Twelve Minutes to Midnight

by Christopher Edge

  With an anguished howl, Wells turned again to face them. His eyes rolled upwards, his features contorted with rage. With a barely suppressed anger, he slammed his fist against the desk.

  “Get out! Get out!” he roared. “Kenton – get this creature out of here. They come to take my ideas – thieves and plagiarists all. Get her out!”

  Almost apologetically, Penny felt the butler’s heavy hands rest on her shoulders. He steered her firmly towards the door as Alfie skulked out of the room in front of her. They could hear the sound of Wells raging behind them as they stepped into the corridor. The last thing Penny saw before the study door closed was the author bent weeping over his writing desk, the pen in his hand still scratching across the page.

  It was the same story everywhere else that they went. From Fleet Street to the Strand, from Bloomsbury to Pall Mall: all across London, on every door that they knocked, they found authors indisposed, magazine offices locked and bolted. But at every window, they could see shadowy shapes hunched over desks, the pens in their hands scratching endlessly across the page.

  As the charcoal grey sky finally faded to black and street lamps flickered into life, Penny and Alfie sat slumped on a bench in the shadow of the British Museum. The look of determination had slipped from Penny’s face and, as Alfie blew into his cupped hands to keep them warm, she shook her head in despair.

  “It’s hopeless. Lady Cambridge has the whole of literary London under her spell. There’s no way of stopping her. When the magazines start to publish their stories, the whole of London itself will fall prey to this madness. What are we going to do?”

  Alfie frowned.

  “Maybe it won’t work,” he said, his wistful tone showing that he was clutching at straws. “Imagine Monty trying to write a story – he wouldn’t know where to begin.”

  Penny shuddered. She could imagine it only too well. The months she’d spent building Montgomery Flinch’s reputation, the exquisitely-crafted tales of terror that she’d written under his name – she could lose it all if Monty managed to put pen to paper.

  The heavy clatter of horses’ hooves and the sound of a wagon unloading pulled Penny’s thoughts away from this misery. At the newsstand on the corner, she saw a young boy carrying heaped bundles of papers from a delivery wagon. The news vendor, a tall, thin man, was crouched, stacking the newly-delivered papers on his stand. As he finished, he turned and, with a bold hand, chalked a new headline across the newsstand board.

  STOP PRESS – FIRST STORIES OF A NEW CENTURY

  Slipping the delivery boy a grubby handful of coins, the newsagent grabbed the topmost paper from his pile and bellowed:

  “Special edition of The Strand Magazine! Exclusive new story from the pen of Arthur Conan Doyle. Read all about his vision of the future!”

  Penny and Alfie stared at each other aghast. Beneath the glow of the street lamp, the passing pedestrians started to crowd around the newsstand, eager to buy their copies of the magazine. Above their heads, thick trails of mist were spreading, ghostly fingers tightening their grip on the sky.

  XXII

  The dreams started that night. A huge spider web of black silken threads stretched across the city, capturing every reader in its snare. As copies of The Strand Magazine sat on bedside tables, an army of sleepers slowly rose from their beds. With eyes glazed, their fingers scrabbled for something to write with, knocking lamps, books and picture frames to the floor in their stupor. Frightened wives screamed as their sleeping husbands scratched strange messages into bedsteads, bewitched children filling their storybooks with frantic scribbles, deaf to their worried parents’ pleas. Outside in the shivering frost, a tramp rolled over in the gutter, his grimy skin showing through the rips in his ragged clothes. Clutching torn pages of newsprint more tightly to his body for warmth, he reached out with a shaking hand. His fingers closed around a broken bottle lying next to him in the gutter and, raising it to the wall, he began to scratch a trembling message across the stone.

  The World Is Gone Mad

  And amongst this madness, an army of thieves were set loose across the city. Recruited by Lady Cambridge from the criminal underworld that lurked in London’s shadows, these thieves had only one instruction: to steal the last instalments of the Midnight Papers. In the dead of night, black-clad burglars broke in through fanlight windows; prowlers and picklocks creeping through the grand houses of Belgravia, Knightsbridge, Mayfair and Sloane Square. As the dreamers sank back into a troubled sleep, her thieves gathered up their freshly inked papers, stealing out from the houses before the dull grey edges of dawn began to stain the sky, and returning them to their mistress’s lair.

