Nighttrap

by Tom Becker

  “Ugh,” he shuddered. “I don’t want to see this guy’s act. I hate rats.”

  “Er, Jonathan?” Raquella said, in an oddly strained voice.

  “What is it?”

  “I don’t think the rats make it on to the stage.”

  He turned round to see a pale Raquella brandishing a poster that read Susie Strange – Mistress of Serpents! The girl in the picture was dressed in a sparkling pink leotard and had a broad smile across her face, despite the snakes coiled around her arms and legs.

  There was a hissing sound in the darkness.

  Jonathan stifled a yell and scanned the floor, his legs trembling. There was a movement underneath the window, a flash of scales, and he saw a long, thick shape slither slowly towards him. Raquella jumped up on to the dressing table and gestured frantically at him to join her, but it felt as if Jonathan’s feet had been glued to the floor. He was mesmerized by the snake as it slid closer, its darting tongue and tiny, cruel eyes.

  “The cages!” Raquella squeaked, her eyes wide. “Open the cages!”

  Jonathan turned round and fiddled with the cage door with shaking fingers, aware of the smooth sound of the snake’s underbelly brushing the floor. Just as he was opening the cage door, the rat rushed forward and tried to bite his fingers. In his haste to move away, Jonathan knocked the cage to the floor, and the rat went shooting out through the open door and huddled in the far corner of the room.

  The snake paused delicately, weighing up this new option, before giving Jonathan a final malevolent glare and making off after the rat. They waited until the snake had cornered the rodent before racing out of the dressing room. Jonathan slammed the door behind them and leant against it.

  “That . . . was . . . too . . . close.”

  They hurried away from the dressing room, determined to get as far away from the snake as possible. Before long the corridor broadened and sloped upwards, and they came out through a side entrance into the main auditorium. The hall was deserted, rows of empty seats watching the stage in silence. The clowns painted on to the ceiling wrestled and battled one another without an audience to spur them on. Jonathan was about to make his way through the auditorium and head backstage when he heard a loud scraping noise. Ducking down behind a chair, he saw in the glow of the footlights a young lad dragging a box across the stage.

  With a sigh of relief, Raquella walked past Jonathan out into the aisle.

  “Sam!” she called out happily.

  The boy looked up, startled. He peered out into the audience, finally catching sight of the maid.

  “Oh, hello, Miss Joubert,” he faltered. “What are doing here? The theatre doesn’t open for a couple of hours yet. I’m the only one here.”

  “Am I early? The back door was open,” Raquella lied breezily. “It’s just that I enjoyed Mountebank’s show so much that I wanted to see it again. He is performing tonight, I take it?”

  At the mention of the magician’s name, Sam stiffened. “I’m afraid not, miss. Mr Mountebank’s contract was cancelled a couple of days ago. I doubt he’ll ever perform here again.”

  “Really? That’s such a shame!” Raquella walked down the aisle and up the steps that led on to the stage. “Will he be performing elsewhere?”

  “I, er, couldn’t say, miss,” Sam stuttered, taking a pace back towards the wings. “I think he may have retired from the business, at least for the time being. Says no one appreciates magicians any more.”

  “So why are you still here?” Raquella asked sweetly.

  Sam gestured at the box in front of him. “He wanted me to put his props into storage. My master is very particular about his props.”

  “Could you tell me where Mr Mountebank is now, then?”

  “I don’t know. Really, you have to go. You shouldn’t be in here.”

  “You’re lying,” Jonathan called out.

  Sam jumped at the sound of the new voice. “Who’s there?”

  Jonathan strode up the steps and on to the stage. Frustration boiled in his veins, and at that moment he felt like shaking the truth from the other boy.

  “Stay out of this, Jonathan,” Raquella warned, as Sam shrank further into the shadowy wings.

  “He’s lying, Raquella, and we haven’t got time for this. Either he tells us where the magician is now or I’ll make him.”

  “No – please!” Sam cried, holding his hands up around his face.

  The maid stepped in front of Jonathan. “Not another step!” she said firmly. “Threatening him isn’t going to help.”

