“But what about us?” Molly asked, distraught. “It’s like we’re back where we started! What do we do now?”
“You can do whatever you’d like,” said her mother. “Even if that means I need to look for a new assistant. You have many talents, Molly. I won’t hold you back from exploring any of them.”
Molly wiped away the tear that formed in the corner of her eye.
“As for me, however,” Cassandra went on. “I’m an inventor. I’m going back to inventing. What should I make next?”
Molly sniffled. “Can you create something that could get us to Antarctica?”
“I can create anything,” Cassandra said with utter confidence.
Molly smiled, then checked over her shoulder to make sure no one was listening. “Mother, there’s something I need to tell you. It’s about Emmett’s— Wait! Where’s Emmett?”
“Molly! Mrs. Pepper!” Emmett called from behind the Polar Pavilion’s igloo. The Peppers ran, kicking up paper-shred snow, and found the boy pointing skyward. They looked up to see a silver figure descending from the clouds. Robot made a graceful, controlled landing and settled his gaze on Molly.
“What would you have me do next, mistress?” asked the robot.
The query was met with a lot of blinking.
“Mistress?” repeated Robot.
Molly turned to her mother. “I didn’t know you programmed him to speak on his own.”
“I didn’t,” Cassandra whispered.
“If the space rock made him fly,” said Emmett, “do you think it did . . . other stuff?”
“Other stuff?” echoed Robot. His chest flared with an orange glow.
“We need to tell Mr. Bell about—” Emmett began.
Molly shook her head. “Like the men in the suits said, we’re very good at keeping secrets.”
Cassandra grinned. “We might make the history books yet.”
“Come, Robot,” said Molly. “Come, family. Let’s go.”
And with that, a woman, a girl, a boy, and an aluminum robot left Central Park and headed home to their abandoned pickle shop.
Afterword: What’s Real and What’s Not in ‘A Dastardly Plot’
This book is a work of fiction, but many of the people, places, and things that appear in these pages actually existed in American history. So, what’s real and what’s not?
Thomas Edison and Alexander Graham Bell: Obviously, these two men really existed. They’re quite famous. But are all the details about them in this book factual? Many, but probably not all. Edison really was totally deaf in his left ear. And his lab in Menlo Park really had all those crazy things in jars that I mentioned. Bell actually was a founding member of the National Geographic Society. And he really did experiment with talking automatons. I have no hard evidence, however, that Edison was a good tap dancer.
The International Inventors’ Guild: While no group with this name may have existed, it was not uncommon in the nineteenth century for professional organizations like it to have all-male membership. (There might even be a few places that still have rules like that today.)
The Mothers of Invention: While I can’t say whether the MOI members teamed up in real life, all of these women were real inventors. Hertha Marks really made groundbreaking discoveries about the nature of electricity, Sarah Goode really built folding furniture, Josephine Cochrane really created the dishwasher, Mary Walton (known to some as the mother of green technology) really developed a noise-control system for railroads, and Margaret Knight really was one of the most prolific inventors of her day. Not-so-fun fact: Margaret Knight almost didn’t get credit for inventing the paper bag! A male colleague tried to claim the idea as his own, but luckily, several witnesses stepped up to shoot down that scoundrel’s lie and make sure the world didn’t miss out on Ms. Knight’s genius.
The Chinese Exclusion Act: Sadly, I did not make this up. Signed by Chester A. Arthur on May 6, 1882, this legislation marked the first time the United States ever banned an entire class of immigrants based on their country of origin. The law was intended to be in effect for only ten years, but didn’t get repealed until 1943.
The Jäger Society: This group is loosely based on the New York Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children (aka the Gerry Society), founded in 1875 by lawyer Elbridge Gerry. Back then, some of its officers—known as Gerrymen at the time—got a reputation for being overzealous in their mission, but the Society eventually took care of its rogue agent problem and changed its focus to helping abused children—an important cause the NYSPCC still fights for today.
