Something rotten (45 page)

I didn’t reply; for some reason I was having a sudden heavy bout of déjà vu.

“Thursday?” repeated Aubrey. “Are you okay? You look like you’re in a dreamworld!”

“I’m fine,” I said slowly. “I’ll wait for your command.”

“Good.”

We all did the
harump
thing, and they went to their places whilst I sat on the bench and looked once again at the scoreboard. We were losing twenty-one hoops to twelve.

Aubrey nodded at Smudger, who took out the Duchess in grand style: they both careered into the Tea Party and knocked over the table.

The Klaxon went off, and the game started with renewed aggression. Biffo whacked the yellow ball in the direction of the up-end hoop and hit the Whackers’ ball. Warg took the roquet. With an expert swing, the opponents’ ball tumbled into the Italian Sunken Garden, and ours sailed as straight as a die over the rhododendrons; a distant
clack
was mirrored by a roar from the crowd, and I knew the ball had been intercepted by Grunk and taken through the hoop. Aubrey nodded at Smudger, who took out the Duchess in grand style: they both careered into the Tea Party and knocked over the table. The Klaxon sounded for a time-out while the Duchess was pulled clear of the tea things. She was conscious but had a broken ankle. Smudger was given the red card but no hoop penalty, as the Duchess had been shown the yellow card earlier for concussing Biffo. I joined the fray as play started up again, but the Whackers’ early confidence was soon evaporating under a withering attack from the neanderthals, who could anticipate their every move simply by reading their body language. Warg passed to Grunk, who gave the ball such an almighty whack that it passed clear
through
the rhododendrons with a tearing of foliage and was converted by Zim on the other side towards an undefended hoop.

By the time there were three minutes to play, we had almost caught up: twenty-five hoops to the Whackers’ twenty-nine. Firmly rattled, the Whackers missed a roquet and, with only a minute to run, scored their thirtieth hoop with us only two behind. All they had to do to win was “peg out” by hitting the center post. Whilst they were trying to do this and we tried our best to stop them, Grunk, with eight seconds to go and two hoops to make, whacked a clear double-hooper that went through one up-end hoop, all the forty yards down the green and through the mid. I’d never heard a crowd yell more.

We had leveled the score and desperately tried to get our ball to the peg in the scrum of players trying to stop the Whackers from doing the same. Warg grunted to Grunk, who ran towards the scrum and tore into them, taking six players down as Warg whacked the ball towards the now unprotected peg. It hit the peg fair and square—but a second
after
the Klaxon had sounded. Play had ended—in a draw.

39.

Sudden Death

Neanderthals Turn Down Croquet Offer

A group of neanderthals unwisely turned down an exciting and unrepeatable offer from the Gloucester Meteors yesterday, following their astonishing performance at the 1988 Whackers v. Mallets SuperHoop on Saturday. The generous offer of ten brightly colored glass beads was rejected by a neanderthal spokesman, who declared that conflict, howsoever staged, was inherently insulting. The offer was raised to a set of solid-bottomed cook-ware, and this was also roundly rejected. A spokesman for the Meteors later stated that the neanderthal tactics displayed on Saturday were actually the result of some clever tricks taught them by the Mallets’ team coach.

Article in
The Toad,
July 24, 1988

G
ood work,” said Alf as we sat on the ground, panting hard. I had lost my helmet in the scrum somewhere but hadn’t until now noticed. My armor was dirty and torn, my mallet handle had split, and there was a cut on my chin. The whole team was muddy, bruised and worn out—but we were still in with a good chance.

“What order?” asked the umpire, referring to the sudden-death penalty shoot-out. It worked quite simply. We took it in turns to hit the peg, each time moving back ten yards. There were six lines all the way back to the boundary. If we got them all, we started again until someone missed. Alf looked at the players who were still able to hold a mallet and put me seventh, so if we went around again, I was on the easiest ten-yard line.

“Biffo first, then Aubrey, Stig, Dorf, Warg, Grunk and Thursday.”

The umpire jotted down our names and moved away. I went to see my family and Landen again.

“What about the steamroller?” he asked.

“What about the steamroller?”

“Didn’t it nearly run you over?”

“An
accident,
Land. Gotta go. Bye.”

The ten-yard line was simple; both players hit the peg with ease. The twenty-yard line was still no problem. The crowd roared as Reading hit the peg first, but our side roared equally when we hit ours. Thirty yards was no problem either—both teams hit the peg, and we all moved back to the forty-yard line. From this distance the peg was tiny, and I didn’t see how anyone could hit it, but they did—first Stern for Reading, then Dorf for us. The crowd roared its support, but then there was a slight rumble of thunder and it began to rain, the full significance of which was yet to dawn.

“Where are they going?” asked Aubrey as Stig, Grunk, Dorf and Warg ran off to find shelter.

“It’s a neanderthal thing,” I explained as the rain increased dramatically to a downpour, the water streaming down our armor and onto the turf. “Neanderthals never work, play or even stand in the rain if they can help it. Don’t worry, they’ll be back as soon as it stops.”

But it didn’t stop.

“Fifty-yard penalty,” announced the umpire. “O’Fathens for the Whackers and Mr. Warg for the Mallets.”

I looked at Warg, who was sitting on the bench under the stands, staring at the rain with a mixed expression of respect and wonder.

“He’s going to lose us the game!” muttered Jambe in my ear. “Can’t you do something?”

I ran across the soggy green to Warg, who stared at me blankly when I implored him to come and take the penalty.

“It’s raining,” replied Warg, “and it’s only a game. It doesn’t
really
matter who wins, does it?”

“Stig?” I implored.

