Island of Doom: Hunchback Assignments 4 (The Hunchback Assignments) (7 page)

“Information about you, my friend. They’ve retrieved your submission forms from Father Mauger.”

“My what?” Modo said.

“The Notre Dame submission forms from 1858,” Colette replied.

“Which are?” Octavia said.

“Forms that parents sign giving their children up to Notre Dame. Most just abandon their offspring on the steps, but there are a few who want to officially hand the child over to the church. These papers may have contained valuable information. Shortly after your birth, Modo, your parents changed their names and left Nanterre. The question is for where? And what are their new names?”

“What was my—their last name?”

“It was Hébert. They were potters.”

Modo paused. Potters! His parents made cookware? How … how normal. He had pictured his father as a doctor or a military officer, something impressive. But a simple potter?

“Well,” Octavia said, “since these enemy agents have all the information, are we stuck just twiddling our thumbs?”

“No. There are other French agents besides me who are working on this case. They have put together an index of names and occupations of residents in the villages surrounding Paris. There’s a high probability that Modo’s parents’ new names are on that list.”

“Why don’t you just go take a look at their list, then?” Octavia asked.

Colette let out a long sigh, and for a moment, Modo thought he saw her eyes become moist. She straightened her shoulders and set her jaw. “I have been discharged from the agency.”

Octavia shot Modo a glance.

“But why?” Modo asked, averting his eyes from his colleague. She was too quick to jump to conclusions.

“They considered the
Ictíneo
assignment a failure,” Colette admitted, “and no one would believe me about the underwater city of New Barcelona. We don’t have submarines capable of diving to that depth. They even insinuated that I was imagining the Clockwork Guild. And they … well … let us just say I was not always the best agent after that. They no longer trusted me.”

“They are wise men,” Octavia said.

Colette stood up, as if to leave. Modo stood up too, putting his hand on her shoulder. “Please sit. Octavia, despite her demeanor, wants to get to the bottom of this as much as I. Don’t you, Tavia?” He shot her a glance and she gave him a grim nod. “How do we get this information from your former comrades?” Modo asked.

“That’s where your spectacular talents come in.” Colette’s voice was suddenly energized again, the vitality that Modo remembered returning to her face. She placed her briefcase on the table. “I would like you to assume another persona, break into a building, and steal the information.”

“Whose persona?” Modo asked.

“And which building?” Octavia added.

“The Deuxième Bureau, our spy agency. And the person I want you to impersonate is Directeur Bélanger, the agency’s head.”

Modo met Colette’s eyes. She was clearly enjoying the shock on their faces.

C
olette gave directions to the fiacre driver, then allowed Modo to hold the carriage door for both her and Octavia. The folding roof was open, letting in the warm September sun. As they sat on the cushioned bench, a luxury Colette was extremely thankful for, she pointed out a few of the sights, hoping that her descriptions weren’t too forced.
He is here! He is right here across from me!

The moment she’d seen Modo there had been a slight skip to her heartbeat. He was wearing the face she’d known on the
Ictíneo
, but something about it had changed, or her memory of it was different. She was also surprised that she had difficulty meeting his eyes. She remembered them with utmost clarity. Once, in jest, she had called them soulful, but it was a word she would use again, this time with sincerity. In Paris. She’d been waiting for him for so long, checking at Le
Hôtel Grand every day. As the weeks passed she’d begun to believe her letter had not been delivered.

She had imagined his arrival often, with anticipation and a little fear. What if she broke down again? But, mercifully, that hadn’t happened. And now it was as though no time had passed, even though it had been almost a year since their last meeting.

“Enough of this tourist talk,” Octavia said. “We need to get to the meat of our visit to your fair country.”

“What a … pleasant way of putting it,” Colette whispered. “Then let us get to the meat.” Colette remembered well Octavia’s protectiveness of Modo, or rather, her possessiveness—that was a better word. “We are nearly at the bureau.”

