They’ll come for me before the night is out, he told himself, and tried hard to believe it.
The constable banged on the door with the side of his fist. ‘Some company for Her Ladyship.’
He unlocked the door and slid aside the bolts top and bottom. Leander glimpsed Pinchbeck’s wizened features as a shaft of light fell upon her from the constable’s lamp. She sat on a wooden stool with her cloak wrapped round her, a cup of water and a bowl of soup at her feet. The ceiling was so low, the feather in her hat brushed against it.
‘Let me out at once. Don’t you see I’m a lady of stature?’
‘We gave thee a candle. More than most folk get.’
The constable shoved Leander down three stone steps and the door slammed behind him.
Leander squashed himself into the corner furthest from Pinchbeck, but the cellar was so small he could have easily reached out and touched her. He pulled the thin blanket tightly round his shoulders, trying to stretch it over as much of his body as possible. A drop of water fell from his hair and dripped off the end of his nose.
‘Good evening, Leander,’ said the familiar voice. ‘I was wondering when you’d come.’
*
Leander was captured, Charlotte missing, Pinchbeck arrested.
For the first time in forever, Felix was alone.
He emerged from the violin case and secured it over his shoulder. The key clasped tightly in his hand, he peered through the carriage window to see if his path was clear. From a safe distance he saw Leander shoved through the door into the constable’s house and, a few short minutes later, stuffed into the same dark cell as Pinchbeck. Poor wretch.
Why didn’t Leander go into his locket? The one good thing Pinchbeck had given them was a perfect hiding place, the ability to vanish into their Cabinets. Why didn’t he use it?
His mind wandered to Isaak’s wooden box rolling across the constable’s office. Pinchbeck had cheated him – all these years she’d let him search for his brother, and she’d had him all along. Sorrow and disbelief and anger clanged together in his head: a cacophony of misery. A fire had been lit inside him, and the last scraps of loyalty to Pinchbeck were burned away.
All this time, a small part of him had hoped he could free Charlotte and Leander, and somehow stay with Pinchbeck. But not any more. All those years, every time he thought she was helping him, showing him kindness, caring for him, it had been nothing but lies. She was controlling him. She had the thing he wanted most in the whole world, and she’d kept it from him. Any bond he once felt for her was severed for ever.
But there was no time to brood. If Felix wanted to free himself and the others, he had to act.
Maybe Charlotte would know what to do next. At least he had the key. Beyond that, he couldn’t guess what would happen.
Charlotte spilled out of the lantern. She took a deep, gasping breath, air rushing into her lungs. Disorientated, she flailed around for something solid to lean against and the hard, rough stone wall pressed back against her. She was real again.
Being solid was sweeter than honey on a summer’s morning.
And there was Felix behind her, holding the lantern. She flung herself against him, her arms tight round his thin, wet body, and she breathed in his scent of rosin and rainwater.
‘Is Pinchbeck here?’ She glanced around, body tense, waiting for the monster to lumber out of the darkness.
‘No. You’re safe,’ said Felix.
She hugged him again. ‘How long was I—’
‘A day. Just a day.’
Only one day? It seemed much longer. She had spent full days in the lantern before, but this time she was exhausted. The fear of being trapped for ever had shaken her to the bones.
But there was no time to wallow in self-pity; she must pull herself together. ‘Where’s Leander? Did Pinchbeck hurt him?’
‘No,’ said Felix. There was anguish in his eyes. ‘The constable caught him.’
‘Constable? I don’t understand.’
‘It’s . . . I don’t know where to start and we don’t have much time. We need to work fast.’
‘I’m so weak. Was it really only one day?’
‘We’re a long way from Pinchbeck. Almost as far as we can go. You’ll feel stronger when we get closer. And look.’
Charlotte crouched beside him and peered into the darkened hole. There was a rusted iron safe, wide open, and ragged bundles of decaying herbs. Felix kneeled in the mud and reached his entire arm into the hole.
‘She had this surrounded with charms and sealed up with clay. This is how she stops the Cabinets from using up her energy.’
‘Where is Pinchbeck?’
