by Tom Becker
“You see, to get the heart of your choice, my machine has to get to the heart of you. And it does so with these special ‘mind readers’ here.”
The magician flicked one of the spikes, which gave off a metallic twang. Finishing with the final ankle strap, he leant over Raquella and whispered, so softly that only she could hear it:
“No one comes to my show late.” His eyes flashed dangerously through the slits in his hood.
“What?”
With a flourish, the magician drew a curtain across the machine and headed back to the front of the stage. Raquella looked up with horror at the army of spikes looming over her.
“One of the first rules of magic, ladies and gentlemen, is that appearances can be deceptive. This is more than just a mere card trick. There is a life at stake here.”
Raquella began to struggle, but the straps were tightly bound, and there was no room for manoeuvre. The magician’s sonorous voice was growing in volume, filling the hall.
“Watch in horror as Mountebank the Macabre performs the most dangerous magic trick in Darkside. May the Ripper have mercy on her should it go wrong.”
“No, please! Carnegie!”
“NOW!”
There was a click, and then the spikes came hurtling down. Raquella screamed.
13
Late night outside King’s Cross station, and suddenly Jonathan was grateful for the presence of Correlli alongside him, the fire-eater’s arms folded menacingly across his bare chest. Fray and Nettle had slipped back to their room to collect their things – still bickering and finger pointing, but seemingly on side. Now they were waiting for the other Troupe member, Verv. Looking around nervously, Jonathan wished he would hurry up. Though the Euston Road was just another wide, nondescript London thoroughfare, at this time of night there was an ugly edge to the atmosphere: angry drunken shouts, scuffles, figures skulking in doorways. Every few minutes, a police car dashed past them, its siren screaming. Jonathan pulled his hood up and tried to melt into the shadows.
After what seemed like an age, the street echoed to the sound of an engine roaring like a scalded dragon. As two powerful beams pierced the night, Correlli drew himself up expectantly.
“Here he comes.”
The roaring grew louder, and the headlights brighter. Jonathan could make out the shape of a vehicle heading down the street towards them. Whatever it was, it was moving fast.
“Are you sure he’s going to stop?” he asked doubtfully.
“One way or another,” Correlli replied, and stepped out into the middle of the road.
“Is that a good idea?” Jonathan called out. “He’s going pretty fast. . .”
By way of reply, the fire-eater adjusted his waistcoat and ran a hand through his wiry hair, calmly facing the onrushing vehicle like a matador at a bullfight. The car was now only a hundred yards away, and devouring the road. Expecting the driver to start applying the brakes at any second, Jonathan was horrified to see the car surge eagerly forward.
“He’s speeding up!” he cried. “He’s going to kill you!”
The car was fifty yards away. Correlli didn’t flinch, didn’t blink.
“Get out of the way!”
Twenty yards away. Jonathan shut his eyes, unable to watch. There was a squeal of brakes, but too late, far too late. He tensed, waiting to hear a sickening thud. When none came, he opened his eyes and blinked with surprise.
Somehow Correlli was still standing unharmed in the middle of the road. The car had come to rest some two inches from him, the front bumper nearly brushing his shins, lying at the fire-eater’s feet like a dutiful dog. Almost as an afterthought, Jonathan realized that the car was a London cab – though not like any other cab he had seen before. It was painted a dark maroon colour, with tongues of flame licking the wheel arches and the bottom of the bodywork. The TAXI sign on the roof of the car was dark.
Correlli banged on the bonnet, smiling.
“You’ve got slack,” he shouted out to the driver. “You used to get much closer to me than that.”
The door opened, and out bounded a skinny young man wearing a leather jacket. His hair was sculpted into a towering bright pink Mohican that blazed in the headlights. When he spoke, it was in an excitable, high-pitched voice.
“You’re getting on, bossman. Didn’t want to make your ticker go ka-boom!”
He clutched at his chest in an exaggerated mime of a heart attack, and collapsed on to the road.
