The Steampunk Detective (10 page)

A ramp fell open from the front and men started pouring out into the room. The freezing, howling wind made it impossible to hear them, but they quickly moved among the inhabitants.

“What the hell is going on?” Jon Harker demanded of the nearest invader.

The man clubbed him to the ground.

“Father!” Lucy cried.

Jack raised his head. He looked upon the scene in absolute shock, sudden fear freezing him to inaction. Scarlet produced her gun, but one of the men wrestled it from her grasp and delivered a punch to her jaw. She sagged. Mr Doyle leapt to his feet and tackled the assailant. As he struggled with the man, another of his companions came up behind the detective and hit him across the back of the head. He dragged Mr Doyle away and lifted Scarlet from the ground.

All this time Lucy had been holding her father in her arms. Now another man slammed her across the face, sending her sprawling. Jack struggled to stand. It seemed to take him an eternity. Finally he found himself standing on shaking legs. He felt completely powerless. This was not simply the sort of assault Big Charley would impose. These men seemed capable of any sort of violence – even murder.

Another man lifted Mr Harker from the ground. In one smooth action Scarlet and Mr Harker were carried into the gondola of the airship. One man, a small black haired man with a postage stamp moustache, stood in the entrance and looked back into the room. He watched as Mr Doyle struggled to his feet. The man gave a small nod of satisfaction before he and his men marched back into the gondola.

The ramp slid up into place.

Jack stood frozen to the spot. He felt like he was in a dream. The roar of the wind was terrible. The cold was mind numbing. It was almost impossible to breathe in the exposed air of the room. At the same time he noticed a vase on the edge of a sideboard. The furniture supporting it had been damaged in the collision, but the vase hovered perilously on the edge. He watched as the vase fell, almost as if in slow motion, to the floor.

It shattered into a thousand pieces.

Jack awoke from his stupor.

The gondola was moving. It was withdrawing from the building – with Scarlet and Jon Harker inside!

No! Jack thought. I’ve got to do something.

Jack ran. He had to stop the airship. He had to save Scarlet and Mr Harker. He had fallen into some short of shocked stupor at the sudden turn of events, but now he knew what he had to do. The gondola pulled away from the building, the distance increasing with every second. Three feet. Four feet. Five feet.

Jack put all his strength into the run as he leapt across the gap from the building to the gondola.

“No!” Mr Doyle cried.

A chain ran across the bottom of the ramp. Jack’s hands slammed against the flat metal above the chain. For one brief instant he bounced away from the upraised ramp. Then one of his hands slapped back down again and connected with the chain. It tightened. The other hand gripped it. He hung suspended on the outside of the ship – miles above the earth.

He looked back to see the shattered metrotower moving away from them – but that was an optical illusion. They were moving away from it. He saw the great detective struggle to his feet. The man looked around desperately. Jack saw him dive into a pile of broken rubble and draw something from it.

A sword.

The detective raced to the edge and flung the weapon with all his might. Jack saw it sail through the air and strike the balloon. It stuck fast. After a few seconds the effect of gravity and the movement of the airship caused it to drop down, tearing a hole in the side of the balloon.

Good old Mr Doyle, Jack thought.

Chapter Twelve

The biting cold was almost unbearable. Jack hung onto the chain. It had some slack in it, so he gradually eased his hand up under one side and wrapped it around his wrist. He did the same with his other hand. He was not sure of the purpose of the chain, but he thought it may have been used to hold the ramp in place when the ship was tethered to the ground. At the moment he did not care. All he wanted was to escape the searing cold. All he wanted was to breathe normally.

He vowed to himself he would not look down, but he could not help it.

He looked down.

The world lay beneath him like a tapestry. He was still so high above the planet it was reduced to a checkerboard of different colours and patterns. He forced himself to not look down. He glanced back at the metrotower. They were rapidly moving away from it and now he saw the ugly scar caused by the airship attack.

At the same time Jack realised they were descending. Rapidly.

