Around the World in 100 Days (31 page)

“Won't she go any faster?” asked Charles anxiously.

“Of course she will. But we've come too far and endured too much for me to risk losing the whole match now. Don't worry; we've plenty of time.”

Charles checked his watch and scowled. “Oh, yes. If by ‘plenty of time' you mean ‘barely enough.'” He shook his head. “I don't know when you got so cautious.”

Harry grinned. “We seem to be trading roles, don't we? Now you're the impatient one.”

In each town they passed through, a few people braved the wind and rain to get a glimpse of the famous
Flash
. As the motorcar cruised by, they waved and cheered. Harry gave a quick toot on the steam whistle.

“The crowds in London will be a good deal larger,” said Charles.

“I'm afraid so,” said Harry. “I've been thinking that we'd do well to avoid the main thoroughfares—take some route no will expect us to take.”

“What about the Vauxhall Bridge?”

“Good idea, old chap. We can go up Bridge Road to Picadilly, then down St. James's Street to Pall Mall. They'll be looking for us to come from the other direction.”

At nine o'clock they turned onto the Old Kent Road, which led to the Vauxhall Bridge. “One and a quarter hours left,” said Charles. All three motorists were so tense that they had fallen into Johnny's habit of speaking in terse fragments. At nine-twenty they crossed the Thames. By nine-thirty they were heading east on Picadilly. “Almost home,” said Harry.

“Don't miss the turn,” said Johnny.

“No fear. Lift your curtain, lads, and keep an eye out for St. James's Street.”

“Just ahead,” sang out Charles.

After a few more minutes of excruciatingly slow and careful driving, they turned onto Pall Mall, the wide avenue on which the Reform Club lay. “Time,” said Harry.

“Twenty minutes until ten,” replied Charles, smiling broadly.

“Well, lads, it looks as though we've got it—”

“Harry!” interrupted Johnny. “Look there!”

Fifty yards ahead of them, a brewer's cart, piled high with kegs of beer, was pulling out of an alleyway and into the street, obstructing it completely. “Good lord,” groaned Harry. It was like a bad dream, in which he would be forced to experience all over again the accident that, some three months earlier, had set into motion this whole chain of events.

But no. This time things were different. This time he was not driving so recklessly. This time he was able to bring the
Flash
to a stop well before he reached the cart. He pushed up the side curtain and leaned out, looking for some sign of the drayman. The wind-driven rain nearly blinded him, but as far as he could tell there was no one about, only the wagon and the horse.

“We'll have to move it ourselves,” said Charles, and climbed from the car. But as he reached for the horse's bridle, half a dozen men in mackintoshes and rain hats emerged from the alleyway. They were carrying clubs, axes, and signs that read NO MORE MOTORCARS and DEATH TO THE DEVIL-WAGONS.

Charles spun about and shouted, “Get the car out of here! Now!” Two of the largest Luddites seized him by the arms and held him helpless, ignoring his desperate struggles and his ungentlemanly curses. Harry sprang from the car, ready to rush to his friend's aid, but Charles shouted, “No! Never mind about me! Save the
Flash
!”

Harry hesitated. Act quickly, but not rashly. Concluding that the car was in more danger than Charles, he jumped back into the driver's seat and stomped on the reverse pedal. But Johnny, who was keeping a look-out to the rear, shouted, “Stop!” Harry braked and peered out through the side curtain. Another wagon had pulled up behind them, blocking the way. There was no escape.

“The guns, Harry,” said Johnny. “Get the guns.”

Harry shook his head in despair. “I can't, lad. They were stolen, remember?”

Grimly, they climbed from the car to face the mob. Harry wished he had had time to learn at least one or two of Ramesh's
kalarippayattu
techniques. The best he could do was to arm himself with a large wrench from the toolbox. He managed to get in a few good blows before one of the men clubbed the makeshift weapon from his hands. Another swung a stick into the backs of his knees, knocking him off his feet.

