Something Rotten (Thursday Next 4)

'Nothing.'

'Nothing? You were thinking of how old I was looking, weren't you?'

It was hard to deny it. Every time I saw her I felt she couldn't look any older, but the next time, with startling regularity, she did.

'When did you get back?'

'This morning.'

'And how are you finding things?'

I brought her up to date with current events. She made 'tut-tutting' noises when I told her about Hamlet and Lady Hamilton, then even louder 'tut-tut' noises when I mentioned my mother and Bismarck.

'Risky business, that.'

'Mum and Bismarck?'

'Emma and Hamlet.'

'He's fictional and she's historical – what could be wrong about that?'

'I was thinking,' she said slowly, raising an eyebrow, 'about what would happen if Ophelia found out.'

I hadn't thought of that, and she was right. Hamlet could be difficult but Ophelia was impossible.

'I always thought the reason Sir John Falstaff retired from policing Elizabethan drama was to get away from Ophelia's sometimes unreasonable demands,' I mused, 'such as having petting animals and a goodly supply of mineral water and fresh sushi on hand at Elsinore whenever she was working. Do you think I should insist Hamlet return to Hamlet?'

'Perhaps not right away,' said Gran, coughing into her hanky. 'Let him see what the real world is like. Might do him good to realise it needn't take five acts to make up one's mind.'

She started coughing again so I called the nurse, who told me I should probably leave her. I kissed her goodbye and walked out of the rest home deep in thought, trying to work up a strategy for the next few days. I dreaded to think what my overdraft was like and if I was to catch Kaine I'd be better off inside SpecOps than outside. There were no two ways about it: I needed my old job back. I'd attempt that tomorrow and take it from there. Kaine certainly needed dealing with, and I'd play it by ear at the TV studios tonight. I'd probably have to find a speech therapist for Friday to try to wean him off the Lorem Ipsum, and then, of course, there was Landen. How could I even begin to get someone returned to the here-and-now after they were deleted from the there-and-then by a chroirupt official from the supposedly incorruptible ChronoGuard?

I was jolted from my thoughts as I approached Mum's house. There appeared to be someone partially hidden from view in the alleyway opposite. I nipped into the nearest front garden, ran between the houses, across two back gardens, and then stood on a dustbin to peek cautiously over a high wall. I was right. There was someone watching my mother's house. He was dressed too warmly for summer and was half hidden in the buddleia. My foot slipped on the dustbin and I made a noise. The lurker looked round, saw me and took flight. I jumped over the wall and gave chase. It was easier than I thought. He wasn't terribly fit and I caught up with him as he tried rather pathetically to climb a wall. Pulling the man down, I upset his small duffel bag and out poured an array of battered notebooks, a camera, a small pair of binoculars and several copies of the SpecOps 27 gazette, much annotated in red pen. 'Ow, ow, ow, get off!' he said. 'You're hurting!' I twisted his arm round and he dropped to his knees. I was just patting his pockets for a weapon when another man, dressed not unlike the first, came charging out from behind an abandoned car, holding aloft a tree branch. I spun, dodged the blow and, as the second man's momentum carried him on, I pushed him hard with my foot and he slammed head first into a wall and collapsed unconscious.

The first man was unarmed so I made sure his unconscious friend was also unarmed – and wasn't going to choke on his blood or teeth or something.

'I know you're not SpecOps,' I observed, 'because you're both way too crap. Goliath?'

The first man got slowly to his feet. He was looking curiously at me, rubbing his arm where I had twisted it. He was a large man but not an unkindly looking one. He had short dark hair and a large mole on his chin. I had broken his spectacles; he didn't look Goliath but I had been wrong before.

'I'm very pleased to meet you, Miss Next. I've been waiting for you for a long, long time.'

'I've been away.'

'Since January 1986. I've waited nearly two and a half years to see you.'

'And why would you do a thing like that?'

'Because,' said the man, producing an identity badge from his pocket and handing it over, 'I am your officially sanctioned stalker.'

I looked at the badge. It was true enough, he was allocated to me. All 100 per cent legit, and I didn't have a say in it. The whole stalker thing was licensed by SpecOps 33, the Entertainments Facilitation Department, which had drawn up specific rules with the Amalgamated Union of Stalkers as to who was allowed to stalk who. It helped to regulate a historically dark business and also graded stalkers according to skill and perseverance. My stalker was an impressive Grade I, the sort who are permitted to stalk the really big celebrities. And that made me suspicious.

'A Grade I?' I queried. 'Should I be flattered? I don't suppose I'm anything above a Grade 8.'

'Not nearly that high,' agreed my stalker, 'more like a Grade 12. But I've got a hunch you're going to get bigger. I latched on to Lola Vavoom in the sixties when she was just a bit part in The Streets of Wootton Bassett and stalked her for nineteen years, man and boy. I only gave her up to move on to Buck Stallion. When she heard she sent me a glass tankard with "Thank you for a great stalk, Lola" etched on it. Have you ever met her?'

'Once, Mr . . .' I looked at the pass before handing it back. '. . . de Floss. Interesting name. Any relation to Candice?'

'The author? In my dreams,' replied the stalker, rolling his eyes. 'But since I'd like us to be friends, do please call me Millon.'