Jasper Fforde
The big over easy
Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall,
Humpty Dumpty had a great fall;
All the king’s horses
And all the king’s men
Couldn’t put Humpty together again.
1. Mary Mary
If Queen Anne hadn’t suffered so badly from gout and dropsy, Reading might never have developed at all. In 1702 the unhealthy Queen Anne, looking for a place to ease her royal infirmities, chanced upon Bath; and where royalty goes, so too does society. In consequence, Reading, up until that time a small town on a smaller tributary of the Thames, became a busy staging post on the Bath road, later to become the A4, and ultimately the M4. The town was enriched by the wool trade and later played host to several large firms that were to become household names. By the time Huntley & Palmers biscuits began here in 1822, Simonds brewery was already well established; and when Suttons Seeds began in 1835 and Spongg’s footcare in 1853, the town’s prosperity was assured.
It was the week following Easter in Reading, and no one could remember the last sunny day. Gray clouds swept across the sky, borne on a chill wind that cut like a knife. It seemed that spring had forsaken the town. The drab winter weather had clung to the town like a heavy smog, refusing to relinquish the season. Even the early bloomers were in denial. Only the bravest crocuses had graced the municipal park, and the daffodils, usually a welcome splash of color after a winter of grayness, had taken one sniff at the cold, damp air and postponed blooming for another year.
A police officer was gazing with mixed emotions at the dreary cityscape from the seventh floor of Reading Central Police Station. She was thirty and attractive, dressed up and dated down, worked hard and felt awkward near anyone she didn’t know. Her name was Mary.
“Mary?” said an officer who was carrying a large potted plant in the manner of someone who thinks it is well outside his job description. “Superintendent Briggs will see you now. How often do you water these things?”
“That one?” replied Mary without emotion. “Never. It’s plastic.”
“I’m a policeman,” he said unhappily, “not a sodding gardener.”
And he walked off, mumbling darkly to himself.
She turned from the window, approached Briggs’s closed door and paused. She gathered her thoughts, took a deep breath and stood up straight. Reading wouldn’t have been everyone’s choice for a transfer, but for Mary, Reading had one thing that no other city possessed: DCI Friedland Chymes. He was a veritable powerhouse of a sleuth whose career was a catalog of inspired police work, and his unparalleled detection skills had filled the newspaper columns for over two decades. Chymes was the reason Mary had joined the police force in the first place. Ever since her father had bought her a subscription to
“Hmm,” murmured Superintendent Briggs, eyeing Mary’s job application carefully as she sat uncomfortably on a plastic chair in an office that was empty apart from a desk, two chairs, them — and a trombone lying on a tattered chaise longue.
“Your application is mostly very good, Mary,” he said approvingly. “I see you were with Detective Inspector Hebden Flowwe. How did that go?”
It hadn’t gone very well at all, but she didn’t think she’d say so.
“We had a fairly good clear-up rate, sir.”
“I’ve no doubt you did. But more important, anything published?”
It was a question that was asked more and more in front of promotion boards and transfer interviews and listed in performance reports. It wasn’t enough to be a conscientious and invaluable assistant to one’s allotted inspector — you had to be able to write up a readable account for the magazines that the public loved to read. Preferably
“Only one story in print, sir. But I was the youngest officer at Basingstoke to make detective sergeant and have two commendations for brav — ”
“The thing is,” interrupted Briggs, “is that the Oxford and Berkshire Constabulary prides itself on producing some of the most readable detectives in the country.” He walked over to the window and looked out at the rain striking the glass. “Modern policing isn’t just about catching criminals, Mary. It’s about good copy and ensuring that cases can be made into top-notch documentaries on the telly. Public approval is the all-important currency these days, and police budgets ebb and flow on the back of circulation and viewing figures.”
“Yes, sir.”
“DS Flotsam’s work penning Friedland Chymes’s adventures is the benchmark to which you should try to aspire, Mary. Selling the movie rights to
“Yes, sir. A two-parter in
He nodded his approval.
“Well, that’s impressive. Prime-time dramatization?”
“No, sir. Documentary on MoleCable-62.”
His face fell. Clearly, at Reading they expected better things. Briggs sat down and looked at her record again.
“Now, it says here one reprimand: You struck Detective Inspector Flowwe with an onyx ashtray. Why was that?”
“The table lamp was too heavy,” she replied, truthfully enough, “and if I’d used a chair, it might have killed
