Magic Lantern (Rogue Angel)

by Alex Archer

  * * *

  FIFTEEN MINUTES LATER, Gaetano pulled to a stop at the curb in front of the storage facility. He got out of the car and fished a walking stick from the backseat. He looked a little embarrassed as he carried it.

  “I don’t like walking into a potentially dangerous situation without some kind of weapon.” He used a swipe card to open the storage building’s security door, then led the way inside.

  “I don’t suppose you have a key to Edmund’s unit.” Alert to everything around her, Annja trailed after the big man. She felt into the otherwhere and briefly touched the sword. The weapon was ready to spring into her hand.

  “No. Then again, locks have never been a problem for an escapologist. I’m certain we’ll manage.” Gaetano winked at her and followed the twisting labyrinth without hesitation. Weak yellow bulbs lit the way.

  Annja noted the numbers and tried not to think about what might be happening to Edmund at that moment. Jean-Baptiste Laframboise didn’t sound like a forgiving man—or one who would want to leave a witness behind.

  She heard furtive jostling and a muttered curse ahead.

  Annja caught Gaetano’s elbow and guided him back against the wall. She put a finger to her lips. His face tightened in consternation as his hands worked along the walking stick, but he nodded his understanding.

  Edging forward, Annja peered around the corner. Halfway down the hall, three men snapped a lock with a large pair of bolt cutters. Their casual clothes gave nothing away, but they kept glancing around.

  One of them took out a cell phone and said in French, “Yes, we’re here now. Number three twenty-seven. There are two locks, Mr. Laframboise. We’ll be through them in just a moment.” He nodded to the one with the bolt cutters.

  Annja pulled back around the corner and glanced at Gaetano. “Three twenty-seven?” she whispered.

  Gaetano nodded.

  “Laframboise’s men are breaking into the unit now.”

  He scowled. “Well, that isn’t good.”

  “Can I borrow your walking stick?”

  Gaetano hesitated, then handed it over. “What are you going to do?”

  “Try to keep them from taking Dutilleaux’s lantern. Once they have that, they might not need Edmund anymore.” Annja focused on what she was about to do, not what might happen. She took a deep breath, kept a loose grip on the walking stick and spun around the corner. Calmly, almost nonchalantly, she walked toward the three thieves breaking into Edmund Beswick’s storage unit.

  10

  Annja walked as if she’d been inside the storage facility several times. She acted a little wary, as any woman would bearing down on three strangers in a close hallway. She didn’t meet their gazes, but she could feel them on her, and she nodded politely. She kept the walking stick tucked behind her right leg. Despite her efforts at hiding her weapon, she knew the subterfuge wouldn’t last.

  The ringleader caught sight of the walking stick, doing a double take. “Look out!” He slid a hand inside his jacket.

  Reacting swiftly as the two other men started to stand, Annja brought the walking stick up. The ringleader expected her to swing at his head, so she feinted the swing. When he raised his left arm to block, she took a quick step forward, whipped the stick around in her hands and jabbed him in the stomach with it.

  The air gusted out of the man and his face turned pale. He had a small pistol in his hand now, but he lacked the strength to raise the weapon.

  Annja snap-kicked the pistol from the man’s hand and sent the gun spinning down the hallway with a rasp of metal. Then she whipped the stick around again and delivered a line drive to his temple. The man sank bonelessly.

  Instantly, the man with the bolt cutters lunged forward and snapped the razor-sharp edges at Annja’s face like a maniacal bird beak. She managed to elude the attempt, but only just. When the bolt cutters closed, a lock of her hair fell away. He immediately thrust again and she gave way before him, measuring his stride and getting his rhythm.

  “Get the lantern, François! The lock is open!” The bolt cutter operator snapped at Annja again and again.

  She kept giving ground, not wanting to do battle over the body of the unconscious man. When the man lashed out once more, she jammed the walking stick into the jaws of the bolt cutters, then twisted hard.

  Yelping in pain, the man lost his grip. Annja flung the tool away. The man immediately drew a locking knife from his pants and took up an experienced stance with the blade reversed and laid along his arm.

