Maskerade (26 page)

‘How can you tell?'

‘He doesn't usually go in for warnings.'

She stepped back quickly and grabbed the boy's arm. ‘Can I have a word with you?' she said.

‘We've got only a few hours and I'd really like to get this—'

‘It's
important
.'

He followed her into the wings. Behind them, the Librarian tapped a few keys on the half-repaired keyboard and then ducked underneath.

‘I know who the Ghost is,' whispered Agnes.

André stared at her. Then he pulled her further into the shadows. ‘The Ghost isn't
anybody
,' he said softly. ‘Don't be silly. It's just the Ghost.'

‘I mean he's someone else when he takes his mask off.'

‘Who?'

‘Should I tell Mr Bucket and Mr Salzella?'

‘
Who?
Tell them about
who
?'

‘Walter Plinge.'

He stared at her again.

‘If you laugh I'll … I'll kick you,' said Agnes.

‘But Walter isn't even—'

‘I didn't believe it either but he said he saw the Ghost in the ballet school and there's mirrors all over the walls and he'd be quite tall if he stood up properly and he roams around in the cellars—'

‘Oh, come
on
…'

‘The other night I thought I heard him singing on the stage when everyone else had gone.'

‘You saw him?'

‘It was dark.'

‘Oh, well …' André began dismissively.

‘But afterwards I'm
certain
I heard him talking to the cat. Talking normally, I mean. I mean like a normal person, I mean. And you've got to admit …
he is strange. Isn't he just the sort of person who'd want to wear a mask to hide who he is?' She sagged. ‘Look, I can see you don't want to listen—'

‘No! No, I think … well …'

‘I just thought I'd feel better if I told someone.'

André smiled in the gloom. ‘I wouldn't mention it to anyone else, though.'

Agnes looked down at her feet. ‘I suppose it does sound a bit far-fetched …'

André laid a hand on her arm. Perdita felt Agnes draw herself back. ‘
Do
you feel better?' he said.

‘I … don't know … I mean … I don't know … I mean, I just can't imagine him hurting anyone … I feel so stupid …'

‘Everyone's on edge. Don't worry about it.'

‘I'd … hate you to think I was being silly—'

‘I'll keep an eye on Walter, if you like.' He smiled at her. ‘But I'd better get on with things,' he added. He gave her another smile, as fast and brief as summer lightning.

‘Thank y—'

He was already walking back to the organ.

This shop was a gentlemen's outfitters.

‘It's not for me,' said Nanny Ogg. ‘It's for a friend. He's six foot tall, very broad shoulders.'

‘Inside leg?'

‘Oh, yes.'

She looked around the store. Might as well go all the way. It was
her
money, after all.

‘And a black coat, long black tights, shoes with them shiny buckles, one of those top hats, a big cloak
with a red silk lining, a bow-tie, a really posh black cane with a very nobby silver knob on it … and … a black eye-patch.'

‘An eye-patch?'

‘Yes. Maybe with sequins or something on it, since it's the opera.'

The tailor stared at Nanny. ‘This is a little irregular,' he said. ‘Why can't the gentleman come in himself?'

‘He ain't quite a gentleman yet.'

‘But, madam, I meant that we have to get the size right.'

Nanny Ogg looked around the shop. ‘Tell you what,' she said, ‘you sell me something that looks about right and we'll adjust him to fit. 'Scuse me …'

She turned away demurely—

—twingtwangtwong—

—and turned back, smoothing down her dress and holding a leather bag.

‘How much'll it be?' she said.

The tailor looked blankly at the bag. ‘I'm afraid we won't be able to have all that ready until at least next Wednesday,' he said.

Nanny Ogg sighed. She felt she was becoming familiar with one of the most fundamental laws of physics. Time equalled money. Therefore, money equalled time.

‘I was sort of hoping to get it all a bit quicker than that,' she said, jingling the bag up and down.

The tailor looked down his nose at her. ‘We are craftsmen, madam. How long did you think it should take?'

‘How about ten minutes?'

Twelve minutes later she left the shop with a large packet under one arm, a hatbox under the other, and an ebony cane between her teeth.

