Haythwaite blinked. 'That's it? That's all? You're sorry? By God, Dunwoody, if you think you're sorry now, just you wait until I'm done with you! There won't be a hole small enough for you to crawl into here or — '
'Oh Errol, put a sock in it,' said a cheerful voice. 'If your family can't rustle you up a new First Grade staff for the ceremony you can borrow one of mine. I must have three I've never so much as breathed on and I'm pretty sure one of 'em's a Stuttley. Bloody manufacturers keep on sending them to me for gratis, hoping I'll give 'em a public endorsement. And since I'm a Masterful Companion myself of course, there'll be no questions asked.'
Haythwaite closed his mouth, his expression curdled. Gerald turned round.
Monk Markham, released at last from the bowels of Research and Development. As usual, his friend's long dark hair was falling over his face in unkempt disarray and there were smudges of something dubious on the end of his aquiline nose and down the front of his shabby blue corduroy jacket. Behind the aggressive cheer he looked bone-tired. Fragrant smells wafted from the brown paper bag he carried in one hand. The other clutched the handle of his battered, bulging briefcase.
Composure recovered, Errol stared at him coldly. 'Markham. Too kind, I'm sure, but it won't be necessary'
'Suit yourself,' said Monk, grinning, then turned. 'So Gerald, I picked up some Yoktok curry and rice on the way home. Fancy sharing?'
For the last two days Gerald had existed on coffee and toast. He had to swallow a bucketful of saliva before he could answer. 'Uh — yes.'
'Excellent! Catch you later, Errol. Give me a shout if you change your mind about the staff. Come on, Gerald. My octopus is getting cold.'
Monk being Monk he occupied a plush apartment on the club's second floor with three rooms, several windows, ample headspace and no smelly chamber-pot or nightly serenade from the plumbing. Not that Monk ever really noticed his surroundings. He'd have been perfectly happy in one of the shoeboxes under the roof, except for the lack of space to continue his incomprehensible mucking about with things metaphysical.
'Careful,' he said, dropping his briefcase as Gerald tripped over an oscillating octogram spinning hysterically between the living room's sofa and bookcase. 'It took me three days to get that bloody thing to hold its axis properly'
Gerald pushed himself off the wall and rubbed his banged elbow. 'What are you trying to measure?'
'Ambient tetrothaumicles in the fourteenth dimension,' said Monk, cat-stepping around a tangle of test tubes.
He swallowed an unworthy lump of envy. 'Of course you are. Isn't everyone?'
Squashed into his kitchenette, Monk grinned over his shoulder as he started unpacking the bag of food. 'Hope not. If it comes off it means an article in The Golden Staff!
The Golden Staff? Good God. To date, the youngest person ever permitted to publish in The Staff had been forty-eight. The idea of a twenty-four-year-old wizard getting the nod from The Golden Staff was unthinkable. Unless, of course, you knew Monk Markham. 'Well, good luck.'
Monk rummaged in a drawer for cutlery. 'Thanks. I need it.'
No, he didn't. He was just being typically Monkish: modest, unpretentious and sensitive to the limitations of his less fortunate friend. Stinging only a little bit, Gerald edged his way around a set of hiccuping test tubes, sidestepped something that looked like a cross between a mouse and a dandelion doing somersaults in its cage, and sat at the gate-leg dining table. On the nearby windowsill sat Monk's crystal ball. It was pulsing a gentle red. 'You've got incoming here.'
Monk had his head in the crockery cupboard under the sink-and-hotplate arrangement in the corner. 'Play 'em back for me, would you?' he said, muffled. 'New password's confabulation.'
A hand wave over the crystal ball and the muttering of Monk's password unlocked its warding. The crystal ball hummed, the red swirl cleared, and the image of a face formed within its depths. It bore a spurious resemblance to Monk but was a year or so older and graced with an immaculately barbered beard, drop-pearl earrings and a starched neck ruff of outrageous proportions.
'Monk, you wart-ridden little toad! the scowling face growled, 'why aren't you there, it's so early it's practically midnight. Are you there? Answer the ball, runt, I don't have all morning!
Gerald paused the message, grinning. At times like this being an only child was a positive advantage. 'It's your brother.'
Monk finished sharing out almond rice into two chipped bowls and started on what smelled like chicken in green sauce. 'Prat. What does he want? Turn up the volume, I can't hear.' He increased the ball's volume, unpaused the message and sat back, prepared to be entertained. Aylesbury Markham's peevish grumble boomed. 'All right then. Listen up, you, because I'm not calling back. The olds are hosting a flash dinner party this weekend for some visiting foreign muckety-muck. Attendance is non-negotiable. So for the love of witchcraft get a sodding haircut, scrub the ink stains off your fingers and make sure you've got something halfway decent to wear, 'cos I'll be buggered if you embarrass me by turning up looking like something a paralytic cat dragged in backwards through a gorse bush, right? Right. I'm warning you, toadstool. Ignore me at your peril!
'Pillock,' said Monk, squashing empty cartons into the rubbish bin. 'Anything else?'
Aylesbury's elegantly menacing face faded away, leaving the crystal ball as innocuous as a lump of glass. 'Doesn't look like it.'
Monk stuck a fork in each steaming bowl and carried them over to the table.'Good. Dig in.'
Gerald practically inhaled the food. After two days of charcoaled and barely buttered stale bread, the savoury chicken and rice was almost enough to make him cry.'This is great, Monk.Thanks.'
'Uh huh,' said Monk, and sat back. 'So. You going to tell me what happened at Stuttley's?'
Damn. Couldn't Monk leave sleeping dogs lie? As soon as he could trust himself not to spit rice everywhere he said, 'I thought you'd have heard by now.'
'I'm interested in what really happened, not a garbled fourth-hand gossip-raddled version flavoured with malice.'
He avoided answering by filling his mouth with more chicken. Monk said, 'Is it true Scunthorpe booted you?'
He nodded. Suddenly his masticated mouthful couldn't get past the lump in his throat. 'Mmm.'
'Pillock,' said Monk, and speared another piece of curried octopus. 'If they handed out medals for covering your arse, Scunthorpe'd be world champion ten years on the trot. Still… I'm a bit surprised you went. At least without a fight.' Gerald threw down his fork.'Really?'
'Yeah. I mean, there must've been something you could do.'
'Says the certified genius and golden boy of the R and D division whose family entertains visiting heads of state every other night!' he retorted.'Well, here's a newsflash, Monk! I'm not you, I'm a barely qualified Third Grade wizard from a long and distinguished line of men's tailors! Don't you think I wanted to fight Scunthorpe? Don't you think I know when I'm being railroaded? I couldn't fight him. He made it damned clear what would happen if I caused any more trouble. I had no choice but to sneak away with my tail between my legs. And if you think I'm happy about that, well — ' 'No,'said Monk.'Sorry. Wasn't thinking.'
His brief spurt of self-righteous anger fizzled and died. Slumping, he picked up his fork and stabbed another piece of chicken. 'It's all right,' he muttered.
'So,' Monk said after a moment. 'What happened?'
In a strange way it was a relief to tell his friend everything, right down to the final humiliation of his magic not working at all in Scunthorpe's office.
By the time he was finished Monk was struggling not to laugh. 'I'm sorry, I'm sorry! It's not funny, I know. But Gerald, in trying to stop Stuttley's from blowing up you blew it up. Admit it, that's a bit bloody ironic'