‘SpecOps.’
   ‘LiteraTec?’
   ‘Yup.’
   I took my drink.
   ‘I trained to be a LiteraTec,’ he said wistfully. ‘Made it to cadetship.’
   ‘What happened?’
   ‘My girlfriend was a militant Marlovian. She converted some Will-Speak machines to quote from Tamburlaine and I was implicated when she was nabbed. And that was that. Not even the military would take me.’
   ‘What’s your name?’
   ‘Chris.’
   ‘Thursday.’
   We shook hands.
   ‘I can only speak from experience, Chris, but I’ve been in the military and SpecOps and you should be thanking your girlfriend.’
   ‘I do,’ hastened Chris. ‘Every day. We’re married now and have two kids. I do this bar job in the evenings and run the Swindon branch of the Kit Marlowe Society during the day. We have almost four thousand members. Not bad for an Elizabethan forger, murderer, gambler and atheist.’
   ‘There are some who say he might have written the plays usually attributed to Shakespeare.’
   Chris was taken aback. He was suspicious, too.
   ‘I’m not sure I should be discussing this with a LiteraTec.’
   ‘There’s no law against discussion, Chris. Who do you think we are, the thought police?’
   ‘No, that’s SO-2 isn’t it?’
   ‘But about Marlowe—?’
   Chris lowered his voice.
   ‘Okay. I think Marlowe might have written the plays. He was undoubtedly a brilliant playwright, as Faust, Tamburlaine and Edward II would attest. He was the only person of his age who could have actually done it. Forget Bacon and Oxford; Marlowe has to be the odds-on favourite.’
   ‘But Marlowe was murdered in 1593,’ I replied slowly. ‘Most of the plays were written after that.’
   Chris looked at me and lowered his voice.
   ‘Sure. If he died in the bar fight that day.’
   ‘What are you saying?’
   ‘It’s possible his death was faked.’
   ‘Why?’
   Chris took a deep breath. This was a subject he knew something about.
   ‘Remember that Elizabeth was a Protestant queen. Anything like atheism or papism would deny the authority of the Protestant Church and the Queen as the head.’
   ‘Treason,’ I murmured. ‘A capital offence.’
   ‘Exactly. In April 1593 the Privy Council arrested one Thomas Kyd in connection with some anti-government pamphleteering. When his rooms were searched they revealed some atheistic writings.’
   ‘So?’
   ‘Kyd fingered Marlowe. Said Marlowe had written them two years ago when they were rooming together. Marlowe was arrested and questioned on 18 May 1593; he was freed on bail so presumably there wasn’t enough evidence to commit him for trial.’
   ‘What about his friendship with Walsingham?’ I asked.
   ‘I was coming to that. Walsingham had an influential position within the secret service; they had known each other for a number of years. With more evidence arriving daily against Marlowe, his arrest seemed inevitable. But on the morning of 30 May, Marlowe is killed in a bar brawl, apparently over an unpaid bill.’
   ‘Very convenient.’
   ‘Very. It’s my belief that Walsingham faked his friend’s death. The three men in the tavern were all in his pay. He bribed the coroner and Marlowe set up Shakespeare as the front man. Will, an impoverished actor who knew Marlowe from his days at the Shoreditch theatre, probably leaped at the chance to make some money; his career seems to have taken off as Marlowe’s ended.’
   ‘It’s an interesting theory. But wasn’t Venus and Adonis published a couple of months before Marlowe’s death? Earlier even than Kyd’s arrest?’
   Chris coughed.
   ‘Good point. All I can say is that the plot must have been hatched somewhat ahead of time, or that records have been muddled.’
   He paused for a moment, looked about and lowered his voice further. ‘Don’t tell the other Marlovians, but there is something else that points away from a faked death.’
   ‘I’m all ears.’
   ‘Marlowe was killed within the jurisdiction of the Queen’s coroner. There were sixteen jurors to view the supposedly switched body, and it is unlikely that the coroner could have been bribed. If I had been Walsingham I would have had Marlowe’s death faked in the boonies where coroners were more easily bought. He could have gone farther and had the body disfigured in some way to make identification impossible.’
   ‘What are you saying?’
   ‘That an equally probable theory is that Walsingham himself had Marlowe killed to stop him talking. Men say anything when tortured, and it’s likely that Marlowe had all kinds of dirt on Walsingham.’
   ‘What then?’ I asked. ‘How would you account for the lack of any firm evidence regarding Shakespeare’s life, his curious double existence, the fact that no one seemed to know about his literary work in Stratford?’
   Chris shrugged.
   ‘I don’t know, Thursday. Without Marlowe there is no one else in Elizabethan London even able to write the plays.’
   ‘Any theories?’
   ‘None at all. But the Elizabethans were a funny bunch. Court intrigue, the secret service…’
   ‘The more things change—‘
   ‘My point entirely. Cheers.’
   We clinked glasses and Chris wandered off to serve another customer. I played the piano for half an hour before retiring to bed. I checked with Liz but Landen hadn’t called.

27. Hades finds another manuscript

   ‘I had hoped that I would find a manuscript by Austen or Trollope, Thackeray, Fielding or Swift. Maybe Johnson, Wells or Conan-Doyle. Defoe would have been fun. Imagine my delight when I discovered that Charlotte Bronte’s masterpiece Jane Eyre was on show at her old home. How can fate be more fortuitous…?’

Acheron Hades. Degeneracy for Pleasure and Profit


   Our safety recommendations had been passed to the Bronte museum and there were five armed security guards on duty that night. They were all burly Yorkshiremen, specially chosen for this most august of duties because of their strong sense of literary pride. One stayed in the room with the manuscript, another was on guard within the building, two patrolled outside, and the fifth was in a little room with six TV screens. The guard in front of the monitors ate an egg-and-onion sandwich and kept a diligent eye on the screens. He didn’t see anything remiss on the monitors, but then Acheron’s curious powers had never been declassified below SO-9.
   It was easy for Hades to gain entry; he just slipped in through the kitchen door after forcing the lock with a crowbar. The guard patrolling inside didn’t hear Acheron approach. His lifeless body was later found wedged beneath the Belfast sink. Acheron carefully mounted the stairs, trying not to make any noise. In reality he could have made as much noise as he liked. He knew the guards’.385 couldn’t harm him, but what was the fun of just walking in and helping himself? He padded slowly up the corridor to the room where the manuscript was displayed and peered in. The room was empty. For some reason the guard was not in attendance. He walked up to the armoured glass case and placed his hand just above the book. The glass beneath his flattened palm started to ripple and soften; pretty soon it was pliable enough for Hades to push his fingers through and grasp the manuscript. The destabilised glass twisted and stretched like rubber as the book was pulled clear and then rapidly reformed itself back into solid glass; the only evidence that its molecules had been rearranged was a slight mottling on the surface. Hades smiled triumphantly as he read the front page:


