How I Overcame My Inventor’s Block

alien race, mountain demons, or the work of a wizard. But our new police chief thinks it is some new type of invention and would launch a thorough investigation.

  There was some final testing to be done. Given that I had the police on my trail, I had to be extra careful. I created a special hiding place in the ceiling. Also I did some more tune-ups. At last, it was ready for submission. On the application I wrote my name as Krampus Karol. I thought it fitting to use as a first name that of the Christmas Day demon that kidnaps bad children in a sack and eats them later. And my last name referenced all the singing that I would do when I won the contest. I took the train to Vienna to get it locally postmarked (to throw anyone following me off) and sent in my application for submission. I just made the deadline — the last possible day for approval!

  Two weeks later I was in Vienna for the show. The day of the show, I went in disguise as a bearded male in his 30s. With my extra savings from my job at the florist’s, I had hired two people via mail to act as spokesperson and to demonstrate the suit (without the fog). The show had 200 amazing exhibits from throughout our beloved nation. I particularly liked the snow-making machine. The judges (three elderly scientists) looked at all the inventions with great focus and seriousness. They spent 20 minutes at my exhibit and asked to see the demo twice. Fortunately, I had anticipated this and had enough materials to complete the demos. They were a success.

  The next day they announced the winners and I won first place. I walked up to the podium disguised as an elderly man, and took the prize and the check. Fortunately the suit and machines had already been sent back to Klagenfurt and to be dropped off in my workshop. As I left the stage, I was surrounded by military officials who wanted to confiscate my “weapon” as a threat to national defense. Also the Klagenfurt police were somehow there and wanted to question me on the bank break-in. Fortunately, I anticipated this happening and turned on the newly added green fog button and disappeared into the crowd. A weapon? It was no such thing. Just a simple invention.

  When I got to the train station, I saw the police there checking all the passengers. I put on my realistic mask of an old woman and limped my way forward to the check-in line where I had the police staring at me. They asked me questions, looked carefully at my forged papers and let me on the train. Four and a half hours later, I was at the Klagenfurt station. Before exiting the train, I checked carefully and saw no policemen. I went into a local building and changed out of my disguise and walked carefully back home. I burned all of my disguises and suitcases. I carefully broke up my prize winning inventions into various parts and threw them away at numerous locations.

  The Vienna paper mentioned the Inventors show and how the police and the military were after the first place prize winner. There was a description of me (as an old man) and police were on the constant lookout to stop this criminal that could break into anywhere. They mentioned what happened in Klagenfurt. Things were getting hot and in spite of my best efforts, something might lead them to me. I had to leave.

  That day I told Katherina what happened. She agreed to leave as she also wanted a change. We had more than enough to live on: Poppa’s safe money, my prize money and the earnings from both our jobs. We left that night using more disguises. Around the same time we got on the train leaving Klagenfurt, I used an explosive that blew up the workshop and left no “clues” that we had escaped. A tragic ending that never happened. Since my Aunt never used it, the ruins of the workshop were soon covered by grass or snow.

  We could have gone anywhere in Europe so we did. Our stops included Munich, Paris for a year, and London. I took my most important possession – my designs – with me. We then decided to go to America while we still had funds so we could be really safe. This took some doing. We had to create forged documents passing us off as English children staying with our American Aunt. Katharina became Jane and I became Tammy. We had an English tutor growing up so we had the accent part down pat. After several weeks of travel, we made it to America, safe from the Austrian officials that very much wanted us. We soon bought ourselves a nice house with a perfect inventor’s basement. Jane got a job to keep the money coming in. I just worked on my inventions knowing that I would create something that would astound the world.

  At last, I wanted something: to make New York my home and to become a great inventor. I knew that it would happen because that was Poppa’s dream for me as well

  [Learn more about what happened to Romy/Tammy, her sister, and her cousin Joseph, in the Amazi Chronicles. Book #1 Automatons for Non-Violence now available on this site.

