Wish You Were Here (35 page)

‘Could be. You never know, with the government and all.'

‘And then,' Linda whispered hopefully, ‘they transfer the actual arms to a helicopter or something for the rest of the journey.'

‘It's possible,' Dieb replied. ‘Hell, anything's
possible
.'

‘There, you see?' Linda smote her fist into the palm of her hand. ‘So all we've got to do is find the first waterfall and there we are. We can intercept the shipment, capture it, and—'

‘Yes?'

‘I'm not sure,' Linda confessed. ‘Still, we'll think of something.'

‘You bet.'

‘I mean,' she continued, ‘we can cross that bridge when we come to it.'

‘Of course.'

‘And we mustn't count our chickens before they're hatched.'

‘Goes without saying.'

‘There's many a slip between cup and lip.'

‘You said it.'

‘Right, then,' Linda said, and she set her jaw in a determined line. ‘Let's go, then.'

‘With you all the way, honey.'

‘Great.' Linda paused, and frowned. ‘Er, which way?'

Calvin closed his eyes and pointed at random. ‘How about over there?' he suggested.

‘You positive about that?'

‘If you want me to be, I am.'

‘OK, then. That way it is.'

 

Grimly determined, icily calm, every fibre of his being dedicated to the mission he had embarked upon, Wesley stood on the top of a low rise and looked round.

‘Um,' he said.

It was all very well setting out to kill a journalist. Nobody could find fault with the general principle. The mathematics are simple in the extreme: to find the optimum number of journalists that there ought to be in a perfect world, divide the actual number of journalists there are at the present time by itself, and subtract one. But Wesley's task was slightly harder, because he had to single out one particular journalist, and that of necessity involved finding her.

Not as easy as it sounds. Not, at least, in the environs of Lake Chicopee, where topography isn't a precise science. It's hard to do a systematic search of somewhere that keeps rearranging itself with every step you take. To put it another way: there's not enough timber in all the rain forests of South America to make enough paper for a 1:2500 scale map of the seven square miles immediately surrounding the lake.

When you're looking for someone in unfamiliar territory, the sensible course of action is, of course, to ask a local. That's what Wesley decided to do. And fortuitously, there was a party of locals just appearing over the skyline to his left.

‘Excuse me,' Wesley said.

‘Hello?'

‘Sorry to bother you,' Wesley called out, ‘but have you seen a journalist?'

The party came closer. It consisted of a man in exotic ermine-trimmed robes, two footmen in powdered wigs and—

‘A journalist, did you say?' said the Prince. ‘Might have done.Truth is, I wouldn't recognise one if I saw one. What's this feller look like?'

‘Um,' Wesley replied. ‘Actually, it's a she. Sort of—'

‘Yes?'

‘Um.' Wesley shrugged, made a vague gesture with his hands. ‘Sort of, er, gorgeous. Well, gorgeousish,' he added, trying not to look at the girl. ‘If you like 'em tall and blonde and . . .'

‘Ah.' The Prince rubbed his chin thoughtfully. ‘Murdoch,' he said to one of the footmen, ‘have we seen anyone like that around here lately?'

‘No, sir.'

‘You sure about that, Murdoch?'

The footman inclined his head gravely. ‘Entirely, sir. Your Majesty will recall that, since Your Majesty's subjects are all exceptionally comely and tall, such a person would scarcely be conspicuous. However, we have been checking all the female subjects we encounter with the slipper.'

‘Yes, of course. Silly me. How about you, Skellidge?'

‘I regret to have to inform His Majesty, no.'

The Prince clicked his tongue. ‘Sorry,' he said. ‘Was it important?'

Wesley shrugged. ‘Not really. Well, quite important, actually. Rather a matter of life and death, in fact.'

‘Oh.' The Prince half turned and addressed her. ‘How about you, my dear?'

‘Mm. Mmmmm. Mmmm mm mmm mmm.'

‘I beg your—? Oh, quite. Skellidge, the gag.'

Wesley hadn't noticed the gag, or the ropes, or the handcuffs. Now he did; and it occurred to him that maybe she wasn't too happy about accompanying the party. He took an advance on next year's courage ration and cleared his throat. ‘Excuse me,' he said.

‘Yes?'

‘Um, why's she all tied up?'

‘To stop her escaping,' the Prince replied. ‘When you say a matter of life and death . . .'

‘Would you mind—?'Wesley took a deep breath, aware as he did so that he was doing something really rather brave and quite remarkably stupid. ‘Would you mind letting her go, please? If it's no trouble, of course.'

‘But my dear fellow.' The Prince gazed at him, utterly bemused. ‘If I do that she might escape. I can't fight a war for her sake if she's not there, it'd rob the whole thing of any significance whatsoever.'

‘A
war
?'

The Prince nodded. ‘The finest gift a man can give,' he replied proudly. ‘Like they always say, carnage is a girl's best friend. And think what an anticlimax it'd be without her.'

Wesley thought for a moment. Hitherto, his experience of dealing with dangerous lunatics had been extremely limited; one of those things he'd always suspected he'd been missing out on, no doubt. However, where there's a loon there's a way. ‘But surely,' he said, ‘you've missed the point. With all due respect,' he added quickly, as Skellidge took a step forward. ‘I don't mean to be rude, but don't you think you've got it the wrong way round?'

The Prince began to look worried. ‘Whatever can you mean?' he asked anxiously. ‘This is very important. Murdoch, the tablets of stone, quickly.'

‘Well,' Wesley said, as Murdoch produced a slab of granite and a cold chisel from the pockets of his tailcoat, ‘take Helen of Troy, for instance.'

‘Always a good place to start,' the Prince agreed. ‘So?'

