Madman's Dance (Time Rovers #3)(9)

“I do suspect the word execute is appropriate here.”

“Absolutely not. He says she pulled a gun on him.”

That wasn’t what he’d heard from Harter. The bullet in his friend’s chest had been courtesy of TPB’s henchman, though apparently they weren’t aware of it.

“You must recall her and Defoe immediately,” Davis ordered.

“We’ve lost contact.”

“Then perhaps we should amend Defoe’s RFW and make it Open Force. He is as much a threat as the other Rover,” Davies argued.

Morrisey’s temper flared. “Harter pioneered this technology. He is time travel. Without him, you wouldn’t have this job, Davies.”

“And I am grateful,” the man replied dismissively. “If you think you’ve gone unscathed, we will be drawing up charges for willfully disregarding our orders. If Defoe and Miss Lassiter return to 2057 immediately, we won’t file those.”

“She still goes to jail?”

“Of course, with time added on for her assault against a TPB employee. She’s up to three years and counting.”

No deal. “I really do not know where she is,” he repeated.

“Well, then, you’re in it deep, aren’t you?” Davies replied, a note of glee in his voice.

That pretty much summed it up.

~??~??~??~



Wednesday, 24 October, 1888

London

As Alastair neared the archway that led to the Metropolitan Police Headquarters, he felt he was crossing into another world. He always had that sensation. He’d not been in London in ’84 when the Irish anarchists had placed a bomb in the public restroom beneath Special Branch’s office, but he’d read the newspaper accounts. There had been many injuries, though fortunately no one had died. Now, as he walked toward that particular building, he wondered what it must have been like in the minutes after the bomb exploded. “What gall,” he muttered.



Would Flaherty attempt that again? Considering the three wagonloads of explosives the anarchist had stolen, he could bring down the entire building. If not for Keats’ keen sleuthing abilities, Flaherty would still be heavily armed.

In early October, Keats had noticed a wagon in Whitechapel and shrewdly deduced that underneath the casks of rum were hidden barrels of gunpowder. As usual, he’d been too eager. Though badly outnumbered, he’d confronted Flaherty and his men, refusing to wait for additional constables to make the arrest. Alastair could still hear the thud of the punches as they landed on his friend, the shouts from the onlookers, the two-tone police whistles shrilling in the night air.

In the end, the police had secured the wagon, but the cost had been unfathomable. The fight had left Keats with a broken rib and a brutal head injury, which rendered him incapable of shifting form. If Jacynda hadn’t treated him with whatever fantastic medicine they had in her time, he could easily have died. Now the Hero of Green Dragon Place, as Keats was once called, was reviled as a murderer. The two accounts did not square.

Once Alastair offered his calling card and explained the purpose of his visit, a constable trotted off to Chief Inspector Fisher’s office. Alastair chose a bench and settled there, resisting the urge to open the parcel and dig into the book. Hopefully, he would not be here long; he just needed to explain the events of the previous night and his involvement in the discovery of Hugo Effington’s body. Scotland Yard would expect such a report, if only to ensure they did not turn their eyes in his direction when it came to the murder.

The last time he’d been here he was full of hope, sure that the evidence he’d uncovered would overturn Keats’ arrest warrant. It had not come to pass, even though he had proved that his friend was too short to have murdered the Hallcox woman. The legal machinery, once in motion, was very hard to stop.

“Doctor?” the constable called, waving him up the stairs.



That came more quickly than expected. Alastair squared his shoulders and marched upward.

“Ah, Dr. Montrose,” Fisher greeted, rising from behind his desk. Keats’ superior was immaculate, his beard and moustache well groomed. He was always that way, no matter the time of day. The instant he saw Alastair’s ravaged face, he winced. “Please sit. We have some matters to discuss.”

The other man in the room wasn’t someone the doctor relished. Inspector Hulme, the local inspector in charge of the Hallcox murder investigation, eyed him glumly.

“Doctor,” he muttered.

Alastair nodded in reply. Fisher leaned forward, his eyes full of morbid curiosity. “You are definitely singed around the edges, Doctor.”

“To be blunt, it was a hellish night.”

“So I hear,” Fisher replied. “I must thank you for coming to us. You were not at your boarding house this morning, and your landlady was unsure of your location.”

“I stayed the night with Dr. Bishop. I was too exhausted to return to my own bed.”

“I see. Do tell us what happened, will you?”

Alastair related the evening’s events, or at least the parts he thought the police might accept. Telling them that Miss Lassiter was actually from the future would only earn him ridicule and render his other testimony suspect. He hardly believed it himself at times.

“What of the fire itself?” Fisher quizzed.