Reggiecide (Reeves & Worcester Steampunk Mysteries) (2 page)

Emmeline wavered. She looked at her chains. She bit her lip. She sighed.

“Don’t listen to him,” said Aunt Valkyrie. “It sounds like a ruse to make you abandon the protest.”

“I’m sorry, Reggie,” said Emmeline, looking down at her feet. “I’ve got to see this through.”

“But Emmy—”

“My mind is made up.”

“I don’t wish to intrude,” said Mr Scrottleton-Ffoukes. “But this
is
a matter of great urgency. I cannot involve the police. I need your assistance this minute.”

I looked once more at Emmeline and realised it would be pointless to try again. Once Emmeline had made up her mind, she was resolute.

“Don’t forget to use a false name, Emmy. I’m rather partial to Nebuchadnezzar Blenkinsop whenever I’m up before the beak. You could be his sister, Nefertiti.”

~

We toddled over the road into the lawned central area of the square and found a quiet spot under that new statue — the one by Eckstein.

“I believe we would be safer over there, sir,” said Reeves, indicating a spot by Westminster Abbey. “If we remain here I fear the police may think us guilty of vandalising this statue.”

I gave the Eckstein a swift perusal. “Are your eyes malfunctioning, Reeves? This statue looks tickety-boo to me.”

“The female personage — if indeed it
is
a female personage, sir — would appear to have three eyes. And is orange.”

I tutted. Fourteen years locked in a cupboard had given Reeves a very narrow view of what is and what is not art. Our opinions had clashed several times.

“It’s modern art, Reeves. And who is to say the model was not orange ... or indeed three-eyed. One should never jump to conclusions these days. As the bard said to Lord Nelson, ‘There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy.’”

Reeves put on his disapproving face — and made a show of shielding his eyes from the offending statue by placing his right hand hard against his brow — whilst Mr S-F presented his story.

And what a story it was.

“Have you heard of Prometheans, Mr Worcester? Corpses assembled from many parts and brought back to life by the introduction of electrical energy?”

“I should say so. I’ve even conversed with a couple. Thinking about it, I was almost related to one once — until she ran off with next door’s pig.”

“Pig?”

“A Promethean pig, assembled from a collection of Europe’s finest porkers. And a Scotsman. Although I’m not quite sure how the Scotsman got into the mix. Do you recall, Reeves?”

“No, sir. I fear that will remain one of life’s little mysteries.”

“Oh.” Mr Scrottleton-Ffoukes appeared somewhat non-plussed, an effect I often have on people. I believe Sherlock Holmes generates a similar effect. Emmeline says it’s because our brains are differently wired. Our thoughts skip and gambol along paths that the general populace doesn’t even know exist.

“Well,” he continued. “I have been financing a study into Necrometheans — that is the reanimation of long dead corpses.
Very
long dead corpses.”

“How long?”

“300 years.”

I whistled. “Three hundred years? Isn’t there a problem with um ... you know ... the condition of the specimen?”

“That was one of the first things Mr Snuggles worked on.”

“Snuggles?”

“He’s the scientist fellow I’ve been financing. A veritable genius. Anyway, to cut a long story short, yesterday we re-animated an ancient relative of mine and this morning he’s gone. We can’t find him anywhere.”

“Are you sure he’s gone and not just ... dissolved into a pile of dust? If someone left a window open last night his ashes may have scattered.”

“I assure you, Mr Worcester, my relative was very much alive when he left the room for he broke the lock on the laboratory door! I fear he has a strong dislike of confined spaces.”

“Three hundred years in a coffin is wont to do that to a person.”

Mr Scrottleton-Ffoukes began to look a little sheepish. “I fear it is more than that,” he said. “He was ... somewhat ill-used before his death. And I think he may be seeking revenge.”

“Upon whom? Mr Snuggles hasn’t re-animated any other 300 year-old corpses, has he? The Jacobean Scrottleton-Ffoukes weren’t involved in a blood feud with the Capulet-Smythes, were they?”