The carriage turned down the Rue de la Mercy and she thumped brusquely on the side of the car. The driver stopped in front of a tall iron fence. Beyond it was a structure Colette knew all too well. From the outside it appeared to be an ordinary seven-story rectangular building; the architects had taken pains to make it look exactly like a textile factory. In reality it was the very heart of French espionage; from here the bureau’s tentacles ran throughout Europe and across the oceans.

Inside those walls Colette had spent far too many hours sifting through paper, searching for clues, taking orders from oafs whose minds worked at half the speed of hers.

“This is the building you will enter, Modo.” She spoke quietly so the driver wouldn’t overhear. “It is the Deuxième Bureau de l’État-major Général, or in English, since I know Octavia doesn’t understand our beautiful language, it means
‘Second Bureau of the General Staff.’ It is the center of our military intelligence.”

“Hmmph.” Octavia gave a dramatic sniff. “It’s rather plain.”

“That is the point.” Colette spoke slowly, as though explaining something to a child. “Did you expect a big sign saying
French Spies Inside
?”

Colette was pleased to hear Modo chuckle. Octavia looked out the window. Colette opened her briefcase and pulled out her dossier. “I have a photograph of Directeur Bélanger, though it is ten years old, so you’ll have to age yourself appropriately.”

Modo examined the photo. “I assume you also have his height, a description of the type of clothing he typically wears, jewelry, his manner of carrying himself, and his personal habits.”

“It is all listed in great detail.”

“And, while I am Mr. Bélanger, would you like me to reinstate you to your position?” Modo asked, cheekily.

Though Colette enjoyed that he could be so flippant at such a time, she could not imagine working for the agency again. “I am done with them. I do hope your French has improved.”

“It is adequate. But there are many other more worrisome and unpredictable matters. For example, Bélanger would know most everyone in that building. Whom do I acknowledge? Which individuals are his close colleagues? There are too many relationships to understand, faces to know on sight. Normally I spend weeks memorizing the interactions of my targets.”

“Monsieur Bélanger is—how do you English say?—gruff. He ignores everyone—his wife, his agents. He even kept
le président
waiting for several hours once.”

“He sounds typically French to me,” Octavia said.

Colette continued. “Your mission will be less complicated if you enter the building at night. Most of the staff are finished by early evening. You’ll stride right in and take the papers and return to us with a canary-eating grin on your face. Did I say that right?”

Modo smiled. “Yes, you did!” That face, Colette thought, that face was so handsome and yet she knew what lay beneath it. No, she reminded herself, the beautiful face was the mask.

She managed to return the smile as she handed him the dossier. “First we’ll go to a tailor,” she said.

“Well,” Modo said, “with the two of you picking my clothes I should be the sharpest dresser in all of Paris.”

I
t was perhaps the most boring week Mr. Socrates had endured. He’d spent nearly every waking moment in his office ferreting through information brought to him by Cook and Footman in the hope of gleaning some telling detail about the Clockwork Guild’s location. Mrs. Finchley would bring him tea and meals, clearing the plates without him even noticing. Tharpa would cajole him into a short constitutional to clear his mind. Data gathering was something Mr. Socrates had always abhorred during his life in the military, but it was a necessary evil of his job. From data came conclusions and from conclusions came action.

A few months earlier he’d have had his team of trusted “ferrets,” as he called the clerks who worked for him, sift through the newspapers and documents. Instead, he was reading shipping records, passenger lists, market trends, even
patents. He wanted to know the prices of metals and the places where they were being bought. Fools often said that money was the root of all evil, but Mr. Socrates knew better. It was metals. If there was anything that drove the vital mechanizations of war it was metal. First for swords. Then cannons. And finally iron-hulled ships.

He did stop to read the papers: the
Montreal Gazette
, the
London Times
, and the
New York Post
. There were the usual stories of terrible railway collisions, of political campaigns, addresses to Republicans, even an article that graded butter. He paused over a story about bodies disappearing along the Pacific Coast. If he’d had more agents, he might have pursued it further. Most likely it was resurrection men selling cadavers to medical establishments. There was so much to learn about the human body and not enough dead bodies to go around. He set down the paper, and his mind cleared.

