Edison's Gold (14 page)

G
loved hands splashed gasoline over every inch of the dark basement, pouring it onto the piles of books and papers, dusty furniture, even the wheelbarrow and cracked flower pots that were in storage until the summer. It was March, which meant the air was wet and cold, so it would take a lot of gas to do the job right
.

The man stood there in silence, surveying the damage. A few days ago, when he'd received an anonymous call offering him five hundred dollars to torch the entire structure, he'd happily complied. It was pretty simple work. Get in, get out. Get the cash
.

As to what he was destroying—nah, he didn't want to know. Better if he didn't. It was a job. Nothing more
.

The match sparked in his freezing hands, and within seconds, the whole space was doused in dancing yellow light. Without even pausing to admire his work, the man climbed up through the sidewalk hatch and disappeared down a side street and into the night
.

The flames licked higher, devouring the paper and exploding toward the ceiling. In minutes, it had spread upward, all the way to the building's second floor
.

Outside, panicked gawkers, their coats and mufflers pulled hastily over their flannel nightgowns, had begun to spill into the sidewalks. Moments later, wailing fire engine sirens whined down the street, and whoever wasn't awake yet was now
.

Horse-drawn and steam-powered, the fire trucks rolled heavily up to the house. Uniformed firemen rolled out their hoses to battle the flames
.

As he turned the corner onto Fifth Avenue, his eyes and ears still rapt from an evening out at the theater, it took Nikola Tesla several moments to register exactly what was going on. Even as he heard the sirens and caught the smell of smoke, a thick current in the cold night air, he never could've imagined
that the cause of all the commotion was his very own building, and even as he stood in front of the blazing block, he needed a few moments to register what was happening
.

Edison.

It was all Tesla could think as he raced up to one of the overseeing police officers, grabbing fistfuls of the man's uniform as he swung him around by his arms. “I know who did this! Do you hear me? I will demand restitution!” His eyes brimmed
.

And I will have my revenge,
he vowed silently
.

The police officer unclasped Tesla's hands. “Mr. Tesla, would you mind answering some questions for us?” The officer spoke slowly as he attempted to escort the shaking inventor away from the fire, to safety. But within a few paces, Tesla broke free from his grasp, collapsing onto the curb in front of the burning building. Let the fire take him, too. He was nothing without his work. Those papers, all that data—it represented years of his life, his best research, his most inspired thought. Without his lab, who was he?

He was ruined—by Thomas Edison
.

T
he digital clock on Tom's bedside table read 10:16. His parents had only gone to bed fifteen minutes ago, but in order to catch the 10:31 Metro-North out of Yonkers, he would have to leave now.

Quietly, Tom rolled out from under his comforter, fully dressed in black like a ninja. The computer printouts, extra pens and notepads, a triple-sealed plastic bottle of hydrochloric acid, two steel shovels, a mallet, and one chisel had already been stuffed into a duffel bag under his bed. Tom had no idea what was waiting for him at mile nine, but whatever it was, he figured he was probably going to have to dig, hammer, or burn his way through something sturdy to get to it.

He held his breath as he slid the heavy duffel bag out into the open, careful not to let the shovels clank against each other.

“Phase one complete,” Tom mumbled to himself.

Phase two: escape.

Tiptoeing toward the bedroom door, he opened it an inch at a time, braced for any telltale whispering or rustling from his parents' bedroom, but all he could hear were the faint sounds of the local TV news coming through their door.

Then, with his shoes in hand and the duffel bag slung over his shoulder, he stepped into the upstairs hallway.

All night, Tom had been at the computer, researching the history of the New York railroad system. As his bedtime came and went, he could feel the scratch behind his eyelids and the heaviness in his bones. He'd have to keep his wits sharp tonight, and that wouldn't be easy.

Though the Edison family's narrow Victorian home had a back staircase, a hidden ladder, a gabled attic, a basement plus root cellar, and a functioning dumbwaiter, the one thing it didn't have was an easy escape route. There was no sturdy ledge under Tom's bedroom
window, and it was a good twenty-foot free fall to the street. The only ways out were the obvious routes: front door or kitchen door. Tom chose the front.

It took him a full three minutes to creep down the main stairs. After each creak or squeak, he'd catch his breath, frozen in the darkness, praying he hadn't tipped off his parents, who were probably just dozing off right about now. The living room was a minefield of half-packed boxes, furniture, book piles, and the most dangerous obstacles of all, Rose's strewn toys. One false move would send Tom crashing to the ground for sure.

After what felt like six lifetimes, he finally reached the front door, stepping through and locking it ever so gently behind him. Outside, the neighborhood was settling down for the night. All along the line of modest homes, lights were being snapped off and doors bolted.

As he continued along the sidewalk, all Tom could hear was the mosquito-like buzz from the streetlights. But no sign of life. Once he'd reached the end of the block, he was welcomed by darkness. And then …

Blink, blink, blink
the flashlight signaled in the distance.

Tom practically keeled over with relief as he darted
across the street to where Noodle and Colby were crouched behind a row of shrubs, waiting for him.

