Imperial Clock

CHAPTER Fifteen

Descent, Ascent



Nude, knees folded up to her chin as she sat on a wicker chair, Meredith stared long and hard at the empty pin-striped suit bespattered with blood on her bed. Denton’s suit. It couldn’t harm her in any way, but it was the most dangerous thing she’d ever had in her possession. The way it draped over the edge of the quilt, expensive, disembodied, seemed symbolic in a thousand different ways. It was the ghost of the man whose death she’d caused. It was mankind, faceless and threatening. It was the husband she didn’t have, maybe never would have. It was the mystery man stealing her sister away. It was the utmost apparel, the man’s suit, that no one in the world looked down upon, worn by kings and politicians and the heads of secret orders. It kept women in their place, a symbol of power and masculinity. It was the empire itself, a beautiful, carefully designed thing that appeared seamless until you looked closer—it was stitched together, and those stitches could be undone. It was her absentee father. It was the role she and Sonja had had to assume themselves, without real guidance these past years. And it was the figure she would always have to look out for, watching over her shoulder, suspecting her of last night’s shocking murders.

The empty suit, bespattered with blood, would haunt her forever.



It was late when Sonja telephoned, well after the last of the anti-conscription demonstrators had been carted away in irons from their last stand against the fence outside Vincey Park, not half a block from Meredith’s apartment. They’d been dispersed from Downing Street, where Prime Minister Pinder had declared them “cowardly insurrectionists”. Then they’d rallied in their hundreds on Bond Street, in defiance of the proposed military draft to replenish the empire’s depleted troops in West Africa, where the Coalition had renewed its campaign to destabilise the Leviacrum’s stranglehold. A bloody confrontation with police on Bond Street had scattered the demonstrators, but pockets of protestors had set up camp in other public places across London. They had not lasted long. The extinguishing influence of the Leviacrum Council was akin to a loyal, ravenous dog unleashed upon command.

“I wanted to ring you yesterday,” Meredith said, “but it got too late, and I didn’t want to upset you, you know, with things being so fragile with Derek.”

“What do you mean, upset me?”

“It’s about Aunt Lily—she’s in hospital.”

“Why?”

“I’m not quite sure how to say this, Sonja, but she’s not—” No, it wouldn’t do to say any more over the telephone. Someone might be listening in. “She was stabbed.”

“No! Is it serious?”

“Not life-threatening. She’ll recover. But there’s more—Cathy was shot, during the same robbery, and she’s in worse shape. A number of other people were killed.”

“How awful. Have you been to visit them?”

“Not yet. The police are being rather tight-lipped about the whole thing. A detective came to see me yesterday, said Aunt Lily and Cathy are receiving the best of care, but he wouldn’t tell me where they’re being looked after.”

“Damned odd. What reason did he give?”

“That they’re the only living witnesses, and they might be able to identify the swine that did it. Their whereabouts need to be kept secret.” To protect a bigger secret.

“Yes, that’s good. Stash them out of harm’s way. Do you think I should come to London? You’ve no one there with you. I should really be there.”

“I’m all right, really. Donnelly’s been a godsend, checks up on me every chance he gets. Let’s just wait and see what happens.”

“All right. If you say so, Merry. But I still wish I was there.”

One of those frustrating pauses took root, so Merry decided to change the subject. Ending the call so soon would be unthinkable. She’d felt so vulnerable in her empty apartment, so reclusive since the incident. Sonja’s voice smuggled in the safest tones of home. “Have you spoken to Derek yet?”

“I have.” A blast of either rage or bonhomie echoed through the receiver. “The fool proposed. Can you believe that?”

Meredith let out the last inkling of the breath she’d held, before slumping, chin-on-collar, into the abyss she’d teetered over for the past two days and nights. The tenterhooks had slipped, her last hold on the family she’d known was lost, and she was utterly, eternally on her own. “He did?” More than just on her own; she was unwanted, superfluous, obsolete.

Stop being so bloody selfish.

“His family were dead against it, told him so, the rotters. They even said it outright to me, to my face, in the most evil ambush you’ve ever heard of, at their house this morning.”

“They sound monstrous.”

“They are. Oh, they are. You’ve no idea. But the strangest thing happened just now, and I tell you what: it’s all going ahead. The engagement, the wedding, with the blessing of Derek’s family. I couldn’t believe it when Mrs. Auric showed up with Derek, not an hour ago, to give me the news. I’d given the whole thing up for dead this morning after the set-to I had with the old man. Oh, you’d have been so proud of me, Merry—they tried roughing me up, the lot of ‘em, but I bided my time and then gave ‘em hell, full triple-deck broadside, right where it hurt. Even booted an old heirloom into the fire. Ha! Ha! You’d have laughed till you wet yourself.”

