The Best of Penny Dread Tales (27 page)

Once they were past the trenches, he took a small mirror out of his pocket and flashed it. A flash came in response from the Boxer ramparts.

“Everyone get in single file,” he said, “and follow—stay in a straight line behind me.”

They fell in, Chen in front, the others behind him. He moved straight toward the flash signal. As they neared the Boxer ranks, the troops opened fire. They left a corridor, though, for Chen and his party. As they ran for cover, bullets whizzed past them like angry wasps buzzing through the air.

They crossed the Boxer lines. A man in a military uniform came to them and bowed.

“I am Yuan,” he said. “The commandant is supervising the firing, but I am here to supply you with horses and send you on your way.”

Chen nodded. His leg hurt. The sutures had split open and the wound bled badly. As rifles stuttered in the background, two men led four strong, sleek horses. Chen collapsed.

Shao and Jing knelt over him.

“I need to go with you,” Chen said, gritting his teeth.

“You are a capable warrior,” Shao replied. “If you lose that leg, however, you will not be so capable. I will leave you here in the care of a physician. You must promise me you will not leave until you are well—the physician who cares for you will determine when you are well.”

He looked up at Jing. Their eyes met.

“I agree.”

“Good. I’ll have a potion for you to drink, but we need to get you out of here.”

The rifle fire continued as four soldiers appeared with a litter. They carried Chen to a house out of the range of the rifle fire. The others followed. Once inside, Shao conferred with the physician. The doctor cleaned and re-sutured the wound. Shao gave Chen the potion. Within a minute, he was out cold.

***

“He will sleep for at least a day and night with that one,” Shao told Jing. “I could tell that in spite of his promise he would be on a horse and heading for Xanting the moment we were out of sight.”

“Will he heal?”

“If his wound is properly cared for, yes.”

Jing turned to Soong.

“You will stay here and assist the physician. See to Chen’s needs and dissuade him from leaving until the doctor releases him. “She turned back to Shao. “We need to go. We have a hard ride ahead of us.”

He only nodded.

They mounted the horses and rode until nightfall, fortunately finding an inn. As they ate, Shao told Jing about his ordeals at the compound.

“At first they thought I was only a noble and beat and threatened me, trying to extract money. Then Cao Cao recognized me. They set me to creating an army of mechanical soldiers to attack the Boxers. Due to your intervention, I was able to send them against the international force. They wanted one-hundred. I had only manufactured twenty.”

“Will they destroy the foreign force?”

“No. They would have run down rapidly. After twenty minutes, they would go inert.”

“But your Weather God device will destroy the fleet of ships they are sending?”

“If we get there on time.”

“We will arise at first light. We’re halfway there already.”

She went to her bedroom. Though she did not believe much in the goddess, she had, in her younger days, dedicated herself to that deity. She opened the widow of her small room and looked up at the moon. It rode in a ship of silver clouds. Stars gleamed through the gaps in the clouds. She closed her eyes and lifted her hands in silent supplication to the Goddess of Compassion for her protection and guidance.

Opening her eyes, she saw three men holding torches ride up to the inn. One of them was the man she had knocked out at Shao’s laboratory: Cao Cao.

She grabbed her sword and hurried through the door. No time to change out of her smock, she ran down the stairs and stood at ready when they entered the door.

They burst in. She threw a dart and killed one. The other two took shelter. Cao Cao produced a pistol and aimed it at her.

Jing had never defended herself against a firearm. Chen had taught her how to block a bullet, and the two of them had practiced the technique with him firing—but he had probably gone easy on her. She raised her sword, watching the angle at which Cao leveled the pistol. He fired twice. She crouched and raised the blade. Both bullets deflected off it. She dropped to her knees and flung a dart at Cao, hitting him the shoulder. The third man had fallen down. Jing sprang, somersaulted and landed on her feet, kicking the firearm out of Cao’s hand and bringing the blade of her sword against the third assailant’s throat.

“I do not desire your death,” she said. She reached down with her free hand and disarmed him. “Go. No harm will come to you.” He nodded. She lowered her sword. The man scrambled out the door. A moment later she heard the sound of his horse galloping away.

She let herself relax. By now the other lodgers and the innkeeper had rushed downstairs. All were armed. She went over to the innkeeper.

“I’m sorry. These men attacked me. I had to defend myself.”

The man squinted. “You are the Princess Jing Li.”

“I am she. I am sorry I brought the ill omen of death to your place.”

“Ill omen of death?” he repeated, his lip curled in scorn. “I’ve been paying protection to this bastard for years. He’s a ruthless criminal, and his gang of thugs terrorizes everyone on the road from Beijing to Xanting. You are an avenging saint.”

