by Carter Roy
“Oh, Jack,” Diz said. They walked off together, talking in low tones.
“You got an email,” Sammy said, tipping his head toward the screen I’d used earlier. It was still logged on to ILZ. The inbox had a “1” next to it.
“Probably my dad changing the plan on us.”
But when I opened my inbox, I found a message from Gideon.
To: DorkLord2K1
From: ArmaGide0n
No problem!!! It was weird and fun. But I think your game scared off the delivery person. Our pizza never came! I had to eat leftovers. Let me know if it’s too late to join your ARG. I have a lot of friends on the boards and could probably put together a team of my own.
I must have made some kind of noise, because Sammy looked over and said, “You just squeaked. Like a little kid. You okay?”
“I’m great,” I said, typing a reply. “My friend Gideon is okay.”
“Oh, good,” Sammy said. “He seemed like a nice guy.”
And then, without consulting Dawkins or Sammy, I came up with a plan of my own.
Diz and Dawkins strolled back.
“Any change on the cat?” Dawkins asked Sammy.
“Nah. It’s still sending a weird signal from the water by the Brooklyn Bridge.”
“You say Greta went for a lie-down in the ladies’ room?” Diz asked. She grabbed her clutch. “I’ll go fix my makeup and see how she’s doing.”
Dawkins went to the one clean cabinet in the room and dug around inside until he came out with a green canvas duffel bag and some work gloves. He threw a pair to me. “Ronan, come out with me to the platform. There’s some scrap on pallets in one of the storerooms—maybe there’s something we can use to create a dummy ’Scope.”
“I’ll just stay here and watch the cat,” Sammy said. “Because that’s exciting.”
We climbed the steps back into the fancy subway station. Immediately on escaping that dusty control room, I breathed easier.
We walked together toward the other end of the platform.
“He wants the Damascene ’Scope?” I asked.
“Probably knows we wouldn’t hand over Greta and intends to follow you after the trade. And figures he may get something else he wants in the bargain.”
The arches over the tracks began to glow with light.
“Train coming through,” he said, pulling me into the shadows of the City Hall stairwell. “Unlikely anyone would notice us, but why risk it?”
A 6 train slowly followed the curving track around and out the other side of the station. Once it was gone, we continued on our way.
“So what if you were right, what you said earlier, about the Damascene ’Scope being able to destroy souls. Are they going to destroy every one of the Pure souls on the planet?” I said. “That’d take forever. That can’t be their plan.”
“Even using the Eye of the Needle would take a long time,” Dawkins mused. “They’d have to locate each of the Pure, defeat the team of Blood Guard protecting that person, use the Eye to comb out the soul, then stash the collected souls in a warehouse or wherever—somewhere, anyway, where the Grand Architect of the Blood Guard won’t be able to perceive the trapped souls. You’re right: it makes no sense.”
“Something else that makes no sense: my dad burning down our house,” I said. “It’s been bothering me.”
“Well that it might,” Dawkins said. “After all, you were asleep upstairs.”
“Not that part of it—I mean, why burn down the house? Because he was trying to make my mom expose the Pure she protected?”
“That’s the Blood Guard’s theory.” Dawkins stopped walking.
“It’s a crazy-dumb, desperate thing to do just to capture a single Pure—he’d be throwing away an undercover identity he spent ages building.” Years of playing the role of my dad, years of duping me into thinking he loved me and my mom. It had all been a lie. “But maybe that was worth the risk? Maybe once he had a single Pure soul, he wouldn’t need to pretend anymore?”
Dawkins snapped his fingers. “That’s why, the moment the Bend Sinister did capture a Pure, your father abandoned his cover and hit the road. Because it no longer mattered; he no longer needed the Pure your mum was guarding.”
“Right,” I said. “But why?”
“We have criminally underestimated the Bend Sinister,” Dawkins said, walking again. “We’d been thinking they must collect as many Pure souls as possible, when all they really need is one.”
“So then my dad gets Flavia’s soul—mission accomplished, right? So why bring it to the Glass estate in that Conceptacle thing?”
