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but a Promethean.
    “Votes for Prometheans! One man, one vote!” shouted the odd-looking man who was dressed in what appeared to be a patchwork suit.
    “Don’t Prometheans have the vote?” I asked Reeves.
    “Apparently not, sir, or they wouldn’t be demonstrating.”
    I gave Reeves a hard look. It was difficult to ascertain — what with the whiskers and the eye patch — whether Reeves had his sniffy face on, but I rather suspected he had.
    “Dr Watson never objects to wearing a disguise, Reeves.”
    “It is my recollection, sir, that it is always Mr Holmes who wears disguises. Dr Watson does not.”
    I was about to launch into a spirited monologue on the crime wave that would result if sidekicks refused the just requests of their young masters when I was tapped on the shoulder by the demonstrating Promethean.
    “Tell me, sir. Do you believe in one man, one vote?”
    “What?”
    “One man, one vote. Are you for or against it?”
    “Er ... for, I think.”
    “Aha! Well, I’m made from five men, so I should get five votes!”
    “I think the intention was one whole man, one vote,” I said.
    “Oh, so you think amputees should have a partial vote, do you? What about midgets? Do they get half a vote?”
    This was entering deep philosophical waters. “Reeves, do you have an opinion?”
    “As an unemancipated mechanical construct, sir, I am not sure I am allowed an opinion.”
    “Reeves, you must stop this sniffiness, at once. You know if I were handing out votes, you’d have ten. Fifteen if you’d had a kipper for breakfast.”
    “Votes for our automaton brothers!” shouted the Promethean. “Would you like a placard, comrade?”
    “I think not,” said Reeves.
    “’ere,” said a rough-looking onlooker. “’Ow do we know all your donors were men? It’s one man , one vote. You might ’ave been given a woman’s kidney.”
    “Yeah,” said another. “And your left arm looks female to me.”
    “No, it doesn’t!” shouted the Promethean.
    “Yes, it does. And that foot looks like a trotter.”
    These were deep philosophical waters indeed, but strangely compelling. A few more passers-by stopped to watch as the Promethean — in between hops — removed a shoe and a sock.
    “There!” he said. “That’s a man’s foot and no mistake!”
    “A dead man’s foot,” said onlooker number two. “Look, you can see the stitches.”
    “So?” said the Promethean.
    “Dead men can’t vote. It’s one live man, one vote. Otherwise you’d have to emancipate the graveyards.”
    “And why not?” said the Promethean. “Votes for the dead! Emancipate our deceased brethren!”
    I had thought I’d long scaled the heights of Boggledom, but here was a peak unclimbed. The dead, the reanimated, the mechanical. Was there anyone who wouldn’t be allowed to vote? It would appear that only the insane and the royal family would remain barred from voting in this brave new future. Which let George III out on both counts, even if they dug him up.
    ~
    The premises of Ernest Durrant, Family Butcher, were little changed from our previous visit — with the one exception that no one was pinned to the sawdust by a large misshapen dog. The tiled walls gleamed; assorted sides of meat hung from a rail in the ceiling; and a large red-faced man in a white apron dispensed chops and sausages to a line of expectant customers.
    “See anything unusual?” I whispered to Reeves.
    “Only us, sir.”
    I gave Reeves as hard a stare as a one-eyed man could muster. And wondered if Watson ever rebelled against the Great Sleuth, and whether he’d write it down if he had.
    The queue shuffled forward as customers came and went. I cast a single eye around the establishment, looking for that one case-breaking clue that we consulting detectives usually discover by page 153.
    But the clue-cupboard was bare. I would have to try something else.
    “Do you have any special cuts?” I asked the butcher as soon I reached the counter. “Something