Airship Hunters (24 page)

“I have a war brewing on the horizon, gentlemen,” the President told the two agents. “And while the stories of these ‘airships’ had intrigued me, I was confident that the matter was being investigated and addressed so that I may focus my attention on Spain.”

“You may have another war on your hands then, Mr. President,” Valiantine said.

They told McKinley all they knew, after the President ushered many of his associates out of his private train compartment, retaining only a few of his closest and most trusted advisers. Valiantine outlined the scope of his and Cabot’s explorations and encounters, all the while fretting over the time that slipped by and the distance between them and the leaders of the conspiracy.

Though Valiantine guessed he might regret it later, he held back some of what he and his partner had learned on the train from Scarborough; there was no way to credit it or present it in any way that would not make them sound like lunatics.

“I met Barnaby Scarborough when I was Governor of Ohio,” the President told the agents, “but he did not strike me at the time as a man with much ambition. Then, roughly a year ago, he seemed to change, become bolder, started espousing grand ideas. I welcomed him into my administration as a visionary.”

Valiantine frowned, looking over at Cabot. “Major Wellington also changed, while I was away on leave. Everything’s backwards now with him. Disconcerting. I should have realized something was terribly wrong in the beginning.”

“Gallows, also, but perhaps not to the extent of the other two,” Cabot added. “But, suffice to say, we know their stripes now. And that they aim to cause untold trouble for the nation.”

“We shall band together ourselves to hunt them down, to bring them to justice,” the President said with resolve. “I will write out the order now for their arrest, and any who serve them.”

For the next twenty minutes, Valiantine and Cabot pleaded with the man to allow them to track down the Trio themselves. Only they, so they reasoned, knew enough of the conspirators’ minds to find them, and a smaller hunting party might not alert their prey to being hunted and drive them further underground.

“Very well,” McKinley said, looking back and forth between the two agents with steel in his eyes. “Tell me what you will need for your, ahem, expedition, and I will see that you have it.”

Valiantine considered, but it was Cabot who spoke.

“Horses,” he said.

They were granted their request on the border of Maryland and Delaware. The President had the trains stopped and sent men to procure two fine equine specimens from a nearby farm, then presented them to Valiantine and Cabot for their approval.

“I never want to ride another train in my life,” the lieutenant opined as he mounted his horse. He had gained experience as a rider throughout his Army career, and felt at home in the saddle. He assumed Cabot also felt no unease at all with the arrangement, for it was the Treasury man himself who had read Valiantine’s mind and made the request.

“Indeed,” the younger man said as he climbed atop his own animal. “Where to now?”

Valiantine sighed, scanning the horizon. It was mid-day and the sun still beat down upon them. His eyes ached from the shaft of it that had burned him before and his hands trembled a bit.

“Scarborough made that remark about joining their ‘brothers in the center.’ I feel strongly that he meant Philadelphia—‘brotherly love’ and all that. It must mean that.”

Cabot nodded his agreement, but narrowed his eyes. “But how will we know once we arrive there? How will we find them?”

“By these.” The lieutenant held up a small, cinched bag. “The coins will show us the way. They’re reacting to the airship, somehow. Damn near burnt my foot off back there on the train. We will know very soon if we are on the right track, though I believe we are.”

Cabot swung his horse around to point its nose toward the northeast. “They’re desperate,” he said matter-of-factly. “They could do anything at this juncture.”

Valiantine smiled slightly. “And does your Yankee Bligh have any words of wisdom about such desperation?”

“‘
Desperate men are a danger both to you and to themselves
,’” the Treasury man quoted as he cracked his reins and rode off.

“That’s what I was afraid he’d say,” Valiantine murmured as he urged his own horse on.

By pushing the horses, they crossed the upper reaches of the state of Delaware in under two hours. While they rode, they attempted to collate everything they knew to that point; Valiantine found the rhythm of his horse’s gait to be conducive to thinking.

“They meant us to fail all along,” Cabot called out over the sound of pounding hooves.

“Apparently,” Valiantine agreed, chewing on the sour taste of it. “Made them look like they were doing something about the phenomenon to the President. We were cherry-picked for asses.”

“Never mind that,” Cabot said. “Think about the coins; the metal is unstable? So, the degradation of their composition somehow reacts strongly to more of the same metal?”

The lieutenant reached into his coat pocket and drew out the bag containing the coins. It was warm to the touch, perhaps slightly warmer than an hour before. His brain balked at it, but it was a mild impossibility compared to all else they’d been asked to accept and believe.

“They’re definitely heating up again. A divining rod to lead us right to our friends.”

“The vapor, the gas, is part of it?” Cabot asked, watching his horse closely for signs of fatigue.

His partner shrugged. “Of the coins? I don’t know, but it figures into the bigger picture mightily, of that I’m certain. I suspect it powers the airships.”

Cabot remained silent, as if mulling it over himself. Valiantine suddenly pulled back on his reins, bringing his animal to a stop beside a large gate, part of a long line of fencing that paralleled the road.

“Catch,” he told his companion, and tossed the bag of coins to him. Cabot caught it with one hand. His eyes widened a bit by holding it a moment.

Valiantine pointed across a broad field that stretched away from them. Some distance away, a collection of buildings sat to the north. To the northeast they could see the outskirts of Philadelphia.

“I’ve a feeling about this,” he said.

A low fog had settled down upon the ground around them, but not the extra-normal variety they’d encountered too many times before; this looked to be a product of nature. Together, they drove their horses to vault the fence and they took off at a canter across the field and toward the buildings. The coins grew hotter within the cinched bag.

“Is this the place?” Cabot asked, eyeing the compound before them.

