35. Chapter 35
Chapter 35
I n the middle of the night, Brayden led Fabienne around the house toward the stables.
“I thought we were going to Hartford,” Fabienne whispered, pulling her black cloak closer.
“We’re taking a horse. I have faith in your walking abilities, but this will be faster, and stealthy enough.”
Winny neighed softly when he disturbed him. He petted his head and prepared the saddle, then offered Fabienne a hand to help her up. She hesitated.
“It’ll be all right. I’ll manage him.”
She grumbled, but let him hoist her up. He sat behind her and picked up the reins.
“See? All is well.”
“We’ll see about that when something spooks it.”
“Winny’s not so twitchy. He’s a good boy, aren’t you? Yes, you are.” He leaned forward to stroke the horse’s neck. “Be nice to Fabienne, and she’ll feed you some sugar when we get back.”
“I definitely wo-on’t,” Fabienne said in a slight singsong voice, as if she tried to fool the horse.
Brayden nudged Winny, and they were on their way, keeping a steady walk. Fabienne slowly relaxed and leaned back, her warmth seeping into him. He should’ve taken her riding more often.
At one point, she giggled.
“What was that?” he asked.
“We’re riding in the middle of the night, dressed in black.” Her hair brushed his chin as she looked at him. “We’re like highwaymen.”
He grinned. “A century past the peak season.”
They rode in a comfortable silence until Fabienne spoke again. “Are you certain you’ll find the proof in his office?”
“He doesn’t have a permanent residence in Hartford, and if he’s keeping sensitive documents anywhere, I’d put his secured office over a boardinghouse.”
“Even if that means there’s more chance his coworkers find them?”
“They can’t find them if they don’t care to look.” Brayden had gone through this kind of reasoning several times now. He assumed—and hoped—Henson would hold the proof close.
If there was any proof. One way or the other, some resolution would come tonight.
They dismounted behind an inn that would give him an easy alibi of spending the evening in town, should it be needed, and headed down the street; two inconspicuous, midnight strollers.
“This is it.” He stopped in front of the entrance to the Watchers’ building on a side street. The area appeared abandoned, the streetlight a few yards away providing weak illumination. Fabienne went to the door and pulled out her kit.
“No need yet.” He showed her the key all Hartford-based members owned. Swiftly, he unlocked the door and rushed Fabienne into a short, narrow hallway. As he lit a lamp on the wall, Fabienne moved to the next door and kneeled.
“Uh… when I said I could lock-pick, I meant the usual locks,” she said uncertainly.
The complex mechanism on the inner door featured a set of rotating, concentric circles with a switch in the middle.
“Not this one, either.”
“Why did you need me again?” she asked while he rotated the circles into the right combination.
“Don’t worry. You’ll be of use yet.”
“Hmm. Words every wife loves to hear.”
The mechanism clicked. Brayden led the way up the stairs on the other side.
“What kind of politician has that type of security, anyway?” Fabienne whispered. “I’ve heard of war generals with less secrecy.”
He chose not to answer. Instead, he gestured to the door of Henson’s office. “All yours.”
“Finally.” She bent down and squinted at the lock.
“That excited about crime?”
“It’s not about the crime.” She slid one pin inside and gently rattled it. With another one, she gripped and rotated the keyhole. “It’s about having something to do. And if it means I’ll do something good, perhaps help someone…” She paused and looked numbly at the door.
“If it’s a condition you can’t help, it’s not your fault,” he said softly.
With a delayed nod, she went back to work. Half a minute later, the lock clicked, and she let out a quiet cry of success.
“Mr. Marshall, if you will.” She opened the door for him and followed into the room. A thin ray of moonlight cast a blueish strip across the desk and over the floor, painting soft shadows where they stood.
“Pull the curtains closed,” he said, then turned on the table lamp as Fabienne did so.
He swept the room. Like all other offices, it was simple and spare in decorations. The few shelves held books, mostly on the topic of law. Nothing incriminating could be found there; anything relating to the Watchers would always be under lock and key.
The desk was a standard knee-hole one with drawers on both sides. Henson kept it orderly, with nothing but a stack of writing paper and some ink and pens on the top. Everything else was kept in the drawers—the locked drawers.
“This should banish any doubts of your usefulness,” Brayden said as Fabienne came to stand by him.
“Oh, my. All of them?”
