Whiteness, blank and liquid, it was like swimming in milk. Trees loomed out of the whiteness like dark ghosts and unseen roots snagged at his feet, trying to trip him. His mind as blank as the fog, he stumbled forward aimlessly, not even trying to think.
Almost imperceptibly the milk began to thin; he could just make out the ground under his feet and the trees coalesced at feet, rather than inches, from his face. He walked faster now, though still with no purpose. A sharp memory of a girl kissing someone who wasn't him stabbed into his chest—he winced, changed direction to escape the thought, and stumbled on.
Voices drifted out of the now watered milk: a woman, loud and angry, and a man. They were coming his way—Loofah stopped and held his breath.
'What's with all this bloody fog?' said the whiteness, in the Under Manager's voice, 'I can't see a damned thing.'
Truscott said something he didn't catch.
'Of course he did, you fool. He wouldn't dare cross me again.'
She was closer now, he could sense her presence just the other side of a thin blanket of opacity. Loofah tensed, holding himself as still as possible. Dry leaves crunched closer and a vague shadow appeared on the screen of mist directly in front of him. If he could see her, then she could see…
'It's thinner over here.' This was a third voice—Meadows—further away down the slope. 'You can see what you're doing.'
'This is utterly hopeless!' muttered Miss Leggett, almost in Loofah's ear. The shadow paused, as if she were listening, and for a long moment there was dead silence.
'Come on, Truscott, let's go!' she shouted, then heavy footsteps crunched in the leaves, moving away. The shadow thinned, then vanished. A branch broke and somebody stumbled with a curse.
'What exactly are we looking for?' asked Truscott, his voice small now, being swallowed by the fog.
'How the hell should I know?' snapped Miss Leggett, 'A hole or something. Maybe some trees knocked over and…' Her voice trailed away into the mist and he missed the rest.
At last Loofah could breathe out and stretch his stiffened limbs. No, he hadn't done what he was supposed to do, he thought, correcting the Under Manager's assumption. He had failed, yet again—he could almost hear her hectoring tones as she informed him of the fact. This time, however, her baleful reprimand bounced off the leather of his jacket and echoed away into the whiteness, leaving him strangely unaffected.
He waited until the voices were little more than distant mutterings and then set off in the opposite direction, taking care to tread lightly. The fog was thinning rapidly now and he wanted to be away while it still gave him some cover.
He had gone no more than fifty yards, however, when a pale shape on the ground in front caught his eye. It was a shoe, a left shoe, a fawn slip-on with a silly side-zip. Loofah recognised it, of course—it was his own shoe. He reached to pick it up but then stopped. No, it wasn't his shoe, for he was wearing both of his. Cold seawater flooded his veins and he shivered. Leave it, it's not yours, said a voice, let's get going. But he didn't get going, he stayed staring at the lost shoe while strange submarine creatures slithered over his flesh. Then, moving with the slow deliberation of an automaton, he crouched down and cupped it carefully in both hands.
He held the shoe gingerly, like an unexploded bomb, and pored over it, soaking up every tiny detail as if it were a religious artefact: the pattern of mud and grass scuffs on the pale leather, the smoothed ridging of the sole, the lining frayed at the heel with the 'St Michael' sticker that was half loose, the adhesive weakened by months of wear. The thinning fog began to resonate quietly with a single deep note, as from a bass organ pipe. He leaned against a tree and, standing on one leg, pulled off his own left shoe and held it beside the other one. There was no difference, they were identical: the worn lining, the loose sticker, every single scuff and stain, all exactly the same.
Loofah looked from one to the other, mesmerised by their weird significance, forgetting which was his and which was not. Indeed, it was no longer relevant which was his and which was not, for they were the same shoe, equal in every way. But this was absurd, it was impossible; how could there be two of one thing? There should be one—the organ note swelled to an ominous crescendo—he must make them one. He pushed the shoes together.
