James Palmer - Shadows Through Time

“Soldiers?” Monckton Milnes murmured.

Abberline sat by the fire, his bowler mounted atop his left knee.

“Frederick, you look positively done in,” said Burton. “Why don’t you go home?”

“No,” said the policeman. “I’ll be right as rain in a moment. Besides, I want to hear this.”

Burton examined the woman as she bounced around his study inspecting his spear collection. She was short and lithe, with close-cropped dark hair and inquisitive brown eyes. She wore a leather, American-style duster coat over a white shirt and brown pants and dark leather knee-high boots, like a man would wear. She wore no bonnet or hat, and her hair wasn’t at all the current style. This, Burton knew, was a woman out of her place, and maybe even time. She spoke with a crisp, North London accent.

The woman slowly turned around as Burton, Monckton Milnes, and Abberline stared up at her. She blushed and smiled. “I’m sorry, gentlemen. Is everyone settled down? That was quite a row, wasn’t it?”

Burton jammed a cheroot in his mouth and lit it, puffing aromatic smoke as he waited for her to get to the point.

“I can’t believe I’m actually here,” she said. “In the presence of such important men of your time. It’s exciting, isn’t it?”

“Perhaps if you tell us who and what you are we can share in your enthusiasm,” said Monckton Milnes with a scowl.

“You’re right. My apologizes. I do get overwrought sometimes. But it isn’t every day you meet—never mind. As I was saying, I am a Time Agent. I come from the future, the year nineteen forty-five to be precise.”

“Now I’ve heard everything,” said Monckton Milnes. “Are we actually entertaining this, Richard?”

“Yes we are,” Burton grumbled. “Now pipe down!”

Monckton Milnes harrumphed and helped himself to another brandy.

“It’s true, Bar—uh, Mr. Monckton Milnes,” said the woman. “I am a Time Traveler, as Captain Burton here has been.”

Monckton Milnes stared at Burton.

“It’s true,” said Abberline. “On my sainted mother’s grave, it’s true.”

“Since I’m not yet thoroughly in my cups,” said Monckton Milnes, “then I must be mad.” He took the entire decanter of brandy back to his seat behind Burton’s other desk and sulked. “Yes, that must be it. I’m bound for Bedlam.”

“Why are you here, Miss Hemlock?” asked Burton, ignoring his fellow Cannibal.

“I came here tracking a mysterious individual. No one knows who he is, but he’s been a thorough thorn in our sides as of late.”

“The man in the tunnel,” said the explorer. “The one who brought the Morlocks back here.”

“Exactly.”

“But who would do such a horrible thing?” murmured Abberline. “And why? And how?”

“The how we know,” said Miss Hemlock. “He has a Time Machine.”

“But how is that possible?” said the detective. “I thought it destroyed.”

“Herbert can build another one,” said Burton. “He already has, once. But I assumed he had taken it to the far future with him and hasn’t returned.”

“That was our summation as well,” said Miss Hemlock. “There is no further official historical record of him. He just up and vanished this year. There’s no census information on him, no record of his death, nothing.”

Burton nodded. “He has a fondness for far futurity,” said Burton. “The year eight hundred and two thousand, seven-hundred and one, if I remember correctly.”

“Good God!” Monckton Milnes, wiping brandy off his chin with a handkerchief.

“Yes, well, wherever he is, someone has gained his ability to travel through Time.”

“Wait a minute,” said the explorer. “You can travel through Time. Could he have absconded with one of your Time Machines?”

Miss Hemlock rolled up her sleeve. “No. All of our temporal transport units are accounted for.” She extended her arm, stepping closer so that Burton could have a better look. Strapped to her wrist by a leather band was a brass contraption that resembled a wristwatch. She flicked a tiny lever, and the device clicked open to become a brass disk made to spin perpendicular to the inner surface of the device, which had some kind of rotating dial inside of it with a month, day and year. This month, day and year.

“Bismillah! It’s a tiny Time Machine!”

“Yes. It allows one to travel through Time without a big, bulky conveyance that is difficult to hide or move around. I was also given to understand it’s less bumpy than the original.”

“But you miniaturized it?” said Burton. “How?”

Miss Hemlock smiled. “In the future, we will have miniaturization capabilities you couldn’t imagine, or understand I’m afraid. It has few moving parts.”

“You live in an age of wonders, Miss Hemlock,” said Abberline.

“I wish that was the case. Such technologies have their downside. For every wondrous thing created, there are those who discern how to put them to terrible ends.”

“That has always been the way of things, Miss Hemlock,” said Burton. “Now, how can we help you? I assume you rescued us tonight for a reason.”

She shrugged. “I had no idea you were going to be there. I was merely tracking our mutual enemy. I knew about the Morlocks, though, that’s why I brought along my trusty electric torch.”

She removed a large contraption from a clip on her belt beneath her voluminous duster. It was shiny yellow, with what appeared to be a large lens and a handle with a black cord depending from it.

“I picked this up in the late twentieth century,” she said proudly. “It gives off ten thousand lumens.”

“By Jove!” exclaimed Monckton Milnes. He followed this with a resounding hiccup.

“Where do you put the kerosene?” asked Abberline. “The candle?”

Miss Hemlock uttered a tinkling little laugh, like crystal. “It runs on electricity, stored in a battery. Unfortunately, the battery doesn’t last very long, but I knew it would shine bright long enough to fend off a few Morlocks.”

“Well, however it works,” said Burton, “we are forever in your debt. We would like to help you apprehend this scoundrel.”

“Good. I don’t know exactly where he is, unfortunately, but I do know what he’s doing here.”

Burton arched an eyebrow. “Oh?”

“Yes. Sometime in the next week, a man named Mycroft Holmes is going to receive a very special document. A timeline of future events from now until the middle of the next century. A so-called Map of Time.”

A knot tightened itself in Burton’s stomach as he recalled Swinburne’s words.

You must stop Mycroft know-it-all Holmes from getting the map. The Map of Time.

“You know of this,” said Miss Hemlock, reading Burton’s expression. It wasn’t a question.

“I’ve heard of it, yes,” said Burton. “I didn’t know what it was before now.”

“You think this mysterious Morlock wrangler is the one who gives this Map of Time to Mycroft Holmes?” asked Abberline.

“I do. Though what he is doing with these Morlocks, I can’t fathom.”

“How did you find out about this Map of Time?” Burton asked.

“That’s probably going to sound like the strangest part of all of this,” said Miss Hemlock. “From Mycroft Holmes himself, in the spring of nineteen forty-five.”

“Bismillah! He’d be over a hundred and twenty years old. There’s no way he could live that long.”

“He doesn’t, er, didn’t,” said Miss Hemlock. “Not exactly. He found a way to circumvent the aging process. After a fashion.”

“Circumvent it?” said Abberline. “Goodness me, but how?”

“Through technology. Near the end of his life, Mycroft Holmes reportedly became interested in methods of prolonging life, through occult as well as materialist means. In nineteen forty-five, he is a being of pure mind, existing inside a complex analytical engine that is continually improved upon, and is currently—in my time—housed inside what once was the Westminster clock tower.”