Lost in a good book (2 page)

“I wish I did,” I replied good-humoredly, “but in truth it’s 70% form filling, 27% mind-numbing tedium and 2% sheer terror.”

“And the remaining 1%?”

I smiled. “That’s what keeps us going.”

We walked the seemingly endless corridors, past large grinning photographs of Adrian Lush and assorted other Network-Toad celebrities.

“You’ll like Adrian,” she told me happily, “and he’ll like you. Just don’t try to be funnier than him; it doesn’t suit the format of the show.”

“What does
that
mean?”

She shrugged.

“I don’t know. I’m meant to tell all his guests that.”

“Even the comedians?”

“
Especially
the comedians.”

I assured her being funny was furthest from my mind, and pretty soon she directed me onto the studio floor. Feeling unusually nervous and wishing that Landen was with me, I walked across the familiar front-room set of
The Adrian Lush Show.
But Mr. Lush was nowhere to be seen—and neither were the “Live Studio Audience” a Lush show usually boasted. Instead, a small group of officials were waiting—the “others” Flakk had told me about. My heart fell when I saw who they were.

“Ah, there you are, Next!” boomed Commander Braxton Hicks with forced bonhomie. “You’re looking well, healthy, and, er, vigorous.” He was my divisional chief back at Swindon, and despite being head of the Literary Detectives, was not that good with words.

“What are you doing here, sir?” I asked him, straining not to show my disappointment. “Cordelia told me the Lush interview would be uncensored in every way.”

“Oh it
is,
dear girl—up to a point,” he said, stroking his large mustache. “Without benign intervention things can get very confused in the public mind. We thought we would listen to the interview and perhaps—if the need arose—offer
practical advice
as to how the proceedings should—er—proceed.”

I sighed. My untold story looked set to remain exactly that. Adrian Lush, supposed champion of free speech, the man who had dared to air the grievances felt by the neanderthal, the first to suggest publicly that the Goliath Corporation “had shortcomings,” was about to have his nails well and truly clipped.

“Colonel Flanker you’ve already met,” went on Braxton without drawing breath.

I eyed the man suspiciously. I knew him well enough. He was at SpecOps-1, the division that polices SpecOps itself. He had interviewed me about the night I had first tried to tackle master criminal Acheron Hades—the night Snood and Tamworth died. He tried to smile several times but eventually gave up and offered his hand for me to shake instead.

“This is Colonel Rabone,” carried on Braxton. “She is head of Combined Forces Liaison.” I shook hands with the colonel.

“Always honored to meet a holder of the Crimean Cross,” she said, smiling.

“And over here,” continued Braxton in a jocular tone that was obviously designed to put me at ease—a ploy that failed spectacularly—“is Mr. Schitt-Hawse of the Goliath Corporation.”

Schitt-Hawse was a tall, thin man whose pinched features seemed to compete for position in the center of his face. His head tilted to the left in a manner that reminded me of an inquisitive budgerigar, and his dark hair was fastidiously combed back from his forehead. He put out his hand.

“Would it upset you if I didn’t shake it?” I asked him.

“Well, yes,” he replied, trying to be affable.

“Good.”

The Goliath Corporation’s pernicious hold over the nation was not universally appreciated, and I had a far greater reason to dislike them—the last Goliath employee I had dealt with was an odious character by the name of Jack Schitt. We had tricked him into a copy of Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Raven,” a place in which I hoped he could do no harm.

“Schitt-Hawse, eh?” I said. “Any relation to Jack?”

“He was—
is
—my half brother,” said Schitt-Hawse slowly, “and believe me, Ms. Next, he wasn’t working for us when he planned to prolong the Crimean War in order to create demand for Goliath weaponry.”

“And you never knew he had sided with Hades either, I suppose?”

“Of course not!” replied Schitt-Hawse in an offended tone.

“If you had known, would you admit it?”

Schitt-Hawse scowled and said nothing. Braxton coughed politely and continued:

“And this is Mr. Chesterman of the Brontë Federation.”

Chesterman blinked at me uncertainly. The changes I had wrought upon
Jane Eyre
had split the federation. I hoped he was one of the ones who preferred the happier ending.

