Chapters 10 to 14

[::: CHAPTER 10 :::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::]
Richard made the hastiest departure that politeness would allow. He said thank you very much and what a splendid evening it had beenand that any time Reg was coming up to London he must let him, Richard,know and was there anything he could do to help about the horse. No?Well, all right then, if you’re sure, and thank you again, so much. He stood there for a moment or two after the door finally closed,pondering things. He had noticed during the short time that the light from Reg’s roomflooded out on to the landing of the main staircase, that there were nomarks on the floorboards there at all. It seemed odd that the horseshould only have scuffed the floorboards inside Reg’s room. Well, it all seemed very odd, full stop, but here was yet anothercurious fact to add to the growing pile. This was supposed to have beena relaxing evening away from work. On an impulse he knocked on the door opposite to Reg’s. It took sucha long time to be answered that Richard had given up and was turning togo when at last he heard the door creak open. He had a slight shock when he saw that staring sharply up at himlike a small and suspicious bird was the don with the racing-yacht keelfor a nose. ‘Er, sorry,’ said Richard, abruptly, ‘but, er, have you seen orheard a horse coming up this staircase tonight?’ The man stopped his obsessive twitching of his fingers. He cockedhis head slightly on one side and then seemed to need to go on a longjourney inside himself to find a voice, which when found turned out tobe a thin and soft little one. He said, ‘That is the first thing anybody has said to me forseventeen years, three months and two days, five hours, nineteenminutes and twenty seconds. I’ve been counting.’ He closed the door softly again. Richard virtually ran through Second Court. When he reached First Court he steadied himself and slowed down to awalking pace. The chill night air was rasping in his lungs and there was no pointin running. He hadn’t managed to talk to Susan because Reg’s phonewasn’t working, and this was another thing that he had beenmysteriously coy about. That at least was susceptible of a rationalexplanation. He probably hadn’t paid his phone bill. Richard was about to emerge out on to the street when instead hedecided to pay a quick visit to the porter’s lodge, which was tuckedaway inside the great archway entrance into the college. It was a smallhutchlike place filled with keys, messages and a single electric barheater. A radio nattered to itself in the background. ‘Excuse me,’ he said to the large black-suited man standing behindthe counter with his arms folded. ‘I...’ ‘Yes, Mr MacDuff, what can I do for you?’ In his present state of mind Richard would have been hard-pressedhimself to remember his own name and was startled for a moment.However, college porters are legendary for their ability to performsuch feats of memory, and for their tendency to show them off at theslightest provocation. ‘Is there,’ said Richard, ‘a horse anywhere in the college -- thatyou know of? I mean, you would know if there was a horse in thecollege, wouldn’t you?’ The porter didn’t blink. ‘No, sir, and yes, sir. Anything else I can help you with, MrMacDuff, sir?’ ‘Er, no,’ said Richard and tapped his fingers a couple of times onthe counter. ‘No. Thank you. Thank you very much for your help. Nice tosee you again, er... Bob,’ he hazarded. ‘Good-night, then.’ He left. The porter remained perfectly still with his arms folded, butshaking his head a very, very little bit. ‘Here’s some coffee for you, Bill,’ said another porter, a shortwiry one, emerging from an inner sanctum with a steaming cup. ‘Gettinga bit colder tonight?’ ‘I think it is, Fred, thanks,’ said Bill, taking the cup. He took a sip. ‘You can say what you like about people, they don’tget any less peculiar. Fellow in here just now asking if there was ahorse in the college.’ ‘Oh yes?’ Fred sipped at his own coffee, and let the steam smart hiseyes. ‘I had a chap in here earlier. Sort of strange foreign priest.Couldn’t understand a word he said at first. But he seemed happy justto stand by the fire and listen to the news on the radio.’ ‘Foreigners, eh.’ ‘In the end I told him to shoot off. Standing in front of my firelike that. Suddenly he says is that really what he must do? Shoot off?I said, in my best Bogart voice, “You better believe it, buddy.”’ ‘Really? Sounded more like Jimmy Cagney to me.’ ‘No, that’s my Bogart voice. This is my Jimmy Cagney voice -- “Youbetter believe it, buddy.”’ Bill frowned at him. ‘Is that your Jimmy Cagney voice? I alwaysthought that was your Kenneth McKellar voice.’ ‘You don’t listen properly, Bill, you haven’t got the ear. This isKenneth McKellar. “Oh, you take the high road and I’ll take the lowroad...”’ ‘Oh, I see. I was thinking of the Scottish Kenneth McKellar. So whatdid this priest fellow say then, Fred?’ ‘Oh, he just looked me straight in the eyes, Bill, and said in thisstrange sort of...’ ‘Skip the accent, Fred, just tell me what he said, if it’s worthhearing.’ ‘He just said he did believe me.’ ‘So. Not a very interesting story then, Fred.’ ‘Well, maybe not. I only mention it because he also said that he’dleft his horse in a washroom and would I see that it was all right.’

