He got out of the van, and found he was several inches taller than her.
"I'm from the Diogenes Club," she said, holding up an envelope. "You're our ride to Somerset. I've got maps and money here. And the rest of the new bugs."
Three assorted types, all less noticeable than Gene, were loitering.
"Keith, Susan and… Sewell, isn't it?"
A middle-aged, bald-headed man stepped forward and nodded. He wore an old, multi stained overcoat, fingerless Albert Steptoe gloves and a tightly wound woolly scarf as if he expected a sudden winter. His face was unlined, as if he rarely used it, but sticky marks around his mouth marked him as a sweet-addict. He held a paper bag, and was chain-chewing liquorice allsorts.
"Sewell Head," said Gene, tapping her temple. "He's one of the clever ones. And one of theirs. Derek Leech fetched him out of a sweet shop. Ask him anything, and he'll know."
"What's Transhumance?" asked Jamie.
"A form of vertical livestock rotation, practised especially in Switzerland," said Sewell Head, popping a pink coconut wheel into his mouth. "Also a London-based popular music group that has never released a record or played to an audience of more than fifty people."
"Fifty is a record for some venues, pal."
"I told you he'd know," said Gene. "Does he look evil to you? Or is Hannah Arendt right about banality. He's behaved himself so far. No decapitated kittens. The others are undecideds, not ours, not theirs. Wavering."
"I'm not wavering," said the other girl, Susan. "I'm neutral."
She wore jeans and a purple T-shirt, and hid behind her long brown hair. She tanned like most other people and had pinkish sunburn scabs on her arms. Jamie wondered if he'd seen her before. She must be a year or two older than him, but gave off a studenty vibe.
"Susan Rodway," explained Gene. "You might remember her from a few years ago. She was on television, and there was a book about her. She was a spoon bender. Until she stopped."
"It wore off," said the girl, shrugging.
"That's her story, and she's sticking to it. According to tests, she's off the ESP charts. Psychokinesis, pyrokinesis, psychometry, telepathy, levitation, clairvoyance, clairaudience. She has senses they don't even have Latin names for yet. Can hard-boil an egg with a nasty look."
Susan waved her hands comically, and nothing happened.
"She's pretending to be normal," said Gene. "Probably reading your mind right now."
Irritated, Susan snapped. "One mind I can't read, Gene, is yours. So we'll have to fall back on the fount of all factoids. Mr Head… what can you tell us about Genevieve Dieudonne?"
Sewell Head paused in mid-chew, as if collecting a ledger from a shelf in his mental attic, took a deep breath, and began "Born in 1416, in the Duchy of Burgundy, Genevieve Dieudonne is mentioned in…"
"That's quite enough of that," said Gene, shutting him off.
Jamie couldn't help noticing how sharp the woman's teeth were. Did she have the ghost of a French accent?
"I'm Keith Marion," said the kid in the group, smiling nervously. It didn't take ESP to see he was trying to smooth over an awkward moment. "Undecided."
He stuck out his hand, which Jamie shook. He had a plastic tag around his wrist. Even looking straight at Keith, Jamie couldn't fix a face in his mind. The tag was the only thing about him he could remember.
"We have Keith on day-release," said Gene, proudly. He has a condition. It's named after him. Keith Marion Syndrome."
Jamie let go of the boy's hand.
"I don't mind being out," said Keith. "I was sitting around waiting for my O Level results. Or CSEs. Or call-up papers. Or…"
He shrugged, and shut up.
"We make decisions all the time, which send us on varying paths," said Gene. "Keith can see his other paths. The ones he might have taken. Apparently, it's like being haunted by ghosts of yourself. All those doppelgangers."
"If I concentrate, I can anchor myself here," said Keith. "Assuming this is the real here. It might not be. Other heres feel just as real. And they bleed through more than I'd like."
Sewell Head was interested for a moment, as if filing some fact nugget away for a future Brain of Britain quiz. Then he was chewing Bertie Bassett's licorice cud again.
"He's seen two other entirely different lives for me," said Gene.
"I'm having enough trouble with just this one," commented Susan.
"So's everybody," said the pale girl. "That's why we've been called — the good, the bad and the undecided."
She opened her envelope and gave Jamie a map.
"We're heading West. Keith knows the territory. He was born in Somerset."
Jamie opened the rear doors of the van. He had tidied up a bit, and distributed cushions to make the space marginally more comfortable.
Susan borrowed a fifty pence coin from him and the foursome tossed to see who got to sit up front with the driver. Keith called «owl», then admitted to Gene his mind had slipped into a reality with different coins. Head droned statistics and probabilities but couldn't decide what to call, and lost to Susan by default. In the final, Gene called tails. The seven-edged coin spun surprisingly high — and slower than usual — then landed heads-up in Susan's palm.
"Should have known not to toss up with a telekinetic," said Gene, in good humour. "It's into the back of the van with the boys for me."
She clambered in and pulled the door shut. There was some kicking and complaining as they got sorted out.
Susan gave the coin back to Jamie. It was bent at a right angle.
"Oops," she said, arching her thick eyebrows attractively.
"You said it wore off."
"It did. Mostly."
They got into the front of the van. Jamie gave Susan the map and appointed her navigator.
"She can do it with her eyes closed," said Gene, poking her head through between the high-backed front seats.
"Just follow the Roman road," said Keith.
Susan held the map up the wrong way, and chewed a strand of her hair. "I hate to break it to you, but I'm not that good at orienteering. I can tell you about the three people — no, four — who have owned this map since it was printed. Including some interesting details about Little Miss Burgundy. But I don't know if we're best off with the A303."
Gene took the map away and playfully swatted Susan with it.
"Mr Head," she began, "what's the best route from the Post Office Tower, in London, to Alder, in Somerset?"
"Shortest or quickest?"
"Quickest."
Sewell Head swallowed an allsort and recited directions off the top of his head.
"I hope someone's writing this down."
"No need, Jamie," said Gene. "Tell him, Susan."
"It's called eidetic memory," said Susan. "Like photographic, but for sounds and the spoken word. I can replay what he said in snippets over the next few hours. I don't even need to understand what he means. Now, 'turn left into New Cavendish Street, and drive towards Marylebone High Street…'"
Relaying Sewell Head's directions, Susan imitated his monotone. She sounded like a machine.
"One day all cars will have gadgets that do this," said Keith.
Jamie doubted that, but started driving anyway.
V
An hour or so into Professor Cleaver's rhotacist monologue, Richard began tuning out. Was hypothermia setting in? Despite thermals and furs, he was freezing. His upper arms ached as if they'd been hit with hammers. His jaws hurt from clenching to prevent teeth-chattering. He no longer had feeling in his fingers and toes. Frozen exhalation made ice droplets in his moustache.