The Enthusiastic Amateur: Chapter Two

  Part Two.

     Pick.

     Pick.

     Pick?

     The word gained buoyancy in Quaint’s mind and he clung onto it, whilst simultaneously trying to avoid any allegories that alluded to drowning: one of the foremost things on his mind. All right, Cornelius, he told himself: focus on the manacles. Rallying his concentration (arguably the weakest aspect of his character) into an alliance with his train of thought (one of his strongest aspects when called for), Quaint gathered all the information he could about the manacles binding his wrists.

     Even though his fingertips were numb from the cold, he felt the edges of the iron cuffs, tracing their path. Standard police issue, if he wasn’t mistaken. Mayhew’s Foundry, based out of Scotland. He could tell by the imprint of the letter ‘M’ stamped onto the iron. He knew Mayhew’s well – an occasion in his past had led him to be placed in them by London’s constabulary (mistaken identity, he swore blind). But he shook that memory from his head. It wasn’t his past he was interested in; it was the future – more specifically, the distinct possibility of a lack of one. Now, what was it about Mayhew’s cuffs? No, they weren’t standard police issue. Not anymore, he corrected himself as he recalled something that he’d heard recently. Something about a faulty batch some months back. Mayhew’s had maintained the Metropolitan Police contract almost since its inception, but there had been a few recent escapes from custody, which led to an immediate cancellation of the supply. It turned out that the metal pin joining the manacles together could be easily pushed out with the right tool, freeing the captive and making the cuffs nothing more than tarnished jewellery. The cancellation of the contract ended up flooding London’s backstreet markets with iron by the bucket-load, snatched up at bargain prices by the blacksmiths. A pair of Mayhew’s could be bought for a handful of pennies. But none of that mattered. It was the central pin that Quaint was looking for.

     He found it, and pressed it with all his strength. It was a good thing that his extremities were so numb; he didn’t feel the pain - but he would surely feel it later once he’d thawed out, he told himself. And then he smiled. If he was thinking about the future, it meant that he was just about confident enough to pull this off. But taking into account that he had always shared a somewhat fractious relationship with luck at the best of times, what were the odds that these manacles were made by Mayhew’s? That was the real question.

     In his fifty-plus years he had witnessed his fair share of luck, and the majority had been of the bad variety. He rarely lingered overlong on those memories, choosing to fill his life with as many good ones as he could find, hoping they would address the balance. But he was deluding himself. Bad luck always won out over good, at least where Cornelius Quaint was concerned. During the trade-off of bad for good, inevitably some good memories had drifted from his grasp. Beyond his ability to recall in any detail, but notable by their absence collectively, like a single dark cloud in an otherwise cloudless sky. It was as if his mind had reached its full capacity, and in order to accommodate new memories, he would have to sacrifice some of his old ones. The only problem was that he had no choice which ones were to be lost, and the longer that he lived, the more room he had to make within his cluttered mind. Childhood friends, the name of the street where he grew up, the housekeepers and maids – he could recall none of them anymore. He was facing certain death, wondering if his life would pass before his eyes. He certainly hoped not. Over the past few years so much of his past had slipped through his fingers that he swore it would never happen again…

Will Cornelius manage to survive?

Find out right here on Monday 5th 2012 !!!

To help Cornelius escape head on over to his Facebook page for a chance to win a free copy of the latest Cornelius Quaint adventure, The Lazarus Curse!

The next step...

Tomorrow will see the conclusion to this week's chapter of 'The Enthusiastic Amateur'. This part of the exclusive new story will finish on a cliffhanger and Quaint's life will hang in the balance. And only YOU can help to save him.

All you need to do after reading the story here is visit Quaint's Facebook page, where you will see a question, as well as a code that needs to be deciphered in order to answer it.


Once you have used the Cornelius Cipher to decode the message, simply Follow @CorneliusQuaint on Twitter and send him a Tweet or Direct Message including the hashtag #LazarusCurse and your answer.

This week's prize will be a free ebook edition

of the latest Cornelius Quaint adventure

'The Lazarus Curse'.

The Enthusiastic Amateur: Chapter Two

     Part One.

