“You shouldn’t have left the house,” his father said, pale with alarm. “Any sign of—” He saw, then, what had happened to the water man.
“Glimmung,” Nick said, in explanation.
“I’ll call the police,” Mr. McKenna said. He glanced in fear up into the trees. “It isn’t safe to be here, for any of us. Glimmung must be very angry; this doesn’t often happen, an outright act like this, especially against humans. Usually they’re more interested in the printers.” Mr. McKenna started back towards the house, leaving Nick and his father and the spiddles.
“No sign of Horace?” Nick’s father asked.
Nick said, “The two trobes went in here; I saw them go in, but then I saw Mr. Frankis. And I stopped following them.”
“I guess we’ve lost Horace,” his father said gently.
“Maybe so,” Nick said. But he didn’t believe it. “The spiddles said—” he started to say, but his father interrupted him.
“Nick, I’m taking you back to the house. We’ll wait for the police there.” His hand firmly on Nick’s shoulder, he led him back up the road, in the direction from which they had come.
One of the spiddles was speaking excitedly to another. “Hey, George—maybe the book is still here. Let’s take a look.” Both spiddles, and then a third, crept into the wrecked car and began to fuss about inside.
“Come on,” Nick’s father said, and urged his son along. “Think what it’ll mean to the last surviving printers,” one of the spiddles chattered eagerly. “If we can only find it, finally.”
To his father, Nick said, “About the book—”
“Forget the book,” his father said. “It’s not important.”
Oh yes it is, Nick said to himself.
Chapter 12
BACK in the house, Nick shut himself up in his room. There, in privacy, he unbuttoned his shirt and got out the book. Seating himself, he opened to the index in the back part and looked under the name Frankis, Reg. What was it the spiddles had said? “The world-book. The book which changes every lime it’s read.” And the spiddles, before that, had said something else. “It’s all there. Everything—the past and the future. Both.”
Under Frankis, Reg the index gave a page number. Page 42. Nick turned to that page, and, his fingers shaking as he held the book, read the text. He read:
“‘for his thieving ways. Alas, alas, but Glimmung knew that it had to be done. The water man had no right to the book. And so he vanished. And his water tank—smashed forever. Pax vobiscum.’”
Yes, there it was. Right in the book. A short but accurate account of Mr. Frankis’ death. Had this passage been here yesterday? Nick wondered. Suppose he had looked this up, on the car trip to the house? Suppose Mr. Frankis had looked for his own name in the index? Would he have found this—and known what was going to happen to him?
But the spiddles had said, “The book which changes every time it’s read.” So maybe this passage had not been here, before now. It had appeared at the time of Mr. Frankis’ death, or else after.
What is there in the book about me? Nick wondered. The text which we read before, on the way here, after Glimmung accidentally gave the book to me? Or by now has it changed?
Again Nick looked in the index, this time under Graham, Peter & family. The index gave page 5, this time. Hadn’t it given page 31 before? Nick asked himself. I’m sure that’s what it said, then, he thought.
He turned to page 5. And read:
“‘The boy will receive a book by mistake. A valuable book. He will trade it and lose it, and then regain it. Trobes, two of them, will carry off the creature who smells of fish. But that creature will bite them and free himself. The creature will wander in the forests of the world. He will cry by day and by night. The boy will find him by his cries. But Glimmung will learn who has his book, and he will come seeking the boy.’”
That ended the passage about Nick.
Nick thought, It wasn’t there before. The spiddles are right; the book changes.
And the book knows the future; it knows that Horace will bite the trobes and escape. And that I’ll find him again, by means of his yowls.
That was one sure thing about Horace: he had an overly large yowl, which he used when necessary, and sometimes when it was not.
What does it have to say in the index under Horace? Nick wondered. Again he turned to the index. Yes, there was an entry for Horace. On page 8, the index said; there he would find an entry about the cat.
