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The 13:42 train pulled into the station with a punctuality that was within time parameters, but outside geographical ones. That is to say the train was on time, but the station was in the wrong place.
‘We welcome your welcome and give thanks for your thanks,’ said the leader of the troupe, making a dramatic flourish to me, Bunty, then in the direction of the Grey Porters.
‘I’ve seen a picture of someone looking at a picture of one,’ I said.
the Rules were infallible because it said so. In the Rules.
I understand you and he were betrothed?’ ‘In every single way but physically, legally, and affectionately,’
‘If there is any way at all I can assist in this effort, please keep it to yourself.’
Some drank muddy water even when there was tea around, and others swore they couldn’t tell the difference.
Some people actually swim in the sea, despite the presence of the Under Toad ready to pull you under and devour you, but I never quite dared myself.’
‘That’s a lot of Somewhere Else out there,’ I murmured, ‘and potentially populated by thousands of Someone Elses.’
Writings from the pre-Epiphanic era spoke of ‘millions of lives being lost on the roads’, so it was a fair assumption the Previous fed their roads daily with human sacrifice.
‘Married?’ I said. ‘Marriage is for hopeless romantics,’ she said. ‘What we have is bigger than that.’ ‘Love?’ ‘Nope. Love fades, and entanglements of emotion lead to irrationality of decision. We have a bond of mutual trust and understanding, forged in the furnace of shared jeopardy.’
‘Goodness me,’ said Tommo, ‘there’s so much stuff I didn’t see today, I’m surprised I saw anything at all.’
Book merits bought mundane, sanctioned goods at set prices. Scented candles, extra pudding and a reconditioned comb – if and when they became available. Cash merits, on the other hand, could buy you anything that had a price – and everything had a price.
Will you tell the Prefects to all go and fuck themselves from me?’ ‘I probably won’t, to be honest.’ ‘Very wise,’ he said, ‘but the sentiment was there, and at least someone knew my mind before I had none.’
But to show that violence of any sort could not be tolerated, Nicola would be compelled to offer Lottie her pudding ration for a month. Equally, to show that forgiveness must be encouraged and that vindictiveness should not be tolerated, Lottie was compelled not to accept the puddings. They were both aged nine.
Cassie was also found in possession of a circular musical playing disc by a performer named ‘Rick Astley’.
‘I’ve been in love with her ever since – no, wait, I’ve been in awe of her ever since I was six.
Samantha and Jethro went into a flurry of what-if scenarios and production projections, and started scribbling on bits of paper and, after a while, had to break the ‘In Emergency Need of Calculations Break Glass’ to view a light shade of maths skill ochre to check their results.
‘Choice,’ went the Word of Munsell, ‘leads only to dithering and unhealthy speculation over alternative outcomes. The choice to have no choice is the best choice of all’.
‘It’s quite simple,’ he said. ‘Our current production is zero – so if we claim to have increased our productivity by twenty per cent next week, the sums do actually work, because twenty per cent of nothing is also nothing.’
His copy of Bill the Burglar had gone down well with the library, and was so popular that the waiting list to the waiting list now had a waiting list.
But cash would buy anything that had a price, and for cash, everything had a price.
‘I’m always on the lookout for new clients if any of you gentlemen—’ ‘Can I stop you right there?’ said Mr Green, and then, while Tommo waited to see what he would say, Mr Green added: ‘No, nothing more. That was a complete sentence.’
There were about a dozen people milling about when I arrived a half-hour later. Either agents, clients, agents for Rainbowers, agents for clients, clients who also acted as agents for other clients, and even agents acting for other agents, eager to strike the best deal possible.
‘That business, his business, can be yours for a measly six thousand. Give us that up front and my client agrees to stay out of the market, trousers firmly buttoned, his talent exclusively reserved for his loved one.
Anecdotally they were seen quite often: here and there, now and again, to this one and that one.
She stared at me with her large eyes, and all of a sudden she didn’t seem like an obnoxious Yellow at all, but a frightened child who also happened to be Yellow and quite obnoxious.
