Lost in a Good Book

  O. NAKAJIMA – Adventures in the Book Trade

  Osaka was less flashy than Tokyo but no less industrious. In the morning I took breakfast at the hotel, bought a copy of the Far Eastern Toad and read the home news, but from a Far Eastern viewpoint – which made for a good take on the whole Russian thing. During breakfast I pondered just how I might find one woman in a city of a million. Apart from her surname and perfect English, there was little to go on. As a first step I asked the concierge to photocopy all the Nakajima entries from the telephone directory. I was dismayed to discover that Nakajima was quite a common name – there were 2,729 of them. I called one at random and a very pleasant Mrs Nakajima spoke to me for about ten minutes. I thanked her profusely and put the phone down, having not understood a single word. I sighed, ordered a large jug of coffee from room service, and began.

  It was 351 non-book-jumper Nakajimas later, and in the doldrums of the depression that brings forth an abundance of negatives, that I started telling myself that what I was doing was useless – if Mrs Nakajima had retired to the distant back-story of Jane Eyre, was she really going to be anywhere near a telephone?

  I stretched one of those groany-clicky stretches, drank the rest of my cold coffee and decided to go for a brief walk to loosen up. I was staring at the photocopied pages as I strolled along, trying to think of something to narrow the search, when a young man's jacket caught my eye.

  In the Far East many T-shirts and jackets have English writing on them – some of them making sense, but others just collections of words that must appear as fashionable to the Japanese youth as Kanji appears elegant to us. I had seen jackets with the strange legend '100% Chevrolet OK Fly-boy' and later one with 'Pratt & Whitney squadron movie', so I should have been ready for anything. But this one was different. It was a smart leather jacket with the following message embroidered on the back. 'Follow me, Next Girl!'

  So I did. I followed the young man for two blocks before I noticed a second jacket much like the first. By the time I had crossed the canal I had seen another jacket with 'SpecOps this way' emblazoned on the back, then 'Jane Eyre for ever!' followed quickly by 'Bad Boy Goliath'. But that wasn't all – as if following some bizarre homing call, all the people wearing these jackets, hats and T-shirts seemed to be heading in the same direction. Thoughts of falling Hispano-Suizas and ambushed Skyrails suddenly filled my head, so I dug the entroposcope from my bag, shook it and noticed a slight separation between the rice and lentils. Entropy was decreasing. I rapidly turned and started walking in the opposite direction. I took three paces and stopped as a daring notion filled my head. Of course – why not make the entropic failure do the work for me? I followed the logos to a nearby market square where the rice and lentils in the entroposcope now formed into curved bands – coincidence had increased to the point where everyone I saw was wearing something with a relevant logo. 'MycroTech developments', 'Charlotte Brontë', 'Toad News Network', 'Hispano-Suiza', 'Goliath' or 'Skyrail' were all sewn or stuck to hats, jackets, umbrellas, shirts, bags. I looked around, desperately trying to find the coincidental epicentre. Then I saw him. In an inexplicably vacant gap within the busy market, an old man was seated in front of a small table. He was as brown as a nut and quite bald, and opposite him the other chair had just been vacated by a young woman. A piece of battered card leaning against his small valise declared, in eight languages, the fortune-teller's trade and pledge. The English part of the sign read: 'I have the answer you seek!' and I was in no doubt that whatever he said would be so – and probably, yet very improbably in its undertaking, almost certainly result in my death. I took two paces towards the fortune-teller and shook the entroposcope again. The patterns were more defined but not the clean half-and-half separation I needed. The little man had seen me dither and beckoned me closer.

  'Please!' he said. 'Please come. Tell you everything!'

  I paused and looked around for any sign of jeopardy. There was nothing. I was in a perfectly peaceful square in a prosperous area of a small provincial town in Japan. Whatever my anonymous foe had in store for me, it was something that I would least expect.

  I stayed back, unsure of the wisdom of what I was doing. It was the appearance of a T-shirt that had nothing to do with me which clinched it. If I let this opportunity slide I would never find Mrs Nakajima this side of next month. I took out my ballpoint, clicked it open and marched purposefully towards the small man, who grinned wildly at me.