A vacuum opened up in front of him; colour, sound, even space itself, collapsed suddenly into the void between his hands—and a split nanosecond later exploded in a blaze of light and noise. The atomic blast hammered into Loofah's chest, hurling him backwards in a mad whirl of colour and a howling as of tearing metal, and then the world crashed in on him with a sickening crunch.
Flickering blue light held together by a spinning black latticework—and silence.
Then, very gradually, trickling into the silence came the rustle of wind in the high leaves and the electronic echo of birdsong. Loofah blinked and the latticework stopped spinning. He was lying on his back flat out on the soft earth, gazing up in to the trees.
He struggled painfully to his feet, pausing halfway up until a wave of dizziness passed. A thick bank of mist was drifting away down the slope, with now only a few tendrils curling across the ground where he stood. Loofah bent down to brush dry leaves and moss from his jeans, but as he went to give a sympathetic rub to a bruised left thigh, he stopped suddenly. There was something in front of him, something that wasn't right, something that—just wasn't. A space in the air, it was somehow less that a space. He winced, and tried to focus on the ground beyond the space, but he couldn't—the earth was there, he could almost see it, but at the same time it wasn't. He rubbed his eyes and concentrated on a single dry leaf, but as he did so it seemed to evade him, blending in with the background, becoming nothing. With his brain crawling like a nest of baby spiders from the effort, he clutched his jacket to his chest and with great relief turned away from the terrible none-ness.
A few feet behind the un-space was a young birch. Loofah saw now that there was a hole in its trunk, where the wood itself was only half-existent. Above this the branches twisted and writhed, not with the usual gentle undulations but in agony, like tortured snakes. And all about on the ground, and on the trunks of other nearby trees, were little fragments of the hideous unreality, as if splattered out from the epicentre of an explosion.
In a sudden rush of panic Loofah held up his hands and then carefully scanned over his jacket and tee-shirt, and down over his jeans. Over his skin and the material of his clothes colours flowed freely and patterns of delectable intricacy formed and reformed themselves in an everlasting dance of shape and light. Everything was normal, thank God—whatever it was, he had somehow escaped damage.
Now all he wanted was to be away from this place of violation as quickly as possible. But as he set off he felt the damp earth under his bare foot. He stopped and hunted around for his lost shoe, but there was no sign of it, it had vanished without trace.
Loofah hobbled down the slope as fast as his unshod foot would allow. The bank of fog was now gone and the last wisps of the magic mist swirled around his hurrying feet. He stopped and turned: the pit of emptiness was out of sight, lost among the trees and the undulations of the ground. He listened: nothing but languid birdsong echoing through the syrupy air and the quiet rustle of the breeze in the high canopy.
At last he breathed freely, and the tight bands around his chest began to loosen and fall away. For the first time since the encounter he felt the loveliness of the woods, with the gentle cadence of the birdsong, the swaying solidness of the tree trunks and the shining fluorescent green of the foliage far above, and the sun-dappled moss at his feet like tiny hill-scapes of fluffy emerald.
Then he noticed a new sound trickling around his ears, the fragile melody of a distant flute. And there was laughter too, drifting towards him through the trees, bubbling out through the birdsong and turning the air into mirthful fizzy-pop. Loofah started towards the sound, forgetting his naked foot and breaking into an easy run.
Soon he was standing on the upper rim of a large shallow hollow scooped into the side of the gently sloping woodland. In the centre was a clearing where the open ground shone with emerald grass, brilliant in the sunshine and colour-splashed with woodland flowers, and where butterflies with shining metallic wings flitted among the sunbeams.
But it wasn't the butterflies that held his attention. For scattered throughout the hollow was a profusion of girls, woodland dryads in flowing white gowns with bare feet and flowers and ivy braided into their hair. There was all manner of girls here: dark ones with black almond eyes and pale ones with ivory limbs, short ones with generous curves undulating in lingering waves under the fabric of their gowns and tall slim ones like thoroughbred fillies. There were girls lounging on the grass, the sun caressing their upturned faces, there were girls chasing each other around the trees, laughing and giggling, and there were girls sitting quietly on the moss carpeted earth just contemplating their own loveliness. Everywhere he looked there were girls, each more delightful than the one before—somehow he had stumbled into paradise.
