“Forgive me if I don't thank you for that comment. So, do I look the part?”
“Muss up your hair a little bit more, Boss.”
Burton did so.
“Perfect.”
“Wait here, Herbert. I hope this won't take too long. It depends how drunk my wayward assistant is.”
He crossed the street, paused outside the tavern, pushed the door open, and entered.
The low-ceilinged interior was quite literally packed to the rafters with working men and women of the very lowest order, with, no doubt, thieves, murderers, and whores mixed liberally among them. They were drunk and boisterous, and many appeared glassy-eyed with something beyond alcoholic intoxication. A few were so far gone they were practically catatonic, standing motionless amid the cacophony with slack faces and eyes rolled up into their sockets.
He pushed his way through the laughing, shouting, singing, squabbling mob, feeling that, at any moment, a knife might be thrust between his ribs or a broken bottle mashed into his face.
“To hell with soddin’ aristocrats!” someone bellowed.
A roar of approval went up and Burton joined in, so as not to stand out.
“Ari-sto-craaats-” rasped a man beside him.
“Three cheers for Sir Roger!”
Burton cheered with them.
“Up with the working man!”
“Aye!” they yelled.
“Aye!” Burton shouted.
As he shoved through what looked to be a group of poorhouse workers, they broke out in song: “When the Jury said I was not Roger,
Oh! How they made me stagger,
The pretty girls they'll always think
Of poor Roger's wagga wagga!”
A wave of maniacal laughter greeted the verse. One man's guffawing turned into a loud, incoherent wail then cut off abruptly. He stood grinning stupidly, with spittle oozing down his chin.
“Pour more booze down the silly bugger's neck,” someone called. “That'll get ’is engine runnin’ again!”
“Aye!” shouted another. “Them what's not quaffin’ will end up in a coffin!”
This was greeted with more mirth and raised glasses.
Burton registered the paradox that those who were most inebriated were apparently also the ones who retained most of their wits. It confirmed that alcohol did, indeed, go some way to counter the effect of the Tichborne emanations.
He saw Swinburne, looking every inch the guttersnipe, squashed into a corner with a hollow-eyed, bespectacled, long-bearded individual.
“Oy! Nipper!” he roared. “Get yer arse over ’ere, yer little brat!”
“You tell ’im, mister!” A dirty-faced strumpet giggled, nudging him in the side. “Put the scamp over yer knee and give ’im a bloody good spankin’-an’ after that, you can do the same to me!”
Raucous laughter erupted around him. He joined in, and bawled, “Aye! An’ the flat of me hand ain't all you'll be a-hankerin’ after, is it? I has it in mind that you'll be a-wantin’ a bloody good roger, too-an’ I don't mean his nibs Tichborne!”
A deafening cheer greeted his gibe and, under cover of the clamour, raised tankards, and gleeful scoffing, he signalled Swinburne to join him.
The poet said something to his companion, stood, and pushed his way through to Burton's side. The king's agent thumbed toward the door, mouthing, “Let's get out of here!” then grabbed his assistant by the ear and dragged him through the pub and out onto the street.
“My ear!” the poet squeaked.
“Dramatic necessity,” Burton grunted.
They crossed the road and joined Spencer.
“How are you holding up, Algy?” the explorer asked.
Swinburne rubbed his ear and said, “Fine. Fine. What about that spanking?”
“You got quite enough of that outside Verbena Lodge. What's Doyle up to?”
“Drinking, drinking, and more drinking. He can really knock it back. I'm astonished he's still standing, and, as you know, I'm a past master in such endeavours. I really am very impressed. If it came down to a challenge, I'd-”
“Stop babbling, please.”
Burton wondered whether mesmerising the poet had been such a good idea. As he'd suspected, the consequential behaviour was proving unpredictable, Swinburne's verbosity being the most obvious symptom.
“He's on his way to a seance, Richard. It's at ten o'clock at 5 Gallows Tree Lane, on the outskirts of Clerkenwell, very close to the Literary Gentlemen's Unpublishables Club. You know the place-I believe you once went there with old Monckton Milnes. If I remember rightly, you wanted to consult their copy of The Seven Perilous Postures of Love by one of your obscure-or do I mean ‘obscene’?-Arabian poets. It's the club with the supposedly secret scroll of-”
“I know! I know!” Burton interrupted.
“My hat! Do you think they chose Gallows Tree Lane because of its name? Nice and morbid for summoning spirits!”
“Be quiet a moment, Algy. I need to think.”
“Very well. I shan't say another word. My lips are-”
Burton grabbed his assistant, whirled him around, pulled him close, clapped a hand over his mouth, and held him tightly.
“Herbert, would you say Doyle is my height?”
“Yus, more or less, but thinner.”
“Reach into the left pocket of my jacket, would you?”
Spencer, who had Burton's jacket draped over his arm, did as directed and pulled out the brown wig and false beard the king's agent had worn to Bedlam.
“A decent match, do you think?”
“I'd say so, Boss. P'raps his is a touch lighter in colour, but not by much.”
“Mmmph!” Swinburne added.
“Good. When Doyle comes out of that tavern, we're going to jump on him and exchange his jacket and hat for mine. Then I want you and Algy to drag him back to Montagu Place. Keep him there and under no circumstances let him go. Is that understood?”
“To the hilt.”
“Question him. He's intoxicated, so maybe he'll blab something of interest. Ask him about fairies.”
Swinburne squirmed wildly and managed to wriggle out of his grasp. The poet hopped up and down excitedly.
“Fairies? Fairies?” he squealed. “Fairies? What's his pet obsession got to do with anything?”
“Just ask him, Algy. See what he says.”
Spencer eyed Swinburne. “If he can get a word in edgeways.”
“Richard! Surely you don't intend to-”
“Yes, Algy. I'm going to that seance in the guise of Charles Altamont Doyle.”
S ir Richard Francis Burton was a master of disguise, but even he couldn't masquerade as another man so convincingly that his subject's friends and acquaintances would be fooled.
He stood on the doorstep of 5 Gallows Tree Lane, an approximation of Charles Doyle. The foppish jacket he wore was too tight, and while makeup from his pocket kit had hidden his scars and given his eyes and cheeks the appropriately gaunt cast of an addict, his pupils were almost black, whereas Doyle's were a pale and watery blue.
He was, therefore, feeling rather nervous when he knocked on the door.
It was dark now and the streets were quiet. The throbbing of a police rotorship pulsed through the air from