“You...really made an impression, then. How on earth did they come around after that?”

“Mrs. Auric—Derek’s mother—said enough was enough when Derek vowed to never clap eyes on any of them again. The ruckus reached white heat, by the sounds of it. She’s not normally like that, though, never so much as raises her voice in anger, so it tells you how volcanic the whole scene must have got. Anyway, to cut a long story short, the old man came out with his big secret in the nick of time. He’s up for the draft soon, and rather than see his family split for good, he reluctantly gave his blessing to the engagement. It really would have been a scandal if Derek had cut the family loose altogether and we’d eloped on our own. At least this way the Aurics still have their successful son. The old man must really have thought he could talk Derek out of it. Tried his darnedest to pull it off, right to the bitter end, but it back-fired. I gather he hadn’t expected me to make such a passionate show of it, and it impressed him no end. Derek said that tipped his decision, but if you ask me the old man’s wife squaring up to him like that shook him to the core. I wish I’d have seen it.”

“Me too.”

“Yes. Oh and by the way, the School Board made its decision. They cleared Challender on all counts of misconduct. Can you believe that? The oaf got away scot free.”

“Idiots. He wants shooting. And Derek?”

“Cleared of misconduct, on account of he did keep everyone alive. But they objected strongly to his relationship with me. Hinted that it had been going on well before the Lake District. I don’t know where they got that idea from—Challender’s my guess, or Dorcas Henshall. Derek did kiss me once under the tarp that night. Apparently they would have suspended him for it but they didn’t have enough evidence, and anyway we’re both out of SHG for good. So it’s turned out well.”

“Good news on all counts.”

“Uh-huh. So, we’re on for the engagement, a full tarted-up party at Auric Manor, the works. It’s all happened so quickly I’m expecting whip-lash any second now. Check your neck too, Merry. That’s horrible what’s happened there, and so out-of-the-blue like that. Will the detective let you know when it’s safe to visit Aunt Lily? And Cathy?”

“He said someone will be in touch. And Donnelly will keep tabs on the investigation for me.”

“That’s good. He must come to the engagement party as well. He’s been a treasure.”

“Well, I’ll...I’ll ask him.”

“And you must tell me how your investigation is coming along. So much news, eh? All at once. We McEwans never do anything by halves, do we?”

“I’ll say.”

“Well, it’ll have to be good-night for now, Merry. Derek’s still here. I left him in the other room. We have rather a lot to talk about.”

“Of course. Hey, congratulations, you! We’ll talk more tomorrow.”

“Yes, let’s. Bye, Merry.”

Meredith waited until her sister had hung up, then whispered, “Farewell, Sonja.”



Over the following days, she saw little of her apartment. It tried to stifle her somehow. Its gloomy twilit funk threatened to slowly and inexorably turn her into a festering zombie spinster. A character in one of Sonja’s penny dreadfuls had ended up that way, unwed and undead, given to stalking and even eating the men who’d turned her down over the years. Well, Meredith was too young to resort to that, but her growing aversion to the domestic, fuelled by glorious hell-for-leather bicycle rides through Vincey Park, along the Thames Embankment, through Hyde Park, and once or twice into the boroughs, left her both exhausted and imbued at the end of each day.

It was also a time for making physical changes, anything that smacked of newness, reinvention. Having her hair cropped to a bob was the first, though the novelty quickly wore off because women weren’t supposed to venture outside without hats. Propriety. The more she observed the corset-centric fashions on parade in the parks, up and down shopping arcades, in every single women’s clothing store without fail, the more absurd it all seemed. It was as though choice itself, rammed down her throat by material society since she’d learned to walk, had been a placebo all along, an illusion. So she began to peruse foreign clothing brochures, not for the fashions, but for the items that caught her eye, made her feel...different...special.

She drew her weekly allowance and spent most of it the same day, on an ankle-length brown leather frock-coat from Germany, a black lace blouse and a pair of tan, tight-fitting, bell-bottom denim trousers from California, riding boots a la Lady Skyhawk, a half-size top hat with a large silver buckle, and the most exciting beige leather gloves with oversized sleeves she could find. Two of everything.

The first time Donnelly saw her in her full get-up, and specifically her denims from the rear when she modelled without her frock-coat, he spat his tobacco onto the grass, in complete shock. He then spent several amusing minutes trying to dissuade her from staying out in public dressed like that. All rather sarcastic and tongue-in-cheek.

