Edison's Gold (22 page)

Tom felt a small flicker of anticipation zap his stomach. “We'd need to find Zytrol somewhere, though. And oil, resin. Some sort of compound to make rubber.”

“And a hot stove.” Lost in thought, Mr. Edison rubbed his forehead and paced away from the group about ten yards.

“Plus, it'd be dangerous,” said Tom, catching up to walk alongside him. “I'm not sure I could get high up enough before the solution—”

“Oh, no. You wouldn't be the one going up,” said Tom's dad. “I would.”

“You sure that's a good idea? You're old.”

“I'm not that old, wise guy.” He gave Tom a light smack on the back of the head. Tom grinned. It was nice to see his father so intrigued. It had been a long time since Tom had witnessed that. “And no. I think this is all one big terrible idea, but I'm all out of any better ones—”

“And I have no clue what the two of you are talking about when you speak in Edisonian geek ciphers,” Noodle interrupted, trailing them.

“Trust me, it's better that you don't,” Tom called back as he scanned the concourse for some place where they might find the necessary ingredients for SuperDuperStick. “What about that restaurant?” he said, pointing toward the Oyster Bar at the end of a lower walkway, just off the Main Concourse. “They've gotta have stoves at a fancy place like that, right? And maybe the ingredients we need.”

“It's worth a shot,” said his dad.

F
ifteen minutes is all we ask, then my son here and I will do your dishes for the rest of the night.”

The Oyster Bar's bearded head chef, who looked more pirate than cook, held Mr. Edison's stare for a long moment, trying to figure out whether or not this was some kind of joke. This was one of those times Tom was thankful his dad had such an innocent face.

“All right,” the cook finally said. “It's a real strange request, but I know a good deal when I see one.”

“I could tell that just from looking at you,” Tom's dad said.

“I'll give you these two burners and any basic pantry ingredients you need for ten minutes. But touch my seafood, I kill you.”

“Great. Hands off the seafood. Got it.” Tom's dad nodded quickly since the chef looked like he was prepared to make good on his threat. “I appreciate this.”

“And once we get slammed with the dinner rush, you and your boy will start in on pots and pans.”

“Absolutely.”

And with a low grunt, the chef stomped back toward his station behind a massive grill, where his minions sautéed shrimp, fried calamari, filleted salmon, and prepared just about every other edible sea creature.

Wasting no time, Mr. Edison grabbed a large pot and saucepan from the shelf behind him, then added in a cup of oil and waited for it to bubble. A few waiters shot him confused looks as they passed through to grab hot plates of food and drop off orders.

Several minutes later, Tom returned from the rear of the kitchen lugging a can of blue paint, a bottle of Clorox bleach, and a small metal tin of industrial wood varnish.

“Your thirteen dollars got me access to the storage closet. Janitor said I could borrow whatever I wanted.” Tom placed all the ingredients onto the countertop. “Zytrol in the paint, bleach in the Clorox, and we can reduce the varnish down to a resin.”

“Excellent.” Tom's dad gave a thumbs-up, all the while stirring the oil until it was splattering over the edges of the pan. “Now measure me out six ounces of bleach.”

Tom did, then dumped it into the large pot. In seconds, the smell of burning Clorox filled the room.

“Yo!” The chef yelled over from across the kitchen with his palms in the air. “You didn't mention anything about stinking up the entire joint.”

“I'm sorry. It'll only be another five minutes, max.”

The chef didn't look pleased or convinced.

“If he thinks that's bad,” said Tom's dad under his breath, “wait till I start simmering the paint.”

“Yeah, this one could get ugly.”

As Tom carefully ladled six tablespoons of gooey blue paint into a measuring cup, he felt an overwhelming warmth come over him. He hadn't worked on an invention with his dad in months, and he'd forgotten how much fun it was.

“The Zytrol's ready when you are,” he said.

T
his is sooooo super boring.”

Colby leaned against one of the many vaulted archways outside the Oyster Bar and let out a huge yawn. “They're taking forever in there.”

“When did you become Indiana Jones?” Noodle asked. “The Colby I know used to have germ-induced panic attacks at recess.”

“A: that was one time when the pollen count was particularly high. And B: the old Colby had never climbed through hundred-foot-high museum vents or been chased by a maniac through Brooklyn, run down by a speeding train, kidnapped, then chased again by said maniac through some freaky haunted mansion.”

“Touché,” said Noodle with a small eyebrow raise, then went back to amusing himself with another round of people watching. “Check out this guy coming in off the Metro-North. He's totally rocking out on his iPod like he's alone in his bedroom.” Colby was about to walk over and help him make fun of the singing freak when—

“You're kinda weird,” came a ghostly voice from behind her head. She turned toward Noodle.

“Why'd you just call me weird?”

