Marianne, the Matchbox, and the Malachite Mouse (14 page)

A large, furry pig in the next cage asked, rather breathlessly, ‘Where from, dearie?’

‘G’nop, most recently,’ replied the mouse.

‘Oh, by my own blessed piglets,’ the pig cried. ‘I spent the worst three minutes of my entire existence at G’nop. Lost three out of the litter and would have been gone, myself, if the time hadn’t run out.’

‘Do you know the game well?’ Marianne asked politely.

‘As well as anyone. They change it from time to time, but I’ve been around three times, including all the sidings except Moebius, thank the Alltime Boar, and take my word for it, avoid Banjog’s Mooring if you
possibly
can.’

Mouse nodded thoughtfully. ‘Let’s suppose I hadn’t thrown the dice, there at G’nop. What would have happened?’

‘Why, you’d have had another three minutes, dearie. I thought everyone knew that.’

‘And, if I were in the Illusion Fields, and ten thousand years passed, and I didn’t throw?’

‘You’d be in for another ten millennia. You want to watch your step there. Along about nine thousand and eight hundred years, you want to start paying very close attention to the passage of time! If you want out, that is.’

‘And if you throw a square where you’ve already been?’

‘Automatic skip over to the next square where you haven’t. Unless it’s a junction, of course. It’s all very simple, really.’

‘What if that square’s a Forever?’

‘If you land on a Forever, we all say ta-ta. Ta-ta, dearie, and it’s been nice to play with you. Forever’s pretty well gone and lost forever, dreadful sorry, pal of mine.’

‘It sounds to me as though the safest bet is just to stay in the Illusion Fields time after time,’ the mouse remarked in a depressed voice.

‘Oh, but so dull! I hate to say it about my own kind, but piggishly dull, dearie. Somnolent, slovenly, sluggardly, lie-about, do-nothing, dreadfully dull. One gets so sick of special effects! Along about the seven thousandth year, one gets absolutely fed up!’

The mouse sighed. ‘I didn’t intend to play this game just now. You see, I’m pregnant.’

‘Well so was I, dearie, when I began. And here you see me with what’s left of the litter, still getting along. Don’t fret. Everything will happen in its own time.’

‘Which is what?’

The pig shrugged, a most expressive gesture when done with furry shoulders, furry hips, furry ears and snout. ‘You mean time inside versus time outside? But, dearie, who knows? Who knows?’

‘Some think they know,’ said a ponderous voice from the cage on the other side. Mouse turned to meet the scrutiny of round, golden eyes in a vast, owllike head that was perched on a dumpy feathered body supported by elephantine legs. ‘Some think they know how long in-here is how long out-there, but then the question arises, doesn’t it, which out-there one is speaking of and which in-here one is speaking of also.’

‘There would be that,’ agreed the mouse.

‘Feeding time here at the zoo is in about an hour,’ the bird advised. ‘You still have time to fill out your menu selection and put it on the outside of the door.’

‘Thank you very much,’ breathed the mouse, suddenly aware of hunger. ‘I don’t think I’ve eaten in a very long time.’

‘Exactly,’ said the bird. ‘That’s how some people think they know.’ He or she then turned its back on the mouse and settled into a squat, as though sleeping.

‘That’s the aepyowl. Been here for simply ages,’ the pig whispered. ‘Refuses to throw the dice. Says it likes the food. And the food is very good, dearie. Do what it said. Fill out your menu card.’

Mouse settled on a seafood bisque, a green salad, and hot buttered rolls, with coffee to follow. The meal was delivered by a short, liveried staurikosaurus who wheeled in a low, rolling table, chatted about the weather, ‘Unusually fine for this part of the game,’ and poured the coffee before leaving. When the mouse had eaten, she felt much better. As she sipped the last of the coffee, she saw something far off in the sky, rather like a contrail. ‘What’s that?’ she asked, attracting the pig’s attention and pointing upward.

‘Hmmm?’ The pig ambled over to get a better look. ‘Down Line Express, dearie. It goes right by here on its way to Frab Junction. Everybody in the game gets to Frab Junction sooner or later. You’ll find if you try, you can throw any number you really want to. Also, you need to have the direction you’re going in mind before you throw. Try real hard to throw a seven from here and concentrate on a left turn at Cattermune’s House. You’ll end up at the junction, sure as sure. Interesting places, junctions.’

