(The first day of the rest of their lives) 7 страница

The questing root must have found the buried soil. It changed color and thickened, like a fire hose when the water is turned on. The artificial waterfall stopped running; Jaime visualised fractured pipes blocked with sucking fibers.

Now he could see what was happening outside. The street surface was heaving like a sea. Saplings were pushing up between the cracks.

Of course, he reasoned; they had sunlight. His tree didn't. All it had was the muted gray light that came through the dome four stories up. Dead light.

But what could you do?

You could do this:

The elevators had stopped running because the power was off, but it was only four flights of stairs. Jaime carefully shut his lunchbox and padded back to his cart, where he selected his longest broom.

People were pouring out of the building, yelling. Jaime moved amiably against the flow like a salmon going upstream.

A white framework of girders, which the architect had presumably thought made a dynamic statement about something or other, held up the smoked glass dome. In fact it was some sort of plastic, and it took Jaime, perched on a convenient strip of girder, all his strength and the full leverage of the broom's length to crack it. A couple more swings brought it down in lethal shards.

The light poured in, lighting up the dust in the plaza so that the air looked as though it was full of fireflies.

Far below, the tree burst the walls of its brushed concrete prison and rose like an express train. Jaime had never realized that trees made a sound when they grew, and no one else had realized it either, because the sound is made over hundreds of years in waves twenty& #8209; four hours from peak to peak.

Speed it up, and the sound a tree makes is vroooom.

Jaime watched it come toward him like a green mushroom cloud. Steam was billowing out from around its roots.

The girders never stood a chance. The remnant of the dome went up like a ping& #8209; pong ball on a water spray.

It was the same over all the city, except that you couldn't see the city any more. All you could see was the canopy of green. It stretched from horizon to horizon.

Jaime sat on his branch, clung to a liana, and laughed and laughed and laughed.

Presently, it began to rain.

– – -

The Kappamaki, a whaling research ship, was currently researching the question: How many whales can you catch in one week?

Except that, today, there weren't any whales. The crew stared at the screens, which by the application of ingenious technology could spot anything larger than a sardine and calculate its net value on the international oil market, and found them blank. The occasional fish that did show up was barreling through the water as if in a great hurry to get elsewhere.

The captain drummed his fingers on the console. He was afraid that he might soon be conducting his own research project to find out what happened to a statistically small sample of whaler captains who came back without a factory ship full of research material. He wondered what they did to you. Maybe they locked you in a room with a harpoon gun and expected you to do the honorable thing.

This was unreal. There ought to be something.

The navigator punched up a chart and stared at it.

" Honorable sir? " he said.

" What is it? " said the captain testily.

" We seem to have a miserable instrument failure. Seabed in this area should be two hundred meters. "

" What of it? "

" I'm reading 15, 000 meters, honorable sir. And still falling. "

" That is foolish. There is no such depth. "

The captain glared at several million yen worth of cutting& #8209; edge technology, and thumped it.

The navigator gave a nervous smile.

" Ah, sir, " he said, " it is shallower already. "

Beneath the thunders of the upper deep, as Aziraphale and Tennyson both knew, Far, far beneath in the abyssal sea/The kraken sleepeth.

And now it was waking up.

Millions of tons of deep ocean ooze cascade off its flanks as it rises. " See, " said the navigator. " 'Three thousand meters already. "

The kraken doesn't have eyes. There has never been anything for it to look at. But as it billows up through the icy waters it picks up the microwave noise of the sea, the sorrowing beeps and whistles of the whalesong.

" Er, " said the navigator, " one thousand meters? "

The kraken is not amused.

" Five hundred meters? "

The factory ship rocks on the sudden swell.

" A hundred meters? "

There is a tiny metal thing above it. The kraken stirs.

And ten billion sushi dinners cry out for vengeance.

– – -

The cottage windows burst inward. This wasn't a storm, it was war. Fragments of jasmine whirled across the room, mingled with the rain of file cards.