  The last day of the nineteenth century was here. New Year’s Eve, 1899.

  Penelope stood in front of the newsstand, reading the morning headlines as, next to her, Alfie leafed through the pages of that day’s edition of the Illustrated London News.

  CRIME WAVE HITS CITY – NIGHT ROBBERIES PLAGUE LONDON

  REAL-LIFE MORIARTY BLAMED FOR STRING OF BURGLARIES

  POLICE BAFFLED BY MYSTERIOUS BREAK-INS

  Penny’s face furrowed in a frown as she tried to crack the riddle behind these headlines. Lady Cambridge’s hand was somewhere behind all of this, she was sure of it. Behind her, the Thames curled lazily under the arches of Westminster Bridge as boats and barges, black with coal, criss-crossed the river. Beyond this, she glimpsed the Houses of Parliament, its gothic towers half-shrouded in mist. All along the embankment, a great tide of people hurried towards their places of work, no rest for them even on the eve of this new century.

  “Penny.”

  Alfie tugged at her sleeve, pulling her gaze away from the rack of daily newspapers. He gestured to the side of the stand where the sour-faced vendor was unbundling a parcel of freshly printed papers, the printers’ string still tied around them. The vendor cursed as the string snapped, spilling the papers across the pavement and Penny saw with a shudder the special editions of numerous magazines scattered amongst them. The Graphic, Chamber’s Journal, The Boy’s Own Paper, Pearson’s Magazine. On the front covers of each and every one, the headline “Visions of the Future” stood out in stark black letters, announcing the wondrous stories that could be found within. Mercifully, The Penny Dreadful wasn’t amongst them.

  Alfie stooped down to help the vendor retrieve the magazines, but as he picked up a copy of The Boy’s Own Paper and started to leaf through its pages, Penny snatched the magazine from his hand with a strangled cry.

  “Don’t!”

  Startled, Alfie turned around, his eyes widening with surprise.

  “I was only—”

  Penny dashed the magazine into the gutter, its front cover tearing as it landed.

  “These stories are dangerous,” she told him. Before she had a chance to explain herself further, the sound of a gruff bellow made Penny suddenly flinch.

  “Oi!”

  She turned to see the beefy newspaperman advancing angrily towards her. In one hand, he had gathered up a loose sheaf of magazines, but his other hand was clenched into a fist.

  “That’s my blasted stock you’re ruining, girl. Come here!”

  For a split second, Penny stood frozen. Then Alfie grabbed hold of her arm, dragging her to her senses as he shouted out a single word of warning.

  “Run!”

  Dodging past the street hawkers with their baskets arrayed on the pavement, Penny and Alfie fled in the direction of Westminster Bridge. Quickly losing themselves in the torrent of people streaming down the street, Penny glanced back through the crowd to see the red-faced vendor turn and aim a frustrated boot at a dog that was snuffling the discarded papers. She reached out for Alfie’s arm, slowing him to a stroll.

  “It’s all right,” she panted. “We’ve lost him.”

  Around them, the crowds hemmed in on all sides, sweeping them along like corks in a surging river. Silver-haired bankers, merchants and lawyers, grey-suited clerks and porters, nurses wheeling tightly-swaddled child
ren for a morning stroll, the constant eddying tide of the London mob. The sky above looked like a great dome of slate, and half-melted snowflakes began to fall in a shower of sleet. Penelope pulled her scarf more closely around her neck as the sharp easterly wind filled her eyes with water.

  “I wasn’t going to read it, you know,” Alfie muttered sullenly, pulling up the collar of his coat against the chill. “Although I don’t see what harm it would’ve done if I had.”

  “Do you want to end up like Monty, H. G. Wells and Mr Wigram?” she snapped. “Driven half mad by the spiders in their minds? Just look around you – all of London is falling prey to their delusions!”

