“I said I’ll go with him. There’s no time to argue, and you can’t stop me, anyway.”
“No sense wasting time. We’re off.” She tossed the microphone back to a startled Simon d’Arco and turned to Gavin. “With that settled, we need to find transportation.”
“Uh …” was all Gavin could say. For months he had dreamed of something exactly like this. He’d constructed elaborate fantasies about swooping into Alice’s life with some grand gesture that would make her fall into his arms, betrothed or not. Now here she was, disheveled and upset after a clockworker attack that
“I’m here. What should I do?”
Simon shot Gavin a look, and his dark eyes were filled with concern. “Lieutenant, Agent Ennock has never operated solo before. I’m not sure that-”
“I can do it, Simon,” Gavin said hurriedly.
“What about Miss Michaels?” Simon asked the radio. “Over.”
The lights on Simon’s pack winked out. He slowly lowered the microphone. Gavin wanted to leap into the air for joy, but he kept his feet on the ground.
“Well!” Alice said, straightening her hat. “You heard the woman. Mr. d’Arco, you should be off.”
“Give me the pack, Simon,” Gavin said. “And take the extra horse with you before someone steals it.”
“Listen.” Simon slid out of the pack and set it down. “This won’t be like chasing L’Arbre Magnifique through the Forest of Fontainebleau, or the time we fought those floating freaks at Furnival’s Inn. You’ll be operating on your own. I don’t want you hurt.”
“Right,” Gavin said.
“So. Good luck.” Simon abruptly caught Gavin in a rough and uncharacteristic hug.
Gavin’s ribs creaked. “Um … sure. Thanks!”
Simon seemed to realize what he’d done, and he let go with a cough. “Miss Michaels. Fine seeing you, as always. Good day.” And he fled.
“I know I am only an automaton and barely worth bothering about,” Kemp moaned, “but if
“Was he that sarcastic before?” Gavin pulled a wand on a wire from the pack.
“No. Something was probably jostled in the accident.” Alice used the crowbar to lever off a chunk of debris, and Kemp sat up. “Can you walk?”
“I believe so.” Kemp got to his feet and staggered in a small circle. In addition to his having a shattered eye, his body was scratched and dented, and his left foot was turned. “I’m half-blind. I work and slave all day, and this is the thanks I get.”
“Go home,” Alice told him. “Tell Mr. Williamson what happened, and I’ll fix you when I get back.”
“I’ll be stripped to my oil pan, and see if I’m not,” Kemp muttered as he limped away. “Not that anyone would miss me. ‘Where’s Kemp?’ they’ll say. ‘No one’s ironed the paper today. Oh well. What’s for tea?’ ”
“Thank you, Kemp,” Gavin called after him.
Alice turned to him. “How are we going to follow the clockworker?”
“The thing is two stories tall. Someone’s probably seen it.”
“And it has a big head start. It could be halfway to Is-lington by now.”
“That was a joke. You Brits have a hard time with American humor.” Gavin waved the wand about in a businesslike manner. “Give the handle on that pack a few turns, would you? I need more power.”
Alice obliged, and several lights on the pack flickered weakly. “What does that object do?”
“It’s an extremely sensitive artificial nose. I smelled paraffin oil when I first got here, so I think I can pick up the mechanical’s exhaust and-aha!” An orange light on the pack gave off a steady glow. “Flip that switch there and help me get this on.”
Gavin winced as the pack’s immense weight landed on his back and shoulder muscles. The beating had been more than a year ago, but his back, crisscrossed with white scars, remained sensitive to sudden jolts. Simon said it was all in his head, but that didn’t make it less painful. He could see the orange light out of the corner of his eye as they picked their way out of the ruined shop, and the glow remained steady, telling him he was on the right trail. A thick layer of clouds covered the sky, but fortunately it wasn’t threatening to rain and wipe out the trail.
“How are we going to catch up with him?” Alice asked. “Run?”
“Better. That switch you flipped sent out a wireless signal. Our transport should be here any moment.”
Heavy footsteps thudded beyond the shop wall and came to a halt amid cries of astonishment from the gathered crowd. Gavin and Alice went outside, where Alice’s eyes widened. Waiting for them was an oak tree as tall as five men, a strange bit of green beauty walking amid the city squalor. Its bottom half was split into a pair of legs that ended in a tangle of roots. Fine vines of copper and brass ran up and down the trunk and wound around the branches. In the sturdier lower branches, seats and benches were carved into the wood. The crowd outside the shop had fled like ghosts fleeing a crucifix.
“What on earth?” Alice gasped.
“It used to belong to L’Arbre Magnifique,” Gavin said, pleased she was impressed. “A clockworker Simon and I captured in France. It’s partly intelligent, which is why it didn’t step on anyone when it followed the signal.”
“I see.” Alice paused. “How do we get up there?”
Gavin put his cap back on and whistled. The tree leaned down, bringing its lowest branches within reach of the ground and allowing Gavin and Alice to climb aboard. Handholds carved into the bark made it easy, and Gavin helped Alice settle into one of the carved wooden seats before choosing his own seat, one near a control panel and in the center of a series of levers, pedals, and ropes. He strapped himself in. The tree straightened with a stomach-dropping swoop that always made Gavin think of a glissando.
“GAVIN. . GO. . NOW. .?” the tree said.
Alice jumped. “It speaks?”
“A little.”
“Where? I don’t see a mouth.”
“Yeah, we haven’t been able to figure that out, either. Tree, this is Alice. She’s a friend.”
“ALISSSSS. . LEAFY. .” The voice creaked and hissed, like wind rushing through treetops on a summer night.
“Leafy?” Alice wrinkled her forehead. “What does that mean?”
Gavin started to blush. Then he straightened. What the hell was he doing? He had fought pirates, watched his best friend die, survived a brutal beating, and faced down a number of mad geniuses who had all tried to kill him. Compared to any of those, a beautiful woman was no threat. Time to stop acting like a stammering boy. He put his hand in his pocket and touched the mechanical nightingale. He had kept it with him all these months, and never once had it been damaged or even scratched. It had become a talisman that kept death away.
“It means he thinks you’re pretty,” he explained, then added, greatly daring, “He’s right.”
“Oh. Well,” Alice said, clearly flustered, and Gavin wondered whether Tree’s remark or his were the actual source of her embarrassment. “Thank you, Tree.”
“LEAFY.”
“We’re off!” Gavin said. He worked pedals and pulled levers. Tree, responding to signals sent through the metal vines, stomped away amid a swish of leaves. Houses and shops rushed past them nearly as fast as a train. People pointed and gawked. Lips parted, Alice clung to her seat, her gaze darting in a dozen directions, and Gavin felt a little thrill at her excitement, as if he had invented Tree just for her. Through it all, he kept an eye on the orange light just over his left shoulder. When it flickered or dimmed, he pulled Tree around to change direction until the light glowed more strongly.
“Does your instrument tell you how far ahead Mr. Barton has gotten?” Alice asked.
“No,” Gavin said. “It only tells direction. And how did you know his name?”
