Her pace grew slower, her gaze dulled and unseeing. She felt weighed down by the utter futility of things. Three years she had been shut up in libraries and dusty rooms, playing at being a magician. And all for what? Nothing had changed. Nothing would change. A cloak of injustice lay upon London, and she, like everyone else, was smothered by it. The Council did what they pleased, oblivious to the suffering they caused. And she was unable to do anything about it.
At The Frog a similarly somber mood prevailed. The taproom had been tidied, the devastation of two nights previously cleared away. At the end of the counter a shiny new piece of wood filled the hole made by the demon’s attack; it did not quite match the rest of the bar, but George Fox had disguised it with a display of postcards and horse brasses. All the broken chairs and tables had been replaced; the circular burn mark near the door was covered with a rug.
Mr. Fox gave Kitty a subdued welcome. “Extra work for us tonight, Clara,” he said. “Haven’t found anyone yet to … you know, replace Sam.”
“No, no. Of course not.” Kitty’s voice was mild, but impotent fury sloshed inside her. She felt she might scream. Grasping a cloth as if it were the neck of a magician, she went about her business.
Two hours passed; the taproom filled. Men and women huddled at the tables or stood talking quietly by the counter.
An unenthusiastic darts match began. Kitty pulled drinks behind the bar, lost in her thoughts. She hardly looked up when the door opened, bringing with it a gust of autumn chill.
As if a switch had just been pushed, or a battery pulled out, all conversation in The Frog suddenly wound down. Sentences were left unfinished, glasses paused en route to open mouths; eyes swiveled, a few heads turned. A dart embedded itself in the plaster wall beside the board. George Fox, who had been bent beside a table chatting, slowly drew himself erect.
A young man stood there. He shook the rain off his long black coat.
Kitty saw the newcomer between the heads of nearby customers. Her hand jerked, splashing gin upon the surface of the counter. Her mouth made a little noise.
The young man removed his gloves. He ran a slender hand through his hair—short, cropped, and flecked with rain—and looked around at the silent room. “Good evening,” he said. “Who is the proprietor here?”
Silence. Shuffling. Then George Fox cleared his throat. “That would be me.”
“Oh, good. A word, please. “The request was quietly spoken, but it held the assumption of authority. Everything about the young man did: his coat, his smart black jacket, the ruched white shirt, his patent leather shoes. In his own way he was as alien a figure in the taproom of The Frog as the demon without a face.
Animosity and fear rippled out around the room in waves. The young man smiled. “If you don’t mind.”
George Fox stepped forward. “What can I do for you?”
The young man was shorter than Mr. Fox by half a head, slim as he was burly. “I believe you have a girl working here,” he said. “What is her name?”
One or two of the customers standing at the counter flicked their eyes at Kitty, who had shrunk back against the cabinet behind the bar. The door to the passage was close: she could slip out, through the kitchens and away.
Mr. Fox blinked. “Um, Clara Bell. She’s the only girl, since Peggy left….” His voice trailed off, was replaced with guarded hostility. “Why? Why do you ask?”
“Is Clara Bell working here tonight?”
George Fox hesitated—precisely the answer the young man was expecting. “Good,” he said. “Fetch her out.” He looked about him. Kitty was concealed behind the patrons standing at the bar. She inched toward the backroom door.
“Fetch her out,” the young man said again.
Still George Fox did not move; his face was set in stone, his eyes bulging. “Why do you want her?” he repeated stolidly. “Who are you? What do you want with her?”
“I am not accustomed,” the young man said; his voice was tired, “to explaining myself, nor to asking more than once. I am from the government. That should be good enough for any of you here—Oh, sorry! I don’t think so—”
A man sitting near the entrance had slipped from his seat and hurried to the door. He opened it, made to depart. The magician spoke a word and gestured. The man was flung backward bodily into the room, landing hard beside the fireplace. The door slammed shut so hard the brasses rattled on the walls.