Like Tom, they were dressed head to toe in black and, like Tom, they both looked sleepy and nervous all at once.

“Ready?” he asked, his breath cold in the sharp spring air.

“Yup. Let's do this.” Noodle adjusted his black baseball cap low over his eyes as they headed in the direction of the Yonkers train station.

Their journey to Hoboken was complicated, with three transfers each way and little room for error. If they missed a single connection, if one subway or train was more than five minutes late, the entire plan would unravel, and they'd be busted for sure.

Tonight would actually be the second time the three of them had pulled an all-nighter. The last one was on Halloween, also the same night as Colby's thirteenth birthday. Noodle had decided it would be fun to watch six straight hours of zombie movies to see how scared they could get. Sure enough, all of them had made it to see the sunrise, simply because they'd been too terrified to fall asleep.

“According to my research,” Tom informed them as they jogged toward the station, “the Lackawanna Line was one of the first interstate railroads ever to have originated out of New York City.”

“And by my math,” added Colby, “mile nine, on the old route, will put us a ways away from the riverfront. Somewhere between Palisades and Central Avenue.”

As they turned onto Buena Vista Avenue, Noodle was the first to see the Metro-North train pulling into the station.

“Wait!” he yelled as the three of them started sprinting. “Hold that train!”

The brakes swooshed to a stop as Tom reached the station. The heavy duffel bag knocked hard against his legs, slowing him down, as Noodle and Colby slipped into the departing train.

“Come on!” they yelled.

Tom dashed onto the platform, heaving his bag between the train's closing doors. Once it began pulling out of the station, Tom had to run to keep up with it—but he couldn't get through the doors.

“Hit the emergency brake!” Tom yelled.

“We got it,” Noodle called back, as he and Colby
pulled on the doors with all their strength, securing it open by two inches.

If he didn't go for it now, he'd miss the train. Tom inhaled and lunged at the door. He got his torso through, but the doors locked around his waist like a mechanical shark.

“Hold on!” Colby commanded as she and Noodle each grabbed one of Tom's hands and pulled him in the rest of the way.

Fifteen minutes into the night's adventure, and they'd almost tripped up at the gate.

They collapsed into the train's vinyl seats. Colby couldn't help laughing. “At least now we're all wide awake.”

A
nyone else having second thoughts about the intelligence of this plan?” asked Noodle, speaking for all of them as their flashlights cut through the deserted railroad tracks that stretched from the Hoboken waterfront. In the distance, a car siren wailed, startling a pack of dogs. Their collective barking filled the night.

“Just keep your eyes peeled,” said Colby. “That's what my nana always says.” Her own eyes were round as saucers.

As they continued along the railroad tracks, Colby knelt down and used her flashlight to check over her notebook calculations, which seemed to indicate that they were somewhere between miles seven and eight on the old Lackawanna Line.

“And what is it we're looking for, again?” asked Noodle.

“Not sure,” said Tom. “I'm hoping we'll know it when we see it.”

“Could it be this?” Noodle's flashlight illuminated a weatherworn white stone marker with the words MI 7 etched in faint block letters.

“Mile seven!” Tom exclaimed. “It must be left over from the original railroad.”

“Good. So we're close. Ish,” said Colby.

“It'd still be nice to know what we're close to.” Noodle slowly swept his flashlight back and forth in front of them, roving the area like a metal detector.

But there was fresh energy in their steps as they upped the pace along the tracks. After another mile, the dark shadows of a large structure began to take form in the far-off distance.

“Tunnel ahead.” Colby motioned to it once she was able to make out its gaping diameter tucked underneath a tree-lined hill.

“I really hope we get to marker nine before we get to the mouth of that thing,” said Noodle. “Doesn't seem to be a lot of wiggle room in there.”

“Well, there's mile marker eight,” said Tom as his flashlight landed on it. They were still several hundred yards away from the tunnel, but it was looking bad, because the track they'd been following from the train station disappeared into a narrow mouth.

“Marker nine's gotta be in there somewhere,” said Tom moments later, when they finally arrived at the tunnel's opening.

They stopped, uncertain. On both sides, there was no more than a foot of space between the edge of the railroad tracks and the wall.

“Any last words?” gulped Noodle, peering forward into the shadows.

“Yeah, how about, I hope I don't get hit by a train?” Colby reflexively glanced behind. In the hour or so that they'd been walking, only one single, tired old freight had chugged past, but none of them wanted to get stuck inside that tunnel if and when the next one decided to come along.

“Let's have some faith. Please.” Tom was busy prying open a metal box affixed to the side of the tunnel's entrance, just beneath a small traffic light. “Hold my flashlight?” As Noodle grabbed for it, Tom explained,
“My dad once told me these stoplights run on timers, so trains can only enter the tunnel when the light's green. If I can somehow rejigger it …”

He opened the well-rusted metal box to reveal the light's circular mechanized timer inside. It made a faint buzzing sound as a gray disk slowly counted off the seconds. Tom folded up two pieces of loose-leaf paper from Colby's notebook and wedged them into the timer's gears.

“Ya know, most kids' dads teach them how to throw a football when they're growing up,” said Noodle.