The Secret Abyss

by Darrell Pitt

  ‘This reminds me of a Brinkie Buckeridge story,’ Scarlet said, tugging experimentally at a metal railing. It refused to budge. ‘She had to bring a train to a halt using only a nail file…’

  Her voice faded. Jack thought of Mr Shore. They had not yet broken the news to him about his son. Both he and his wife would be shattered to learn of Frankie’s death. How would they cope with the double tragedy of losing their daughter?

  ‘…finally firing the nail file through the length of bamboo, and disabling the control mechanism,’ Scarlet said. ‘Jack?’

  He had already started down the platform. At the overhead bridge, he climbed a metal ladder to the top where he found a barrier of barbed wire. Easy enough to climb over.

  ‘Jack!’ Scarlet yelled. ‘What are you doing?’

  ‘Trying to save Helen’s life.’

  ‘Mr Doyle said not to do anything dangerous.’

  ‘He told us not to chase the Chameleon.’

  The roller coaster had begun its approach. The engine had a small cab for the driver. Behind was the coal caboose and half-a-dozen carriages.

  ‘Oh dear,’ Scarlet said, as though she was reading his mind. ‘Isn’t there a superstition about this? About jumping onto the roof of a moving train?’

  ‘I don’t think so,’ he said. ‘But I wish there was.’

  Jack estimated the length of the sand box. Thirty feet. What he had to do was clear: a long run-up followed by a jump. One of the routines he and his parents had practised had been similar. Of course, that had been with a net…

  The train approached.

  Scarlet was silent as Jack positioned himself at the nearest end of the sand box. The locomotive grew louder. The metal housing shook. Jack swallowed hard. He glanced at Scarlet. The blast of air of the approaching train played havoc with her hair, which flew madly about her shoulders.

  Good luck, she mouthed.

  Bazookas, he thought. How do I get myself into these situations?

  He ran.

  The roar of the Rocket was deafening. Like a thousand drums—like a mighty heartbeat counting off the seconds of a person’s life. Jack picked up speed. Come on, he thought. Faster. Faster!

  He reached the end and leapt as the train passed underneath. Black, poisonous smoke blinded him. He threw his arms wide. Slammed into the hard roof of the coal caboose. Bounced. Rolled. Scrambled for a handhold. Connected with nothing…

  No!

  But then Jack’s hands found a groove. He squeezed with all his might, his other hand gripping the corner. The smoke cleared a little, and he saw the steam engine ahead of him. He peered back to Helen.

  But she was gone!

  That’s impossible, Jack thought, searching about until he saw a motionless shape in one of the last carriages. It was Helen, and she appeared to be unconscious.

  The engine changed pitch. The Rocket had reached an incline and was charging full pelt up the slope. Jack lost his grip. Desperately raking the surface, he found nothing but smooth metal, and fell backwards into darkness.

  Jack felt like he was falling for a million years, but it was only a second. He relaxed his body, bending his knees to absorb the impact as he landed feet first on the coupling joining the carriages.

  Yes!

  But then the momentum of the train threw him backwards. He flipped over into the first row of seats, his head colliding with the floor, his legs sticking into the air.

  Ouch!

  Jack scrambled to his feet. He spotted Helen sprawled in a seat halfway along the carriage, an arm hanging over the side. As the train raced across a level section of track, he climbed over more seats to check Helen’s pulse. She was alive, although she had a nasty lump on her forehead.

  When the Rocket reached the top of another incline it slowed. The engine disappeared from sight before its momentum increased again and it charged down the slope. Jack braced himself against Helen, holding on to the seat with all his strength.

  His stomach dropped as the Rocket reached the bottom. It continued racing along the straight track, rocking wildly from side to side. Calliope music drifted up from the carnival as the engine started up another incline. Jack remembered what Stevie Barnes had said: It will continue to pick up speed until it flies off the tracks.

  The Rocket was already screaming along at a dangerous speed. Jack had to act fast if he stood any chance of stopping it. Easing Helen down onto the floor, he began climbing towards the engine. The track ahead followed a series of rises and falls before the final drop, and the terrifying section known as the Corkscrew.

