The Forever Man (W.A.R.P. 3)

And wasn’t it a small world, as they say, for Tom Riley had been working not a stone’s throw away as a stoker in Saint Pancras. He’d been a doddle to find once the railway track had been followed.

Sobbed like a baby, the man did, when he got the news. Fell to his actual knees in the rail yard. In fact, Bob was getting a little embarrassed by the continuing snuffle.

But I loves me little brothers too, right enough, he reasoned. So perhaps Tom Riley is entitled.

Now, though, wasn’t Riley missing? And there were rumours of some commotion in Newgate this very morning. Something about magic and a poleaxed attorney, and Bob had a cramp in his gut from fretting over his boss and pal.

Come back to us, Riley. Come back.

Then something truly extraordinary happened, something the reports of which would spread across the country like wildfire until the number who claimed to have seen it would swell to the thousands, in spite of the fact that the cramped theatre could barely accommodate two hundred souls. Though the accounts were exaggerated, for they could not realistically be so, they would ensure that the Great Savano’s reputation was solidly stamped in the register of great stage illusionists.

A hole opened in the air, ridged with a milky ring of sparks, and it was immediately obvious to the Orient’s patrons that this was more than a mere workaday hole from which such things as sewage or bilge would spill. They witnessed the stars that lived inside this hole, and as it grew to the dimensions of a whale’s maw it was clear that other things lived there too. Things that were multi-tentacled and vari-tusked flashed across the space within, and many gave thanks that they did not make it their business to investigate without. A noise emanated from this otherworldly aperture, which some veterans would later describe as the sound of a battlefield’s entire complement of cannons, and others would swear sounded exactly like the drone of countless foghorns during a pea-souper.

Panic would surely have ensued had not a figure appeared in the hole and transfixed the audience with its radiance. Humanoid in shape but composed entirely of swarming orange sparks, as though a man were being held aloft by golden bees.

Bob was the first to twig.

Nah, he thought. We ain’t got the budget.

But his instincts proved correct and the figure solidified.

‘It’s a man!’ shouted a drunken swell a bit off his turf. ‘It’s the Great Savano!’

If this was the Great Savano, then he was indeed great and, as the figure took on more of a real aspect, it was clear that he wore the high-collared cape of a magician and his face, though young, burned bright with intelligence and triumph.

‘Savano!’ said another, and commenced a-clapping. ‘Savano!’

The assembly took up the chant and the clap, some with trepidation, but this changed to genuine rapture when the illusionist closed the terrifying hole with a snatch of his fist, hung for a moment in the air, then dropped neatly into the glow of the footlights. Orange sparks trailed him down and gathered at his feet as though awaiting the illusionist’s command.

In the audience Bob was on his feet with the rest of them.

Go on, boss! he thought. Tie a ribbon on it!

And Riley did, bowing low and sweeping the folds of his cape before him like the wings of a great black swan, dispelling the last of the quantum sparks.

‘The Great Savano,’ he said, and his voice carried to the rafters in spite of the tumult.

It seemed as though the applause would never end, and some claimed to have heard it clear across the river.

Though he had travelled through the centuries, to Riley the journey had seemed almost instantaneous and, though he was glad to be home and grateful to be fully human, as far as he could tell, his joy would not have extended to theatrical flourishes had it not been for three persons his keen eyes spotted among the audience members.

There, beside faithful Bob, a red-headed man sporting his own serious brow and high cheekbones.

Tom! he thought – no, he knew. This time there was no doubt and his senses, amplified by the wormhole (a gift that would serve him well throughout his long career), heard his brother’s voice cry, ‘Redmond! Redmond! Is it you, brother?’

Redmond, thought Riley, and the name fitted him more snugly than a baker’s apron; he felt the rightness of it and remembered how his mother had told him he would carry the name of her Wexford clan as his own Christian name.

Redmond Riley, he thought, and felt himself whole at last.

There was another who Riley saw, standing in the wings and seeming as surprised to be there herself as she was to see him. It was his own dear Chevie, dressed out of character in a sunflower-yellow dress, woven bonnet, with silver on her neck and wrists, her clear brown eyes returned to her. Somewhere in his bones, which were still tingling with quantum magic, Riley knew that this day would be the first of many happy ones, and so he dropped to the boards he would tread so often over the years, bowed low, cast his glance sideways to his Native American princess and said:

‘The Great Savano at your service.’