by Mal Peet
‘Not Sigourney Hookway.’
‘Oh yes.’
‘Oh no.’
‘Ho yes.’
And here the Weird Sisters lean towards each other and press their foreheads together and harshly draw in noisy breaths. (This is their mode of hysterical laughter, a bonding ritual. It is one of the things that persuaded their parents, twenty years earlier, to depart without them in the middle of the night and move to Shetland.)
‘Cos,’ Merilee continued breathlessly, ‘Murdsten dunno no one go to Sigourney’s till cos she don know a bar code from a dead zebra. So there she be, fumblin away with his stuff, four or five goes, random like, before the bleddy thing go beep, and there’s I, right behind un, seein he’s like a man with a stag beetle up his chuff, which Miss Special Needs Hookway don’t notice at all. So’s to detract him I says … Did I mention he had a belt round his chest looked like from a dressun gown?’
Francine looked blank for a moment. ‘No, you didn. Why did he?’
‘I dunno. Bleddy hell, Francine. Anyway, he’s grabbin all the bottles offa Sigourney soon as she put them through and stuffin ’em in the bags, an I’m standin there tryun a make conversation about his beard an what all, and he’s jiggin about going Ahhh an Hmmm with his eyes rollin about in his haid like a steer lookin in a butcher’s winder, an then’s when things got peculiar. You wunt believe what happened next.’
Here, for dramatic purposes, Merilee paused to take a further draught of Malibu and Pepsi. Francine, expecting it, did likewise.
‘So,’ Merilee said, daintily wiping her moustache with the back of her hand, ‘Sigourney’s somehow managed to put about halfa Murdsten’s stuff through when he clutch both his hands to his chest, right where he’ve got the belt knotted, an he stagger back and let out this horrible groan. No, that don’t do’n justice. More like a wail, it was. Made the hair on the backa my legs stand on end, Francine, I swear to God. Then he start sayin things like No an Wait an Please, not yet. Sweat standin out on his forrid like the lumps on a toad. Well, everyone shrunk back, a course. An you know what I thought?’
‘Heart attack.’
‘Heart attack is ezackly what I thought, Francine. Specially when he start goin, Pocket! Please, pocket!’
Francine looked puzzled.
‘Pocket, Francine. Pills. Quick as a flash, I thought, He’ve got a heart contrition, an he’ve got the pills for it in his pocket. But he’s holding onta his chest so hard he dusn’t go for em. So I says, “Which pocket, Mister Murdsten?” Cos I was all set to put my hand in there if needs be, an don’t you look at me like that, Francine. But I’ve got my hand only halfway to his trousers when he whirls round and stare at me like … well, I can’t say as I’ve ever seen a face like it, not in real life. An he yell, No, get back! Get away from me! All a you! He’ve still got his hands clammed onta his chest, and then somethen horrible flash through my mind.’
‘That filum. Alien One.’
‘Alien One, Francine, you’m right on the money there agen. I had a vision of it. A gret long slimy thing like a donkey’s todger with teeth at the enda it burstin outa Murdsten’s chest an scuttlin along the floor.’
‘An did it, Merilee?’
‘As it happen, no. Might as well a done, though, cos by now there’s pandominion breakin out. That thick mare Lesley on Cigarettes and Lotto start screamin Tas a sewerside bomber! Us’s all gorna die! An a course that start everyone off.’
‘Was you scared, Merilee? I’d a wet maself, I think I honestly would.’
‘Acourse I wasn scared, Francine. Well, not that way. Cos I knew it was Murdsten not Al Kyder, beard or no beard. Mind you, I did back off on account a how he’s carryin on. Lookin up at the ceiling shoutin, Don’t! Don’t! They’re not creams! They’re not creams!’
‘Creams, Merilee? Whatever did he mean?’
‘Buggered if I know. He wasn on about biscuits, though, cos he hadn bought any biscuits. Nor choclates. Anyway, then he sort of hunch up and let go a his chest with one hand and fish about in his pocket …’
‘For them pills, Merilee.’
‘Thas what I thought, but no, he brung out his wallet and fumble about with it, going Fuckfuckfuck, which is somethun I never thought to hear a novelist of his statue say aloud, and then he just chuck a buncha money down in fronta Sigourney who’s sittin there with her mouth open wide enough to get a bucket in, then he grab up the bags with the bottles and that in and take off down the street like a dog with its arse afire. An thas it.’