  'You come!' he said in poor English. 'You learn everything. Good buy, from me!'

  But I didn't stop. As I walked towards the fortune-teller I thrust my hand in my bag and pulled out a sheet of the Nakajima pages at random, then, just as I passed the little nut-brown man, I stabbed randomly on the page with my pen and broke into a run. I didn't stop to look when I heard the lightning strike, nor the horrified gasps of onlookers. I didn't stop until I was away from that place, back to plain polo shirts and ordinary designer labels and my entroposcope had returned to random clumping. I didn't investigate what had happened; I didn't need to. The fortune-teller was dead – and I would have been too if I had stopped to talk to him. I sat on a bench to get my breath back, felt nauseous again and almost threw up in a nearby trash can, much to the consternation of a little old lady who was sitting next to me. I recovered slightly and looked at the Nakajima that the fall of my ballpoint had decreed. If coincidences were running as high as I hoped, then this Nakajima had to be the one I sought. I asked the woman sitting on the bench next to me for directions. It seemed that a small amount of negative entropy still lingered – I was barely two minutes' walk from my quarry.

  The apartment block I was directed to was not in a very good state of repair. The plaster that was covering the cracks had cracks, and the grime on the peeling paint was itself starting to peel. Inside there was a small lobby where an elderly doorman was watching a dubbed version of 65 Walrus Street. He directed me to the fourth floor, where I found Mrs Nakajima's apartment at the end of the corridor. The varnish on the door had lost its shine and the brass doorknob was tarnished, dusty and dull, no one had been in here for some time. I knocked despite this and, when silence was all that answered me, grasped the knob and turned it slowly. To my surprise it moved easily and the door creaked open I paused to look about me and, seeing no one, stepped inside.

  Mrs Nakajima's apartment was ordinary in the extreme. Three bedrooms, bathroom and kitchen. The walls and ceiling were plainly painted, the flooring a light-coloured wood. It seemed as though she had moved out a few months ago and taken almost everything with her. The only notable exception to this was a small table near the window of the living room, upon which I found four slim hide-bound volumes lying next to a brass reading lamp. I picked up the uppermost book. It had 'Jurisfiction' embossed on the cover, above a name I didn't recognise. I tried to open the book but the covers were stuck fast. I tried the second book with no better luck, but paused for a moment when I saw the third book. I gently touched the slim volume and ran my fingertips across the thin layer of dust that had accumulated on the spine. The hair bristled on my neck and I shivered. But it wasn't a fearful feeling. It was the light tingle of apprehension; this book, I knew, would open. The name on the cover was my own. I had been expected. I opened the book. On the title page was a handwritten note from Mrs Nakajima that was short and to the point:

  For Thursday Next, in grateful anticipation of good work and fine times ahead with Jurisfiction. I jackanoried you into a book when you were nine but now you must do it for yourself – and you can, and you shall. I also suggest that you are quick, Mr Schitt-Hawse is walking along the corridor outside as you read this and he isn't out collecting for ChronoGuard orphans. – Mrs Nakajima

  I ran to the door and slid the bolt just as the door handle rattled. There was a pause and then a loud thump on the door.

  'Next!' came Schitt-Hawse's unmistakable voice. 'I know you're in there! Let me in and we can fetch Jack together!'

  I had been followed, obviously. It sudde
nly struck me that perhaps Goliath were more interested in how to get into books than in Jack Schitt himself. There was a billion-pound hole in the budget for their advanced weapons division and a Prose Portal, any Prose Portal, would be just the thing to fill it.

  'Go to hell!' I shouted as I returned to my book. On the first page, under a large heading that read 'READ ME FIRST!', there was a description of a library somewhere. I needed no second bidding; the door flexed under a heavy blow and I saw the paint crack near the lock. If it was Chalk or Cheese they wouldn't take long to gain entry.

  I relaxed, took a deep breath, cleared my throat and read in a clear, strong and confident voice, expressive and expansive. I added pauses, inflections and raised the tone of my voice where the text required it. I read as I had never read before.

