‘Have you heard from anyone who’s come home? I mean, recently?’ Serendipity asked.
‘Not a word. The writers I know aren’t writing. Or else they’re missing.’ Blake sat down in the big red chair and clasped his hands together. ‘I could go. I really could go. I mean, Tuesday might need help.’
‘No, Blake, it’s too risky.’
‘If I don’t, and she doesn’t come back, you might go to jail.’
‘I might,’ said Serendipity. ‘But that would all take months and she’s sure to be home by then.’
‘How are you going to explain it when she does come back?’
‘Well, I could tell them that she ran away to work on a novel at the home of her friend, Blake Luckhurst?’
Blake grinned a little ruefully. ‘Okay … then why didn’t I alert the police?’
‘Because she was hiding in your attic and stealing food from the kitchen by night, obviously.’
‘And Baxterr?’
‘Same.’
‘Agog,’ he said.
‘What?’ asked Serendipity.
‘I remembered it before you came into the room. It was the word Miss Digby was looking for in the crossword at the television station that night. I asked her what the clue was and she said “highly excited, in a state of anticipation”.’
‘And you said “agog”?’ asked Serendipity.
‘Yes,’ said Blake. ‘So she knows – Miss Digby, I mean? Where Tuesday is.’
‘No. I think she would be agog if we were to tell her.’
‘You know, I always wondered,’ said Blake nodding, ‘how Tuesday got to be with the characters in your world.’
‘Oh, yes,’ said Serendipity. ‘That was unexpected, wasn’t it? Of course she helped me make so much of it up. She was always telling me what Vivienne would say and do. I’m very fond of both my capable girls.’
‘Yeah,’ said Blake. ‘They’re all right.’
‘Blake,’ said Serendipity, trying not to smile, ‘right now, I have simply got to get some sleep. Let’s go find something for you to eat, and then you can decide if you’re going to go home, or if you’d like to stay here until Tuesday gets back.’
‘I think I’d like to stay, if it’s okay with you,’ said Blake.
‘Of course,’ said Serendipity. ‘I’ll have Miss Digby make up a bed.’
They descended the stairs together.
Miss Digby came out of the kitchen to meet them.
‘Miss Digby,’ said Serendipity, ‘Blake understands everything. He’ll be staying with us for a few days. Perhaps until Tuesday gets home.’
‘What does he understand exactly?’ Miss Digby asked, giving them both a piercing glance. ‘Am I right in assuming that you two know where Tuesday is?’
‘I’m so sorry, Miss Digby,’ said Serendipity helplessly. ‘I wanted to …’
‘Some kind of writer’s code, between the two of you?’ asked Miss Digby.
‘Kind of,’ said Blake.
‘Well, it’s complicated. You see—’ said Serendipity.
‘No, no. You need neither explain nor apologise. I appreciate a good secret.’ She sighed. ‘If you had told me there was nothing to worry about, we might have saved ourselves a lot of trouble with the police. So when is she coming home?’
‘We don’t know. When she’s ready,’ said Serendipity.
‘Well, we’re stuck with all this now. Best make the most of it. Maybe one of you can use it in a story one day.’
‘Agog,’ said Blake. ‘I am agog, Miss Digby.’
Miss Digby smiled. ‘Ah, yes. That’s very good, Blake. You have quite a memory. But once Tuesday is home again, there are some things that you will have to forget.’
‘I’m not sure what you mean,’ said Blake politely.
‘If you ever, I mean ever, give any indication that Serendipity Smith is anyone other than Serendipity Smith, or that any member of this family is anything other than exactly who the world currently believes them to be, then I will personally ensure you die a long and painful death.’
‘Miss Digby! I think that’s going a bit far,’ said Serendipity.
‘On the contrary,’ said Miss Digby, in her sternest tone. ‘I think that’s exactly the sort of language Blake Luckhurst understands. Am I right?’
‘Yes, Miss Digby,’ mumbled Blake.
‘What did you say?’ barked Miss Digby.
‘I swear I will faithfully keep the secrets of this family forever, and never reveal them to anyone even under pain of death,’ said Blake.
