Immortal.
I’d refused to believe what Gideon said at first, because it was so absurd, and my life seemed about to collapse under the sheer weight of all these complications anyway. My mind just wouldn’t face facts.
But deep inside, I’d known that Gideon was right as soon as he said it: Lord Alastair’s sword had killed me. I had felt the pain and watched what little life was left in me simply drain away. I had drawn my last breath—and here I was, alive and well.
The subject of immortality had kept us talking all the rest of the evening. After the first shock, there was no stopping Lesley and Xemerius, in particular.
“Does that mean she’ll never get any wrinkles?”
“Suppose an eight-ton concrete block falls on you, would you have to live forever squashed as flat as a postage stamp?”
“Maybe you’re not really immortal, you just have nine lives, like a cat.”
“If someone put out one of her eyes, would it grow back?”
Gideon didn’t know the answers to any of these questions, but that didn’t bother anyone much. We’d probably have gone on all night if Mum hadn’t come in and sent Lesley and Gideon home. She was firm about it. “Don’t forget, you were still sick only yesterday, Gwyneth,” she told me. “I want you to get a good night’s sleep.”
A good night’s sleep—as if I could think of sleeping after a day like this! And there was still so much to discuss!
I went downstairs with Gideon and Lesley to say good night at the front door. Lesley, like the good friend she is, took the hint at once and went a little way ahead, looking as if she was making an urgent phone call. (I heard her telling her dog, “Hi, Bertie, I’m on my way home.”) Xemerius wasn’t so considerate. He dangled upside down from the roof of the porch, chanting, “Necking in the porch, fit to make it scorch. If things get too hot, I shall laugh a lot.”
Finally, and reluctantly, I’d said good night to Gideon and gone back to my room, firmly intending to spend all night thinking, phoning, and making plans. But I thought I’d just lie down on my bed for a few minutes first, and then I fell fast asleep. It must have been the same with the others. When I woke in the morning, I didn’t see a single missed call on the display of my mobile.
I looked accusingly at Xemerius, who had curled up at the end of my bed and was now stretching and yawning. “You might have woken me!”
“Am I your alarm clock, O immortal mistress?”
“I thought ghosts—I mean demons—didn’t need any sleep.”
“Maybe we don’t need it,” said Xemerius, “but after such a hearty supper, I felt I could do with a little nap.” He wrinkled up his nose. “Like you could do with a shower right now.”
He was right. All the others were asleep (it was Saturday, after all), so I could spend ages in the bathroom, using vast amounts of shampoo, shower gel, toothpaste, body lotion, and Mum’s antiwrinkle cream.
“Let me guess,” said Xemerius dryly later, when I came out and beamed at my own reflection in the mirror as I got dressed. “Life is wonderful, wonderful, wonderful, and you feel reborn—ha, ha, ha!”
“That’s right. You know, all of a sudden, I seem to be seeing life through entirely new eyes—”
Xemerius snorted. “Maybe you think you’ve seen a great light, but it’s really just hormones. One day up in the clouds, the next day down in the dumps,” he said. “Girls! And this will go on for the next twenty or thirty years. Then, next thing we know, it’ll be all that change-of-life stuff. Or come to think of it, maybe not with you. An immortal with a midlife crisis somehow doesn’t sound right.”
I gave him a forgiving smile. “You know, my little grouch, you’re really—” But the ring tone of my mobile interrupted me. It was Lesley, wanting to know when we were going to meet to stick the Martian costumes for Cynthia’s party together.
Party! How could she think of a thing like that now? “Listen, Lesley, I’ve been thinking I may not go at all. So much has happened, and—”
“You must come. And you will.” Lesley obviously wasn’t taking no for an answer. “Because I organized company for us yesterday, and it would be very embarrassing if I had to call that off.”
I groaned. “Not your silly cousin again, and his friend who’s always farting, Lesley?” For a frightful moment, I imagined a green garbage sack slowly inflating itself. “You promised, after last time, that you’d never do that again. I hope I don’t have to remind you of those chocolate marshmallows that—”
“How stupid do you think I am? I never make the same mistake twice, you know I don’t!” Lesley paused for a moment, and then went on, apparently unruffled. “On the way to the bus stop yesterday, I told Gideon about the party. He positively insisted on coming with us.” Another little pause. “And his little brother too. So you can’t wriggle out of it now.”
“Lesley!” I could imagine exactly how that conversation had gone. Lesley was a brilliant manipulator. Gideon probably didn’t even know what had hit him.
“You can thank me later,” said Lesley, giggling. “Now we just have to think how to fix our costumes. I’ve already stuck feelers into a green kitchen sieve—that’ll look good as a hat for a Martian. You can have it if you like.”
I groaned. “Oh, my God! Are you really asking me to go on my first official date with Gideon in a garbage sack with a kitchen sieve on my head?”
Lesley hesitated, but only for a moment. “It’s art! And witty. And it won’t cost us anything,” she explained. “Anyway, he’s so crazy about you, he won’t mind at all.”
