Turnkey (The Gaslight Volumes of Will Pocket Book 1) (75 page)

“You sure?” I
replied. “I’m seeing them pretty well.”

“It’s a matter of
angles. See, from our vantage point, certainly the—”

“Forget it. I
don’t need the details. So that’s it, right? Can’t just ride through the
streets.”

“And remain
unseen? No. Even if we hid you, I’m sure they’d search us. But you might get by
on foot if you play it right. Look behind those buildings, where the fencing
goes up. Doesn’t look like there’s much of a patrol, so if you can squeeze your
weight through without being spotted, eh, might work.”

“And that’s my
best shot?” I asked.

“Afraid so,”
Doctor D shrugged, wringing his hands.

I tapped nervously
against the metal of my boots. The brothers noticed and placed sympathetic
hands on my shoulders.

“Fear not!” Doctor
P proclaimed, the frantic gleam bouncing in his eye. “I have no doubt, Mister
Pocket, that you shall be successful! For you are a man of great stuffing!”

“Great…stuffing?”

“Yes! Only the
rarest human breeds are of such an ilk! And while the souls of many men only
float and linger about in their fleshy sacks,
yours,
I can plainly see,
is a great pedigree, developed and fluffed out through a metaphysical
maturation uncommon to our times.”

I scratched the
back of my neck. “And that means…what?”

Doctor D looked at
me with a kind smile. “It means that we’d be honored to someday keep you in a
jar.”

I laughed weakly
and shook my head. Those damned, daft medicine pushers.

“Boys,” I spoke
with weary amusement, “I don’t suppose your father was a migrant Frenchman, was
he?”

“Why?” Doctor P
said. “Was yours?”

I laughed again
and pulled gently away. “Forget it,” I smiled in the dark. “It’s not
important.”

“Well, off you go,
then,” Doctor D said. “And I’m sorry we couldn’t be of any greater help.”

I looked over his
shoulder at the paraphernalia hanging off of the brothers’ caravan and back at
the street below.

A flicker of hope
turned over in my stomach.

“You know
something?” I spoke. “Maybe you can.”

A few minutes
passed.

At the bottom of
the slope, a pair of Magnates met at the center of the road and conversed. A
third soon approached and brought attention to the Marins’ wagon as it slowly
teetered into their view. The Magnates exchanged words and began to move toward
it.

“Now?” Doctor D
whispered, hunched atop of his vehicle.

“Now!” Doctor P
whispered, clutching to the back.

“Godspeed!” I
whispered, hiding in a bush. “And be careful!”

“Don’t worry!”
Doctor P said to me as he struck a match and put the crackling flame to a long,
spiraling fuse. “The good man never dies unredeemed!”

Terribly great
splashes of sparks and smoke blossomed out in every imaginable direction as the
brothers barreled down the great slope upon their mount of wood and steel.

“G-good Lord!” I
heard one of the Magnates shout, followed by the ricocheting clang of their
gunshot against the wagon.

“LONG LIVE THE
KING OF ENGLAND!” Doctor D shouted from the top of his lungs.

“LONG LIVE THE
KING!” Doctor P shouted.

The white-hot
sparks spread into a zipping torrent that burned through the cold night sky and
exploded with hues of, quite possibly, every color in existence.

Fireworks. Turns
out that the Marin boys were loaded with them, and they were all too happy to
indulge me with an impromptu celebration.

And here’s why…

Peeking from where
I kneeled, I watched the Magnates stop shooting and stare on in confusion as
the caravan came to a halt in the center of the street.

“Wh-what is the
meaning of this?” one of them asked. I think the others chimed in, but I wasn’t
in earshot to hear.

“LONG LIVE LIFE!”
Doctor D shouted as I watched his brother light another fuse. “IN ALL OF ITS
FORMS!”

Spark. Burn. Bam!
More fireworks loudly clapped around the moon.

And then it
happened. Doors lining both sides of the streets opened and sleepy, confused
residents of the great city walked out to complain about the noise. Until they
saw the lights in the sky, that is.

“Mama!” I heard a
little girl shout from somewhere. “Look! It’s pretty! It’s a pretty party!”