     Quaint had never actually timed how long he could hold his breath for; he had grown out of escaping from chains and tanks of water. Holding one’s breath was a trick for younger men, and it had been twenty years at least since he’d tried it. He only had one resort: no matter what Quentin Claremont had said about escape being impossible, he had to find a way to prove him wrong. After all, his life depended on it. He was caught between the devil and the deep blue sea, not for the first time in his life, but at least this death came with options. That was new. Not necessarily any better, but new nonetheless. If he did nothing, the weight of the straitjacket would slowly drag him down into the water and if he hadn’t freed himself by then he would drown, and if he struggled too much trying to free himself, the post supporting the chain would snap and he would drown. How he would have dearly loved a third option, and preferably one that didn’t involve him drowning, but none sprang to mind.

     Quaint glared at the image of Claremont’s face through the glass tank, as warped and indistinct as the man himself. He didn’t know him either by name or reputation. In fact, he’d never even heard of him before, nor any of the other magicians he had mentioned. Either that meant that Claremont wasn’t quite as professional as he claimed to be, or that Quaint rarely kept abreast of his competitors. The answer, as things turned out, was a little bit of both.

     This trap was built upon layers, and he knew that in order to escape, the solution to this type of problem was always to release one’s self from each layer in sequence.

     The manacles first, then the straitjacket to free up his arms and stop him sinking like a lead weight to the bottom of the tank. It was unlikely that the wooden post would hold his weight, so freeing the chain would be the next objective. Getting out of the tank would pose a problem though. Its sides were taller than him at full stretch, and they would need to be at least a half inch thick to be able to hold such a volume of water. Because of the pressure, there was no guarantee that he would be able to break the glass, and even if he could, he had nothing to break it with.

     With his escape from the tank included as an overall objective, Quaint now had plenty of hurdles to mount - and here he was without a clue how to achieve any one of them. If only he could take care of the manacles then at least he might have a chance, but with no other options presenting themselves, it wasn’t as if he could take his pick…

The Enthusiastic Amateur will continue right here on Wednesday 29^th February 2012!!!

In the meantime, please check out the Cornelius Quaint Facebook page and Twitter for more information.

What happens next?

This week's chapter of 'The Enthusiastic Amateur' has reached it's cliffhanger ending and now only YOU can help to save him.

All you need to do is answer this question: In which country was Houdini born?


Then visit Quaint's Facebook page, where you will see the answer in code, along with the cipher that you need to answer it.

Once you have used the Cornelius Cipher to decode the message, simply Follow @CorneliusQuaint on Twitter and send him a Tweet or Direct Message including the hashtag #LazarusCurse and your answer.

This week's prize will be a free ebook edition

of the latest Cornelius Quaint adventure

'The Lazarus Curse'.

The Enthusiastic Amateur: Chapter One

Part Two.

   Quaint awoke (with a cracking headache) an undefined lapse of time later and surveyed his predicament. And what a predicament it was! One perilous situation was bad enough, but he seemed to be saddled with at least four of them.

     He could feel cold metal pinching the skin around both wrists.

1.     Manacles

Something was hooked to his back.

2.     Chain

His whole body was constricted.

3.     Straitjacket

His chest was freezing cold.

4. Ice

And it was also very wet.

5. Correction: Water

     Furthermore his vision was blurred, and at first he put it down to the fact that he’d been clobbered on the back of the head, but as he blinked the blur away he realised that he was looking through glass covered with green mould, it was as if he inside a gigantic fish tank in desperate need of a clean. Taking all individual factors into consideration and totalling them up into a reasonable summary of his situation, Quaint concluded that he was bound by manacles with his arms behind his back and a straitjacket was clamping said arms firmly in place whilst he was suspended by a chain and up to his waist in a massive glass tank full of freezing cold water.

     On the whole, things looked bleak.

     He didn’t ponder how exactly he had got into this sticky situation; the only thing that mattered was getting out of it. Thankfully, he had studied escapology under one of the best in the business and little things like manacles, chains, straitjackets and tanks of freezing cold water were of no consequence. Using skills perfected over decades of application, Quaint waited for the manacles to slip free of his wrists.

     And he waited.

     And he waited for a bit more.

     And then he began cursing, his voice echoing off the walls of the glass tank as he demanded to know why the iron was not obeying his commands. And then a thought struck him. There was only one reason why he was unable to free himself. Only someone with the required degree of skill could possibly have secured him in a position from which there was no escape.

     ‘Sorry to keep you hanging around, Mr Quaint,’ called a voice from down below. Quaint recognised it immediately – after all, it had been heckling him all night. It was the thin man with the clipped moustache from the front row. ‘Thank you for coming. I know you’re probably a very busy man. No doubt you’ve already taken stock of your situation and come to the conclusion that escape is impossible?’