‘The End?’
‘The End. Then I jus run back here on legs like jelly a tell you.’
The sisters stared at each other for quite some time. The only sound was of polystyrene granules shifting rhythmically inside the beanbags beneath them.
Then Francine said, ‘So, did you get them curry pasties?’
9
Philip shouldered open the door to his cottage and almost died of shock because there was a blackened mannequin sitting in his fireplace. Without taking his eyes off it he sidled into the kitchen and with a thief’s cautiousness placed his bags on the counter. He extracted a bottle of Highland Park from its festive tube and took a slug straight from the neck, and then another.
He closed his eyes while he shuddered and kept them closed as he felt his way back to the door into the living room. When he opened them the mannequin was still there. Its legs were splayed, one of them slightly bent. A rustic coronet of dirty twigs sat askew on its head, which was resting against one of the fireplace’s granite flanks. It appeared to have no eyes. There was a good deal of soot fanned onto the hearth rug, and granules of it drifted in the light beams from the window like a descending cloud of midges.
Philip realized that the Amulet had become cool and passive against his chest, but was so fascinated by what he was looking at that his anger and grief lasted only a moment. He crept across the room until he was within touching distance of the small and filthy corpse. The only thing moving on it was a reddish trickle coming from a wound on the forehead; it oozed down, gathering black grains like magma seeping from a tiny volcano. He was stooping to examine it more closely when the thing opened its eyes.
Eyes that he knew only too well.
It spoke. ‘Murdstone?’
‘Pocket?’
‘Murdstone.’
‘Pocket!’
‘We could go on like this all bleddy day.’ A pale tongue appeared and cleaned soot from lips. ‘Me going Murdstone, you going Pocket. Still got water?’
‘Yes,’ Philip said. ‘Shall I get you some?’
‘No. I was only asking out of polite bleddy interest. Fluke me, Murdstone.’
Philip went to the kitchen and filled a glass from the tap, then grabbed up the whisky and brought both back to the fireplace.
The Greme drank, gargled, spat.
‘You’ve hurt your head,’ Philip said.
‘Not as bad as you’ve hurt it, you piddick. Never mind it. Comes of getting your shitter mixed up with your chimbley. Whoa. Ought to be a saying, that. I might slip it into the ledger.’ Wellfair drained the glass and set it down in a small soot-dune. ‘I see you still got the Amulet lashed to yerself.’
Philip took two steps back.
The Greme lifted a limp black hand. ‘Ease up, ease up. Don’t get your clouts up your crack. I’ll not be trying the rough stuff. Bruised as a charity apple I was, after the last time. No, there’ll be none of that.’
‘Promise?’
‘On my Old Dame’s bollix. Solemn, that is.’
‘Right. OK, then. Do you want a hand up?’
‘No, I’m fair set as I am, thankee. I don’t expect to be here long. So. How’s tricks, Murdstone? The Amulet coughed up the rest of your nobble, then?’
‘What?’
‘You know,’ the Greme said, casually aiming a filthy thumb in the general direction of Philip’s study. ‘The Great Work. Wondered how it was comin’ on.’
Philip stared, speechless for several seconds; the
n all his weeks of frustration and misery and bitterness formed a ripe boil and burst.
‘You, you … fucking little … You think this is funny, do you? It’s a bloody laugh, is it, keeping me up there going through ten thousand silent hells a bloody hour for what feels like a fucking year? That’s what passes for comedy, is it, in those stinking little bloody burrows of yours? Keeping some poor sod on the hook, torturing him, pulling him up, dragging him down, seeing how much he can take? You bastard. And, and, and then you, you just materialize in my fireplace and take the piss? How’s tricks, Murdstone? How’s the nobble? When you know there’s no bloody nobble because you haven’t, you won’t … give it to me, you – you sadistic little fucking gnome! All right, all right! I can’t take any more. Is that what you want to hear?’
Pocket Wellfair sat in his soot, immobile and silent, for the whole of this soliloquy and for some little time after. Then, thoughtfully, he murmured, ‘So. Hum-de-hum and doodle-dee,’ and looked over at Philip, who had slumped onto the sofa, snuffling. ‘Right. Done? Now then, sit up straightish, there’s a good pony. There’s a thing I have to do.’
