‘Hello, Sweetpea!’ he said, walking up to me out of the shadows. ‘Am I disturbing anything?’
‘Most definitely—yes.’
‘I won’t be long, then. What do you make of this?’
He handed me a yellow curved thing about the size of a large carrot.
‘What is it?’ I asked, smelling it cautiously.
‘It’s the fruit of a new plant designed completely from scratch seventy years from now. Look—‘
He peeled the skin off and let me taste it.
‘Good, eh? You can pick it well before ripe, transport it thousands of miles if necessary and it will keep fresh in its own hermetically sealed biodegradable packaging. Nutritious and tasty, too. It was sequenced by a brilliant engineer named Anna Bannon. We’re a bit lost as to what to call it. Any ideas?’
‘I’m sure you’ll think of something. What are you going to do with it?’
‘I thought I’d introduce it somewhere in the tenth millennium before the present one and see how it goes—food for mankind, that sort of thing. Well, time waits for no man, as we say. I’ll let you get back to Landen.’
The world flickered and started up again. Landen opened his eyes and stared at me.
‘Banana,’ I said, suddenly realising what it was that my father had shown me.
‘Pardon?’
‘Banana. They named it after the designer.’
‘Thursday, you’re making no sense at all,’ said Landen with a bemused grin.
‘My dad was just here.’
‘Ah. Is he still of all time?’
‘Still the same. Listen, I’m sorry about what happened.’
‘Me too,’ replied Landen, then lapsed into silence. I wanted to touch his face but I said instead:
‘I missed you.’
It was the wrong thing to say and I cursed myself; too much, too soon. Landen shuffled uneasily.
‘You should take aim more carefully. I missed you a lot, too. The first year was the worst.’
Landen paused for a moment. He played a few notes on the piano and then said: ‘I have a life and I like it here. Sometimes I think that Thursday Next was just a character from one of my novels, someone I made up in the image of the woman I wanted to love. Now… well, I’m over it.’
It wasn’t
‘But you came to find me.’
Landen smiled at me. ‘You’re in my town, Thurs. When a friend comes in from out of town, you look them up. Isn’t that how it’s supposed to work?’
‘And you buy them flowers? Does Colonel Phelps get roses too?’
‘No, he gets lilies. Old habits die hard.’
‘I see. You’ve been doing well for yourself
‘Thanks,’ he replied. ‘You never answered my letters.’
‘I never
‘Are you married?’
‘I can’t see that’s any of your business.’
‘I’ll take that as a no.’
The conversation had taken a turn for the worse. It was time to bale out. ‘Listen, I’m bushed, Landen. I have a very big day ahead of me.’
I got up. Landen limped after me. He had lost a leg in the Crimea but he was well used to it by now. He caught up with me at the bar.
‘Dinner one night?’
I turned to face him. ‘Sure.’
‘Tuesday?’
‘Why not?’
‘Good,’ said Landen, rubbing his hands. ‘We could get the old unit back together—‘
This wasn’t what I had in mind. ‘Hang on. Tuesday’s not very good after all.’
‘Why not? It was fine three seconds ago. Has your dad been round again?’
‘No, I just have a lot of things that I have to do and Pickwick needs kennelling and I have to pick him up at the station as airships make him nervous. You remember the time we took him up to Mull and he vomited all over the steward?’
I checked myself. I was starting to blabber like an idiot.
‘And don’t tell me,’ added Landen, ‘you have to wash your hair?’
‘Very funny.’
‘What work are you doing in Swindon anyway?’ asked Landen.
‘I wash up at SmileyBurger.’
‘Sure you do. SpecOps?’
I nodded my head. ‘I joined Swindon’s LiteraTec unit.’
‘Permanently?’ he asked. ‘I mean, you’ve come back to Swindon for good?’
‘I don’t know.’
I placed my hand on his. I wanted to hug him and burst into tears and tell him I loved him and would
‘Are
‘No.’
‘Never thought about it?’
‘I thought about it a lot.’
We both lapsed into silence. There was so much to say that neither of us could think of any way to start. Landen opened a second front: ‘Want to see
‘Is it still running?’
‘Of course.’
‘I’m tempted but the fact remains I don’t know when I will be free. Things are… volatile at present.’
I could see he didn’t believe me. I couldn’t really tell him I was on the trail of a master criminal who could steal thoughts and project images at will; who was invisible on film and could murder and laugh as he did so. Landen sighed, dug out a calling card and placed it on the counter.
‘Call me. Whenever you’re free. Promise?’
‘Promise.’
He kissed me on the cheek, finished his drink, looked at me again and limped out of the bar. I was left looking at his calling card. I didn’t pick it up. I didn’t need to. The number was the one I remembered.
My room was exactly like all the other rooms in the hotel. The pictures were screwed to the walls and the drinks in the mini-bar had been opened, drunk, then resealed with water or cold tea by travelling reps too mean to pay for them. The room faced north; I could just see the airship field. A large forty-seater was moored on the mast, its silver flanks floodlit in the dark night. The small dirigible that had brought me in had continued on to Salisbury; I briefly thought about catching it again when it called on its return the day after tomorrow. I turned on the television just in time to catch
