Horten's Miraculous Mechanisms (22 page)
“And where’s Jeannie?” added Clifford.
“It’s a long story,” said Stuart, getting up slowly. “A very long story.”
Before he could say more, there was noise behind them—a clatter of footsteps on the fireman’s ladder—and they all turned to see a man climbing down. He had a keen expression and a camera slung over his shoulder.
“Well,
wow!
” he said, jumping the last two rungs to the floor and looking around. “This is
incredible
! I’m Dave Harper, incidentally, from the
East Midlands Gazette
, I was just talking to the mayoress earlier. Where is she?”
Clifford and April looked at Stuart.
He thought hard. “Meeting new people,” he said.
“Oh, right.” Dave Harper raised his camera and snapped a couple of photos of the Well of Wishes. “Well, she was being very mysterious about what was down here. Don’t suppose you can tell me anything about it?”
Stuart took a deep breath. “It was the workshop of Tony Horten, a magician often known by his stage name of Teeny-Tiny Tony Horten. He started his stage career in the nineteen-thirties, and he designed and built all his own illusions, inspired by the famous Victorian stage engineers, such as the Great Hortini, whose real name was also Horten. He was the inventor of the Horten Ready-Release, a safety catch used on many of his greatest illusions, including the Book of Peril which you can see over there to your right.”
Dave Harper glanced at the giant book and then looked back at Stuart, his expression baffled.
“But how do know all that?” he asked. “How do you know so much about this workshop?”
Stuart grinned.
The answer was simple and wonderful and true.
“Because it’s mine,” he said.
THE END
Stuart Horten’s mysteriously strange adventures continue in
HORTEN’S INCREDIBLE ILLUSIONS...
Inside the dusty side room of the Beeton Museum, Stuart wrote “
THE PHAROAH'S PYRAMID
” in large, careful letters at the top of the page, and then underlined it. Twice.
He put down the paper and stood on tiptoe, gripped the nearest snake-shaped handle, and pulled. The whole triangular side immediately swung down, cracking him on the head. Rubbing his skull for a moment, he crouched down and stepped inside the pyramid.
Stuart ran his fingertips over the walls and felt, near the top of each, a little loop of metal, just big enough to hook a finger into and colored the same jet-black as the rest of the surface. He hooked his finger and heaved. The side began to swing shut.
There was a loud and definitive click, and Stuart found himself in utter darkness. Then nine or ten stars twinkled from each wall; as he twisted around to look at them, a glimpse of red on the floor caught his eye. One single star shone from the center of it.
Stuart reached out to touch it, and his fingers felt a series of grooves: six of them, like the spokes of a wheel. He delved into his pocket and took out the metal star. It would fit, he just
knew
it would.
Heart trotting, mouth dry, he slotted the star into place. The effect was instantaneous. All four sides of the pyramid fell open with a noise like a thunderclap, and Stuart screamed.
Instead of the Beeton Museum, Stuart saw a sweep of grayish sand, peppered with rocks. A few low thorn trees were the only vegetation; not far away, a camel was grazing on one of them. The air was cold, damp, and misty; the sky a dirty white. Overhead, a large, dark bird was circling.
Stuart Horten was in the middle of a desert.