“Very thoughtful of you, Verv,” Correlli said drily.
Verv remained kicking and convulsing for a few seconds, and then lay very still. He giggled and raised his head.
“Anyone want a lift?”
Behind the wheel, Verv was a figure of perpetual motion. As the cab careered through the streets of London, he bounced up and down in his seat, headbanging, drumming on the steering wheel and whooping with joy. Sitting beside him, Jonathan was transfixed by the speedometer, which never dropped below a hundred. Every traffic light they passed through was green, and no queues of cars held them up. It was as if the city had opened up for Verv. Even so, every time they hurtled around a sharp corner, Jonathan had to fight the urge to cling on to something.
“Hey! Hey!”
Verv swivelled in his seat and leant towards Jonathan, his hair like a Day-Glo shark’s fin.
“You know best thing about Lightside?”
The cab was bearing down on a tramp staggering across the road. Jonathan pointed frantically.
“Watch out for that guy!”
Without taking his eyes from the boy, Verv spun the steering wheel through his hands and smoothly swerved round the tramp.
“Tarmac!” he bellowed, beating the roof of the cab. “I love tarmac.”
He squeezed down on the accelerator pedal and the car leapt forward again.
“Cobbled streets are no fun. Here I can go super-fast – quickety-quick.”
“No kidding,” Jonathan said meaningfully.
“Me fastest cabbie in the whole city,” Verv proclaimed proudly. “Free ride, too.”
“They must love you round here,” Correlli called out from the back seat.
A sad look came over Verv’s face.
“Lightsiders rude,” he said. “They too busy screaming and being sick to thank me.”
“So what’s the deal, bossman?”
Verv opened his fourth sachet of ketchup and poured it over his chips, his right foot tapping out a furious drumbeat on the tiled floor. They were sitting in the neon glow of a fast-food restaurant, the cab cooling off in the car park outside. This late at night, the place was all but empty, save for a couple of bored attendants, an arguing couple, and a man slumped over on a table, snoring. Having jabbered his order to the man behind the counter, Verv was now struggling to fit four burgers, three cartons of chips and an extra-large milkshake on to his tray. Jonathan felt queasy just looking at his meal.
Correlli shifted awkwardly, wedged uncomfortably into an undersized plastic chair.
“One job. One night. Unimaginably high security. Unlikely that all of us will get out alive.”
Verv’s eyes widened. He took a giant bite out of a burger.
“Cool!” he said, spraying Jonathan with pieces of processed meat. “Be like old times. Be like Baskerville job.” He thrust a handful of chips into his mouth and chewed reflectively. “Me drive so fast that night. . .”
Correlli’s face darkened at the mention of the Baskerville robbery.
“So you’re in?” he asked, brusquely.
Verv chuckled. “I’m in . . .”
Jonathan let out a small sigh of relief.
“. . . on one condition.”
“Which is?”
Verv took a deep slurp from his milkshake, his eyes bright with adrenalin.
“Bossman race me first.”
Back
behind the wheel of his cab, Verv dusted off his hands and swallowed his last mouthful. His mouth was ringed with ketchup, which in the dark looked horribly like blood. Instinctively Jonathan thought of Vendetta, and shuddered. Verv wound down the window.
“You ready?”
The fire-eater sighed. “I guess so. We’re racing down Euston Road, one lap around Regent’s Park and then the first one to pass through Marble Arch wins, right?”
“But this isn’t fair!” Jonathan protested. “We’re on foot and you’re in that thing!”
“Yeah, but me go get the twins too. They live long way out of town. You got loads of time to get a lift. Plenty of cars in London. Just ask!”
“That’s as maybe, Verv,” Correlli replied wearily. “But this is still an unbelievable pain.”
“Don’t be mean, bossman. It’s more fun this way!”
He flicked a switch, and suddenly the TAXI light on top of the cab lit up. The cab driver winked at Jonathan.
“Might take a fare on the way. Ciao!”