Cao Cao was not dead, but he would be soon. Jing used poisoned darts. His death would not be quick or easy. The poison had no antidote, and its effects were irreversible. Fatigue from all she had gone through fell heavily on her. Shao came up to her. He looked down at Cao Cao.

“He will not recover,” she said.

Shao nodded. “Should we leave here?” he asked. “We can ride by torchlight.”

“I must sleep,” she replied. “We’ll get up early.”

She went back to her chamber. Despite the danger that other members of Cao’s gang might arrive, she slept soundly until pre-dawn. She and Shao ate a quick breakfast and headed for Xanting and the shore.

They rode steadily and arrived at the site of the Weather God machine when the sun was still high. Du Mu awaited them with a guard of soldiers in case someone tried to intervene. The three of them entered the area through a door and wound up a series of staircases carved out of rock. They toiled their way upward in lamp lit dark until they came to a platform that looked down at the sea, the shoreline, the Weather God, and the wall around him. She also noticed, from up high, that the floor of the sea below the complex was covered with flat tiles. It made Jing dizzy. The breeze blew full in their faces. Du Mu pointed.

“There they are.”

Shao gazed out at the horizon. “Too far off,” he said. “We need to let them get closer.”

Jing strained her eyes. She saw the ships, white shapes above the blue water. She could see the plumes of smoke rising from their smokestacks. The wind blew her hair in her face. She pulled it back and saw a flash come from one of the vessels.

“They’re firing their cannons at us,” she said.

Shao nodded. A second later they heard a whistling sound. A violent explosion shook the ground as a shell blew apart a section of one of the buildings on the shore.

“Will they destroy the device?”

“They’re not hitting the device. Those buildings are nothing but empty facades. They look like a fortress, but they’re hollow. That’s what the Westerners will shell, though, so—at least as they think—their landing here will be unopposed.

The ships grew closer. The shelling continued. Deafening explosions went out in profusion. Jing summoned her self-control so she did not appear frightened before the two men. Du Mu winced. Shao stood by placidly. The shelling from the warships soon reduced the buildings on the shoreline to a smoking pile of rubble. The ships had come near enough that she could see the masts and flags. She counted twelve.

She also had become aware of a rumbling sound. The ground under her feet seemed to move. She wondered for a moment if an earthquake had come—if their plans might be ruined by an unexpected natural event. She said nothing. The shaking and twisting sensation continued. She realized in a flash that what she felt was the mountain behind her filling with water.

The ships were now visible, perhaps only a half mile from the shoreline. They had stopped firing their guns. Shao walked over to a wooden trap Jing had not noticed, opened it and walked down a set of ten steps. Jing and Du Mu moved forward so they could see. Another explosion rocked the decoy buildings. Shao calmly seized the lever and drew it back.

A clanging of machinery sounded—a cacophony of metal on metal, of creaking, groaning, grating, the sound of pulleys and leavers, a release of steam, and finally the noise of a cataract more deafening than the Huangguoshu Waterfall (Jing had journeyed there not long ago). The walls and superstructure below the statue of the Weather God fell away, releasing a torrent of cold blue that plunged in a giant mass straight down toward the sea.

For just a second the liquid hung in the air. Then, with a crash like thunder, like landslides, like the days of the gods’ judgment, it hit the surface of the sea below them.

The tons of falling water from the mountain sluice struck with such force it heaped the standing water of the shore into a giant column. Jing would have guessed its height as twenty feet. For a moment it seemed to hang there, churning, seething, growing. She wondered if it might collapse upon itself or back on them, but then it rolled seaward, toward the East, toward the shores of Japan and Korea, toward the ships entering the harbor.

She did not see them go under. The wall of water hid their sinking. She only knew that when the wave rolled on out to the sea and disappeared in the distance, all the ships were gone.

The physician had still not released Chen by the time Jing returned to Beijing. He was grumpy but valued his health and mobility enough to obey medical orders. His wound was healing. Soong, he said, had been a good nurse.

The Europeans, Americans, and Japanese were shocked and devastated when they discovered a tsunami had sunk their fleet. A freak occurrence, they reasoned. The besieged garrison in the embassy compound had begun negotiations with the Boxers who had agreed to allow them to evacuate the embassy compound, if they agreed to remove all troops of all nationalities from Chinese soil. Politicians in London, Berlin, Washington, Tokyo, and elsewhere were saying that maintaining spheres of influence in China was costly and dangerous. Their nations, they argued, needed to abandon the venture altogether.