Jane Eyre
An autobiography bycurrer bell
October 1847

   Acheron meant to take the book straight away, but he had always liked the story. Succumbing to temptation, he started to read.
   It was open at the section where Jane Eyre is in bed and hears a low cackle of demonic laughter outside her room. Glad that the laughter is not coming from within her room, she arises and throws the bolt on the door, crying out:
   ‘Who is there?’
   By way of an answer there is only a low gurgle and a moan, the sound of steps retreating and then the shutting of a door. Jane wraps a shawl around her shoulders and slowly pulls back the bolt, opening the door a crack and peering cautiously outside. Upon the matting she espies a single candle and also notices that the corridor is full of smoke. The creak of Rochester’s half-open door catches her attention, and then she notices the dim flicker of a fire within. Jane springs into action, forsaking all thoughts as she runs into Rochester’s burning chamber and attempts to rouse the sleeping figure with the words:
   ‘Wake! Wake!’
   Rochester does not stir and Jane notices with growing alarm that the sheets of the bed are starting to turn brown and catch fire. She grasps the basin and ewer and throws water over him, running to her bedroom to fetch more to douse the curtains. After a struggle she extinguishes the fire and Rochester, cursing at finding himself waking in a pool of water, says to Jane:
   ‘Is there a flood?’
   ‘No, sir,’ she replies, ‘but there has been a fire. Get up, do; you are quenched now. I will fetch you a candle.’
   Rochester is not fully aware of what has happened.
   ‘In the name of all the elves in Christendom, is that Jane Eyre?’ he demands. ‘What have you done with me, witch, sorceress? Who is in the room besides you? Have you plotted to drown me?’

   ‘Turn around really slowly.’
   The last line belonged to the guard, whose own demand broke into Acheron’s reading.
   ‘I hate it when that happens!’ he lamented, turning to face the officer, who had his gun trained on him. ‘Just when you get to a good bit!’
   ‘Don’t move and put the manuscript down.’
   Acheron did as he was told. The guard undipped his walkie-talkie and brought it up to his mouth.
   ‘You shouldn’t do that,’ said Acheron softly.
   ‘Oh yes?’ retorted the guard confidently. ‘And why the hell not?’
   ‘Because,’ said Acheron slowly, catching the guard’s eye and looking deep inside him, ‘you will never find out why your wife left you.’
   The guard lowered his walkie-talkie.
   ‘What do you know about Denise?’

   I was dreaming fitfully. It was the Crimea again; the crump-crump-crump of the guns and the metallic scream that an armoured personnel carrier makes when hit. I could even taste the dust, the cordite and the amatol in the air, the muffled cries of my comrades, the directionless sound of the gunfire. The eighty-eight-calibre guns were so close they didn’t need a trajectory. You never heard the one that hit you. I was back in the APC, returning to the fray despite orders to the contrary. I was driving across the grassland, past wreckage from previous battles. I felt something large pluck at my vehicle and the roof opened up, revealing a shaft of sunlight in the dust that was curiously beautiful. The same unseen hand picked up the carrier and threw it in the air. It ran along on one track for a few yards and then fell back upright. The engine was still functioning, the controls still felt right; I carried on, oblivious to the damage. It was only when I reached up for the wireless switch that I realised the roof had been blown off. It was a sobering discovery, but I had little time to muse. Ahead of me was the smoking wreckage of the pride of the Wessex Tank: the Light Armoured Brigade. The Russian eighty-eights had fallen silent; the sound was now of small arms as the Russians and my comrades exchanged fire. I drove to the closest group of walking wounded and released the rear door. It was jammed but it didn’t matter; the side door had vanished with the roof and I rapidly packed twenty-two wounded and dying soldiers into an APC designed to carry eight. Punctuating all this was the incessant ringing of a telephone. My brother, minus his helmet and with his face bloodied, was dealing with the wounded. He told me to come back for him. As I drove off the spang of rifle fire ricocheted off the armour; the Russian infantry were approaching. The phone was still ringing. I fumbled in the darkness for the handset, dropped it and scrabbled on the floor, swearing as I did so. It was Bowden.
   ‘Are you okay?’ he asked, sensing something was not quite right.
   ‘I’m fine,’ I replied, by now well used to making everything appear normal. ‘What’s the problem?’ I looked across at my clock. It was 3 a.m. I groaned.
   ‘Another manuscript has been stolen. I just got it over the wire. Same MO as Chuzzlewit. They just walked in and took it. Two guards dead. One by his own gun.’
   ‘Jane Eyre?’
   ‘How the dickens did you know that?’
   ‘Rochester told me.’
   ‘What—?’
   ‘Never mind. Haworth House?’
   ‘An hour ago.’
   ‘I’ll pick you up in twenty minutes.’
   Within the hour we were driving north to join the Mi at Rugby. The night was clear and cool, the roads almost deserted. The roof was up and the heating full on, but even so it was draughty as the gale outside tried to find a toehold in the hood. I shuddered to think what it might be like driving the car in winter. By 5 a.m. we would make Rugby and it would be easier from there.
   ‘I hope I shan’t regret this,’ murmured Bowden. ‘Braxton won’t be terribly happy when he finds out.’
   ‘Whenever people say: “I hope I won’t regret this”, they do. So if you want me to let you out, I will. Stuff Braxton. Stuff Goliath and stuff Jack Schitt. Some things are more important than rules and regulations. Governments and fashions come and go but Jane Eyre is for all time. I would give everything to ensure the novel’s survival.’
   Bowden said nothing. Working with me, I suspected, was the first time he had really started to enjoy being in SpecOps. I shifted down a gear to overtake a slow-moving lorry and then accelerated away.
   ‘How did you know it was Jane Eyre when I rang?’
   I thought for a minute. If I couldn’t tell Bowden, I couldn’t tell anyone. I pulled Rochester’s handkerchief out of my pocket.
   ‘Look at the monogram.’
   ‘EFR?’