A twig snapped close by—a girl with golden hair was half-hiding behind a nearby tree, peeping out at him. When she saw that he had seen her, she blushed and giggled, and then skipped away to join her companions. Loofah laughed and followed her into the hollow, drawing sidelong glances and shy smiles as he passed.
It was then that he noticed the golden youth sitting among the girls on the sunlit grass of the central clearing; it was he that was the source of the music, stroking the delightful swirling melody from a silver flute pressed to his lips. He looked up as Loofah approached and, smiling a brilliant smile and laying aside his flute, rose to greet him.
Dressed in a tunic of the purest white with hems embroidered with gold, he was a truly magnificent creature, with tight yellow curls clustered about his sculptured head and long tanned limbs, muscular and smooth.
'The long temps awaited for Monsieur Le Seeker!' he exclaimed in a romantic and rolling accent, 'Welcome to our petit gathering.'
He smiled again and then leaned forward to kiss Loofah quickly on each cheek.
'Come,' he said, taking Loofah's arm, 'Sit with us for a while or two. Rest yourself, you must surely be having the grand tiredness.'
And he was led, mesmerised, through the throng of flirting loveliness into the shining glade.
'Please, my friend, be seating yourself down,' said the youth.
As Loofah went to sit on the grass, a dark skinned girl skipped forward and spread a folded white cloth under him, flashing a smile of sultry temptation as she pulled back. He felt like an honoured guest in a foreign prince's harem.
The gorgeous prince himself sat opposite, cross-legged on his own white cloth, carefully smoothing out his tunic.
'Dentressangle,' he said, with a rolling 'r' and a long 'a', holding out his hand.
'I am delighted to meet you, Monsieur Dentressangle.'
'Call me Norbert, please. There can be no formality between us; I feel I have been knowing you for already a thousand, thousand years.'
Loofah felt himself enveloped in the soft embrace of the young Frenchman's charm; even the Christian name, so prosaic in its English version, sounded suave and urbane when pronounced to rhyme with 'bear'.
'I do like the white, do you not?' said Dentressangle, absently caressing the material of his tunic with long elegant hands, 'It compliments the skin with such… éloquence. And do you not like the edging?—real gold thread, vingt-deux carrottes.'
'It's—um—very fetching. The thread matches your hair.'
'Ah, but look at your jacket.' Dentressangle reached over to stroke a sleeve. 'Noir leather. So heavy. So dark. So—masculine.'
He smiled, sending an unexplained shiver down Loofah's spine.
'But enough of these serious talkings. A petit peu de refreshment, I think.'
The dark girl was now by Loofah's side, offering him a golden goblet on a silver tray.
'Please, my friend, be my guest,' said Dentressangle.
Loofah took the goblet and peered into it, slightly anxious about its contents.
'Drink,' said the Frenchman, smiling a beautiful smile full of warmth and reassurance, 'It is good, très, très good.'
Loofah lifted the cup to his lips and took a hesitant sip. A gob of viscous liquid slipped into his mouth and then slid over his tongue, moving of its own accord like an oversized amoeba.
For a moment he felt nothing, just the unpleasant slither of the living drink across his tongue. Then it came, an explosion of sensation bursting across his mouth in wave after wave of delight: freshly squeezed orange juice, full of the Florida sunshine; roasted Kenyan coffee beans, rich and aromatic; and a fine nutty claret, definitely of a classic vintage. And it was not just flavour—he could feel the sun-drenched orange groves all around him, he was up in the African highlands with the dry breeze in his face, and deep in the musty Bordeaux cellar surrounded by vast oak barrels and racks of cobwebbed bottles.
The glob slid down his throat, caressing his gullet like a mother's hand. When it reached his stomach it detonated into a sunburst of happiness that spread out from his belly in a great wave that rolled back up his body before crashing like an ocean breaker across his skull. The world shimmered then collapsed in on itself; colour and sound, happiness and pleasure, all blended together into a shapeless cocktail of pure delight that lasted for an eternity and longer.