Granny was waiting outside. ‘Got it all?'

‘Ess.'

‘I'll take the eye-patch, shall I?'

‘We've
got
to get a third witch,' said Nanny, trying to rearrange the parcels. ‘Young Agnes has got good strong arms.'

‘You know if we was to drag her out of there by the scruff of her neck we'd never hear the last of it,' said Granny. ‘She'll be a witch when she wants to be.'

They headed for the Opera House's stage-door.

‘Afternoon, Les,' said Nanny cheerfully as they entered. ‘Stopped itching now, has it?'

‘Marvellous bit of ointment that was you gave me, Mrs Ogg,' said the stage-doorkeeper, his moustache bending into something that might have been a smile.

‘Mrs Les keeping well? How's her sister's leg?'

‘Doing very well, Mrs Ogg, thank you for asking.'

‘This is just Esme Weatherwax who's helping me with some stuff,' said Nanny.

The doorkeeper nodded. It was clear that any friend of Mrs Ogg was a friend of his. ‘No trouble at all, Mrs Ogg.'

As they passed through into the dusty network of corridors Granny reflected, not for the first time, that Nanny had a magic all of her own.

Nanny didn't so much enter places as insinuate herself; she had unconsciously taken a natural talent
for liking people and developed it into an occult science. Granny Weatherwax did not doubt that her friend already knew the names, family histories, birthdays and favourite topics of conversation of half the people here, and probably also the vital wedge that would cause them to open up. It might be talking about their children, or a potion for their bad feet, or one of Nanny's really filthy stories, but Nanny would be
in
and after twenty-four hours they'd have known her all their lives. And they'd tell her things.
Of their own free will
. Nanny Got On with people. Nanny could get a statue to cry on her shoulder and say what it really thought about pigeons.

It was a knack. Granny had never had the patience to acquire it. Just occasionally, she wondered whether it might have been a good idea.

‘Curtain up in an hour and a half,' said Nanny. ‘I promised Giselle I'd give her a hand …'

‘Who's Giselle?'

‘She does makeup.'

‘You don't know how to do makeup!'

‘I distempered our privy, didn't I?' said Nanny. ‘And I paint faces on eggs for the kiddies every Soul Cake Tuesday.'

‘Got to do anything else, have you?' said Granny sarcastically. ‘Open the curtains? Fill in for a ballet dancer who's been taken poorly?'

‘I did say I'd help with the drinks at the swarray,' said Nanny, letting the irony slide off like water on a red-hot stove. ‘Well, a lot of the staff have buggered off 'cos of the Ghost. It's in the big foyer in half
an hour. I expect you ought to be there, being a patronizer.'

‘What's a swarray?' said Granny suspiciously.

‘It's a sort of posh party before the opera.'

‘What do I have to do?'

‘Drink sherry and make polite conversation,' said Nanny. ‘Or conversation, anyway. I saw the grub being done for it. They've even got little cubes of cheese on sticks stuck in a grapefruit, and you don't get much posher than that.'

‘Gytha Ogg, you ain't done any …
special
dishes, have you?'

‘No, Esme,' said Nanny Ogg meekly.

‘Only you've got an imp of mischief in you.'

‘Been far too busy for anything like that,' said Nanny.

Granny nodded. ‘Then we'd better find Greebo,' she said.

‘You sure about this, Esme?' said Nanny.

‘We might have a lot to do tonight,' said Granny. ‘Maybe we could do with an extra pair of hands.'

‘Paws.'

‘At the moment, yes.'

It
was
Walter. Agnes knew it. It wasn't knowledge in her mind, exactly. It was practically something she breathed. She felt it as a tree feels the sun.

It all fitted. He could go anywhere, and no one took any notice of Walter Plinge. In a way he was invisible, because he was always there. And, if you were someone like Walter Plinge, wouldn't you long to be someone as debonair and dashing as the Ghost?

If you were someone like Agnes Nitt, wouldn't you long to be someone as dark and mysterious as Perdita X Dream?

The traitor thought was there before she could choke it off. She added hurriedly: But I've never killed anyone.

Because that's what I'd have to believe, isn't it? If he's the Ghost, then he's killed people.

