The Well of Lost Plots

21 Who stole the tarts?

The Gryphon was a creature with the head and wings of an eagle and the body of a lion. In his youth he must have been a frightening creature to behold, but in his later years he wore spectacles and a scarf, which somewhat dented his otherwise fearsome appearance.

He was, I was told, one of the finest legal eagles around, and after Snell's death he became head of the Jurisfiction legal team. It was the Gryphon who managed to secure the record pay-out following the celebrated Farmer’s Wife v. Three Blind Mice case and was instrumental in reducing Nemo's piracy charges to 'accidental manslaughter'.

The Gryphon was reading my notes when I arrived and made small and incomprehensible noises as he flicked through the pages, grunting here and there and staring at me over his spectacles with large eyes.

'Well!' he said. 'We should be in for some fun now!'

'Fun?' I repeated. 'Defending a Class II fiction infraction?'

'I'm prosecuting a class action for blindness against the Triffids this afternoon,' said the Gryphon soberly, 'and the Martians' war crimes trial in War of the Worlds just drags on and on. Believe me, a fiction infraction is fun. Do you want to see my case load?'

'No thanks.'

'Okay. We'll see what their witnesses have to say and how Hopkins presents his case. I may decide not to put you on the stand. Please don't do anything stupid like grow — it nearly destroyed Alice's case there and then. And if the Queen orders your head to be cut off, ignore her.'

'Okay.' I sighed. 'Let's get on with it.'

The King and Queen of Hearts were seated on their thrones when we arrived, but they were the only people in the courtroom who were seemingly composed — Alice's exit two pages earlier had caused a considerable amount of distress to the jury, who were back in their places but were bickering furiously with the foreman, a rabbit who stared back at them, nibbling a large carrot that he had somehow smuggled in.

The Knave of Hearts was being escorted back to the cells and the tarts — exhibit 'A' — were being taken away and replaced by the original manuscript of Jane Eyre. Seated before the King and Queen was prosecuting attorney Matthew Hopkins and a collection of very severe-looking birds. He glared at me with barely concealed venom. He looked a lot less amused than when we last crossed swords in The Trial, and he hadn't looked particularly amused then. The King was obviously the judge because he wore a large wig, but quite which part the Queen of Hearts was to play in the proceedings, I had no idea.

The twelve jurors calmed down and all started writing busily on their slates.

'What are they doing?' I whispered to the Gryphon. 'The trial hasn't even begun yet!'

'Silence in court!' yelled the White Rabbit in a shrill voice.

'Off with her head!' yelled the Queen.

The King put on his spectacles and looked anxiously round, to find out who had been talking. The Queen nudged him and nodded in my direction.

'You there!' he said. 'You will have your say soon enough, Miss, Miss …'

'Next,' put in the White Rabbit after consulting his parchment.

'Really?' replied the King with some confusion. 'Does that mean we're done?'

'No, Your Majesty,' replied the White Rabbit patiently, 'her name is Next. Thursday Next.'

'I suppose you think that's funny?'

'No indeed, Your Majesty,' I replied. 'It was the name I was born with.'

The jurymen all frantically started to write 'It was the name I was born with' on their slates.

'You're an Outlander, aren't you?' said the Queen, who had been staring at me for some time.

'Yes, Your Majesty.'

'Then answer me this: when there are two people and one of them has left, who is left? The person who is left or the person who has left? I mean, they can't both be left, can they?'

'Herald, read the accusation!' said the King.

At this, the White Rabbit blew three blasts on the trumpet, and then unrolled the parchment scroll, and read as follows:

'Miss Thursday Next is hereby accused of a fiction infraction Class II against the Jurisfiction penal code FAL/0605937 and pursuant to the BookWorld general law regarding continuity of plot lines, as ratified to the Council of Genres, 1584.'

'Consider your verdict,' said the King to the jury.

'Objection!' cried the Gryphon. 'There's a great deal to come before that!'

'Overruled!' shouted the King, adding: 'Or do I mean "sustained"? I always get the two mixed up — it's a bit like "feed a cold and starve a fever" or "starve a cold and feed a fever". I never know which is right. At any rate, you may call the first witness.'