He turned to page 8. And read:
“‘The creature who smells of fish will find his way, one day, to the ocean. Then he will be grey and very old. He will go down to the ocean and he will make a certain cry. At that cry, a great fish will come, which will open its mouth, and into the great fish the creature will go. The fish will carry him out to sea, and there will be crying and the chant of sorrowful people.’”
Nick wondered how far in the future that would happen, when Horace would find his way to the ocean and the great fish. But—at least Horace would get away from the two trobes. And he himself would find the cat.
That meant the Glimmung would not get in and destroy him, at least not for a while.
If Glimmung comes, Nick decided, I’ll hand the book over to him. That would be wise, in view of what he can do. But—
If only, Nick thought, I had time to make a copy of the book. It would take hours to do, perhaps even days. And what he copied would not change, as did the book itself.
And then it came to him, the realisation of what he must do. If I can find a printer, he said to himself, it could make a duplicate of the book. An exact copy. If, he thought, I’m right as to what printers do. I can ask the spiddles; they’ll know.
Going from his room, he made his way to the front door, opened it, and looked out into the shrubbery of the yard. His father and mother and Mr. McKenna were nowhere in sight; evidently they must have gone back to the grove of trees, where Mr. Frankis was, to wait for the police to come.
“Calling all spiddles,” Nick said loudly. “Come in, spiddles. Do you hear me?”
A sleepy spiddle-head popped up; the spiddle had obviously been taking a nap. “Interruption city,” the spiddle said, and shook his head to clear it. “What’s the action, mister?” he asked Nick.
Nick said, “Can you take me to a printer?”
“The other mister, the bigger mister, said you should stay inside,” the spiddle pointed out. “I heard him. Incarceration city; that’s what it is.” The spiddle eased himself back down into the shrubbery once more, to resume his nap.
Taking a deep breath, Nick said, “I have Glimmung’s book again.”
At once, four spiddle-heads popped up; the four spiddles stared at him; eight unwinking eyes that shone like morning dew.
“You’re putting us on,” one of the spiddles said. “I’ll lay it in front,” it said to its companions. “He doesn’t have Glimmung’s book. Glimmung got it back from the water man. We ourselves looked all around.”
Nick said, “I had the book before you began to look.”
“Revelation city,” a spiddle said, an awed, hopeful expression on its gnarled little brown face. “What are you going to do with it, mister? We don’t have any money; neither do the printers. Maybe some other human colonists have.”
“It isn’t a question of money,” Nick said. “It’s a question of me saving myself from what happened to Mr. Frankis.”
“Then give us the book,” a spiddle suggested.
Nick said, “Glimmung would still think I had it. He’ll go on thinking this until I give it back to him.” But, secretly, Nick had another reason for keeping the book. He wanted to read it, and not just now but always; he wanted the book to remain his forever.
The spiddles seemed to guess this, because one of them said, “I think you’re being foolish, mister, to hang on to Glimmung’s book. You’d be a lot safer if you gave it to us. But we understand. A book like that, a book which can do what it does, is hard to forget about. All
right; we’ll settle for a copy; we’ll take you to the nearest of the printers and get it to make a replica of Glimmung’s book…which it will be most glad to do. We have been searching for this book, praying Glimmung would lose it, for years. Opportunity city. Come on.” The spiddles leaped from the shrubbery and scooted down the path, looking back to be sure that Nick was following.
High above them, in the sky, a black dot circled.
“A werj,” the spiddles murmured as they led Nick on to the road.
“Can it see us from that far away?” Nick asked uneasily.
“Probably,” a spiddle said. “Do you have anything on you which would discourage a werj? Some odor-producing object, such as an onion?”
“No,” Nick said. “I forgot to get an onion. I meant to, but—”
“Here’s a valuable, anti-werj item that a human colonist gave me,” one of the spiddles said; evidently the hope of getting hold of Glimmung’s book at last had made the spiddles reckless. “A piece of blue cheese,” the spiddle said, as Nick reached out his hand.
