Wilhelm

Seattle, WA—Laszlo’s Residence

Tuesday, August 10, 1909

THINKING ABOUT THE future was dangerous. Imagining a future when I was no longer Teddy’s prisoner led to hope; hope, nurtured and whispered to in the darkest hours, led to expectations; and when those expectations withered and hope crumbled to ash, I was left with only despair.

It was a cycle I experienced multiple times before I finally came to the conclusion that I would never be free. I would never escape, and no one was coming to rescue me. Accepting the stark, unyielding reality of my situation didn’t eliminate the pain; it did, however, harden me against the worst of it.

But Jack made me hope again. Not simply for freedom, not just to see my family again, but that nothing I had done while in the possession of Teddy had tarnished my soul so deeply that I couldn’t be redeemed. He gave me hope that I was still worthy of love. He made me want to think about the future again.

“You have failed.” Teddy stood in the doorway. He flung his hat atop the table and crouched in front of the cage. I hadn’t expected him to return so soon. “I gave you two weeks, but you’ve yet to make any progress.”

“I’ve tried, sir,” I said, gripping the bars. “Why is this so important? We can come up with another illusion.”

“You stupid boy, haven’t you figured it out yet?” Teddy smacked my knuckles. “On September sixth—the day devoted to celebrating the city of Seattle—as the sun begins to descend over the Alaska-Yukon-Pacific Exposition, Laszlo will perform his greatest illusion to date—an illusion superior to The Butterfly, better even than The New Butterfly—The Gilded Cage.”

Teddy said the name with a flourish, as if introducing it to a captive audience of hundreds instead of only to me.

“In the Alaska Building there sits an iron cage, within the iron cage a glass case, and within the glass case one million, two hundred fifty thousand dollars in gold bars. With as many people as will fit into the building to witness, Laszlo will cause the gold bars to vanish and be replaced with his humble assistant. And after a suitable period of time for the audience to appreciate what they’ve seen, Laszlo will cause the gold to return and his assistant to disappear.”

Jack had guessed correctly, though Teddy hadn’t admitted to me that he intended to replace the gold with painted lead. “You’re going to steal that gold, aren’t you?”

Teddy snorted. “Of course I’m going to steal it. Did you really think I became Laszlo because I enjoy performing tricks for dimwits and children?”

“But why all this?” I asked. “If you wanted to steal the gold, we could have sneaked in during the night and taken it.”

Teddy raked his hands through his hair. He was agitated, though I wasn’t sure whether at me or something else. “Nobody knows my name,” he said. “I have committed the most audacious burglaries ever conceived, and nobody knows that I was the genius behind them. If I died tomorrow, those fools in Beesontown would never know that I robbed their vault right under their noses. Did you know some hack journalist actually wrote in their local paper that the theft might have been carried out by some local drunkard?”

“I didn’t, sir.”

“But this time, when the dust settles and the crime is revealed, everyone will know that, not only did I steal their precious gold while they watched, but they applauded me for it. From that day forward, everyone will know the name Laszlo.”

Everything we had done from the moment we arrived in Seattle had been to ensure Teddy’s legacy. We had spent countless hours learning to stage illusions, building up the name Laszlo in order to impress the exposition officials so that they would invite Laszlo to perform at the Beacon, all so that Teddy could steal a pile of gold. “If you want people to remember you, then why not become the best magician the world has ever seen?”

“Because magic doesn’t pay as well.” Teddy clapped his hands. “Now, in order to perform The Gilded Cage, you must be able to pass through the iron bars surrounding the gold. I had hoped to avoid this, but it seems that what you lack is the proper motivation.”

Teddy dragged a chair in front of the cage, like he had with the hat, but I feared that he would not be using a hat again.

“Bring him,” Teddy called.

A moment later, George McElroy dragged Jack’s limp body through the open door.

“Teddy, no!”

George heaved Jack around like a doll, dumping him on the chair. Then he went around to the back and bound Jack’s hands.

“You’re going to escape that cage tonight, Wilhelm. You’re going to do it or something upsetting is going to happen to this boy.” Teddy subtly patted the pocket where he frequently kept his revolver.

George McElroy grabbed a handful of Jack’s hair and yanked his head back, revealing a bruised lump the size of a goose egg bulging from his forehead. Jack’s eyes were half shut and confused. George slapped his cheek. “Wake up, ratbag.”

