‘I suppose you’re right,’ George admitted. After all, he himself scarcely believed the events of the last few days, and he knew them to be true. Setting their improbable story against the reputation of an establishment figure like Augustus Lorimore, and Eddie was right — the police would be no help.
Which meant they were on their own. ‘What can we do?’ George wondered out loud. He looked round the laboratory — the floor strewn with debris, the workbench lying on its side, the door a tangled, splintered mess. He did not think they wanted to be there when the first Museum staff began to arrive in a few hours.
‘We’ve got to rescue Liz and Sir William,’ Eddie told him.
‘That won’t be easy. And we also have to get back your stone.’
‘The dinosaur egg. And we have to stop Lorimore.’ Eddie was picking through some of the broken apparatus lying on the floor. ‘There must be something here that can help. Something we can use to fool Lorimore, or distract him or something.’
George could see nothing. He thrust his hand into his jacket pocket and sighed. Then he smiled, feeling the cold hard metal in his pocket. The glimmerings of a plan were beginning to shine deep inside his mind. ‘There may be something,’ he said. ‘Something we can adapt. But not here, come with me.’
‘Where are we going?’ Eddie wanted to know as he hurried after George down the passageway, and up the main stairs.
‘I’m going to show you where I work,’ George said. Blade had returned from deploying the lightning conductors and was now up a ladder, connecting cables to metal brackets set into the ceiling of the laboratory.
Sir William had earlier got to his feet, smiled affably at the man standing guard over him, and tried to stretch some life back into his tired limbs.
Lorimore glanced up from his intense work. ‘I do apologise for the delay,’ he said. ‘But everything must be exact, as I am sure you of all people will appreciate. By all means feel free to look round. I have some fascinating automata and specimens in my collection. You may go into the drawing room, but no further.’ He paused, before adding for the benefit of the two guards: ‘Miss Oldfield may go with him. If either of them touch anything or attempt to escape, kill them both.’
It was said in such a straightforward tone of voice that it took a moment for Liz to register what he had said. She swallowed, her throat dry with fear.
‘Shall we?’ Sir William suggested.
‘I suppose we might as well.’
They left Blade up his ladder, reaching for the glass roof and the metal sockets set into the supporting braces. Cables trailed down to the metal bowl on the workbench below.
‘We have to do something. Escape or anything,’ Liz whispered to Sir William once they were in the drawing room. The two guards with them could probably hear her, but she didn’t care. Without specific instructions she hoped they would do nothing.
But Sir William ignored her too. He was peering in fascination at one of the automata — a train that was fixed to a loop of track running under a mountain. ‘I imagine that once wound, the train runs round the track, and the mountain is somehow made to smoke in sympathy. Like a small volcano.’ He smiled at Liz. ‘It really is very clever and intricate.’
Liz sighed, not at all interested. ‘But what are we going to do?’
Sir William shrugged. ‘As things stand at the moment, my dear, I don’t think there is anything very much that we can do. Except wait.’
‘For what?’ she demanded in exasperation.
‘For help. Though I must confess I have no idea whether it will come, or if it does what form it will take.’
From out in the hallway came the sound of a bell ringing insistently. It seemed somehow out of place in the still of the house.
‘Who can that be at this hour?’ Lorimore’s voice demanded from the laboratory behind them. ‘It’s not yet six in the morning. Blade, see who it is.’
‘Sir.’
Blade barely glanced at them as he strode past on his way to answer the door.
‘Help?’ Liz suggested quietly. She hardly dared hope.
‘Who knows?’ Sir William whispered back.
They did not have to wait long to find out. Blade returned within a minute, carrying a wooden box the size of a small suitcase. Liz and Sir William exchanged glances and followed the man back into the laboratory, where he set the box down on the workbench in front of Lorimore.
‘What is it?’
‘I’m afraid I don’t know sir. The boy said he had strict instructions to deliver it here as soon as possible. That he had been told Mr Lorimore would want to see it straight away.’
‘Boy? What boy?’ Lorimore asked suspiciously.
‘Just a delivery boy. Barely more than an urchin by the look of him. He didn’t wait — in a hurry to get home.’
Lorimore considered this. ‘I wonder.’ He glanced at Liz and Sir William. ‘But what can they do?’ he murmured. His fingers tapped against the top of the workbench like the legs of a spider. ‘And we can do nothing either, not until the power builds to a precipitate level. So, open it, Blade,’ he ordered, nodding at the box. ‘But, be careful.’
Liz and Sir William watched curiously from the back of the room as Blade took out his knife and levered the lid off the wooden box. Nails squealed in protest as the lid tore free. Blade pushed his hand under it and ripped it away, dropping it to the floor. Frowning, he reached inside the box and carefully lifted out the contents.
Lorimore had come round the workbench to see what it was, blocking Liz’s view. Whatever Blade was holding was obviously large and heavy. Lorimore swept the empty box off the workbench and gestured for Blade to set down the object.
‘No packing slip, sir,’ Blade said. ‘Nothing to say who sent it.’
‘There will no doubt be a letter in the first post this morning, Blade. But let us be cautious, just in case …’ Lorimore’s voice was hushed with awe, his suspicion diluted as he examined the object on the workbench. ‘Look at this. The workmanship, the skill that must have gone into it. Look!’
As he spoke, he stepped aside so that now Liz was afforded a clear view of the object on the table. She heard Sir William’s sharp intake of breath as he too saw it.
It was a model ship, exquisitely made from wood and metal and about a foot long. Without realising it, Liz had walked with Sir William across the laboratory and joined Lorimore and Blade as they stared down at the impressive craftsmanship.
‘Magnificent,’ Sir William said.
Lorimore looked up at him, with the trace of a smile. ‘Indeed.’ His eyes were shining with enthusiasm as he gently turned the ship round. ‘And see, here, on this side — it is a clock.’
There was, Liz could now see, a clock dial set into the side of the ship. It was showing the right time so far as she could tell — several minutes to six. She could see the intricately fashioned figures of the captain and his crew going about their business on deck and in the rigging — ticking through the everyday motions as the second hand clicked round. But this was not what surprised and interested her most. Her eyes were fixed on something else and she stared at it as hard as she could, willing Sir William to see what she could see.
Set into the deck was a silver plate where one might expect to see a hatchway down into the hold. The middle of the plate was indented, gently sloping inwards to form a shallow bowl. It was a plate she was sure she had seen before — in the hands of George Archer. But now, resting in the centre of the plate was a small wooden barrel — a powder keg. A tiny fuse was sticking out of one end of it, and a sailor stood beside it, his hands outstretched towards the fuse.
‘I have seen something like this before,’ she said quietly to Sir William, hoping that Lorimore would not pick up on her meaning.
Lorimore ignored her. But Sir William met Liz’s gaze. He was smiling, and nodding. ‘So have I, my dear,’ he replied in the ghost of a whisper, so quiet that only Liz could hear him. ‘So have I.’
Before he could explain further, Sir William gasped. Lorimore looked up at him sharply, but the gasp had