“CELEBRATE!” the
Marins shouted to the bewildered onlookers. “IN THE NAME OF LADY ENGLAND,
CELEBRATE!”

Oh, and celebrate,
they did. You would think those silver-tongued peddlers had struck the Sandman
himself in the side with a blade, seeing how those people rose and gathered
their loved ones.

Sure, the soldiers
tried to settle the crowd, but it soon became far too big, as the Marins
started blowing their breath into musical instruments to the delight to
everyone. People went and woke their families, took to the street, and just
started dancing as if the world had no greater purpose.

This was my
chance.

As bodies clogged
the streets, jumping and pointing and shoving, I mounted my offense on the tips
of my elbows and plowed a tight path through the mob. The sky was filled,
absolutely splattered and smeared with pastels, as I gingerly walked right past
the very men who were after my head. Blanketed by bodies, hidden behind flesh,
Will Pocket went along his way.

At last, I made it
free to the other end of the street, the Marin brothers still carrying on for
my benefit.

I remember the
last time I looked upon those boys. They were just sitting in the dark, atop
their great caravan, feeding off of the clamor. Their wooden perch seemed to
bob amongst the ocean of bodies as if it was riding them.

The Marvelous
Marins. Twin captains on the waves of madness.

Glorious,
wonderful madness.

I put on a
grateful and amused smile in their honor and left them to their celebration.

I was soon jogging
down an intersecting street and the smile was soon discarded. I wiped it clean
off, using the sobering paranoia I felt as a handkerchief to dab the amusement
off of my face.

I hurried into the
night, passing sleeping storefronts and dusty adverts as I moved. I had no idea
where I was headed, but I was well on my way there.

Sadly, that was
when I met my next setback.

I turned a few
more corners, covered another straightaway, and moved from a cobbled path to
one comprised solely of soft dirt. Suddenly, my foot lifted for another step
and smacked against something thick and binding. I gasped, twisting my ankle
into the ropelike obstruction, and tripped headfirst into a stack of abandoned
crates that were slumped against the side of a building.

I crashed down
with the crates into the dirt, making a considerable bit of noise as I did.
Almost immediately thereafter, a startled voice shouted out in response from
somewhere unseen in the distance, demanding that “whoever you are, just stay
put!”

“Damn it,” I
groaned, not in the mood for further interruptions, and tried to jump up into a
quick sprint.

I failed.

The obstruction
that had toppled me was still wrapped around my foot, and looking down, I saw
that it was actually some sort of very thick, black electrical cabling. Or so I
assumed, having very little knowledge of the workings of electricity. The black
cable extended far off into the shadows and even seemed to crawl up buildings
like a plant. Strange, I thought.

I heard someone approach,
assumably the owner of that startled voice from before. I quickly tried to free
my foot, seeing that the wrapped cable was actually clenched onto some of the
sharper metal corners of my unusual footwear. But of course, the moment I laid
my hands on the coil around my ankle, I was greeted with a demanding voice.

“Stop what you’re
doing!” it said. “Whatever that it is you’re doing, stop it now!”

I grunted, more
aghast than outright fearful, and slowly lifted my hands in surrender.

“I’m not doing
anything,” I blandly said, looking at yet another Magnate making his rounds at
this miserable hour.

Lovely.

I decided to try
to talk things out, seeing as this one looked a bit too restless with his
brandished gun. The last thing I needed right then was some shaky finger
hugging its friend, the gun trigger, because some lout in a pair of gold boots
went for something in his coat pocket.

So I’d talk things
out.

Or at least I
thought.

“Listen,” I began
to say, “let’s just take a moment, breathe, and be calm and reasonable about—“

Suddenly, the
ground swung up against my face, and that soft dirt smeared against my teeth.
Air whooshed alongside my ears as I quickly spit out the grime. I was moving.
The buildings on both sides of me were speeding past in a blur. It didn’t take
me long to realize what had happened. The cable that was wrapped around me had
been pulled, and by something powerful enough to yank me off of my feet. I was
now being dragged face down through the streets of the city, catching spatters
of earthy filth across my face. I was angry then, but I guess if that soft dirt
had been hard cobblestone, my face would now be wearing considerably less skin.