“Because he thought he’d be able to permanently destroy it using the Damascene ’Scope,” Dawkins said.
“What good is that?” I asked.
“I wish I knew,” Dawkins said, heaving open a creaky metal door. On the other side were piles of gears and unidentifiable things all covered in rust and grease. Dawkins gestured at a fat, rusty section of pipe. “Voila—that lovely hunk of junk is going to be our Damascene ’Scope.”
When we hauled our duffel back into the control room, Sammy looked up. “The ping came aboveground and now it’s moving up this street here.”
“Maybe it’s just the cat wandering around,” I suggested.
“Some cat,” Sammy said and whistled. “It can move at like fifteen miles an hour. And stops at intersections.”
“That’s Broadway,” Diz said, tracing the street on the screen. “They’re already heading to the meet at Times Square.”
“How’s Greta?” Dawkins asked.
Diz sighed. “Depressed, furious, hates you, and doesn’t believe you’re going to be successful in rescuing her mom.”
“You know, a simple ‘sad’ would have sufficed.”
“You asked,” Diz said. She zoomed the map into the Times Square area. “Where is this trade supposed to take place?”
“Here,” I said, tapping a triangle of pavement where Broadway crossed Forty-Fifth Street. “When I was six, my dad took me to see Mr. Met there—you know, the guy with a baseball for a head? He signed a jersey for me.”
“I’m a Yankees girl, myself,” Diz said. She sighed. “This is going to be a bear to stake out. Jack, you can maybe perch up here, on these benches by the TKTS booth, and I can wait over here.”
Sammy stood up. “Don’t forget me.”
Dawkins guided him back into the chair. “You, Sammy, will be our eyes and ears.” He typed a few commands into one of the computers, and the live feed from the subway terminals changed to live feeds of Times Square.
“Whoa,” Sammy said. “I didn’t know you could do that.”
“We’re going to need someone to pinpoint Mrs. Sustermann’s location using the cat’s collar,” Dawkins said.
“As well, you see anything scary going down, you warn us,” Diz said.
“How am I supposed to warn you?” Sammy asked. “Telepathy?”
Diz rolled her eyes. “Using cell phones, of course.”
“But our cell phones don’t work down here,” Dawkins said.
Diz laughed. “Of course they do, you idiot.”
Dawkins held out his phone. “No bars, see?”
She took his phone from him and knocked it against his head, then tapped through a series of screens. “There is wifi here, Jack. Calls can be carried over wifi.”
Sammy already had his phone out. “I don’t see an available network.”
“It’s hidden,” Diz said, then leaned down and logged him onto the network.
“Excellent,” Sammy said. “So your plan is to leave me here alone?”
“No,” Dawkins said, glancing back toward the bathrooms. “Greta will be here. There is no way we are taking her to this meet-up with Ronan’s dad. We have to keep her safe, for reasons you understand.”
“Got it,” Sammy said.
“Guys, this isn’t going to work,” I said. “I can’t be talking into my phone when I’m going to meet my dad. He’ll know something is up.”
Diz ca
refully raised her chunky silver necklace over her head. “Here,” she said, handing it to me.
“Thanks,” I said. The necklace weighed a ton. “But … it’s not my style?”
“It’s against the law for taxi drivers to talk on the phone, so drivers use Bluetooth,” Diz explained. “But that’s way too obvious for a woman who wears her hair up, so I had a friend design a Bluetooth receiver that goes with my look. It’s got a mic, little speakers, and—serious bonus—fashion value. Now, when people see me talking to myself, they just think I’m crazy.”
I draped the necklace around my neck. “Right. This doesn’t look weird at all. My dad won’t think anything of my suddenly wearing jewelry.”
“Say Greta asked you to give it to her mom so that she knows Greta is okay,” Diz said. “That’s exactly the sort of weird thing I would have done when I was a teenager.”
“Okay,” I said. “That will be my story.”
“Now, Ronan, your task is to keep your dad occupied for as long as possible while Sammy uses the cat to pinpoint where Greta’s mum is being held,” Dawkins said. “Then Diz and I will go, grab her, and whisk her to safety. The moment she’s in the clear, we’ll tell Sammy, who will tell you, and you make a break for it.”
