Текст книги "The curious case of the Clockwork Man"

Автор книги: Mark Hodder

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“My hat! A present from the king! How splendid!”

“Don't get too excited. We're going to have to be cautious about using the flying machines during this Tichborne business. Our opponent has already demonstrated an uncanny ability to deprive springs of their elasticity, thus disabling clocks, wind-up lanterns, and the hammer mechanisms of gun triggers. Since rotorchair engines employ spring pistons, I think we'll stick with swans for the time being.”

“Blast! I have a new toy and I can't play with it!”

“We may have to drop our ideas about John Speke, too. Whatever is going on, it seems less and less likely to me that he's behind it.”

“Why so?”

“Because what began as the theft of diamonds has broadened into some sort of political agitation. That's not John's style at all. He's far too selfish a man to care about such matters.”

“Then who? Edward Kenealy?”

Herbert Spencer interrupted: “No, lad. Back at the house, after you left, Kenealy was a-holdin’ seances to consult with Lady Mabella. If you ask me, the ghost is the one pullin’ the strings.”

Burton made a sound of agreement, but then the words the puppeteer is herself a puppet flashed through his mind.

“The odd thing is,” he said, “when Sir Alfred was being dragged through the house to his death, the apparition warned me not to interfere. I heard her voice clearly in my mind and it had a distinct accent. Russian, I'm positive.”

“Why is that odd?” asked Swinburne. “Aside from the obvious.”

“Because Lady Mabella Tichborne was from Hampshire.”

“Hamp-what? She was English?”

“Thoroughly. So whatever's been haunting Tichborne House, it is not the ghost of the woman who crawled around the wheat fields. In fact, I doubt that it's really a ghost at all.”

“It looked like one to me.”

“Then perhaps you can explain why it was rapping its knuckles on walls rather than floating straight through them?”

“You have an explanation?”

“I have never given credence to ghosts, but I've read much about what spiritualists term the projection of the ethereal or astral double. Occultists state that it is perfectly possible to pass through solid objects while in astral form, but it should not be done too often, as it can disrupt the connection between the ethereal and the physical bodies. My supposition is that we witnessed an individual in such a form, and they solidified their knuckles for the purpose of searching the house rather than risk being forever separated from their corporeal body.”

Swinburne jerked his limbs spasmodically-a sign of his growing excitement.

“So we're dealing with a spiritualist, a table-tapper?”

“That's my current theory, and one who appears to be using the Cambodian fragments and the South American Eye to somehow transmit and amplify mediumistic projections. I'm almost certain that support for the Claimant-who anyone in their right mind can see is a phony-is, through this method, being artificially generated to stir up the masses. What puzzles me is why the emanations influence some and not others. You are apparently rather sensitive to them, though more resistant when you're drunk. Myself, Trounce, and Honesty feel them only faintly, while Herbert here is not touched at all.”

“From what I can see, the working classes are the most susceptible,” put in Swinburne. “Though I'd hardly place myself in that category. Whereas Herbert-”

“-is a bloomin’ philosopher,” the vagrant interjected. He tore his eyes away from the mechanical man and peered at the poet from beneath his bushy grey eyebrows, one of which was raised speculatively.

“Quite so. Quite so,” Swinburne conceded. “Forgive me for the observation, though, my dear chap, but you seem to be a singularly unsuccessful one. What exactly is your philosophy? Perhaps the nature of your thoughts bears some relation to your apparent immunity.”

“That's an interesting hypothesis,” Burton said. He faced his two guests. “Talk to us, Herbert.”

“Hmmph!” Spencer grunted. “You'll have to give me a minute or two to prepare meself. It don't come easy to me, I'm afraid.”

“Go ahead. Take whatever time you need.”

The king's agent and his assistant looked on in interest as the vagrant set his glass aside, propped his elbows on the arms of his chair, steepled his fingers in front of his face, closed his eyes, and laid his head back. He relaxed, and a remarkable tranquillity seemed to wash over him.