“Jack! Jack, are you okay?” I gripped the bars and shook the cage. I snarled at George. “Don’t you touch him!”

“Come out here and stop him,” Teddy said.

George wound another length of rope around Jack’s torso, securing him to the chair. “All you had to do was say a couple of nice things about me to Ruth,” George said, almost as if he was talking to himself. “She belongs to me. You’ll see.” Suddenly, he pointed at me. “Now I know what you did to the liquor.” He tapped the side of his head. “Mr. Laszlo told me all about you.”

“Stop this, George, and think,” I pleaded with him. “If you know the truth about me, then your life is in grave danger.”

Teddy tsk’d at me. “I would never hurt my young friend here. Especially not after he’s been so helpful.”

“Mr. Laszlo’s helping me out too,” George said. “He wasn’t real happy when he found out who his butterfly was spending her time with.”

“My butterfly no more.” Teddy’s lip curled. “Miss Valentine’s services are no longer needed, though I can still get to her if you disobey me.” He caught my eye. “Now, escape or Jack Nevin will pay the price of your failure.”

I shut my eyes and slipped into the between. Teddy was the sound of maggots squirming against each other, and George was a malodorous cloud. I slammed into the iron bars over and over and over. My bones broke and my teeth shattered and I screamed and screamed.

“Wil?” Jack’s voice lifted my chin.

“Jack! I’m so sorry. This is all my fault.”

“Yes,” Teddy said. “It is.”

George brandished a switchblade that he flicked open. The edge was dull and the metal was stained. He pressed the point to Wil’s earlobe and slashed down. A dribble of blood oozed from the shallow wound, but I screamed as if George had injured me.

Jack’s head swiveled to the side, and he looked up at George. “Oh. It’s you.” He vomited on George’s pants and shoes.

“You son of a—” George pulled back his knife hand to strike.

“No!” I yelled.

“Not yet!” Teddy said, stilling George’s anger. He pressed his hand to his nose and suppressed a gag. Teddy did not handle vomit well. “There are rags in the other room.”

Jack smiled, drool hanging from his bottom lip. “Sorry about your shoes.”

When George was gone, Teddy knelt before me. “This is easy, Wilhelm. That brutish oaf would love nothing better than to cut your inamorato into pieces. As difficult as blood would be to clean out of the floor, I’m willing to let him.”

“Don’t worry about me, Wil,” Jack said, slurring his words. “Whatever happens, it isn’t your fault.”

Teddy clenched his fists, but maintained his focus on me. “You can save him, Wilhelm. All you have to do is escape the cage.”

“And then you’ll let Jack go?”

“You know that Jack’s fate is already sealed,” Teddy said. “But if you escape the cage now, I assure you his death will be quick. However, fail . . .” Teddy spread his hands.

George returned with rags to cover the vomit. “You seem okay, except for your taste in friends,” he said to me. “But I hope you fail.” He pressed the edge of the knife against Jack’s throat.

“Ignore him, Wil,” Jack said. “George is all bluster and no rain. He’s all stem and no fruit. He’s all—”

George boxed Jack’s ear. “Shut up!”

“What I mean to say is that he’s a fucking coward.”

George pushed the point of the knife into Jack’s shoulder until Jack let out an animal cry. George just laughed.

“Jack!”

“He doesn’t need both ears, does he?” George asked.

“Not particularly,” Teddy replied.

I squeezed shut my eyes and threw myself at the bars, trying to push myself through them, but they were as solid in the between as they were in the real world. They were fire and ice and razor blades that tore at my frozen and burned skin. I needed to reach Jack. I had to save him somehow. But I couldn’t do it from within the cage.

“Admit it, Laszlo,” Jack said, his voice carrying through to the between. “You’re the reason Wil’s sick. I don’t know how, but you’ve been making him sick all these years so he couldn’t run away.”

“Shut up,” Teddy said.

“What kind of man kidnaps a young boy and keeps him chained to a bed?”

“I said shut up!”

“You want folks to know that you’re the greatest thief in the world, but you’re not. Wil does all the work. You’re nothing without him.”

Jack screamed. The sound was a million shards of broken glass in the between, each of which cut me to ribbons.

“I hope you still think he’s pretty when he’s missing pieces,” George said to me.

“Still be prettier than you,” Jack muttered, but his voice was weak and raw.

