Julius and the Watchmaker by Tim Hehir Page A

here,’ he said, as he reached for the quill standing in the inkwell.
    â€˜You’ll be glad to know that Mr Higgins is not in too bad a shape…all things considered,’ said the man under his breath as he accepted the quill.
    â€˜What?’
    Julius looked at the curtain behind him to make sure Clements was gone. They’ve taken him hostage, that’s it. They’ll stop at nothing to get the diary.
    â€˜The professor visited Mr Higgins this morning, and bought a very expensive volume from the old wheeler dealer, just to cheer him up. He was very shaken though, and upset, the professor said. Apparently his grandson and he had very serious words the other night. So serious, in fact, that the grandson ran off into the night and the grandfather thinks he may never return. A disagreement over an item of stock, apparently.’
    Julius gasped.
    â€˜Julius,’ whispered the man, looking into his eyes, ‘go home, make it up with your grandfather. Clements is the last person you should be getting mixed up with.’
    â€˜How…how did you know about my grandfather?’ Shut up, Higgins.
    â€˜You wrote a note to the professor asking us to look in on him for you. You were worried about him. You asked us to meet you at the river last night.’
    â€˜No I didn’t. You’re lying.’
    â€˜You haven’t written the note yet, young fella. That’s why you don’t remember,’ said the man.
    â€˜What?’
    The man held out the two five-pound notes and the sovereigns. ‘Here, take these. The professor wanted you to be set. Pay your way with Clements—don’t get into his debt.’
    Julius pocketed the money.
    â€˜Go home and make it up with the old wheeler dealer. Whatever happened between you can be sorted out,’ said the man.
    Julius looked down at the squeeze box. ‘I can’t.’ Not without the diary.
    â€˜I see,’ said the man. ‘It’s like that is it?’
    The man signed the loan agreement, tipped his hat and turned to leave. Then he stopped. A thought seemed to occur to him.
    â€˜Meet the professor and me at midnight, at the steps of St Paul’s,’ he said, and then walked out of the shop, leaving the squeeze box on the counter. Julius looked down at the elegant signature. ‘Daniel Patrick Flynn’, it read.
    Julius sniffed his boots and put them on. The smell was not too bad. In a few days the fish would fade away completely.
    Back in the kitchen, Clements was examining Mr Flynn’s ring while Springheel was examining Harrison’s watch.
    â€˜Ha, ha, I’ll take this to a jeweller I know tomorrow and get twenty pounds for it,’ said Clements, as Julius sat down.
    â€˜Who was that then?’
    â€˜That, Higgins, was Daniel Flynn, better known as “The Duke”. He’s the champion bare-knuckle boxer of all London,’ said Clements.
    â€˜Oh.’
    â€˜Oh, indeed, Higgins,’ said Clements. ‘You don’t want to get on the wrong side of the likes of him. He’s king of the Fancy, he is. A more treacherous, violent brute you’ll not find. Steer well clear of him, Higgins.’
    Springheel was examining his watch, prodding and poking at it as if he were trying to find a hidden switch. Clements leaned in to get a closer look.
    â€˜What are you looking for, Springheel?’
    â€˜Harrison’s diary, my corpulent companion, is a confused jumble of remembrances, not a set of instructions as I had hoped. The man does not write a single thing in the King’s plain English. It is a mishmash of technical terms and specifications—this cog must be such-and-such a density and have such-and-such a resistance to temperatures and such-and-such a viscosity ratio when close to light speed and—’
    â€˜Did you say light speed? ’
    â€˜Don’t interrupt me when I am in full flow, Clements, there’s a good fellow. Where was