  Raquella took a step towards the magician’s assistant, her arms outstretched.

  “No one’s going to hurt you, Sam, I promise. But you must understand, we have to find Mountebank. I know he’s your master, but he’s done some terrible things and we have to stop him before he does any more. You’re a good person, I can see that. You must help us.”

  Jonathan was surprised to see the boy’s shoulders shake as he started to cry.

  “Please, Sam,” Raquella said gently. “For me?”

  The boy sniffed loudly, and stepped out into the footlights. Raquella’s hand flew to her mouth in shock. Sam’s face was covered in red, puffy bruises, and his right eye was swollen completely shut.

  “I can’t tell you anything!” he shouted, tears streaming down his face. “He’ll kill me if I do! And you too! He’ll kill us all!”

  24

  Sam slumped down on the box and put his head in his hands. Instinctively Raquella crossed the stage to comfort him, but he shied away as she tried to stroke his arm. The maid shot Jonathan a wide-eyed glance over Sam’s shoulder. Jonathan didn’t know what to say. Despite everything, even though Mountebank had deceived and double-crossed them, it was hard to believe that the softly-spoken magician could have been capable of delivering such a beating.

  “Why?” he said eventually.

  “He caught me practising one of his tricks,” Sam sniffed, the words tumbling from his mouth. “He’d gone away and I didn’t know if he was coming back and I thought it couldn’t hurt if I tried The Exploding Death again but then he did come back and he saw me doing it and. . . He’s warned me before about using his props – my master’s very particular about them – but he’s never been like this before. He’s never. . .”

  He trailed off.

  “Oh, Sam,” Raquella said gently.

  Jonathan got down on his haunches and looked the boy in the eye.

  “So where’s Mountebank now?”

  “He told me to gather up all of his props and take them to him.”

  “Where?”

  “I can’t tell you!” Sam said miserably. “If he finds out, my life won’t be worth living. Mountebank will hurt you too, and I don’t want that.” He looked up at Raquella, his eyes burning fiercely through the tears.

  “The boy doesn’t need to tell you,” a deep voice boomed from the back of the auditorium. “It’s perfectly clear where the swine’s gone.”

  Jonathan peered out through the footlights and made out a familiar burly figure striding towards them, his barrel chest adorned only by a red waistcoat.

  “Correlli!” he called out.

  The fire-eater nodded grimly at him as he climbed up on the stage. There was a nasty swelling on his forehead, and his jaw was set with murderous intent.

  “You got here quickly.”

  “No thanks to you!” Jonathan replied indignantly. “Why did you run off like that? I thought it was you who’d knocked me out.”

  Correlli sighed. “You weren’t the only one to get jumped. I got a glimpse of Mountebank before he hit me, and when I woke up the only thing I could think about was getting my hands on him. The police were already exploring the place upstairs, and I couldn’t afford to get caught. Sorry I left you to it, Jonathan. To be honest, I wasn’t thinking very straight.” He turned and looked a
t Sam. “Mountebank’s gone back to Spinoza’s Fairground, hasn’t he? Where we all used to perform?”

  Sam nodded, wiping his eyes with the back of his hand. “He said something about selling a stone tonight, and that it was going to make him rich.”

  “OK,” Correlli frowned, “so Mountebank’s selling the Crimson Stone, but who to?”

  A face came unbidden into Jonathan’s mind. He shivered. “Vendetta. It must be. Correlli, we’ve got to stop him! If he gets the stone from Mountebank, we’ll never get Mrs Elwood back!”

  “Oh, we’ll stop him all right,” the fire-eater replied darkly. “One way or another, this ends tonight. I should have made that cheap conjuror pay a long time ago. He’s not going to get away with it twice.”

  Jonathan fished a pocket watch from his trousers and consulted the dial. “It’s half past seven now. How far’s this fairground?”

  “Far enough. If Mountebank’s selling the Stone tonight, we need to move.”

  They glanced at one another, and then Raquella gave Sam’s arm a squeeze.

  “Are you going to be OK here?”

