We R Igors 2 страница

Lu-Tze stepped out onto a frail-looking wood-and-rope bridge.

“Well? ” he said. “What d'you think? ”

Lobsang took a deep breath. He felt that if he fell off the bridge he'd drop into the surging colours and never, ever hit the floor. He blinked and rubbed his forehead.

“It's… evil, ” he said.

“Really? ” said Lu-Tze. “Not many people say that the first time. They use words like ‘wonderful’. ”

“It's going wrong! ”

“What? ”

Lobsang clutched the rope railing. “The patterns—” he began.

“History repeating, ” said Lu-Tze. “They're always there. ”

“No, they're—” Lobsang tried to take it all in. There were patterns under the patterns, disguised as part of the chaos. “I mean… the other patterns…”

He slumped forward.

The air was cold, the world was spinning, and the ground rushed up to enfold him.

And stopped, a few inches away.

The air around him sizzled, as though it was being gently fried.

“Newgate Ludd? ”

“Lu-Tze? ” he said. “The Mandala is…”

But where were the colours? Why was the air wet and smelling of the city? And then the ghost memories faded away. As they disappeared, they said: How can we be memories, when we have yet to happen? Surely what you remember is climbing all the way up onto the roof of the Bakers' Guild and finding that someone had loosened all the capping stones, because that just happened?

And a last dying memory said, Hey, that was months ago…

“No, we're not Lu-Tze, mysterious falling kid, ” said the voice that had addressed him. “Can you turn round? ”

Newgate managed, with great difficulty, to move his head. It felt as though he was stuck in tar.

A heavy young man in a grubby yellow robe was sitting on an upturned box a few feet away. He looked a bit like a monk, except for his hair, because his hair looked a bit like an entirely separate organism. To say that it was black and bound up in a ponytail is to miss the opportunity of using the term “elephantine”. It was hair with personality.

“Mostly my name's Soto, ” said the man underneath. “Marco Soto. I won't bother memorizing yours until we know if you're going to live or not, eh? So tell me, have you ever considered the rewards of the spiritual life? ”

“Right now? Certainly! ” said… yes, Newgate, he thought, that's my name, yes? So why do I remember Lobsang? “Er, I was thinking about the possibility of taking up a new line of work! ”

“Good career move, ” said Soto.

“Is this some kind of magic? ” Newgate tried to move but hung, turning gently, in the air just above the waiting ground.

“Not exactly. You seem to have shaped time. ”

“Me? How did I do that? ”

“You don't know? ”

“No! ”

“Hah, will you listen to him? ” said Soto, as if talking to a genial companion. “There's probably the spin time of a whole Procrastinator being used up to prevent your little trick causing untold harm to the entire world, and you don't know how you did it? ”

“No! ”

“Then we'll train you. It's a good life, and it offers excellent prospects. At least, ” he added, sniffing, “better than those that confront you now. ”

Newgate strained to turn his head further. “Train me in what, exactly? ”

The man sighed. “Still asking questions, kid? Are you coming or not? ”

“How—? ”

“Look, I'm offering you the opportunity of a lifetime, do you understand? ”

“Why is it the opportunity of a lifetime, Mr Soto? ”

“No, you misunderstand me. You, that is Newgate Ludd, are being offered, that is by me, the opportunity of having a lifetime. Which is more than you will have shortly. ”

Newgate hesitated. He was aware of a tingling in his body. In a sense, it was still falling. He didn't know how he knew this, but the knowledge was as real as the cobbles just below him. If he made the wrong choice the fall would simply continue. It had been easy so far. The last few inches would be terminally hard.

“I must admit I don't like the way my life is going at the moment, ” he said. “It may be advantageous to find a new direction. ”

“Good. ” The be-haired man pulled something out of his robe. It looked like a folded abacus, but when he opened it up parts of it vanished with little flashes of light, as if they'd moved somewhere where they could not be seen.

“What are you doing? ”

“Do you know what kinetic energy is? ”

“No. ”

“It's what you have far too much of. ” Soto's fingers danced on the beads, sometimes disappearing and reappearing. “I imagine you weigh about a hundred and ten pounds, yes? ”

He pocketed the little device and strolled off to a nearby cart. He did something that Newgate couldn't see, and came back.