Slowly, the colours coalesced, slowly, the world reformed. The sunlit glade regained its shape, as did the ring of girls surrounding him with their smiles—and the beautiful young Frenchman, his dearest, dearest friend.
'It is good, yes?' said Dentressangle, 'Drink, enjoy.'
Loofah stared into the goblet, struggling to focus. The next sip seemed to separate itself from its colleagues and slid towards the rim, ready for his lips.
As the last explosion of colour ebbed away, the empty goblet slipped from his fingers and rolled onto the grass. His whole body tingled with unalloyed happiness, there was not a single scintilla of discontent anywhere in his entire being. He was replete, totally and utterly satisfied, he wanted for nothing. Lying back with the sun on his face, he shared a smile with the dark girl as she slipped a pillow behind his back.
The Frenchman said something Loofah didn't catch. He smiled anyway—what a delightful man, what a dear, dear friend. Love welled up inside until it filled him, until he was about to burst with it.
'Your shoe,' repeated Dentressangle, 'What has happened to your shoe?'
Loofah looked at his feet: one fawn slip-on with a silly side zip and one black sock with a few bits of leaf stuck to the material. He wiggled the unshod toes and giggled.
'Shoe? What shoe?'
'Ha, ha!' laughed Dentressangle, 'But the autre, where is she?'
Loofah thought for a minute, struggling to push aside the soporific curtains of happiness that were draped across his brain.
'Um, I think I lost it,' he said, 'Ah yes, I remember. I tripped up. It came off when I tripped up.'
'You tripped?'
'Yes, I was running. I was being chased.' He puzzled for a moment. 'No, no—that's wrong—I think. Perhaps it was me that was doing the chasing.'
'And who were you chasing?' asked Dentressangle, 'If you do not mind of the asking, that is.'
A little white dog, a mirror, a lime green tee-shirt with orange lettering—and a memory of violence, horrible, awful violence. A small dark cloud scudded across the blue sky of his happiness and he shuddered.
'A reflection—a mirror,' Loofah stammered, 'No—a man, it was a man.' He stuttered to a halt, confused.
'Un homme who was like a reflection?' asked Dentressangle, tentatively, 'Un homme—like you?'
The memory returned like a spectre to the tomb and Loofah shuddered again.
'Yes, that's it—a man like me. Very like me, in fact.'
Dentressangle frowned, shaking his head. 'An evil creature, a very evil creature indeed,' he said.
'But I'm not evil,' cried Loofah, pushing himself up from the cushions, 'I'm a nice person, honestly I am. Please, you must believe me.'
The Frenchman patted his arm. 'It's OK, my friend, of course I am believing you.'
'I could never hurt a little puppy. And as for chain-sawing those poor children—not me, never, I love children. That was him, not me—Miss Leggett said so.'
'Relax, my friend,' cooed Dentressangle, 'I am knowing all about the puppies and the children. And of course it was the other one, of course it was not yourself.'
As relief flooded over him, Loofah sank back, warmed again by his new friend's kindness.
'But tell me,' continued the Frenchman, 'What else did Mademoiselle Leggett say?'
'That he—I mean the other one—is working for bad people, enemies of Mr Stobart. The Chief Executive, that is. Miss Leggett is the Under Manager, you see, she works for Mr Stobart.'
'Yes, I am knowing Monsieur Stobart. And aussi Mademoiselle Leggett. Please—go on.'
'Well, she said that he and I are—are not from here,' explained Loofah, 'She said that I have to catch him so that—somehow—we both go home. And that this will stop him doing nasty things. Upsetting Mr Stobart and hurting people—children and animals and the like.'
The Frenchman leaned forward, eyes widened with horror. 'She said that you must be catching it? This autre one?'
'Yes. To get rid of him, to stop his crimes. It's my pigeon, she said, two sides of the same half or something like that.'
'Ah!' said Dentressangle, slapping his fist into his palm, 'This is terrible! Terrible!'
