"S'not!" said Pigbog, nettled. "It's like War, and Famine, and that. It's a problem of life, isn't it? Answer phones. I hate bloody answer phones."

"I hate ansaphones, too," said Cruelty to Animals.

"You can shut up," said G.B.H.

"Can I change mine?" asked Embarrassing Personal Problems, who had been thinking intently since he last spoke. "I want to be Things Not Working Properly Even After You've Thumped Them."

"All right, you can change. But you can't be ansaphones, Pigbog. Pick something else."

Pigbog pondered. He wished he'd never broached the subject. It was like the careers interviews he had had as a schoolboy. He deliberated.

"Really cool people," he said at last. "I hate them."

"Really cool people?" said Things Not Working Properly Even Af­ter You've Given Them A Good Thumping.

"Yeah. You know. The kind you see on telly, with stupid haircuts, only on them it dun't look stupid 'cos it's them. They wear baggy suits, an' you're not allowed to say they're a bunch of wankers. I mean, speaking for me, what I always want to do when I see one of them is push their faces very slowly through a barbed‑wire fence. An' what I think is this." He took a deep breath. He was sure this was the longest speech he had ever made in his life.[43] "What I think is this. If they get up my nose like that, they pro'lly get up everyone else's."

"Yeah," said Cruelty to Animals. "An' they all wear sunglasses even when they dunt need 'em."

"Eatin' runny cheese, and that stupid bloody No Alcohol Lager," said Things Not Working Properly Even After You've Given Them A Good Thumping. "I hate that stuff. What's the point of drinking the stuff if it dun't leave you puking? Here, I just thought. Can I change again, so I'm No Alcohol Lager?"

"No you bloody can't," said Grievous Bodily Harm. "You've changed once already."

"Anyway," said Pigbog. "That's why I wonter be Really Cool People."

"All right," said his leader.

"Don't see why I can't be No bloody Alcohol Lager if I want."

"Shut your face."

Death and Famine and War and Pollution continued biking toward Tadfield.

And Grievous Bodily Harm, Cruelty to Animals, Things Not Working Properly Even After You've Given Them A Good Thumping But Secretly No Alcohol Lager, and Really Cool People traveled with them.

– – -

It was a wet and blustery Saturday afternoon, and Madame Tracy was feeling very occult.

She had her flowing dress on, and a saucepan full of sprouts on the stove. The room was lit by candlelight, each candle carefully placed in a wax‑encrusted wine bottle at the four corners of her sitting room.

There were three other people at her sitting. Mrs. Ormerod from Belsize Park, in a dark green hat that might have been a flowerpot in a previous life; Mr. Scroggie, thin and pallid, with bulging colorless eyes; and Julia Petley from Hair Today,[44] the hairdressers' on the High Street, fresh out of school and convinced that she herself had unplumbed occult depths. In order to enhance the occult aspects of herself, Julia had begun to wear far too much handbeaten silver jewelry and green eyeshadow. She felt she looked haunted and gaunt and romantic, and she would have, if she had lost another thirty pounds. She was convinced that she was an­orexic, because every time she looked in the mirror she did indeed see a fat person.

"Can you link hands?" asked Madame Tracy. "And we must have complete silence. The spirit world is very sensitive to vibration."

"Ask if my Ron is there," said Mrs. Ormerod. She had a jaw like a brick.

"I will, love, but you've got to be quiet while I make contact."

There was silence, broken only by Mr. Scroggie's stomach rum­bling. "Pardon, ladies," he mumbled.

Madame Tracy had found, through years of Drawing Aside the Veil and Exploring the Mysteries, that two minutes was the right length of time to sit in silence, waiting for the Spirit World to make contact. More than that and they got restive, less than that and they felt they weren't getting their money's worth.

She did her shopping list in her head.

Eggs. Lettuce. Ounce of cooking cheese. Four tomatoes. Butter. Roll of toilet paper. Mustn't forget that, we're nearly out. And a really nice piece of liver for Mr. Shadwell, poor old soul, it's a shame . . .

Time.

Madame Tracy threw back her head, let it loll on one shoulder, then slowly lifted it again. Her eyes were almost shut.

"She's going under now, dear," she heard Mrs. Ormerod whisper to Julia Petley. "Nothing to be alarmed about. She's just making herself a Bridge to the Other Side. Her spirit guide will be along soon."

Madame Tracy found herself rather irritated at being upstaged, and she let out a low moan. "Oooooooooh."

Then, in a high‑pitched, quavery voice, "Are you there, my Spirit Guide?"

She waited a little, to build up the suspense. Washing‑up liquid. Two cans of baked beans. Oh, and potatoes.

"How?" she said, in a dark brown voice.

"Is that you, Geronimo?" she asked herself.

"Is um me, how," she replied.

"We have a new member of the circle with us this afternoon," she said.

"How, Miss Petley?" she said, as Geronimo. She had always under­stood that Red Indian spirit guides were an essential prop, and she rather liked the name. She had explained this to Newt. She didn't know anything about Geronimo, he realized, and he didn't have the heart to tell her.

"Oh," squeaked Julia. "Charmed to make your acquaintance."

"Is my Ron there, Geronimo?" asked Mrs. Ormerod.

"How, squaw Beryl," said Madame Tracy. "Oh there are so many um of the poor lost souls um lined up against um door to my teepee. Perhaps your Ron is amongst them. How."

Madame Tracy had learned her lesson years earlier, and now never brought Ron through until near the end. If she didn't, Beryl Ormerod would occupy the rest of the seance telling the late Ron Ormerod every­thing that had happened to her since their last little chat. (". . . now Ron, you remember, our Eric's littlest, Sybilla, well you wouldn't recognize her now, she's taken up macrame, and our Letitia, you know, our Karen's oldest, she's become a lesbian but that's all right these days and is doing a dissertation on the films of Sergio Leone as seen from a feminist perspec­tive, and our Stan, you know, our Sandra's twin, I told you about him last time, well, he won the darts tournament, which is nice because we all thought he was a bit of a mother's boy, while the guttering over the shed's come loose, but I spoke to our Cindi's latest, who's a jobbing builder, and he'll be over to see to it on Sunday, and ohh, that reminds me . . .")

No, Beryl Ormerod could wait. There was a flash of lightning, followed almost immediately by a rumble of distant thunder. Madame Tracy felt rather proud, as if she had done it herself. It was even better than the candles at creating ambulance. Ambulance was what mediuming was all about.