“A werj would die,” another spiddle added, “if it got within ten yards of this strange blue cheese object. What is it used for, on your home planet?”
Nick said. “Blue cheese is eaten there.”
“Incredibility city,” the spiddles said in unison. They hopped rapidly on, with Nick keeping up with them. The journey to the printer had begun, despite the werj hanging far above them in the mid-morning sky. Glancing up, a spiddle said. “I hope it can’t tell what we’re doing.”
I’m taking what my dad would call a “calculated risk”, Nick said to himself. He’ll be very angry when he finds me gone, angry and worried. But—this is the only way I can rid myself of Glimmung’s attention, at least, Nick pondered, without giving up the book.
Which, he thought, I do not intend to do.
Chapter 13
HOW far,” Nick asked, after an interval of walking, “is the printer? Will it take us much longer?”
“Not far,” a spiddle said, puffing for breath.
Above them, the werj had been joined by a second black dot. Two werjes now circled, keeping directly above them, and yet doing nothing. Nick thought. They must not be able to see the book; they must not know that I have it.
He had once again buttoned up his shirt over the book. Against his skin the book felt as dry and scratchy as the pelt of a wild, unnatural serpent. As before, he did not enjoy the feel of it.
“Where did the trobes get the dark glasses they wear?” Nick asked the spiddles.
“Originally, years ago, they stole one pair from a colonist,” the spiddles answered. “And then they forced a printer, whom they had caught, to make many, many copies for them.”
Nick asked, “Do you have a trobe-beam with you? To shine at them if they attack?”
“Yep.” the spiddles said. “Protection city,” one added, with glee. The spiddles did not seem to feel the fear of trobes that they felt towards Glimmung and the werjes.
“Did the printer get away again?” Nick asked.
Á spiddle said, “Unfortunately no. Finally Glimmung stuck it with his spear. Anyhow, that printer had become very old and trail. That is why the trobes could take it captive. Disparity city.”
“What does ‘disparity’ mean?” Nick asked.
“Well,” a spiddle began. And then all the spiddles fell to arguing about it; they chattered like angry mice.
“Let it go,” Nick said.
“Incomprehensibility city,” one of the spiddles said, concluding the argument.
The orange bushes and grass on both sides of the road had begun to give way to pale desert, a dry stretch where nothing grew. No place for us to hide if were attacked, Nick realized. But, at the same time, no place for trobes to ambush us. He could see for miles, now, as could the spiddles.
Something small and round rolled across the road ahead of them. Something alive.
“A nunk,” the spiddles told him. “This is a place of nunks, here, where nothing grows. The war has forced the once prosperous nunks to take up residence in certain barren surroundings.”
“Hello, there!” the nunk called in a squeaky, small voice.
“How do, nunk,” the spiddles answered; they did not slow down, and neither did Nick.
“Where you going so fast?” the nunk inquired. It rolled back on to the road; Nick had to be careful not to step on it.
“A printer,” the spiddles declared. “We’re looking for old Lord Blue. Or has he expired?”
The nunk said cheerfully, “Lord Blue is busy as usual turning out toasters and waffle irons and radios for the colonists. Who’s this young colonist, here? We haven’t seen him before.”
“My family and I just arrived from Earth,” Nick said. And then he thought, Was it only yesterday that we came here? So much has happened…and in less than one full day.
“Bit of warning,” the nunk said as it rolled along with them. “You see the werjes up above? I’ve been listening to their talk. They think that this young colonist knows where Glimmung’s book is. What say you to that, young colonist? Any retort on your part?”
Nick said cautiously, “I gave it to the water man.”
“The werjes say they didn’t find it.” the nunk said, zipping about between their feet, as if it were a game. “They looked and then they gave up; they decided that the water man never had it.”
“That’s not so,” Nick said.
“Another thing,” the nunk said. “A father-thing is following after you.”
Chilled, Nick said, “One that looks like me?”