The White Rabbit blew three more blasts on the trumpet, and called out:

'First witness!'

The first witness was Mrs Fairfax, the housekeeper at Thornfield Hall, Rochester's home. She blinked and looked around the court slowly, smiling at Hopkins and glaring at me. She was assisted into the witness box by an usher who was in reality a large guinea pig.

'Do you promise to tell the whole truth and nothing but the truth?' asked the White Rabbit.

'I do.'

'Write that down,' the King said to the jury, and the jury eagerly all wrote "write that down" on their slates.

'Mrs Fairfax,' began Hopkins, rising to his feet, 'I want you to tell me in your own words the events surrounding Miss Next's intrusion into Jane Eyre, starting at the beginning and not stopping until you get to the end …'

'And then what?' asked the King.

'Then she may stop,' said Hopkins with a trace of annoyance.

'Ah,' said the King in the voice of someone who thinks they understand a great deal but are sadly mistaken, 'proceed.'

For the next two hours we listened not only to Mrs Fairfax but also Grace Poole, Blanche Ingram and St John Rivers, all giving evidence to explain the old ending and how by calling 'Jane, Jane, Jane!' at Jane's bedroom I had changed the narrative completely. The jury tried to keep up with the proceedings, and they wrote as and when directed by the King until there was no more room on their slates, whereupon they tried to write on the benches in front of them, and failing that, on each other.

After every witness the smallest dormouse in the jury was excused for a trip to the bathroom, which gave the Gryphon time to explain to the King — who probably wouldn't have been able to touch his head with his eyes shut — the procedure of the law. When the dormouse returned the witness was given to the Gryphon for cross-examination, and every time he called: 'No further questions.' The afternoon wore on and it became hotter in the courtroom. The Queen grew more and more bored, and seemed to demand the verdict on a more and more frequent basis, once even asking during a witness's testimony.

And throughout this tedious performance, as the characters from Jane Eyre came and repeated the truth in front of me, a seemingly endless parade of guinea pigs interrupted the proceedings. Each one was immediately set upon and placed head first into a large canvas bag, then ejected from the court. Each time this happened there followed a quite inordinate amount of confusion, cries and noise. As the din grew to fever pitch the Queen would scream, 'Off with his head! Off with his head!' as though she were somehow in direct competition with the tumult. By the time the latest guinea pig had been thrown from the court, Grace Poole had vanished in a cloud of alcoholic vapours, and no one knew where she was.

'Never mind!' said the King, with an air of great relief. 'Call the next witness.' He added in an undertone to the Queen: 'Really, my dear, you must cross-examine the next witness. It quite makes my forehead ache!'

I watched the White Rabbit as he fumbled over the list and read out at the top of his shrill little voice the name: 'Thursday Next!'

'Excuse me,' said the Gryphon, stirring himself from the lethargy he had shown throughout the trial, 'but Miss Next will not be giving evidence against herself in this court of law.'

'Is that allowed?' asked the King. The jury all looked at one another and shrugged.

'It proves she's guilty!' screamed the Queen. 'Off with her head! Off with—'

'It proves nothing of the sort,' interrupted the Gryphon. The Queen went scarlet and would probably have exploded had not the King laid his hand on her arm.

'Come, come, my dear,' he said softly, 'you must stay calm. All these orders of execution are probably not good for your hearts.' He chuckled. 'Hearts,' he said again. 'I say, I've made a joke, that's rather good, don't you think?'

The jury all laughed dutifully and the brighter ones explained to the more stupid ones what the joke was, and the stupid ones explained to the even stupider ones what a joke actually is.

Excuse me,' said the dormouse again, 'may I go to the bathroom?'

'Again?' bellowed the King. 'You must have a bladder the size of a peanut.'

'A grain of rice, so please Your Majesty,' said the dormouse, knees knocking together.

'Very well,' said the King, 'but make it quick. Now, can we reach a verdict?'

'Now who wants a verdict?' asked the Queen triumphantly.

