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With his usual loquacious eloquence, Mr Ambrose made a jerking movement with his hand over his jugular.
‘Thank you so much for your reassurance, Sir!’
‘You’re welcome, Mr Linton.’
Truth be told, I had expected nothing less, but still, the thought made sweat appear on my forehead. Slowly, we began to ascend. We were about halfway up when my worst nightmare happened. I heard footsteps from above us. Mr Ambrose’s steps didn’t falter. He continued upwards as if nothing had happened.
A man appeared in front of us, in the uniform of a colonel. He stopped dead as he saw us.
What now? Is he going to offer us iced lemonade?
‘Hey! You two! What the blazes are you doing here?’
Apparently not.
‘Private Williamson and Private Jones, Sir. Change of guard, Sir,’ Mr Ambrose said, deadpan, and snapped to attention. Thank the Lord I had enough presence of mind to emulate him.
‘Really?’ The colonel frowned and took a watch out of his pocket. ‘I didn’t think it was time yet… No, it isn’t time yet! You are early. What is going on here?’ His eyes narrowed suspiciously, and I had to work hard to resist wiping the sweat of my forehead.
‘Really? Early?’ Mr Ambrose’s voice rang with honest surprise. ‘Are you sure, Colonel…?’
‘Colonel Townsend.’
‘Are you sure that we’re early, Colonel Townsend, Sir?’ Taking his own watch out of his pocket, Mr Ambrose let it snap open. ‘Sorry, Sir, but according to my watch we’re exactly on time. Look.’
The officer stepped up beside Mr Ambrose and looked over his shoulder.
‘Struth! You are absolutely right, soldier. I
t’s just time for the guard to change. How the time flies.’
‘And my watch is very reliable, Sir.’
‘Looks like it.’ Colonel Townsend glanced at the silver pocket watch with admiring eyes. ‘Mine is such a modern piece of trash. Yours looks like a much nicer piece. A family heirloom?’
A muscle in Mr Ambrose’s jaw twitched. Suddenly, he didn’t look nearly as much like the obedient soldier of a second ago. ‘Yes! Why?’
The officer seemed taken aback by such abrupt tones from an underling. ‘I just asked because the crest on the lid looks a little familiar.’
With an obvious effort, Mr Ambrose forced a polite mask on his face. ‘My… father gave it to me, Sir’
His father? I stared at him out of the corner of my eye. Mr Ambrose had a father? Did that mean he had actually been conceived in connubial congress, not hewn out of the rock of some mountain, as I had always suspected? Could it be true? Or just another lie to put the officer off?
‘I see.’ The colonel shrugged. ‘Well, you may continue, men. I’ll have to go and reset my watch…’
And he went off, mumbling about unreliable modern mechanics.
We continued up the stairs. I did my best to try and appear calm, ignoring the fact that my heart was pounding and my head was buzzing with a thousand questions.
‘How did you know when they changed the guard here?’ I demanded in a low voice, as soon as he was out of earshot.
And do you really have a father? Well, do you? And if so, how did your poor mother ever survive giving birth to a living rock?
‘I didn’t, Mr Linton. I knew from Warren’s report when the guard changed at number 97 East India Dock Road, and, based on the hypothesis that all the Presidency Army soldiers were likely to operate on the same schedule, I set my watch to local time before we went into the mine.’
I had to admit, he had brains, even if they were frozen. But that answer wasn’t enough. I itched to ask him just one more question.
Was the watch really your father’s? Why is there a crest on the lid? Does it really belong to a noble family, and if so, what the heck are you doing with it? You’re no nobleman, right?