The southeast corner of Vincey Park was the most exposed to prying eyes. Trees were scarce except for a line of silver birches accompanying the main path. But it was the flattest, and also the grassiest section, with a large open area popular with picnickers at weekends, perfect for what Donnelly had in mind. For today he was living up to a promise he’d made the first time they’d met, on board the Boadicea. Today he would teach her the art of fly-mech, a popular field sport across the Channel.

“It’s yet to catch on over here.” He unpacked a brass and leather harness from the kit, tested its various straps and spring mechanisms, then motioned it at her midriff. “May I?” Meredith assented, fighting back a hot flush as he delved inside her coat, almost cheek to cheek—his Eau de Cologne mixed with the smell of tobacco was an inspired combination, almost her undoing. He fastened the harness belt around her waist. “If that’s too tight, let me know.”

“No, it’s...just right.” No man had been this close to her before without receiving a smack, and she didn’t want him to move, unless it was to her lips, which she licked in anticipation, in vain. Donnelly was a married man, an honourable man. But damn it, how could a man this enticing and intoxicating be the exclusive property of one woman? It wasn’t natural. It wasn’t fair.

“There you are—all fixed—”

She kissed him as he rose—an unplanned peck on the lips she immediately apologized for. “Oh my God. I didn’t mean to—that was horrid of me. I’m so sorry.”

After a quick moment of surprise, he gave a polite, amused smile. “Not horrid, no. Quite the contrary. If I were ten years younger and didn’t have this...” He held up his wedding finger, caressed the ring, “...I might be a different story. But I wouldn’t want to give you the wrong idea.”

“No, of course not. I didn’t mean to—hell, I don’t know what I meant. Can’t we forget it ever happened?”

“Already forgotten.”

That stung more than it reassured, but he was being a gentleman about it, and that had to be that. “So, about this fly-mech...”

“Yes, about the fly-mech. Okay, maybe not quite as disarming as a kiss, but you have to exercise caution whenever you use this apparatus. It’s already been banned in several schools in France because students aren’t just using it for sport, they’re fighting duels, Joute du Cuivre, honest-to-God duels, like in the old days. You see, the greater the spring tension, the faster the projectile will fly—it can get very dangerous.” And he went on to demonstrate, with his own rig, how to use the contraption for the various sports.

In essence it was a kind of spring-loaded catapult for firing different projectiles. When more than one person took part, playing catch with light cork balls worked best, but you had to be fearless as the fly-mech could fling the ball harder than a batsman could hit a six.

First you loaded the projectile into the grooved accelerating barrel, which curved in a rapid S shape around the front of your waist and then onto the length of your arm. You held the end of the barrel in place at arm’s length by gripping a sort of cushioned stock handle.

Cranking the hydraulic spring mechanism on your belt panel decided how much velocity you could generate. To aim, you adjusted the telemetry by raising or lowering your fly arm before you began the cranking. Then the S shape was locked. The rest was about body position. When you were ready to shoot, you gripped the handle located at your hip and pressed the trigger. The jolt of release knocked her off balance until she learned to widen her stance.

You caught the ball with padded leather glove. Donnelly was a good catcher. Meredith? Not so good. But her strength lay in her aim. Straight-shot duelling involved a kind of cat and mouse battle of wits, using obstacles such as trees or bushes to sneak up your opponent and fire at him. The first hit won. Ideally duellists were supposed to wear padded jackets, and use balls that left an undeniable mark—coated with dye, say—but Donnelly had only brought soft balls. He won the first three duels, whereafter Meredith beat him every time, her aim improving dramatically with each shot. She suspected he let her win, but she milked the victories nonetheless.

When it was time for him to leave, he collapsed her harness and belt and packed them, along with all her fly-mech accessories, into a special wooden valise he’d had inscribed with her initials.

“Thank you. That’s lovely.”

He kissed her cheek with such simple honesty it almost made her cry. She knew it was a farewell kiss, and she couldn’t face losing another treasured person from her life today. “Just remember, safety first,” he said.

“Yes.”

“Good, good. Well then, I’m off. I’ve a new client pestering me six ways from Sunday—the sooner I crack the case, the sooner she stops cracking the whip. Take care of yourself, Meredith.”

“Donnelly?”

“Hmm?”

“Will you call on me sometime? Just to see how I’m getting on? I’d hate for us to be strangers.”

The contents of his own bag clattered as he slung it over his shoulder. “Don’t you worry about that. It’s not every day a private investigator gets out-meddled by his own client, even if she did go and stir up a bleedin’ hornet’s nest. If there’s any further word from Scotland Yard about you-know-what, I’ll be sure to pass that along. And if you ever need my help, for anything, I’ll be there.”

“Thank you.”

“Look after yourself, Lady Skyhawk. Give my regards to Swanny when you see her.”

