One of Our Thursdays Is Missing

32. Homecoming

We dodged Jurisfaction officers for two hours and eventually negotiated a ride home aboard a copy of the recently discredited President Formby War Diaries, which was on a one-way trip to Historical Counterfactuals.

“May I be so bold,” said Sprockett once we had landed and were on the train heading back towards Fantasy and home, “as to inquire about our next move?”

“Placating an angry Carmine, I should imagine—I’ve been away a lot these past few days. After that we’ll have to recover anything Horace has stolen again, put up with petulant huffing and tutting from Pickwick—and my dopey father will be complaining about something, I shouldn’t wonder.”

“I was referring to Racy Novel, ma’am. Should you call Commander Bradshaw again?”

I’d asked myself the same question on the way back from Biography. I’d spoken to him briefly while on board the World Hotel Review. He had expressed surprise and alarm about the Men in Plaid and had also checked out Mediocre’s address and reported back to us no sign of metaphor—in bridges or otherwise. Unwisely, I had told him we were going on to Biography, and now I didn’t know if I could trust him or not.

“He might have tipped off the Men in Plaid,” I said after airing my thoughts, “or he simply might be having his footnoterphone messages read in transit.”

It wasn’t hard, apparently. All you needed do was to sit in the footnoterphone ducts and read the messages as they flitted past.

“Even if he is on the level,” I added, “it’s not like we have any answers or evidence—just a geologist out to grass and a rough sketch of the strata beneath the northern part of Fiction.”

Sprockett nodded agreement.

“But,” I added, “we know that Thursday would have been working to avert war at the peace talks. If she was silenced, the attacks by the Men in Plaid would seem to implicate the Council of Genres, but the CofG want to avoid a war, not start one. It was Senator Jobsworth himself who wanted me to go to the peace talks tomorrow. The only person we know who seems to actually welcome war is Speedy Muffler.”

“Would he have access to Duplex-6 automatons that could be made to look like Men in Plaid?” asked Sprockett.

“Duplex will sell to anyone with the cash, but the Council’s strict sales embargoes are hard to circumvent. Not impossible, but hard.”

“What about Red Herring, ma’am?”

“I’m not sure. Is Red Herring a red herring? Or is it the fact that we’re meant to think Red Herring is a red herring that is actually the red herring?”

“Or perhaps the fact you’re meant to think Red Herring isn’t a red herring is what makes Red Herring a red herring after all.”

“We’re talking serious metaherrings here. Oh, crap, I’m lost again. Who’s talking now?”

“It’s you,” said Sprockett.

“Right.”

“Whatever is going on,” I said, “it’s big. Really big. If it’s big enough to risk killing Thursday Next, destroying a book and subverting the Men in Plaid from their usual duties of frightening the citizenry to the more specific duty of frightening individual citizens, then there is no limit to what they might do. We need to keep our eyes open at all times.”

We took a cab from Le Guin Central and, deep in thought, walked up to the house. I had my hand on the butt of my pistol, just in case. I needn’t have worried. Men in Plaid were never seen without their Buick Roadmasters, and the driveway was empty. I opened the front door and found a dozen members of the cast sitting around the kitchen table.

“Hello,” I said, somewhat surprised. “Have we got a cast meeting scheduled for this evening?”

“We have now,” replied Carmine.

My eyes flicked from face to face, and they seemed very serious. Most of the major players were there—my father, Bowden, Hades, Jack Schitt, Braxton, Rochester, Paige Turner, Joffy, Stig, Victor Analogy, my mother and even Bertha Rochester, although she had been put in a straitjacket in the event she tried to bite anyone.

“What’s going on?”

“You’ve been acting a bit irresponsibly recently,” said Carmine, “running around the BookWorld, pretending to be her. You’ve been neglecting your duties. I’ve been covering for you far more than is written in my contract, and only yesterday you were shouting at us all.”

“I’ve had things on my mind,” I replied by way of excuse, “ important things.”

“So you say. To the casual outside observer, you’re simply getting delusions of adequacy. Play a strong character for too long and it tends to have an unhinging effect.”

“And today,” said Bowden in an annoying “I told you so” sort of voice, “you were threatening to tell the Outland all about the BookWorld. There’s a good reason the real Thursday never put that part of the story in her books, you know.”

“I admit I might have gone too far on that point,” I conceded, but I could see they didn’t believe me.

“None of us are happy,” said my father, “and we feel you might be leading the series into disrepute. If the book gets punished for your transgressions, then every one of us has to suffer. Punish one, punish all. You know how it works.”

I did, far too well. To keep books in line, the entire cast is often disciplined for the misdeeds of one. It generated a certain degree of conformity within the cast—and a lot of ill feeling.

“So what are you saying?” I asked.

My father nudged Bowden, who nudged Victor, who nudged Acheron Hades.

“We’re saying,” said Hades slowly, “that we might need to make some . . . changes.”

“Changes? What sorts of changes?”

“Changes in leadership.”

“You want to have me fired? You can’t do that.”

