Billie was walking up the hotel’s front steps. But he wouldn’t have recognized her if she hadn’t been pointed out. An elegant silk gown swept down from her shoulders, peacock feathers sprouted from a bonnet, and most impressively, a large pair of wire-framed, dark-lensed spectacles wobbled on her nose, giving her a mysterious air. She was also several inches taller, and Harry glimpsed, just under the hem of the silk dress, some wooden blocks attached to the bottom of her boots. No wonder she was swaying slightly as she twirled a dainty umbrella and headed up toward those revolving hotel doors.
“Wha—What is she doing, Artie?”
“It’s all based on the Atlantic City Laundry Caper.”
“The what?” Vaguely, he remembered the words. “But—”
“It’s a pretty simple business, really. I think you’re going to like it, now that you’re actually listening,” said Arthur, swinging around. He put an arm around Harry, and a smile was back on his face. “So, back on the road, Billie rolled into Atlantic City, out of cash. She needed to get a job quick, so she tried to get one at a laundry, a fancy one for ladies and gents and their fancy clothes. The owner said she’d have to prove herself by washing a load of his stinky stockings and shirts, which she did and did it perfectly too.
“But the owner didn’t give her the job and didn’t pay her for washing the socks and shirts either! Just rolled around laughing, saying he’d never in a month of Sundays have a ‘dirty hobo kid from New Orleans’ messing up his fancy clean laundry! Big mistake. Billie grabbed a few bits and pieces off a laundry line and disguised herself as the servant of some rich lady who’d just arrived in town and—”
“But…how…” Harry tried to take it all in.
“I’m getting to that! She stuck blocks of wood under her shoes to make herself taller, pulled a bonnet over her face, and counted on the thick laundry steam to stop anyone from looking too closely. Clever, eh?” Arthur chuckled. “She just turned up at the door, asked the maids who worked there about placing a large order on behalf of her mistress for washing household linen. While they were fetching the owner, she slipped in, vanished into the steam, and tipped seventeen boxes of washing powder into one of the vats. Bubbles everywhere. That owner got himself a fancy clean laundry all right—took nearly two days to rinse the place out! Pretty good, don’t you think?” Arthur pointed back down at the hotel steps. “And it’s come in pretty handy for this Herbie business too, I’d say.”
Billie was at the top of the steps now, bulked-up shoes, silk dress, and all. She was mumbling to the doorman, while making various grand gestures with the umbrella. And whatever she was saying, it seemed to work, because the doorman stood aside, and the elaborately disguised street girl swept through the revolving doors. The doors spun behind her, and Arthur nodded with a small, precise action.
“But this disguise—I don’t see how it works.” Harry stared at the still-spinning doors. “It’s one thing to pretend to be a servant, but what’s she pretending to be now?”
“That’s mainly down to me.” Another tweak of his tie. “I remembered reading that particular hotels are often popular with particular professions—word spreads, you see. So I said to myself, if this Boris Zell uses the Hotel Crosby, maybe other magicians do too. I ran back to the library and did some research, checked through old newspapers and hotel guides, and it turns out I was right. Magicians, illusionists, men of the theater—they’ve been using the Crosby for years.
“So would they be surprised if someone a bit exotic and theatrically dressed turned up—I don’t think so.” He was speaking quickly now. “The more exotic the better, probably. Billie and I had a quick think, and with the help of a few more books, we invented a whole new magician for her to be—Princess Moldo. That’s who she’s going to check in as!”
“Princess Moldo?” Harry had no idea what to say.
“The famous illusionist from Peru. I’ve been running around like mad ever since, finding out a few other things, buying the bits of costume, the dress, the umbrella—and not forgetting those dark spectacles.” He pointed back down toward where Billie had been, wearing those glittering frames. “Do you know they actually come from Peru? From Lima? Found them in an antique shop—the Princess Moldo spectacles, I’m calling them.”
