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Through it, Burton strode, his demonic features attracting disapproving and rather fearful glances from the more well-heeled passersby. To them, his gentleman’s clothes were an incongruous affectation, as if a tiger had adorned itself with lace. He glowered back, silently railing against the judgements of so-called civilised society.
His mania for exploration had been steadily increasing these past few days. Restlessness boiled within. London was a confinement, its social rituals a bore. He yearned for the fresh stimuli of exotic lands.
However, he also sensed that events were accumulating around him and fast reaching a tipping point. This u
“Come on,” he whispered. “Show yourself.”
Unfamiliar horizons or an implacable foe, either would suffice to fill the absence that gnawed at his heart, anything to distract him from the fact of Isabel’s death.
He tipped his hat to Mr. Grub at the corner of Montagu Place and Gloucester Place, and a few paces later arrived home. Bram Stoker greeted him in the hallway. Burton said to him, “I have a job for you, young ’un.”
As member of the Whispering Web—a remarkable communications system comprised of the empire’s millions of orphans, ragamuffins and street Arabs—Stoker was able to send a message that, by word of mouth, would reach its destination with greater rapidity than the post office could offer. He also had access to a repository of practical knowledge that, in its field, was the equivalent to anything held in the British Library or British Museum.
“Sir?”
Burton divested himself of hat and coat.
“I need the location of a company called Locks Limited.”
“Shouldn’t take long,” the youngster said. “I’ll get the boys onto it at once.”
“Good lad.”
While Stoker slipped into his outdoor clothing, Burton went up to his study, lit its lamps, threw himself into his chair in front of the fireplace, rested his feet on the fender, lit a cheroot, and smoked.
He thought about Saltzma
He sighed and massaged his forehead with his fingertips.
Idiot, Burton. Idiot.
He considered the enhanced awareness the tincture instilled—the almost overwhelming cognisance that countless possible consequences extended outward from every circumstance—and realised the liquid had endowed him with this enriched perception even before he’d been made the king’s agent, before he’d learned of the i
The correlation between the medicine’s effects and his current knowledge couldn’t be ignored.
“Mr. Shudders,” he muttered. “Are you really a straightforward pharmacist, or maybe something more?”
An hour and a half later, there came a light tap at the door and, in response to Burton’s hail, Stoker entered. Fidget padded in beside him, crossed the floor, collapsed onto the hearthrug, and started snoring.
“Hallo, young ’un,” Burton said. “Did you find any answers?”
“To be sure, sir. There’s four companies what is called Locks Limited, an’ it ain’t no surprise that two of ’ em make locks. Of t’other two, one supplies materials to the building trade, an’ one sells pianos.”
“None providing pharmaceuticals as a sideline, then?”
“It’s unlikely, so it is.”
“Thank you, lad.”
Stoker gave a nod and left the room.
Burton spent the next hour meditating. He allowed his thoughts to roam freely, dwelling for a time on this, for a while on that, following paths that trailed into nowhere, and others that led to the peripheries of an idea until, from the meanderings, the vaguest glimmer of a form emerged; the ghost of an incomplete conception.
Multiple Babbages. Multiple time suits. A single moment. A synchronous act.
On this he dwelled, neither judging nor accepting, but simply observing as one notion clicked into place beside another.
The grandfather clock in the hallway below, as if encouraging his nascent revelation, chimed nine.
A detonation rattled the windows.
Startled, Burton jumped to his feet.
There came a loud crash from downstairs.
In the street, people yelled and screamed.
“What now?” he muttered.
He heard Mrs. Angell cry out in alarm. Fidget woke up, dived beneath a table, and started to bark.
A voice roared, “Burton!”
Heavy footsteps thudded up the stairs, and the study door flew open, slamming against the bookshelf behind it, sending books spilling to the floor.
Spring Heeled Jack ducked through the opening and stalked in.
“Burton! Have I found you? Here? In this side note?”
Burton rapidly backed away until his heels bumped against the hearth. He thought fast and said, “Side note? Perhaps in a biography? A book written about me after my death? One that exists in the future? Is that how you know the places I frequent?”
He observed the intruder’s smooth chest. No scratch. A different mechanism. Not the one he’d fought in Leicester Square.
“Why am I here?” the creature demanded. It shoved a desk aside and kicked a chair out of its way. “What have you done?”
“I don’t—”
Before Burton could finish, Jack pounced forward, seized him by the lapels, and shook him until his teeth rattled. “Why are you significant?”
The king’s agent felt his fingertips brush against a poker. He pulled it from its stand, swept it up, and whipped it against the side of his assailant’s head.
“Get the hell off me!”
Spring Heeled Jack dropped him and staggered to the side, putting a hand to its dented cranium. “Where is the prime minister? What am I doing here? I’m lost! I’m lost!”
“Just stop!” Burton commanded. “Calm down. We can talk.”
The figure crouched, and Burton was convinced that, had there been a face, it would be snarling.
“It’s your fault!” Jack said.
Burton brandished the poker like a sword. “Stay back, I say! What is my fault? From where—and when—have you come?”
Disregarding the questions, the intruder took one slow step closer, its head waving from side to side like a cobra’s. A shudder ran through it. “Prime Minister. Guide me. Please!”
“Which prime minister?” Burton asked. “Whom do you serve?”
Raising its blank face to the ceiling, Jack hollered, “I serve Queen Victoria!”
It lunged forward, knocked the poker from Burton’s hand, and slapped the side of his head with such force that the king’s agent was sent spi
Please. Not again.
He glimpsed Mrs. Angell standing in the doorway with Bram Stoker. They both had their hands clenched over their mouths. He cried out, “Stay back! Fetch the pol—”
He was grabbed by the neck, hauled upright, and struck again, viciously. His head jerked sideways, and blood sprayed from his mouth.
“Tell me! Tell me!” Jack screamed. “Why do I fear you?”
Burton rasped, “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
He saw his housekeeper crossing the room behind his attacker, opened his mouth to warn her away, but hadn’t a chance to utter a sound before a fist impacted against his eye. He clutched at Spring Heeled Jack’s arms. His muscles, already weakened, were no match for the creature. It shoved him hard against the wall.
The wind knocked out of him, Burton slid to his knees and put a hand down to steady himself. A glutinous string of blood oozed from his mouth and nose. He looked up. “You insane bastard.”