Simon was watching Amanda in her cell. He was fascinated by her encounter with Micajah Splunk and was tempted to let Ramon know about it, but the bloke was such a twit he couldn’t be bothered. Hugh might or might not be alive but Ramon was out of his mind if he thought he could just sense it. Scapulus’s measure of increased electric activity was a much better indicator, and it was troubling.
As he helplessly watched Amanda and Nick flail, he again tried to come up with new angles of attack but Ivy was stopping him, or rather thoughts of Ivy were stopping him. He got up to clear his head and walked outside into the warm-for-Scotland fall air.
Suddenly Clive came tearing out the door. “Did you see what Sherlock Holmes said?”
“You mean all those questions about phobias?” Simon said.
“No, later.”
“I haven’t gotten that far.”
“Well guess what,” Clive said. “He and Nick know we’re watching them, and he told us to reverse the process.”
“You mean reverse engineer it?” said Simon. “What do you think I’ve been doing for the last two days? I’ve looked at the code until I can’t see straight. I’ve tried to figure out what Hugh is doing. It’s impossible to tell how or where my machine and his interference are interacting. I’d need infinite processing power to tell.”
“Then he must mean something else,” said Clive.
“What does Sherlock Holmes know about digital technology?” said Simon. “This is all so complex I doubt even Hugh could figure it out.”
“Please don’t tell me you’re giving up,” said Clive.
“I’m not,” said Simon, kicking a rock. “I’m just massively stuck.”
Clive pointed to the forest outside the castle. “Let’s walk.” Simon began to race down the path. “Hey, not so fast. I can’t think when I’m trying to keep up with you.”
“You are short,” said Simon unkindly.
“Would you just cut it out?” said Clive. “This is serious. What about Scapulus?”
Simon was still walking fast, leaving Clive a couple of paces behind him. “He’s in London. Also stuck.”
“Could you recreate Amanda and Nick’s disappearance? And slow down while you’re at it.”
Simon stopped, turned around, and stuck out his tongue. “Only if that thing comes out of the machine, and it hasn’t returned.”
Clive caught up with him and they started walking again. “What if you set it to that exact date and time again?”
Simon shook his head. “Do you really want to risk sending someone else back? What if it only works one way?”
“Maybe someone would volunteer,” Clive panted.
“Like you?”
Clive stopped and Simon kept going. After a few steps he realized he was alone. Clive ran to catch up. “I would, yeah.”
“Forget it, slowpoke” said Simon. “I’m not having you on my conscience too. “
“Then I’ll do it alone,” said Clive stubbornly.
“You will not. If you do I’ll tell Owla you’re crushing on her.”
“You wouldn’t,” said Clive.
“Oh, Owla,” Simon called out. “Can you come out here a minute.”
“You turd. The window’s open. She’ll hear you,” said Clive, and stomped off.
“What’s going on?” said Owla out the common room window.
“My mistake,” Simon called. “Sorry.”
Clive had had it up to his eyeballs with Simon. Of course the scientific method was critical, but sometimes you had to think way, way outside the box. Simon refused even to consider possibilities beyond his own rigid view of the world. Clive’s experiments with Ramon over the summer—the ones they’d conducted when trying to keep Professor Scribbish from communicating with his twin telepathically—had shown him that. Ramon was a lunatic, but he did sometimes come up with interesting ways of looking at things. Damn Simon for throwing the baby out with the bath water.
The more he thought about trying to re-create the time travel, the more convinced he was that that was the way to solve the problem. Forget Simon’s threat about Owla. His fellow detectives were more important than his ego. Even if Simon did tell Owla how he felt, so what? He owed his friends and his profession so much more than that.
And so that evening when everyone was eating dinner, he crept into the common room and set the day and time on the history machine to the exact moment when the shadow appeared.
The last thing he saw before he blacked out was Owla walking through the door.
The first thing Clive saw when he came to was the face of Blixus Moriarty, except that something was off about it, as though someone had drawn the criminal’s features wrong. He was also younger-looking, but by how much Clive couldn’t tell. What he could tell was that his hands and feet were bound. The criminal had done that to him before and he was getting tired of it.
