Childermass came to himself with a start. The pen jerked from his hand and the ink splattered over the letter.

He looked around in confusion. He did not appear to be dreaming. All the old, familiar objects were there: the shelves of books, the mirror, the ink pot, the fire-irons, the porcelain figure of Martin Pale. But his confidence in his own senses was shaken. He no longer trusted that the books, the mirrors, the porcelain figure were really there. It was as if everything he could see was simply a skin that he could tear with one fingernail and find the cold, desolate landscape behind it.

The brown fields were partly flooded; they were strung with chains of chill, grey pools. The pattern of the pools had meaning. The pools had been written on to the fields by the rain. The pools were a magic worked by the rain, just as the tumbling of the black birds against the grey was a spell that the sky was working and the motion of grey-brown grasses was a spell that the wind made. Everything had meaning.

Childermass leapt up away from the desk and shook himself. He took a hurried turn around the room and rang the bell for the servant. But even as he waited the magic began to reassert itself. By the time Lucas appeared he was no longer certain if he were in Mr Norrell’s library or standing upon an ancient road …

He shook his head violently and blinked several times. “Where is my master?” he said, “Something is wrong.”

Lucas gazed at him in some concern. “Mr Childermass? Are you ill, sir?”

“Never mind that. Where is Mr Norrell?”

“He is at the Admiralty, sir. I thought you knew. The carriage came for him over an hour ago. I dare say he will be back shortly.”

“No,” said Childermass, “that cannot be. He cannot have gone. Are you sure that he is not upstairs doing magic?”

“Quite sure, sir. I saw the carriage leave with the master inside it. Let me send Matthew for a physician, Mr Childermass. You look very ill.”

Childermass opened his mouth to protest that he was not ill at all, but just at that moment …

… the sky looked at him. He felt the earth shrug because it felt him upon its back.

The sky spoke to him.

It was a language he had never heard before. He was not even certain there were words. Perhaps it only spoke to him in the black writing the birds made. He was small and unprotected and there was no escape. He was caught between earth and sky as if cupped between two hands. They could crush him if they chose.

The sky spoke to him again.

“I do not understand,” he said.

He blinked and found that Lucas was bending over him. His breath was coming in gasps. He put out his hand and his hand brushed something at his side. He turned to look at it and was puzzled to discover that it was a chair-leg. He was lying on the floor. “What … ?” he asked.