“In a few seconds you will complete your fall, ” he said, reaching under him to place something on the ground. “Try to think of it as a new start in life. ”

Newgate fell. He hit the ground. The air flashed purple and the laden cart across the street jerked a foot into the air and collapsed heavily. One wheel bounced away.

Soto leaned down and shook Newgate's unresisting hand.

“How do you do? ” he said. “Any bruises? ”

“It does hurt a bit, ” said the shaken Newgate.

“Maybe you're a bit heavier than you look. Allow me…”

Soto grabbed Newgate under the shoulders and began to tug him off into the mists.

“Can I go and—? ”

“No. ”

“But the Guild—”

“You don't exist at the Guild. ”

“That's stupid, I'm in the Guild records. ”

“No, you're not. We'll see to that. ”

“How? You can't rewrite history! ”

“Bet you a dollar? ”

“What have I joined? ”

“We're the most secret society that you can imagine. ”

“Really? Who are you, then? ”

“The Monks of History. ”

“Huh? I've never heard of you! ”

“See? That's how good we are. ”

And that was how good they were.

And then the time had just flown past.

And now the present came back.

“Are you all right, lad? ”

Lobsang opened his eyes. His arm felt as though it was being wrenched off his body.

He looked up along the length of the arm to Lu-Tze, who was lying flat on the swaying bridge, holding him.

“What happened? ”

“I think maybe you were overcome with the excitement, lad. Or vertigo, maybe. Just don't look down. ”

There was a roaring below Lobsang, like a swarm of very angry bees. Automatically, he began to turn his head.

“I said don't look down! Just relax. ”

Lu-Tze got to his feet. He raised Lobsang, at arm's length, as though he was a feather, until the boy's sandals were over the wood of the bridge. Below, monks were running along the walkways and shouting.

“Now, keep your eyes shut… don't look down! … and I'll just walk us both to the far side, all right? ”

“I, er, I remembered… back in the city, when Soto found me… I remembered…” said Lobsang weakly, tottering along behind the monk.

“Only to be expected, ” said Lu-Tze, “in the circumstances. ”

“But, but I remember that back then I remembered about being here. You and the Mandala! ”

“Is it not written in the sacred text, ‘There's a lot goes on we don't know about, in my opinion’? ” said Lu-Tze.

“I… have not yet come across that one either, Sweeper, ” said Lobsang. He felt cooler air around him, which suggested they had reached the rock tunnel on the far side of the room.

“Sadly, in the writings they have here you probably won't, ” said Lu-Tze. “Ah, you can open your eyes now. ”

They walked on, with Lobsang rubbing his head to take away the strangeness of his thoughts.

Behind them the livid swirls in the wheel of colour, which had centred on the spot where Lobsang would have fallen, gradually faded and healed.

According to the First Scroll of Wen the Eternally Surprised, Wen and Clodpool reached the green valley between the towering mountains and Wen said: “This is the place. Here there will be a temple dedicated to the folding and unfolding of time. I can see it. ”

“I can't, master, ” said Clodpool.

Wen said, “It's over there. ” He pointed, and his arm vanished.

“Ah, ” said Clodpool. “Over there. ”

A few cherry blossom petals drifted down onto Wen's head from one of the trees that grew wild along the streamlets.

“And this perfect day will last for ever, ” he said. “The air is crisp, the sun is bright, there is ice in the streams. Every day in this valley will be this perfect day. ”

“Could get a bit repetitive, master, ” said Clodpool.

“That is because you don't yet know how to deal with time, ” said Wen. “But I will teach you to deal with time as you would deal with a coat, to be worn when necessary and discarded when not. ”

“Will I have to wash it? ” said Clodpool.

Wen gave him a long, slow look. “That was either a very complex piece of thinking on your part, Clodpool, or you were just trying to overextend a metaphor in a rather stupid way. Which do you think it was? ”

Clodpool looked at his feet. Then he looked at the sky. Then he looked at Wen.

“I think I am stupid, master. ”

“Good, ” said Wen. “It is fortuitous that you are my apprentice at this time, because if I can teach you, Clodpool, I can teach anyone. ”

Clodpool looked relieved, and bowed. “You do me too much honour, master. ”

“And there is a second part to my plan, ” said Wen.