“Good morning,” said Blixus.
“What are you doing here?” said Clive, noting that he was in some kind of a dark room. “I thought you were dead.”
“I live here, and I assure you I’m very much alive,” said Blixus, who come to think of it was dressed most oddly, as if he along with the black shadow had popped out of the nineteenth century. His coat was so long and narrow it reminded Clive of something out of Dickens. The waistcoat looked pretty snazzy though, and what was that? A gold pocket watch on a chain? Yeesh. Blixus really had become affected. Another manifestation of his arrogance, he supposed.
“Why are you dressed like that?” said Clive, full well knowing the answer. Blixus had been grabbed by Simon’s machine just as Amanda and Nick had and was somewhere in the nineteenth century. But how could that have happened when he was nowhere near the thing?
“I could ask you the same thing,” said Blixus, who couldn’t possibly be Blixus. “I’ve never met a Chinaman before. And I’ve certainly never seen one dressed like that. I’m intrigued. That’s why I brought you here. It isn’t every day you find someone so interesting just lying on the street. So tell me. And while you’re at it you might thank me. You could have been trampled out there.” He eyed Clive up and down.
“I’m from Guangdong Province,” said Clive, who was not about to thank Blixus for anything, especially when he was all tied up. At least the man had explained how he’d got there though. That was something.
“Never heard of it,” said Professor Moriarty, for that was undoubtedly who the man was, not Blixus at all. They just looked a lot alike. “You sound English.”
“I’ve been here a while,” said Clive, trying to take in the scene through his peripheral vision. It looked like he was in some kind of an office. There was a lot of noise outside, heavy machinery, he thought.
“You’re a liar,” said Moriarty.
“And you’re a criminal,” said Clive.
“That took no amount of genius to deduce,” said Moriarty. “I’ve obviously kidnapped you.”
“That’s not what I meant and you know it,” said Clive. This man was beginning to annoy him every bit as much as Blixus did.
“Mouthy, aren’t we?” said Moriarty, sounding very much like his great grandnephew.
“Only when I’ve been kidnapped,” said Clive. “There will be no ransom so you can just let me go.”
“How disappointing,” said Moriarty. “I was hoping for a few pennies in exchange for your freedom. However, you have other uses. Tell me about your friends.”
Uh oh. So Moriarty had seen Amanda and Nick. This wasn’t good.
“I have no friends,” said Clive. “I don’t have time. I’m apprenticed to Mr. Taylor and I work all day every day. I have no time to meet people.”
“And your Mr. Taylor is . . .” His words were drowned out by a great crash outside.
Clive searched his brain quickly. The way he was dressed—in T-shirt and jeans—it wouldn’t do to claim he worked for a tailor.
“A butcher, sir,” he finished.
Moriarty examined him. “Your clothes are perfectly c
lean. You’re lying.”
Oh great. Wrong choice,
“Fine, I lied,” said Clive. “I’m unemployed. Happy?”
Moriarty guffawed. “Actually yes. There’s no one to miss you and you can be of great use to me. Now who are your friends? A man and a girl.”
A man and a girl? Clive was stumped. Who could he mean? Oh, right. Nick and Amanda. Nick looked more like a man than a boy. Moriarty must not realize how old he really was.
“I told you I have no friends,” said Clive.
Moriarty clucked. “Oh come now. A nice young lad like you? You seem quite personable. Just the type to have a tall, dark young man and a beautiful Jewess as friends.”
Jewess? Amanda wasn’t Jewish. Her hair was kind of frizzy. Was that what Moriarty thought Jews looked like? Good grief.
“I don’t know who you’re talking about,” Clive said.
Moriarty slapped him in the face. “Think harder.”
Clive was as incensed as he was smarting. “You can slap me all day but I can’t tell you what I don’t know.”
At that Moriarty seemed to give pause. Perhaps he was finally believing him?
But then he slapped Clive again, harder. “I’ve got nothing but time,” he said.
