He moved towards the hatch.

‘Well, there’s no need to go in now, is there?’ asked Winnowner. Jack Duggat half-blocked Rory’s nonchalant advance.

‘I mean,’ said the old woman, ‘the point was to see if you could open the door, and that point’s been made.

There’s no need to go in.’

‘Well, no, I suppose,’ said Rory.

‘We had resolved to consult our Guide Emanual,’

Bill Groan said to Winnowner. The chequer has confirmed Elect Rory’s worthiness. Why would we not include him in our study?’

Winnowner dropped her voice and spoke very directly and intently to Bill Groan.

‘Our council,’ she hissed. ‘Our council, not anybody else’s! This is a matter for Beside, and the council of Beside, and the word of our Guide Emanual as it is expressed to our council, not to anyone else! I’m sure Elect Rory and his council would not wish any of us to go prying into his Incrypt if we were visiting his plantnation.’

‘What about a fresh eye, an alternative approach?’

Vesta suggested.

‘No!’ snapped Winnowner.

‘It’s not for you to say no,’ said Bill Groan.

‘Nor is it for you to say yes,’ replied Winnowner.

‘The council must vote on it. That is all there is to it.’

Bill Groan nodded. He glanced at Sol. ‘Can we get back into the hall?’

The hammering had died away. It seemed quieter in the assembly. Things had calmed down. Or things were waiting to pounce the moment the doors opened.

‘Jack and I will check,’ Sol replied.

‘Send everyone home except the council,’ said Bill.

‘Clear the assembly. We need to settle this and we need to get on. If this danger is as urgent as Vesta and Rory say…’

The two men unbolted the doors and went back into the hall. Rory heard a renewed round of raised voices.

He glanced at Vesta, worried. She smiled back reassuringly.

After a couple of minutes, Sol reappeared at the doors and beckoned them through. The assembly room had been emptied apart from the remaining council members. One of Jack Duggat’s labourers was closing up the outer doors. Nothing had been overturned, but many of the chairs and benches in the congregation section had been pushed aside or left in disarray. The meeting had not ended happily.

‘I had to bend the truth a little,’ Rory heard Jack Duggat mutter to Bill Groan. ‘I told them they had to return to their homes tonight because Guide needed the space. Deliberations had to be made. I told them it was Guide’s express desire.’

‘Guide will forgive you, Jack,’ Bill replied.

‘I said they’d have answers come Guide’s Bell,’ Jack added.

‘Then well have to find them by then,’ said Bill.

He gestured to Vesta, indicating she should take Rory to one side and be seated. There was drink and a little food set out on a sideboard. Rory hadn’t realised just how hungry he was. He took some kind of soup, and some spelt bread, and watched as the council sat in discussion. Vesta ate too, with gusto, her eyes not leaving the debating council members.

‘Oh,’ she said suddenly, and sadly.

‘What?’ asked Rory. Before she could answer, he saw that Bill Groan was coming over.

‘We’ve taken the vote,’ Bill said. ‘It’s gone against you. I’m sorry, Elect.’

‘OK,’ said Rory. ‘What happens now?’

‘The Council will withdraw to the Incrypt and start work,’ said Bill. ‘I suggest you two stay here for now.

Stay close by so we can talk, if we need to. Help yourself to more food. Rest a while.’

Bill walked back to the council members, who stood and followed him through the doors into the Incrypt.

Jack Duggat went with them, leaving Sol Farrow behind to keep an eye on them. Sol closed the back doors, and then shrugged at Vesta and Rory, acknowledging that he shared their helplessness. Then he ladled out a bowl of soup and went to sit by one of the firebuckets.

Rory sat while Vesta and Sol continued to eat. He listened to the crack and pop of the embers in the firebuckets. A soft but steady tapping on the panes of the assembly windows told him it was snowing hard again.

He realised that, despite the dangers and alarms of the day, waiting was perhaps the worst thing of all.

‘Can we leave this place now?’ Amy asked. ‘Because it pongs.’

‘Uh-huh,’ the Doctor nodded. She could tell he wasn’t really listening. He was too deep in thought.

She could almost see the cogs going around.

‘Shall we go out the way we came in?’ she asked, gesturing to the door that led back into the prep room.

‘Mm-hmm,’ he said. She still didn’t have his attention properly. He was just making sounds in response to her sounds, encouraging, nonspecific sounds that created the illusion of an actual conversation without him having to engage in one.

That worried Amy. When the Doctor got sidetracked and lost in thought, it meant that there was a lot at stake. There was clearly a big problem on Hereafter, a proper, serious life-and/or-death problem. She’d worked that much out for herself. But the Doctor seemed to be troubled because, on top of the problem, there was a mystery as well.

She knew the Doctor quite liked problems. It didn’t matter how big, or difficult, or scary, or intractable, or galaxy-crushing, or tal-king-like-this-in-a-ras-ping-mon-otone-ro-bot-voice-and-u-sing-words-like-ex-terminate a problem was, the Doctor relished them. He could confront them. He could take them on. He could solve them. He could usually say something quite pithy and off the cuff while solving them.

Mysteries, on the other hand, nagged. They festered and itched. They got him distracted and made him fidgety. A problem and a mystery at the same time was a body blow, because the Doctor could only get on with solving the problem once he’d explained the mystery.

The mystery here had various elements: the complexity and scale of the terraformer, the machinations of the surly and relentless Ice Warriors, and the seriously terrible weather. Amy thought that, if it was up to her, she might choose to add a complete and utter lack of Christmas to the list, but that seemed unfair. However, there were other elements. Something to do with this giant greenhouse stacked with tanks of rotting meat, for a start. She didn’t really get the significance of that, but it seemed to trouble the Doctor greatly. It didn’t seem to fit with the other things he was worried about. It was odd. It was inexplicable.

Still, a bad smell was a bad smell, and a bad smell would have come as a welcome and fragrant breath of fresh air compared to the honk in the gallery. They’d been obliged to stand around in that place, surrounded by those reeking vats, for far too long as it was.

‘Well go back out then?’ she prompted.

‘Mm-hmm.’

He wasn’t even looking at her. He was pacing up and down, his finger to his lips.

‘We’ll come back out through that prep room with all the suits, then?’ she asked. ‘Find something else to look at?’

‘Uh-huh.’

She turned to Bel and Samewell.

‘Come on,’ she said. ‘If we start walking, he’ll follow us.’

They started walking back along the row of vats towards the exit hatch. Sure enough, the Doctor followed them, though he was still so deeply submerged in thought it looked like he needed an idea snorkel.

They went out through the domed prep room with the Doctor tagging along behind.

‘Maybe well find a nice spot for a picnic?’ Amy called out over her shoulder.

‘Mm-hmm,’ the Doctor responded.

‘He’s not listening to us,’ Amy said to Samewell and Bel. ‘His mind’s gone walkabout. He’s going into thinky overdrive.’

‘Does he get like this often?’ asked Arabel.

‘Yeah,’ said Amy. ‘Check this out.’ Still walking, she called out over her shoulder, ‘I see the walruses are very big this season.’

‘Mmmmm.’

‘They’re flowering very early.’

‘Mm-hmmm.’