"Traditional or atmospheric railway, sir?"

"Atmospheric."

"Yes, sir."

He was handed the train timetable. The next atmospheric train was leaving in fifty minutes. Time enough to throw a few odds and ends into a suitcase and get to the station.

It was a fast and smooth ride to London.

Isambard Kingdom Brunel's atmospheric railway system was a triumph. It used wide-gauge tracks in the centre of which ran a fifteen-inch-diameter pipe. Along the top of the pipe there was a two-inch slot, covered with a flapvalve of oxhide leather. Beneath the front carriage of each train hung a dumbbell-shaped piston, which fitted snugly into the pipe. This was connected to the carriage by a thin shaft that rose through the slot. The shaft had a small wheeled contrivance attached to it that pressed open the leather flap at the front while closing and oiling it at the back. Every three miles along the track, a station sucked air out of the pipe in front of the train and pumped it back in behind. It was this difference in air pressure that shot the carriages along the tracks at tremendous speed.

When Brunel first created the system he encountered an unexpected problem: rats ate the oxhide. He turned to his Eugenicist colleague, Francis Galton, for a solution, and the scientist had provided it in the form of specially bred oxen whose skin was both repellent and poisonous to the rodents.

The pneumatic rail system now ran the length and breadth of Great Britain and was being extended throughout the Empire, particularly in India and South Africa.

A similar method of propulsion was planned for the new London Under ground railway system, though this project had been delayed since Brunel's death two years ago.

Burton arrived home at 14 Montagu Place at half past six, by which time a mist was drifting through the city streets. As he opened the wrought-iron gate and stepped to the front door, he heard a newsboy in the distance calling: "Speke shoots himself. Nile debate in uproar! Read all about it!"

He sighed and waited for the young urchin to draw closer. He recognised the soft Irish accent; it was Oscar, a refugee from the never-ending famine, whose regular round this was. The boy possessed an extraordinary facility with words, which Burton thoroughly appreciated.

The youngster approached, saw him, and grinned. He was a short and rather plump lad, about eight years old, with sleepy-looking eyes and a cheeky grin marred only by crooked, yellowing teeth. He wore his hair too long and was never without a battered top hat and a flower in his buttonhole.

"Hallo, Captain! I see you're after making the headlines again!"

"It's no laughing matter, Quips," replied Burton, using the nickname he'd given the newspaper boy some weeks previously. "Come into the hallway for a moment; I want to talk with you. I suppose the journalists are all blaming me?"

Oscar joined the explorer at the door and waited while he fished for his keys.

"Well now, Captain, there's much to be said in favour of modern journalism. By giving us the opinions of the uneducated, it keeps us in touch with the ignorance of the community."

"Ignorance is the word," agreed Burton. He opened the door and ushered the youngster in. "If the reaction of the crowd in Bath is anything to go by, I rather suspect that the charitable are saying Speke shot himself, the uncharitable that I shot him."

Oscar laid his bundle of newspapers on the doormat.

"You're not wrong, sir; but what do you say?"

"That no one currently knows what happened except those who were there. That maybe it wouldn't have happened at all had I tried a little harder to bridge the divide that opened between us; been, perhaps, a little more sensitive to Speke's personal demons."

"Ah, demons, is it?" exclaimed the boy, in his high, reedy voice. "And what of your own? Are they not encouraging you to luxuriate in selfreproach?"

"Luxuriate!"

"To be sure. When we blame ourselves, we feel no one else has a right to blame us. What a luxury that is!"

Burton grunted. He put his cane in an elephant-foot umbrella stand, placed his topper on the hatstand, and slipped out of his overcoat.

"You are a horribly intelligent little ragamuffin, Quips."

Oscar giggled. "It's true. I'm so clever that sometimes I don't understand a single word of what I'm saying!"

Burton lifted a small bell from the hall table and rang for his housekeeper.

"But is it not the truth, Captain Burton," continued the boy, "that you only ever asked Speke to produce scientific evidence to back up his claims?"

"Absolutely. I attacked his methods but never him, though he didn't extend to me the same courtesy."

They were interrupted by the appearance of Mrs. Iris Angell, who, though Burton's landlady, was also his housekeeper. She was a wide-hipped, white-haired old dame with a kindly face, square chin, and gloriously blue and generous eyes.

"I hope you wiped your feet, Master Oscar!"

"Clean shoes are the measure of a gentleman, Mrs. Angell," responded the boy.

"Well said. There's a freshly baked bacon and egg pie in my kitchen. Would you care for a slice?"

"Very much so!"

The old lady looked at Burton, who nodded. She went back down the stairs to her domain in the basement.

"So it's information you'll be wanting, Captain?" asked Oscar.

"I need to know where Lieutenant Speke has been taken. I know he was brought to London from Bath-but to which hospital? Can you find out?"

"Of course! I'll spread the word among the lads. I should have an answer for you within the hour."

"Very good. Miss Arundell is also making enquiries, though I fear her approach will have caused nothing but trouble."

"How so, Captain?"

"She's visiting the Speke family to offer her condolences."

Oscar winced. "By heavens! There is nothing more destructive than a woman on a charitable mission. I hope for your sake that Mr. Stanley doesn't get wind of it."

Burton sighed. "Bismillah! I'd forgotten about him!"

Henry Morton Stanley, the journalist, was recently arrived in London from America. His background was somewhat mysterious; traces of a Welsh accent suggested he wasn't the authentic "Yankee" he claimed to be, and there were rumours that his name was false. Whatever the true facts about him, though, he was making a big splash as a newspaper reporter, having taken a particular interest in the various expeditions organised by the Royal Geographical Society. Befriending Doctor Livingstone, Stanley had sided with him against Burton in the Nile debate and had written some less than flattering articles in the Empire, including one that accused Burton of having murdered a boy who caught him urinating in the European fashion during his famous pilgrimage to Mecca. As Burton had been quick to point out, his disguise, skill with the language, and painstaking observation of customs were convincing enough to fool his fellow pilgrims into believing him an Arab over a period of many months; it was therefore quite unthinkable that he'd have been caught making so basic a mistake as to urinate standing up. Besides which, killing the boy would certainly have led to his exposure as an impostor and a summary execution.