“But costume, spectacles, umbrellas—it must have cost a fortune…” Harry butted in.
“A fair bit, yes, but my allowance covered it.” Arthur tapped his wallet inside his jacket. “What else am I going to spend my money on, apart from my friends? Us and our plans, Harry, that’s all that matters.” Briefly, that troubled look returned. “To me, anyway…”
It might just work. Harry was still taking in a lot of what Arthur had said, but clearly this scheme was a good one, and so far it had worked. But would it continue to succeed? Getting through the door disguised as a Peruvian illusionist was clever. There was no question about that. But how exactly was Billie going to break into Room 760 itself? What about checking in at the hotel reception desk, which would need forms filled in and questions answered, during which time her disguise could easily be detected? All risky…
“Harry? What are you doing?”
“I’m going in too.” Harry was back on the rail. “Like I said, I’m almost there anyway.”
“But Billie and me… We’re the ones who are doing this!”
“Why can’t we carry out my plan too?” One foot edged out on the rope. “Doubles our chances in case something goes wrong. Herbie’s been kidnapped, Artie! Zell could be doing all sorts of stuff to him, and he won’t stop until he gets the secrets to Herbie’s tricks and—”
“I know all that!” Arthur’s face was red again, bright red. “Look, the whole Princess Moldo plan depends on the hotel staff not suspecting a thing! If you burst in there and get caught, then—”
“I’m not going to get caught, am I? Just guard the rope, Artie!”
“I don’t need to! Just like you don’t need to do this trick of yours!”
“I’ll be back soon!”
“Harry! You’re not listening to me again!”
“This is all for Herbie! That’s what matters!”
“Of course it’s about Herbie! Why else do you think me and Billie thought up our—”
“Remember the rope!”
“Harry! Stop acting like you don’t want anything to do with me! I’ve got enough of that in my life already!”
Harry swung around and saw his friend’s face. He had never seen it look quite like that before. It was trembling all over. Artie’s hand was trembling too, as it reached into his pocket and tore out a letter, the letter to the school, the one Harry had helped snatch just a few hours ago.
“Next thing, you’ll want to send me 452 miles away too! You won’t have to listen to me then! Is that what you want? Is it? Is it—”
“Whoa!”
Harry had lost his balance. He recovered it the only way he could, by swinging his foot right around and planting it on the rope out over the street. He was balanced again, but he had also started the walk, and he couldn’t stop. He had to keep walking, walking out over the street. Perhaps that’s for the best. The echoes of Artie’s words were still shuddering around him, making his face burn.
He had no idea how to reply. Perhaps this way I don’t have to—at least until I’ve thought of something to say. His face still pulsing with heat, he angled his arms, steadied his legs, and bit his lip. Need to concentrate on the rope walk, he told himself—because it was turning out to be harder, much harder, than the one in the park.
The breeze sweeping up from the street was surprisingly powerful, full of the distant sounds of the street below. Harry glanced down, and his heart throbbed as he made out the tiny shapes of people, horses, cabs. The breeze flapped through his clothes, buffeting him about, and each time he lifted a foot from the rope he had to adjust his position, leaning into the gusts so that they w
ouldn’t blow him off. Completely different from the park.
The wind was affecting the rope too, making it quiver, and it bounced slightly with every step. Harry’s heart pounded and the palms of his hands, flung out on either side of him, were damp with sweat. He tried to think of nothing but his feet, edging along the rope step by step, and he kept leaning slightly into the wind, letting it support him…
With no warning, it changed direction.
Harry’s arms flailed. Desperately, he tried to right himself as he tilted off the rope, unable to regain his balance. The wind spiraled around him with its noises of the far-below street, and Harry watched his arms blur through the air, felt his heart hammer inside his chest, and then, just in time, shot out a trembling leg.
