The Better Mousetrap (37 page)

So: maybe Pereira had been wrong. His work was, necessarily, entirely theoretical, and perhaps there was a flaw in the maths somewhere. Sums, Amelia was prepared to admit, weren’t her strongest suit. Nevertheless, she couldn’t help thinking that she’d been cheated somehow.

Anyhow; no use crying over vanished Doors. She comforted herself with the thought of Uncle Dennis explaining to the goblins that he’d just lost all their money. It was possible, of course, that they’d be terribly nice and understanding about it, point out that they’d known the risks when they’d decided to make the investment and urge him not to feel bad about it, because after all, it’s only money, isn’t it, and family’s so much more important; oh, and look out, low-flying pigs operate in this area. Or they might tear him into little bits and jump on them.

Poor Uncle Dennis.

The Door opened.

‘Look out!’ Frank yelled, and he lunged forward and shoved Erskine aside, just in time to stop him being flattened by a speeding, brand new Triumph Herald.

‘Oh God,’ he heard Emily say, somewhere behind him. ‘It’s true. She really did it.’

Frank looked up and down the street. They weren’t in Cheapside any more. The wall they’d just stepped out of stood in a leafy suburban street, all very mock Tudor and privet-hedged. At first glance it wasn’t so very different, until he registered the stuff that wasn’t there: no satellite dishes, not many TV aerials, only a few parked cars instead of a continuous bumper-to-bumper line. Smoke curled up from many of the chimneys. Not so very different; but, he had an unpleasant feeling, different enough.

‘Emily,’ he said. ‘Did they have cashpoint machines in the Sixties?’

‘No.’

‘Fine. So our plastic’s useless, and— Bloody hell, I guess they’re probably still using the old money. You know, shillings and things.’

‘Very interesting, but what’s that got to do with—?’

‘It means we’re penniless, that’s all. No money we can actually use. Not our biggest problem, maybe, but—’

‘You don’t seriously imagine we’re going to stay here, do you?’

Frank pulled a face. ‘What did you have in mind?’

Emily pushed past him. ‘We’re going to bash Dog Boy here to a pulp, take the Door and go back,’ she said. ‘I assume that’s all right with you.’ She advanced a step or two, then stopped as Erskine made a deep growling noise that seemed to root her to the spot. It wasn’t a specific threat of any kind, but suddenly she felt extremely reluctant to move.

‘Sorry,’ Erskine said.

That just seemed to try Emily’s patience. ‘No, you bloody well aren’t,’ she said. ‘If you were sorry, you’d give us the bloody Door.’

Erskine shook his head miserably. ‘I can’t,’ he said. ‘I have to do as I’m told, or She’ll be angry.’

‘Oh, screw you,’ Emily replied. ‘Frank, get him.’

There’s something about the way a dog growls. Even if it’s just one of those little yappy self-propelled-toilet-brush jobs with no visible legs, it makes you stop and think, if only for a split second. Erskine, of course, was an unknown quantity. If he’d been human, the two of them rushing him would’ve probably been a justifiable business risk. But he wasn’t, was he? Human beings can’t make a noise like that.

‘You’re pathetic,’ Emily said, sounding rather unconvinced. ‘You’re not scared of a stupid dog, are you?’

‘I’m not if you’re not.’

She had the grace not to reply. Erskine shifted slightly. The Door, of course, was still there on the wall, slightly ajar. If Frank peered past Erskine’s shoulder, he could just about catch a glimpse of forty-five years into the future.

‘I really am very sorry,’ Erskine said.

‘Are you?’ Emily scowled at him, but stayed where she was. ‘Fine way you’ve got of showing it.’

‘Don’t say that,’ Erskine practically whimpered. ‘I’m not enjoying this, you know. I like to be nice to people, I want to be friends with everybody. But I can’t not do what She told me to. I just can’t.’

Frank looked at him. ‘Let me get this straight,’ he said. ‘That dog that kept following me around. That was you.’

Erskine couldn’t help smiling as he nodded. ‘That’s right,’ he said. ‘I had a great time, too.’

‘Did you?’

‘Oh yes. We went to all different places, with lots of really great smells. You even bought me a little ball that squeaked.’

‘Did I? Oh, right, yes. And I saved your life just now,’ Frank added sternly.

‘Yes. You did.’

‘How many times do I have to tell you, don’t run out in front of the cars.’

No tail to put between his legs, but Erskine managed to convey the same thing by facial expression alone. ‘Sorry.’

