Stryker turned to the tackle box again, ferreted inside, and withdrew a pair of tweezers. He set the tweezers on the desk, opened a dresser drawer under the workbench, and pulled out a candle.
He turned and looked searchingly at the shelves. “Now, where did I put that?”
The man strolled the room’s perimeter, reaching here and there, shoving aside jars, cans, boxes, bags, kits, tools, and other items that had been sitting on the shelves untouched for years.
Stryker scratched his head and fondled his mustache. He glanced across the room and said, “There you are.”
He strode directly towards Ned and Hannah.
“Quick,” Ned said, “behind the clock!”
The two coins dashed for an old, two-belled alarm clock. The clock’s battery had tired months earlier, and now it only told the correct time twice a day, 4:06. They tucked themselves behind the clock moments before the man reached for the brass candlestick they had been hiding beside.
Seizing the candlestick, Stryker took a step, paused, and returned to the shelf. He smirked and grabbed up the Hills Bros. coffee can. He gave it a shake, and together with the candleholder returned to the workbench.
The man inserted the candle into the holder, swiped a Diamond strike-anywhere match across the bench top, and lit the candle. Tweezers in hand, he reached them towards Quimby Quarter, changed his mind, and picked up Porter Penny.
Stryker held the penny up and looked at him through his magnifying glass. “No need mussing up your friend’s shiny coat just yet,” he said.
Porter swallowed hard and stared straight ahead. Never in his wildest imagination did the penny think he’d ever find himself in such a macabre situation.
Stryker lowered the magnifying glass towards the quarter. To Quimby, the man’s big, dark eye and heavy, wiry-haired lashes looked like a monstrous caterpillar.
“You can end this charade now and save your little friend,” the man said.
The quarter appeared to remain unmoved, though a more powerful lens might have detected Quimby’s twitching eye and the small tear that had formed in its corner.
“I have all day,” Stryker snickered, and out of habit glanced at the frozen clock.
Ned and Hannah dropped flat and out of view.
Stryker made a mental note to replace the clock’s battery, and then he returned to the job at hand. He hovered the penny over the candle’s flame and began to roast him like a marshmallow.
“Ned, we have to stop the fiend!”
“Of course I want to, but there’s no way out of here. He closed the latch, and the dungeon hasn’t a single window. It would only be a matter of time before he caught us.”
Stryker squinted at the penny. Thinking he recognized a minuscule change in the coin’s expression, he lowered Porter towards the burning wick.
Porter Penny grit his teeth and winced as the collector passed him back and forth through the flame. Noting that the flame’s smoke had begun to cloud his magnifying glass, the man put down the lens. He set the penny on the workbench, replaced his stethoscope, and listened.
He thought he heard a faint whimpering sound, but he couldn’t be sure. Was it just his imagination?
Stryker reached for the Hills Bros. coffee can. He rattled the tin and addressed the two coins.
“Know what’s in here?” he asked impishly.
Quimby and Porter exchanged terrified glances.
Porter, who was still smoldering from his torching, moaned and said, “Quimby, I don’t know how much more I can take.”
“Ned,” Hannah said, “the man is a sadistic brute. I can’t bare to watch anymore!”
“Then don’t.”
But she did watch, and what she saw the man draw from the can dropped her jaw like a roll of quarters.
The man jangled a bracelet over Porter and Quimby, making sure they got a good look. A piece of green twine ran through a perfectly drilled hole in the center of dozens of coins—pennies, nickels, dimes, and quarters.
Stryker sneered and gave the threaded band of coins another clanking jingle. “These fellas also refused to cooperate,” he said.
Without further explanation, Stryker picked up Quimby Quarter and walked with him to a vise attached to the end of the workbench. He placed the quarter vertically between the vise’s jaws and clamped him in tight. Next, he reached towards the pegboard and unhooked an electric hand drill. He inserted a drill bit and plugged the drill’s cord into a nearby wall socket.