“Ah, ” said Clodpool, with an expression that he thought made him look wise, although in reality it made him look like someone remembering a painful bowel movement. “A plan with a second part is always a good plan, master. ”

“Find me sands of all colours, and a flat rock. I will show you a way to make the currents of time visible. ”

“Oh, right. ”

“And there is a third part to my plan. ”

“A third part, eh? ”

“I can teach a gifted few to control their time, to slow it and speed it up and store it and direct it like the water in these streams. But most people will not, I fear, let themselves become able to do this. We have to help them. We will have to build… devices that will store and release time to where it is needed, because men cannot progress if they are carried like leaves on a stream. People need to be able to waste time, make time, lose time and buy time. This will be our major task. ”

Clodpool's face twisted with the effort of understanding. Then he slowly raised a hand.

Wen sighed.

“You're going to ask what happened to the coat, aren't you? ” he said.

Clodpool nodded.

“Forget about the coat, Clodpool. The coat is not important. Just remember that you are the blank paper on which I will write—” Wen held up a hand as Clodpool opened his mouth. “Just another metaphor, just another metaphor. And now, please make some lunch. ”

“Metaphorically or really, master? ”

“Both. ”

A flight of white birds burst out of the trees and wheeled overhead before swooping off across the valley.

“There will be doves, ” said Wen, as Clodpool hurried off to light a fire. “Every day, there will be doves. ”

Lu-Tze left the novice in the anteroom. It might have surprised those who disliked him that he took a moment to straighten his robe before he entered the presence of the abbot, but Lu-Tze at least cared for people even if he did not care for rules. He pinched out his cigarette and stuck it behind his ear, too. He had known the abbot for almost six hundred years, and respected him. There weren't many people Lu-Tze respected. Mostly, they just got tolerated.

Usually, the sweeper got on with people in inverse proportion to their local importance, and the reverse was true. The senior monks… well, there could be no such thing as bad thoughts amongst people so enlightened, but it is true that the sight of Lu-Tze ambling insolently through the temple did tarnish a few karmas. To a certain type of thinker the sweeper was a personal insult, with his lack of any formal education or official status and his silly little Way and his incredible successes. So it was surprising that the abbot liked him, because never had there been an inhabitant of the valley so unlike the sweeper, so learned, so impractical and so frail. But then, surprise is the nature of the universe.

Lu-Tze nodded to the minor acolytes who opened the big varnished doors.

“How is his reverence today? ” he said.

“The teeth are still giving him trouble, O Lu-Tze, but he is maintaining continuity and has just taken his first steps in a very satisfactory manner. ”

“Yes, I thought I heard the gongs. ”

The group of monks clustered in the centre of the room stepped aside as Lu-Tze approached the playpen. It was, unfortunately, necessary. The abbot had never mastered the art of circular ageing. He had therefore been forced to achieve longevity in a more traditional way, via serial reincarnation.

“Ah, Sweeper, ” he burbled, awkwardly tossing aside a yellow ball and brightening up. “And how are the mountains? Wanna bikkit wanna bikkit! ”

“I'm definitely getting vulcanism, Reverend One. It's very encouraging. ”

“And you are in persistent good health? ” said the abbot, while his pudgy little hand banged a wooden giraffe against the bars.

“Yes, Your Reverence. It's good to see you up and about again. ”

“Only for a few steps so far, alas bikkit bikkit wanna bikkit. Unfortunately, young bodies have a mind of their own BIKKIT! ”

“You sent me a message, Your Reverence? It said, ‘Put this one to the test. ’”

“And what did you think of our want bikkit want bikkit want bikkit NOW young Lobsang Ludd? ” An acolyte hurried forward with a plate of rusks. “Would you care for a rusk, by the way? ” the abbot added. “Mmmm nicey bikkit! ”

“No, Reverend One, I have all the teeth I need, ” said the sweeper.

