It was the afternoon of the party and Hardacre
had managed more than an hour in the garden. During that time he had weeded a
flower bed and raked some debris from the front lawn. The front path surroundings now looked
acceptable, and he was briefly very pleased with his exertions. However, he was
distressed to find that, even at that moment, his thoughts turned back to Viola
and her explorations. He had been
convinced from the beginning that she was behaving foolishly and this made him
worry more and more as the days wore on.
Hardacre had, of
course, been invited to Kathleen’s and Tom’s betrothal party but had politely
declined. He had written a long letter, however, sending his best wishes and
expressing his (genuine) pleasure at the happy event. He had not considered it rude to decline the
invitation– in his mind the opposite would have been true, accepting the
invitation would have been ungracious and acting far above his station. In
addition, of course, he hadn’t forgotten his ‘work-to-rule’. He had no desire
to be among a gaggle of witches all of whom could probably find innumerable new
things for him to do.
After the garden he
returned to the kitchen table to study his notes about Macrocephalos, the naga
and other related matters. He hoped that somehow this might put his mind at
rest, or provide some more clues as what it would be sensible to do next. He
had a mutton and vegetable casserole on the hob and stirred it every now and
then with a big wooden spoon. The smell was wonderful, and assuming that Mr
Ismay didn’t reappear suddenly, he would be able to make it last several days.
On a big sheet of
paper he had drawn nine circles, each labelled with a thick ‘N’. Above each one
of the circles he had written a number – all of the prime numbers from thirteen
to eighty-three (given his affiliations he was not at all surprised to find the
nature of the first enneic prime). He
knew from what the Kinspit naga had said that she was guarding a prime, but he
had no idea which number it was, and, in any case, he had no way of knowing
whether the identity of particular numbers was relevant. The only other thing
that he knew was that Viola and her team were heading towards Klethropolis,
where she expected to find another naga, which would also, presumably, be
guarding another prime. He really knew that he had to show all of his findings
to Mr Ismay as soon as possible, but he was torn between two sacred duties – to
his master and to his friend. While Mr Ismay was away this wasn’t a large
problem, but as soon as he returned then he would feel obliged to tell him and
that thought was causing him some pain.
He hated to let anyone down.
Hardacre had heard
nothing from Viola for three days, not since he had written to her advising her
to give up her quest. He could guess how well that letter had been received and
he hoped that the only reason she hadn’t written was because she had not worked
out how to respond. There was a deep part of him, the part of himself that he
couldn’t really admit to existing, which wanted to blink to where Viola was and
try to help her in any way that he could. But all his training and the dictates
of common sense would not allow this. It simply wasn’t done to rush off without
permission, and, in any case, he had no trace to teleport to. He did the only
thing that he could do, which was to write Viola another letter, pointing out
that unless he heard from her soon that he would have to tell Mr Ismay
everything. After that, all he could do
now was wait and hope for the best.
He ladled out a
portion of the casserole into a bowl and placed it by his notes. He sat down
and read through the notes slowly, dipping his fork into the bowl every now and
then and eating at the same slow speed. This year really was turning out to be
rather trying,
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