He raised his left hand and released a charge that for one second converted the contents of Philip’s lymphatic system into formic acid. Savaged by internal ants, Philip screamed and sloshed Highland Park onto his lap.
‘Pardon begged for that little wibbler, Murdstone. You called me a gnome, see, and so I had to. Ordained Comeback, Cantle Two of the Greme Code. Can’t frolic with anything in Cantle Two. Stings a bit, I expect. Drew that snot back up your nosehole, though, didn’t it? You have another swig of your damage there, and you’ll be right as a trivet.’
Philip drank, then sat glaring sullenly.
Pocket hitched himself more upright, wincing a little.
‘So then, down to business. Cos, appearances contrariwise or otherwise, this is not a social call. Now, you listen up, Murdstone, and oblige me by not chipping in with your usual Whats and Whys and Wherefores. Since our last little misunderstanding, which, surprise bleddy surprise, earned me an Ache as would bring your arsecheeks up to your collar, certain things have come about.’
He cleared his throat importantly.
‘Which are as follows. After ferking back and forth and mumblin and jumblin for about a bleddy moonpassage, Scholar Volenap finally agrees to call a Clear Table Colligation of all the surviving Readers.’
Here Pocket paused to allow the enormous significance of this to sink in.
‘First one for over seven Circuits. Sod of a pig to organize it was, what with the scatter and most of our Lines bollixed by Swelts. Bleddy risky an all, as even you can imagine. Despite of which, most of ’em made it. First matter arising, of course, is the fact we haven’t got a Clear Table.’
‘I know,’ Philip said. ‘It was lost during the—’
Wellfair’s icy glance silenced him.
‘So we had to use a door set atop of my truckle. There’s a mighty flapdoodle about that, naturally, and so there has to be a whole flukin day of Abjurations and Revouchments and Solemn this and Solemn the other, before we can even get down to the rabbit. Naggled me to the wick, I can tell you. Anyways up, to trim the fat off the tale – and a bleddy fat tale it was, Murdstone, some of them frowsty old wrinklers think even their farts is High Rhetoric, make Volenap sound sharp as a tree-pecker – we did come to a Clear Resolution.’
Pocket paused again, to let the weighty phrase settle.
‘Want to know what it was, Murdstone?’
‘Er, yes. Yes, of course.’
‘I should think so. So, the Clear Resolution was that I, Pocket Wellfair, do write a flaky ledger. Being the first time such a thing has ever been attempted in the annals of the Realm. What you think of them parsnips, Murdstone?’
‘Flaky ledger? You mean a novel?’
‘Indeed I do. A nobble.’
‘Right. And, er …’
‘And I have done one? Ho yes. Settled the inkage about, lessee, two hours back, in your money.’
‘Christ, Pocket, that’s … I mean, is it …?’
‘Any good?’ The Greme blew soot from his fingertips and admired his nails. ‘Well, ’tis like judging cats in the dark, for me, of course. But I’d say it’d do.’
Philip was trembling now, and took a shot to steady himself. ‘And are you going to, I mean, is it, will you …?’
‘Give it to you? Course I will. No bleddy use to me, is it?’
Philip put his bottle down carefully on the sofa beside him and covered his face with his hands. He made small plaintive noises.
‘Well, in a pig’s arse, Murdstone. I reckoned you’d be pleased.’
When Philip uncovered his face it was wet with tears. ‘Oh, God, I am, I am! You’ve no idea … Thank you, Pocket, thank you, thank, you, thank you. I can’t tell you what this … You’ve no … Oh, God.’
‘Fluke me, Murdstone. No need to carry on like a tupped granny.’
Philip collected himself. ‘When can I have it? Today? Tomorrow?’
Wellfair raised a hand. ‘Rein up, rein up. Whoa. There’s more.’
‘More? There’s more?’
‘Ho yes. Cos the Clear Resolution comes with a Clear Pendicle.’
‘Pendicle?’
‘Yes, Pendicle. What you might call a, bogger, what’s your word …?’
Philip knew. ‘Condition?’