“Ludd is a puzzle, is he not? His tutors have nicey bikkit mmm mmm bikkit told me he is very talented but somehow not all there. But you have never met him and don't know his history and so mmm bikkit and so I would value your uninfluenced observations mmm BIKKIT. ”

“He is beyond fast, ” said Lu-Tze. “I think he may begin to react to things before they happen. ”

“How can anyone tell that? Want teddy want teddy wanna wanna TEDDY! ”

“I put him in front of the Device of Erratic Balls in the senior dojo and he was moving towards the right hole fractionally before the ball came out. ”

“Some kind of gurgle telepathy, then? ”

“If a simple machine has a mind of its own I think we're in really big trouble, ” said Lu-Tze. He took a deep breath. “And in the hall of the Mandala he saw the patterns in the chaos. ”

“You let a neophyte see the Mandala? ” said chief acolyte Rinpo, horrified.

“If you want to see if someone can swim, push him in the river, ” said Lu-Tze, shrugging. “What other way is there? ”

“But to look at it without the proper training—”

“He saw the patterns, ” said Lu-Tze. “And reacted to the Mandala. ” He did not add: and the Mandala reacted to him. He wanted to think about that. When you look into the abyss, it's not supposed to wave back.

“It was teddyteddyteddywahwah strictly forbidden, even so, ” said the abbot. Clumsily, he fumbled among the toys on his mat and picked up a large wooden brick with a jolly blue elephant printed on it and hurled it clumsily at Rinpo. “Sometimes you presume too much, Sweeper lookit 'lephant! ”

There was some applause from the acolytes at the abbot's prowess in animal recognition. “He saw the patterns. He knows what is happening. He just doesn't know what he knows, ” said Lu-Tze doggedly. “And within a few seconds of meeting me he stole a small object of value, and I'm still wondering how he did it. Can he really be as fast as that without training? Who is this boy? ”

Tick

Who is this girl?

Madam Frout, headmistress of the Frout Academy and pioneer of the Frout Method of Learning Through Fun, often found herself thinking that when she had to interview Miss Susan. Of course, the girl was an employee, but… well, Madam Frout wasn't very good at discipline, which was possibly why she'd invented the Method, which didn't require any. She generally relied on talking to people in a jolly tone of voice until they gave in out of sheer embarrassment on her behalf.

Miss Susan didn't appear ever to be embarrassed about anything.

“The reason I've called you here, Susan, is that, er, the reason is—” Madam Frout faltered.

“There have been complaints? ” said Miss Susan.

“Er, no… er… although Miss Smith has told me that the children coming up from your class are, er, restless. Their reading ability is, she says, rather unfortunately advanced…”

“Miss Smith thinks a good book is about a boy and his dog chasing a big red ball, ” said Miss Susan. “My children have learned to expect a plot. No wonder they get impatient. We're reading Grim Fairy Tales at the moment. ”

“That is rather rude of you, Susan. ”

“No, madam. That is rather polite of me. It would have been rude of me to say that there is a circle of Hell reserved for teachers like Miss Smith. ”

“But that's a dreadf—” Madam Frout stopped, and began again. “You should not be teaching them to read at all yet! ” she snapped. But it was the snap of a soggy twig. Madam Frout cringed back in her chair when Miss Susan looked up. The girl had this terrible ability to give you her full attention. You had to be a better person than Madam Frout to survive in the intensity of that attention. It inspected your soul, putting little red circles around the bits it didn't like. When Miss Susan looked at you, it was as if she was giving you marks.

“I mean, ” the headmistress mumbled, “childhood is a time for play and—”

“Learning, ” said Miss Susan.

“Learning through play, ” said Madam Frout, grateful to find familiar territory. “After all, kittens and puppies—”

“—grow up to be cats and dogs, which are even less interesting, ” said Miss Susan, “whereas children should grow up to be adults. ”

Madam Frout sighed. There was no way she was going to make any progress. It was always like this. She knew she was powerless. News about Miss Susan had got around. Worried parents who'd turned to Learning Through Play because they despaired of their offspring ever Learning By Paying Attention to What Anyone Said were finding them coming home a little quieter, a little more thoughtful and with a pile of homework which, amazingly, they did without prompting and even with the dog helping them. And they came home with stories about Miss Susan.