After a few days of rest and quiet, Jing stood on a balcony, enjoying the cool of the night and the spectacle of moon and starlight. Soong came and knelt in front of her. Jing insisted she rise and stand.

“Do not bow to me. You are my sister and my comrade, not my servant. You saved my life. I am greatly in your debt.”

“If you are in my debt, repay it by teaching me the arts of war. I want to learn to fight for my people, as you do.”

“You’re a great warrior already. But go home to your family. Spend a season with them. When harvest time and winter have passed, I will come to your home. We can begin to train.”

“Thank you, my Lady. Will you marry Chen?”

“Neither of us can think of marriage now. There is too much to be done. Perhaps someday—at least I hope so.”

Soong smiled and took her leave.

Jing looked up. The night sky, she thought, was the garment of Kuan Yin, Goddess of Compassion.

The stars were jewels in her quiet, dark gown.

***

The Spirit of the Grift

Sam Knight

“Spiritualist and Medium,” Georges deciphered aloud. The hand-painted sign was decorated with so many flourishes that the storefront name had been rendered nearly illegible. He turned his attention away from the row of businesses lining the street and grinned at his brother Yves. “I believe we have found our next benefactor.”

Yves smiled back. “Mother would be proud!” The two looked nothing alike. Georges was dark haired, dark complexioned, and kept himself immaculately groomed, while Yves had a mop of dirty blond hair, grimy fair skin, and teeth that would make a warthog jealous.

“You really think so?” Georges looked quizzically at his brother. “I mean, we are kind of cheating.…”

“Honestly! Worried about cheating the cheaters? How could you forget the look on Mum’s face when she realized she had run out of money, giving it away to swindlers like this?” Yves pointed angrily at the little shop.

“Out the way!” a voice cried out behind them.

Yves and Georges hurried out of the cobblestone street just as an ice wagon raced past. Both brothers gestured rudely at the driver who had not only failed to slow, but had flicked the reins to speed the horses up. The improper gesture befit Yves ragged appearance, but it was comical when matched with Georges’ pinstriped suit and gentlemanly façade.

“Bastard!” Georges called after the horse and wagon, knowing the insult fell on deaf ears. “I hope your ass freezes to the buckboard!”

“Let it go.” Yves patted his brother on the shoulder. Georges could easily work the minor incident up into a major occurrence that would overshadow the next few days. “It’s not worth it.”

“Still. He’s a bastard. Acting like he owns the streets.”

“Well, we were just standing in the road gawking like village idiots.” Yves’s pale countenance went slack-jawed as he made a blank expression at Georges.

Georges reluctantly smiled. “All right, then. Let’s go make some money.”

“Now yer talkin’,” Yves replied in a slurred voice to match his idiot persona. “Oh, wait.” He dropped out of character and patted his pockets. “Do you have a kaleidoscope? I don’t think I have one on me.”

“I’ve got one. Do you have the ghost-scope?”

Yves rolled his eyes. “I’ve
always
got that.”

“All right then. Again. Let’s go make some money.”

Georges glanced up and down the street to make sure no more carriages would try to run him over before stepping back out onto the cobblestones. He straightened his jacket cuffs, adjusted his waistcoat, and corrected his posture to be as stiff as possible. He strode across the street with an air of dignity.

Yves followed, slouching and swinging his arms like the hunchback of Notre Dame.

The kingly fashion in which Georges entered the shop was wasted on the unoccupied room. The show Yves put on, attempting to open the door Georges had allowed to shut in his face—by using only the backs of his hands—was also wasted. Neither brother was discouraged in the slightest.

Looking around at the shelves and glass display cabinets full of expensive oils, potpourris, and incense, Georges smiled to himself. This place obviously made plenty of money.

“Ahem!” Georges cleared his throat in the rudest polite way possible.

On the other side of the room, Yves began picking at the seat of his pants with one hand while stretching up on tip-toe to try to reach glass baubles off the top shelf of a display with the other. When no one emerged from the back, Yves went ahead and knocked a few of the curios off.

The resulting sound of shattering glass quickly summoned two people; an overweight middle-aged man wearing standard homemade burlap pants and shirt, and an attractive young woman in a velvety red dress befitting a spiritualist. The man wore a sour look and had a small club clenched tightly in one fist. The woman, wild-eyed, held the top of her bodice together with one hand while frantically trying to button it up with the other.

Georges had a hard time deciding which of the two he most wanted to keep his eyes upon. Fortunately, Yves chose that moment to curl up on the floor and begin wailing like an infant.

