Desperation and Decision (3 page)

"No one's here," Twist mused, again resorting
to that tablet and leaving me standing by the lift. "Lady Leader,
what's the news? I've delivered Prince Charming, but there's no
jungle man, no financiers, and most of all no Phoebe-Bird. Concert
run over?"

"Doctor Twist, please make his highness
comfortable." The voice that seemed to speak as clearly as if it
were next to me was that of the lovely gypsy-complexioned woman who
had invited me to this otherworldly gathering. "We've had a mishap,
but things are under control now, thanks to Mowgli and Bagheera,
and we shall arrive very shortly. Alert the hotel maids that we
shall need towels and dry clothing, and tell them to lay out the
doctor's medical bag, please."

"Medical bag?" Twist echoed. "What's
happened? Who's hurt? Never mind." He tossed the tablet into a
wingback chair and hurried to ring a bell. Up the lift came a half
dozen hotel staff members clad in blue and bronze. Twist rapidly
gave them instructions and they scattered to obey. I still stood by
the lift entrance, having only moved a few inches to allow the
staff to pass. Twist sent Tod down the lift with instructions to
meet the incoming party and then puttered about, managing to make
himself useful getting a Gladstone bag from one of the suites and
setting it out on a sideboard. He popped his head into a second of
the four suite doors and called a cheery, "Don't be alarmed,
nannies and kids, but it seems someone's been hurt and good night
kisses may be slightly delayed." He shut the door before I could
fathom what he meant by such a speech.

The lift rose and from it emerged the
beautiful woman from my afternoon acquaintance. Phoebe
Moore-Campbell was heavily swathed in a glittering satiny cloak I
could only describe as midnight green with a deep metallic sheen.
She led a figure closely wrapped in a blue velvet hooded cape that
hung heavy with water around the tiny wearer. I could briefly see
sodden white fox fur lining the costly garment and then the taller
woman whisked away her charge to the suite from which Twist had
retrieved the black bag.

Next up in the lift came two tall,
blond-haired men, both hatless, both in greatcoats, accompanied by
Tod carrying their hats under one arm. The coach driver/airship
pilot and the slightly shorter one supported the taller, bearded
man and they disappeared into a suite as well. As quickly as that,
the room was left once again to Twist and myself. Tod rejoined us
in another moment. Servants poked up the fire and added fuel to
make it blaze up warm and bright.

"What happened?" Twist demanded of Tod.

"Don't jist know yet, Doc," Tod replied. "But
yew better 'op to it an' switch off th' tripwires on th' roof, on
accounta there's one more pair incomin' what ain't ower fond o'
lifts nor yet o' doors."

Twist grabbed his tablet as a scraping
sounded above our heads. I started violently but neither of my
companions seemed in the least perturbed.

"How did they get out without setting it
off?" Twist asked Tod.

"As I 'ears it, they been out since dark,
afore yew set it, prowlin'-like. Picture the 'eadlines tomorra as
yew meditates on 'at, Doc."

Twist muttered under his breath. A moment
later the two blond men emerged in quilted robes and the bearded
one was tucked into a wingback chair before the cheery fire.

"Here, my little mistress, I heated the
towel, and there's a good fire to dry your dear little feet." The
beautiful dark-haired woman applied a thick white towel to the
dripping golden curls of her diminutive companion. The tiny woman
smiled and drew the comforting royal blue wrapper closer around her
shoulders. Their hostess handed off a pile of sodden garments to a
maid, who disappeared down the lift as Madame Moore-Campbell
bustled the other lady around the garden to the fireside.

"Come and sit by Doctor Mac and please don't
catch a chill." The lady fussed over her light-haired charge like a
mother ewe with a newborn lamb, clad in an emerald dressing gown
and her hair was already in her night braid.

"No, heaven forbid," growled the bearded man.
Madame Phoebe tucked the little blond into a cozy dark red brocaded
armchair across the brick hearth from its twin, where the bearded
man sat. "I'm not taking the blame for another case of 'Pewmonia,'
Miss Phoebe, even if it was Mrs. Rose's idea to hoof it to the
hotel."

Oliver Twist started to push me forward so
that our hostess might become aware of my presence when a stream of
children suddenly began to issue forth from the room where Twist
had called out his cryptic announcement regarding kisses. I
resigned myself to being a "fly on the wall," especially since
Twist and Tod were also invisible to the assembled conversants,
clearly made up of intimate friends and, based on the resemblance
among the blond people, probably some close relatives. Twist
steered me to a divan partly concealed by greenery and joined me in
observing the rest of the tableau.

A somewhat older girl, halting and hesitant,
with long dark hair hanging into her thin little face, stole out
leading a little boy and girl. White flannel nightgowns decked with
pink roses didn't hide the girls' bare feet pattering on the
crimson-flowered carpet. The boy wore cadet blue pajamas with feet
and his pale hair stood up like dry cornshocks. The little blond
lady enveloped them all in hugs and kisses, seeing the fear in
their eyes for the bearded man who was clearly their father.
"Doctor Mac" looked very grim as he unbound the handkerchief from
his hand. I was shocked to see a bleeding gash in his palm.

"Are you all right, Mac?" The
strawberry-blond gentleman opened the medical bag and brought it
close, pulling out carbolic and cloths to place on the side table.
His robe matched Mrs. Moore-Campbell's, identifying him in my mind
as her husband of whom she had spoken, and his mule-style brown
slippers kept slipping off as he tried to hurry the supplies across
the room. "You look white as a sheet."

The one called Doctor Mac looked distractedly
up at Mr. Campbell, stretching his neck out of the depths of the
black quilted bed jacket he wore, and caught a glimpse of his
equally-white-faced family. He quickly cleaned and bound his hand,
clearly an expert in such matters and deserving of the title of
doctor. "My darling wife applied the proper aid on the spot and I
doubt if I'll even have a scar on my precious composing hand."

