“Darwin was friends with him during his medical school training. He even took some lessons in taxidermy from Edmonstone, which not only fueled his interest in biology, but also taught him valuable information about animal preservation that would come in handy during his voyage on the Beagle.”
“So we’ve got our Darwin link. What does it say?”
Alexa skimmed down the page until she saw a paragraph with the words she was searching for. “Listen to this. ‘One story that was passed to me is especially interesting given the recent photo of a creature in Loch Ness taken by surgeon Robert Kenneth Wilson and featured in many newspaper articles in 1934. During an interview with noted Scottish taxidermist Ewan Stewart, I was regaled with a tale that he alleged had originated with John Edmonstone. Edmonstone claimed that he and a college student had been attacked by a fantastical beast on an outing to Loch Ness and speculated about why it had been drawn to them.”
“So Edmonstone had a Nessie hunting call?” Grant asked.
“I doubt he would name it that if he was attacked by Nessie.”
“True. It would be like having a grizzly bear whistle. Not something you’d want to use again.”
“The rest of this is even better,” Alexa said, and continued reading. “‘An unnamed companion was said to have cut off a part of the beast, which can only be supposed to be an ancestor of the creature photographed by Mr. Wilson. Although we can’t attest to the veracity of Edmonstone’s story, Mr. Stewart also claimed that the entire account was recorded in a journal that Edmonstone kept secreted inside a mounted stag head that adorned his flat, accessed by a latch cleverly hidden under the fur at the base of the stag’s neck. No one knows what happened to Edmonstone’s possessions upon his death, so we may never learn more about his tall tale.’”
“No problem,” Grant said sarcastically. “Assuming the story is true, all we have to do is find a two-hundred-year-old stag head that may not even exist any more and hope that no one has already removed the journal. What could be easier?”
“There has to be a way to find it or Laroche wouldn’t have laid out all of these clues. He must have read this book and begun a search for the stag-head trophy. He might even know where it is. Stop being so pessimistic.”
“Well, we’re not going to be able to ask Laroche. Last I heard, he was still in a coma.” Grant knocked his knee against the bookshelf, and his face contorted in pain. He held his leg for few a moments until he relaxed again.
“You don’t look so good, either. Are you all right?”
“Just a little joint soreness. Probably got it from all the plane travel in the past week.” He wasn’t very convincing, but before Alexa could probe, he went on. “Tyler and Brielle are coming back to London tonight. We’ll put our heads together at the hotel and see if we can make sense of this.”
“Are they a thing? I got a weird vibe when I saw them together.”
“It’s complicated. She’s Jewish.”
“That shouldn’t be a problem for Tyler. We were raised Presbyterian by our grandmother, but neither of us has been much of a church-goer since we were kids.”
“I think it’s more a problem for her.”
Alexa frowned. “That’s too bad. Even though she’s kind of gruff, I like her. She seems like a good match for him.”
“Sometimes it doesn’t work out like you want it to,” Grant said, looking intently at Alexa. He took out his phone. “I’ll call Ashburn to pick us up.”
Alexa stuck the note card in the page as a bookmark. When they got to the lobby, Ashburn was waiting for them and checked out the book. Alexa wanted to read it more closely to see if there were any other clues. She tucked the book in her purse, and they got in his car for the two-minute ride to the engineering lab. Ashburn assured them that they wouldn’t miss their return train to King’s Cross.
They pulled into a gated car park and Ashburn swiped his card to lift the barrier. Once they were parked, Ashburn escorted them to a garage-type roll-up door. Alexa could make out all kinds of equipment inside the lab where two students were working, but Ashburn waved his arm at four go-karts lined up in front of the open door. Each one was painted in a different color: black, red, green, and yellow, with wraparound black rubber bumpers.
As Grant and Alexa approached, the students dropped what they were doing and gathered at the door.