I could see I’d have to try a little more subtlety here. “Okay,” I said, pretending to be resigned to my plastic fate. “If you absolutely insist, we’ll go as Martian garbage men. You’re so cool! And I’m a little envious of you, because you couldn’t care less whether Raphael thinks girls with feelers and sieves on their heads are sexy. And you don’t mind whether you crackle while you’re dancing and you’ll feel like … well, like a garbage sack. Or give off a faintly chemical smell … while Charlotte sweeps past us in her elf costume making snide remarks.”
Lesley didn’t reply for all of three seconds. Then she said slowly, “No, I don’t care in the least about any of that—”
“I know. Otherwise I’d have suggested letting Madame Rossini dress us. She said she’d lend us anything she has that’s green. The kind of dresses that Grace Kelly and Audrey Hepburn wear in films. Charleston dance dresses from the golden twenties. Or ball gowns from—”
“Okay, okay,” Lesley interrupted me impatiently. “You hooked me when you said ‘Grace Kelly.’ So let’s forget the stupid garbage sacks. Do you think your Madame Rossini is awake yet?”
* * *
“HOW DO I LOOK?” Mum pirouetted on her own axis. Since Mrs. Jenkins, the secretary at the Guardians’ Lodge, had phoned this morning asking her to come with me when I went to the Temple to elapse, she’d changed three times already.
“Great,” I said, without really looking. The limousine would be coming around the corner at any moment. Would Gideon be in it to collect me? Or would he be waiting for me at the Guardians’ headquarters? Yesterday evening had ended far too suddenly. There was still so much we had to say to each other.
“If I may say so, I thought the blue outfit was better,” remarked Mr. Bernard, who was dusting the picture frames in the hall with a huge feather duster.
Mum ran straight upstairs again, calling back, “You’re right, Mr. Bernard! This one looks much too formal. Too elegant for a Saturday afternoon. Goodness knows what he’d think. As if I’d prettified myself specially for him.”
I gave Mr. Bernard a reproachful smile. “Did you have to say that?”
“She did ask.” His brown eyes behind the owl-like glasses twinkled at me, but then he looked through the window in the front hall. “Ah, here comes the limousine. Shall I tell the driver he’ll have to wait a little while? She’s not going to find the right shoes to go with the blue outfit in a hurry.”
“I’ll do it.” I put my bag over my shoulder. “See you later, Mr. Bernard. And please keep an eye on You Know Who.”
“Of course, Miss Gwyneth. You Know Who won’t get anywhere near you know what.” With a smile that you would hardly have noticed, he went back to his dusting.
No Gideon in the limousine. Instead it was Mr. Marley, who had already opened the door of the car as I came out of the house. His moonface looked as disapproving as it ever had during the last few days. Maybe even more disapproving. And he said nothing at all in reply to my exuberant, “Isn’t this a wonderful spring day?”
“Where’s Mrs. Grace Shepherd?” he asked instead. “I have orders to deliver her to the Temple at once.”
“Sounds like you were going to bring her up before the magistrates,” I said. If I’d known how close this flippant remark was to the facts, I wouldn’t have felt half as cheerful as I did when I settled into the back seat of the car.
Once Mum was finally ready, the drive to the Temple was quite fast for London conditions. We got stuck in only three traffic jams, it took us fifty minutes, and once again, I wondered why we couldn’t simply take the Tube.
Mr. George met us at the entrance to the Guardians’ headquarters. I thought he was looking more serious than usual, and his smile somehow seemed forced. “Gwyneth, Mr. Marley will take you downstairs to elapse. Grace, you’re expected in the Dragon Hall.”
I looked inquiringly at Mum. “What do they want to see you for?”
Mum shrugged her shoulders, but she suddenly looked tense.
Mr. Marley brought out the black silk scarf. “Come along, Miss Shepherd,” he said. He took my elbow, but let go of it again at once when he saw the look in my eyes. Lips tight, ears bright red, he growled, “Follow me. We have a very tight schedule today. I’ve already set the chronograph.”
I gave Mum an encouraging smile and then stumbled down the corridor after Mr. Marley. He was setting a fast pace, and as usual, he was muttering to himself. He’d have run straight into Gideon around the next corner if Gideon hadn’t stepped aside in time.
“Morning, Marley,” he said casually, as Mr. Marley, a good deal too late, did a little jump. So did my heart, particularly as the sight of me made a smile about as wide as the eastern delta of the Ganges (at least!) spread over Gideon’s face. “Hi, Gwenny, did you sleep well?” he asked affectionately.
“What are you doing up here?” snapped Mr. Marley. “You’re supposed to have been with Madame Rossini ages ago, getting into costume. We really do have a very tight schedule today, and Operation Black Tourmaline forward slash Sapph—”
“You just go on ahead, Marley,” Gideon told him in friendly tones. “Gwenny and I will catch up with you in a couple of minutes. And after that, I can get into costume quickly. That’s no problem.”