“I will. And my best to your family.”

With that they parted. Meredith’s vision misted as she watched him leave.

After wiping her eyes, she went straight back to her apartment to drink as much sherry as she could until she passed out or her world was set to rights again, whichever came first.

She didn’t get that chance. Another gentleman caller was waiting on the front step outside her apartment. He spun a letter in his hands, and leapt to his feet, startled, when he recognised her in her new attire. He’d grown rather dashing since the last time she’d seen him, and was well-groomed to boot.

The gentleman was William Elgin. The letter was from her father.



My dearest Meredith,

Forgive me for not writing to you directly. The official courier channels are being watched, and I would not have my whereabouts known to anyone outside the expedition, save Messrs Sorensen, Elgin, and Tangeni, whom you will by now have guessed I hold in the highest regard. I trust no other to deliver this letter to you, and nor have I disclosed any geographical names in it. Suffice it to say my fellow travellers and I have arrived at our remote destination, though not without considerable hardships—two of our number were killed by natives en route, and a further five have contracted a wicked, though thankfully curable, fever.

There is every indication that our way into Subterranea remains unchanged since the last expedition. If all goes as planned, we shall have begun our descent by the time you read this. It is a most remarkable thing, to be faced by the ancient perils of this vast, unexplored underworld and yet, even as I look upon our light-starved point of ingress, to feel somehow at home. As it was the last time, the closer I venture to the secret I am certain lies deep within, the closer I feel to your mother, whose very essence exists all around me here. If I should find a civilisation in Subterranea, she will have led me there. And if not, I will return until I find it. This I have sworn.

How are you, Meredith? Word has reached me that you’ve moved to London for a spell. I’m glad you’re spreading your wings, my dear, and hope you find it exciting there. But I worry for your safety when the inevitable civil unrest spills on to the streets as a result of several radical political reforms the Leviacrum is said to be pushing through Parliament. You may have heard of them by now. The first is a mandate for military conscription to be effected whenever the powers-that-be deem it warranted, and not, as was previously the case, only during wartime.

Consider the implications of that. Anyone, man or woman, can be called into service at any time, answerable only to whomever is pulling the strings of power. It is the most radical move yet by the Leviacrum Council, which there can be no doubt now controls the empire itself. It will make slaves of us all before it is finished, and its scientific “utopia” will spread to all corners of the globe. I fear Subterranea may soon be the last free realm anywhere, and therefore when the time is right, should I find a hidden civilisation, I will have no choice but to warn it of the danger of intercourse with the world above.

I would not tell you any of this in a letter were my concerns for your safety not urgent. My advice is to return to Southsea as soon as you are able. From there at least you will be able to gauge the happenings in London from a place of safe remove, and take whatever action is necessary to avoid the shockwaves that will surely spread.

Listen to your Aunt Lily; she speaks for me on all matters. Learn from Lady Catarina, who has been a good friend to your mother and I for years, and who knows a great deal more than I about London and its politics. And finally, be supportive of your sister during this important time for her. I like Derek Auric very much from what I’ve seen and heard of him, and whatever happens between them, they have my deepest blessings.

Have you found anyone in London, Meredith? I think of it often, and I’m confident you will find happiness when you least expect it. Somewhere out there is a young man worthy of my lovely eldest daughter. Will he have the courage to declare himself, I wonder?

The sun is starting to set here, and we have to see to the camp’s defences before nightfall. So I must leave you here, with the promise to return home sometime next year. Whatever the outcome of my expedition, seeing my two brave daughters again will have made it all worthwhile.

With love, always—

From Subterranea,

Father



P.S. It is probably best that you destroy this letter after reading, lest unsavoury eyes discover it.



Their taxi made its turn onto Cromwell Road as she refolded the letter after reading it for the third time. She stuffed it in the inside pocket of her coat. London’s Natural History Museum loomed ahead. Though dwarfed by the more popular and newly expanded Science Museum, the NHM held Britain’s most famous exhibit, the giant baryonyx, which was the focus of this month’s gala exhibition. A red carpet laid over the stone steps up to the NHM’s entrance was packed with ticket holders, a few hundred at least, while massive red and brown banners flapping from the upper balcony read, A PREHISTORIC JOURNEY—Brave the Real Perils of the Age of the Dinosaurs. Ticket Holders Only. Parental Caution Advised.

William paid the driver and escorted Meredith to the back of the queue. Wherever she turned, quizzical gazes leeched her rebellious glow until she’d rather they look elsewhere and ignore her bold new apparel altogether. But they didn’t stop looking, and after a while she stopped looking to see who was looking. She engaged William instead, who hadn’t said much since inviting her here from her front step. “Did you know my sister’s engaged to be married?”

