“You explained all this to SO-5?”

“Many times. Quinn was the same, only she ‘came to’ a day sooner then me, upside down in a Mercedes she’d bought for cash two hours previously. There was an iguana on the backseat, and the trunk was full of rabbits.”

I exchanged looks with Landen. One of Aornis’ little memory tricks was to make you think you were someone you weren’t, then send you off to cause mayhem on a five-day nonrecall bender. We thanked Highsmith, who told us that on the plus side he now had a very lovely wife and two-year-old daughter— and when no one claimed the cheese, he was allowed to keep it.

“That was a waste of a morning,” said Landen, once we had dropped into Yo! Toast for a coffee and a bowl of crusty toastettes.

“Perhaps,” I mused, thinking of the tattoo on my hand. I needed to ask Swindon’s lone tattooist at Image Ink if she knew why I’d had it done on me rather than Landen, but I wanted to do it on my own—he didn’t need to have a panic.

“I’m going to walk up to the library,” I said, “to have a look at my new office.”

“I’ll come with you.”

“No, no,” I said hurriedly. “I’d like to do this on my own. I won’t be long. New password?”

“How about me saying, ‘Nothing should disturb . . .’ and then you finish it by saying, ‘. . . that condor moment’?”

“Condor moment. Very random. Got it.”

We agreed to meet in Shabitat in an hour as they were having a closing-down sale, and I walked out of the Brunel Centre. I looped up and around Commercial Road and then, once I was halfway up, remembered that I was supposed to be visiting the tattooist. I was closer to the library by now, so I elected to visit her on my way back and arrived outside the library ten minutes later, my leg feeling sore and tired. It was just over a mile, and this was the first time I’d done a walk that long. Before the accident I could have run it in a couple of minutes.

The Swindon All-You-Can-Eat-at-Fatso’s Drink Not Included Library was a large, glassy and very angular building sixteen stories high, at the corner of Emlyn and Commercial. Libraries had always been a priority for the Commonsense Party along with training, educational standards, national exercise programs and preschool assistance for mothers, and the sleek and brightly colored building was only two years old.

I announced myself to the receptionist, who went into a frantic lather, dialed a number with shaky hands and announced “She’s here!” breathlessly down the line. While we waited, she simply stared at me, transfixed.

“Nice building,” I said by way of conversation.

“Yes it is isn’t it? Gosh we love it here and we’re so glad it’s you finally we might be able to get something done around here especially sorting out the budget ha-ha-ha you’ll speak to the council won’t you I have a daughter I need to pay through school she has only one leg and can’t—”