The twins stared at each other, thumbs in mouths, sharing a thrill of horror.
Then Francine said, ‘Oh, Merilee. What if he come here an find out aller his books’ve been burned in fronter the public?’
‘Shit an biscuits,’ Merilee said. ‘Thas a thought.’
They considered it.
Francine said, ‘Us’ll have ter keep watch. Take turns at the winder. If he come, lock the door. Put up a sign sayin Closed Fer …’
‘Lunch?’
‘No. Cause of it might be afternoon.’
‘You’m right there, Francine. Sharp thinkin. Stock-takin, then. Or Death in the Fambly.’
Despite being de facto orphans, the sisters were comforted by this plan.
Until Francine said tremulously, ‘But what if he come as the Fly, Merilee? What if he can shrink inter like a normal one an come in through a winder or the keyhole? Then swell up huge agen?’
Merilee seemed about to faint but gathered herself. ‘Nip down the supermarket, Francine. Buy a swatter an aller the inseck spray they’re got on the shelf.’
‘Aisle Four,’ Francine said.
‘Five,’ Merilee said.
Stoned on jetlag, Philip had driven most of the A30 with the window down and the hi-fi at full whack. Despite these precautions, he’d almost missed his exit and had veered across the inside lane, cutting up a blaring truck carrying two thousand almost featherless chickens to their destiny.
This incident shattered the frosted glass behind which his mind had lurked for the past five – or was it six? – days. Now, as the familiar bends of the country road unfurled, he realized that he felt rather sick. It was a nausea that could not be entirely attributed to thirteen in-flight meals. No. His gastric unease was anxiety. No, again. Fear. The return to his tainted cottage, his tainted life, frightened him. As did the prospect of a third and final return to the Realm, despite the promise of liberation that accompanied it. Completeness and Closure were words on the same spider-chart as Death.
He passed the turning to Slewchurch. Ten miles to go. The time, according to the dashboard clock, was 11.21. He slowed and stabbed the music off. He tried to let the autumnal curvaceousness of Devon soothe him. So much more pleasant, really, than the soul-freezing splendour of the Himalayas.
The sign loomed: WELCOME TO FLEMWORTHY, to which a local wit had added TWINED WITH MORLS THOOL.
He passed through the almost deserted square and turned onto Dag Lane. A black-suited bicyclist was heading in the opposite direction. Philip recognized him as the local vicar, but could not remember the man’s name. As they passed he called ‘Good Morning’ from his window.
The vicar opened his mouth as if to reply, but Philip did not catch what he said. He glanced at his wing mirror and was surprised to see the vicar and his bike toppling sideways into the hedge. A bit early for a clergyman to be pissed, Philip thought, even for a High Anglican.
He parked and got out of the Lexus. His legs were unsteady. Quite some time since he’d walked more than four hundred metres of departure lounge carpet. He lit a duty-free cigarette and sought comfort from the view. A sense of belonging.
None came.
He walked to his home. In front of it he halted, astonished. Someone had turned his fence into an artwork of some kind. It had been adorned with swags of garlic, crosses of wood or other plant material, small mirrors, scraps of paper covered in scrawls of writing, CDs, rosary beads, strips of flypaper and little dolls crudely fashioned out of stuffed fabric. On closer inspection, these dolls had been pierced through various parts of their anatomies by pins, nails, sewing needles and cocktail sticks.
Philip was so absorbed in examining these tributes that it took him some time to notice that a white cross had been painted on his door. When he pushed it open he was almost overwhelmed by stench. He stepped over the slew of mail, returned the phone to its cradle and shoved the window open. He located the source of stink as the kitchen waste bin and carried it outside. He dallied with the idea of adding the fence fetishes to it, but decided that it might offend the well-meaning person or persons who’d placed them there.
He was surprised that he still had electricity, that the central heating whuffed into action, that the fridge illuminated its emptiness when he opened it. The rug in front of the hearth was webbed by glittery trails of congealed slime. Only slugs, of course.