Miss Digby smiled. She offered her hand to Blake, who also shook hands with Serendipity.
‘You are an incredible woman, Miss Digby,’ said Serendipity.
‘It takes one to know one,’ said Miss Digby mildly.
Chapter Eighteen
Every day for three weeks, vercaka came to the City of Clocks at sunrise, perching on the city’s spires and crying out in their ugly voices to the people below.
‘Your wife doesn’t love you.’
‘Your neighbour is going to burn your house down.’
‘Your parents are not your parents.’
‘Your daughter is stealing your money.’
‘Everybody knows how ugly you really are.’
Their words unleashed chaos. Secrets that had long been buried were unearthed. Husbands confronted wives, neighbours feuded, children cried, cats fought, and the dreadful birds watched on, enjoying it all.
Each day there were more vercaka, and every day the people of the city became more terrified. Most people kept to their houses until noon, when the birds rose suddenly from the spires in a great mass of tattered white, and flew south to terrorise other townships up the Mabanquo River.
The smell the vercaka left behind was appalling, as was the green and mustard-coloured poo all over the clock faces and spires. The vercaka took things too. Every morning they snatched away humans and cats alike, carrying them off into the sky, the sounds of screaming and howling lingering long after they were out of sight. Those who were taken did not come back.
For three weeks, Vivienne and Baxterr searched the city for a door that would lead to the Gardener, leaving no park or garden unexplored. Vivienne questioned everyone she found with a lawn, or a fence lined with roses, or fruit trees bending their boughs to the street. She interrogated every city official responsible for the extensive parks and gardens across the city. Baxterr sniffed at window boxes, at pot plants and even the grassy strips between footpaths and roads. Vivienne must have asked a thousand people if they knew the Gardener, or if they had seen someone called the Gardener, or perhaps noticed a door that had something strange about it.
‘In what way, strange?’ the people would ask. Vivienne couldn’t tell them. We’ll know it when we see it, Tuesday had said, and that was all Vivienne knew.
By the third week of searching, Vivienne was losing hope. And although Baxterr followed her wherever she went, loyally searching beside her, it was clear that his heart was as heavy as his paws. The city, too, was thick with sadness and fear. This most beautiful of cities, home to long boulevards of towering trees, wide streetscapes with flowerbeds and fountains, was under attack. And for the first time in history, some of the city’s clocks stopped, their workings seized up and ruined by sludgy vercaka droppings.
Vivienne had begun searching beyond the boundaries of the city. On this particular afternoon, she had made her way down to the Mabanquo River, checking every door in every house along the way. By the long pier, she came across a small crowd examining a dead vercaka. Its feet were turned up and it resembled a giant ugly chicken. One woman, a fish merchant, was loudly describing the vercaka attack.
‘I swear I thought I was dead,’ she was saying. ‘I mean, it came at me, snapping its jaws, waving its wings.’
‘So what did you do?’ someone in the crowd asked.
‘Well, it was the darndest thing. It started scooping up all my fish. Guzzling them off my table and I was so cross, I threw my coi
n box at it. And blimey, if the bird didn’t fall down dead.’
‘You mean you killed it with a lump of wood?’
‘I know it’s strange,’ the woman said, ‘but that’s what happened. The box burst right open when it hit the bird, coins flying everywhere, and I was thinking how stupid I’d been, that not only was I going to lose all my fish, but I’d thrown away all my money as well. Then it keeled over.’
Once the crowd had dispersed, Vivienne spoke to the woman, asking her to tell the story one more time. She asked her several more questions, and then she turned back towards the city, Baxterr at her heels. At the Mayor’s house, she came across Harlequin, newly returned from her latest expedition far to the north, or south, or east, or west, seeking the rivers that might contain the poison they needed to kill the vercaka. And there Vivienne related all she had heard from the fisherwoman.
The following morning, very early, Harlequin and Vivienne did something very dangerous. They set about trying to catch a vercaka.
