I close my eyes and see Kazia stepping out of the circle, her face blank like she doesn’t even know me. I don’t like that, so I open them and Marvo’s staring across at me.
“You were right, Frank.”
“Right about what? I mean, I haven’t been right about anything since this whole stupid mess started.”
We picked up a cab outside the railway station, and now we’re heading past the Oxpens. Through the window, I can see the ragged silhouette of the scaffolding around the cathedral spire, exactly like that first morning. I didn’t realize you could have so much fun in just ten days.
“You were right to give her a chance.”
“You wouldn’t be saying that if I’d got you and your mum killed.”
Marvo smiles. “Take more’n a demon to kill my mum.”
I’ve got used to her bleached hair. Trouble is, it reminds me of Kazia and it’s like Marvo’s reading my thoughts because she says, “If she asked you . . . you know, to help her again—”
“Not that she would.”
“Yeah, but you’d do it, right?”
I nod.
“Must be love then. Nothing else could be that stupid!”
I can’t think of anything to say.
“So what you gonna do now?” Marvo asks.
I shrug. “Any ideas?”
“Talk to Caxton.”
I shake my head. “The Society wants me to go to Rome. That’s what I’m going to do.”
“You’re kidding!”
“Any better ideas? Matthew isn’t there to defend me anymore. If I don’t go . . . well, it’s only a month to bonfire night.”
Marvo doesn’t say anything for a while, just sits there with her face turned away, staring out of the window. At last she says, “There must be someone else you can trust.”
“Just you and Charlie.”
“Charlie can’t help you—”
“And you’d better not try. Just forget about me.”
She goes red and says, “I don’t think I can do that.”
OK, I’m slow but I finally get it. Reg Garston was right. But it’s like Marvo’s handed me this present, all beautifully wrapped up with a satin bow, and I know it cost her a pile of money, and I feel grateful . . . and incredibly embarrassed and actually a bit pissed off, because I’ve got absolutely no idea what to do with it.
So I sit there and stare at it, and don’t even unwrap it, which is a crap thing to do.
“Then I’m sorry.” I don’t know what else to say.
Yeah, I know it’s unfair. I get to fancy Kazia, but I can’t handle Marvo fancying me. Because I realize that Marvo really means it. And of course the whole point about Kazia was that in my heart of hearts I always knew she was winding me up, so it felt . . . well, kind of safe.
Apart from Alastor, obviously.
Anyway, we ride on, and after a bit Marvo shakes her head and says, “You can’t just leave him down there.”
“Huh?”
“Your boss . . .”
“I can’t feed him to Alastor.”
“You can’t afford to let him go.”
“So he’d better get used to the sandwiches.”
“The demon,” says Marvo. “Won’t he get bored or something?”
“No idea. There’s nothing in any of the grimoires about a situation like this.” I smile. “I’m breaking new ground.”
She pulls out her scryer. “Let me call Caxton.”
I grab her arm before she can open the lid. There’s this wrestling match, but I’m stronger than her.
“Did I hurt you?”
She shakes her head. “You can’t help her.”
“I can give her a head start. There’s still stuff in my studio I gotta get rid of. And you and me, we’ve got to get your story straight . . .”
So we argue about that all the way back to her mum’s place. We agree that none of last night happened and that she knows nothing about Groce’s body disappearing from the suicide plot.
Finally she nods. “That’ll have to do.”
We’re at her place. I check my magic watch. “I’ll say good-bye now.”
I see her hand move. It’s going to be another of those cheek-patting moments and I really haven’t got the strength for it anymore. I lean back. I can see she’s upset, but I can’t help that.
“You were going to help me with Sean.”
“Now’s not a good time.” There was never a good time. “I’m sorry.”
She gives me this sad smile and gets out. As she pushes the front gate open, the surviving hinge finally gives up the struggle and the whole thing collapses. She kicks the rotten fragments savagely into the bushes and walks up to the house. She stops on the doorstop and shouts back at me:
“What about my mum?”
“She’s just hypnotized. She’ll wake up in an hour or two—won’t remember a thing.”
The red duffle coat disappears into the house. The door closes. I bang on the roof of the cab.
The first train up to London is at 5:24. I’m back at the station with just enough time to buy a ticket and get noticed.
He’s this great long streak of misery with a mustache. He’s wearing a porter’s peaked cap and jacket, but he hasn’t lifted a suitcase in living memory. I know him because he used to show up at Saint Cyprian’s when I was there. He’s one of the Knights of Saint Cyprian’s plainclothes goons. He hangs around the station, watching who comes and goes, and scries the Society if anything interesting happens.
He clocks me and the pilgrim’s emblem I’ve pinned to the front of my woolly hat. I pretend I haven’t noticed him. The train arrives. Yeah, I know I’m supposed to walk, but why should I be the only one to compromise?
I glance back as the train pulls out. The streak of misery is on his scryer.
We trundle past the Bishop’s Palace and the cathedral, and bang over Boney’s Bridge.
A bit farther down the line, they’ve been working on the Black Bridge at Nuneham for months and the trains have to slow right down to cross it.
I’m ready, with the door open and steam and hot cinders blowing in my face. I thought we’d be going slower. Don’t think about it, Frank. Just jump.
There’s a crash and all the breath is knocked out of me. I’m spinning and bouncing, and then I’m lying in the long grass at the bottom of the embankment, hoping that nobody’s seen me. Nothing broken; just a few scrapes and bruises. I open my backpack and pull out the repair kit.
When everything’s stopped hurting, I get to my feet, pull out a trowel, and dig a small hole at the foot of a tree. I bury a small tin, its lid sealed with wax. I fill in the hole and conceal it. I toss the trowel into the river and start the long walk back along the bank to Doughnut City.
A hundred yards along, a flock of crows have come in to feed on the field beside the path. I run at them, yelling and screaming and waving my arms, and they scatter up into the sky.