Evolution Expects Read online

  The armour in place, he secured it to the suit beneath via a series of hastily added buckles. It covered his shoulders, chest and back, with curved plates coming down over his upper arms. Once he came to put on his newly improved gloves – now transformed into gauntlets by the addition of more metal – practically the entirety of his arms would be covered, only the less easily reached underarms still vulnerable to attack.

  Next, Thomas pulled on the sturdy leather boots. There hadn’t been much he could do with these yet, or else he wouldn’t have been able to walk when he was grounded, but at least they already had steel toe caps. He had thought about adding some sort of toe weapon, but that would have to wait until he had more time to make further improvements. With the Limehouse Golem still out there, events were in danger of spiralling out of his control, and he had had quite enough of external events and other people dictating how his life should be run. It inevitably ended in misery and suffering.

  He had been able to beef-up his leg protection, however, mainly to the knees and the front of his thighs. He had a feeling that he could expect a few more ungainly landings before he mastered the jetpack completely, and he didn’t want to be crippled by them thanks to having taken all the skin off his knees, again.

  Buckles and straps secure, he turned to the frame from which hung the jetpack. The flaring around the jets themselves were already showing signs of wear and tear, the metal scorched black and brown. Perhaps there was a more suitable material from which they could be made – an alloy of some kind? That was something else that he would have to look into another time. Since his initial flight, he had managed to carry out a little fine-tuning, mainly regarding the palm-held throttle control. It should now allow for greater variation in changes in velocity and, hopefully, mean that he could hover upright, if he proved adroit enough.

  He had refuelled the pack’s tanks from his father’s supply of reactants and his shoulders ached as they took the weight of the pack again so soon after sustaining his injuries in the tussle with the golem. But once the harness was secured over the plates of armour, the pressure eased a little, and it had already started to feel like an almost reassuring encumbrance.

  Open to its full extent, on another frame, was the cape-cum-glider wing. Thomas crouched awkwardly in the armoured suit, ducked beneath the outstretched wings and then rose to standing again with the cape now in place, securing it around his chest and shoulders, and connecting it to the jetpack harness, making sure that he was securely locked within it.

  Turning to one of the work benches dotted around the room, he picked up the utility belt he had made for himself, designed to carry all those little items he had a feeling might come in useful during whatever escapades awaited him in his new role as a masked avenger. For the time being all that it held was a skeleton key and, most importantly, the micro-transmitter he had created – cannibalising parts of another of his father’s discarded contraptions to do so – specifically for the operation he was about to embark upon.

  Returning to the desk, looking for his gloves, his eye fell on the paper that lay there.

  The front page, and most of those that followed it, were taken up with the Prime Minister’s very public attack on China, regarding the Eastern Empire’s lack of a stance on climate change, along with ongoing developments surrounding the launch of the Jupiter Station, now only a matter of weeks away. But in spite of all this media coverage of what was already being hailed, by some, as Devlin Valentine’s day, Thomas had still managed to make page seven. He read the headline again, with an almost guilty feeling of self-satisfaction.

  MAYHEM AND MURDER STALK THE EAST END

  A warm glowed filled his aching body as he savoured the article. He felt... flattered. That was it. It felt good to be noticed, and he took pleasure from being the centre of attention, although, of course, he had not been portrayed as the hero of the piece. In fact, he had been vilified as much as anything else, practically tarred with the same brush as the Golem, whatever that really was. But then he hadn’t made the most auspicious of starts in his battle with the beast. In fact, he had given a good example of what it meant to take a pasting. No, he had to admit that he had his work cut out for him, if he wanted to improve his image in the eyes of the public. But then, he had to admit, part of him also took a vicarious thrill from being feared by the general masses.

  Distracted, skim-reading the article he had perused half a dozen times already, ignoring the bit at the start about the fire that had consumed the Palace Theatre and unreliable eye-witness reports stating that a terracotta giant had started the blaze, he paused at one particular passage.

  Eye-witnesses reported that the creature attempted to strike back against the seemingly unstoppable juggernaut, but to no avail. But what was it?

  Witnesses describe it as having the semblance of a man-sized bat, breathing fulminous smoke and with terrible burning eyes, ‘like looking into the hellish pit of Hades itself,’ as a Mrs Doris Channing of Limehouse, put it.

  Another eye-witness, chimney sweep Sidney Proudfoot, told our reporter that it, ‘just looked like some bloke in a Hallowe’en costume.’

  But The Times can reveal, after exhaustive research, that this is Spring-Heeled Jack, back to terrorise the city after 160 years.

  After his assault on the monster that attacked the Palace Theatre in Limehouse last night, some claim that he is a hero, here to help our beleaguered capital in these dire times we now find ourselves living in.

  Vigilante or villain? What is the true identity of this Spring-Heeled Jack? This is the question Londoners are asking themselves now. Who is this strange caped figure, and does he fight for good or for ill?

  Spring-Heeled Jack. The press had branded him with an alternative identity before he had properly created an alias for himself, through which to go about exacting his revenge on those who had engineered matters so that he was put away for a crime he didn’t commit. And it was an identity that would strike fear into the hearts of his enemies. The greatest fear of all, the fear of the unknown.

