Something rotten (26 page)

“I need to spend more time with my family,” muttered Kapok, shrugging his shoulders and clearly not keen to remain in the stadium one second longer than he had to. “You’ll be fine—hasn’t St. Zvlkx predicted it?”

“Seers aren’t always a hundred percent accurate—you said so yourself!” I retorted. “Who are you two really?”

“Leave us out of it,” said the tall suited man. “All we did was make an offer—Mr. Kapok decides if he stays or goes.”

Kapok and the two men turned to leave.

“Kapok, for God’s sake!” yelled Biffo. “The Whackers will knock the stuffing out of the team if you’re not here to lead us!”

But Kapok continued walking; his former teammates looked on in disgust and grumbled and swore for a while before the Mallets’ manager, a reedy-looking character with a thin mustache and a pale complexion, walked on the green and asked what was going on.

“Ah!” he said when he heard the news. “I’m very sorry to hear that, but since you are all present, I think it’s probably the right time to announce that I’m retiring on grounds of ill health.”

“When?”

“Right now,” said the manager, and ran off. Goliath was working overtime this morning.

“Well,” said Aubrey as soon as he had gone, “what now?”

“Listen,” I said, “I can’t tell you why, but it is historically imperative that we win this SuperHoop. You
will
win this match because you
have
to. It’s that simple. Can you captain?” I asked, turning to a burly croquet player named Biffo. I had seen him do “blind passes” across the rhododendron bushes with uncanny accuracy, and his classic “pegging out” shot from the sixty-yard line during the league game against Southampton was undeniably one of the Top Ten Great Croquet Moments of history. Of course, that was over ten years ago and before a bad tackle had twisted his knee. These days he played defense, guarding the hoops against opposition strikers.

“Not me,” he replied with a resigned air.

“Smudger?”

Smudger played attack and had made midair roquets something of a trademark. His celebrated double hoop in the Swindon-Gloucester playoff of 1978 was still talked about, even if it hadn’t won us the match.

“Nope,” he answered.

“Anyone?”

“I’ll captain, Miss Next.”

It was Aubrey Jambe. He had been captain once before until a media-led campaign had had him ousted following allegations about him and a chimp.

“Good.”

“But we’ll need a new manager,” said Aubrey slowly, “and since you seem to be so passionate about it, I think you’d better take it on.”

Before I knew what I was saying, I had agreed, which went down pretty well with the players. Morale of a sort had returned. I took Aubrey by the arm, and we walked into the middle of the green for our first strategy meeting.

“Okay,” I said, “tell me truthfully, Jambe, what are our chances?”

“Borderline impossible,” answered Aubrey candidly. “We had to sell our best player to Glasgow to be able to meet the changes that the World Croquet League insisted we do to the green. Then our top defender, Laura de Rematte, won a once-in-a-lifetime trip to Africa on one of those junk-mail prize-draw things. With Kapok gone, we’re down to ten players, no reserve, and lost the best striker. Biffo, Smudger, Snake, George and Johnno are all good players, but the rest are second-raters.”

“So what do we need to win?”

“If all the players on the Reading team were to die overnight and be replaced by unfit nine-year-olds, then we might be in with a chance.”

“Too difficult and probably illegal. What else?”

Aubrey stared at me glumly. “Five quality players and we might have a chance.”

It was a tall order. If they could get to Kapok, they could offer “inducements” to any other player who might want to join us.

“Okay,” I said, “leave it to me.”

“You have a plan?”

“Of course,” I lied, feeling the managerial mantle falling about my shoulders. “Your new players are as good as signed. Besides,” I added, with a certain amount of faux conviction, “we’ve got a revealment to protect.”

23.

Granny Next

Reading Whackers Confident to Win SuperHoop

Following the surprise resignation of both Roger Kapok and Gray Ferguson from the Swindon Mallets croquet team this afternoon, the Whackers seem almost certain to win next Sunday’s SuperHoop, despite the prophecy by St. Zvlkx. Betting shops were being cautious despite the news and lowered the Mallets’ odds to 700-1. Miss Thursday Next, the new manager of the Mallets, derided any talk of failure and told waiting reporters that Swindon would triumph. When pressed how that might be so, she declared the interview over.

