“You should run for parliament.”
Grub shook his head sadly. “Nah. It’s not me place to do so.”
Six weeks later, Burton took lunch with Thomas Bendyshe in the Athenaeum. Despite being a palatial and tall-ceilinged chamber, the club’s eatery had always been known by the rather more humble appellation of ‘the Coffee Room.’
Bendyshe, as usual, was at full volume. Oblivious to the morsel of lamb chop lodged between his front teeth, he bellowed, “So you’ll be off tomorrow then, old boy?”
“Keep your voice down,” Burton urged. “For pity’s sake, Tom, why must you always hoot like a confounded foghorn? And yes, the Orpheus is ready at last.”
“My word!” his companion trumpeted. “What a rapid job they’ve made of it, hey? Bloomin’ miracle workers!”
It was true, the Department of Guided Science, and especially Charles Babbage and Daniel Gooch, had worked at a phenomenal rate to prepare the vessel for its forthcoming voyage. Battersea Power Station had never been so crowded or so active. Its engineers, physicists, logicians, theoretical mathematicians, designers, inventors, chemists and metallurgists had worked night and day without pause. Even the venerable Michael Faraday had been called out of retirement to contribute his expertise to the project.
Bendyshe used his fork to stab the last potato on his plate, transferred it to his mouth and before he’d swallowed it, said, “I’ve not seen you since that extraordinary meeting at the Venetia. Lord, what a couple of months. How many times have you been assaulted by the jumping Jacks?”
“Eleven,” Burton replied. “And look at this.”
He took a quick gulp of wine then reached into his jacket and pulled out a folded letter, which he handed across the table.
Bendyshe put down his cutlery, took it, opened it, read it, and hollered, “From old George Herne on Zanzibar!”
“Shhh!” Burton hissed. “It is. He reports that the stilt men have been causing mayhem even there, and word has reached him from Kazeh that they’ve been seen in that far-flung town, too. The Africans consider them invading demons.”
“They might be right,” Bendyshe observed. He took a couple of minutes to scan through the missive. “So everywhere you’ve been, there the freakish creatures are. A veritable infestation. Poor old Bartolini has been forced to close his restaurant. You aren’t his favourite customer, not by a long shot. I reckon he’d kick you in the seat of the pants if he dared.”
Burton offered a regretful grimace. “I’ve been banished from the Royal Geographical Society, as well. Four times, the Spring Heeled Jacks have crashed into its lobby demanding to see me. I have a permanent police guard outside my home. Ten battles have been fought in Montagu Place. Though perhaps ‘battle’ is too strong a word.”
“Eh? Why so?”
“They don’t put up much of a fight. Grub, the vendor who plies his trade on the corner, saved me last week by clouting one of them over the head with his coal shovel.”
“Ha! Good man!” Bendyshe frowned, applied a fingernail to his teeth, dug out the strand of meat, looked at it, put it back into his mouth, and said, “I read those crazy tales left by Abdu El Yezdi. So you really think these stilt-walkers are some aspect of Edward Oxford?”
“Yes, though they don’t appear to realise it.”
“Peculiar, hey?”
“It is.”
A waiter stopped at their table and refilled their glasses. Burton turned down the offer of another bottle. When the man had gone, he said, “Are you comfortable with your new role, Tom? The Cannibal Club will soon become a very different prospect. There’ll be no more horseplay.”
“Apart from the hunt for a suitable spouse, hey?”
“Well, yes, I suppose.”
“I’m ready, willing and able. Incidentally, your brother intends to combine my anthropological knowledge with his own financial nous in order to play the markets.”
Burton rubbed the scar on his chin with his forefinger. “Anthropological stockbroking?”
“If I can accurately forecast the ebb and flow of human affairs, and the minister, based on those predictions, invests wisely, then we should be able to establish assets enough to fund the Cannibal Club for many generations to come.”
“On what will you base your prognostications?”
“I shall consult with the Department of Guided Science to learn what varieties of machinery they think will develop in future years and how it might be employed by industry and society. I’ll work with old Monkey Milnes to examine up-and-coming politicians, their philosophies and inclinations, and where they might take our world. I’ll learn from the patterns of history, and will scrutinise current trends and project them forward. And I’ll confer with the Empire’s most talented mediums.”
“A major project, Tom.”
“I relish it. I hope that my—” He stopped and gaped as, somewhere behind Burton, a loud pop sounded, followed immediately by a crash and cries of alarm.
The king’s agent jumped out of his seat and whirled, yanking a Beaumont-Adams revolver from his waistband.
A Spring Heeled Jack had materialised in the dining room and landed on a table. It was flailing about amid broken glasses and crockery, yelling, “Where is Burton? My neck! Don’t break my neck! Prime Minister? Where are you?”
Burton raised his gun.
“Everybody stand clear!”
Patrons scattered. He aimed at the figure and, as it clambered to its feet, pulled the trigger, once, twice, three times, hitting it in the chest. The stilt man collapsed to its knees, a bubble peeled outward from its skin, and it vanished.
Tom Bendyshe, temporarily neglecting his atheism, cried out, “Mary mother of God! Won’t they ever stop?”
Thirty minutes later, Burton’s membership was rescinded and he was banished from the Athenaeum.
“Soon, I shan’t be allowed anywhere,” he complained, as he bid his friend farewell.
“Tomorrow, you won’t be anywhere,” Bendyshe observed. “At least, nowhere in this age.”
The following day, the minister of chronological affairs said, “Whatever else you do during your visit to the future, will you please prevent the Spring Heeled Jacks from making further visits to us? I’m thoroughly irritated by the infernal pests.”
Miraculously, Edward Burton had left the Royal Venetia Hotel and was sitting in a growler at the foot of the Orpheus’s boarding ramp. Battersea Power Station towered in the background.
It was raining.
Sir Richard Francis Burton, standing beside the carriage and holding an umbrella against which the water drummed, replied, “Must I remind you, Edward, that while you’ve been hiding away in your hotel suite, it is I who’ve borne the brunt of the intrusions?”
“A reminder isn’t necessary,” his brother said. “I’m exhausted by the constant worry.”
“About the disruption?”
“About you, you dolt.”
Burton was silent for nearly a minute. Then he said, “It appears that eugenics, or a similar science, will make a resurgence in the future.”
“You base that assertion on what?”
“Joseph Lister has finally identified the flesh inside the Spring Heeled Jack mechanisms.”
“And?”
“It appears to be a variation of pork.”
“Pork? You’re telling me they’re pigs?”
“A pig machine hybrid.”
“God in heaven! What nightmarish world does Oxford inhabit?”
“I’ll soon find out.” Burton hesitated, then added, “If I don’t come back—”