“Back there is Captain Marat of the ChronoGuard,” continued Braxton. Marat, at this moment in
his
time, was a schoolboy of about twelve. He looked at me with interest. The ChronoGuard were the SpecOps division that took care of Anomalous Time Ripplation—my father
had been
one or
was
one or
would
be one, depending on how you looked at it.

“Have we met before?” I asked him.

“Not yet,” he replied cheerfully, returning to his copy of
The Beano.

“Well!” said Braxton, clapping his hands together. “I think that’s everyone. Next, I want you to pretend
we’re just not here.
”

“
Observers,
yes?”

“Absolutely. I—”

Braxton was interrupted by a slight disturbance offstage.

“The
bastards!
” yelled a high voice. “If the network dares to replace my Monday slot with reruns of
Bonzo the Wonder Hound
I’ll sue them for every penny they have!”

A tall man of perhaps fifty-five had walked into the studio accompanied by a small group of assistants. He had handsome chiseled features and a luxuriant swirl of white hair that looked as though it had been carved from polystyrene. He wore an immaculately tailored suit and his fingers were heavily weighed down with gold jewelry. He stopped short when he saw us.

“Ah!” said Adrian Lush disdainfully. “SpecOps!”

His entourage flustered around him with lots of energy but very little purpose. They seemed to hang on his every word and action, and I suddenly felt a great sense of relief that I wasn’t in the entertainments business.

“I’ve had a lot to do with you people in the past,” explained Lush as he made himself comfortable on his trademark green sofa, something he clearly regarded as a territorial safe retreat. “It was I that coined the phrase ‘SpecOops’ whenever you make a mistake—sorry, ‘Operational unexpectation’—isn’t that what you like to call them?”

But Hicks ignored Lush’s inquiries and introduced me as though I were his only daughter being offered up for marriage.

“Mr. Lush, this is Special Operative Thursday Next.”

Lush jumped up and bounded over to shake me by the hand in an effusive and energetic manner. Flanker and the others sat down; they looked very small in the middle of the empty studio. They weren’t going to leave and Lush wasn’t going to ask them to—I knew that Goliath owned Network Toad and was beginning to doubt whether Lush had any control over this interview at all.

“Hello, Thursday!” said Lush excitedly. “Welcome to my Monday show. It’s the second-highest-rated show in England— my Wednesday show is the first!”

He laughed infectiously and I smiled uneasily.

“Then this will be your
Thursday
show,” I replied, eager to lighten the situation.

There was dead silence.

“Will you be doing that a lot?” asked Lush in a subdued tone.

“Doing what?”

“Making jokes. You see . . . have a seat, darling. You see, I
generally
make the jokes on this show and although it’s
perfectly
okay for you to make jokes, then I’m going to have to pay someone to write funnier ones, and our budget, like Goliath’s scruples, is on the small side of Leptonic.”

“Can I say something?” said a voice from the small audience. It was Flanker, who carried on talking without waiting for a reply. “SpecOps is a serious business and should be reflected so in your interview. Next, I think you should let Mr. Lush tell the jokes.”

“Is that all right?” asked Lush, beaming.

“Sure,” I replied. “Is there anything else I shouldn’t do?”

Lush looked at me and then looked at the panel in the front row.

“Is there?”

They all mumbled among themselves for a few seconds.

“I think,” said Flanker again, “that we—sorry,
you
—should just do the interview and then we can discuss it later. Miss Next can say whatever she wants as long as it doesn’t contravene any SpecOps or Goliath Corporate guidelines.”

“—or military,” added Colonel Rabone, anxious not to be left out.

“Is that okay?” asked Lush.

“Whatever,” I returned, eager to get on with it.

“Excellent! I’ll do your intro, although you’ll be off camera for that. The floor manager will cue you and you’ll enter. Wave to where the audience might have been and when you are comfy, I’ll ask you some questions. I may offer you some toast at some point as our sponsors, the Toast Marketing Board, like to get a plug in now and again. Is there any part of that you don’t understand?”

“No.”

“Good. Here we go.”