‘In a cell. A cellar really. Your uncle must have found the note because the magistrate was looking for you. She’s . . . Oh.’
With a final tug, Felix pulled out a coarse drawstring bag. He carried it to where a gas street lamp cast a circle of milky light and Charlotte followed, clutching Felix’s shoulder as he loosened the strings. She already knew what he would find.
Cabinets. A whole bag of them. Twelve or fifteen at first glance, an assortment of ordinary objects only they would have recognized as magical. A silk purse. A snuffbox. A medicine bottle. And something else, which made her heart tighten. The bottom of the bag was filled with shards of glass and pottery. Broken Cabinets.
How many people had Pinchbeck condemned to death this way? She pictured the woman gleefully tossing these treasures into a sack and stuffing it into the box, not noticing or caring whether the fragile pieces shattered against the hard metal.
Charlotte covered her eyes with her apron, as though it could shield her from the unfolding horror. ‘Open them.’
‘Not yet,’ said Felix. ‘We don’t know who they are, or what state they’ll be in. They could be dangerous.’
Charlotte knew he was right. They should take the sack, and look after it until it was safe to open the Cabinets. But first they had to rescue Leander. They needed to get back to him as fast as possible. She was relieved to be out of her Cabinet, but nothing would feel right until the three of them were back together. ‘Why did—’
The crunch of boots on gravel interrupted her. Felix clutched the bag to his chest as they turned to see who was approaching. Night was falling and, beyond the town gates, the world was in darkness. They could barely make out the shape of a man on the road, but his feet made an uneven stomp-scrape as he limped along. Charlotte and Felix stood side by side as the figure emerged into the lamplight.
Edmund Pellar.
He trudged towards them, looking as wild and weird as he had in the graveyard, coated with a fresh layer of mud and grime. He wheezed as though the effort of travelling such a distance had taken every bit of his strength.
‘Where is she?’ he hissed.
‘Not here,’ Charlotte snapped. How did he find them? If she had strayed so far from Pinchbeck, she would never have found her way back. She hadn’t counted on his fortitude. ‘How did you— How are you still solid?’
‘I’m gettin’ closer, I can tell. Gettin’ stronger with each step. That’s how I knew I was headin’ in the right direction.’ He paused to hack and splutter into a grubby handkerchief. His eye caught the open hole in the wall. ‘Found one of her little cubbyholes, have you? I shouldn’t trouble yerselves. It’ll all be over soon.’
‘You shan’t find her.’ Felix spoke with venom, but inched nearer to Charlotte’s side.
‘Come this far, en’t I?’
‘Help us,’ Charlotte pleaded. ‘You and us, together . . .’
Pellar laughed.
Charlotte and Felix could outrun this twisted, broken man, and he’d have no chance of keeping up. But that wouldn’t stop him. He had tracked Pinchbeck here, despite his cough and his limp, despite being weakened by time and distance. Pellar could be their ally, but his burning need for revenge would destroy them all.
‘There’s no use protectin’ her. Tell me where she is and we can get this over with. It’s fo
r yer own good.’
Felix inched backwards. ‘She’s locked away where you can’t reach her.’
Pellar stooped until his eyes were level with theirs. He twitched as if he was trying to smile, but had forgotten how.
‘Holed herself up, eh? No matter. Fire will clear a building me, I shall burn her out. Like vermin.’
Felix lunged at Pellar. He snatched something from the man’s chest with a mighty tug and Pellar staggered forward, almost butting heads with Charlotte. Felix was off and away, still clutching the bag of Cabinets to his chest. She ran after him, gripping her lantern.
Pellar gave a cry of pain, which quickly faded into a long, maniacal laugh. He didn’t chase them, but shouted, ‘Keep it, lad! I’ll still find her. I can smell her.’
Charlotte and Felix dashed away, fighting the weakness in their limbs. They threw themselves down the first alleyway and zigzagged from street to street, over cobbles and dirt, until they were long out of sight of Pellar.
Felix came to a sudden halt. ‘Leander,’ he said between pants.
‘What about him?’