Some people, when they are frightened, get very vague and forget what they are doing. Other people get very cold and require blankets and cups of tea. But the most useful of people, when faced with extreme fear, become very focused. And this is what happened to Miranda Templeton, the Mayor of the City of Clocks. For three weeks she had been meeting daily with the Council of Wisdom in an attempt to agree on a battle strategy to fight the vercaka and rid the town of their ugly and terrifying presence.
The meetings had faced problems since the first day, for on the Council of Wisdom was a man called Nigel Finkwatter. Some years earlier, Finkwatter had wanted to be Mayor, but had not received sufficient votes, and had therefore devoted his energies to making Miranda Templeton’s life as difficult as possible. As a sign of dissent, he stopped wearing hats and instead went about with his mane of long white hair curled and coiffed into towering arrangements.
On this day, Finkwatter was again objecting to Tarquin’s presence at the meeting.
‘He talks with his mouth and inside one’s head,’ Finkwatter had said, ‘which as everyone knows is not normal, but a trick of mind! He, and that other one who came with him, should not be welcomed here. How do we know that they did not bring the vercaka here deliberately? You tell us they are seeking a poison to kill these birds, but how can we be sure they are not planning to invade our world? How do we know they didn’t bring these birds here to do this? To distract us? Terrify us! Maybe it’s these two who are causing more birds to come every day!’
Nigel Finkwatter was very rich and he had become so by being very persuasive. He had a handsome face with a rather large nose and his voice was smooth and slippery. Like the vercaka, he knew exactly how to play on each person’s worst fears. So, as he spoke, several people on the council nodded.
‘As I have said before, if we are to fight these birds,’ said Miranda Templeton, with her usual dignity, ‘then we must have the help of people who have fought them all their lives.’
‘I am sorry, we have been unable to find a suitable poison,’ said Tarquin, speaking as he did with his mouth, but also into the minds of the councillors. ‘At this moment, my sister is attempting a new course of action with Vivienne Small. We will know soon if they have been successful.’
Finkwatter shook his head as if trying to dislodge Tarquin’s voice.
‘I will not tolerate these mind games!’ he fumed.
‘We are sorry if this unsettles you,’ Tarquin said. ‘Imagine how very strange it is for us that you cannot communicate with your minds.’
‘Insults!’ Nigel Finkwatter roared, then thumped the great council table. ‘I demand your removal from this meeting! You have nothing to give us. We will kill these vercaka ourselves.’
Miranda Templeton insisted that Tarquin stay. Tarquin sat patiently and silently, watching as councillors put forward new ideas and strategies, all of which he knew would be unsuccessful.
In the middle of Finkwatter’s next tantrum, Tarquin spoke directly into the Mayor’s mind.
‘Excuse me, Mayor Templeton, my sister approaches the door,’ he said. ‘And with good news.’
To the puzzlement of the councillors, Miranda Templeton strode to the doors and threw them open. There stood Harlequin and Vivienne, trailing behind them a large cage containing a vercaka. There was a stunned silence as everyone in the room took in the sight of the enormous bird.
‘How on earth …’ began Miranda Templeton.
‘You can’t bring that bird in here,’ exploded Finkwatter.
‘Your children would be happier without you,’ it screeched.
‘Quiet, you vile bird,’ said Harlequin, and everyone heard her words in their heads. The bird shut its mouth and glared at her with its huge, dull eyes.
‘We wish to offer the council a demonstration,’ said Vivienne Small, holding out a large fish. Into the fish’s mouth she slipped a gold coin.
‘We have been searching for the poison in the wrong places,’ said Harlequin.
The bird was already salivating at the sight of the fish in Vivienne’s hands. Vivienne tossed it through the bars and the bird snapped it up, gulped the fish down and then, within seconds, the bird slumped to the floor of the cage.
‘Is it dead?’ asked Miranda Templeton.
‘What? The fish is poison?’ asked another councillor.
‘No,’ Harlequin. ‘In our world, the poison that kills these birds, as we have told you, is a liquid that runs in small rivers across the ground. But here, thanks to Vivienne Small, we have discovered, it is a solid. We believe you call it gold.’