  To learn more about this and other writings of this author , please visit -- https://sites.google.com/site/hallettgermanfiction/]

  The following is from Amazi Chronicles. Book #1 Automatons for Non-Violence

  After an uneventful twenty minute ride, we made it to my new home in New York, right off of A Avenue. This new home consisted of a building of six levels, which later I learned it was called a tenement building. Many large extended families lived together in these dark, unappealing buildings. My host Isaac and his family lived on the 6th floor. The bathrooms were outdoors, lighting was based on gas lamps, and as I would learn that winter – a coal stove was used for heating.

  Isaac’s living quarters consisted of four rooms. There was a Front Room for socializing during the day and sleeping for the men at night. It had some beds that converted to chairs during the day, some pictures of Saint Petersburg, and a small closet overstuffed with clothes. At one end of this room there was an entrance to the kitchen. The kitchen had a small stove, shelves for a few pots, pans, and dishes, a sink, an icemaker which Tomas the iceman kept filled, and a small table for eating. Through the kitchen there were two backrooms: one for Isaac and his wife Annie, and the other room for the girls. It was crowded but manageable. Isaac and Annie had two girls Jennie and Fanny. They also had a boarder named Matilda, nicknamed Tilly. Tilly with her green eyes, flowing red hair, and deep voice immediately caught my attention. In Russia, I had no time for women since I was too busy spending hours with my current or would-be friends. Isaac and Annie also had three boys – Morris, Louis, and Herman. I would be sharing a bed next to Herman. Exhausted I fell asleep. The next day, Annie woke me up from sound asleep. I had breakfast which was some sort of stew and was then sent to work.

  I was expected to work at a clothing factory as a sewing machine operator for five dollars a week. Out of these meager wages, I would give one dollar a week to Isaac and Annie to pay for my rent, food, and clothes washing. Herman and Tilly also worked in the same factory. We worked from 7 a.m. to 6 p.m. with a forty minute break for lunch. This went on every day, Monday through Saturday.

  From the start, the factory was an unwelcomed and unpleasant work environment for me. One walked into a room where two hundred people – male and female, healthy or sick, sat in close proximity to each other, squished like sardines. The room had little light coming from multiple broken windows high above the ground. The factory floor had an overpowering ever-present musty smell. The little ventilation allowed temperatures to soar and the unrelenting heat felt muggy and oppressive.

  When at the point of exhaustion, the lunch bell rang. I bought an apple for five cents at the pushcart outside the factory. I then started looking for someone to eat with. I tried to find Herman but he had disappeared. So I just listened. I overheard some men talking about “sweatshop conditions “ and “the need to form a union.” I stopped listening -- I didn’t need any new trouble in my life.

  Someone tapped gently on my shoulder and said: “So your first day here and already oppressed -- such a sad fate for someone so young, tall, and handsome.” I turned around and saw Tilly in a friendly mood. She then started to tell me the story of her life. She had been here for two years and stayed with the Taroffs (Isaac and Annie) because they had been friends with her mother in Saint Petersburg. “I never knew much about my father other than he wasn’t Russian and had been visiting for a few days. Momma had forgotten his nam
e and had no way to contact him.” We talked a little bit more and then went back in. Before she headed back to work, she told me that she was 21.

  At closing time, Herman was already gone but Tilly was waiting for me. “Do you want to walk back together? It isn’t always safe walking around here alone especially for single women. You look like a strong, well-built young man and I would feel safer with you. Herman is always rushing somewhere so I rarely walk back with him.” I said yes and we walked together. She continued her story about how Russia was pressuring woman to marry early to make more soldiers. Tilly would have nothing to do with that. “I choose those I wish to love – not the State. I do not wish to bring children in the world only to see them injured or killed. I had read Tolstoy and the American named Thoreau’s thoughts on how to resist the state’s attempt at war. I do not want to see any more unnecessary deaths. Have you read Thoreau?” I said no and had read Bakunin and others preaching violent resistance instead. She gave an understanding look and pulled out of her bag a copy of Thoreau in Russian. “I’m always re-reading it. Please read it and let