‘She’s Mrs Norton,’ said Norton, ‘and if you go spreading the bald head thing about it won’t be just the King and Blix playing “jail the wizard”.’
‘Hey, plod,’ said Tiger, who had just walked in, ‘I can make a bacon roll vanish – and then make it reappear the following morning in a completely different form. You going to arrest me for illegal wizardry too?’
Norton and Villiers glared at Tiger, appalled at his gross impertinence. If they’d not been busy they would have arrested him too.
‘Bloody foundlings,’ said Norton, ‘a waste of space the lot of you. One more thing: if you’re looking for Patrick of Ludlow, don’t. We just picked him up, too – on charges relating to marzipan abuse. So long, Jenny.’
And a moment later the doors were swinging shut behind them.
‘This is all my fault,’ I said, sitting down and putting my face in my hands. It was now Perkins up against the powers of Blix and his cronies. One of ours against three of theirs.
‘It’s not your fault and it could be worse,’ said Tiger in a soothing voice.
‘How could it possibly be worse?’
‘It could be Friday. It isn’t. It’s only Thursday morning. Lots can happen. So we’re down to only one sorcerer. Big deal. There must be others we can use.’
‘No one else has a licence.’
‘What about sorcerers who had licences from the old days? Ones who never had them taken away?’
‘If they were sane enough to work, they would be.’
Tiger nodded his head towards the front door.
‘I wasn’t thinking of in here. I was thinking of . . . out there.’
I sat up. Hope had not yet fully departed.
‘You’re right. There are two I could try. I’ll start with Mother Zenobia.’
‘Would she help us?’
‘Almost certainly not – but it’s worth a shot. And listen, if Blix wants to play dirty, so should we.’
‘Meaning?’
‘Meaning we should find out something about him. Something we can use against him. Past misdemeanours, dirt, unpaid parking tickets – I don’t know. You do some snooping, and I’ll try and rustle up some sorcerers.’
I walked out of the front entrance, suddenly remembered I’d forgotten my keys, pushed open the door to Zambini Towers, stepped inside – only to find myself stepping out of the back entrance of the hotel. I held the door wide open and, impossibly, the front entrance led straight to the back. It was as if the old hotel wasn’t there at all. I closed the door again and pressed the doorbell.
The door was answered by Perkins, and, oddly, he was in the hotel – behind him I could see the lobby.
‘Forget your keys?’
‘Look at this.’
He stepped out and I closed the door, then told him to reopen it. He did so, and stared not at the lobby, but at the alleyway on the far side of the building.
‘Where’s the hotel gone?’
‘I was hoping you’d tell me.’
‘You think I did this? No way. I have trouble making dogs bark at a distance.’
‘Then who?’
He shrugged.
‘I don’t know. Listen, you must have a word with Tiger. He was trying to fool me into thinking that Patrick, Moobin and the Prices have all been arrested, and he really shouldn’t joke about such things.’
I raised an eyebrow and stared at him.
‘Crumbs. You mean he wasn’t kidding?’
‘I wish he was.’
I pressed the doorbell again and a few minutes later Tiger answered. I explained what had happened, and after checking the other entrances and the windows – but with one of us keeping the door open so we could get back in – we found that all access points led to an instant exit on the other side of the building. We couldn’t agree who might have done it, but did agree that it was an excellent defence – something that was tested twenty minutes later when Norton and Villiers returned to ‘interview’ Lady Mawgon. I shouted through the door that she would be surrendering herself to the authorities on Monday, and after a brief exchange of discourtesies, they left.
‘Right,’ I said once I’d found my car keys, ‘I’m off to get help.’
‘What can I do?’ asked Perkins.
‘Help Tiger find out what you can about Blix. There must be something we can use to our advantage. Oh, and congratulations. You’re doing the bridge gig on your own tomorrow.’
He stared at me with a look of horror.
‘If I’m going to fail I guess I should do it in a spectacular fashion.’
I told him it wasn’t over until it was over, picked up my car and was soon heading out of town.
Mother Zenobia
As I drove to Clifford to see Mother Zenobia, I wasn’t very hopeful that I would have much luck recruiting her to our cause. She was old, tired and for almost 75 per cent of the day a form of limestone. What wizidrical powers she had available to her were most likely limited, and I knew for a fact that she hadn’t been out of the convent for years. But I wasn’t the only person who wanted to see Mother Zenobia that afternoon, and their presence was neither welcome, nor, as I considered it later, surprising.
It was none other than Conrad Blix, and I met him walking out of the Sisterhood of the Blessed Lady of the Lobster as I was walking in.
‘Jennifer!’ he said with a mockingly pleasant demeanour. ‘How is the team bearing up?’
‘You know well enough,’ I replied coldly. ‘What are you doing here?’
He leaned closer.
‘Dealing with a few flies in this particular ointment, Miss Strange. This morning Norton and Villiers were merely assuring our victory. Just now I was guaranteeing it.’
I didn’t like the sound of this.
‘What have you done to her?’
He smiled.
‘I will get so much satisfaction watching you work for me as a parlourmaid for the next two years. And for your complete and utter humiliation, I will insist you wear the uniform.’
‘You’re a coward to use such underhand means to win the most noble of contests, Blix.’
He narrowed his eyes.
‘And you’re very impertinent considering you’re nothing but a foundling who lucked out in your work allocation.’
‘On the contrary,’ I replied evenly, ‘foundlings are always impertinent – it’s because we’ve nothing to lose. I’m actually one of the politer ones.’
‘You’ll regret your words, Jennifer.’
‘And you your actions,’ I replied, ‘and even if you do win, none of us will ever work for you.’
‘I wouldn’t expect you to,’ he said. ‘All I need is control of Kazam and with it a monopoly on magic – surely that’s obvious?’
‘To reanimate the mobile phone network?’
He grinned.
‘That’s just for starters. You have no idea how much a wise investor can make by exploiting the crackle. The licensing deals on electromagical devices will make a fortune – millions alone for something as simple as a pocket calculator. And all that work you’re doing to reanimate medical scanners for free – deluded. How much do you think people will pay to detect an early tumour?’
I clenched and unclenched my fists.
‘Magic is not for the one,’ I said through gritted teeth, ‘it’s for the many.’
‘I agree wholeheartedly. But in this particular instance, “many” means only myself, Lord Tenbury, the King and his Useless Brother. Oh, and good move with Zambini Towers and the “infinite thinness” enchantment. Lady Mawgon, was it?’