Swinburne looked at Burton, who whispered almost soundlessly: “Self-mesmerism!”

The clock on the mantelpiece clicked softly.

Distant shouts and crashes sounded from outside.

Two minutes passed.

Herbert Spencer sniffed, cleared his throat, and began to talk. Astonishingly, he was suddenly possessed of a finely spoken, urbane, and educated voice.

“Well, gentlemen,” he said, without shifting position or opening his eyes, “let's see if I can offer you a little food for thought. To illustrate the core of my philosophy, I would ask you to imagine that you are blindfolded and don't know where you are. You stretch out your hands and walk slowly ahead until you encounter a wall. It may be a single wall blocking your way or it could be the side of a room. You don't know. Your only certainty is that the wall is there. So what do you do? I haven't a notion. What I do know is this: whatever your next action, it will be done in relation to the fact that you ran into that wall. Maybe you'll climb over it. Maybe you'll try to knock it down. Maybe you'll build a house adjacent to it.”

Burton and Swinburne glanced at each other, amazed at their friend's eloquence and perfect intonation; wondering where his words were leading.

“The question now is this: if you weren't the only blindfolded person to have bumped into the wall-let's say, for argument's sake, that twenty others have done so, too-which of you is best able to make the most of your situation? I'm not referring to the strongest or most intelligent or most resourceful; what I mean to ask is, which of you happens to be in possession of the abilities and attitude that can best adapt to the circumstance of encountering a wall? Am I making sense?”

“Manifestly,” Swinburne replied. “When we first met, you used the phrase ‘survival of the fittest.’ You're referring to that, yes?”

Spencer opened his eyes, which were oddly glazed, and jabbed a finger at the poet.

“Exactly! However, don't mistake the ‘fittest’ for the healthiest or the cleverest or any other specific trait. I use it in the same sense that a square peg ‘fits’ into a square hole. The fittest man is the one most constitutionally suited to the conditions in which he finds himself. It's a two-way relationship: the particular nature of the individual confronting the particular nature of reality. Or, I should say, what appears to be reality.”

“What appears to be?” Burton asked.

“That's right, because it isn't possible to know if the reality you perceive is all there is. You can only deal with what you are cognizant of.”

Burton frowned and nodded. “Knowledge is phenomenal? It pertains only to appearance-or in the case of your blindfolded individual, to the other material senses?”

Spencer resumed his closed-eyed, steeple-fingered position.

“Something like that, yes, though I don't mean to suggest that it's necessarily deceptive. We might only be aware of a small portion of reality, but it is reality nevertheless, so however we apprehend it, that apprehension has validity.

“Existence, then, is, I posit, a continuous adjustment of internal relations to external relations. Which brings us to the crux of the matter, for if our existence depended not upon such adjustments but rather upon quantifiable attributes such as strength, health, and endurance-and if reality were known in its entirety and measured, mapped, and gauged-then it would be easy to determine one individual's chances of survival against another's. The Eugenicists propose the improvement of the human race on just such a basis. They are in error. What they overlook is that, because one person's reality isn't necessarily the same as another's, so the traits required to best prosper differ from person to person.”

Swinburne bounced in his chair excitedly. “I see! I see! A man who perceives a barrier needs the dexterity to climb over it, while the man who sees a foundation would benefit from the talent to design and erect a structure upon it.”

The philosopher nodded without reopening his eyes.

“Just so. These differing notions of life and how to best deal with it have caused the human race to tend toward greater heterogeneity. Individuals are becoming more specialised and differentiated as they each adapt to their own perception. To compensate for this diversification, we, as a species, have developed the ability to integrate almost everyone by creating an interdependent society.

“If we allow the Eugenicists to alter the race according to their infinitesimally narrow criteria, I think it almost certain that this interdependence will collapse and extinction will follow.”

