“Flap-tongued baboon!” sang Pox.
The king's agent drew in smoke, put his head back, and blew out a perfectly formed ring.
“Good news regarding Sir Roger, too. The Arundell family has taken him in, and Brunel is fitting him with power-driven arms, the same as those worn by Daniel Gooch. That'll certainly compensate for his missing limb. Nothing doing with the face, though; I fear the poor soul will be behind that iron mask for the rest of his life.”
“Will he take up residence at Tichborne House?”
“Yes, and he's adamant that the dole will continue to be paid every year. He still believes in Lady Mabella's curse.”
“I don't blame him. His family has had nothing but trouble since Sir Henry broke his ancestor's vow.”
Burton jumped up and said: “What about that brandy, then?”
He crossed to the chest of drawers by the door and returned with a decanter and a couple of glasses. He poured generous measures and handed one to his friend.
“How's Honesty?” he asked as he returned to his armchair. “Has he recovered from his injuries?”
“More or less. He'll not have use of his hand for a while. He's taking a month's leave. I think the sight of all those animated corpses pushed him to the brink. I've never seen him so unnerved. I daresay time spent with his wife and garden will put him to rights. He's a tough little beggar.” The Scotland Yard man raised his eyebrows. “I'm still waiting,” he said. “It's all good news but none of it explains your—what is it?—ebullience. Is that a word?”
“It is,” Burton smiled. “And the correct one.”
“So let's have it. Tell all.”
The famous explorer took a gulp of brandy, put his glass aside, and said: “Acting on a recommendation from my extraordinarily talented and brilliant assistant—”
“And perverted,” Trounce added.
“And perverted—the government has purchased the seven François Garnier Choir Stones from Edwin Brundleweed. They will, I'm happy to report, continue to reside in Herbert Spencer's babbage brain. The government has also bought the seven South American fragments from Sir Roger. Palmerston wants to ensure that all the Eyes of Nāga are in British hands. It's a matter of state security.”
“So now they are. What of it?”
“Two of them are, Trounce. Two of them.”
The detective inspector frowned and shook his head. “There are only two. The third has never been discovered. It's somewhere in—Oh.”
Burton's eyes glinted. “Africa!” he said.
“You mean—?”
“Yes, my friend. Tomorrow I shall start putting together an expedition. I'm off to search for the third stone, and, while I'm at it, I mean to locate once and for all the source of the River Nile!”
“You're going to put yourself through all that again?”
“Don't worry, old man. With the government funding the expedition and Brunel supplying vehicles for the initial stages of the safari, I think I can safely predict that this attempt will be a great deal less traumatic than the last!”
Pox let loose a terrific shriek: “Bollocks!”
SIR RICHARD FRANCIS BURTON (1821–1890)
1862 was a particularly bad year for Burton. Newly married to Isabel Arundell, he was separated from her for almost the entire twelve months. As consul on the disease-ridden island of Fernando Po, he spent much time exploring West Africa and was exposed to areas that had been decimated by the slave trade. As ever, he managed to commit his astute observations and sometimes extremely harsh opinions to paper, resulting in three books: Wanderings in West Africa, Abeokuta and the Cameroons Mountains, and A Mission to Gelele, King of Dahomé.
ALGERNON CHARLES SWINBURNE (1837–1909)
Due in no small part to the efforts of Richard Monckton Milnes, 1862 was the year that Swinburne's maturing poetry gained greater critical recognition. It was not, however, an easy year for him personally. His great friend Lizzie Rossetti (née Siddal) died, and his one and only marriage proposal was rejected—the recipient, whose identity remains a mystery, laughed in his face. His alcoholism was also reaching epic proportions by now, making his behaviour erratic in the extreme.
Wouldst thou not know whom England, whom the world, Mourns? …
is from the poem Elegy, which appeared in Astrophel and Other Poems in 1904. It does not refer to Sir Richard Francis Burton.
If you were queen of pleasure …
is from the poem A Match, which appeared in Poems and Ballads in 1866.
CHARLES BABBAGE (1791–1871)
The man who is regarded as the father of computing was a complex personality, haunted by personal tragedies (including the death of five of his eight children) and ongoing funding problems. Some of his most groundbreaking designs, such as his Difference Engine, were never built during his lifetime. The unfinished status of so many of his projects can, in part, be blamed on financial woes, but Babbage's eccentric character certainly didn't help matters. Among his many quirks, he possessed a distaste for “common people” and an aversion to the noise they produced. His ire was particularly directed at street musicians.
Babbage was never knighted.
In 1862, he was busy writing his autobiographical Passages from the Life of a Philosopher.
THE MEASUREMENT OF BRAINWAVES
The understanding and measurement of the brain's electrical activity properly began with a British physician, Richard Caton (1842–1926), who presented his findings to the British Medical Journal in 1875.
