The Mechanical Messiah (46 page)

‘We will have to land,’ said Darwin. ‘Choose a field, Colonel. One without sheep in it would be nice.’

‘Quite right, my dear fellow, let me see.

Even though all but gone with the fuel, the
Marie Lloyd
was still cracking along at a goodly pace. They had reached the outskirts of Croydon now. And all agreed, without the need for words, that they had no wish to set down there.

Darwin made adjustments to the controls. ‘Well now,’ he said. ‘There is a thing.’

‘A
good
thing?’ asked Cameron Bell.

‘Not as such,’ said the monkey. ‘Do you recall when we left Venus? How we were chased by the aether ship?’

Heads went nodding all around.

‘And how it shot at us?’

Heads went nodding once again.

‘And how it shot off two of the tail fins?’

Heads stopped nodding. But all remembered
that.

‘The thing,’ said Darwin. ‘Is. That lacking those two tail fins, the landing of the ship might prove problematic.’

‘Problematic?’ asked Cameron Bell. ‘As in difficult? Or impossible?’

Darwin made a so-so gesture.

‘Oh my dear dead mother,’ said Cameron Bell.

The
Marie Lloyd
passed over the Crystal Palace.

‘How splendid,’ said Cameron. ‘It has been rebuilt. But look at the spaceport, odd.’

The survivors peered towards the spaceport.

‘Where are all the spaceships?’ asked the colonel. ‘Damn place is deserted. Nose up, Darwin, if you will.’

Darwin struggled to bring up the nose of the
Marie Lloyd,
but at least one of the engines had now given up the ghost.

‘We’re heading towards the centre of London now,’ the colonel huffed and puffed. ‘Might be an idea to veer off towards the outskirts.’

‘It might be,’ said Darwin. ‘But sorry to say…’ And he cupped a hairy hand to his ear.

And all listened and all heard … nothing at all but silence.

‘We are out of fuel,’ said Darwin. ‘Please say prayers for me.

The
Marie Lloyd
dropped towards London. Its undercarriage struck one of the tall Tesla towers, dislodging the great steel ball from the top in a bright cascade of sparks. Causing chaos and destruction far below.

As all aboard stared white-faced and praying through the blurred windscreen, the spaceship smashed into the roof of Buckingham Palace, cleaving away a vast section of the front façade, struck the Mall with a hideous rending of metal, ploughed along its length then bounced over the archway and plunged with a devastating swerving crash into Trafalgar Square.

Bringing down Nelson’s Column and burying its nose deep into the front of the National Gallery.

state of National Emergency was brought into being. A regiment of the Household Calvary rode out from their barracks at the rear of the stricken palace. Electric tanks growled onto the streets of the great metropolis. Black Marias, some bearing the distinctive crest of the Metropolitan Police Force, others not, clattered towards Trafalgar Square. Chaos had come to the Empire’s heart, and many were fleeing in terror. A platoon of the Queen’s Own Electric Fusiliers circled the sky above the ruination aboard a sleek silver airship. In the wheelhouse stood young Mr Winston Churchill, cigar in mouth, examining a map of London.

An hour had passed since the
Marie Lloyd
crashed and already newsboys were hawking broadsheets which announced in letters bold and black that

MARTIANS ATTACK LONDON

AGAIN!

1000s ALREADY DEAD

In fact, miraculously, there had been no loss of life, although a lady in a straw hat had been elevated to a state of hysteria by a close encounter with a falling statue of Nelson.

The
Marie Lloyd
lay crumpled and broken, smoke rising gently from battered bits and bobs.

No Martian storm troopers had so far emerged from the wreck to lay further waste to London.

At a little after five of the Greenwich Meridian clock, Mr Winston Churchill ordered an assault to be made upon the invaders and joined one hundred fusiliers as they abseiled down to the square.

These noble warriors of the British Empire met with no resistance as they charged the crumpled craft. Onboard they found the bodies of the dead Jovians dressed in their safari suits.

But no one else at all.

Colonel Katterfelto, Major Tinker, Cameron Bell, Alice and Darwin the monkey had quietly slipped away from the wreck of the
Marie Lloyd
long before the cordoning off of central London and the arrival of assorted troops. They had mingled with those fleeing the National Gallery and Trafalgar Square. They had, miraculously once more, remained uninjured by the crash.

They now sat in the Ritz taking afternoon tea.

There had been some unpleasantness, though.

The gentlemen of the party had
not
been wearing ties and the Ritz enforces a strict dress code for afternoon tea.

The maitre d’ had supplied them with ties. And a striped cravat for Darwin.

‘Well,’ huffed, puffed and gruffed the colonel, lifting his teacup and taking a sip. ‘I’ve said it once. I’ve said it twice. Very close thing, was that.’

Cameron Bell had his face buried deep in his hands. ‘Buckingham Palace,’ he was heard to mumble. ‘The Mall. Nelson’s Column. The National Gallery. Dear oh dear oh dear.’

‘Could have been worse,’ said Major Tinker. ‘Could have hit the Electric Alhambra. Anyone fancy joining me in a box there tonight?’

No one seemed particularly keen.

Darwin the monkey said, ‘I don’t see bananas on the menu.

‘If we are to go our separate ways,’ said Cameron Bell, ‘which I would personally recommend as our departure from the
Marie Lloyd
might well have been observed and our descriptions circulated, might I ask where I can find you all should the need arise?’