With eyes fixed on the vagrant philosopher, Burton moved to his saddleback armchair and sat down. “While I find myself in agreement with your notion of interdependent diversity,” he said, thoughtfully, “do you not think that it is overwhelmed by a rather more dominant division? I speak of that which we've seen demonstrated today-to wit, the segregation of society into the working and the educated classes.”

“Ah, Captain Burton, you have hit the nail on the head. The Eugenicists may be wrong in their approach, but they are correct in their assessment that our society, in its present divided form, must either change or die. It is what prompted me to bring Darwin's theory into the picture.”

“How so, Herbert?”

“You see, when the mechanism of natural selection is transposed from the biological to the social arena, we can immediately see that our interdependence has become so extreme that evolution cannot possibly occur. Individuals have become too specialised. Consider our prehistoric ancestor. He knew how to create a fire, make a weapon, hunt an animal, fashion clothes and a shelter from its skin, cook it and eat the flesh, carve tools from its bones, and so much more. What man of the nineteenth century can do all those things? None! Instead we have engineers and weapon-smiths and tailors and cooks and craftsmen and builders-each excellent in his own field, each entirely helpless in the others!”

Spencer opened his eyes again and turned them toward Admiral Lord Nelson, who was standing in his usual position by the bureau.

“The idea that the Empire is progressive is an insidious myth. A myth! Look at that brass man! It is our tools that are evolving, not us! If anything, we are going in the opposite direction. While an increasingly exclusive elite are gathering information about ways in which the world might function, the ever-expanding majority are becoming ever more proficient in a single field of endeavour while comprehending less and less about anything else.”

Swinburne paraphrased something Burton had said on the evening of the Brundleweed robbery: “The acquisition of knowledge has become too intimidating a prospect for them, so they shun it in favour of faith.”

“Sadly so,” said Spencer. “There is a principle which is a bar against all information, which is proof against all arguments, and which cannot fail to keep a man in everlasting ignorance-that principle is contempt prior to investigation; contempt carved from the immovable rock of faith.

“Thus it is, gentlemen, that the masses are not only kept from the knowledge that would aid their ability to adapt and evolve, but they also actively reject it. Minds have become trammelled by ingrained social conditions. Working-class parents instill in their children the concept that reality offers nothing but hardship, that poverty always beckons, and that small rewards can be achieved only through strife and labour. Why should they teach differently when, under those same conditions, they themselves have survived? The child takes this as the unquestionable truth of the world. Opportunities are not recognised. The desire for change remains within the realm of dreams. Adaptability is devalued. Evolution is halted.”

Spencer's face suddenly dropped into an expression of abject misery.

“I'm runnin’ out o’ steam,” he said. “Me bloomin’ brain can't cope with it!”

His arms suddenly dropped and dangled over the sides of his chair, his head nodded forward, and he emitted a loud snore.

“Good lord!” Swinburne exclaimed.

“Asleep,” Burton noted. “What an extraordinary man!”

“I say, Richard, what do you make of all that?”

Burton reached for his cigar case. “I think this warrants a two-Manila muse, Algy. Sit quietly, would you, while I give it a ponder.”

Sitting quietly didn't come naturally to the diminutive poet but he gritted his teeth and managed to remain silent for ten minutes while Spencer snored and Burton smoked.

“Fascinating!” Burton said, speaking at last.

Herbert Spencer snorted and looked up. “Hallo, Boss! Did I take forty winks?”

“You did, Herbert. Does that always happen after you philosophise?”

“Yus. It exhausts me bloomin’ brain. How did I do? I hope I didn't humiliate meself.”

“Humiliate?” Swinburne cried. “Good lord, no, Herbert! You did splendidly! You are absolutely remarkable!”

Burton blew out a plume of tobacco smoke and said, “Forgive the question, Herbert-I mean no offence-but why on earth aren't you a sensation? With an intellect like yours, you should be writing books and touring universities!”