THE TICHBORNE AFFAIR
The sensation of the age, the Tichborne affair commenced in 1866, when the Dowager Lady Tichborne received a letter from a man purporting to be her long-lost son, Roger. This man, who was in all probability Arthur Orton, a morbidly obese butcher from Wapping, had relocated to Australia some years before. When he arrived back in England to claim the Tichborne estates, he was strongly opposed by the establishment but fervently supported by the working classes. Two trials followed. During the first, which lasted 102 days, the Claimant failed to prove his identity and the Tichborne inheritance was denied him. The second trial—a criminal prosecution—lasted 188 days. Arthur Orton was found guilty of perjury and sentenced to fourteen years of hard labour (he served ten).
Despite the overwhelming evidence against him (not least being the fact that he looked nothing like Sir Roger Tichborne), the Claimant became a great favourite among the lower classes, and was the subject of humour, songs, and plays. His trial exposed the weaknesses of the aristocracy and led many ordinary men and women to the conviction that he was the victim of a conspiracy.
The Tichborne/Doughty/Arundell family weathered the storm, though they became doubly vigilant that the annual Tichborne dole should never be missed.
HERBERT SPENCER (1820–1903)
One of the most influential, accomplished, and misunderstood philosophers in British history, Herbert Spencer melded Darwinism with sociology. He originated the phrase “survival of the fittest,” which was then taken up by Darwin himself. It was also adopted, misinterpreted, and misused by a number of governments, who employed it to justify their eugenics programs, culminating in the Holocaust of the 1940s. Spencer, unfortunately, thus became associated with one of the darkest periods in modern history.
Bizarrely, he is also credited with the invention of the paperclip.
He said:
“The wise man must remember that while he is a descendant of the past, he is a parent of the future.”
“When a man's knowledge is not in order, the more of it he has, the greater his confusion.”
“There is a principle which is a bar against all information, which is proof against all arguments, and which cannot fail to keep a man in everlasting ignorance—that principle is contempt prior to investigation.”
“The republican form of government is the highest form of government, but, because of this, it requires the highest type of human nature—a type nowhere at present existing.”
ISABELL
A MARY MAYSON (1836–1865)
In 1856, Isabella Mayson married Samuel Orchart Beeton. As Mrs. Beeton, she became famous as the author of Mrs. Beeton's Book of Household Management, and was arguably the very first celebrity chef. She died from puerperal fever, aged just twenty-eight.
OSCAR WILDE (1854–1900)
As an adult, Oscar Wilde, who in his childhood was neither a refugee nor a paperboy, said:
“Whenever people agree with me I always feel I must be wrong.”
“The only way to get rid of a temptation is to yield to it.”
“The difference between literature and journalism is that journalism is unreadable, and literature is not read.”
“My own business always bores me to death; I prefer other people's.”
—From Lady Windermere's Fan
“To disagree with three-fourths of the British public is one of the first requisites of sanity.”
“We have really everything in common with America nowadays except, of course, language.”
“The fact is that civilisation requires slaves. The Greeks were quite right there. Unless there are slaves to do the ugly, horrible, uninteresting work, culture and contemplation become almost impossible. Human slavery is wrong, insecure, and demoralising. On mechanical slavery, on the slavery of the machine, the future of the world depends.”
DOCTOR EDWARD VAUGHAN HYDE KENEALY (1819–1880)
Most famous for his role as counsel for the Tichborne Claimant, Kenealy's scandalous conduct during the trial earned him widespread notoriety. In the aftermath, he published a newspaper through which to harangue the judges and jury. He was subsequently disbenched and disbarred. Entering politics, he sought to employ his position in parliament to further the Tichborne cause. He failed, and though always a controversial and extremely eccentric figure, he gradually faded from the public arena.
ANDREW BOGLE (APPROX. 1801–1877)
Formerly a slave, Bogle was taken from Jamaica to England by Edward Tichborne (who became Sir Edward Doughty) to work as his valet. In 1830, he married the family's household nurse and they had two sons.
In 1853, after Sir Edward's death, Bogle, whose first wife had died, retired with a small pension, married a teacher, and moved to Australia where, in 1866, Arthur Orton approached him. Convinced that Orton was the long-lost Sir Roger Tichborne, Bogle travelled with him to England and supported him through the course of the two trials. Afterward, though the Tichborne family restored his pension, the old Jamaican lived in near poverty until his death.
MARIE JOSEPH FRANCOIS GARNIER (1839–1873)
Garnier was a French military officer and explorer who became famous for his exploration of the Mekong River in Southeast Asia. He did not discover any black diamonds in Cambodia.
RICHARD SPRUCE (1817–1893)
One of the foremost botanists of the Victorian era, Spruce was the first man to successfully cultivate bitter bark quinine, making its antimalarial qualities widely available. During his wide-ranging, fifteen-year-long exploration of the Amazon, he visited many places hitherto unseen by Europeans, and returned with many thousands of specimens. A quiet, solitary, and studious man, he was loyal to the British Empire and was involved with neither Eugenicists nor Germans.
He was elected a member of the Royal Geographical Society in 1866.
