The City of Dreaming Books (14 page)

The muffled figure blew a disgusting raspberry.

‘And who are you to insult me like that?’ he growled back.

‘I’m Optimus Yarnspinner,’ I replied proudly.

‘Yarnspinner, eh?’ he muttered. He produced a pad and pencil from his cloak and jotted something down. ‘You haven’t published anything yet or I’d know it - I keep a close check on contemporary Zamonian literature - but coming from Lindworm Castle you’re bound to sooner or later. You goddamned lizards can’t hold your ink.’

I walked off. What had possessed me to bandy words with such scum!

‘I’m Laptantidel Latuda!’ he called after me. ‘No need to make a note of my name, you’ll be hearing from me in due course!’
⁴

Two Bookhunters were standing in a gloomy doorway, loudly haggling over some black market wares. Poison Alley was a dead end, of course, so I had to turn and walk all the way back past those ramshackle buildings and that muckraker, who bleated with laughter as I went by. I shook myself like a wet dog when I finally left him and his rat’s nest behind.

I traversed the compositors’ quarter, where the buildings were faced with worn-out lead type, and walked along
Editorial Lane
, which rang with the groans and curses of the copy-editors at work there, many of whom were clearly being driven to despair by lapses of style and punctuation. From one first-floor window issued a bellow of rage followed by a stack of handwritten sheets, which came fluttering down on my head.

I left the tourist quarter behind at last and proceeded ever deeper into the heart of Bookholm. According to Regenschein’s book, this was where the oldest antiquarian bookshops were situated. Half-timbered and steeply gabled, the ancient buildings resembled elderly sorcerers huddled together for mutual support as they gazed down at me through their dark window embrasures.

Picturesque though the neighbourhood was, very few tourists frequented it. There were no street traders or loudly declaiming poets, no Live Newspapers or vendors of melted cheese, just age-old buildings whose windows were coated on the inside with soot to keep out harmful rays of sunlight. Shop signs were few and far between, so I could only guess which the bookshops were. Antiquarianism of the highest order was carried on here. Seated behind those blackened window-panes, for all I knew, might be wealthy collectors and celebrated dealers engaged in negotiating the sale of books worth as much as a whole row of houses. In this part of Bookholm one instinctively walked on tiptoe.

It wasn’t midday yet and Pfistomel Smyke’s establishment would still be shut, so I paused at an intersection and debated whether to kill time in some bookshop or other. On the door of one establishment, which had some gruesome faces carved on the half-timbering above its blackened window, I noticed the Triadic Circle I had first seen displayed on the door of Kibitzer’s shop. The minuscule sign below it read:

Wow! An Ugglian bookshop, probably run by a genuine Uggly! It had been a long-standing childhood wish of mine to encounter a real live Uggly. The creatures abounded in the children’s books and old fairy tales Dancelot had read me at bedtime - and, of course, in my subsequent nightmares. I now had an opportunity to see one in the flesh and was old enough not to run off screaming at the sight, so why wait? With a pleasurable shudder, I turned the door handle.

My presence was announced by the metallic screech of hinges left unoiled for an eternity. The interior of the shop was dimly illuminated by one or two little oil lamps. The book dust stirred up by my abrupt entrance danced round me and infiltrated my nostrils. I sneezed despite myself.

A tall, thin figure attired in black shot up from behind a stack of books like a jack-in-the-box. ‘What do you want?’ it shrieked.

‘Er, I don’t want anything in particular,’ I said haltingly. ‘I’d simply like to browse a bit.’

‘You’d simply like to browse a bit?’ the Uggly repeated as loudly as before.

‘Er, yes. May I?’

The gaunt creature tottered towards me, nervously interlacing her spindly fingers.

‘This is a specialised antiquarian bookshop,’ she croaked malevolently. ‘I doubt if you’ll find what you’re looking for.’

‘Really?’ I retorted. ‘What do you specialise in?’

‘Ugglian literature!’ the hideous bookseller crowed triumphantly, as if those words alone would drive me out of the shop.

Looking deliberately unimpressed, I scanned the backs of the books nearest me. Soothsayers’ prophecies, wart-curers’ incantations, maledictions - nothing suitable for an enlightened Lindworm like me. I really wanted nothing more to do with this psychic scarecrow, but her unfriendly manner had provoked me. Instead of leaving the shop at once I lingered there and made my way along the shelves.

‘Oh, Ugglian literature!’ I crooned. ‘How exciting! I’m passionately interested in predictions based on toads’ entrails. I must root around in your treasures a while longer.’

I had resolved to teach the old crone some manners. From now on I would treat her with breathtaking condescension. I removed one of the books from a bookcase.

‘Hm, Looba Gordag’s
How to Foretell the Future by Interpreting Nightmares.
That’s my kind of book!’

‘Kindly replace it on the shelf. It’s reserved.’

