The White City (29 page)

Cody pushed his way through the mob of pirates surrounding Ray. His eyes seemed to glow as he stared at Ray. “I’ve met a few Ramblers in my time. I knew they had strange powers, but what you just did, I’d always took as exaggeration and legend. Until now.” He gave a crooked smile. “So tell me, Rambler. How many?”

“What do you mean?” Ray asked.

“I can’t work miracles here,” Cody said. “I’m just trying to figure how I can help you. I can’t tell you where Stacker Lee is or John Henry’s hammer, but I’m a planner. Some would say a schemer. Comes with the business. Now, say for a moment you knew where to find Stacker Lee, how many would you send? What I’m getting at is who needs to go and who can stay to fight?”

Ray nodded. “Conker and me,” he said. “We’d have to go.” Then turning to Jolie, he added, “And her.”

“I’m with you too,” Si said.

Ray expected Conker to argue, but he said nothing, so Ray looked back up at Cody. “Four of us.”

“Good,” Cody said, clapping his gloved hands.

“Why’s that good?” Conker asked.

“Because the four of you might be able to escape notice.” Cody had an odd tilt to his mouth, one that Ray imagined the old showman often got as he devised a new act for his Wild West show.

Conker frowned. “How you reckon we’re going to escape notice if we’re supposed to be handed over to the Gog along with Nel?”

“Because the four the Gog thinks he’s being handed will not be you,” Cody said, splaying out his hands like a man showing a winning hand. “And by the time Mister Grevol realizes it, you’ll be long gone.”

“Decoys,” Ray whispered.

Cody pointed at Ray with a smile.

A murmur bubbled around the mob in the lobby.

“It’s a good plan,” the Pirate Queen said, digging into her
pocket for a cigar. “But the only problem is, what are you four going to do? Knock on the door to Grevol’s hall and ask if Stacker is home?”

“She’s right,” Si said. “What good is all this if we don’t know how to find the hammer? This is hopeless.”

Conker spun around to face Si. “What did you say?”

She waved a hand at him. “Spare me the speeches, Conk, about not giving up hope—”

“Hope,” Conker gasped, his eyes wide.

Si looked over at Ray. Ray wasn’t sure what had caused Conker to grow so still, but he’d seen that expression before, that look on Conker’s face when he was figuring out something critical.

“He’s lost it,” the Pirate Queen murmured.

“No, what is it, Conker?” Ray asked.

A smile crept across Conker’s face as he clapped his coal-shovel hands onto Ray’s shoulders. “I know where it is,” he said. “I just figured out where the Nine Pound Hammer’s hidden.”

The day seemed to alternate between alarming velocity and painful slowness. Ray was not sure which he preferred, as every moment seemed ripe with apprehension.

Cody’s men had another show to put on and carried out preparations as they would on any other day. However, up on the uppermost level, in the storage room, the Pirate Queen led plans for the confrontation ahead. Hobnob had been sent to find Nel, and Ray went often to the window to peer out for signs of his return.

Around two sides of the Wild West’s encampment ran the
elevated train tracks. On the other lay the Expo’s Midway, marking the entrance to the fairgrounds, with its odd jumble of exotic buildings and, rising above them all, Mister Ferris’s enormous mechanical wheel. Beyond, tucked into the other buildings of the White City, Ray could see the black mass of the Hall of Progress, unassuming yet chilling. Buck must be there by now, he thought grimly. Was he lost to them for good?

Then his eyes went to a gap among the Expo’s buildings, where Ray remembered the long fountain called the Grand Basin rested. He thought he could just make out a glint of gold.

“Big Mary?” Ray said. “The statue of the Republic.”

“She’s liberty,” Conker said. “Remember what Buck said when Stacker threw him in the lake? Something about hope being at liberty’s feet.”

“ ‘Hope lies at liberty’s feet,’ ” Si said. “He’s been mumbling for days.”

“What does that mean?” the Pirate Queen asked.

“Liberty’s feet. That statue’s feet,” Conker said. “It means Stacker hid the hammer beneath Big Mary somewhere.”

“So Stacker wants us to find the hammer?” Ray asked. “Is that why he told Buck that?”

Conker tapped a hand to his chin as he thought. “When I went into the Hall of Progress to get the hammer, Stacker started to say something to me … something like ‘It’s not what it seems’ and then ‘Didn’t Buck tell you …’ ”

“Tell you what?” Si asked.

