“Where are we meeting Sir Charles?” she asked suddenly, as if she was really saying: “Can we leave this place?”
Understanding her hidden meaning, Newbury took her arm again and led her away from the scene of the fight. “He said he’d find us.”
“What, amongst all of these people?”
“He’ll find us.” Newbury shrugged. “He is, after all, a chief inspector.”
Veronica couldn’t help but smile. She was sure he was only searching for an excuse to continue wandering around the exhibits for a while. She didn’t want to spoil his mood. Nevertheless, she had to air her concerns. “I remain … unconvinced about all of this, you know,” she said, squeezing his arm a little tighter to let him know she was searching for reassurance, as opposed to simply questioning his judgement outright.
“The exhibition?” asked Newbury.
“No. Professor Angelchrist,” she replied. “Meeting him here. What if we’re seen?”
“We shall have to be exceedingly careful,” said Newbury, acknowledging her concerns. “We shall talk as we tour the exhibits, being careful not to be heard or seen together. I have no doubt that more of Her Majesty’s agents will be here at the exhibition, perhaps even unknown to us. We should remain cognisant of that.”
“Hmmm,” said Veronica. However impressive Newbury’s stealth skills might be, remaining unseen was not going to prove easy. “Are you sure we can trust him?”
Newbury met her gaze. He looked serious, all the playfulness suddenly gone. “Charles or Angelchrist?” he asked. His jaw was set.
“Angelchrist,” she said, quietly.
Newbury inclined his head. “As far as we can trust anyone,” he said, his tone level, unreadable.
Veronica nodded absently. What was he getting at? Was that a reference to her, their history together, the fact that it had taken so long for her to admit the truth about her role as an agent of the Queen? Or perhaps even a remark about her feelings towards Newbury, and the time they had shared in a cell, where they had talked about their mutual attraction? Could he even be making an obscure reference to Bainbridge? Was he, too, feeling that his friend had somehow got in over his head, mixed up in affairs that he shouldn’t have? Was this his way of advising caution?
Now, she decided, was not the time to press him on the matter. She would do that later, once they had heard what the Professor and Bainbridge had to say, when they could find a moment alone.
She was woken from her reverie by the insistent pinging of a bell and looked up to see she was standing directly in the path of a hurtling bicycle. Newbury was looking in the other direction at a strange dome-like machine. She tugged them both out of the way as the bicycle rushed by, its rider grinning and doffing his hat politely in acknowledgement. She realised, surprised, that the man was not actually pedalling, but that the bicycle-not unlike a penny farthing, with a large front and smaller back wheel-was self-propelled via a handle beneath the seat. She realised that the device must be a part of the exhibition and grinned. Now that was a progressive invention she could appreciate: no smelly fumes, no dusty coal. She wondered whether they’d ever actually take off.
Newbury, intent on other things, dragged her on towards the exhibit he had admired from afar. “Look at this,” he said, reading the small plaque beside the strange device. “The ‘Tempest Prognosticator.’”
“The what?” Veronica asked, perplexed.
“It’s a machine that predicts rain,” said Newbury, pressing his face to the glass dome and peering at the contents inside. Veronica could see over his shoulder that the centre of the machine was comprised of a large bell, a series of strings emerging from its heart. These strings terminated inside a circle of jars, each of which contained the squirming, bloated bodies of leeches.
Veronica took a step back, slightly repulsed.
“Apparently, when it is about to rain, the leeches-sensitive to this change in clemency-climb out of their jars, which causes the strings to pull taut and sound the bell in alarm,” said Newbury, grinning. “Quite ingenious.”
“Would it work?” asked Veronica.
“Who knows,” replied Newbury, with a shrug. “But it’s a fine-looking machine, all the same.” He glanced around, as if trying to get his bearings. A wide grin spread across his lips. “Look, over there!”
He was pointing to a bright yellow banner hanging between two posts. Painted on it in garish red letters were the words: THE MENAGERIE.
“Must we?” said Veronica, knowing full well what the answer would be.
“Oh yes,” said Newbury, laughing. “We absolutely must.”
“Very well,” she said, with a playful sigh. She allowed herself to be led across the floor of the exhibition hall once again, jostled by the over-enthusiastic crowd at every step.
They stopped before what appeared to be an artificially constructed passageway: a cave system of sorts, formed from elaborate plasterwork designed and painted to represent coral. Embedded in these walls were a series of large glass tanks, each of them filled with burbling water. The lighting inside the cave system was diffuse and dim.
“We’re going in there?” she asked.
“Come on, Veronica!” he chided. “Where’s your sense of adventure?”
“I rather fear I left it in Kensington,” she replied, wryly.
There were only a handful of other people meandering through the unusual exhibit as they stepped into the first of the darkened passageways. Newbury, releasing his hold on Veronica’s arm, went directly to the wooden sign beside the nearest of the glass tanks. She heard him chuckle and then turn away from the brief description of the tank’s contents, cupping his hands to the glass and peering inside.
“What is it?” she asked.
“Come and have a look.”
She crossed over to join him.
“There,” he said, pointing to something in the water. At first it was indistinct, a dark shape about a foot long, suspended in the gloom. She moved to get a better view. As the nature of the tank’s inhabitant became clear, she must have pulled a face, because she heard Newbury laughing beside her.
“It’s … it’s…” She was lost for words to describe it.
“A merman,” interjected Newbury.
“Grotesque,” she finished.
The creature in the water was a sort of twisted hybrid of a monkey and a fish. Its lower half comprised a fish’s tail, glistening with silvery scales, but above the waist it had the torso, arms, and head of a small mammal. In its hand it held a tiny spear. It appeared to be unmoving.
“I’ve seen these before,” said Newbury. “It’s not alive.”
“It’s not?” she asked.
“No. It’s a fake, an example of creative taxidermy. Someone very skilled dissected the two animals and attached their remains together to form the illusion of a new ‘undiscovered’ beast. It…” he trailed off.
“What is it?” she prompted.
Newbury’s face had taken on an ashen appearance. He was staring at the thing in the tank. She turned to look and saw it move. Its head turned towards her, glossy black eyes peering right through her. Its lips curled back, baring its sharpened fangs, and then its tail flicked once, twice, and it was swimming towards the surface of the water, breaking for air. It moved with a lack of grace born of compromise-as if this creature, whatever it actually was, had been forced to learn its movements anew and was not yet entirely comfortable with them.
“Good Lord,” said Newbury, uncharacteristically invoking the deity’s name. “Someone’s actually done it.”
“But you said it wasn’t alive?” said Veronica, confused.
“I was mistaken,” replied Newbury, “although it certainly isn’t natural. This is the result of some diabolical experiment, a creature constructed in a laboratory. Two animals welded together in a bizarre biological alliance. The knowledge and the skill to create such a thing…”