Stolen History - The Flat

London 2022

Cai and Nadia stared, letting their vision adjust to the gaslight sconces, and slowly looking around the high-ceilinged flat. But it was a flat in name only. What lay before them was a workshop, a laboratory, a training facility, and a command center that looked like it had been ripped from the pages of some steampunk graphic novel and thrown back into 1958. Vacuum tubes climbed the walls and crisscrossed the ceiling. A giant brass chandelier hung from the ceiling on an intricate contraption of pulleys and cables, and clockwork gears ticked softly all around them.

Nadia breathed, “What in the Victorian aesthetic nightmare…”

The center of the room was mostly bare, with a large circle inlaid in the stone with a delicately laid mosaic depicting six figures inside the shape. The first was a woman dressed in a toga, carrying a torch and a key. Next was a black spider in a web of green, yellow, and red. A serpent made of mistletoe vines and fire woven together in intricate knots was facing a stylized black and indigo raven in flight. Finally, a monkey wearing a crown and holding a staff appeared to be dancing with an old, laughing coyote.

Cai leaned over the tiled artwork and emitted a soft, low whistle. “Well, it’s a den of thieves, alright.” Nadia joined her at her side.

“I see Anansi, the spider there,” she pointed. “That’s got to be Sun Wukong, the Monkey King.”

“Dancing with Coyote, no doubt,” added Cai.

Nadia chuckled and shook her head. “Nope. Look, see that headdress? It’s Aztec. That’s Huehuecóyotl.”

“Good call,” agreed Cai. “And then you have Raven there. Pretty straightforward.”

“Who’s the leafy fire snake thingy?”

Haversleigh stepped forward. “That would be Loki. It seems you have a rogues gallery of trickster gods from around the world here.” He looked very pleased with himself. “Beautifully done, I might add.”

Cai moved to a large wooden table with numerous tools and gadgets laid out on top of it. Blueprints in faded black ink with furiously written notes in smudged pencil. Tiny screwdrivers and pliers, magnifying glasses and clamps. The workbench was well used.

“Look at this,” came Nadia’s voice from the other side of the room. She stood in front of a giant corkboard, covered in pictures and maps, with handwritten notes pinned seemingly haphazardly. “All it’s missing is a bunch of red string.”

“No,” said Cai, approaching slowly, taking in the array of images and papers. “It’s not connected stuff. Look, it’s simply… reminders? Like here.” She tapped on one of the hand-scrawled notes that was tacked on top of several pictures of what appeared to be North Africa. It read ‘Places we never should have gone, but did anyway’ and listed Lisbon, Tangiers, Marrakesh, and Trieste.

“What the hell does that mean?” Nadia crossed her arms. “What was your great-grandfather doing in Morocco?”

“Antiquities acquisition, I believe,” said Haversleigh, finally speaking. The women started, having momentarily forgotten the barrister was there. “Or rather, the return of said antiquities.”

“Return?” Cai shifted her focus to the elderly man. “What do you mean?”

“To their rightful owners. Now I don’t know this first hand, but the story is that your great-grandfather… appropriated certain items of cultural significance from those who may have come by them in less than honorable fashions.”

“Like grave robbers,” interjected Nadia.

“Among others, yes,” he replied. “More often than not, he found out who the robbers had sold them to and then reclaimed them.”

“So Grandma C was right,” whispered Cai. “He was a thief, but used his skills for good.”

“That might be giving the man a bit too much credit,” chuckled Haversleigh. “Mr. Lassiter was a thief, first and foremost. And while his actions may have the trappings of a Robin Hood, make no mistake, he profited greatly from each and every object he returned home.”

Photo by Thérèse Photo on Unsplash

Cai began to wander the room, exploring further. Nadia continued studying the corkboard and its images. “Wow, he really travelled. Looks like the only place he didn’t make it to was Antarctica.”

“Not much cultural heritage there,” mused Cai, running her hands over the front panel of a huge grandfather clock.

“Or profit, for that matter,” added Haversleigh.

