Amanda Lester and the Black Shadow Terror Read online

  Ivy grinned. “We don’t. If he’s alive he’ll find us.”

  “No, you don’t get Ivy,” said Scapulus. “Or Basilica.”

  “Oh, I will,” said Hugh. “And you can’t stop me.” He reached for Scapulus’s phone and punched in a text. “We’re going to have a bit of a wait, so I suggest you make yourselves comfortable.”

  Scapulus lunged for him, but Blixus stepped between them.

  “I wouldn’t try that if I were you, Holmes. Jacko, sit them down and bind their feet.”

  Jacko scurried to do Blixus’s bidding. He shoved Diamond into a chair first, binding her feet quickly and efficiently. Then he did the same with Mrs. Bipthrottle. When he got to Scapulus, the detective kicked him. Blixus pulled out a pistol and pointed it at him.

  “Don’t.”

  Scapulus stood still and let Jacko handle him. How he was going to get out of this he had no idea.

  “Scapulus is in trouble,” said Ivy when she’d listened to the boy’s text.

  “How can you tell?” said Simon, burying his face in her hair.

  “He doesn’t talk like that. “‘Trouble at BL Rare Book Room. Come at once.’ That isn’t him.”

  “It sounds okay to me.” His voice came out all muffled.

  “Simon, listen please,” she said. “He doesn’t abbreviate things like that, and he doesn’t give orders. Plus he’d use my name.”

  Simon lifted his head from her intoxicating hair. “So it is Blixus, and he’s alive, which implies Hugh is too.”

  “I’ll alert Thrillkill. Can you please contact Blair Belize? He’s your buddy, right?”

  He hadn’t heard that name in a while. Blair Belize was the MI5 agent he’d come across the previous year. The man was quite mysterious—a little cracked, but a great detective. He was based in London, conveniently close to the British Library.

  “Yuppers,” he said. “Right after I—”

  “Simon!” She pushed him away. “Focus. We can canoodle later.”

  He pulled her back to him. “But you feel so good.”

  She stood up and walked away from him. “Your friends are in trouble. Doesn’t that mean anything to you?”

  He could feel himself wake, as if an alarm clock were going off. She was right. What was he doing? He grabbed his phone and pressed Belize’s icon, which for some reason looked a lot like Ivy’s face.

  After contacting Belize, Simon, Ivy, and Thrillkill sprang into action, and within half an hour they were headed for London by helicopter. Professors Also, Browning, Pole, and Ashtar followed on a separate aircraft with David and Gordon. Binnie and Dreidel did not answer their texts.

  When they arrived at the library, Ivy insisted on going into the Rare Book Room with Simon. Nigel was to remain with the pilot for safety. Thrillkill argued with her, but when she explained what she had in mind he relented.

  “Take good care of her,” he told Simon.

  “Always, sir,” said Simon, grinning at his lady love.

  They entered the Rare Book Room, where they were met by a smug Gwendolyn Airedale. “This way,” she said. She caught a glimpse of Ivy. “Seriously? A blind girl? You detectives slay me.”

  Simon gulped. If anything happened to his precious Ivy he would kill himself—right after doing away with those evil Moriartys. He patted the phone in his pocket. It had better do the trick.

  They were in. Simon gasped when he saw his friends and Mrs. Bipthrottle tied up.

  “Welcome,” said Blixus, the oily git. “My son would like to say a few words.”

  But Hugh was gazing dumbly at Ivy and said nothing. The way he was looking at her made Simon’s blood boil.

  “Hugh?” said Blixus.

  Hugh looked up, startled.

  “Thank you for coming,” he said displaying uncharacteristic politeness. He was still gazing at Ivy. He looked doubtfully at Blixus. “I don’t know what to do with her.”

  “You’re the boss,” said Blixus.

  Hugh turned his attention back to Ivy. Simon wanted to pop him.

  “Sing,” he said. “Please sing for me.”

  Ivy smiled and said, “Delighted.”

  She began to sing something Simon hadn’t heard before. It was plaintive and mesmerizing.