In time his boredom grew to excitement, for a pattern was beginning to emerge. A large purchase of metal from Ontario had been made by several companies with Greek names. Did the Clockwork Guild not have a penchant for using Greek names? It was perhaps a reference to the past glory of that civilization. The metal had been shipped to an unknown destination in the Pacific.

He worked even longer hours. He read accounts of metal leaving from Vancouver, from Seattle—and spotted a large shipment three years ago to a Chinese buyer in the Yellow Sea. That piqued his curiosity, for he knew that Hakkandottir had once been employed by the Chinese triads, the pirates and brigands who fought both the emperor and the
British empire. He’d dealt with many of them, Hakkandottir included. He knew she’d not easily give up those ties.

Sixteen years ago he had met her in a sword fight on the deck of a two-masted junk and severed her hand. At the time he’d been pursuing the leader of a triad, someone known only as 489. It was a number from Chinese numerology that referred to the dragon master, the leader. Mr. Socrates had been reassigned to India, but his fellow servicemen had never discovered the identity of that triad leader. Why hadn’t it occurred to him before? The elusive 489 could have formed the Guild. The organization did not have the structure of a triad—it was something much larger—but would take the same skill set to control. It was entirely possible.

He remembered the junk, the ship of Hakkandottir’s that he had captured. It had been steam-powered, with an engine he’d never seen before.

Was it all connected?
Oh, Alan, you fool. Of course!
Their nest was in the Pacific; as far from British might as possible. Now the only difficulty was to pinpoint exactly where they were.

It became clear what he must do. It was a big world, made smaller by train and steamship. He summoned Cook and Footman. By the time they were standing before him, he was practically vibrating with excitement.

“I’m about to ask the two of you to charge full steam up a hill,” Mr. Socrates said.

“I was hoping so, sir,” Cook said. “I’m ready, willing, and able. Just point me in the right direction.”

Footman only nodded in agreement, but Mr. Socrates was certain he saw excitement in the Chinese man’s eyes.

I
t had been relatively simple for Modo to take Directeur Bélanger’s form. Modo had paid for a room in a nearby hotel and rested for several hours. He then removed his mask and composed the face while staring at the man’s photograph. Colette had fetched clothing from a haberdashery, while Octavia quizzed him about the upcoming mission. When he emerged, dressed in a dark suit and a long jacket, belt cinched tight, he was amused by Colette’s shocked expression.

“Sacré bleu!”
she said. “You have captured the image of Directeur Bélanger.”

“It’s a stunning gift, this shape-shifting.” Modo had meant this to be lighthearted, but he was suddenly aware that it sounded like bragging.

“
Très excellent
is what it is!” Colette said.

“I prefer when he looks younger,” Octavia added.

“Young or old, the disguise lasts for only a few hours, so let us hasten away,” he said. Within minutes they were in another fiacre and, shortly after that, had returned to the Bureau.

Despite the plain facade of the stone building, Modo felt as if he were looking at a fortress. The fence was taller than any of the nearby ones and there were several guard stations and plenty of gas lamps, making the courtyard relatively bright. He wiped the window of the fiacre, for their breath had fogged the glass.

Smoke rose from three smokestacks protruding from the roof of the building. In the short time Modo had been watching he’d seen three tarp-covered wagons stop at the gates, present papers, and then continue up to a large delivery door that led into the lower section of the building. Were the tarps hiding arms or stacks of files?

“Are you certain you want to do this?” Octavia asked. “I don’t know that we can trust her.”

“I do have ears,” Colette said.

“I want you to hear,” Octavia answered. “This could very well be a trap.”

“Why this whole complicated ruse, then?” Colette asked. “If it were a trap I could have agents swoop down on us at this very moment.”

“Modo is the strongest man I’ve ever met. To even stand a chance of capturing him you would need to draw him into your lair first.”

For a moment Modo thought Octavia was having him
on, but her face said otherwise. She really was bragging on his behalf. Well, it was the truth. Even Tharpa couldn’t beat him at arm wrestling.