There was a flurry of activity as Lush had his hair adjusted, his makeup checked and his costume tweaked. After a cursory glance at me I was ushered offstage and after what seemed like an epoch of inaction, Lush was counted in by a floor manager. On cue he turned to camera one and switched on his best and brightest smile.

“Tonight is a very special occasion with a very special guest. She is a decorated war heroine, a literary detective whose personal intervention not only restored the novel of
Jane Eyre
but actually improved the ending. She single-handedly defeated Acheron Hades, ended the Crimean War and boldly hoodwinked the Goliath Corporation. Ladies and gentlemen, in an unprecedented interview from a serving SpecOps officer, please give a warm welcome to Thursday Next of the Swindon Literary Detective office!”

A bright light swung onto my entrance doorway, and Adie smiled and tapped my arm. I walked out to meet Lush, who rose to greet me enthusiastically.

“Excuse me,” came a voice from the small group sitting in the front row of the empty auditorium. It was Schitt-Hawse, the Goliath representative.

“Yes?” asked Lush in an icy tone.

“You’re going to have to drop the reference to the Goliath Corporation,” said Schitt-Hawse in the sort of tone that brooks no argument. “It serves no purpose other than to needlessly embarrass a large company that is doing its very best to improve everyone’s lives.”

“I agree,” said Flanker. “And all references to Hades will have to be avoided. He is still listed as ‘Missing, fervently hoped dead,’ so any unauthorized speculation might have dangerous consequences.”

“Okay,” murmured Lush, scribbling a note. “Anything else?”

“Any reference to the Crimean War and the Plasma Rifle,” said the colonel, “might be considered
inappropriate.
The peace talks at Budapest are still at a delicate stage; the Russians will make any excuse to leave the table. We know that your show is very popular in Moscow.”

“The Brontë Federation is not keen for you to say the new ending is
improved,
” put in the small and bespectacled Chesterman, “and talking about any of the characters you met within
Jane Eyre
might cause some viewers to suffer Xplkqul-kiccasia.”

The condition was unknown before my jump into
Eyre.
It was so serious that the Medical Council were compelled to make up an
especially
unpronounceable word to describe it.

Lush looked at them, looked at me and then looked at his script.

“How about if I just said her name?”

“That would be admirable,” intoned Flanker, “except you might also want to assure the viewers that this interview is uncensored. Everyone else agree?”

They all enthusiastically added their assent to Flanker’s suggestion. I could see this was going to be a very long and tedious afternoon.

Lush’s entourage came back on and made the tiniest adjustments, I was repositioned, and after waiting what seemed like another decade, Lush began again.

“Ladies and gentlemen, in a frank and open interview tonight, Thursday Next talks unhindered about her work at SpecOps.”

No one said anything, so I entered, shook Lush’s hand and took a seat on his sofa.

“Welcome to the show, Thursday.”

“Thank you.”

“We’ll get on to your career in the Crimea in a moment, but I’d like to kick off by asking—”

With a magician’s flourish he pulled a serviette off the table in front of us, revealing a platter of toast with assorted toppings.

“—if you would care for some toast?”

“No, thanks.”

“Tasty and nutritious!” He smiled, facing the camera. “Perfect as a snack or even a light meal—good with eggs, sardines or even—”

“No, thank you.”

Lush’s smile froze on his face as he muttered through clenched teeth:

“Have . . . some . . . toast.”

But it was too late. The floor manager came on the set and announced that the unseen director of the show had called
cut.
Lush’s face dropped its permanent smile and his small army of beauticians came on and fussed over him once more. The floor manager had a one-way conversation into his headphones before turning to me with a concerned expression on his face.

“The Director of Placements wants to know if you would take a small bite of toast when offered.”

“I’ve eaten already.”

The floor manager turned and spoke into his headphones again.

“
She says she’s eaten already! . . .
I know. . . . Yes. . . . What if . . . Yes. . . . Ah-ha. . . .
What do you want me to do? Sit on her and force it down her throat!?! . . .
Yesss. . . . Ah-ha. . . . I know. . . . Yes. . . . Yes. . . . Okay.”

He turned back to me.

“How about jam instead of marmalade?”

“I don’t
really
like toast,” I told him—which was partly true, although to be honest I think I was just feeling a bit troublesome because of Braxton and his entourage.