Turquoiselle, Tanith Lee [100 best novels of all time .TXT] 📗

“Thankyou,” said Croft stonily, not as he had on that other occasion.

Thegirl now said nothing. She went out again, failing to shut the door.

Croftshut it. “We’ll take the lift down to the side terrace,” said Croft. “That partof the grounds has as a rule less traffic – with luck, not enough of them willbe out there to cause immediate concerns. This is going to be tight shit,Carver. Can you handle that?”

Carvernodded once. He thought of Anjeela a moment, wondering where she was. But hisbrain was by now mainly exploring the abrupt new idea: that Croft could enablethem – Carver – to leave the confines of the ‘Place’. For there was a boundary, away out – there had to be – and Croft would know where it was and how to useit. Chaos had come. And as any of the gods in any proper fantasy game (even inthe Bible) knew, from chaos might be created – anything.

Twenty

Croft and Carvertravelled down in the lift that was corridor-attached to Croft’s room. Six – seven?– levels below, they emerged onto the terrace with steps and handrail. Theydescended the steps to the grass. No one was there. The whole area, includingthe lush wilderness ahead, seemed held in a unique pocket of unmotion andblurred quiet – though raucous shouts and other disturbances were audible, theysounded removed and irrelevant; noises off. On the slopes, and among the trees,no burning was to be seen, and nothing stirred in the windless, smoke-driedairlessness. Already the day was too warm. The sky had a glaring pallor.Nothing moved there, either. The gulls were gone.

Thenfour security men ran out of the trees up ahead. Their advent was so unannouncedCarver suspected they had been hidden from sight, waiting for anyone – or twospecific persons – to come down the steps.

Carverstopped dead. Croft also. They watched as the four men – coordinated, expressionless– bounded towards them.

Noneof the four carried a weapon, but all were no doubt armed, and with a selectionof devices. This was like the schools. Carver, almost mindlessly now, seeingin pictures not words – one or two boys on their own, hoping it was OK, andabruptly confronted out of nowhere by the bullies. But here the bullies hadbeen cloned – they alllooked alike. The man with the spiked hair was not included.

Aboutfive metres from them, the gang came to a halt.

Croftspoke. “Yes?” His voice was steady and pitched, and kept a balanced authority.He was in charge. That was all there was to it.

Ornot.

Theface of the slightly taller security man sagged to let out a ribald laugh.

“Hello,Crofty. Look, it’s Crofty. Who’dhave guessed?”

Twoof the others laughed, softly, not minding.

Thefourth man stared hard through round unliking glassy eyes. “Well,” the fourthman said, “he can frenchy kiss up his own shitty arse.”

Thatmade all four men laugh. Even the glassy-eyed man who had said it.

Thetaller one said, “So. What’ll we do with him, boys?”

Croftdid not speak now. To speak was very likely useless.

Carverreadied himself for what must come next – a fight with professional strong-armballetics, the utilisation, probably, of instruments intended to subdue, if not– essentially – to kill. He did not look at Croft. To look at Croft would notbe useful either.

Shortand incongruous, a firework cracked, somewhere around the building.

Itwas not a firework.

Asone, the four-man gang altered, everything about them changing .

Theirfaces had resumed likeness, blankly serious and fixed. Only “Shooting–” theglassy-eyed man murmured, as if explaining to himself, giving his body an extrasplit second to respond. And they all broke into motion, running, sprinting atand then past the two men who had seemed to be their quarry. Off they raced,away along the wall of the building, the shortest of them leaping a low bushthat had encroached.

Alitter of several more disembodied shots fractured through far-off air. Thenquietness reassembled, and the sense of total distancing.

“Thisplace smells like badly-smoked haddock,” remarked Croft, “don’t you think so?”

Carverdid not answer.

Croftbegan to stride up the incline, more or less in the direction he had led Carverbefore. Carver followed. Nobody else, nothing, sprang from the trees. Atleast, not yet.

“Hiding,”said Croft, “in plain sight.”

Theyhad met no one at all, though they had not paused at the griffin bench on theslope, but progressed around, by the rises and dips of the higher ground,towards the northern side. To the sheds. Carver’s sheds.

AlthoughCarver had been left with keys, unsurprisingly Croft had another set.

Heunlocked the central door of the central shed.

Insideit was cooler than the woods. (Cool. Play it...)

Carverlooked around him. He had been about here last night till dawn, had sat below,looking up, or sleeping, under the yellow eye of the 4th Level Alert that theglow in the shed had become. Unless he had imagined this, as he had imagined,or been made to imagine, that Anjeela Merville could grow her hair and fingersto unusual lengths.

Theshed had, it was true, also changed somewhat. In addition to the table, onwhich he had put the small random group of ‘stolen’ objects, three chairs wereinstantly notable. They had been arranged against the walls. Plus there was aminiature white fridge, working on batteries, whose door Croft at once flungwide. “Good, good,” said Croft, with sombre gratification. And drew out alarge bottle of vodka with a white and brown label, its pedigree written inRussian characters. A filled ice-tray came next, and a dish of anchovies.Everything began at once to smoke as its frigidity met the surrounding warmth.Croft set the bottle and fish on the table, and pulled up two of the chairs.

Carvernow noted another much lower table had been positioned under the main table,with a dozen glasses standing on it. “My apologies, they didn’t bring thecoffee, as I asked. I know you’re not enamoured of alcohol, Car. That was yourfather, was it? There is bottled water in the fridge, nicely chilled – yes?”

“Allright,” Carver said.

Croftwent back and drew out a two litre bottle that had lain on its side due to thecramped space. Its label also was unknown. It seemed to be in French, and bore thereproduced pen-and-ink illustration of a fairy-tale well.

“Come,”said Croft, as he seated himself. “Sit.” Carver remained