Thief of Time

Lu-Tze glanced down at the pile of grey dust under the disintegrating hat as he hurried past. Well, maybe it was the way he'd want to go—

A scream of tormented stone made him look up.

“Keep those bearings greased, you lazy devils!” he yelled, running down the rows. “And watch those rails! Hands off the splines! We're doing fine!”

As he ran he kept his eyes on the columns. They were no longer turning randomly. Now, they had purpose.

“I think you're winning, lad!” he shouted to the figure on the podium.

“Yes, but I can't balance it! There's too much time wound up and nowhere to put it!”

“How much?”

“Almost forty years!”

Lu-Tze glanced at the shutters. Forty years looked about right, but surely—?

“How much?” he said.

“Forty! I'm sorry! There's nothing to take it up!”

“No problem! Steal it! Shed load! We can always pull it back later! Dump it!”

“Where?”

“Find a big patch of sea!” The sweeper pointed to a crude map of the world painted on the wall. “Do you know how to—Can you see how to give it the right spin and direction?”

Once again, there was the blueness in the air.

“Yes! I think so!”

“Yes, I imagine you do! In your own time, then!”

Lu-Tze shook his head. Forty years? He was worried about forty years? Forty years was nothing! Apprentice drivers had dumped fifty thousand years before now. That was the thing about the sea. It just stayed big and wet. It always had been big and wet, it always would be big and wet. Oh, maybe fishermen would start to dredge up strange whiskery fish that they'd only ever seen before as fossils, but who cared what happened to a bunch of codfish?

The sound changed.

“What are you doing?”

“I've found space on number 422! It can take another forty years! No sense in wasting time! I'm pulling it back now!”

There was another change of tone.

“Got it! I'm sure I've got it!”

Some of the bigger cylinders were already slowing to a halt. Lobsang was moving pegs around the board now faster than the bewildered Lu-Tze could follow. And, overhead, the shutters were slamming back, one after another, showing age-blackened wood instead of colour.

No one could be that accurate, could they?

“You're down to months now, lad, months!” he shouted. “Keep it up! No, blimey, you're down to days… days! Keep an eye on me!”

The sweeper ran towards the end of the hall, to where the Procrastinators were smaller. Time was fine-tuned here, on cylinders of chalk and wood and other short-lived materials. To his amazement, some of them were already slowing.

He raced down an aisle of oak columns a few feet high. But even the Procrastinators that could wind time in hours and minutes were falling silent.

There was a squeaking noise.

Beside him, one final little chalk cylinder at the end of a row rattled around on its bearing like a spinning-top.

Lu-Tze crept towards it, staring at it intently, one hand raised. The squeaking was the only sound now, apart from the occasional clink of cooling bearings.

“Nearly there,” he called out. “Slowing down now… wait for it, wait… for… it…”

The chalk Procrastinator, no bigger than a reel of cotton, slowed, spun… stopped.

On the racks, the last two shutters closed.

Lu-Tze's hand fell.

“Now! Kill the board! No one touch a thing!”

For a moment there was dead silence in the hall. The monks watched, holding their breath.

This was a timeless moment, of perfect balance.

Tick

And in that timeless moment the ghost of Mr Shoblang, to whom the scene was hazy and fuzzy as though seen through a gauze, said, “This is just impossible! Did you see that?”

SEE WHAT? said a dark figure behind him.

Shoblang turned. “Oh,” he said, and added with sudden certainty, “You're Death, right?”

YES. I AM SORRY I AM LATE.

The spirit formerly known as Shoblang looked down at the pile of dust that represented his worldly habitation for the previous six hundred years.

“So am I,” he said. He nudged Death in the ribs.

EXCUSE ME?

“I said, ‘I'm sorry I'm late.’ Boom, boom.”

I BEG YOUR PARDON?

“Er, you know… Sorry I'm late. Like… dead?”

Death nodded. OH, I SEE. IT WAS THE “BOOM BOOM” I DID NOT UNDERSTAND.

“Er, that was to show it was a joke,” said Shoblang.

AH, YES. I CAN SEE HOW THAT WOULD BE NECESSARY. IN FACT, MR SHOBLANG, WHILE YOU ARE LATE, YOU ARE ALSO EARLY. BOOM, BOOM.

“Pardon?”

YOU HAVE DIED BEFORE YOUR TIME.

“Well, yes, I should think so!”

DO YOU HAVE ANY IDEA WHY? IT'S VERY UNUSUAL.

“All I know is that the spinners went wild and I must've copped a load when one of 'em went overspeed,” said Shoblang. “But, hey, what about that kid, eh? Look at the way he's making the buggers dance! I wish I'd had him training under me! What am I saying? He could give me a few tips!”

Death looked around. TO WHOM DO YOU REFER?

“That boy up on the podium, see him?”

NO, I'M AFRAID I SEE NO ONE THERE.

“What? Look, he's right there! Plain as the nose on your fa—Well, obviously not on your face…”

I SEE THE COLOURED PEGS MOVING…