Spruce never said: “I see a tremendously bright future …”
THE TRENT AFFAIR
Also known as the Mason and Slidell Affair, this was a major diplomatic incident that, in 1861, came close to pulling Great Britain into the American Civil War. Fortunately, President Lincoln was able to calm Lord Palmerston down somewhat, and the prime minister resisted the temptation to align his country with the Confederate forces.
CHARLES ALTAMONT DOYLE (1832–1893)
The father of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Charles suffered from severe alcoholism and was also a depressive. Overshadowed by his more successful brother, Richard, he earned a pittance as a book illustrator and became best known for his increasingly macabre paintings of fairies. He was eventually committed to an asylum, and remained incarcerated until the end of his life.
Sir Arthur also became obsessed with fairies, most famously those supposedly photographed at Cottingley. It almost ruined his reputation.
HELENA BLAVATSKY (1831–1891)
A psychic medium and occultist, Madam Blavatsky rode a wave of interest in spiritualism and became one of its foremost proponents, founding Theosophy and the Theosophical Society. She claimed to have many psychic abilities, such as the power of levitation, clairvoyance, astral projection, and telepathy. For much of her life, she toured the world to promote her beliefs. Unsurprisingly, her work attracted a great deal of criticism, and she was accused of fraud, racism, and even of being a Russian spy. She died in England, aged sixty.
Madam Blavatsky said:
“Therefore, the Esotericists maintain that there is no inorganic or dead matter in nature, the distinction between the two made by Science being as unfounded as it is arbitrary and devoid of reason.”
“If coming events are said to cast their shadows before, past events cannot fail to leave their impress behind them.”
It is not known whether she ever used the Russian proverb: “Bare derutsya—u kholopov chuby treshchat,” which translates as, “When masters are fighting, their servants’ forelocks are creaking,” suggesting that the common people suffer when powerful people fight.
SIR DANIEL GOOCH (1816–1889)
Sir Daniel Gooch was a railway engineer who worked with such luminaries as Robert Stephenson and Isambard Kingdom Brunel. He was the first chief mechanical engineer of the Great Western Railway and was later its chairman. Gooch was also involved in the laying of the first successful Transatlantic telegraph cable and became the chairman of the Telegraph Construction Company. Later in life he was elected to office as a parliamentary minister. He was knighted in 1866.
WILLIAM HOLMAN HUNT (1827–1910)
Holman Hunt, one of the Pre-Raphaelite artists, did not say: “The Technologists tell us not to worry about the machines …”
WILLIAM GLADSTONE (1809–1898)
One of Britain's longest serving politicians, Gladstone, a Liberal, was four times prime minister and four times chancellor of the Exchequer. He served under Robert Peel, Lord Aberdeen, and Lord Palmerston. He is credited with the creation of many modern political campaigning techniques. One of the most famous quirks of his personality was his dedication to the rehabilitation of prostitutes. Even while prime minister, he used to walk the streets late at night, approaching “fallen women” to try to persuade them to mend their ways. This, obviously, led to rumours. In 1927, long after his death, claims that he'd had improper relationships with these women led to a court case during which the jury, upon examining the evidence, vindicated Gladstone, confirming his high moral character.
HENRY MORTON STANLEY (1841–1904)
Stanley said:
“An insuperable obstacle to rapid transit in Africa is the want of carriers, and as speed was the main object of the Expedition under my command, my duty was to lessen this difficulty as much as possible.”
He did not add:
“Rotorchairs were the obvious solution.”
BATTERSEA POWER STATION
Battersea Power Station was not built until the 1920s.
… and the Eyes of Nāga, if they exist, remain undiscovered.
MARK HODDER is descended from John Angell, a pirate who sailed with Captain Kidd. According to family legend, Angell invested most of his ill-gotten gains in land, particularly in Angell Town near Brixton in London. Anyone who can provide irrefutable legal evidence that they are descended from Angell will inherit the land, which is estimated to be worth at least £64,000,000. Over the course of generations, members of the family have lost a fortune trying to prove the link, and many people who have no connection with the family at all have adopted the name in order to make a claim. As a result, the family tree is extremely tangled and a legal con
nection to the pirate's treasure is almost certainly impossible to establish.
Mark's great-grandfather was Doctor Albert Leigh, who went to medical school with Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. The two men were great friends—they joined the Freemasons together—and Sir Arthur presented Albert with a complete set of Sherlock Holmes first editions, all inscribed: To dear Leigh, from your friend Doyle. They would fetch a fortune at auction today. Unfortunately, upon Leigh's death in 1944, his housekeeper, an actress, made off with the volumes.
Thus it is that two great fortunes have eluded Mark Hodder.
Denied money-for-nothing and the luxury, idleness, and indulgences it would bring, Mark lives in Spain, teaches English as a foreign language, and writes novels. His first Burton & Swinburne adventure—The Strange Affair of Spring Heeled Jack—was published in 2010.
Mark Hodder, The Curious Case of the Clockwork Man
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