   ‘It belongs to Edward Fairfax Rochester.’
   Bowden looked at me doubtfully.
   ‘Careful, Thursday. While I fully admit that I might not be the best Bronte scholar, even I know that these people aren’t actually real.’
   ‘Real or not, I’ve met him several times. I have his coat too.’
   ‘Wait—I understand about Quaverley’s extraction but what are you saying? That characters can jump spontaneously from the pages of novels?’
   ‘I heartily agree that something odd is going on; something I can’t possibly explain. The barrier between myself and Rochester has softened. It’s not just him making the jump either; I once entered the book myself when I was a little girl. I arrived at the moment they met. Do you remember it?’
   Bowden looked sheepish and stared out of the sidescreen at a passing petrol station.
   ‘That’s very cheap for unleaded.’
   I guessed the reason. ‘You’ve never read it, have you?’
   ‘Well—‘ he stammered. ‘It’s just that, er—‘
   I laughed.
   ‘Well, well, a LiteraTec who hasn’t read Jane Eyre?
   ‘Okay, okay, don’t rub it in. I studied Wuthering Heights and Villette instead. I meant to give it my fullest attention but like many things it must have slipped my mind.’
   ‘I had better run it by you.’
   ‘Perhaps you should,’ agreed Bowden grumpily.
   I told him the story of Jane Eyre over the next hour, starting with the young orphan Jane, her childhood with Mrs Reed and her cousins, her time at Lowood, a frightful charity school run by a cruel and hypocritical evangelist; then the outbreak of typhus and the death of her good friend Helen Burns; after that of how Jane rises to become a model pupil and eventually student teacher under the principal, Miss Temple.
   ‘Jane leaves Lowood and moves to Thornfield, where she has one charge, Rochester’s ward, Adele.’
   ‘Ward?’ asked Bowden. ‘What’s that?’
   ‘Well,’ I replied, ‘I guess it’s a polite way of saying that she is the product of a previous liaison. If Rochester lived today Adele would be splashed all over the front page of The Toad as a “love child”.’
   ‘But he did the decent thing?’
   ‘Oh, yes. Anyhow, Thornfield is a pleasant place to live, if not slightly strange—Jane has the idea that there is something going on that no one is talking about. Rochester returns home after an absence of three months and turns out to be a sullen, dominating personality, but he is impressed by Jane’s fortitude when she saves him from being burned by a mysterious fire in his bedroom. Jane falls in love with Rochester but has to witness his courtship of Blanche Ingram, a sort of nineteenth-century bimbo. Jane leaves to attend to Mrs Reed, who is dying and when she returns, Rochester asks her to marry him; he has realised in her absence that the qualities of Jane’s character far outweigh those of Miss Ingram, despite the difference in their social status.’
   ‘So far so good.’
   ‘Don’t count your chickens. A month later the wedding ceremony is interrupted by a lawyer who claims that Rochester is already married and his first wife—Bertha—is still living. He accuses Rochester of bigamy, which is found to be true. The mad Bertha Rochester lives in a room on the upper floor of Thornfield, attended to by the strange Grace Poole. It was she who had attempted to set fire to Rochester in his bed all those months ago. Jane is deeply shocked—as you can imagine—and Rochester tries to excuse his conduct, claiming that his love for her was real. He asks her to go away with him as his mistress, but she refuses. Still in love with him, Jane runs away and finds herself in the home of the Rivers, two sisters and a brother who turn out to be her first cousins.’
   ‘Isn’t that a bit unlikely?’
   ‘Shh. Jane’s uncle, who is also their uncle, has just died and leaves her all his money. She divides it among them all and settles down to an independent existence. The brother, St John Rivers, decides to go to India as a missionary and wants Jane to marry him and serve the Church. Jane is quite happy to serve him, but not to marry him. She believes that marriage is a union of love and mutual respect, not something that should be a duty. There is a long battle of wills and finally she agrees to go with him to India as his assistant. It is in India, with Jane building a new life, that the book ends.’
   ‘And that’s it?’ asked Bowden in surprise.
   ‘How do you mean?’
   ‘Well, the ending does sound a bit of an anticlimax. We try to make art perfect because we never manage it in real life and here is Charlotte Bronte concluding her novel—presumably something which has a sense of autobiographical wishful thinking about it—in a manner that reflects her own disappointed love life. If I had been Charlotte I would have made certain that Rochester and Jane were reunited—married, if possible.’
   ‘Don’t ask me,’ I said, ‘I didn’t write it.’ I paused. ‘You’re right, of course,’ I murmured. ‘It is a crap ending. Why, when all was going so well, does the ending just cop out on the reader? Even the Jane Eyre purists agree that it would have been far better for them to have tied the knot.’
   ‘How, with Bertha still around?’
   ‘I don’t know; she could die or something. It is a problem, isn’t it?’
   ‘How do you know it so well?’ asked Bowden.
   ‘It’s always been a favourite of mine. I had a copy of it in my jacket pocket when I was shot. It stopped the bullet. Rochester appeared soon after and kept pressure on my arm wound until the medics arrived. He and the book saved my life.’
   Bowden looked at his watch.
   ‘Yorkshire is still many miles away. We shan’t get their until—Hello, what’s this?’
   There appeared to be an accident on the carriageway ahead. Two dozen or so cars had stopped in front of us and when nothing moved for a couple of minutes I pulled on to the hard shoulder and drove slowly to the front of the queue. A traffic cop hailed us to stop, looked doubtfully at the bullet holes in the paintwork of my car and then said: ‘Sorry, ma’am. Can’t let you through—‘
   I held up my old SpecOps 5 badge and his manner changed.
   ‘Sorry, ma’am. There’s something unusual ahead.’
   Bowden and I exchanged looks and got out of the car. Behind us a crowd of curious onlookers was being held back by a Police Line Do Not Cross tape. They stood in silence to watch the spectacle unfold in front of their eyes. Three squad cars and an ambulance were on the scene already; two paramedics were attending to a newborn infant who was wrapped up in a blanket and howling plaintively. The officers were all relieved that I had arrived—the highest rank there was Sergeant and they were glad to be able to foist the responsibility onto someone else, and someone from SO-5 was as high an operative as any of them had even seen.
   I borrowed a pair of binoculars and looked up the empty carriageway. About five hundred yards away the road and starry night sky had spiralled into the shape of a whirlpool, a funnel that was crushing and distorting the light that managed to penetrate the vortex. I sighed. My father had told me about temporal distortions but I had never seen one. In the centre of the whirlpool, where the refracted light had been whipped up into a jumbled pattern, there was an inky black hole, which seemed to have neither depth nor colour, just shape: a perfect circle the size of a grapefruit. Traffic on the opposite carriageway had also been stopped by the police, the flashing blue lights slowing to red as they shone through the fringes of the black mass, distorting the image of the road beyond like the refraction on the edge of a jam jar. In front of the vortex was a blue Datsun, the bonnet already starting to stretch as it approached the distortion. Behind that was a motorcycle, and behind this and closest to us was a green family saloon. I watched for a minute or so, but all the vehicles appeared motionless on the tarmac. The rider, his motorcycle and all the occupants of the cars seemed to be frozen like statues.
   ‘Blast!’ I muttered under my breath as I glanced at my watch. ‘How long since it opened up?’
   ‘About an hour,’ answered the sergeant. ‘There was some kind of accident involving an ExcoMat containment vehicle. Couldn’t have happened at a worse time; I was about to come off shift.’