‘Well then,' Wesley said. ‘Just ask yourself; in the end, who won? Who got the girl? Was it the kidnappers, or the people she was kidnapped from?'

‘I see what you mean,' the Prince said slowly. ‘Do go on, this is probably very relevant.'

‘Think about it,' Wesley urged. ‘Which lot was it that launched the thousand ships? And which side would you rather be, more importantly? Remember, it's the side who wins that gets the glory.'

For a while there was silence, except for the sound of steel on stone and a polite enquiry as to how you spell
importantly
. ‘What you're saying is,' the Prince replied eventually, ‘is that I'd do far better to let someone carry her off, and then fight the war to get her back. Is that it?'

‘In a nutcase, sorry, nutshell, yes.' Wesley could feel moisture ooozing out of his pores, but decided it would be a tactical error to do anything about it. ‘That way, you'd be right as well as romantic. You do see that, don't you?'

The Prince nodded. ‘That only leaves the problem,' he added, ‘of who's going to be mug enough to carry her off. Bearing in mind that he'd have to fight this amazingly destructive thermo-nuclear war shortly afterwards, I mean.'

‘Thermo—'

‘Absolutely,' the Prince said, his head bobbing like something hanging from a car mirror. ‘Murdoch here's got seventy-five Pershing missiles trained on the major population centres right now, haven't you, Murdoch?'

‘Of course,Your Majesty.'

‘Oh.' Wesley hesitated. ‘I see. And as soon as someone abducts the girl, you'll, um, press the—?'

‘That's it,' said the Prince, smiling benignly. ‘Our response time's really rather impressive, though I say it myself. Seventeen minutes and thirty-two seconds, and we could have most of Europe and the United States glowing so bright you could see them from Alpha Centauri. And that's just Phase One.'

‘Gosh,' Wesley said. He looked at the girl out of the corner of his eye. True, she was ravishingly gorgeous, in a substantial sort of way. True, all he really wanted to do for the rest of his life was stand on one leg at a distance of twenty yards or so gazing adoringly at her. On the other hand; most of Europe and the United States . . . ‘Well,' he said, ‘I'm glad we've got that sorted out. And if I happen to bump into anybody who might be interested in abducting girls, I'll be sure to let them know.'

‘Oh.' The Prince's face fell a little. ‘Oh, I see. I'm dreadfully sorry, I'd sort of got the impression that you—'

‘Me?' Wesley's nose twitched. ‘Gosh, no, not
me
. I mean, usually I'd be only too happy, but I've got this journalist to find, matter of life and death, so . . .'

‘Of course,' the Prince sighed. ‘I quite understand. I'd better not keep you any longer, in that case. Much obliged to you, by the way, for clarifying that point about the war. Skellidge, make this chap a viscount or something. '

‘Very good, Your Majesty.' Skellidge straightened his back a little and cleared his throat. ‘You're a viscount,' he said. ‘All hail.'

‘Thank you,' Wesley said, walking backwards. ‘Thank you ever so much. Well, must fly, 'Bye for now.'

The girl, who'd been painstakingly chewing through the gag all this time, chomped out the last few strands, spat and yelled out, ‘Hey, come back!' just as Wesley disappeared over the rise and into the trees. However, since he didn't return, he couldn't have heard her.

 

 

T
he Proprietor began to stir.

He was, of course, fast asleep; but the images reflected on the still mirror of His mind were unquiet, and tiny ripples from the top side clouded His enormous dreams. He grunted, muttered, and stirred ever so slightly.

Then an image moved in His mind that really had no place being there; something which could never have got in there and certainly couldn't get out again. It was long and black and vaguely cigar-shaped, and it left a stream of bubbles behind as it slipped upwards out of existence.

The Proprietor didn't like it; not one bit. Having checked His memory, just to make sure He hadn't eaten a huge chunk of cheese shortly before He fell asleep, He came to a decision.

Damn, He thought.

 

‘You sure it was this way?' Calvin Dieb enquired cheerfully. ‘Only, it's at least an hour since we set off, and I'll swear I've passed that rock four times already. I remembered it particularly because it reminds me so much of my ex-wife's brother.'

Linda didn't reply. She was not, in truth, in the best of moods, and Calvin's blithe, carefree chatter was beginning to annoy her. She stopped, shaded her eyes with the palm of her hand and looked out over the lake.

‘Hey!' she yelled. ‘Over there!'

‘Yes?'

‘Look!' She jumped up and down five times. ‘It's the submarine. Look, you can see its periscope, just breaking the . . .'

‘Where? I can't see . . .'

‘Where I'm pointing. Oh, come on, you dimwit, it's as plain as the nose on your face. Just there, where those ducks are swimming round.'

‘What?' Dieb squinted. ‘Oh yes. Well, I can see
something
, anyway.You sure it's not the Loch Ness Monster? I mean, you're always hearing reports of people seeing what they think are remarkable things, such as submarines, and they turn out just to be something mundane and ordinary, like sea-monsters.'

In spite of her excitement, Linda frowned. ‘Mundane and ordinary? The Loch Ness Monster?'

‘I reckon so,' Calvin replied. ‘At any rate, it's a sight more mundane and ordinary than submarines that can shin up waterfalls. Which is probably just as well, don't you think?'

Linda left that remark well alone, and resumed her excited staring. She was so preoccupied, in fact, that it was quite a while before she noticed that there was someone standing beside her.

Four people, in fact; a man in peculiar clothes, something like a fur-trimmed dressing gown, two other men with powdered wigs on their heads, and the ugly girl she'd bumped into earlier.

Something about legs like pink elephant's trunks . . . No, she couldn't quite remember. Nevertheless, she had the feeling she didn't like the ugly girl. Call it a hunch; and hunches don't just materialise, you pay for them with hard-earned experience. No such thing as a free hunch.