  As she moved deeper into the song Hugh got an even goofier look on his face and gazed into her sunglasses. She removed them and he looked into her sightless green eyes. When she finished he approached her and fitted his lips to her ear. Simon stiffened. If he so much as touched her . . .

  But he didn’t. Instead he whispered, “I’ll do anything” loud enough for everyone to hear.

  Ivy cupped her hands and whispered in Hugh’s ear, but Simon couldn’t make out what she was saying.

  Hugh nodded, pulled out his phone, and hit a few keys. Then he looked at Blixus.

  “She’s mine,” he said.

  He linked arms with Ivy and began to walk her out of the room. Simon was beside himself but he knew what was about to happen. His phone sounded and he lunged for the girl he loved, pulling her away and under a table. Then Thrillkill, the four teachers, Blair Belize, David, Gordon, and several MI5 agents burst through the door.

  “What did you say to him?” Simon said as he pulled Ivy out of the way.

  “I asked him to fix the history machine,” she said clutching him. “I told him I’d join them if he did that and spared you.”

  “Good grief,” said Simon. “That voice thing of yours really works.”

  “Cool isn’t it?’’

  But their next words were drowned out by the fighting going on around them.

  Blixus pointed his pistol at Thrillkill but Gordon, who had always excelled in Professor Peaksribbon’s self-defense class, kicked it out of his hand. Blixus scrabbled for it, but David grabbed it and pointed it at him. Jacko threw an original copy of the Canterbury Tales at it and knocked it out of David’s hand. David went for it again but Airedale kicked it out of the way. Never had a pistol taken such a circuitous route so quickly.

  Suddenly a gang of men Simon had never seen before came barreling through the door with electronic pistols: cartel members. That was his cue. He pressed an icon on his phone and jammed the weapons, rendering them useless. Thus deprived of their arms the men put up their fists and began fighting the detectives hand to hand.

  Watching those finely tuned human machines was a joy to behold. Professor Peaksribbon, who had stayed behind to help guard the school, would be proud. Professor Browning, the art teacher, wielded her fists as beautifully as her brushes. Professor Also, naturally athletic, did something Simon didn’t see that caused several of the detectives’ enemies to fall flat on their tushes. Professor Pole, who wasn’t young but was in better shape than most people twenty years his junior, became a kicking machine and turned his opponents’ shins into black and blue works of art. But the most impressive display came from Professor Ashtar, the new logic teacher, whose mixed martial arts moves were so precise and lethal that he was able to permanently disable five opponents with one motion.

  “Stay here,” Simon said to Ivy as he shoved something into her hand. He jumped up, untied Scapulus, Diamond, and Mrs. Bipthrottle and handed them devices to put into their ears. Then he pressed his screen again, turning the earbugs into noise blockers.

  “Now!” he said and pressed another icon. A terrible noise filled the room, causing Blixus, Hugh, the evil librarians, and the cartel members to squeal in agony. Hugh pulled out his phone and began pressing something, and within a minute the noise had stopped. He didn’t seem to realize that the detectives were protected because he said, “You do one more thing to hurt Ivy and I’ll kill you with my bare hands, Binkle,” which Simon didn’t hear.

  Hugh dove under the table where Ivy was hiding and wrapped her in his arms. This so infuriated Simon that he leapt after him, and soon the two boys were fighting under the table while Ivy tried to calm them with her voice. Meanwhile, weaponless, the cartel members, Blixus, Jacko, and Airedale were pulling rare vol
umes off the shelves and hurling them at the detectives, shocking behavior from librarians who minutes before had fought over the rare treasures. At one point David was hit with a copy of the Lindisfarne Gospels and Thrillkill with Leonardo da Vinci’s Notebook, the two priceless objects destroyed in an instant. To confuse their enemies, the detectives grabbed valuable letters and manuscripts out of cabinets and threw them into the air, then turned on the fan. This created a gale of papers that made it difficult for anyone to see.

  The scene was absolute chaos, with no one making gains on anyone else. Then suddenly the fan stopped, the papers fluttered to the floor, and the outer door opened to reveal Lila Lester and a bevy of burly men.