“Not one of you leaves this room until Clara Bell is found.” The young man looked testily toward the commoner lying on the floor. “Stop that groaning! You’re not injured.” He turned back to George Fox. “Well?”
Kitty was by the backroom door. One of the customers at the bar nodded his head almost imperceptibly. “Go on,” he hissed. “Get out.”
The young man tapped a shoe upon the tiles. “It won’t surprise you to learn that I have not come to this hovel alone. Unless the girl is brought before me in thirty seconds, I shall issue orders that you will presently regret.” He glanced at his watch.
George Fox looked at the floor. He looked at the ceiling. His hands clenched and unclenched. He tried not to meet the beseeching gazes of the people all around. Lines of weariness and age were etched upon his cheeks. He opened his mouth, closed it—
“It’s all right, George.” Kitty pushed her way around the end of the bar; she carried her coat across one arm. “You don’t have to. Thanks.” She walked slowly between the tables. “Well, Mr. Mandrake? Shall we go?”
For a moment the magician did not answer. He was staring at her, his pale face a little flushed, perhaps affected by the heat of the room. Collecting himself, he gave a slight bow. “Ms. Jones! I am honored. Would you mind coming with me?” He stood aside. Stiff-backed, staring straight ahead, Kitty passed him. He followed her to the door.
The young man looked back at the silent room. “My apologies for disrupting your evening.” He went out; the door closed. For almost a minute no one moved or spoke.
“You’ll be needing a new barmaid, George,” someone said.
In the yard the vigilance sphere had gone. A few car lights moved on the road beyond the passageway. A light rain fell. Kitty heard it tapping against the river in the darkness below the parapet. Cool air brushed her face, and specks of dampness; their sudden touch made her feel alive.
Behind her, a voice: “Ms. Jones. My car is close by. I suggest we walk to it.”
At the sound, a fierce exultation suddenly flowered in Kitty. Far from the fear she should have felt, she knew only defiance and a kind of joy. Since the first numb shock of Mandrake’s appearance she had been quite calm—calm and curiously revived. For three long years she had led a solitary, cautious life. Now, with all its prospects shattered, she knew she could not have endured that life a moment longer. She wanted action, regardless of the consequences. Her old recklessness came flooding back to her upon a tide of frustrated rage.
She turned. Mandrake stood before her—Mandrake, one of the Council. It was like the answer to her prayers.
“So what are you going to do?” she snapped. “Kill me?”
The young man blinked. His face was dimly lit by lights from the old inn’s windows; it gave him a sickly, yellow cast. He cleared his throat. “No. I—”
“Why not? Isn’t that what you do to traitors?” Kitty spat the last word out. “Or to anyone who crosses you? One of your demons was here two nights ago. It killed a man. He had a family. He’d never done anything against the government. But it killed him even so.”
The magician made an irritable noise behind his teeth. “That is unfortunate. But it is nothing to do with me.”
“No, except you control the demons.” Kitty’s voice was hard and shrill. “They’re just the slaves. You direct them.”
“I meant it wasn’t me personally. That’s not my department. Now, Ms. Jones—”
“Sorry,” she said, laughing, “that is just the most lamentable excuse I’ve ever heard. Not my department. Ooh, that makes it all right then.
And I suppose the war isn’t your department either, or the Night Police, or the prisons in the Tower. None of them are anything to do with you.”
“As a matter of fact, they’re not.” His voice grew stern. “Now can you manage to be silent on your own, Ms. Jones? Or perhaps you wish my help?” He clicked a finger; a shadow detached itself from the darkest corner of the yard. “That is Fritang,” Mandrake said. “Most savage of my slaves. He will do whatever I comm—”
Kitty gave a cry of derision. “That’s right, threaten me! Just like you threatened the people in the inn. Can’t manage to do anything without force to back you up, can you? I don’t know how you sleep at night.”