Newt and Anathema clung to one another in the space between the overturned table and the wall.

" Go on, " muttered Newt. " Tell me Agnes predicted this. "

" She did say he bringeth the storm, " said Anathema.

" This is a bloody hurricane. Did she say what's supposed to happen next? "

" 2315 is cross& #8209; referenced to 3477, " said Anathema.

" You can remember details like that at a time like this? "

" Since you mention it, yes, " she said. She held out a card.

3477. Lette the wheel of? Some mysticism here, one fears.

Fate turne, let harts en-[A F Device, Octbr 17, 1889]

join, there are othere

fyres than mine; when the

wynd blowethe the blos-

soms, reach oute one to

anothere, for the calm

cometh when Redde and Peas/blossoms? [OFD, 1929, Sept 4]

Whyte and Blacke and

Pale approche to Peas is Revelations Ch 6 again, I presume.

Our Professioune. [Dr Thos. Device, 1835]

Newt read it again. There was a sound outside like a sheet of corrugated iron pinwheeling across the garden, which was exactly what it was.

" Is this supposed to mean, " he said slowly, " that we're supposed to become an, an item? That Agnes, what a joker. "

Courting is always difficult when the one being courted has an elderly female relative in the house; they tend to mutter or cackle or bum cigarettes or, in the worst cases, get out the family photograph album, an act of aggression in the sex war which ought to be banned by a Geneva Convention. It's much worse when the relative has been dead for three hundred years. Newt had indeed been harboring certain thoughts about Anathema; not just harboring them, in fact, but dry& #8209; docking them, refitting them, giving them a good coat of paint and scraping the barnacles off their bottom. But the idea of Agnes's second& #8209; sight boring into the back of his neck sloshed over his libido like a bucketful of cold water.

He had even been entertaining the idea of inviting her out for a meal, but he hated the idea of some Cromwellian witch sitting in her cottage three centuries earlier and watching him eat.

He was in the mood in which people burned witches. His life was quite complicated enough without it being manipulated across the centuries by some crazed old woman.

A thump in the grate sounded like part of the chimney stack coming down.

And then he thought: my life isn't complicated at all. I can see it as clearly as Agnes might. It stretches all the way to early retirement, a whipround from the people in the office, a bright little neat flat somewhere, a neat little empty death. Except now I'm going to die under the ruins of a cottage during what might just possibly be the end of the world.

The Recording Angel won't have any trouble with me, my life must have been dittoes on every page for years. I mean, what have I ever really done? I've never robbed a bank. I've never had a parking ticket. I've never eaten Thai food& #8209;

Somewhere another window caved in, with a merry tinkle of breaking glass. Anathema put her arms around him, with a sigh which really didn't sound disappointed at all.

I've never been to America. Or France, because Calais doesn't really count. I've never learned to play a musical instrument.

The radio died as the power lines finally gave up.

He buried his face in her hair.

I've never& #8209;

– – -

There was a pinging sound.

Shadwell, who had been bringing the Army pay books up to date, looked up in the middle of signing for Witchfinder Lance& #8209; Corporal Smith.

It took him a while to notice that the gleam of Newt's pin was no longer on the map.

He got down from his stool, muttering under his breath, and searched around on the floor until he found it. He gave it another polish and put it back in Tadfield.

He was just signing for Witchfinder Private Table, who got an extra tuppence a year hay allowance, when there was another ping.

He retrieved the pin, glared at it suspiciously, and pushed it so hard into the map that the plaster behind it gave way. Then he went back to the ledgers.

There was a ping.

This time the pin was several feet from the wall. Shadwell picked it up, examined its point, pushed it into the map, and watched it.

After about five seconds it shot past his ear.

He scrabbled for it on the floor, replaced it on the map, and held it there.

It moved under his hand. He leaned his weight on it.

