adventures

when at rest. Then I stopped. 'Let him in, Joseph.'
I found my glasses on the sideboard, and, in one of those little gestures that only people who
think that they're mistresses of their own narrative make, snapped them clean in two and dropped
them into a vase.
Doran looked worried. He was dressed in the most profoundly adult way, in a casual suit which
looked so ridiculous on him that I couldn't help but smile. He carried my book. 'I finished it, Professor,'
he said. 'And I found that it had many interesting things to say about –'
'I don't think you're Cute,' I said.
'Oh,' he said.
'Not the definitive article, anyway. Do you remember much of what happened to us in pantoland?'
Most of us did, but as a dream, with strange conflicts and bits missed out.
'No.' He took a seat near me and looked at me with anxious eyes. 'Well, actually yes. I'm not
like that, you know.'
I went and sat by his knees and looked up at him over my shoulder. He got the idea after a
moment and sank down to sit beside me, looking more worried than ever. 'So I take it you don't
make good speeches? That you don't express love in an extraordinarily pure and refreshing
fashion? That you don't think I'm young?'
'I do think you're young,' he whispered, with a nervy depth to his voice that made me smile a
softer smile. 'That's why I like you so much. I don't think you're ever going to get old.'
We watched the leaves for a while, and I idly found his hand with mine once more. We were,
after all, fellow survivors in need of comfort. Aren't we all? 'Oh yes I am,' I told him.
'Oh no you're not,' he said.
That went on for quite a while. And at some point during that conversation I found that I'd
started to believe my student's theory. I opened the book he'd given back to me, and pointed out
a passage that I wanted to hear him read.
At some point in that long autumn afternoon I was sure that I would ask for 'Lullaby of Birdland'.
And good brandy.
And love.
Extract Ends
Late that night, Professor F. Archduke's English Pantomime: A Critical Study, in data module form,
sat on the side of the Dean's desk.
From which it suddenly overbalanced.
The room was empty, so there was nobody to comment on the sudden movement.
The module stopped a few inches above the floor, and swung to the left and right. On its side
appeared a graphic window, and in that window appeared the image of the program that had suddenly
come to life to activate these hidden gravitic motors and move the module.
The image wore a turban and an all-consuming grin. It pointed upwards.
The module rose to the level of the Dean's porterhatch. Then sped out through it.
The module flew through the night, along the walkways of St Oscar's University. It flew past several
colleges, over several islands, and down several tunnels.
Until it came to the cloisters of Pierce College.
The little box hopped a hedge, sped at surface level over gravel, took a left at the fountain, and
stopped before one particular door.
The door opened.
Professor Ferdinand Archduke, specialist in Obscure Theatrical Forms, stood framed in the light
from his rooms behind him. He reached out for the module and missed it. It wavered in the air,
the power in its batteries failing.
'Stop messing about,' he said.
The module settled into his grasp. The Professor slipped the module into one of his gown's
deepest pockets, glanced ruefully at some distant, imagined audience of his own, and then closed
the door behind him.