“Enjoy.” He moved aside to give her the room to work. After the first cracked lock, her pace accelerated, and by the time she was done with all the drawers, Brayden had merely sifted through the contents of the first.
She really was good. Strangely though, instead of shock, a sense of pride filled him. Or perhaps admiration. Fabienne did have the effect of jumbling all of his emotions.
She peeked into a drawer. “What are we looking for?”
“Oh, no. You’re not seeing this.” He pulled her away. Bringing Fabienne here was risky, and the last thing he needed was her reading about time travel. It wouldn’t be discernible right away; Henson’s documents didn’t start with “time travel exists, and this is how we do it”. But even a few strange words or dates would beg for an explanation.
“Well, that’s not very nice,” she complained as he guided her to the window.
He gave her an apologetic look. “You know I can’t tell you the details. Besides, I need someone on the lookout. Watch the street.”
With a frown, she complied.
He returned to the papers. Standard reports: schedules of travels and travelers, a collection of stored telegraphs addressed to Henson—nothing that would implicate him. No indication he’d meddled in the affairs of the Approval Committee or had anything to do with Lincoln’s missing watch.
“Are you sure you don’t need my help?” Fabienne asked after twenty minutes of standing and doing nothing.
“I don’t know,” he murmured, more to himself than her. He stood and cracked his neck. “Maybe he does keep it elsewhere. The added security is not worth the risk.”
“You found nothing in the drawers?”
“Nothing that would help.” Should he waste more time here? Henson could have any number of places to hide things.
“Maybe he’s got a secret shelf.” Fabienne lifted a few books. “When I was little, Antoine told me we had one in our library that opened to an underground tunnel, so I took out all the books to find it. It was a prank. Maman was furious with me. We had no secret shelf, but perhaps here…?”
No, the shelves were just shelves, Brayden was sure of that. All rooms were designed the same, with no secret compartments within walls. The books? That would be a risky maneuver, hiding something so out in the open. Brayden let out a sigh and leaned his arms on the desk.
The desk. Henson had brought it when he moved in.
He kneeled and felt the underside of the holed area.
“You’re getting very familiar with that desk.”
“Come help me.”
“Oh, so now I’m allowed to.”
“Fabienne…”
“Fine, fine. What are we doing?”
“Desks can have secret compartments. Dozens of them. The trouble is finding them.” He slid his fingers over the smooth writing surface. “Sometimes, a crack will indicate them. Or you have to pull out the right drawer, more of them, maybe in the right sequence. The trick could also be in the merged parts of the desk—they may not be merged at all.”
She lifted an eyebrow. “You and Antoine could’ve had some nice secret compartment talks.”
For a moment, a shadow crossed her eyes—the look of regret. Clearly she missed her family, but something about that look didn’t sit well with him.
Focus. “Sometimes, they’re mechanical. But then you need a lock, and if you don’t want a lock to be seen…”
The central drawer featured a golden embellishment shaped like a lion’s head. Brayden wiggled it carefully. The head rotated, then slid aside, revealing a tiny lock.
Fabienne gasped. “That’s so clever. How did you know it was there?”
“Mr. Wallace made a few mechanisms for such desks in his time.”
“The man who taught you tinkering?”
“Yes. Mechanical desks like this are complicated, but if you find the starting point, you can often open the entire thing. A turn of the key can release all the hidden drawers. Of course, you need to have a key.”
She smiled. “Or similar means.”
Brayden stayed quiet and let her concentrate. She brought her ears closer to the lock as she worked on it. A tiny click sounded, and then another—not coming from the lock, but from the side.
“Did something open?” she asked.
Brayden followed the sound. He trailed the surface of the side of the table, feeling for dents or hidden buttons. As he touched the inserted square panel—another ‘decoration’—it moved slightly up. “Got it.” He pushed the panel up. Behind it was a shallow compartment containing a brown folder.
“We did it!” Fabienne raised her voice in joy, then grew serious. “I have to go stand by the window again, don’t I?”
He gave her another apologetic glance, but she didn’t complain further as she resumed her guard position.
When he removed the folder, something else behind it fell to the ground. A small cardboard box, the length of his hand, but thin. He opened it up and pulled out a vial, filled with dark blue liquid.
A shiver ran down his back. Almonite. More than that—this was the serum they used to create time travelers. The kind Brayden had taken at his initiation. He tilted the bottle. No, not quite the same—the color was off. It might be the version that only granted abilities for a few weeks or months. Used for emergencies.
