The Strange Affair of Spring Heeled Jack - Mark Hodder [36]
In an instant, horror sucked the heat from Trounce's body and time slowed to a crawl.
His legs pumped; his boots thudded into the grass; he heard himself shout, "No!"
He saw heads turning toward the man.
His breath thundered in his ears.
The man's left arm came up.
The queen stood, raising her hands to the white lace around her throat.
Her husband reached for her.
A second man leaped forward and grabbed the gunman.
"No, Edward!" came a faint yell.
The scene seemed to freeze; the two men entwined; their faces, even from this distance, so similar, like brothers; each person in the crowd poised in midmotion, some stepping forward, some stepping back. The queen standing, wearing a cream-coloured dress and bonnet. Her consort leaning forward, in a top hat and red jacket. The outriders turning their horses.
Christ! thought Trounce. Christ, no! Please, no!
Suddenly a freakish creature flew past him.
What the hell? A-a stilt-walker?
Tall, loose-limbed, bouncing on what seemed to be spring-loaded stilts, it stopped just ahead of the constable, who stumbled and fell to his knees.
"Stop, Edward!" the weird apparition bellowed.
A bolt of lightning shot from its side into the ground and the lean figure staggered, groaning and clutching at itself.
Below, the two struggling men turned and looked up.
A puff of smoke from the pistol.
Blood spraying from Queen Victoria's head.
"Merciful heaven!" gasped Trounce.
A detonation echoing away over the park; rippling into the distance, taking with it the consequences of the heinous act; history, quite literally, in the making; expanding outward to envelop the Empire.
"No," groaned the stilt-walker. "No!"
It turned and Trounce saw the face: crazy eyes, a thin blade of a nose, a mouth stretched into a rictus grin, drawn and lined features, pale beneath a sheen of sweat, twisted in agony.
The thing was wearing a big round black helmet and a black cloak beneath which there was a white, tight-fitting bodysuit. Some sort of flat lantern hung on the chest, spitting fire. There were scorch marks on the material around it.
The odd figure bobbed on the short stilts then bounded forward and leaped right over the police constable's head.
Trounce toppled onto the grass, rolled over, and looked behind him. The costumed figure was nowhere to be seen. It had vanished.
Christ Almighty. Christ Almighty.
Screams.
Trounce looked down the slope.
Victoria had flopped backward out of the carriage onto the ground. Her husband was scrambling after her.
The assassin was still struggling with the other man but, as Trounce watched, the gunman was suddenly thrown off his feet by his assailant. His head hit the low wrought-iron fence that bordered the path. He went limp and lay still.
The crowd surged around the royal carriage. The outriders plunged through the throng and attempted to hold the panicked people back, away from the stricken monarch. A police whistle blew frantically.
That's me, thought Trounce. That's me blowing the whistle.
A figure detached itself from the mob and started running across the park, northwestward, heading for Piccadilly.
It was the man who'd grappled with the assassin.
Trounce took off in pursuit. It seemed the right thing to do.
The thought occurred to him that police-issue boots were ill designed for running.
"For goodness' sake!" he gasped to himself. "Concentrate!"
He raced past the outriders.
A dazed young man, squinting through a monocle, wandered into his path and Trounce barrelled into him, shoving him aside with a curse.
His quarry angled up a slope and disappeared into the heavily wooded upper corner of the park. Trounce grunted with satisfaction; he knew there was a high wall behind those trees.
He was breathing heavily and had a stitch in his side by the time he got to the edge of the woods. He stopped there, gulping air, eyeing the gloomy spaces beneath