   He jerked a thumb in the direction of the baby on the stretcher, who had put his fingers in his mouth and stopped yelling. ‘That was the driver. Before the accident he was thirty-one. By the time we got here he was eight—in a few hours he’ll be nothing more than a damp patch on the blanket.’
   ‘Have you called the ChronoGuard?’
   ‘I called ‘em,’ he answered resignedly. ‘But a patch of Bad Time opened up near Tesco’s in Wareham. They can’t be here for at least four hours.’
   I thought quickly.
   ‘How many people have been lost so far?’
   ‘Sir,’ said an officer, pointing up the road, ‘I think you had better see this!’
   We all watched as the blue Datsun started to contort and stretch, fold and shrink as it was sucked through the hole. Within a few seconds it had disappeared completely, compressed to a billionth of its size and catapulted to Elsewhere.
   The sergeant pushed his cap to the back of his head and sighed. There was nothing he could do.
   I repeated my question.
   ‘How many?’
   ‘Oh, the truck has gone, an entire mobile library, twelve cars and a motorcycle. Maybe twenty people.’
   ‘That’s a lot of matter,’ I said grimly. ‘The distortion could grow to the size of a football field by the time the ChronoGuard get here.’
   The sergeant shrugged. He had never been briefed on what to do with temporal instabilities. I turned to Bowden.
   ‘Come on.’
   ‘What?’
   ‘We’ve a little job to do.’
   ‘You’re crazy!’
   ‘Perhaps.’
   ‘Can’t we wait for the ChronoGuard?’
   ‘They’d never get here in time. It’s easy. A lobotomised monkey could do it.’
   ‘And where are we going to find a lobotomised monkey at this time of night?’
   ‘You’re being windy, Bowden.’
   ‘True. Do you know what will happen if we fail?’
   ‘We won’t. It’s a doddle. Dad was in the ChronoGuard; he told me all about this sort of thing. The secret is in the spheres. In four hours we could be seeing a major global disaster occurring right in front of our eyes. A rent in time so large we won’t know for sure that the here-and-now isn’t the there-and-then. The rout of civilisation, panic in the streets, the end of the world as we know it. Hey, kid—!’
   I had seen a young lad bouncing a basketball on the road. The boy reluctantly gave it to me and I returned to Bowden, who was waiting uneasily by the car. We put the hood down and Bowden sat in the passenger seat, clutching the basketball grimly.
   ‘A basketball?’
   ‘It’s a sphere, isn’t it?’ I replied, remembering Dad’s advice all those years ago. ‘Are you ready?’
   ‘Ready,’ replied Bowden in a slightly shaky voice.
   I started the car and rolled slowly up to where the traffic police stood in shocked amazement.
   ‘Are you sure you know what you’re doing?’ asked the young officer.
   ‘Sort of,’ I replied, truthfully enough. ‘Does anyone have a watch with a second hand?’
   The youngest traffic cop took his watch off and handed it over. I noted the real time—5.30 a.m.—and then reset the hands to twelve o’clock. I strapped the watch on to the rear-view mirror.
   The sergeant wished us good luck as we drove off, yet his thoughts were more along the lines of ‘sooner you than me’.
   Around us the sky was lightening into dawn, yet the area around the vehicles was still night. Time for the trapped cars had stood still, but only to observers from the outside. To the occupants, everything was happening as normal, except that if they looked behind them they would witness the dawn breaking rapidly.
   The first fifty yards seemed plain enough to Bowden and me, but as we drove closer the car and bike seemed to speed up and by the time we had drawn level with the green car we were both moving at about sixty miles per hour. I glanced at the watch on the rear-view mirror and noted that precisely three minutes had elapsed.
   Bowden had been watching what was going on behind us. As he and I drove towards the instability the officers’ movements seemed to accelerate until they were just a blur. The cars that had been blocking the carriageway were turned round and directed swiftly back down the hard shoulder at a furious rate. Bowden also noticed the sun rising rapidly behind us and wondered quite what he had let himself in for.
   The green saloon had two occupants; a man and a woman. The woman was asleep and the driver was looking at the dark hole that had opened up in front of them. I shouted to him to stop. He wound down his window and I repeated myself, added ‘SpecOps!’ and waved my ID. He dutifully applied his brakes and his stoplights came on, puncturing the darkness. Three minutes and twenty-six seconds had elapsed since we had begun our journey.
   From where the ChronoGuard were standing, they could just see the brake lights on the green saloon come languidly on in the funnel of darkness that was the event’s influence. They watched the progress of the green saloon over the next ten minutes as it made an almost imperceptible turn towards the hard shoulder. It was nearly 10 a.m. and an advance ChronoGuard outfit had arrived direct from Wareham. Their equipment and operatives were being airlifted in an SO-12 Chinook helicopter, and Colonel Rutter had flown ahead to see what needed to be done. He had been surprised that two ordinary officers had volunteered for this hazardous duty, especially as nobody could tell him who we were. Even a check of my car registration didn’t help, as it was still listed as belonging to the garage I had bought it from. The only positive thing about the whole damn mess, he noted, was the fact that the passenger seemed to be holding a sphere of some sort. If the hole grew any bigger and time slowed down even more it might take them several months to reach us, even in the fastest vehicle they had. He lowered the binoculars and sighed. It was a stinking, lousy, lonely job. He had been working in the ChronoGuard for almost forty years Standard Earth Time. In logged work time he was 209. In his own personal physiological time he was barely 28. His children were older than him and his wife was in a nursing home. He had thought the higher rates of pay would compensate him for any problems, but they didn’t.
   As the green saloon fell quickly away behind us, Bowden again looked back and saw the sun rising faster and higher. A helicopter arrived in a flash with the distinctive ‘CG’ motif of the ChronoGuard. Ahead of us now there was only the motorcyclist, who seemed to be perilously close to the dark, swirling hole. He wore red leathers and was driving a top-of-the-range Triumph motorcycle, ironically enough about the only bike capable of escape from the vortex if he had known what the problem was. We had taken another six minutes to catch up with him and as we approached a roaring sound started to rise above the wind noise; the sort of scream a typhoon might make as it passed over the top of you. We were still about twelve feet behind and finding it difficult to keep up. The speedometer needle on the Porsche touched ninety as we roared along together. I blew my horn but the screaming drowned it out.
   ‘Get ready!’ I shouted to Bowden as the wind whipped our hair and the air tugged at our clothes. I flashed my lights at the bike again and at last he saw us. He turned around and waved, mistook our intent for a desire to initiate a race, kicked down a gear and accelerated away. The vortex caught him in an instant and he seemed to stretch out and around and inside out as he flowed rapidly into the instability; within what appeared to be a second he had gone. As soon as I thought we could get no closer I stamped on the brakes and yelled:
   ‘Now!’