  The men rushed into the room. Sliding on the precious manuscripts they skated toward Blixus, the librarians, and the cartel members, and in seconds had them restrained. Hugh was lying on his back under the table, holding his nose where Simon had punched him. Simon had his arms around Ivy, and the detectives were scattered around the room in attack poses.

  “Lila!” cried Thrillkill. “You’re alive.”

  “Of course I’m alive,” Lila sneered. “But thanks to you Banting isn’t. You killed the love of my life. Now you’re going to pay.” She pointed to Hugh. “Get that boy.”

  One of the toughs pulled Hugh out from underneath the table and bound his wrists. Hugh, nose dripping blood, looked wistfully at Ivy. Simon peered at his phone and swiped, then pressed. The fire sprinklers burst forth, unleashing a torrent and dousing the room—including the rare materials. This once again led to complete chaos, as the detectives battled Lila’s men hand to hand.

  Blair Belize whirled in the air, a human throwing star taking out one opponent after another. Professor Ashtar chopped his way through his enemies as if they were butter. Thrillkill must have been working out because he had the moves of a much younger man. He brought down two thugs at a time, and then another two, and another.

  But not all was going well for the detectives. One of Lila’s goons got hold of Diamond and was lifting her over his head, ready to dash her to pieces. Scapulus, who had been fighting a giant of a man seven feet tall leapt into the air and hit the man in the back with his feet, causing him to drop Diamond, who twisted so that she was cushioned by a pile of papers as she hit the floor. Another of Lila’s goons grabbed Professor Browning around the middle and began to pull her out of the room. Elbows flying, she attempted to punch him behind her, but he was too strong and the pair disappeared into the reading room. Professor Also had fallen, a victim of friendly fire when Professor Pole mistook her for an old enemy he’d known back in his police days and decked her.

  Suddenly the sprinklers stopped again and a lone man appeared at the door. He had long sandy hair, a full beard, and bright blue eyes. From behind him stepped a man and a woman. The woman, plump and not young but as colorful as a peacock, flashed a small knife, and the man, shortish and bald with an enormous stomach, brandished a jar of something purple. The three of them stood there for a moment, arms folded across their chests.

  The sandy-haired man surveyed the room, eyes lighting on Blixus. The criminal, meeting his eyes, flinched and went for something in his pocket, but not quickly enough.

  “Maneuver twenty-two!” cried the stranger.

  It was a familiar drill, one Professor Peaksribbon conducted often. Everyone complied at once, pressing their hands to their ears and focusing on a mental image they’d chosen for its calming power. Thank goodness they did because the next moment the strange man held up a phone that gave out an awful noise ten times worse than the one Simon had produced. Blixus, Hugh, Lila, the librarians, and every cartel member screamed and covered their ears, falling to the ground. The room filled with the worst odor Simon had ever smelled as the bad guys lost control of both bladder and bowel, messing not only themselves but hundreds of rare documents.

  The side man and woman, whom Simon now recognized as Despina and Hillary Lester, ran forward and, breathing through their mouths, tied up all the criminals. But the real show was David Wiffle, who ran to the sandy-haired man and threw his arms around him.

  “What’s going on?” Ivy whispered after she and Simon had removed their earbuds.

  “I have no idea,” he said. “Some strange bloke just pulled a real number on Blixus. That noise made them all poop!”

  “Is that what I smell?” said Ivy. “I’ve been meaning to try something like that myself. Apparently I wasn’t as original as I thought.”

  “Wink?” said Thrillkill, aghast, as he beheld the man.

  “Hello, Gaston,” said Wink Wiffle, hugging his son.

  “Is that who I think it is?” said Scapulus.

  “It’s David’s dad,” said Gordon. “Wink Wiffle.”

  “But he’s dead,” said Scapulus. “His skeleton had orange crystals all over it. I was there when we found it.”

  “It seems the rumors of his death have been greatly exaggerated,” said Diamond.

  As Simon helped Ivy up Herb Lester and several monks came striding in. The room was so crowded it was beginning to resemble a Marx brothers film.

  “You! “Lila shrieked from her place on the filthy floor.

  Herb silenced her with a look. “You’re alive.”

