'We think,' said Silverfish, leaning closer, 'that he found a way of making himself invisible.'
'Really?'
'Because,' said Silverfish, nodding conspiratorially, 'no-one's seen him.'
'Ah,' said Cuddy. 'Er. This is just off of the top of my head, you understand, but I suppose he couldn't . . . just have gone somewhere where you couldn't see him?'
'Nah, that wouldn't be like old Leonard. He wouldn't disappear. But he might vanish.'
'Oh.'
'He was a bit . . . unhinged, if you know what I mean. Head too full of brains. Ha, I remember he had this idea once of getting lightning out of lemons! Hey, Sendivoge, you remember Leonard and his lightning lemons?'
Sendivoge made little circular motions alongside his head with one finger. 'Oh, yes. “If you stick copper and zinc rods in the lemon, hey presto, you get tame lightning.” Man was an idiot!'
'Oh, not an idiot,' said Silverfish, picking up a billiard ball that had miraculously escaped the detonations. 'Just so sharp he kept cutting himself, as my granny used to say. Lightning lemons! Where's the sense in that? It was as bad as his “voices-in-the-sky” machine. I told him: Leonard, I said, what are wizards for, eh? There's perfectly normal magic available for that kind of thing. Lightning lemons? If 11 be men with wings next!
And you know what he said? You know what he said? He said: Funny you should say that . . . Poor old chap.'
Even Cuddy joined in the laughter.
'And did you try it?' he said, afterwards.
'Try what?' said Silverfish.
'Har. Har. Har,' said Detritus, toiling behind the others.
'Putting the metal rods in the lemons?'
'Don't be a damn: fool.'
'What dis letter mean?' said Detritus, pointing at the paper.
They looked.
'Oh, that's not a symbol,' said Silverfish. 'That's just old Leonard's way. He was always doodling in margins. Doodle, doodle, doodle. I told him: you should call yourself Mr Doodle.'
'I thought it was some alchemy thing,' said Cuddy. 'It looks a bit like a crossbow without the bow. And this word Ennogeht. What does that mean?'
'Search me. Sounds barbarian to me. Anyway . . . if that's all, officer . . . we've got some serious research to do,' said Silverfish, tossing the fake ivory ball up in the air and catching it again. 'We're not all daydreamers like poor old Leonard.'
'Ennogeht,' said Cuddy, turning the paper round and round. 'T-h-e-g-o-n-n-e—'
Silverfish missed the ball. Cuddy got behind Detritus just in time.
'I've done this before,' said Sergeant Colon, as he and Nobby approached the Fools' Guild. 'Keep up against the wall when I bangs the knocker, all right?'
It was shaped like a pair of artificial breasts, the sort that are highly amusing to rugby players and anyone whose sense of humour has been surgically removed. Colon gave it a quick rap and then flung himself to safety.
There was a whoop, a few honks on a horn, a little tune that someone somewhere must have thought was very jolly, a small hatch slid aside above the knocker and a custard pie emerged slowly, on the end of a wooden arm. Then the arm snapped and the pie collapsed in a little heap by Colon's foot.
'It's sad, isn't it?' said Nobby.
The door opened awkwardly, but only by a few inches, and a small clown stared up at him.
'I say, I say, I say,' it said, 'why did the fat man knock at the door?'
'I don't know,' said Colon automatically. 'Why did the fat man knock at the door?'