“I fear it is not so much a person that he intends to harm, as an institution.”

Institution? The Worcester brain boggled.

“Perhaps if you gave us the name of your relative, sir?” asked Reeves.

Mr Scrottleton-Ffoukes looked down at his brogues and shuffled. “Er ... Guy Fawkes.”

You could have struck me across the mazzard with a wet halibut.

“
The
Guy Fawkes?” I asked. “The Gunpowder Plot Guy Fawkes?”

“Yes, though I am sure he is innocent. I have read a great deal upon the subject and am quite convinced the plot was orchestrated by Robert Cecil. He wanted to ingratiate himself with King James
and
convince the King of the Catholic menace.”

“Really?” I said. History had never been one of my strong subjects. I knew King James had written the Bible, and what schoolboy hadn’t heard of the Gunpowder Plot? Bonfire Night was one of the highlights of the school year — all those fireworks and the weeks beforehand spent constructing your Guy to toss onto the bonfire.

But this Cecil cove had passed me by.

“It was to clear his name that I had Snuggles re-animate Guy — so he could give his side of the story. I have a son, Mr Worcester, and I do not want him to suffer the same humiliation I had to suffer at school. Every November the Fifth it was
my
effigy the boys placed on the bonfire in the quad. It’s about time the world knew the truth.”

“Quite,” I said. “Did your ancient relative have much to say upon the matter?”

“He was not entirely coherent. He was frightened at first — which was not surprising as his last memories were ones of torture and execution. Then he became angry, and later violent. It took two of us to hold him down while Snuggles administered a sedative. We hoped a night’s rest might calm him down.”

“But he broke out instead. What do you think, Reeves?”

“Perhaps if we were to visit the location Mr Fawkes was last seen, sir. There may be evidence of a trail.”

I wasn’t sure what kind of trail a three-hundred year old reanimated corpse would leave but, that aside, Reeves’s steam-powered logic could not be faulted.

r Scrottleton-Ffoukes conducted us to a fourth-floor attic in a Georgian house off Great Smith Street in Westminster. The attic door looked undamaged at first sight. It wasn’t until our host pushed the door open that one could observe the splintered wood around the lock on the doorjamb.

“Are Prometheans noted for their prodigious strength, Reeves?” I asked. Both lock and door looked on the heavy side to me. And yet Guy had wrenched the door clean open.

“Not that I have read, sir,” said Reeves, bending down to give the door a thorough eyeballing.

I left Reeves to his sleuthing and toddled inside after our host. It was one of those large attics lit by several skylights — the sort much favoured by artists, except this one was pervaded by a strange smell as though someone had been experimenting with cocktails and had mistaken a bottle of floor cleaner for gin.

I don’t know what I’d expected a Promethean laboratory to look like: maybe lined with shelves full of jars containing spare knees; or giant electrical machines buzzing and belching forth sparks of electrical energy; or grave robbers lining the stairs with today’s special offers in a sack.

I
was
right about the electrical machines, but they were neither buzzing nor sparking. They towered over a plinth-like bed whilst three large leather straps dangled from the plinth’s sides.

“Was Guy strapped to that plinth?” I asked.

“Only during the reanimation,” said Mr S-F. “When we left him he was unfettered.”

Reeves coughed from the doorway. “May I make an observation, sirs?”

“Observe away, Reeves. We are agog with anticipation.”

“I do not believe Mr Fawkes to be responsible for the forcible opening of this egress, sir.”

“Why ever not?”

“Because the door was forced open from the outside, sir. One can observe the faint outline of a boot upon the lock rail. A size eight right boot if I am not mistaken.”

“Someone kidnapped Guy?” said an incredulous Mr S-F.

“Someone with at least one leg,” I added.

“One leg?” said Mr S-F.

“That’s all we can deduce from the evidence so far. We consulting detectives are pretty hot on deduction. Any sign of a left boot, Reeves? On the landing, perhaps? An outline in a patch of rare silt of tropical origin, tracked in on the sole of our mystery man’s boot?”

