‘I do?’ I asked, looking up at him with carefully engineered innocence.

‘Well?’

‘Well what?’ I stared into his bright, concerned face with what I thought was a blank expression. But I couldn’t hold it for long and was soon a bundle of girlish giggles and salty tears. He hugged me tightly and placed his hand gently on my tum.

‘In there? A baby?’

‘Yes. Small pink thing that makes a noise. Seven weeks. Probably appear Julyish.’

‘How are you feeling?’

‘All right,’ I told him. ‘I felt a bit sick yesterday but that might have had nothing to do with it. I’ll work until I start waddling and then take leave. How are you feeling?’

‘Odd,’ said Landen, hugging me again. ‘Odd… yet elated.’ He grinned. ‘Who can I tell?’

‘No one quite yet. Probably just as well—your mum would knit herself to death!’

‘And what’s wrong with my mother’s knitting?’ asked Landen, feigning indignation.

‘Nothing.’ I giggled. ‘But there is a limit to storage space.’

‘At least it’s recognisable,’ he said. ‘That jumper your mum gave me for my birthday; what does she think I am, a squid?’

I burried my face in his collar and held him close. He rubbed my back gently and we stood together for several minutes without talking.

‘Did you have a good day?’ he asked at last.

‘Well,’ I began, ‘we found Cardenio, I was shot dead by an SO-14 marksman, became a vanishing hitch-hiker, saw Yorrick Kaine, suffered a few too many coincidences and knocked a Neanderthal unconscious.’

‘No puncture this time?’

‘Two, actually—at the same time.’

‘What was Kaine like?’

‘I don’t really know. He arrived at Volescamper’s as we were leaving—aren’t you even curious about the marksman?’

‘Yorrick Kaine is giving a talk tonight about the economical realities of a Welsh free-trade agreement—’

‘Landen,’ I said, ‘it’s my uncle’s party tonight. I promised Mum we’d be there.’

‘Yeah, I know.’

‘Are you going to ask me about the incident with SO-14 now?’

Landen sighed. ‘All right. What was it like?’

‘Don’t ask.’

My Uncle Mycroft had announced his retirement. At the age of seventy-seven, and following the events of the Prose Portal and Polly’s imprisonment in ‘I wandered lonely as a cloud’, they had both decided that enough was enough. The Goliath Corporation had been offering Mycroft not one but two blank cheques for him to resume work on a new Prose Portal, but Mycroft had steadfastly refused, maintaining that the Portal could not be replicated even if he had wanted it to be. We took my car up to Mum’s house and parked a little way up the road.

‘I never thought of Mycroft retiring,’ I said as we walked down the street.

‘Me neither,’ Landen agreed. ‘What do you suppose he’ll do?’

‘Watch Name That Fruit! most likely. He says that soaps and quiz shows are the ideal way to fade out.’

‘He’s not far wrong,’ added Landen. ‘After a few years of 65 Walrus Street, death might become something of a welcome distraction.’

We heaved open the garden gate and greeted the dodos, who all had a bright pink ribbon tied round their necks for the occasion. I offered them a few marshmallows and they pecked and plocked greedily at the proffered gifts.

‘Hello, Thursday!’ said the prematurely grey-haired man who answered the door.

‘Hello, Wilbur,’ I said. ‘How are you doing?’

Wilbur and Orville were Mycroft and Polly’s only sons and were remarkable for… well, you’ll see.

‘I’m very well,’ replied Wilbur, smiling benignly. ‘Hello, Landen—I read your latest book. It was a big improvement on the last one, I must say.’

‘You’re very kind,’ replied Landen drily.

‘I was promoted, you know.’

He paused to allow us to murmur a congratulatory sound before continuing:

‘Consolidated Useful Stuff always promote those within the company who show particular promise, and after ten years in pension fund management ConStuff felt I was ready to branch into something new and dynamic. I’m now Services Director at a subsidiary of theirs named MycroTech Developments.’

‘But my goodness, what a coincidence!’ said Landen. ‘Isn’t that Mycroft’s company?’

‘Coincidental,’ replied Wilbur stoically, ‘as you say. Mr Perkup—the CEO of MycroTech—told me it was solely due to my diligence; I—’

‘Thursday, darling!’ interrupted Gloria, Wilbur’s wife. Formerly a Volescamper, she had married Wilbur under the misapprehension that a) he would be coming into a fortune and b) he was as intelligent as his father. She had been wrong—in a spectacular fashion—on both counts.

‘Darling, you are looking simply divine—have you lost weight?’

‘I have no idea, Gloria, but… you’re looking different.’

And she was. Habitually dressed up to the nines in expensive clothes, hats, make-up and lashings of what-have-you, tonight she was attired in chinos and a shirt. She was wearing hardly any make-up and her hair, usually perfectly coiffured, was tied up in a ponytail with a black scrunchie.

‘What do you think?’ she asked, doing a twirl for us both.

‘What happened to the five-hundred-pound dresses?’ asked Landen. ‘Bailiffs been in?’

‘No, this is all the rage—and you should know, Thursday. The Female is promoting the Thursday Next look. This is very much “in” at present.’

‘Ridiculous,’ I told her ‘If Bonzo the Wonder Hound had rescued Jane Eyre, would you all be wearing a studded collar and smelling each other’s bottoms?’

‘There is no need to be offensive,’ replied Gloria haughtily as she looked me up and down. ‘You should be honoured. Mind you, the December issue of The Female thinks that a brown leather flyer’s jacket is more in keeping with “the look”. Your black leather is a little bit passe, I’m afraid. And those shoes—hell’s teeth!’

‘Wait a moment!’ I returned. ‘How can you tell me that I don’t have the Thursday Next look? I am Thursday Next!’

‘Fashions evolve, Thursday—I’ve heard that next month’s fashions will be marine invertebrates. You should enjoy it while you can.’

‘Marine invertebrates?’ echoed Landen. ‘What happened to that squid-like jumper of your mum’s? We could be sitting on a fortune!’

‘Can neither of you be serious?’ asked Gloria disdainfully. ‘If you’re not in you’re out, and where would you be then?’

‘Out, I guess,’ I replied. ‘Land, what do you think?’

‘Totally out, Thurs.’

We stared at her, half smiling, and she laughed. Gloria was a good sort once you broke down the barriers. Wilbur, seizing the chance to tell us more about his fascinating new job, carried on as soon as his wife stopped talking.

‘I’m now on twenty K plus car and a good pension package. I could take voluntary retirement at fifty-five and still draw two-thirds of my wage. What is the SpecOps retirement fund like?’

‘Crap, Wilbur—but you know that.’

A slightly smaller and more follicularly challenged version of Wilbur walked up

‘Hello, Thursday.’

‘Hello, Orville. How’s the ear?’

‘Just the same. What was that you were saying about retiring at fifty-five, Will?’

In all the excitement of pension plans I was forgotten. Charlotte, who was Orville’s wife, also had the ‘Thursday Next’ look, she and Gloria fell eagerly into untaxing conversation about whether leather shoes in ‘the look’ should be worn above or below the ankle, and whether a small amount of eyeliner was acceptable. As usual, Charlotte tended to agree with Gloria, in fact, she tended to agree with everybody about everything. She was as hospitable as the day was long, but it was important not to get caught in an elevator with her—she could agree you to death.

We left them to their conversation and I walked in through the living room door, deftly catching the wrist of my elder brother Joffy, who had been hoping to give me a resounding slap on the back of my head as was his thirty-five-year-old custom. I had seen him lurking and was prepared. I twisted his arm into a half nelson and had his face pressed against the door before he knew what had happened.