He looked carefully at the rubbish. It was just possible to imagine someone had been lying there, watching. He rummaged among it and found a small sandwich wrapper.
He took the coat back out with him; there didn't seem to be much else to do.
A dozen nomes were waiting anxiously on the all-soaked floor under the engine. Masklin held out the coat, and shrugged.
'No sign,' he said. 'He's been there, but he's not there now.' 'What could have happened to him?' said one of the older nomes.
Someone behind him said darkly: 'Perhaps the Rain squashed him. Or he was blown away by the fierce Wind.' 'That's right,' said one of the others. 'There could be dreadful things, Outside.' 'No!' said Masklin. 'I mean, there are dreadful things-' 'Ah,' said the nomes, nodding.
'-but not like that! He should have been perfectly all right if he stayed in the lorry! I.told him not to go exploring-' He was aware of a sudden silence. The nomes weren't looking at him but past him, at something behind him.
The Duke de Haberdasheri was standing there, with some of his soldiers. He stared woodenly at Masklin, and then held out his hands without saying a word.
Masklln gave him the coat. The Duke turned it over and over, staring at it. The silence stretched out thinner and thinner, until it almost hummed.
'I forbade him to go,' said the Duke softly. 'I told him it would be dangerous. You know, that was foolish of me. It just made him more determined.' He looked back up at Masklin.
Well?' he said.
'Er?' said Masklin.
'Is my son still alive?' 'Urn. He could be. There's no reason why not.' The Duke nodded, vaguely.
This is it, thought Masklin. It's all going to end here.
The Duke stared up at the lorry, and then looked around at his guards.
'And these things go Outside, do they?' he said.
'Oh, yes. All the time,' said Masklin.
The Duke made an odd noise in the back of his throat.
'There is nothing Outside,' he said. 'I know this. But my son knew differently. You think we should go Out. Will I see my son then?' Masklin looked into the old man's eyes. They were like two eggs that weren't quite cooked yet. And he thought about the size of everything outside, and the size of a nome. And then he thought: a leader should know all about truth and hones ty, and when to see the difference. Honestly, the chance of finding Angalo out there is greater than the whole Store taking wings and flying, but the truth is that- 'It's possible,' he said, and felt terrible. But it was possible.
'Very well,' said the Duke, his expression unchanged. 'What do you need?' 'What?' said Masklin, his mouth dropping open. 'I said, what do you need? To make the lorry go Outside?' said the Duke.
Masklin floundered. 'Well, er, at the moment, I suppose, we need people-' 'How many?' snapped the Duke.
Masklin's mind raced.
'Fifty?' he ventured.
'You shall have them.' 'But-' Masklin began. The Duke's expression changed now. He no longer looked totally lost and alone. Now he looked his usual angry self.
'Succeed,' he hissed, and spun on his heel and stalked off.
That evening fifty Haberdasheri turned up, gawping at the garage and acting generally bewildered. Gurder protested, but Masklin put all those who looked even vaguely capable on to the reading scheme.
'There's too many!' said Gurder. 'And they're common soldiers, for Arnold Bros (est. 1905)'s sake!' 'I expected him to say fifty was too many and beat me down to twenty or so,' said Masklin. 'But I think we will need them all, soon.' The reading programme wasn't going the way he expected. There were useful things in books, it was true, but it was a hard job to find them among all the strange stuff.
Like the girl in the rabbit hole.
It was Vinto who came up with that one.
'...and she fell down this hole and there was a white rabbit with a watch, I know about rabbits, and then she found this little bottle of stuff that made her BIG, I mean really huge, and then she found some more stuff which made her really small,' he'd said breathlessly, his face glowing with enthusiasm, 'so, all we need do is, we just find some more of the BIG stuff and then one of us can drive the lorry.' Masklin didn't dare ignore it. If just one nome could be made the size of a human, it would be easy. He'd told himself that dozens of times. It had to be worth an effort.
So they'd spent nearly all the night searching the Store for any bottles labelled 'Drink Me'. Either the Store didn't have it and Gurder wasn't prepared to accept that, because the Store had Everything Under One Roof- or it just wasn't real. There seemed to be lots of things in books that weren't real. It was hard to see why Arnold Bros (est. 1905) had put so many unreal things in' books.
'So the faithful can tell the difference,' Gurder had said.
Masklin had taken one book himself. It just fitted his box. It was called A Child's Guide to the Stars and most of it was pictures of the sky at night. He knew that was real.
He liked to look at it when he had too much to think about. He looked at it now.
They had names, like Sirius and Rigel or Wolf 359 or Ross 154.
He tried a few on the Thing.
'I do not know the names,' it said.
'I thought we came from one of them,' said Masklin. 'You said-' 'They are different names. Currently I cannot identify them.' 'What was the name of the star that nomes came from?' said Masklin, lying back in the darkness.
'It was called: The Sun.' 'But the sun's here!' 'All stars are called The Sun by the people who live nearby. It is because they believe them to be important.' 'Did they - I mean, did we visit many?' 'I have 94,563 registered as having been visited by nomes.' Masklin stared up at the darkness. Big numbers gave him trouble, but he could see that this number was one of the biggest. Bargains Galore! he thought, and then felt embarrassed and corrected it to Gosh! All those suns, miles apart, and all I have to do is move one lorry! Put like that, it seemed ridiculous.
10
x. When Lo! One returned, saying, I have Gone upon Wheels, and I have Seen the Outside.
xi. And they said to him, What is the Outside? xii. And he said, It is Big.
From The Book of Nome, Accounts v.X-XII On the fourth day Angalo returned, wild-eyed and grinning like a maniac.
The nome on guard came running into the department, with Angalo swaggering behind him and a gaggle of younger nomes trailing, fascinated, in his wake. He was grimy, and ragged, and looked as though he hadn't slept for hours - but he walked proudly, with a strange swaying motion, like a nome who has boldly gone where no nome has gone before and can't wait to be asked about it.
'Where've I been?' he said. 'Where've I been? Where haven't I been, more like. You should see what's out there!' 'What?' they asked.
'Everywhere!' be said, his eyes glowing. 'And you know what?' 'What?' they chorused.
'I've seen the Store from the outside! It's...' he lowered his voice, 'it's beautiful. All columns and big glass windows full of colour!' Now he was the centre of a growing crowd as the news spread.
'Did you see all the departments?' said a Stationeri.
'No!' 'What?' 'You can't see the departments from outside! It's just one big thing! And, and...' in the sudden silence he fumbled in his pouch for his notebook, which was now a lot fatter, and thumbed through the pages, 'it's got a great big sign outside it and I copied it down because it's not Trucker language and I didn't understand it but this is what it was.' He held it up.
The silence got deeper. Quite a few nomes could read by now.