Article in the
Swindon Evening Blurb,
July 18, 1988

Y
ou’re the manager of the Mallets?” asked Bowden with incredulity. “What happened to Gray Ferguson?”

“Bought out, bribed, frightened—who knows?”

“You like being busy, don’t you? Does this mean you won’t be able to help me get banned books out of England?”

“Have no fear of that,” I reassured him. “I’ll find a way.”

I wished I could share in my own confidence. I told Bowden I’d see him tomorrow and walked out, only to be waylaid by the overzealous Major Drabb, who told me with great efficiency that he and his squad had searched the Albert Schweitzer Memorial Library from top to bottom but had not unearthed a single Danish book. I congratulated him for his diligence and told him to check in with me again tomorrow. He saluted smartly, presented me with a thirty-two-page written report and was gone.

Gran was in the garden of the Goliath Twilight Homes when I stopped by on the way home. She was dressed in a blue gingham frock and was attending to some flowers with a watering can.

“I just heard the news on the wireless. Congratulations!”

“Thanks,” I replied without enthusiasm, slumping myself into a large wicker chair. “I have no idea why I volunteered to run the Mallets—I don’t know the first thing about running a croquet team!”

“Perhaps,” replied Gran, reaching forward to deadhead a rose, “all that is required is faith and conviction—two areas in which, I might add, I think you excel.”

“Faith isn’t going to conjure up five world-class croquet players, now, is it?”

“You’d be surprised what faith can do, my dear. You have St. Zvlkx’s revealment on your side, after all.”

“The future isn’t fixed, Gran. We
can
lose—and probably will.”

She tut-tutted. “Well! Aren’t you the Moaning Minnie today! What does it matter if we do lose? It’s only a game, after all!”

I slumped even lower. “If it
was
only a game, I wouldn’t be worried. This is how my father sees it: Kaine proclaims himself dictator as soon as President Formby dies next Monday. Once he wields ultimate executive power, he will embark on a course of warfare that results in an Armageddon of life-extinguishing capability Level III. We can’t stop the President from dying, but we can, my father insists, avoid the world war by simply winning the SuperHoop.”

Gran sat down in a wicker chair next to me.

“And then there’s Hamlet,” I continued, rubbing my temples. “His play has been subjected to a hostile takeover from
The Merry Wives of Windsor,
and if I don’t find a Shakespeare clone pronto, there won’t be a
Hamlet
for Hamlet to return to. Goliath tricked me yet again. I don’t know what they did, but it felt as though my free will was being sucked out through my eyeballs. They said they’d get Landen back, but, quite frankly, I have my doubts. And I have to illegally smuggle ten truckloads of banned books out of England.”

Tirade over, I sighed and was silent. Gran had been thoughtful for a while and, after appearing to come to some sort of a momentous decision, announced, “You know what you should do?”

“What?”

“Take Smudger off defense and make him the midhoop wingman. Jambe should be the striker as usual, but Biffo—”

“Gran! You haven’t listened to a word I’ve said, have you?”

She patted my hand. “Of course I did. Hamlet was having his merry wives smuggled out of England by sucking out his eyeballs, which leads to an Armageddon and the death of the President. Right?”

“Never mind. How are things with you? Found the ten most boring books?”

“Indeed I have,” she replied, “but I am loath to finish reading them, as I feel there is one last epiphanic moment to my life that will be revealed just before I die.”

“What sort of epiphanic moment?”

“I don’t know. Do you want to play Scrabble?”

So Gran and I played Scrabble. I thought I was winning until she got “cazique” on a triple-word score, and it was downhill from there. I lost, 503 points to 319.

24.

