Richard Newsome - The Curiosity Machine

PRAISE FOR

THE BILLIONAIRE SERIES

I loved this book. I really did. Ever since I got the first book in this series, I was on the lookout for more! The charactersGerald getting tangled up in relationshipsand the plots were just fantastic. Corinna, age 13, YAAR-A reviews

A great whodunit which is almost as engrossing for adults as it is for children. Books+Publishing

Filled with secret passageways and deadly booby traps, youll be on the edge of your seat! K-Zone

Weird dreams, kidnapping, attacks by bandits, hectic chases and eerie explorations in archaeological sitesslapstick humour, verbal wit and a pervasive spirit of youthful exuberance. Magpies

An irresistibly fun-tastic tale thats virtually guaranteed to keep youngsters reading, chuckling and desperately waiting for the next book in the series. Independent Weekly

From Roman emperors to murderous cults, Indian dynasties to secret fraternities, the adventures of Gerald and his friends will keep young readers turning the pages at lightning speed. Fiction Focus

It is obvious that Richard Newsome has enjoyed writing this series as much as young readers, and especially boys I suspect, will love reading them. Pass It On

A rollicking good yarn. Weekend Herald

THE BILLIONAIRE SERIES

Book I The Billionaires Curse

Book II The Emerald Casket

Book III The Mask of Destiny

Book IV The Crystal Code

Book V The House of Puzzles

Book VI The Curiosity Machine

Richard Newsome lives in Brisbane with his family. He won the inaugural Text Prize for Young Adult and Childrens Writing for The Billionaires Curse, the first book in The Billionaire Series.

richardnewsome.com

textpublishing.com.au

richardnewsome.com

The Text Publishing Company

Swann House

22 William Street

Melbourne Victoria 3000

Australia

Copyright Richard Newsome 2016

The moral right of Richard Newsome to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted.

All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright above, no part of this publication shall be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise), without the prior permission of both the copyright owner and the publisher of this book.

First published by The Text Publishing Company, 2016

Cover and page design by Text

Cover illustration by Sebastian Ciaffaglione

Typeset by J&M Typesetting

National Library of Australia Cataloguing-in-Publication entry

Author: Newsome, Richard. 1964 author.

Title: The curiosity machine / by Richard Newsome.

ISBN: 9781925355246 (paperback)

ISBN: 9781922253828 (ebook)

Series: Newsome, Richard 1964 Billionaire series; book 6.

Target Audience: For children.

Subjects: Adventure stories.

Dewey Number: A823.4

For the actual Gerald, Ruby

and Sam, with thanks.

Prologue

The jungle was alive. Screeches from unseen birds pierced the night air, air that was already thick with the thrum of blood-thirsty mosquitoes. Monkey howls and big cat growls punctured the nerves of the rotund, roly-poly man who was doing his best to hack through the undergrowth. He and his machete were having a hard time of it.

Alphonse Poulet loathed jungles. He was a man of city streets, of cafes and galleries. The rainforest heat had brought his skin out in the most horrendous rash. His armpits were swampy swimming holes, and the state of his underpants did not bear mentioning. But Alphonse had to go where the work took him. And as the Falconthe worlds premier art thiefhis work had brought him to the depths of Zimbabwe.

Could that nights target even qualify as art? Alphonse sniffed at the indignity. But no matter. The bills must be paid. When Sir Mason Green called, Alphonse Poulet answered.

Africa.

The Dark Continent.

It was certainly dark enough around the remote homestead that Alphonse was hacking his way towardshe could barely see a metre in front of his face. Alphonse took another swing with his huge bush knife and failed to make any impression on a net of vines. The blow sent a judder along his arm. He leaned against a tree trunk and wiped a handkerchief across his face. Then he took a water bottle from his belt and drank deep.

The Falcon was not impressed. But Sir Mason Green had promised an extraordinary sum for the target of the nights labours, and if there was one thing that registered with Alphonse it was money. He stowed his handkerchief in his pocket and wrenched the knife free from where it had become lodged in the foliage. The Falcon would not be beaten, not by man and not by a very large vegetable.

With considerable pain, and after losing several litres of perspiration, he broke through the last of the jungle and stumbled, breathless, into a large clearing. On the other side of a manicured lawn sat a low-set homestead, dark and unwelcoming in the silvery moonlight. The hum of an air-conditioning plant harmonised with the jungle chatter that surrounded him. Alphonse scuttled across the grassy expanse, his moon shadow bobbling before him. He crouched under a broad veranda and rested against the cool of a concrete-rendered wall. With the faintest of tickles, a fat scorpion emerged from the collar of his shirt and crawled onto the plateau of his shoulder.

Eep! Alphonse squeaked. He flicked the creature onto the ground and stamped his boots as if trying to put out a grass fire, flailing his hands about his head and neck to make sure there were no other beasties on board. Finally satisfied that he was not about to be stung, bitten, poisoned or eaten, Alphonse pulled a folded square of paper from his shirt pocket and flattened it on his knee. From inside the false belly strapped to his front he retrieved a torch and shone a light onto a rough floor plan of the homestead. Sir Mason Green had provided him with only the vaguest of details, but the large red X drawn in one of the rooms was plain to see.

Alphonse glanced both ways along the length of the building. All was quiet. The homestead was usually reached only by helicopter, and the owners were supposed to be on holidays in South America. Sir Mason had assured Alphonse that they relied on the kilometres of surrounding jungle as their primary security system. Alphonse would have the place to himself.

He fished inside his belly pouch and produced a contraption with a large suction cup on one end and a metal arm that protruded from the centre. He rolled onto his knees and pressed the cup onto the pane of a window by his head. He bent the metal arm across until the point touched the glass, then rotated it in a slow circle. A diamond-head cutting tool sliced a hole sixty-centimetres across with an ear-wincing SCRRRRREEEEEEEE. The glass section popped through. Alphonse smiled. Even deep in the Zimbabwean jungle on a steamy night, the Falcon could still soar high.

Then the circle of glass popped from the suction cup and shattered into a thousand pieces on the floor inside.

Eep! Alphonse squeezed his eyes shut, bracing for an alarm to pierce the still night.

Nothing.

Just the low hum of the air conditioning, and the sound from a nearby tree of something large devouring something small.

Alphonse peered through the hole in the window. Apart from the floor being covered with shattered glass, everything appeared as he had expected. It was a good-sized lounge room, furnished in colonial chic: elephant tusks crossed above the fireplace, a lumpy cheetah-skin rug in front of the hearth. And a motion detector in one corner of the ceiling.