I’ve got to hang on
, he thought.
I’ve got to hold on till we land.

He placed his face against the metal ramp of the airship. He needed air and he needed warmth. He forced himself to suck air into his lungs as deeply as he could, but something was wrong. He could not take in enough in this rarefied atmosphere. His head swam.

It occurred to Jack he was about to die. The prospect scared him, but he knew he could not have done anything else under the circumstances. Mr Doyle had been good to him – and Jack would not let him down.

He felt terribly dizzy. Forcing himself to think of Scarlet, he promised to ask her out if he ever had the chance. Certainly she was a lady, but she was different to all the other toffs. She was friendly, and kind, and…well, just so blinkin’ beautiful.

Dots appeared before his eyes.

If he were about to die, he promised himself, he would imagine Scarlet’s face at the end.

He remembered her eyes. So pretty. Green, they were. He remembered her eyes and just before he passed out he imagined he could see her eyes multiplied again and again. Him looking into her eyes and she looking into his.

Blackness came.

He awoke to the feeling of water trickling down his face. His hands felt numb. Opening his eyes he saw a large grey shape above him. It seemed to stretch forever. He looked directly ahead and saw a curving horizon of white cloth.

How did he end up in this place? And his hands…

His hands were bright purple.

What the blinkin’–.

Jack looked down and saw a field of wheat about a hundred feet below him. His memory slowly returned. The metrotower. The airship attack. His leap. Hanging onto the side of the balloon.

The airship was coming in to land – and quite rapidly by the look of it. He could hear a hissing coming from somewhere. That’s right. Mr Doyle had pierced the side with that sword. He had to disengage himself from the gondola and hide before the occupants exited, otherwise the ramp would drop down – right on top of him.

He slowly twisted the chain so that his left hand drew free. He tried gripping the chain again, but he had lost all sensation. Instead, he wrapped his arm around the chain, distributing the weight across a broader area. Now he did the same with his right hand.

As the airship slowly descended, he felt sensation starting to return to his hands. He tried flexing his fingers. Good. They moved. Looking back down again, he saw the ground coming up fast. Too fast.

He was sure they were about to crash, until at the last moment the airship seemed to increase its forward motion and shunted horizontally across the field. It scraped along the ground.

Jack made a decision. This was where he got off.

He unwrapped his arms and let go of the chain. As he fell, he threw himself into a rolling motion. Hitting the ground hard, he let out a cry of pain, but he continued to roll just as his parents had always taught him.

He lay motionless in the field. A clear blue sky lay above him. The sun, although not hot, blazed brightly down. What he wanted to do was curl into foetal position, lay completely still and sleep for the rest of the week. But he forced Scarlet’s face into his mind and so he rolled over and climbed onto his knees. He peeked up above the brown grass.

The enormous airship filled much of the field. It had made an untidy landing. On the side he saw a jagged hole.

That’s Mr Doyle for you, he smiled. Always thinking.

A vehicle screeched to a halt on a dirt road running alongside the field. Tall trees ran around the property, partly obscuring the airship from the outside world. Jack knew immediately what the enemy was about to do. They were going to transport Scarlet and Mr Harker aboard the truck.

I have to be on that truck, he decided.

Staying low, he scampered across the field as quietly as he could. He hoped no–one was looking in his direction otherwise they might see the wheat moving. After what seemed an eternity he reached the edge of the tall grass and hurried across the dirt road.

He reached a long hedge of overgrown bushes. Taking refuge, he looked back to the airship. It seemed to be taking them a long time to do anything. The balloon was still deflating. Obviously Mr Doyle had dealt it a mortal blow. People were leaving the vessel and huddling about in a group.

Finally two people were brought out of the ship wearing black hoods over their heads and their hands tied. Scarlet and Jon Harker! Jack’s heart leapt into his throat. He had to get aboard the truck, he realised, but where could he hide?

