Un Lun Dun - China Mieville [99]
It got slowly louder and louder, until suddenly Deeba heard a voice call her name. She turned and looked up in dismay. Descending towards them, through a brief flock of scurrying laundry, was Rosa and Conductor Jones’s bus, the Scrollscrawl Sigil clear on the front.
Murgatroyd was leaning from the platform, shouting, “Deeba Resham, stop! We need to talk!”
68
The Functionary’s Tireless Hunt
Deeba and her companions ran.
“Wait, Deeba, wait!” It wasn’t just Murgatroyd leaning out now. He had been joined by Conductor Jones, Obaday Fing, and even Skool, the brass helmet peering down.
“This way!”
“No, this way!”
Deeba and Hemi dithered at every turn, while the book barked directions. They were in an area of moil houses and streets littered with skips and obsolete machinery, with no arches or overhangs under which they could hide. The bus followed them through the intricate streets, while UnLondoners watched curiously from windows.
“Wait, Deeba!” The voices were insistent. “We want to help!”
Deeba turned in to an alley full of clotheslines and clothes gyrating as if they were in a dryer, though there was no wind. They ran through layers of cloth like curtains, until at the end of the streetlet they reached a blockage, a steep wall of broken clocks, slippery as scree.
“Listen,” whispered Deeba. The noise of the bus had ebbed.
“They’ve gone,” whispered Hemi.
“I think we lost them,” Deeba said, and indicated the tight alley. “It’s too narrow for the bus here.”
Even as she said that, though, cords dropped out of the sky, from the bus hovering above the buildings. Conductor Jones rappelled down, landing in front of them.
“Deeba, Hemi, Book,” he said, and held out his hands as they backed away. “Please wait. Listen. We’re on your side.”
“Leave us alone,” Hemi said. “Leave her alone.”
“Stay back,” Deeba said. “You don’t know it, but you’re working for the Smog.”
“These crazy allegations have to stop,” said a voice. Climbing clumsily down a rope ladder was Murgatroyd. He stumbled to the ground and dusted himself off, stood by Jones, and pulled a strange-looking gun out of his suit. He aimed it at Deeba.
Following him down the ladder came Obaday Fing, in an outfit stitched of monochrome book jackets.
“Careful, now, Deeba,” Fing said. “Don’t move suddenly; there’s no need to get hurt.”
“You let him pull a gun on me?” Deeba said, aghast, staring at Jones and Obaday, who shifted uncomfortably.
“It’s a tranquilizer,” Murgatroyd said. “I don’t want to use it, and I’m hoping you don’t make me. It’s purely in case you refuse to listen to reason. We’re here to help.”
“How’d you find me?” said Deeba. She refused to look at Murgatroyd, only addressing Fing and Jones.
“Jones came and asked my advice,” Obaday Fing said. “Together we figured out how your mind works, Deeba. When the Propheseers told us about the tasks in the book, we thought we knew what you might try to do.”
“And there’s been sightings for days,” Jones said, and winked. “You’re noticeable, girl, been making an impact. I been sticking close to Murgatroyd. He made sure he was the first person who heard all the rumors that came through.”
“Your friends’ve come along, to prove that you’ve no reason to be anxious,” Murgatroyd said. “This is all for your own good. We just want to stop this misunderstanding.”
“You going to try to blame everything on Hemi again?” Deeba said.
“We’ll sort out the truth about this half-boy later,” Murgatroyd said. “Please come with us. The Unbrellissimo’s program to hand out unbrellas is continuing—nearly a third of UnLondon’ve been issued protection now, and just in time, because the Smog’s attacks are increasing. We urgently want you on-side, Deeba. We want all this unpleasantness and misunderstanding to stop.”
Cauldron and Bling looked one way and another, trying to work out if they could rush past their captors.
“Listen here,” the book said with a pompous voice, “I think you should know that I believe Miss Resham may not be wrong