“It beats me.”
By midnight, Algernon Swinburne was staring at the spare bedroom's ceiling, wishing he could be rid of the sharp tang of brandy that burned at the back of his throat.
He couldn't sleep and the room seemed to be slowly revolving.
He felt strange-and it was something more than mere drunkenness.
He'd been feeling strange ever since Burton had mesmerised him.
Tonight, though, the strangeness felt… stranger.
He shifted restlessly.
Doyle, draped over the sofa, was breathing deeply and rhythmically, a sound not too far removed from that made by waves lapping at a pebble beach.
The house whispered as the day's heat dissipated, emitting soft creaks and knocks from the floorboards, a gentle tap at the window as its frame contracted, a low groan from the ceiling rafters.
“Bloody racket,” Swinburne murmured.
From afar came the paradiddle of rotors and the muffled blare of the police warning.
“And you can shut up, too!”
He wondered how much damage the riot had caused. There had been a great many acts of arson and vandalism, and beatings and murders, too.
“London,” he hissed. “The bastion of civilisation!”
He could hardly believe that the supposed return of a lost heir had developed into such mayhem.
He looked at the curtained window.
“What was that?”
Had he heard something?
It came again, a barely audible tap.
“Not a parakeet, surely! Not unless its beak is swathed in cotton wool! Good lord, what's the matter with me? I feel positively spooked!”
Tap tap tap.
“Go away!”
He experienced the horrible sensation that someone other than Doyle and himself was present in the room. It didn't frighten him-Swinburne was entirely unfamiliar with that emotion-but it certainly made him uneasy, and he knew he'd never sleep until he confronted it head-on.
“Who's there?” he called. “Are you standing behind the curtains? If so, I should warn you that I'm none too keen on cheap melodrama!”
Tap tap.
He sighed and threw the bed sheets back, sat up, and pushed his feet into the too-big Arabian slippers that he'd borrowed from Burton's room. He stood and lifted a dressing gown from the bedside chair, wrapped it around himself, and shuffled to the window. He yanked open the curtains.
Smoke and steam, illuminated by a streetlamp, were seething against the glass.
“Hasn't it cleared up yet?” the poet muttered. “What this city needs is a good blast of wind. I say! What's that?”
The fumes were thickening, forming a shape.
“A wraith? Here? What on earth is it up to?”
He pulled up the sash and leaned out of the window.
“What's the meaning of this? Bugger off, will you! I'm thoroughly fed up with phantoms! Go and haunt somebody else! I'm trying to sleep! Wait! Wait! What? My hat! Is that-is that you, Richard?”
The ghostly features forming just inches from his own were, undoubtedly, those of Sir Richard Francis Burton.
“No!” the poet cried. “You can't be dead, surely!”
His friend's faintly visible lips moved. There was no sound, but it seemed to Swinburne that the defensive walls Burton had implanted in his mind suddenly crumbled, and the noise of their destruction was like a whispered voice: Help me, Algy!
“Help you? Help you? What? I- My God!”
He stumbled backward away from the window and fell onto the bed.
The ghostly form of Burton had melted away.
He sat for a moment with his mouth hanging open, then sprang up, grabbed his clothes, and raced from the room. He thundered down the stairs and into the study.
“Herbert! Herbert! Wake up, man!”
“Eh?”
“Richard's in trouble! We have to find him!”
“Trouble? What trouble? How do you know?”
“I had a vision!”
The vagrant philosopher eyed the younger man. “Now then, lad, that brandy-”
“No, I'm suddenly sober as a judge, I swear! Get dressed! Move, man! We have to get going! I'll meet you in the backyard!
Spencer threw up his hands. “All right, all right!”
Swinburne somehow combined putting on his clothes with descending the stairs. In the main hallway, he snatched a leash from the hatstand, and continued on to the basement and out of the back door.
The poet crossed the yard and squatted down in front of Fidget's kennel.
“Wake up, old thing,” he urged, in a low voice. “I know you and I have our differences but there's work to be done. Your master needs us!”
There came the sound of a wheezy yawn followed by a rustling movement. The basset hound's head emerged. The dog stared mournfully at the poet.
“Your nose is required, Fidget. Here, let me get the lead onto you, there's a good dog.”
Swinburne clipped the leather strap onto the hound's collar then stood and said, “Come on, exercise time!”
Fidget dived at his ankle and nipped it.
“Ow! You rotter! Stop it! We don't have time for games!”
Spencer stepped out of the house, wearing his baggy coat and cap.
“Take this little monster!” Swinburne screeched.
“So where are we off to, lad?” the philosopher asked, grabbing Fidget's lead.
“Gallows Tree Lane.”
“It's past midnight the night of a riot! How do you expect us to get to bloomin’ Clerkenwell? Weren't it difficult enough gettin’ here from Fleet Street?”
“Follow me-and keep that mongrel away from my ankles!”
Swinburne walked to the back of the yard, opened the door to the garage, and passed through. “We'll take these,” he said, as Herbert stepped in behind him.
“Rotorchairs? I can't drive a blinkin’ rotorchair!”
“Yes you can. It's easy! Don't worry, I'll show you how. It's just a matter of coordination, which means if I can do it, anyone can.”
“An’ what about the dog?”
“Fidget will sit on your lap.”
“Oh, heck!”
Swinburne opened the main doors and they dragged the machines out into the mews. Despite his protestations, Spencer absorbed the poet's instructions without difficulty and was soon familiar with the principles of flying. It was only experience he lacked.
“Swans I'm happy with,” he grumbled. “They was born to it. But takin’ to the air in a lump o’ metal and wood? That's plain preposterous. How the blazes do these things fly?”
Swinburne nodded and grinned. “I felt the same the first time. It's the Formby coal, you see. It produces so much energy that even these ungainly contraptions can take to the air. I should warn you, though, Herbert, that there's a chance our enemy will cause them to cease working. We could plummet from the sky. All set, then?”
