“
What?
” Reg rattled her tail feathers. “D’you mean to tell me you let that manky Sir Alec get his sticky fingers on it? Monk Markham, how could you be so stupid?”
“Sorry,” he said, shrugging. “Maybe I should’ve asked you to swallow it, Reg.”
“You’ll be swallowing your own eyeballs if you’re not bloody careful!” she snapped. “Our one advantage and you let that sneaky government stooge run off with it? What were you thinking? Were you trying to save your own hide at the expense of—”
“No, Reg, he wasn’t!” said Melissande, whipping around. “How can you even suggest it? Of course he gave the other Monk’s portal opener to Sir Alec. He didn’t have a choice. And anyway, since we’re the ones who got Sir Alec involved in the first place it’d be pretty stupid of us to hide crucial evidence from him, don’t you think?”
She and Reg glared at each other, then Reg looked away. “I’m telling you, ducky, the man’s not to be trusted. He’ll use that other Monk’s portal opener as a paperweight, you mark my words.”
Rolling her eyes, Bibbie crunched a piece of her cold toast. “Yes, yes, Reg, I’m sure that’s terribly likely. What about
your
jigged-up portal opener, Monk? Will that get the job done?”
“No,” he said, and dragged his fingers through his hair. “Because Sir Alec’s confiscated it too and anyway, I have no idea how to double-jig it to open a door into a parallel world.
Any
parallel world, let alone the right one.”
“You don’t know no»u dorlw,” said Bibbie. “But if you had some time I’ll bet you could work it out. And
what do you mean, Sir Alec’s confiscated your portable portal opener too?”
Feeling like a little boy again, he scowled at the toast crumbs she was scattering on the table. “While you and Mel were—were making the other Monk tidy,” he muttered. “He asked for it, so I gave it to him.”
Now Melissande was staring. “Just like that? Monk—I’m starting to think Reg has a point. It’s one thing to hand over the opener the other Monk used to get here, but
why
would you give up the only advantage we have?”
“Well, I could hardly say no, could I?” he retorted, not liking the way they were all looking at him. As though he were the village idiot’s even dimmer cousin. “Not after I told him about it. Not after he came rushing out here to help because I contacted him using the super secret password I’m not even meant to know exists.”
Bibbie tossed her half-eaten piece of toast back on its plate, her eyes lit up with a dangerous gleam. “And is he going to give it back? Because Monk, that’s your invention. It’s your intellectual property. He’s got no right—”
“And you think that’s going to stop him, ducky?” said Reg, rousing out of her funk. “That superior secret government stooge? That stuck-up, autocratic, officious pen-pusher? That—”
“Reg,” Melissande said gently, and perched on the table-edge beside her. “Don’t. You’re not angry with Sir Alec. You’re angry with Gerald for disappearing without a trace. You’re angry with that other Monk for putting the cat among the pigeons.
And you’re furious because he died in such a horrible way.”
Silence. Reg sank her head into her shoulders and grieved. Bibbie, the tears still sluicing her cheeks, dabbed up her toast crumbs with the tip of one unsteady finger. Monk, looking at Melissande as she gazed out of the window, thought he’d never loved her more.
Say it. Say it.
But he couldn’t. This wasn’t the time. On the wall beside the window the kitchen clock quietly ticked. It felt like the ageing night was holding its breath.
“What are we going to do with him?” Bibbie whispered at last. “I’ll want to bury him, won’t I? I mean, his sister will. Even if she’s—” her breath caught, “—different? She’ll want to say goodbye.”
Leaning forward, he touched his fingers to her wrist. “We’ll work something out, Bibs. We’ll get Sir Alec to help us.”
She looked at the closed kitchen door. “What’s he doing, do you think? Is he even still here?”
“Of course he’s still here,” said Melissande, wearily. “He wouldn’t leave without telling us.” She bit her lip. “Would he, Monk?”
There wasn’t much point asking him. Sir Alec was mostly Gerald’s problem. The few times he’d crossed paths with Uncle Ralph’s mysterious colleague everything had been strictly business. Whatever Gerald’s boss was or wasn’t likely to do he didn’t know him well enough to hazard a guess.
