Maskerade

“Amazing,” said Agnes, glumly. “And it's not as if you've even sung. Er. Who's it from?”

“He didn't say, of course!! It has to be a secret admirer!! He'll probably want to send me flowers and drink champagne out of my shoe!!”

“Really?” Agnes made a face. “Do people do that?”

“It's traditional!!”

Christine, boiling over with cheerfulness, had some to share…

“You do look very tired!” she said. Her hand went to her mouth. “Oh!! We swapped rooms, didn't we!! I was so silly!! And, d'you know,” she added with that look of half-empty cunning that was the nearest she came to guile, “I could have sworn I heard singing in the night… someone trying scales and things?!”

Agnes had been brought up to tell the truth. She knew she should say: ‘I'm sorry, I appear to have got your life by mistake. There seems to have been a bit of a confusion…’

But, she decided, she'd also been brought up to do what she was told, not to put herself first, to be respectful to her elders and to use no swearword stronger than 'poot'.

She could borrow a more interesting future. Just for a night or two. She could give it up any time she liked.

“You know, that's funny,” she said, “because I'm right next door to you and I didn't.”

“Oh?! Well, that's all right, then!!”

Agnes stared at the tiny meal on Christine's tray. “Is that all you're having for breakfast?”

“Oh, yes! I can just blow up like a balloon, dear!! It's lucky for you, you can eat anything!! Don't forget it's practice in half an hour!”

And she skipped off.

She's got a head full of air, Agnes thought. I'm sure she doesn't mean to say anything hurtful.

But, deep inside her, Perdita X Dream thought a rude word.

Mrs Plinge took her broom out of the cleaning cupboard, and turned.

“Walter!”

Her voice echoed around the empty stage.

“Walter?”

She tapped the broom?handle warily. Walter had a routine. It had taken her years to train him into it. It wasn't like him not to be in the right place at the right time.

She shook her head, and started work. She could see it'd be a mop job later. It would probably be ages before they got rid of the smell of turpentine.

Someone came walking across the stage. They were whistling.

Mrs Plinge was shocked.

“Mr Pounder!”

The Opera House's professional ratcatcher stopped, and lowered his struggling sack. Mr Pounder wore an old opera hat to show that he was a cut above your normal rodent operative, and its brim was thick with wax and the old candle ends he used to light his way through the darker cellars.

He'd worked among the rats so long that there was something rat?like about him now. His face seemed to be merely a rearward extension of his nose. His moustache was bristly. His front teeth were prominent. People found themselves looking for his tail.

“What's that, Mrs Plinge?”

“You know you mustn't whistle on stage! That's terrible bad luck!”

“Ah, well, it's 'cos of good luck, Mrs Plinge. Oh, yes! If you did know what I d'know, you'd be a happy man, too. O' course, in your case you'd be a happy woman, on account of you being a woman. Ah! Some of the things I've seen, Mrs Plinge!”

“Found gold down there, Mr Pounder?”

Mrs Plinge knelt down carefully to scrape away a spot of paint.

Mr Pounder picked up his sack and continued on his way.

“Could be gold, Mrs Plinge. Ah. Could very well be gold—”

It took a moment for Mrs Plinge to coax her arthritic knees into letting her stand up and shuffle around.

“Pardon, Mr Pounder?” she said.

Somewhere in the distance, there was a soft thump as a bundle of sandbags landed gently on the boards.

The stage was big and bare and empty, except for a sack which was scuttling determinedly for freedom.

Mrs Plinge looked both ways very carefully.

“Mr Pounder? Are you there?”

It suddenly seemed to her that the stage was even bigger and even more distinctly empty than before.

“Mr Pounder? Cooo?eee?”

She craned around.

“Hello? Mr Pounder?”

Something floated down from above and landed beside her.

It was a grubby black hat, with candle ends around the brim.

She looked up.

“Mr Pounder?” she said.

Mr Pounder was used to darkness. It held no fears for him. And he'd always prided himself on his night vision. If there was any light at all, any speck, any glimmer of phosphorescent rot, he could make use of it. His candled hat was as much for show as anything else.

His candled hat… he'd thought he'd lost it but, it was strange, here it was, still on his head. Yes, indeed. He rubbed his throat thoughtfully. There was something important he couldn't quite remember…

It was very dark.

SQUEAK?

He looked up.

Standing in the air, at eye?level, was a robed figure about six inches high. A bony nose, with bent grey whiskers, protruded from the hood. Tiny skeletal fingers gripped a very small scythe.

Mr Pounder nodded thoughtfully to himself. You didn't rise to membership of the Inner Circle of the Guild of Ratcatchers without hearing a few whispered rumours. Rats had their own Death, they said, as well as their own kings, parliaments and nations. No human had ever seen it, though.

Up until now.

He felt honoured. He'd won the Golden Mallet for most rats caught every year for the past five years, but he respected them, as a soldier might respect a cunning and valiant enemy.

“Er… I'm dead, aren't I…?”

SQUEAK.

Mr Pounder felt that many eyes were watching him. Many small, shining eyes.

“And… what happens now?”

SQUEAK.

The soul of Mr Pounder looked at his hands. They seemed to be elongating, and getting hairier. He could feel his ears growing, and a certain rather embarrassing elongation happening at the base of his spine. He'd spent most of his life in a single?minded activity in dark places, yet even so…

“But I don't believe in reincarnation!” he protested.

SQUEAK.

And this, Mr Pounder understood with absolute rodent clarity, meant: reincarnation believes in you.