  The carriage would not survive the Corkscrew. Jack knew that for sure. He clambered over the caboose and dropped into the engineer’s cabin, just as the Rocket crested the rise. Usually it would have paused, but it now continued at full speed. Jack desperately hung on to a rail as the train became momentarily airborne—before smashing back onto the tracks.

  The locomotive continued hurtling like a boulder down a hill. Jack seized the handbrake and pulled back as hard as he could. A terrible screeching cut through the air. He fell against the firebox—the surface of the metal was boiling hot—and his head collided with the wall.

  Jack awoke to the smell of smoke and fire. The faraway music had stopped. He was lying on the floor of the control cabin; the firebox had flown open and burning coals lay everywhere. He staggered to his feet, head throbbing. The locomotive was upright, but tilted at forty-five degrees. Jack peered out to the night sky, the caboose and Helen. She was still alive.

  A groan emanated from under the train. It sounded like a sea monster had risen from the depths. Sounds came from far below; the cries of voices, men shouting orders to one another, sirens.

  An ominous shudder vibrated through the floor. The Rocket had come to a halt hundreds of feet above the ground. Jack looked down at the carnival. The people were like ants as they fled the amusement park in panic. A shriek cut the air as steam poured from a broken pipe. The engine lay half off the rails. If it tilted an inch more…

  Jack made his way gingerly across the coal caboose towards Helen. The train—and the roller-coaster track—swayed beneath him. To his relief, Helen’s eyes were open.

  ‘What’s happening?’ she asked, dazed. ‘Where am I?’

  ‘We’ve got to go.’

  ‘Jack Mason? But where…?’

  The tracks swung under them like a swing at the playground. Timber beams snapped with every movement. They needed to move fast if they were going to survive. Jack pulled Helen across rows of seats. They had only one more carriage to climb over.

  ‘Where are we?’ Helen pleaded. ‘What’s going on?’

  ‘There’s no time to explain.’

  ‘Where are my parents?’

  An explosion came from the front, sending pieces of track and timber flying in all directions. A metal stanchion—as long as a grown man—shot past them as if it had been thrown by a giant, slamming into a supporting beam.

  ‘Quickly!’ Jack yelled.

  He heard Helen gasp. ‘We’re on the roller coaster!’

  What was left of the structure rocked wildly. Jack ducked and threw Helen over his shoulder. She screamed, but her cry was drowned out by more explosions from the engine. Jack lurched across the final rows of seating before jumping onto the tracks.

  Somehow remaining on his feet, Jack stumbled along the sleepers. He had learned tightrope walking in the circus: he had to use Helen’s weight as a balance to stay upright. A tightrope walker would normally use a long, stationary pole. But Helen was neither long, nor was she stationary. She fought against him, still confused about what was happening.

  ‘Hang on,’ he grunted. ‘We’re almost there!’

  ‘Almost where?’

  Another explosion and the tracks heaved sickeningly. Jack fell and grabbed the timber cross ties. Helen screamed. The tracks swayed—too far—in the opposite direction. The train and cabooses tipped over the side.

  The Rocket carved a path of destruction through the supp
ort structure, tons of metal annihilating everything in its path until it slammed into the ground, sending a cloud of smoke rising from the disaster.

  Pieces of track continued to drop away from the broken track, but their section was safe, swinging like a pendulum for another minute before slowly easing to a halt. Helen, lying next to him, gently extricated herself from Jack’s grasp and her eyes stared into his.

  ‘Jack Mason?’ she said. ‘Is that really you?’

  An hour later a rescue airship, commanded by a talented pilot, was able to manoeuvre in close enough to extricate them from their precarious position. The carnival was in chaos, with fire engines everywhere.

  Jack was reunited with Mr Doyle and Scarlet. His mentor gave him a relieved hug—and was then furious.

  ‘What did you think you were doing? Are you mad?’

  Jack apologised, pointing out that he was saving Helen’s life. The detective grunted and gripped his shoulder. ‘My boy,’ he said.

  Scarlet sidled close and delivered a friendly dig in the ribs. ‘You did well, Jack,’ she said. ‘Brinkie would be proud.’

