Doctor Who: Devil in the Smoke by Justin Richards

Author:Justin Richards
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: BBC Digital

The Seventh Chapter

In which it seems the world may soon come to an end…

Madame Vastra and the others made their return to Paternoster Row by a circumspect route. Strax in particular was keen to intercept any individual he suspected might be following and forcibly remove a variety of their limbs and appendages. But Jenny prevailed upon him that most of the people he singled out were merely walking past. Given the lateness of the hour there were, thankfully, not many.

‘What about him?’ Strax said, pointing to a figure shambling slowly along on the opposite pavement.

‘That old lady is selling lucky heather, and she’s heading in a different direction so she’s unlikely to be following us.’

‘She could be bluffing. And who is this Lucky Heather anyway?’

‘It’s heather – it’s a plant not a person. It’s supposed to be lucky.’

‘Not if I catch her, it won’t be.’

‘Strax,’ Vastra said simply. ‘No.’

Harry was in a daze for much of the journey. He felt he was living through a dream – a nightmare. It was an effort to put one foot in front of another. Wherever he looked, the gathering gloom of the London smog reminded him of the smoke in the cauldron below him as he was lowered down in his cage.

It was well into the night by the time they arrived back at Paternoster Row. Jenny sat Harry down before the fire in the drawing room, then withdrew to make a pot of tea. It took a while, and a lot of tea, but finally Harry felt recovered enough to recount his adventures.

He told them how Jim had found him in the carriage, and lured him to Able Hecklington.

‘He wanted both possible witnesses taken care of,’ Vastra said. ‘I’m afraid your friend Jim will suffer a similar fate. He was merely postponing the inevitable.’

‘He ain’t my friend,’ Harry said. ‘Not no more, he ain’t.’

Strax leaned across to Jenny. ‘At what age do these cubs become grammatical?’ he demanded.

‘Depends,’ she told him. ‘At what age do Sontarans become pacifists?’

‘Did he tell you anything of his plans?’ Vastra was asking Harry.

The boy shook his head. ‘Not really. But I did overhear him talking to Jim and to some of the other men. Like sort of boasting he was, about how everything was going according to plan.’

‘What plan?’ Strax asked. ‘He has a strategy? Or is this merely tactical thinking at a preliminary stage of military operations?’

‘Eh?’

‘Ignore him,’ Jenny whispered. Louder she said: ‘Just tell us what you know. Anything might help, anything at all.’

Harry struggled to recall what he had overheard. He had been scared – more scared than he could ever remember, and Harry had already been through a lot in his short life.

‘He talked a lot about “the Smoke”.’

‘The smoke? The smoke in that cauldron?’ Jenny wondered.

‘He said it like it was a living thing. He talked about meeting it, said he had come to an understanding with it.’

‘Did he explain this Smoke’s stratagem?’ Strax asked.

‘No. But he did say…’ Harry’s eyes widened as he remembered what he had heard.

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