Johnny's huge fists took a worse toll on their attackers, but it was only a matter of moments before he lay helpless, all but unconscious, on the wet street.

With its defenders disabled, the
Flash
was easy prey for the Luddites. They did not, as Harry expected, rain aimless blows down upon the motorcar; they were more methodical in their destruction. Two of the men unfastened the front of the leather rain cover and folded it back. Two others yanked up the rear seat and flung it aside, revealing the car's wire-wrapped boiler. A hulking man with an ax stepped forward and delivered a fierce blow to the top of the boiler. The thin steel split open, sending a geyser of steam into the air, like a sigh of defeat.

The axeman gave a brisk, satisfied nod. “That should do it,” he said. “Let's go.”

The men moved off, taking the cart and horse with them. Charles's captors released him and pushed him toward the car almost gently, as though they had no wish to harm him. “You blackguards!” Charles shouted hoarsely, tears of frustration mingling with the rain that streamed down his face. “You won't get away with this! I'll see that you're brought to justice, every last one of you!”

Harry got unsteadily to his feet and was almost knocked off them again by the fierce wind. He shuffled over to Johnny, who had risen no farther than his knees. With Harry's help, Johnny made it to the rear seat of the
Flash
, which had been tossed onto the sidewalk. There he sank down again. “How's the car?” he murmured.

Though Harry knew without looking that it was bad, he forced himself to examine the damage. There was a ragged rent in the top of the boiler, not unlike the one left in Johnny's head years earlier by the horse's hoof. The hole in the metal could probably be repaired, but not without a welding torch, and certainly not in the half hour that remained before they must be at the front steps of the Reform Club.

Charles kicked at one of the signs the Luddites had tossed aside. “It's hopeless, isn't it?”

“I'm afraid so.” Harry sank down on the running board, out of the wind, and put his head in his hands. “We were so close to winning.”

“But see here, we're only a quarter mile from the club. Surely we could push her that far?”

“No doubt we could,” said Harry. “But the rules state in no uncertain terms that the
Flash
must travel the entire distance under her own power.”

“I won't tell anyone.”

“They'll
see
us doing it, Charles.”

“I suppose you're right. So we're just going to give up, is that it?”

Harry threw up his hands. “I don't
want
to give up, old man! You know how much I have riding on this! But I don't see that we have any choice!”

“The
Flash
's wheels can still turn,” insisted Charles. “There must be
some
way of getting her rolling.” He turned his face into the wind, which was blowing from southwest to northeast—the same direction in which Pall Mall ran. “If only we had a sail of some sort.”

“A sail,” said Harry.

“Yes, you know, like that wind-driven sled you said your father rode on across the prairies.”

Harry rose to his feet, impelled by a growing feeling of excitement and hope, like a head of steam slowly building. “Perhaps we do, though. Perhaps we do.”

“The tents were stolen. What do we have that—” He followed Harry's gaze. “The rain hood?”

“Of course! We unbolt it and turn it around so it catches the wind!”

“Do you really think—”

“There's no
time
to think, old chap, let's just
do
it!”

FORTY
In which

When Johnny saw what they were up to, he pushed himself painfully to his feet and lent a hand. He had designed the rain hood to be easily removable. Within ten minutes, they had completely detached it from the car. Though the wind threatened to tear it from their hands, they managed to turn it 180 degrees and fasten it to the windscreen supports with clamps and heavy wire.

The moment they unfolded the hood, the wind caught it, rocking the car forward. “It looks as though it may work,” said Harry, “if we can find something to hold it open—a sort of mast, as it were.”

Charles scooped up a heavy stick that one of the Luddites had dropped. “Will this do?”

“I think so.” Harry grinned. “Ironic, isn't it, us making use of one of their weapons to help propel the car?” While Johnny and Charles struggled to hold the hood open, Harry wired the stick to the metal bars of the frame. They had to stand on the running boards in order to finish the job, because the
Flash
had already begun to move.