“We’d work in the rain for you, Thursday, but we’ve taken our turn already. Rain is precious; it gives life—you should respect it more, too.”

I returned to the fifty-yard line as slowly as I could to try to give the rain time to finish. It didn’t.

“Well?” demanded Jambe.

I shook my head sadly. “I’m afraid not. Winning has never been of any interest to the neanderthals. They played only as a favor to me.”

Aubrey sighed.

“We’d like to delay the next penalty until it stops raining,” announced Twizzit, who had appeared holding a newspaper over his head. He was on legal marshland with this request, and he knew it. The umpire asked the Whackers if they wanted to delay, but O’Fathens stared at me and said that he didn’t. So the next person on the list took her turn at the fifty-yard line—me.

I wiped the rain from my eyes and tried to even
see
the peg. The rain was coming down so heavily that the cascading droplets created a watery haze a few inches above the turf. Still, I had the second shot—O’Fathens might miss, too.

The Whackers’ captain concentrated for a moment, swung and connected well. The ball went sailing high towards the peg and seemed set to hit it fairly and squarely. But with a loud
plop
it landed short. There was an expectant rumble from the crowd.

The word was relayed up the field—O’Fathens had landed four feet from the peg. I had to get closer than that to win the SuperHoop.

“Good luck,” said Aubrey, giving my arm a squeeze.

I walked up to the fifty-yard line, the now muddy ground oozing around my boots. I removed my shoulder pads and cast them aside, made a few practice swings, wiped my eyes and stared at the multicolored peg that somehow seemed to have retreated another twenty yards. I squared up in front of the ball and shifted my weight to maintain the right poise. The crowd went silent. They didn’t know how much was riding on this, but I did. I didn’t dare miss. I looked at the ball, stared towards the peg, looked at the ball again, clasped the handle of my mallet and raised it high in the air, then swung hard into the ball, yelling out as the wood connected and the ball went sailing off in a gentle arc. I thought about Kaine and Goliath, of Landen and Friday and the consequences if I missed. The fate of all life on this beautiful planet decided on the swing of a croquet mallet. I watched as my ball plopped into the soggy ground and the groundsman dashed ahead to compare distances. I turned away and walked back through the rain towards Landen. I had done my best, and the game was over. I didn’t hear the announcement, only a roar from the crowd. But whose crowd? A flashbulb went off, and I felt dizzy as the sounds became muted and everything appeared to slow down. Not in the way that my father could engineer, but a postadrenaline moment when everything seems odd, and
other.
I searched the seating for Landen and Friday, but my attention was distracted by a large figure dressed in a duster coat and hat who had vaulted over the barrier and was running towards me. He drew something from his pocket as he ran, his feet throwing up great splashes of muddy water on his trousers. I stared at him as he came closer and noticed that his eyes were yellow and beneath his hat were what appeared to be—
horns.
I didn’t see any more; there was a bright white flash, a deafening roar, and all the rest was silence.

40.

Second First Person

Yacht Choice of Famed Literary Detective a Mystery

The shooting of Thursday Next last Saturday leaves the question of her favorite yacht unanswered, our Swindon correspondent writes. “From the look of her, I would expect a thirty-two-foot ketch, spinnaker-rigged and with a Floon automatic pilot.” Other yachting commentators disagree and think she would have gone for something larger, such as a sloop or yawl, although it is possible she might only have wanted a boat for coastal day work or a long weekend, in which case she might have gone for a compact twenty-footer. We asked her husband to comment on her taste in sailing, but he declined to give an answer.

Article in
Yachting Monthly,
July 1988

I
was watching her, right up to the moment she was shot. She looked confused and tired as she walked back from the penalty, and the crowd roared when I shouted to get her attention, so she didn’t hear me. It was then that I saw a man vault across the barrier and run up to her. I thought it was a nutty fan or something, and the shot sounded more like a firecracker. There was a puff of blue smoke, and she looked incredulous for a moment, and then she just crumpled up and collapsed on the turf. As simple as that. Before I knew what I was doing, I had handed Friday to Joffy and jumped over the barrier, moving as fast as I could. I was the first one to reach Thursday, who was lying perfectly still on the muddy ground, her eyes open, a neat red hole two inches above her right eye.

Someone yelled, “Medic!” It was me.

I switched to automatic. For the moment the idea that someone had shot my wife was expunged from my mind; I was simply dealing with a casualty—and heaven knows I’d done that often enough. I pulled out my handkerchief and pressed it on the wound.

I said, “Thursday, can you hear me?”

She didn’t answer. Her eyes were unblinking as the rain struck her, and I placed my hand above her head to shield her. A medic appeared at my side, sloshing down into the muddy ground in his haste to help.

He said, “What’s happened?”

I said, “He shot her.”

I reached gingerly around the back of her head and breathed a small sigh of relief when I couldn’t find an exit wound.

A second medic—a woman this time—joined the first and told me to step aside. But I moved only far enough for her to work. I took hold of Thursday’s hand.

The first medic said, “We’ve got a pulse,” as he unwrapped an airway, then added, “Where’s the blasted ambulance?”

I stayed with her all the way to the hospital and let go of her hand only when they took her into the operating theater.

A friendly casualty nurse at St. Septyk’s said, “Here you go,” as she gave me a blanket. I sat on a hard chair and stared at the wall clock and the public-information posters. I thought about Thursday, trying to figure out how much time we had spent together. Not long for two and a half years, really.

A boy next to me with his head stuck in a saucepan said, “Wot you in here for, mister?”

I leaned closer and spoke into the hollow handle so he could hear me and said, “I’m okay, but someone shot my wife.”