How was I to tell him that I was hesitating mostly because I wanted so badly to do it myself? Half the way I hurt was because I wanted to use Babylon. You are not supposed to use a deep secret if you think you are only doing it because you want to. And the thought of using it and getting it wrong was unbearable, almost as bad as the thought that I might be doing wrong because I wanted Maree so much. I took some of my feelings out by shouting at Stan. “Intended! Then why have they gone through all this trouble if it was what they Intended anyway? Why bring me into it at all?”
“You know they can’t work directly,” Stan said reproachfully. “It’s not allowed. You can have my verse when you want it. It won’t be the same as yours.”
“I hope you realise just what you’re asking, both of you!” I said. I think my voice cracked like Nick’s. “You’re asking me to do a risky major working, a working that can kill, in a place where I’ve got another major working already set up, and a wounded centaur to hide from two murderers, one of whom keeps tampering with the node. And the node’s so strong that, even with Will to help, I’m not sure I can do all the rest and keep the road open and look after Maree on the way—”
“I’ll look after Maree,” Nick put in. “I’m the one doing that.”
“…and then there’s Andrew as well as everything else!” I finished. “Yes, I think you’ll have to, Nick. I can’t do it all!”
“You’re forgetting what I always used to tell you, Rupert,” Stan said. “Take things one by one, as they come. There’s no need to load yourself with the lot. You just get your knickers in a twist.”
“I’ll do everything I can to help,” Nick said. “Anything. I promise.”
“All right,” I said. “All right.” I sat back, feeling a clean blast of relief. “As soon as we get loose from this bloody bus shelter then.”
We waited. It was not really long. Once anything is growing, it doubles in size steadily. The metal rails had taken on the segmented look of bamboos and were spreading, gracefully, out and up, carrying the fluted, leaf-like plastic canopy with them. This had turned darker and buds in it were thrusting long, half transparent fronds up. We could hear them rattle in the slight wind. The shelter was quite quickly taking on the aspect of an arcade of interlaced trees. My hands shook on the steering wheel while I waited for it to finish growing. Nick truly did not know what he was asking, of himself or me. But Stan did. The fact that I had wanted Stan to ask it only made me all the more nervous.
“About ready to go?” Stan suggested at length.
I turned on my headlights again and restarted the engine. The shelter was suddenly green, and not only green overhead. Spear-shaped green plastic leaves were actually beginning to sprout from the joints in the rails, translucent in the headlights. The whole growth rustled and creaked and swayed as the car crawled along inside it. I was rather impressed. The whole thing was so graceful that I felt quite regretful, when we came sliding out through the end of it with long shining leaves brushing the windows, because I then had to turn and suggest to the shelter that it went back to its former shape. I had to suggest with precision and concentration in order to leave Maree out of this part.
“Pity,” Stan remarked as the
green foliage began to wilt. “I’d love to have seen their faces when they found it.”
“Are you going to do the working now?” Nick asked.
“In the hotel, in my room,” I promised him. “I need to talk to Will first.”
I drove to the hotel as fast as the one-way system would let me. My poor car rattled and seemed to limp a little, with a clank underneath in the chassis somewhere. As we rattled into the market street, Nick said, “They keep a wheelchair behind the reception desk. Shall I get it?”
We stopped outside the main entrance for Nick to do that. His door would not open. I had to do a small working to spring the lock, and after that the door would not shut. We limped into the staff car park with the offside door swinging and stopped beside Will’s pseudo Land Rover. I was heartily glad to see it there. I needed Will. I could not even express to Stan how much. I sent off a strong call to Will to meet me by the lifts and then set about forcing the other doors open.
“You need my verse?” Stan asked.
“Please,” I said, with one foot up on the driver’s door. It took a severe kick to open it.
“Here it is then,” Stan said. His creacking voice recited:
“How do I go to Babylon?
Outside of here and there.
Am I crossing a bridge or climbing a hill?
Yes, both before you’re there.
If you follow outside of day and night
You can be there by candle-light.
“There,” he said. “Does that make any sense with what you’ve got?”
“Quite a lot,” I said. “My verse suggests it’s like that too, but mine’s got a warning in it as well. I’m hoping Will’s verse is going to be the missing link.”
I had just wrenched the rear door open (bent, dented and scratched) when Nick arrived with the wheelchair. Together we manoeuvred Maree out of the back seat and sat her in it. I could tell that my accidental working was still operating on her. She seemed heavier than she had been. She sat slumped in the chair, looking very small, waving her hands and muttering. I made Nick walk ahead in case she fell out, waved to Stan, and wheeled her cautiously and carefully into the hotel.
As soon as we were under the lights and among the ubiquitous mirrors, I saw what a weird trio we made. Nick was covered with golden dust, hair and all, with streaks of it on his face, and he had a ragged, slightly bloody hole in both knees of his jeans. I was not much better, and I was charred into the bargain. My good suede jacket was black and crisp in front. Holes had been burnt randomly in my trouser-legs. The front locks of my hair had frizzled off short and my face was red and blistered, except for the white rings where my glasses had kept the heat off. As for Maree, she was like a mad little dowager over whom someone had emptied a bag of flour.