I clenched my jaw and prepared to throw myself at the cage again when a word became lodged in my mind. Pieces. If I were in pieces, I could fit through the bars instead of trying to force the iron to pass through me.

But that was it. The rules were different in the between. I didn’t have to be a boy, I could be a river. And a river didn’t flow through a boulder, it flowed around it.

I pictured myself as a river—I was here and I needed to get there, I needed to be water, separating into narrow streams that rejoined on the other side.

There was no pain, no tearing, no shattered bones. There was only the grace of movement, the slight drag of my body, and the first breath of freedom.

I wasn’t in the between, I was the between. I was here and there in the space where thought becomes voice and today becomes yesterday. But I wasn’t finished, because Jack wasn’t yet safe. I didn’t just escape the cage, I put George McElroy inside in my stead.

“Well done, Wilhelm!” Teddy’s voice boomed through the room, and I felt pride in what I had accomplished, but not because Teddy told me I should.

George attempted to stand and slammed his head against the metal ceiling. “Let me out of here!”

Teddy moved toward me, and I placed my hand on Jack’s shoulder, preparing to Travel us out of the house. “Stay where you are, please.”

Teddy held up his hands. “And what do you think happens now, Wilhelm? Do you think you and this boy are going to leave me? Do you think you can reach Miss Valentine before I can? What about that girl she’s been associating with? Miss Valentine’s mother? Jack’s sister? Evangeline Dubois? Can you get to every single one of them before I do?”

“Don’t listen to him, Wil,” Jack said. “He won’t hurt anyone. We’ll make sure they’re safe.”

I didn’t respond to Teddy because I was so close to escaping, and I couldn’t falter now. All I had to do was take Jack and leave. I undid the knots and unraveled the rope binding Jack to the chair. He stood slowly, weaving on his feet.

“Are you well enough to walk?”

Jack grinned and looped his arm over my shoulders. “Right now, I could fly.”

We moved toward the door. I was steps from freedom.

“What about your family, Wilhelm?” Teddy said. “Your mother and father. Your little sister, Lina.”

I froze.

“You don’t even remember your sister, do you? She was only just born when I found you.”

“Wil—”

Teddy chuckled. “Go ahead and run. Do what you must. And then I will do what I must.”

Jack tried to get me walking again, but I was a statue. “We’ll find them, Wil.”

“But will you find them before I do?” Teddy asked. “You don’t even know where to begin looking.”

“Come on,” Jack said. “He’s bluffing.”

“Jack lives.” My voice was just loud enough for Teddy to hear.

“Wil, no!”

“What is that?” Teddy asked.

I gently lifted Jack’s arm from around my shoulders. “I’ll stay with you, I’ll do whatever you ask, but you don’t hurt Jack; you don’t hurt anyone.”

Teddy’s brow furrowed, and he tapped his lips. “How do I know he won’t immediately run to the police the moment he leaves here?”

Tears were running down my cheeks. I couldn’t look at Jack. “Because he cares for me as much as I care for him, and he knows what you’ll do to me unless he stays away and remains silent.”

“Please, Wil, don’t do this.”

“So the lives of your family ensure your good behavior, and your life ensures his?” Teddy asked. “I think that’s acceptable.”

“Wilhelm?”

I finally turned to look at Jack. I used my sleeve to dab the blood from his ear. God, how I wished I could take his hand and run away with him. I wanted it more than I had wanted anything for myself in a long time.

“You have to leave, Jack. And you can’t return.”

Jack looked as if I had stabbed him myself. “We can figure this out.”

“I can’t risk it.” I could barely speak. I stood on my toes and kissed his forehead. “Thank you for everything. I’ll never forget you.”

I feared Jack would refuse, that he would attempt to stay, but he finally recognized that we had been defeated. His shoulders sank, and a piece of me died. But only so that Jack could live.

Without another word, Jack turned and limped out the door.

I sat, ravenous and sick and exhausted.

George screamed and shook the bars of the cage, but they held him fast. It was difficult to find sympathy for him, and I was too spent by my efforts to try.

“You did well tonight,” Teddy said.

“I didn’t do it for you.”

“All the same.” Teddy yawned. “I’m exhausted. Now that you’ve escaped the cage, you may sleep in your bed. Sweet dreams, my boy.” He climbed the stairs and shut his door, leaving me alone with George, the cage, and my despair.