'There's more evidence to come yet, please Your Majesty,' said the White Rabbit, jumping up in a great hurry. 'We have to hear from the defence yet.'

'The defence?' asked the King wearily. 'Haven't we just heard from them?'

'No, Your Majesty,' replied the White Rabbit. 'That was the prosecution.'

'The two always confuse me,' replied the King, staring at his feet, 'a bit like that "overruled" and "sustained" malarkey — which was which again?'

'The prosecution rests,' said Hopkins, who could see that this trial might last for months if he didn't get a move on, 'and I think,' he added, 'we have conclusively proved that Miss Next not only hanged the ending of Jane Eyre but was also premeditated in her actions. This is not a court of opinion, it is a court of law, and there is only one verdict which this court can reach — guilty.'

'I told you she was guilty,' muttered the King, getting up to leave.

'Please Your Majesty,' said the White Rabbit, 'that was just the prosecution summing-up. You must listen to the defence now.

'Ah!' said the King, sitting down again.

The Gryphon stood up and walked to the jury box. They all recoiled in fear as he scratched his chin with a large paw. The dormouse put up his hand again to be excused and was allowed to leave. When he had returned the Gryphon began.

'The question here is not whether Miss Next took a few textual and narrative liberties with the end of Jane Eyre, as my learne friend the prosecution has made so abundantly clear. We admit that she did.'

There was a gasp from the jury.

'No, I contend that while Miss Next broke the law in a technical sense, she did so for the best possible motives — love.'

The Gryphon paused for dramatic effect.

'Love?' said the King. 'Is that a defence?'

'Historically speaking,' whispered the White Rabbit, 'one of the best, Your Majesty.'

'Ah!' said the King. 'Proceed.'

'And not for her own love either,' continued the Gryphon. 'She did it so that two others who were in love might stay that way and not be parted. For such things are against the natural order, a court far higher than the court Miss Next faces today.'

There was silence, so he continued:

'I contend that Miss Next is a very extraordinary person with a selfless streak that demands the highest leniency from this court. I have only one witness to call who will prove the veracity of this defence. I call … Edward Rochester!'

There was a sharp intake of breath and the remaining guinea pig fainted clean away. The clerks of the court, unsure what to do, popped the guinea pig in a sack and sat on it.

'Call Edward Rochester!' cried the White Rabbit in his shrill voice, a demand that was echoed four times with a succession of voices each diminished further by the distance.

We heard his footfalls shuffle on the floor before we saw him, a slightly hesitant stride with the click of a cane for punctuation. He walked slowly into the courtroom with a fragile yet resolute air, and scanned the room carefully to gauge, as well as he could, which of the shapes before him were judge, jury and counsel. The change I had wrought upon Jane Eyre had not been without its price. Rochester had lost a hand and had only the milkiest vision in one eye. I put my hand to my mouth as I watched his form shuffle into the silenced courtroom. If I had known the outcome of my actions, would I still have taken them? Acheron's perfidy had been the author of Rochester's ills, but I had been the catalyst.

Edward's face was healed although badly scarred, but it did no desperate harm to his looks. He took the oath, his features glowering beneath the dark hair that hung in front of his face.

'Excuse me,' said the dormouse who was sitting closest to Rochester, 'would you sign my slate, please?'

Rochester gave a dour half-smile, took the stylus and said:

'Name?'

'Alan.'

Rochester signed and returned the slate and was instantly handed eleven more, all wiped clean of their carefully written notes.

'Enough!' roared the King. 'I will not have my court turned into a haven for autograph hunters! We pursue the truth here, not celebrities!'

There was dead silence.

'But if you wouldn't mind,' said the King, passing his notebook down to Rochester and adding quietly: 'It's for my daughter.'

'And your daughter's name?' asked Rochester, pen poised.

'Rupert.'

Rochester signed the book and passed it back.

'Mr Rochester,' said the Gryphon, 'I wonder if you might expound in your own words on what Miss Next's actions have done for you?'

The court fell silent. Even the King and Queen were interested to hear what Mr Rochester had to say.