He returned to the car for the bags of stuff he’d bought at the branch of Sainsbury’s just off the Exeter bypass. A movement tickled the corner of his eye. He looked down the lane and saw, or thought he saw, two figures nip smartly behind a beech tree. On his second trip to the car he paused at the buckled gate and glanced across the coombe. On its far side a gaggle of birdwatchers had their binoculars trained in his direction.
Back indoors, he extricated a pair of sandwiches from their triangular blister and ate them. He gouged mould from the cafetiere and washed it out and made coffee. It tasted of mould. He added a slosh of whiskey to the cup. Better.
He continued to restore things to order, because although he was tired to the edge of hallucination he didn’t dare sleep and didn’t know what to expect. He’d tethered the Amulet against his chest with his trusty dressing-gown belt, of course, but Pocket had said he’d ‘come through’, which might mean he’d put in a personal appearance.
The thought jerked him. He went upstairs. The window-ledge in his study was thickly strewn with fly husks. He dabbed the laptop on and endured ten seconds of acute worry before the screen came up. He opened a New Document and gave it the bold title 3.
Then he clicked on his email and was appalled by the infinite downscroll of little unopened envelopes. He clicked back to the blank page and went downstairs. He repositioned the armchair to where he could monitor both the lavatory and the chimney, poured himself a glass of Jameson and sat down to wait.
He was unconscious within five minutes.
7
Two things awakened him: a warm stirring, a tactile chuckle, against his chest; and a squeal of door hinges. The room was filled with soft amber light. The silhouette of a hooded figure occupied the doorway.
‘Murdstone?’
‘Pocket?’
‘Oh, don’t start that bleddy wrigglemeroll again. You sound, Murdstone? Your wits lined up? I see you’ve been at the damage again.’
‘Yes. No. I’ve only had a sip or two. Come in, come in.’
The Greme came to the middle of the room, sniffing the air like a beagle, then settled himself comfortably on the sofa.
Philip went to the door and scanned the shadow-barred lane. There seemed to be no one about. He closed and bolted the door, drew the curtains, switched on lamps. Only then did something occur to him.
‘You came in through the front door,’ he said.
‘Bugger me, you’re sharp, Murdstone. There’s not a lot gets past you.’
‘No, I meant, usually you—’
‘Clap into your shitter or down the chimbly with my arse asmoulder and knocked as a conker.’
‘Yes.’
‘Ah, well. We smuggled a pair of spellwrights in from Hazy Vale, see. Couldn’t understand a bleddy word they said, but they abjurated some of the seals on the Dimensional Projector, diddled the equipollence on some of the others, gave it a quick wipe with a damp cloth, and stap me if tweren’t good as new. Bugger, do they charge, though. Ole Volenap nigh on fell dead when I read him the price. Mind you, well worth the coin. That’s how come I angled you in that Phunky Bum place. And this time I come through to your crib slick as a sea weasel through a sluice. Not a lump nor flecker. Found myself outsider your door not a mollicle out of place.’
‘I see,’ Philip said, a little surprised by this uncharacteristically prolix explanation. ‘That’s good, then.’
And Pocket did indeed seem in much better shape than on previous visitations. To Philip’s inexpert eye, he seemed to have put on a little weight. His hooded tunic thing was not only unstained and unscorched, it appeared to be new. His lowe
r legs, bare and skinny on earlier occasions, were plumply sheathed in white woven stockings. The Greme sat at ease, his right elbow on the arm of the sofa, his chin resting on a loose fist, looking, Philip thought, like someone posing for a photograph. And in no particular hurry.
Philip returned to his chair and took a dainty sip of whiskey.
‘So, another nobble, eh, Pocket?’
‘Yup.’
‘Why?’
‘Why? On account of you were desperate for it. Urging at it like a stalled bridegroom, wasn’t you?’
‘I suppose I was, yes.’
‘And anyways up,’ the Greme said, making an airy gesture, ‘we left things adangle, end of the last one. Walking round the whole matter, I saw it wouldn’t do. It was a two-legged trivet. And that started to naggle me. Flaky ledger or no, it can’t just stop, I told meself.’ He paused and aimed an authorial finger. ‘Tales need shaping off, Murdstone. Top advice, that. You take it.’
‘God help you, Pocket. You’ve become a nobblist. I thought this might happen.’
