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He was frustrated by his aches and pains and had to remind himself that only thirty-six hours or so had passed since he’d been thrown through a plate glass window. Sadhvi’s lotions did nothing to soothe his impatience. Tiredness, weakness—there was no place for them in Burton’s philosophy.
With his lip curled in self-disdain, he tugged open a bedside drawer and pulled from it a bottle of Saltzma
“Blast you, Algy,” he muttered. “I’ll not spend the day hobbling about like a confounded invalid.”
He twisted out the cork and drank.
“And to hell with all objections!”
He sat on the bed, leaned forward with his head hanging, and waited for the tincture to enter his circulation.
It hit him like an exploding sun.
He gave a quavering cry and toppled to the floor, holding himself up with his hands and knees.
He felt a cold gun barrel press into the back of his neck.
He heard Isabel Arundell’s voice.
“If you move, I swear to God I’ll put a bullet through your brain.”
Dick Burton, spy, traitor to his native country, and Otto von Bismarck’s strongest piece in the deadly chess game currently being played across Europe, was defeated.
He’d come so close. He’d discovered the existence of Spring Heeled Jack. He’d learned the truth about the apparition’s identity and origin. He’d found where the British government’s secretive Society of Science was keeping the time suit. And he’d almost snatched it from them.
The accursed king’s agent! She’d been on his heels ever since he’d killed Krishnamurthy and Bhatti, and now, just as his victory seemed assured, she’d caught up with him.
Still dazed from the knock to his head, on his hands and knees, with pain searing through his skull, he tried desperately to gather his thoughts.
“Stay down,” she advised. “Try anything and I’ll not hesitate.”
“Miss Arundell,” he rasped. “Your sense of timing is immaculate—and exasperating.”
He tried to push himself up, but her weapon jabbed into his neck again.
“Last chance. Believe me, I’m itching to pull this trigger.”
Perhaps his attempt to move so soon after being clouted was a mistake anyway; it sent his senses spi
As if to confirm it, he heard Babbage’s characteristic rasp. “Have you quite finished, Madam? Am I to suffer these interruptions every time I’m on the verge of an important experiment?”
“Had I not interrupted, Charles,” Isabel responded, “you’d have nothing to experiment with. He was about to steal the time suit.”
Isabel. Alive. She’s alive.
“Please,” Burton croaked. “Let me stand. Let me look at you.”
“Keep him in your sights, Algernon,” she said.
“Rightie ho.”
Swinburne. So he was here, too.
Burton put a hand to his face. It was clean-shaven.
He had thoughts overlaying thoughts, memories upon memories.
One stratum clarified, the rest blurred.
He recognised himself.
Another side step.
“All right,” Isabel said. “Get to your feet. Slowly. Any sudden movement and I’ll shoot you dead.”
Another voice, male: “Be careful. I know to my cost how dangerous the swine can be.”
Burton raised his head and saw John Ha
“Run to earth, at last,” Speke said. “You’ll not escape this time, Dick. It’s the noose for you.”
Burton didn’t respond. Very gradually, he turned. He saw Babbage, standing by a workbench with the damaged suit on it. He saw a hulking contraption of jointed legs and tool-bearing limbs, which he guessed was Isambard Kingdom Brunel. He saw Algernon Swinburne, short-haired, scar-faced, and despite his diminutive and somewhat effeminate form, looking surprisingly brutal. And he saw Isabel Arundell.
She was slender, elegant, beautiful, and aiming her pistol straight between his eyes.
“Isabel,” he whispered, hardly able to resist rushing forward to take her into his arms.
“Shut up,” she snapped. “Charles, please proceed. We’ll allow our uninvited guest to witness the activation of the suit. I want him to go to the gallows knowing we have it, knowing it works, and knowing we’ll use it to defeat his master’s filthy empire.” She flicked the end of the gun slightly and said to Burton, “Watch. This marks the end of all Bismarck’s schemes.”
Burton looked back at Babbage. The elderly scientist clapped his hands together. “Have you all quite finished? Interruption after interruption! Unacceptable! This is a place for science and the advancement of understanding, not for your ridiculous games of politics and one-upmanship. Now, be quiet and observe.” He tapped the suit’s helmet. “This, as I have already told you, has the ability to repair itself but currently lacks sufficient energy to do so. By reestablishing its co
He reached down and traced a shape on the side of the generator. It glowed, crackled and let forth a shower of sparks.
“I’d move back if I was you,” Burton advised.
A bubble swelled out of the suit. Babbage and Speke, standing closest to it, retreated hastily.
“And,” Burton said, “hey presto.”
The time suit vanished, taking half the bench and a chunk of Isambard Kingdom Brunel with it.
“How did you do that?” Isabel demanded. “Bring it back at once!”
Burton turned to face her. “Isabel, know this. I loved you from the very first moment I saw you.”
She snarled at him. “You traitorous hound.”
He saw her finger tighten on the trigger.
There was a loud report.
He felt himself explode out of his body.
Dying was like blinking.
He was sucked back into it.
When he opened his eyes, Burton was facing Babbage again, and the bench and the suit were back.
Isambard Kingdom Brunel, in human form except for an accordion-like apparatus creaking in and out on his chest, took a cigar from his mouth and said, in a gravelly voice, “Will it work, Charles?”
“Of course it will.”
Brunel looked to Burton’s right. “Should we do it, sir?”
“Yes.”
Burton turned his head to see the man who’d spoken. It was Lord Elgin’s former secretary, Laurence Oliphant. His skin and hair were alabaster white. His features were distorted, resembling those of a panther.
Babbage a
Burton waited silently while Babbage and Oliphant tied a tourniquet around Brunel’s right arm, the engineer’s hand having been taken by the bursting bubble.
Isabel is alive in at least one branch of history. My enemy, but alive. By God! To see her! To see her!
Grief tightened his chest. He closed his eyes, swayed, and thought he might fall.
Babbage said, “Mr. Lister, note that the experiment commences at nine o’clock, fifteenth of February, 1860.”