“Didn’t you notice?” he asked, and when I said I didn’t, he counted out the people at the group on his fingers. “Only three of us die seemingly natural deaths. I’m murdered in 2041, as are Shazza and Bendix, Miranda, Joddy and Sarah. The other six die in ‘unexplained’ deaths, all of them in 2040. Can you see a pattern?”

“None of us live beyond February 2041,” said Shazza in a quiet voice.

“Right,” said Friday. “I’m the last to die—three days before HR-6984 is scheduled to strike the earth. No one lives long enough to be killed by the meteorite that’s hurtling our way.”

“Does that mean the HR-6984 will definitely happen?” asked Shazza.

“It means we can’t prove it won’t,” said Friday, “since none of us live beyond it.”

“Why would anyone want to murder someone just before everyone is about to die anyway?” asked Jimmy-G. “It raises vindictiveness to a whole new level.”

They all looked at one another in a confused and dejected manner. It must be like having an itch and not being able to scratch it. Nevertheless, I thought I should be a mother rather than a colleague, so I said the first thing that came into my head. “Fish and chips, anyone?”

21. Wednesday: Library

21.

Wednesday: Library

The Hotel Bellvue was squeezed disagreeably between the M4, the Swindon tannery and the city’s main electrical substation, hence the name it was popularly known by: the Substation. It was the last place one would book a room, even if hygiene weren’t an issue, and it seemed to exist only to give other hotels a benchmark for failure. Indeed, the Substation had managed to wrestle Clip-Joint magazine’s coveted Five-Bedbug rating from its only competitor in the southeast: the equally grimy Bastardos, in Reading.

Josh Candle, Ten Places Not to Visit in Wessex

“Good morning,” said Duffy as I walked into the office. “Did the car find you okay?”

“Eventually.”

“If you want a different pickup address, we’d appreciate it if you would give us more notice. It helps the Special Library Services to ensure that your route is safe.”

“I understand,” I said, “and I’m sorry. I was called to the Substation Hotel this morning. It was . . . um . . . family business.”

I wasn’t going to tell him we’d discovered Krantz—or what remained of him.

“Mrs. Duffy and I spent our honeymoon there. The hum and crackle of the electrical substation was . . . restful.”

“It sounds very romantic.”

“When we want to rekindle that flame,” continued Duffy, “we leave an orbital sander running in the basement. Hums just like a five-hundred-KVA transformer. If we want to hear the crackle of morning dew on the insulators, we have Gizmo play with a cellophane wrapper.”

“I’m so hoping Gizmo is a dog.”

“A pug.”

“Duffy?”

“Yes, ma’am?”

“Do people usually attack the chief librarian as he or she is driven in?”