“Lawrence and Penelope,” Ashburn said, “I would like to introduce you to senior Gordian engineer Grant Westfield and Dr. Alexa Locke, the sister of Gordian’s founder, Tyler Locke. Lawrence and Penelope are two of the students responsible for developing the HydroSpeed project for which Gordian has so generously provided funding. Unfortunately, the rest are in class at the moment.”
The students smiled and nodded.
“You may not be aware, Alexa,” Ashburn continued, “but the intent of HydroSpeed is to perfect a simplified hydrogen fuel cell vehicle that would be affordable enough for emerging markets. It was your brother’s suggestion that we put our ideas to the test using go-karts before we move on to a full-scale car.”
“Are they operational?” she asked.
“Absolutely. A full twenty horsepower. We expect a top speed of fifty miles per hour. They’ll be put through their paces during an endurance race at a local track tonight. We’ll be loading them onto the transport lorry within the hour. I do wish you could stay to watch.”
“I’m afraid we don’t have time,” Grant said.
“Of course, of course.” Ashburn clapped his hands. “I know! Perhaps you’d like to take one for a short jaunt around the car park.”
“I don’t know…”
“We test them out here all the time. It’s really very simple. The accelerator pedal is on the right and the brake on the left. To reverse, you hold back the lever in the center.”
“Aren’t I a little big to fit in one?”
“Nonsense,” Ashburn said, patting his considerable belly. “You can’t weigh more than I do, and I’ve driven them myself.”
“Come on,” Alexa said to Grant. “Take it for a spin. I want to see what these things can do!” While she had never developed the passion for competition Tyler had, racing go-karts with him as a teenager had given her a taste for speed. As an adult, she drove a Mini Cooper, the closest she could get to a street-legal go-kart.
“All right,” Grant said. “Just once around the lot.”
“Excellent,” Ashburn said. “We’ll put you in the red one. Lawrence, please fetch a helmet for Mr. Westfield. Penelope, please keep an eye on the gates to make sure we don’t have anyone drive in during the run.”
The students scattered, and Grant eased himself into the seat of the go-kart, the stiff suspension groaning under him. Grant buckled himself in as Ashburn switched the engine on. Unlike the noisy gas-powered karts Alexa had raced before, the fuel cell on this one merely hummed like a fan.
Her phone chimed. She looked at the display and saw an unfamiliar number.
“Hello?” she answered.
“Alexa, it’s Tyler.”
“Where have you been? We’ve got some incredible information to—”
“Tell us tonight. You need to know something. Zim was here.”
“Zim? At Versailles?”
Grant looked up at her when she mentioned the name.
“Yes,” Tyler said. “I don’t know how he knew we’d be here, but we have to assume he knows you’re in Cambridge as well.”
Alexa spun around, scanning the area around the car park. Her eyes settled on a Range Rover idling on the street. There was no mistaking the woman sitting in the passenger seat.
Marlo Dunham.
She stared back at Alexa with utter contempt, then spoke something over her shoulder. Two men burst from the SUV, guns drawn, and ran toward them.
“Shit,” Alexa hissed.
If they chased Grant and Alexa into the building, Ashburn and his students would be caught in the crossfire and might be killed before the police could arrive. She and Grant ha
d to get away from the others and put some distance between them.
Alexa pocketed the phone without bothering to hang up, scrambled into the black go-kart, and switched the power on. She hoped Ashburn’s students had been as good with the execution as they had been with the design.
“Call the police!” she yelled at Ashburn, who was stunned at her sudden action. When he didn’t move, she pointed at the running assailants and shouted even louder. “Now!”
He turned heel and ducked into the lab, herding Lawrence, who had arrived with the helmet.
Alexa snapped the harness together. Grant, still belted into his low go-kart, craned to see what had alarmed her.
“Dunham’s men,” she said to him. “Follow me.”
She mashed the accelerator, and the go-kart rocketed forward. She twisted the wheel to head for the gate opposite from where Dunham’s SUV was. The kart pirouetted like it was on toe shoes, and Alexa zipped under the barrier while bullets carved divots in the asphalt.