   Smoke poured off the tyres as we careened across the tarmac; Bowden threw the basketball, which seemed to swell in size with the hole, the ball flattening to a disc and the hole stretching out to a line. We saw the basketball hit the hole, bounce once and let us through. I glanced at the watch as we tipped through into the abyss, the basketball shutting out the last glimpse of the world we had left behind as we dropped through to Elsewhere. Up until the point we passed the event, twelve minutes and forty-one seconds had elapsed. Outside it had been closer to seven hours.
   ‘Motorcycle’s gone,’ remarked Colonel Rutter. His second-in-command grunted in reply. He didn’t approve of non-Chronos attempting his work. They had managed to maintain the job’s mysticism for over five decades with the wages to suit; have-a-go heroes could only serve to weaken people’s undying trust in what they did. It wasn’t a difficult job; it just took a long time. He had mended a similar rent in spacetime that had opened up in Weybridge’s municipal park just between the floral clock and the bandstand. The job itself had taken ten minutes; he had simply walked in and stuck a tennis ball across the hole while outside seven months flashed by—seven months on double pay plus privileges, thank you very much.
   The ChronoGuard operatives set up a large clock facing inwards so any operatives within the field’s influence would know what was happening. A similar clock on the back of the helicopter gave the officers outside a good idea of how slow time was running within.
   After the motorcycle disappeared they waited another half-an-hour to see what would happen. They watched Bowden slowly rise and throw what appeared to be a basketball.
   ‘Too late,’ murmured Rutter, having seen this sort of thing before. He ordered his men into action, and they were just starting to crank up the rotors of the helicopter when the darkness around the hole evaporated. The night slid back and a clear road confronted them. They could see the people in the green saloon get out and look around in amazement at the sudden day. A hundred yards farther on, the basketball had neatly blocked the tear and now stood trembling slightly in midair as the vortex behind the rip sucked at the ball. Within a minute the tear healed and the basketball dropped harmlessly to the asphalt, bouncing a few times before rolling to the side of the road. The sky was clear and there was no evidence that time wasn’t the same as it had always been. But of the Datsun, the motorcyclist and the brightly painted sports car, there was no trace at all.
   My car slid on and on. The motorway had been replaced by a swirling mass of light and colour that had no meaning to either of us. Occasionally a coherent image would emerge from the murk and on several occasions we thought we had arrived back in a stable time, but were soon whisked back into the vortex, the typhoon raging in our ears. The first occasion was on a road somewhere in the Home Counties. It looked like winter, and ahead of us a lime-green Austin Allegro estate pulled out from a slip road. I swerved and drove past at great speed, sounding my horn angrily. That image collapsed abruptly and fragmented itself into the dirty hold of a ship. The car was wedged between two packing cases, the closest of which was bound for Shanghai. The howl of the vortex had diminished, but we could hear a new roar, the roar of a storm at sea. The ship wallowed and Bowden and I looked at one another, unsure as to whether this was the end of the journey or not. The roaring sound grew as the dank hold folded back into itself and vanished, only to be replaced by a white hospital ward. The tempest subsided, the car’s engine ticking over happily. In the only occupied bed there was a drowsy and confused woman with her arm in a sling. I knew what I had to say.
   ‘Thursday—!’ I shouted excitedly.
   The woman in the bed frowned. She looked across at Bowden, who waved back cheerily.
   ‘He didn’t die!’ I continued, saying now what I knew to be the truth. I could hear the tempest starting to howl again. It wouldn’t be long before we were taken away.
   ‘The car crash was a blind! Men like Acheron don’t die that easily! Take the LiteraTec job in Swindon!’
   The woman in the bed just had time to repeat my last word before the ceiling and floor opened up and we plummeted back into the maelstrom. After a dazzling display of colourful noise and loud light, the vortex slid back to be replaced by the parking lot of a motorway services somewhere. The tempest slowed and stopped.
   ‘Is this it?’ asked Bowden.
   ‘I don’t know.’
   It was night and the streetlamps cast an orange glow over the parking lot, the roadway shiny from recent rain. A car pulled in next to us; it was a large Pontiac containing a family. The wife was berating her husband for falling asleep at the wheel and the children were crying. It looked like it had been a near-miss.
   ‘Excuse me!’ I yelled. The man wound down his window.
   ‘Yes?’
   ‘What’s the date?’
   The date?’
   ‘It’s 18 July,’ replied the man’s wife, shooting him and me an annoyed glance.
   I thanked her and turned back to Bowden.
   ‘We’re three weeks in the past?’ he queried.
   ‘Or fifty-six weeks into the future.’
   ‘Or one hundred and eight.’
   ‘I’m going to find out where we are.’
   I turned off the ignition and got out. Bowden joined me as we walked towards the cafeteria. Beyond the building we could see the motorway, and beyond that the connecting bridge to the services on the opposite carriageway.
   Several tow trucks drove past us with empty cars hitched to the back of them.
   ‘Something’s not right.’
   ‘I agree,’ replied Bowden. ‘But what?’
   Suddenly, the doors to the cafeteria burst open and a woman pushed her way out. She was carrying a gun and pushing a man in front of her, who stumbled as they hurried out. Bowden pulled me behind a parked van. We peered cautiously out and saw that the woman had unwelcome company; several men had appeared seemingly from nowhere and all of them were armed.
   ‘What the—?’ I whispered, suddenly realising what was happening. ‘That’s me!’
   And so it was. I looked slightly older but it was definitely me. Bowden had noticed too.
   Tm not sure I like what you’ve done with your hair.’
   ‘You prefer it long?’
   ‘Of course.’
   We watched as one of the three men told the other me to drop her gun. I-me-she said something we couldn’t hear and then put her gun down, releasing her hold on the man, who was then grabbed roughly by one of the other men.
   ‘What’s going on?’ I asked, thoroughly confused.
   ‘We’ve got to go!’ replied Bowden.
   ‘And leave me like this?’
   ‘Look.’
   He pointed at the car. It was shaking slightly as a localised gust of wind seemed to batter it.
   ‘I can’t leave her—me—in this predicament!’
   But Bowden was pulling me towards the car, which was rocking more violently and starting to fade.
   ‘Wait!’
   I struggled free, pulled out my automatic and hid it behind one of the wheels of the nearest car, then ran after Bowden and leaped into the back of the Speedster. I was just in time. There was a bright flash and a peal of thunder and then silence. I opened an eye. It was daylight. I looked at Bowden, who had made it into the driver’s seat. The motorway services carpark had vanished and in its place was a quiet country lane. The journey was over.
   ‘You all right?’ I asked.
   Bowden felt the three-day stubble that had inexplicably grown on his chin.
   ‘I think so. How about you?’
   ‘As well as can be expected.’
   I checked my shoulder holster. It was empty.
   ‘I’m bursting for a pee, though. I feel like I haven’t gone for a week.’
   Bowden made a pained expression and nodded.
   ‘I think I could say the same.’