Unfortunately, it was heading straight for the sidewalk. “Harry!” shouted Johnny. Without even pausing in his task, Harry calmly thrust out one foot and used it to turn the steering wheel.

At last the stick was wired securely in place. “Got it!” he shouted. “Jump down, lads!” He hopped into the street, too, and walked alongside the car, guiding the steering wheel through the open driver's door. When a particularly strong gust of wind filled the improvised sail, he actually had to break into a trot to keep up. Elated, he burst into song. “Sailing, sailing, over the bounding main, and many a sto-ormy wind shall blowwww . . . ere Jack comes home again!”

Charles jogged up to join him. “If the wind gets any stronger,” he said anxiously, “it's going to tear the whole thing apart.” At that moment, the breeze died down a bit, and the car slowed. “Oh, no!” said Charles.

Harry laughed. “There's just no pleasing some chaps. Do you want a strong wind or not?”

“I just want to get there.”

The clock in the tower of St. James's Palace sounded the first of ten strokes. “Is that the right time?” asked Harry.

Charles checked his watch. “Mine says two minutes after.”

“So we have at least thirteen minutes, then.”

“You say that as if it's plenty of time.”

Harry grinned. “In a rugby match, it's an eternity.” His smile faded. He glanced toward Johnny, who was plodding along some distance behind them, then said softly to Charles, “You know, I've been thinking.”

“Really?” said Charles, in mock amazement.

Harry ignored the sarcasm. “It occurs to me that there was something odd about the way those Luddites attacked the
Flash
.”

“How do you mean?”

“Well, they didn't behave as you'd expect machinery-hating fanatics to behave, did they? They obviously had no desire to destroy the car. They wanted only to disable her, and they knew exactly how to do it. I don't believe they actually were Luddites, Charles. I think they were ordinary thugs who were hired to stop us.”

“Hired? By whom?”

“Well, whoever it was, he obviously instructed his men not to harm you. They had no qualms about beating up Johnny and me, but I noticed they treated you with kid gloves.”

Charles stared at him. “You think—you think it was my father!”

“I didn't say that.”

“But you implied it!”

“Well, think about it. What other explanation is there?”

“I don't know!” said Charles. “But I can assure you, my father would never stoop to such tactics!” He had made this same protest before, in nearly the same words, but this time it seemed, even to him, to lack conviction.

Behind them, Johnny called, “Look there!”

Harry faced front. The rain had let up a little and, for the first time, he could see more than a dozen yards ahead. The street before the Reform Club was packed with people, all of them facing east, the direction from which they expected the
Flash
to appear—if they expected it to appear at all.

“I'll clear a path for us,” said Charles, and ran ahead, shouting, “Move out of the way, please! Let us through!”

A few spectators turned in his direction, then a few more, until finally everyone had spotted them. A clamor arose from the crowd, composed of cheers, cries of astonishment, and shouts of encouragement. Over the din, Charles's voice could barely be heard, crying, “Get out of the way! Clear the street!”

As the windblown motorcar sailed into the narrow passage between the banks of bodies, Harry hopped into the seat and pulled gently on the hand brake. The
Flash
rolled to a stop directly before the Reform Club steps. “Time!” he shouted. Though he was addressing Charles, he was answered by a whole host of voices. There was considerable dispute over the precise number of minutes past ten, but there was unanimous accord that they had beaten the ten-fifteen deadline.

Harry and Charles made their way through a throng of well-wishers offering congratulations and handshakes and slaps on the back. Near the top of the stairs, Harry turned and scanned the street in the direction they had come, searching for Johnny. He felt a pang of panic, fearing that perhaps his friend had been hurt worse that he realized, and had collapsed somewhere. Then he noticed a large figure, shoulders hunched against the rain, hurrying away, unable to endure the prospect of facing so many people.

Harry sighed and shook his head. A newspaper reporter forced his way through the crowd of admirers, shouting, “Mr. Fogg! Mr. Fogg! Can you tell me what one factor was most important in accomplishing this amazing feat?”