Madman's Dance (Time Rovers #3)(14)

Fisher leaned back into the wooden chair. “If we do, it will look as if we’d forced him to testify to save Keats’ neck. It will only work if Flaherty comes forward voluntarily and we have evidence to substantiate his testimony.”



Which will never happen.

“Someone must have seen them in Whitechapel,” Alastair complained. “You can’t have…” he flipped through the pages again, “five Fenians in an alley accosting a man without someone noticing. And this coffin Keats mentions, where did that come from?”

“That is yet to be determined.”

“Why not put a knife into him, or beat him senseless like the last time?” Alastair persisted. “Why go to all the trouble of hauling him out of the city?”

“It is a puzzle,” Fisher replied. “I’ll put Ramsey on this tomorrow morning, but I doubt he’ll learn much. No one’s going to talk to save a member of the Yard, not when Flaherty’s involved.”

Alastair handed the correspondence to the chief inspector. “Where was this mailed?”

“Wapping. The postmark is from last night.”

Jacynda. When he’d encountered her in Wapping the previous evening, she’d just mailed a letter—perhaps this very one, which meant she knew where Keats was hiding. Had he told her of his alibi? Why hadn’t Keats shared this information with him first?

Fisher rose and tidied up the pages, putting them back into the envelope. He tucked it away inside his coat and then let his hands drop to his sides.

“I have held hope in my breast since this first happened, but every day makes it worse. There are even calls for my resignation.”

“You cannot resign,” Alastair protested. “Keats must have a champion.”

“That is all that keeps me in place.”

Alastair rose and offered his hand. “Thank you for sharing this information, Chief Inspector. I deeply appreciate your courtesy.”

They shook hands solemnly. “I felt of all people, you should know. Keats fought for you when it looked as if you had blood on your hands. I know you will do the same, even if I’m not there to help him.”



Fisher retreated down the stairs, his shoulders hunched, appearing older than his fifty-plus years. In his distraction, he’d left the spare chair behind—not like him at all.

What must it be like for the man? He’d painstakingly groomed Keats to take his place in the years to come. Now that dream was over, snuffed by the sergeant’s relentless drive to exceed his superior’s expectations, to make the grade. In his own way, Fisher had aided Keats in his destruction.

There are no winners here.

After he closed the door, Alastair sat next to the fire, trying to stave off the chill in his bones. His eyes drifted shut as he pulled Desmond Flaherty’s face from memory, letting the image flood through him, pushing through the shakes and the queasiness in his stomach. When the sensation faded, he studied himself in the small mirror above the basin.

The face of the anarchist stared back. He closed his eyes and shifted back into his own form. This time, the sensation wasn’t as bone-jarring. Instead, it felt right.

Until now, he’d never viewed the ability to go en mirage as a blessing, rather a blatant invitation to evil, a point Keats and he had argued repeatedly. He’d had no notion that the Transitives existed before Marda’s death. He had simply held the woman he loved while the ability crossed to him with her last breath. The Transitives had a name for it—the Rite de la Mort. His life had changed. That was many years ago and he’d steadfastly resisted the urge to indulge his “curse,” as he called it.

Alastair had risked his career and even his life to hold that line. In the end, the other Transitives had won.

But not for the reason they might believe.

~??~??~??~



Thursday, 25 October, 1888

Scotland Yard



“It’s a load of bollocks,” Inspector Ramsey fumed, tossing the papers on his superior’s desk with disgust. “Keats is a damned liar. Flaherty would cut his throat right off, not stuff him in some box and ship him across the country like a bunch of apples.”

Fisher retrieved Keats’ report, organizing it into a neat stack, unruffled by Inspector Ramsey’s outburst. “I know how much you detest the sergeant, but the fact remains he is one of us. To that end, you will conduct the most thorough investigation of your career. Do you understand?”

Ramsey’s face flushed with anger. “Sir, I—”

“What if this load of bollocks, as you call it, is the truth?”

Ramsey settled back against the chair. It gave a decided squeak at his weight.

“If he’s guilty…” The inspector paused and shook his head. “Bloody hell.”

“If he’s guilty, then that’s his fate. But by God, Ramsey, it just doesn’t feel right.”

“You’re too partial to the little bugger. It clouds your judgment.”

Fisher’s moustache twitched. “I admit it, I am partial to Keats, but that doesn’t explain why my gut has been in a knot since this started.”

Ramsey looked away, then down at his boots. “I…oh, shite,” he muttered under his breath. He looked up. “I don’t like it either, sir. It puts us all in a bad light. Keats is a swaggering little gnome, but he wants your job and he damned well won’t get it by strangling some pox-ridden tart.”