Spencer shrugged and tapped the side of his head. “When a man's knowledge ain't in order, the more of it he has, the greater is his confusion.” He looked at Admiral Lord Nelson and sighed. “I should be more like him! There's one what's got an ordered mind!”

“But no knowledge, Herbert,” Burton said. “No knowledge at all. So do you mean to say that your thinking processes are more usually in disarray?”

“Yus, just that. When I sits down an’ talks, it's all fine, but for most o’ the time, me brainbox is a right old jumble.”

“Hmm. I wonder if that has some bearing on your immunity to the Tichborne influence?”

“Richard, that doesn't make sense,” Swinburne objected. “In the main, it's the working classes who've come out in support of the Claimant, which suggests they're most affected by whatever this emanation is. If a disordered mind is immune, then the working classes have ordered minds and most of London's gentry, including yourself, don't!”

“No, Algy, that's not it at all. Let me pose a question: what would you be if you weren't a poet?”

“Dead.”

“Seriously.”

“I am serious. There's nothing else I could be. I was born a poet. I think like a poet. I act like a poet. I look like a poet. I'm a poet.”

“Accepted. By contrast, Herbert here, when we first met him, made it quite clear that he wasn't at all sure that he was cut out to be a philosopher.”

“It's no way to earn a livin’, that's for certain,” Spencer muttered.

“As for me,” Burton continued, “I've never possessed a clear idea of my function in society. I've been a soldier, a spy, a geographer, an interpreter, an explorer, an author, a surveyor, and now the king's agent, whatever the blazes that is. As for this country's gentry, I think you'll find that they mostly have a sense that life is filled with options; that, in terms of what they actually do with their time, there are few limitations.”

“Herbert used the word ‘trammelled.’ Are you suggesting that the trammelled mind is the susceptible mind?”

“Precisely.”

“Funny. I've never considered myself trammelled. Quite the opposite, in fact!”

“It's not that your mind or imagination is in any respect confined, Algy. It's simply that you've never given consideration to the notion of doing anything else. You even offered your services as my assistant because you felt the danger involved would cure your ennui and inspire greater depth in your poetry.”

“Which it has. You suspect, then, that the black diamonds somehow break down the mental structures that keep a mind channelled, which is why the working classes are suddenly feeling hard done by-they're realising that they're being cheated out of alternatives?”

“Yes. Remember the line in the poem? Vexations in the poor enables. And what about Edwin Brundleweed's story of how, the afternoon before the robbery, he suddenly and inexplicably felt dissatisfied with his lot in life?”

“But what's it all about, Richard? What's the point?”

“Judging by today's events, I'd say the point is chaos; maybe even insurgency-an assault against the very fabric of our society. I would even go so far as to say that the British Empire is under attack.”

“My hat! By a foreign power?”

“Or a budding despot. You understand now why John Speke can probably be discounted?”

Swinburne nodded. “Unless it's the Prussians. You did say he'd gone to Prussia. On the other hand, our ghost is Russian.”

Burton asked Admiral Lord Nelson to top up their cups from the coffee pot and they sat in silence for a few moments.

“Are we on the brink of a revolution?” Swinburne whispered. “Think of it! A reign of terror could descend on us just as it did on France. We might end up under the rule of an abominable tyrant like Napoleon!”

“Or we might not,” Spencer muttered. “Would it be so bad if the workin’ man-an’ woman, I might add-gained some measure of power? Don't you think it's becomin’ a matter of urgency that they do?”

“Maybe so,” Burton replied, thinking of Countess Sabina and his subsequent dream: a transition begins-a melting of one great cycle into another. “But do we really want such a change to be forced upon us by an external power? I find it inconceivable that they might be doing it for our own good!”

He flicked the stub of his cheroot into the fireplace, stood, and paced back across to the window.

“We must get to the root of this.”

