The Eyre Affair_ A Novel - Jasper Fforde [561]
“Illegal genetic experiments on humans undertaken covertly by an apparently innocent multinational.”
Millon nearly passed out with the conspiracy overload. When he had recovered, he asked how he could help.
“I need you to find any pictures, plans, layout drawings—anything that might be of use for a visit.”
Millon opened his eyes wide and scribbled in his notepad. “You’re going to go into Area 21?”
“No,” I replied, “we both are. Tomorrow. Leaving here at seven in the morning, sharp. Can you find what I asked for?”
He narrowed his eyes. “I can get you your information, Miss Next,” he said slowly and with a gleam in his eye, “but it will cost. Let me be your official biographer.”
I put out a hand and he shook it gratefully. “Deal.”
I walked back inside to find Landen talking to a man dressed in slightly punky clothes, with brightly colored spectacle frames, bleached-blond hair and an infinitesimally small goatee firmly planted just under his lower lip.
“Darling,” Landen said, grasping the hand that I had just rested on his shoulder, “this is my very good friend Handley Paige.”
I shook Paige’s hand. He seemed pretty much the same as any other SF writers I had ever met. Slightly geeky, but pleasant enough.
“You write the Emperor Zhark books,” I observed.
He winced slightly. “No one ever talks about the decent stuff I write,” he moaned. “They just ask me for more and more Zhark stuff. I did it as a joke—a pastiche of bad science fiction—and blow me down if it isn’t the most popular thing I’ve ever done.”
I remembered what Emperor Zhark had told me. “You’re going to kill him off, aren’t you?”
Handley started. “How did you know that?”
“She works for SO-27,” explained Landen. “They know everything. ”
“I thought you guys were more hooked on the classics?”
“We deal with all genres,” I explained. “For reasons that I can’t reveal, I advise you to maroon Zhark on an uninhabited planet rather than expose him to the humiliation of a public execution.”
Handley laughed. “You talk about him as if he were a real person!”
“She takes her work very seriously, Handley,” said Landen without the glimmer of a smile. “I’d advise you to consider very seriously anything she happens to say. Wheels within wheels, Handley.”
But Handley was adamant. “I’m going to kill him off so utterly and completely that no one will ever ask me for another Zhark novel again. Thanks for lending me the book, Land. I’ll see myself out.”
“Is Handley in danger?” asked Landen as soon as he had gone.
“Quite possibly. I’m not sure the Zharkian death-ray works in the real world, and I’d hate for Handley to be the one who finds out.”
“This is a BookWorld thing, isn’t it? Let’s just change the subject. What did your stalker want?”
I smiled. “You know, Landen, things are beginning to look up. I must call Bowden.”
I quickly dialed his number.
“Bowd? It’s Thursday. I’ve figured out how we’re going to get across the border. Set everything up for tomorrow morning. We’ll muster at Leigh Delamare at eight. . . . I can’t tell you. . . . Stig and Millon. . . . See you there. Bye.”
I called Stig and told him the same, then kissed Landen and asked him if he’d mind feeding Friday on his own. He didn’t, of course, and I dashed off to speak to Mycroft.
I was back in time to help Landen scrub the food off Friday, read the boy a story and put him to bed. It wasn’t late, but we went to bed ourselves. Tonight there was no shyness or confusion, and we undressed quickly. He pushed me backwards onto the bed and with his fingertips—
“Wait!” I cried out.
“What?”
“I can’t concentrate with all those people!”
Landen looked around the empty bedroom. “What people?”
“Those people,” I repeated, waving a hand in the general direction of everywhere, “the ones reading us.”
Landen stared at me and raised an eyebrow. I felt stupid, then relaxed and gave out a nervous giggle.
“Sorry. I’ve been living inside fiction for too long; sometimes I get this weird feeling that you, me and everything else are just . . . well, characters in a book or something.”
“Plainly,