  'I was in a long, dark, wood-panelled corridor,' I began, 'lined with bookshelves that reached from the richly carpeted floor to the vaulted ceiling—'

  The sound of thumping increased and as I spoke the door frame splintered near the hinges and collapsed inward as Chalk fell with a heavy thump on to the floor, closely followed by Cheese, who landed on top of him.

  'The carpet was elegantly patterned and the ceiling was decorated with rich mouldings that depicted scenes from the classics—'

  'Next!' yelled Schitt-Hawse, putting his head round the door as Chalk and Cheese struggled to get up. 'Coming to Osaka was not part of the deal! I told you to keep me informed. Nothing will happen to you—'

  But something was happening. Something new, something other. My utter loathing of Goliath, the urge to get away, the knowledge that without entry to books I would never see Landen again – all of these things gave me the will to soften the barriers that had hardened since the day I first entered Jane Eyre in 1958.

  'High above me, spaced at regular intervals, were finely decorated circular apertures through which light gained entry—'

  I could see Schitt-Hawse move towards me but he had started to become less tangible; although I could see his lips move, the sound arrived at my ears a full second later. I continued to read, and as I did so the room about me began to fworp from view.

  'Next!' yelled Schitt-Hawse. 'You'll regret, this I swear!'

  I carried on reading.

  '—reinforcing the serious mood of the library—'

  'Bitch!' I heard Schitt-Hawse cry. 'Grab her!'

  But his words were as a zephyr; the room took on the appearance of morning mist and darkened. I felt a gentle tingling sensation, the feeling of tepid water brushing on the skin – and in the next instant, I had gone.

  I blinked twice but Osaka was far behind. I closed the book, carefully placed it in my pocket and looked around. I was in a long, dark, wood-panelled corndor lined with bookshelves that reached from the richly carpeted floor to the vaulted ceiling. The carpet was elegantly patterned and the ceiling was decorated with rich mouldings that depicted scenes from the classics, each cornice supporting the marble bust of an author. High above me, spaced at regular intervals, were finely decorated circular apertures through which light gained entry and reflected off the polished wood, reinforcing the serious mood of the library. Running down the centre of the corridor was a long row of reading tables, each with a green-shaded brass lamp. The library appeared endless; in both directions the corridor vanished into darkness with no definable end. But this wasn't important. Describing the library would be like going to see a Turner and commenting on the frame. On all the walls, end after end, shelf after shelf, were books. Hundreds, thousands, millions of books. Hardbacks, paperbacks, leather-bound volumes, uncorrected proofs, handwritten manuscripts, everything. I stepped closer and rested my fingertips lightly on the pristine volumes. They felt warm to the touch, so I leaned closer and pressed my ear to the spines. I could hear a distant hum, the rumble of machinery, people talking, traffic, seagulls, laughter, waves on rocks, wind in the winter branches of trees, distant thunder, heavy rain, children playing, a blacksmith's hammer – a million sounds all happening together. And then, in a revelatory moment, the clouds slid back from my mind and a crystal-clear understanding of the very nature of books shone upon me. They weren't just collections of words arranged neatly on a page to give the impression of reality – each of these volumes was reality. The similarity of these books to the copies I had read back home was no more than the similarity a photograph has to its subject – these books were alive!

  I walked slowly down the corridor, running my fingers along the spines and listening to the comfortable pat-pat-pat sound they made, every now and then recognising a familiar title. After a couple of hundred yards I came across a junction where a second corridor crossed the first. In the middle of the crossway was a large circular void with a wrought-iron rail and a spiral staircase bolted securely to one side. I peered cautiously down. Not more than thirty feet below me I could see another floor, exactly like this one. But in the middle of that floor was another circular void through which I could see another floor, and another and another and so on to the depths of the library. I looked up. It was the same above me, more circular light wells and the spiral staircase reaching up into the dizzy heights above. I leaned on the balcony and looked about me at the vast library once again.

  'Well,' I said to no one in particular, 'I don't think I'm in Osaka any more.'

