Edison's Gold Read online

  EGMONT

  We bring stories to life

  First published by Egmont USA, 2010

  443 Park Avenue South, Suite 806

  New York, NY 10016

  Copyright © Geoff Watson, 2010

  All rights reserved

  www.egmontusa.com

  LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA

  Watson, Geoff.

  Edison’s gold / Geoff Watson.

  p. cm.

  Summary: Tom Edison and his friends become embroiled in a mystery involving his “double-great” grandfather’s inventions, a secret society, and a vendetta being carried out by a descendant of inventor Nikola Tesla.

  eISBN: 978-1-60684-471-7

  [1. Adventure and adventurers—Fiction. 2. Secret societies—Fiction. 3. Inventors—Fiction. 4. Edison, Thomas A. (Thomas Alva), 1847–1931—Fiction. 5. Tesla, Nikola, 1856–1943—Fiction. 6. Mystery and detective stories.] I. Title.

  PZ7.W3268Ed 2010

  [Fic]—dc22

  2010011312

  CPSIA tracking label information:

  Random House Production · 1745 Broadway · New York, NY 10019

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher and copyright owner.

  v3.1

  For Rob

  Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  1. A Visitor

  2. Clorox Invention #28

  3. In Trouble, Again

  4. More Bad News

  5. Hidden Heirloom

  6. Polished Silver

  7. Key to the Past

  8. Golden Cookbook

  9. The Secret Exhibit

  10. Sign of the Rose

  11. Escape Hatch

  12. Deeper into the Labyrinth

  13. Emergency Raisins

  14. Free as a…

  15. Roundup

  16. Dropping the Bomb

  17. Bands of Hope

  18. New Headquarters

  19. Clued In

  20. Meeting Mitzi

  21. Behind the Cages

  22. A Chocolate Solution

  23. Bounce-off

  24. Last Resort

  25. A Long Shot

  26. A Message from Another Country

  27. The Waltz

  28. Up in Flames

  29. The Great Escape

  30. Welcome to Hoboken

  31. MI 9

  32. The Mystery Toaster Oven

  33. The Man Behind the Screen

  34. The Luxury Suite

  35. Separated

  36. Coming Clean

  37. A Slip of History

  38. Urban Labyrinth

  39. A Trunk Full of Trouble

  40. Reconnected

  41. Roadblocked

  42. City Beneath the City

  43. Don’t Go to the Light…

  44. End of the Line

  45. Partners in Crime

  46. Spidey Sense

  47. Chef Edison

  48. The Whispering Gallery

  49. Unlikely Hero

  50. Familiar Terrain

  51. A Gift from the Bambino

  52. The Final Clue

  53. Biding Time

  54. The Sleepy Estate

  55. A Door in the Floor

  56. The Golden Formula

  57. A New Invention

  Acknowledgments

  The man in the stained suit stared up at the driveway that ended at Thomas Edison’s Victorian mansion. He’d sworn to himself that this day would never come—when he’d have to grovel like a dog at the feet of his old enemy. But news of the famous scientist’s declining health had reached Manhattan, and the man had one final score to settle with his old rival.

  Trudging toward the door, he winced as tiny pebbles pierced his worn-out soles. He desperately needed new shoes, but every cent he earned went toward rent. Twelve dollars a month for one shabby room and hot plate—criminal! A sorry end for the man who helped invent the X-ray and radio, who had once been offered $150,000 by J.P. Morgan himself to redesign the entire Niagara Falls Power Plant.

  The maid answered on the first ring.

  “I’m here to see Thomas Edison.” Even in front of this servant, he was self-conscious about his patched jacket and uncombed hair.

  “I’m afraid Mr. Edison isn’t seeing any more visitors.”

  “Tell him it’s his old colleague, Nikola Tesla.” As the words left his mouth, the maid seemed to catch her breath.

  “This way,” she murmured, smoothing her apron, then leading him through the foyer and up the creaky stairs.