  Alfie glanced up as they pushed their way through the buffeting crowd. He noticed for the first time the glazed look in the eyes of the people they passed. A bowler-hatted gentleman, with a copy of Cassell’s Magazine tucked under his arm, was walking straight towards them. In his right hand he held a house brick pressed to his ear and was scowling as he jabbered wildly into the empty air. Alfie and Penny had to quickly step to one side, pressing themselves against the wall as the man brushed past, still blindly ranting to nobody at all.

  “He should be in the madhouse,” Alfie whistled, shaking his head in disbelief.

  Penelope stared out at the jostling crowds. Amongst the noisy bustle of cabs and carriages, most of the passers-by seemed to be half sleeping as they walked, their eyes heavy with tears, whilst others gazed awestruck at the empty skyline as though seeing wonders that weren’t even there. Alfie followed her gaze, his forehead creasing in confusion.

  “What can they all see?”

  “The future,” Penny replied grimly. “The madness is spreading like a virus. We need to stop people from reading these stories – wake them up from this nightmare.”

  “How?” asked Alfie, his face flushed by the ice-cold wind.

  Penny looked down at the rolled-up newspaper in Alfie’s hand. Her eyes narrowed and the spark of an idea caught flame in her mind.

  “We need to tell them what’s really going on,” she explained, her voice rising in excitement. “Get the newspapers to print the truth. Tell the world that Lady Cambridge is behind this outbreak of madness. Stop her before she changes the future forever.”

  Alfie shook his head, a doubtful expression on his face.

  “Everybody thinks that Lady Cambridge is dead,” he reminded her. “Nobody will believe us.”

  Penny bristled at this suggestion.

  “They’ve got to believe me,” she replied indignantly. “Don’t forget, I own The Penny Dreadful. I’m the bestselling author in Britain. I can make them listen to me. I will…”

  Her voice trailed into silence as the realisation slowly dawned. Whatever she said, nobody would pay her the slightest bit of attention. The whole world thought that Monty Maples was Montgomery Flinch. Her brilliant scheme to give the mysterious author a public face had been too successful. Penny’s face fell in disappointment and despair.

  “You’re right,” she said. “There isn’t a journalist in London who would listen to us now.”

  But even as she said these words, the face of a man swam to the front of her mind. She could see his lean pockmarked features, the neatly-trimmed moustache, and his suspicious eyes peering inquisitively back at her. A journalist who didn’t believe that Montgomery Flinch was all that he claimed to be.

  “That’s it!”

  Stepping out into the street, Penny flung her hand out in front of her. A hansom cab was clattering at full pelt across the cobbles and, thinking she had lost her mind, Alfie dashed into the street after her. With a horrified expression flashing across his face, the cabbie reined his horses to a halt, stopping only inches from where Penelope was standing.

  The cabman leaned down from the driver’s seat.

  “What the blazes do you think you are doing?” he roared. “Get out of the road.”

  Shaking her head, Penny clambered up into the cab, motioning for Alfie to climb in after her. As they settled in their seats, she turned to address the driver through the window at the top of the cab.

  “Take us to Northumberland Street,” she ordered him as the cab driver stared back at her, dumbfounded by her nerve. “The offices of the Pall Mall Gazette.”

  XXIII

  “You’ve got to help us, Mr Barrett,” Penelope pleaded. “Time is running out.”

  She hurried down Fleet Street with Alfie by her side as the tall figure of the journalist strode a pace ahead of them, his overcoat buttoned against the cold. Above their heads, large black clouds were spreading out across the sky, thickening the darkness. As they passed beneath a street lamp’s pale moonlight glow, Penny glanced nervously at her pocket watch. It was seven in the evening. Only five hours left until midnight and the end of the century. Lady Cambridge’s prophecy was almost fulfilled.

  Penny and Alfie had spent most of the day trying to track the young journalist down. From the Northumberland Street offices of the Pall Mall Gazette to the pubs and taverns of Fleet Street, they had followed his trail, but the elusive correspondent had always been one step ahead of them. Only now as night drew in around them, had they finally spotted him, lurching from the doors of one pub and hurrying on to the next.

  Penelope quickened her pace to keep up with Barrett as the tall journalist made a beeline towards the dimly-lit windows of the tavern dead ahead. Above its door, a pub sign reading “Ye Olde Cheshire Cheese” swung in the stiffening breeze.