   I nipped behind a wall. Bowden walked stiffly across to the other side of the road and relieved himself in the hedge.
   ‘Where do you suppose we are?’ I shouted to Bowden from behind the wall. ‘Or more to the point, when?’
   ‘Car twenty-eight,’ crackled the wireless, ‘come in please.’
   ‘Who knows?’ called out Bowden over his shoulder. ‘But if you want to try that again you can do it with someone else.’
   Much relieved, we reconvened at the car. It was a beautiful day, dry and quite warm. The smell of haymaking was in the air, and in the distance we could hear a tractor lumbering across a field.
   ‘What was all that motorway services thing about?’ asked Bowden. ‘Last Thursday or next Thursday?’
   I shrugged.
   ‘Don’t ask me to explain. I just hope I got out of that jam. Those guys didn’t look as though they were out collecting for the church fund.’
   ‘You’ll find out.’
   ‘I guess. I wonder who that man was I was trying to protect?’
   ‘Search me.’
   I sat on the bonnet and donned a pair of dark glasses. Bowden walked to a gate and looked over. In a dip in the valley was a village built of grey stone, and in the field a herd of cows was grazing peacefully.
   Bowden pointed to a milestone he had found.
   ‘That’s a spot of luck.’
   The milestone told him we were six miles from Haworth.
   I wasn’t listening to him. I was now puzzling over seeing myself in the hospital bed. If I hadn’t seen myself I wouldn’t have gone to Swindon and if I hadn’t gone to Swindon I wouldn’t have been able to warn myself to go there. Doubtless it would make complete sense to my father, but I might well go nuts trying to figure it out.
   ‘Car Twenty-Eight,’ said the wireless, ‘come in please.’
   I stopped thinking about it and checked the position of the sun.
   ‘It’s about midday, I’d say.’
   Bowden nodded agreement.
   ‘Aren’t we Car Twenty-Eight?’ he asked, frowning slightly. I picked up the mike.
   ‘Car Twenty-Eight, go ahead.’
   ‘At last!’ sounded a relieved voice over the speaker. ‘I have Colonel Rutter of the ChronoGuard who wants to speak to you.’
   Bowden walked over so he could hear better. We looked at each other, unsure of what was going to happen next; a chastisement or a heap of congratulations, or, as it turned out, both.
   ‘Officers Next and Cable. Can you hear me?’ said a deep voice over the wireless.
   ‘Yes, sir.’
   ‘Good. Where are you?’
   ‘About six miles from Haworth.’
   ‘All the way up there, eh?’ he guffawed. ‘Jolly good.’ He cleared his throat. We could sense it coming.
   ‘Unofficially, that was one of the bravest acts I’ve ever seen. You saved a great number of lives and stopped the event from becoming a matter of some consequence. You can both be very proud of your actions and I would be honoured to have two fine officers like you serving under me.’
   ‘Thank you, sir, I—‘
   ‘I’m still talking!’ he snapped, causing us both to jump. ‘Officially, though, you broke every rule in the book. And I should have both your butts nailed to the wall for not following procedure. If you ever try anything like this again, I most certainly will. Understand?’
   ‘Understood, sir.’
   I looked at Bowden. There was only one question we wanted to ask.
   ‘How long have we been gone?’
   ‘The year is now 2016,’ said Rutter. ‘You’ve been gone thirty-one years!!’

28. Haworth House

   ‘Some would say the ChronoGuard have a terrific sense of humour. I would say they were just plain annoying. I had heard that they used to bundle up new recruits in gravity suits and pop them a week into the future just for fun. The game was banned when one recruit vanished outside the cone. Theoretically he is still there, just outside our time, unable to return and unable to communicate. It is calculated we will catch up with him about fourteen thousand years from now—sadly, he will have aged only twelve minutes. Some joke.’

Thursday Next. A Life in SpecOps


   We were both victims of the ChronoGuard’s bizarre sense of humour. It was just past noon the following day. We had been gone only seven hours. We both reset our watches and drove slowly into Haworth, each sobered by the experience.
   At Haworth House a full media circus was in progress. I had hoped to arrive before this sort of thing really gained a toehold, but the hole in the Mi had put paid to that. Lydia Startright from the Toad News Network had arrived and was recording for the lunch-time bulletin. She stood outside the steps of Haworth House with a microphone and composed herself before beginning. She signalled to her cameraman to roll, adopted one of her most serious expressions, and began.
   ‘…As the sun rose over Haworth House this morning the police began to investigate a bold theft and double murder. Some time last night a security guard was shot dead by an unknown assailant as he attempted to stop him stealing the original manuscript ofJane Eyre. Police have been at the crime scene since early morning and have as yet given no comment. It is fairly certain that parallels must be drawn with the theft of the Martin Chuzzlewit manuscript which, despite continued police and SpecOps efforts, has so far not come to light. Following Mr Quaverley’s extraction and murder, it can only be surmised that a similar fate is in store for Rochester or Jane. The Goliath Corporation, whose presence this morning was an unusual development, have no comment to make—as usual.’
   ‘And—cut! That was very good, darling,’ declared Lydia’s producer. ‘Can we do it once more without the reference to Goliath? You know they’ll only cut it out!’
   ‘Then let them.’
   ‘Lyds, baby—! Who pays the bills? I like free speech as much as the next man, but on someone else’s airtime, hmm?’
   She ignored him and looked around as a car arrived. Her face lit up and she walked briskly across, gesturing for her cameraman to follow.
   A lean officer of about forty with silver hair and bags under his eyes looked to heaven as she approached, cracking his unfriendly face into a smile. He waited patiently for her to make a brief introduction.
   ‘I have with me Detective Inspector Oswald Mandias, Yorkshire CID. Tell me, Inspector, do you think this crime is in any way connected to the Chuzzlewit theft?’
   He smiled benignly, fully aware that he would be on thirty million television screens by the evening.
   ‘It’s far too early to say anything; a full press release will be issued in due course.’
   ‘Isn’t this a case for the Yorkshire LiteraTecs, sir? Jane Eyre is one of this county’s most valued treasures.’
   Mandias stopped to face her.
   ‘Unlike other SpecOps departments, the Yorkshire LiteraTecs rely on evidence supplied by the regular police. LiteraTecs are not police and have no place in a police environment.’
   ‘Why do you suppose the Goliath Corporation made an appearance this morning?’
   ‘No more questions!’ called out Mandias’s deputy as a throng of other news crews started to converge. Goliath had been and gone but no one was going to learn any more about it. The police pushed their way past and Lydia stopped to have a snack; she had been reporting live since before breakfast. A few minutes later Bowden and I drove up in the Speedster.
   ‘Well, well,’ I muttered as I got out of the car, ‘Startright keeps herself busy. Morning, Lyds!’
   Lydia almost choked on her SmileyBurger and quickly threw it aside. She picked up her microphone and chased after me.
   ‘Although the Yorkshire LiteraTecs and Goliath are claimed not to be present,’ muttered Lydia as she tried to keep up, ‘events have taken an interesting turn with the arrival of Thursday Next of SO-27. In a departure from normal procedure, the LiteraTecs have come out from behind their desks and are visiting the crime scene in person.’
   I stopped to have some fun. Lydia composed herself and started the interview.
   ‘Miss Next, tell me, what are you doing so far out of your jurisdiction?’
   ‘Hi, Lydia. You have mayonnaise on your upper lip from that SmileyBurger. It has a lot of salt in it and you really shouldn’t eat them. As for the case, I’m afraid it’s the same old shit: “You will understand that anything we may discover will have to remain a blah-de-blah-de-blah.” How’s that?’
   Lydia hid a smile.
   ‘Do you think the two thefts are linked?’
   ‘My brother Joffy is a big fan of yours, Lyds; can you let me have a signed picture? “Joffy” with two Fs. Excuse me.’
   ‘Thanks for nothing, Thursday!’ called out Startright. ‘I’ll be seeing you!’
   We walked up to the police line and showed our IDs to the constable on duty. He looked at the badges, then at the two of us. We could see he was not impressed. He spoke to Mandias.
   ‘Sir, these two Wessex LiteraTecs want to get at the crime scene.’
   Mandias ambled over painfully slowly. He looked us both up and down and chose his words with care.
   ‘Here in Yorkshire LiteraTecs don’t leave their desks.’
   ‘I’ve read the arrest reports. It shows,’ I replied coldly.
   Mandias sighed. Keeping what he described as eggheads in check, especially those from another SpecOps region, was obviously not something he was keen to do.
   ‘I have two murders on my hands here and I don’t want the crime scene disturbed. Why don’t you wait until you get the report and then take your investigation from there?’
   ‘The murders are tragic, obviously,’ I replied, ‘but Jane Eyre is the thing here. It is imperative that we get to see the crime scene. Jane Eyre is bigger than me and bigger than you. If you refuse I’ll send a report to your superior officer complaining of your conduct.’
   But Mandias was not a man to listen to threats, idle or otherwise. This was Yorkshire, after all. He stared at me and said softly:
   ‘Do your worst, pen-pusher.’
   I took a step forward and he bridled slightly; he wasn’t going to give way. A nearby officer moved in behind him to give assistance if needed.
   I was about to lose my temper when Bowden spoke up.
   ‘Sir,’ he began, ‘if we could move slowly towards a goal we might be able to burrow our way out of the predicament we find ourselves shuffling into.’
   Mandias’s attitude abruptly changed and he smiled solemnly.
   ‘If that is the case, I am sure we could manage a quick look for you—as long as you promise not to touch anything.’
   ‘On my word,’ replied Bowden pointedly, patting his stomach. The two of them shook hands and winked and we were soon escorted into the museum.
   ‘How the hell did you do that?’ I hissed.
   ‘Look at his ring.’
   I looked. He had a large ring on his middle finger with a curious and distinctive pattern on it.
   ‘What of it?’