'What is?' asked Loofah, 'I tried my hardest, I nearly got him but—.'
'It is so fortunate that you did not. You are a very lucky homme, a very lucky homme indeed.'
'Why? I don't understand.'
'You are touching your reflection-man, you do not know what happens?'
'Well—I suppose we both go home, like Miss Leggett said.'
'No, not like Mademoiselle Leggett said, not one tiny little peu like Mademoiselle Leggett said.'
The Frenchman shook his head angrily as he spoke. Then he looked across at Loofah, his face very serious.
'You want to know what really happens when you are touching the reflection creature? I tell you—pouf!' He threw his hands apart in an explosive gesture. 'And then you are gone certainement enough—but not to your home.'
'You mean…?'
'Yes, I'm afraid so,' said Dentressangle, drawing his finger across his throat in a dramatic gesture.
'Like poor little Hamish,' muttered Loofah, under his breath.
For a long time neither spoke. A blonde girl at the edge of the clearing began to pluck a golden lyre, the notes plopping into Loofah's mind like jewels into a mountain pool. And yet his happiness was not pure, not like it had been, for a tiny worm of worry now nibbled at his spleen. He looked across at Dentressangle, who smiled, ever friendly and reassuring.
'But I don't understand,' said Loofah, 'Why would Miss Leggett want to do something like that?'
'You English have a saying, how goes it? Ah yes—to be killing the two birds in a bush avec a single rolling stone. You catch the other one and—pouf!—the two birds are gone away. And why should Mademoiselle Leggett care where gone to as long as you are both—how you say?—untangled from her hair?'
'But what about Mr Stobart. Surely he wouldn't allow—.'
'You are not from these parts, you are not knowing Monsieur Stobart like I am knowing him.'
'But—but he's a public benefactor. What about all his good work with children and animals?'
'Ah, the powerful man and his largesse! So very inspiring,' sneered Dentressangle, 'But only for those who are licking at the soles of his boots. For the rest?—you notice my words, my friend, they had better be watching out.'
Miss Leggett and Mr Stobart trying to kill him—it was a nasty, yet strangely credible, thought. Loofah leaned back and found himself lying on the dark girl's lap. She smiled down at him and began to stroke his hair.
'But the danger is now over,' the Frenchman went on, 'You are in the good hands now. Just relax, be enjoying yourself.'
The girl's stroking was like the lapping of gentle waves. Loofah nestled his head between the soft pillows of her thighs and closed his eyes.
'There's so much I don't understand,' he said, 'To be frank, I really haven't got a clue what's going on.'
'Do not be worrying about this. You are so new here, an étranger in an étrange land.'
'Am I? Am I really? That's what Miss Leggett said.'
'Of course you are. This is not your home.'
'No—no, it's not, is it?' Loofah said dreamily, lulled by the lyre and the softness of the girl; the Under Manager and the Chief Executive dissolved smoothly into the growing pool of warm honey that was filling his skull.
'But would you not like to be going to your home?' asked the Frenchman softly, after a long pause, 'To go back where you are belonging?'
Loofah reached up to adjust his glasses, but the girl took his hand and laid it gently on her breast. He hesitated.
'I don't know—would I? Maybe I would, but then…'
'Of course you would—everybody is wanting to go to his home.' Dentressangle paused. 'And you are so lucky, for you are having a way to get there.'
'I do? Which way is that?' said Loofah, only half concentrating, 'Is there a train? Or do I need to take the car?'
The Frenchman laughed, a clear ringing sound like the tumbling of a mountain stream over polished pebbles.
'Un train! Une voiture! Oh you English, you always are making the jokes!'
'You mean I have to catch an aeroplane?'
'Ha, ha! Très droll! But seriously, enough of your jokings. There is only one way for you to go home, and this you are knowing, I am sure of it.'
'One way?'
'La femme, of course.'
Loofah's eyes snapped open and he pushed himself up. 'Woman? Which woman is that?'
'She Who Looks Both Ways,' said Dentressangle, 'L'Une Qui Est Deux. But you know all this, I am knowing that you do.'
