rolled over the encampment, followed by a flash of light and the intoxicating bite of ozone, which always reminded Lloyd of Lodema. A storm was moving in and, given the hothouse air and the voraciousness of the midges and mosquitoes, a dump of rain was seen as a relief. Lloyd considered it a good omen. He wanted the air fresh and clear for the morrow, with a good wind. Not gusty but steady.
The first pregnant drops of rain hit the roof of the tent and the wagon, and Lloyd hastened to gather up his booty. He did not want to get caught in the downpour. Before he departed, he gave the Ladies Mulrooney each a kiss on the cheek and told the professor to be at the courthouse on Fourth Street no later than noon the next day.
“I wish you would let me in on your little secret, my boy,” the showman lamented. “After all, we are partners. Aren’t we?”
Lloyd had grown adept at his management of both information and personnel. He thought of Brookmire’s intensifying questions, and how the easterner was probably pacing back at the warehouse awaiting the final preparations.
“Trust me,” Lloyd said. “Remember what you have taught me.”
“That’s what I’m afraid of!” the showman confessed.
“Fear is the price of surprise,” Lloyd answered.
The professor twisted the ends of his mustache at this remark, trying to think if he had said it or if the boy had out-Mulrooneyed him.
“I’ll be at the appointed rendezvous—with bells on,” the showman confirmed. “How will I find you?”
“That won’t be a problem.” Lloyd smiled and then was gone, picking his way through the trees as fast as he could, eyes ever on the alert for confrontation, the warm big drops of rain sticking to his back like flies.
In spite of the boy’s nonchalance, the professor had the nagging suspicion that he would never see his protégé again, and it pained him to think that he was in some way responsible. Little did he know that the boy would be back again later that night.
In the interim, Lloyd had a hectic schedule. He had to return to the mission house and see his mother before lights-out, then slip out of the dormitory, as usual—go meet Brookmire at the vacant warehouse, beautify his creation with Mulrooney’s baubles, make his final inspection, and then return to the showman’s camp amid the storm to perform what would be the most troublesome part of the entire scheme. He had left this crucial element to the last minute because he had no choice. If he had put forward an open request to Mulrooney, he knew the showman would have outright refused.
Once his delicate errand was completed, he would then have to get himself and his unlikely accomplices over the river to where Cahill’s barge was moored and across to Illinois, where they would lie in wait for the morning light. Meanwhile, Brookmire and the covert team he had employed would transport the balloon, the kite assembly, and the parawing glider. If the storm did not pass, all these preparations would be for naught. It would be the busiest night of his life, and a day of reckoning whichever way the wind blew. “So much to do,” he mourned. “And so little time.”
It was the familiar complaint of his father back in his inventing days, Lloyd realized, and the thought of his missing father and the concern over his whereabouts wavered before him like a ghost. “But I can’t think about that now!” he told himself. There were theatrical effects that needed to be applied, checks and counterchecks to be performed. His mother would be fretful and despondent. Brookmire would be wound as tight as a cheap watch. The Vardogers could be laying for him—or some villain like before. And always the specter of Schelling and Mother Tongue’s emissaries haunted him. Even if they meant well, they could derail everything. But there was no turning back now. He had to hurry and be very careful. He darted through the gathering storm unaware of the greater storm that was mounting.
Back at Mulrooney’s, the showman battened down the wagon and the tent. The horses were jumpy, and so were the brothers. Not even a foot rub from his wives could dispel the professor’s apprehensions, so he had a nip of LUCID!, then a vial. Then one more. His silent wives laid him to rest in a rumpled state and extinguished their candles. White barbs of lightning tore the sky and precipitation plummeted,