Science, Eternal Life, and a Traveling Circus |1|

Chapter Seventeen

The reveal of the recording device induced a squeal from Abraham. He threw down his newspaper and reached for it. Derrick glared and pulled it out of the twig's reach. He closed his fingers around the device. It was designed to appear as a silver gear, and with each spaced dip in the cog's ridges, there was a different button that served its own function. Play, pause, stop, record, and so forth.

"I haven't had the chance to use it yet."

"Obviously, you've only just bought it." Abraham laced his fingers under the table and twiddled his thumbs in aggravation. End game was near enough that he could smell it, and he grew impatient. Luck was on his side, he thought. How perfect it was that Derrick's fondness for the look of silver had led to such a covert selection of technology.

"I don't know how much storage it has, or how much battery."

"It doesn't matter. This could be our only chance," the former captain growled. "Millions of reward money comes from that man sitting at that bar, right now. I can't be seen, or I'll be recognized. All you have to do is hit your record button and slip it into his pocket."

Derrick sucked on his cigarette. He exhaled in Abraham's face. The ex-smoker grimaced and bitterly waved the smoke away. He was almost grateful that Derrick hadn't offered a cigarette. Freed from the addiction by his banishment, his lungs had never felt better. Alas, his mind still guiltily yearned.

"And, what, am I supposed to just ask for him to give it back?" Derrick drawled. "I've a tracker on it, but a tracker is only going to tell me where it is. It isn't going to get it back."

"I don't know," Abraham snapped. He folded his arms and drummed his fingers on his sallow flesh. "We'll figure it out."

"And what makes you think he'll say anything revealing?"

"Didn't you say an Evelyn Marsh was around here? She knew him?"

"Yes...?"

"Then get them together, and they'll be talking like long-lost pals in no time. Surely."

"I believe she comes to the inn closer to seven."

"Then we wait."

"I'll go now." Derrick stood.

"Are you daft?"Abraham gasped. He prodded his glasses up his nose and shook his head. "Wait for him to be a little tipsy before you go shoving things in his pockets. Didn't you see? He ordered a strong bourbon, and no small amount of it. Five minutes, Derrick. Five more minutes."

Derrick narrowed his eyes and slowly returned to his seat. He puffed on his cigarette and rolled the silver recording device twixt his fingers. "That's what got you banished, wasn't it?" He chuckled, and a knowing smile crept crookedly up his face. His dark peach fuzz beard spread with the grin. "Precious little Abe couldn't take the pressure of work and spent all his salary on bourbon liquors."

Abraham bristled, turning bright red. He clenched his crossed arms so tightly that his knuckles turned white and his pale flesh swam with sudden bruising.

"Oh, everyone knows, Abe."

"It is Abraham," Abraham barked.

"Drinking more and more every night until you started showing up to your shifts late and sodden. You've always been pitiful, Abe. That's why it was so easy to turn you in."

The former captain recoiled. His eyes widened with accusation, and his hands blindly drove into the satchel on his seat. "The cameras caught me. No one turned me in."

"Of course not," Derrick agreed, smiling with too much joy. As if he knew something.

It sickened Abraham.