Felix was clearly drained from his day’s adventures, pale, winded and shivering. He struggled to regain his breath.
‘Leander is with Pinchbeck. They’re locked together in the same cell. We have to reach them before Pellar does.’
More than anything else, Felix’s panic scared Charlotte. He was right: if Leander and Pinchbeck were trapped together, and Pellar followed through with his threat, they’d both be burned alive.
Felix bent double and put his hands on his knees. ‘Leander figured out where the key was to free you. We were getting it out of the carriage when the constable’s men caught him.’
Emotions swept over Charlotte and she leaned against a wall lest they wash her away. Leander had been arrested trying to save her. He had tried to help her even though she’d been so cruel to him. How she wished she could go back to that first night and speak some words of kindness to him.
‘Why didn’t he go into his locket?’ she asked.
‘I think . . .’ Felix pressed his hand to his brow.
‘What? What’s wrong?’
‘He might have lost it.’
Charlotte didn’t know what would happen if a Cabinet was lost. Leander’s locket contained a piece of his soul. If it was gone . . .
Felix uncurled his fingers. ‘This is what I took from Pellar.’ He was holding a hagstone on a piece of broken string. ‘I think he was using it to track Pinchbeck.’
‘That should slow him down.’
Felix pulled out his own hagstone and held them both in his open palm. ‘I’ve never seen anything through mine.’ He lifted Pellar’s stone to his eye and gasped.
‘What is it?’
‘Look!’ He thrust it into her hand. ‘Look at me.’
The houses and fences were unchanged, but Felix looked different. There was an odd shimmer around him, a milky, misty sheen in the air like the spray from a waterfall. Charlotte moved the stone away and the shimmer was gone.
She picked up his other stone, and looked through that. Nothing.
She compared them side by side. Pellar’s was smoother. The rock was thinner around the hole. Felix’s stone was crude and chunky. The hole was rough on the inside.
‘This is the one Pinchbeck gave you, isn’t it?’
‘Yes.’
‘She lied, Felix. Water didn’t make this hole. It’s not a real hagstone at all.’
Felix took it in his hand and squeezed. ‘Of course she lied. It’s always been lies!’ He threw the stone and it clattered on to a rooftop somewhere out of sight.
Charlotte felt her friend’s pain, hard and sharp and brutal. But there was no time to mope – she needed to keep Felix focused. Keep him fighting.
‘We have to help Leander,’ she said gently.
‘If we rescue Leander, Pinchbeck will be free as well.’
‘And, if Pellar reaches them first, he’ll kill them both. Kill us all.’ The words tasted like curdled milk. Free Pinchbeck when she was so close to being punished? She deserved to suffer. There must be another way. ‘If we find Leander’s locket, we could lower it in through a window, and he could disappear into it.’
‘There are no windows. And we don’t have time to search for the locket.’
‘What about using Pellar’s hagstone to find it?’
‘It could be anywhere. We’ve been all over the town, through the woods,’ said Felix, rubbing his knuckles over his forehead. ‘And it’s tiny, and Pellar . . . Oh, wait! I forgot! We found Pinchbeck’s book!’
Felix fumbled the remains of the commonplace book out of his pocket and pushed it into Charlotte’s hands.
‘Leander and I used it to find you. Some of it’s in Latin and we couldn’t read it, but maybe there’s something here?’
It was damp. Soggy pages were stuck together, crumbling into wet lumps as she tried to prise them open.
‘It’s ruined,’ said Charlotte. ‘I can’t read a thing.’ The pages were stained with smears of black ink, years of Pinchbeck’s secrets destroyed.
Felix took a deep breath. ‘That’s that, then.’ He was being so brave that Charlotte loved him more than ever. ‘We have to get them both out of the cell before Pellar finds them. We can’t leave Leander – he’s one of us now. He’s family.’ He set off walking.
Charlotte nodded as she trotted after him. ‘If Leander can’t disappear into his locket, we’ll have to get the cell door open somehow. Even if that means Pinchbeck escapes, too,’ she said. The thought of freeing Pinchbeck was like a sharp stone stuck in her throat. Their choices were probable death at the hands of Pinchbeck, or certain death at the hands of Pellar.