   ‘The Most Worshipful Brotherhood of the Wombat.’
   I smiled.
   ‘So what have we got?’ I asked. ‘A double murder and a missing script? They just took the manuscript, right? Nothing else?’
   ‘Right,’ replied Mandias.
   ‘And the guard was shot with his own gun?’
   Mandias stopped and looked sternly at me. ‘How did you know that?’
   ‘A lucky guess,’ I replied evenly. ‘What about the videotapes?’
   ‘We’re studying them at the moment.’
   ‘There’s no one on them, is there?’
   Mandias looked at me curiously. ‘Do you know who did this?’
   I followed him into the room that once held the manuscript. The untouched glass case was sitting forlornly in the middle of the floor. I ran my fingertips across a mottled and uneven patch on the glass.
   ‘Thanks, Mandias, you’re a star,’ I said, walking back out. Bowden and Mandias looked at one another and hastened after me.
   ‘That’s it?’ said Mandias. ‘That’s your investigation?’
   ‘I’ve seen all I need to see.’
   ‘Can you give me anything?’ asked Mandias, trotting to keep up. He looked at Bowden. ‘Brother, you can tell me.’
   ‘We should tell the DI what we know, Thursday. We owe him for allowing us in.’
   I stopped so suddenly Mandias almost bumped into me.
   ‘Ever hear of a man named Hades?’
   Mandias went visibly pale and looked around nervously.
   ‘Don’t worry; he’s long gone.’
   ‘They say he died in Venezuela.’
   ‘They say he can walk through walls,’ I countered. ‘They also say he gives off colours when he moves. Hades is alive and well and I have to find, him before he starts to make use of the manuscript.’
   Mandias seemed to have undergone a humbling change as soon as he realised who was behind it all.
   ‘Anything I can do?’
   I paused for a moment.
   ‘Pray you never meet him.’
   The drive back to Swindon was uneventful, the area on the Mi where all the trouble had been now back to normal. Victor was waiting for us in the office; he seemed slightly agitated.
   ‘I’ve had Braxton on the phone all morning bleating on about insurance cover being inoperative if his officers act outside their jurisdiction.’
   ‘Same old shit.’
   ‘That’s what I told him. I’ve got most of the office reading Jane Eyre at the moment in case anything unusual happens—all quiet so far.’
   ‘It’s only a matter of time.’
   ‘Hmm.’
   ‘Mьller mentioned Hades being at Penderyn somewhere,’ I said to Victor. ‘Anything come of that?’
   ‘Nothing that I know of. Schitt said he had looked into it and drawn a blank—there are over three hundred possible Penderyns that Mьller might have meant. More worrying, have you seen this morning’s paper?’
   I hadn’t. He showed me the inside front page of The Mole. It read:

TROOP MOVEMENTS NEAR WELSH BORDER

   I read on with some alarm. Apparently there had been troop movements near Hereford, Chepstow and the disputed border town of Oswestry. A military spokesman had dismissed the manoeuvres as simple ‘exercises’, but it didn’t sound good at all. Not at all. I turned to Victor.
   ‘Jack Schitt? Do you think he wants the Prose Portal badly enough to go to war with Wales?’
   ‘Who knows what power the Goliath Corporation wields. He might not be behind this at all. It could be coincidence or just sabre-rattling; but in any event I don’t think we can ignore it.’
   ‘Then we need to steal a march. Any ideas?’
   ‘What did Mьller say again?’ asked Finisterre.
   I sat down.
   ‘He screamed: “He’s at Penderyn”; nothing else.’
   ‘Nothing else?’ asked Bowden.
   ‘No; when Schitt asked him which Penderyn he meant, as there must be hundreds, Mьller told him to guess.’
   Bowden spoke up.
   ‘What were his precise words?’
   ‘He said “Guess”, then repeated it but it turned into a yell—he was in grave pain at the time. The conversation was recorded but there is about as much chance as getting hold of that as—‘
   ‘Maybe he meant something else.’
   ‘Like what, Bowden?’
   ‘I really only speak tourist Welsh but “Gwesty” means hotel.’
   ‘Oh my God,’ said Victor.
   ‘Victor?’ I queried, but he was busy rummaging in a large pile of maps we had accumulated; each of them had a Penderyn of some sort marked on it. He spread a large street plan of Merthyr Tydfil out on the table and pointed at a place just between the Palace of Justice and Government House. We craned to see where his finger was pointing but the location was unmarked.
   ‘The Penderyn Hotel,’ announced Victor grimly. ‘I spent my honeymoon there. Once the equal of the Adelphi or Raffles, it’s been empty since the sixties. If I wanted a safe haven—‘
   ‘He’s there,’ I announced, looking at the map of the Welsh capital city uneasily. ‘That’s where we’ll find him.’
   ‘And how do you suppose we’ll manage to enter Wales undetected, make our way into a heavily guarded area, snatch Mycroft and the manuscript and get out in one piece?’ asked Bowden. ‘It takes a month to even get a visa!’
   ‘We’ll find a way in,’ I said slowly.
   ‘You’re crazy!’ said Victor. ‘Braxton would never allow it!’
   ‘That’s where you come in.’
   ‘Me? Braxton doesn’t listen to me.’
   ‘I think he’s about to start.’

