“You don’t know what people saw or didn’t see,” says Lamont. “Sometimes in the confusion, you can get away with things. But you need to be careful, especially when you’re starting out. Stick to the rules. No mistakes.”
“I remember once,” Margo says, “Lamont had to disappear while he was wearing a terrycloth robe. I could still see the loose end of his little belt flopping around in midair.”
“Ugggh!” This is totally humiliating! Maybe I should just stick to mind control. I just want to be gone. Then I feel it—the rush in my head, the rise in my belly, the clarity in my mind.
Then—guess what?—I disappear.
CHAPTER 59
CREIGHTON POOLE HAD absolutely nothing to do. Sometimes he wondered why he even showed up in the office. Force of habit, no doubt. And the need to keep some filament of his faded career glowing. There was also the possibility that the phone would ring with a call that would move him into some government ministry, where he might have a flicker of power, or at least a way back up the ladder.
The last thing he expected on a quiet Thursday was a buzz on his intercom. He instinctively turned to call out to his assistant, then remembered that he no longer had one. He pressed the button on his desk console.
“Creighton Poole,” he said. “Who’s there?”
“Mr. Poole!” A familiar voice came through the speaker. “It’s me. Maddy. Maddy Gomes.” Poole pressed the button again, this time with annoyance.
“What do you want?” he asked. His last meeting with Maddy Gomes had not exactly gone according to plan. This girl was wily—not to mention some kind of sorceress.
“We need to talk,” said Maddy.
“About what?” asked Poole.
“I have an assignment for you,” said Maddy. “I have money.”
The magic word. Poole pressed the buzzer.
Still no elevator. While waiting for guests to walk up thirty flights, Poole usually lit a cigar. The little ritual relaxed him. But this time, he wanted to keep his edge. Whatever this crafty brat wanted this time, he would play hardball. No tricks. In the meantime, he paced.
A few minutes later, he heard a knock on the outer office door. He opened it a crack. And there she was. Same attitude. New wardrobe.
“No skateboard today?” he asked.
“Scooter,” she corrected him. “The sun was so warm, I decided to walk.”
Poole opened the door wider for Maddy. Suddenly, two other people—a man and a woman—stepped in from the sides. Before Poole could react, all three were standing in his outer office.
Poole looked perplexed. He looked to Maddy for answers.
“I’m sorry…” he stammered. “Who are…?”
“Mr. Poole,” said Maddy, “this is Lamont Cranston.”
“My pleasure,” said Lamont, extending his hand. Poole shook it gingerly and squinted at Lamont’s face.
“Dear God,” said Poole.
“You look surprised, Mr. Poole,” said Margo, holding out her hand as well. “Margo Lane.”
“Margo Lane?” said Poole, taking her hand limply. Now his mind was reeling. “But you’re…”
“I know,” said Margo. “Dead.”
“Check out this view!” said Maddy. She was already in Poole’s inner office, standing at his wall of windows. Margo brushed past Poole to join her.
“You have a balcony!” said Margo. She reached for the door handle.
“Don’t open that!” said Poole. “You’ll let the smoke in.”
Margo opened it anyway. She stepped out onto the narrow platform, put her arms on the railing, and took a deep breath. Poole retreated to the safe space behind his desk and loosened his tie, feeling flushed and nervous.
“What…what do you want?” he asked. “Maddy said something about an assignment?” He cleared his throat. “And money?”
Lamont leaned over Poole’s desk.
“The assignment is very simple,” he said. “Produce every document in your possession that concerns Maddy and Jessica Gomes. And there is no money.”
“Sorry,” said Maddy. “I lied a little.”
Poole looked down. He felt the tingle of sweat in his armpits.
“We want to know about Maddy’s history,” said Lamont. “Her parents. How she and I are connected.”
“Every juicy detail,” said Margo, peeking in from the balcony.
“I’ll bet it’s all in there,” said Maddy. She pointed to a metal file cabinet in a corner of the office. Poole looked over at the cabinet and gave it a dismissive wave.
