Doctor Who: The Many Hands Read Online Free Page A

Martha said.
    The Doctor smiled.
    'Benjamin Franklin's living in London now,' the
Doctor explained. 'That's another thing he did:
diplomacy. He's the Pennsylvania Assembly's agent
to the Government of the United Kingdom of Great
Britain and Ireland.'
    'Pennsylvania's?' Martha shook her head. 'Did the
Cotswolds get to send an agent to America as well?'
    'Ye-es,' said the Doctor, extending the word out as
long as it would go without breaking. 'Don't forget,
the Americas are just a collection of separate colonies
at the moment. They don't unite for another sixteen
years, when they fight the... Well, before that thing
that unites them.'
    'You mean the...' Martha said slowly, looking
nervously at the two loaded muskets pointing her
way.
    'That's the one,' the Doctor agreed in a whisper. 'But
that's just the sort of talk that makes British soldiers
nervous, so there's no reason why we need to throw
words like "American revolution" around, is there?'
    'Oh no,' Martha agreed. 'No reason at all.'
    And she smiled at the soldiers.
    They didn't smile back.
    'Halt,' McAllister yelled.
    His voice echoed through the air for a moment.
They had emerged out of the passageway and back
onto the High Street, making the return considerably
more slowly than Martha had made her descent. The
soldier in front, a grey-haired man who she thought
was the one McAllister had called Brown, was panting
audibly. She didn't dare think what he would have
been like if McAllister had chosen him to carry the
highwayman's body back to the Castle: that soldier
had disappeared up the Cowgate at a gallop, muttering
pityingly to himself about the stairs he would have to
climb at the end of it.
    Without pause, McAllister had turned them to the
left and marched them back up the sloping street, the
old soldier taking the opportunity to duck behind
them and slacken his pace. As they moved, more
people gathered on the edges of the street to watch,
but the reaction was different here. The street was
wider, so Martha wasn't brushing through the crowd,
but she had the feeling that these people weren't as
nervous of the soldiers. After all, the army was on their
side, protecting them from the criminal tendencies of
the poor below the hill.
    It didn't take long to reach their destination: they
stopped in a large square, in front of an imposing
church. It seemed to be made exclusively from giant
slabs of stone and dark serrated towers stabbing up
into the air, the product of a time when believers were
reminded God should be feared, as well as loved.
Attached to the church, and blocking off the square
from the Lawnmarket, was a large building four
storeys tall with a tower running down the front of
it, reminding Martha of the Castle that sat at the top
of the hill.
    'That's the Tolbooth,' the Doctor whispered to her.
    'I suppose it's not the kind I'll need change for?'
Martha whispered in reply.
    'It's an old Scots word,' the Doctor answered softly.
'It's where the council meets.'
    'Well,' said Martha with enforced cheerfulness.
'That doesn't sound so bad.'
    'And they usually have prisons underneath them.'
    'Oh,' said Martha.
    McAllister studiously ignored his prisoners,
choosing instead to glare at the three red-coated
men.
    'You three get the prisoners to the cells,' McAllister
instructed sharply. 'I'll be talking with the Lord
Provost, and if I have to be called out because of any
of you...'
    The threat hung in the air for a moment, then
McAllister marched inside.
    There was a moment in which the soldiers relaxed
slightly, their shoulders drooping as the tension
created by McAllister's presence eased. Despite all
the years between them, Martha could recognise
her old colleagues in the soldiers: if they'd been back
at the hospital, the soldiers would have been junior
doctors leaning against the wall and starting to
gossip the moment the consultant's back was turned.
Sometimes, she wished she was back with them: since
she'd met the Doctor, there never seemed to be any
time to