But the girls were waiting for an answer, touchingly certain he had one. At least, Mel and Bibbie seemed touchingly certain. The glint in Reg’s eyes
suggested she was happily »he fowaiting for him to fall on his face. Or better yet his ass.
“I don’t think so,” he said at last. “I expect he’s around here somewhere.”
“Yes, all right, but what is he
doing
?” Bibbie persisted. “Why isn’t he in here with us, making plans?”
He managed a tired smile. “Because Sir Alec put the
secret
into secret agent, Bibs.” Muscles complaining, he pushed to his feet. “I’ll go and see what he’s up to. You three stay put. And
don’t
try anything thaumaturgical, all right? We’ve got enough trouble to contend with as it is.”
The fact that not one of them had a go at him for saying something so blatantly provocative was a depressing reminder of how much trouble they were in.
Bloody hell, Gerald. Where are you?
When he couldn’t find Sir Alec anywhere in the house, he looked outside. Finally ran the man to ground out the back, in the old stable yard, where he was sitting on the rim of a large ornamental flower pot smoking a cigarette. Its tip glowed a bright and oddly comforting orange in the moonless night’s star-pricked darkness. The scent of burning tobacco tinted the cold air.
“Here’s some unsolicited advice, Mr. Markham,” said Sir Alec, not turning. Lamplight from the open mud-room door brushed him with warm soft strokes, like an antique oil painting. In profile his face was remote and severely economical. “Never start smoking. The damned things are too tempting when the world’s gone and turned itself ass over elbows.”
“Thank you, sir,” he said, halting a few paces distant. “I’ll try to remember that.”
Sir Alec inhaled, then blew out another thin stream of smoke. “So. Have you given any thought as to Mr. Dunwoody’s whereabouts?”
He shoved his hands in his pockets. “We reckon the other Gerald’s kidnapped him.”
“Do you?” Sir Alec slid him a sideways look. “Interesting.”
“You don’t?”
“Did I say that?”
“No, sir.”
“Well, then.”
Bemused, he watched intensely enigmatic Sir Alec smoke a little more of his cigarette. “Ah—Sir Alec—”
“Yes, Mr. Markham?”
“Did you know?”
Sighing, Sir Alec stubbed out the cigarette on the side of the flower pot and carefully placed it on its weed-choked dirt. “About the existence of parallel worlds?”
“Yes. Did you know?”
“The notion is hardly groundbreaking, Mr. Markham. I’d be surprised if you’d not bandied it about yourself.” Sir Alec snorted. “I’d be surprised to find one thaumaturgical undergraduate who hasn’t. It’s a popular theme in certain types of literature, I believe.»uref.””
Oh, this
bloody
man. He stamped his feet a little against the creeping cold. “Sure, yeah, but—that’s just theory. That’s just mucking about, you know, playing
what if
. What I want to know is whether
anyone in the government knew for sure there are—other realities mirroring ours. I want to know whether anyone knows that they’re dangerous.”
That earned him a wry look. “You’re under the impression thaumaturgics are
safe
? My, my, Mr. Markham. It seems I’ve overestimated you.”
In his pockets his fingers clenched to fists. “Just
answer
me, would you?
Does anyone know?
”
“I think,” said Sir Alec, after a long silence, “that what you’re
really
asking me, Mr. Markham, is whether anyone in the government is working on ways to access these parallel worlds.”
Somewhere in the neighborhood a cat yowled and a dog barked. The waning night was so still and quiet the squabbling animals sounded quite close, even though they were probably streets and streets away.
“Well?” he said, his heart erratically thumping. “Are they?”
“Mr. Markham…” Sir Alec turned up his coat collar, his only concession to the cold. “At the risk of inflating your already highly-evolved sense of worth, I’ll say this: if the Ott government was working on such a project you would know all about it because you would be heading it. When it comes to experimental thaumaturgics there is Monk Debinger Aloysius Markham… and then there’s everyone else, eating his dust.”
Monk felt his face warm. “Oh. Sir Alec, I—”
“Which is
why
,” Sir Alec added, ruthlessly severe, “your thoughtless rompings are so frowned upon, young man. If we worry about the wrong people getting their hands on Mr. Dunwoody, you can believe
we worry no less about
you
.” He shook his head, exasperated. “Dear
God
, you invented an interdimensional portal opener! By
accident
. Young man, you are
lethal
.”