He made his way along the untidy hedge. Reaching the rear of the vehicle, he kept close to the ground. He could see the feet of two men on the other side. The driver and a guard. The back of the truck lay open. He glanced inside. Nowhere to hide in there. Looking underneath he saw a big, self contained wedge running all the way under the vehicle.

He had never seen anything like it before, but there was obviously nowhere to hide under it.

On top
, he thought.
On top or nowhere at all.

He climbed onto the open back of the vehicle as quietly as possible, reached up and gripped the top edge. Slowly, he eased himself up, sliding himself onto the roof. One sound and they would be onto him. They might even shoot him.

He slid along the roof, barely breathing. He could hear the group from the airship heading in his direction. They were speaking that foreign lingo – what was it – German. A muffled cry came from the group followed by the sound of a blow. Either Scarlet or Mr Harker must have protested and received a thump for it.

They drew closer and he felt the vehicle shift and shudder as people climbed in. The driver and his companion climbed into the front while others slid into the rear. There was more talking between the driver and others who were to be left behind.

Jack wished he knew how to speak German. Then he would know what they were jabbering about.

Finally the engine started.

The sun beat down on Jack as he gripped thin grooves in the metal work running along the roof. Designed to drain rain water to the rear of the vehicle, his fingers gained a sturdy purchase as the steam engine roared into motion. The vehicle started down the track, bouncing roughly along the dirt road.

The journey was much tougher than Jack had expected. He felt like an egg being tossed about in a saucepan of boiling water. His face kept on jolting against the hard metal. 

It felt so uncomfortable, for the first time he felt like letting go and sliding off the rear of the van. Anything would be better than this constant battering. Then he thought of Scarlet and Mr Harker. He was their only hope. Without him they might both die.

Up till now he had remained spread-eagled across the top of the roof. Now he allowed his arms to slide in together and he braced them under his body, laying his head on his hands. As the truck raced down the road he felt more pressure on his arms, but at least his face had more support.

That’s better
, he thought.
But not much.

Occasionally he looked up. At least the vehicle seemed to be avoiding towns and populated areas. It stuck to country roads. As best as Jack could tell, they were headed west.

The afternoon wore on. The strain on his arms grew worse and worse. He had barely recovered from his afternoon on the outside of the balloon. The pain in his shoulders grew unbearable as he gripped the grooves in the roof.

As the sun dropped further towards the horizon, Jack felt exhaustion setting in. He had no idea as to his location. His whole body ached with pain, starting from his fingers and working all the way back to his shoulders and back.

He couldn’t take it much longer.

Sweat dripped into his eyes as he remembered his father.

“…must practice your movement again. There is no room for error…”

Jack hung on tighter.

“…people in the crowd are paying for a spectacle…not for failure…”

Tears ran down Jack’s face. He could not hold on much longer. He took long breaths in and out. When would the vehicle end its journey? And when it did, how would he contact Mr Doyle?

The steam truck slowed. Jack allowed himself to look up. To his immense surprise he could see the ocean. The sun straddled a bank of clouds on the horizon. The vehicle was either stopping at a house on the coast, or it was meeting a boat.

Now the truck dipped suddenly and Jack felt himself almost slide forward over the front of the vehicle. He fanned himself out again and tried to hang onto the grooves along the side – but his fingers would not catch. The truck jolted and dipped suddenly to his left. Jack’s nose collided with the roof.

“Ooof,” he grunted.

The jolt of pain exploded across his face as if he had been punched in the nose. Pain and exhaustion had taken their toll. He couldn’t hang on much longer. Maybe minutes. Maybe only seconds.

He looked up again. Unconsciousness would take him at any time. His arms shook uncontrollably as trees left and right slapped at the roof of the truck. It was heading down a rough track to the ocean.

It reached the pebbles lining the seashore. Jack let out a gasp of relief. At least now the truck would stop and the kidnappers would start the next phase of their journey. Possibly he could smuggle himself onto their boat or he could throw himself at the mercy of a local farmer and get the police involved.

The truck slowed to a crawl as it trundled across the pebbles.