  Entering the bedroom, Tesla immediately sensed the contempt of the others who were already gathered to pay their respects. He had not expected to see them, and his stomach churned with each recognizable face: Babe Ruth, Harvey Firestone, Henry Ford—even the silvery-haired New York Governor Franklin Roosevelt had taken a break from his presidential campaign to make the trip to New Jersey. They were Edison’s inner circle, and once upon a time, Tesla had considered a few of them his dear friends and colleagues. Now mistrust and betrayal had distanced them.

  Propped up by pillows, his old rival regarded him with those same electric blue eyes. Tesla could feel the edges of his heart soften. If he’d had a hat, he’d have removed it. Respect trumped dislike, even now.

  “How many years has it been, Nikola?” Edison finally spoke. His voice was weak and raspy.

  “Ten, twelve?” Tesla was shocked at how frail the inventor had become. As young scientists, the two of them had been tireless, working straight through the night, fueled by nothing more than the excitement of discovery.

  He cleared his throat. “Thomas, could I have a moment in private?”

  Edison gave a knowing nod, then signaled for the others to take their reluctant leave.

  “They hate me,” said Tesla as soon as the group had vacated the room.

  “They fear you.”

  Ha! This, from the man who ruined my career. “I assume you know why I’ve come,” said Tesla.

  Edison closed his eyes and nodded. His expression was one of resigned irritation.

  Even now, at death’s doorstep, the old man is still so condescending, Tesla thought.

  He could feel the angry blood rushing to his head like hot lava.

  “Give me the formula!” he shouted into the silence. He hadn’t meant to blurt it out like that, but old wounds had been torn open.

  “You are much too angry to be trusted—”

  “Your opinion is not my concern. You stole my research, then destroyed my life’s work.”

  Edison began to cough. Tesla automatically reached for the pitcher of water by his bed and poured a glass, then handed it to him.

  “You still wear that stupid ring,” Tesla noted when he saw the aged scientist’s hand. A single emerald set within filigree gold adorned his pinkie. “Just to rub it in my face.”

  “Whatever actions I’ve taken in my life were done for a reason,” said Edison. “And whatever emotional burdens I carry are mine alone.”

  “You had no right to do what you did! So let’s just finish this business, and I’ll be on my way.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Edison glanced toward the open window, unable to look his old colleague in the eyes. Lying had never been one of the inventor’s strong suits.

  “You know I have as much right to it as anyone else!” Tesla added, “Even more.”

  “There are rumors that you roam the Bowery,” said Edison after a moment, with slow care to his words
, “addled with drink, cursing my name. And now that I see you, I know the worst.”

  It was Tesla’s turn to be silent. He shifted his weight, embarrassed.

  “You have lost your mind, my friend,” said Edison, his tone softening now. “To give you any power at all would be unconscionable.”

  “You are not God!” And before he could make full sense of his actions, Tesla had lifted the water pitcher and, in a burst of fury, sent it crashing to the floor, a smash of icy water and splintering shards.

  “Get out! You foolish man!” Henry Ford’s voice was like a knife to the back. Tesla spun to see Ford and Firestone barreling through the door toward him, and before Tesla could protest, Harvey had him by the lapels and was pushing him into the hallway.

  “This isn’t over!” Tesla heard himself yell, like a spurned villain from one of those new Buck Rogers comic strips, as he was shoved down the stairs and out the front door so quickly it left him gasping for breath.

  He was alone now; his trousers were soaked from the smashed water pitcher. Bits of glass clung to them, reflecting a kaleidoscope prism of light. He blinked, a moment’s pause at the unexpected beauty. He’d spent his life working in spectrums of light, sound, and energy. So brilliant, so marvelous, so many years ago.

  And now only one thought filled his head, a truth as unforgiving and absolute as the cold winter sun. If he wanted to claim his formula—the formula for turning base metal into pure gold—he would have to fight for it.

  I’m about to make you a legend, Noodle.”

  Tom Edison IV’s unruly tuft of blond bed hair stuck out from behind the wood-framed car as his thin fingers nimbly connected an eight-volt battery to a large bundle of wires. “We’re both going down in history with this one.”