“And I’ve got none,” thought Clive. But he was not about to give up his friends, no matter what.
Moriarty circled him, examining his head, eyes, chin, and hands and poking his body. Now Clive could see that he was indeed in an office, a very messy one, with papers everywhere, and a massive desk that could have doubled as a second home. There was a chalkboard with some kind of math in the corner too.
“You’re not a large fellow, are you?” he said.
Clive was terrified at the prospect of what that might mean but said nothing.
“I could cut you, whip you, beat you,” Moriarty continued, “But that’s not my way. Too crass. I’m more of a mental sort of bloke.”
Clive thought about the criminal’s formulas and what they had meant for Amanda, and his blood ran cold. He did have a few mental tricks up his own sleeve, but he had no idea whether they would stave off a man as powerful as Moriarty. Even if they did the criminal was likely to turn to violence, and Clive was certain he couldn’t withstand much of that, despite his self-defense training.
Moriarty stroked his chin. “I think you’ll do quite nicely, come to think of it.” He eyed Clive’s head again. “Yes, quite nicely indeed. What serendipity it’s been coming across a perfect subject like you.”
Subject? Clive didn’t like the sound of that. It sounded as though Moriarty wanted to conduct experiments on him, like some space alien taking humans up to its ship and poking them.
“W-what are you going to do?” he stammered.
“You sound scared,” said Moriarty. “You should be.”
Clive just about wet his pants. Then he remembered his mindfulness training and took a deep breath, then another. He could feel his body relax ever so slightly.
“I suppose there’s no time like the present,” Moriarty said. “We will begin at once. Unless you’d like to tell me who your friends are.”
“They’re not my friends,” said Clive.
“You know I can tell when you’re lying,” said Moriarty. “Your pupils dilate.”
“I take drugs,” Clive lied. “That’s why.”
“Very well,” said Moriarty. “I can play games too. Unfortunately I don’t think you’re going to enjoy mine as much as I’m enjoying yours.”
What a smarmy git he was, just like his descendants—every one of them: Blixus, Stencil, Hugh, and as it turned out, Amboy, aka Christopher Scribbish. Clive wondered whether it would ever be possible to isolate the gene for snideness. The Moriarty family surely possessed it.
Moriarty walked to the desk and pulled out a drawer from which he extracted a well-thumbed green leather notebook. He opened the notebook and began to riffle through.
“No, not that one. No, that one is too mild. Perhaps this one.” Finally he stopped on a page near the end and tapped it with his left index finger. “This is the one. I’ll start here.”
A nasty smile spread across his face making him look exactly like Blixus. Clive couldn’t get over the resemblance. Moriarty put down the notebook, circled around in front of him, and stared deep into his eyes. The feeling was so uncomfortable that he shut his eyes tight.
“Open them,” said Moriarty. Clive shook his head. “Open them or I will poke hot needles through them,” said Moriarty.
Clive’s eyes sprung open.
“Good. Now keep them open or I will do as I said.”
If Clive had been terrified before he was apoplectic now. He was so scared he was trembling and was afraid he’d lose control of his bowels. He’d never been so scared in his life, not even when Blixus’s men had captured him at the zoo the previous year. This Moriarty was way more frightening than Blixus had ever been, and that was saying a lot.
“I will,” he said. “You don’t have to worry.”
“I never worry,” said Moriarty. “It shortens your life. Now sit still.”
Clive didn’t know if “sit still” referred to voluntary or involuntary motion. He tried to keep his body and head steady but he couldn’t stop the trembling. Nevertheless Moriarty seemed satisfied. The man stared into his eyes again and within twenty seconds Clive began to feel an unbearable pressure inside his head.
In seconds more it felt as if it would split open. He desperately tried to focus his attention on his breathing, ragged as it was, to distract himself from the pain and find a peaceful place inside his mind. But the pressure was too great and he could focus for only half a second. He wished he could hold his ears—not that that would do any good. He began to whimper, then scream, and still the pain persisted. And then suddenly it was gone. He slumped forward in his chair, his head resting on his chest.
