Turnkey (The Gaslight Volumes of Will Pocket Book 1) (54 page)

Jack’s hand
reached in and quickly yanked me out. I tumbled backward, landing stomach up on
the soft grass. As I rose, Jack leaned back in and tried to help Quill.

“Haste!” he
shouted.

“I’m trying!” she
shouted back.

Quill shrieked and
as I got to the window, I saw that Helen had caught her by the arm. The others
were fumbling with the donations.

Things seemed
bleak, but then spirited, little Quill surprised me. With her free hand, she
ripped off her fake mustache and glared at her assailant.

“This is
not
how
a lady behaves!” she shouted to Helen, who in her disbelief momentarily lost
her guard. Quill grabbed the hardcover book the other possessed and bopped her
on the crown with it. Stunned, Helen shuffled back. Quill slipped free and
jumped headfirst like a rabbit out the window and onto me and Jack’s arms. Of
course, we hadn’t expected this, so we were instantly knocked flat onto the
ground.

“Come on!” Quill
said, climbing off of our fallen bodies. “Stop lying around! We aren’t out of
this yet!”

And she was all
too right.

“Eloquent exit,
Pocket.”

“Dazed and on my
back, Alan. My signature.”

We ran in the
dark, hurrying along the outside of the manor as angry men shouted and climbed
out of the window after us. The stars above seemed to cheer us on, popping and
glowing with each footstep.

“Faster!” Jack
yelped. “Where the hell is Gren?!?”

“Good question,” I
replied.

We rounded a
corner of the building and came face to face with a wrought iron gate.

Locked.

“We’re fenced in!’
Quill gasped, pulling at the gate.

“And climbing
over’s out of the question,” Jack said, referring to the row of sharp-pointed,
decorative spearheads that lined the entire fencing.

“Okay,” I said,
catching my breath, “there could be some other exit nearby, maybe along the
bars. Something subtle.”

Jack snorted and
picked up a stone.

“I’m through being
subtle!” he growled.

“Don’t!”

He launched his
stone without a second thought through a nearby manor window. The shattered
glass fell like rainwater. Reveling in his victory, Jack peeled off his
mustache and laid it to rest with the shards.

“Let’s move!” he
said.

“You want to go
back in there?!?” I yelled.

“Do you know
another way?”

I swore and
followed them through the hole. We hurried down a dark corridor and up a flight
of stairs, feeling for a light. Instead, we found a pair of doorknobs, both of
which turned in our hands.

“You two try the
left one,” I said. “I’ll take the right.”

They nodded and
disappeared. I took a deep breath, hoping to find something helpful on the
other side of my door, and entered.

I was met with a
chorus of shrieks and sundries thrown at my head as a frantic rush of bodies
plowed by me, leaving me tattered, dizzy, and alone.

I had discovered,
it seemed, the ladies’ lavatory.

Quickly, I grabbed
a chair sitting before a lavish vanity mirror and wedged it under the doorknob
to block entry to the room. It wasn’t long before someone came banging on the
other side, of course, so I hurried out to a connected balcony and actually
managed to climb up from it and get myself onto the roof of the place.

Walking slowly and
looking around the area, I quickly spotted Hack-Jack and Quill scrambling out
onto the open lawn at the front of the manor. I signaled to them, throwing my
arms around like an idiot, but had no luck. Finally in desperation, I removed
my shoes and threw them at the pirates.

The first shoe got
no reaction.

The second caught
Jack in the head.

And after a
half-minute of swearing, he spotted me and moved within earshot.

“I see you both
got free,” I stated.

“And I see you
got…onto the roof,” Quill said, perplexed. “Why is that?”

“Not really sure.
Did you find Gren?”

“Nope. Just more
angry people. You?”

“The same.”

“So now what?”
Jack asked.

I groaned, truly
not wanting to speak the following sentence.

“I’m going back in
there for him.”

“You sure?” Quill
asked.

“Yeah. There’s a
little door up here, access from the roof to…somewhere back inside. You two get
out of here. Start up the
Prospero,
and for God’s sake, be ready to pick
us up when we come running!”

“Can do!” Jack
said. “You watch your neck in there, Pocket.”