‘I should’ve guessed earlier,’ Emily was saying. ‘I mean, it was pretty bloody obvious, now I come to think of it. I told you, didn’t I, about not being able to hear him.’ She gave Erskine an extra-special scowl, and he slumped a little.

‘And you were nice to me too,’ he said.

‘Was I?’

‘Oh yes. We went to see the spiders together, and then we met that nice troll sort of person, and you let me carry the suitcase and everything.’

‘True,’ Emily said carefully.

‘And in the taxi, you let me sit on the seat.’

‘Yes, I did, didn’t I?’ Emily replied, in a slightly strained voice. ‘That’s got to count for something surely. In terms of pack loyalty, I mean.’

‘Yes, but—’

Frank was about to ask her what she was talking about, but she shushed him. ‘Really,’ she went on, ‘there are times when a person’s got to think about stuff like that, and decide for himself exactly whose dog he really is. Isn’t that right, Frank?’

‘Absolutely.’

‘Just think about it,’ she went on quickly. ‘We didn’t turn you into a human and leave you to fend for yourself.’

‘Damn straight,’ Frank said. ‘That’s cruelty, if you ask me. A dog is for life, not just for—’

‘We didn’t send you off trailing someone on your own, not even caring if you came back or not. Surely that’s part of the deal. You fetch the stick, we’re there to take it when you come back, it’s the basic ethical contract between the species. But I don’t think she sees it like that, somehow.’

‘Bet she never bought you a squeaky rabbit,’ Frank added scathingly.

‘Ball.’

‘Whatever. It’s the thought that counts.’

‘But I can’t,’ Erskine wailed. ‘She told me, I’ve got to leave you here and bring the Door back. I’ve got to do what She says, or I’ll end up in the place where bad dogs go. I don’t want to go there, it’s scary.’

Emily took a deep breath. ‘You could come with us,’ she said. ‘You could be our-Jesus fucking Christ, I can’t believe I’m saying this-you could be our dog. We’d look after you. Your own basket by the radiator. Chicken. We’d let you drink dirty rainwater from puddles.’

It was tearing Erskine apart. ‘Really?’

‘Really.’

‘Could I sleep on the bed?’

‘No.’ Both of them together, like a well-trained chorus. ‘But you can roll in all the smelly stuff you like, and we won’t make you have a bath.’

There were big fat tears in Erskine’s eyes now, and Emily thought, While he’s distracted we could probably jump him. Probably. Possibly. Possibly not. ‘I’m sorry,’ Erskine said with a sniff like tearing calico. ‘I really, really am. I do like you, both of you, very much.’

‘We like you too,’ Emily snarled. ‘Really we do.’

‘But I can’t.’ Erskine stepped back and put his hand on the knob of the Door. Oh well, Emily thought, and tensed herself for a flying tackle. She was just about to let herself go when Erskine said, ‘I could give you the other Door, I suppose, if that’d be any help.’

It was one of those moments when everything seems to stop dead. Nothing moved, no bird sang and the only noise was the faint whine of the Everley Brothers from a distant wireless.

‘The other Door,’ Emily said.

Erskine nodded. ‘Mr Gomez gave it to me when She wasn’t looking. I was going to ask him why but he sort of scowled at me, so I didn’t.’

‘But there can’t be another Door,’ Frank objected. ‘You told me, everybody knows there’s only the—’

‘Quiet, Frank.’ Emily pulled herself together so smoothly that for a moment Frank forgot all about the context and was lost in admiration. ‘I think that’d be all right, don’t you, Frank? I mean, she didn’t say anything at all about the other Door, did she?’

‘Nope,’ Frank managed to say.

‘She just said, take them to nineteen sixty-three and bring the Door back. Not both Doors. Just the Door.’

‘Absolutely,’ Frank put in. ‘I heard her say it.’

‘I’m sure she’d have said both Doors,’ Emily went on pleasantly, ‘if it’d been important.’

Erskine frowned. There was something wrong there, he couldn’t help thinking. Maybe, he thought, She hadn’t known about Mr Gomez giving him the other Door. But no, that couldn’t be right. She was, well, Her. It went without saying, She knew everything.

‘I suppose it’d be all right,’ he said doubtfully. ‘I mean, I’d still be doing as I was told.’

‘Of course you would,’ Emily said, trying hard to keep the hunger out of her voice. ‘In fact, I’m pretty sure it’s what she wants you to do, or else she’d have said bring back both Doors, instead of bring back the Door.’

‘But maybe She didn’t know that Mr Gomez had given me the other one.’