“Exactly like you,” the nunk said, and then happily rolled away, leaving Nick and the spiddles.
“That’s not good news,” a spiddle said presently.
“We better not slow down,” another said. “Urgency city; let’s hurry.”
Nick and the spiddles hurried.
Above them, the werjes continued to circle.
Chapter 14
THE desert, became a rising slope on which odd spike-like plants grew, shafts of mottled grey on which no leaves could be seen. The plants, to Nick, seemed old and dead. They did not stir in the faint midday wind. It was like an orchard which had been abandoned. On some of the plants little dried fruits hung, withered and stale. And, off along a cracked, desolate side road, what appeared to be the ruins of a farmhouse could be made out. Someone, Nick decided, lived here, once. Perhaps a human being. But that person had given up, had gone away. Never to return.
“Once this was a ripe, rich field, a place of many harvests.” a spiddle said in a somber voice. “Then Glimmung came. He blasted this region with his presence; he made the settlers go away. That was years back.”
“I see,” Nick said, and shivered.
“Glimmung took all the life here away,” the spiddle went on.
“He drained it from the ground; he stole it from the plants. The man and woman who tilled and farmed here became stiff and brittle, like parched bone. Because of that they couldn’t stay. Others have tried to come here, since then, but it’s always the same; they always leave. Glimmung’s curse hangs over this land, and always will. At least until Glimmung himself is destroyed.”
“Which probably will never happen,” another spiddle said.
“Maybe it will,” Nick said.
“If it happens,” one of the spiddles said, “it will not be our doing. Spiddles can’t really accomplish very much. Impotence city, I’d say.”
Ahead, low hills confronted them, bleak and evidently uninhabited. Nick saw huge boulders of some kind of white rock; the color did not please him, nor did it seem to make the spiddles very happy either. In silence, he and the spiddles ascended a rough and twisting trail which passed between heaps of once-molten slag. As if, Nick thought, a dead volcano exists here, nearby. Its fire gone, perhaps for many decades, perhaps for as much as a thousand years.
Ahead, on the ragged peak of a hill, Nick saw a wide irregular cleft, as if lightning had hurled itself d
own, burning this awesome slot into the dim, cold rise of earth.
“Glimmung’s mark,” a spiddle said. All the spiddles paused in their climb and so did Nick. “At that spot, over there, Glimmung first appeared on this world. He flashed down out of the midday sky, shedding grey fire, burning everything he came near. Since then nothing has lived here. Out of this place, Glimmung spread over all the planet, like a lake of hateful night. Fire and night; that is Glimmung’s way. That is his nature.”
The spiddles, having rested, started on once more.
“Is it far, now?” Nick asked, panting as he ascended step by step.
“On the plain beyond these hills,” the spiddles gasped; they, also, were nearly spent. Weight hung on them, a burden conferred by this place. Even to walk here took enormous strength; Nick felt as if the world itself had settled on to his back, bowing him and bending him. He felt weary and very old, as if he had lived for a thousand years.
“Fatigue,” a spiddle panted, “is everywhere, here. As if gravity forages from these hills, searching for living things to infest with its weight. But it won’t be long, now.”
Above them, the two werjes had been joined by a third. And now a fourth werj flap-flapped towards the others, to take up its station with them.
“They must know where we’re going,” Nick said.
“True,” a spiddle agreed. “But werjes are afraid of printers. Printers have a power over other creatures…at least when the printer is strong. But they are so weakened, now. The struggle with Glimmung has gone on so long.”
They had reached the top; here, they paused. Nick looked down the far side of the hill and saw, below, level land stretching out, with grass and an occasional tree. And, here and there, a farmhouse. Human colonists evidently lived here, a fair number of them, in fact.
“Now the journey will be easier,” a spiddle told him; the spiddle got out a large handkerchief and noisily blew its nose. Another spiddle dabbed delicately at its forehead, where perspiration shone.