“I didn't, dork. Even though it happens to be true.”

The ghostly voice behind her giggled.

Colby spun onto her hands and knees. Perhaps it was lack of sleep, but if she didn't know any better, she'd have sworn the wall was speaking to her. Slowly she peered close to the base of the archway.

“Who are you?” she whispered.

“Look behind you,” said the voice.

She turned. Standing about fifty feet away from her was a little boy, both hands in the air, waving. Colby stared back at the curving wall.

“How am I able to hear you?” she asked.

“Because it's the Whispering Gallery.”

“Who are you talking to?” A confused Noodle approached with caution. “You just became way more interesting to watch than any of the weirdo commuters.”

“I'm talking to him.” She nodded across the archway, then to prove her point, cupped her hands around her mouth and leaned close to the wall. “Say something for my friend.”

“He looks like a poodle,” said the voice.

Noodle squinted his eyes to make out the little boy.

“I'm twice your size, punk,” he whispered.

Another echoing giggle.

Colby stepped out into the middle of the archway. “It's like perfect acoustic symmetry. The pressure waves from our voices must be internally reflected somehow.”

“Colb!” Noodle's mouth was wide open. “Didn't that old record say something about a whisper?”

It took her a moment to realize what he was talking about.

“Oh, yeah!” Colby clapped her hands together. “It was like, ‘My whisper takes you to the place,' then something about being right below your feet.”

“Right, right, but it kept repeating the whisper part.”
Noodle followed her, snapping his fingers to an unheard waltz, trying to recall the song. “Then hop on a railway cart, remember? To some secret suite.”

“Our secret suite.”

“Yes!”

The little boy scurried away toward a woman in a business suit, who was talking on her cell outside the Oyster Bar.

“What do you think it means? Our secret suite?” Colby now approached the other side of the archway and ran her hand along its stone surface, searching for any secret levers, marks, or symbols.

“That there's a hidden room somewhere around here, obvi,” said Noodle as he walked to the middle of the archway. A few businessmen brushed past him.

“ ‘My whisper takes you to the place, I'm right below your feet,' ” Colby said to herself as she turned her gaze toward the ground. “Right below your feet,” she repeated.

The floor was dark with square tiles. Nothing out of the ordinary, except …

“Noodle, what are you standing on?” Colby raced over
and pointed at his sneakers, where a sliver of shiny yellow peeked out from beneath his soles.

He stepped back to reveal a gold-plated, encircled rose that had been laid into the floor. It was smaller than a DVD.

He crouched down to inspect it. “Thousands of people probably walk over this thing every day and never think twice about it.”

“So if it's right below our feet, the clue must be in the floor?”

“Except the song says to hop a railway cart,” added Noodle. “It doesn't make any sense.”

At that moment, almost like a sign from the heavens, the terminal rumbled with the sound of a train departing the station.

“There's our answer.”

“Oh, God.” Noodle shook his head. “More railroads?”

“It's worth checking out.” Colby was already jogging toward the railway stairs without waiting for a response.

Noodle raced to catch up with her. “Not to sound like, well,
you
or anything, but shouldn't we wait for Tom and his dad?”

“I'm very good at spatial geometry, Noodle,” she answered. “I don't need Tom to help me find out where the spot is. Plus they've got their hands full.”

She continued on toward the stairs, and before Noodle could do anything to stop her, she had already disappeared out of the terminal.

F
rom his pocket, Tom's dad whipped out a fresh pair of latex gloves that he'd grabbed from the Oyster Bar kitchen and slid them on.

“I don't feel right about doing this without finding Noodle and Colby first,” he said as he took off his loafers and placed them upside down on the bathroom floor. Tom meanwhile swirled the still steaming, gooey blue liquid in a Styrofoam cup.

“Don't worry, Dad. Wherever they went, I'll find them,” Tom assured him. “Besides it's you and me Keller's after.”

Mr. Edison nodded slowly. His son had a point, and time was not their friend right now. They had ten minutes until the solution dried completely.

The two had locked themselves in a public restroom stall for privacy, but the ammonia-like stench of the SuperDuperStick solution was sure to draw some suspicion.

On his father's signal, Tom poured the contents of the cup first onto his dad's gloves, then onto the soles of his discarded shoes.

“The longer it sits, the stickier the solution gets.” And as his dad stepped back into his goo-smeared loafers, they made a loud
glip-glop
sound, sticking to the floor but leaving no mark, thanks to the solution's gelatin-like properties.

“So you gotta move fast.” Tom unlatched the stall door and followed his father out of the bathroom.

But as they stepped into the Main Concourse, a new fear gripped Tom. Had he pushed his father too far?

Digging up old artifacts was one thing, but scaling the Grand Central Terminal wall, in front of hundreds of people, including police—that was a whole other level of insanity.