‘Did you indeed? Never had you marked as a man could see round the next corner.’
Philip took another, less dainty, sip of Jameson. He noticed that his hand shook. Cautiously, he said, ‘So, did you, er, shape it off? Does it … end? Satisfactorily?’
‘Ho yes. Time you come to the end of the inkage you wouldn’t be hungering after more.’
The Greme’s gaze wavered, drifted off to the fireplace. For a few pleasant moments, Philip entertained the possibility of the two of them passing the evening in companionable, writerly conversation. Or even silence. Then Pocket stood and briskly rubbed his narrow hands together.
‘Come on then, my pony. A comfy arse gathers no turnips, as my Old Dame was wont to say. You got that device of yours sparked up? Bring your grog, if you can’t do without. Won’t make a difference.’
Philip seated himself at the keyboard and fastened the Amulet more tightly to his chest. He dabbed the space-bar and the empty page appeared.
‘Fair set, then, Murdstone?’
‘Yes. No.’
‘No?’
‘I’m not sure I want to do this, Pocket.’ The shake in his hand had reached his heart and brain.
‘Say what?’
‘I don’t know if I can do it.’
‘Murdstone, if this’s more of your flukin bumgullery to hang onto the Amulet …’
‘No. It’s not that. Honestly. I’m frightened. My head is full of dark patches.’
‘In a pig’s arse, man,’ the clerk said gently. ‘We know that. We knew that from start-off. Couldn’t figure how you managed with so little candle. Part of the reason we angled you, truth to tell.’ Pocket’s birdy hand nested on Philip’s left shoulder. ‘But we’re nearly done, Murdstone. So don’t you go getting frembly now. Third and last part of the tribble. Then you can rest the plough and graze the hosses. Square?’ The hand gripped.
‘Square?’
Philip nodded, gasped out a breath. ‘All right.’
‘Good. I’ll leave you to it, then.’
‘Pocket?’
‘What now?’
‘What if the Amulet, you know, doesn’t want to, won’t let you take it? Last time, it—’
‘Don’t you bandy your wits about that. It’ll come peaceful.’
‘Will it? How do you know?’
‘Just write the flukin nobble, Murdstone. Then you’ll have your answers.’
The door closed. Philip listened to Pocket’s footsteps on the stairs. He took a quick slug from his glass and braced himself.
It began as before: a stirring of dry leaves, an unseen walker’s whispery approach modulating into nibscratch. The Amulet trembled, awoke. Philip’s hands spread themselves, hovering over the keys. In the darkened auditorium of his head images gathered and flickered into smooth unreeling. Inkage writhed onto his monitor.
Into and through the deepening night he saw and transcribed the third and final part of the Murdstone Trilogy.
He saw and wrote the blade of Cwydd Harel shatter a doorway through the outer wall of the Vednodian labyrinth. He saw and wrote Cadrel step onto the ledge and vanish into the cataract. Then emerge, bearing the sorely magicked but yet living body of the Sage, GarBellon.
His flying fingers recorded the rage of the Antarch, Morl, when he discovers that the thirty-second manifestation of Trover Mellwax has disappeared from the Dimensionless Table.
He watched this raging through the purple eyes of a warp-rat concealing itself in the deepest shadows of the laboratory.
He wrote and witnessed the Sage-burdened and perilous descent of Cadrel from the heights of Vedno to be reunited with his fearful troops. He saw them take ship, only to discover that Turbid Hoag has been whipped by the dark storm of Morl’s flight into towering hills of water.
He saw and wrote the loss of every ship save Cadrel’s. Porlocs and Gremes swept into the furious Hoag. Heard their screams as the Slankers closed in.
Some still-functioning particle of Philip’s mind worried that things weren’t going too well, Realm-wise. And there was a touch too much … relish in the account of disaster when it happened to the Good Guys. Bloody good, though. Thrilling.
What next?
What
next?
My triumph, Murdstone.
What? Who said that?
He wrote and saw Cadrel’s reunion with Mesmira. Deeply emotional. Good old Tyle Gether, carrying the lantern from the bedroom then tending to GarBellon’s damage. Mesmira hungry for Cadrel’s touch. His hand limply fondling her before he falls exhausted onto the pillow. Her sigh. They sleep.