A tiny thread of smoke curled out of the map. Shadwell gave a whimper and sucked his fingers as the red& #8209; hot pin ricocheted off the opposite wall and smashed a window. It didn't want to be in Tadfield.

Ten seconds later Shadwell was rummaging through the WA's cash box, which yielded a handful of copper, a ten& #8209; shilling note, and a small counterfeit coin from the reign of James I. Regardless of personal safety, he rummaged in his own pockets. The results of the trawl, even with his pensioners' concessionary travel pass taken into consideration, were barely enough to get him out of the house, let alone to Tadfield.

The only other people he knew who had money were Mr. Rajit and Madame Tracy. As far as the Rajits were concerned, the question of seven weeks' rent would probably crop up in any financial discussion he instigated at this point, and as for Madame Tracy, who'd only be too willing to lend him a handful of used tenners. . .

" I'll be swaggit if I'll tak the Wages o' Sin frae the painted jezebel, " he said.

Which left no one else.

Save one.

The southern pansy.

They'd each been here, just once, spending as little time as possible in the room and, in Aziraphale's case, trying not to touch any flat surface. The other one, the flash southern bastard in the sunglasses, was& #8209; Shadwell suspected& #8209; not someone he ought to offend. In Shadwell's simple world, anyone in sunglasses who wasn't actually on a beach was probably a criminal. He suspected that Crowley was from the Mafia, or the underworld, although he would have been surprised how right he nearly was. But the soft one in the camelhair coat was a different matter, and he'd risked trailing him back to his base once, and he could remember the way. He thought Aziraphale was a Russian spy. He could ask him for money. Threaten him a bit.

It was terribly risky.

Shadwell pulled himself together. Even now young Newt might be suffering unimaginable tortures at the hands of the daughters o' night and he, Shadwell, had sent him.

" We canna leave our people in there, " he said, and put on his thin overcoat and shapeless hat and went out into the street.

The weather seemed to be blowing up a bit.

* * * * *

A ziraphale was dithering. He'd been dithering for some twelve hours. His nerves, he would have said, were all over the place. He walked around the shop, picking up bits of paper and dropping them again, fiddling with pens.

He ought to tell Crowley.

No, he didn't. He wanted to tell Crowley. He ought to tell Heaven. He was an angel, after all. You had to do the right thing. It was built& #8209; in. You see a wile, you thwart. Crowley had put his finger on it, right enough. He ought to have told Heaven right from the start.

But he'd known him for thousands of years. They got along. They nearly understood one another. He sometimes suspected they had far more in common with one another than with their respective superiors. They both liked the world, for one thing, rather than viewing it simply as the board on which the cosmic game of chess was being played.

Well, of course, that was it. That was the answer, staring him in the face. It'd be true to the spirit of his pact with Crowley if he tipped Heaven the wink, and then they could quietly do something about the child, although nothing too bad of course because we were all God's creatures when you got down to it, even people like Crowley and the Antichrist, and the world would be saved and there wouldn't have to be all that Armageddon business, which would do nobody any good anyway, because everyone knew Heaven would win in the end, and Crowley would be bound to understand.

Yes. And then everything would be all right.

There was a knock at the shop door, despite the CLOSED sign. He ignored it.

Getting in touch with Heaven for two& #8209; way communications was far more difficult for Aziraphale than it is for humans, who don't expect an answer and in nearly all cases would be rather surprised to get one.

He pushed aside the paper& #8209; laden desk and rolled up the threadbare bookshop carpet. There was a small circle chalked on the floorboards underneath, surrounded by suitable passages from the Cabala. The angel lit seven candles, which he placed ritually at certain points around the circle. Then he lit some incense, which was not necessary but did make the place smell nice.

And then he stood in the circle and said the Words.

Nothing happened.

He said the Words again.

Eventually a bright blue shaft of light shot down from the ceiling and filled the circle.

A well& #8209; educated voice said, " Well? "

" It's me, Aziraphale. "

" We know, " said the voice.

