The slim detective shook his hands, flexed his fingers, and ran over to Burton with a smile on his face.
Detective Inspector Trounce, meanwhile, was displaying a much more basic form of combat. Truncheon in hand, he was moving from Technologist to Technologist, Rake to Rake, walloping them over the head.
He, too, paced over to Burton.
"The fight is moving up the field!" he shouted. "They have more men than us! We're losing constables fast, Captain!"
"Where's your jumping Jack character?" asked Honesty, wiping a spot of blood from his goggles.
"There!" said Burton, but as he pointed to where Edward Oxford had fallen, the stilt-man suddenly bounded up and sprang away, a shower of sparks and blue flame trailing behind him.
"After him! Don't let him escape!"
Oxford took two mighty strides, plucked a shovel out of a villager's hand, whacked the man on the head with it, then started laying about himself indiscriminately.
Trounce and Honesty sprinted toward him.
Burton raised the crossbow and took aim at Spring Heeled Jack's left leg. He began to apply pressure to the trigger.
A blade slid out of his upper right arm, then withdrew.
With a cry of pain, Burton dropped the Technologist weapon, its bolt sizzling into the air.
He turned and faced Laurence Oliphant.
"From behind, Oliphant?" he asked, stepping back and drawing his blade left-handed.
"I'm not feeling gentlemanly today," answered the albino. "Fighting with my off-hand doesn't agree with me; though I have, at least, evened things up on that score."
"How is your paw? Haven't you licked it better yet? And a bullet in the arm just above it. Poor little kitten."
Their swords clicked together.
Blood ran down the fingers of Burton's right hand and dripped onto the grass.
"I see you have my blade," observed Oliphant. "I want it back. I had it specially made. It's a very fine piece."
"That's true. It's wonderfully balanced," agreed Burton. "I have it in mind to keep it as a souvenir, something to remember you by after I run it through you. Don't you find it nicely ironic that the blade you commissioned is the one that'll pierce your dastardly heart?"
They circled each other.
Oliphant's sword blurred through the air. Burton countered it with ease and pricked the panther-man's shoulder.
"My my!" exclaimed the king's agent. "You aren't nearly so fast today!"
Oliphant bared his canines.
Over his opponent's shoulder, Burton saw Trounce knocked to the ground by a wolf-man. Detective Inspector Honesty crossed to his colleague, pulled out a pistol, and put a bullet through the monster's skull. He looked up and saw Burton, then raised his pistol and pointed it at the back of Oliphant's head. Burton shook his own slightly, as if to say, "No. This one is mine."
Honesty gave a curt nod and plunged back into the battle, chasing after Spring Heeled Jack.
Oliphant lunged and almost caught Burton in the chest. The king's agent barely managed to parry, but parry he did, then turned the tables with an une-deux of such power that the albino's sword not only flew from his hand but also broke into two pieces.
Burton levelled his blade at his adversary's throat.
Oliphant laughed viciously, stepped back, and drew a pistol, aiming it between Burton's eyes.
The king's agent lowered his blade. "What a blackguard you are!" he sneered.
Oliphant's feline eyes narrowed. His finger applied pressure to the trigger.
A dark object smacked into his face and exploded in a cloud of black dust. He fell backward. His gun cracked and the bullet flew wild.
"Yaah-hooo!" came a cry from above.
Burton looked up and saw Algernon Swinburne grinning down at him from a madly tumbling box kite that was being towed along by a huge swan. A great flock of the giant birds was flying in from the south, their feathers startlingly white against the night sky, the lamps from the rotorchairs shining off them.
In each kite-with the exception of Swinburne's-sat two boys, chimney sweeps, who were eagerly throwing bags of soot down onto the combatants below.
Now it became apparent why the all policemen were wearing goggles, for while it was true that they had to frequently wipe the black powder from their eyepieces, at least their eyes were protected. Not so the Rakes and Technologists! As the air clouded with the dust, which whirled through the steam as it was blasted by the rotorship overhead, the enemy forces stumbled around half blinded. Man after man, with watering eyes, walked into a descending truncheon and fell senseless onto the grass.
Meanwhile, the sweeps, directed by Swinburne, split into two groups. The first continued to circle under the rotorship, the kites whipped about by its downdraught, the boys throwing soot bombs. The second group peeled off and swooped out, up, and over the massive ship, then began to wheel above it. The boys took out metal rods-handle sections of their chimney brushes-and dropped them onto the spinning wings beneath. Loud clangs sounded and chunks of the damaged wings streaked out sideways, spinning away over the trees that bordered the field.
It had the desired effect: very slowly, the rotorship began to retreat, sliding westward at a snail's pace.
Laurence Oliphant kicked Burton's legs out from under him. The famous explorer sprawled onto the ground and cried out as pain lanced through his injured arm. The panther-man hurled himself onto him. They rolled, punching, scratching, biting, kicking, forcing their elbows into each other's throats, head-butting and scrambling for an unbreakable hold. Burton had the skill, the strength, and the training, but Oliphant possessed animal savagery; his mock manners had fallen away to reveal the beast within, and the king's agent felt as if he were back in Africa, fighting hand to hand with one of that continent's great cats.
It was impossible to get a grip on the albino, and Burton's strength drained rapidly as he weathered the storm of slashing claws and snapping teeth. Then Oliphant's brow hammered into his face with such force that for a second Burton saw nothing but stars. His vision returned as the pantherman bent over his throat, his jaw distending unnaturally, his dripping canines glinting with wicked intent.
A rope slid across Burton's outstretched hand. He snatched at it and, in one lightning-fast motion, coiled it about the albino's neck. With a choking cough, the panther-man was yanked backward and dragged from him, slid across the grass, then was hauled into the air. He swung, kicking and jerking convulsively at the end of the line, which descended from one of the departing rotorship's open doors. Then he became still, his white face blackening, until he limply vanished into the cloud of steam and soot.
"Still hanging around with the wrong crowd!" observed Burton.
There came a sudden flash and Oliphant's body swung back into view, burning brightly; he had spontaneously combusted.
Burton watched as the blazing corpse vanished into the pall again, then he located the crossbow, picked it up, and went in search of Honesty and Trounce.