A rustle ascends the ivy that coats the wall of the Grange. A slithering through the half-opened sash, a tiny patter of clawed feet across the room. Mellwax the warp-rat hauling himself up the coverlet. Settling himself on Cadrel’s pillow. Chewing patiently, silently, through the leather thong that attaches the Amulet to Cadrel’s neck. Carrying the Amulet, careful not to make contact with it, to the window and thence into the night.
He witnessed and wrote treachery.
In the eerie half-light of a sullen dawn, a hooded figure leads a cohort of Swelts through the mazy tracks of Farrin. Guides them to the secret entrance to the subterranean library.
He wrote with viscious enthusiasm the butchering of Orberry Volenap, hearing groans which he dimly recognized as his own.
He saw the burning of the Ledgers, heard the squealing of the inkage as it turns into black insects that live for only moments before they disperse as windblown motes of ash.
While the harvest moon made its slow traverse of his window he witnessed and recorded, tirelessly and with deep repugnance in his soul, Morl’s conquest of the Realm.
The body of GarBellon on its rude catafalque being hauled along the Third Way towards the Thule. The Swelt escort standing by as it is pelted with filth and ordure when it passes through the encampments of the dispossessed.
Cadrel’s rotting corpse, impaled on the blade of Cwydd Harel, suspended
No!
Yes, Murdstone
in an iron cage for all to see.
He wrote of
Remember this, Murdstone
the leaching of amnesia into the Realm.
Of Gremes, Morvens, Porlocs, Bubblers, moth farmers, wenders, bobbers, framers, barquemakers, wheelwrights, all smiling, forgetful, numb, queuing in the last colours of the day for their Thule tablets and grog.
He saw and wrote long lines of redundant Swelts, marshalled by the Praetorian Guard, waiting patiently in line for the Elimination Chambers. He watches them exit through the vents as rings of green vapour, and dissipate.
He groaned in libidinous agony writing Mesmira. Naked. Reclining languid on a white silk divan. One hand between her thighs. A sound summons her from trance and she looks up. Her blank eyes click on Lust and Brighten. Her lips part.
She reaches out
Something stirring, Murdstone?
and guides a withered ha
nd, a claw, to the rosy aureole of her perfect left breast.
Oh, no. No!
Yes. Oh, yes
Morl mounts the divan. Mesmira, moaning desire, disappears beneath the billows of the green and silver necromantic cloak.
The image fades to black. There is no more.
Philip’s hands stopped typing.
From the direction of the village a cockerel challenged the day.
8
It seemed to Philip that his brain had turned septic. That vileness had infected his senses. A greenish darkness edged his vision. The banister rail felt blood-sticky to his hand, the stair carpet marshy beneath his feet. The smell in his nostrils was yellow.
Pocket Wellfair was sitting on the sofa, breakfasting on a hand of bananas. He greeted Philip with manifestly false cheeriness.
‘By the Knob, Murdstone, these things are bleddy tasty. What d’you call em?’
‘Bananas. You’re supposed to peel them.’
‘Hum! Each to his own, says I. Want one?’
‘You’re still here.’
The Greme shook his head admiringly. ‘Up all night and still sharp as a bodkin.’ He crunched the last of his banana, regarding Philip sombrely. ‘You look like a man as has leaked his bone marrow into his boots, Murdstone. Wassup? The nobble not to your taste?’
‘Have you read it?’
‘What kind of a patecracked question is that? I wrote the bleddy thing.’
‘Did you?’
‘Yes I did.’
‘I don’t think I believe you.’
‘Fluke me,’ Pocket said impatiently. ‘Who gives a tinker’s toss who wrote what? Not you. Ho, no. You’ve been more’n happy to put your name to my flaky ledgers, so don’t you stand there like a virgin’s tombstone and come on all primsy with me.’
Philip nodded meekly and regretted it; it caused slippage in his eyesight. He steadied himself and said, ‘But this one’s not flaky.’
‘Some of it is. The brighter bits, to my manner of thinking.’