Emily managed to synthesise a look of shocked amazement. ‘But Colin Gomez is on her side,’ she said. ‘So, naturally, he wouldn’t do anything she didn’t want him to do. You must see that, surely.’

Despairingly, Erskine looked at Frank, who gave him a slight nod. That decided him. After all, Mr Arkenstone was a nice man, he’d given him the squeaky ball.

All in all, Erskine wished that he could be a dog again. Being human was very exciting, and obviously it was a great honour to be promoted and allowed to walk on his hind legs and wear clothes and everything. But being human was so difficult. People made demands of you, and forced you to make awkward choices, and some of them told you one thing and some of them said another, and he couldn’t remember the last time anybody had thrown a stick for him or taken him for a walk. Perhaps the simple truth was that he wasn’t worthy of promotion.

‘All right,’ he said miserably, and from his pocket he took the roll of plasticky stuff. A voice at the back of his mind told him that he ought to carry it over in his mouth and lay it at Mr Arkenstone’s feet, but he decided to keep it simple, for now. He held it out, and Ms Spitzer snatched it out of his hand.

‘Good boy,’ she said. ‘Good boy.’

Now that he’d actually done it, Erskine felt much better. ‘Thanks,’ he said, and turned to walk through the Doorway in the wall behind him. ‘I’ve got to go now,’ he said. ‘See you.’

‘Just a moment.’ Emily held out an arm to stop him. ‘When you get back, I wouldn’t bother mentioning giving us the spare Door.’

That didn’t sound right either. ‘Really? Are you sure?’

‘Better not.’

‘Oh.’ Erskine wondered about that. ‘Why not?’

Ms Spitzer seemed lost for words, but Mr Arkenstone said, ‘Well, you know how busy she is. And she doesn’t need to be told all the fiddly little details. Just tell her you did as she said, and that’ll do fine.’

‘Oh. All right, then.’ Erskine was still thinking about it as he stepped over the Door’s threshold and came out in the twenty-first century.

‘Where the hell have you been?’ She asked, sitting upright in her chair with her hand over the mouthpiece of her phone. ‘Never mind. Sit still while I finish this call.’

So Erskine sat, while She uncovered the phone and said, ‘Sorry about that, now where we? Oh yes. Right. All right, this is what we’re going to do.’

Colin Gomez stirred in his chair. For more years than he cared to remember, he’d been happy in that chair. When he was sitting in it, it was like being the captain of a starship, that same balance of being in control and facing a whole galaxy of uncertain but wonderful possibilities, never knowing what extraordinary opportunities the next day might bring. It could be just another day at the office-the bread-and-butter work, the reliable bedrock customers; it could just as easily be the day he made first contact with strange new clients, sought out new work and new ways of charging for it. To that chair for their orders came his loyal crew, hand-picked, dependable, almost as essential to his well-being as the punters themselves, but ready (whether they knew it or not) to be sacrificed for the greater good without a moment’s hesitation. As for himself: he liked to tell himself that it was better to be a captain than the admiral of the fleet, anchored to the big desk instead of skirmishing the galaxy questing for new people to do business with. And if he didn’t actually believe that, the self-deception was his own precious secret, something to take out and love when nobody was looking—

Now everything had changed. Colin reckoned (though with Amelia Carrington you never knew) that he’d got away with it so far. By turning in his unexpected and unwanted allies, he’d clawed back a little bit of her trust. Letting them have the other Door (assuming that Erskine could be relied on; which was a bit like putting your weight on a spun-glass stepladder) meant they’d be back again to help him, any moment now. At which point he’d have to do it: stage his coup, overthrow the government and get himself crowned as the God-emperor of Carringtons.

It wasn’t what he’d wanted, except in the safe privacy of his daydream. For one thing, he wasn’t entirely sure he was up to the job. Oh, he knew how to win clients and keep them happy, and surely that was all there was to it. But supposing it wasn’t? He was dimly aware that there was rather more to it than just doing a good job and finding ways of charging twice as much as it was worth without letting the client find out he’d been scalped. There was-well, politics: diplomatic relations with other firms, industrial relations inside the firm itself, all manner of things that called for approaches more cynical and brutal than he was comfortable with. More to the point, he had to get there first; and that would mean bloodshed.

All in all, a bit of a pickle; which was why, for the first time that Colin Gomez could remember, his chair didn’t feel right. It sort of caught him in the small of the back.

To distract his mind he turned on his screen and scrolled through the latest news update. The headlines hit him right between the eyes like a stone from a slingshot.