small, intricately carved wooden box that stood upon it. From this he extracted a few coins, before silently slipping past Elsie and out of the room.
"What is it, Miss Elsie?" Burton asked.
"Excuse me, sir," she said, curtseying for a second time. "Sorry to dis - disperupt your music, but a message just arrived in the thingamajig."
"Thank you. And you mean disrupt."
"That's right, sir. Disperupt."
The maid bobbed again, backed out of the room, ran down the stairs, retrieved her broom, and was out of the study before Burton got there. She descended to the basement and entered the kitchen.
"All swept clean as a whistle, ma'am," she told Mrs. Angell.
"Did you dust the bookshelves?"
"Yes, ma'am."
"And the mantelpiece?"
"Yes, ma'am."
"And that big old African spear?"
"Yes, ma'am."
"And did you polish the swords?"
"Yes, ma'am."
"And beat the cushions?"
"Yes, ma'am."
"And what about the doorknobs?"
"You can see your face in 'em, ma'am."
"Good girl. Take a piece of fruitcake from the tin and have a rest. You've earned it."
"Thank you, ma'am."
Elsie took her slice of cake, put it on a plate, and settled on a stool.
"By the way, ma'am, the musical shriek has left and the master's got a message in the thingamajig."
"Sheik," the housekeeper corrected. She sighed. "Oh dear. I'm convinced that contraption only ever delivers trouble!"
She turned to the clockwork man, who was standing at the table, peeling potatoes. "Attend Sir Richard, please, Lord Nelson."
The valet laid down his knife and saluted, wiped his fingers on a cloth, and marched out of the kitchen and up the stairs to the study. He entered and moved to the bureau between the windows, standing motionless beside it, awaiting orders.
Burton was by the fireplace.
"Listen to this," he said, absently. "It's from Palmerston."
He read from the note in his hand:
Investigate the claimant to the Tichborne title.
The king's agent sighed. "I was hoping to avoid all that blessed nonsense!"
He looked up, saw his valet, and said: "Oh, it's you. Lay out my day suit, would you? I think I'll drop in on old Pouncer Trounce, see what he knows about the affair."
Half an hour later, Burton stepped out of 14 Montagu Place and strolled in the direction of Whitehall. He'd not gone more than three paces when a voice hailed him: "What ho, Cap'n! Fit as a fiddle, I see!"
It was Mr. Grub, the street vendor, who supplied chestnuts from a Dutch oven in the winter, and whelks, winkles, and jellied eels from a barrow in the summer.
"Yes, Mr. Grub, I'm much improved, thank you. How's business?"
"Rotten!"
"Why so?"
"Dunno, Cap'n. I think it's me pitch."
"But you always pitch your barrow here. If it's so bad, why not move?"
Grub pushed his cloth cap back from his brow. "Move? Phew! Dunno about that! I've been here for years, an' me father afore me! Fancy a bag o' whelks? They're fresh out o' the Thames this morning!"
"No thank you, Mr. Grub. I'm on my way to Scotland Yard."
Burton wondered how anything from the Thames could possibly be classified as "fresh."
"Well, you ain't the only one what don't want nuffink." Mr. Grub sighed. "Cheerio, Cap'n!"
"Good day, Mr. Grub!"
Burton tipped his hat at the vendor and continued on his way.
It was a fine spring day. The sky was blue and the air still. All across the city, thin pillars of smoke rose vertically, eventually dissipating at a high altitude. Rotorchairs left trails of steam between them, a white cross-hatching that made an irregular grid of the sky. Swans, too, swooped among the columns like insects flying through a forest.
The king's agent swung along at a steady pace, with the hustle and bustle of the streets churning around him. Hawkers hollered, prostitutes wheedled and mocked, ragamuffins yelled, traders laughed and argued and haggled, street performers sang and juggled and danced, pedestrians brandished their canes and parasols and doffed their hats and bobbed their bonnets, horses clip-clopped, velocipedes hissed and chugged, steam-horses growled and rumbled, carriages rattled, wheels crunched over cobbles, dogs barked. It was an absolute cacophony. It was London.
He spotted a familiar face.
"Hi! Quips!" he called, waving his cane.
Oscar Wilde, nine years old, orphaned by the never-ending Irish famine and earning his daily crust by selling newspapers, was loitering outside a sweet shop.
"Top o' the morning to you, Captain!" He smiled, revealing crooked teeth. "Help me to choose, would you? Bullseyes or barley sugars? I'm after thinking barley sugars."
"Then I agree, lad."
Oscar pulled off his battered top hat and scratched his head.
"Ah, well now, whenever people agree with me I always feel I must be wrong. So I suppose