“You think he’ll just let me go?” I said. “He’ll have people in the crowd.”
“You’ll have to evade them,” Dawkins said. “You’re trained, and you’re smart, and they’re going to be in disarray after Diz and I take out the agents holding Greta’s mum.”
“This is hardly a plan at all,” I said. “We should wait for the rest of the Blood Guard.”
But Dawkins shook his head. “We can’t risk that. I’m sorry, Ronan, but we have a very small window here. As long as your dad is operating by himself, we have a chance to best him and retrieve Mrs. Sustermann. But if he somehow rejoins the Bend Sinister, we will be vastly outnumbered.”
Diz went to the restroom to fetch Greta, but came out looking scared for the first time since I’d met her.
She didn’t have to say a thing.
In the little hallway to the restrooms was an open door. The words FIRE ESCAPE WERE PAINTED IN FAT RED LETTERS ACROSS IT.
“I swear, Jack, that door’s been locked since the Nixon administration,” Diz protested. “I know, because we’ve looked for the keys.”
“Greta Sustermann doesn’t need things like keys,” Dawkins said, peering through the doorway. “Any idea where this leads?”
“To some metal stairs that lead up to a street grating,” Diz said. She pulled on her sweater. “Should I go after her?”
“She’ll be long gone,” Dawkins said.
Sammy stood on the steps to the control room. “This door was sitting wide open. I bet she heard our whole plan.”
Dawkins closed his eyes. He looked tired. “So we now have less than ninety minutes to catch Greta before your dad does.”
“We’ll take my cab,” Diz said. “Let’s grab our gear and bounce.”
“What if we can’t find her?” I asked.
“We are going to find her. I am not about to give up another Pure.”
“Another Pure?” I asked. “You mean Flavia?”
“No, not Flavia. It was a long time ago—back in 1840,” Dawkins said, leading us to the control room. “I’d been sent to Paris on my first solo assignment for the Blood Guard. The mission went south fast. I’ll tell you all about it on our way to Times Square.” He buckled on his sword belt. “And to be clear: I didn’t give up anyone. But I lost her all the same.”
CHAPTER 9
JACK DAWKINS, IMBECILE ABROAD
I was hungry, filthy, wobbly with exhaustion, and wearing a pair of scavenged brogues three sizes too large for my feet. After two weeks on the road, a run-in with four highwaymen, and an unfortunate encounter with a manure pile, I’d been left a beggar again.
I double- and triple-checked the address on the envelope.
Monsieur E. F. Vidocq, No. 13 Galerie Vivienne, 2nd arrondissement, Paris.
Galerie Vivienne was the sort of glass-roofed shopping arcade for the well-to-do that I’d only ever seen from the outside. The inside looked shady and cool, and a breeze blew that carried soft scents of chocolate and tobacco, perfume and flowers.
The walks were crowded with people. I didn’t need a peek in their wallets to know they were wealthy—their clothes were a dead giveaway. The women’s dresses were full of fussy, impractical bits that get in the way of real work; and the men’s suits were too clean, too crisp, and fit too perfectly.
I didn’t belong in this world.
A group of three women carrying parasols passed, glancing over and covering their noses with handkerchiefs.
They didn’t think I belonged, either.
So, head held high, I marched right in.
Shoppers hurried out of my way and I reached number 13 quickly, then climbed the curving wooden staircase to the door above the gallery marked BUREAU OF UNIVERSAL INTELLIGENCE.
My knock was answered by a gruff “Entrée!” and I let myself into an office where a portly man with enormous graying sideburns sat writing at a rolltop desk. Even though some windows were open, the room was as warm and clammy as an armpit.
His eyes flicked at me, then he muttered, “Les mendiants. Be off if you know what’s good for you.”
“I have a letter,” I said in my best French, which wasn’t good at all. My mentor Jenks had given me a few lessons back in London, but I’d only just learned to read and write English; learning another language was beyond me.
The man held out his hand. “You’ll get no tip from me.”
