One of Our Thursdays Is Missing (Thursday Next 6)

“Goodness,” said Faux Jenny, “I’d clean forgotten about that one.”

“And now that you’ve told me,” I said, “I’m hardly likely to go for it, am I?”

“Well done, Einstein,” said Faux Jenny to her partner in a sarcastic tone. “Any other bright ideas?”

Ersatz Sprockett looked at me, then at Faux Jenny, then tried to telegraph an idea across to her in a very lame portrayal of someone being in a shower.

“Oh!” said Faux Jenny as she twigged to what he was talking about. “Good idea.”

But I had figured it out, too.

“You wouldn’t be thinking about pulling a Bobby Ewing on me, would you?”

And they both swore under their breath.

“Well,” grumbled Ersatz Sprockett with a shrug, “that’s me, clean out of ideas.”

And as I watched, they reverted to the strangely misshapen shape-changers who skulked around Psychological Thriller, hoping to trap unwary travelers into thinking they had once been homicidal mania

cs but now had amnesia and all their previous visions depicted in horrific nightmares were actually recovered memories. In a word, they were a pair of utter nuisances.

“Thank heavens for that,” I said. “Let’s get down to business. Where is Thursday, and why didn’t you report her presence here to Jurisfiction?”

“We send so many conflicting and utterly bizarre plot lines out of the genre that everyone ignores us,” said Shifter Once Jenny sadly. “I think Jurisfiction set our messages to ‘auto-ignore.’”

“For good reason,” I replied. “You’re only marginally less troublesome than Conspiracy.”

“That’s why Thursday asked us to transmit all those ambiguities direct to you. We were hoping you’d get here sooner than this. We peppered you with as much confusion as we could, but you didn’t pick it up.”

If I’d been Thursday, I would have. Being confused over identity had been a mainstay of Psychological Thriller for years. I had a lot to learn.

“I’m new to this.”

“You’ll get the hang of it.”

“I hope not. Where is she?”

“In that antechamber.”

I turned and followed a short corridor to where there was a small room off the main mausoleum. It was obviously where the shape-changers usually lived, as there were posters of Faceache on the wall. They had given over the one bed to Thursday, who was lying on her back. The room was lit by a gas lantern, and by its flickering jet I could see that she was in a bad state. There was an ugly bruise on her face, and one eye was red with blood. She moved her head to look at me, and I saw her eyes glisten.

“Hey,” I said.

“Hey,” said Thursday in a weak voice.

I placed my hand on her forehead. It was hot.

“How are you feeling?” I asked.

She gave a faint smile and shrugged, but she winced when she did it.

“Landen?” she whispered.

“He’s fine. Kids, too.”

“Tell them—”

“Tell them yourself.”