Miss Susan spoke all languages. Miss Susan knew everything about everything. Miss Susan had wonderful ideas for school trips…

…and that was particularly puzzling, because as far as Madam Frout knew, none had been officially organized. There was invariably a busy silence from Miss Susan's classroom when she went past. This annoyed her. It harked back to the bad old days when children were Regimented in classrooms that were no better than Torture Chambers for Little Minds. But other teachers said that there were noises. Sometimes there was the faint sound of waves, or a jungle. Just once, Madam Frout could have sworn, if she was the sort to swear, that as she passed there was a full-scale battle going on. This had often been the case with Learning Through Play, but this time the addition of trumpets, the swish of arrows and the screams of the fallen seemed to be going too far.

She'd thrown open the door and felt something hiss through the air above her head. Miss Susan had been sitting on a stool, reading from a book, with the class cross-legged in a quiet and fascinated semicircle around her. It was the sort of old-fashioned image Madam Frout hated, as if the children were Supplicants around some sort of Altar of Knowledge.

No one had said anything. All the watching children, and Miss Susan, made it clear in polite silence that they were waiting for her to go away.

She'd flounced back into the corridor and the door had clicked shut behind her. Then she noticed the long, crude arrow that was still vibrating in the opposite wall.

Madam Frout had looked at the door, with its familiar green paint, and then back at the arrow.

Which had gone.

She transferred Jason to Miss Susan's class. It had been a cruel thing to do, but Madam Frout considered that there was now some kind of undeclared war going on.

If children were weapons, Jason would have been banned by international treaty. Jason had doting parents and an attention span of minus several seconds, except when it came to inventive cruelty to small furry animals, when he could be quite patient. Jason kicked, punched, bit and spat. His artwork had even frightened the life out of Miss Smith, who could generally find something nice to say about any child. He was definitely a boy with special needs. In the view of the staffroom, these began with an exorcism.

Madam Frout had stooped to listening at the keyhole. She had heard Jason's first tantrum of the day, and then silence. She couldn't quite make out what Miss Susan said next.

When she found an excuse to venture into the classroom half an hour later, Jason was helping two little girls to make a cardboard rabbit.

Later his parents said they were amazed at the change, although apparently now he would only go to sleep with the light on.

Madam Frout tried to question her newest teacher. Glowing references were all very well, but she was an employee, after all. The trouble was, Susan had a way of saying things to her, Madam Frout had found, so that she went away feeling quite satisfied and only realized that she hadn't really had a proper answer at all when she was back in her office, by which time it was always too late.

And it continued to be too late because suddenly the school had a waiting list. Parents were fighting to get their children enrolled in Miss Susan's class. As for some of the stories they brought home… well, everyone knew children had such vivid imaginations, didn't they?

Even so, there was this essay by Richenda Higgs. Madam Frout fumbled for her glasses, which she was too vain to wear all the time and kept on a string around her neck, and looked at it again. In its entirety, it read:

“A man with all bones came to talk to us he was not scarey at all, he had a big white hors. We pated the hors. He had a sighyve. He told us interesting things and to be careful when crosing the road. ”

Madam Frout handed the paper across the desk to Miss Susan, who looked at it gravely. She pulled out a red pencil, made a few little alterations, then handed it back.

“Well? ” said Madam Frout.

“Yes, she's not very good at punctuation, I'm afraid. A good attempt at ‘scythe’, though. ”

“Who… What's this about a big white horse in the classroom? ” Madam Frout managed.

Miss Susan looked at her pityingly and said, “Madam, who could possibly bring a horse into a classroom? We're up two flights of stairs here. ”

Madam Frout was not going to be deterred this time. She held up another short essay.

“Today we were talked at by Mr Slumph who he is a bogeyman but he is nice now. He tole us what to do abot the other kind. You can put the blanket ove your head but it is bettr if you put it ove the bogeymans head then he think he do not exist and he is vanishs. He tole us lots of stores abot people he jump out on and he said sins Miss is our teachr he think no bogeymen will be in our houses bcos one thing a bogey dos not like is Miss finding him. ”

“Bogeymen, Susan? ” said Madam Frout.

“What imaginations children have, ” said Miss Susan, with a straight face.

“Are you introducing young children to the occult? ” said Madam Frout suspiciously. This sort of thing caused a lot of trouble with parents, she was well aware.

“Oh, yes. ”

“What? Why? ”

“So that it doesn't come as a shock, ” said Miss Susan calmly.

