The Map of the Sky (Trilogía Victoriana #2)(162)

“Yes, he escaped down a drain hole,” said Murray.

“Good, we’re exactly where we wanted to be!” exclaimed Clayton, who, during what to me was Murray and Wells’s incomprehensible exchange, had been pacing obsessively round the office, inspecting everything. “There couldn’t be a more ideal venue for our plan.”

“What plan, Inspector?” Murray asked. “If my memory serves me correctly, our plan was to flee London.”

“It was, Mr. Murray, it was,” replied the young man, jabbing a finger at him. “However, the paths we choose don’t always take us where we want to go. Sometimes they take us where we need to go.”

“Would you mind getting to the point, Inspector?” said Wells, before we all lost our patience.

Clayton nodded and gave a sigh, as though our continual demands were beginning to weary him.

“Naturally I was referring to the plan I devised while those adorable children were leading us here,” he replied, beckoning us over while he glanced warily at the door. Once we had gathered round him, intrigued, Clayton raised his metal hand, pulling back his sleeve with the other one, like a magician wanting to prove he had no aces hidden up there. “Observe. This hand contains a bomb powerful enough to destroy the whole room if detonated.”

The rest of us exchanged startled looks, wondering whether the inspector was intending to blow us all up forthwith, to spare us any possible suffering.

“Oh, don’t worry. My plan isn’t to kill you,” he reassured us. “My hand also has a smoke capsule built into the forefinger. When the Envoy arrives, I’ll unscrew it, creating a smoke screen that will allow you to escape. Once you’re safely out of the room, I’ll detonate the bomb, killing the Envoy and myself.”

A stunned silence descended on the room. In the end it was Murray who broke it, capturing everyone’s bewilderment in a single question.

“Are you out of your mind, Clayton?”

“On the contrary, Mr. Murray,” the inspector replied, unruffled.

Murray having opened the way, we all began expressing our doubts about this monstrous idea.

“For the love of God . . .”

“He’s not serious, is he, Bertie?”

“Did he say he’s going to create a smoke screen?”

“Of course he isn’t, Jane. Honestly, Clayton, this is hardly the time for jokes!”

“I’m afraid he did, sir. And in my humble opinion, I don’t think it’s—”

“And he’s going to sacrifice himself in order to kill the Envoy?”

“—a very good idea, because the smoke will get in our eyes and—”

The inspector suddenly raised his hands.

“Quiet, everyone! You heard me. I’ll explode the bomb, killing the Envoy and myself instantly,” he repeated, with an alarming display of disregard for his own life.

“But what about the guards in the passageway?” asked Murray, seemingly unmoved by Clayton’s proposed act of altruism.

Clayton addressed Shackleton.

“You’ll take care of them, won’t you, Captain?” he said. Shackleton opened his mouth, but did not know how to respond to the inspector’s exaggerated confidence in him. “If you move quickly enough, you can surprise them before they have time to transform themselves, which will make it easier to overpower them. They don’t amount to much as humans, I’ve noticed. I suppose Mr. Murray, Mr. Winslow, and the coachman . . . and even Mr. Wells can help you. After that you have to lead them all out of the sewers.”

“For God’s sake, Clayton!” Wells interjected, with a mixture of anger and frustration. “Have you forgotten your colleague at Scotland Yard? There must be at least five or six of those monsters out there . . . possibly more. What chance does Captain Shackleton have against them, with or without our help?”

“You’ll just have to be quick,” the inspector replied, shrugging his shoulders, as though this part of the plan wasn’t his concern and he was doing us a special favor discussing it. “Remember, the element of surprise will work in your favor: the Martians won’t be expecting you to break out of here; you’ll catch them off guard. However, I don’t think the difficulty of the plan lies in these details, do you? Not if you consider the role I’ll be playing,” he concluded, slightly dismayed.

Wells, Murray, and Shackleton sighed as one. Harold shook his head in the same way he might if Clayton had worn the wrong suit to a reception. The women seemed on the verge of tears or hysterical laughter. I simply stared at the inspector, bewildered. Part of me wanted to believe in him: wasn’t this what I’d been longing for from the moment I discovered the captain in my uncle’s basement, what I’d tried to argue for in the face of the others’ skepticism: a plan that would halt the invasion? Yes, and here it was. At last, our path had been mapped out for us . . . but another part of me, the supposedly rational, intelligent part, was protesting loudly that this couldn’t be the long-awaited plan, that we would quite simply be placing ourselves in the hands of a maniac if we did what Clayton suggested.

“Forgive me, Inspector,” I intervened, attempting to clarify things a little, praying that Clayton’s plan only appeared impractical on the surface, and that by digging deeper we’d discover the genius behind it, “but what good will come of killing a few Martians in the sewer when there’s a powerful army up there, doubtless invading the entire planet as we speak?”