“And how do you propose that we do this?” Tim asked.

“Barry,” said Will.

“Zzzz,” went Barry.

“Barry!” went Will once again.

“Oh-ah-what, chief?”

“Barry, it is time to rouse yourself and go into action.”

“Have you messed up already, chief? Sorry I missed it.”

“No,” said Will. “I haven’t. But there’s something I want you to do for me. Remember when you told me that you could not take me to the exact time and place when the big trouble was going to occur?”

“I do indeed, chief. If it was only known to me and not to you, then I can’t do it. Outside my remit. Sorry; that’s the way it works.”

“Well, Barry,” said Will. “Now I do know where and when I want to be. Exactly where and when. So you can take me there right?”

“Certainly can,” said Barry.

“So I’d like you to take all of us to—”

“All of you, chief?”

“All of us, Barry.”

“No can do, once more, chief. I can take you and Mr McGregor, but not Mr Wells and Master Scribbens.”

“No matter,” said Will. “They can meet us there in the future.”

“How far?” Barry asked.

“Not far,” said Will. “Only fifteen days.”

“Ah,” said Barry.

“Ah,” said Will. “Take Tim and me to the circus.”

41

It was a wonder.

Even in an age of wonders, it was a wonder.

Count Otto Black’s Circus Fantastique hung in the night sky above Whitechapel. The vast star-shaped blimp sparkled with thousands of light bulbs which flashed on and off, the way that some of them do, spelling out Count Otto’s name and tracing the outlines of galloping horses, gambolling clowns and dancing bears, high-wire walkers and jugglers, mimes and marmosets too.

It was the thirty-first of December, the year was eighteen ninety-nine, it was half past nine and it wasn’t raining.

Will and Tim emerged from the Naughty Pope public house into a thoroughfare that jostled with New Year merrymakers. Almost everyone waved a Union flag and most were already drunk.

Will looked up and whistled. The sheer scale of the flying circus was awesome in the absolute. “That is big,” was all he could manage for the moment.

Tim shook his head and patted down his wandering hair. “It’s beyond anything,” he said. “But I just don’t get it.”

“What is it that you just don’t get?” Will was jostled by revellers. A young ragamuffin called Winston, who had recently failed his interview for the job of curator at the Tate Gallery and decided instead to join the rest of his brothers and pursue a life of crime, deftly relieved Will of his wallet.

“It’s technology,” said Tim. “Astounding technology. Count Otto Black designed the flying circus himself, didn’t he?”

“It said so on the flyer we were reading in the pub.”

“So why go to all the trouble and expense, if at the stroke of midnight, his Doomsday Programme kicks in and the whole caboodle goes belly up, ceases to exist, in fact?”

Will shrugged. Winston’s brother Wycliff deftly relieved Will of his pocket watch.

“It’s a fiendish plot,” said Will. “And fiendish plots only really make sense to the fiends who plot them, I suppose.”

“Doesn’t make sense,” said Tim.

“Curious, that,” Will smiled, “considering that everything else so far has made such perfect sense.”

“That would be irony, right?”

Will nodded unthoughtfully. Winston’s other brother, Elvis, relieved Will of his circus tickets.

“Ah, no,” said Will, taking Elvis by the wrist and hauling him into the air. “I didn’t mind about the watch or the wallet, but I need those tickets.”

“Right you are, guv’nor,” said the dangling Elvis, as Will plucked the tickets from his grubby little mitt.

“Good boy,” said Will, and he set Elvis down.

Winston’s other brother, Kylie, deftly relieved Elvis of a digital wristwatch that Kylie had recently swiped from a toff named Burlington Bertie.

Tim reached down and deftly relieved Kylie of a packet of Spangles.

Will, in turn, deftly relieved Tim of his straw hat.

“I wasn’t wearing a straw hat,” said Tim.

“That’s mine!” said a lady, snatching it back.

“Sorry,” said Will. “I got carried away.”

The lady, once more in her straw hat, kicked Will in the ankle. Winston relieved her of her bundle of War Crys.

“Stop it now,” said Will. “It’s all getting out of hand.”

“Who’s nicked my boots?” said Wycliff.

“Let’s go, Tim,” said Will.

“Do we have to?” Tim asked. “I’ve acquired a packet of Spangles. Oh no I haven’t, they’re gone.”

“We have to go,” said Will. “It’s not clever and it’s not funny.”

“What swab’s scarpered with me wooden leg?” cried a pirate, collapsing into an ungathered heap of the pure.

Will and Tim buttoned up their coats, thrust their hands into their pockets and pressed forward into the noisy crowd.

Street sellers were out in force, hawking Union flags and roasted chestnuts, centennial souvenirs and pictures of Little Tich.

“Mud on a stick, squire?” asked a young rapscallion.

“Mud on a stick?” asked Tim in ready reply.

“Looks like a toffee apple from a distance, squire.”

“I’ll take two then, please,” said Tim.

“No, you won’t,” said Will.

“Poo on a stick,” cried another rapscallion. “Looks like mud from a distance.”

“Press on,” said Will. And Tim pressed on.

“Tell me, Will,” said Tim, as the two pressed on together. “What of the plan thus far?”

“Thus far,” said Will, “the plan stands at this. I have here two complimentary tickets dispatched to me by Master Scribbens, who is aloft, probably making himself up even now in preparation for his performance.”

“What exactly does he do for a performance?”

Will shrugged. “I’m not exactly sure. He hinted to me that there was a degree of sliding involved.”

“Hopefully we’ll be in time to miss his act, if you know what I mean. And what of Mr Wells?”

“He slipped aboard the flying circus with Master Scribbens this morning. He’s had a day to search for the computer programme. Let’s hope he’s been successful. An aerial hansom awaits us upon the corner of Hobs Lane; I ordered it earlier. It will take us up to the circus. Once there Mr Wells will take you to the computer room, where you will disable the system.”

“Right,” said Tim, somewhat dubiously.

“And I will take care of Count Otto.”

“Bring him to justice?” said Tim. “How?”

“Kill him,” said Will.

“What?”

“He was responsible for Rune’s death. I know I don’t have any definite proof, but I believe it all the same. And he is the King of the witches. All of this, everything that I and my other self have been through, is because of him. He has to die.”

“That’s savage,” said Tim. “It will make you a murderer. How can you live with that?”

“I won’t be living with that.”

“How so?”

“Because if I thwart Count Otto’s plans, our future will cease to exist, Tim. We will cease to exist.”

“I’m not at all keen on this plan. Isn’t there another we could try?”

“How many times has he tried to kill me?” Will asked. “And you too. He did kill you. One of his clockwork terminators shot you with a General Electric Minigun.”

Tim shivered. “You do what you have to do,” he said. “I’ll take care of the Doomsday Programme.”

They had reached the aerial taxi. Will turned and took Tim’s hand in his. “It all ends tonight,” he said. “In a few hours from now. However it ends, I just want to say that you are the best friend I’ve ever had. And the best half-brother also.”

“Stop it,” said Tim. “You’ll have me getting a crinkly mouth.”

“I’m sorry I got you involved in this.”

“I’m not,” said Tim. “I’ve loved every moment.”

“So, shall we go?”

The cabbie swung open a passenger door.