[::: CHAPTER 11 :::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::]
Gordon Way drifted miserably along the dark road, or rather, triedto drift. He felt that as a ghost -- which is what he had to admit to himselfhe had become -- he should be able to drift. He knew little enoughabout ghosts, but he felt that if you were going to be one then thereought to be certain compensations for not having a physical body to lugaround, and that among them ought to be the ability simply to drift.But no, it seemed he was going to have to walk every step of the way. His aim was to try and make it to his house. He didn’t know what hewould do when he got there, but even ghosts have to spend the nightsomewhere, and he felt that being in familiar surroundings might help.Help what, he didn’t know. At least the journey gave him an objective,and he would just have to think of another one when he arrived. He trudged despondently from lamppost to lamppost, stopping at eachone to look at bits of himself. He was definitely getting a bit wraithlike. At times he would fade almost to nothing, and would seem to belittle more than a shadow playing in the mist, a dream of himself thatcould just evaporate and be gone. At other times he seemed to be almostsolid and real again. Once or twice he would try leaning against alamppost, and would fall straight through it if he wasn’t careful. At last, and with great reluctance, he actually began to turn hismind to what it was that had happened. Odd, that reluctance. He reallydidn’t want to think about it. Psychologists say that the mind willoften try to suppress the memory of traumatic events, and this, hethought, was probably the answer. After all, if having a strange figurejump out of the boot of your own car and shoot you dead didn’t count asa traumatic experience, he’d like to know what did. He trudged on wearily. He tried to recall the figure to his mind’s eye, but it was likeprobing a hurting tooth, and he thought of other things. Like, was his will up-to-date? He couldn’t remember, and made amental note to call his lawyer tomorrow, and then made another mentalnote that he would have to stop making mental notes like that. How would his company survive without him? He didn’t like either ofthe possible answers to that very much. What about his obituary? There was a thought that chilled him to hisbones, wherever they’d got to. Would he be able to get hold of a copy?What would it say? They’d better give him a good write-up, thebastards. Look at what he’d done. Single-handedly saved the Britishsoftware industry: huge exports, charitable contributions, researchscholarships, crossing the Atlantic in a solar-powered submarine(failed, but a good try) -- all sorts of things. They’d better not godigging up that Pentagon stuff again or he’d get his lawyer on to them.He made a mental note to call him in the mor... No. Anyway, can a dead person sue for libel? Only his lawyer would know,and he was not going to be able to call him in the morning. He knewwith a sense of creeping dread that of all the things he had leftbehind in the land of the living it was the telephone that he was goingto miss the most, and then he turned his mind determinedly back towhere it didn’t want to go. The figure. It seemed to him that the figure had been almost like a figure ofDeath itself; or was that his imagination playing tricks with him? Washe dreaming that it was a cowled figure? What would any figure, whethercowled or just casually dressed, be doing in the boot of his car? At that moment a car zipped past him on the road and disappeared offinto the night, taking its oasis of light with it. He thought withlonging of the warm, leather-upholstered, climate-controlled comfort ofhis own car abandoned on the road behind him, and then a suddenextraordinary thought struck him. Was there any way he could hitch a lift? Could anyone actually seehim? How would anyone react if they could? Well, there was only one wayto find out. He heard another car coming up in the distance behind him and turnedto face it. The twin pools of hazy lights approached through the mistand Gordon gritted his phantom teeth and stuck his thumb out at them. The car swept by regardless. Nothing. Angrily he made an indistinct V sign at the receding red rearlights, and realised, looking straight through his own upraised arm,that he wasn’t at his most visible at the moment. Was there perhapssome effort of will he could make to render himself more visible whenhe wanted to? He screwed up his eyes in concentration, then realisedthat he would need to have his eyes open in order to judge the results.He tried again, forcing his mind as hard as he could, but the resultswere unsatisfactory. Though it did seem to make some kind of rudimentary, glowingdifference, he couldn’t sustain it, and it faded almost immediately,however much he piled on the mental pressure. He would have to judgethe timing very carefully if he was going to make his presence felt, orat least seen. Another car approached from behind, travelling fast. He turnedagain, stuck his thumb out, waited till the moment was right and willedhimself visible. The car swerved slightly, and then carried on its way, only a littlemore slowly. Well, that was something. What else could he do? He wouldgo and stand under a lamppost for a start, and he would practise. Thenext car he would get for sure.

[::: CHAPTER 12 :::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::]
‘...so if you’d like to leave a message, I’ll get back to you assoon as possible. Maybe.’ Beep. ‘Shit. Damn. Hold on a minute. Blast. Look... er...’ Click. Richard pushed the phone back into its cradle and slammed his carinto reverse for twenty yards to have another look at the sign-post bythe road junction he’d just sped past in the mist. He had extractedhimself from the Cambridge one-way system by the usual method, whichinvolved going round and round it faster and faster until he achieved asort of escape velocity and flew off at a tangent in a randomdirection, which he was now trying to identify and correct for. Arriving back at the junction he tried to correlate the informationon the signpost with the information on the map. But it couldn’t bedone. The road junction was quite deliberately sitting on a page divideon the map, and the signpost was revolving maliciously in the wind.Instinct told him that he was heading in the wrong direction, but hedidn’t want to go back the way he’d come for fear of getting suckedback into the gravitational whirlpool of Cambridge’s traffic system. He turned left, therefore, in the hope of finding better fortune inthat direction, but after a while lost his nerve and turned aspeculative right, and then chanced another exploratory left and aftera few more such manoeuvres was thoroughly lost. He swore to himself and turned up the heating in the car. If he hadbeen concentrating on where he was going rather than trying to navigateand telephone at the same time, he told himself, he would at least knowwhere he was now. He didn’t actually like having a telephone in hiscar, he found it a bother and an intrusion. But Gordon had insisted andindeed had paid for it. He sighed in exasperation, backed up the black Saab and turnedaround again. As he did so he nearly ran into someone lugging a bodyinto a field. At least that was what it looked like for a second to hisoverwrought brain, but in fact it was probably a local farmer with asackful of something nutritious, though what he was doing with it on anight like this was anyone’s guess. As his headlights swung aroundagain, they caught for a moment a silhouette of the figure trudging offacross the field with the sack on his back. ‘Rather him than me,’ thought Richard grimly, and drove off again. After a few minutes he reached a junction with what looked a littlemore like a main road, nearly turned right down it, but then turnedleft instead. There was no signpost. He poked at the buttons on his phone again. ‘...get back to you as soon as possible. Maybe.’ Beep. ‘Susan, it’s Richard. Where do I start? What a mess. Look I’m sorry,sorry, sorry. I screwed up very badly, and it’s all my fault. And look,whatever it takes to make up for it, I’ll do it, solemn promise...’ He had a slight feeling that this wasn’t the right tone to adoptwith an answering machine, but he carried straight on. ‘Honestly, we can go away, take a holiday for a week, or even justthis weekend if you like. Really, this weekend. We’ll go somewheresunny. Doesn’t matter how much pressure Gordon tries to put on me, andyou know the sort of pressure he can muster, he is your brother, afterall. I’ll just... er, actually, it might have to be next weekend. Damn,damn, damn. It’s just that I really have promised to get, no, look, itdoesn’t matter. We’ll just do it. I don’t care about getting Anthemfinished for Comdex. It’s not the end of the world. We’ll just go.Gordon will just have to take a running jump -- Gaaarghhhh!’ Richard swerved wildly to avoid the spectre of Gordon Way whichsuddenly loomed in his headlights and took a running jump at him. He slammed on the brakes, started to skid, tried to remember what itwas you were supposed to do when you found yourself skidding, he knewhe’d seen it on some television programme about driving he’d seen agesago, what was the programme? God, he couldn’t even remember the titleof the programme, let alone -- oh yes, they’d said you mustn’t slam onthe brakes. That was it. The world swung sickeningly around him withslow and appalling force as the car slewed across the road, spun,thudded against the grass verge, then slithered and rocked itself to ahalt, facing the wrong way. He collapsed, panting, against the steeringwheel. He picked up the phone from where he’d dropped it. ‘Susan,’ he gasped, ‘I’ll get back to you,’ and hung up. He raised his eyes. Standing full in the glare of his headlights was the spectral figureof Gordon Way staring straight in through the windscreen with ghastlyhorror in its eyes, slowly raising its hand and pointing at him. He wasn’t sure how long he just sat there. The apparition had meltedfrom view in a few seconds, but Richard simply sat, shaking, probablyfor not more than a minute, until a sudden squeal of brakes and glareof lights roused him. He shook his head. He was, he realised, stopped in the road facingthe wrong way. The car that had just screeched to an abrupt halt almostbumper to bumper with him was a police car. He took two or three deepbreaths and then, stiff and trembling, he climbed out and stood up toface the officer who was walking slowly towards him, silhouetted in thepolice car’s headlights. The officer looked him up and down. ‘Er, I’m sorry, officer,’ said Richard, with as much calmness as hecould wrench into his voice. ‘I, er, skidded. The roads are slipperyand I, er... skidded. I spun round. As you see, I, I’m facing the wrongway.’ He gestured at his car to indicate the way it was facing. ‘Like to tell me why it was you skidded then, exactly, sir?’ Thepolice officer was looking him straight in the eye while pulling out anotebook. ‘Well, as I said,’ explained Richard, ‘the roads are slipperybecause of the mist, and, well, to be perfectly honest,’ he suddenlyfound himself saying, in spite of all his attempts to stop himself, ‘Iwas just driving along and I suddenly imagined that I saw my employerthrowing himself in front of my car.’ The officer gazed at him levelly. ‘Guilt complex, officer,’ added Richard with a twitch of a smile,‘you know how it is. I was contemplating taking the weekend off.’ The police officer seemed to hesitate, balanced on a knife edgebetween sympathy and suspicion. His eyes narrowed a little but didn’twaver. ‘Been drinking, sir?’ ‘Yes,’ said Richard, with a quick sigh, ‘but very little. Twoglasses of wine max. Er... and a small glass of port. Absolute max. Itwas really just a lapse of concentration. I’m fine now.’ ‘Name?’ Richard gave him his name and address. The policeman wrote it alldown carefully and neatly in his book, then peered at the carregistration number and wrote that down too. ‘And who is your employer then, sir?’ ‘His name is Way. Gordon Way.’ ‘Oh,’ said the policeman raising his eyebrows, ‘the computergentleman.’ ‘Er, yes, that’s right. I design software for the company.WayForward Technologies II.’ ‘We’ve got one of your computers down the station,’ said thepoliceman. ‘Buggered if I can get it to work.’ ‘Oh,’ said Richard wearily, ‘which model do you have?’ ‘I think it’s called a Quark II.’ ‘Oh, well that’s simple,’ said Richard with relief. ‘It doesn’twork. Never has done. The thing is a heap of shit.’ ‘Funny thing, sir, that’s what I’ve always said,’ said thepoliceman. ‘Some of the other lads don’t agree.’ ‘Well, you’re absolutely right, officer. The thing is hopeless. It’sthe major reason the original company went bust. I suggest you use itas a big paperweight.’ ‘Well, I wouldn’t like to do that, sir,’ the policeman persisted.‘The door would keep blowing open.’ ‘What do you mean, officer?’ asked Richard. ‘I use it to keep the door closed, sir. Nasty draughts down ourstation this time of year. In the summer, of course, we beat suspectsround the head with it.’ He flipped his book closed and prodded it into his pocket. ‘My advice to you, sir, is to go nice and easy on the way back. Lockup the car and spend the weekend getting completely pissed. I find it’sthe only way. Mind how you go now.’ He returned to his car, wound down the window, and watched Richardmanoeuvre his car around and drive off into the night before headingoff himself. Richard took a deep breath, drove calmly back to London, let himselfcalmly into his flat, clambered calmly over the sofa, sat down, pouredhimself a stiff brandy and began seriously to shake. There were three things he was shaking about. There was the simple physical shock of his near-accident, which isthe sort of thing that always churns you up a lot more than you expect.The body floods itself with adrenaline, which then hangs around yoursystem turning sour. Then there was the cause of the skid -- the extraordinary apparitionof Gordon throwing himself in front of his car at that moment. Boy ohboy. Richard took a mouthful of brandy and gargled with it. He put theglass down. It was well known that Gordon was one of the world’s richest naturalresources of guilt pressure, and that he could deliver a ton on yourdoorstep fresh every morning, but Richard hadn’t realised he had let itget to him to such an unholy degree. He took up his glass again, went upstairs and pushed open the doorto his workroom, which involved shifting a stack of BYTE magazines thathad toppled against it. He pushed them away with his foot and walked tothe end of the large room. A lot of glass at this end let in views overa large part of north London, from which the mist was now clearing. StPaul’s glowed in the dark distance and he stared at it for a moment ortwo but it didn’t do anything special. After the events of the eveninghe found this came as