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The collected agents instantly started chattering. We hadn’t had anything like this for years, which made it seem even more stupid that Bradshaw wasn’t including me on the assignment. I caught up with him as he sat at his desk.
“What’s going on?” I asked. “You need me on this.”
“Hello, my dear! Not like you to nearly miss a session—problems in the Outland?”
“I was up at Goliath.”
He raised an eyebrow. “How do things look?”
I explained at length what I had seen, ending with the observation that it wasn’t likely they’d perfect a transfictional machine anytime soon, if at all—but we needed to keep our eyes on them.
Bradshaw nodded sagely, and I reiterated my feeling that I was being somehow “left out” of the Holmes inquiry.
“How’s Friday? Still a bed slug?”
“Yes—but nothing I can’t handle.”
“Have you told Landen about us yet?”
“I’m building up to it. Bradshaw, you’re flanneling—why aren’t I on the Holmes case?”
He gestured for me to sit and lowered his voice. “I had a call from Senator Jobsworth this morning. He’s keen to reinstate a certain cadet that we recently…had to let go.”
I knew the cadet he was referring to. There was a sound reason for her rejection—she’d been euphemistically entitled “unsuitable.” Not in the way that my nice-but-a-bit-dopey cadet was unsuitable, but unsuitable as in obnoxious. She’d gone through five tutors in as many days. Even Emperor Zhark said that he’d preferred to be eaten alive by the Snurgg of Epsilon-7 than spend another five minutes in her company.
“Why has Jobsworth requested her? There are at least ten we rejected that are six times better.”
“Because we’re light on agents in contemporary fiction, and the CofG thinks she checks all the genre boxes.”
“He’s wrong, of course,” I said quite matter-of-factly, but people like Jobsworth are politicians and have a different set of rules. “I can see his point, though. The question is, what are you going to do about it? She’s exhausted all the agents licensed to take apprentices.”
Bradshaw said nothing and stared at me. In an instant I understood.
“Oh, no,” I said, “not me. Not in a thousand years. Besides, I’ve already got a cadet on assessment.”
“Then get rid of her. You told me yourself that her timidity would get her killed.”
“It will—but I feel kind of responsible. Besides, I’ve already got a full caseload. The Mrs. Danvers that went berserk in The God of Small Things still needs investigating, the Minotaur tried to kill me—not to mention about thirty or so cold cases, some of which are potentially solvable—especially the Drood case. I think it’s possible Dickens was…murdered.”
“In the Outland? And for what reason?”
“To silence Edwin Drood—or someone else in the book.”
I wasn’t sure about this, of course, and any evidence was already over a hundred years old, but I would do anything not to get stuck with this apprentice. Sadly, Bradshaw wasn’t taking no for an answer or softening to my pleas.
“Don’t make me order you, old girl. It will embarrass us both. Besides, if you fail her—as I’m sure you shall—then we really have run out of tutors, and I can tell Jobsworth we did everything in our power.”
I groaned. “How about I take her next week? That way I can come to grips with the Holmes death thing.”
“Senator Jobsworth was most insistent,” added Bradshaw. “He’s been on the footnoterphone three times this morning already.”
I knew what he meant. When Jobsworth got his teeth into something, he rarely let go. The relationship between us was decidedly chilly, and we were at best only cordial. The crazy thing was, we both wanted the best for the BookWorld—we just had different methods of trying to achieve it.
“Very well,” I said finally. “I’ll give her a day—or a morning, if she lasts that.”
“Good lass!” exclaimed Bradshaw happily. “Appreciate a woman who knows when she’s being coerced. I’ll get her to meet you outside Norland.”
“Is that all?” I asked somewhat crossly.