  “That’s right, girl. Come on. I’ll take your head off.” He spoke in heavily accented French to himself, obviously not knowing or even thinking she could speak French fluently.

  Annja dropped into a crouch and swung the walking stick only inches off the ground. The hardwood shaft contacted explosively against the man’s ankle. In the next instant, the numbed foot gave way under him. She blocked a feeble thrust of the knife with the stick as she stood, then kicked the man in the crotch.

  He screamed high and thin, like a dying horse, and fell over. The knife tumbled from his hands as he reached for his ankle and his crotch.

  Annja stepped past him and saw that François had opened the storage unit door and gone inside. She stepped through the door and was amazed to see all the boxes and crates piled inside.

  A small stainless-steel table, like something salvaged from a hospital, stood against the wall on the right. Several objects sat on it, and chief among them was a lantern.

  The device looked like a dragon rearing on its hind legs. Crafted out of brass, the dragon held a round glass lens in its mouth. Heavy coats of lacquer covered the dark wood at the lantern’s base, but it was scraped and scarred from rough handling and hard years.

  For a moment, Annja just stared at the piece and wondered about all the stories it held. How many people had stared enraptured at the ghostly images Anton Dutilleaux had projected for them in the Parisian tunnels? Where had the stories come from? Were they ones Dutilleaux made up? Or were they ones he’d borrowed from the places he’d traveled?

  Then the present rushed at her again as François grabbed the lantern and wheeled around. He wasn’t any bigger than Annja and he had his hands full. The only problem was making sure the lantern wasn’t harmed.

  Slowly, Annja spread her arms out to her sides, the walking stick still in her right hand. She spoke in French in a calm voice. “François, I don’t want to hurt you.”

  He sneered and produced a knife. “You will not hurt me.”

  Annja smiled. She let go of the walking stick.

  François got the wrong idea. He started forward with the knife held out before him. “Now go away before I carve the face off you.”

  Reaching into the otherwhere, Annja drew the sword into the room. The dulled lighting ran along the razor-sharp edges. “Mine’s bigger. And I promise, I will hurt you if I have to.”

  “Where did you get that?” François backed up.

  “Where is Edmund Beswick?”

  The Frenchman looked uncomfortable. Nervously, he glanced past Annja toward the door.

  “Your friends aren’t coming. I made certain of that. Tell me about Edmund Beswick. I’m not going to ask again.”

  “Laframboise has him.”

  “Jean-Baptiste Laframboise?”

  François nodded angrily.

  “Where?”

  “In a warehouse on the Isle of Dogs. I don’t know the address. This city is new to me.”

  “Is he all right?”

  “Yes. Laframboise gave us instructions that the professor was not to be harmed until we had the secret of the lantern.”

  Her relief was short-lived when Gaetano called hoarsely from outside, “Annja!”

  Moving back cautiously, keeping the sword between her and François, Annja peered out into the hallway. Down at the corner, Gaetano pointed at the other end of the corridor.

  Three Asians in jeans and a whole lot of leather approached the locker.

  Annja ducked ba
ck inside. There was no way those men happened to be here by accident. She looked at the Frenchman. “Who are the Asian guys?”

  “Chinamen.” François spat, but he looked afraid. He clutched the lantern close to his chest. “They work for a man named Puyi-Jin.”

  “Who’s he?”

  “A Triad boss. He hired Laframboise to find the lantern.”

  “If your boss is supposed to get the lantern for him, why is Puyi-Jin sending people after me?”

  “Once my boss figured out where the lantern was, he tried to cut a new deal with Puyi-Jin.” François grimaced. “They haven’t reached an accord.”

  “So whoever has the lantern gets to negotiate the new deal.”

  “You see how it is.”

  “Great. Your boss gets greedy and I’ve got Chinese gangsters after me.”

  François shrugged. “Puyi-Jin must have figured Edmund Beswick told you about the lantern.”

