“Boo!” hooted someone close to Burton and his colleagues.
“In fact,” Kenealy continued, “he is actually a distant cousin of my client!”
“Hurrah!” yelled the man who'd just booed.
“Please spare a little of your time for Mr. Anthony Biddulph!”
Kenealy stepped down and a short, skinny man sporting a mustache and bushy side whiskers took his place at the Claimant's side.
“My friends,” Biddulph boomed, in a surprisingly powerful tone, “I could point out several English gentlemen who would not pass muster as English gentlemen any better-” he placed a hand on the Claimant's forearm “-than this man here does.”
Laughter and jeers from the crowd.
“For no matter the circumstances of their birth, they are apparently no better than farmers, and I would place Tichborne among that class.”
“Cor blimey! You ain't suggestin’ that aristos are stupid, are yer?” someone shouted.
The crowd cheered.
“I refer to the accusations that have been levelled at this man which suggest he can't be who he says he is because he seems uneducated. Well, let me tell you, I have heard of persons called English gentlemen who were so illiterate in conversations that you would take them to be nothing better than pig-jobbers!”
“There ain't nuffink wrong wiv a pig-jobber!” cried a voice. “I should know, I be one meself-an’ I hain't hilliterate neither!”
More laughter.
“Quite so!” Biddulph cried. “And this man is unique in his class in that he knows what it means to earn his daily crust!”
Long enthusiastic cheers erupted.
Biddulph stepped down.
“Tichbooooorne,” the Claimant rumbled, grinning vacantly. A string of drool swung from his lower lip.
Kenealy reappeared beside him. “You have all heard our enemies’ protestations!” he cried. “You all know that they refuse to believe that this man is Sir Roger Tichborne.”
“It's a conspiracy!” someone shouted.
“Precisely!” Kenealy agreed. “Precisely! I have here a former Carabineer who served at my client's side; slept in the same barracks; spent day after day in his company! Spare a moment, if you will, for Mr. James M'Cann!”
He removed himself from the podium again and was replaced by a burly individual, who, in a melodramatic tone, announced: “There's no doubt in my mind that the man who stands at my side, though rather stouter than previous-”
Loud guffaws all around.
“-is undoubtedly Roger Tichborne, or ‘Frenchy,’ as we used to call him. I recognised him the instant I saw him by his forehead, head, and ears.”
More laughter, cheers, and jeers.
“His ears I knew well by seeing him in bed every morning for two years.”
“Stuck out from under the blankets, did they?” came a distant voice.
Burton stood on tiptoe and looked back. The crowd had more than trebled in size since he and his friends had arrived.
“There is nothing extraordinarily particular about the ears that I know of,” M'Cann answered. “Only I knew ’em. I don't know if I could have recognised him from his ears if I had seen nothing else.”
A fresh outburst of raucous laughter rippled through the crowd. Cloth caps were thrown into the air.
Steam billowed over the gathering, rolling from east to west. The platform was momentarily obscured, and when Burton saw it clearly again, M'Cann had departed and Edward Kenealy was silencing the vast audience.
“Sir Roger Tichborne will now address you directly,” he proclaimed.
This was greeted by more cheering, which quickly gave way to an expectant silence.
The Claimant grinned, and drawled, “Cruelly persecuted is what I am. Yesss. There is but-one course I can- seeee, and that is to-to-to adopt the suggestion so many have made to me. Thus, I must a-appeal to you-the British public-for funds for my-my-my defence. Yesss. I appeal to you to help defend the weak against-against- against the strong.”
Burton looked down at Fidget in surprise. The hound was growling ferociously and all along his spine the hair was standing on end. The king's agent looked up and around. For the most part, the gathering seemed transfixed by the Claimant. Off to his left, though, it appeared that an argument was developing between a small group of gentlemen and the workers surrounding them. There were also-
Burton blinked and peered into the steam. Bismillah!
There were things moving in the ever-shifting white vapour!
“Look!” he hissed at his friends.
Unfortunately, Swinburne, Trounce, and Honesty were too short to see over the heads of the men surrounding them, so only Burton was aware that vague, wispy, and transparent figures were materialising among the crowd, dispersing then re-forming, glimpsed then instantly doubted. He could only see them from the corners of his eyes; the moment he directed his gaze full upon them, they seemed to melt away.
He rubbed a hand across his face, squeezed his eyes shut, and opened them again.
A sudden cry of pain came from one of the gentlemen off to the left.
“What was that? What's happening?” Trounce demanded.
“I insist-upon,” the Claimant declared, “fair play for-for every maaan!”
“A fight has broken out,” Burton answered. He started to shoulder his way toward the scuffle, with Fidget at his heels and Swinburne and the two police detectives following behind.
“I look-to the-the working classes!” the fat orator bellowed, his voice thick and slurred. “That noble part of the-the-the British public!”
The crowd loosed a deafening roar of approval.
Burton saw a top hat knocked from a head.
“Watch where you're bleedin’ well goin’, you stupid git!” a man spat as the king's agent pushed past.
“Them lawyers call me such baaad names, yesss,” the Claimant rumbled.
Burton nearly tripped over a body that lay sprawled on the grass. He looked down and saw a well-dressed youth whose nose had been badly bloodied. A brutish-looking older man, dressed in canvas trousers and a grimy cotton shirt, was in the act of swinging his booted foot into the prone youngster's side.
Burton pushed the assailant away.
“Get off him, man!”
“Oy! What's it to do wiv you?” came the aggressive response.
“Yeah, tell ‘im to keep ‘is toffee-nose out of it, Jeb!” another of the crowd added.
Swinburne bent to help the young gentleman to his feet but hiccupped, lost his balance, and pitched over on top of him.
“Oops!” he said.
The man pushed him aside, cast him a doubtful look, retrieved his dented top hat, scrambled to his feet, and backed away.
Trounce and Honesty positioned themselves at either side of the king's agent.
The man named Jeb stepped close to Burton until their noses were just inches apart and tried to stare him down.
“Are you an’ your pals gonna get in my way, chum?”
“My pals are from Scotland Yard,” Burton replied quietly, his sullen and intense gaze holding firm.
Jeb looked from Burton to Trounce to Honesty then back at Burton.
“Need the ladies’ protection, do yer? Can't take care o’ yerself, I suppose?”
“Ow!” Swinburne yelled.
Jeb looked down and saw a small basset hound with its teeth embedded in the little red-haired man's ankle. He looked up and saw Burton's knuckles. The punch caught him square between the eyes and he stumbled backward, with blood spraying from his nose, into one of his cohorts.
Trounce and Honesty swooped and grabbed him by the arms. He struggled, shouting incoherently.
