The Secret of Abdu El Yezdi (49 page)

As they emerged into Whitehall, Harris pointed at St. Stephen's Tower and exclaimed, “Would ya look at that! The clouds are so low you can barely see the clock. Say, though, what's the story? Ain't that the famous Big Ben? I've not heard a chime all night.”

“The bell's cracked,” Burton explained. “They made the hammer too big. I believe they're currently adjusting the mechanism to strike the hour on the quarter bells while the main one's repaired. It's the second—” He cried out and whipped his hands up to his eyes, half-blinded by the flash that suddenly burst from the top of the tower. A thunderous detonation smacked against his ears. Peering past his fingers, he saw a ball of flame pushing bricks and masonry away from the edifice. Without thinking, he knocked his companions back into the shelter of Derby Street. Debris started to rain down around them; bricks and concrete thudding and shattering on the roads and smashing through windows; metal and glass clanging and clattering; pieces of flaming wood falling like comets. The noise pummelled them, jumbling their senses, then thick, black dust came at them like an avalanche, enveloping and blinding, filling their mouths and nostrils.

Half a brick ricocheted off the side of Harris's head. The American slumped into Swinburne's arms, his weight carrying the poet to the ground.

Burton crouched over them, trying to shield them with his body. Small fragments of stone thudded into his back and bounced all around. He pressed his palms to his ears but the cacophonous sound of destruction penetrated his skull, so harsh that he bellowed with the pain of it.

Finally, silence fell, only gradually giving way to individual sounds: screams; cries of alarm; shouts; police whistles; the rattle of small stones still raining down.

The explorer uncurled and stood, powder cascading off him. He coughed and spat.

“Are you hurt, Algy?”

“No, but you could pull this great lump off me.”

Burton lifted Harris from the poet and laid him on his back.

“Is he dead?” Swinburne asked.

“No. Knocked cold.”

“He'll be disappointed. The Lily Queen might have been expecting him.”

“The angels will have to wait. Brush yourself down and help me carry him. We'll take him to the Regency.”

They hoisted the American to his feet and got beneath his arms to support him. He was so limp he might as well have been boneless, and the difference in height between Burton and Swinburne, along with the poet's inability to walk in a straight line, made the operation extremely awkward. However, they managed to drag him out onto Whitehall, where they stumbled to a halt and gazed in horror at the scene.

The top half of St. Stephen's Tower had gone and what remained was a shattered and burning stump. Even from this distance, they could feel the heat of the flames. Black smoke and dust were billowing through the streets and debris was strewn everywhere. Fortunately, the lateness of the hour meant there were fewer people about than usual, but nevertheless many individuals could be seen staggering aimlessly, their faces slack with shock.

Burton and Swinburne half-carried, half-dragged Harris northward past the government buildings, then turned right into Whitehall Place in order to rest on the steps of the Royal Geographical Society. They watched policemen and detectives pouring out of Scotland Yard.

“Excuse me, sir. Do you know that gentleman? Is he badly hurt?”

Burton looked up to find a young, round-faced, and sandy-haired man standing beside him. “He's a visiting American. Thomas Lake Harris. He's out for the count but not badly wounded, as far as I can make out. Who are you, sir?”

“Detective Inspector Spearing.”

“Ah, then I suppose you've been following us? I know you were ordered to keep an eye on this fellow. It's all right, Spearing—I'm Burton.”

“Oh, I see. Detective Inspector Trounce has told me all about you, of course. Can I be of assistance?”

Swinburne piped up, “You could tell us what the blazes has happened!”

“This is my colleague, Mr. Swinburne,” Burton explained.

“I have no idea, sir,” Spearing said. “They've been making repairs in the clock tower, but I can't credit them with using anything capable of causing such a blast. What are you going to do with Mr. Harris?”

“We're taking him back to the Regency Hotel.”

“You'll need a ride. Here, let me lend a hand. We'll take him through to the back of the Yard. You can commandeer a police vehicle.” Spearing paused, then said, “You won't crash it, will you?”

“I appear to have gained a reputation,” Burton noted ruefully.

They lifted Harris and carried him across the road, treading carefully to avoid the scattered rubble.

“Through here,” Spearing said, leading them into a narrow alleyway.

At the back of the police headquarters, in a large courtyard lined with stable-like buildings, Spearing left them, entered one of the structures, and a few moments later steered out a steam-horse-drawn brougham. He jumped down from the driver's seat. “I'd take you myself, sir, but I think it's a case of all hands on deck at the Yard.”

“I quite understand. Help me get him into the cabin, would you?”

They lifted Harris into the vehicle. The detective pointed to an open gate and said, “That opens onto Northumberland Street.”

“Thank you, Spearing.”

The policeman saluted and hastened away.

Swinburne climbed in beside the American. Burton took the driver's seat, gripped the tiller, and guided the machine out through the gate and to the left, in the direction of Trafalgar Square. It was slow going—there were lumps of masonry in the road and rapidly expanding crowds of people, all gathering to gaze at the destruction.

When they reached the square, Burton made to steer into the Mall, intending to follow it westward, but Swinburne thumped on the roof and screeched, “Stop! Hey, Richard, stop, I say!”

The explorer pulled over and the poet jumped out and scrambled up beside him.

“I've been looking at his face,” Swinburne said breathlessly, “and it's given me an idea. Let's take him to your place.”

“Why?” Burton asked, puzzled.

“Because his bone structure is similar to yours. With whitened skin, a false beard, and a few other cosmetic adjustments, you could pass yourself off as him.”

“You intend to hold Harris prisoner, Algy, while I go off to meet this Count Sobieski fellow?”