“I intend to. No,
go on. Run!”

And off they went,
waving goodbye while kicking up dust. I looked down at myself, standing on a
dirty roof in my socks.

“I’m a fool,” I
said, moving to the roof’s entry hatch. “You hear that, Dolly? A complete
fool.”

I pulled open the
small door, a slightly difficult task due to the build-up of rust, then moved
downward through a dusty attic and eventually arrived back on the second floor.
I was lucky. The hall was empty, but I still moved fast, fearing that a search
party would turn up at any moment.

I passed door
after door, keeping my concentration on finding any sign of Gren.

Fortunately for
me, his voice carries.

“For the last
time,” I heard him shout in the distance, “I don’t have any damn idea what
you’re talking about! All I can tell you is that my brothers are somewhere at
this party. That’s all. So let me go!”

I moved to the
sound of his complaints, which led me to a door and a golden plaque.

TROPHY ROOM

CONTRIBUTIONS COURTESY OF THE NEWCASTLE GAME AND RIDING
SOCIETY

All right, Pocket,
I told myself. You’ve got one shot at an entrance. Make it count.

I cracked the door
and peered inside, unnoticed. Two men stood with their backs to me. Gren was
against the opposite wall. My only chance was to take them by surprise.

So silently, I
pushed the door open and crept in.

Silently, I
approached the two men.

Silently, I
tripped on a bunched rug.

Silently, that rug
yanked at a large, stuffed grizzly to my forward left.

And not at all
silently, the bear tottered and fell, landing directly on the two men who were
keeping Gren at bay. They yelled and pushed, but ultimately were pinned beneath
the animal.

“Wow,” Gren said,
looking at the scene. “Nice work.”

I shrugged.
“Thanks. Ready to go?”

“Is the money
secured?”

“There’ve been
some complications.”

“What does that
mean?”

“I’ll explain
later. We’ve got to get out of here!”

“Hey, what
happened to your shoes?”

“Gren!”

“Fine. Oh, hold
on.” Gren pried from the wall a pair of sizable, golden blunderbusses that had
been mounted amongst the trophies. He tossed one to me, then hopped over the
grizzly. “
Now,
let’s go.”

I sighed and
clutched the gun in my hand. “Tally ho.”

We ran madly
through the manor, waving our guns about like children with toys. Confused
staff and guests shrieked and dodged out of our way as we passed. We descended
to the ground floor and cut back across the ballroom. Too engrossed in their
own playing to notice us, the harpist and the pianists spun an accompaniment to
our escape, each frantic step met with a matching note.

“Stop right
there!” a single, muscle-bound man shouted, blocking our exit. He quickly
produced a pistol and trained it on us. We responded by aiming our weapons back
at him.

“Make a move and
it’ll be your last,” the man threatened.

“No, no!” Gren
retorted. “
You
make a move and it’ll be your last!”

“Big talk,” the
man sneered. “Goes with your big mouth.”

“Big mouth, huh?
Is that right? Fine. Pull the trigger. Go on. You’ll only have time to shoot
one of us before the other drops you dead. So go on and shoot!”

“Hang on, Gren,” I
interjected.

“You don’t scare
me,” the man said. “Hell, you probably don’t know how to handle what you’ve got
in your hands.”

“You think so?”
Gren snarled, gnashing his teeth. “What does this tell ya?” He swung his
blunderbuss skyward and fired a warning shot to the ceiling.

Except no shot was
fired.

Because Gren and I
hadn’t considered that a pair of hunting guns mounted in a public setting would
most likely not be left with live ammunition.

Because Gren and I
were idiots.

“Damn it,” Gren
said, speaking for the two of us.

We dropped our
firearms and raised our hands in surrender. The strong man grinned darkly and
shook his pistol at us.

“Let’s take a
walk, boys,” he said.

And we would’ve,
had fate not intervened.

And by fate, I
mean Jack and Quill.

The loud
screeching of machinery mixed with the cackling laughter of Hack-Jack bellowed
from outside. This seemed to be just the night for helpful distractions. The
noise caught the gunman off guard, and as he turned his head toward the sound,
Gren threw a punch. It caught the man under his chin, and our captor crumpled
to the floor. The pistol bounced out of his hand and I quickly put my foot on
it. With a kick, I sent it sliding across the room. Gren and I took off. I ran,
quickly taking in air as I sprinted. I got to the front parlor and broke
through the double doors.