Cai came to a bookcase filled with leather-bound notebooks. She pulled one out, blew the dust off of it, and opened it. Page after page of yellowing paper, filled in a tiny, tight script. She flipped through the book, stopping every so often, each page dated with a location.

• London, 1931 - Incoming from Coscuez, est. value - £3m - Forestal

• Glasgow, 1932 - Incoming from Dakar, est. value - £5.1m - Katanga

• Nice, 1933 - Incoming from Aggameda Khyang, est. value - £5.8m - Ying

• Margate, 1935 - Incoming from Berlin, est. value - £9m - von Fursten

Page after page, with locations, times, names, and then some undecipherable reference code. Hundreds of millions of British pounds in… something. There was no indication of what was incoming. She set down the journal and moved to a different section of the collection, grabbing a larger tome.

This one had sketches and maps, with timelines and more codes. They were labeled with names that meant little to Cai. She put the book back on the shelf and continued, and found herself facing a grandfather clock, well over six feet in height. It ticked away softly, but she could hear a soft hum from inside and more clicking than seemed needed for a timepiece. With a careful touch, she turned a small latch to open the glass casement. There was a click, and then what sounded like a hiss. The entire front of the clock shifted, then swung open.

Cai exclaimed, “What the…” and Nadia rushed over.

The innards of the clock had been entirely removed and replaced with a network of gears, sprockets, chains, and cables. Several levels were connected to bars and axles that disappeared into the floor and wall. Cai reached for one of the levers.

Nadia cried out, “Wait! You have no idea what that does!”

Cai shrugged and pulled, creating a creaking, grinding sound. For a moment, nothing happened, but then with a hiss and scraping of stone, the mosaic in the center of the room rose straight up several feet, a pedestal of hewn stone underneath it. After a few seconds, the mosaic itself flipped vertically, turning itself over and revealing a glass top criss-crossed with a grid. Another few seconds, and a low hum began, and a blueish light glowed under the glass with a slight flicker. The three of them gathered around it, bathed in the aqua glow.

“What is it?” asked Nadia.

“No idea. Some kind of light table? Maybe there’s a projector somewhere?”

“It’s wild. And definitely weird.”

“No argument there,” laughed Cai. She turned back to the clock and reached for another lever. It resisted slightly, but then gave, and the wall on the far side of the room began to slide down, revealing a wall of safes, another set of bookcases, and a small alcove with a writer’s desk. On the desk was a small machine with a brass keyboard and a spool of what looked like ticker tape coming out of the side. There were some letters and symbols on it, but they were mostly faded.

Cai pulled a desk drawer open and removed a small notebook, bound in black leather. Inside were symbols and cyphers, annotated with more of the now-familiar handwriting.

“More weirdness,” sighed Nadia. “I mean, what even is all of this…”

Cai interrupted. “There’s no electricity.”

Nadia looked at her. “What? What do you mean?” She looked around and realized her friend was right. There was not a wire or switch or outlet to be seen: every moving piece, every gadget, even every light. Everything was mechanical. The lights were all gas, as far as Cai could tell.

“Astonishing,” whispered Haversleigh. “I had heard that Mr. Lassiter was eccentric. Even paranoid.”

“What do you mean, Algy?”

“Well, now don’t go putting too much stock in the stories people tell about old men who are not around to defend themselves, but… There were some rumblings that, as he got up in his years, your great-grandfather’s distrust of the government expanded significantly to include corporations, big businesses, and so on.”

“That doesn’t sound paranoid,” said Nadia, crossing her arms. “Sounds like a smart man.”

“Even so,” continued Haversleigh. “He may have taken it to an extreme. Gave up the use of electricity because he thought they were using it to spy on him.”

“Again, that’s not far-fetched at all. They do it now.”

“Perhaps, but in 1960?”

Cai nodded. “Point taken. But how did he get all of this stuff to work here? He wasn’t an engineer, was he?”

“No, but he certainly had a lot of acquaintances, and no end of resources. My guess is he was willing to pay for his paranoid vision of security.”

Cai ran her hand over the machine on the desk. “Any idea what any of this stuff is or does?”

