Grimus - By Salman Rushdie Page 0,35

protect.

There was no time; they sat, stood, moved, slept. At some point, Flapping Eagle had asked:

—What about yourself, Virgil?

—What about me? replied Virgil.

—You were saying every life has a peak … what about you?

—O yes, said Virgil. Long past it.

The silence settled again. Then Virgil said:

—Once. Then. Before. The terror of the titties, eh?

Flapping Eagle asked: —Were you married?

—O, said Virgil, yes. Eventually. Roughly. Temporarily.

There was a wind. The rudimentary sail was full; they moved from anywhere to nowhere across the infinite sea.

—Towards infinity, said Virgil Jones, where all paradoxes are resolved.

—Virgil, asked Flapping Eagle, am I getting better?

—Better?

—The Dimension-fever, said Flapping Eagle. Everything seems to be smooth just at the moment. Am I mending?

—I don’t know, said Virgil. Perhaps. Perhaps not. Usually one meets a few monsters. You know the sort of thing.

—No, said Flapping Eagle.

—At any rate, said Virgil, trying to sound confident, between us, we should be able to handle them.

The Gorf had made a decision. No more meddling. But he might speed things up a bit; he was getting bored. Though Mr Jones’ presence was very interesting.

XXIV

LAND ROSE UP from the sea to meet them, but it was unlike any soil or earth either of them had ever seen. It was not so much solid as not-liquid, a viscous, glutinous stuff. At one second it seemed insubstantial as air, at another it acquired the consistency of treacle, at another it lay smooth as glass. It seemed to smoke, or steam, a little.

Virgil Jones knew where they were. It was the nearest they would get to escape, and also the most dangerous of the Inner Dimensions. They stood at the very fringes of Flapping Eagle’s awareness, close to the point at which his senses merged with the void. This was unmade ground, the raw materials of the mind. If they bent it right, it would lead them wherever they wished to go; if they failed to master it, they could drift on its wisps out of Flapping Eagle’s existence. To put it another way, they would die.

The raft had lodged—or stuck—in the land. Gingerly, they placed feet upon the colourless, formless substance. Flapping Eagle looked nervous.

—We’re in very deep, said Virgil and explained.

—Now then, he said, we’ll need to concentrate as hard as we can. Try and imagine the topography of this Dimension, since it seems to be topographic. It’s a series of concentric circles.

—A series of concentric circles, repeated Flapping Eagle.

—We’re on the outermost circle. We need to get to the centre.

—We need to get to the centre, repeated Flapping Eagle.

—Once we’re in the centre, we’ll need to climb. The waking state lies directly above the centre. Do you understand?

—Yes, said Flapping Eagle.

—If we concentrate hard enough we can use this stuff to make a passage. We’ll be able to move through it to the centre without being affected by the Dimensions.

Virgil Jones had taken on a new dimension himself. He was crisp, authoritative. Flapping Eagle settled down to shape the stuff of his mind.

The passage, or tunnel, took shape around them. It was dark grey, suffused with dirty yellow light. In mounting excitement, Flapping Eagle realized that he was shaping it into a passable facsimile of the red tunnel down which Bird-Dog had fled at the beginning of the fever. His strength began to flood back; the malleable not-land stretched into a longer and longer tunnel. Virgil Jones, watching, felt an enormous relief. And finally at the very far end of the tunnel they saw a tiny beckoning pinprick of light.

—Time to go, said Virgil Jones.

Flapping Eagle didn’t speak. All his efforts were plunged into holding the tunnel, preserving its existence until it set. So Virgil Jones, ever co-operative, concentrated on creating a means of transport. A moment later (he derived a sizeable pleasure from the speed) they were the proud possessors of two bicycles.

—I’m sorry, he apologized, the mysteries of the internal combustion engine have always been beyond me.

The tunnel had set. They mounted their anachronistic steeds and headed into its depths, towards the siren light.

For all his recent achievements, for all his new-found confidence, Virgil seemed to Flapping Eagle to be a worried man.

—Virgil, he asked, you wouldn’t hold anything back from me, would you?

—My dear fellow, admonished Virgil Jones. My dear fellow.

—Well, then. You wouldn’t know what’s at the other end of this tunnel, would you?

—My dear fellow, repeated Virgil Jones; and then, after a pause, he added quietly: That depends entirely on you.

—Explain?

—In all probability, said Virgil, there will be nothing