  “No.” Not yet. Annja drew in a deep breath and took a fresh hold on the sword. “Do you know why everyone is after the lantern?”

  “No.”

  “You realize it’s supposed to be cursed?”

  François didn’t look happy all of a sudden. “Laframboise didn’t mention that.”

  “Yeah. Well, it is. And guess what? Now we’ve got the Triad out in the hallway. You’d think the curse is working.”

  “We can give them the lantern,” François said hopefully.

  “Do you really think they’ll just let us go?”

  “Probably not.”

  Annja didn’t think so, either, and she wasn’t going to lose the opportunity to get Edmund away from Laframboise. She glanced around the shelves, looking for anything she could use. The possibility of getting out of the storage facility unscathed was dim.

  Edmund had a storage chest against one wall that had paraphernalia from his magic act. She looked through the contents, searching desperately for an advantage.

  “Annja!” Gaetano sounded positively panicked.

  She heard footsteps and quiet voices speaking Chinese.

  Spotting a box marked Flash Paper, Annja grabbed a handful of sheets and a lighter. The next shelf yielded a gallon jug of cleaning solvent that smelled properly combustible. She took the jug, added it to her collection and hurried back to the door.

  “Annja Creed.” That wasn’t Gaetano.

  She opened the gallon of solvent and poured it at the edge of the door. She’d already seen the fire extinguisher out in the hallway. She hoped it would be enough to take care of the fire. Or that the fire department would get there in time to save everything.

  “Come out.” The speaker sounded young and irritated. “Otherwise, we’re coming in to get you.”

  Once the gallon jug was empty, Annja placed it behind her. The sword had vanished the moment she’d let go of the hilt, but the weapon was still there waiting for her.

  “What are you doing?” François shifted nervously farther back in the storage unit.

  “Trying to save us. Get ready to run.” Annja watched as shadows fell across the doorway. She held the lighter and the flash paper ready.

  A moment later, a young Asian man rounded the corner and came into view of the doorway. Metal studs glinted on his face, and tattoos snaked up from his neck to his chin. He held a pistol before him. Satisfied Annja wasn’t holding a weapon, he grinned. “I have her.”

  Shielding her movements in her hands, Annja lit the flash papers. There was an instant flare of bright light and heat. She threw them at her attacker.

  The flaming sheets sailed into the young Triad member’s face and dropped to the floor. The solvent started to burn at once and the harsh chemical smell grew even stronger.

  The gunman’s feet caught on fire from the burning solvent that had coated them in the doorway. He screamed and backed away, but his finger was on the trigger and he fired three times in quick succession as Annja pursued, jumping over the solvent trap. Safely inside his gun arm so the bullets couldn’t hit her, she punched him in the throat and ripped the pistol away from him.

  As the man staggered backward, flames wrapping his feet, Annja moved out into the hallway and used the man for cover. The two other men with guns weren’t standing in the growing pool of fire.

  Annja shoved the staggering man into the others and tossed the captured pistol away. She wasn’t going to kill anyone if she could help it. She was already in enough hot water with Westcox and the Metro police. But she wasn’t going to let her or Gaetano be killed, either. With her right hand now free, she reached for the sword and pulled it into the hallway with her.

  The element of surprise was only going to last a moment. She stayed low as she stepped over the gangster on fire. The man was too distracted by kicking his shoes off to be a threat at the moment.

  The pool of solvent that had collected in a depression worn into the hallway ignited in a rush that sent flames spiraling three feet high, much higher than Annja had anticipated. She threw her left arm across her face as she charged through them, keeping the flames from her face and eyes and hair.

  On the other side, the two remaining Triad members took hasty steps back from the fire and their fallen comrade. They lifted their pistols and fired, and the crescendo of sudden thunder pealed through the hallway. At the same time, the fire alarm stuttered to life.

  One bullet plucked at Annja’s jacket sleeve. The other five or seven—she lost count—screamed off the walls.

  She swung the sword and caught the weapon of the man on the left in midrecoil. The slide snapped off the pistol, flying through the air and leaving the weapon useless. She set her left leg, pivoted and drove her right into the man’s face.