All the same … he does look odd, and he talks as if the words are trying to escape …

A hand touched her shoulder. She spun round.

‘It's only me!' said Christine.

‘… Oh.'

‘Don't you think this is a
marvellous
dress!?'

‘What?'

‘This dress, silly!!'

Agnes looked her up and down. ‘Oh. Yes. Very nice,' she said, disinterest lying on her voice like rain on a midnight pavement.

‘You don't sound very impressed!! Really, Perdita, there's no need to be
jealous
!!'

‘I'm not jealous, I was thinking …'

She'd only seen the Ghost for a moment, but he certainly hadn't
moved
like Walter. Walter walked as though his body were being dragged along by his head. But the certainty was as hard as marble now.

‘Well, you don't seem very impressed, I must say!!'

‘I'm wondering if Walter Plinge is the Ghost,' said Agnes, and immediately cursed herself, or at least pooted. She felt embarrassed enough about André's reaction.

Christine's eyes widened. ‘But he's a clown!!'

‘He walks odd and he talks odd,' said Agnes, ‘but if he stood up straight—'

Christine laughed. Agnes felt herself getting angry. ‘And he practically
told
me he was!'

‘You believed him, did you?!' Christine made a little tutting sound that Agnes considered quite offensive. ‘Really, you girls believe the strangest things!!'

‘What do you mean,
we
girls?'

‘Oh,
you
know! The dancers are always saying they've seen the Ghost all over the place—'

‘Good grief! Do you think I'm some sort of impressionable idiot?
Think
for a minute before answering!'

‘Well, of course I don't, but—'

‘Huh!'

Agnes strode off into the wings, concerned more with effect than direction. The background noise of the stage faded behind her as she stepped into the scenery store. It didn't lead anywhere except to a pair of big double doors opening to the world outside. It was full of bits of castles, balconies and romantic prison cells, stacked any old how.

Christine hurried up behind her.

‘I really didn't mean … look, not
Walter
… he's just a very odd odd-job man!'

‘He does all kinds of jobs! No one ever knows where he is – they all just assume he's around!'

‘All right, but you don't have to get so worked up—'

There was the faintest of sounds behind them.

They turned.

The Ghost bowed.

‘Who's a good boy, then? Nanny's got a bowl of fish eggs for a good boy,' said Nanny, trying to see under the big dresser in the kitchen.

‘Fish eggs?' said Granny, coldly.

‘I borrowed them from the stuff they've done for the swarray,' said Nanny.

‘Borrowed?' said Granny.

‘That's right. Come along, Greebo, who's a good boy then?'

‘Borrowed. You mean … when the cat's finished with them, you're going to give them back?'

‘It's only a manner of speaking, Esme,' said Nanny in a hurt little voice. ‘It's not the same as stealing if you don't
mean
it. Come along, boy, here's some lovely fish eggs for you …'

Greebo pulled himself further into the shadows.

There was a little sigh from Christine and she folded up into a faint. But she managed, Agnes noticed sourly, to collapse in a way that probably didn't hurt when she hit the ground and which showed off her dress to the best effect. It was beginning to dawn on Agnes that Christine was remarkably clever in some specialized ways.

She looked back at the mask.

‘It's all right,' she said, her voice sounding hoarse even to her. ‘I know why you're doing it. I really do.'

No expression could cross that ivory face, but the eyes flickered.

Agnes swallowed. The Perdita part of her wanted to give in right now, because that would be more exciting, but she stood her ground.

‘You want to be something else and you're stuck with what you are,' said Agnes. ‘I know all about that.
You're
lucky. All
you
have to do is put on a mask. At least you're the right shape. But why did you have to go and kill people? Why? Mr Pounder couldn't have done you any harm! But … he poked around in odd places, didn't he, and he … found something?'

The Ghost nodded slightly, and then held out his ebony cane. He grasped both ends and pulled, so that a long thin sword slid out.

‘I know who you are!' Agnes burst out, as he stepped forward. ‘I … I could probably help you! It might not have been your fault!' She backed away. ‘
I
haven't done anything to you! You don't have to be afraid of me!'