  The boy struggled to his feet, hastily wiping his eyes. “I’ll come with you,” he said. “You’ll need me – no one knows my master like I do.”

  “No,” Correlli said, shaking his head. “There’s enough youngsters going as it is. You look like you’ve been through enough today, son. Put some ice on that eye and leave us to take care of Mountebank.”

  Sam opened his mouth to argue, then appeared to think better of it.

  “OK, but . . . Miss Joubert?” He drew himself up as the maid glanced back at him. “Take care of yourself.”

  Raquella nodded gravely, and then walked off the stage and away through the auditorium, leaving the young teenager alone in the gloom.

  As the three of them made their way through the dingy foyer, there came the high-pitched squeal of a horse from outside the theatre, and then an almighty crash. Correlli smiled thinly.

  “I was wondering when they’d get here,” he said.

  Jonathan didn’t have chance to ask what he meant. The fire-eater swung a hefty boot and kicked the front doors of Kinski’s open, before striding out into chaos.

  Directly in front of the theatre, a large, horse-drawn vehicle had reared up on to the pavement, its front right wheel spinning crazily in the air. The main part of the vehicle was an elongated carriage, in which rows of seats could be seen through large glass windows. On the roof of the carriage was an exposed top deck filled with long benches. The impact of the crash had thrown many of the passengers from the vehicle, leaving one portly man hanging from the side, his feet scrabbling desperately for purchase. Two horses were prancing skittishly on the pavement, their reins tangled up around a lamp post. A crowd of Darksiders had formed around the scene. Next to Jonathan, two urchins were rifling through the pockets of an unconscious accident victim.

  Jonathan glanced at Correlli. “What is that thing?”

  “That, my friend, is a Darkside Omnibus. It’s the safest public transport in the borough. Not as safe as walking or staying indoors, I’ll grant you, but it’ll take you where you want to go. And by the looks of the driver, as fast as you want to go to.”

  Jonathan saw a spike of pink hair jutting up from the driver’s seat and a fist punching the air in celebration. He laughed.

  There was a commotion from the downstairs compartment, and Fray and Nettle came tussling down on to the pavement.

  “That was your fault! You had to tell him ‘left’, didn’t you?”

  “You lying snake! I told him ‘right’ – it was you who said left!”

  Seeing Jonathan, they stopped pushing each other and raced over to envelop him in a large hug.

  “You made it! After your dad told us what was going on . . .”

  “. . . we made it over here as fast as we could. Hijacked some wheels too.”

  Correlli loomed up on Jonathan’s shoulder and greeted the twins. “Hello, ladies.”

  At the sight of the fire-eater, the twins recoiled.

  “It’s all right,” Jonathan cut in hastily. “I was wrong – Correlli didn’t double-cross us. It was Mountebank – he faked his death!”

  “What ?” Nettle screeched.

  Fray cackled triumphantly. “Told you so.”

  “Am I forgiven?” Correlli asked, with a raised eyebrow.

  Fray gave him a fierce hug, while Nettle sniffed a grudging welcome. Amid the hullabaloo, a grizzled head lifted itself slowly from behind the guardrail on the top deck of the omnibus.

  “If you don’t hurry up and get on this infernal contraption, boy,” a low voice said ominously, “we’re going to have a serious falling out.”

  “Carnegie!” Jonathan cried out.

  As the rest of the Troupe and Raquella filed into the main part of the carriage, Jonathan scampered up the small flight of steps that curved round the back of the vehicle, and came out on to the top deck. Amazingly, a small congregation of hijacked passengers remained sitting on the right-hand bench: a huge man with a violent tic muttering to himself; a woman in a low-cut violet dress bearing a profoundly indignant look; and a gaunt old man with sallow eyes. On the other side of the deck, Carnegie was hunched down on the floor, gripping the rail behind his head and looking slightly green.

  “Hello, boy,” he said weakly.

  “You don’t look so great.”

  “Buses. Can’t stand them. Now go and tell that harebrained driver if he takes any more corners like the last one I’m going to throw him off the roof and run him over.”