‘For whom?’ I asked sharply.

‘For, er . . . I don’t know the customer’s name.’

‘Then it could, purely in theory, be reserved for me. You don’t know my name either.’

The Uggly wrung her spindly fingers in despair. I flung the book at the bookcase. It sailed past and landed on the floor, losing its back in the process.

‘Whoops!’ I said.

With a groan, the Uggly bent down to retrieve the book.

‘What’s this?’ I exclaimed in delight, pointing to a big fat tome. ‘Ah, a collection of Ornian curses!’

I leafed through the valuable book, clumsily dog-earing a couple of pages, and proceeded to read from it in a loud, resonant voice. At the same time I waved my free hand portentously in the Uggly’s direction.

The Uggly shielded her face with one arm and ducked down behind the counter. ‘Stop that!’ she screeched. ‘Those curses are most effective!’

What a hoot! She actually believed in this stupid mumbo-jumbo! I tossed the book aside. It landed in an old wooden box, sending up a cloud of the finest book dust. An idea occurred to me.

Slowly turning to the Uggly, I levelled my forefinger at her in an inquisitorial manner and spread my leather wings a trifle. This made my cloak bulge in the shoulder region.

‘I have another question,’ I said.

This was an old Lindworm trick. My wings - they’re just a bequest from some pterodactylic member of my ancestral line - are incapable of flight but admirably suited to spreading. It always amuses one to observe the intimidating effect this has on the unwary. Producing Dancelot’s manuscript from my cloak, I held it under the Uggly’s nose - near enough for her to read the text.

‘Do you by any chance know the author of these lines?’ I asked sharply.

The Uggly’s face froze. She stared at the manuscript as though hypnotised, uttering a series of squeaks, then staggered backwards, bumped into a bookcase and clung to it like someone in the throes of a heart attack. Her violent reaction surprised me.

‘You
do
know the author, don’t you?’ I said. There was no other explanation for her behaviour.

‘No, I don’t,’ the Uggly croaked. ‘Leave my premises at once!’

‘I simply must find out who wrote this,’ I insisted. ‘Please help me!’

The Uggly took a step forward and struck a pose. Narrowing her eyes to slits, she spoke in a dramatic whisper: ‘
He will descend into the depths! He will be banished to the realm of the Animatomes, the Living Books! He will consort with Him whom everyone knows but knows not who He is
!’

I was aware that Ugglies employed such cryptic utterances to impress potential customers. They didn’t work with me.

‘Was that a threat or an Ugglian prophecy?’

‘It will come true unless that manuscript is destroyed at once, more I cannot say. And now get out of my shop!’

‘But you obviously know who—’ I persisted.

‘Get out!’ screeched the Uggly. ‘Get out or I’ll summon the Book Police!’ She dived behind the counter and grabbed a cord connected to a large bell suspended from the ceiling.

‘Out!’ she snarled again.

There was nothing for it. I turned to go.

‘One more thing,’ I said.

‘Leave!’ the Uggly gasped. ‘Just go!’

‘What’s the significance of that peculiar sign on your door?’

‘I don’t know,’ the Uggly replied. ‘Goodbye for ever. Never dare to set foot in this shop again.’

‘I thought Ugglies were omniscient, but you know surprisingly little,’ was my parting shot. Opening the door provocatively slowly, I sauntered out to a squeal of hinges.

Slightly dazed, I stood there in the sunlight and listened to the sounds emanating from the bookshop. The Uggly was swearing unintelligibly to herself and fiddling with a bunch of keys. A lock clicked behind me for the second time in a few hours.

Great! I was getting nowhere fast. I hadn’t been two days in Bookholm and already two booksellers had given me my marching orders.

S
eventy-seven, seventy-eight . . .
I was familiar with the antiquated numerals peculiar to Bookemistic numerology, as luck would have it, or I would have been unable to decipher the house numbers. Darkman Street was the oldest thoroughfare in Bookholm. The buildings here were so old and dilapidated that they had half subsided below ground level and their crooked roofs resembled alchemists’ hats that had slipped sideways. Thistles were sprouting from their walls and birds nesting in the grass that thickly carpeted their shingled roofs. The eaves of these decrepit old buildings almost met overhead, they canted forward at such an angle. Indeed, they seemed to be pressing ever closer for the purpose of appraising me, their uninvited guest. Although it was noon and the sun was shining, I had made my way through the narrow streets almost entirely in shadow. I had a sneaking sensation that the houses formed a single building into which I’d stolen like a thief. There was no sound save the hum of insects and the squalling of cats. The cobblestones had cracked open in numerous places, forced apart by weeds, and I occasionally saw emaciated rats flit across the street. Did anyone live here? It was hardly surprising the streets received no normal visitors. I felt as if I had walked through an invisible gate into another age hundreds or even thousands of years in the past, a long forgotten epoch when decay reigned supreme.