  Danny and Emily Shore were delighted that their daughter was alive, but then Mr Doyle led them to a local hotel, telling them about the fire at their home.

  ‘How did such a thing happen?’ Mr Shore asked. ‘Was it set on purpose? Did the same person try to harm Helen?’

  ‘I believe the events are linked,’ Mr Doyle said, carefully. ‘We will find you all a room for the night.’

  The detective paid the bill. It was a generous room, clean and fresh. Jack peered through the window. It was almost two in the morning, but he could see a garden with rolling hills in the background. It would be pleasant in tomorrow’s sunshine.

  Grateful for Mr Doyle’s generosity, the family seated themselves around a table as Scarlet made tea. ‘But how will Frankie find us?’ Emily Shore asked. ‘One of us should return home and wait for him.’

  ‘I’ll go,’ Danny Shore said, standing. ‘He’s probably waiting on the doorstep.’

  Mr Doyle stopped him with a hand on his forearm. ‘I have some news for you,’ he said. ‘Some terrible, terrible news.’

  The strongman was taller than Mr Doyle by several inches. He looked down at him, his moustache bristling. ‘More terrible than someone trying to kill Helen? And burning our house down?’ he asked. ‘What could that be?’

  Mr Doyle told them, gently, what had happened to Frankie. At first there was silence before Mrs Shore’s face twisted with disbelief. ‘But that’s not possible,’ she said, shaking her head. ‘We only saw him this morning.’

  With great compassion, the detective confirmed the events. Mrs Shore burst into tears. Helen clung to her, weeping as she buried her face in her mother’s breast. Mr Shore fell back a step, as though struck by a hammer. ‘No,’ he said. ‘Not my boy. Not my boy.’ He sunk to the ground, shaking, as if he was a mighty tree felled by an axe.

  ‘I’m so sorry,’ Mr Doyle said, placing a hand on his shoulder. ‘It happened very quickly.’

  Jack and Scarlet exchanged glances. Scarlet looked ready to burst into tears as well. It didn’t feel real—just like the last time Jack had seen his parents, as they lay on the ground, broken and unmoving in the flickering light of the circus, their pale faces staring sightlessly towards the roof. People had been screaming and scrambling to escape from the tent, fearful that the whole place might collapse. Someone found a sheet and covered their bodies, as Mrs McGregor—the fortune teller—gently eased Jack away.

  It was only later, when he was at the funeral, that he realised he would never see their faces again. Their bodies had already been locked inside two simple wooden boxes. Closed off from the world. Two sparrows laid to rest in the earth away from the warm light of day.

  Jack knew the Shores would think back to their last memory of Frankie, struggle to remember that final time they saw his face. Had he been happy? Had he smiled? Had he waved farewell to them as he headed out the door?

  Gripping his lucky compass and locket inside his pocket, Jack listened as Mr Doyle offered his condolences and told the family he would return the next morning. Jack wasn’t sure they heard. Helen and Mrs Shore seemed to have lapsed into shock, while Mr Shore’s eyes were focused on some faraway point only visible to him.

  The team headed back to the Lion’s Mane. By now Jack was so tired he was practically sleepwalking. After Mr Doyle moved the airship to a small field adjoining the town, he found them a hotel where they settled in for a few hours of restless sleep.

  When Jack woke, it was still very dark, but a tiny glow had brightened the horizon as if the curtain had begun to lift on another day. A wind had picked up. Jack’s eyes made out the stars as a branch scraped across the glass. Before sleep overtook him again, Jack thought he could hear a voice in the wind. Mr Shore’s voice.

  Not my boy. Not my boy.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Mr Doyle, Scarlet and Jack ate a small breakfast of sausages and eggs before leaving early the next morning to meet with Frankie’s family. The wind had dropped away during the night and the ground lay smothered in fog. A dog barked distantly. The hotel, an ancient stone building with a thatched roof, was shrouded in mist. Jack’s head ached from the nasty bump he had sustained on the Rocket, but he was otherwise uninjured. Shivering, he wrapped his arms around himself.

  ‘I am not looking forward to this,’ Scarlet said.