‘What makes them interesting?’

‘There are nine junction squares – not counting the Forever one – and they aren’t like anyplace else in the game. You can go there twice or three times or a dozen. You can meet people you’ve met before. Catch up on what’s happening in all the squares. Find out who the current Grisl Queen is, and who G’nop’s swallowed recently. Hear the latest on Gerald and George. Find out what’s going on at Cattermune’s House.’ The pig shuddered delicately. ‘It’s just interesting.’

The mouse patted its whiskers on the napkin which had been provided with dinner and watched the Down Line Express come nearer. It seemed to be running on a dim tracery, like the faintest cobweb stretched across the sky. When it was at its closest point it stopped. Various creatures, dwarfed by distance, got off the train and stared toward the zoo. There was something about one or two of them that tickled at Mouse, worrying her. Where had she seen those shapes before? She stared and stared, almost but not quite recognizing them.

With an exclamation of impatience, Mouse got the dice out of her matchbox. Surely at least three hours had passed since she first entered the zoo! Remembering the advice of pig, she concentrated on what she was doing and threw a seven.

‘I can’t understand how you got here so quickly,’ exclaimed the tortoise. ‘We passed you, way back there, behind the Polemic.’ Tortoise still had shreds of Polemic caught on her back claws, and she shuffled them on the pavement. The stuff was like chewing gum!

‘I know you did,’ answered the mouse, who had remembered them the minute she had seen them up close.

‘Mouse threw the dice when she saw us go by,’ said the amethyst ape, thoughtfully, stroking the malachite mouse with both hands. ‘Oh, lovely Mouse, are you well, are you coherent, are you in one piece, are you all right?’

‘Perfectly all right,’ the mouse said with a tiny catch in the voice, like the smallest possible sob. ‘I spent eight interminable years in Buttercup. I was almost eaten in G’nop. I did, however, have an excellent supper in the Dinosaur Zoo, and I am here, so, yes, I’m all right.’

They were sitting on a bench just outside the terminus of the Down Line Express, among a fuming welter of passersby, hawkers, mongers, and kiosk-holders, all greeting one another or calling out their wares in loud and uninhibited voices. Beyond this hubbub were streets full of wanderers and windows full of watchers. A streetcar clanged busily up a hill, striking sparks from the wires strung above the street, its bell ringing frantically. Food carts offered roast nuts, ethnic dishes, and brightly colored galoshes for those traveling to the Puce Polemic, the Worm Pits, or the Six Howlers. A newsmonger was doing a brisk business and the ape went to fetch one of the red lettered tabloids. ‘NEW GRISL QUEEN REIGNS AS BUTTERCUP I,’ headlined the front page, subheaded by ‘DOGS ARE LATEST ROYAL FAD,’ and ‘DOG IMPORTERS DO BRISK BUSINESS.’ Other front page headlines included, ‘SELDOM SIDING TRANSIENTS IN RIOT DEMAND MORE FREQUENT SERVICE,’ and ‘PUCE POLEMIC SEEN AS HEALTH HAZARD.’

On page two was a lengthy list of names headed, ‘G’NOP VICTIMS INCREASE IN RECENT,’ followed by an even longer list headed, ‘VACATIONERS RETURNING TO GAME FROM ILLUSION FIELDS.’ Ape read these lists almost compulsively, wondering if he would recognize anyone, realizing that he could not recognize anyone under the guise of carnelian cocks or emerald emus. On page three was a brief interview in which George confided that he hadn’t really meant what he said about Gerald, and another putatively conducted in the Dinosaur Zoo with a short-time visitor, a malachite mouse, in which the mouse was quoted as saying, ‘I didn’t plan to make this trip just now as I’m pregnant.’

‘That pig,’ breathed Mouse.

‘Never mind,’ said the ape. ‘It would seem the item to which our attention must inevitably be drawn is this one, here.’ He pointed to a feature article on the back page, ‘CATTERMUNE’S HOUSE HOSTS CELEBRITIES FOR BIRTHDAY FETE.’ ‘It is the only mention of a birthday I can find, and didn’t someone say that something had to be done by someone’s birthday?’

‘I wonder if it’s the same Cattermune?’ asked Mouse.

‘Surely there wouldn’t be more than one,’ commented Tortoise.