a pleasant surprise. At the other end of the room were a couple of long tables smotheredin, at the last count, six Macintosh computers. In the middle was theMac II on which a red wire-frame model of his sofa was lazily revolvingwithin a blue wire-frame model of his narrow staircase, complete withbanister rail, radiator and fuse-box details, and of course the awkwardturn halfway up. The sofa would start out spinning in one direction, hit anobstruction, twist itself in another plane, hit another obstruction,revolve round a third axis until it was stopped again, then cyclethrough the moves again in a different order. You didn’t have to watchthe sequence for very long before you saw it repeat itself. The sofa was clearly stuck. Three other Macs were connected up via long tangles of cable to anuntidy agglomeration of synthesisers -- an Emulator II+ HD sampler, arack of TX modules, a Prophet VS, a Roland JX 10, a Korg DW8000, anOctapad, a left-handed Synth-Axe MIDI guitar controller, and even anold drum machine stacked up and gathering dust in the corner -- prettymuch the works. There was also a small and rarely used cassette taperecorder: all the music was stored in sequencer files on the computersrather than on tape. He dumped himself into a seat in front of one of the Macs to seewhat, if anything, it was doing. It was displaying an ‘Untitled’Excel spreadsheet and he wondered why. He saved it and looked to see if he’d left himself any notes andquickly discovered that the spreadsheet contained some of the data hehad previously downloaded after searching the World Reporter andKnowledge on-line databases for facts about swallows. He now had figures which detailed their migratory habits, their wingshapes, their aerodynamic profile and turbulence characteristics, andsome sort of rudimentary figures concerning the patterns that a flockwould adopt in flight, but as yet he had only the faintest idea as tohow he was going to synthesise them all together. Because he was too tired to think particularly constructivelytonight he savagely selected and copied a whole swathe of figures fromthe spreadsheet at random, pasted them into his own conversion program,which scaled and filtered and manipulated the figures according to hisown experimental algorithms, loaded the converted file intoPerformer, a powerful sequencer program, and played the resultthrough random MIDI channels to whichever synthesisers happened to beon at the moment. The result was a short burst of the most hideous cacophony, and hestopped it. He ran the conversion program again, this time instructing it toforce-map the pitch values into G minor. This was a utility he wasdetermined in the end to get rid of because he regarded it as cheating.If there was any basis to his firmly held belief that the rhythms andharmonies of music which he found most satisfying could be found in, orat least derived from, the rhythms and harmonies of naturally occurringphenomena, then satisfying forms of modality and intonation shouldemerge naturally as well, rather than being forced. For the moment, though, he forced it. The result was a short burst of the most hideous cacophony in Gminor. So much for random shortcuts. The first task was a relatively simple one, which would be simply toplot the waveform described by the tip of a swallow’s wing as it flies,then synthesise that waveform. That way he would end up with a singlenote, which would be a good start, and it shouldn’t take more than theweekend to do. Except, of course, that he didn’t have a weekend available to do itin because he had somehow to get Version 2 of Anthem out of the doorsometime during the course of the next year, or ‘month’ as Gordoncalled it. Which brought Richard inexorably to the third thing he was shakingabout. There was absolutely no way that he could take the time off thisweekend or next to fulfil the promise he had made to Susan’s telephone-answering machine. And that, if this evening’s débacle had not alreadydone so, would surely spell the final end. But that was it. The thing was done. There is nothing you can doabout a message on someone else’s answering machine other than letevents take their course. It was done. It was irrevocable. An odd thought suddenly struck him. It took him by considerable surprise, but he couldn’t really seewhat was wrong with it.

[::: CHAPTER 13 :::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::]
A pair of binoculars scanning the London night skyline, idly,curious, snooping. A little look here, a little look there, just seeingwhat’s going on, anything interesting, anything useful. The binoculars settle on the back of one particular house, attractedby a slight movement. One of those large late-Victorian villas,probably flats now. Lots of black iron drainpipes. Green rubberdustbins. But dark. No, nothing. The binoculars are just moving onwards when another slight movementcatches in the moonlight. The binoculars refocus very slightly, tryingto find a detail, a hard edge, a slight contrast in the darkness. Themist has lifted now, and the darkness glistens. They refocus a very,very little more. There it is. Something, definitely. Only this time a little higherup, maybe a foot or so, maybe a yard. The binoculars settle and relax -- steady, trying for the edge, trying for the detail. There. Thebinoculars settle again -- they have found their mark, straddledbetween a windowsill and a drainpipe. It is a dark figure, splayed against the wall, looking down, lookingfor a new foothold, looking upwards, looking for a ledge. Thebinoculars peer intently. The figure is that of a tall, thin man. His clothes are right forthe job, dark trousers, dark sweater, but his movements are awkward andangular. Nervous. Interesting. The binoculars wait and consider,consider and judge. The man is clearly a rank amateur. Look at his fumbling. Look at his ineptitude. His feet slip on thedrainpipe, his hands can’t reach the ledge. He nearly falls. He waitsto catch his breath. For a moment he starts to climb back down again,but seems to find that even tougher going. He lunges again for the ledge and this time catches it. His footshoots out to steady himself and nearly misses the pipe. Could havebeen very nasty, very nasty indeed. But now the way is easier and progress is better. He crosses toanother pipe, reaches a third-floor window ledge, flirts briefly withdeath as he crawls painfully on to it, and makes the cardinal error andlooks down. He sways briefly and sits back heavily. He shades his eyesand peers inside to check that the room is dark, and sets about gettingthe window open. One of the things that distinguish the amateur from the professionalis that this is the point when the amateur thinks it would have been agood idea to bring along something to prise the window open with.Luckily for this amateur the householder is an amateur too, and thesash window slides grudgingly up. The climber crawls, with some relief,inside. He should be locked up for his own protection, think the binoculars.A hand starts to reach for the phone. At the window a face looks backout and for a moment is caught in the moonlight, then it ducks backinside to carry on with its business. The hand stays hovering over the phone for a moment or two, whilethe binoculars wait and consider, consider and judge. The hand reachesinstead for the A-Z street map of London. There is a long studious pause, a little more intent binocular work,and then the hand reaches for the phone again, lifts it and dials.

