The Eyre Affair_ A Novel - Jasper Fforde [432]
I got up and walked to the Jurisfiction table as a drumroll announced the final category. The Bellman nodded politely to me and I looked around the room. It was time to act. UltraWord™ was not the savior of the BookWorld—it would be the end, and I hoped that Mimi down in the footnoterphone conduits was ready.1
“And now, ladies, gentlemen and things, for the high point of the evening, the 923rd Annual BookWorld Award for Most Troubled Romantic Lead (Male). To read the nominations we have none other than WordMaster Xavier Libris, all the way from Text Grand Central!”
There was loud applause, which I hadn’t expected—TGC wasn’t that popular. I had a sudden attack of doubt. Could Deane be wrong? I thought again about Perkins, Snell and Havisham and my resolve returned. I grabbed my bag and got up. I saw Legree stiffen and rise from the Uncle Tom’s Cabin table, speaking into his cuff as he did so. I headed towards the exit with him tailing me.
“Thank you very much!” said Libris, raising his hands to quell the applause as Hamlet, Jude Fawley and Heathcliff stood close by, each wishing that Libris would hurry up so they could collect the statuette. “I have a few words to say about the new Operating System and then we can all get back to the awards.”
He took a deep breath. “Many good words have been written about Ultra Word™, and I have to tell you, they are all true. The benefits to everyone will be felt throughout the BookWorld, from the lowliest D-10 in the trashiest paperback to the finest A-1 in high literature.”
I walked to the side of the stage, towards the swing doors that led through to the hospitality lounge. Legree followed but was tripped up by Mathias’s widow. She placed a hoof on his chest and held him firm while Mrs. Hubbard grabbed one arm and Miss Muffet the other. It had been done so quietly no one had noticed.
“Nonfiction is gaining in popularity, and this invasion into areas historically part of fiction must be cut off at the root. To this end, myself and the technicians at Text Grand Central have created Ultra Word™, the Book Operating System that gives us more choice, more plots, more ideas and more ways in which to work. With these tools you and I will forge a new fiction, a fiction so varied that the readers will flock to us in droves. The future is bright—the future is Ultra Word™.”
“Going somewhere, missy?” asked Heep, blocking my path.
“Get out of my way, Uriah.”
He pulled a gun from his pocket but stopped dead when a voice said:
“Do you know what an eraserhead can do to an A-7 like you, Heep?”
Bradshaw emerged from behind a potted Triffid. He was carrying his trusty hunting rifle.
“You’d never kill a featured Dickens character, Mr. Bradshaw!” said Heep, attempting to call his bluff.
Bradshaw pulled back the hammer on his rifle. “Poltroon! Ever wondered what happened to Edwin Drood?”
Heep’s eyes nearly popped out of his skull, and coward that he was, he dropped his pistol and started pleading for his life.
Mrs. Bradshaw tied Heep’s thumbs together and, after gagging him, hid him under the Summer Lightning table.
“Drood?” I asked Bradshaw with some surprise. “Was that you?”
“Not at all!” He laughed. “I only asked him if he had ever wondered what happened to Drood. Now get out of here, girly—there’s work to be done!”
I pushed the swing doors to the hospitality lounge and pulled out my mobilefootnoterphone. The room was deserted, but I met Tweed at the entrance to the stage. I could see Libris talking, and beyond him, the audience hanging on his every word.
“Of course,” he went on, “the new system will need new work procedures, and all of you have had ample time to study our detailed seventeen-hundred-page prospectus; all jobs will be protected, the status of all Generics will be maintained. In a few minutes I will ask for a vote to carry the new system, as required by the Council of Genres. But before we do,