" I've got great news! I've located the Antichrist! I can give you his address and everything! "

There was a pause. The blue light flickered.

" Well? " it said again.

" But, d'you see, you can ki& #8209; man stop it all happening! In the nick of time! You've only got a few hours! You can stop it all and there needn't be the war and everyone will be saved! "

He beamed madly into the light.

" Yes? " said the voice.

" Yes, he's in a place called Lower Tadfield, and the address& #8209; "

" Well done, " said the voice, in flat, dead tones.

" There doesn't have to be any of that business with one third of the seas turning to blood or anything, " said Aziraphale happily.

When it came, the voice sounded slightly annoyed.

" Why not? " it said.

Aziraphale felt an icy pit opening under his enthusiasm, and tried to pretend it wasn't happening.

He plunged on: " Well, you can simply make sure that& #8209; "

" We will win, Aziraphale. "

" Yes, but& #8209; "

" The forces of darkness must be beaten. You seem to be under a misapprehension. The point is not to avoid the war, it is to win it. We have been waiting a long time, Aziraphale. "

Aziraphale felt the coldness envelop his mind. He opened his mouth to say, " Do you think perhaps it would be a good idea not to hold the war on Earth? " and changed his mind.

" I see, " he said grimly. There was a scraping near the door, and if Aziraphale had been looking in that direction he would have seen a battered felt hat trying to peer over the fanlight.

" This is not to say you have not performed well, " said the voice. " You will receive a commendation. Well done. "

" Thank you, " said Aziraphale. The bitterness in his voice would have soured milk. " I'd forgotten about ineffability, obviously. "

" We thought you had. "

" May I ask, " said the angel, " to whom have I been speaking? "

The voice said, " We are the Metatron. "

" Oh, yes. Of course. Oh. Well. Thank you very much. Thank you. "

Behind him the letterbox tilted open, revealing a pair of eyes.

" One other thing, " said the voice. " You will of course be joining us, won't you? "

" Well, er, of course it has been simply ages since I've held a flaming sword& #8209; " Aziraphale began.

" Yes, we recall, " said the voice. " You will have a lot of opportunity to relearn. "

" Ah. Hmm. What sort of initiating event will precipitate the war? " said Aziraphale.

" We thought a mufti& #8209; nation nuclear exchange would be a nice start. "

" Oh. Yes. Very imaginative. " Aziraphale's voice was flat and hopeless.

" Good. We will expect you directly, then, " said the voice.

" Ah. Well. I'll just clear up a few business matters, shall I? " said Aziraphale desperately.

" There hardly seems to be any necessity, " said the Metatron.

Aziraphale drew himself up. " I really feel that probity, not to say morality, demands that as a reputable businessman I should& #8209; "

" Yes, yes, " said the Metatron, a shade testily. " Point taken. We shall await you, then. "

The light faded, but did not quite vanish. They're leaving the line open, Aziraphale thought. I'm not getting out of this one.

" Hallo? " he said softly, " Anyone still there? "

There was silence.

Very carefully, he stepped over the circle and crept to the telephone. He opened his notebook and dialed another number.

After four rings it gave a little cough, followed by a pause, and then a voice which sounded so laid back you could put a carpet on it said, " Hi. This is Anthony Crowley. Uh. I& #8209; "

" Crowley! " Aziraphale tried to hiss and shout at the same time, " Listen! I haven't got much time! The& #8209; "

" & #8209; probably not in right now, or asleep, and busy, or something, but –"

" Shutup! Listen! It was in Tadfield! It's all in that book! You've got to stop& #8209; "

" & #8209; after the tone and I'll get right back to you. Chow. "

" I want to talk to you now& #8209; "

BeeeEEeeeEEeee

" Stop making noises! It's in Tadfield! That was what I was sensing! You must go there and& #8209; "

He took the phone away from his mouth.

" Bugger! " he said. It was the first time he'd sworn in more than four thousand years.