Conker shrugged. “I punched him then, so I don’t know what else he was aiming to say. But now I think I do. I think Stacker was trying to say the hammer in the hall was a fake and that he had expected Buck to tell me something.”

“Probably to have figured out his message about liberty’s feet,” Jolie said.

Si scowled. “Why would Stacker want to help us? Why would he tell us where he’s hid the hammer?”

“Buck thought Stacker wanted to redeem himself,” Ray answered.

Si held up her hand. “The same Stacker who did this to me?” she snarled.

“I don’t trust him either,” Conker said. “And if I see him again, he’ll be sorry for what he did to you. But if he did it, if he hid the hammer beneath that statue, then who cares why. Tonight, this is our last chance. We have to go there and hope Stacker hasn’t changed his mind.”

There was a cough, and everyone turned. “How do I look?” Big Jimmie asked.

Ray watched as Conker strode slowly over to stand before the enormous pirate. Jimmie’s face had been darkened with a stick of greasepaint Gilley had brought from the show’s makeup room. Ray had seen plenty of blackface performers on vaudeville stages, but never anyone as large and ugly as Big Jimmie.

Conker had his hand cocked under his chin as he inspected the disguise. Fortunately Jimmie had thick, curly hair, which after being cut passed for Conker’s. Conker continued stroking his chin as everyone waited. Then he erupted into a bellowing laugh. “You look preposterous!”

Big Jimmie chuckled uncertainly as the others slapped their knees and pointed.

“You’re still about a foot too short,” Conker said. “But you’re big enough. Besides, this is what the Gog’s men will look
for.” He handed Jimmie the hammer he had taken from the Hall of Progress. “Your Nine Pound Hammer.”

“Good enough, given it will be dark,” the Pirate Queen said. “Get out here, Piglet.”

Two pirates had been holding up a curtain for Piglet to put on her outfit. She stepped out slowly, her hands crossed over her chest. Mister Lamprey had fashioned a green gown from some of the fabric in the storage room. Piglet was barefoot and seemed clearly uncomfortable. Her arms and feet were as pale as an egg, but her hands, neck, and face were sun-browned with abrupt edges at her wrists and neckline.

“I feel half naked,” Piglet said, rubbing her hands over her bare arms. “Where’s there to hide a gun?”

Ray looked at Jolie, who was blushing at the strange vision of herself.

“At your back,” the Pirate Queen said, coming forward to brush Piglet’s dark hair forward across her face. “We’ll need powder to cover your tan.”

“I’ll get some,” Gilley said.

“We’ll get to it later,” the Pirate Queen said, waving a hand before the freckle-faced cowboy could leave. “She’ll just manage to smear it.”

“What about me?” Big Jimmie asked. “It’s itchy.”

“Wipe it off if you want,” Mister Lamprey said. “We’ll touch you up tonight.”

“Leaves just Si and Ray,” the Pirate Queen said.

Si sat on a trunk with her back to the wall, watching the proceedings with raised eyebrows. “There’s only one I know small enough to pass for me.”

Mister Lamprey nodded. “Aye, you’re thinking of Peter Hobnob?”

Si smiled. “We can paint his hand, but what about that nest of hair?”

The Pirate Queen turned to Gilley. “Have you got wigs?”

The boy nodded, tipping back his cowboy hat. “Yeah, we’ll have something that’ll work.”

“Which leaves us Ray …,” the Pirate Queen murmured. Her eyes scanned the room full of pirates.

Ray looked around as well. They were all a gnarled, ugly bunch, not one of them besides Piglet younger than thirty.

The Pirate Queen was frowning. “Even with makeup and in the dark, I don’t see one among you fair enough to be young Ray.”

Gilley cleared his throat before saying, “I could do it, ma’am.”

All eyes turned to the young man, and the room grew quiet.

“It’s too dangerous,” Ray said. “There’s no telling what will happen, Gilley.”

Gilley clenched his jaw and his freckled cheeks grew red. “I’ve been in fights aplenty.”

“This ain’t fighting,” Conker said. “This’ll be killing.”

Gilley looked around at the crowd. “I grew up reading dime novels about Mister Cody. How he killed Chief Yellow Hand and all. Why I joined up. Not to be an errand boy and not to be a performer. I can do this. And besides, you need me, right?”

The Pirate Queen asked, “You know how to shoot a gun?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

She clapped a hand to Gilley’s back. “You’re in. We’ll be watching over you.”

As the attention returned to the planning, Ray could not shake the fear—fear upon fear. This boy might lose his life tonight.