“No, sir.”

“What about a circular indentation from a wooden leg? Sherlock Holmes rarely investigates a case without finding at least one one-legged man.”

“Not that I can observe, sir.”

“Well, there we have it. A person, or persons, with at least one leg between them. Now, who else knew that your relative was here?”

I think Mr S-F was pretty impressed by my demonstration of the deductive arts, for he took a moment to reply, his mouth agape in obvious reverence. “Er ... Who else knew? No one, except for Snuggles and myself. We were very careful. Neither of us wished for news of this event to leak out before we were ready to tell the world.”

“So,” I said, embarking on a spot of pacing. I always find pacing aids the detecting process. Well, that and gin. But as our host hadn’t offered the latter, the former had to suffice. “No unexpected callers in the last couple of days? Or anyone showing an unusual interest in your activities?”

“Not at all.”

This sounded to me like a three-cocktail problem and there I was without so much as an olive!

I paced some more. In
The Woman in Taupe
, Inspector Lapin of the
Sȗreté
solved the case by examining the psychology of the victim. What did I know of Guy Fawkes other than he’d been burned at the stake?

Wait a minute!

“How can Snuggles have reanimated Guy if his body had been burned at the stake?”

“He wasn’t burned,” said Mr S-F. “He was hung, drawn and quartered.”

“Are you sure? If he wasn’t burned, why do we burn effigies of him every Bonfire Night?”

“One supposes, sir,” said Reeves. “That Hanging, Drawing and Quartering Night would not convey the same message of festive family fun as Bonfire Night.”

Reeves, as ever, had a point.

“I have a colour photograph,” said Mr S-F, his right hand reaching inside his topcoat. “Mr Snuggles likes to keep a record of his work and took this with his Autochrome just before the reanimation began. You can compare it to contemporary drawings of my unfortunate relative. It is definitely he. A year after his execution, the family collected all his remains and had them interred in our vault at St Stephen’s.”

I had a look at the photograph. It showed a tall, stocky man with a bright orange complexion and strands of reddish brown hair emanating from his scalp, upper lip and chin.

“Was his face always that colour?” I asked.

“Having one’s head impaled on a spike and exhibited on London Bridge for three months is wont to be hard on the complexion, sir,” said Reeves.

“That’s all very well,” I said. “But he’s bright orange. His hands, too.”

“That’s the revitalising skin cream,” said Mr S-F. “Guy’s skin was grey and cracked, and as dry as dust when we exhumed him. Unfortunately the most efficacious skin revitalizer, though a marvel of modern skin care for the departed, has an artificial tanning agent. It
is
French.”

“Should be easy to spot then, don’t you think, Reeves? Large orange man in tattered Jacobean clothing.”

“That’s what Snuggles and I thought. But not
one
of the local traders has seen hide nor hair of him.”

Our conversation was interrupted by a clattering of feet upon the stairs, shortly followed by the arrival of a middle-aged cove with an abundance of long, lank, black hair. He stopped dead in the doorway the moment he saw us.

“Oh,” he said, his startled expression giving way to an oily smile. “Mr. Scrottleton-Ffoukes, sir. And you are accompanied. May I inquire as to the identity of these gentlemen?”

“This is Mr Worcester, the gentleman’s consulting detective, and his man. They’re here to help us find Guy. Have you had any luck, Snuggles?”

Back came the startled expression. “You’ve told them about ... him, sir?”

“Of course. We need expert help and Mr Worcester is the soul of discretion.”

“It’s a consulting detective’s middle name,” I said. “Sometimes
I
don’t even know what I’m investigating.”

“In that case, sir, I can report that I have travelled as far south as the Old Vauxhall Bridge and as far east as Victoria station, and no one reports seeing anyone fitting your illustrious ancestor’s description.”

Snuggles smiled unctuously, reminding me of a used Zeppelin salesman I’d once been seated next to at Henley.

While Mr S-F brought Snuggles up to speed viz. doors and boots, I gave the latter the once-over with a consulting detective’s deductive eyeball.