“That’s rich coming from you,” Mandrake snapped. “I don’t remember the Resistance being afraid to use force when it suited them. Let’s see now, what were the casualty figures? Several people killed, others maimed and—”
” That was different. We were fighting for ideals—” “Well, so am I. However …” He took a deep breath. “I admit to being discourteous in the present instance. “The magician waved a hand, spoke a word of dismissal; the menacing shadow faded into nothing. “There. Now you can talk without fear.”
Kitty looked directly at him. “I was not afraid.” Mandrake shrugged. He glanced back over his shoulder at the closed inn door, then out toward the road. In contrast to his imperious efficiency inside The Frog, he seemed suddenly hesitant, unsure what to do.
“Well?” Kitty said. “What normally happens next when you arrest someone? Spot of torture? A beating? What’s it to be?”
A sigh. “I’ve not arrested you. At least, not necessarily.”
“Then I’m free to go?”
“Ms. Jones,” he snarled, “I am here as a private individual, not as a member of the government, though if you don’t stop your histrionics, that may change. Officially you are dead. Yesterday I received word that you were alive. I wanted confirmation.”
Kitty’s eyes narrowed. “Who told you I was here? A demon?”
“No. It is not important.”
Clarity came. “Ah, it was Nick Drew.”
“I said it is not important. You cannot be surprised that I would want to find you—a fugitive from justice, a member of the Resistance.”
“No,” she said. “I’m just surprised you haven’t cut my throat already.”
The magician gave a cry of genuine annoyance. “I am a minister, not a murderer! I help protect our people against … against terrorists like you and your friends.”
“Yeah, because the people are so safe in your care,” Kitty sneered. “Half our young men are dying in America, and we’ve got the police mauling others in the street, and demons attacking anyone who protests, and enemies and spies at large in our suburbs. We’re all having a great time!”
“If it wasn’t for us, it would be much, much worse!” Mandrake’s voice was high and tight; with evident effort he lowered it to a purr. “We use our power to rule for the good of all. The commoners need guidance. Admittedly, we’re going through a ropey patch, but—”
“Your power is based on slavery! How can it be for anyone’s good?”
The magician seemed genuinely shocked. “Not human slavery,” he said. “Just demons.”
“That makes it better, does it? I think not. Everything you do is tainted with that corruption.”
His answer was faint. “That’s not so.”
“It is so, and I think you know it.” Kitty frowned at him. “What are you here for? What do you want? The Resistance was a long time ago.”
Mandrake cleared his throat. “I was told …” He drew his coat around him, looked out across the river. “I was told you saved me from the golem. That you risked your life to save mine.” He glanced at her; Kitty kept her face impassive. “I was also told you died doing it. Now that I find you alive, I am … naturally curious as to the truth.”
Kitty scowled. “What do you want: the details? Yes, I did, and I must have been mad. I stopped the golem from crushing your sorry head into a pulp. Then I ran away. That’s all there is to it.”
She stared at him fixedly; he gazed back, face pale and stark in the artificial light. The rain pattered down between them.
Mandrake coughed. “Well, the details are fine. Thanks. In fact, that wasn’t exactly it so much as—as I kind of wondered why.“ He shoved his hands in his pockets.
“I don’t know,” Kitty said. “I really don’t know.”
“Put your coat on,” he said. “You’re getting soaked.”
“Like you care.” Even so, she put it on.
He watched her as she wrestled with the sleeves. When she had finished doing up the buttons he cleared his throat again. “Well, whatever your reasons might have been,” he began, “I suppose I need to th—”
“Don’t,” she said. “Don’t. I don’t want to hear it. Not from you.”
He frowned. “But—”
“I did it without thinking and if you want to know the truth, I’ve regretted it ever since, whenever I’ve seen your hideous, lying leaflets on the streets, or passed those stages where your actors do your lying for you. So don’t thank me, Mr. Mandrake.” She shivered; the rain had steadily intensified. “If you must thank someone, make it Bartimaeus. He’s the one who prompted me to save your life.”
Even in the dark she could see it startled him. His posture stiffened, his voice grew brittle. “He prompted you? I find that hard to credit.”