  The second man whirled on her and fired again. Annja dropped into a crouch and the bullets cut the air over her head before thudding into the wall behind her. She stepped forward and drove the sword into the man’s shoulder just deeply enough to cause him to drop the pistol. Blood streamed from the wound but she knew it wasn’t life-threatening.

  The man stumbled back and clasped his good hand over his injured arm. Annja kept moving forward and kicked him in the crotch. When he bent over, she brought a knee up into his face and left him sprawled on the floor.

  The man whose shoes she’d set on fire had scrambled out of them and was batting at sparks on his pant legs. He caught her looking at him and quickly backed away.

  The fire in the hallway licked at the walls, seeking fresh footholds in the building. Annja let go of the sword and sprinted a few steps down the hall to grab the fire extinguisher from the wall.

  As she returned, the man she’d kicked in the face was scrambling for his weapon. She swung the fire extinguisher against his head and he dropped like a rock.

  Aiming the fire extinguisher at the base of the flames, Annja yanked the safety pin and squeezed the release handle. A cloud of white chemicals boiled from the nozzle and spewed over the fire. When it finally cycled dry, the flames were out and only scorch marks remained.

  Annja ran back to Gaetano and found him nursing a large bump on his forehead. His eyes looked glassy. “I’m afraid we’ve lost Edmund’s magic lantern. I tried to stop the Frenchman, but he got away. I wasn’t strong enough to overpower him.”

  “That’s all right. We’ve got a lead on where Laframboise is keeping Edmund. That’s more than what we had when we came here.” Annja pulled Gaetano into motion and herded him toward the door as the fire alarm continued to shrill.

  Thankfully, none of the combatants she’d left behind were in any shape to pursue.

  11

  The sign on the door was professional and understated. Bronze letters barely stood out against the simulated wood. Fiona Pioche, Private Inquiries.

  When Annja knocked, the solid sound told her the wood was merely a veneer over a security door. Fiona Pioche’s offices were in the upscale Mayfair district of London. She had a downstairs corner office, which would be even more expensive. Annja decided that whoever Fiona Pioche was, she must b
e doing quite nicely for herself.

  And she wondered how Roux knew the woman. Of course, Roux and Garin knew all sorts of people, from refined gentry to cold-blooded killers. Unfortunately, both Roux and Garin seemed more at home with the latter. And that made Ms. Pioche even more interesting.

  Gaetano stood unsteadily at Annja’s side. He blinked repeatedly, trying to bring his vision into focus. Seeing her concern, he patted her on the shoulder, missing the first time before correcting his aim.

  “I’m perfectly fine. Don’t worry about me.”

  “I wish you’d let me take you to see a doctor. You could have a concussion.”

  “It won’t be the first concussion I’ve had. We need to find Edmund.”

  “If you’re not feeling any better when we finish up here, you’re going to see a doctor.”

  “I fear the chief inspector will have you locked up and possibly deported if he gets his hands on you.”

  Annja worried about that, too.

  The door opened and a young man about Annja’s age stood there in an expensive suit. His black hair was neatly cropped and he wore a tailored Savile Row suit that emphasized his lean athleticism. “Ah, Ms. Creed, we’d been wondering when you would show up.”

  He opened the door wider to reveal a large and expensive office filled with modern furniture.

  “My name is Oliver Wemyss. You may call me Ollie, if you like.” He waved Annja and Gaetano to plush seats in front of the desk. “Would you care for a refreshment?” He crossed the room to a service bar. “We have tea and coffee, and a large selection of juices, liquors, beers, wines and soft drinks.”

  Annja shook her head. “No, thank you.”

  Gaetano declined, as well.

  “Come, Mr. Carlini, you simply must have a spot of tea. I have some analgesics for that headache you’re obviously sporting, and you need something to wash them down.”

  “You’re right. And thank you. Tea with milk, please.”

  Ollie poured and brought a steaming cup and saucer over to Gaetano, who managed to take it in shaking hands.