‘Here,’ said Darwin. ‘I will be engaging a suite of rooms right here.’

‘And you, Colonel?’ asked Cameron Bell.

‘Have to go to Alperton. Pick up the key to the chapel I rented. The you-know-what should already have been delivered there, ready to be energised.’

Alice did not know what the you-know-what was, but neither did she care.

‘Then I’ll probably take a room here, too,’ continued the colonel.

‘Me also,’ said Major Tinker. ‘Handy for the Halls and all that.’

‘It is not really
going our separate ways,
is it?’ said Cameron Bell. ‘Alice, what of you?’

‘I am going with
you,’
said Alice.

‘Oh,’ said Cameron Bell.

‘To the pet shop in Sydenham to collect my kiwi birds. We can then take rooms at the Adequate.’

‘Yes,’ said Mr Bell, between gritted teeth. He had quite forgotten about the Adequate. The kiwi birds, however, were being constantly brought to mind.

‘Unless you wish simply to abandon me,’ said Alice.

Cameron Bell shook his head.

Major Thadeus Tinker asked, ‘Is there Treacle Sponge Bastard on the menu?’

The drive out to Sydenham in the hansom cab was quite without incident. The driver did not ask Cameron whether he wished to travel like a batsman out of Hell. Nor did he throw up his hands in horror, recalling how Cameron had robbed him at ray-gun-point at the Crystal Palace.

Because he was not
that
hansom cabbie.

That sometimes it was
not
a small world brought some small degree of cheer to Mr Cameron Bell.

The fact that the pet shop was still open on their arrival at Sydenham did
not,
however.

Alice paid for the hansom cab, as Cameron Bell did not have a single penny to his name.

‘It is
you,’
cried the pet—shop owner. Which rattled the private detective.

‘ALICE AT THE PALACE!’ he continued.

Cameron mouthed a silent prayer of thanks. The pet-shop owner went on, ‘We all thought that you were dead,’ he went on. ‘There was a lovely obituary in
The Times
newspaper. Did you know,’ he said to Cameron, ‘that this young woman is the Alice in Wonderland of the books?’

‘No,’ said Cameron. ‘I did not.’ And he hated himself for not knowing.

‘I do not like to talk about that,’ said Alice. ‘But where are my kiwi birds? I hope you did not sell them when you thought that I was dead.’

‘I wish that I had,’ said the pet-shop owner.

‘That is a strange thing to say,’ said Alice.

‘We live in very strange times.’ The pet-shop owner turned his full gaze upon Mr Cameron Bell. ‘Now you, sir, look very familiar,’ he said. ‘I know your face from somewhere.’

‘People are always saying that,’ replied Mr Bell.

‘And what about these Martians?’ the pet-shop owner asked. ‘Attacking London
again.
You would have thought they’d have learned their lesson when we completely wiped out their race, wouldn’t you?’

Cameron agreed that this was so.

‘Stop changing the subject,’ said Alice. ‘Where are my kiwi birds?’

‘If you stay around here you’ll know soon enough. Be inside before dark if you value your life.’

‘What of
this?’
asked Cameron Bell.

‘What of this
indeed?’
demanded Alice.

‘It all began a year ago on the night of the terrible fire,’ the pet-shop owner began. ‘But then you would know that, because you were there. People were fleeing down the hill from the burning palace. But up there—’ the pet-shop owner pointed with a trembling finger ‘—up there amidst the conflagration the kiwi birds got their first taste of human flesh.’

‘Oh dear, oh dear,’ said Cameron Bell.

‘Be quiet
please,’
said Alice.

‘A toff, they say,’ continued the storyteller. ‘They brought him out all pecked into pieces. Though they say that he still lives.’

‘Oh dear,’ said Cameron.

Alice glared at him.

‘The birds, having feasted upon this innocent toff, escaped into the grounds of the Crystal Palace. And despite all attempts to capture them, there they remain. Breeding. ‘The pet-shop owner’s voice took on a sinister tone. ‘And now there are dozens of them. All hungry for man meat. And being nocturnal by nature, they hunt their prey at night.’

Alice’s eyes were very wide indeed.

Cameron Bell chewed on his bottom lip.

‘Where did they take the
innocent gentleman
who was attacked?’ he asked.

‘That doesn’t matter!’ shouted Alice. ‘My poor kiwi birds, living out in the cold. Being hunted down. This is terrible.’

‘Terrible,’ agreed the pet-shop owner. ‘As are their terrible feastings. They eat—’ He drew his visitors closer with an ever-more-trembling finger. ‘They feast upon virgins. Five have gone missing at night from the village. Not a trace of them ever found.’

Cameron prepared to mouth another, Oh
no.

Alice offered him a bitter look. ‘This is all
your
fault,’ she said.

‘My fault?’
said Cameron Bell. ‘By what stretch of the imagination can it be
my
fault?’

‘Hold on there,’ said the pet-shop owner. I
do
recognise you now. Hold on—’ And he rooted about beneath his counter and brought to light a crumpled WANTED poster.

Beneath an illustration of Mr Pickwick, by Boz, were printed the words:

REWARD OF £1000

FOR INFORMATION LEADING TO THE ARREST

OF THIS DANGEROUS MAN

CAMERON JAMES BELL

____

To answer charges of

The instigation of the Hyde Park Massacre