“The Master was faultless,” said the other Will. “It says so in Scripture.”

“But he wrote the Scripture!”

“Then it must be true, mustn’t it? Scripture doesn’t lie.”

Will dusted beer froth from his shirt front. “Scripture doesn’t lie, eh?” he said thoughtfully. “And your entire future society is based upon this Scripture, is it?”

“It brought peace to the world.”

“It brought you here to die.”

“That’s all your fault.”

“Turn it in,” said Will. “This is getting us nowhere.”

“Perhaps you should just put him out of his misery, chief. Get someone to employ the Dimac Death Touch for you. It’s being cruel to be kind.”

Will thought the words “SHUT UP!” as loudly as he could.

“Wah!” went Barry. “Don’t do that, chief. It gives me a headache and as I’m all head, that’s a lot of ache.”

“I don’t mean you any harm,” said Will to his other self. “In fact, quite the reverse. I don’t want you to die here. I don’t want anyone to die.”

“I want plenty of people to die,” said the other Will. “All those witches that tormented me. I want them to die. I’ll kill the lot of them if I get the chance.”

“Really?” said Will. “You’d do that, would you?”

“Slow down, chief. I know what you’re thinking.”

“I’d kill them all,” said the other Will.

“Then maybe I can help you out of this. I have something in my head.”

“An idea?” said the other Will.

“Not as such.”

“Forget it, chief. I’m not going into his bonce, it’s already occupied and anyway, he’s stone bonker.”

“Do you have a long, sharp pencil about your person?” Will asked.

“No, chief, let’s be reasonable about this.”

“But you both share the same goal,” Will whispered into his hand. “You could train him up, Barry. He is me, isn’t he?”

“No, chief. We’re a team, you and me. You can’t break up a team. It’s like Marks and Spencer, or Burke and Hare, or even Jekyll and Hyde, who live just around the corner; we—”

“SILENCE!” Will thought. “All right,” he said to his other self. “We will speak more of these things. For now I can say only this, trust me. I am you and you are me and there is no point in us arguing. I suggest we return to my hotel room.”

“Why?” asked the other Will.

“So you can take a bath, have a shave, eat a splendid lunch and so that I can have a flick through The Book Of Rune. It does tell exactly how you thwart the witches, doesn’t it?”

“It tells exactly how you thwart them,” said the other Will.

To add an extra something to the drive back, Will steered Silver the horse around the Borough of Brentford first, to take in more of its beauty. And as both Wills still felt somewhat dry of throat, they also took in some of Brentford’s other drinking houses. Although not any of those that the part-time barman of the Flying Swan had mentioned. They visited the Four Horsemen, the Shrunken Head and the Princess Royal.

They ran their way through the fine and hand-drawn ales of Brentford, savouring each and every drop that they didn’t spill down themselves. And as the hours passed and the glasses emptied, talk became merrier and the many troubles the two of them shared were pushed somewhat to the side, although Will remained ever at arm’s length of his other self, for fear of the terrible Time Cop/David Warner consequences that might occur should they actually touch each other.

“Chiesh,” went Barry. “I’m somewhat schoozled here, shouldn’t we be getting back?”

“So, I was doing The Times crossword, the other day,” said Will. He and his other self now sat in the Hands of Orloc, which is in Greendragon Lane, on Brentford’s east side. “And I managed to answer every single clue, except one.”

“And what was that?” The other Will quaffed further ale. He had a healthier pallor now, which is one more reason for drinking beer, as if one more should be needed.

“Overloaded postman,” said Will.

“Overloaded postman?” The other Will stroked at his chin and missed. “Overloaded postman? How many letters?”

“Thousands!” Will spluttered laughter into his beer. “That was why he was so overloaded.”

“Thousands,” said the other Will. “It must have been a very large crossword.”

“No,” said Will. “It was a joke. Overloaded postman. Thousand of letters. Get it?”

“What is a postman?” asked the other Will. “A man who sells posts, would it be?”

“It’s a joke.” Will wiped beer froth from his mouth. “A joke. Surely you know what a joke is.”

“I don’t feel quite right,” said the other Will. “Is there something wrong with this cordial we’ve been drinking?”

“It’s beer,” said Will. “You’re getting drunk, that’s all”

“Drunk?” said the other Will. “What is drunk?”

“What is drunk? Don’t they have booze in your world?”

“Booze? There is no booze in my world. Booze is evil. There has been no booze since the mid two-thousands. Is that what we’ve been drinking? Booze?”

“No booze?” Will said back in his chair. “You come from a world without booze?”

“Booze is forbidden. It says so in Scripture. The Master foreswore all hard liquor. He lived upon dry bread and water all his life, and only the occasional sprout to give him iron.”

“What wash that?” slurred Barry.

“Foreswore hard liquor?” Will laughed heartily. “That’s a joke if ever I heard one. And what about the bottle of champagne he was going to greet you with?”

“I don’t understand. Although I feel, I don’t know, I feel—”

“Happy?” Will asked.

“Yes, that’s it. That must be it. I’ve heard of happy, but I’ve never experienced it before.”

“Never?” Will’s face fell. “You’ve never been happy?”

“I’ve seen people laughing. Lots of times. But I never knew why they laughed. They never laughed when they were with me. They always had grave expressions.”

“Now that is evil.”

“But I do feel it. I feel – happy. Can I have some more of this booze?”

“But it’s against Scripture.”

“Stuff Scripture!” said the other Will. “Stuff everything. I won’t play by the rules of Scripture. I’ll be free of Scripture. I’ll be free of everything.”

“Once you’ve thwarted the witches,” said Will.

“Once you’ve thwarted the witches. Tell me another joke. I don’t want to think about witches. We weren’t thinking about witches, were we? We were thinking about being happy.”

“We were,” said Will. “I’ll get us in another drink.”

And he rose unsteadily and went off to do so.

The other Will sat staring dreamily into space.

“I think things are going rather well, squire,” said a voice in his head. “I think we can pull this thing off and come up trumps all round.”

“Who said that?” The other Will’s eyes widened and he stared all around and about.

“It’s me, squire. Larry, your Holy Guardian sprout. I’ve been trying to get through to you for ages. The beer has eased the passage, as it were.”

“Who’s saying this?” The other Will’s head turned this way and that.

“Me, Larry, Barry’s brother. They thought I was done for in the Great Fire of London, but I wasn’t and now I’m in your head. I’m your protector. We can beat this other schmuck, we have him eating right out of our hands. Well your hands; I don’t have any.”

The other Will clutched at his head. “I am possessed!” he howled, which drew the attention of several other patrons of the Hands of Orloc, amongst them a big bargee and his smaller counterpart, who had stopped off for the night in Brentford (which is upon Thames), and a lady in a straw hat, who was hawking copies of the War Cry.

“Great scabs of scurvy!” said the big bargee. “Tell me, Charlie; ain’t that the bloke we had a punch-up with the other day?”

“The undertaker’s lad, with the parsnip up his bum?” said his smaller companion. “I do believe it is.”