“Um…” He cleared his throat. “Well. You know. Not on purpose.”
Sir Alec’s lips twitched. “The answer, incidentally, is no, Mr. Markham. The existence of parallel worlds is held to be nothing more than a fanciful, far-fetched theory.”
“Yeah,” he said. “All right. Only… there’s a dead man upstairs that proves the theory’s a fact.”
“Indeed there is, Mr. Markham,” said Sir Alec, most pensive. “But I suggest we tackle one hurdle at a time.” He rubbed the side of his nose. “I suppose the appalling bird is demanding that you all go charging off to rescue Mr. Dunwoody?”
“Yes, sir,” he said. “Although, to be fair, Reg isn’t the only one afraid of sitting around doing nothing. We all want to get Gerald back home safe and sound. I’m assuming you do too.”
Sir Alec reached inside his coat and pulled out one of the confiscated portal openers. Tossed it sideways without looking. “Catch.”
He snatched the innocuou»ed ops stone mid-flight and wrapped his fingers tightly around it. Felt the sizzling tingle of powerful thaumics embedded deep in its igneous heart.
“So whose is that one?” said Sir Alec, contemplating the distant, twinkling constellations. “Yours? Or his?”
The trick, Gerald had told him once, was never to let Sir Alec get the upper hand. “Can’t you tell?”
Sir Alec’s lips twitched again, in what might have been a dry smile. “Pretend that’s the case.”
“His,” he said, and felt a funny little catch in the back of his throat.
“And how can
you
tell?”
Blowing out a breath, watching it mist the air, he rubbed his fingers over the other Monk’s extraordinary invention. “There’s a—a twist in the thaumics,” he murmured. “The operating incant’s matrix, it’s—different. More complex. Same principles as what I did with mine, only—expanded. And a lot trickier.”
Sir Alec nodded. “Could you get it to work, do you think?”
“Oh, yes. Absolutely. I mean, it’s keyed to my—I mean his—thaumic signature. Which
is
, y’know, my thaumic signature. Why? Did you want me to—”
“No, no,” said Sir Alec. “That’s quite all right. I believe you, Mr. Markham.”
“Fine, only if we are going to rescue Gerald then—”
Sir Alec stabbed him with a look. “
I said no
, Mr. Markham. First things first, understood?”
He swallowed. “Yes, sir. Understood.”
“I wonder,” said Sir Alec, his voice soft again, one pale brown eyebrow quizzically raised. “How long would it have been, d’you think, before you put the same thaumic twist into your own unsanctioned interdimensional portal opener?”
He felt his fingers fist again. “I can’t help it, you know. I mean, it’s not like I sit around twiddling my thumbs and thinking of ways to get up the Department’s nose. I don’t go out of my way to flout authority.”
“No?” Sir Alec slid his hand back inside his coat, withdrew a slim silver case and a lighter and took a moment to extract then ignite a fresh cigarette. With case and lighter returned to his coat, he inhaled deeply, then exhaled fresh smoke. “And if we went upstairs to your attic right now, Mr. Markham? What would we find?”
“Look,” he said, feeling another hot rush of blood to his face. “You don’t understand. Ideas come to me. I can’t stop them. Even while I’m sleeping, they fill up my skull. They never leave me alone. And if I don’t—if I don’t
do
something with them, if I don’t turn them from dream to reality, it’s like—” Frustrated, he yanked his hands out of his pockets and folded his arms. “I suppose you’re going to tell Uncle Ralph?”
Sir Alec looked at him, cigarette idly balanced between the first and second fingers of his left hand. His chilly gray eyes were lazily intent. “Just as a matter of interest, idle curiosity, no more than that—what
are you working on, up in your attic?”
And now he knew how a rabbit felt, frozen in the middle of the road with a car bearing down on it…
If I tell him he’ll make me pull the plug. But if I don’t tell him he’ll—
“Relax, Mr. Markham,” said Sir Alec, his regard still intent. “I’m not a compliance officer. I only want to know because it’s likely we’ll soon be engaging in some… questionable… thaumaturgics. Given the delicacy of our situation I’m concerned we don’t inadvertently mix our etheretic messages.
The last thing we need tonight is a complication of consequences.”