Mark Hodder - The curious case of the Clockwork Man

The constables swiped their truncheons, crunched skulls, and splattered lifeless brains, but they were badly outnumbered and, furthermore, were distracted by swooping wraiths.

The seeming ghosts wafted in and out of sight, sometimes almost solid, other times a mere suggestion, and every time one appeared, policemen nearby slumped and clutched their heads. More than a few suddenly turned, with the word “Tichborne” blurting out of their lips, and attacked their colleagues.

Police truncheons smacked down onto police heads. The Rakes weren't the only ones apologising.

The battle intensified.

“Don't hold back, lads!” Trounce shouted. “Have at ’em!”

He stepped aside as a svelte and fashionable but sagging and bluish corpse minced out of the pall and said: “What ho! Would you mind awfully if I took your life, old thing? I seem to have mislaid my own. Jolly careless of me, what!”

“Oh, bugger off, you ridiculous ass,” the detective snarled. He dodged the Rake's blade and swung his truncheon into the side of the man's head.

The dandy staggered and protested: “Rotten show, old man!”

The detective hit him again, sending him to his knees.

“Really! This isn't at all cricket!”

“Shut the hell up,” Trounce hissed, and bashed his attacker's skull in. The Rake folded onto the cobbles and twitched weakly.

Detective Inspector Honesty emerged from the fog and nodded a greeting. Trounce returned it and warned: “Watch behind you!”

Honesty twisted and ducked under a blade. The Rake holding it was a badly moldering cadaver, perhaps one of the first to die. It stank, and when the Scotland Yard man punched it hard on the chin, its head simply fell off and split on the cobbles like an overripe melon. The body toppled after it.

Honesty turned away, his nose wrinkled in disgust.

“Where's Swinburne?” Trounce asked.

“I don't know.”

“Was the signal given early?”

“Yes. One of my men panicked.”

“Blast!”

“My fault.”

“I doubt it. Don't blame yourself. Can we hold them off until he arrives?”

“No choice. Burton's depending on it.”

Trounce grunted his agreement, stepped away from his fellow officer, gripped the handle of his truncheon with both hands, and swiped it into the ear of an attacking Rake. The corpse stumbled and fell. The detective stepped onto its chest, heaved himself over, and swung his weapon upward into the chin of another dead man. The head snapped back, came forward, and was met by a crushing blow to the forehead. The Rake grabbed at the detective's arm but missed, and the truncheon came arcing back and impacted against the carcass again. Bone shattered.

“Lie-” Trounce grunted, putting his full strength into a fourth blow “-down!”

The Rake tottered, swayed, and fell.

There was a loud smack and fragments of flesh, bone, and hair showered over the Scotland Yard man. He looked back in time to see a headless body fall. Constable Lampwick stood beyond it, bloodied truncheon in his hand.

“Sorry, sir,” he said. “It was about to jump on you.”

“Much obliged. I'll send you the laundry bill in the morning.”

The constable smiled, grimaced, clutched his head, raised his weapon, and yelled: “Not guilty! Tichborne has been cheated, you bastard!”

He swung his club at Trounce's head. The detective yelled, dodged backward, fell over the corpse he'd just downed, rolled, jumped to his feet, and threw his truncheon. It hit Lampwick square between the eyes and the man collapsed, unconscious.

“I'm sorry, son.”

Honesty, meanwhile, had scooped up a second weapon, and, with a truncheon in each hand, was ducking under clutching hands, swiping at kneecaps, and crippling his opponents. Five of his men, staying close to him, were then finishing the job by flattening heads.

It became a routine, almost rhythmic: dodge-duck- Smack! Smack! -pulverise. Dodge-duck- Smack! Smack! -pulverise.

“Winter jasmine,” Honesty declared. “Very cheerful.”

Dodge-duck- Smack! Smack! -pulverise.

“And maybe wisteria. A good climber for the back fence.”

Charles Altamont Doyle's astral body drifted through the fog and mingled with Commander Krishnamurthy's men. Some took a swing at him, which didn't affect him at all, while others seemed to hear the voice that reverberated through what little essence he possessed. “Rebel!” it urged them. “Turn against your oppressors!” They put their hands to their heads, winced, and assaulted their fellows. Fights broke out.

The other part of Doyle was at the junction of the Strand, Aldwych, and Lancaster Place, at the end of Waterloo Bridge. Despite having a dent in his cheek where a truncheon had caught him, he still moved and he still hungered. He could not resist his appetite; others had life, and he wanted it!

A policeman charged at him and slashed at his forehead. Doyle shifted and the weapon thudded down onto his shoulder. He felt nothing, though he heard his collarbone crack. He clutched his attacker's wrist and slammed his other hand into the man's elbow, which snapped with a nasty crunch. The policeman let loose a scream. Doyle released the arm and wrapped his fingers around the man's neck. He started to squeeze. The scream gurgled into silence.

“Give me your life!” Doyle moaned. “Please!”

At the edge of Trafalgar Square, Commander Krishnamurthy listened to the growing sounds of battle and made a decision. He ordered his men to advance.

From the north and south sides of the Strand, smaller police teams also responded to the intensifying conflict and moved into the fog.

Tock!

Krishnamurthy's truncheon bounced from the back of a constable's skull. It was the fifth of his men he'd had to personally render unconscious.

There were wraiths everywhere, and the Flying Squad man could feel them digging into his mind, trying to wheedle their way inside to take control. His headache was almost overpowering.

“Do your duty, old son!” he advised himself. “Don't give in to these bloody spooks.”

Despite the steady loss of men, he still had a reasonably sized force at his command, and he was leading them at a steady pace toward the end of Lancaster Place.

Now Rakes, as well as wraiths, began to appear out of the miasma, and combat became rather more deadly. Five men went down before the Flying Squad commander realized that not a single pistol was functioning. The only way to beat the walking corpses was to obliterate their heads. He yelled the order, and a few moments later gore was spraying everywhere.

Krishnamurthy forgot his headache as he started to exact vengeance for Milligan's death.

Amid the carnage, as his team penetrated deeper into the battle zone, he caught sight of Trounce, who was laying about himself like a wild man, and Honesty, who was industriously crippling the shambling monstrosities.

Krishnamurthy realised that the three main groups of policemen had made it to the rendezvous point as planned. However, unlike Honesty and Trounce, he didn't know that the signal whistle had been sounded by mistake or that the advance had been made some considerable time ahead of schedule. Now, as the police teams merged, it dawned on him that something had gone badly wrong.

Swinburne was supposed to be here. The opposition should be on its back foot by now. The police were meant to be in control of the situation.

They weren't.

“Hold fast,” he breathed. “Just hope the poet shows up.” He lashed out at a Rake and muttered: “A poet, by crikey! A blessed poet!”

Detective Inspector Honesty strode past, brandishing his weapons.

Krishnamurthy clearly heard his superior bark: “Petunias.”

“Did you say Tichborne, sir?” he asked.