Jolie’s hand slipped into Ray’s and she whispered, “We all have to make sacrifices.”

After a moment, Ray went back to the window to look for Hobnob, an unsettling feeling in his chest.

Evening came, and noise rose as the coliseum filled with the evening’s audience.

“You bunch had better just stay up in here for the show,” Gilley said as he came through the door. “Special guests tonight. President Cleveland’s here, along with some governors and diplomats and whatnot.”

As they listened to Cody’s voice filling the stadium and the cheers and mock gunfights and laughter, Ray tried to stomach a meal but could not force himself to have an appetite. He gave his hat and coat to Gilley, along with a Solomon’s seal root from his toby, hoping the charm would offer a small measure of protection as well as a bit of hoodoo in case Grevol was looking for it. Si had laid out her tunic and loose pants for Hobnob and dressed in a simple set of dark clothes she had found in one of the trunks. No other clothes would have fit Conker, and Big Jimmie seemed convincing enough with the greasepaint and the hammer. Jolie wore a black silk frock belonging to one of the smaller performers to cover her luminous arms.

Conker began prying apart the boards of the ceiling to open a hole to the coliseum’s roof for their escape later. Si and Ray and Jolie passed around a whetting stone to sharpen their knives. Mister Lamprey had urged them to take guns, but all refused. They did not know how to use them, and as Si said, they would hopefully have no need for one. Fighting was not part of their plan.

The door opened, ushering in the laughter and voices from the audience. Nel entered, followed by Hobnob and Marisol. Redfeather shut the door behind them.

As Hobnob slumped into a chair, Si tossed her tunic, pants, and the wig into his lap. “These are for you.”

The little thief lifted the wig with a horrified look.

“Were you spotted?” Conker asked.

“How could we not be,” Nel said, removing his fez and coat. “There must be a hundred agents surrounding this stadium.”

“There’s something going on,” Marisol said. “The crowd is huge. Lots of talk about somebody at the show.”

“It’s President Cleveland,” Ray said. “He’s in the audience tonight.”

Nel’s eyebrows leaped. “I was afraid of something like this. By any sort of logic, Grevol should have captured you all this morning. He’s waited until night for a reason, and I fear it has to do with our special guests out there.” He sighed grimly. “Even though I can feel that Grevol has not yet finished his Machine, it might be ready enough.”

“Enough for what?” Si asked.

“For what he’s conspired for these luminaries visiting the
Expo.” Nel nodded to Redfeather. “Unfortunately I doubt we’ll be able to convince President Cleveland’s party to take any of my handiwork.”

“Your handiwork?” Conker asked.

“These,” Redfeather said, opening his satchel. “We were fortunate to find the right plants.”

“We need to pass them out to everyone,” Marisol said.

Ray looked curiously at the hundreds of tiny pouches Redfeather was spilling onto the floor. “What are they?”

“Protection,” Nel said. “Protection for when the Gog unleashes his Darkness.”

As the performance roared below, Nel made his way around the room, speaking quietly to each of the children of the medicine show. The pirates were loading pistols, polishing and sharpening blades, sipping rum, and inspecting the tiny pouches Nel had instructed them to wear around their necks. Ray had seen them face battles before, and they did it with glee. But not tonight. He sensed in their overly loud voices and sidelong glances that tonight was different.

“Ray,” Nel said, as he sat down beside him on a trunk in the corner. The old pitchman clapped his large hand over Ray’s knee. “Are you ready?”

“Is that possible?” Ray asked.

Nel shook his head. “My choice in words has become trite in the face of all that’s before us. Forgive me.”

Ray peered up at Nel. “You never have to ask that, Nel.”

“But I fear I must,” Nel said. He sighed heavily. “You know that I have spent my later days trying to shelter you all from the
dangers of the Gog. And now, what I’m allowing you to do …” Nel leaned forward, his face in his hands. “Were I able to go in your place, I would,” he whispered.

“I know.”

“But the Gog would know where I was, and our plan would be ruined,” Nel continued. “Go to the statue and retrieve the Nine Pound Hammer. Get into the hall. Reach the Gloaming—”

“I know,” Ray repeated gently.

Nel’s expression softened. He clasped Ray’s arm.

“Nel?” Ray struggled to ask the question that was gnawing at him. “How will you defeat the Gog?”

Nel stood as he forced a smile. “Don’t worry about this clever old fox, Ray. I’ll create the necessary diversion for you four to stealthily make your getaway. Then I’ll attend to how to defeat Grevol. Focus on your own task. We each have our part to play.”