“Nonsense!” Elinor’s voice sounded cross but relieved, too. “The only one who may be as good at it as you are is your daughter.”
Mo smiled at Meggie and put another slice of cheese on top of the jam. “Thanks, very flattering.
But, however that may be, our knife-happy friend Basta has gone! And I hope he’s taken the wretched book with him and put an end to that story forever. There’ll be no more need for Elinor to jump when she hears something rustling in the garden at night, and Darius won’t have to dream of Basta’s knife – which means that the news Farid has brought is in fact very good news! I hope you’ve all thanked him warmly!”
Farid smiled shyly as Mo raised his coffee cup to him, but Meggie saw the anxiety in his black eyes. If Mo was right, then by now Basta was in the same place as Dustfinger. And they all thought Mo was right. You could see the relief in Darius’s and Elinor’s faces, and Resa put her arms around Mo’s neck and smiled as if everything was fine again.
Elinor began asking Mo questions about the books he had so shockingly abandoned to answer Meggie’s phone call. And Darius was trying to tell Resa about the new system of classification he had thought up for Elinor’s library. But Farid looked at his empty plate. Against the background of its white china, he was probably seeing Basta’s knife at Dustfinger’s neck.
Basta. The name stuck in Meggie’s throat like a pebble. She kept thinking the same thing: If Mo was right, Basta was now where she soon hoped to be herself. In the Inkworld.
She was going to try it that very night, she would try to use her own voice and Orpheus’s words to make her way through the thicket of written letters, into the Wayless Wood. Farid had pleaded with her to wait no longer. He was beside himself with anxiety for Dustfinger, and Mo’s remarks had certainly done nothing to change that. “Please, Meggie!” He had begged her again and again. “Please read it!”
Meggie looked across the table at Mo. He was whispering something to Resa, and she laughed.
You heard her voice only when she laughed. Mo put his arm around her, and his eyes sought Meggie. When her bed was empty tomorrow morning he wouldn’t look as carefree as he did now. Would he be angry or merely sad? Resa laughed when, for her and Elinor’s benefit, he mimicked the horror of the collector whose books he had abandoned so disgracefully when Meggie had phoned, and Meggie had to laugh, too, when he imitated the poor man’s voice. The collector had obviously been very fat and breathless.
Elinor was the only one who didn’t laugh. “I don’t think that’s funny, Mortimer,” she said sharply. “Personally, I’d probably have shot you if you’d simply gone off leaving my poor books behind, all sick and dirty.”
“Yes, I expect you would.” Mo gave Meggie a conspiratorial look, as he always did when Elinor lectured him or his daughter on the way to treat books or the rules of her library.
Oh Mo, if only you knew, thought Meggie, if only you knew. . She felt as if he would read her secret in her face any minute now. Abruptly, she pushed back her chair, muttered, “I’m not hungry,”
and went off to Elinor’s library. Where else?
Whenever she wanted to escape her own thoughts, she went to books for help. She was sure to find something to keep her mind occupied until evening finally came and they all went to bed, suspecting nothing.
Looking at Elinor’s library, you couldn’t tell that scarcely more than a year ago it had contained nothing but a red rooster hanging dead in front of empty shelves, while Elinor’s finest books burned on the lawn outside. The jar that Elinor had filled with some of their pale ashes still stood beside her bed.
Meggie ran her forefinger over the backs of the books. They were ranged side by side on the shelves again now, like piano keys. Some shelves were still empty, but Elinor and Darius were always out and about, visiting second-hand bookshops and auctions, to replace those lost treasures with new and equally wonderful books. Orpheus .. where was the story of Orpheus?
Meggie was on her way over to the shelf where the Greeks and Romans whispered their ancient stories when the library door opened behind her, and Mo came in.
“Resa says you have the sheet of paper that Farid brought with him in your room. Can I see it?”
He was trying to sound as casual as if he were just asking about the weather, but he’d never been any good at pretending. Mo couldn’t pretend, any more than he could tell lies.
“Why?” Meggie leaned against Elinor’s books as if they would strengthen her backbone. “Why?
Because I’m curious, remember? And what’s more,” he added, looking at the backs of the books, as if he could find the right words there, “and what’s more, I think it would be better to burn that sheet of paper.” “Burn it?” Meggie looked at him incredulously. “But why?”
“I know it sounds as if I’m seeing ghosts,” he said, taking a book off the shelf, opening it, and leafing absentmindedly through it, “but that piece of paper, Meggie .. I feel it’s like an open door, a door that we’d be well advised to close once and for all. Before Farid tries disappearing into that damn story, too.” “What if he does?” Meggie couldn’t help the cool note that crept into her voice. As if she were talking to a stranger. “Why can’t you understand? He only wants to find Dustfinger! To warn him about Basra.”
Mo closed the book he had taken off the shelf and put it back in its place. “So he says. But suppose Dustfinger didn’t actually want to take him along, suppose he left him behind on purpose? Would that surprise you?”
No. No, it wouldn’t. Meggie said nothing. It was so quiet among the books, so terribly quiet among all those words.
“I know, Meggie,” said Mo at last, in a low voice. “I know you think the world that book describes is much more exciting than this one. I understand the feeling. I’ve often imagined being right inside one of my favourite books. But we both know that once imagination turns to reality things feel quite different. You think the Inkworld is a magical place, a world of wonders – but believe me, your mother has told me a lot about it that you wouldn’t like at all. It’s a cruel, dangerous place, full of darkness and violence, ruled by brute force, Meggie, not by justice.”
He looked at her, searching her face for the understanding he had always found there before but did not find now. “Farid comes from a world like that,” said Meggie. “And he didn’t choose to get into this story of ours. You brought him here.”
She regretted her words the moment they were out. Mo turned away as if she had struck him.
“Yes. You’re right, of course,” he said, going back to the door. “And I don’t want to quarrel with you again. But I don’t want that paper lying around your room, either. Give it back to Farid. Or else, who knows, there could be a giant sitting on your bed tomorrow morning.” He was trying to make her laugh, of course. He couldn’t bear the two of them to be on bad terms again. He looked so depressed. And so tired.
“You know perfectly well nothing like that can happen,” said Meggie. “Why do you always worry so much? Things don’t just come out of the words on the page unless you call them. You should know that better than anyone!”