Stryker bent over, and placing the drill bit’s tip before Quimby’s nose, he gave the drill’s trigger two high-pitched, whizzing blasts.
George Washington’s eye widened in terror, but without his magnifying glass the man couldn’t make out the quarter’s horrified expression. Stryker retrieved the glass, picked up the drill, and squeezed the trigger again, this time peering closely for a reaction.
Quimby, mustering what courage he had left, stared ahead with stoic resignation.
From across the table, Porter Penny shouted, “Quimby, it’s not worth it! Give him what he wants!”
Quimby did not reply. Rather than surrender the secret of Coinworld to the Mengelian madman, he chanted under his breath an ancient psalm he had learned from a wise Indian nickel many years earlier when trapped together in a broken cigarette vending machine:
“The Lord is my Minter; I do not want for a cent.
He maketh me to lie down in silk purses: he leadeth me beside the still fountains.
He restoreth my value: He leadeth me in the paths of currency for His Name’s sake.
Yea, though I pass through the hands of shadowy thieves, I will fear no greed or counterfeiter: for Thou art with me; Thy motto and Thy stamp they comfort me.
Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of hoarders and collectors: thou embossed my obverse with Liberty, my reverse with E Pluribus Unum.
Surely, generosity and charity shall follow me all the exchanges of my life, and I will dwell in the Mint of the Lord forever.”
Hannah turned to Ned, horror-stricken.
“That may be the bravest quarter I’ve ever seen,” Ned said. “A coin of his character deserves better.”
“What are you thinking, Four?”
“I’m not thinking; that’s the problem.”
Hannah noticed that Ned had closed his eye and was winding up his inner wampum. Was he going to spring from the shelf and try to rescue the quarter? She had no idea, but her protestations fell on a deaf ear. Hannah prepared herself, ready to leap after him and obtain flight.
“Dad?” came a call from the top of the stairs. “Dad, are you down there?”
Monroe Stryker released the trigger. “Yes, Adam. I’m here.”
The hatch to the bomb shelter clanged open and moments later eight-year-old Adam Stryker appeared at the bottom of the stairs.
“What are you doing, Dad?”
“Come here and I’ll show you.”
7
old blue eyes
Adam Stryker hustled over to his father. The boy, whose freckled nose stood level with the vise, stared at the trapped quarter with his inquisitive, powder-blue eyes.
“Where’s your mother?” the boy’s father asked.
“She should be home soon,” Adam answered. “I think she’s at the beauty parlor.”
Mr. Stryker patted his son’s back. “Thanks for the heads-up, pal.”
Adam smiled knowingly up at his father. “Yeah, she’ll like that you noticed this time.” He turned his attention back to the quarter. “Is there something wrong with this coin, Dad? Is it bent or something?”
“Nothing like that, no. It’s a healthy, shiny quarter.”
“Is it special somehow?”
“There’s something special about all coins, son. Just like people. All coins are unique. Like you.”
“A quarter can buy a lot of candy.”
“Something more special than that,” his father said.
Adam put finger to chin and thought what else a quarter might bu
y. “Baseball cards?”
“What if I told you that coins can talk and walk, and even fly?”
“Aw, Dad, you’re just joshing me.”
“I’ve seen it with my own eyes.”
“You have?”
“More than once. Scouts honor.”
“All coins can do that stuff?”
“Not all coins, but certain coins, yeah.”
“Is this one of those?”
“I’m afraid not. I don’t think it learned how to move yet.”
“Coins learn? That’s funny, Dad.”
“Coins are very intelligent.”
“How come I never heard about such a thing at school? We had a class about coins and counting money, but the teacher never said anything about them being smart, or even alive.”
“That’s because it’s a secret.”
“Does my teacher know?”
“Nobody knows except you and I. And you mustn’t tell anyone, do you understand?”
“Not even Billy Hornsby?”
“Especially Billy Hornsby.”
“But he’s my best friend.”