The New York City Lunatic Asylum on Blackwell’s Island: Totally real and totally scary! Luckily for all of us, it was shut down a few years after this story takes place, thanks to the investigative reporting of a true American hero, Nellie Bly. Blackwell’s Island is today known as Roosevelt Island and is much less terrifying.
Robots: I hate to break it to Molly, but in 1883, they really would have been called “automatons.” The word “robot” was coined by Czech playwright Karel Čapek for his 1920 play, R.U.R.—Rossum’s Universal Robots. (Or did Capek just overhear the word from a precocious twelve-year-old New Yorker?)
The Brooklyn Bridge: It was originally called the “New York and Brooklyn Bridge”—since New York and Brooklyn were separate cities at the time—but that name is simply too long to keep writing over and over in a book. The opening ceremony happened pretty much as described here. Except no one reported any assassins climbing the cables. (Then again, that’s exactly the kind of detail they’d want to keep quiet, isn’t it?)
The 1883 World’s Fair in New York: If you do a little research (and I strongly suggest you do—research is awesome), you will most likely learn that there was no World’s Fair in 1883. And that poor Mr. Ferris would have to wait a whole decade to debut his wheel at the 1893 World’s Fair in Chicago. But if you dig a little deeper, you will learn that a World’s Fair really was scheduled to be held in New York in 1883. And Ulysses S. Grant really was on the planning committee. And yet, there are no reports of that Fair ever taking place. So what happened? The official story is that New Yorkers rejected the Fair because they thought it would ruin Central Park. And that’s most likely the truth. (Or is it . . . ?)
—Christopher Healy, 2018
Acknowledgments
I’m not nearly as amazing and awesome as the women of the MOI, but one thing we have in common is that we all recognize the benefits of collaboration. Which is why I have so many people to thank in helping me put this book together. Thanks, as always, to my first line of defense, my home team, Noelle, Bryn, and Dash—without you all, some of the best parts of this story might never have made it onto the page, and some of the worst parts might not have been deleted. Thanks, of course, to my editor, Jordan Brown, and to Debbie Kovacs at Walden Media, for believing in this book from the start and skillfully ushering it to fruition (looking forward to Book 2!). Thanks to Cheryl Pientka and everyone at Jill Grinberg Literary for all your support, both literary and emotional. Thanks to Kevin Chu at the Museum of Chinese in America for so graciously answering my many emails. Thanks to Martha Brockenbrough, Jennifer Chu, Geoff Rodkey, Shenwei Chang, Tiffany Dayemo, Barry Wolverton, and Christine Howey for all your invaluable input. Every opinion I got on this book helped shape what it has become. And lastly, thanks to the fans of my Hero’s Guide books who said they’d stick with me for a trip to a very different world. Your promises meant more than you know. (And, obviously, I believed them, otherwise why would I be assuming you’re reading this now?)
About the Author
Photo credit Christopher Barth
CHRISTOPHER HEALY is the author of The Hero’s Guide to Saving Your Kingdom, a New York Times Book Review Editor’s Choice, as well as its two sequels, The Hero’s Guide to Storming the Castle and The Hero’s Guide to Being an Outlaw. Before becoming a writer, he worked as an actor, an ad copywriter, a toy store display designer, a fact-checker, a dishwasher, a journalist, a costume shop clothing stitc
her, a children’s entertainment reviewer, and a haunted house zombie. He lives in New Jersey with his wife, two children, and a dog named Duncan. You can visit him online at www.christopherhealy.com.
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Copyright
Walden Pond Press is an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers.
Walden Pond Press and the skipping stone logo are trademarks and registered trademarks of Walden Media, LLC.
A PERILOUS JOURNEY OF DANGER & MAYHEM #1: A DASTARDLY PLOT. Copyright © 2018 by Christopher Healy. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
www.harpercollinschildrens.com
Cover art by Antonio Caparo
Cover design by Joel Tippie
* * *
Library of Congress Control Number: 2018021260
Digital Edition SEPTEMBER 2018 ISBN: 978-0-06-234199-0
Print ISBN: 978-0-06-234197-6
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1819202122PC/LSCH10987654321
FIRST EDITION
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