“That’s just old firm business,” said Poole. “Ancient history at this point. I wouldn’t even know where to find the key!”
“That’s a real shame,” said Margo. She was now closer, leaning over the desk. Poole looked around. Suddenly, he and Margo were the only two people in the room.
“Wait!” he said, looking wildly from side to side. “Where did…?”
He felt himself being lifted by both arms, and dragged toward the open balcony door.
“No! Stop!” he said, looking desperately at Margo. “What’s happening?”
“It’s called persuasion, Mr. Poole.”
Poole flailed, his body jerking around so that his back was to the railing.
Suddenly he felt pressure behind his knees and then a solid lift. A second later, he was hanging backward over the balcony, upside down, tie flapping in the wind.
He screamed—loud enough to make people thirty stories down look up.
“Maddy’s records?” It was Lamont’s voice. But it was coming from thin air.
“Sweet Jesus!” screamed Poole. “Don’t drop me!”
“My records?” Now it was Maddy’s voice, from the other side. Poole’s eyes rolled back and caught a blur of buildings, streets, and barrel fires four hundred feet down.
“Yes!” he whimpered. “Yes! Put me down!”
He felt a strong hand hook around the front of his belt. With one powerful pull, he was upright again, feet on the balcony, face nearly purple. He felt lucky that he was wearing a dark suit. It concealed that he had slightly peed himself.
CHAPTER 60
POOLE SLUMPED BACK into one of his leather guest chairs, trembling. His face was returning to its usual doughy pallor, but sweat still beaded his forehead. He reached for his pocket square and dabbed at the droplets. He was panting, trying to catch his breath.
In front of him stood Lamont and Maddy, fully visible again. Margo was leaning against the desk, her arms folded. Poole’s head swiveled from Lamont to Maddy and back again.
“How did you…?” he said, his voice thin and reedy. “I didn’t see…”
“Ever hear of the Shadow?” asked Maddy.
Poole looked confused.
“The Shadow?” he repeated. “Is that…a magic trick? Some kind of illusion? Is that what just happened? Was I really just sitting here the whole time?”
“The Shadow was a crimefighter,” said Maddy. “He fought evil in the city back in the 1930s.”
Poole spun through his mental trivia bank. Crime-fighter. Evil. Big City.
“You mean like…Batman?” he asked.
Lamont looked puzzled.
“Who’s Batman?”
“Batman,” repeated Poole, digging deep into cultural memory. “I think he had some kind of double identity. A rich playboy. He had a mansion. And he came out at night to fight bad guys. Like a bat.”
“Goddamned copycat!” said Lamont.
“Not nearly as mysterious as the Shadow,” said Maddy.
“Thank you,” said Lamont.
Poole wasn’t following any of this. What were these two nutcases talking about? Who cared about a couple of made-up superheroes from the last century?
“Batman was a comic-book character,” said Poole. “Not an actual person. He wasn’t…he wasn’t real.”
“Well, the Shadow was,” said Lamont. He leaned in close to Poole’s face. “The Shadow is.”
“Oh,” said Poole, pressing b
ack into his chair. “I see.” He decided it was best to play along. He looked at Lamont. He blinked nervously. “You mean…you’re the Shadow?”
“Correct,” said Lamont.
Early in his law practice, Poole had deposed a number of defendants with mental issues. He had learned that the best thing was to remain calm and humor their delusions.
“Well,” said Poole, sticking his sweaty pocket square back in his pocket, “that must be fascinating.”
“The files?” asked Maddy. “That’s why we’re here.”
“As I told you,” said Poole, “I have no idea what’s in that cabinet. It came with the office. I don’t have any clue where the key might be.”
“Well then,” said Margo. “Why don’t we look?” She moved around to the back of Poole’s desk and opened one drawer after another, peeking in, running her hands through the contents. She pulled out the wide top drawer and dumped everything onto the desktop—pens, cigars, paper scraps, pencil shavings, business cards. But no key.