Haversleigh shook his head and shrugged. “Not in the foggiest, Miss Cai. You would probably understand it better than I would anyway.” He stopped and pulled out his pocket watch. “Oh, it is later than I expected. I have errands to attend to, I’m afraid.”

“Go ahead,” said Cai. “I guess no time like the present, right?” She turned to Nadia. “Wanna help me figure this place out?”

Nadia grinned. “Say less. But we’re going to need some snacks and drinks.”

“Deliveroo?”

“Perfect. Curry? Donner?”

“Both?” They laughed. Nadia picked up her phone. “No signal in here. I guess that’s not surprising. I’ll call from downstairs. I want to look in that shop a little, anyway!”

“Perfect,” said Cai. “I am going to start looking at these books some more. Oh, and make sure you get plenty of booze!”

“Oh,” said Haverleigh, turning around and coming back into the room. “I nearly forgot. Friday evening, you have been invited to a Gala. I am supposed to introduce you to your new patron there.” He fished out two envelopes from his coat pocket and handed one to each woman.

Nadia’s eyebrows rose. “Me, too?”

Haversleigh smiled. “Of course, Miss Mansouri. Lady Campbell knew her granddaughter would never attend something like this without you at her side.”

“Damn straight,” said Cai. “You’re the fancy one, anyway. You know I hate those things.”

As he was entering the lift, Haversleigh called out, “I’ll send the car for you whenever you are ready to come back to The Lane, ladies. Have a good day.” He disappeared, and the lift clanged shut, the cables and gears lowering him out of sight.

Cai looked at the envelope. It was a cream-colored parchment, addressed to her in stylish calligraphy and sealed with a purple wax and a logo she was vaguely familiar with. She looked at Nadia and cracked the seal. The card was the same deep purple color and bore a logo on the top that matched the wax

“Holy shit,” said Nadia, staring at the card in her hand. Cai’s eyes widened as she read the invitation.

“Um…”

“Afolabi Balogun and Gerritt van der Bijl?!” Nadia began to bounce on her toes.

“Why are we going to a party with a tech savant and a billionaire?”

Nadia squealed. “You mean a fine ass tech savant!”

“...and a billionaire. We don’t believe in billionaires, remember?”

Nadia glared at her. “Okay, but as billionaires go, he’s one of the good ones, right? Like, he’s giving away hundreds of millions to every cause you love! Environment, health care, anti-poverty, pro-democracy, women’s education…”

“Yes,” interrupted Cai, annoyed at her friend’s excitement. “But you cannot be a billionaire and be ethical. There is no way that can happen in a just and fair system.” She crossed her arms defiantly. Nadia looked at her and raised an eyebrow.

“Do you want to discuss income inequality right now, Miss ‘I just inherited five million pounds and a secret hideout funded by criminal enterprise?’”

Cai sighed. “I know. I’m a hypocrite.” She flung herself into an uncomfortable chair next to the workbench and winced. It was harder than it had appeared. “I mean, Balogun is a genius. And he is doing really amazing things with A.I. in Benin and for his community.”

“Exactly! And van der Bijl has been one of the big voices behind reparations and anti-colonialism in developing countries. He’s implemented changes around the world for worker safety and education…”

“I know. But it just feels… icky. You know?”

Nadia pulled a chair up next to her friend. “I know. But let's be real for a minute. We’re not invited to this thing to meet them. Algy is using the event as a cover to introduce you to some shadowy old friend of your grandmother’s, right? Honestly, I doubt they will even stick around after they give their self-congratulatory speeches.”

Cai nodded. “Yeah, you’re probably right. Besides, it’s an antiquities exhibit! Right up my alley.” She shot Nadia a conspiratorial grin.

Nadia glared. “No. Cai, no. You are not stealing anything from Orisha Tower! This is not some private collection in an office in Omaha.”

Cai shoved her friend playfully. “I know, I’m teasing… maybe.” She shot her another sweet smile.

Nadia suddenly stood, panic on her face. “You know what this means?”

Alarmed, Cai stood as well. “What?!”

A grin spread across Nadia’s face. “We need to go dress shopping.”