Page 112 of The Paid Companion

“Stay right where ye are, yer lordship,” the short man said, holding the pistol so that his intended victim could see it clearly. “Don’t move so much as yer little finger. My companion here is going to play valet for ye and see that yer dressed right and proper for yer visit to Mr. Stone.”

The figure in the greatcoat did not speak.

“Not feeling in the mood to chat, eh?” The taller man moved forward, rope in hand. “Can’t say that I blame ye. I wouldn’t be anxious to be in your shoes right now and that’s a fact. Mr. Stone is a strange bird all right.”

“But he’s generous when it comes to our pay so we try not to notice his odd ways,” the short man said. “Let’s get on with it. Put your hands behind your back so my associate can truss ye up. We don’t have all night, y’know.”

“No,” Jenks, said, removing his hat. “We do not have all night.”

Ned and Hitchins stepped quickly out of the shadows of the doorway behind the two footpads.

At the sound of the footsteps behind them, the pair started to turn. But Ned and Hitchins were already upon them. They jammed the barrels of their pistols into the spines of the two footpads.

“Drop the weapons or you’re both dead men,” Hitchins said.

The villains froze. The pistol clattered on the stones. The knife followed.

“Now, hold on. My friend and I were hired to take his lordship to our employer,” the short man said, unnerved. “We were told it was all arranged and that his lordship was agreeable to the plan. There’s no crime here.”

“That’s a matter of opinion,” Hitchins said.

The taller of the two villains squinted at him uneasily. “Are ye St. Merryn?”

“No. St. Merryn decided to take another route to meet up with your employer.”

38

Parker pulled his gold watch from his pocket and checked the time again. “Another half hour until my employees leave St. Merryn, neatly bound and secured, in the iron cage in the chapel above this room.”

“You mean your men know about this laboratory?” Elenora asked, astonished.

“What do you take me for?” He gave her a disdainful look. “Do you think that I would risk telling a couple of footpads such a great secret? They were given instructions to secure St. Merryn, leave him locked in the cage in the back of the chapel and then depart. No one knows about this place except me.”

“I now know about it,” she pointed out.

He inclined his head, amused. “I stand corrected.” He looked up at the vaulted ceiling. “And, in a short time, after the cage is lowered through the hidden trapdoor in the floor of the chapel, St. Merryn will learn of it also. I trust the two of you will both be suitably cognizant of the great honor that I have bestowed upon you.”

“The honor of allowing us to view the secret laboratory of England’s second Newton?”

“You sound so scathing, Miss Lodge. Really, you wound me.” He chuckled and reached out to take hold of a handle on Jove’s Thunderbolt. “But you will change your tune after you see what this device can do.”

He began to turn the crank very quickly.

Elenora watched uneasily. “What are you doing?”

“Building up a strong store of electricity. When it is ready, I will use it to activate the machine.”

She studied the device with mounting anxiety, paying close attention now. “How does it work?”

“Once the charge of electricity has been properly stored, I can release it by turning that knob on top of the machine.” He pointed to it. “That is also how one turns off the thunderbolt. When the sparks of electricity come in contact with the three stones in the chamber it excites the energy stored in them, just as the old alchemist predicted. A very narrow beam of crimson light is released. I tested it once, just before my grandmother had me carried off. It worked perfectly.”

“What does the beam do?”

“Why, the most amazing thing, Miss Lodge.” Parker exclaimed. “It destroys whatever happens to be in its path.”

She would not have thought it possible to be any more terrified than she had been already. But when she saw the madness burning in Parker’s eyes, the icy sensation in the pit of her stomach became a thousand times more intense.

She knew then that whatever else he planned to do with Jove’s Thunderbolt, he intended to turn it on Arthur and herself first.

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