Spring-heeled Jack and the President's Ring

Chapter 9 ~ Magnetron and the Dinner Theater

"Boileau watched Hugo's carriage clattering down his cobbled stone drive, clearly deriving immense pleasure from having succeeded in antagonizing the renowned playwright.  'Look at him run! Yes, yes, yes!'"

I had first met Ulysses S. Grant when he presided over a ceremony during which I was decorated for my skill at catching bullets.  He did not remember me this evening, of course.  As an otherwise undistinguished private, I would have been but another solemn face among uncounted thousands.  Now that Grant had returned to civilian life and embarked on a world tour with his wife, he had lost none of the West Point poise and homespun wisdom which had sustained him during and after my country's bloodiest conflict.

Victor Hugo was a clever chap who evidently knew Boileau well.  Apparently, he had had his driver question the Grants's driver about his passengers, and foiled Boileau's contemptible maneuver by removing from the premises without making an appearance.  Boileau watched Hugo's carriage clattering down his cobbled stone drive, clearly deriving immense pleasure from having succeeded in antagonizing the renowned playwright.  "Look at him run! Yes, yes, yes!"

During dinner, Boileau dominated the conversation, even interrupting President and Mrs. Grant at times.  Boileau chattered endlessly about his wine cellar, his violin, and a hundred and one other topics of limited interest, as Gurusigphat accompanied from behind with his own silently whimsical histrionics.  The Grants bore it all with consummate grace.

My attention drifted.  Mrs. Mackenzie had cabled me about the search for Anders.  Anders still missing stop Hawkshaw looking too stop Pung driving me crazy stop Come home soon stop.  Anders's disappearance, Boileau's machinations, my interview with Dr. Glockenholz, the baffling Luftigel phantasm, the missing Luftigel plans—these things conspired to abduct my faculties, rendering me insensible to further stimuli.  I struggled to suppress this incomprehensible buzzing, as I could bear it no longer, and endeavored to divert my attention to Gurusigphat's humorous performance.

Boileau was chattering about Spring-heeled Jack, the terror of London who had apparently been unusually active of late in various parts of England.  Boileau claimed to be advising Scotland Yard on Jack's mercurial behavior and possibly paranormal nature.  "Seven feet tall and powerfully built, this evil creature strikes with shocking swiftness and fury and then disappears into the night.  He conceals his identity with a most unusual costume, yes, yes, yes.  A silvery helmet covers his face and head, and a short cape snaps in the wind as he bounds from building to building, from building to treetop, from treetop to street, and from there to— who knows where?"  Gurusigphat held his hands up to his face and screamed in silent terror.  "And I, François Boileau, swear by all that is sacred that I shall capture this barbaric fiend and bring him—or it—to justice!"  Gurusigphat leered with pompous conceit.

Having waited patiently for Boileau to stray onto the topic which had occasioned their visit, President Grant raised a finger in anticipation of an opportunity to speak, but it fell to his wife to seize the rare occasion of Boileau stopping to breathe to adroitly steer the conversation to that topic.

"Monsieur Boileau, I daresay your description of Spring-heeled Jack closely matches the fellow who stole my husband's ring."

Boileau became visibly annoyed as our attentions were redirected from him to Mrs. Grant, but we were transfixed, and the enchanting creature was clearly dead-set on making her evidence known before Boileau had a chance to resume prattling.

"Yes, it was about two weeks ago, when we were in London.  Ulysses was sleeping and I decided to go shopping.  When I returned to our room, a man fitting that description burst from inside and disappeared in a twinkling.  I thought he might have been a burglar, but at first nothing seemed to be missing from our room.  In fact, he left something behind."

"What did he leave behind?" asked Satyros.  "A wooden mask of some kind," replied Mrs. Grant.  "It was dreadful.  I had the concierge throw it out."  She looked at her husband, and he finally spoke.  "I cannot say how it is that I slept peacefully through the tumult, but when Julia woke me, I realized that my ring was gone.  My West Point ring.  I had left it on the dressing-table in a small—" 

A terrific noise like a cowbell being dragged over a cheese grater suddenly began to emanate from an adjacent room and Boileau returned to center stage, standing exultantly.  "Aha, it is my tel-e-phone!  You will excuse me."  He returned moments later, his face white as our table linen.

"That was the Calais police," he said.  "Spring-heeled Jack has been captured.  In Calais!"