“Mr. Bell?” Emmett whispered.
“Aye, Emmett,” Bell replied. “But you knew that already, didn’t you? Since you stole those plans from my workshop.”
Molly grabbed Emmett’s trembling hand.
“So, why the mask, you ask?” Bell went on.
“No, we didn’t,” Molly said. “We didn’t ask.”
“You little thieves may have lucked into my secret,” Bell said, reverting to his “evil” voice. “But that doesn’t mean I want the whole world to know. Not yet. But like the spider who spends years weaving a gargantuan web until it is one day vast enough to snare a wild stallion, I too will shock the world with my abilities.”
“Your knowledge of spiders is seriously flawed,” said Molly.
“Watch yer yap, girl,” snarled the man in the comedy mask. “If the boss says there’s giant spiders, there’s giant spiders.”
“Ignoramus,” Bell hissed. “It’s not the spider that’s huge, it’s the web.”
“But if it’s a tiny spider, how’s it gonna eat a horse?” asked Tragedy.
“It’s a metaphor!” Bell snapped.
“Ah, I heard of them metaphor spiders,” Comedy said seriously. “Deadly creatures.”
“A metaphor is not a—!” The leader took a long, deep breath through his nose.
“Hey, boss—” said Tragedy.
“Do not ask me about spiders!” Bell snapped. “I will strangle you with my bare hands if you—”
“I just wanted to ask why there ain’t been no boom,” said Tragedy. “In there.” He motioned toward the building.
Bell glared through the eyeholes of his mask. “There has been no . . . boom, as you so eloquently put it,” he said, “because these supposed saboteurs were apparently unable to set off even a simple—”
BOOM!
Bell’s lab exploded.
19
Rocket’s Red Glare
WINDOWS SHATTERED, FLAMES gushed forth, and the garbage hatch was blown violently from its hinges. The force of the blast sent the trash bin—and its three passengers—careening madly down the alleyway. Bell and his goons dove out of the way as the runaway rubbish cart bounced off the curb and rattled along the cobblestone street.
“Stop, stop, stop!” Emmett shouted, crouching amid the trash with Cassandra and Molly. Cassandra reached over the side and dragged a metal pipe along the stones until the bin slowed down. That’s when they saw the masked trio climbing onto a horse-drawn wagon.
“Go, go, go!” Emmett shouted.
Cassandra tore open the bag on Emmett’s back and pulled out the Self-Propelled Mop. “I knew there was a reason I’d packed you!”
Molly watched in confusion as her mother leaned over the back of the cart and fastened the motorized mophead between the bin’s wheels. Outside the burning warehouse, Bell snapped the reins and his open-backed wagon headed their way.
“Mother, I see what you’re trying,” Molly said with urgency. “But that mop goes about as fast as a tort—”
The mop motor began spinning and the trash cart took off like a runaway streetcar.
“Tornado?” Cassandra asked, sounding very proud of herself. “Is that what you were going to say? Fast as a tornado?”
“How?” Molly shouted.
“When I saw how you used it against Nertha, I realized how much better it could be, so I—look out!” Cassandra thrust her pipe out and pushed them away from a dangerously close tree.
As the bin sped along, Cassandra jabbed her pipe out every time an oblivious street musician, clumsy pedestrian, or cat with a death wish crossed into their path. And Molly whooped victoriously every time they avoided a collision. But the farther they went, the more people began clogging their path. The noise of the fireworks was also getting louder—and closer.
“We’re going too fast,” Emmett said, covering his head.
“It’s a clockwork motor,” Cassandra said. “It will wind down eventually.”
“When’s eventually?” Emmett asked.
Molly pointed above the eastern rooftops, where sparks cascaded across the night sky. “We’re headed toward the bridge,” she said.
“Wonderful,” Cassandra replied, steering around a terrified bicyclist. “We can lose our pursuers in the crowds.”
Suddenly, Bell was right alongside them. “Impressive motor,” he said. “Perhaps you’re cleverer than I’ve given you credit for.”
“It’s about time somebody realized that!” Cassandra cried.