'You can be trusting me, il n'y a pas de problem. Just tell me where she is and I am going to fetch her. You stay here with my young friends and I will be back in two shakings of the sheep's tail. And then you home can go.'
'Norbert, if I had any idea where this woman was, I'd tell you. I promise I would.'
Loofah was now submerged in a lake of female flesh, with the dark girl for a pillow and four others crooning around him, attempting to smother him with the soft cushions of their breasts. Wave after woozy wave of contentment lapped over him, dulling his will and sapping his strength. And yet he sensed he must fight against it; somehow, despite the velvet softness of the girls and the gentle buzz of the delightful drink, he must keep his head above the sticky-sweet waters.
'You do not wish to be telling me? Then we shall together go. The ladies will wait for us.'
'But I don't know where she is. I don't know anything about her.'
'No hurry, we go in a petit while. We will together find her, yes?'
It had been like this ever since Dentressangle had first mentioned double woman; Loofah just didn't seem to be able to make him understand.
'Norbert, please believe me—I really don't know where she is.'
'You are The Seeker—look, it is on your chemise—the one who will find She Who Is Two. Of course you are knowing where she is—government sources have said this and they are never wrong.'
'Well I'm sorry, but they're wrong this time,' Loofah snapped with a flicker of irritation, 'And not only do I not know where she is, but I also haven't got a clue who she is. I'm sorry to disappoint you, but there it is.'
'Perhaps another little boisson,' cooed the Frenchman, 'Just to be helping the memory.'
A girl's hand pressed the goblet to Loofah's lips and tilted. He reached forward to drink, but stopped.
'Actually I won't.'
'Yes, yes, yes,' said Dentressangle, 'Just a little.'
'No, thank you—really, I'm OK.'
Loofah struggled to get up but couldn't, held down by a dozen gentle hands. The goblet touched his lips and the sip slithered over the rim. But he held his lips tight closed, denying it entry.
'Come—it is good, it is so good.'
The sip climbed onto Loofah's closed lips and slithered up and down trying to find a way in. Suddenly it felt horrible, like a parasitic slug; he spat it away and shook his head violently, knocking the goblet out of the girl's hands.
'I don't want a drink,' he snapped, 'Now please let me get up!'
Anger flared quickly in Dentressangle's eyes—but his lips smiled.
'If the gentleman is not wishing to boire, ladies, then the gentleman does not have to boire.' He kicked the goblet away with theatrical disdain. 'But there are autre pleasures to be relaxing the mind,' he continued in a silky tone, 'to be opening the blocked synapses.'
Soft hands, still holding him down, now slipped under Loofah's tee-shirt, sliding over the bare skin of his chest and belly. The dark girl hoisted up her gown so that his cheeks rested on the naked flesh of her thighs and another of the dryads took his right hand to her bosom, rubbing his palm against the rubber button of a nipple. He half-heartedly thought about struggling, but a warm wave swept up from his abdomen and swamped what was once his will. And so with eyelids sliding closed, he sank back into the sticky softness, like a wasp in a pool of honey.
A hand touched his cheek, a harder bigger hand.
'Pauvre garçon, so far from home, so lost and so confused,' whispered Dentressangle, 'Just relax, let your dear friend be looking after you.'
Loofah opened his eyes. The young Frenchman was leaning over him, gazing longingly into his face. Now naked, his golden torso shimmered in the soft sunlight.
'We take our pleasures, yes? You and me and the ladies.'
'I—er—um,' burbled a voice in the pool of stickiness.
'And then we go and find la femme double,' purred Dentressangle, leaning down with lips parted for a kiss.
A bell rang and something that was nearly asleep snapped to wakefulness. Loofah twisted his face away, avoiding Dentressangle's mouth.
'Actually, Norbert, I really should be going.'
'There is no rush,' crooned the Frenchman, stroking Loofah's chest, 'Stay a while, be taking your pleasures. After this we are going to the finding of her.'
Two of the girls now pressed in against Loofah from either side, gripping him in a mammary vice.