His eyes scanned the road below. Two labourers were trailing along behind a gentleman, mocking him relentlessly. Despite this scene, Montagu Place was unusually quiet for the hour.

“In order to strengthen our campaign against the enemy, Algy, we must first strengthen ourselves. I've resisted it in the past, but I think it's time I mesmerised you.”

“Really?”

“Really. I want to see whether I can stop you becoming a Tichborne supporter every time the Claimant is nearby. If I can't, the only other option is for you to stay permanently drunk, and I'd rather avoid that.”

Swinburne puffed out his cheeks and expelled a breath with a pop. “Oh, it wouldn't be so bad! Besides, you've always refused to exercise your mental magnetism on me before!”

“True,” Burton affirmed. “I was concerned that your excitable disposition might react in an unpredictable manner. However, seeing as this affair is making you unpredictable anyway, my former caution seems somewhat misplaced. I shall employ a Sufi technique to fortify my own psychic defences, too. Then I have a task for you.”

“Good! What?”

“The Rake connection interests me. We've yet to identify their new leader. I want you to dig around-but keep out of mischief.”

“I'll talk to my Libertine chums. I say, though-Rakes and Tichborne-it seems a contradiction, doesn't it? If our mysterious opponent is attempting to stir up the working classes, why employ Rakes, who epitomise the idea of the insouciant aristo?”

“My thought exactly!”

Swinburne suddenly froze and looked at his friend with a puzzled expression.

“That wraith,” he said. “The one by the chaunter. You saw it?”

“Clearly!”

“For a moment, it seemed to manifest rather more solidly and took on the appearance of a tall bearded man. I swear he was wearing wire-rimmed spectacles, too. The thing of it is, I feel I've seen him somewhere before.”

“You recognised the manifestation as an actual person?”

“Yes. That wisp of steam resembled someone whose path I've crossed at some point, I'm sure of it, but for the life of me I can't recall whom. The name ‘Boyle’ or ‘Foyle’ springs to mind.”

“Keep thinking on it, Algy-it could be important.”

Spencer rubbed a hand over his bald scalp and said, “Is there anythin’ I can do to help, Boss?”

“Thank you, Herbert, there is. Your immunity and your-if you don't mind me saying so-disreputable appearance, enable you to wander through the thick of it without being molested. I'd like you to keep an eye on things at street level, see how widespread the apparitions are, and, if possible, find out where they're most numerous.”

“Right you are!”

“First, though, I'd like you to return to Miss Mayson's to make a purchase on my behalf.”

He explained further and supplied the philosopher with the requisite amount of money.

Swinburne piped up: “It's a quarter to eight, Richard. What say you we toddle on over to the Cannibal Club for a natter with Monckton Milnes? He usually has a better handle on what the Rakes are up to than I do. You can mesmerise me afterward.”

“An excellent idea. We'll take the penny-farthings. I don't fancy walking the streets at night, not while the rank and file are up in arms.”

Half an hour later, Herbert Spencer descended the steps of 14 Montagu Place and headed off toward SPARTA on Orange Street.

Meanwhile, Burton and Swinburne left the study and went down the stairs to Mrs. Angell's domain. While Swinburne waited by the back door, Burton tapped lightly on the entrance to the old lady's parlour. A voice called from within. He poked his head into the room beyond.

“I thought I'd check to see how you are,” he said. “I hope you didn't tire yourself cooking for us. It was very kind of you to do so.”

“I'm fine, Sir Richard. No need to worry. A bruised hip, nothing more. How's little Elsie?”

“Doctor Steinhaueser gave her a sedative. She's asleep in the guest room and certainly won't wake up before morning. I sent a message to her parents and they'll come to pick her up soon. You needn't do anything more this evening. Just rest, my dear, and if you want anything, ring for Admiral Lord Nelson.”

“I will. Thank you.”

Burton returned to Swinburne and they went out to the garage. A few moments later they steered their penny-farthings into Wyndham Mews and set off toward Leicester Square.