“No. No, I didn’t.” He seemed genuinely surprised. “Is it to her teacher—the one from the Steam Fair?”

“It is. Derek Auric’s his name. He recently won a prestigious apprenticeship in the Leviacrum tower.”

“I know.”

“How do you know?”

The queue started advancing, so tightly packed that everyone had to take penguin steps or else clip the heels of the person in front. Meredith and William relinquished their tickets at the door and he led her inside, following the course of the carpet but at an appreciable distance from the crowd. He stopped under the windows, where he finally answered her question at a whisper: “I know all about you and Sonja, and what happened to you in the Atlas tunnels the other night.”

She considered him for a moment, his acquaintances, the fact that Father had entrusted him with her letter. “You’re Coalition, aren’t you.”

He disguised his affirmation by nodding up at the flying reptile exhibits, enormous monsters with elongated beaks and wing-spans of about forty feet. A flash of recognition seemed to make him shudder. He looked away. “Welcome aboard, Miss McEwan.”

“Don’t be glib. I know very well I was to blame for what happened, and I know they can never forgive me. But are they truly all right—Aunt Lily and Cathy?”

“Safe and both on the mend. They’re both important players in the social scene in London, so the Leviacrum Council has gone to great lengths to look after them. Your aunt’s an absolute master at recruiting new talent, and so is Lady Catarina. They can sniff out a person’s loyalties from across the room, or so I’m told. Which is why they’re never away from social functions.”

“I see. And while they’re ostensibly recruiting talent for the Leviacrum, they’re really creating Coalition agents, spies?”

“Exactly,” he said. “And those agents might not even know they’re Coalition agents. They go about their Leviacrum business, maybe working their way up the hierarchy, and all the while their every move is followed, their telephone conversations recorded, their contacts put under surveillance, etcetera.”

“A grubby little business.”

“Yes, and it works both ways, of course. The Leviacrum has infiltrated the Coalition from the beginning as well. We don’t know how high up they’ve reached. But it’s doubtful they have anyone as successful as your aunt, or Cathy. When you turned up that night, they were guests of the first eight of that particular sect, invited to sit in on the monthly meeting, to discuss recruitment. People like Connorwyle Denton, Sybil Aames, John Patrick Smythe, Ardet Ibn Zishan: all noted high-ups in the Atlas organisation, almost members of Council itself. Now they’re all dead, and Cathy and your aunt had a narrow escape. Your little stunt has had the rats investigating their own maze, trying to figure out how the raiders got in, who told them how to get in. You’re certain no one saw your face?”

“No one who still lives.” Her turn to shudder.

“You cut your hands and feet on the glass, didn’t you?”

“Yes. Why?”

“It’s nothing. They have samples of your blood, that’s all. From the carpet as you were leaving, the walls of the stairwell, and from the magnetic sled. They know someone fled the fight that way. For all they know, it was a bunch of raiders. But they’re now extremely paranoid about any documents that may have been stolen. One item in particular—”

“Denton’s device, the miniature document reader. You can have it if you like. Cathy only gave it me to keep safe, and I haven’t even looked at it. I promise.”

“Don’t be so jumpy. We’re on the same side, remember? I’ll escort you to your apartment later—you can give it to me then.”

“You’re welcome. But just so you know, you’d be jumpy, too, Billy boy, if you’d been through what I went through.”

“I dare say.”

She stepped in front of him. “I dare say, I dare say? Who are you trying to be now? One minute you’re from Manchester, the next it’s Norway, now you’re a full-blown toff. Make up your mind!”

“Sshh!”

“Don’t you sshh me.”

Taking her by the arm, he grunted and said, “Come with me,” before finding them a place in the busy thoroughfare. “The pterosaurs up there are called Hatzegopteryx.”

“Huh? Oh yes, I almost forgot, you were there to see firsthand—”

William’s elbow in her side made her wince. She snarled, “Do that once more and I’ll bite a chunk out of you myself.”

“Say, that doesn’t sound entirely disagreeable,” said a tall young man over her shoulder. He wore a lopsided beret and a tartan cloak, and had very long blond hair. He winked at her when she peered back. “I’ve been watching you,” he said. “A hundred pounds is yours if you’ll leave this sour half-pint and spend the night with me instead.”

“Excuse me?”

“That is one enticing ensemble—enough to make any man pocket his wedding ring for the night. Whatever he’s paying you, I’ll triple it, or one hundred pounds.”

“Are you smogged? What do you think I am?”

“Delectable, miss.”