The cab screeched away in a wreath of smoke, filling the air with the smell of burning rubber. Correlli stood motionless as it flew out of the car park, nearly rising up on to two wheels.
“What are we waiting for?” Jonathan cried. “He’s getting away!”
The fire-eater waved him away. “Be quiet. I’m thinking. We’ll never beat Verv in a straight race. We need to out-think him.”
He punched his fist into his palm. “Right. I know. Let’s go.”
And with that, Correlli began to run.
At first Jonathan was surprised by how quickly the burly fire-eater thundered along the backstreets, but he soon slipped into a natural running rhythm, and matched Correlli stride for stride. It was almost enjoyable, haring down the pavements in the centre of the city, through the shadows of deserted office blocks, their footsteps echoing in tandem. Then Jonathan thought of Verv charging towards the finishing line at a hundred miles an hour, and he wondered how they could hope to beat him.
As they headed west, the lights became brighter, and the streets busier. Jonathan realized that they were entering Soho, the heart of London nightlife, where the bars and restaurants stayed open well into the early morning. Correlli came to a halt by a giant oriental arch that looked down the length of a broad pedestrianized street filled with people. A group of rickshaws had been pulled over underneath the arch, and a gaggle of men were talking and laughing with one another. Panting slightly, the fire-eater approached them and called out:
“Rufus?”
A tall, muscular man stepped forward and nodded at Correlli. “Hello, Antonio. It’s been a while. In a rush?”
“No time to explain. Marble Arch, as fast as you can.”
Rufus nodded, and ushered them into his rickshaw. His bulging arms lifted up the carriage as if it were a toy, and then, with a silent heave, he began to pull them forward. Gradually the rickshaw picked up speed, until it was keeping pace with the cars on the road. Startled by the rate at which they were travelling, Jonathan looked down at Rufus’s legs, which were galloping like a racehorse. Amidst the blurring, it looked for all the world as if there were more than two limbs moving.
Jonathan shot Correlli a questioning glance.
“Rufus is an old friend from back home,” the fire-eater explained. “He’s the fastest thing on three legs. Verv drives incredibly fast, but the twins live miles away. If we forget about Regent’s Park and take a shortcut, we might be able to beat him to Marble Arch. And that’s all that matters.”
The rickshaw ride through Soho was a blur of faces, shouts from startled passers-by, garish window displays and neon lights. Rattling around in the back, Jonathan felt every bump and every pebble in the road. He couldn’t help but marvel at the speed with which Rufus weaved in and out of the traffic. When they burst out of the winding alleys of Soho and on to the wider Oxford Street, the rickshaw managed to pick up even more pace. Deaf to the horns of angry bus drivers, Rufus raced west.
Eventually the road widened, and up ahead Jonathan saw an island in the middle of a busy intersection of roads. On the island, a squat white structure gazed solemnly down at the cars swarming around its base: Marble Arch. To Jonathan’s amazement, Verv was nowhere to be seen. He nudged Correlli.
“I don’t believe it! We’re going to win!”
From behind him came a familiar throaty roar. Jonathan twisted in his seat to see the flame-painted cab speeding down Oxford Street after them, headlights on full beam.
“Spoke too soon! He’s coming! Rufus!”
Rufus bowed his head and strained even harder, hauling the rickshaw forward again, but the cab loomed ever closer on their tail, sounding blasts on its horn as if it were on a hunt. Verv brushed his bumper against the back of the rickshaw, sending Rufus stumbling forward. Looking behind him and through the cab’s windscreen, Jonathan could see the driver grinning manically and headbanging to some unheard beat. As they reached the traffic lights before the intersection, Verv pulled out from behind them and moved to the right, primed to overtake.
But not, as it turned out, in time.
In a final, daredevil manoeuvre, Rufus galloped through a red light and cut across the stream of cars heading in the other direction, before executing a wild left turn and hurtling up on to the island and underneath Marble Arch. Equally mindless of his own safety, Verv zoomed through the traffic and crashed through the arch millimetres after them, coming to a skidding halt on the broad promenade beyond.