'To me alone?' replied Rochester slowly. 'Nothing. For us, my own dear sweet Jane and I — everything!'

He clenched the hand that carried his wedding ring, rubbing the band of gold with his thumb, trying to turn his feelings into words.

'What has Miss Next not done for us?' he intoned quietly. 'She has given us everything we could want. She has released us both from a prison that was not of our making, a dungeon of depression from which we thought we should never be free. Miss Next gave us the opportunity to love and be loved — I can think of no greater gift anyone could have been given, no word in my head can express the thanks that are ours, for her.'

There was silence in the courtroom. Even the Queen had fallen quiet and was staring — quite like a fish, I thought — at Rochester.

The Gryphon's voice broke the silence.

'Your witness.'

'Ah!' said Hopkins, gathering his thoughts. 'Tell me, Mr Rochester, just to confirm one point: did Miss Next change the end of your novel?'

'Although I am now, as you see, maimed,' replied Rochester, 'no better than the old lightning-struck chestnut tree in Thornfield orchard, I am happier than I have ever been. Yes, sir, Miss Next changed the ending, and I thank her every evening for it!'

Hopkins smiled.

'No further questions.'

'Well,' said the Gryphon after the court had been adjourned for the King to consider what form the sentence should take. The Queen, unusually for her, had called for acquittal. The word sounded alien on her lips and everyone stared at her with shock when she said it — Bill the lizard almost choked and had to be slapped on the back.

'The outcome was a foregone conclusion,' said the Gryphon, nodding his respect to Hopkins, who was organising some notes with the White Rabbit, 'but I knew Rochester would put a good show on for you. The King and Queen of Hearts may be the stupidest couple ever to preside over a court, but they are, after all, Hearts, and since you were undeniably guilty, we needed a court to show a bit of compassion when it came to sentencing.'

'Compassion?' I echoed with some surprise. 'With the Queen of "Off with her head"?'

'It's just her little way,' replied the Gryphon. 'She never actually executes anyone. I was just worried for a moment that they might try to hold you on remand until the sentencing, but fortunately the King isn't very up on legal terminology.'

'What do you think I'll get?'

'Do you know,' replied the Gryphon, 'I have absolutely no idea. Time will tell. I'll see you around, Next!'

I made my way slowly back to the Jurisfiction offices, where I found Miss Havisham.

'How did it go?' she asked.

'Guilty as charged.'

'Bad luck. When's the sentencing?'

'Not a clue.'

'Might not be for years, Thursday. I've got something for you.'

She passed me across the report I had written for her regarding Shadow the Sheepdog. I read the mark on the cover, then read it again, then looked at Havisham.

'A++ Hons?' I echoed, incredulously.

'Think I'm being over-generous?' she asked.

'Well, yes,' I said, feeling confused. 'I was forcibly married and then nearly murdered!'

'Marriage by force is not recognised, Next. But bear this in mind: We've given that particular assignment to every new Jurisfiction apprentice for the past thirty-two years and every single one has failed.'

I gaped at her.

'Even Harris Tweed.'

'Tweed was married to Mr Townsperson?'

'Apart from that bit. He didn't even manage to buy the pigs — let alone fool the vet. You did well, Next. Your cause-and-effect technique is good. Needs work, but good.'

'Oh!' I said, kind of relieved, then added after a moment's reflection: 'But I could have been killed!'

'You wouldn't have been killed,' she assured me. 'Jurisfiction has eyes and ears everywhere — we're not that reckless with our apprentices. Your multiple-choice mark was ninety-three per cent. Congratulations. Pending final submissions to the Council of Genres, you're made.'

I thought about this and felt some pride in it, despite knowing in my heart of hearts that this would not be a long appointment — as soon as I could return to the Outland, I would.

'Did you find out anything about Perkins?'

'Nothing,' I replied. 'Any news of Vernham Deane?'

'Vanished without trace. The Bellman's going to talk to us about it.'

'Could the two be related?'

'Perhaps,' she said, slightly mysteriously. 'I'll have to make further enquiries. Ask me again tomorrow.'