“Well, I’d rather get cosy with Hat-shop-chops-chips up there. Now go away before I set Half-Pint on you. You’ve been warned.”

“Two hundred.”

“Go away.”

“Three?”

“William,” she raised her voice and the man stopped to let several people pass him. A smart move, too, as William, for his age, was built like a brick outhouse and had already proved he didn’t shy away from a fight.

“What is it?”

“I was just wondering...what these are called...the little bipeds with bright feathers?”

“Dromaeosaurus,” William replied. “They’re scavengers, pack hunters, and they have a bloody strong bite. Very nasty.”

“Then they’re a species of Southsea Pub Crawler.”

He sprouted a cute grin. “You’ve clearly never been to Manchester, then.”

“Do I want to?”

“Not dressed like that you don’t.”

Meredith mock-punched his arm. “Not you as well. For a prehistoric adventuress I think I’m dressed rather appropriately.”

“So does every slobbering male animal here tonight.”

“Yourself included, Dino Boy?”

He cleared his throat, adjusted his collar as they approached the entrance to the baryonyx exhibit, which, even from a distance, had punters playfully clinging to one another, chuckling in giddy terror. Imitation lightning flashes, thunder rolls, ground-quaking thumps meant to signify monstrous steps, the dinosaur’s gruelling, ear-piercing roars simulated all too convincingly through loudspeakers: it was a show worth the ticket price, whatever William had paid.

Meredith jumped out of her skin as they brushed through a artificial grass thicket and the colossal jaws of a full-sized baryonyx thrust out over their heads, about fifteen feet from the ground. It gave off an almighty roar. Though William snatched a laugh, he began to sweat. She watched him closely. She saw defiance, desperation, a sharp edge. In his eyes blazed the nightmares ripped forth from his adolescence, a flash of unshielded terror with which no one else on Earth had ever had to contend. He’d been a boy of eleven when he’d faced the two baryonyx in the Cretaceous Period. The only child. Now he pretended amusement the way a survivor of a traumatic sea disaster might, years later, tremulously smile at his children playing tug-of-war with a life-belt on a ferry across the Channel.

The exquisite mechanical monster, moulded into an exact replica of its living counterpart, reared and swivelled its enormous crocodilian head, and scrabbled at the air with its claws. It slid forward and back on some sort of track hidden by the undergrowth. An impressive steam-powered creation. Even the steam itself was utilised in the staging of the prehistoric environment, venting from craters in the volcanic terrain.

Next was the actual baryonyx skeleton, protected by a reinforced pane of glass. It stood on its own, without need for props or effects. One look at its dimensions, and its frightening hunting posture—those long, clawed hands, those titanic jaws—was enough to make her thankful elephants were the largest land animals in the twentieth century.

The tour continued in the aquarium section, where something called Liopleurodon awaited. But William had clearly unearthed enough painful memories for one night, and suggested they leave the crowd and sneak upstairs instead, to take in the African exhibition as a tribute to her father’s adventure. Oh yes? And it had nothing to do with the fact that William had fancied her for years and this was an excuse to spend some time alone with her?

Or maybe her new apparel had gone to her head.

“Take a seat,” he said upstairs, motioning at a bench opposite the miniature hot air balloon display. It was a detailed tableau housed in a large glass case, depicting the famous Kennedy-Ferguson East African expedition of 1863, complete with a working hydrogen balloon visitors could control by means of brass knobs for the direction of air currents and a cord for the height of the balloon.

Dim light on this floor, the third, told her it was off-limits, but William wasn’t fazed, so nor would she be. “I’ve been wondering, how exactly do you figure in the Coalition, William? You can’t be more than seventeen, eighteen.”

“Seventeen. I’m still learning the ropes, not much more than a courier for the time being. Professor Sorensen doesn’t want me getting mixed up in the fighting until I’ve graduated university.”

“Which university is that?”

“Oxford. I start next year—European History.”

“Congratulations. History, though? I would have thought, with Sorensen for a mentor—”

“I know.” For some reason the observation tickled him. “Ironic, ain’t it? Two science professors to take after, and I’m still an absolute duffer at math. But history’s a more useful subject than people realise. The past is where we learn the most about ourselves. If you think about it, every mistake has already been made. A study of history is a study of how to conduct ourselves, and how not to conduct ourselves. Politicians would do well to learn from it.”

“Nicely put. But since when did you become eloquent, William Elgin? If I recall, you could barely untie your tongue in Niflheim.”

He gazed at her now with steady admiration, as an equal. The answer was in his composure, his newfound confidence, and he didn’t feel the need to verbalise it. It satisfied her. More than that, the tacit silence made her feel mature too, engaged beyond words, fluent in the nuance of an attraction without explanation.