'Please,' he said, 'I really have to go.'
'No, no, no—now the pleasures, the finding later.'
Dentressangle again leaned down for a kiss, but this time Loofah rolled quickly to one side, barging half of the breast-vice out of the way; the Frenchman overbalanced and with a grunt of surprise fell on top of the dark girl. Though half a dozen hands still tethered him, Loofah managed to pull free in the tumble of confusion and struggled to his feet. For a few moments the sun-dappled glade teetered insanely, looming in on top of him before accelerating away. He staggered, nearly falling back into to the writhing pile of loveliness at his feet, but somehow held his balance.
'Must be going,' he stammered, 'Thanks for everything. See you around.'
Loofah stumbled out of the clearing, rolling like a drunkard. He tripped, nearly fell, then set off at an ungainly sprint up the side of the hollow and out onto the main slope of the wood. As he ran, however, the earth rolled wildly like a storm-tossed deck, throwing him first to one side then the other, while the trees whirled around him like manic dancers, trying to pull him over.
'Attendes à moi!' shouted Dentressangle from behind, 'I am coming avec you.'
Dizzy with seasickness, Loofah could run no more and so, steadying himself against the trunk of a massive oak, he stopped and turned. The Frenchman, naked as a woodland fawn, was running down the slope towards him with half a dozen of his dryads scampering at his heels. It was hopeless—with a shoe missing and a head full of wooze, Loofah had no chance of escape.
Then something seized his jacket sleeve and pulled him behind the tree, and a girl in a white gown was pressing her body against his. Damn!—it was one of the dryads in a pincer movement, cutting off his retreat.
But then he saw that the girl was lovelier than any of Dentressangle's harem. The nymph smiled up at him, flooding his befuddled soul with golden sunlight—so she hadn't forsaken him after all. As she snaked her arms around his neck, she pressed something into his left hand.
'Follow me,' she breathed and then kissed him.
The urgency of the moment instantly forgotten, Loofah closed his eyes and melted into the soft wetness of her lips. Dentressangle called to him, but from the edge of the universe, a billion miles away. The foggy memory of a previous kiss—that may or may not have included him—wriggled through his grey matter like a larval parasite, but as her lithe body pressed against his a sunburst of warm delight exploded across his skull blasting everything that was not within the immediate encompass of her embrace into non-existence. With a sigh of infinite bliss, he reached round to fold her into his own arms—but clutched at emptiness. He opened his eyes—to whiteness, blank and solid, a whole world of sweetly perfumed whiteness. And his nymph was gone.
Then the whiteness spoke, intimate and close, like a voice in his head. 'My friend, are you there? I cannot see you.' There was a crackle of bare feet on dry leaves and breathing—that could have been his own. 'Where are you, my friend? C'est moi—Norbert.'
He could feel the golden body suspended in the whiteness, embracing him in its warmth. Lighter steps came up from behind—one of the dryads—followed by silence as they both paused to listen. But Loofah was a statue, cold stone, utterly still; they moved for him, they breathed for him, their hearts pumped his blood.
An infinity crept slowly past.
'Merde!' spat Dentressangle, eventually, 'Il a disparu en le brouillard.'
Then petulant footsteps crunched away into the fog, stumbling once on an unseen root.
Loofah waited until he could hear only silence. Then, when he was once again living, breathing flesh, he realised that he was holding something in his hand, something light and pliable—the gift from the girl. As he lifted it to his face, what emerged through the drifting veils of mist was a shoe, a left shoe, a fawn slip-on with a side zip. It was his own shoe, the one he had lost!
And yet it was somehow different—the leather was unmarked, the lining pristine with its label firmly stuck, proudly proclaiming the manufacturer's name. No, this shoe was brand new, this wasn't his old one after all. He puzzled for a minute, then with a shrug bent down to slip it over his damp sock.
When Loofah started to walk he found that his head was clear, with not a trace of Dentressangle's noxious drink. He breathed deeply, cleansing his lungs and invigorating himself with the sweet fog.