[::: CHAPTER 14 :::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::]
Susan’s flat was small but spacious, which was a trick, reflectedRichard tensely as he turned on the light, that only women seemed ableto pull off. It wasn’t that observation which made him tense, of course -- he’dthought it before, many times. Every time he’d been in her flat, infact. It always struck him, usually because he had just come from hisown flat, which was four times the size and cramped. He’d just comefrom his own flat this time, only via a rather eccentric route, and itwas this that made his usual observation unusually tense. Despite the chill of the night he was sweating. He looked back out of the window, turned and tiptoed across the roomtowards where the telephone and the answering machine stood on theirown small table. There was no point, he told himself, in tiptoeing. Susan wasn’t in.He would be extremely interested to know where she was, in fact -- justas she, he told himself, had probably been extremely interested inknowing where he had been at the beginning of the evening. He realised he was still tiptoeing. He hit his leg to make himselfstop doing it, but carried on doing it none the less. Climbing up the outside wall had been terrifying. He wiped his forehead with the arm of his oldest and greasiestsweater. There had been a nasty moment when his life had flashed beforehis eyes but he had been too preoccupied with falling and had missedall the good bits. Most of the good bits had involved Susan, herealised. Susan or computers. Never Susan and computers -- those hadlargely been the bad bits. Which was why he was here, he told himself.He seemed to need convincing, and told himself again. He looked at his watch. Eleven forty-five. It occurred to him he had better go and wash his wet and dirty handsbefore he touched anything. It wasn’t the police he was worried about,but Susan’s terrifying cleaner. She would know. He went into the bathroom, turned on the light switch, wiped it, andthen stared at his own startled face in the bright neon-lit mirror ashe ran the water over his hands. For a moment he thought of thedancing, warm candlelight of the Coleridge Dinner, and the images of itwelled up out of the dim and distant past of the earlier part of theevening. Life had seemed easy then, and carefree. The wine, theconversation, simple conjuring tricks. He pictured the round pale faceof Sarah, pop-eyed with wonder. He washed his own face. He thought: ‘...Beware! Beware! His flashing eyes, his floating hair!’ He brushed his own hair. He thought, too, of the pictures hanginghigh in the darkness above their heads. He cleaned his teeth. The lowbuzz of the neon light snapped him back to the present and he suddenlyremembered with appalled shock that he was here in his capacity asburglar. Something made him look himself directly in the face in the mirror,then he shook his head, trying to clear it. When would Susan be back? That, of course, would depend on what shewas doing. He quickly wiped his hands and made his way back to theanswering machine. He prodded at the buttons and his conscience proddedback at him. The tape wound back for what seemed to be an interminabletime, and he realised with a jolt that it was probably because Gordonhad been in full flood. He had forgotten, of course, that there would be messages on thetape other than his own, and listening to other people’s phone messageswas tantamount to opening their mail. He explained to himself once again that all he was trying to do wasto undo a mistake he had made before it caused any irrevocable damage.He would just play the tiniest snippets till he found his own voice.That wouldn’t be too bad, he wouldn’t even be able to distinguish whatwas being said. He groaned inwardly, gritted his teeth and stabbed at the Playbutton so roughly that he missed it and ejected the cassette bymistake. He put it back in and pushed the Play button more carefully. Beep. ‘Oh, Susan, hi, it’s Gordon,’ said the answering machine. ‘I’m juston my way to the cottage. It’s, er...’ He wound on for a couple ofseconds. ‘...need to know that Richard is on the case. I mean reallyon...’ Richard set his mouth grimly and stabbed at the Fast Forwardagain. He really hated the fact that Gordon tried to put pressure onhim via Susan, which Gordon always stoutly denied he did. Richardcouldn’t blame Susan for getting exasperated about his work sometimesif this sort of thing was going on.’ Click. ‘...Response. Make a note to Susan would you please, to get an“Armed Response” sign made up with a sharp spike on the bottom at theright height for rabbits to see.’ ‘What?’ muttered Richard to himself, and his finger hesitated fora second over the Fast Forward button. He had a feeling that Gordondesperately wanted to be like Howard Hughes, and if he could never hopeto be remotely as rich, he could at least try to be twice as eccentric.An act. A palpable act. ‘That’s secretary Susan at the office, not you, of course,’continued Gordon’s voice on the answering machine. ‘Where was I? Ohyes. Richard and Anthem 2.00. Susan, that thing has got to be in betatesting in two...’ Richard stabbed at the Fast Forward, tight-lipped. ‘...point is that there’s only one person who’s really in a positionto know if he’s getting the important work done, or if he’s justdreaming, and that one person...’ He stabbed angrily again. He hadpromised himself he wouldn’t listen to any of it and now here he wasgetting angry at what he was hearing. He should really just stop this.Well, just one more try. When he listened again he just got music. Odd. He wound forwardagain, and still got music. Why would someone be phoning to play musicto an answering machine? he wondered. The phone rang. He stopped the tape and answered it, then almostdropped the phone like an electric eel as he realised what he wasdoing. Hardly daring to breathe, he held the telephone to his ear. ‘Rule One in housebreaking,’ said a voice. ‘Never answer thetelephone when you’re in the middle of a job. Who are you supposed tobe, for heaven’s sake?’ Richard froze. It was a moment or two before he could find where hehad put his voice. ‘Who is this?’ he demanded at last in a whisper. ‘Rule Two,’ continued the voice. ‘Preparation. Bring the righttools. Bring gloves. Try to have the faintest glimmering of an idea ofwhat you’re about before you start dangling from window ledges in themiddle of the night. ‘Rule Three. Never forget Rule Two.’ ‘Who is this?’ exclaimed Richard again. The voice was unperturbed. ‘Neighbourhood Watch,’ it said. ‘If youjust look out of the back window you’ll see...’ Trailing the phone, Richard hurried over to the window and lookedout. A distant flash startled him. ‘Rule Four. Never stand where you can be photographed. ‘Rule Five... Are you listening to me, MacDuff?’ ‘What? Yes...’ said Richard in bewilderment. ‘How do you know me?’ ‘Rule Five. Never admit to your name.’ Richard stood silent, breathing hard. ‘I run a little course,’ said the voice, ‘if you’re interested...’ Richard said nothing. ‘You’re learning,’ continued the voice, ‘slowly, but you’relearning. If you were learning fast you would have put the phone downby now, of course. But you’re curious -- and incompetent -- and so youdon’t. I don’t run a course for novice burglars as it happens, temptingthough the idea is. I’m sure there would be grants available. If wehave to have them they may as well be trained. ‘However, if I did run such a course I would allow you to enrol forfree, because I too am curious. Curious to know why Mr Richard MacDuffwho, I am given to understand, is now a wealthy young man, something inthe computer industry, I believe, should suddenly be needing to resortto house-breaking.’ ‘Who -- ?’ ‘So I do a little research, phone Directory Enquiries and discoverthat the flat into which he is breaking is that of a Miss S. Way. Iknow that Mr Richard MacDuff’s employer is the famous Mr G. Way and Iwonder if they can by any chance be related.’ ‘Who -- ?’ ‘You are speaking with Svlad, commonly known as “Dirk” Cjelli,currently trading under the name of Gently for reasons which it wouldbe otiose, at this moment, to rehearse. I bid you good evening. If youwish to know more I will be at the Pizza Express in Upper Street in tenminutes. Bring some money.’ ‘Dirk?’ exclaimed Richard. ‘You... Are you trying to blackmail me?’ ‘No, you fool, for the pizzas.’ There was a click and Dirk Gentlyrang off. Richard stood transfixed for a moment or two, wiped his foreheadagain, and gently replaced the phone as if it were an injured hamster.His brain began to buzz gently and suck its thumb. Lots of littlesynapses deep inside his cerebral cortex all joined hands and starteddancing around and singing nursery rhymes. He shook his head to try andmake them stop, and quickly sat down at the answering machine again. He fought with himself over whether or not he was going to push thePlay button again, and then did so anyway before he had made up hismind. Hardly four seconds of light orchestral music had oozedsoothingly past when there came the sound of a key scratching in thelock out in the hallway. In panic Richard thumped the Eject button, popped the cassette out,rammed it into his jeans pocket and replaced it from the pile of freshcassettes that lay next to the machine. There was a similar pile nextto his own machine at home. Susan at the office provided them -- poor,long-suffering Susan at the office. He must remember to feel sympathyfor her in the morning, when he had the time and concentration for it. Suddenly, without even noticing himself doing it, he changed hismind. In a flash he popped the substitute cassette out of the machineagain, replaced the one he had stolen, rammed down the rewind buttonand made a lunge for the sofa where, with two seconds to go before thedoor opened, he tried to arrange himself into a nonchalant and winningposture. On an impulse he stuck his left hand up behind his back whereit might come in useful. He was just trying to arrange his features into an expressioncomposed in equal parts of contrition, cheerfulness and sexualallurement when the door opened and in walked Michael Wenton-Weakes. Everything stopped. Outside, the wind ceased. Owls halted in mid-flight. Well, maybethey did, maybe they didn’t, certainly the central heating chose thatmoment to shut down, unable perhaps to cope with the supernatural chillthat suddenly whipped through the room. ‘What are you doing here, Wednesday?’ demanded Richard. He rose fromthe sofa as if levitated with anger. Michael Wenton-Weakes was a large sad-faced man known by some peopleas Michael Wednesday-Week, because that was when he usually promised tohave things done by. He was dressed in a suit that had been superblywell tailored when his father, the late Lord Magna, had bought it fortyyears previously. Michael Wenton-Weakes came very high on the small but select list ofpeople whom Richard thoroughly disliked. He disliked him because he found the idea of someone who was notonly privileged, but was also sorry for himself because he thought theworld didn’t really understand the problems of privileged people,deeply obnoxious. Michael, on the other hand, disliked Richard for thefairly simple reason that Richard disliked him and made no secret ofit. Michael gave a slow and lugubrious look back out into the hallway asSusan walked through. She stopped when she saw Richard. She put downher handbag, unwound her scarf, unbuttoned her coat, slipped it off,handed it to Michael, walked over to Richard and smacked him in theface. ‘I’ve been saving that up all evening,’ she said furiously. ‘Anddon’t try and pretend that’s a bunch of flowers you’ve forgotten tobring which you’re hiding behind your back. You tried that gag lasttime.’ She turned and stalked off. ‘It’s a box of chocolates I forgot this time,’ said Richard glumlyand held out his empty hand to her retreating back. ‘I climbed up theentire outside wall without them. Did I feel a fool when I got in.’ ‘Not very funny,’ said Susan. She swept into the kitchen and soundedas if she was grinding coffee with her bare hands. For someone whoalways looked so neat and sweet and delicate she packed a hell of atemper. ‘It’s true,’ said Richard, ignoring Michael completely. ‘I nearlykilled myself.’ ‘I’m not going to rise to that,’ said Susan from within the kitchen.‘If you want something big and sharp thrown at you why don’t you comein here and be funny?’ ‘I suppose it would be pointless saying I’m sorry at this point,’Richard called out. ‘You bet,’ said Susan, sweeping back out of the kitchen again. Shelooked at him with her eyes flashing, and actually stamped her foot. ‘Honestly, Richard,’ she said, ‘I suppose you’re going to say youforgot again. How can you have the gall to stand there with two arms,two legs and a head as if you’re a human being? This is behaviour thata bout of amoebic dysentery would be ashamed of. I bet that even thevery lowest form of dysentery amoeba shows up to take its girlfriendout for a quick trot around the stomach lining once in a while. Well, Ihope you had a lousy evening.’ ‘I did,’ said Richard. ‘You wouldn’t have liked it. There was ahorse in the bathroom, and you know how you hate that sort of thing.’ ‘Oh, Michael,’ said Susan brusquely, ‘don’t just stand there like asinking pudding. Thank you very much for dinner and the concert, youwere very sweet and I did enjoy listening to your troubles all eveningbecause they were such a nice change from mine. But I think it would bebest if I just found your book and pushed you out. I’ve got someserious jumping up and down and ranting to do, and I know how it upsetsyour delicate sensibilities.’ She retrieved her coat from him and hung it up. While he had beenholding it he had seemed entirely taken up with this task and obliviousto anything else. Without it he seemed a little lost and naked and wasforced to stir himself back into life. He turned his big heavy eyesback on Richard. ‘Richard,’ he said, ‘I, er, read your piece in... in Fathom. OnMusic and, er...’ ‘Fractal Landscapes,’ said Richard shortly. He didn’t want to talkto Michael, and he certainly didn’t want to get drawn into aconversation about Michael’s wretched magazine. Or rather, the magazinethat used to be Michael’s. That was the precise aspect of the conversation that Richard didn’twant to get drawn into. ‘Er, yes. Very interesting, of course,’ said Michael in his silky,over-rounded voice. ‘Mountain shapes and tree shapes and all sorts ofthings. Recycled algae.’ ‘Recursive algorithms.’ ‘Yes, of course. Very interesting. But so wrong, so terribly wrong.For the magazine, I mean. It is, after all, an arts review. I wouldnever have allowed such a thing, of course. Ross has utterly ruined it.Utterly. He’ll have to go. Have to. He has no sensibilities and he’sa thief.’ ‘He’s not a thief, Wednesday, that’s absolutely absurd,’ snappedRichard, instantly getting drawn into it in spite of his resolution notto. ‘He had nothing to do with your getting the push whatsoever. Thatwas your own silly fault, and you...’ There was a sharp intake of breath. ‘Richard,’ said Michael in his softest, quietest voice -- arguingwith him was like getting tangled in parachute silk -- ‘I think you donot understand how important...’ ‘Michael,’ said Susan gently but firmly, holding open the door.Michael Wenton-Weakes nodded faintly and seemed to deflate. ‘Your book,’ Susan added, holding out to him a small and elderlyvolume on the ecclesiastical architecture of Kent. He took it, murmuredsome slight thanks, looked about him for a moment as if he’d suddenlyrealised something rather odd, then gathered himself together, noddedfarewell and left. Richard didn’t appreciate quite how tense he had become till Michaelleft and he was suddenly able to relax. He’d always resented theindulgent soft spot that Susan had for Michael even if she did try todisguise it by being terribly rude to him all the time. Perhaps evenbecause of that. ‘Susan, what can I say...?’ he started lamely. ‘You could say “Ouch” for a start. You didn’t even give me thatsatisfaction when I hit you, and I thought I did it rather hard. God,it’s freezing in here. What’s that window doing wide open?’ She went over to shut it. ‘I told you. That’s how I got in,’ said Richard. He sounded sufficiently as if he meant it to make her look round athim in surprise. ‘Really,’ he said. ‘Like in the chocolate ads, only I forgot the boxof chocolates...’ He shrugged sheepishly. She stared at him in amazement. ‘What on earth possessed you to do that?’ she said. She stuck herhead out of the window and looked down. ‘You could have got killed,’she said, turning back to him. ‘Well, er, yes...’ he said. ‘It just seemed the only way to... Idon’t know.’ He rallied himself. ‘You took your key back remember?’ ‘Yes. I got fed up with you coming and raiding my larder when youcouldn’t be bothered to do your own shopping. Richard, you reallyclimbed up this wall?’ ‘Well, I wanted to be here when you got in.’ She shook her head in bewilderment. ‘It would have been a great dealbetter if you’d been here when I went out. Is that why you’re wearingthose filthy old clothes?’ ‘Yes. You don’t think I went to dinner at St Cedd’s like this?’ ‘Well, I no longer know what you consider to be rational behaviour.’She sighed and fished about in a small drawer. ‘Here,’ she said, ‘ifit’s going to save your life,’ and handed him a couple of keys on aring. ‘I’m too tired to be angry anymore. An evening of being lobbiedby Michael has taken it out of me.’ ‘Well, I’ll never understand why you put up with him,’ said Richard,going to fetch the coffee. ‘I know you don’t like him, but he’s very sweet and can be charmingin his sad kind of way. Usually it’s very relaxing to be with someonewho’s so self-absorbed, because it doesn’t make any demands on you. Buthe’s obsessed with the idea that I can do something about his magazine.I can’t, of course. Life doesn’t work like that. I do feel sorry forhim, though.’ ‘I don’t. He’s had it very, very easy all his life. He still has itvery, very easy. He’s just had his toy taken away from him that’s all.It’s hardly unjust, is it?’ ‘It’s not a matter of whether it’s just or not. I feel sorry for himbecause he’s unhappy.’ ‘Well, of course he’s unhappy. Al Ross has turned Fathom into areally sharp, intelligent magazine that everyone suddenly wants toread. It was just a bumbling shambles before. Its only real functionwas to let Michael have lunch and toady about with whoever he liked onthe pretext that maybe they might like to write a little something. Hehardly ever got an actual issue out. The whole thing was a sham. Hepampered himself with it. I really don’t find that charming orengaging. I’m sorry, I’m going on about it and I didn’t mean to.’ Susan shrugged uneasily. ‘I think you overreact,’ she said, ‘though I think I will have tosteer clear of him if he’s going to keep on at me to do something Isimply can’t do. It’s too exhausting. Anyway, listen, I’m glad you hada lousy evening. I want to talk about what we were going to do thisweekend.’ ‘Ah,’ said Richard, ‘well...’ ‘Oh, I’d better just check the messages first.’ She walked past him to the telephone-answering machine, played thefirst few seconds of Gordon’s message and then suddenly ejected thecassette. ‘I can’t be bothered,’ she said, giving it to him. ‘Could you justgive this straight to Susan at the office tomorrow? Save her a trip. Ifthere’s anything important on it she can tell me.’ Richard blinked, said, ‘Er, yes,’ and pocketed the tape, tinglingwith the shock of the reprieve. ‘Anyway, the weekend --’ said Susan, sitting down on the sofa. Richard wiped his hand over his brow. ‘Susan, I...’ ‘I’m afraid I’ve got to work. Nicola’s sick and I’m going to have todep for her at the Wigmore on Friday week. There’s some Vivaldi andsome Mozart I don’t know too well, so that means a lot of extrapractice this weekend, I’m afraid. Sorry.’ ‘Well, in fact,’ said Richard, ‘I have to work as well.’ He sat downby her. ‘I know. Gordon keeps on at me to nag you. I wish he wouldn’t. It’snone of my business and it puts me in an invidious position. I’m tiredof being pressurised by people, Richard. At least you don’t do that.’ She took a sip of her coffee. ‘But I’m sure,’ she added, ‘that there’s some kind of grey areabetween being pressurised and being completely forgotten about that I’dquite like to explore. Give me a hug.’ He hugged her, feeling that he was monstrously and unworthily lucky.An hour later he let himself out and discovered that the Pizza Expresswas closed. Meanwhile, Michael Wenton-Weakes made his way back to his home inChelsea. As he sat in the back of the taxi he watched the streets witha blank stare and tapped his fingers lightly against the window in aslow thoughtful rhythm. Rap tap tap a rap tap a rap a tap. He was one of those dangerous people who are soft, squidgy andcowlike provided they have what they want. And because he had alwayshad what he wanted, and had seemed easily pleased with it, it had neveroccurred to anybody that he was anything other than soft, squidgy andcowlike. You would have to push through a lot of soft squidgy bits inorder to find a bit that didn’t give when you pushed it. That was thebit that all the soft squidgy bits were there to protect. Michael Wenton-Weakes was the younger son of Lord Magna, publisher,newspaper owner and over-indulgent father, under whose protectiveumbrella it had pleased Michael to run his own little magazine at amagnificent loss. Lord Magna had presided over the gradual butdignified and well-respected decline of the publishing empireoriginally founded by his father, the first Lord Magna. Michael continued to tap his knuckles lightly on the glass. A rap tap a rap a tap. He remembered the appalling, terrible day when his father hadelectrocuted himself changing a plug, and his mother, his mother,took over the business. Not only took it over but started running itwith completely unexpected verve and determination. She examined thecompany with a very sharp eye as to how it was being run, or walked, asshe put it, and eventually even got around to looking at the accountsof Michael’s magazine. Tap tap tap. Now Michael knew just enough about the business side of things toknow what the figures ought to be, and he had simply assured his fatherthat that was indeed what they were. ‘Can’t allow