Hold on. The demon had another line, didn't he? He was that kind of person. Aziraphale fumbled in the book, nearly dropping it on the floor. They would be getting impatient soon.

He found the other number. He dialed it. It was answered almost immediately, at the same time as the shop's bell tingled gently.

Crowley's voice, getting louder as it neared the mouthpiece, said, " & #8209; really mean it. Hallo? "

" Crowley, it's me! "

" Ngh. " The voice was horribly noncommittal. Even in his present state, Aziraphale sensed trouble.

" Are you alone? " he said cautiously.

" Nuh. Got an old friend here. "

" Listen& #8209; 1"

" Awa' we ye, ye spawn o' hell! "

Very slowly, Aziraphale turned around.

– – -

Shadwell was trembling with excitement. He'd seen it all. He'd heard it all. He hadn't understood any of it, but he knew what people did with circles and candlesticks and incense. He knew that all right. He'd seen The Devil Rides Out fifteen times, sixteen times if you included the time he'd been thrown out of the cinema for shouting his unflattering opinions of amateur witchfinder Christopher Lee.

The buggers were using him. They'd been making fools out o' the glorious traditions o' the Army.

" I'll have ye, ye evil bastard! " he shouted, advancing like a motheaten avenging angel. " I ken what ye be about, cumin' up here and seducin' wimmen to do yer evil will! "

" I think perhaps you've got the wrong shop, " said Aziraphale. " I'll call back later, " he told the receiver, and hung up.

" I could see what yer were about, " snarled Shadwell. There were flecks of foam around his mouth. He was more angry than he could ever remember.

" Er, things are not what they seem& #8209; " Aziraphale began, aware even as he said it that as conversational gambits went it lacked a certain polish.

" I bet they ain't! " said Shadwell triumphantly.

" No, I mean& #8209; "

Without taking his eyes off the angel, Shadwell shuffled backwards and grabbed the shop door, slamming it hard so that the bell jangled.

" Bell, " he said.

He grabbed The Nice and Accurate Prophecies and thumped it down heavily on the table.

" Book, " he snarled.

He fumbled in his pocket and produced his trusty Ronson.

" Practically candle! " he shouted, and began to advance.

In his path, the circle glowed with a faint blue light.

" Er, " said Aziraphale, " I think it might not be a very good idea to-"

Shadwell wasn't listening. " By the powers invested in me by virtue o' my office o' Witchfinder, " he intoned, " I charge ye to quit from this place& #8209; "

" You see, the circle& #8209; "

" & #8209; and return henceforth to the place from which ye came, pausin' not to& #8209; "

" & #8209; it would really be unwise for a human to set foot in it without-"

" & #8209; and deliver us frae evil-"

" Keep out of the circle, you stupid man! "

" & #8209; never to come again to vex& #8209; "

" Yes, yes, but please keep out of& #8209; "

Aziraphale ran toward Shadwell, waving his hands urgently.

" & #8209; returning NAE MORE! " Shadwell finished. He pointed a vengeful, black& #8209; nailed finger.

Aziraphale looked down at his feet, and swore for the second time in five minutes. He'd stepped into the circle.

" Oh, fuck, " he said.

There was a melodious twang, and the blue glow vanished. So did Aziraphale.

Thirty seconds went by. Shadwell didn't move. Then, with a trembling left hand, he reached up and carefully lowered his right hand.

" Hallo? " he said. " Hallo? "

No one answered.

Shadwell shivered. Then, with his hand held out in front of him like a gun that he didn't dare fire and didn't know how to unload, he stepped out into the street, letting the door slam behind him.

It shook the floor. One of Aziraphale's candles fell over, spilling burning wax across the old, dry wood.

* * * * *

C rowley's London flat was the epitome of style. It was everything that a flat should be: spacious, white, elegantly furnished, and with that designer unlived& #8209; in look that only comes from not being lived in.

This is because Crowley did not live there.

