“Monk, I don’t like this!” she said, mortified to hear a quaver in her voice. “I don’t like this at-”
“Oh, don’t worry,” he said blithely, glancing up from his equipment. “I’m pretty sure the spores are harmless.”
“ Pretty sure? Monk, you raving lunatic, you irresponsible bird brain, you-”
“Oy!” said Reg. “Mind who you’re calling a bird brain, madam!”
Monk looked up, surprised. “You’re fine, Mel. Really.”
“Says you,” she retorted. “Forgive me if I’d like a second opinion. After all, you’re the one who thought sprites were mythical!”
His face split in another wide grin. “And now we know they’re not! Isn’t it great? I had no idea that humming three bars of descending cyclonic harmonics in B-flat minor while holding the portal key would get me into other dimensions! If I had I would’ve gone looking for the one with the voluptuous can-can girls!”
If she’d had a parasol handy she would have poked him in the buttocks with it. “Monk Markham, I swear, either you start taking this seriously or-”
“I am taking this seriously!” he protested. “This is a major thaumaturgical breakthrough, Mel, and they don’t come along every day. It’s fantastic!”
“ Fantastic?” Breathless with outrage, she came perilously close to snatching up the carpetbag and throwing it at him. “It’s not fantastic, you-you turnip, it’s disgusting! I’m covered in interdimensional sprite shit! Where’s the nearest tap? Has anybody got a clean hanky? How much of the stuff is on me, I can’t see a bloody thing!”
Monk stared at her, bemused. “Of course you can’t. We’re dealing with a basic visual incompatibility between dimensional vibrations, remember?”
“No, not really!” she shouted. “I’m a bit too busy being covered in interdimensional sprite shit! Where’s the wretched thing now, Monk? Is it in my hair?” She began frantically patting her head. “Oh, Saint Snodgress preserve me, don’t let there be a sprite in my hair!”
He ran the sprite detector over her again. This time the volume was appreciably lower, more beeping than screeching. “It’s okay, it’s okay, it’s not in your hair, Mel,” he said, trying to appease. “It’s not anywhere. You’re one hundred percent sprite-free, I promise.”
“And yet still covered in sprite shit, yes?” she demanded.
“Um… well… yes. Sorry about that. But the rate of decay is accelerating,” he added encouragingly. “That’s good, isn’t it?”
She goggled at him. “ Decay? You mean I’m covered in decomposing sprite shit? How is that good, Monk? ”
“It’s all right, Mel,” said Bibbie, trying to be helpful. “We’ll get you cleaned up somehow.”
“We certainly will,” said Reg from her safely distant tree branch. “The Department’s bound to have a decontamination chamber they can spare for a week or two. In the meantime, Mad Miss Markham and I can mind the agency. She’ll even remember to collect the mail without being reminded, won’t you, ducky?”
“Absolutely,” Bibbie agreed. “I promise.”
Breathing heavily, Melissande glared at the pair of them. “Strange as it may seem, I don’t consider that particularly comforting. In fact I won’t be comfortable until we track down this inconvenient creature and send it back where it belongs!” She rounded on Monk. “So if it’s not stuck on me, where is it?”
“Still at the agency,” said Bibbie. “It must be.”
Raising her eyebrows, Melissande flicked a glance at Monk’s unhelpful sister. “Must it? How do we know it’s not rampaging around town even as we speak?”
“Because there’s nothing registering on the Department’s monitors,” said Monk. “Believe me, I’ve checked. Besides, if the sprite was loose in town we’d have heard about it by now. Exploding tamper-proof ink would be the least of our worries.”
“Then what are you waiting for?” she demanded. “Let’s get back to the office so you can catch the little bugger and send it packing!”
He winced. “Sorry. I’d love to, only I can’t. I’ve got a secret briefing with Uncle Ralph. But after I invented the portable sprite detector I invented a sprite trap to catch it in. See?”
She stared as he opened the carpetbag again and pulled out what looked like a birdcage for a stunted canary. “It’s not very big.”
He shrugged. “Neither’s the sprite.”
“How do you know, Monk? The sprite’s invisible!”
“I know,” he insisted. “I’m a thaumaturgist, remember?” When she didn’t say anything, he adopted a wounded expression. “What? Don’t you trust me?”
She gave him an incendiary look. And to think he nagged Gerald for turning Tavistock into a lion… “ Of course I do, Monk. When it comes to inventing new ways of getting into trouble I trust you implicitly.”
Reg sniggered. “You tell him, ducky.”
“And speaking of invisible,” she added, “since we can’t see this wretched sprite, how exactly are we supposed to catch it?”
“Easy,” said Monk, so effortlessly confident. So completely unmoved by her righteous indignation. He was the most infuriating man… “There’s an etheretic normaliser built into the trap. You activate it with this switch here, see?” He pointed. “If the sprite’s within range the multi-phase thaumaturgic agitation will render it visible.”
“For how long?”
“Long enough, I promise.”
“And how do you define “within range”?”
“A few feet.”
“Is that all?” she said, dismayed. “Monk-”
“I know, I know,” he said, carelessly apologetic. Infuriating? He was impossible. “Sorry, Mel. What can I say? It was a rush job.”
As solutions went it was far from perfect, but with time and circumstances against them it would have to do. “Fine. And what happens once we’ve caught our uninvited guest?”
“You can leave me a message at the Department and I’ll drop by the agency and pick it up,” said Monk. “Better yet, come to dinner tonight and bring it with you.”
She stared at him. He was serious. He was actually, deadly, serious. If I wasn’t in lo-quite fond of him, I really would punch him in the nose. “ Monk-”
“Oh, save your breath, ducky,” said Reg, and flapped down from the tree branch to take up her favoured shoulder-perch. “Let’s just take care of this, shall we? I don’t know about you but I want a bath!”
“ One bath?” Melissande stared down at her invisible-sprite-shit-covered self. “I won’t be getting out of the tub for a week! I don’t care how many times I have to tramp up and down those stairs with kettlefuls of hot water!”
“Does that mean you’ll do it?” her infuriating, impossible young man asked hopefully.
Yes, indeed. She so wanted to punch him. “Do I have a choice?”
Beaming, Monk kissed her swiftly and chastely on the cheek. “Terrific!” He shoved the sprite detector and sprite trap into the carpetbag then thrust the bag at her. “Knew I could count on you, Mel.”
“And me,” said Bibbie, offended.
“Yes, yes, you too,” he added hastily.
“Oh? And what am I, then?” demanded Reg. “A bowl of chopped chicken liver?”
“Of course not!” said Monk. “I can count on all of you.” He fished out his fob watch and flicked it open. “Only I’m going to have to count on you from afar, because-”
“Not so fast!” said Melissande. “You have to show us how this sprite trap works.”
“I wrote down some instructions,” he said. “They’re in the bag. Honestly, Mel, you’ll be fine.”
“You hope,” she retorted. “I mean, what if your precious sprite does have a mind of its own and doesn’t want to be caught? What if it fights back? What if-”
“It won’t. I doubt it’s aware of what’s going on. To be honest, Mel, I don’t even think it’s intelligent.”
“Well, that makes two of you,” she snapped. And to think that an hour ago she’d thought the darkest clouds in her sky were shaped like sagging buttocks. “Honestly, Monk. Why does your problem have to become my problem?”
He winced. “I am sorry. Truly.”
And he was, she didn’t doubt it. The trouble was, being sorry this time wouldn’t stop him next time. When metaphysical madness struck again, and it would, he’d not be strong enough to resist it. Asking Monk to turn his back on a new discovery was as futile as expecting Reg to be ladylike.