29. Jane Eyre

   ‘Jane Eyre was published in 1847 under the pseudonym Currer Bell, a suitably neuter name that disguised Charlotte Bronte’s sex. It was a great success; William Thackeray described the novel as “The master work of a great genius”. Not that the book was without its critics: G. H. Lewes suggested that Charlotte should study Austen’s work and “correct her shortcomings in the light of that great artist’s practice”. Charlotte replied that Miss Austen’s work was barely—in the light of what she wanted to do—a novel at all. She referred to it as “a highly cultivated garden with no open country”. The jury is still out.’

W.H.H.F. Renouf. The Brontes


   Hobbes shook his head in the relative unfamiliarity of the corridors of Rochester’s home, Thornfield Hall. It was night and a deathly hush had descended on the house. The corridor was dark and he fumbled for his torch. A glimmer of orange light stabbed the darkness as he walked slowly along the upstairs hall. Ahead of him he could see a door which was slightly ajar, through which showed a thin glimmer of candlelight. He paused by the door and peered around the corner. Within he could see a woman dressed in tatters and with wild unkempt hair pouring oil from a lantern on to the covers under which Rochester lay asleep. Hobbes got his bearings; he knew that Jane would soon be in to put out the fire, but from which door he had no way of knowing. He turned back into the corridor and nearly leaped out of his skin as he came face to face with a large, florid-looking woman. She smelled strongly of drink, had an aggressive countenance and glared at him with thinly disguised contempt. They stood staring at each other for some moments, Hobbes wondering what to do and the woman wavering slightly, her eyes never leaving his. Hobbes panicked and went for his gun, but with wholly unlikely speed the woman caught his arm and held it pinched so tightly that it was all he could do to stop yelling out in pain.
   ‘What are you doing here?’ she hissed, one eyebrow twitching.
   ‘Who in Christ’s name are you?’ asked Hobbes.
   She smacked him hard across the face; he staggered before recovering.
   ‘My name is Grace Poole,’ said Grace Poole. ‘In service I might be, but you have no right to utter the Lord’s name in vain. I can see by your attire that you do not belong here. What do you want?’
   ‘I’m, um, with Mr Mason,’ he stammered.
   ‘Rubbish,’ she replied, staring at him dangerously.
   ‘I want Jane Eyre,’ he stammered.
   ‘So does Mr Rochester,’ she replied in a matter-of-fact tone. ‘But he doesn’t even kiss her until page one hundred and eighty-one.’
   Hobbes glanced inside the room. The madwoman was now dancing around, smiling and cackling as the flames grew higher on Rochester’s bed.
   ‘If she doesn’t arrive soon, there won’t be a page one hundred and eighty-one.’
   Grace Poole caught his eye again and fixed him with a baleful glare.
   ‘She will save him as she has before thousands of times, as she will again thousands of times. It is the way of things here.’
   ‘Yeah?’ replied Hobbes. ‘Well, things just might change.’
   At that moment the madwoman rushed out of the room and into Hobbes with her fingernails outstretched. With a maniacal laugh that made his ears pop she lunged at him and pressed her uncut and ragged nails into both his cheeks. He yelled out in pain as Grace Poole wrestled Mrs Rochester into a half nelson and frogmarched her to the attic. As Grace got to the door she turned to Hobbes and spoke again.
   ‘Just remember: it is the way of things here.’
   ‘Aren’t you going to try and stop me?’ asked Hobbes in a puzzled tone.
   ‘I take poor Mrs Rochester upstairs now,’ she replied. ‘It is written.’
   The door closed behind her as a voice shouting ‘Wake, wake!’ brought Hobbes’s attention back to the blazing room. Within he could see the night-robed Jane throwing a jug of water over the recumbent form of Rochester. Hobbes waited until the fire was out before stepping into the room, drawing his gun as he did so. They both looked up, the ‘elves of Christendom’ line dying on Rochester’s lips.
   ‘Who are you?’ they asked, together.
   ‘Believe me, you couldn’t possibly begin to understand.’
   Hobbes took Jane by the arm and dragged her back towards the corridor.
   ‘Edward! My Edward!’ implored Jane, her arms outstretched to Rochester. ‘I won’t leave you, my love!’
   ‘Wait a minute,’ said Hobbes, still backing away, ‘you guys haven’t fallen in love yet!’
   ‘In that you would be mistaken,’ murmured Rochester, pulling out a percussion pistol from beneath his pillow. ‘I have suspected something like this might happen for some time.’ He aimed at Hobbes and fired in a single quick movement. He missed, the large lead ball burying itself in the door frame. Hobbes fired back a warning shot; Hades had expressly forbidden anyone in the novel to be hurt. Rochester pulled a second pistol after the first and cocked it.
   ‘Let her go,’ he announced, his jaw set, his dark hair falling into his eyes.
   Hobbes pulled Jane in front of him.
   ‘Don’t be a fool, Rochester! If all goes well Jane will be returned to you forthwith; you won’t even know she has gone!’
   Hobbes backed down the hall towards where the portal was due to open as he spoke. Rochester followed, gun outstretched, his heart heavy as his one and only true love was dragged unceremoniously from the novel to that place, that other place, where he and Jane could never enjoy the life they enjoyed at Thornfield. Hobbes and Jane vanished back through the portal, which closed abruptly after them. Rochester put up his gun and glowered.
   A few moments later Hobbes and a very confused Jane Eyre had fallen back through the Prose Portal and into the dilapidated smoking lounge of the old Penderyn Hotel.
   Acheron stepped forward and helped Jane up. He offered her his coat to warm herself. After Thornfield Hall the hotel was decidedly draughty.
   ‘Miss Eyre—!’ announced Hades kindly. ‘My name is Hades, Acheron Hades. You are my respected guest; please take a seat and compose yourself
   ‘Edward—?’
   ‘Quite well, my young friend. Come, let me take you to a warmer part of the hotel.’
   ‘Will I see my Edward again?’
   Hades smiled.
   ‘It rather depends on how valuable people think you are.’