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By Root 903 0

fetched a candle from the cottage and handed it to the waiting figure. As she did so, it threw back its cloak to reveal itself as Spring Heeled Jack. Grabbing her, it tore her dress down to her waist before she managed to break free and run back along the path. Jack followed and caught her at the threshold of the front door. He was pulling her hair and yanking at her slip when her younger sister entered the hallway, witnessed the scene, and let out a loud scream of terror. At this, the older sister came running and managed to drag Jane from the thing's grasp. She pushed him back and slammed the front door in his face. The apparition then bounded away and vanished into the night."

There came a knock at the door.

"Come!" cried Trounce.

A short white-haired woman shuffled in bearing a tray.

"Coffee, sir,"

"Thank you, Gladys."

The woman padded over to the desk and laid down the tray. She poured two cups and silently withdrew, closing the door behind her.

Burton flicked his cigar stub into the hearth.

"Milk?" asked Trounce.

"No. Just sugar." The famous explorer shovelled four teaspoonfuls into the steaming liquid.

"By Jove!" blurted Trounce. "You have a sweet tooth!"

"A taste I picked up in Arabia. So what happened next?"

"Jane subsequently gave the most complete description of Spring Heeled Jack we have on record and, I can confirm, it matches yours in every respect, even down to the blue flame flickering around its head.

"Eight days later, another eighteen-year-old girl, Lucy Scales, and her younger sister, Lisa, were passing through Green Dragon Alley on the outskirts of Limehouse when they spotted a figure slumped in an angle of the passage and draped with a cloak. The person appeared to be in distress; the sisters heard groans of pain. Lucy approached it and asked whether she could help, at which the figure raised its head, which was clad in a black helmet around which blue fire raged. The creature screamed and a tongue of flame leaped from its head to Lucy's face, blinding her and sending her staggering backward. She dropped to the ground and was stricken with violent fits which continued for many hours after the encounter. Lisa held Lucy, called for help and-My God!"

Trounce's eyes widened and he stared at Burton, his mouth working.

"What is it?" asked the explorer, puzzled.

"I-I'd forgotten!"

"Forgotten what?"

"My God!" repeated Trounce, in a whisper.

"Spit it out, man!" snapped Burton.

The detective cleared his throat and continued, speaking slowly and with apparent amazement: "As Lucy lay in her sister's arms, Spring Heeled Jack walked quickly away. Lisa reported that he was talking to himself in a highpitched, crazy-sounding voice. Most of his words, she said, were unintelligible. There was, however, one phrase that came to her clearly."

Trounce paused. He looked at the man opposite, who asked: "What was it?"

"Apparently," replied Trounce, "he shouted, `This is your fault, Burton!"'

Sir Richard Francis Burton felt icy fingers tickling his spine.

The two men looked at one another.

Shadows shifted across the walls and the sound of a mournful foghorn pushed at the windowpane.

"Coincidence, of course," whispered Trounce.

"Obviously," replied Burton, in an equally hushed tone. "In 1838, I was seventeen years old and living with my parents and brother in Italy. I'd spent very little of my life in England and had certainly never encountered or even heard of Spring Heeled Jack."

Another pause.

Trounce shook himself, opened the report, and looked down at it.

"Anyway, now we come to my own encounter," he said, brusquely, "which occurred on June 10, 1840; perhaps the most infamous date in English history."

Burton nodded. "The day of the assassination."

THE ASSASSINATION

Assassination has never changed the history of the world.

-BENdAmin DisRA ui

ennis the Dip slowed down Police Constable William Trounce by five minutes; five minutes in which the eighteen-year-old policeman could have become a national hero rather than the laughing stock of Scotland Yard.

Constable Trounce's beat incorporated