A blank-walled lift carried her to the fifth floor. The switchboard room might as well have been windowless, since supervisor Bertha insisted on pulling down the blind as soon as the sun appeared in the window. Though the lines weren't due to open for five minutes, the girls were at their boards. "Here's Lisette," Vi said, blowing on her nails. "Bet she doesn't care if Tommo lives or dies."
"Double bet she's never seen him in her life," said Doris, appraising her face in a pocket mirror.
Bertha held up a hand as if to check it was as pale as the un-sunned sky. "Hush now, ladies. She may not even know who our favorite gentleman is."
"Of course I do. He's one of your soapy people who's on every night. I wouldn't be watching him even if I had a television," Lisette said, and once the chorus of incredulity had passed its crescendo "I've a date with a man at a bookshop."
"I thought you saw him last night," protested Doris.
"That's why I am tonight."
"Is he one of your horrors?"
"He's the best there's ever been or will be," said Lisette, switching on her computer terminal as her board winked at her.
The caller was desperate for the times of a bus that had changed its route, the sort of call she and her colleagues dealt with every day. The world was full of people trying to catch up with it, and everybody had to find their own way of coping. Perhaps her work-mates managed by doing away with their imaginations, she thought, and had to pity them for their need to care about someone who didn't exist. The point was to find out all you could about yourself, to store up that secret until you were alone with it, the prize you gave yourself at the end of the day'except that tonight she meant to win herself a bonus.
She dined swiftly at a Bunny Burger opposite the car park, then she drove to the next town. She was able to park almost outside another branch of Book Yourself that appeared to have brought many of its neighbors with it from her town for company. She let herself into the shop, and Willy Bantam saw her at once.
He didn't look at her again until the dozen people ahead of her had taken turns to linger. A fat man with a stammer moved aside at last, leaving her the aroma of his armpits, and the author met her eyes. "Back again," she said.
He was producing his smile when he saw the books she'd brought. "That's right, I signed these for you."
"Are you truly not going to write any more like them?"
"Nothing's changed since yesterday."
"Then I shouldn't make you. I've thought what you can do for me instead."
"What's that?"
She opened Ravage! at her chapter and turned it towards him. "Put me in this one."
"Put you... How..."
"Cross Sally out and put my name instead. The way you describe her you could have been thinking of me. Here, use my pen."
When he didn't take it she planted it between his thumb and forefinger, and pressed her thighs together to contain an inadvertent stirring. "You only use her name five times. It won't take long," she said to enliven him. "She's Nell in Writhe! too, isn't she? Could she be your girlfriend?"
"It doesn't work like that."
"Here I am, then. Just this one," Lisette said, nudging the book towards him. "Don't worry, I won't sue."
He raised the pen, but only to level it at her. "For what?"
"Using me for the worst you could think of."
He laid the pen at the very edge of the table and pulled his hand back. "That's yours."
"Can't you use that kind of pen?"
"I can't use any for what you want."
"No, you don't understand. I said I wouldn't sue you, as if I could when it's me who asked for it. I won't be any trouble, I promise."
"Then please don't be," the author said, and looked past her.
"Are you embarrassed? Hasn't anyone ever told you why they read your books? All us girls want to be his victims," Lisette said, turning to the next in line, "don't we?"
The girl seemed in danger of blushing, even though that would upset her color scheme'face white as bone and not much meatier, spiky hair the black of her gloves and boots and long tube of an overcoat'but managed to respond with no more than a series of alarmed blinks. "We do even if we won't say," Lisette told the author, and had to regain her voice, because he'd closed her book and was sliding it towards her with his fingertips. "Couldn't you just..."
"Your name's in it. You can't ask more than that."
"Oh, thank you." It seemed hardly possible that he could have substituted her name five times while she was busy with the other girl, but it would be worse than ungrateful of her to inspect the book in his presence. One acknowledgment of herself had to be all the magic Lisette needed. She bore her broad smile past the queue and smiled all the way home.
The garage closed itself behind her, the stairs lit the way to her bedroom. She took her time over removing her coat and unbuttoning the front of her dress, enjoying the delicious tension. She lay on the bed and took out _Ravage!__, which parted its pages at her chapter as though it was as eager to open as her body. Then her mouth widened, but no longer in a smile. Sally; Sally; Sally, Sally'Sally. Not a single use of the name had been changed to hers.
He'd lied to her, she thought shrilly as a scream, and then she saw he might only have told her he'd already signed the book. If he'd taken advantage of her willingness to trust him, that was worse than lying. Everything of importance in her room'the Willy Bantam books, the fragments of them on the walls'seemed implicated in the betrayal; the mouths were jeering at her. She flung herself off the bed and was on her way to the stairs before she realized the bookshop would be shut by the time she drove back.
She'd been made to look enough of a fool. That wasn't her kind of victim. When she felt calm enough she reopened the book and read the description of herself'long slim legs, trim waist, full breasts, blond hair halfway down her back. Only the name was false. "Not for long," she promised, and kept repeating it as she lay at the edge of sleep.
Next morning she was at the office twenty minutes ahead of Bertha and the girls. She might as well not have bothered: at that hour Bassinet Press was represented only by an answering machine. She left a message for someone who was privy to Willy Bantam's movements to call her at the inquiry office by name, then waited most of the morning while nobody did. No doubt whoever should have called would be going for an extended lunch as Lisette understood everyone in publishing did, and so she had to contact them before they turned into a machine. The moment Bertha wasn't there to see her phoning out Lisette dialled Bassinet Press and spoke low. "I left a message for Willy Bantam's person. Can I have them now?"
"I'll give you publicity," the receptionist said, which struck Lisette as a generous offer until another voice announced "Publicity."
"Are you Willy Bantam's girl?"
"Mr Bantam's publicist is on the road with him. Can she call you next week?"
"What road are they on? Where is he tonight?"
"Nowhere, I believe. May I ask who's calling?"
"I'm an old friend he used in one of his books. Where's he on next?"
"I think he's reading at a library tomorrow afternoon."
"Have you got the address? I want to surprise him."
There was a pause that might have denoted reluctance, so that Lisette was searching the depths of herself for some further persuasiveness when her informant returned with the address, followed by a question: "Can I just take your—"
"Don't spoil the surprise," Lisette said as she saw Bertha returning from her customary five-minute visit to the toilet. "Thank you for calling," she added, she hoped not too suspiciously loud.