“Gotcha!” From the rear of Bell’s wagon, Comedy reached out and wrapped his meaty fingers over the side of the trash cart, extending himself like a clothesline between the two speeding vehicles.
“Nice idea,” said the gangly Tragedy before placing one foot squarely on the small of his partner’s back.
“That—oof!—was not the idea,” Comedy grunted.
Tragedy jumped into the trash cart. “Looks like the hunter has become . . . still the hunter.”
Emmett tried to back away from the henchman, kicking out at him, but Tragedy grabbed the boy by the feet. “Aha! Gotch-YOWWW! His shoe bit me!” Emmett clicked his toes up and down, repeatedly stabbing his attacker’s palms with dozens of tiny pins.
While Tragedy rubbed his aching hands, Molly clambered onto Comedy’s back. “Aw, no,” the minion groaned. “You ain’t really gonna—oof!” Molly crossed the human bridge into Bell’s wagon. Emmett followed (“Not again!”). As did her mother (“Enough already!”).
“Fools!” Bell hollered at his minions. “Get back into the wagon!”
“Coming, boss!” Tragedy shouted.
“Please no more,” Comedy groaned. But Tragedy was already straddling his partner’s back. At that moment, however, the mop motor ground to a halt. The trash bin slowed, while Bell’s wagon continued flying. Both henchmen flopped into the street.
“That,” Cassandra said. “Was eventually.”
“Fools!” Bell screamed again.
“You’re repeating yourself, Belly-Boy,” Molly said. She, Bell, and Cassandra began fighting over the reins, but the horse took their tugging as a signal to turn, and the wagon veered directly toward the Brooklyn Bridge—and a thousand oblivious spectators staring at the fireworks show overhead.
“Move, move, move!” Emmett shouted.
As people shrieked and dove for cover, Molly noticed with horror that the bridge’s main roadway was lined with loads of rapidly firing mortars and rockets. She yanked the reins to the right, and the wagon jolted onto the pedestrian walkway, which quickly proved too narrow. The wagon jammed itself tightly between the steel railings, and all four passengers tumbled onto the wood-plank deck as the spooked horse broke free and continued its mad dash to Brooklyn.
With no choice but to run farther onto the bridge, Cassandra and the children darted into a war zone. Molly could feel the shock waves in her chest as mortars boomed below, enshrouding her in wafting clouds of pastel smoke. Her rib cage rattled as rockets zoomed skyward and filled her nostrils with sulfur.
“I think there’s a reason they cleared the walkway!” Emmett shouted as he ducked a wayward rocket.
They heard Bell grumbling in the fumes behind them, and then the shouting of police officers. “Stop! You can’t be in there!” A group of cops rushed onto the bridge.
“Are they chasing us or Bell?” Emmett asked.
“I’m not sure it will matter, if Bell reaches us first,” said Cassandra.
“Then let’s make ourselves harder to catch.” Molly hopped the railing onto one of the bridge’s massive steel cables. Wide as a tree trunk, the cable arced all the way up to the peak of an enormous limestone tower. Imagining she was scaling the back of a mythical serpent, Molly moved cautiously, making hand- and footholds of the gray metal clamps that ringed the cable every yard or so, all while glowing cinders rained down upon her. Halfway along, Molly took the risk of looking down. Bell had abandoned the walkway as well, but he was out on the network of steel girders above the roadwa
y, leaping from beam to beam with a dancer’s grace.
“You all right, Emmett?” Molly called. “Got your climbing spikes out?”
“None of this is really happening,” she heard the boy mutter. “I am not really clinging to a cable hundreds of feet above the East River. Not in real life. I would never do that in real life.” A rocket whizzed by close enough to singe Molly’s hair, and she speedily resumed her ascent. The higher they climbed, the stronger the wind grew, and the tighter they needed to hold on. Eventually Molly hauled herself onto the flat top of the stone tower and, after slapping out a small sleeve fire, helped the others up. She, Cassandra, and Emmett lay on their backs, catching their breaths, as enormous balls of red, white, and blue sparks blossomed overhead like electric dandelions.
“And I thought I was going to have to miss the fireworks!” Molly said, awestruck.