“In point of fact,” piped up Pickwick, “we can. Article 218 of the Textual Code states, ‘If the nominated leader of a book acts in an unlawful or reckless manner that might affect the smooth operation of a book, he or she can be removed by a simple show of hands.’”

There was a deathly hush as they waited to see what I would say.

“The series is operating smoothly. It will be hard to prove recklessness on my part.”

“We don’t need to,” replied Carmine. “We need only prove unlawfulness.”

“And how would you do that?”

“The Toast Marketing Board subplot. Totally illegal. You wrote out the new pages in your own handwriting.”

“Listen,” I said, changing my tone to one of conciliation, “we have an average weekly ReadRate of 3.7 at present—remaindered, out of print and, technically speaking, unread. You need my leadership to try to turn this series around. If you want to negotiate, we can negotiate—everything’s on the table. So let’s talk. Who’s for tea?”

They all stared at me in a stony-faced manner, and I suddenly felt that things were a lot worse than I’d thought. There had been grumblings before, but nothing like this.

“Well, then,” I said, my temper rising, “who’s going to lead the book? Carmine?”

“I can handle it.”

“You can handle it now. What if the ReadRate goes above forty? How screwed will you be then?”

“There is no need to be unkind,” said my father. “With our support she’ll manage. At least she doesn’t spend her days gallivanting around the BookWorld on arguably pointless quests for a namesake who doesn’t even like her.”

That hurt.

“Well,” I replied in a sarcastic tone, “how does consorting with a goblin fare on the ‘bringing the book into disrepute’ stakes?”

“You can talk,” retorted Carmine. “ Your intended boyfriend set fire to a busload of nuns.”

“And puppies,” said Pickwick.

“ Orphaned puppies,” added Rochester, dabbing his eyes with a handkerchief.

“Besides,” said Carmine, “Horace and I have agreed to a trial separation.”

“I think we’ve all said quite enough,” announced Bowden haughtily. “All in favor of replacing Thursday with Carmine, raise a hand.”

They all raised a hand except Stig, who I know liked me, Bertha Rochester who was in a straitjacket, and Pickwick.

“Thank you, Pickwick,” I said. “Nice to know some friends haven’t abandoned me.”

“Are we voting now?” asked Pickwick, waking with a start. “I’m in.”

And she put a wing in the air.

“All right, you bunch of disloyal ingrates,” I said, taking the Snooze Button’s access codes and the key to the core containment from around my neck, “have the job. Who cajoled you all when you thought you were rubbish? Who made sure we rehearsed the whole way through the six weeks we were unread last winter?”

Victor looked at the ceiling, and Pickwick stared at her foot. They all knew I’d been holding things together for a while. The previous written Thursday had left the series in a terrible state. Everyone arguing with everyone else, and with a humor deficit that I had only just managed to plug.

“And a fat lot of good it did us,” replied Carmine angrily. “We’re the laughingstock of Speculative Fantasy.”

“We’re still being read. Do you know what to do if there is a flameout on the e-book throughput intensifiers?”

Carmine’s blank look told me she didn’t.

“Or if the metaphor depletes midscene? What about the irony injectors? How often should they be cleaned? Do you even know what an adjectivore looks like or what happens if you get Martha Stewarts behind the wainscoting?”

“Hey,” said Horace, who had been sitting unnoticed on the top of the bureau, “why don’t you go do a Plot 9 on yourself? We can muddle through. With less than twenty active readers, we’ve certainly got enough time.”

“We?” I demanded. “Since when were you anything to do with this series?”

“Since Carmine asked me.”

“He has some very good ideas,” said Carmine. “Even Pickwick thinks they’re quite good. Isn’t that so, Pickers?”

“Sort of,” said Pickwick, looking the other way huffily.

“We’d better get on,” said Hades in a pointed fashion. “We’ve got some readings to attend to.”

“Right,” I said, lips pursed as I tried to control my temper, “I’ll let you get on with it.”

And without another word, I strode out of the house with as much dignity as I could muster. As soon as I was outside, I sat on the garden wall, my heart beating fast, taking short gasps of air. I looked back at the series. It was a jagged collection of settings—the towers of Thornfield Hall set among the floodlights of the Swindon croquet field and the Penderyn Hotel. There were a few airships, too, but only one-tenth scale. It was all I’d ever known. It had seemed like home.

“You should look on the bright side, ma’am,” said Sprockett, handing me a Chicago Fizz he had conjured up seemingly from nowhere.

“There is a bright side? No book, no home, no one to believe in me and no real idea what became of Thursday—or what the hell’s going on. And in addition I’d really like to punch Horace.”

“Punching goblins,” replied Sprockett soothingly, “while offering short-term relief, has no long-term beneficial value.”

I sighed. “You’re right.”

“By referring to the ‘bright side,’ ma’am, I merely meant that the recent upset simply frees your schedule for more pressing matters. You have larger fish to fry over the next couple of days.”

I stood up. Sprockett was right. To hell with the series—for the moment at least.

“So where do you suggest we go now?”

“Back to Vanity.”