Jasper Fforde - The Last Dragonslayer

‘I was last asked that question twenty-three years, two months and six hours ago. The only fish that begins and ends with a “K” other than the Killer Shark is the King-sized portion of haddock .’

‘And what was your answer?’

‘ The record number of pockets in a single pair of trousers is nine hundred and seventy-two. Only three had zippers, and the combined loose change was enough to buy a goat at 1766 prices . Four hundred moolah, please.’

‘Four hundred?’ I repeated incredulously. My only possession was my Volkswagen Beetle, and it was barely worth a tenth of what he was asking.

‘Four hundred moolah,’ replied William of Anorak firmly, ‘in cash. The secretions of the ultra-rare Desert Shridloo are said to have remarkable properties. The other remarkable thing about a Desert Shridloo is that it doesn’t live in the desert .’

‘Do you have to keep on reeling off useless facts?’

‘Unfortunately so,’ replied William of Anorak, adjusting his glasses, ‘I have over seven million facts in my head and if I don’t repeat them to myself in order I run the risk of forgetting them completely. Milton wrote Samson Agonistes. Would you like to hear it?’

‘No thanks,’ I said hurriedly. ‘Who was it who said: “Never commit anything to memory you can’t look up?”’

‘It was Albert Einstein and I see your point, yet I am as much a victim of my own powers as those who have the misfortune to stay in my company. You have been here over five minutes; that is better than most. Most people prefer carpooling when other people do it, and the average number of pips in a tangerine is 5.368 .’

‘I have no money,’ I implored, ‘not even a twenty-moolah note. But to know the answer to my question I will gladly give you everything I possess.’

‘Which is? An anagram of Moonlight is thin gloom, and the average Troll can eat fifteen legs at one sitting .’

‘A 1958 Volkswagen Beetle with an MOT that expires next week, a few books and half a piano.’

William of Anorak looked up and stopped scribbling in his pad.

‘ The most favourite boy’s name is James; the least favourite is Gzxkls . How can you have half a piano?’

‘It’s a long story, but basically I’m a musical duet penfriend with another foundling in San Mateo.’

He continued to stare at me.

‘ A red setter is so stupid even the other dogs notice, and cats aren’t really friendly, they’re just cosying up to the dominant life-form as a hedge against extinction . You’re a foundling? From where?’

‘The Lobsterhood.’

A smile crossed his grubby unshaven features.

‘You’re that Jennifer Strange? The one at Kazam with the Quarkbeast?’

I nodded and pointed at the Quarkbeast, who was sitting in the car. He had once idly chewed his way through a locomotive’s drive wheel, and hadn’t been allowed on railway property since.

‘ In the first photograph ever taken ,’ said William, staring at me thoughtfully, ‘ someone blinked, and they had to begin again from scratch. It set the industry back two decades, and the problem has still not been properly rectified . You were left in that Beetle when a foundling, yet you would give it to me?’

‘I would.’

‘Then I will tell you the answer to your question for free. You will find Brian Spalding, worshipful Dragonslayer, appointed by the Mighty Shandar himself and holder of the sacred sword Exhorbitus—’

‘Yes, yes?’

‘Probably at the Duck and Ferret in Wimpole Street.’

I thanked him profusely and shook his hand so hard I could hear his teeth rattle.

‘There’s one other thing!’

He beckoned me to lean closer. I did so and he whispered:

‘ The largest deposit of natural marzipan ever discovered is a two-metre-thick seam lying beneath Cumbria. The so-called “ Carlisle Drift ” is worth a potential 1.8 trillion moolah, and may provide light and heat for two million homes when it comes on stream in 2002 . Not a lot of people know that. Good luck, Miss Strange, and may you always walk in the shadow of the Lobster.’

I thanked William of Anorak and hurried off towards the Duck and Ferret. It was shut so I sat down on a bench, next to a very old man who had skin like a pickled walnut and eyes sunk deep in his head. He wore a neat blue suit and homburg hat, and carried a cane with a silver top. He looked at me with great interest.

‘Good afternoon, young lady,’ said the old man in a chirpy voice, tipping his head back to allow the warmth of the sun to fall upon his face.

‘Good afternoon, sir,’ I replied, always meeting politeness with politeness as Mother Zenobia had taught me.

‘Is that your Quarkbeast?’ he asked, his eyes following the creature as it sniffed suspiciously at a statue of St Grunk the Probably Fictitious.

‘He’s totally harmless,’ I replied. ‘All that stuff about Quarkbeasts eating babies is just fear-mongering by the papers.’

‘I know,’ he replied, ‘I used to have a Quarkbeast once myself. Fiercely loyal creatures. Where did you find him?’

‘It was in Starbucks,’ I replied, ‘about two years ago. The manager said to me: “Your Quarkbeast is making the customers pass out in shock” and I turned round and Quark , there he was, staring at me. So I said he wasn’t mine, and they went to call the Beastcatcher, and I know what they do with Quarkbeasts, so I said he was mine after all and took him home. He’s been with me ever since.’

The old man nodded thoughtfully.

‘I rescued mine from a Quarkbaiting ring,’ he said, shuddering at the thought. ‘Frightfully cruel sport. He could chew his way through a London bus lengthwise in under eight seconds. A good friend. Does yours speak?’

‘Not that I’m aware of. I’m not even sure if he’s a boy or a girl. I wouldn’t know how to tell, and quite frankly, it might be undignified to try and find out.’

‘They don’t procreate in the usual manner,’ said the old man, ‘they utilise quantum reproduction—they are just suddenly there, seemingly out of nothing.’

I didn’t know this, and told him so.

‘Quarkbeasts always arrive in pairs,’ added the old man knowledgeably, ‘somewhere there will be an anti-Quarkbeast—a mirror image of your own. If paired Quarkbeasts come together they disappear in a flash of energy. Remember the explosion last year in Hythe, which they claimed was a gas explosion?’

‘Yes?’ I said slowly, for the explosion had left a crater twelve metres deep in a housing estate, and fourteen dead.

‘It was an unlucky confluence of Quarkbeasts. A separated pair came together quite by chance. They’re lonely creatures—they have to be. Misunderstood, too.’

This was indeed true. I’d owned mine for six months before the lingering suspicion that I might be eaten alive gave way to genuine affection.

The old man paused to give a coin to a beggar-lady collecting for the Troll Wars Widows, then added: ‘Are you waiting for something?’

‘I’m waiting for someone .’

‘Ah!’ he replied. ‘Me also.’ He sighed deeply and looked at his watch. ‘I wait for many years, but still Jennifer Strange does not appear.’

‘I’m sorry?’ I said with a start. ‘Who did you say you were waiting for?’

‘Jennifer Strange.’

‘But I’m Jennifer Strange!’

‘Then,’ replied the old man with the ghost of a smile, ‘my wait is over!’

By the time I had recovered from this shock, the old man had jumped to his feet and was walking swiftly along the pavement.