The evening sky was clear, a dark and deepening blue, with three or four stars already twinkling. It was warm. A slight, directionless breeze stirred the air lazily.

At ground level, ribbons of steam twisted slowly across the surface of the road, occasionally rising up like serpents poised to strike. They swirled away from passing traffic then curled back inward.

There were far fewer vehicles on the streets than usual.

“Where is everyone?” Swinburne called over the racket of his penny-farthing's chugging engine.

“Sheltering behind locked doors, I imagine,” Burton responded. “Or resting after a hard day's rioting!”

“By golly, what a lot of broken windows! It looks as if a tornado passed through town!”

“Watch where you steer. There might be debris in the road. Hey! Where are you going?”

“This way, it's a short cut!” the poet shrilled, suddenly veering off the main street and into a narrow lane.

“Blast it, Algy, what are you up to?”

“Follow me!”

The steam proved to be much thicker in the backstreets; a dense milky pall, reminiscent of that which rose from the Crawls in the grounds of Tichborne House. The top of the cloud was almost level with the saddles of the velocipedes-about the same height as the top of an average man's head-and the two penny-farthings, as they clattered through it, left a widening wake behind them, exactly as if they were steering through a liquid.

Gas lamps flared, casting sharp shadows on the sides of the buildings and walls on either side of the lane, and making the top of the mist glaringly luminescent.

“Slow down, Algy! I can't see the surface of the road! Are you sure you know where we're going?”

“Yes, don't worry! I've been this way many a time!”

“Why?”

“For Verbena Lodge!”

“The brothel?”

“Yes!”

“I might have-” Burton's teeth clacked together as his vehicle bounced over a pothole “-known!”

They turned right into a less well-lit street, then left into another, and immediately found themselves in the midst of a disturbance. Yells and screams rose out of the cloud, women's shouts and men's protestations.

There came a loud report, almost like a gunshot, and Swinburne suddenly vanished.

The king's agent saw the small rear wheel of his assistant's velocipede fly upward before dropping back into the mist. He heard the machine's engine race, cough, splutter, and die.

He squeezed his brake levers and swung down from his vehicle, plunging into the cloud.

“Algy? Did you hit something? Are you all right?”

“Over here, Richard! I-”

Crack!

“Yow!”

Burton moved toward the raised voices, peering into the murk. Were those figures just ahead?

“Algernon?” he called.

“Gah!” came the response.

A man ran out of the rolling vapour. He was dressed in nothing but a ripped and bloodied shirt, a top hat, and a pair of socks held up by gaiters. “She's bloody insane!” he wailed, and sped past.

Another gentleman followed, barefoot and buttoning up his trousers. “Get out of here! The strumpet is spitting feathers!”

A woman in a floral dressing gown hurried into view and shouted after them: “Oy! Sir George! Mr. Fiddlehampton! Come back! Sirs! Sirs! You ain't paid the bleedin’ Governess!”

She looked at Burton. “You a bloody rozzer, or what? ’Cos if you are, you can bleedin’ well stuff it.”

“I'm not the police. What's all that noise about? Who's screaming?”

Crack!

“Yow! Ow! Ow! Ow! Ha ha!”

That was Algy!

“What's happening? Answer me!”

The girl shrugged and gestured over her shoulder. “It's Betsy, ain't it? She's gone bloody loopy. ’Ere, if ya ain't a rozzer, maybe we could-”

Burton pushed past her and strode forward until he found himself mingling with a small crowd of semi-clad men and girls who'd gathered in a wide ring around a curvaceous brunette. She was heavily made-up, and wore little more than a tight black whalebone bodice, French bloomers, and high-heeled boots.

In her left hand she held a whip, the end of which was coiled around the neck of a man kneeling meekly behind her wearing nothing but underpants. She had a second whip in her right hand, and with this, she was lashing at a small figure that hopped, jerked, and danced before her.

