“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.
A guard opened the doors in response to their knock and ushered them through. “Mr. Babbage is in the workshop, sirs,” he said, peering with interest at the limp, sheet-concealed figure.
They entered, crossed the quadrangle, and went into the workshop. A technician gestured for them to follow him. They did so, trailing between the machines to the central work area.
Yet again, Burton looked upon Charles Babbage, who, with Daniel Gooch, was attending to a throne-like chair beside which the Field Preserver was suspended. The undamaged time suit was on a bench beside it. The men were tinkering with a great mass of wires that stretched between the hanging box and a framework that surrounded the suit’s helmet.
Isambard Kingdom Brunel was standing nearby, completely motionless. Trounce stood in front of him, peered at the metal face, and muttered, “Dead as a doornail.”
Gooch looked up at them as they placed the Spring Heeled Jack on a worktop and removed the sheet. “Sir Richard! You’ve captured one of the mechanisms!”
“I have,” Burton said. “Though I suffered a drubbing in the process.”
“So I see. My goodness, you’ve certainly been in the wars lately.” Gooch approached and started to examine the prone figure. “My stars! This looks like flesh.”
“It is. How’s Brunel?”
“In a total fugue. I checked his probability calculator and it seems fine. We’re leaving him for a while to see whether he comes out of it naturally.”
Burton looked at Babbage, who was so deeply engrossed in his work he had neither glanced up from it nor acknowledged the new arrivals. “I understand my presence is required, Daniel? Why?”
“Charles can explain it best.” Gooch called to the scientist, waited a moment, then, when the old man failed to respond, shouted more loudly, “Charles!”
The elderly scientist finally tore his eyes from the box and looping wires. He clapped his hands together, cried out, “Ah! Burton! Excellent! Just the man!” but then saw the stilted figure and, for the next fifteen minutes, utterly ignored everyone while he pored over it.
Finally, he addressed Gooch. “Have this stored in ice. Send for Mr. Lister. His medical knowledge is required. This mechanism has biological components. Our investigation of it might be more autopsy than dismantlement. Incredible! Incredible!”
Gooch called over a group of technicians and issued orders. Three of them carted the corpse away. A fourth hurried off to summon Lister.
“We shall proceed with our experiment while we await his arrival,” Babbage asserted. He jabbed a finger first at Burton then at the throne. “You. Sit.”
The king’s agent stayed put and folded his arms across his chest. “I’ll not subject myself to anything before you explain it to my satisfaction.”
Babbage gave a cackling laugh. “Ha! The primitive man views scientific processes as the darkest of sorceries, is that it? Don’t you worry, sir. No harm shall come to you. All you have to do is wear the helmet for a few moments and issue an instruction that it will accept from only you.”
Gooch added, “As you know, Sir Richard, Abdu El Yezdi allowed Mr. Babbage to ask questions of the functioning helmet but strictly forbade him to issue it with commands. We still follow that dictate.”
“An absurd precaution,” Babbage spat. “My research is needlessly crippled.”
“My counterpart saw the suit give rise to unhealthy enthusiasms in certain scientists,” Burton commented. “He no doubt intended that you be spared the same.”
“I’m not subject to childish passions.”
“I’m glad to hear it. To return to the matter in hand, what instruction?”
Babbage pressed his fingertips together. “Ah. The instruction. Yes. At the moment the outfit vanished, it broadcast its electromagnetic field with such strength that it was inscribed into my Field Preserver. The reverse of what I intended.”
“The experiment was supposed to record the contents of the healthy headpiece, not the damaged,” Maneesh Krishnamurthy clarified.
“That is what I just indicated, young man. Do you intend to add unnecessary observations to everything I say?”