  16

  Interview with the cat

  * * *

  'The Cheshire cat was the first character I met at Jurisfiction and his somewhat sporadic appearances enlivened the time I spent there. He gave me much advice. Some was good, some was bad and some was so nonsensically nonsequitous that it confuses me even now to think about it. And yet, during all that time, I never learned his age, where he came from or where he went when he vanished. It was one of Jurisfiction's lesser mysteries.'

  THURSDAY NEXT – The Jurisfiction Chronicles

  'A visitor!' exclaimed a voice behind me. 'What a delightful surprise!'

  I turned and was astonished to see a large and luxuriant cat sitting precariously on the uppermost bookshelf. He was staring at me with a curious mixture of lunacy and benevolence, and remained quite still except for the tip of his tail, which twitched occasionally from side to side. I had never come across a talking cat before, but good manners, as my father used to say, cost nothing.

  'Good afternoon, Mr Cat.'

  The cat's eyes opened wide and the grin fell from his face. He looked up and down the corridor for a few moments and then enquired:

  'Me?'

  I stifled a laugh.

  'I don't see any others.'

  'Ah!' replied the cat, grinning more than ever. 'That's because you have a temporary form of cat blindness.'

  'I'm not sure I've heard of that.'

  'It's quite common,' he replied airily. 'I suppose you have heard of knight blindness, when you can't see any knights?'

  'It's night, not knight,' I corrected him.

  'It all sounds the same to me.'

  'Suppose I do have cat blindness,' I ventured. 'Then how is it I can see you?'

  'Suppose we change the subject?' retorted the cat. 'What do you think of the library?'

  'It's pretty big,' I murmured, looking all around me.

  'Two hundred miles in every direction,' said the cat offhandedly, beginning to purr, 'twenty-six floors above ground, twenty-six below.'

  'You must have a copy of every book that's been written,' I observed.

  'Every book that will ever be written,' corrected the cat, 'and a few others besides.'

  'How many?'

  'Well, I've never counted them myself but certainly more than twelve.'

  'You're the Cheshire cat, aren't you?' I asked.

  'I was the Cheshire cat,' he replied with a slightly aggrieved air. 'But they moved the county boundaries, so technically speaking I'm now the "Unitary Authority of Warrington Cat", but it doesn't have the same ring to it. Oh, and welcome to Jurisfiction. You'll like it here; everyone is quite mad.'

  'But I don't want to go
among mad people,' I replied indignantly.

  'Oh, you can't help that,' said the cat. 'We're all mad here. I'm mad. You're mad.'

  I snapped my fingers.

  'Wait a moment!' I exclaimed. 'This is the conversation you had in Alice in Wonderland, just after the baby turned into a pig!'

  'Ah!' returned the cat with an annoyed flick of his tail. 'Fancy you can write your own dialogue, do you? I've seen people try; it's never a pretty sight. But have it your own way. And what's more, the baby turned into a fig, not a pig.'

  'It was a pig, actually.'

  'Fig,' said the cat stubbornly. 'Who was in the book, me or you?'

  'It was a pig,' I insisted.

  'Well!' exclaimed the cat. 'I'll go and check. Then you'll look pretty stupid, I can tell you!'

  And so saying, he vanished.

  I stood there for a moment or two, and pretty soon the cat's tail started to appear, then his body and finally his head and mouth.

  'Well?' I asked.

  'All right,' grumbled the cat. 'So it was a pig. My hearing is not so good; I think it's all that pepper. By the by, I almost forgot. You're apprenticed to Miss Havisham.'

  'Miss Havisham? Great Expectations Miss Havisham?'

  'Is there any other? You'll be fine – just don't mention the wedding.'

  'I'll try not to. Wait a moment – apprenticed?'

  'Of course. Getting here is only half the adventure. If you want to join us you'll have to learn the ropes. Right now all you can do is journey. With a bit of practice on your own you might learn to be page accurate when you jump. But if you want to delve deep into the back-story or take an excursion beyond the sleeve notes, you're going to have to take instruction. Why, by the time Miss Havisham has finished with you, you'll think nothing of being able to visit early drafts, deleted characters or long-discarded chapters that make little or no sense at all. Who knows, you may even glimpse the core of the book, the central nub of energy that binds a novel together.'