Legends From the End of Time, Michael Moorcock [best motivational books of all time TXT] 📗
- Author: Michael Moorcock
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"Isn't this jolly, though, mama?"
"J —?" Her mouth refused the word.
"What tales we'll have to tell. Who will believe us?"
"We must say nothing, save to the committee," she warned. "This is a secret you must bear for the rest of your boyhood, perhaps the rest of your life. And you must make every effort to — to expunge — to dismiss this — this…"
"Twa-la! The time twavellers, doubtless. Even now Bwannaht seeks you out. Gweetings! Gweetings! Gweetings! Welcome, welcome, welcome to the fwutah!"
Looking to her right she drew in such a sharp gasp of oxygen that the respirator on her chest missed a motion and shivered; she could scarce credit the mincing young fantastico pressing a path for himself with his over-ornamented dandy-pole through the grass, brushing at his drooping, elaborate eyebrows, which threatened to blind him, primping his thick, lank locks, patting at his pale, painted cheeks. He regarded her with mild, exaggerated eyes, fingering his pole as he paused.
"Can you undahstand me? I twust the twanslatah is doing its stuff. I'm always twisting the wong wing, y'know. I've seahched evewy one of the thiwty-six points of the compass without a hint of success. You haven't seen them, have you? A couple of lawge hunting buttahflies? So big." He extended his arms. "No? Then they've pwobably melted again." He put index finger to tip of nose. "They'd be yellah, y'know."
A collection of little bells at his throat, wrists and knees began to tinkle. He looked suddenly skyward, but he was hopeless.
"Are you real?" asked Snuffles.
"As weal as I'll evah be."
"And you live in this city?"
"Only ghosts, my deah, live in the cities. I am Sweet Ohb Mace. Cuwwently masculine!" His silks swelled, multicoloured balloons in parody of musculature.
"My name is Dafnish Armatuce. Of the Armatuce," said she in a strangled tone. "And this is Snuffles, my son."
"A child!" The dreadful being's head lifted, like a swan's, and he peered. "Why, the wohld becomes a kindehgahten! Of couwse, the otheh was actually Mistwess Chwistia. But weah! A gweat pwize foh someone!"
"I do not understand you, sir," she said.
"Ah, then it is the twanslatah." He fingered one of his many rings. "Shoroloh enafnisoo?"
"I meant that I failed to interpret your meaning," said Dafnish Armatuce wearily.
Another movement of a ring. "Is that bettah?"
She inclined her head. She was still less than certain that this was not merely another of the city's phantasms, for all that it addressed them and seemed aware that they had travelled through Time, but she decided, nonetheless, to seek the help of Sweet Orb Mace.
"We are lost," she informed him.
"In Djer?"
"That is the city's name?"
"Oah Shenalowgh, pewhaps. You wish to leave the city, at any wate?"
"If possible."
"I shall be delighted to help." Sweet Orb Mace waved his hands, made a further adjustment to a ring, and created something which shone sufficient to blind them for a moment. Of course they recognized the black, spare shape.
"Our time craft!" cried Snuffles.
"My povahty of imagination is wenowned, I feah," said Sweet Orb Mace blithely. "It's all I could come up with. Not the owiginal, of coahse, just a wepwoduction. But it will sehve us as an aih cah."
They entered, all three, to find fantasy within. Gone were the instruments and the muted lights, the padded couches, the simple purity of design, the austere dials and indicators. Instead, caged birds lined the walls, shuffling and twittering, their plumage vulgar beyond imagining; there was a carpet which swamped the legs to the calves, glowing a violent lavender, a score of huge clocks with wagging pendulums, a profusion of brass, gold and dark teak.
Noting her expression, Sweet Orb Mace said humbly: "I saw only the extewiah. I had hoped the inside would sehve foh the shoht time of ouah flight."
With a sob, she collapsed into the carpet and sat there with her visor resting upon her gauntlets while Snuffles, insensitive to his mother's mood, waggled youthful fingers and tried to get a macaw to reveal its name to him.
"A mattah of moments!" Sweet Orb Mace assured her. He tapped at a clock with his cane and they were swinging upwards into the sky. "Do not, I pway you, judge the wohld of the End of Time by yoah impwession of me. I am weckoned the most bohwing being on the planet. Soon you shall meet people much moah intewesting and intelligent than me!"
3. A Social Lunch at the End of Time
"Look, mama! Look at the food!" The boy shuddered in his passion. "Oh, look! Look!"
They descended
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