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Jack loomed over him. “I want to go home.”
There came a loud thunk. The white head fell from the shoulders and bounced onto the floor. The figure folded down on top of Burton. Blue sparks crackled from its severed neck. They sputtered and died.
He struggled from beneath it.
Mrs. Angell, with her hands clutched around the hilt of a scimitar, said, “It’s kneading the bread and tenderising the meat what does it.”
“Does what?” Burton croaked, as he struggled to his feet.
“Puts the strength in me arms, sir. Did I do the right thing? Panicked, I did. Grabbed this here sword off your wall and afore I knew what I was intending I’d chopped the head off the clockwork man. A new type, is it? I hope they haven’t built many of ’em, not if they loses control of ’emselves like what this ’un did!”
“You were splendid, Mother Angell.” Burton took her by the elbow as the weapon dropped from her hand, and she suddenly swayed. “Sit down, dear.”
“My heart’s all a flutter,” she said tremulously. “It’s lucky you keep your blades so sharp. Goodness gracious, but look at your poor face. Thumped again! You don’t ’alf make an ’abit of it.”
The king’s agent pulled a handkerchief from his pocket and applied it to his mouth. His bottom lip was split, and the cut on his chin had reopened.
“Is our front door broken?” His voice sounded unsteady.
“The main lock, but it weren’t bolted.”
“Stay here. I’ll go and make us a little more secure.” He nudged his foot into the prone form of Spring Heeled Jack—it was completely lifeless—then walked to the door, stopped, and looked back. “That was a very brave thing you did.”
“Oof!” she responded. “Oof!”
He lurched down the stairs, his legs almost giving way, went to the front door, and examined its splintered frame. The lock had been knocked out of the wood, but the bolts at the top and bottom of the portal were intact.
Bram Stoker appeared on the doorstep with two constables in tow.
“I fetched the coppers!” the lad exclaimed. “Crikey! What was it?”
Both policemen were familiar to Burton, and they, in turn, knew he was the king’s agent. He greeted them. “Kapoor. Tamworth. I’ve just been assaulted. Can’t go into details. I need you to stand sentry duty until further notice.”
His authority was absolute. They asked no questions, but saluted and immediately positioned themselves at either side of his doorstep.
“Bram, will you get messages to Mr. Krishnamurthy and Mr. Bhatti. They’re probably at Battersea Power Station. I need them to come here immediately with a wagon big enough to cart off our uninvited guest.”
The boy raced away. Burton addressed P. C. Tamworth. “I’m leaving the door ajar. Let my guests through when they arrive, please.”
Hearing the stairs creak, he turned and saw Mrs. Angell descending with Fidget behind her.
“He ain’t much of a guard dog, is he?” she said.
“You should rest.”
“Oh, don’t fuss. I’m all right. I’m a policeman’s widow, ain’t I? Seen some things in my time, I have, though stilted men without faces takes the biscuit. Fair chills the blood. I’ll fetch a raw steak for that eye an’ me broom for your study.”
“I’ll clean the mess.”
Mrs. Angell grumbled, “Well, see that you do. I don’t care ’ow much time you’ve spent among them African head-hunters, I’ll not ’ave stray noggins layin’ around the house.” She headed toward her basement domain, the dog following.
Burton went up to his bedroom, sponged his wounds, then returned to his study and closed the door. After placing the spilled books back onto the shelves, he crossed to Spring Heeled Jack and retrieved the creature’s decapitated head from beneath a chair. He carried it to one of his desks, sat, and started to inspect it. What he saw u
“Bismillah!” Burton muttered. “What are you? Man or machine?”
He had to wait until midnight for Krishnamurthy and Bhatti, and when they arrived, Burton was surprised to hear a third person piling up the stairs with them. They hurtled into the room without ceremony, and the addition proved to be Detective Inspector Trounce.
“Mayhem!” the Scotland Yard man thundered. “Bloody mayhem! Spring Heeled Jacks left, right and centre! By Jove, what the blazes has happened here?”
Burton removed the raw steak he’d been holding to his swollen eye and held up the severed head. “This did.”
“You got one!”
“More the case that it got me.”
The two Indians moved over to the stilted body and squatted down beside it. They each gave a cry of surprise at the exposed fleshy interior of its neck.
“How many, Trounce?” Burton asked.
“Hard to say. Six that I’m sure of, counting this one. Leicester Square again. The Royal Geographical Society again. Old Ford village. Marvel’s Wood. Battersea Fields.” He pointed a thick forefinger at Burton. “You. Without a doubt, they’re hunting you. Why?”
“I don’t think they themselves could answer that,” Burton said. “As with the first encounter, this one found me but didn’t know what to do about it.”
Bhatti looked up. “The minister has received further reports about yesterday’s manifestations, Sir Richard. Apparently, our friend here—” he patted the decapitated corpse, “or his brethren—also visited Lucca and Naples in Italy, and Boulogne in France.”
“All places I’ve lived,” Burton said. Inwardly, he flinched. It wasn’t true that he’d lived in Boulogne, but he didn’t want to explain that it was significant for being the place where he’d first met Isabel.
“It’s obvious that a net is being cast with you as its prey,” Bhatti went on, “but what is the point, when you’ve been twice caught with no consequence aside from a severe beating?”
“Consequence enough,” Burton protested. Gingerly, he felt his eye. It had closed almost to a slit.
“And in the meantime people are being frightened witless,” Trounce said. “I’ll not have it! It has to stop!” He snatched his bowler hat from his head, dropped it, and kicked it at the fireplace. It narrowly missed the blaze, bounced from the hearth, and rolled beneath a desk.
Burton said, “We’re doing what we can. Maneesh, what’s the news from Babbage?”
“Probably that he’ll be over the moon when we deliver this body to him. But, also, he needs you at the station straightaway. He thinks he may be able to locate our absconding time suit, but your assistance is required.”
“Mine? What can I do? I’m no scientist.”
“For sure, but you’re the same man as Abdu El Yezdi, which apparently is of considerable significance.” Krishnamurthy and Bhatti lifted the headless cadaver. “Let’s put this into the carriage and get going.”
“Lord help us, cover it with a sheet, at least,” Trounce snapped. “We don’t want to look like confounded body snatchers.”
This was done, and a few minutes later the group squeezed into a steam horse–drawn vehicle, which then went trundling southward, Battersea bound. Trounce had elected to join them and watched as the king’s agent dabbed an alcohol-soaked handkerchief against his latest facial injuries.
“I’m sure it looks worse than it is, Trounce.”
“It looks hideous. Even your bruises have bruises. One more punch-up, and you’ll be unrecognisable.”
“That might prove advantageous.”
There was insufficient light in the cabin to allow for further scrutiny of the Spring Heeled Jack, but Bhatti, who was holding the head upside-down on his lap, remarked, “The texture of its skin is exactly like the cloth of the time suit. More solid, but the same scaly feel.”
It was the last thing said for the duration of the journey. A pensive silence fell upon them.
They travelled down Gloucester Street, past Hyde Park and Green Park, along Buckingham Palace Road, over Chelsea Bridge, and arrived at Battersea Power Station.