With his hands stretched out in front of him and his eyes spread very wide in hopes of seeing something – which was unlikely, since they were streaming from the fog, and so was his nose – Paolo coughed and sniffed and shuffled his way forward until his toes came up against stone. Paolo looked down, but he could not see what it was. He tried lifting one foot, with his toes scraping against the obstruction. And, after a few inches, the obstruction stopped and his foot shot forward. It was a ledge, then. Probably the kerb. He had been near the edge of the road when he ran away from the elephant. He got both feet on the kerb and shuffled forward six inches – then he fell upstairs over what seemed to be a body.
It gave Paolo such a shock that he dared not move at first. But he soon realised the body beneath him was shivering, as he was, and trying to cough and mutter at the same time. “Holy Mary—” Paolo heard, in a hoarse blurred voice. Very puzzled, Paolo put out a careful hand and felt the body. His fingers met cold metal buttons, uniform braid, and, a little above that, a warm face – which gave a croak as Paolo’s cold hand met its mouth – and a large furry moustache beneath the nose.
Angel of Caprona! Paolo thought. It’s the Chief of Police!
Paolo got himself to his knees on what must be the steps of the Art Gallery. There was no one around he could ask, but it did not seem fair to leave someone lying helpless in the fog. It was bad enough if you could move. So hoping he was doing the right thing, Paolo knelt and sang, very softly, the most general cancel-spell he could think of. It had no effect on the fog – that was evidently very strong magic – but he heard the Chief of Police roll over on his side and groan. Boots scraped as he tested his legs. “Mamma mia!” Paolo heard him moan.
He sounded as if he wanted to be alone. Paolo left him and crawled his way up the Gallery steps. He had no idea he had reached the top, until he hit his elbow on a pillar and drove his head into Lucia’s stomach at the same moment. Both of them said some extremely unpleasant things.
“When you’ve quite finished swearing,” Lucia said at length, “you can get between these pillars with me and keep me warm.” She coughed and shivered. “Isn’t this awful? Who did it?” She coughed again. The fog had made her hoarse.
“It wasn’t us,” said Paolo. “We’d have known. Ow, my elbow!” He took hold of her for a guide and wedged himself down beside her. He felt better like that.
“The pigs,” said Lucia. “I call this a mean trick. It’s funny – you spend your life being told what pigs they are, and thinking they can’t be, really. Then you meet them, and they’re worse than you were told. Was it you singing just now?”
“I fell over the Chief of Police on the steps,” said Paolo.
Lucia laughed. “I fell over the other one. I sang a cancel-spell too. He was lying on all the corners of the stairs and it must have bruised him all over when I fell on him.”
“It’s bad enough when you can move,” Paolo agreed. “Like being blind.”
“Horrible,” said Lucia. “That blind beggar in the Via Sant’ Angelo – I shall give him some money tomorrow.”
“The one with white eyes?” said Paolo. “Yes, so shall I. And I never want to see another spell.”
“To tell you the truth,” said Lucia, “I was wishing I dared burn the Library and the Scriptorium down. It came to me like a blinding flash – just before I fell over that policeman – that no amount of spells are going to work on those beastly kidnappers.”
“That’s just what I thought!” exclaimed Paolo. “I know the only way to find Tonino—”
“Hang on,” said Lucia. “I think the fog’s getting thinner.”
She was right. When Paolo leant forward, he could see two dark lumps below, where the Chief of Police and his lieutenant were sitting on the steps with their heads in their hands. He could see quite a stretch of the Corso beyond them – cobbles which were dark and wet-looking, but, to his surprise, neither muddy nor out of place.
“Someone’s put it all back!” said Lucia.
The fog thinned further. They could see the glimmering doors of the Arsenal now, and the entire foggy width of the Corso, with every cobblestone back where it should be. Somewhere about the middle of it, Antonio and Guido Petrocchi were standing facing one another.
“Oh, they’re not going to begin again, are they?” wailed Paolo.
But, almost at once, Antonio and Guido swung round and walked away from one another.
“Thank goodness!” said Lucia. She and Paolo turned to one another, smiling with relief.
Except that it was not Lucia. Paolo found himself staring into a white pointed face, and eyes darker, larger and shrewder than Lucia’s. Surrounding the face were draggled dark red curls. The smile died from the face and horror replaced it as Paolo stared. He felt his own face behaving the same way. He had been huddling up against a Petrocchi! He knew which one, too. It was the elder of the two who had been at the palace. Renata, that was her name. And she knew him too.
“You’re that blue-eyed Montana boy!” she exclaimed. She made it sound quite disgusting.
Both of them got up. Renata backed into the pillars, as if she was trying to get inside the stone, and Paolo backed away along the steps.
“I thought you were my sister Lucia,” he said.
“I thought you were my cousin Claudio,” Renata retorted.
Somehow, they both made it sound as if it was the other one’s fault.
“It wasn’t my fault!” Paolo said angrily. “Blame the person who made the fog, not me. There’s an enemy enchanter.”
“I know. Chrestomanci said,” said Renata.
Paolo felt he hated Chrestomanci. He had no business to go and say the same things to the Petrocchis as he said to the Montanas. But he hated the enemy enchanter even more. He had been responsible for the most embarrassing thing which had ever happened to Paolo. Muttering with shame, Paolo turned to run away.
“No, stop! Wait!” Renata said. She said it so commandingly that Paolo stopped without thinking, and gave Renata time to snatch hold of his arm. Instead of pulling away, Paolo stood quite still and attempted to behave with the dignity becoming to a Montana. He looked at his arm, and at Renata’s hand holding it, as if both had become one composite slimy toad. But Renata hung on. “Look all you like,” she said. “I don’t care. I’m not letting go until you tell me what your family has done with Angelica.”
“Nothing,” Paolo said contemptuously. “We wouldn’t touch one of you with a barge-pole. What have you lot done with Tonino?”
An odd little frown wrinkled Renata’s white forehead. “Is that your brother? Is he really missing?”
“He was sent a book with a calling-spell in it,” said Paolo.
“A book,” said Renata slowly, “got Angelica too. We only realised when it shrivelled away.”
She let go of Paolo’s arm. They stared at one another in the blowing remains of the fog.
“It must be the enemy enchanter,” said Paolo.
“Trying to take our minds off the war,” said Renata. “Tell your family, won’t you?”
“If you tell yours,” said Paolo.
“Of course I will. What do you take me for?” said Renata.
In spite of everything, Paolo found himself laughing. “I think you’re a Petrocchi!” he said.
But when Renata began to laugh too, Paolo realised it was too much. He turned to run away, and found himself facing the Chief of Police. The