Yes, she liked William, had for a while now, but she couldn’t quite put her finger on why. He didn’t have striking good looks, but he was passably handsome. He had no conception whatsoever of how to charm a lady, but that in itself held its own sort of charm—the naive, guileless kind. A year ago she wouldn’t have considered him; yet something in her had changed lately, something she knew in her gut would never change back.

“If you could be anything you wanted, what would it be?” He checked his watch, then nudged her with his knee to elicit a reply.

“Can I think about that one?”

“No.”

“Oh? Well in that case, I would have to say a moon-voyager,” she said.

“Good one.”

“And you?”

“A mountaineer,” he replied. “Maybe even on the moon.” His wink surprised her, and by the time she reciprocated he’d looked away.

“All right, my turn, fellow lunatic.” Meredith tugged at his jacket. “What’s your favourite drink?”

Despite his propensity for looking at his watch at regular intervals—a rude habit in most people, but somehow an amusing eccentricity in William, perhaps because he lavished her with attention the rest of the time—they chatted eagerly until it was dark outside. Their conversation veered from his prehistoric reminiscences to her ordeal in the Atlas tunnels to her father’s expedition to the tidal wave in Niflheim and the decisive victory over the Sorensen cousins, who had, it seemed, quickly bounced back from their public embarrassment. Suitors had flocked to their doorstep after the worst of the tidal wave disaster had passed. The eldest two, Brigitte and Freya, were courting men of good standing, while the youngest, Helga, had taken to sulking ever since William had rebuffed her advances.

“Poor little troll!” Meredith stretched her arms, then clasped her gloved hands on the back of her neck. “She drew the short straw, didn’t she. Sonja will be cock-a-hoop when I tell her.”

Once more he glanced at his timepiece.

She playfully shook her head. “Damn that confounded thing. It’s got you wound up on a timer, Billy boy. You’re its cuckoo.”

“Hold that thought. And watch me carefully.” He stared at her, didn’t blink.

“Is this the one where you turn your eyelids inside out and go cross-eyed? I’ve seen it. Boys at school were fond of—”

She leapt up and froze. The depression in the cushion where he’d sat...slowly reshaped itself...in his absence.

He was not there. Not anywhere. He’d been there a moment ago, but now he was gone. She hugged herself through a sudden chill, back-stepped away, snatching glances from the deepest, darkest nooks of the corridor as well as the few feet in front of her, behind her, either side, again and again, over and over. Somehow, yes, somehow he had to have tricked her, but...but nothing short of magic could make a person disappear without trace...right in front of her eyes!

The weakest, fakest impression of a lion’s roar she’d ever heard sounded partway up the corridor. It stilled her panic a little, allowed her to let out more than a wisp of breath. “William?” Again the pitiful roar, now followed by an even more pitiful whine. “Is that you?”

Beyond the hot air balloon display she found a stuffed Oryx in mid-flight from a chasing lion on a dry savannah. The tableau was labelled Hunter and Prey. As an addendum to the scene, a group of wildlife photographers were huddled over a tripod-mounted camera on the other side of a bracken thicket, filming the chase. Without warning one of the men stood up, doffed his hat to her. Before she could untangle her feet she was on the floor, scrabbling away in terror, her boot heels squealing on the polished surface.

“Wow, Meredith, I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. It was only meant to be a joke.” William made his way out of the tableau and helped her up, took her back to the bench. “It’s nothing sinister, I can assure you.”

“Nothing sin...you’re the devil!”

“Ouch. All right, all right, you sit there and recover, and I’ll try to explain.”

“Please do, before I say a prayer and send you back to the hell you escaped from. What on earth are you?”

“A time traveller, remember? This was my way of demonstrating...my other secret.”

“A what? Time? Black magic, more like!”

“What rot! No, it’s simply a side-effect of our time jump—a bizarre one, I grant you, but it happens twice a day without fail, and every survivor experiences it. You see, we left 1908 for the Cretaceous at five past eight. Big Ben’s face froze to commemorate it. And that time must have imprinted on our beings somehow, because ever since we returned, time stops for us at five past eight every day, twice a day, for precisely forty-one seconds. I’m used to it now, but for those first few weeks I thought I really had gone cuckoo.

“It’s like a glitch in time that only we experience. The world around us slows down to such an extent it appears to be static. We can move around freely, make physical changes to our surroundings, while ordinary people don’t realise anything has happened. To you I simply disappeared from here and reappeared all the way over there in an instant, yes? But in that instant I ran twenty feet, climbed into the exhibit, and managed to blend in with the tableau. An instant to you was forty-one seconds to me. Do you follow?”