  “More’s the pity for you,” she said, holding her hands to her aching throat.

  “I hardly think you’re in a position to make threats,” he said to his ex-wife.

  “Do you really think I don’t know how to get around your tricks?” she threatened. “I’ll be out of jail in no time and my first order of business will be to come after you.”

  “I urge you to try,” said Herb placidly.

  “You have no idea what you’re dealing with, do you?” she said. “I didn’t live with you for sixteen years because I loved you. I was there because I was on a mission.” She searched Herb’s face and seemed annoyed that the emotion she’d expected wasn’t there. “Doesn’t that bother you?”

  “Nope,” he said.

  Her face was red with anger. “Why the hell not?”

  “Because I know who you really are,” he said calmly.

  At first Lila looked stunned. Then a smirk distorted her face. “You have no idea who I am.”

  “Do you really think I don’t know who your great-grandmother was?” he said.

  Lila went pale. “How do you—”

  Herb blinked and Lila fell silent, unable to speak. He snapped his fingers and a familiar figure came forward and fastened a gag over her mouth.

  What’s happening?” said Ivy.

  “Blair Belize shut her up,” Simon muttered. “He can’t stand Amanda’s mother. You should hear what he says about her.” He stroked her hair. “It’s all over now. Come on. Let’s go get Nigel.”

  22

  Now for My Next Trick . . .

  When the detectives returned to Legatum, Scapulus declared the place free from Hugh’s interference. Everyone was issued new devices, backups were restored, and all systems, including the history machine, returned to normal.

  “We need to deconstruct the sound map,” Ivy said, sitting next to Simon and stroking Nigel’s head. “Each tone represents a set of phenomena: electric energy, digital instructions, hardware state.”

  “That’s pretty complex,” said Simon.

  “Without my hearing yes,” said Ivy. “But you have the logs, which will show you what was happening at the time Amanda and Nick disappeared. Each item has its own tone. If it corresponds to the map, great. If it doesn’t, we vary Hugh’s interference patterns until they match the sound maps. I expect your logs and his patterns to intersect quite a bit.”

  “Let me see if I have this straight,” he said. “I come up with a sound palette. Each item in the log—every instruction—has its own tone.”

  “Yes,” she said. “Let’s try it.”

  Simon pored over his log and chose a simple GET command.

  “This was executed right before Amanda and Nick disappeared,” he said. “Three point two two
seconds, to be exact.”

  “Fine,” said Ivy. “And the tone on the map at that point is . . .” She played one tone from the video log.

  “So that’s what the GET command sounds like,” he said.

  “Yes. Now let’s pick another tone.” She played a half-second of the audio. “Hear the difference?”

  “Yes,” he said. “Let’s see what that is.”

  He took the next instruction in the code. “It’s a PUT statement.”

  “Good. So each time those tones appear on the sound map, that’s what’s going on. The first tone represents that GET call and the second the PUT statement. It’s like a Rosetta Stone.”

  “Clever,” he said. “So once we’ve assigned each command to the map, the ones that are still unknown are the ones where Hugh’s interference kicked in.”

  “Exactly. Then it’s a process of trial and error to find out what he was doing at that moment. But we have lots of clues. Scapulus intercepted some of them, so he’ll know what those are. As for the others, we can probably infer what they were from their effects.”

  Simon gazed at Ivy’s beautiful face. “I love you.”

  “It’s just logic,” she said.

  “No,” he said. “It’s Ivy magic.”

  Amanda glanced at Sherlock Holmes. He was everything Watson had described him to be and more. Tall, spare, aloof, and brilliant, the man she had once disparaged was about to save her life.

  “So you see, Inspector,” he said to Lestrade, “Miss Lester couldn’t have committed the murder.”

  “I apologize once more for having escaped,” Amanda said. “It was wrong and I shouldn’t have done it.”

  “You’re right about that, girlie,” said Lestrade. He turned to Holmes. “Explain to me again the Moriarty-Parrot connection.”

  Holmes sighed. “As I said they were old flames. They used to work together but she betrayed him. As she rose in society he plotted his revenge. He used the cover of robbing her and her guests to kill her.”