“Sure he is, and he’s a good kid like you, Adam, but his father is a policeman, and policemen are very suspicious people.”
“Is that a bad thing? I like Mr. Hornsby.”
“Not bad. It’s his job to ask questions. He’s a nice man, but a secret is a secret, and we don’t want anyone asking questions.”
“But why, Dad?”
“Because one day what we know will be worth a lot of money.”
Adam’s eyes widened. “Like a hundred dollars?”
His father smiled and rubbed Adam’s head. “A lot more than that, son.”
“A thousand?”
“Maybe a million, or even more.”
“Wowee,” Adam said. Visions of a new bicycle, a chemistry set, a baseball glove, and all things boyhood paraded through his mind.
He spotted the coin bracelet and walked over to retrieve it. Beside the chain he saw a lone penny. Adam grabbed both and returned to his father.
“Is this bracelet for mom?” He slipped his hand through the center of the chain.
“I don’t think mom would find it very attractive.”
“And she doesn’t know about Coinworld either?”
“Coinworld,” Monroe Stryker repeated approvingly. “That’s right, Adam. Just you and I know about Coinworld.”
“Because you want to surprise her when we’re rich?”
“Exactly.”
“Or because you’re afraid she might gab to her friends?”
Monroe Stryker smiled. “No wonder you’re the smartest eight-year-old at your school,” Mr. Stryker said.
“Nine next month,” Adam reminded him.
“January sixth, Adam. I won’t forget.”
Adam beamed. “And don’t worry, Dad. Our secret is safe with me.”
“Attaboy.”
Adam removed the bracelet and weighed it in his hand. “So, if it’s not for mom, who’s it for?”
“No one. I just like to keep the coins together like this.”
“But couldn’t you have just kept them in a little piggy bank or something? Why’d you drill a hole in them?”
“You might say they are part of an ongoing experiment.”
Adam nodded, not really understanding. “So, um, these coins aren’t alive anymore?”
Sensing his son’s apprehension, Mr. Stryker answered, “Coins aren’t people, Adam. And they’re not like pets either. They don’t have feelings. They’re more like—”
“Bugs?”
“Smarter than bugs, but to tell you the truth, I’m not sure how to classify them yet. That’s why I study them.”
“And that’s why you have all those books and magazines about coins upstairs?”
“That’s right, son.”
“Where do coins come from, Dad?”
“The government makes them.”
“Does the president grow them on a farm or something?”
Mr. Stryker smiled. “It’s called minting.”
“Is that like mining?”
“There is mining involved. That’s how it all starts. If you want, after dinner we can look through some of my books and I’ll show you pictures of how it’s done.”
“So that means I can help you?”
“Sure, but remember, no telling anyone. Not Billy, not your teachers, and not even your mother. It’s our little secret.” He put out his hand. “Deal?”
The boy smiled and shook. “Deal!”
Adam studied Porter Penny, turning the coin over between his fingers. “I don’t think Billy would believe me anyway,” he said. “He’d probably say I’m bananas and tell me to prove it.”
“Well, it is difficult to believe, so we couldn’t blame him for that. But that’s okay. Once upon a time people believed that the Earth was as flat as a coin too. Now those people are the ones called bananas.”
“Will we be able to prove that coins are alive, Dad? Like they did with the world being round and all? Is that what your experiments are about?”
“That’s part of it, yeah. But what I’m most interested in is a particular coin.”
“But you said all coins are special. Why just one?”
“Extra special.”
Adam glanced at the penny, and then at the trapped quarter. “Is it one of these guys?”
“Not them. A nickel. A four-cent nickel.”
Adam scrunched his brow. “But everyone knows a nickel is five cents. A nickel isn’t a nickel if it’s only worth four cents.”
“Mathematically, you’re correct. But some things are valued differently. All paintings are just paint and a canvas, right?”
“I guess so.”
“But some you can buy for ten dollars, and others cost thousands.”
