Excerpt from The Darwin Affair by Tim Mason, plus links to reviews, author biography & more

"Nosebleed, right, then." In less than a moment Inspector Field was roughly handcuffed to the iron fence, with the body at his feet.

Meanwhile the alarm surrounding the assassination attempt had risen, with bells sounding in the distance, horses' hooves pounding up and down the Mall, and police whistles blowing. The crowd in St. Albans, watch-ing Field's arrest and morbidly eyeing the nearly headless figure of young Hatchet-Face, had grown. Police Constable Kilvert pushed his way through the throng.

"Josiah!" cried the inspector. "Get me clear of these fools!"

"Officers," said Kilvert, "you've made a grave mistake here. Just up from the provinces, aren't you, and soon to return at this rate."

The constables looked abashed, but the man in footman's livery was sputtering. "It weren't no mistake! I was watchin' from the winder all mornin', an' there wasn't nobody but 'im in the road—'im and the bloke 'e done for!"

"That's enough out of you, Brass Buttons, this man here is Detective Field!" Kilvert grew indignant. "Mr. Charles Dickens called him Bucket!"

"Shut up, Kilvert!" said Field.

"Inspector Bucket of the Detective!"

"Kilvert, you ass," said Field, " just get me out of this!"

As the inspector was released, there was renewed scrutiny from the crowd. It was clear that many of them had heard of Dickens's fictional detective. For a person who did not in fact exist, Mr. Bucket was quite the celebrity, and so was his model.

"I don't care who he is," cried the woman from the corner, "he's been a-murderin' the populace!"

"You there!" said Field, thrusting a large forefinger at the liveried servant.

"You're going to tell me what you saw from the window, lad—that's what you're going to do."

The young man with the brass buttons, somewhat abashed by the turn of events, muttered, "You know wot I saw."

"I do not, in point of fact. I know what I saw, but I've a keen interest in your observations. Go on. You were watching, you say. You saw no one but me and the, uh—this fellow?"

"That's right. Just you and 'im, and you weren't poundin' 'im, oh no, you weren't!"

The onlookers murmured ominously.

Field put a fatherly arm round the servant's narrow shoulders, causing the young man to shudder.

"What's your name, son?"

Looking as though he wasn't eager to expand the acquaintance, he replied, "Willis."

"Right, then, Willis. You saw no one but me and ..." He tilted his head in the direction of the corpse. "No passersby? No tradesmen? Not so much as a nurse pushin' a pram?"

"Not to mention, no. I mean, there was an old lady just now."

"How old was she, Willis?"

Willis glanced over his shoulder at the crowd and felt their support. "A hundred and twenty-six, sir."

The laughter was universal and no one seemed more pleased than Inspector Field.

"Delightful lad," he said, beaming. "So we got one crone, we got me and the dead bloke, and that's all, that's it, there ain't no more, we can all go home now, is that right, young Willis?"

Willis was beginning to enjoy the show. "That's about it, sir. Oh, there was a dog, I was forgettin' the dog."

Gusts of laughter from the crowd."The dog could be important, Willis, you never know," said Field, still smiling and nodding. "What was the dog doing?"

Groans now from the crowd, whose impression of the police as a bunch of sorry buffoons was being confirmed.

"Doin'?" said Willis. "Dog was doin' 'is bizness, wasn't 'e?" Laughter, tinged with scorn. "Doin' 'is bizness an' sniffin' up the butcher's man, just like always."

"Which butcher's man was this, now, Willis?"

"Comes every second day, don't 'e? Brings a joint to No. 42." Field flicked the merest glance at Kilvert, who nodded and moved quietly through the crowd toward No. 42 St. Albans.

Excerpted from The Darwin Affair by Tim Mason. Copyright © 2019 by Tim Mason. Excerpted by permission of Algonquin Books. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.