“Why? Because he’s a demon? Yeah, I know. Doesn’t make much sense. But he told me how to stop the golem, he called me back when I would have run. Without him you’d be dead. But don’t let that bother you. He’s just a slave.”
The magician was silent for a time. Then he said, “I had been meaning to ask you about Bartimaeus. For some reason he regards you with affection. Why is that?”
Kitty’s laugh was genuine. “There is no affection between us.”
“No? Why then did he tell me you were dead? He said the golem killed you. That is why I have not searched for you in all these years.”
“He said that? I didn’t know.…” Kitty looked out over the black river. “Well,” she said, “perhaps it was because I treated him with some respect! Perhaps because I didn’t enslave him, perhaps because I didn’t seek to keep him in service for year after year without a break till his essence wore away!” She bit her lip, and looked quickly at the magician.
His eyes were hidden in a strip of darkness. “And what,” he said very quietly, “can you possibly know about that? You haven’t seen Bartimaeus for years. Have you?”
Kitty edged back toward the river wall. The magician stepped toward her—
A sudden hissing in midair; raindrops fizzed and steamed on something materializing above the water. A small orb, pink and shiny. Music sounded as of an orchestra far way. Mandrake drew back; he uttered a quiet curse.
A faint round face, disrupted by crackles of static, appeared in the orb. A voice issued forth, similarly disrupted. “John! I’ve found you! You are late! Even now the musicians are warming up! Come quickly!”
The magician gave a little bow. “Quentin. My apologies. I have been delayed.”
“No time to waste!”The face seemed to fix on Kitty for a moment. “Bring your girlfriend too. I shall save a seat. Ten minutes, John. Ten minutes!”
The orb fizzed, blurred, vanished. Dark rain fell uninterrupted into the Thames.
Kitty and Mandrake stared at each other. “It seems,” the magician said slowly, “that we shall have to continue this conversation later. Do you like the theater, Ms. Jones?”
Kitty pursed her lips. “Not much.”
“Nor me.” He made an elegant gesture up toward the road. “We shall have to suffer together.”
19
Our raid on the Ambassador Hotel was planned with military precision and the utmost care. Just ten minutes’ bickering in a phone box and we had the plan set straight.
After leaving our master we’d flown speedily across Londo
n in the guise of starlings, crossing above the park where so recently I’d had my misadventure. The Glass Palace, the pagoda, the ill-omened lake—all glinted dourly in the last light of evening. Most of the illuminations were off; the normal crowds were absent, though small pockets of commoners moved here and there with unknown purpose across the grass. I saw police cordons, hurrying imps, an unusual amount of activity … then we were over the streets of St. James, and circling down to the hotel.
It was an upmarket affair, a slender gray-stone house set among the embassies and gentlemen’s clubs; a place both sophisticated and discreet, where foreign diplomats and princelings might rest their wallets while in town. It did not look the kind of hotel to welcome an invasion of five ragtag djinn, particularly ones as unsavory as Hodge. We saw hexes shimmering in the windows and a lattice of thin nodes upon the fire escape. The doorman, resplendent in lime-green livery, had the sharp-eyed look of someone wearing lenses. Caution was required. We couldn’t just stroll in.
The phone box was right opposite. One by one, five starlings flew down behind it. One by one, five rats hopped through a hole inside. Mwamba used her tail to brush away the worst of the cigarette butts, and we began our solemn conclave.
“Right, troops,” I said brightly. “Here’s what I suggest—”
A one-eyed rat held up a paw of protest. “Just a moment, Bartimaeus,” it said. “What makes you the leader all of a sudden?”
“You want the full inventory of my talents? Remember we have to capture Hopkins sometime this evening.”
“If hot air counted for anything, Bartimaeus, we’d follow you with pleasure.” This was Cormocodran. His basalt-thick voice boomed about the phone box; the vibrations made my whiskers ripple. “Unfortunately, you’re old and tired and useless.”
“We heard about your adventures as a mighty frog” Hodge added, chuckling. “Relying on the master to save you, scattering your essence like rain across the city.”