Rolling his eyes up toward the heavens, Georges assumed the look of someone so disaffected he might die just to relieve his boredom. “Oh, puh-lease! Not again. Three times in one day is quite enough!”

Georges spun on his heel and marched over to Yves. “Here.” He pulled a telescoping brass tube from his coat pocket and held it out.

Yves peeked through his fingers to see what was being offered before he stopped crying. When he saw the kaleidoscope, he snatched at it instantly. Tears a thing of the past, Yves put the tube to his eye and grinned as he looked around the room.

With a heavy sigh, Georges tiredly turned back to the other two people in the room. “I am terribly sorry. I will pay for whatever it is he has broken.”

The heavy man’s knuckles returned to a normal color as he relaxed his grip on the club. The woman turned her back to Georges and Yves and quickly finished buttoning up the front of her dress.

“I’ve got it, Papa,” she whispered.

The man eyed Georges, then Yves. Yves eyed him back through the kaleidoscope with a silly grin. Grunting, the man returned to the back room.

“Please, sir,” the woman called Georges attention back to her, “allow me just a moment to clean up the glass.” She bent down behind the sales counter.

As soon as she was out of sight, Yves put the kaleidoscope in his pocket and pulled out an identical looking brass tube, his ghost-scope.

The woman came out from behind the counter with a broom and dustpan and began sweeping up the colored shards from the wooden floor.

Yves followed her every movement with his scope. Georges was hard pressed to keep a straight face as Yves waggled his eyebrows at the young woman’s lithe form.

A nearly overwhelming scent of perfumed flowers and fruits filled the air, mixing with a horrid burnt smell.

“Dear God!” Georges covered his nose with the back of his hand. “What is
that
?”

Yves retreated to the farthest corner of the shop and began feigning retching noises. At least Georges thought Yves was pretending.

“I’m terribly sorry, sir!” The woman continued cleaning. “Some of those oils were quite rare and valuable because of their strong scents.”

“Hmph!” Georges almost sniffed in disgust, but thought better of it. “
Of course
they were.”

With an apologetic smile, the young woman finished sweeping up the shards and took them into the back room. When she returned, she opened windows and used a small wooden stool to prop open the front door.

Yves went back to looking at everything in the shop through his mock-kaleidoscope, although he continued to make quiet gagging noises.

Georges, still holding the back of his hand to his nose, was on the verge of gagging himself. “Perhaps I should return later, after this has aired a bit.”

“Oh yes, sir,” the woman bowed slightly. “That might be a wise choice.”

Georges narrowed his eyes at her. “Are you trying to get rid of me?”

“Oh, no—!”

“Do you find you have difficulty hiding your disdain for my poor brother? Do you think it improper that a wealthy family would keep one if its own around instead of putting him in an asylum or turning him out to the gutter?”

“Sir! I—No!” The woman’s face turned red as she became flustered.

“You’ll not be rid of me that easily! I came here to speak with the dead, and I’ll not leave until I have!”

“Please, sir. This way.” She pointed to a wooden door in the back. “We hold our séances back here where the bright of day doesn’t interfere as much.”

When Georges didn’t follow her gesture, she led the way.

“Come, Tomás,” Georges said to Yves. “Let us go see if Mummy will talk to you here.”

“Mummy!” Yves spoke for the first time since entering the shop. “Mummy, Richie! Mummy!” He jumped up like a child and danced over to hug Georges.

“Yes, Tomás, Mummy.” Georges stiffly hugged Yves back for a moment before pushing his brother away again and straightening his jacket.

“Where? Where Mummy?”

“In there, Tomás. In that room. Let’s go.”

Yves stopped and looked around with a confused look on his face. “No Mummy?” he said to the air. He frowned deeply. “No Mummy!” he told Georges and stomped his foot.

Georges sighed. “Let’s go see anyway, Tomás.”

“No, Richie! No Mummy!”

“Please, Tomás. Let’s go see.”

Yves pouted. “Richie. No Mummy.”

Georges put his arm around Yves. “Please. For Richie? Come on.” He began gently pulling Yves toward the back room.

Georges gave the woman a weak apologetic smile as they crossed the threshold to enter the darkened room. He looked over his shoulder and quietly whispered, “Tomás thinks he can talk to an invisible lady named Angelica, and she tells him things. Right now she seems to be telling him we will not be seeing our mother here.”

“The spirits do as the spirits wish, sir.” The woman seemed to plead with her eyes. “We will see what we can see.”