  Why did Tom always make things a billion times crazier than they had to be? thought Bernard—aka Noodle—Zuckerberg to himself. None of the other ten soapbox cars at the starting line even had motors.

  Noodle tried to calm his nerves by focusing on the thumping rap beats pulsing through the iPod earbuds hidden beneath his scribbly hair, but it wasn’t helping. At five feet, ten inches—by far the gangliest in his class—he looked and felt like an oversize giraffe test-driving a Prius. His knobby knees stuck out the side of the car, and he had to hunch his body just to fit inside this mobile death trap. No wonder people had been calling him Noodle since his first day at Saint Vincent’s.

  “And you’re sure this thing’s one hundred percent safe?” he yelled over the music while bopping his head along to the beat.

  “Of course it’s safe,” Tom said confidently as he peeked his freckled face around the side of the car, although the truth was, he’d never exactly tested the design for the bleach-battery motor he and his dad had formulated exactly three weekends ago in their basement lab.

  Tom pulled the engine’s rope, and the car coughed to life. Black smoke billowed into the air as every other kid in Mr. Fazool’s science class gaped.

  “All right, my little Jeff Gordons, remember—today’s race isn’t about winning.” Fifty yards away, at the other end of the parking lot, Tom’s shaggy-haired science teacher, Mr. Fazool, fiddled with the cap gun. “It’s about … er, observing the concepts we studied this semester. Kinetic and potential energy, friction …”

  All month long, the seventh graders at Saint Vincent’s had been working on their cars, sawing down blocks of wood and fastening on plastic wheels, while Tom feverishly constructed his latest invention like a mad scientist.

  “Ten bucks that beast stalls right out of the gates.” Strapped into the triple-reinforced car next to theirs sat brown-haired, pigtailed Colby McCracken, Tom’s only other friend in class, beaming at him.

  “Not a chance, Colb,” Tom fired back. “Prepare to be blown out of the water.”

  “You’re way too ADD to pull it off,” she said. “I’m sure you messed up the calculations along the way.”

  Maybe Tom wasn’t the math whiz Colby was—he was more of a big-ideas guy—but he had ambition. And he knew a bleach-powered electric car would be as revolutionary as his great-great-grandfather’s first commercial lightbulb.

  “On your mark. Get set—”

  Bang! As Mr. Fazool fired the gun early, Noodle’s startled foot hit the pedal, blasting his car to life. Its axles glittered against the pavement.

  “Ease the brake!” Tom shouted. “You gotta slow down!”

  “Yo, I did! I can’t!” Noodle’s voice echoed as the car whizzed down the parking lot, making windy tracks of burned rubber behind it.

  Tom darted after him. What was going wrong? Maybe he should have added more sugar? Or maybe the bleach ionized too quickly?

  Either way, that car was moving way too fast.

  “Noodle!” he shouted, racing after his now smoking creation. “Stay calm!”

  “Tom, you promised me no more malfunctions!” Mr. Fazool had dropped his clipboard and had joined the footrace to catch Noodle.

  Up ahead, a school bus turned a corner and was beginning to veer straight into Noodle’s path. Tom could see his friend’s elbows madly jerking the wheel left and right, but the car maintained a direct crash course toward the bus.

  Hoooooooonk! The bus belched its warning as Noodle narrowly whizzed past its front bumper. The car had a mind of its own now, wheeling past a cluster of gossiping sophomores, then heading directly toward the middle of the campus quad.

  “Watch it!”

  “Slow down!”

  “Sorry!” Noodle’s voice was pure fear.

  His heart thudding, Tom pumped his legs faster to keep up with the car, which had bumped up onto the sidewalk, and was now fast-approaching a long flight of stairs that led down to the upper school gym. He could barely watch as the car hit the stairs and began tearing down them, heading straight into the pride of the Saint Vincent’s Academy campus, its reservoir.

  Which was centered by a stone fountain statue of old Saint Vincent himself.