“That cabinet hasn’t been opened in decades,” said Poole. “If I had a hammer and screwdriver, maybe we could…”
“Hold on,” said Maddy. “I almost forgot.” She reached into her pocket and pulled out her scooter pin. She walked over and inserted the pin into the cabinet. She gave it an expert twist. There was a metallic clunk as the drawers released. Margo gave Maddy an admiring look.
“You’re a safecracker?”
Maddy slipped the pin back in her pocket.
“Working on it,” she said.
“Hey!” said Poole, starting to rise from his chair. “Whatever’s in there is privileged information. Confidential files. Private property.”
Margo looked at Lamont.
“Maybe Mr. Poole needs a little more air?” she said.
“Never mind,” said Poole, slumping back into the chair. “Help yourself.”
Lamont joined Maddy and Margo at the open file drawer. It had the musty smell of old paper. They started thumbing through the thick sections of manila folders. Halfway to the back, Maddy’s finger stopped at a folder with a single word on the label: “Gomes.”
“Jackpot,” she said.
Maddy opened the Gomes file on the desk and spread out the contents—some loose papers, some stapled together. The various headings were all very official-looking: “Power of Attorney,” “Irrevocable Trust,” “Legal Guardianship.” But there was one thing all the documents had in common.
Every line of legal text had been completely blacked out.
CHAPTER 61
“LAMONT, THIS IS the last place in the universe we should be right now,” said Maddy, her voice muffled slightly by the panda mask. After the unproductive visit to Poole’s office that morning, Lamont had come up with another angle.
“Do you want to find your grandmother?” asked Lamont from behind the raccoon mask.
“Obviously I do,” said Maddy.
“Then we need to know what’s going on here,” said Lamont. “We need to find out where they’re holding people. For all we know, your grandmother could be here.”
They were standing across the street from the World President’s Residence, though Lamont insisted on calling it “my place.” From their position, they could see the whole rear of the house and the small balcony overlooking the back garden, although the garden itself was hidden behind a cement wall.
It was a warm night, and the neighborhood was crowded. There were the usual curious onlookers, a constant stream of official vehicles, and the usual heavy presence of TinGrin patrols and residential guards. Lamont had built his mansion to be secure. Now it was a fortress. And the rear gate was closed.
But not for long.
“There!” said Lamont. He pointed to an arriving van with an official emblem on the side. “Let’s go!” he said.
They moved quickly to a spot just across from the gate where the truck was idling. The driver was having a routine exchange with a gate guard. ID scan. Manifest check. All the while, the gate stayed open. Lamont and Maddy ducked back into an angle formed by intersecting hedgerows. A blind spot for security cameras, Lamont had calculated.
“Remember what we talked about,” he said, pulling off his mask.
“Stay focused. Stay calm. Don’t stretch it,” recited Maddy. Her mask yanked at her hair as she slid it off.
“Fifteen minutes, tops,” said Lamont. “Anything beyond that is too risky. Ready?”
“Ready,” Maddy answered.
They disappeared.
As the gate slid open, two young boys wandered past the small shelter where Maddy and Lamont had been standing. A raccoon mask and a panda mask lay on the ground. The boys scooped them up and ran off down the street.
One thing Maddy had learned about invisibility was the need to adjust her body movements to stay as quiet as possible. She was used to clomping around in heavy boots, but now she wore a pair of supple running shoes. She had learned to watch where she walked, to avoid puddles and dust that would show her footsteps. It wasn’t enough for her body and clothes to disappear; she had to remove all signs that she even existed. Part art. Part science.
And then there was the problem of staying out of Lamont’s way. When they were both invisible, she could see him but he could not see her. After having her toes stepped on a few times, she learned to synchronize her movements with his, even in close quarters.
But of course, to the guards, the van driver, and everybody else bustling around the mansion, they were both as invisible as air. Lamont and Maddy followed the van through the gates.
“Follow me!” Lamont whispered. He led the way to a set of stone stairs leading down from the parking area—toward the secret entrance he had used hundreds of times.