  Beneath the rather sensationalist piece of writing, there was a plea published on behalf of the Metropolitan Police, who were now dealing with the related case of recent attacks perpetrated in the Limehouse area, against both the Chinese and Jewish communities, some experts fearing a new era of gang warfare was about to consume the area.

  The Police are offering a reward for any information regarding this masked mystery man – if he is a man – that will help lead to an arrest. A spokesman for Scotland Yard asked anyone who might know the man to come forward and even urged the rogue to give himself up and hand himself over to the Police at the earliest opportunity.

  There was a genteel knock, followed by a polite cough, and Mrs May appeared at the study door.

  “Your whiskey, sir.”

  She didn’t bat an eyelid, seeing him got up like he was, but then she had been the one to find him when he had arrived back at Sanctuary House, the night before, his head still reeling, as he crashed back through the door of the rooftop conservatory, cutting the power just before he rocketed into the far wall, and it was there that Mrs May found him, battered and bruised and blacked out.

  “Shall I prepare a light supper for when you return?”

  “Err, let’s see how it goes, shall we?”

  “It’s only that I was about to retire for the night,” she explained, but without any hint of a complaint, despite the fact that she had been deprived of sleep, either tending to Thomas’s injuries or helping him with the re-invention of his suit.

  “Oh, of course. Sorry, how selfish of me.”

  “I’ll leave some bread and dripping out for you then, in the kitchen, shall I?”

  “Yes. Please. That would be ideal. Thank you,” he answered stiltedly, embarrassed. He had been so focused on his mission he hadn’t given the needs of anyone beyond himself a moment’s thought.

  Suddenly, remembering why she had climbed all the way to the top of the house in the first place, T
homas took the glass of whiskey and knocked it back in one go. The alcoholic warmth eased the nervous knot in his stomach, helping to banish his doubts about the forthcoming venture, and helping him to take that crucial, final step.

  He picked up the suit’s headpiece and, having slicked back his unruly mop of hair, pulled it on over the top of his head. As the mask came down, he saw the world again through the bloody tinge of its night-vision goggles and was immediately transported back to the events of two nights before.

  “So you’re going out again.”

  “Yes, Mrs May.” His voice sounded strangely altered by the mask.

  “Does it really have to be so soon?”

  He dropped the paper, with its artist’s impression of a giant blood-sucking horned bat-monster, onto the silver tray on which she had carried his pick-me-up.

  “Yes, Mrs May.”

  Opening the conservatory doors – the broken panes replaced now with sheets of ply board – the transformed Thomas stepped out onto the battlements of Sanctuary House.

  The jetpack roared into life as he thumbed the ignition switch.

  Shouting to be heard over the rising roar of the jets, he turned back to the open doors of the conservatory, regarding the slouched form of his exhausted housekeeper and unlikely confidante, he added, “Sleep well.”

  And with that he opened the throttle and took off into the encroaching night, rocketing up into the heavens.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  The Rabbi

  THE AIR WITHIN the synagogue was redolent with the smell of dust and beeswax. Clouds of sickly-sweet amber incense clogged the vaulted ceiling space of the old building like the nicotine yellow Smog that clogged the streets beyond the holy sanctuary.

  The glass of the high, narrow windows shone blackly in the reflected candle light. The Rabbi walked the length of the synagogue lighting the last of the candelabras.

  Beyond the walls of the synagogue, crammed in as it was between the looming warehouse and teetering tenements, all was hustle and bustle. The constant background hubbub coming from the docks, the river, cars clogging the city’s exhaust-choked streets even at this time of night, the clatter and bangs of ships being loaded and unloaded, and the shouts of stevedores from inside the synagogue sounded like the city’s own song, sung over and over, just as King David had sung psalms of praise to God.

  Inside the temple, all was still. The only sound was the tapping of the Rabbi’s heels on the tiled floor and his own monotone humming as he subconsciously chanted from the scriptures of the Song of Songs to himself.

  He passed beneath the lamp of the Eternal Light and approached the Holy of Holies, intending to take out the Torah scrolls and seek guidance from their chapters and verses.

  Last Sabbath Day had seen a marked increase in attendance by God’s children. Reports had it that the attack on the Palace Theatre had been carried out by a Golem. Rabbi Moses Babad felt a thrill of nervous excitement at the thought – had some student of Rabbinic lore really managed to create life from the clay of the Earth, as God had done on the sixth day, to be a vessel of His vengeance?

  Although people had lost their lives, Jews as well as Irish and Chinese, some good had come out of it, although he could not condone it, of course. But then could he wholly condemn what had happened when it had brought so many of his stray flock back to the temple?

  The downside was, of course, that he had taken to locking the door of the synagogue when it wasn’t in use, for fear of reprisals against his community, and himself in particular.

  The door! Rabbi Babad suddenly remembered. It was still unlocked!

  The Rabbi spun on his heel, as quickly as his arthritic joints would allow, and set off at a trot towards the back of the building.

  The sudden bang on the door startled him.

  A man stood within the entrance porch of the synagogue, letting the noise and dust of the street into the sacred place for a moment before the door swung closed, shutting out the world once more.