She peeked back. Grant got the message and wasn’t far behind her.
Unfortunately, two of Dunham’s men got the same idea and jumped into the green and yellow karts. Before she even turned the corner, they were in hot pursuit.
TWENTY-NINE
No matter how hard he stood on the gas, Grant couldn’t keep up with Alexa, who had to continually slow down for him to catch up. It was really a simple matter of physics. Their go-karts had the same horsepower, but he outweighed her by over a hundred pounds. He could feel the inertia slowing him every time they made a turn, and it was letting the lighter men behind them close the gap.
Grant was impressed by Alexa’s skill and fearlessness. Tyler must have taught her a few driving tricks because she didn’t show any hesitation darting around cars, drawing honks from the normally polite British drivers. The only problem she had was remembering to drive on the left. Twice she swerved into oncoming traffic, which might not have ended well for the tiny go-kart.
Grant struggled to set himself in a better driving position, but it was no use. Although the kart could handle his weight, his wide shoulders spilled out from the molded seat, making him lean forward. The suspension had no give, which meant that every seam, bump, and crack in the road was transferred directly to his pelvis, causing him to grimace in pain. Without the helmet, his eyes watered as he squinted to see through the wind, and there was nothing he could do to avoid bugs and the stench of auto exhaust fumes that were at nose level.
An engine roared behind Grant. A look over his shoulder revealed the black Range Rover coming up on him. It wasn’t nearly as nimble as the kart, but its top speed was far higher. If they spent much longer on the main road, it would flatten him.
Alexa turned and saw the same thing. Grant pointed to a side alley ahead of them that wasn’t wide enough for the SUV. The Range Rover was so close now that the sound of the V8 was deafening.
Alexa juked left, and the go-kart threaded through concrete pylons placed to prevent vehicles from using the pedestrian walkway. Grant followed and nicked the bumper, causing the wheels to skid sideways. The Range Rover kept going down the street, but the green and yellow go-karts followed them.
The cobblestone surface made the go-kart buck like a bronco. Without horns, they couldn’t beep at the pedestrians sauntering through the shopping arcade. Alexa’s shouts of warning were the only thing keeping bystanders from getting run down.
They shot out of the arcade and into the street, cars screeching and spinning to a halt as they blasted through the traffic. Out of the corner of his eye, Grant caught a glimpse of the Range Rover pacing them on a parallel street. He’d seen an earpiece on one of the pursuers, so Grant assumed he was in cell-phone contact with Dunham, giving her their position.
They needed to thin the number of their opponents.
They flashed into another narrow shopping arcade. Dumbfounded faces in shop windows whizzed by. Grant shouted Alexa’s name. When she turned, he motioned for her to let him catch up. She slowed and he pulled even with her.
“I have an idea!” he yelled over the wind. “Remember those concrete pylons?”
“Yeah.”
“Let the guy behind us catch up.”
“What?”
“We’ll herd him.”
Alexa gave him a confused glance at first, but then lit up and nodded.
“One! Two! Three!”
At the same time, they hit their brakes and went to either side of the arcade, Grant barely missing chairs at an outdoor café. The green go-kart nearly raced past them, but he slowed to keep from overshooting. Grant gunned the engine and yanked the wheel over, aiming for the green go-kart like he was in a high-speed bumper car. He rapped the side of the kart, sending it careening sideways into Alexa, who bumped him back.
The steering wheel was so jittery that it required both hands to use, which was why neither of the men in the pursuing karts had taken a shot at them. Driving with only one hand would be suicide. But now that he was boxed in, the grinning man between them went for his pistol, thinking he had the perfect opportunity. He lowered his arm to take a bead on Grant, never noticing that they were reaching the end of the arcade.
Three short concrete pylons blocked the entrance, and the gunman was headed straight for the center one. Grant wrenched his wheel to the side, and Alexa did the same. Both of them missed the pylons by inches.
The gunman wasn’t so lucky.
