The Well of Lost Plots

'You forget that we are out of print pending modernisation,' he replied shortly, tossing my ID back across the table. 'You have no mandatory powers here, Apprentice Next. I think Jurisfiction will look very carefully before attempting a change on a book without internal approval. You can tell the Bellman that, from me.'

We stared at each other, a diplomatic impasse having arrived. I had an idea and asked him:

'How long have you been an auctioneer in this book?'

'Thirty-six years.'

'And how many cups of tea have you had in that time?' I asked him.

'Including this one?'

I nodded.

'One.'

I leaned forward.

'I can fix it for you to have as many cups of tea as you want, Mr Phillips.'

He narrowed his eyes.

'Oh yes?' he replied. 'And how would you manage that? As soon as you've got what you want you'll be off and I'll never be able to reach Miss Pittman's proffered cup again!'

I stood up and went to the table on which the tea tray was sitting. It was a small table made of oak and lightly decorated. It had a vase of flowers on it, but nothing else. As Mr Phillips watched I picked up the table and placed it next to the window. The auctioneer looked at me dumbfounded, got up, walked to the window and delicately touched the table and the tea things.

An audacious move,' he said, waving the sugar tongs at me, 'but it won't work. She's a D-7 — she won't be able to change what she does.'

'D-7s never have names, Mr Phillips.'

'I gave her that name,' he said quietly. 'You're wasting your time.'

'Let's see, shall we?' I replied, speaking into the intercom to ask Miss Pittman to bring in more tea.

The door opened as before and a look of shock and surprise crossed the girl's face.

'The table!' she gasped. 'It's—!'

'You can do it, Miss Pittman,' I told her. 'Just place the tea where you always do.'

She moved forward, following the well-worn path, arrived at where the table used to be and then looked at its new position, two strides away. The smooth and unworn carpet was alien and frightening to her; it might as well have been a bottomless chasm. She stopped dead.

'I don't understand—!' she began, her face bewildered as her hands began to shake.

'Tell her to put the tea things down,' I told the auctioneer, who was becoming as distressed as Miss Pittman — perhaps more so. 'TELL HER!'

'Thank you, Miss Pittman,' murmured Mr Phillips, his voice croaking with emotion, 'put the tea things down over here, would you?'

She bit her lip and closed her eyes, raised her foot and held it, quivering, above the edge of the shiny floorboards. Then she moved it forward and rested it on the soft carpet. She opened her eyes, looked down and beamed at us both.

'Well done!' I said. 'Just two more.'

Brimming with confidence, she negotiated the two remaining steps with ease and placed the tray on the table. She and Mr Phillips were closer now than they had ever been before. She put out a hand to touch his lapel, but checked herself quickly.

'Shall … shall I pour you a cup?' she asked.

'Thank you!' exclaimed Mr Phillips. 'Milk and—'

'—one sugar.' She smiled shyly. 'Yes, yes, I know.'

She poured the tea and handed the cup and saucer to him. He took it gratefully.

'Mr Phillips?'

'Yes?'

'Do I have a first name?'

'Of course,' he replied quietly and with great emotion. 'I have had over thirty years to think about it. Your name is Aurora, as befits somebody as beautiful as the dawn.'

She covered her nose and mouth to hide her smile and blushed deeply. Mr Phillips raised a shaking hand to touch her cheek but stopped as he remembered that I was still present. He nodded imperceptibly in my direction and said:

'Thank you, Miss Pittman — perhaps later you might come in for some … dictation.'

'I look forward to it, Mr Phillips!'

And she turned, trod softly on the carpet to the door, looked round once more and went out. When I looked back at Mr Phillips he had sat down, drained by the emotionally charged encounter.

'Do we have a deal?' I asked him. 'Or do I put the table back where it was?'

He looked shocked.

'You wouldn't?'

'I would.'

He considered his position for a moment and then offered me his hand.

'Pigs at treble the going rate?'

'Top of page two thirty-two.'

'Deal.'

Pleased with my actions so far, I collected the dog and jumped forward to the middle of page 232. By now the sale of Johnny's father's pigs was the talk of the town, and had even made it into the headlines of the local papers: Unprecedented pig price shocks town. There was only one thing left to do — replace the blind collie with the sighted one.

'I'm looking for the vet,' I said to a passer-by.

'Are you?' replied the woman amiably. 'Good for you!' and she hurried on.

'Could you tell me the way to the vet?' I asked the next person, a sallow man in a tweed suit. He was no less literal.

'Yes I could,' he replied, attempting to walk on. I tried to grasp him by the sleeve but missed and momentarily clasped his hand. He gasped out loud. This was echoed by two women who had witnessed the incident. They started to gossip volubly. I pulled out my ID.

'Jurisfiction,' I told him, adding: 'On official business,' just to make sure he got the picture.

But something had happened. The inhabitants of the village, who up until that moment had seemed to wander the streets like automatons, were all of a sudden animated individuals, talking, whispering and pointing. I was a stranger in a strange land, and while the inhabitants didn't seem hostile, I was clearly an object of considerable interest.

'I need to get to the vet,' I said loudly. 'Now can anyone tell me where he lives?'

Two ladies who had been chattering suddenly smiled and nodded to one another.

'We'll show you where he works.'

I left the first man still staring at his hand and looking at me in an odd way.

I followed the ladies to a small building set back from the road. I thanked them both. One of them, I noticed, remained at the gate while the other bustled away with a purposeful stride. I rang the doorbell.

'Hello?' said the vet, opening the door and looking surprised; he only had one client booked in that day — Johnny and Shadow. The vet was meant to tell the young lad how Shadow would stay blind for ever.

'This dog,' said the vet automatically, 'will never see again. I'm sorry, but that's the way it is.'

'Jurisfiction,' I told him, showing him my ID. 'There's been a change of plan.'

'If you're exchanging golliwogs for monkeys, you're in the wrong book,' he said.

'This isn't Noddy,' I told him.

'What sort of change, then?' he asked as I gently forced my way in and closed the door. 'Are you here to alter the less-than-savoury references to stereotypical gypsy folk in chapters XIII to XV?'

'We'll get round to that, don't you worry.'

I wasn't going to take any chances and go through the same rigmarole as I had with Mr Phillips, so I looked around furtively and said in a conspiratorial whisper:

'I shouldn't be telling you this, but … wicked men are planning to steal Shadow and sell him off for medical experiments!'

'No!' exclaimed the vet, eyes open wide.

'Indeed,' I replied, adding in a hushed tone: 'And what's more, we suspect that these men might not even be British.'

'You mean …Johnny Foreigners?' asked the vet, visibly shocked.

'Probably French. Now, are you with me on this?'

'Absolutely!' he breathed. 'What are we going to do?'

'Swap dogs. When Johnny arrives you tell him to go outside for a moment, we swap the dogs, when he comes back you unwrap the bandages, the dog can see — and you say this dialogue instead.'

I handed him a scrap of paper. He looked at it thoughtfully.

'So Shadow stays here and the swapped Shadow is abducted by Johnny Foreigner and used for medical experiments?'