Suddenly everything was very quiet. Correlli blew out his cheeks with relief, and patted the exhausted Rufus on his back. Jonathan peeled himself from his seat and climbed out of the rickshaw, relieved to feel the broad paving stones beneath his feet. Above his head, the national flags that lined the promenade were gently fluttering in the night breeze. Jonathan walked slowly over to the cab and got into the front seat, where he was surprised to see Verv humming cheerily to himself, tapping on the steering wheel. In the back seat, Fray and Nettle were sitting with their arms folded, pointedly looking out of opposite windows. When he saw Jonathan, Verv giggled and whispered in his ear.
“Bossman is getting old. Had to wait twenty minutes for you to show up.”
Jonathan stared at him, dumbfounded.
“You threw the race? Why – what was the point. . .?”
Verv simply whooped, banged the roof of his cab, and revved up his engine once more.
14
Suddenly Raquella was tumbling down a narrow chute, her arms and legs banging against the sides. From somewhere above her head there was a deafening clang, and then she landed with a thump on something soft, sending a cloud of feathers into the air. The maidservant lay dazed for a second, and then sneezed violently.
Gingerly, Raquella got to her feet and surveyed her surroundings. She had fallen into a small room underneath the stage. An old mattress had been laid on the ground to break her fall. At the top of the chute, the underside of the steel table appeared as solid and immovable as it had been before, but the leather straps that had pinned her down were now dangling uselessly from her wrists and ankles, and the sound of enthusiastic applause was filtering down from the auditorium.
“Thank you! Thank you!” she heard Mountebank cry. “It is indeed the Queen Of Knives! My machine never fails! Till next we meet. . .!”
There was the sound of an explosion, and then a gasp of surprise from the audience.
“Stupid magician,” Raquella muttered to herself, as she undid the straps from her wrists. “I’ll make him disappear.”
“Er . . . excuse me, miss?”
She looked up. A door had opened and a boy of Raquella’s age was peering into the room. He had a cloth cap on his head, and his face was covered in what looked like soot.
“What?” she snapped.
“Are you OK? Soft landing?”
“Never better. Who
are you?”
“Samuel Northwich. You can call me Sam.”
He waited expectantly.
“Raquella Joubert,” the maid said finally. “You can call me Miss Joubert.”
“Oh, right. Well, I’m Mr Mountebank’s apprentice. I’m here to take you to his dressing room. He always wants to say thank you to people who’ve helped him out with a trick.”
“How generous of him. Lead the way. There’s a few things I’d like to say to him myself.”
Raquella smoothed down her hair and headed after the boy with as much dignity as she could muster. He scampered through a network of corridors that ran underneath the theatre, respectfully doffing his cap as they passed dressing-room doors tattooed with pentagrams and the word “Star” scrawled beneath them. Backstage, it was as if all the theatre’s productions were taking place at once: Raquella had to duck down as a team of jugglers hurled knives at one another out in the hallway, swerve out of the way as a clown pursued a fleeing rabbit, and step over the prone form of a suited gentlemen lying on a bed of nails, reading a copy of The Darkside Informer.
Eventually the corridor became quieter and dingier, and the cacophony of rehearsals faded away to nothing. They came to a halt by two doors facing each other at the end of the corridor. A puddle of brown water was seeping out from underneath one. The boy opened the other and grandly gestured for Raquella to enter.
“This is the dressing room of Mountebank the Magnificent?” asked the maidservant, her voice heavy with irony.
“’S’not so bad,” the boy said loyally. “If he wants to use the loo, it’s just across the hall.”
“I’m sure that’s a great comfort,” she murmured.
Compared to the scene outside, Mountebank’s dressing room was surprisingly warm and welcoming. It was bursting at the seams with props and gadgets: coloured scarves and magic lanterns; top hats and giant playing cards. A collection of swords leant idly against a large cabinet decorated with stars. Near to the door, a pristine mirror hung over a dressing table cluttered with make-up.