“Best seats in the city!” her mother yelled over the noise. “And we deserve it! Bell may not be happy with us, but we’ve foiled his plans! The robots are kaput and the city is safe!”
The blasts came rapidly now, the mushrooming sparks going higher and wider with each new boom. Balloons the size of hippopotami rose into the air around them, each carrying a basket from which rained fountains of gleaming sparks. And then, with one punctuating blast that seemed to shake the sky itself, the display was over.
“—eet again.”
Molly, Cassandra, and Emmett bolted to their feet. Their masked enemy stood at the tower’s edge.
“Sorry, did you say something?” Molly asked.
Bell huffed in frustration. “I said, ‘So, we meet again.’ I’ve said it three times! But you people are utterly oblivious! And now you’ve robbed the line of all its impact.”
“How’d you get up here?” Molly asked.
“Ladder,” he said, gesturing.
“Our way was more fun,” Molly said. “Ladders? Pfft! Who hasn’t climbed a ladder?”
“I’ve climbed hundreds,” Cassandra said. Emmett tried to fake a laugh, but it came out more like sobbing.
“Silence!” the villain shouted with enough force that the Peppers actually fell quiet. “I bet you’re all—” As the last spark faded, thunderous applause rose from below. Bell crossed his arms and waited for the noise to die down before continuing. “I bet you’re all quite proud of yourselves. But if you think those automatons were the entirety of my plan, you are sorely mistaken.”
Molly bit her lip.
“You know, when you first stumbled onto my plot, I was annoyed,” Bell continued. “But after observing you for a time, my opinion of you evolved. What a motley and unexpected gaggle of antagonists! I began to think you three might pose a uniquely interesting challenge. What changed my mind, you ask?”
“No,” said Molly. “Nobody asked that.”
“I don’t understand, Mr. Bell,” Emmett said. There was so much pain in his voice. “Why are you doing this?”
“Oh, Emmett,” Bell said in his softer, lilting voice. “You in particular deserve an answer to that question. And if you’d simply allowed me to capture you earlier, I would have happily given you a full explanation. Unfortunately, we are short on time now, so . . . you’ll have to die unfulfilled.”
Somewhere a beating drum was joined by French horns and trumpets. “Pomp and Circumstance.” The second leg of the parade had begun its march from the Brooklyn side of the bridge. Bell reached into his coat and Cassandra pushed the children behind her. Molly gasped as something brushed across her back. One of the big balloons was floating by, its basket of sparklers burned out. She grabbed it and tapped Emmett on the shoulder. “Do you trust me?”
“I don’t know,” Emmett answered. She pushed him into the small basket and climbed in next to him.
“Mother, quick!” Molly yelled as the balloon immediately began to sink.
Bell withdrew a weapon that resembled a musket, but with a glowing orange coil where the barrel of the gun would be. Cassandra turned, but instead of joining the kids in the basket, she pushed the balloon away. “Three’ll be too heavy,” she said. “You two have fun!”
“Mother, no!” Molly shouted as she and Emmett began to drift out and downward.
“Mrs. Pepper, here!” With a grunt, Emmett reached out to another passing balloon and nudged it back toward the tower. But Bell was already aiming his strange weapon at Cassandra—no, past her, at the flapping American flag planted on the tower. The gun’s orange coil glowed bright as the flagpole suddenly wrenched itself from its base and flew at Cassandra, knocking her off the tower’s edge.
Molly felt her heart stop as her mother fell—and then start again at double speed as Cassandra caught herself on the basket of the other balloon.
“She’s okay!” Emmett shouted. “She’s okay!”
But Molly’s relief turned to anger. “That was so . . . stupid of her! What was she thinking, pushing us away like that?”
“She was trying to save you,” Emmett said. “It’s what any good parent would’ve done.”
“As if she could get by without me!” Molly snapped. She wasn’t sure where this rage was coming from. “She needs me! She barely survives as it is!”
“Can we talk about this on the ground?” Emmett said, gripping the ropes tightly to keep himself in the cramped basket.
Below them, the band played the “1812 Overture,” while above, Bell began to lower himself, spiderlike, on a long cord that extended from his belt. Halfway down, he pointed his bizarre, glowing weapon at a nearby steel beam. Two bolts ripped loose and zipped through the air like bullets. Molly and Emmett ducked.
