Jasper Fforde - Lost in a Good Book

‘Thanks, Bowden.’

‘Sorry.’

‘Well, congratulations!’ said Cordelia, hugging me. ‘Who is the lucky father?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘You mean you haven’t told him yet?’

‘No, I mean I don’t know. My husband, hopefully.’

‘You’re married?’

‘No’

‘But you said—?’

‘Yes, I did,’ I retorted as drily as I could. ‘Confusing, isn’t it?’

‘This is very bad PR,’ muttered Cordelia darkly, sitting on the edge of the desk to steady herself. ‘The leading light of SpecOps knocked up in a bus shelter by someone she doesn’t even know!’

‘Cordelia, it’s not like that, and I wasn’t “knocked up”—and who mentioned anything about bus shelters? Perhaps the best thing would be if you kept this under your hat and we pretended that Bowden never said anything.’

‘Sorry.’

Cordelia leapt to her feet.

‘Good thinking, Next. We can tell everyone you have water retention or an eating disorder brought on by stress.’ Her face fell. ‘No, that won’t work. The Toad will see through it like a shot. Can’t you get married really quickly to someone? What about Bowden? Bowden, would you do the decent thing for the sake of SpecOps?’

‘I’m seeing someone over at SpecOps 13,’ replied Bowden hurriedly.

‘Blast!’ muttered Flakk. ‘Thursday, any ideas?’

But this was an aspect of Bowden I knew nothing about.

‘You never told me you were seeing someone over at SO-13!’

‘I don’t have to tell you everything .’

‘But I’m your partner, Bowden!’

‘Well, you never told me about Miles.’

‘Miles?’ exclaimed Cordelia. ‘The oh-so-handsome-to-die-for Miles Hawke ?’

‘Thanks, Bowden.’

‘Sorry.’

‘That’s wonderful !’ exclaimed Cordelia, clapping her hands together. ‘A dazzling couple! “SpecOps wedding of the year!” This is worth soooooo much coverage! Does he know?’

‘No. And you’re not going to tell him. And what’s more— Bowden —it might not even be his.’

‘Which puts us back to square one again!’ responded Cordelia in a huff. ‘Stay here. I’m going to fetch this chap and his daughter. Bowden, don’t let her out of your sight!’

And she was gone.

Bowden stared at me for a moment and then asked:

‘Do you really believe the baby is Landen’s?’

‘I’m hoping.’

‘You’re not married, Thurs. You might think you are but you’re not. I looked at the records Landen Parke-Laine died in 1947.’

‘ This time he did. My father and I went—’

‘You don’t have a father, Thursday. There is no record of anyone on your birth certificate. I think maybe you should speak to one of the stressperts.’

‘And end up doing comedy stand-up, arranging pebbles or counting blue cars? No thanks.’

There was a pause.

‘He is very handsome,’ said Bowden.

‘Who?’

‘Miles Hawke, of course.’

‘Oh. Yes, yes, I know he is.’

‘Very polite, very popular.’

‘I know that.’

‘A child without a father—’

‘Bowden, I’m not in love with him and it isn’t his baby—okay?’

‘Okay, okay. Let’s forget it.’

We sat there in silence for a bit. I played with a pencil and Bowden stared out of the window.

‘What about the voices?’

‘Bowden!’

‘Thursday, this is for your own good. You told me you heard them yourself and Officers Hurdyew, Tolkien and Lissning heard you talking and listening to someone in the upstairs corridor.’

‘Well, the voices have stopped,’ I said categorically. ‘Nothing like that will ever happen again.’ [ 17 17 ‘Miss Next? Havisham speaking!’ ]

‘Oh, shit.’ [ 18 18 ‘I hope you didn’t say what I thought I heard you say!’ ]

‘What do you mean, “oh, shit”?’

‘Nothing—just, well, that. I’ve got to use the ladies’ room—would you excuse me?’

I left Bowden shaking his head sadly and was soon in the ladies’. I checked that the stalls were empty and then said. ‘Miss Havisham, are you there?’ [ 19 19 ‘I am here, young lady, but I am shocked by your coarse language!’ ]

‘You must understand, Miss Havisham, that where I come from customs are different from your own. People curse here as a matter of course.’ [ 20 20 ‘Really? Well, I will not hear it from my apprentices. But I forgive you, I suppose. I need you to attend to me right now. Norland Park, Chapter 5, paragraph one—you’ll find it in the travel book Mrs Nakajima left for you.’ ]

‘I’ll be there directly, ma’am!’

I bit my lip and hurriedly rushed out of the ladies’, grabbed my Jurisfiction travel book and my jacket, and was heading back when—

‘Thursday!’ came a loud and strident voice that I knew could only be Flakk’s. ‘I’ve got the winner and his daughter outside in the corridor!’

‘I’m sorry, Cordelia, but I have to go to the loo.’

‘Don’t think I’m going to fall for that one again,’ she growled under her breath.

‘It’s true this time.’

‘And the book?’

‘I always read on the loo.’

She narrowed her eyes at me and I narrowed my eyes back.

‘Very well,’ she said finally, ‘but I’m coming with you.’

She smiled at the two lucky winners of her crazy competition, who smiled back through the half-glazed office door, and we both trotted into the ladies’.

‘Ten minutes,’ she said to me as I locked myself in a cubicle. I opened the book and started to read:

Many were the tears shed by them in their last adieus to a place so much beloved. ‘Dear, dear Norland!’ said Marianne, as she wandered alone before the house, on the last evening of them being there…

The small melamine cubicle started to evaporate and in its place was a large park, bathed in the light of a dying sun, the haze softening the shadows and making the house glow in the failing light. There was a light breeze, and in front of the house a lone girl walked, gazing fondly at the—

‘—do you always read aloud in the toilet?’ asked Cordelia from behind the door.

The images evaporated in a flash and I was back in the ladies’.

‘Always,’ I replied. ‘And if you don’t leave me alone, I’ll never be finished.’

‘…when shall I cease to regret you!—When I learn to feel a home elsewhere?—Oh! happy house, could you know what I suffer in now viewing you from this spot, from whence perhaps I may view you no more!—and you, ye well known trees!—but you will continue…’

The house came back again, the young woman talking quietly, matching her words to mine as I drifted into the book. I was now sitting not on a hard SpecOps standard toilet seat but on a white-painted wrought-iron garden bench. I stopped reading when I was certain I was completely within Sense and Sensibility and listened to Marianne as she finished her speech:

‘…and insensible of any change in those who walk under your shade! But who will remain to enjoy you?’

She sighed dramatically, clasped her hands to her breast and sobbed quietly for a moment or two. Then she took one long look at the large white-painted house and turned to face me.

‘Hello!’ she said in a friendly voice. ‘I haven’t seen you around here before. Would you be working for Juris-thingummywhatsit?’

‘Don’t we have to be careful as to what we say?’ I managed to utter, looking around nervously.

‘Goodness me no!’ exclaimed Marianne with a delightful giggle. ‘The chapter is over and, besides, this book is written in the third person . We are free to do what we please until tomorrow morning when we depart for Devon. The next two chapters are heavy with exposition—I hardly have anything to do, and I say even less! You look confused, poor thing! Have you been into a book before?’