  Jonathan patted the wereman’s arm sympathetically and clambered over to where Verv was perched at the front of the carriage. The getaway driver had changed back into a more sober, old-fashioned Darkside suit, which only served to throw his bright pink Mohican into sharper relief. He clapped his hands excitedly when he saw Jonathan.

  “Back on the cobbles,” he giggled, clattering his teeth together and bouncing round in his seat. “Just like old times! Where we going now?”

  “The old fairground on the way to Bleakmoor. And Verv?”

  The Mohican driver looked up expectantly.

  “Quickety-quick, yeah?”

  Verv snatched up the reins and geed the horses into life, his delighted war-cry louder than their startled whinnies. The omnibus crashed down from the pavement and on to the road, sending Jonathan flying backwards. Unable to control his feet, he was staggering towards the edge of the deck when a cold hand fastened on to him and pulled him back. Jonathan turned round to see the gaunt man staring at him oddly.

  “Thanks, mister. I nearly went overboard there.”

  The man smiled, revealing a set of gums that were bleeding so badly they had stained his teeth a sickly red.

  “We wouldn’t want that, would we?” he breathed. “Lovely little morsel like you.”

  He lunged forward, fastening long fingers around Jonathan’s neck. Jonathan tried to cry for help, but his windpipe was choked and it was impossible to make himself heard over the thunderous clattering of the carriage wheels on the cobblestones. Frantically, he waved his arms in an attempt to get Carnegie’s attention, but the wereman’s head was in his hands and he didn’t look up.

  Black spots were forming in front of Jonathan’s eyes. He reached up and tried to prise the man’s fingers from his throat, but his grip was astonishingly strong. The man smiled in hungry anticipation.

  “Been waiting all day to eat,” he breathed. “You’d better be worth it.”

  Jonathan’s head lolled back as his oxygen supply grew weaker and weaker. His legs were feeling numb and he knew he had only seconds before he passed out. The wind howled and buffeted his ears, merciless to the last.

  Suddenly the carriage tipped sharply to one side, as Verv swerved off the Grand at full speed. The gaunt man stumbled, sending the pair
of them flying into the guardrail that ran round the circumference of the deck. Jonathan found himself looking down at the road, seeing the cobbles flying beneath him and the startled faces of pedestrians. With the fingers around his throat relaxing for a second, he summoned the energy to throw his shoulder into his assailant’s bony ribcage, and was rewarded with an “oof” as the air flew out from his lungs. Jonathan kicked out, and felt his foot connect with a kneecap. The gaunt man screamed with pain, and slipped further over the edge of the rail. Still he refused to let go of Jonathan’s throat. At this rate he would take them both crashing to the pavement.

  From nowhere a large object came crashing down on the gaunt man’s forehead, tipping his entire body over the side of the vehicle. As he fell, the man grabbed a desperate fistful of Jonathan’s shirt; he had to clutch the rail to stop himself from following the man over the edge. For a second their eyes locked together, before the gaunt man’s fingers finally gave way and he fell in a jarring heap on to the pavement.

  Half on his knees, Jonathan turned round, expecting to see Carnegie standing over him. Instead the woman in the violet dress put down her umbrella, brushed down her skirts and sat imperiously back in her seat, but not before shooting Jonathan a warning glance.

  “Any more mischief from you and you’ll follow him over. Understand? I’m late enough as it is.”

  Too out of breath to reply, Jonathan nodded and slumped back down by Carnegie, rubbing his bruised neck. Spots were bursting in front of his eyes like fireworks. The wereman still refused to look up.

  “Are we nearly there yet, boy?”

  Jonathan rested his head back against the bench.

  “I dunno,” he panted. “I bloody hope so, though.”

  25

  The omnibus continued on without a breath or a pause: a reckless, rattling juggernaut. As they raced from the crowded streets in the centre towards the outskirts of Darkside, the last light drained from the summer evening sky, and workmen began lighting the streetlamps. The houses cowered from the hidden dangers of the night. Despite the lateness of the hour, the air was still warm and cloying, and Jonathan was glad for the cooling breeze that whipped across the top deck.