Home Again

Denmark Blamed for Dutch Elm Disease

“Dutch elm disease was nothing of the sort,” was the shock claim from leading arborealists last week. “For many years we had blamed Dutch elm disease on the Dutch,” declared Jeremy Acorn, head spokesman of the Knotty Pine Arboreal Research Facility. “So-called Dutch elm disease, a tree virus that killed off nearly all England’s elms in the mid-seventies, was thought to have originated in Holland—hence the name.” But new research has cast doubt on this long-held hypothesis. “Using techniques unavailable to us in the seventies, we have uncovered new evidence to suggest that Dutch elm disease originated in Denmark.” Mr. Acorn went on to say, “We have no direct evidence to suggest that Denmark is engaged in the design and proliferation of arborealogical weapons, but we have to maintain an open mind. There are many oaks and silver birches in England at present unprotected against attack.” Arboreal Warfare—Should We Be Worried? Full report, page 9.

Article in the
Arboreal Times,
July 17, 1988

I
hurried home to get there before my mother, as I wasn’t sure how she’d react to finding that Friday was being looked after by a gorilla. It was possible that she might not have any problems with this, but I didn’t really want to put it to the test.

To my horror Mum had got there before me—and not just her, either. A large crowd of journalists had gathered outside her house, awaiting the return of the Mallets’ new manager, and it was only after I had run the gauntlet of a thousand “no comments” that I caught her, just as she was putting her key in the front door.

“Hello, Mother,” I said, somewhat breathlessly.

“Hello, daughter.”

“Going inside?”

“That’s what I usually do when I get home.”

“Not thinking of going shopping?” I suggested.

“What are you hiding?”

“Nothing.”

“Good.”

She pushed the key in the lock and opened the door, giving me a funny look. I ran past her and into the living room, where Melanie was asleep on the sofa, feet up on the coffee table, with Friday snoring happily on her chest. I quickly shut the door.

“He’s sleeping!” I hissed to my mother.

“The little lamb! Let’s have a look.”

“No, better let him be. He’s a very light sleeper.”

“I can look very quietly.”

“Maybe
not
quietly enough.”

“I’ll look through the serving hatch, then.”

“No!”

“Why not?”

“It’s jammed. Stuck fast. Meant to tell you this morning, but it slipped my mind. Remember how Anton and I used to climb through it? Got any oil?”

“The serving hatch has never been stuck—”

“How about tea?” I asked brightly, attempting a form of misdirection that I knew my mother would find irresistible. “I want to talk to you about an emotional problem—that
you
might be able to help me with!”

Sadly, she knew me only too well.

“Now I know you’re hiding something. Let me in!”

She attempted to push past, but I had a brain wave.

“No, Mother, you’ll embarrass them—and yourself.”

She stopped. “What do you mean?”

“It’s Emma.”

“Emma? What about her?”

“Emma . . . and Hamlet.”

She looked shocked and covered her mouth with her hand. “In there? On my sofa?”

I nodded.

“Doing . . . you know? Both of them—together?”

“And
very
naked—but they folded the antimacassars first,” I added, so as not to shock her too much.

She shook her head sadly. “It’s not good, you know, Thursday.”

“I know.”

“Highly immoral.”

“Very.”

“Well, let’s have that cup of tea, and you can tell me about that emotional problem of yours—is it about Daisy Mutlar?”

“No. I don’t have any emotional problems.”

“But you said . . . ?”

“Yes, Mother, that was an excuse to stop you barging in on Emma and Hamlet.”

“Oh,” she said, realization dawning. “Well, let’s have a cup of tea anyway.”

I breathed a sigh of relief, and Mother walked into the kitchen—to find Hamlet and Emma talking as they did the washing up. Mother stopped dead and stared at them.

“It’s disgusting!” she said at last.

“Excuse me?” inquired Hamlet.

“What you’re doing in the living room—on
my
sofa.”

“What are we doing, Mrs. Next?” asked Emma.

“What are you doing?” flustered my mother, her voice rising. “I’ll tell you what you’re doing. Well, I won’t because it’s too—Here, have a look for yourself.”

And before I could stop her, she opened the door to the living room to reveal—Friday, alone, asleep on the sofa.

My mother looked confused and stared at me.

“Thursday, just what is going on?”

“I can’t even begin to explain it,” I replied, wondering where Melanie had gone. It’s a big room, but not nearly large enough to hide a gorilla. I leaned in and saw that the French windows were ajar. “Must have been a trick of the light.”