Possibly, it wasn't even a man.
The steam parted and from it sprang a bizarre apparition: a massively long-legged shape-like a carnival stilt-walker-a long, dark cloak flapping from its hunched shoulders, bolts of lightning crackling around its body and head.
Burton retreated hastily until his back brought up against the wall. He blinked rapidly and licked his lips.
Was it human, this thing? Its head was large, black, and shiny, with an aura of blue flame crawling around it. Red eyes peered at him maliciously. White teeth shone in a lipless grin.
The creature stalked forward, bent, its talonlike hands flexing, and Burton saw that his first impression was accurate: the thing walked on twofoot-high stilts.
Its lanky body was clad in a skintight white scaly suit that glittered in the dim light of the single guttering gas lamp. Something circular glowed on its chest and emitted bursts of sparks and ribbons of lightning that snaked over the thing's long limbs.
'Burton!' the apparition croaked. 'Richard Francis bloody Burton!'
It suddenly pounced on him and a hand slashed sideways, slapping hard against his right ear, sending him reeling. His top hat went spinning into a puddle. He dropped his cane.
'I told you once to stay out of it!' snapped the thing. 'You didn't listen!'
All of a sudden, Burton felt icily sober.
Fingers dug into his hair and yanked his head up. He felt an agonisingly powerful static charge coursing through his body. His arms and legs twitched spasmodically.
Red eyes glared into his.
'I'll not tell you again. Leave me alone!'
'W-what?' gasped Burton.
'Just stay out of it! The affair is none of your damned business!'
'What affair?'
'Don't play the innocent! I don't want to kill you, but I swear to you, if you don't keep your nose out of it, I'll break your fucking neck!'
'I have no idea what you're talking about!' protested Burton.
His head was shaken violently, causing his teeth to clack together.
'I'm talking about you organising forces against me! It's not what you're meant to be doing! Your destiny lies elsewhere. Do you understand?'
The creature rammed its forearm into Burton's face.
'I said, do you understand?'
'No! '
'Then I'll spell it out for you,' growled the stilt-man. Dragging Burton around, it slammed him against the wall, drew back its arm, and sent a fist crashing into the explorer's mouth.
'Do what-'
Again. Crack!
– you're supposed-'
Crack!
– to do!'
Burton sagged back against the bricks. He mumbled through split lips, 'How can I possibly know what I'm supposed to do?'
The fingers in his hair jerked him up until he was looking directly into the thing's eyes, which stared down, inches from his own. They burned redly, and Burton realised that his attacker was completely insane.
Blue flame leaped from the thing's head and licked at the explorer's brow, scorching his skin.
'You are supposed to marry Isabel and be sent from one fucking miserable consulship to another. Your career is supposed to peak in three years when you debate the Nile question with Speke and the silly sod shoots himself dead. You are supposed to write books and die.'
Burton braced his legs against the wall.
'What the hell are you babbling about?' he demanded, in a stronger voice. 'The debate was cancelled. Speke shot himself yesterday-but he's not dead!'
The creature's eyes widened.
'No!' it whispered. 'No!' It gritted its teeth and snarled, 'I'm a historian! I know what happened. It was 1864 not 1861. I know-'
A look of bemusement passed over its gaunt, horrible features.
'God damn it! Why does it have to be so complicated?' it whispered to itself. 'Maybe if I kill you? But if the death of just one person has already done all this-?'
Burton, feeling the fingers loosening, took his chance. He jerked his head free, shoved his shoulder into his attacker's stomach, then threw himself sideways.
The apparition teetered back to the opposite wall. It clutched at it for balance and glared at Burton as he regained his footing. They stood facing each other.
'Listen to me, you bastard!' snapped the creature. 'For your own good, next time you see me, don't come near!'
'I don't know you!' objected Burton. 'And, believe me, if I never see you again, I'll not regret it one iota!'
Lightning exploded from the apparition's chest and danced across the ground. The stilt-man cried out in agony, almost falling.
Suddenly, its wild eyes dimmed and Burton saw a brief glimmer of reason in them. It looked down at itself, then at him, and in low tones said, 'The irony is that I'm running out of time. You're in my way, and you're making the situation much worse.'
'What situation? Explain!' snapped the explorer.
The uncanny, spindly figure stepped forward and the irises of its eyes narrowed to pinpricks.
'Marry the bitch, Burton. Settle down. Become consul in Fernando Po, Brazil, Damascus, and wherever the fuck else they send you. Write your damned books. But, above all, leave me alone! Do you understand? Leave me the fuck alone!'
It crouched low, glared at him, and suddenly straightened its legs, shooting vertically into the air.
Burton twisted his head to look up. His assailant soared high above the top of the warehouses, and, in midair, vanished.
THE COMMISSION
Die, my dear doctor! That' s the last thing I shall do!
Great Scott, man!' exclaimed Lord Palmerston. 'What have you been up to now?'
Burton lowered himself gingerly into the chair before the prime minister's desk. His body was bruised; his right eye blackened; his lips cut and puffy.
'Just an accident, sir. Nothing to worry about.'
'You look perfectly hideous!'
You're a fine one to talk! thought Burton.
For the past two years, Palmerston had been receiving Eugenicist lifeextension treatments. Though seventy- seven years old, he currently had a life expectancy of about a hundred and thirty. To match this, he'd received a cosmetic overhaul. The loose skin of his face had been tightened, the fatty deposits removed, and the discolorations eliminated. Paralysing toxins had been regularly injected into the wrinkles on his forehead and around his eyes and mouth, smoothing them out and giving his face the clean contours of a young man-or, thought Burton, of a waxwork, because, in his opinion, the prime minister appeared to have wandered out of Madam Toussaud's. There was nothing natural about him; he was a shiny mockery of himself, a freakish caricature, his face too white and