‘What Cattermune is that?’ asked the ape. ‘The name does sound familiar. Do you know this Cattermune?’

‘The Cattermune who lent a certain matchbox to the father of a certain person,’ said Mouse. ‘If you know who I mean.’

The tortoise sighed. ‘You don’t need to try to spare my feelings. It was my father who borrowed the matchbox from Cattermune. Presumably, if we are to avoid disaster, it must be returned to Cattermune, at Cattermune’s House, in time for Cattermune’s birthday.’

‘You didn’t mention the name Cattermune,’ said the ape. ‘When we discussed doing … coming … proceeding after Mouse, you didn’t so much as hint at Cattermune. We could have gone right past Cattermune’s and missed Mouse completely.’

‘You don’t need to be testy,’ said Tortoise. ‘It had slipped my mind, that’s all. In all this flurry and haste, the reason for the whole matter had simply slipped my mind.’

‘The matchbox,’ Mouse told Ape vehemently. ‘That’s what it’s all about. The return of the matchbox to Cattermune!’

‘A matchbox?’ the ape asked. ‘Do you have it?’

In answer the mouse took the box from her pocket and rattled it. ‘It was in one of the drawers at Buttercup’s house, that is, at Thrumm House. I was inhabiting Buttercup herself …’

‘Which is what the game square said,’ the tortoise interrupted. ‘It said Buttercup.’

‘Well, I was in Buttercup, and there was no room in there for anything but me and her, but at least the matchbox didn’t end up far away.’

‘Thank heaven you didn’t mislay it,’ said the tortoise fervently.

‘I had some trouble getting Buttercup to find it, but I certainly wouldn’t have mislaid it,’ replied the mouse. ‘That’s what I came for. Or what I would have come for if I had intended to come at all.’

‘Oh, most sweet and excellent companions, I am correct in thinking that a birthday was mentioned, am I not?’ Ape received two solemn nods in confirmation of this. ‘And since this paper indicates that a birthday is imminent, and since we have no idea how much time goes by within the game as compared to our customary world, hadn’t we better get ourselves to Cattermune’s House at once?’

‘If we’re in a hurry, we will need to throw a three,’ said Mouse plaintively.

‘But what if we don’t. Or one of us doesn’t?’ Tortoise asked.

The ape laid his hands on Tortoise’s shell, patting her gently. ‘Come, come, now. Let us not give way to hysteria or melancholy. I seem to have noticed that when we really concentrate, we can throw any number we really desire to throw.’

‘It did seem that was what’s been going on, but it makes no sense. If one can throw any number one wishes, then …’

‘Oh, most excellent Tortoise, then there are a finite number of choices,’ said the ape. ‘And that number gets smaller and smaller the longer one stays in the game.’

‘Until, at last, there is nothing left but junctions, Forevers, and The End,’ said Mouse, examining the huge game map mounted on the wall behind them. ‘Players can gyrate back and forth between junctions for a long, long time. From Buttercup to Cattermune to Frab, from there to Snivel’s Island – and Mother’s Smithy. Over to Seldom and Last Chance What? and Usable Chasm. And then you’d throw two elevens and be back at the Down Line again. It could go on and on and on and on …’ Her voice dwindled away.

‘Shh,’ comforted the ape. ‘We must not allow ourselves to be disheartened. Someone I once knew well always told me that a stout heart is the only true requisite in the game of life. I am not at all sure what he meant, but it sounds exemplary, doesn’t it? Let’s not get ahead of ourselves. The most important thing right now is to return the matchbox, don’t you agree?’

‘It’s certainly a place to start,’ the mouse assented. ‘If Tortoise thinks so.’

‘I think so,’ said Tortoise slowly. ‘I really do think so.’

‘I’d been looking forward to sight-seeing here for a while,’ Mouse sighed. She looked tired. The malachite around her eyes had faded to a limey green and her whiskers were limp.

‘Every moment we spend here might be the last moment for return,’ remarked the tortoise.

‘Of course.’ Mouse sighed again, getting out her dice as she saw the other two doing so. ‘Three, from here, didn’t you say?’ Listlessly she rolled the dice. ‘To Cattermune’s House.’

The man turned around and saw her, putting out his hands to hold hers, very tightly. As for the young woman, she cried, her tears running down her face to make a salty wetness.

‘So here we are,’ he said.