     ‘In my experience, impossible is all relative,’ said Quaint. ‘So you must be Quentin Claremont, I presume?’

     ‘The very same,’ said Claremont, with a bow. ‘Do you like my little contraption? I thought seeing as you were gracious enough to accept my invite, it was only polite of me to orchestrate a worthy test of your abilities. As I said, I’m in the conjuring trade myself…and as I also said, it is impossible to escape from my trap.’

     ‘We’ll see,’ muttered Quaint. ‘You’ve gone to a lot of effort just to prove a point, I’ll say that for you.’

     ‘Actually, Mr Quaint, the only point I intend to prove is your death.’

     ‘Better men than you have tried,’ Quaint said, truthfully. ‘So, what do you want?’

     ‘Want?’ enquired Claremont. ‘Why, I would have thought that was perfectly obvious! Despite what I said in my note, I do actually rate you as a performer – and that’s the reason why you’re here. No doubt you heard about Hans Aberguise, the German conjuror? Ah, such a terrible tragedy. Someone tampered with his guillotine before his act, and he ended up with his head in a basket. Shame. And what about Monsieur Claude de Corsair? He used to be one of the finest sword-swallowers in France before someone coated his tools of the trade with black pepper. One fatal sneeze later and he ended up shoving a blade right through his brain. He’s dead now too, of course.’

     Quaint rolled his eyes. ‘Look, whilst this is all very fascinating, is it going to take much longer? It’s just that I’d sort of like to jump straight to the point where I bust out of this trap and then get to work on busting you.’

     Claremont permitted a sly smile to grace his thin lips. ‘The point is, Mr Quaint, that I’ve been trying to make my mark on the conjuring circuit, yet have found myself faced with plenty of competition…and so now I’m eliminating it…one by one.’

     Quaint struggled against the manacles, feeling the rough edges cut into his flesh.

     ‘I wouldn’t do that if I were you,’ taunted Claremont. ‘It will only speed things up…and by ‘things’ I really mean ‘your imminent and inevitable death’.’ The thin man took a glance up the length of the chain that was attached to Quaint’s back. ‘You see that post that the chain is fixed to? It’s been sawed through, so too much wriggling about on your part and it’ll snap, which would be bad news for you seeing as it’s the only thing keeping you from sinking. Additionally, the material that your straitjacket is manufactured from has a tremendous capacity to soak up water. In other words, the longer you hang there, the heavier you’re going to get. It looks like how much time you’ve got left to live depends entirely on how long you can hold your breath. Goodbye, Mr Quaint. I hope you die with dignity.’

     Quentin Claremont pulled a lever attached to the wooden post and the chain began to move, slowly dipping Cornelius Quaint deeper into the water…

Will Cornelius manage to survive?

Find out right here on Monday 27^th February 2012 !!!

To help Cornelius escape head on over to his Facebook page for a chance to win a free copy of the latest Cornelius Quaint adventure, The Lazarus Curse!

The rules of engagement...

Tomorrow will see the conclusion to this week's chapter of 'The Enthusiastic Amateur'. This part of the exclusive new story will finish on a cliffhanger and Quaint's life will hang in the balance. And only YOU can help to save him.


All you need to do after reading the story here is visit Quaint's Facebook page, where you will see a question, as well as a code that needs to be deciphered in order to answer it.


Once you have used the Cornelius Cipher to decode the message, simply Follow @CorneliusQuaint on Twitter and send him a Tweet or Direct Message including the hashtag #LazarusCurse and your answer.

This week's prize will be a free ebook edition

of the latest Cornelius Quaint adventure

'The Lazarus Curse'.

The Enthusiastic Amateur: Chapter One

Part One.

Whenever he stepped off-stage after a performance, conjuror and circus proprietor Cornelius Quaint always felt a tinge of pride. It wasn’t just the audience’s astonished faces or their gasps of wonder - it was the knowledge that he’d managed to fool every single one of them. Whether it was dazzling card tricks or amazing feats of escapology, it was a pleasure that he readily indulged himself in. Yet on this particular night, and after this particular performance, there seemed to be at least one member of the audience that was neither dazzled nor amazed.  Quaint peered through the curtains at a thin man with a clipped moustache in the front row.

