Reversal of All
R EVERSAL OF A LL
T HE GRAY FOUR-DOOR H UMBER Snipe drove slowly through the darkened, empty roads with Cedric at the wheel. Next to him was Oliver. In the rear seat, a tall, thick-shouldered man in dark clothing held a Luger on Molly and Charlie.
Cedric looked in the mirror at them. “This does not make me happy in the slightest, Ignatius. I have children of my own.”
“You think it makes me happy?” retorted Oliver. “I’d grown rather fond of them.”
“But this was your fault. You brought them to your home. And now they have eavesdropped. That leaves us no choice, you understand this?”
“I understand all too well,” Oliver replied quietly.
“Mr. Oliver,” began Molly in a pleading tone.
He held up a hand for her to stop speaking. Oliver looked at Cedric. “Next left. It’s wooded, quiet, and the river bends at the right angle for our purposes. The current is very swift there and they’ll be past Southend-on-Sea in very short order.”
Molly started to quietly weep while Charlie looked at Oliver in disbelief.
Oliver gave Cedric further directions, and he pulled the Snipe to a stop in a small clearing well outside of London where the rush of water could be clearly heard.
They all got out and Oliver looked at Cedric. “Down by the riverbank. It can be done there.”
The man with the Luger eyed first Molly and then Charlie. “No pain. You just go to sleep, little ones.”
“And you can go straight to hell.” This came not from Charlie, but Molly. It was not directed at the man who was about to kill them, but rather at Ignatius Oliver.
An impassive Oliver said to Cedric, “Right through the gap here.”
They had walked only a few more steps when they were hit with flashes of intense light from multiple torches.
“Police!” cried out a voice. “Hold it right there. What are you doing with them kids?”
“What is going on!” screamed Cedric, pulling a gun and waving it around.
Oliver snatched it away, tugged Cedric close, and said, “Don’t be stupid. It’s just the bloody police. They must have seen us put Molly and Charlie in the car and followed. Get them to the river, I’ll hold them off.”
He fired at the torch lights. As did the other man.
Then multiple shots rang out.
The large man next to Oliver dropped his Luger, clutched his stomach, and toppled to the ground.
Molly had fallen to her knees and watched in horror as the shots were fired. She saw Oliver flinch once and then again, his body twisting with the impacts. He cried out in pain and his gun fell to the dirt.
“Get away from them kids!” screamed a uniformed man, appearing in the light. “You damn slavers.”
Oliver’s mouth sagged and his hand gripped his chest, where his shirt was fast turning crimson. He looked at Cedric in desperation. “The b-book. R-run. Back to the… c-car. B-before it’s all scuppered.” Blood was leaching from Oliver’s mouth, as Cedric fled into the trees.
A swaying Oliver looked at Charlie and Molly. They were staring back at him in disbelief and shock. “I-I’m… so s-sorry.” Then he dropped to the dirt and lay still.
A uniformed man rushed up to Molly and Charlie. “You okay? Nothing hurt?”
They shook their heads, both their gazes fixed on Oliver’s body.
“Where’d the other bloke go?” someone shouted as the sound of a car starting up reached them.
Charlie and Molly pulled their gazes away from Oliver’s body when Major Bryant stepped into the clearing and shone a light on them and then on himself, so they could see him.
He looked down at the dead, Luger-toting man, and then at the bloody Oliver lying there, before glancing at Molly and Charlie and saying quietly, “It’s all right, children. You’re safe now.”
“Mr. Oliver was working with the Germans,” Charlie cried out.
“They sh-shot him. He’s d-dead,” added Molly tearfully.
Bryant’s trim mustache twitched. “Okay, the coast is clear, you can be resurrected now.”
Oliver slowly sat up and wiped the “blood” off his mouth with a handkerchief. He stood and said, “I trust Cedric made his escape?”
Bryant nodded. “We have him on a short leash, of course.”
Oliver then looked guiltily at the dazed Charlie and Molly. “Perhaps this can all be better explained back at The Book Keep.”