  The Rabbi could immediately tell that he wasn’t one of his usual congregation. In fact, Rabbi Babad sincerely doubted that he was of Jewish stock at all. He was tall, with a slim to athletic build. His hair fell in a foppish sweep across his forehead and his eyes sparkled in the candle-lit gloom. Everything about him, from the clothes he wore – a crumpled linen suit with a rough silk waistcoat and mustard cravat, the whole ensemble finished off with a diamond tie-pin – to the extravagant bloodstone-tipped cane in his hand, to the way he carried himself, spoke of his obvious wealth and status. This gentleman belonged to the upper echelons of Magna Britannian society.

  Catching the Rabbi’s eye, the man strode boldly towards him, with a cheery, “Hello there!” completely failing to follow correct, and respectful, decorum upon entering this house of God. Rabbi Babad clicked his tongue in annoyance, a frown taking his features. He pointed to the small wicker basket on top of a bookcase just within the entrance.

  A look of embarrassed surprise seized the man’s face and with a hurried apology of, “Oh, sorry,” he scurried back to the door and, taking one of the cloth skullcaps from the basket, placed it on his head. The kippah in place, he began to approach the Holy of Holies and the Rabbi.

  “YES, MY SON?” the Rabbi intoned, in thickly accented English, the frown on his face becoming a placid expression of calm. “Can I help you?”

  “I certainly hope so, Rabbi,” Ulysses Quicksilver replied, feeling rather self-conscious having been reprimanded by the old priest before he had even been able to introduce himself. There was nothing like making a good first impression, and his had been nothing like a good first impression. He only hoped he claw something back from the gulf of his social faux pas.

  “Then speak, and tell me what it is you seek to know, for we gain nothing through silence. It is not very often that we receive a visit from outside of the Jewish community. What brings you to Limehouse?”

  Ulysses regarded the diminutive form of the rotund Rabbi, dressed in the traditional robes of an Orthodox Jewish teacher. He had a beard as thick and grey as wire wool, and his hair hung down around his ears in ringlets. He could be only a little over five feet in height, but that didn’t change the fact that in the Rabbi’s presence Ulysses felt like he was still in short trousers, back at preparatory school, facing the fearsome Biblical wrath of his Religious Studies teacher.

  “I’m here investigating the recent attacks in the area. You heard about the fire at the Palace Theatre?”

  “But of course,” the Rabbi said, looking grave. “A terrible business.”

  “And I take it you’ve heard what people are saying was behind it?”

  “It had nothing to do with me, if that’s what you’re implying.”

  “Then you know people say a Golem has done these things.”

  The other man tensed. “I have heard the rumours. But I promise you that no-one from the Jewish community had anything to do with it.”

  “But the Golem is a creature from Jewish folklore, is it not?”

  “I do not have to answer your questions,” the Rabbi suddenly shouted, spittle flying from his lips. “There has already been enough anti-Semitic feeling stirred up by recent events. I do not need you coming here, harassing me in my own synagogue. What are you really doing here? Are you from the papers?” he said, suspicious.

  “No, I can assure you that I am nothing to do with the press,” Ulysses said calmly, reaching inside a jacket pocket and taking out a leather card holder, showing the distrustful Rabbi his credentials.

  “Ah, I see,” the Rabbi muttered, the fire within him suddenly doused.

  “I am sure that reports of a Golem trashing the East End would indeed stir up plenty of anti-Jewish feeling. But can you be sure that that wouldn’t lead to reprisals from your side, as it were?”

  The Rabbi looked at the floor, saying nothing for a moment. “Would that I could. But as the Holy Torah teaches us, in the ninth commandment, I shall not lie.”

  “There you are then.
Members of some local Chinese tong were attacked and killed recently, weren’t they?”

  “Yes. I heard about that. And I wish I could say that they were the only ones.”

  “But they weren’t, were they?”

  The Rabbi shook his head. “But if certain members of our community had taken matters into their own hands, say, it would only have been because they were provoked!” he said, the still-glowing coals of his anger being fanned by his discussion with this intruder into his world. He looked up again, fixing Ulysses with the sparkling black dots of his eyes, buried as they were amidst all the beard and hair. “But create a Golem? Do you really believe that such a thing is possible?”

  “You mean, you don’t?”

  “I mean it hasn’t been heard of in five hundred years!”

  “You’re talking about Rabbi Loew’s golem, in Prague?”

  “No! Rabbi Loew was one of the most outstanding Jewish scholars and would never have undertaken to create a golem. No, it is much more likely that if the Prague golem ever existed, it would have been the work of Rabbi Eliyahu of Chelm.”

  “I see,” Ulysses said slowly, not wanting to enrage the Rabbi any further. He certainly had a temper, but was he the one behind the attacks, whatever it was that had actually performed them?

  “But do you think it is possible to create life, in God’s name?”

  “As God created Adam from the dust of the earth? If one has faith, one can do anything. Certainly the Sefer Yezirah contains instructions on how to make one and the stories would have us believe that it is possible.”

  “And how is the creation of a golem achieved?”