The shift of weight tilted him back, just a little. He re-angled his arms, and that helped too. The wind buffeted, his clothes flapped, the rope shuddered. He was balanced again, but only just. His legs were weak and trembling, and his face clenched as tight as a fist. Concentrate. Think of nothing but the rope. And yet, even as Harry tried to do just that, he couldn’t help noticing something out of the corner of his eye.
A window in a nearby building. It was level with him, ten stories up. Someone was watching him from it. A face. White hair, white eyebrows, a pair of staring eyes. A pale-suited figure, two hands resting neatly on the windowsill. Whoever he was, he was watching Harry, and something made Harry start turning his head to take in this figure properly, to see him more clearly.
The wind blew. Harry’s arms sprang out on either side, but he was tilting off the rope again. His arms swirled, his heart pounded, his hands snatched at the empty air as he fought to pull himself back. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw that the pale-suited figure had vanished from the window.
Leaving nothing but dark, empty glass.
Chapter 13
Harry had only glimpsed his observer. But the observer himself had seen Harry plainly. Even now, as he stepped back up to the window, he continued to study the boy who, for some reason, was teetering on a rope stretched between two buildings, nearly ten stories up in the air.
About eleven years old. A street boy, from the look of him. A shoeshiner, given certain dark blotches on his clothes and face which the observer had spotted, even at this distance.
The man stood at the window. His suit was elegantly tailored, its cloth cream. Neatly manicured fingers rested on the polished windowsill, then rose to fetch a pen and a small leather notebook from their owner’s pockets.
The boy had regained his balance. For the second time, he had nearly fallen, but his quick, nimble body had righted itself, and he was wobbling onward, making his way once more along the quivering rope. The man observed this and made a quick sketch of the two buildings and the rope. Next to it, the pen dotted out several lines of complicated numerical code, along with another symbol, a very curious one indeed.
At first, it was just a circle. But the steel nib shaded inside it, until it was black with ink. Further up the pen’s length, a finger twitched, flicking a tiny button. A hiss, as white mist leaked out of the pen’s nib. The mist thickened and drifted away.
Burned into the black circle, the white shape of a bird.
The boy had gone now. Only the rope remained. But the notes had been made. The man closed the leather book, revealing on its cover another white bird shape. He slid it back into his pocket with the pen.
One hand waved, dispersing any lingering traces of mist. Another lifted a telephone from the desk and dialed a number.
The telephone’s earpiece buzzed. A voice in a language that wasn’t English muttered through the crackles.
“It is possible,” the man said, “that we have discovered a candidate.”
Chapter 14
Harry toppled onto the roof. He clung to a chimney stack, shaking all over. His body was weak, his heart still pounded, and when he lifted his hands from the chimney’s brickwork, he saw they had left behind the shape of his palms and fingers in sweat. But he had made it back to the hotel, where he was sure the secret behind Herbie’s disappearance would lie. Steadied by the thought, he set off across the roof, weaving past more chimney stacks toward the hatch he had spotted from the other side
Not even locked. Why would it be when there was no reason to think anyone could get onto a ten-story-high roof? But the door to Room 760 would be locked, that was for sure. Harry pulled the hatch open, slid down the ladder inside, and arrived at the top of a stairwell. Clattering down it, he peered around in his usual way for any stray bits of metal—a nail, a pin, anything at all useful.
Nothing in the stairwell, but as he reached the seventh floor and slid down a corridor, he saw a row of framed paintings on the wall. He stopped, lifted one down, and plucked the nail out of the plaster. A pick. Hurrying on, he prepared to inspect the lock on Zell’s door and bend the nail into the right shape. But then he reached the corner, peered around it, and saw that he didn’t need a lock pick after all.
The door to Room 760 was open. Next to it stood a cart of fresh linen, and two maids were hurrying into the room with fresh sheets. Harry tossed the nail away and ducked under a table by the wall. Watching from under the tablecloth, he waited until the maids’ backs were turned. He glided through the door and rolled under the bed…
…straight into a peacock feather, an umbrella, and a pair of dark-lensed spectacles.