The supposedly destroyed five vials in Henson’s project.
Brayden put it aside and focused on the folder. It contained a small leather-bound notebook and a stack of documents. He skimmed through them, looking for words that would stand out. His heartbeat picked up, and the papers rustled as his fingers shook.
A stack of old reports. The dates started years ago—‘58, summer of ‘59, April… of ‘65.
This year. Henson had been traveling to the future—and Brayden had the proof he needed. Glancing over the document, he caught a few names—Richmond, Petersburg, South Side Railroad, something about “weak and shallow defenses at Five Forks, without reinforcements”. The dates were less than two weeks away.
Next was the notebook. The writing differed from the documents, descending into scribbles that were a nightmare to read. He came across a drawing of a pocket watch—the back and front casing only. Like all of their watches, the lid had a decorative engraving.
Those served no other function than to differentiate one watch from another. Brayden’s—and his father’s before him—had a meander border. The watch in the sketch had two concentric circles at the edge, filled with fine diagonal lines. Not Henson’s—but not Lincoln’s, either; his had a floral engraving.
“Brayden!” Fabienne hissed, and from her tone, he gathered this wasn’t the first time she called. “Someone’s coming!”
Quick. He couldn’t take it all—if Henson peeked into the drawer, he’d notice. The page with the April travel should be enough; he tucked it into his coat pocket. Fabienne came over to help him collect things and put them back in the drawer.
They hurried to the office door. “They’ll need some time to get through the sequence lock,” he whispered. “Follow me.” He led her down the hallway, unlocked his office, and pushed her in. Safe on the other side, he leaned on the door and listened.
Slow, dragging steps came from the staircase, with a thump every few seconds. A walking stick. Caldwell didn’t need it, but he still brandished it. Brayden let out his breath. Good—they could avoid the old man easily.
“Uh, Brayden?” Fabienne whispered. “Shouldn’t we… what if he comes in here…”
“He won’t. It’s my office.”
Her eyes widened. The steps moved past them, and down the hallway, a door creaked as Caldwell entered his office.
“Don’t worry. It’s not him,” Brayden said.
“Who comes here in the middle of the night? I mean, besides us.”
“Caldwell has trouble sleeping sometimes. Let him sit for a few minutes. He’ll get distracted with a book and barely pay attention to other noises.”
Fabienne nodded and looked around the office. “I never imagined where you work.” She softly tapped her fingers on the desk. “Any secret compartments?”
“Not that I know of.” He walked up to her. Her eyes glistened in the dark, and her breath tickled his neck as she laid her hands on his chest.
“You were great in there,” he said.
“You, too.”
Oh, how he’d missed her. The warmth of her touch, the way her body pressed against his… Once this was all over, if the consequences weren’t too dire, they’d need to have a final talk about their marriage. Especially the possibility of her returning to his bedroom.
But this wasn’t the time for it—or the many other things he’d love to do. He moved away. “I think Caldwell has settled in. Let’s go.”
Fabienne must’ve grown accustomed to Winny on the way back, since she was half-asleep when they reached home. Brayden helped her to her bedroom and through a change of dress, then tucked her into her bed. She fell asleep in seconds.
He collected her clothes and carried them to the wardrobe. Something hit his boot and clinked to the floor.
The almonite vial.
He picked it up and looked at Fabienne, snoring gently. Damn. She’d told him she was at risk when she was anxious. Why didn’t he check her before they left?
He blew out the candle and retreated to his study, where he twirled the vial between his fingers. It all made sense now. The almonite in Henson’s experiment was never destroyed; Henson took it. Lowe wasn’t worried about Lincoln’s watch missing since nobody outside the Watchers could abuse the power. Brayden had thought Henson found a way around the system to do it himself, but what if he hadn’t?
What if he found Lincoln’s watch and used the stolen almonite to create someone the Watchers could never track down—a rogue time traveler?
A man outside their reach and completely under Henson’s control.
Brayden shivered, unsure if from the realization, or from the excitement that he finally had proof against Henson. But unlike with the documents, there was no paper trail for the almonite. The surest way to indict Henson would be to get the vial back where it belonged and order a search, but that would require another break-in, and it complicated matters.
First, he’d see what the documents brought. They may be proof enough.
He stored the vial in a drawer of his desk, safe for now.