“That seemed to work quite well,” said Moriarty. “I’m surprised. I thought you Chinese had all sorts of mental tricks to call upon. I expected you to block me.”
Clive couldn’t have spoken if he’d wanted to. His head hurt like the dickens and his ears were pounding. A bit of saliva escaped his lips and dribbled down his shirt.
“Actually, I think that should be our next test,” said Moriarty. “I’ll activate the formula again, but this time you try to block me.”
Clive barely heard him. The man’s voice felt like a drone inside his head.
“You can have a few minutes to rest. You’d like that, wouldn’t you?” Moriarty lifted Clive’s chin and let it fall. “Oh come on now. Stop malingering. It isn’t that bad.”
But it was, and somewhere deep inside himself Clive was ashamed. He should have been able to resist. Professor Peaksribbon had taught him all about mindfulness, mental clarity, and relaxation in the face of incredible stress and distraction, and he’d failed. He had to find the strength and focus to fight this evil man and protect his friends.
The pain was beginning to recede a little, so he pictured Legatum—the old Legatum before it was destroyed—and all his friends there. He imagined Simon’s face screwed up in concentration, the light reflecting off his thick glasses. He pictured Ivy, her lovely face in its usual expression of repose, her hand gently caressing Nigel’s head. He thought of Amanda, with her bird’s nest hair and happy smile, and even Ramon, his smug expression annoying everyone in sight. Then he envisioned his beautiful Owla, her chocolate skin shining, her long dreads falling over her shoulder as she hunched over a textbook. She was really something, that girl. So smart, so sweet, so . . . not his and never would be.
He sighed.
“You’re back!” said Moriarty, clapping his hands together. “Splendid. Let’s continue our work, shall we?”
Clive had fortified himself a bit but was not sure he was up to much. Unfortunately he had no choice. Moriarty was once again standing in front of him, staring into his eyes.
“Now this time I want you to resist,” he said. “Don’t let me in.
All right? Go.”
Clive felt the pressure in his head again. Quickly he shifted his attention to an image of the school—the turrets, fly-eyed windows, happy corridors, crowded classrooms. The pressure abated for an instant.
“Good, good,” said Moriarty. “I knew you could do it. Now see if you can handle this.”
The pain came back stronger now. Clive yelped.
“Sissy,” said Moriarty. “I hardly changed a thing.”
That made Clive mad. He pictured Simon this time, thought immediately of the argument they’d had about the history machine, and felt such rage that everything else disappeared. The pain was gone. All he could feel was red-hot fury.
“Excellent,” said Moriarty, eyes boring into his. “Now try this.”
The pain returned, stronger this time. Clive pictured Simon again, felt the rage he’d conjured up before, but it wasn’t enough. The pain overwhelmed the vision and he screamed.
“What is wrong with you?” said Moriarty. “You’re nothing but a little weakling.”
Even with the pain tearing up his head, Clive could hear that, and it enraged him. The red-hot fury surged, and the pain receded.
“I see,” said Moriarty. “Anger makes you stronger. Well then, let’s try this now.”
The pain came back so intensely that Clive screamed and fainted.
“Too much apparently,” said Moriarty. “Oh well. Tomorrow is another day.”
That night Moriarty disappeared and Clive was left alone. He was hungry, tired, and dispirited, and his head hurt something terrible, as well as his wrists and ankles where he was bound. Moriarty had gagged him as well, and he was so thirsty he felt like he was going to shrivel up and crumble into bits. But he could recognize an opportunity when he saw one. He would try to beat the odds and escape.
The question, of course, was how. If he was really lucky, Simon would swoop in and rescue him. But he couldn’t depend on that. So what were his options?
He looked around the room. It had horrible green walls and a hard, bare floor. The walls were metal and the furniture other than the enormous desk, such as it was, was beat up and full of nicks, dings, and dents. If this was Moriarty’s usual hangout, he obviously wasn’t bothered with aesthetics.
Amanda Lester and the Black Shadow Terror Page 22