She followed them in, and the room went dark as she closed the door. A clicking sound repeated three times as she twisted the key on the wall to light the gas fueled sconce. A warm glow filled the room as the flame came to life and revealed the dark red velvet drapes that hid the walls. Mostly filled by a large round table with a glass ball for a centerpiece, the room also held eight chairs, gathered around the table, and a large portrait of a scowling older woman.

“Please, sit.” She gestured to the chairs.

Georges led Yves to a chair and put him in it before sitting himself. The woman took a moment to straighten her dress and her hair, and then, with a flourish, she walked around to the large leather covered chair that established the head of the table.

“I am Madame Limatana, and here, in this room, the spirits do
my
bidding.” She waved her arms wide and looked upwards with a distant gaze. Yves followed the pretty young woman’s every movement through his kaleidoscope so intently Georges began to worry Yves might break character again.

Madame Limatana seated herself in the leather chair and placed her hands upon the table. She began murmuring a rhythmic chant and swaying in her seat while sliding her hands around on the table.

The light abruptly dimmed. The two men could barely make out the woman’s silhouette. Yves made appropriate frightened sounds and leaned into Georges for comfort.

The slight glow from the eyepiece of Yves’s ghost-scope caught Georges’ eye, and he quickly put his hand over it. Yves pulled away sharply, as though he thought Georges was going to take Tomás’ precious kaleidoscope away from him, but he had gotten the hint and the scope disappeared into his pocket, hiding the faint luminescence.

“Spirits! I sense your presence!” Madame Limatana opened her eyes and looked around the room. “Reveal yourselves to us!”

The glass globe in the center of the table began to glow a faint blue. Madame Limatana reached out and caressed the ball with her hands.

“I see your mother …” she whispered breathily. “She is not happy. She has been trying to contact you, but something has been stopping her. I can hear her … She is saying … Richie. Richie. Richie.” As she whispered the name, it echoed faintly from elsewhere in the room, imitating her tone and cadence. “Richie, why won’t …” Madame Limatana’s voice faded out as the other voice grew to a whisper.

“… you listen to me? Richie? Your brother needs you to be strong!” The voice seemed to come from above them. It was just loud enough to be heard, but not loud enough to recognize the identity of the speaker.

Madame Limatana’s eyes were focused upward.

Georges pretended to look up as well, but kept his eyes upon the young woman.

“Not Mummy,” Yves whispered to himself and cradled his kaleidoscope. “Not Mummy.”

“Tomás? Can you hear me, dear? Tomás?” The voice faded slightly, making it even more difficult to recognize. “Are you being good for Mummy?”

Georges saw Madame Limatana do something with her hand next to her ear, and he knew she was ready for the next trick. Under the table, he nudged Yves’ foot with his own to give his brother warning.

“Are you …” The overhead voice faded.

“… being good for Mummy?” Madam Limatana finished the sentence with her eyes closed. “I need you to be a good boy.” The chair Madam Limatana sat in began to slowly rise, taking her up into the air with it. It stopped when her knees reached the height of the tabletop. She shook her head from side to side, as though trying to wake up. “Be good for Mummy! Mummy has to go now. Be good!” She opened her mouth and a ghostly white form began to emerge from within her.

Slowly coming out like smoke, the pale form seemed to expand and rise as it materialized from Madame Limatana’s body. Madame Limatana’s form undulated eerily slow and fluidly, as though underwater, seemingly trying to wake herself up.

“Not Mummy.” Yves voice was quiet, yet carried the shrill edge of panic. “Angie says not Mummy.”

“Shhh! Tomás. Everything is all right.” Georges whispered.

The last of the ectoplasmic form came out from Madame Limatana’s mouth, and her eyes flew wide open as she jerked awake and her chair crashed back down to the floor.

“Angie says not Mummy!” Yves stood up angrily. “Angie says man and woman trick Richie! Angie says fake!” He threw his kaleidoscope through the ghostly apparition floating across the room. The brass tube hit the middle of the suspended cloth, tore a hole through it, and continued on into the curtains covering the walls where it hit with a loud
thud
.

“Yi!” A figure cried out and stumbled out from behind the curtain.

Georges stifled a grin. Yves’ marksmanship was good.

“What the hell is going on here?” Georges stood up angrily.

“Papa!” Madame Limatana rushed to check on the man who had held the club earlier.

“You have deceived us!” Georges pointed with a shaking finger.

“Fake!” Yves yelled again and pointed at the glass ball on the table. “Fake!” He pointed at the chair Madame Limatana had been sitting in. “Fake!” He went around the room pointing at things, both seen, such as the scowling portrait, and unseen, such as the curtain he pulled open to reveal a woman who looked just like the portrait.