“Because one is prettier?”
“Not necessarily. It could be for many reasons. The painting’s age, its particular history, the painter who painted it, and so on. In the marketplace, the value of something is determined by whatever a person is willing to pay for it.”
Adam held up the penny. “But it says here, one cent, and nobody would give me five cents for it. Not even Stupid Stuart at school is that stupid. Well, maybe he is, but…”
“But if the back of that penny said two cents, Stuart would be the genius, and he would laugh all the way to the bank.”
“Because the coin is freaky?”
“Rare is the better word. A mistake can make something very valuable.”
“Not on a math test,” Adam insisted.
“No, but on a coin it can.” He smiled. “I’m sure even your math teacher would give you a dollar for it.”
“This four-cent nickel, how do you know it’s for real?”
“Because I’ve seen it,” his father answered. He looked into the palm of his hand. “Twice I even held it. The pipsqueak bit me.”
“He did?” Adam said with amazement. He squinted at the penny, wondering if it might bite him too. “Did it hurt?”
His father absently rubbed his thumb at the spot. “As much as a pin prick would,” he answered.
“But why? Are some coins bad?”
“I think he was scared and was only protecting himself. Just like a bee might sting you if it felt threatened, or snake might bite, or a mule might kick.”
“So he got away?”
“Like I said, coins are very clever, especially that four-cent nickel and his friends.”
“Wow…” Adam said, drawing out the word with his ignited imagination. “Did you talk to the nickel, Dad?”
“I did, but our ears aren’t good enough to hear them.”
Adam pointed at the stethoscope. “Not even with that?”
“Maybe with that,” Mr. Stryker answered, “but so far I haven’t heard much. I think they want to keep Coinworld a secret even more than we do.”
Adam glanced at the burning candle, then at the drill, and then at the coin bracelet still in
his hand.
Monroe Stryker watched with interest the moral dilemma he saw developing in his son’s perspicacious blue eyes, but he said nothing.
Adam glanced at Porter Penny, and then at the quarter stuck between the vise’s claws. “You said the nickel and his friends. Coins have friends?”
Mr. Stryker put a reassuring hand on Adam’s shoulder. “I meant in the way that ants or wasps or potato bugs are friends. Not like you and Billy are friends.”
“How do you know if you can’t hear them?” Adam asked innocently. “When we’re not looking, maybe they are playing or singing, or, I don’t know, maybe even kissing. I mean, if they can walk and talk and stuff…”
“Well,” his father said, thinking fast, “how about we make it your job to find out?”
“How would I do that?”
Mr. Stryker gave the vise’s handle a turn and removed the quarter. “I found these two together,” he said. “Why don’t you keep them in your room. And take the stethoscope. Let me know if you hear or see anything, okay?”
Adam put out his hand with the penny. A smile of relief floated across his mouth.
Mr. Stryker put the quarter into Adam’s hand and rolled the boy’s fingers closed around them. “Take good care of them, and remember, don’t tell anyone, okay?”
Adam nodded, and then reopened his hand. “Hello, guys,” he chirped. He looked up at his father. “What do I call them?”
“Well, who’s that on the penny?”
“Abraham Lincoln.”
“And the quarter?”
“George Washington. But they can’t all have the same name or it would be very confusing, wouldn’t it?”
Mr. Stryker chuckled. “Actually, I never thought about it.”
The boy pursed his lips in thought, and then put the coins to his ear. His bright eyes widened in surprise. He lowered the coins, and turning to his father, Adam announced, “Porter Penny and Quimby Quarter!”
Mr. Stryker cocked his head. His lips parted, dumb and unsure.
Adam broke into giggles. “Just joshing you, Dad!”
Mr. Stryker squatted, and laughing along with his son, he gave him a playful, rough-housing hug. “A real smarty-pants, aren’t you?”
The Amazing Adventures of 4¢ Ned (Coinworld: Book Three) Page 6