     ‘Someone should go out there and teach him some manners!’ he said to the circus strongman Prometheus; a titan in more than just a name, for he towered at least a foot and a half above Quaint’s six feet. ‘Someone like you, I mean.’

     The strongman’s brush-bristle beard twitched as he spoke: ‘Ah, Cornelius, don’t pay him any mind. What does he know, eh? He’s just one bloke out of hundreds.’

     ‘Sometimes one is all it takes.’ Quaint tore off his top hat and dragged his fingers through his silver-white curls. ‘It’s not that I begrudge him his opinion, of course.’

     ‘Heaven forbid,’ said Prometheus.

     ‘But when his opinion happens to be blatantly wrong, I feel obliged to knock him about the head a few times! Did you hear what he was saying? That any fool with a mirror and a trap door could do what I did? That I’ve got so many cards up my sleeves it’s a wonder I can fit my arms in my coat? That even a blind man wouldn’t be fooled by my sleight of hand? You know me, Prom, I’m not an unreasonable man.’

     ‘Hardly ever in my experience,’ said Prometheus, which was plentiful.

     ‘When a paying customer has a legitimate cause for complaint, I’m perfectly willing to accommodate, but when a buffoon like that heckles throughout my entire act, I don’t care what his complaint is, there’s no excuse for being rude!’

     ‘And it’d make you feel better if I roughed him up a little, would it?’

     ‘Much!’ said Quaint, halting the strongman’s stride. ‘But we won’t stoop to violence, my capacious friend – even though you do it so well. No, I’ve got a better idea. Tell the clowns to make a bee-line for him. I want him soaked to the bone and thoroughly miserable…and then we’ll see how chatty he is!’

*

     Always willing to do their employer’s bidding (especially when it involved the humiliation of an obnoxious snot) the two circus clowns targeted the thin man with the clipped moustache – who no doubt not only reconsidered his earlier criticisms after he’d been pelted with eggs and covered in sawdust, but also his decision to sit in the front row. Despite this, that night Cornelius Quaint slept with an unburdened conscience, and was mildly surprised to find a note slid under the door to his caravan the following morning.

      “Dear Mister Quaint,

Upon hearing that you claimed to be one of the finest conjurors in all of Europe, my curiosity led me to attend your performance this evening. I happen to be in the trade myself and professionally speaking, I saw nothing in your act above the level of an enthusiastic amateur. If you would like an opportunity to see if you are capable of living up to your boasts, meet me at St Mercer’s docks along the Thames at noon.

     Quentin Claremont (conjuror par excellence).”

     Quaint’s first thought was to discard the letter and think no more about it. If this Claremont fellow believed for one moment that he was going to accept the invitation, he was a misguided fool. But Quaint’s second thought was that his stage-craft had been called into question, and for that nothing would give him more pleasure than wiping the smug grin off Quentin Claremont’s face.

     At ten minutes to midday, Quaint arrived at St Mercer’s docks. Making his way to a warehouse lit with a roaring brazier outside, he spotted a large painted sign. The warehouse was currently available for lease. With his curiosity duly piqued, he pulled open the warehouse doors and stepped inside.

     Of course, had he not thought harder about the letter’s content, and had he not allowed his ire to be stoked so easily, and had he not let his pride get the better of him, perhaps he might have avoided the striking blow to the back of his skull…

What fate awaits Cornelius when he wakes up?

Will he wake up at all?

Find out here on Wednesday 22^nd February 2012 !!!

In the meantime, please follow Cornelius on Twitter @CorneliusQuaint and check out Quaint's Facebook page for more information.

The Enthusiastic Amateur...

From The Cornelius Quaint Chronicles comes 'The Enthusiastic Amateur', an untold tale from the conjuror's past - but this story is a little different because this time he can't just rely on his wits, skills and belligerent character to save him - this time he needs YOU!

Join Quaint in his duel against Quentin Claremont, a rival magician that aims to eliminate all the competition...the competition in this case being Quaint himself. 

Every Monday of each week the story will unfold exclusively right here on this blog, continuing every Wednesday when the tale will end on a cliffhanger and a link to Quaint's Facebook page, where a cunning teaser will be revealed. You will need to be as sharp as Quaint himself in order to decipher the answer to the question and then Tweet the answer back to Cornelius via @CorneliusQuaint.

For more information on how to read and play along, visit the Cornelius Quaint Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Cornelius-Quaint/155138904602523 from Monday 20th February.

The master conjuror will be waiting for you.