‘That’s the badger. Condition. Which is, that in exchange for the prescribed nobble, the Oath of the Four Orbs sworn between Pocket Wellfair and one Murdstone be renewed.’
‘Ah.’
‘Well may you bleddy Ah, Murdstone, cos this time there’ll be no wrigglemalarkey. You go wormy on me again and there’ll be no demanding Render, not even the once. I’ll have your peepers and seeders out afore you can say Fork. Got me?’
Philip nodded. ‘Yes. All right.’
The Greme squinted at him suspiciously. ‘You agreed to that a bit sharpish.’
‘Well, I don’t have much choice, do I? My deadline is three weeks away.’
‘Deadline? What you mean, deadline? You look all right to me, Murdstone. Apart from that twat thatch of a beard.’
‘No, what I mean is, I have to finish, have, the book, the nobble, in three weeks. No, before three weeks have … passed.’
‘Three weeks? That’s, er, lemme work this out … Bogger, that’s more than plenty. Took me less’n half that.’
‘My God. Is that true?’
‘Well, I was in a bleddy hurry, wasn’t I? Now then, where was I? Right. We’ll do the deal in a minute. Afore that, though, tell me this, and no flammery. That flyshit inkage of yours, up there on that wordtapper thing. What you was writing last time I came through and we had our little disagreement. Did you do what I told you? Did you do Wake and Banish on it?’
‘Did I do what?’
‘Did you’ – Wellfair fluttered his hands impatiently – ‘make it go back where it came from?’
‘No,’ Philip admitted.
‘I thought as much, you scrotewart. You don’t know what’s good for you, do you, Murdstone?’
‘I don’t know how to make it go back where it came from,’ Philip said defensively.
The Greme squinted at him. ‘What, you sit there without any say in it? No wiping the slate clean?’
‘Well, I can delete it. Is that what you mean? Go back to white paper? I can do that, yes.’
‘Thank the Knob for that. Thought we were back in the slurry there. Right, then. So here’s what you do, and don’t you bollix this up, hear me? You go up there – no, not now, not now, you piddick – and you delite all that hagwrit. All of it, mind. Not a bleddy word remaining, and I mean it. Give me your oath on that, Murdstone. Not that your oath’s worth the steam off a rat’s piss.’
‘I promise. Honestly.’
Pocket cocked an eye. ‘You naggle my wits, Murdstone. We spent untold amounts of time looking for you. The man for the job, we reckoned. Thought you’d know how dangerous ledgers are,
let alone flaky ones. Turns out you’ve got no flukin idea. None of you do, to be fair. All just mumble and money. But it’s come to this. Everything depending on a human nobblist. Buggers belief, don’t it?’
‘I’m sorry,’ Philip said. ‘Everything just got a bit out of hand. But I’m sure it’ll be all right in the end. It usually is.’
The clerk laughed sootily. ‘Well, we’ll see. So, let’s get on. You know what to do. Fingers on your eyeballs, that’s it, and your other hand on your … No, no, inside your britches. I want to be sure you’ve got ’em cupped snug. Right. Here we go, then.’
Wellfair recited the Oath of the Four Vital Orbs, enunciating Philip’s surname with pedantic exaggeration. The room dimmed while he spoke. Then the Greme reached into his coat, took out the blue egg and rotated its upper part a quarter-turn. He put the egg away again, and fixed his owlish eyes on Philip’s face.
‘So,’ he said. ‘We’re done, and this time we’re square-done. Don’t you make a bumscumble of this, Murdstone, cos if you do I’ll drag you to damnation by the back legs, and that’s solemn.’
‘OK.’
‘So you go up there and delite that shite. Then at, lessee, give me … Well, at what you call ten o’clock, I’ll start to send you my flaky ledger, pardon begged, nobble. Same as before. And when you’ve got it all, I’ll be back for the Amulet. Can’t say exactly when, so don’t you go rambly. Got that?’
‘Yes. Fine. OK. Ten o’clock.’
Pocket sat silently contemplating his amanuensis for a second or two. It seemed that he was about to say something further, but then, to Philip’s considerable alarm, the great granite blocks of the fireplace seemed to sag and flex and the Greme was gone. The updraught of his passing hoovered soot from the rug and the hearth so that when the stonework had resolidified the fireplace was as clean as a baby’s conscience. Only the empty water glass remained.
