One of Our Thursdays Is Missing - Jasper Fforde [81]
“Ask me some questions,” I said finally. “I want to convince myself I’m not her.”
“What’s my middle name?” he asked.
“Is it . . . Whitby?”
“Not even close. Where was our first date?”
“At the Alhambra. The Richard III thing.”
“No, that was later. Where did I lose my leg?”
“You’ve lost a leg?”
Mrs. Next came back into the room. “You never told me you’d bought a gold-plated toilet.”
Landen frowned. “We don’t have a gold-plated toilet.”
“Oh, dear,” said Mrs. Next. “I think I’ve just peed in your tuba.”
She then muttered something about “the shocking price of dodo feed” and went out without saying good-bye to either of us.
“Daft as a brush,” said Landen, “and just a teeny-weeny bit repulsive.”
“Plock.”
I turned. A dodo stood at the open door. It was nothing like the Pickwick/Lorina back home. This dodo was old. Her beak was worn and scaly, she had no feathers, and her left foot had a tremor. She was dressed in an all-over body warmer made of fleecy material and was regarding me curiously.
“Pickwick?”
“Plock?” said the dodo, cocking her head to one side. She walked unsteadily up to me and looked very closely at me for a long time.
“Plock, plock,” she said, and rubbed her beak affectionately on my trouser leg before walking over to her water dish.
“Pickwick thinks you’re real.”
“Pickwick has a brain the size of a petit pois.”
“True.”
The doorbell went again.
“That will be the Toad News Network.”
As soon as he had gone, the broom-cupboard door opened again.
“Has he gone?” asked Jenny.
I nodded.
“Right, then. I’ll show you what I mean about Thursday not being dead. Come with me.”
22.
Jenny
Places to Eat #15: Bar Humbug, 68 Christmas Carol. Very cheap food served in an authentically austere and utterly miserable Dickensian atmosphere. Waifs wait at tables, and portions are notoriously small. People with silly names particularly welcome, and those with an archaic job title (beadle, proctor, sexton, etc.) can eat for free.
Bradshaw’s BookWorld Companion (5th edition)
Jenny opened the back door and checked to make sure the coast was clear.
“Why do you do that?” I asked. “Check that no one’s coming? Only I can see you, right?”
Jenny looked at me and raised an eyebrow. “When you’re illusory like me,” she said, with great clarity, “it pays to keep an eye out for imaginary foes.”
She checked again and beckoned me out. I followed her down to the end of the garden and opened the door that led into the garage behind. I knew that my car would be kept here, but Thursday’s figment had no time to waste and hurriedly led me down the rear access road until we came back out onto the same street. Landen had been correct. Parked outside the house was a large Toad News Network van, complete with transmitter dish ready for bouncing a live feed to a handy airship.
“Landen will be surprised to find me not there.”
“Nothing could surprise Landen. This way.”
“Miss Next?” asked a man who had just gotten out of a car opposite. “May I have a word?”
I looked around, but Jenny seemed to have vanished. “I suppose so.”
“I just heard about your return. I’m a huge fan of your work. Adrian Vole of the Wapcaplit and Vole Advertising Agency. We understand you travel in Fiction, and we were wondering if you wanted to do a bit of product placement around the written world.”
“I hardly think that’s appropriate, do you?” I said, adding quickly, “Even if there is a BookWorld, which is by no means proven.”
“Thirty grand to plug the Toast Marketing Board in the Thursday Next series. You can introduce it how you want.”
“I’ve never even heard of the Toast Marketing Board.”
“You wouldn’t. It’s new. What do you say?”
“What do you think I’m going to say?”
“Yes,” said Vole unhappily, “we thought you’d tell us to stick it in our ear. Here’s a check. If you cash