‘We can at least hide our Cabinets,’ suggested Felix. ‘Far enough away so we can’t be forced inside, no matter how many orders she shouts.’
‘Or we could make a magical barrier between us and our Cabinets – like the one in the hiding place?’
It would be guesswork at best, and, even if they could make one, Charlotte didn’t know if it would work, but they were out of options. The thought of being back where they started, despite all their efforts, was just too much.
‘You must stay hidden,’ said Felix, turning to face her. ‘Pinchbeck mustn’t know I found you. She mustn’t see you at all.’
‘What if someone else let them out, then we could both stay hidden?’ Charlotte suggested. She could already feel her limbs growing stronger as they moved nearer to Pinchbeck.
‘Who in their right mind would release her?’
20
The Hanged Man, Reversed:
Imprisoned, Trapped,
Helpless
This must be what death feels like.
The suffocating scent of Pinchbeck’s floral perfume mixed with the wet-dog stench of the old blanket and the earthy scent of the bare floor. Leander tried to imagine himself as a smaller boy playing at hide- and-seek in the coal-hole. The scent of baking bread and the warmth in his mother’s voice as she pretended not to see him. Her laughter as she wiped the smudges from his cheek with her apron.
‘I appreciate the company,’ said Pinchbeck. ‘Though I’d have preferred you to let me out. Where’s Felix?’
Leander shrugged. Felix and Charlotte would come for him. They wouldn’t leave him here to rot with Pinchbeck – would they? He felt sick. No one ever wanted Leander. Why would they put themselves in danger to save him?
‘I suppose you can’t pick the lock, then?’ she asked.
‘No.’
‘Useless. I thought I was hiring myself a skilled thief. I might have thought twice if I’d known how stupid you were.’
‘Hiring me? You stole me.’
‘How did you get caught?’
‘I went back to the carriage.’ Leander drew his feet in and made himself as small as possible.
‘Why didn’t you vanish into your Cabinet until they were gone? You’re no use to me in here.’
He wouldn’t exp
lain himself to Pinchbeck. Without her deviousness, Leander would still be in the relative safety of the library with only the wrath of Mrs Smart to worry about. Pinchbeck had stolen his life, and Charlotte’s life, and Felix’s life, even Pellar’s.
And she had promised he could speak to his mother. All lies. He knew that now.
‘You’re a monster.’ The words spilled out before he could stop them.
There was a silence, then Pinchbeck laughed. ‘Silly boy. After I’ve been so kind to you.’
Her beautiful dress was dusty and creased, her skin sagging, like the ruins of a cathedral, dignified but decaying. The light flickered, and for half a second it seemed as if Pinchbeck flickered, too – Leander was sure he saw sharp yellowish teeth protruding from her bottom jaw. He blinked, and the image was gone.
Leander said, ‘What have you done with Charlotte?’
‘It was for your own good. Her or you. You’d thank me if you knew what was good for you.’
‘Never.’
‘Mind your manners, boy. I’ve already dispatched one rude child – I’ll not think twice about doing it again.’
‘You’ll be hanged for kidnap and murder first.’
‘You’d better hope not.’ She fixed him with an iron gaze, eyes almost black in the candlelight. ‘My death will be the end of you, too.’
‘I know that broken glass in the jar isn’t Charlotte’s lantern,’ he said. ‘Is she dead? Tell me.’
‘Charlotte is safe,’ said Pinchbeck. ‘Somewhere the cruel world can’t hurt her. Somewhere she won’t have to worry about hunger, or pain, or the ravages of old age. She’s one of the lucky ones, Leander.’
‘If you don’t want her any more, why not just let her go?’
‘But I do want her, little one. I want all of you. All you poor, forgotten, unwanted things. Didn’t I take you in when no one else would? Haven’t I fed and clothed you? All the suffering I’ve saved you. This world’s no place for orphans, son. Orphans like you waste away in the workhouse or die down the mines. But that will never happen to you. Because of me.’
The Vanishing Trick Page 17