‘Not unless one or the other of us confesses. Which I will not do,’ Pamarchon said.
‘Nor I,’ added Catherine.
‘Well,’ said Rosalind, ‘you’ll just have to sit and grouch at each other while your world goes up in flames, then. What?’
Jay was waving his hand nervously like a schoolboy in class.
‘Not now, Jay,’ Catherine said.
But Jay, evidently, had had enough of being ignored. ‘I want to say something. You’re all talking but going nowhere. None of you knows what to do.’
‘Do you?’
‘Yes. This bickering is a waste of time. Rosalind is right there, but she doesn’t know anything about us. She just dismisses everything and says it is all silly. It’s not. The Story provides everything we need, if we understand it properly.’
‘So how does it help here?’ asked Rosalind in a somewhat offended tone.
‘Esilio,’ Jay replied. ‘His shrine is in the woods near Willdon.’
‘I’ve seen it. So?’
‘I’ve studied it, in old parts of the Story that very few people know much about. There is one tale of two men with a dispute over a horse. They cannot agree, so they ask for the wisdom of Esilio to decide. They go to his shrine, and as they talk to the people, setting out their case, a wild horse wanders into the stone circle. They see it is a gift from the gods; both now have a horse, so there is nothing to argue about and the dispute is settled.’
‘I don’t see how that helps.’
‘It sets a precedent. It is set out in the Story. Anyone with a grievance not satisfied in any other way can appeal to his judgement. I do not know if it has ever been used.’
‘Not in my time,’ Catherine said, ‘but there is no reason it could not be, if the two sides agree.’
‘Then what?’ Rosalind asked. ‘You wait for some message from on high, or something?’
‘Each would make their case,’ Jay said. ‘Then the wisdom of Esilio offers a solution. That’s what the story says.’
‘You’re sure of that?’ Rosalind asked.
‘It would have to take the form of a disputation,’ Catherine said. ‘The wisdom would flow through the will of the audience.’
‘You mean they vote on it? Anyone?’
‘Anyone present. It is an ingenious idea. The trouble is that it would give me the advantage Pamarchon is so afraid of. It would be my people there. Pamarchon would never agree.’
‘Of course he wouldn’t,’ Antros said. ‘Nobody but a fool would.’
‘Then I am a fool,’ Pamarchon said. ‘If I wait, then Gontal gets Willdon and my hopes will be gone for ever. He will hunt me to death, or I him. I have always been prepared to fight if I must, but will not do so if there is even the smallest alternative. Besides,’ he smiled at Catherine, ‘they are not your people at the moment. Perhaps the wisdom of Esilio is already at work.’
So it was settled. An hour later, they left for Willdon.
48
‘I must have been followed to the Depository,’ Jack said. ‘They may well know by now why we were there, and why Emily was with me. Do you have somewhere we can go?’
He was talking to Sylvia at the communal food hall, which daily saw to the nutrition of tens of thousands of workers. It was easy to go unnoticed in the vast, smoke-filled room and the noise made it impossible for anyone to overhear. In general, people came in, ate and left within ten minutes. Jack and Emily had had to wait for nearly an hour before Sylvia showed up in response to their urgent message.
‘There are many such places,’ she said calmly, ‘but you never said you were doing anything illegal. You know how precarious our position is. We cannot afford the slightest—’
‘It’s not illegal,’ he interrupted. ‘This document is valuable. Invaluable, I might say. I am trying to get it back to its rightful owner. Others wish to take it for themselves.’
‘What others?’
‘Zoffany Oldmanter, I believe.’
‘Would this be connected to the sudden renewal of the campaign against us? The accusations of terrorism?’ She seemed neither surprised nor perturbed by his statement.
‘It’s possible,’ he said after a moment’s hesitation. ‘If so, then possession of this document might help in blunting the attack on you. If I get it back to Hanslip, it will give him a powerful bargaining chip.’
‘That may help him. What will it do for us?’
‘He will abide by any assurance I give you. He is a decent enough man, so I have found. For what it is worth, you have my word on that.’
‘I’m afraid it is not worth much. We will help you, but only if we keep possession of this document Emily found for you, as a guarantee.’
‘I was going to say she would have to come anyway. Association with me, with her mother, with the document. That is more than enough reason to arrest her.’
‘No. We have done enough for you.’
‘But you must understand—’
‘Well, that’s the problem,’ Sylvia interrupted. ‘We don’t understand, because you refuse to explain. You come to our Retreat, get our help, and we find ourselves attracting the attention of Zoffany Oldmanter. Yet we do not know why, or what this is about.’
She spoke quietly, so that Jack had to lean forward across the table to hear what she was saying. He looked around to make sure that no one was listening, but the people sitting nearby were intent only on their food, shovelling it down, occasionally pausing to take a drink.
‘Angela Meerson,’ he began, ‘Emily’s mother, seems to have discovered a way of accessing parallel universes, although there is a dispute over what that means exactly. She disappeared, destroying her data before she left. Such a discovery could obviously be of immense importance. The person who controls it might become powerful beyond words, and the world might gain access to unlimited resources. That’s a simple summary.’
‘So the rightful owner of this data is Angela Meerson? Should it not be given to her?’
‘I have no idea. If I could find her, then I would ask, but I have had people searching for some time now, and there has been nothing. You know better than most that evading detection even for more than an hour is difficult. The moment you walk down a street, buy something, touch something, it leaves a trace. She has vanished completely. Meanwhile Oldmanter wants this badly. There isn’t time to worry about the finer points of legal ownership. If he gets it, they will all become irrelevant anyway, and the people I work for and with will be arrested, as, most probably, will you be.’
‘I see. This booklet you discovered today. That is the data?’
‘Probably. If it is, then you and Hanslip can pretty much name your price.’
‘Is this discovery of Angela Meerson’s practical or just theoretical?’
‘She built machines to test it, but they are at an early stage of development.’
‘This dispute. Why did it cause her to disappear?’
‘She thinks her discovery allows travel through time, not to parallel worlds. This document will enable her invention to be used and if it’s old — I mean, really old — it may also answer the question of whether she’s right. As far as I understand it, if she is correct, then it may be too dangerous to use.’
Sylvia glanced at Emily, but all she did was pick at her piece of bread and stare dreamily across the hall as though this was nothing to do with her.
‘In that case,’ Sylvia said, ‘I think we had better find out. Emily? Would you take Mr More to Wales to see Kendred?’
Jack and Emily waited on the street outside until an ancient transporter, rusty and noisy, drew up alongside them and then lumbered through the streets at an agonisingly slow pace. For the first half hour Emily kept an eye on the other vehicles passing them, while Jack periodically wound down the windows to gaze up into the sky.