  The journalist shook his head, glancing down irritably at Penny as she kept step by his side.

  “I’m off duty,” he told her bluntly. “Save it until next year and stop by the newspaper then.”

  “It’ll be too late then,” Penny replied. “Look around you. There’s a madness spreading across the city – the whole of London is losing its mind. Don’t you want to know why?”

  Barrett paused at the entrance to the pub, his hand on the door handle. The muffled noise from the drinkers inside seeped out as he turned to face them.

  “It’s New Year’s Eve,” he reminded her with a scornful smile. “The dawn of a new century. Everybody’s going a little bit crazy. And, if you’ll excuse me, I’ll soon be joining them.” As he pushed the door open, a tumult of voices, laughter and clattering glasses spilled out into the street. “Goodbye, Miss Tredwell.”

  Her face hardening into a scowl, Penny seethed at the man’s ignorance. Here was the one person who could help them get the truth heard and he was about to disappear into a drunken haze. She had to do something.

  “I’ll give you the biggest story you’ve ever heard,” she snapped. “A story that will make you the most famous journalist this country has ever seen.”

  Framed in the doorway, Barrett glanced back at her with a flicker of distrust.

  “Why should I believe you?”

  Penny looked him straight in the eye. Her long, dark fringe fell across her pale face, but behind this her eyes were narrowed into a deadly serious stare.

  “Because I’m Montgomery Flinch,” she replied.

  “It’s the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard!”

  Barrett pushed his pint glass away, beer slopping over its sides and spilling out across the cramped table as Penny and Alfie sat there facing him. Around them in the dimly-lit bar, the hubbub of conversation continued unabated. Grizzled newspapermen, their fingers stained with ink, sat along long wooden tables loaded with pots and glasses, the noise of their voices filling the room with raucous debate. The dark walls were ornamented with the framed front pages of Fleet Street’s finest newspapers, each print representing a sensational scoop written by one of the journalists who drank there.

  Other drinkers sat huddled in armchairs near the warmth of the fireplace, the smoke from their cigars curling towards the flames. Some were reading from newspapers and magazines, whilst one bearded gentleman was penning a letter on some paper that was stretched upon his knee.

  “The idea that this country’s leading authors have all been hy
pnotised with venom extracted from an exotic spider, that the tales they are now publishing give glimpses of the future and send everybody who reads them insane.” Barrett rolled his eyes. “It’s beyond belief.”

  “But you’ve got to—”

  Alfie tried to interrupt, but Barrett silenced him with a sharp look as he carried on speaking.

  “And now you tell me that the person who is behind this sinister scheme is the recently-deceased Lady Isabella Cambridge – a woman who has miraculously risen from the grave to spread chaos through the city.” He laughed mirthlessly. “If you think I can get my editor to publish this nonsense, then you’re the maddest of them all.”

  Raising his hand, Bennett called out for another drink. At the bar, the portly landlord nodded in acknowledgement, his eyes glancing up from the magazine open on the counter in front of him.

  “You’ve got to publish this,” Penny replied, indignation rising in her voice as the buzz of conversation around them quietened. “It’s the truth.”

  Draining the last of the beer from his glass, the journalist shook his head dismissively as he wiped the froth from his moustache.

  “I’m sorry, Miss Tredwell, or should I say Miss Flinch,” he replied wearily, “but newspapers don’t print the truth – not without proof.” He banged his glass back on the table. “So, why don’t you both go and bother somebody else with your childish stories and leave me alone to welcome in the New Year in peace.”

  As he spoke these words, the pub fell silent. Turning uneasily in their chairs, Penny and Alfie glanced around the crowded bar. At the long tables, the rattle of glasses and the low murmur of conversation had died away entirely. The drinkers gathered there sat hunched noiselessly over the tables, their inky fingers tracing the shapes of words amidst the spilled drinks.

  From the direction of the fireplace came the scratching sound of pen against paper. Penny shivered in recognition. Turning, she saw the gentlemen sitting in their armchairs, slumped around the fire. Their glazed eyes reflected the orange glow of the flames and, at first glance, it just looked as though they had drunk more than they could hold. But then Penelope saw the pens in their hands scrawling across pages of newsprint and sheets of paper.