this job just to be a sinecure, you must see that, oldfellow, you have to pay your way or how would it look, how would itbe?’ his father used to say, and Michael would nod seriously, and startthinking up the figures for next month, or whenever it was he wouldnext manage to get an issue out. His mother, on the other hand, was not so indulgent. Not by alorryload. Michael usually referred to his mother as an old battleaxe, but ifshe was fairly to be compared to a battleaxe it would only be to anexquisitely crafted, beautifully balanced battleaxe, with an elegantminimum of fine engraving which stopped just short of its gleamingrazored edge. One swipe from such an instrument and you wouldn’t evenknow you’d been hit until you tried to look at your watch a bit laterand discovered that your arm wasn’t on. She had been waiting patiently -- or at least with the appearance ofpatience -- in the wings all this time, being the devoted wife, thedoting but strict mother. Now someone had taken her -- to switchmetaphors for a moment -- out of her scabbard and everyone was runningfor cover. Including Michael. It was her firm belief that Michael, whom she quietly adored, hadbeen spoiled in the fullest and worst sense of the word, and she wasdetermined, at this late stage, to stop it. It didn’t take her more than a few minutes to see that he had beensimply making up the figures every month, and that the magazine washaemorrhaging money as Michael toyed with it, all the time running uphuge lunch bills, taxi accounts and staff costs that he would playfullyset against fictitious taxes. The whole thing had simply got lostsomewhere in the gargantuan accounts of Magna House. She had then summoned Michael to see her. Tap tap a rap a tappa. ‘How do you want me to treat you,’ she said, ‘as my son or as theeditor of one of my magazines? I’m happy to do either.’ ‘Your magazines? Well, I am your son, but I don’t see...’ ‘Right. Michael, I want you to look at these figures,’ she saidbriskly, handing over a sheet of computer printout. ‘The ones on theleft show the actual incomings and outgoings of Fathom, the ones onthe right are your own figures. Does anything strike you about them?’ ‘Mother, I can explain, I --’ ‘Good,’ said Lady Magna sweetly, ‘I’m very glad of that.’ She took the piece of paper back. ‘Now. Do you have any views on howthe magazine should best be run in the future?’ ‘Yes, absolutely. Very strong ones. I --’ ‘Good,’ said Lady Magna, with a bright smile. ‘Well, that’s allperfectly satisfactory, then.’ ‘Don’t you want to hear -- ?’ ‘No, that’s all right, dear. I’m just happy to know that you do havesomething to say on the matter to clear it all up. I’m sure the newowner of Fathom will be glad to listen to whatever it is.’ ‘What?’ said a stunned Michael. ‘You mean you’re actually sellingFathom?’ ‘No. I mean I’ve already sold it. Didn’t get much for it, I’mafraid. One pound plus a promise that you would be retained as editorfor the next three issues, and after that it’s at the new owner’sdiscretion.’ Michael stared, pop-eyed. ‘Well, come now,’ said his mother reasonably, ‘we could hardlycontinue under the present arrangement, could we? You always agreedwith your father that the job should not be a sinecure for you. Andsince I would have a great deal of difficulty in either believing orresisting your stories, I thought I would hand the problem on tosomeone with whom you could have a more objective relationship. Now, Ihave another appointment, Michael.’ ‘Well, but... who have you sold it to?’ spluttered Michael. ‘Gordon Way.’ ‘Gordon Way! But for heaven’s sake, Mother, he’s --’ ‘He’s very anxious to be seen to patronise the arts. And I think Ido mean patronise. I’m sure you’ll get on splendidly, dear. Now, if youdon’t mind --’ Michael stood his ground. ‘I’ve never heard of anything so outrageous! I --’ ‘Do you know, that’s exactly what Mr Way said when I showed himthese figures and then demanded that you be kept on as editor for threeissues.’ Michael huffed and puffed and went red and wagged his finger, butcould think of nothing more to say. Except, ‘What difference would ithave made to all this if I’d said treat me as the editor of one of yourmagazines?’ ‘Why, dear,’ said Lady Magna with her sweetest smile, ‘I would havecalled you Mr Wenton-Weakes, of course. And I wouldn’t now be tellingyou straighten your tie,’ she added, with a tiny little gesture underher chin. Rap tap tap rap tap tap. ‘Number seventeen, was it, guv?’ ‘Er... what?’ said Michael, shaking his head. ‘It was seventeen you said, was it?’ said the cab driver, ‘‘Causewe’re ‘ere.’ ‘Oh. Oh, yes, thank you,’ said Michael. He climbed out and fumbledin his pocket for some money. ‘Tap tap tap, eh?’ ‘What?’ said Michael handing over the fare. ‘Tap tap tap,’ said the cab driver, ‘all the bloody way here. Gotsomething on your mind, eh, mate?’ ‘Mind your own bloody business,’ snapped Michael savagely. ‘If you say so, mate. Just thought you might be going mad orsomething,’ said the cabbie and drove off. Michael let himself into his house and walked through the cold hallto the dining room, turned on the overhead light and poured himself abrandy from the decanter. He took off his coat, threw it across thelarge mahogany dining table and pulled a chair over to the window wherehe sat nursing his drink and his grievances. Tap tap tap, he went on the window. He had sullenly remained as editor for the stipulated three issuesand was then, with little ceremony, let go. A new editor was found, acertain A. K. Ross, who was young, hungry and ambitious, and he quicklyturned the magazine into a resounding success. Michael, in themeantime, had been lost and naked. There was nothing else for him. He tapped on the window again and looked, as he frequently did, atthe small table lamp that stood on the sill. It was a rather ugly,ordinary little lamp, and the only thing about it that regularlytransfixed his attention was that this was the lamp that hadelectrocuted his father, and this was where he had been sitting. The old boy was such a fool with anything technical. Michael couldjust see him peering with profound concentration through his half moonsand sucking his moustache as he tried to unravel the arcanecomplexities of a thirteen-amp plug. He had, it seemed, plugged it backin the wall without first screwing the cover back on and then tried tochange the fuse in situ. From this he received the shock which hadstilled his already dicky heart. Such a simple, simple error, thought Michael, such as anyone couldhave made, anyone, but the consequences of it were catastrophic.Utterly catastrophic. His father’s death, his own loss, the rise of theappalling Ross and his disastrously successful magazine and... Tap tap tap. He looked at the window, at his own reflection, and at the darkshadows of the bushes on the other side of it. He looked again at thelamp. This was the very object, this the very place, and the error wassuch a simple one. Simple to make, simple to prevent. The only thing that separated him from that simple moment was theinvisible barrier of the months that had passed in between. A sudden, odd calm descended on him as if something inside him hadsuddenly been resolved. Tap tap tap. Fathom was his. It wasn’t meant to be a success, it was his life.His life had been taken from him, and that demanded a response. Tap tap tap crack. He surprised himself by suddenly punching his hand through thewindow and cutting himself quite badly.