Time Rovers 03 Madman's Dance (53 page)

Anderson frowned. “Nothing but my word.”

“Which means nothing to me. You might be the guy who talked to Defoe, you might not.”

“I am. I’m also the one who off-timed him to New York and sent you to the Thames the night your lover died.”

She reeled back. “Why are you guys doing this?”

“Because we have to. Things are so off track we have no choice.” He gestured toward the watch. “Please, just give me the interface.”

“Damn you!” With a cry of anguish, she tossed it at him. Anderson caught it on the fly.

“Thank you.” He tucked it in a pocket. “Copeland has your boss.”

“Where?” she snapped.

“Defoe is the key to all this,” he replied, avoiding her question. “Copeland’s masters want him. We’ve hidden Rover One in the time stream while we figure out why he’s so important to them.”

“Why take Theo?”

“Your boss is leverage. All that matters to Copeland is that he remain on the good side of his employers. He’ll do anything to stay alive.”

Anything.

“Is Theo dead?”

“Not yet.”

She shivered. “How do I find them?”

“Copeland has a cat’s-paw here in ’88 named Hezekiah Grant. He’s the weakest link in the chain.”

“The Ascendant,” she whispered. Theo had spoken of him. She fumbled with the silver pendant, pulling it out. If this had Grant’s address in the files…

“Don’t bother,” Anderson advised. “He’s in hiding. Within a few hours, Grant will be contacting you. You should be preparing yourself for that moment. It’s your best chance to get Morrisey back alive.”

A second later, Cynda was staring at empty air.

~••~••~••~

Too slow.
Five stories in each warehouse. Thousands of barrels to search. Most of them were the huge ones, but a smaller one could be tucked in amongst them. Keats heard the men muttering. They realized the futility of this gesture as much as he did.

He moved to the next barrel. “Mind you, be careful!” he warned.

“If’n I was bein’ careful, guv, I’d be in a pub right now ’steada in here with ya,” someone called back.

“He has a point.”

Keats turned toward the familiar voice. “Hello, my friend. How is life in the East End these days?”

“Quiet so far,” Alastair replied, shifting a barrel to examine it. “Fisher was given orders to pull the constables back and let Jacynda and her people handle the problem.”

“Who issued that order?” Keats asked, taken by surprise.

“Warren.”

Keats snorted. “I had hoped she’d be out of this.”

“You’re mad if you think that. According to Mr. Morrisey, you should find one of those coins in each of these barrels. He said you should remove it first thing. It’s how the detonations are triggered.”

“Of course,” Keats muttered under his breath.

Ramsey thumped down the row. “Doctor, we have need of you. One of the lads tangled with a hogshead and got his foot mashed.”

Alastair threw Keats a resigned look. “I’ll be happy to help.”

They’d taken only a few steps when there was a muted explosion. Shouts erupted outside.

“Where did that come from?” Keats called to a man near the door. “Was the blast on this side of the river?”

The man shook his head. “North, I think.”

The East End.

Keats waited for the watchman to return so they could lock up. Of all the warehouses, this was the least full, the easiest to check. They had to have missed something. He ducked inside for one last look.

He walked down the closest row again. This was futile. No wonder the newspaper accounts had reported no one knew exactly where the bombs had been placed.

As he returned to the double doors, he noted a piece of tarp in a corner. Had they looked under it? Keats knelt and flung the cover aside. He was rewarded with a barrel decorated with strange red writing on the side. A quick shift of the cask brought the dynamite into sight.

“How did we miss you?” he muttered. As his fingers deftly worked the rope holding the dynamite in place, a glancing blow struck him hard on the back of the head. He slumped against the barrel, struggling to remain conscious.

“Bloody rozzer!” A swift kick hit his thigh, then there was the sound of running footsteps.

Besides the pounding of his head, there was some sort of queer buzzing sound. A moment later, he was grabbed by the collar and hauled to his feet. “Too close,” a voice said. “We’re out of here.”

Then everything went frigid black.

Keats came to his senses, his head on fire, mind tumbling like an acrobat in a stage show. He wanted nothing better than to vomit.

“You okay?” a voice asked.

He made it to his knees, bending over in an effort to reduce the throbbing headache. Slowly lifting his head, he studied the man. Young. Worried, if the expression in his eyes counted for anything. Then he saw the pocket watch in the fellow’s hand.

“You’re one of them?” he managed to croak.

The man nodded. “I’m Hopkins. I work with Lassiter. I’m sorry I did that, but the bomb was due to go off right after I found you. I jumped us back a couple minutes to be safe, then disarmed it.”

“Thank you,” he said, still stunned. “You saved my life.”

“Part of the job. Lassiter would never forgive me if anything happened to you.”

“I heard an explosion. Is Jacynda unharmed?”

“Last time I saw her.”

Keats rubbed the back of his neck.
Blast, that hurts.
“Did you see who hit me?”

“No, sorry.”

“Not surprising, really. Nobody likes a copper.”

The newcomer offered his hand, and Keats used it to rise.

“We’ll work as a team. There are six more. Either they’re already in place or will arrive shortly before they detonate,” he said. Hopkins tapped his interface. “I can find them for you,” he added, a smug grin on his face.

“Arrive from where?”

“Best you not know.”

“Do I have to go into that blackness again?” Keats asked. “I didn’t like that a bit.”

“No. That was so against the rules I don’t want to even think about it.”

Keats winced, his head spinning again. He tried to steady himself and nearly fell.

“Hold still.” Something cold pressed against Keats neck. He remembered that sensation. It’d been that night in the carriage, after Flaherty had struck him on the head. Jacynda had put something against his neck and he’d felt so much better. The same was happening now. His headache eased immediately and with it, the dizziness.