I could hear the
surprised Magnate, now even more confused, shout and pursue on foot after me.
But he couldn’t keep up and soon fell behind, disappearing in the dust.

I lifted my chin
as I was dragged backwards, eventually rolling upon my spine. I managed to lean
up and clutch the black coil around my ankle. It wasn’t exactly easy untangling
myself under the conditions, but I did it, at last ripping the cable away.

Once free, I
tumbled and rolled until coming to a blunt stop against a brick wall. Horribly
dizzy, I curled into a lopsided ball for a moment, trying to regain my focus.

When that didn’t
work, I just turned over and started talking to the sky.

“All right,” I
muttered to the moon, “so I’m not making a great go at this thus far. So maybe
we can work something out. If you’d be willing to hang around in the sky for an
extra hour or two tonight, I’ll give you…eh…”

I pulled off my
once again beaten and bent top hat.

“I’ll give you
this marvelous gentleman’s hat. And I’ll throw in a spoon for free.”

The moon said
nothing, and I placed the hat back upon my crown.

“All right…well,
what else do I still have?”

I took out the
pistol I still possessed, and pointed it up at the glowing orb.

“Here, a shiny,
nearly new, little pistol.”

I thought about it
and took another approach.

“All right,
glowball!” I muttered, gripping the gun with a greater tenacity. “You just stay
put where you are and we won’t have any problems. You got that?”

I stared up for a
moment more, sighed, and shoved the gun back into my coat.

“All right then,”
I whispered.

I wobbled to my
feet and took a step. The buildings were still speeding around me, which was
bad because I was standing still. Feeling sick, I fumbled around where I stood,
and tried to brace myself against the glass window of a novelties shop across
the way.

I fell over
myself, twisted around, and fell backward into the storefront. The thin glass
shattered as my weight collided with it, and I dropped hard into a front
display of new and wonderful products.

“Ug.”

I hurt. Bits of
glass slit marks into my fingers and glittered like starlight where they
landed. I closed my eyes, arms miserably widespread. My legs rested on hard
boxes of screws and springs. My head made a home atop an arrangement of shiny,
miniature music boxes. My open palms ached and reached out for something to
hold onto. They pulled loose an accompanying display of modern, miniature
musical cylinders. The rounded pieces of waxes rolled onto my stomach like the
first shovelful of dirt tossed upon a broken man. I wet my chapped lips and
tasted the airborne dust of that place. It seemed oh so fitting. I was
blanketed in glorious music and I couldn’t hear a note of it. The cylinders had
titles etched into their flat-topped end, and I read the words for momentary
company.

“A Lover’s Waltz.”

“Rhymes for
Children.”

“Great Mother
England.”

“Far Too Early
.
”

That last one
caught me as familiar, and I remembered the tune that had played in the watch
shop the night I met Dolly. “I’m singing this too early, something something…”
You know, Alan, that Lady Jay song you recalled to me. Anyway, I took that
cylinder in my fingers and for some reason stuck it in proper position on the
miniature music box under my neck.

You wouldn’t think
that a man in my predicament, moving on a very gruesome time limit and direly
needing to avoid attention, would be stupid enough to sit around in a broken storefront
that he had just shattered and play a piece of music.

Oh, but ladies and
gentlemen, never underestimate the breadth of my stupidity! It could fill the
country twice over!

So, Alan, sing it
again. Past the first two verses, if you will, this time. Because that’s how
far the needle rolled before I was found in my place of electric rest.

“I think I'm
singing this too early, far too early for this tune.

But I find
myself here crawling, searching beneath an autumn moon.

And I've got my
worst foot forward, yes, this time, I'm on my own.

Spun and
shaken, I am looking, waiting just to be shown.

I found a hole
deep in my pocket, and what I put in there is gone.

Because of you
I am down crawling, and I've been down here far too long.”

Someone was coming
for me.

I could hear the
broken glass crunching under their feet as they got near.

“And I think
it's far too early to admit that I have lost.