  Kids were shrieking and whooping, their phones out to snap pictures, though it was all Tom could do not to hide his eyes as … splash!

  Nose first, Noodle second, the car hit and then submerged, displacing a wave of water that soaked over the lip of the reservoir and onto the quad lawn.

  A hiss, and then, silence. All eyes, even the stony downcast eyes of Saint Vincent, watched Tom’s latest bright idea as it sank.

  “Someone needs to jump in.”

  “I think that dude might be drowning.”

  More students gathered around. Nobody was snapping pictures anymore.

  “Coming through!” Tom yelled, pushing into the crowd. “Outta my way!” Memories of learning mouth-to-mouth at the Y catapulted through his brain. If anything happened to Noodle, he would never be able to live with himself. He dove in—just as his friend wobbled and sputtered to the water’s surface, looking like a wet poodle.

  “He lives!” Some kids burst into applause, while others shook their heads, as Tom and Noodle, soaked and somber, climbed out of the water.

  “I’m not sure we’re going down in history,” said Noodle when he saw their breathless and angry science teacher approaching. “But I sure think we’re going down to see Phelps.”

  “Hey, Edison,” yelled a blond-haired senior from behind them. Tom turned around and met his smirking face. “Is there anything you don’t screw up?”

  It was not an ideal way to end the last day before spring break.

  Sitting in Headmaster Phelps’s wood-paneled, leather-smelling office on a Thursday afternoon, Tom chewed his fingernails down to the nubs. Partly from nerves, but also because he was one of those fidgety kids who couldn’t sit still for longer than two-minute intervals. Even when he was in trouble, his mind was a distracted flurry of explosions and ideas. This was probably the reason he’d been summoned to this very office three times in just as many months.

  Experience had taught Tom that the best thing to do when being lectured was to stare straight ahead with an appropriately remors
eful look on his face, and at all costs avoid eye contact with his no-nonsense mother, who’d been called out of Highland Elementary, where she’d been substitute teaching.

  Last time he had gotten into this kind of trouble, Phelps had threatened to take away his scholarship. Then, Tom had sworn to his parents—and truly believed—that he was turning over a new leaf and that his days of detentions were over.

  How had he managed to mess up so spectacularly? Again?

  “Steven, you’ve known Tom since he was in first grade.” His mom tried her best to sound composed as she attempted to placate the quietly smoldering Dr. Phelps. Tom knew it was going to be a far less diplomatic conversation once they got home. “He’s always cooking up his little inventions—”

  “Little inventions? June, you’re a teacher. Don’t pull the wool over your own eyes. Your son’s out of control. Just last week, he invented a way to destroy half the football field.”

  Tom piped up in his own defense. “That’s a quick fix. All those mowers need is a GPS installed, and they’ll—”

  “And how would you ‘quick-fix’ your bionic lunch lady?” The angry blue vein pulsing on the side of Dr. Phelps’s head was a good indication for Tom to keep his mouth shut. So he did.

  Phelps just didn’t get it. Once Tom had ironed out all the kinks in those auto-mowers, he knew he could save the maintenance staff hours of labor on a sweltering hot day.

  And then, he’d be a legend.

  “This is your third strike, Tom.” Phelps held up three chubby fingers to clarify. “So I want you to use this spring break to mull over a better academic fit. Maybe take a tour of Astoria Junior High, what do you think?”

  Tom saw the panic flicker in his mom’s eyes. “But Tom is the third generation of Edisons to go to Saint Vincent’s,” she protested. “Our family name has always—”

  “Frankly, June, the Edison name, such that it is, is not what it was.”

  Tom bit hard on his tongue. It was bad enough when kids at school teased him for not having the Edison gene every time one of his inventions went spastic, but now his own principal thought he was a loser.

  Dr. Phelps stood up from behind his desk. “I’m very sorry, but I’m handing the matter over to the academic policy board. We’ll let you know if we think Tom should be allowed to return to Saint Vincent’s after spring break.”