Back at the warehouse, Lamont had explained it all to Maddy, drawing elaborate diagrams on East River Storage stationery. He had designed the system himself and he was immensely proud of the whole setup: The button hidden beneath the crown of the entryway lamp. The secret door disguised as a stone wall. The complex assembly of gears, cables, and levers that made everything work seamlessly and silently.
“What makes you think any of that stuff is still there?” Maddy had asked. “It’s been over a century! We might as well be breaking into King Tut’s tomb!”
“Please,” said Lamont, insulted. “You don’t know anything about quality workmanship!”
The van was backed up near the rear wall of the mansion. Kitchen workers in white uniforms pulled crates and bins from the cargo area as the guards paced nearby.
Maddy was surprised that the antique carriage lamp was still there, mounted on the granite wall to the right of the door. Lamont reached for the top of the lamp, its copper plating now covered with green corrosion. His fingers clamped around the ornamental tip. He tried to turn it, but it was stuck shut. Maddy rolled her invisible eyes.
Lamont picked up a loose rock from the entryway. He held it about six inches from the lamp, ready to give it a solid tap. He looked over as the workers took the last of the supplies from the back of the van. The driver came around and put his palms against the doors. At the exact second he slammed the doors shut, Lamont whacked the stone against the crown of the lamp. The whole top of the lamp flew off, sending an ivory button flying, along with a few screws and a small bunch of brittle wires.
“Any other ideas?” whispered Maddy, her back pressed against the cold stone wall. Suddenly, she felt movement. She turned around. The secret door was opening! Unbelievable.
Shadow’s luck.
CHAPTER 62
AND…WE’RE IN! Creeping through the basement. The ceiling is low and the whole place smells like wet dirt. Lamont leads the way, obviously. He knows this place from top to bottom. The basement has passages that lead off in every direction. Here and there, I see signs with old-fashioned lettering—STORAGE, UTILITIES, PUMP, TOOL ROOM. I can picture Lamont designing them himself.
At the end of the corridor is a set of wooden stairs. Lamont waves me forward. Am I still
invisible? The only way I can tell is the feeling in my brain. It’s like a low-level hum. My personal generator.
When we reach the door to the first floor, Lamont slowly nudges it open. We peek out. The hallway is buzzing with ministers and assistants scurrying back and forth. Even from the little sliver I can see, this place is amazing. The floors are so polished, they glow. The chandeliers look like they’re made from icicles. It looks more like a castle than somebody’s home.
We wait until the hall is almost empty, then slip into the hall and close the door behind us. My heart is beating fast. I’m still adjusting to the idea that even though I can see Lamont, nobody else can. People coming down the hall look right through him. And me. So weird.
Right away, we can see that the center of activity is a room down the hall.
A bunch of men in suits are huddled together near the doorway. More servants in white uniforms are wheeling in carts of wine.
“This way,” whispers Lamont. “The dining room.”
I follow close, but not too close. I don’t want to step on his heels. When somebody approaches on our side, we press ourselves against the wall and suck everything in to make ourselves as thin as possible. So far, so good.
Now we’re at the entry to the dining hall. Inside, through a huge wooden arch, I can see a long wooden table with chairs set all around it. I can hear people talking in a bunch of different languages. Lamont slips into the dining room, staying close to the wall. I follow his route exactly. The center of the table is filled with the kind of food I’ve only seen in pictures. Enough to feed my neighborhood for a month, with plenty left over. Platters of seafood. Baskets of fruit. Huge piles of bread.
Lamont leads the way to a winding staircase at the back of the room, up to a small balcony that overlooks the table. I’m tempted to reach out and swing from a chandelier, but that would be a dead giveaway. Stay focused. Stay calm. Don’t stretch it.
Now all the people from the hallway are streaming into the dining room. About twenty people or so, mostly men, just two or three women. I can’t understand what anybody is saying. They’re all talking at once and I can only pick out a few words.
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