Read Online Shades of Grey by Jasper Fforde - Free Book Online Page B

That is to say, we arrived at the rear, tradesman’s entrance. The façade with the front door would face the town square. If we hadn’t just received the disturbing news about Robin Ochre, I daresay my father would have insisted on being taken to the front entrance. As it was, he said nothing.
    The porter opened the door, bid us enter and then placed our bags in the scullery hall as we stood, blinking, in the gloom.
    “My goodness,” he said, “it’s as dark as the belly of a frog in here.”
    He walked past us and into the kitchen, where by the dim glow of the windows I could faintly see him turn the winding crank and then fiddle with the two manual-override rods that dangled from the ceiling. High above us the roof mirror rotated toward the afternoon sun; catching the rays, it then beamed them down the light well and onto a frosted-glass panel set into the ceiling.
    “Whoops,” said Stafford as the light swept the muddy gloom from the house. “I should have wound the heliostat spring before you arrived. No one’s lived in this house for a while. Will there be anything else?”
    “How on earth can one be ‘fatally self-misdiagnosed’?” asked Dad, who was still not over the news that his former colleague was dead. The porter thought for a moment.
    “The Council decided at the inquest that he must have thought he had the Mildew and consigned himself to the Green Room to be hastened. As it turned out, he didn’t.”
    “A shocking mistake to make.”
    “It was, sir, yes. Fine man, Mr. Ochre. We haven’t lost a single resident to the Mildew for seven years. And he wasn’t hue-specific, if you know what I mean.”
    “Munsell stated that health care is universal,” remarked my father, but we knew what Stafford meant. Some swatchmen favored those only of a similar hue.
    Dad gave a shiny half merit to Stafford, who tipped his hat and told us he hoped our stay in East Carmine would be happily uneventful. I saw him to the back door, then asked him if the prefects read outgoing telegrams.
    “Mrs. Blood is the communications clerk,” he said, “and is well known for her discretion—as long as an extra twenty cents is added to the fee. But,” he added, “even Yvonne might balk at sending a message of improper raciness or anything against the best interests of the Collective.”
    “It’s poetry,” I confessed, “to a sweetheart.”
    Stafford smiled. “I understand. Mrs. Blood would have no problem with that. She’s something of a romantic herself.”
    This was good news, albeit expensive. But with the Oxbloods on a nine-week redirection service and me away for only a month, there was little choice.
    “Excellent!” I remarked. “I suppose—” Suddenly my eye was caught by the figure of a man in his early thirties, standing in the shadows of the alleyway opposite. He was grimy and unshaven and had NS -B4 carved rather clumsily below his left clavicle—most scars were neat affairs, but his looked like a bad weld. He was also inappropriately naked and, while staring vacantly up at the sky, was actually peeing on his left foot.
    “Stafford?” I whispered, a tremor of fear sounding in my voice.
    “Yes, Master Edward?”
    “There’s a naked man in the alleyway behind us. I think it might be . . . Riffraff .”
    Stafford turned around, looked at the man and said, “I don’t see anyone.”
    “How can you not see him? He’s peeing on his own foot.”
    “Master Edward, you can’t see him.”
    “I can.”
    “You can’t. He doesn’t exist , Master Edward—take Our Munsell’s word for it.”
    I suddenly understood. The Rules, despite their vast complexity and extensive range, had no way of dealing with anything that had no explainable position within a world of ordered absolutes. So instead of attempting to understand or explain them, they were simply awarded the status of Apocrypha and stridently ignored lest they raise questions of fallibility.
    “He’s Apocryphal?” I asked.
    “He would be