The Woman Who Died a Lot (Thursday Next 7)

“Ready—but help me off this chair. This vest is heavy.”

Phoebe heaved me to my feet, and we paced down the corridor to the Dyson Suite. But before we could knock on the door, it was opened—by Jack Schitt himself, dressed in an Adelphi-monogrammed bathrobe. As soon as he saw that we were armed, he put his hands in the air, and we all stared at one another. I could feel my finger tight upon the trigger. If he’d twitched, I would have fired.

But he didn’t.

“Hello, Thursday,” he said. “How have you been?”

“Is he real?” asked Phoebe.

“Easy way to tell,” I replied. “Day Players are budget humans— anything not required for a simple twenty-four-hour existence is eliminated. He won’t have an alimentary canal or genitals.”

“Show us,” said Phoebe.

“I’m sorry?” said Jack.

“Open the bathrobe,” I said, “and slowly. Phoebe—you look. I’m covering him for any tricky business.”

He stared at us both and very gently complied.

“Well,” said Phoebe, “that looks a lot like a penis to me.”

I looked then.

“Yes,” I conceded, “I think you’re right. His Day Player, who just killed my Day Player, must have just killed himself—and Jack is back.”

“You’re making no sense,” said Jack. “Can I cover myself up now?”

“Yes.”

“What’s going on?” came a voice, and a woman’s face hove into view behind Jack. She was also wearing a bathrobe and covered a bare shoulder when she saw us.

“Keep your hands where I can see them!” yelled Phoebe, and the woman wearily complied, as if this sort of thing happened to her a lot, which I knew for a fact it did.

“Is that you, Thursday?” she said.

“Hello, Flossie,” I replied. “Anyone else in the suite?”

“No. And why are you calling him Jack?”

“It’s complicated.”

I told Schitt to step back, and while I kept the two of them covered, Phoebe checked the rest of the suite. It was quite large, so this took more than just a cursory glance.

“Day Players on the mainland?” said Jack with a creditable pretense of shock and outrage in his voice. “How irresponsible do you think we are?”

“How long have you been back inside this body?” I asked. “Five minutes?”

“We’ve been together all morning,” said Flossie, “and I can assure you that the only body he’s been inside during that time is—”

“Thank you, yes, I get the picture, Miss Buxton.”

“Nothing here,” said Phoebe as she returned. “Just a suitcase and a Gravitube ticket from Karachi. Hey, Thursday, the suites here are huge. There’s even a snooker room, and the minibar has fourteen different types of water.”

“Are you sure? No coffin-size Tupperware?”

“Well, let me go and look again,” she said sarcastically. “I just might have missed one of them.”

She looked at me with an annoyed glare, and I felt a bit . . . well, stupid.