“But Mrs Robertson told me that her Emma was going round the house looking for monsters in the cupboards! And up until now she's always been afraid of them! ”

“Did she have a stick? ” said Susan.

“She had her father's sword! ”

“Good for her. ”

“Look, Susan… I think I see what you're trying to do, ” said Madam Frout, who didn't really, “but parents do not understand this sort of thing. ”

“Yes, ” said Miss Susan. “Sometimes I really think people ought to have to pass a proper exam before they're allowed to be parents. Not just the practical, I mean. ”

“Nevertheless, we must respect their views, ” said Madam Frout, but rather weakly because occasionally she'd thought the same thing. There had been the matter of Parents' Evening. Madam had been too tense to pay much attention to what her newest teacher was doing. All she'd been aware of was Miss Susan sitting and talking quietly to the couples, right up to the point where Jason's mother had picked up her chair and chased Jason's father out of the room. Next day a huge bunch of flowers had arrived for Susan from Jason's mother, and an even bigger bunch from Jason's father.

Quite a few other couples had also come away from Miss Susan's desk looking worried or harassed. Certainly Madam Frout, when the time came for next term's fees to be paid, had never known people cough up so readily.

And there it was again. Madam Frout the headmistress, who had to worry about reputations and costs and fees, just occasionally heard the distant voice of Miss Frout who had been quite a good if rather shy teacher, and it was whistling and cheering Susan on.

Susan looked concerned. “You are not satisfied with my work, madam? ”

Madam Frout was stuck. No, she wasn't satisfied, but for all the wrong reasons. And it was dawning on her as this interview progressed that she didn't dare sack Miss Susan or, worse, let her leave of her own accord. If she set up a school and news got round, the Learning Through Play School would simply haemorrhage pupils and, importantly, fees.

“Well, of course… no, not… in many ways…” she began, and became aware that Miss Susan was staring past her.

There was… Madam Frout groped for her glasses, and found their string had got tangled with the buttons of her blouse. She peered at the mantelpiece and tried to make sense of the blur.

“Why, it looks like a… a white rat, in a little black robe, ” she said. “And walking on its hind legs, too! Can you see it? ”

“I can't imagine how a rat could wear a robe, ” said Miss Susan. Then she sighed, and snapped her fingers. The finger-snapping wasn't essential, but time stopped.

At least, it stopped for everyone but Miss Susan.

And for the rat on the mantelpiece.

Which was in fact the skeleton of a rat, although this was not preventing it from trying to steal Madam Frout's jar of boiled sweets for Good Children.

Susan strode over and grasped the collar of the tiny robe.

SQUEAK? said the Death of Rats.

“I thought it was you! ” snapped Susan. “How dare you come here again! I thought you'd got the message the other day. And don't think I didn't see you when you turned up to collect Henry the Hamster last month! Do you know how hard it is to teach geography when you can see someone kicking the poo out of a treadmill? ”

The rat sniggered: SNH. SNH. SNH.

“And you're eating a sweet! Put it in the bin right now! ”

Susan dropped the rat onto the desk in front of the temporally frozen Madam Frout, and paused.

She'd always tried to be good about this sort of thing, but sometimes you just had to acknowledge who you were. So she pulled open the bottom drawer to check the level in the bottle that was Madam's shield and comforter in the wonderful world that was education, and was pleased to see that the old girl was going a bit easier on the stuff these days. Most people have some means of filling up the gap between perception and reality, and, after all, in those circumstances there are far worse things than gin.

She also spent a little while going through Madam's private papers, and this has to be said about Susan: it did not occur to her that there was anything wrong about this, although she'd quite understand that it was probably wrong if you weren't Susan Sto Helit, of course. The papers were in quite a good safe that would have occupied a competent thief for at least twenty minutes. The fact that the door swung open at her touch suggested that special rules applied here.

No door was closed to Miss Susan. It ran in the family. Some genetics are passed on via the soul.

When she'd brought herself up to date on the school's affairs, mostly to indicate to the rat that she wasn't just someone who could be summoned at a moments notice, she stood up.

“All right, ” she said wearily. “You're just going to pester me, aren't you? For ever and ever and ever. ”