a brass creature returned to the barn, where he emerged again with a series of wooden crates.  These items safely out of the inferno, the machine-man sat atop the chest and waited patiently, no doubt, for Master Krest to return.
         “What all this then, Charles?”
         Ashamed and embarrassed – both from my most juvenile disaster and my unseemly need for a washing – I turned and looked at him with a half grin.
         “I seem to have found a most volatile and combustible solution,” I replied.
         “Testing your skills as a chemist, are we, Charles?”
         “Yes, Sir,” I replied.
         “Do you remember this formula?”
         I gave the master with a curious gaze.  His eyes shone brightly in the flames as he stared mutely watching the destruction of his laboratory and barn.  He was a man of fair and noble demeanor but swift in justice when it came to household staff.  I, being a gentleman's gentleman, had some priority over those other members, but I feared that his ire would be wrought upon me, though with just cause.
         “Yes, Sir,” I replied.
         “Very good, Charles,” Master Krest said.  “Have that written down, and we shall look over it in the morning.”
         “Sir?”
         “And have the stable boy send for the carpenter.”
         “Yes, Sir.”
         I turned my gaze to the barn, the flames roaring fiercely as the wood popped and squealed.
         “I am terribly sorry, Sir,” I said as humbly as I could manage.
         “My things were rescued?”
         “Yes, Sir, by your automaton.”
         “Very good,” Master Krest said, turning to me.  He gave me a good grin and a sturdy pat on the shoulder and nodded.  “Then there is nothing more to discuss.”
         With that he left me standing rather dumbly, looking like the town sop, staring at the fire as one of the walls collapsed.  I shook my head and quickly turned to follow him, no doubt to his study to relax for a while with a pipe and some brandy.

Word Count: 999