‘Let me see that list,’ said Daisy.
Hackle handed the paper over to her. She looked down the names for a few seconds: Jagger, Adam; Six-Five. Kelly, Caroline; Four-One. Latchkey, William; Three-Two…
‘You’re looking for your father, I presume?’
‘Here he is. Love, James; Five-Four. He’s still got that bloody domino.’
Hackle smiled. He pulled open a drawer, placed an old, battle- scarred bone rectangle on the table. It was the two-zero domino.
‘A year we shall never forget,’ he whispered.
‘No wonder I can never beat him,’ said Daisy.
‘He was a quiet kid, sat at the back, staring out of the window. Miss Sayer really turned him around. Your father became the best mathematician in the year. I’m sorry to find him so destitute these days. A fine talent. To have to pretend he’s dead, in order to get you a scholarship. Really, it is a great waste.’
Daisy looked over the list of pupils for a few seconds more.
She was trying to connect with the past. Her father’s childhood with her own. The connections between them. What he had become. What she was becoming. The mathematics…
‘OK. What’s the plan?’
‘Excellent news! Report at my house this Friday, six o’clock. Last Friday we did some preliminary research, but this will be the first proper meeting. Meanwhile…’ Hackle reached into his drawer once again, this time pulling out a green cardboard folder. It had Daisy’s name on the cover.
‘You knew I’d say yes, then?’
‘I was hoping you would, that’s all. Inside are some of my papers for your perusal. They will explain the connections.’
‘Do I get to know who I’m working with? Joe Crocus, I presume?’
‘Of course. Joe will be the leader of the group. I won’t be directly involved, but Joe will report to me. Under him will be student Dopejack, on computers and the Burgernet, and Benny Fenton on analysis. Yourself, of course, as the probability expert.’
‘That’s it? Just the four of us, against the dominoes?’
‘Well, I’d like to find a natural, of course. We’re looking at that. And then there’s Jazir, on the—’
‘Jaz! You’ve got Jazir? Where is he?’
‘Right outside.’
‘He is? I was worried… I mean, I haven’t seen him since—’
‘He’s the key, Daisy. The way in.’
Play to win
Jazir and Daisy, walking along the Oxford Road, away from the university. The time was approaching five o’clock, filled with rush-hour traffic. Daisy wasn’t in the mood for talking. Not yet. Still in shock from Max’s request and her acquiescence. Outside that office, outside the university’s cloisters, the whole mad scheme started to feel like paranoia, and she was already working out the chances broken by her acceptance.
‘You got the package off Max, right?’ asked Jazir.
‘What? Oh, yeah.’
‘That list of pupils. What do you reckon? You reckon that Paul Malthorpe’s the one we’re after? Do you?’
‘I suppose so.’
‘Your dad’s on that list, isn’t he?’
‘So? So is Max Hackle.’
‘Come off it. No way is Max Hackle actually Mister Million.’
‘So no way is my father, OK?’
‘OK. Fine.’
It was fair weather, which brought the blurbflies out in swarms of whispers.
‘Watch this, Daisy.’ Jazir held out his arms on both sides, hands palm upwards. Immediately a blurbfly landed on his left hand, another on his right.
‘Jaz? What are you doing?’
‘Just a little trick I learned. Watch. Keep watching.’
More and more of the blurbs were attracted to Jazir. The flies started circling his body, filling his shape with song. A personal message about how he was the best ever player of the game and deserved to win untold riches.
Play to win! Purchase a thousand bones! Play to win! Adverts in orbit. Daisy had never seen anything like it.
‘Jaz, people are looking at us.’
‘Jealous, more like.’ He turned on the onlookers. ‘I’m the fucking pied piper, me. Go on, get your own fucking blurbs!’
‘Jaz!’ A few stray blurbs had landed on Daisy’s head. ‘Urgh! Get them off me!’ She was scrabbling at her hair.
Jazir laughed at her. ‘Oh dear. They must think you’re my partner, you know, my lover, my mate.’
‘This isn’t funny.’ Daisy was still struggling.
‘You’re right.’ A clap of his hands. ‘Blurbs be gone!’
Immediately they flew off and dispersed, to plague the city, normal style, blurb style.