He then proceeded to scoop up his children,
arrange them all on his long lap, and kiss away their round-eyed
terror, painting a comical face on his bandage with mercurochrome
and making his thumb serve as a jaw for the improvised puppet.

"It's just a nick," the puppet proclaimed in
a scratchy voice.

"Phoebe, you must stop acting like my maid."
The little golden-haired lady pushed Mrs. Moore-Campbell away from
her feet. "Those days are long past. You are Mrs. Archibald
Campbell now, a society lady, and Miss Phoebe Moore, a world-famous
performer."

Something nagged at the back of my mind, a
memory of an encounter before my day had given way to the bizarre
events of the past few hours, but I had no time to pull out the
recollection. Two more children, dark-haired like Mrs.
Moore-Campbell but with dark blue eyes, both in yellow nightclothes
decked with ducklings, fussed with pillows and tried to prop up
Doctor Mac's injured hand until the puppet growled, "Give me some
peace, if you please," and made all five children giggle away their
nervousness.

"When I'm with you, Mrs. Rose, I'm just your
girl Phoebe, and I'll never change," declared Mrs.
Moore-Campbell.

"Never try to stop Phoebe from being a nurse,
Rosie-Posie," Mr. Campbell smiled. "It can't be done. So, Mac, are
you ready to be interviewed by the police about your evening's
excitement?"

"Not me," Doctor Mac retorted. "Not until I'm
sure I haven't gone crazy and seen what shouldn't be lurking about
in a London alley."

"Whatever do you mean?" Mrs. Moore-Campbell
glanced at her husband.

"He saw the same thing I saw," the lady
called Rose said quietly. "A small, half-naked man in a tiger skin
with black hair streaming down to his waist, along with a creature
I've never seen outside a zoo or an Indian jungle."

"It was a black leopard," Doctor Mac added.
"The two of them got between us and that pickpocket's knife or we'd
probably both have been killed."

"Ah," said Mr. Campbell. "Well, I wouldn't
mention that to the constable if I were you. He has his pickpocket
in custody and he just needs a simple statement that you were the
victim and you tripped the boy up with your cane. No reason to
bring up any half-naked men or jungle cats."

A stranger entered the room from the fourth
suite as Mr. Campbell finished, moved like a shadow along the
red-and-gold-flocked wallpaper, and stationed himself near the
fireplace. He was dressed in a dark, quiet costume that looked like
shimmering black silk pajamas. His feet were bare. More silk was
bound in a sort of turban around his head, framing sleek dark skin,
glittering dark eyes and high cheekbones.

A slightly fairer-skinned boy in a bright
orange nightshirt affair that exposed his spindly legs darted out
of what was clearly the nursery suite but was scooped up and
shepherded away by an exotic little lady in dark green brocaded
robes who bowed her way out, chattering music at the child in her
native tongue and smiling timidly at the roomful of people. She
even noticed Twist and I and dipped her head, but no one else took
note of our presence, their attention captivated by the small,
dark-clad man.

"This is – uh – this is Mowgli, whom we met
during that concert series in India," Mr. Campbell explained.

Doctor Mac rose and approached the small
stranger, who looked up without any expression into the American
giant's narrowed blue eyes.

"He might be a bit shy around strangers,"
Mrs. Moore-Campbell warned.

The small man rose on his toes before Doctor
Mac. From the folds of his tunic he produced a globe-headed,
rosewood walking stick with a flip of his muscular wrist. Grasping
it in both hands he gave it a twist, exposed an inch or two of
thin, sharp blade, then slipped it back into place.

"I had a toy like this once." Mowgli
presented the sword-cane to Doctor Mac. "It was the king's ankus,
an elephant goad made of gold and ivory and encrusted with jewels.
Six men killed each other for it in one day after I pulled it out
of a treasure pit in an old city. I threw it back into the pit, but
still men kill for things they cannot eat."

"Thank you for returning it," Doctor Mac
said. "It really isn't very valuable and I absolutely was not out
to kill anyone. That's just a reminder of a verse I learned as a
boy, 'Go ye into all the world and preach the gospel to every
creature ...'And it's also helpful for when I forget another verse,
the one that says I should turn the other cheek." He grinned at the
broad, dazzling white smile that broke the small stranger's
inscrutable expression. "The pickpocket that cut my glove open was
after my grandfather's watch, and he got it, too."

"Both verses are very good things to be
reminded of," nodded the small man. "Were it not for such
Scriptures as that first, I would still be prowling the jungles of
India thinking myself half a wolf and liking to hear a fat German
tell me I am a forest god." Mowgli took a handsome silver pocket
watch from his clothing and held it out to Doctor Mac. His wife
gasped.

"These scars are very interesting." Doctor
Mac took the stranger's hand. "They appear to be bites from some
large animal."

"We played rough, my brothers and I. You
should try harder to remember that second verse, or put a little
oil on the slide of your sword sheath next time." A pleasant chime
sounded from below the garden somewhere.

"Mac, you had better come and see the
constable," Mr. Campbell reminded him. "I'll come with you, if you
like. And by the way, we want the lad released into our custody if
at all possible."

Mr. Campbell summoned the mob-capped, sleepy
nursemaids attending to the children. They were herded away to bed
with protests of "Not being the least bit sleepy," and wanting to
"play some more with the great black kitty and the dear Indian
boy."

"What is this all about, chief?" I heard
Doctor Mac say as he stepped into the cupola with Mr. Campbell.
"That was our half-naked rescuer, as plain as day. Isn't he
attending the interview with the officer?"

"Don't be an idiot, Mac," Mr. Campbell's
voice faded as the lift descended out of sight.