The
Prospero
was
moving in figure eights across the front lawn, kicking up dust and dirt. Jack
looked delighted.

“There! It’s
Pocket!” Quill yelled.

Jack slammed on
the brakes and whistled me over. I was already halfway to the steam car before
it had stopped.

“Go!” I said,
climbing in.

“What about Gren?”
Quill asked.

“What do you mean,
he’s right—” I looked back and realized that he was no longer beside me. “We…we
must’ve gotten separated. He was—”

Bang! A single
gunshot rang out from inside the building. We all froze in position, staring at
the investors’ ball and fearing the worst.

“Gr…Gren?” Quill
whimpered, afraid.

The air hung
thick.

“Forget the
suspense, Pocket. I already know he lives.”

“Oh, yeah? Why so
sure?”

“Because you
promised me a scene with him and a windmill, and I haven’t heard any mills so
far.”

“Hmph. Shrewd.”

“Thanks.”

We breathed a
collective sigh of relief as Gren jogged at last outside, a bundle of coats
clenched in his hand and a line of blood running down his left shoulder.

“Jack!” he shouted
as he ran.

“I know, I know!”
his friend yelled back, spinning the
Prospero
back toward the investors’
ball.

Gren got onboard
just in time to miss an irate and rock-throwing mob forming on the lawn. Jack sprayed
them with a fresh coat of dirt as he drove us away.

“Pull over, Jack,”
Gren griped. “I’m driving.”

“The hell you
are!” Jack responded. “Just sit there and try not to bleed on me.”

“Oh, I’m sorry! Is
my bleeding wound inconveniencing you?”

“Shut up.”

I rolled my eyes
and slumped down in the backseat.

“What happened in
there?” I asked.

Gren grunted.
“Bastard found his pistol, got a shot off on me.”

“Serves you right
for dragging your feet! What were you doing that took so long? You could’ve
been killed!”

Gren smirked and
tossed the bundle of coats over the seat onto my lap.

“You forgot
something,” he said.

I reached my hand
into the coat I had worn and gripped the familiar metal.

The turnkey.

“Oh,” I said
stupidly. “Thanks.”

“Forget it.”

“Were you hurt
badly?”

“Nah,” Gren said.
“Bullet just nicked me.”

“Good,” I nodded.
“So no new metal plating?”

“Not this time.”

“Still…that was
risky.”

Gren looked away
from me and threw his words out the window.

“Yeah…well…” he
muttered, “it was for something pretty important, right?”

I rolled the
turnkey with my fingers. “Right. Thank you, Gren.”

He grunted off my
sincerity and asked the dreaded question.

“So did we get the
money?”

The drive became
very quiet, as we all began silently contemplating how best to avoid answering
Gren’s question. It was Quill who finally spoke.

“Well,” she said.
“About that…”

The trip back to
the
Lucidia
was a sobering one. The initial thrill of getting out alive
soon wore off and we were left with the disappointing knowledge that this long,
exhausting night had given us nothing but a free meal, a few drinks, and a
bloody shoulder for Gren. We had, simply put, failed.

Gren let out a low
sigh as we neared the shore. Jack was turning the wheel and Quill was sound
asleep next to me in the back.

I felt that I
should say something, or maybe I just couldn’t stand the mood any longer.

“Hey,” I said to
Gren, careful not to wake the girl beside me. “You all right?”

“I’m fine,” he
said bluntly.

“Look, they told
me that you are having a little trouble—“

“I’m fine. Don’t
worry about it.”

“We really tried
to get that money out—“

“I’m fine.”

I became quickly
annoyed and let it go, crossing my arms and leaning back in my seat. It wasn’t
comfortable. I was in a bad mood, which is something I hate to be in, and
therefore was instantly in a
worse
mood.

My coat slumped
off of the seat and onto my feet. Glancing over, I saw something flat and
square that had suddenly appeared beside me. Surprised, I picked up the token.

It was a card,
lavishly decorated with waves and serpents. A tarot card.