  ‘Nor I,’ Mr Doyle agreed.

  They found the Shore family around a small table in their hotel room, listlessly eating breakfast. Mrs Shore was slumped in her chair, her eyes red and swollen, clutching a half-eaten piece of toast. Her husband had his hand on her shoulder. Overnight he had aged twenty years. The few words about his son’s death had sapped his strength. Helen was also quiet and withdrawn. Her forehead was bruised and a cut ran across her left cheek.

  While Helen busied herself in making a fresh pot of tea, Mr Doyle quizzed her parents about Frankie’s movements.

  ‘Why has this happened to us, Mr Doyle?’ Danny Shore asked. ‘Is there a madman on the loose? A crazy person with a vendetta?’

  ‘That is what I am trying to ascertain,’ Ignatius Doyle said. ‘I believe that Frankie may have discovered something that led to his murder.’

  ‘Discovered what? What would a fourteen-year-old boy know?’

  ‘Did Frankie ever mention a man known as the Chameleon to you?’

  ‘No. Is that the man in jail? The assassin?’

  Mr Doyle nodded. ‘What about an eagle? A whip of fire?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘The word liberty? Or two doors?’

  ‘No…nothing…’ Danny Shore stared through the window at the shifting sea of fog. ‘This makes no sense. Frankie was a good boy. A hard worker.’

  ‘We heard that Frankie had begun a new job.’

  ‘That’s true. A workshop in Norbury.’

  Helen sat at the table. ‘The job paid well, but Frankie was worried about the men who worked there.’

  ‘Worried? In what way?’

  ‘He thought they were bad types,’ Danny Shore said. ‘But I met them. Or one of them anyway. He was an inventor.’

  ‘Did you get his name?’

  ‘He was a foreigner. Slate was his name. Olinka Slate. A pleasant enough man. I never dreamed…’

  ‘He may have nothing to do with our investigation,’ Mr Doyle said. ‘But we have to follow all leads. Do you have the address of the workshop?’

  Mr Shore scribbled it down on a piece of paper. ‘Did these people kill Frankie? I told him to take the job. I would never forgive myself if it got him murdered.’

  ‘You can’t blame yourself for any of this. Is there anywhere you can stay? Somewhere in the country?’

  ‘I have an old friend who lives on the West Coast.’

  ‘Good. I advise you to go there. And tell no-one of your location.’

  ‘You think we’re still in danger?’

  ‘Possibly.’ Mr Doyle memorised
the new address. ‘It’s best if you remain out of sight. My team and I will follow up on the information you have supplied.’

  Mr Shore followed them to the door. ‘And Mr Doyle?’ he said.

  ‘Yes?’

  The man’s chin quivered. ‘I beg you to find my son’s killer.’

  ‘I’ll do everything in my power.’ Mr Doyle shook Mr Shore’s hand. ‘I promise.’

  After returning to the Lion’s Mane, the detective started up the steam engine. Within minutes they were high above open fields, soaring towards Norbury. Jack stared gloomily out the window.

  ‘Do you think this inventor caused Frankie’s death, Mr Doyle?’

  ‘I’m not sure. Frankie might have learned something of great importance. Something that brought about his death—and would have brought destruction upon the rest of his family if we had not intervened.’

  ‘So they were also targets,’ Scarlet said.

  ‘Undoubtedly. The killers were determined to remove anyone who might know of their secret.’

  ‘A whip of fire, two doors, liberty and an eagle,’ Jack said. ‘What can it all mean?’

  ‘I must confess to being quite perplexed.’ Mr Doyle took a lump of dusty cheese from his pocket. ‘Would anyone like a piece? I have some spare.’

  Bertha’s cage had been moved to the main cabin. Leaving Mr Doyle at the controls, Scarlet and Jack went to check on her.

  ‘She looks a little piqued,’ Scarlet said.

  ‘Piqued?’ Jack frowned. ‘It’s a tarantula. How can you tell?’

  ‘She doesn’t appear her usual happy self.’

  Jack stared at the creature. ‘What does she do when she’s happy? Sing and dance?’

  ‘You’re being silly. You see that place at the top? Where the ladder meets that perch?’