It was Algernon Swinburne.

Crack!

The leather thong coiled around the poet's hindquarters.

“Ouch! Ouch! Hah, yes! But really, Betsy, what do you think-”

Crack!

It slashed at his waist, ripping his shirt and slicing through his belt.

“Woweee! No! Ow! Ow!-do you think you are doing with that-”

Crack!

His trousers slid to his ankles.

“Narrgh! Oof! Ha ha ha!-doing with that poor gentleman?”

Burton glanced at the woman's prisoner. He looked again, and recognised him: it was the Chancellor of the Exchequer, William Gladstone.

“Mr. Gladstone!” he called, pushing past prostitutes and angry customers. “What are you doing?”

“Shut up!” snapped the whip-wielding woman, who Swinburne had addressed as Betsy.

“It's all right, Richard!” the poet panted. “I have the situation under control.”

“So I see,” Burton replied sarcastically.

“Who are you, sir!” the kneeling politician demanded haughtily.

“Sir Richard Burton.”

“I said shut up!” Betsy ordered.

“Palmerston's swashbuckler?”

“Well, I wouldn't put it quite like that, but-”

Crack!

Burton cried out and fell to one knee, clutching his head, feeling his scalp open up above the left ear. Blood dripped through his fingers.

Crack!

Leather encircled his forearm and neck, tightened cruelly, ripped his sleeve, and slid away. The explorer toppled to the cobbles and quickly rolled aside as the lash sliced through the air again and smacked loudly against the road beside him.

“Hey! I say!” Swinburne shouted. “Don't flog him! Flog me!”

“Be quiet!” Betsy commanded.

“Yes,” said Burton, scrambling to his feet, “be quiet, Algy.”

Above the general hubbub, there sounded the clank and rattle of an approaching litter-crab.

The crowd thinned as men slipped away into the mist.

“Burton,” called Gladstone. “Do not misjudge what you witness here. I am present simply to rehabilitate these fallen women.”

“In you undergarments, sir?”

“They stole my clothes!”

Betsy pulled her lips back over her teeth and hissed: “Oppressor! Hypocrite! Conspirator!”

“Betsy, dear,” said Swinburne, soothingly, “the middle of the street is no place for a discussion about-about-by the way, what is it we're discussing?”

“Pervert!”

Crack!

“Argh! Yowch! You mean poet! ”

“For pity's sake,” Burton growled impatiently. He took three long strides and grabbed the prostitute by the wrists. She let out a howl of fury and started to struggle, biting and kicking.

“Algy! Pull your bloody pants up and help me!”

Swinburne hoisted his trousers up to his waist, held them with one hand, shuffled over, and pulled the thong from around Gladstone's neck.

“I'm married,” the politician told him earnestly. “I've never been guilty of an act of infidelity.”

“You may tell that to the marines-” the poet grinned “-but the sailors won't believe you. There. You're free. I suggest you leg it before the police get here.”

“The police!” Gladstone exclaimed in horror, and without a backward glance, he jumped to his bare feet and took off.

“I'd love to see how he gets home,” said Swinburne.

“Damn it!” Burton yelled as Betsy sank her teeth into his wrist. He pushed her from him and backed away, with Swinburne at his side. The woman, with a whip in either hand, spat and snarled like a wild animal.

The crowd had dispersed-the men running off, the women retreating into the brothel.

Crack!

The tip of a whip flicked through the skin of Burton's forehead. He staggered. Blood dribbled into his eyes.

Betsy circled the two men. “Tichborne is innocent!” she said.

The bulky grey metallic form of the litter-crab loomed out of the mist behind her, its eight legs thumping against the road. From beneath its belly, twenty-four thin arms extended downward, flicking back and forth, picking rubbish from the road and depositing it into the mechanism's flaming maw to be incinerated.

“Move aside, madam,” Burton advised.

“Why don't you keep your fat mouth shut?”