The Eyre Affair_ A Novel - Jasper Fforde [37]
Mycroft looked over my shoulder and grunted.
“You probably weren’t pressing hard enough. You’re police, aren’t you?”
“SpecOps, really.”
“Then this might interest you,” he announced, leading me off past more wondrous gadgets, the use of which I could only guess at. “I’m demonstrating this particular machine to the police technical advancement committee on Wednesday.”
He stopped next to a device that had a huge horn on it like an old gramophone. He cleared his throat.
“I call it my Olfactograph. It’s very simple. Since any bloodhound worth its salt will tell you that each person’s smell is unique like a thumbprint, then it follows that a machine that can recognize a felon’s individual smell must be of use where other forms of identification fail. A thief may wear gloves and a mask, but he can’t hide his scent.”
He pointed at the horn.
“The odors are sucked up here and split into their individual parts using an Olfactroscope of my own invention. The component parts are then analyzed to give a ‘pongprint’ of the criminal. It can separate out ten different people’s odors in a single room and isolate the newest or the oldest. It can detect burned toast up to six months after the event and differentiate between thirty different brands of cigar.”
“Could be handy,” I said, slightly doubtfully. “What’s this over here?”
I was pointing to what looked like a trilby hat made from brass and covered in wires and lights.
“Oh yes,” said my uncle, “this I think you will like.”
He placed the brass hat on my head and flicked a large switch. There was a humming noise.
“Is something meant to happen?” I asked.
“Close your eyes and breathe deeply. Try to empty your mind of any thoughts.”
I closed my eyes and waited patiently.
“Is it working?” asked Mycroft.
“No,” I replied, then added: “Wait!” as a stickleback swam past. “I can see a fish. Here, in front of my eyes. Wait, there’s another!”
And so there was. Pretty soon I was staring at a whole host of brightly colored fish all swimming in front of my closed eyes. They were on about a five-second loop; every now and then they jumped back to the starting place and repeated their action.
“Remarkable!”
“Stay relaxed or it will go,” said Mycroft in a soothing voice. “Try this one.”
There was a blur of movement and the scene shifted to an inky-black starfield; it seemed as though I were traveling through space.
“Or how about this?” asked Mycroft, changing the scene to a parade of flying toasters. I opened my eyes and the image evaporated. Mycroft was looking at me earnestly.
“Any good?” he asked.
I nodded.
“I call it a Retinal Screen-Saver. Very useful for boring jobs; instead of gazing absently out of the window you can transform your surroundings to any number of soothing images. As soon as the phone goes or your boss walks in you blink and bingo!— you’re back in the real world again.”
I handed back the hat.
“Should sell well at SmileyBurger. When do you hope to market it?”
“It’s not really ready yet; there are a few problems I haven’t quite fixed.”
“Such as what?” I asked, slightly suspiciously.
“Close your eyes and you’ll see.”
I did as he asked and a fish swam by. I blinked again and could see a toaster. Clearly, this needed some work.
“Don’t worry,” he assured me. “They will have gone in a few hours.”
“I preferred the Olfactroscope.”
“You haven’t seen anything yet!” said Mycroft, skipping nimbly up to a large work desk covered by tools and bits of machinery. “This device is probably my most amazing discovery ever. It is the culmination of thirty years’ work and incorporates biotechnology at the very cutting edge of science. When you find out what this is, I promise you, you’ll flip!”
He pulled a tea towel off a goldfish bowl with a flourish and showed me what appeared to be a large quantity of fruitfly larvae.
“Maggots?”
Mycroft smiled.
“Not maggots, Thursday, bookworms!”
He said the word with such a bold and proud flourish that I thought I must have missed something.
“Is that good?”
“It’s very good, Thursday. These