“They missed,” Emmett said shakily.
Then came the hissing sound.
“Or maybe not.”
Their balloon had been punctured and they were descending fast. Very fast. Straight toward the parade.
20
Assassins!
MOLLY SPILLED FROM the basket, bowling over several important-looking men who hit the ground yelping, their neckties and mustaches in equal disarray. Some band members continued to play, while others stopped and screamed. Still more marched in circles, tooting out random notes as if the surprise had broken something in their brains. Police officers shouted. Bystanders shrieked. It was pandemonium. Molly couldn’t find Emmett and had no idea whether her mother was down there with them or floating over Long Island by now. She stayed down and tried to crawl away, as people tripped over one another.
“Emmett?” someone said.
Molly stood to look and was knocked off-balance by a fleeing flautist. Stumbling deeper into the chaos, she crashed into a broad, fuzzy chest. A bear? No, a fur coat. She reached up to grab whatever handholds she could find.
“My word!” coughed a deep voice.
Molly gazed up at the horrified face of President Chester A. Arthur. She was clutching each of the man’s ample sideburns.
“Assassin!” someone yelled. “Protect the president!” From all sides, men began fighting to reach their commander in chief.
“No,” said Molly, releasing her whiskery handfuls. “I—”
Strong hands gripped her by the waist. She reacted quickly, spinning around and tripping the person who’d grabbed her—only to realize too late that it was her mother. Cassandra slammed the president to the ground, plopped on top of him, and was promptly tackled by three federal agents.
“Mother,” Molly gasped. But before she could intervene, Emmett tugged the bottom of her dress.
“Down here.” He was crouched between the voluminous skirts of two ladies fanning themselves melodramatically.
“But—”
Emmett tugged harder and began crawling away. Reluctantly, she crouched and followed him. While everyone’s attention was on the president, they slipped under the railing and dropped down to a thin ledge along the outside of the bridge. Balancing on tiptoe hundreds of feet above the fast-flowing river, Molly and Emmett peered through the guardrail and saw Cassandra, surrounded by police officers, her hands bound behin
d her back.
“I’m going to get Bell for this,” Molly growled.
“It isn’t Bell,” Emmett said.
“What?”
“It wasn’t Mr. Bell in the mask,” Emmett explained. “I bumped into Bell. Up there, in the parade. He saw me too—called me by name.”
It wasn’t possible, thought Molly. Emmett still simply couldn’t accept that his mentor was capable of the things they’d seen that night.
“Look, there he is now. Talking to Governor Cleveland.” Emmett pointed to a tall, bearded man running his fingers through his thick, wavy hair as he surveyed the chaos around him. His was the same face Molly had drawn an eye patch over in that newspaper photo. It was definitely Alexander Graham Bell.
“He . . . he must’ve pulled off his mask to blend in,” she said, refusing to believe that she could have been so wrong.
“And changed his clothes? Molly, it’s not Bell.” Emmett pointed up to the grid of girders overhead. Still lowering himself on a wire was the man in the crooked mask.
21
Accusations!
CASSANDRA PEPPER WAS being arrested.
Throughout the years, Molly had prepared herself for such an event, expected it even. But in the hundreds of times she’d played out the scenario in her mind, she never imagined she’d be watching it from afar. She always pictured herself in matching handcuffs, fighting by her mother’s side. She also never dreamed the charges would rise to the level of high treason.
“Madam, you are under arrest for the attempted assassination of the president of the United States,” said a federal officer in a long black coat.
“Assassination?” Cassandra scoffed as several aides brushed smooth the president’s fur coat. “Poppycock! All I did was take a little tumble onto the man. How fragile do they think you are, Mr. President? Pleasure to meet you, by the way. I can’t say I voted for you. But then again, I can’t vote for anybody.”
Around them, newspaper reporters jotted down notes.
“Even if our politics don’t always align, Mr. President, I must add that my daughter and I are big fans of your sideburns,” Cassandra continued. “They’re like baby wolves suckling at your earlobes.”