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He seemed happier at this. “Okeydokey. Whereabouts in Longfellow were you wanting to go?”
“‘The Wreck of the Hesperus.’”
He turned around to stare at me. “Hesperus? You’re one whole heap of trouble, lady. I’ll drop you off at ‘A Psalm of Life,’ and you can walk from there.”
I glared at him. “An original Hoppity Hop was it? Boxed?”
He sighed. It was a good deal, and he knew it.
“Okay,” he said at last. “Hesperus it is.”
We moved slowly past a small steam launch that was shooting some rapids on the Ulanga, and the cabbie spoke again. “So what’s your story?”
“I was replaced by my written other self, who is rubber-stamping the CofG’s most harebrained schemes with the woeful compliance of our prime minister back home. You’ve heard about Pride and Prejudice being serialized as a reality book show called The Bennets? That’s what I’m trying to stop. You got a name?”
“Colin.”
We fell silent for a moment as we followed the Ulanga down-river to where it joined the Bora and then into the lake, where the gunboat Königin Luise lay at anchor. I busied myself reloading my pistol and checking the last two eraserheads. I even took the pistol’s holster and clipped it to my belt. I didn’t like these things, but I was going to be prepared. Mind you, if they decided to send in the clones, I’d be in serious shit. There were seven thousand Danvers and only one of me. I’d have to erase over three thousand per cartridge, and I didn’t think they’d all gather themselves in a convenient heap for me. I pulled out my cell phone and stared at it. We were in full signal, but they’d have a trace on me for sure.
“Use mine,” said Colin, who’d been watching me. He passed his footnoterphone back to me, and I called Bradshaw.
“Commander? It’s Thursday.” 4
“I’m in a taxi heading toward Moby-Dick via The Old Man and the Sea.” 5
“Apparently not. How are things?” 6
“No; I’ve got to destroy something in Hesperus that will hopefully raise the Outlander ReadRates. As soon as I’m done there, I’ll go straight to Jobsworth.” 7
I looked out of the window. We were over the sea once again, but this time the weather was brighter. Two small whaling boats, each with five men at the oars, were pulling toward a disturbance in the water, and as I watched, a mighty, gray-white bulk erupted from beneath the green water and shattered one of the small boats, pitching the hapless occupants into the sea.
“I’m just coming out the far end of Moby-Dick. Do you have anything for me at all?” 8
I closed the phone and handed it back. If Bradshaw was short on ideas, the situation was more hopeless than I had imagined. We crossed from Maritime to Poetry by way of The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, and after hiding momentarily in the waste of wild dunes, marram and sand of “False Dawn” while a foot patrol of Danvers moved past, we were off again and turned into Longfellow by way of “The Light house.”
“Hold up a moment,” I said to Colin, and we pulled up beneath a rocky ledge on a limestone spur that led out in the deep purple of the twilight to a light house, its beam a sudden radiance of light that swept around the bay.
“This isn’t a wait-and-return job, is it?” he asked nervously.
“I’m afraid it is. How close can you get me to the actual wrecking of the Hesperus?”
He sucked in air through his teeth and scratched his nose. “During the gale itself, not close at all. The reef of Norman’s Woe during the storm is not somewhere you’d like to be. Forget the wind and the rain—it’s the cold.”
I knew what he meant. Poetry was an emotional roller coaster of a form that could heighten the senses almost beyond straining. The sun was always brighter, the skies bluer, and forests steamed six times as much after a summer shower and felt twelve times earthier. Love was ten times stronger, and happiness, hope and charity rose to a level that made your head spin with giddy well-being. On the other side of the coin, it also made the darker side of existence twenty times worse—tragedy and despair were bleaker, more malevolent. As the saying goes, “They don’t do nuffing by half measures down at Poetry.”
“So how close?” I asked.
“Daybreak, three verses from the end.”
“Okay,” I said, “let’s do it.”
He released the handbrake and motored slowly forward. The light moved from twilight to dawn as we entered “The Wreck of the Hesperus.” The sky was still leaden, and a stiff wind scoured the foreshore, even though the worst of the storm had passed. The taxi drew to a halt on the sea beach, and I opened the door and stepped out. I suddenly felt a feeling of strong loss and despair, but knowing full well that these were simply emotions seeping out of the overcharged fabric of the poem, I attempted to give it no heed. Colin got out as well, and we exchanged nervous looks. The sea beach was littered with the wreckage of the Hesperus, reduced to little more than matchwood by the gale. I pulled my jacket collar close against the wind and trudged up the shoreline.
“What are we looking for?” asked Colin, who had joined me.
“Remains of a yellow tour bus,” I said, “or a tasteless blue jacket with large checks.”
“Nothing too specific, then?”