“What did you do to me?”

“I played doctor, but don’t tell anyone.” The man rolled his eyes. “Lassiter is
so
not a good influence.” He stuck something in his pocket, then held his pocket watch in front of him like a compass. Revived, Keats followed him, rolling his neck from side to side to diminish a slight cramp.

“You know about the coins?” Keats nodded. “Just keep them far away from anything flammable,” Hopkins explained. “And don’t put them in your pocket,” he said, gesturing toward one of his own. It sported a sizeable scorch mark.

As they walked the row of warehouses, Hopkins studied the watch dial and then smiled broadly. “It’s already in place. That’ll make it easier.”

“I don’t understand,” Keats replied.

“They changed the bomb delivery schedule in the East End. Made it lot harder. They didn’t over here. Probably figured we wouldn’t find them in time.” Hopkins gestured. “In this one,” he advised, “ground floor, near the north end.”

“How long do we have?” Keats asked.

“Five and a half minutes, as long as they don’t change the timing.”

Keats didn’t want to think about that.

“All right lads. It’s in here,” Keats called out. The dockworkers swept in, racing down the row of casks while calling out encouragement to each other, betting who would be able to find the bomb before the other.

Inspector Ramsey stomped over. “Any luck?”

“Found one in the first warehouse. It’s taken care of.” Keats did the introductions. “Hopkins works with Miss Lassiter.”

“Pinkerton’s?” Ramsey asked. The young man nodded. “Are there any of you left in America?”

“Probably not,” Hopkins replied, smiling.

A dockworker skittered out the door of the nearest building.

“Oy, rozzer. It’s here!” he shouted, jumping up and down like he’d found the Crown Jewels.

Keats took off at a run. The barrel was in an empty space near the back of the building, a knot of men ringed around it.

“The rest of you lads clear off. Go help the others, and I’ll work on this one.”

There was the sound of rapidly retreating footsteps.

Keats dropped to his knees and carefully removed the dynamite, setting it on the floor near him. Then he dug out the cork and went hunting inside for that strange coin. He couldn’t find it. Swearing under his breath, he kept digging. He found the paper liner that kept the gunpowder dry. Something cool brushed his fingers. He pulled out the coin and sighed with relief. He jammed the cork back into the cask and waved forward one of the constables who was nervously hovering nearby. “Roll this out of here,” he ordered.

He was surprised to find Ramsey standing just behind him. “What was the thing you took out of the barrel?”

Keats displayed it on his palm. “A very strange coin. According to Hopkins, it detonates the gunpowder.”

He watched as the color drained out of Ramsey’s face. “There’s more here than you’re telling me.”

“There’s more here than I know.”

The moment they cleared the door, two dockworkers sang out, beckoning them forward. Keats split off toward one warehouse and Ramsey toward another. In the distance they could see Hopkins and Alastair entering a third.

By God, we’re going to do it.

~••~••~••~

The question was always the same, but it didn’t really matter. He didn’t have the answer. Theo spit a gob of blood from his mouth, narrowly missing Copeland’s boot. It earned him another backhand across the face. The pain was everywhere now, every nerve competing to shout its own private agony.

He’d been beaten by Copeland’s men, then taken to a huge building. When he’d first arrived, it had smelled of wool. Now he could only smell his own blood.

Copeland’s face came into view. “It’s an easy question—where’s Defoe?”

“Don’t know,” Theo said in the barest of whispers.

“Where’d you see him last?”

“Here, in London. He transferred, and I haven’t seen him since.”

“That’s bullshit.”

Morrisey stared at him through swelling eyes. “I don’t know where he is.”

“Why did you go back home?”

“Looking for Defoe,” Theo lied.

“Not buying that. You could just send a message. What were you up to?”

When Theo didn’t reply, another fist landed in his stomach. As he fought not to vomit, Copeland started to circle him, like a lion.

There was a commotion. Through the painful haze, Morrisey tried to focus on what was happening. Voices. One was panicky. Copeland’s was harsh.

“What do you mean all the bombs didn’t go off?” his captor demanded.

“Only one, in the East End. They found the rest of them,” the man answered breathlessly.

“How in the hell did they do that?”

“I don’t know.”

There was a grunt of pain as someone paid the price for delivering the bad news, then the sound of a body being dragged away.

Somehow Jacynda had stopped them.

“Not going well?” Theo asked, wishing he had the strength to laugh in Copeland’s face. “She outwitted you, didn’t she?” he said.

Another tremendous blow—this one to the head. Theo’s ears rang like church bells on Easter morning.

Copeland stepped closer. “Seems all I got left is you, geek freak. Where’s Defoe?”

“I don’t—”

The chair went out from under him, and Theo landed hard on the wooden floor. A second later a boot catapulted into his ribs. Bones snapped. He tried to cry out, but he couldn’t get enough air.

“Give him another round, lads.”

Blows rained down on him from all sides, so many he could hardly feel them anymore.

Jacynda.
It was her face that comforted him as he slipped into the darkness.

“Ah, Christ,” Copeland swore. He rubbed a hand across his chin, trying to figure out how to work this to his best advantage. The failure of the plot was going to cost him everything if he didn’t find Rover One.

“This one’s a waste of time. Load him up, drop him in the Thames,” he ordered the trio standing over the body. “If he’s still alive, cut his throat before you do. Cut anything you want.”

“What about his boots?” one of the toughs asked.

Copeland smirked. “Strip him bare, I don’t give a goddamn. Just get him out of my sight.” He tossed each of them a sovereign and then scooped up the prizes he’d taken from his victim.

One last chance. This time he had to come out on top.