Lady Friday(72)

I’m sure—’ ‘Enough!’ ordered Arthur.

He bent his head and kneaded his forehead with his gauntleted fingers until a sudden fear that this could somehow contaminate him even more made him sit back straight, just in time to see the Mariner approaching. He was leading two bedraggled Denizens, who were in turn carrying across their shoulders Friday’s Noon and Dusk. The two superior Denizens were silent and still, their eyes closed, but they were not dead. There were papers stuck on their foreheads, hanging down over their elegant noses. Friday’s Noon had lost his monocle.

‘Milka and Feorin!’ said Leaf. ‘These were the two who helped me. Not that they really meant to.’

‘I found them trying to sneak out and board my ship!’ The Mariner laughed. ‘Doubtless they did not know what I do with stowaways!’

Arthur looked at the bedraggled would-be star sailors, and then at Friday’s Noon and Dusk. He was annoyed that they had escaped punishment, the more so that they were doing it by partaking of some poor long-lost mortals’ lives.

‘Can they be brought out of their experiencing?’ he asked.

‘Not without breaking their minds,’ said Scamandros. ‘It is not an area which I have studied. I don’t know who has. Now, Arthur, we must get these sleepers back to their Secondary Realm, to your Earth. They will wake up before too long and I doubt that waking here would serve them well.’

‘I need to get Aunt Mango back,’ confirmed Leaf.

‘Easier said than done.’ Arthur felt the pocket at his side where the Fifth Key rested. They had already established that there were two ways out of Friday’s retreat, mirror-paths set up that could be activated by the Key. One went back to the private hospital on Earth and the other to the Middle of the Middle House.

‘Martine can lead us back if you can open the way with the Key,’ said Leaf. She had spoken to the craggy-faced, grey-haired woman, who was not anywhere near as mad as Harrison had made out. She was just shy and deathly afraid of Lady Friday and the Denizens, though she’d served the former Trustee for at least thirty years.

‘I’ve got a Transfer Plate too,’ said Suzy, pulling out a disc of burnished electrum. ‘The doc can retune it for the Citadel or wherever you want to go, Arthur.’

‘I want to go back to Earth!’ said Arthur. ‘I’m just not sure if that’s the right thing to do. The Piper may already be attacking the Citadel again, and without the Keys, Dame Primus will be hard-pressed. So perhaps I should go there. Or I should move directly against Saturday … if I can figure out some way of getting into the Upper House. There’s just so much I don’t know!’

‘Knowledge, like all things, is best in moderation,’ intoned the Will. ‘Knowing everything means you don’t need to think, and that is very dangerous.’

‘Whatever you decide, Arthur, I must be away,’ said the Mariner. ‘The solar tide of this purple star flows strongly, and I would catch it. If you do not require them, I might also take these Denizens. My current ship requires no crew, but I have my eye on a larger vessel.’

‘They may go, if they wish,’ said Arthur. ‘Though if you could stay, Captain, I’d really appreciate it.’

‘Do we wish?’ Feorin asked Milka.

‘Definitely,’ said Milka. She bowed low to Arthur, and then almost as low to Leaf.

‘I must catch the tide,’ said the Mariner. ‘I am a seafarer, Arthur. Long ago I decided I did not want to be immured in all the politicking and bickering within the House. When my debt to you is fully paid, I shall not come again, save that it be at my own whim.’

The Mariner saluted Arthur. Then he took his crew and left, striding back inside to begin the long climb up to the crater rim where his small starship nestled against a crack in the dome. As they disappeared, Leaf heard Feorin asking the Mariner whether he had his ship’s log bound in leather or calfskin.

‘I have decided,’ said Arthur. ‘I will go back to Earth with you, Leaf, and the sleepers. Suzy – you, Fred, and the Will had better use the Transfer Plate to go to the Great Maze and take Friday with you to be locked up, with her Noon and Dusk. Dr Scamandros, I have the plate here that took me to the Middle House. You can reset it for Monday’s Dayroom – I know Dame Primus wants you to keep an eye on the Old One.’

‘It is not the Old One that is troubling,’ said Dr Scamandros. ‘He is chained as always. But there has been a curious winnowing of Coal-Collaters and other strangeness in the cellars. I am investigating that.’