“Yes! Why not become the twelfth messenger of God?”

Burton considered the poet's enthusiastic countenance.

“Just how drunk are you?”

“Hah! Considerably!” Swinburne smiled. “How else could I have come up with such a ridiculous scheme?”

“It
is
ridiculous,” Burton agreed. “And I rather like it.”

The sewer tunnels are constructed from brick and stone and range from six to twenty feet in diameter. The smaller of them are round in section, the larger egg-shaped, with the narrow end downward, which serves to increase the flow and prevent silt from building up. The main interceptor tunnels run from west to east. North-and-south-flowing sewers run into them, the waste being diverted away toward the mouth of the Thames, rather than flowing straight into it. Each tunnel is fitted with many iron sluice gates, some of massive proportions, which can be manually raised or lowered by means of geared mechanisms, and which are used to regulate the flow and, on occasion, to block it, so that sections of the tunnels can be inspected and, if necessary, repaired.

—F
ROM
MR. BAZALGETTE'S UNDERGROUND MARVEL,
T
HE
D
AILY
B
UGLE

Burton leaned on his cane and snapped open his new pocket watch. His eyes lingered on the lock of Isabel's hair before registering the time. Ten-past eight. Count Sobieski was late.

Earlier that afternoon—it was now Wednesday the 9
th
of November—Trounce had called again at Montagu Place, finding Swinburne already there with Burton and Levi. The detective inspector was dishevelled and tired, and grateful for a brandy and water. “Seven killed last night and more than a hundred injured. It was a bomb. A big one, too. Three hours after it went off, a chap walked into the offices of the
Daily Bugle
, introduced himself to the night editor as Vincent Sneed—thirty-two years old, a chimney sweep—and made a full confession. He recently cleaned the flues at the Whitechapel Bell Foundry, where Big Ben was cast, and stole a spare set of tower keys from there.”

“But his motive?” Burton asked. “Why commit such an atrocity?”

Trounce had pulled a notebook from his pocket, extracted a sheet of paper from it, and passed it to the explorer. “The statement he made to the newspaper man.”

Burton read it, handed it to Swinburne, and said, “They don't strike me as the words of a sweep.”

“I thought the same,” Trounce muttered.

“My hat!” Swinburne exclaimed. “What could possibly warrant such an outpouring of hatred? Smash the German Alliance? Hang Prince Albert as a traitor? Assassinate Bismarck?”

“That last is an oddity in itself,” Burton observed. “Bismarck is out of the picture. Why include him?”

“Why any of it at all?” Trounce asked. “According to Sneed's apprentice—a lad named William Cornish—the man has never once before expressed a political opinion.”

“Has he said anything more?”

Trounce took up his bowler from beside the chair and punched it in frustration. “That's the problem. He can't. He's dead.”

“Dead?”

“Inexplicably. We put him in a cell, intending to question him this morning, but at dawn he simply stopped breathing. The coroner was unable to identify the cause.”

Eliphas Levi exclaimed, “
Mon Dieu! Où est le cadavre maintenant?
”

“Eh?”

“The corpse,” Burton translated. “Where is it?”

“In the mortuary.”

The explorer and occultist exchanged a glance.

“Trounce,” Burton said, after a momentary pause, “I have to use my authority to issue you with a direct order.”

“On the basis of that statement, should I expect an unusual one?”

“Yes. Take Monsieur Levi to the mortuary and do exactly as he tells you. It's probable that Sneed is
strigoi morti
. He may have been acting under the spell of Perdurabo.”

“I find it hard to believe any of this.”

Levi murmured, “I show you. You will believe.”

“Think of it as a disease,” Burton advised. “John Judge carried it aboard the ship from Fernando Po. If Sneed has been infected, as I suspect he has, he'll appear to die in daylight but will rise at night. While active, he'll be highly infectious.”

Trounce scratched his chin. “Then Perdurabo, in the body of Thomas Honesty, is hiding out among the anti-German activists in the Cauldron? Infecting them? Is that what you're suggesting?”

“It is. Or, at very least, he's made of the district a hunting ground. Tonight, Levi will accompany you to the East End. Take young Bram, too, but keep him away from any trouble. The Whisperers have a strong presence in the Cauldron—there are more street Arabs there than anywhere else in the city. Use Bram to collect information from the district. Look for signs of the un-dead.” He turned to the Frenchman. “You will advise, monsieur?”

“
Oui.
We find them and do what must be done.”

Burton said to Trounce, “Come with me.”

They went upstairs to the room where Burton's half-unpacked African crates were stored. Thomas Lake Harris was bound to a chair in the middle of it with his head bandaged and a gag in his mouth.

“What the blazes?” Trounce cried out. “Who's this? What are you playing at?”

“It's Mr. Harris, the American spiritualist Detective Inspector Spearing has been following. He's due to give a lecture at the Enochians' Club tonight. I intend to masquerade as him and go in his stead.”

“But—but—by Jove! Is he one of them? Has he done anything wrong?”

“Nothing, unless you count his incessant spouting of sheer nonsense.”

“But you can't keep him here like that! Hell's bells! I know the king gave you special dispensation, but this is indefensible.”

“The security of the Empire is at stake.”

Trounce pointed at the prisoner. “From him?”

“No.”

“Then you have to let him go.”

“It would be better if you took him into police custody for the night. It's for his own protection—he's in danger of associating with bad people.”

“By the looks of it, he's already done so.”

“I didn't thump him over the head, Trounce, he was hit by a falling brick. As for his current incarceration, it inconveniences him, that's all. It's necessary.”

“Humph! I'll put him in a police cell, but I don't approve of this. The law is the law. You have to realise where the boundaries lie.”