He hit the pylon head-on at forty miles an hour. Worse, he hadn’t taken time to latch his harness. The go-kart jolted to a stop, but the gunman flew into the air, his arms pinwheeling as he tumbled. He landed head first on the asphalt, and his body rolled through the street like a ragdoll before coming to rest.
They were out of arcades, so Alexa turned left onto the road. Grant had become disoriented in the winding alleys, but he recognized the boulevard as Trumpington Street, the same road where the department of engineering was located. If they followed it back south, they would return to the lab where surely the police would be by now.
“Keep going straight!” he shouted. Alexa raised a thumb in response.
The Range Rover blew out of a side street and nearly ran Grant over. He turned sharply and slammed on the brakes to keep from going through the front door of a tea shop. The yellow go-kart whooshed by him, intent on getting to Alexa. Dunham must have been aware that she was the key to finding the Loch Ness monster. Without her, their plans would be destroyed, not to mention the grief her death would cause Tyler.
Watching the Range Rover and go-kart converge on her, Grant was consumed by an overwhelming sense of protectiveness at the danger Alexa faced. He’d lost a woman close to him before. He wasn’t going through that again.
Grant focused his entire being on catching up with them. He stood on the gas and willed the go-kart to go faster. Alexa was weaving all over the road in attempt to shake her pursuers, which gave Grant the slim hope that he could make up the distance.
The man in the go-kart pulled next to Alexa and grabbed for her in a bid to take her hand off the wheel. He was only able to latch onto her purse strap instead. He pulled hard, and Alexa leaned awkwardly to the right. A parked car two hundred yards down the road had to be his target. If he steered her into it, she’d be killed, seatbelt or not.
Alexa shrugged out of the strap as her purse was ripped away from her. She regained control but had no room to maneuver with his kart in the way. The Range Rover was now next to the yellow kart, and Dunham had the window unrolled. She waved for the man to throw her the purse.
All of this distracted them from Grant’s pursuit. He was right behind the yellow go-kart and rammed it with his right front bumper just as the man tossed the purse up. Dunham caught it, but the action had required the man to take his hand off the wheel.
Grant’s nudge was enough to push the man’s kart sideways under the rear wheel of the Range Rover, crushing the go-kart. Its driver screamed for an instant and went silent.
At the last moment, Alexa
was able to dodge and missed the parked car by inches.
The Range Rover pulled up to finish the job, Dunham brandishing her own pistol through the open window, but without warning Alexa threw the go-kart into a hard right turn and Grant followed. They raced through a gate labeled The Fitzwilliam Museum. The entryway was far too narrow for the SUV to follow. The driver kept going instead of stopping, no doubt scared off by the sound of sirens now ringing throughout the town.
Alexa circled around in the opposite direction and came to a stop next to the museum entrance. She threw off her belts and sprang wildly from her seat as if she were planning to take off at a sprint. Grant exited the go-kart and stopped her, pulling her to him.
“They’re gone! They’re gone. We’re safe. Are you all right?”
“I’m okay,” she said, gulping in breaths as if she’d run a marathon. “I’m okay. I’m okay.”
Grant smiled at her. “That was some amazing driving back there. You could be a pro.”
“Tyler taught me well.”
“Who knew he was good at something?”
“They took my purse.”
“I know. I couldn’t get to it in time. We’ll get you a new passport and phone in London.”
“It’s not that.”
Grant looked at her in confusion and then realized what she meant before she uttered it.
“They’ve got the book,” Alexa said. “Marlo Dunham now knows what we know.”
THIRTY
It was eight p.m. by the time Victor Zim and Hank Pryor filed off the P&O ferry at Dover with the other foot passengers. Using the fake passports provided by Dunham, they didn’t have any trouble getting through British customs.
Zim’s original plan had been to drop into the Versailles estate using a helicopter, but since his only chopper pilot died over Lake Shannon in Washington, he took a page from Locke and hijacked a float plane instead. Pryor, an experienced aircraft pilot, was able to fly it without much trouble before they abandoned it at a local lake to make their final getaway.
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