‘That’s money!’ exclaimed Nigel Finkwatter.
‘And it kills them,’ said Vivienne.
‘We can’t fight with money. It would be unthinkably expensive …’ spluttered Finkwatter.
‘You are quite sure?’ asked the Mayor, looking from Harlequin to Vivienne.
Harlequin nodded and smiled. ‘We will need a great deal.’
‘How much?’ the Mayor asked.
‘All that can be acquired,’ said Harlequin.
‘This is preposterous!’ cried Nigel Finkwatter, and the council erupted.
There are no fights worse than the ones people have over money. And in the City of Clocks there were no fights nastier than those that involved Nigel Finkwatter. For Nigel Finkwatter was stingy. He wouldn’t lend you enough money to buy a toothpick. If one of his children broke a shoelace, he made them knot it rather than buy them a new one. His family lived on fish soup, dry cheese and biscuits. And even if vercaka were destroying the City of Clocks, and preying on its residents, Nigel Finkwatter was not going to throw gold at the problem.
And so three days passed. While most of the city prepared for battle, Nigel Finkwatter refused to help.
‘I have said it before, and I will say it again,’ said Miranda Templeton late on the third day. ‘The city will find a way of repaying you, Nigel, but we must act immediately, before it is too late.’
‘Your plan will never work,’ he insisted.
Miranda’s hat had fallen sideways, her clothing was dishevelled and her eyes were red with fatigue. Other than to go home and sleep for a few hours, she had worked tirelessly for the past three days in preparation. When word had got out that gold was needed, the city folk had come forth with coins in bags and purses, boxes and suitcases. Miranda Templeton had ensured a list was kept of every cent loaned to the city, and had posted guards on the room where the money was to be kept under lock and key. She noticed that many of the poorest people had given the most, and she herself had emptied all of her savings.
‘If that is your final word, Nigel, then we will manage without you or your gold,’ said Miranda Templeton.
‘And you will fail,’ said Finkwatter.
‘And you sound more like a vercaka every day,’ she retorted. To the council, she said, ‘We will begin at dawn. Make the necessary arrangements.’
The councillors dispersed and word went out across the city.
As Miran
da Templeton wearily made her way home, she did not look up. If she had, she might have seen hundreds of cats making their way along the city rooftops, and if she had watched for long enough, she might have seen them all come to sit on a single rooftop and gather for a great meeting while a full moon rose into the sky. If the city was extra quiet that night, people put it down to the coming battle. They kissed their children more than usual, went to bed early and slept fitfully. Quite a few people noticed that their cats had not returned home.
Chapter Nineteen
But where, for all of that time, was Tuesday?
She was in a room that was large and circular, with curved glass walls that opened up into a boundless night sky like a planetarium. But instead of being dotted with a billion stars, this sky was filled with worlds. There were so many you could never have counted them all, just as you couldn’t hope to count the stars in the night sky above you. Many worlds were old, some were still expanding and some were being born.
At either side of the round room was a jetty leading out into the darkness. One was as wide as a street but narrowed as it neared the room. The other was the width of a footpath. The narrow jetty had a door leading to it, the other no door at all, only a round glass chute in the wall. Of course, there was no water beneath them – only that world-filled sky all around.
One half of the room Tuesday was in was a like a workshop, with a long bench that was piled with books and notes. Further along it were all manner of implements and tools in disarray. There were magnifying glasses and microscopes. There were tweezers, miniature secateurs and tiny hammers as well as scissors of every size and sort. There were tiny paintbrushes and trays that held stacks of miniature bricks. There were jars of sand in many different colours, toothpicks, tiny spray bottles and watering cans. There were also a number of round things on stands, each one covered by a green cloth.
The other half of the room was set out like a home. There were clearly spaces for eating and reading and sleeping, with couches and tables, rugs and chairs. However, there was hardly anything in the way of walls – only the occasional painted screen. And it was in this half of the room that Tuesday slept. She lay on a primrose yellow velvet couch, and although she was pale, her breathing was even and a soft primrose eiderdown was keeping her warm.
A Week without Tuesday Page 13