‘Chaos for chaos’s sake. Your world is at a tipping point. You can’t see it from where you are … ’ He glanced at us, a little shifty-like, his eyes suddenly looking as old as Time, then resumed his theme. ‘But what can seem ordered and stable one minute can suddenly change. Here we are. England in the late nineteenth century. Centre of a global empire. Top of the heap! But civilisations fall. Plates shift. I’ve seen it a hundred times. A thousand. Rome, Athens, the Tumescent Arrows of the Half-Light. The Great Catastrophe. Brexit. Everything seems sunny and rosy and then – wallop – a new Dark Age. And that’s what these people are dedicated to ushering in. Whatever this latest scheme is, it’s somehow connected to that singer, Anne Dante,’ he said, slurping his brew.

‘How do you make that out?’ I asked.

‘Gallifreyan intuition. Something like that. The question is, how do we get ourselves close enough to her to ask some questions?’ He got up and started pacing up and down in front of the hothouse flowers whose drooping heads crowded round us. ‘We could cause a distraction outside the theatre, then nip her off in a cab.’

‘Sound enough,’ said Madam.

‘Yes,’ I said. ‘Or—’

‘I could materialise the TARDIS around her on stage!’ cried the Doctor. ‘No –’ he concluded bitterly. ‘Too conspicuous. Blow pipe?’

‘What?’

‘Use a blow pipe dart to knock her out. Just for a bit. Long enough to get her back here. Strong cuppa. Two rounds of toast. Gentle interrogation … ’

‘Right,’ I sighed. ‘Or—’

‘Befriend her as a child! Easy! I can nip back in the TARDIS, make a huge impression on her when she’s just a nipper then reappear in her life and then it’ll be all bunting out, hail the conquering Doctor, all that. It’s worked before!’

‘Yes,’ I cried. ‘Or … ’

‘Or?’

‘Or we could just call on her at home.’

The Doctor’s face fell. ‘You’ve got her address?’

‘Took me five minutes,’ I said with a crafty smile. ‘Talked me way round that lanky Italian at the stage door and, when he wasn’t looking, I managed to crib her address from his little record book. And there’s a clue in her name.’

‘There is?’

‘The Cripplegate Siren, ain’t she?’

‘Oh well,’ said the Doctor a little huffily. ‘Yes. Yes, I suppose there’s that. Look – why don’t you two pop round and see her? See what you can glean. I’m gonna head back to the music hall and have another nosy around. Unofficially this time.’

‘I think that’s an excellent suggestion,’ said Madam, squeezing my hand. ‘Jenny. Where exactly in Cripplegate does the lady reside?’

*