Faint from hunger, I swayed on my feet and watched while he tore open the envelope and read through Jenks’ note. I already knew what it said. She’d written of how I’d once been a petty thief and an orphan, but that she’d reformed me. She asked that Monsieur Vidocq train me for a month in the new art of “criminal detection.” She’d signed the note “Love, M.”
After he was done, he set the letter down and regarded me. “Mademoiselle Jenks believes that because I myself was once a thief and a convict, that I will have a … soft spot in my heart for you,” he said in good English.
“Yes, sir,” I said, relieved to be back in my native tongue. “She told me about your illustrious career with the police, how you founded the Sûreté, and now—”
“I have no taste for flattery,” he snapped, waving his hand and then sniffing. “But I observe that you were robbed. And slept in a manure pile. And you took those shoes from a trash heap.”
“I was pushed into the manure, monsieur, but everything else is correct! How did you know?”
“Observation. You come from far away yet carry nothing. Your trousers are stained along your thighs and backside from your fall. And those … things on your feet are so old that they are not worth repairing.” He clucked his tongue and sighed. “Mademoiselle Jenks was correct. I do feel a tenderness toward you, Master Dawkins.” He pronounced it Dawkeen. Turning back to his desk, he grabbed a wooden-handled bell and rang it.
Immediately, a door opened across the room. A young woman my age glided in. She was willowy but looked strong like a dancer, and was dressed in close-fitting, simple black clothes. Her long blond hair was pulled back into a braid.
“Monsieur?” she said.
He flicked his fingers at me. “Mathilde, I am … we are taking on this new recruit.”
Mathilde.
My target: a sixteen-year-old Pure who’d gone from starving street thief to private detective—and who was now in mortal danger. “Monsieur Vidocq is not one of us,” Jenks had explained, “so he does not understand that his newest case involves the Bend Sinister. Our worry is that he has made this Pure girl a part of his investigation.”
“Where are her usual Guard?” I’d asked.
“If any of that team joined Mathilde, she would become suspicious and have Monsieur Vidocq cast the person out. No,” she’d said, “it has to be a stranger—you. But be
careful: whatever diabolical business the Bend Sinister is conducting, hundreds of citizens have disappeared. Vidocq’s team was hired to find two of the missing people.”
Mathilde turned to me now, her eyes lit with obvious irritation.
“He will join you and Fabrice on the missing-persons case.”
“Oui, monsieur,” she said, bowing her head, “but he does not know your methods, and he is …” She fluttered her hands, exasperated.
“Nonetheless,” Vidocq said, “you will train him. He will need new shoes, clothes, a bath, and …” He watched me sway in place. “How long has it been since your last meal, Master Dawkeen?”
“Catch me, please,” I whispered, as my vision darkened and I fell toward Mathilde. I was aware just long enough to see her step aside as I slammed into the marble floor.
When I woke, I was on a cot in a dim room. There were three other cots, as well as open chests spilling clothes. A dormitory of some kind.
My head hurt something awful. Beside me, someone laid a cool, wet washcloth on my face, and I turned.
A young man with long brown hair and peach fuzz on his face smiled at me. Fabrice, I guessed.
“Comment vas-tu?” he asked. How are you?
In my pidgin French, I responded that I was well, thanks, and then pointed to my head.
He laughed and said in accented English. “You went down”—he smacked his palms together. “It was very … um, how do you say? Funny.”
“I bet,” I said, sitting up.
Somebody had bathed me and dressed me in black pants and a black shirt; folded over the foot of the cot was a white dress shirt and a coat. Beneath them were a pair of new leather shoes.
“Thank you,” I said.
“It’s nothing,” Fabrice said, handing me a cutting board with meat, bread, and cheese. “Here, you will eat. We work tonight, yes? You must be strong!” He struck his right fist against his chest, clapped my shoulder, and left.
After the sun set, we made our way by streetlight and carriage lamp through the narrow alleys of the city. I’d been outfitted with four knives in secret pockets of my clothes, a stick of chalk, a pad, a pen, and a measuring tape.
I was completely lost within half an hour, which is when Mathilde clucked her tongue and said, “You, Englishman—you observe from here.”