Part 27 (1/2)

The section of corridor before them was long, plain, and high.

Its upper half was filled by a huge block of stone, suspended by some hidden means so that it just cleared the side walls by a couple of centimetres. There was no way past it. Alpha examined it closely, confirming that it was real stone. With all his strength, Drorgon could just set it swaying slightly, indicating that it was hanging freely, and must have ma.s.sed a few hundred tonnes. If it was released while somebody was in the corridor below it would crush them flat.

'It's so obviously a trap, Alpha said, 'but is it as harmless as the others?'

'Like I said before, somebody is playing some really sick jokes around here!' Peri fumed, pulling the sticky threads of a giant cobweb from her. A spider six feet across was still twirling slowly on its thread before her. It was, as they had ascertained only after its dramatic appearance, made of rubber. Red sniffed at it curiously.

'I don't think anything has been placed here simply for the fun of it,' the Doctor corrected her gently. 'I think there is a far deeper purpose.'

'But what?' Jaharnus said, looking anxiously up and down the corridor, grasping her sword more tightly.

'A final warning, perhaps: that they can kill us any time they wish if we continue? Or is it meant to symbolise something: traps that no longer function guarding a treasure that is no longer there?'

'You've thought that all along, haven't you, Doctor?' said Peri quietly.

'Let's say I believe it is a strong possibility.'

'So you're saying I should be prepared to be disappointed?'

'I thought you'd renounced treasure hunting?'

Peri grinned. 'Well, I thought, as we're here anyway and if we sort of stumbled over it, we might as well take a look...' They rounded the next corner.

'Ah... now this is something a little different,' the Doctor said.

There was a ma.s.sive stone block suspended above the corridor.

The Marquis prepared to step under the slab that overhung their section of corridor. Arnella was trying to stop him. 'Please, Uncle.

This one might be real.'

'I have not come this far to give up now.'

'It could be suicide!' Brockwell said. 'Professor, talk some sense into him.'

Thorrin looked anything but stable himself. 'I don't know, any more,' he said faintly. 'Perhaps it is real, perhaps another fake. Is it to test our resolve, or ingenuity? But I don't see any other way to test it than we already have. It is worth every risk but this... a paradox.'

Brockwell was looking at him in dismay. The Marquis pulled free of Arnella.

'I refuse to cower here paralysed by uncertainly,' he said, and stepped boldly forward.

Fearfully, Drorgon had stamped on the floor under the block, thrown rocks, and done everything else Alpha had commanded in order to spring any hidden mechanism. The block still hung there menacingly.

'Such an obvious hazard, whereas the others were hidden,'

Alpha mused. 'Is that the actual intent? To trap us into knowingly pa.s.sing under it? There is nothing else for it.

Gentlemen, I need a volunteer...'

Either it will fall and you will die, or else it will not and you will live. It certainly makes you think, said the Doctor, staring at the slab. 'Is that its purpose? To decide what value you really put on your life? Do you gamble everything on a fifty-fifty chance - the toss of a coin?'

'Doctor,' said Peri, 'there's no end to second-guessing this thing and wondering if its a bluff or not. I don't think I can stand waiting here much longer. We have to find out the truth!'

'The truth? Is that fundamentally what its all about?'

And then they heard Falstaff say softly, 'Cowards die many times before their deaths: the valiant never taste of death but once...'

And he ran through the pa.s.sage under the block.

They looked at each other in surprise, then dashed after him, Red bounding along excitedly in the rear, followed by the DAVE unit.

The block did not fall.

Falstaff was lying sprawled on his face on the far side. They rolled him over and the Doctor examined him anxiously, then grinned. 'He's all right. Heart beating like a trip hammer. Fainted from shock, I think.' He slapped Falstaff's face lightly. 'Come on, Sir John. You've made it. Wakey, wakey...'

His eyes flickered open, and he stared at them for a long moment. 'Preston Loxley the Third,' he said faintly.

'Pardon?'

'Preston Loxley the Third. It's my real name.'

'Ah,' the Doctor said slowly. 'Well we had surmised it wasn't really Falstaff.'

'Why the deception?' Jaharnus asked suspiciously.

Loxley/Falstaff heaved himself up until he rested against the wall. 'It's nothing sinister, Inspector; just sad, perhaps. But you may not understand my reasons.' Peri thought his speech sounded strangely bland now, shorn of its antique frills and allusions. He sighed. 'You've always known who you are and what your purpose is in life. I haven't. My family was wealthy but completely undistinguished - and so was I. Other people had personalities that shone out - I had money, a glib tongue with nothing worth saying, and a slight weight problem. I wanted to be genuinely interesting: a real character. Someone people would remember, instead of wondering afterwards: who was that fat man anyway? Then I came across Falstaff in some ancient texts.

It was a revelation! Here was somebody who was fat, a cheat, and a liar, and yet he was popular. People forgave him his faults. And so I, well, borrowed him.'

'That was years ago. I've grown into the part since, you might say. But life sometimes rather cruelly imitates art, you know.

Falstaff was a coward at the core... and I slowly discovered that so was I.'

'So you came on the quest to prove yourself?' said the Doctor.

'Yes. But it's hard to abandon a character just like that. It's so much easier to keep up the barrier, and to go on making up excuses and talking your way out of trouble.'

'There's nothing wrong with talking your way out of things,'

said Peri sympathetically.