Jasper Fforde - The Well of Lost Plots

'Take this to Professor Plum at JurisTech and have him look at it. I'd like to be sure.'

'But … but why am I a threat?' I asked.

'I don't know,' admitted Miss Havisham. 'You are the most junior member of Jurisflction and arguably the least threatening — you can't even bookjump without moving your lips, for goodness' sake!'

I didn't need reminding but I saw her point.

'So what happens now?' I asked at length.

'We have to assume whoever killed him might try again. You are to be on your guard. Wait— There she is!'

We had walked over a small rise and were slightly ahead of the boat. A young woman was lying on the ground in a most unladylike fashion, pointing a sniper's rifle towards the small skiff that had just come into view. I crept cautiously forward; she was so intent on her task that she didn't notice me until I was close enough to grab her. She was a slight thing and her strugglings, whilst energetic, were soon overcome. I secured her in an armlock as Havisham unloaded the rifle. Maggie and Stephen, unaware of the danger, drifted softly past on their way to Mudport.

'Where did you get this?' asked Havisham, holding up the rifle.

'I don't have to say anything,' replied the angelic-looking girl in a soft voice. 'I was only going to knock a hole in the boat, honestly I was!'

'Sure you were. You can let go, Thursday.'

I relaxed my grip and she stepped back, pulling at her clothes to straighten them after our brief tussle. I checked her for any other weapons but found nothing.

'Why should Maggie force a wedge between our happiness?' she demanded angrily. 'Everything would be so wonderful between my darling Stephen and me — why am I the victim? I, who only wanted to do good and help everyone — especially Maggie!'

'It's called "drama",' replied Havisham wearily. 'Are you going to tell us where you got the rifle or not?'

'Not. You can't stop me. Maybe they'll get away but I can be here ready and waiting on the next reading — or even the one after that! Think you have enough Jurisfiction agents to put Maggie under constant protection?'

I'm sorry you feel that way,' replied Miss Havisham, looking her squarely in the eye. 'Is that your final word?'

'It is.'

'Then you are under arrest for attempted fiction infraction, contrary to Ordinance FMB/0608999 of the Narrative Continuity Code. By the power invested in me by the Council of Genres, I sentence you to banishment outside Mill on the Floss . Move.'

Miss Havisham ordered me to cuff Lucy, and once I had, she held on to me as we jumped into the Great Library. Lucy, for an arrested ad-libber, didn't seem too put out.

'You can't imprison me,' she said as we walked along the corridor of the twenty-third floor. 'I reappear in Maggie's dream seven pages from now. If I'm not there you'll be in more trouble than you know what to do with. This could mean your job, Miss Havisham! Back to Satis House — for good.'

'Would it mean that?' I asked, suddenly wondering whether Miss Havisham wasn't exceeding her authority.

'It would mean the same as it did the last time,' replied Havisham, 'absolutely nothing .'

'Last time?' queried Lucy. 'But this is the first time I've tried something like this!'

'No,' replied Miss Havisham, 'no, it most certainly is not.'

Miss Havisham pointed out a book entitled The Curious Experience of the Patterson Family on the Island of Uffa and told me to open it. We were soon inside, on the foreshore of a Scottish island in the late spring.

'What do you mean?' asked Lucy, looking around her as her earlier confidence evaporated to be replaced by growing panic. 'What is this place?'

'It is a prison, Miss Deane.'

'A prison?' she replied. 'A prison for whom?'

'For them,' said Havisham, indicating several identically youthful and fair-complexioned Lucy Deanes, who had broken cover and were staring in our direction. Our Lucy Deane looked at us, then at her identical sisters, then back to us again.

'I'm sorry!' she said, dropping to her knees. 'Give me another chance — please!'

'Take heart from the fact that this doesn't make you a bad person,' said Miss Havisham. 'You just have a repetitive character disorder. You are a serial ad-libber and the 796th Lucy we have had to imprison here. In less civilised times you would have been reduced to text. Good day.'

And we vanished back to the corridors of the Great Library.

'And to think she was the most pleasant person in Floss !' I said, shaking my head sadly.

'You'll find that the most righteous characters are the first ones to go loco down here. The average life of a Lucy Deane is about a thousand readings; self-righteous indignation kicks in after that. No one could believe it when David Copperfield killed his first wife, either. Good day, Chesh.'

The Cheshire Cat had appeared on a high shelf, grinning to us, itself, and anything else in view.

'Well!' said the Cat. 'Next and Havisham! Problems with Lucy Deane?'

'The usual. Can you get the Well to send in the replacement as soon as possible?'

The Cat assured us he would as soon as possible, seemed crestfallen that I hadn't bought him any Moggilicious cat food and vanished again.

'We need to find anything unusual about Perkins' death', said Miss Havisham. 'Will you help?'

'Of course!' I enthused.

Miss Havisham smiled a rare smile.

'You remind me of myself, all those years ago, before that rat Compeyson brought my happiness to an end.'

She moved closer and narrowed her eyes.

'We keep this to ourselves. Knowledge can be a dangerous thing. Start poking around in the workings of Jurisfiction and you may find more than you bargained for — just remember that.'

She fell silent for a few moments.

'But first, we need to get you fully licensed as a Jurisfiction agent — there's a limit to what you can do as an apprentice. Did you finish the multiple choice?'

I nodded.

'Good. Then you can do your practical exam today. I'll go and organise it while you take your Eject-O-Hat to JurisTech.'

She melted into the air about me and I walked off down the Library corridor towards the elevators. I passed Falstaff, who invited me to 'dance around his maypole'. I told him to sod off, of course, and pressed the elevator 'call' button. The doors opened a minute later and I stepped in. But it wasn't empty. With me were Emperor Zhark and Mrs Tiggy-winkle.

'Which floor?' asked Zhark.

'First, please.'

He pressed the button with a long and finely manicured finger and continued his conversation with Mrs Tiggy-winkle.

'… and that was when the rebels destroyed the third of my battle stations,' said the emperor sorrowfully. 'Have you any idea how much these things cost?'

'Tch,' said Mrs Tiggy-winkle, bristling her spines. 'They always find some way of defeating you, don't they?'

Zhark sighed.

'It's like one huge conspiracy,' he muttered. 'Just when I think I have the Galaxy at my mercy, some hopelessly outnumbered young hothead destroys my most insidious Death Machine using some hithero undiscovered weakness. I'm suing the manufacturer after that last debacle.'

He sighed again, sensed he was dominating the conversation and asked:

'So how's the washing business?'

'Pretty good,' said Mrs Tiggy-winkle, 'but the price of starch is something terrible these days.'

'Oh, I know,' replied Zhark, thumbing his high collar, 'look at this. My name alone strikes terror into billions, but can I get my collars done exactly how I want them?'

The elevator stopped at my floor and I stepped out.

I read myself into Sense and Sensibility and avoided the nursery rhyme characters, who were still picketing the front door; I had Humpty's proposals in my back pocket but still hadn't given them to Libris — in truth I had only promised to do my best, but didn't particularly want to run the gauntlet again. I ran up the back stairs, nodded a greeting to Mrs Henry Dashwood and bumped into Tweed in the lobby; he was talking to a lithe and adventurous-looking young man whose forehead was etched with an almost permanent frown. He quickly broke off when I appeared.