“I-I think so. But I’m afraid you’ll have to give me chance to think about this one. I’m all inside out.” She fanned her face, gathered herself. “So Tangeni has this ability too? And all the others?”

“Yes. Everyone who survived the return time jump.” Meredith gripped his wrist when he fetched his pocket watch once more. “Don’t worry,” he said, “I can’t do that again tonight.”

“Then why the clockwatching?”

“There’s something I want you to see. It’s the reason I frequent London so often, and I think you’ll find it interesting.”

She swallowed. “Not another trick, I hope.”

“No, no more tricks. But for this we’ll have to go to the roof. Are you game?”

“In the non-hunter-and-prey sense, I suppose so.”

He laughed and helped her to her feet, then gently took her by the hand up two more flights of steps until they reached a white cordon chain with a sign that read, Private—Staff Only Beyond This Point. William lifted her over it, and after clambering up another, much narrower flight in total darkness but for a few successive matches he lit, they soon trod the dove-grey stone of the museum roof on a windless night. She looked out over the waning embers of industry, onto a city-wide glut of gaslit smog and shadow.

A half mile away stood the Leviacrum tower. It pierced not only the smog but the moonlit clouds high above as well. She couldn’t see its pinnacle. Lights inside porthole windows dotted the giant edifice from top to bottom. They flickered different colours through the polluted atmosphere as though the tower itself were alive somehow, perspiring, doomed to forever burn the midnight oil. Few airship lights were visible across London, and none in the immediate vicinity save those of a small dirigible hovering directly above them, at a height of about a thousand feet. She only noticed it because William was pointing.

“Friends of yours?” she asked.

“Some of them. I know Tangeni’s up there.”

“How strange, to just be hovering there. For what purpose?”

“They’re signalling to a special friend.” The lad’s smile as he gazed up smacked of pride, of a thrill of certain knowledge the rest of London was ignorant of. She cast her mind back to his tales of prehistory, of the special friends he’d made there: Tangeni, up in the dirigible above them; Verity Champlain and Lord Garrett Embrey, trapped in the Cretaceous; and Professor Reardon, the inventor of time travel, reclusive inhabitant of...the tower!

“You’re signalling Cecil Reardon?”

“Exactly. Look, Meredith!” He dashed over to her, produced a pair of spectrometer goggles—

“That’s fine. I have my own. Where are we looking?”

“You have a Cavendish lens on yours?”

“Yes.”

“Good. About two thirds of the way up the tower—the floor with only one light, a pulsing Cavendish lamp a few windows right of centre. Do you see it?”

“Very clearly. My God, is that Reardon?”

“Certainly is. We communicate back and forth once a week.”

“How exciting. Smuggling secrets, you mean?”

“We exchange snippets of news, yes, but more importantly we play a game, the professor and I. One move each per week.”

“What sort of game?”

“Snakes and Ladders.”

Meredith lowered her goggles. “You mean to tell me you go to all this trouble, criss-crossing coded messages through thin air, using a dirigible...just so you can play a dumb board game?”

“It means a lot to the professor and me. We used to play it during our adventure. It helps keep his spirits up. He’s a prisoner in there, you know, and we’re doing our best to think of a way to break him out. We’ve tried all sorts. Nothing’s worked...yet.”

“How long have you been doing this—signalling like this?”

“Six years.”

“Six years?”

“Uh-huh. And I’ll never stop, not until he’s out of there. Not until he’s—oh, there it is, his farewell for the night. Have a good one, Cecil. See you next week, my friend.” And to Meredith, “Now you know why I’ve always been so secretive, why I had to change my surname from Ransdell to Elgin. If Agnes Polperro and her cronies found out where I was, they’d send half the empire after me, and I’d be a prisoner up there, too.”

“But why?”

“Because they never found the crucial missing piece of the professor’s time machine, so they’ve never been able to reproduce his experiment. And he’s never cooperated in building a new one.”

“You have the missing piece?” She watched him with even greater fascination. And to think, this time last year she’d treated him with almost criminal disdain. How wrong could a girl be?

“Tangeni and I smuggled it to Professor Sorensen in Norway. That was Cecil’s final instruction to us before he was taken—to safeguard it, to never let it fall into Leviacrum hands.”

“I see. And if you ever do manage to free Cecil from the tower, he’ll be able to reproduce his experiment for the Coalition? Maybe turn the tide of the conflict somehow?”

“Oh, I don’t know about that, Meredith. To be honest, I just want the old man back. I miss him.”

She sighed, placed a reassuring hand on his shoulder, and watched the solitary dirigible sail away into the never-ending gloom. “I know the feeling, brother.”