Valiantine nodded once, curtly, as he set the bag of coins down on the grass next to the fence they peered over. It was a low structure, serving more to define the property than as any sort of barrier to keep onlookers such as themselves from entering. The entire area looked almost deserted, with weeds growing up around the cobblestone walkways and buildings, and a general taint of disuse hanging in the foggy air.

The gigantic stone structure they surveyed was one of five, dark and foreboding, with massive chimneys and blackened windows. The fog parted here and there, intermittently, allowing the agents glimpses of its massive presence, and sounds emanated from within its walls, indicating some activity.

Cabot scanned the building’s length, then its height, which extended to five stories of near-black brick, dark windows, and a huge, oddly hulking structure that encompassed the majority of its top; he could not divine its use or purpose through the choking fog.

He turned to his comrade. “Munitions. I smell a foundry.”

Valiantine stared at the building without blinking. “I concur.”

Cabot appeared to think for a moment. “Their armament. The cannons. They mean to—good Lord.”

“Yes,” Valiantine nodded, grimacing underneath his moustache, “I follow your reasoning and again agree. They mean to lay waste to something. Again.”

The lieutenant began to walk. Pushing open a rickety gate, he moved through it like an automaton, his eyes never leaving the building before him. Cabot followed.

“The city? Philadelphia?”

“No. I would say not. They’ve just had their plot to kill the President foiled. They will be quite put out. No, they have bigger prey in mind, I’d wager.”

Valiantine strode across the cobblestones and the weeds, heading for a large doorway set into the side of the factory. His steps were unsure, though he did not falter in his headlong movement.

“Washington, then,” Cabot offered soberly. “Damn them, but it has to be the capital.”

The lieutenant stopped and glanced over his shoulder at his partner with deadened eyes.

“Yes.”

“Putting a halt to it won’t be easy,” Cabot said, standing at Valiantine’s side, shoulder to shoulder. “They’ll have numbers on their side, their soldiers, and weapons. They’re desperate, as we’ve said. But they’re no fools.”

The younger agent looked down at his partner’s arm, frowning.

“Valiantine, your hand. It’s trembling.”

“Nonsense.”

“No, in fact, your quirks are worse than before.”

“Quirks?”

Cabot sighed. “Yes, you’re riddled with them. Your... drives, your compulsions; call them what you will, but they’re overtaking you. Perhaps it’s wise if we—”

“No,” Valiantine said. “We move
now
, while we have them within our grasp.”

He spun on Cabot, his face reddened and angry. “I’m sick to death of the hunt. Sick of chasing these phantoms.” He pointed up at the building. “We go in there now, together, and put an end to it. Or I go in there alone and execute my duty.”

“Of course,” Cabot said quietly, yet firmly, extending a hand. “Together. There is no other way, you blasted idiot.”

“There is another way, you know.”

The two agents spun around to see a figure step out of the fog and toward them: Awanai the bandit.

Though the air around them was murky, Valiantine could discern the distinct muzzle of a Colt pointed in their direction.

“Should never have given you that hooch in Indiana, Michael,” the man said, shaking his head. “Now you think yourself attached to me.”

Valiantine stared coldly at the figure he’d run across through several states, but said nothing.

“Pistols, gentlemen,” Awanai ordered with a minute twitch of his own weapon. “Let’s have them.”

The bandit looked as he had before, but there was a look of unease about him; the lieutenant guessed all was not well in the airship circle.

He and Cabot offered their pistols, but Awanai motioned to drop the guns on the ground. He instructed the agents to slide the weapons toward him with their feet.

“You believe you can keep us both from advancing on you?” Cabot asked.

The bandit’s countenance hardened. “Why don’t we just find out then, boy?” he replied, raising his Colt, cocking it, and pointing it directly at the Treasury agent’s head.

“Why did you kill Andrew Carnavon?” Valiantine asked. “And why are you here, now?”

Without taking his eyes off Cabot, Awanai offered a sly grin on his Oriental face. “Heh. Ol’ Barnaby said you wanted answers, but he’s never big on supplying them.”

“You’re not like the others,” Cabot opined.

“No, no I’m not,” the bandit said, lowering the pistol to his waist, but still covering both men. He smiled. “I’m smarter than them. I brought them here. They wouldn’t be here, on your world, if not for me.”

Valiantine squeezed his eyes shut, wagging his head slightly. “Scarborough said that, too: ‘your world.’” He popped his eyes open again. “What the devil do you mean by that? You told me you were born in Indiana, in Manitou. And what have you done with Mr. Perklee?”

Awanai furrowed his brow. “Hmm, I’d given you two more credit than I needed to. Thought you’d... but no, I can see I was wrong. Ah, well, there’s no harm now in telling you that we’re not from here, if Barnaby took no care in hiding it. And Perklee? Alive and well, yet under lock and key. He’s still got quite a brain underneath all that drunkenness. He’s still important to me.”

“The vapors, the gas,” Cabot said. “From your ‘world,’ I surmise? And a kind of power source?”

The bandit looked upon the younger agent as if seeing him for the first time, or in a new light. He scrutinized Cabot’s face.

“Yes, and from yours, too, but we took care of that. Can’t have you following us into the heavens. The loss of Carnavon knocks you from that path just fine.

“And by the way, I call it ‘vox.’”

“You’re murderers,” Valiantine seethed, doubling his fists. “Cold-blooded killers. The deaths in Detroit alone will see you rot in Hell—”

“You didn’t care much for my beasties, did you, Agent Cabot?” the bandit said, ignoring Valiantine.

At that particular moment, a band struck up a tune, unseen, but distinct in its surreal orchestration.

“Lieutenant Valiantine’s correct, sir,” Cabot said to Awanai. “A berth in Hell awaits you, and I shall see you there.”