“Harry? I don’t believe it! What are you doing here?”
“I came down from the roof…Ow!”
“Didn’t Arthur find you? Didn’t he tell you that we already had a plan?”
“Well, I…mmmpf!”
Billie was squashed under the bed. The springs above were close to her head, her silk dress and bonnet and umbrella were bulky, and her elbow had ended up in Harry’s mouth, making it hard for him to speak. Another hand was right in front of his face, holding up a little slip of paper.
“Well, you better not interfere! This plan’s working just dandy, and I’m not having you wreck it!” She pushed the bit of paper closer. “This is the seventh-floor linen-changing rotation. Artie got it by sweet-talking one of the maids who works here, so we knew I could just slip in here, nice and easy. ’Course, I had to get up here quick, but that was no trouble, ’cause it took no time at all to check in. Whenever they asked me questions, I just answered in Spanish, which is what they speak down Peru way, and Artie gave me a few phrases to remember.”
The Princess Moldo spectacles, made in Lima itself, tilted on her nose. “So I get my key, I go up to my room, I walk straight on past it, and come up here instead. Pretty impressive, huh? So don’t you try to interfere, you hear me?”
The elbow left Harry’s mouth. But he wasn’t sure what to say anyway. Point by point, Billie had removed any possible questions he might have had about Arthur’s and her plan, which he could see really was a very good one.
“So how did you get in? You better not have been spotted!” Billie hissed.
“I…I came down from the roof,” he said. “Threw a rope from the building next door. It was like the trick we did in the park, Billie…”
“You tightroped here?”
“Yes—ten stories up! It’ll work for getting out too, I think, as long as Artie follows his instructions—”
“Artie? Instructions? So you did see him!”
Harry stopped talking as instantly as if the elbow had blocked his mouth again. But the Princess Moldo spectacles were even closer now. He was glad their lenses were so dark, because he sensed the eyes behind would be staring at him in a very unfriendly way indeed.
“You saw him! So he would have told you about our plan!”
“Yes but…”
“He told you, and you decided to come anyway. You ignored him!”
“I know…” Harry winced. “Except—”
“Typical! Can’t you see how he’s going to feel about
that? With that father of his—grrmpf!”
The maids had hurried over to the bed, so Billie had been forced to swallow her words. But her face was still right in front of Harry’s, those dark lenses glinting. He tried to wriggle away, but the bed wasn’t wide enough, so the two of them were stuck there, unable to move, unable to speak, their noses less than an inch apart. For nearly a minute, they stayed like that, while the maids changed the sheets above and delicately dusted nearby ornaments. But at last, the maids left, shutting the door behind them, and Harry scrambled out.
“I’m sorry…I…”
“What’s gotten into you, Harry?” Billie scrambled out too. “Running off all the time! Never listening to a word me and Artie say!”
“Herbie’s been kidnapped! I can’t just stand around—”
“Think me and Artie don’t know that? We want to help Herbie too!”
“So let’s rescue him!”
“That’s what we are doing! That’s what the Princess Moldo plan is all about, not that you’ve noticed. You know, Harry, when I met you and Artie, I thought you were the best friends I’d found since New Orleans.” The glasses trembled and their lenses flashed. “Well, I was right about Artie—not so sure about you! All you care about is thinking up plans of your own like this tightroping business… Supposed to be impressed, am I?”
“It got me in here, didn’t it?”
“But you don’t need to be here! That’s what I’m saying!”
“Of course I need to be here! Herbie’s my friend.”
“He’s our friend too! We’re meant to be doing this together. We’re a team, aren’t we? Oh, confound it!”
Harry ducked. Billie had hurled her silk umbrella straight at him, and he managed to dodge it, but only just. It smashed into the mantelpiece, splintering several of the ornaments the maids had so carefully dusted, and then flew off at an angle, thudding into a chair. Porcelain fragments fell from the mantelpiece, rocked on the floor, and went still.
Magician's Fire Page 8
