“Dammit.” Betsy pressed some soft red wax hastily into the door lock, then mashed a seal into the wax. Pushkar took down a pool cue from the rack and practiced a couple of businesslike bo staff strikes. He looked like he knew how to use it, though if it got to the point where they were fighting with pool cues they were all pretty much screwed anyway.

Pushkar broke off his routine.

“Something’s coming.” He tapped his temple. “Precognition.”

“Get the carpet ready to go,” Lionel said. “Quentin and Plum, how much longer?”

Still reciting smoothly, Plum held up four fingers. Quentin took a tuner out of his pocket and began plucking the strings on the cube—perfect fifths, and they had to be precise to within a couple of hertz. Betsy formally addressed herself to each wall, then the floor, then the ceiling, hands pressed together, her lips moving. Each wall flashed silver as she did so. Plaster dust drifted down from the corners.

Stoppard’s device sighed quietly as something inside it snapped or melted fatally, and the ticking stopped. No one moved. For a long moment the only sound in the room was Plum whispering over the case. Quentin gripped one of Mayakovsky’s coins in one hand.

Hoarse shouting came from somewhere on the first floor, then silence. A door slammed. Pushkar peered out a window, shook his head: nothing yet. Betsy was bobbing up and down on her toes, flexing her fingers, practically humming with excitement. Lionel stared grimly at the door, grinding his teeth. He squared off his blocky hands in front of him at chest height, fingers spread, thumbs touching.

The floor bounced once under them, hard, and then a second time—Quentin had to put a hand on the pool table to keep from falling over, and a couple of stacks of boxes toppled. They were trying to break through from below. He kept his place in the chant, just barely. Footsteps pounded by in the hall, then stopped outside the door. Something Betsy had left out there went off with a sharp bang, but it was hard to know if it did any good.

Almost time. Quentin and Plum kept their gazes locked to make sure they were in perfect sync. The door started to vibrate in its frame, hard, making an even tone that gradually rose in pitch. A thump, and a dent appeared in the wall at head height, then another, then a third.

But they had it. Time. The strings were chiming all at once, without even being plucked. If it was going to work, it was now. Quentin gripped the coin in his hand—he thought he could feel it getting warm, getting ready to give up its payload. He took a breath.

Soundlessly and all at once, the lights went out. Did he do that? No—he hadn’t said the keyword yet. Plum cocked her head in the semidarkness, confused.