It was simply the place he went back to, at the end of the day, when he was in London. The beds were always made; the fridge was always stocked with gourmet food that never went off (that was why Crowley had a fridge, after all), and for that matter the fridge never needed to be defrosted, or even plugged in.

The lounge contained a huge television, a white leather sofa, a video and a laserdisc player, an ansaphone, two telephones& #8209; the ansaphone line, and the private line (a number so far undiscovered by the legions of telephone salesmen who persisted in trying to sell Crowley double glazing, which he already had, or life insurance, which he didn't need)& #8209; and a square matte black sound system, the kind so exquisitely engineered that it just has the on& #8209; off switch and the volume control. The only sound equipment Crowley had overlooked was speakers; he'd forgotten about them. Not that it made any difference. The sound reproduction was quite perfect anyway.

There was an unconnected fax machine with the intelligence of a computer and a computer with the intelligence of a retarded ant. Nevertheless, Crowley upgraded it every few months, because a sleek computer was the sort of thing Crowley felt that the sort of human he tried to be would have. This one was like a Porsche with a screen. The manuals were still in their transparent wrapping.

In fact the only things in the flat Crowley devoted any personal attention to were the houseplants. They were huge and green and glorious, with shiny, healthy, lustrous leaves.

This was because, once a week, Crowley went around the flat with a green plastic plant mister, spraying the leaves, and talking to the plants.

He had heard about talking to plants in the early seventies, on Radio Four, and thought it an excellent idea. Although talking is perhaps the wrong word for what Crowley did.

What he did was put the fear of God into them.

More precisely, the fear of Crowley.

In addition to which, every couple of months Crowley would pick out a plant that was growing too slowly, or succumbing to leaf& #8209; wilt or browning, or just didn't look quite as good as the others, and he would carry it around to all the other plants. " Say goodbye to your friend, " he'd say to them. " He just couldn't cut it. . . "

Then he would leave the flat with the offending plant, and return an hour or so later with a large, empty flower pot, which he would leave somewhere conspicuously around the flat.

The plants were the most luxurious, verdant, and beautiful in London. Also the most terrified.

The lounge was lit by spotlights and white neon tubes, of the kind one casually props against a chair or a corner.

The only wall decoration was a framed drawing& #8209; the cartoon for the Mona Lisa, Leonardo da Vinci's original sketch. Crowley had bought it from the artist one hot afternoon in Florence, and felt it was superior to the final painting.

Crowley had a bedroom, and a kitchen, and an office, and a lounge, and a toilet: each room forever clean and perfect.

He had spent an uncomfortable time in each of these rooms, during the long wait for the End of the world.

He had phoned his operatives in the Witchfinder Army again, to try to get news, but his contact, Sergeant Shadwell, had just gone out, and the dimwitted receptionist seemed unable to grasp that he was willing to talk to any of the others.

" Mr. Pulsifer is out too, love, " she told him. " He went down to Tadfield this morning. On a mission. "

" I'll speak to anyone, " Crowley had explained.

" I'll tell Mr. Shadwell that, " she had said, " when he gets back. Now if you don't mind, it's one of my mornings, and I can't leave my gentleman like that for long or he'll catch his death. And at two I've got Mrs. Ormerod and Mr. Scroggie and young Julia coming over for a sitting, and there's the place to clean and all beforehand. But I'll give Mr. Shadwell your message. "

Crowley gave up. He tried to read a novel, but couldn't concentrate. He tried to sort his CDs into alphabetical order, but gave up when he discovered they already were in alphabetical order, as was his bookcase, and his collection of Soul Music.

Eventually he settled down on the white leather sofa and gestured on the television.

" Reports are coming in, " said a worried newscaster, " uh, reports are, well, nobody seems to know what's going on, but reports available to us would seem to, uh, indicate an increase in international tensions that would have undoubtedly been viewed as impossible this time last week when, er, everyone seemed to be getting on so nicely. Er.

" This would seem at least partly due to the spate of unusual events which have occurred over the last few days.