“We do, Mr. Burke.”
“Noxious fume-pumpers!” Pox screamed.
Hare ignored the bird and indicated the package. “A gift for you, Captain.”
“Really?”
Hare took hold of the linen and unfolded it, revealing the item wrapped inside. It was a green, organic, fleshy-looking thing, with a stubby barrel and a handgrip from the base of which small white roots grew. There were various nodules protruding from the object, one being positioned where the trigger would be on a pistol.
“What on earth is it?”
“It's a cactus,” said Burke.
“A cactus?”
“Yes. A cactus. From Ireland.”
“It has no spines.”
“As a matter of fact, it does, but they grow on the inside. You are aware of a gentleman named Richard Spruce?”
“Yes, of course. He's been much in the public eye of late. He's a member of the RGS. I bump into him from time to time.”
“He's become something of a pariah, wouldn't you agree?”
Burton nodded. “As far as the public and the press are concerned, he's solely responsible for the Irish tragedy.”
“Indeed, Captain, indeed. Which, in turn, some say, has led us into the American conflict. That's a lot of weight for one man to carry.”
“I would think so.”
“Which may explain why he and a number of his Eugenicist colleagues met with a German spy named Count Zeppelin last week and attempted to flee to Prussia, taking state secrets with them.”
“He did what? The confounded idiot!”
“Monkey gland!” Pox added.
“You call him an idiot, sir. I call him a traitor. The damage he could have done selling secrets like this-” Burke nodded at the object on the desk “-is incalculable.”
“A cactus is a state secret?” Burton asked, puzzled.
“This variety most definitely is.”
Hare took over from Burke: “Fortunately, we were able to capture Spruce and his cohorts before Zeppelin got them away. The count himself, I regret to say, eluded us. The Eugenicists are currently being held in the Tower of London.”
“Why there?”
“We have a special security establishment below the old dungeons. It's where the likes of Darwin and Babbage would have ended up, had you not-um- dealt with them as you did. Isn't that right, Mr. Burke?”
“Indeed, indeed, Mr. Hare.” Burke tapped the cactus. “Anyway, the point is, we can't allow material of this sort to fall into foreign hands, least of all Prussian ones. The Bismarck Dynasty is attempting to unite the Germanic states in order to establish a European Empire. If that comes to pass, it could lead to a war the likes of which the world has never seen. We don't want them in possession of weapons like this.”
“‘Tumultuous the change that comes,’” Burton quoted softly. “‘A storm shall wipe many of thy soft-skinned kinsfolk from the Earth.’”
“I beg your pardon, Captain?”
“Nothing. Just something I heard once.”
The storm will break early and you shall witness the end of a great cycle and the horrifying birth pains of another; the past and the future locked together in a terrible conflict.
He remembered his dream.
He remembered Countess Sabina.
He remembered that John Hanning Speke was currently in Prussia and had taken Eugenicists with him.
He looked down at the cactus. “It's a weapon?”
“Yes,” said Hare. “You must be very, very careful with it. Carry it with you at all times and never allow it into the hands of your enemies.”
“Allow me to demonstrate,” Burke said, picking up the cactus. He held it like a pistol. “Strangely comfortable in the hand,” he noted. “Slightly yielding to the grip yet solid and a good weight. You see this nodule here? Give that a tweak and the cactus immediately goes into a defensive state. Inside, juices are coagulating, forming sharp, venomous spines, and doing so in an instant. Now, I'll just-” He aimed the cactus at the opposite wall and pressed the trigger nodule. There came a sound- phut! -and a number of spines suddenly appeared in the wall, their arrival announced with a soft thud.
“Great heavens!” Burton exclaimed. He crossed the room and counted the projectiles. They had embedded themselves in the wallpaper perilously close to where a treasured framed miniature of his mother and father hung. There were seven, each about three inches long, each gleaming wetly. He reached up to pull one out.
“Don't touch!” Gregory Hare cried. “They're coated with a tremendously potent resin. One drop of it on your skin and you'll fall unconscious in an instant and won't recover your wits for three hours!”
“Bloody hell!”
“The venom will become harmless in five minutes or so.”
“The cactus has reloaded already,” Burke said, waving the pistol. “For as long as it's in a defensive state, it'll produce spines continuously. You could fire this thing for hours on end and never run out of ammunition! However-” he pinched the activation nodule “-There. It's dormant now. No chance of accidentally shooting you in the leg. Not that I would. I'm cautious by nature, aren't I, Mr. Hare?”
“Very cautious, Mr. Burke.”
“Take it, Captain,” Burke said. “It's yours. Be sure to soak this end, with the roots, in water for a couple of hours each week.”
Burton returned to his visitors and took the proffered weapon. It felt strange, alive-which, he reminded himself, it was.
“If you'll pardon me raising what I'm sure is a sensitive subject,” Burke said, “you've been responsible for a few deaths since taking on your current role. We understand why those deaths occurred and we fully support you.”
Gregory Hare nodded his agreement. “Even in the case of Sir Charles Babbage,” he said. “An execution which some might say was unprovoked.”
Burton swallowed. “I must confess,” he said, quietly, “I have asked myself over and over whether my action was justified. Did I commit murder that day?”
“No!” Burke and Hare chorused.
“I was delirious with malaria. I wasn't in a fit state to judge.”
“You judged correctly. We'd been following Babbage and his work for some time. He was what we in our business classify as ‘a developing threat.’”
“This spine-shooter will ease the moral burden of your role, Captain Burton,” Hare added. “You can simply render your opponents insensible, then call us. We will remove them to a place of safekeeping where they'll be interrogated and, ultimately, if possible, rehabilitated.”
“That sounds strangely ominous.”
Neither of his visitors answered.
The clock began to chime eleven.
“Rabbit-ticklers!” Pox murmured.
Burton slipped the cactus gun into his pocket.
“Thank you, gentlemen,” he said. “I daresay this pistol, peculiar as it is, will prove most useful. Now, to business: you have the papers?”
“Yes,” Burke answered.
“They will pass examination?”
“Even the most rigorous,” Hare replied.
“Then if you'd care to step into my dressing room, I'll make you up and fit you out with clothing more suited to asylum inspectors.”
Hare gave an audible gulp and glanced at Burke.
Burke cleared his throat and looked first to the right, then to the left, then at Hare, and finally at Burton.
“I thought-” he mumbled. “I thought we might go like this.”
Burton gave a bark of laughter. “Trust me, chaps, if you step into Bedlam dressed like that, there's every chance that you'll never step out again!”
Bethlem Royal Hospital.
First it was a priory, erected by the sisters and brethren of the Order of the Star of Bethlehem in the year 1247.
Then it became a hospital in 1337.
Twenty years later it started to treat the insane, if “treat” is the appropriate word for what amounted to restraint and torture.
In the 1600s it gained the nickname “Bedlam,” which was soon a part of everyday language, invoked to suggest uproar, confusion, and madness.