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'A rebuttal of a rebuttal?' I cried. 'The rules don't state that!'
'But they do!' said Libris kindly. 'Perhaps you'd like to look at the
BookWorld constitution?'
He pulled the slim volume from his coat and I could smell the cantaloupes from
where I stood. It would say whatever they wanted it to say. Libris walked over
to us and said to the Bellman in a quiet voice:
'We can do this the easy way or the hard way. We make the rules, we can change
the rules, we can modify the rules. We can do anything we want. You are due to
step down. Go with me on this one and you can have an easy retirement. Go
against me and I'll crush you.'
Libris turned to me.
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'What do you care? No one in the Outland will notice the difference. You'll
have a week to pack up and move out  you have my word on that.'
The Bellman glared at Libris.
'How much did they pay you?'
'They didn't need to. Money doesn't mean anything down here. No, it's the
technology that I really love.
It's too perfect to be sidelined by people like you. I get a hundred per cent
control. Everything will go through TGC. No more Well of Lost Plots, no more
Generics, no more Council, no more strikes by disgruntled nurseries. Design
and marketing must be brought together for efficiency reasons. But do you know
the best bit? No more authors. No more missed deadlines. No more
variable-quality second books 
each one in the series will be the same as the next. When a publisher needs a
best-seller all they need do is contact our sole representative in the
Outland!'
'Yorrick Kaine,' I murmured.
'Indeed. Do you know how much money is lost through people lending their
books? The advertising revenue and product placement deals made possible by
UltraWord"! are worth billions. Books will have links to related products and
services on every page. It's all for the best, Thursday, artistically and
financially. In fact, as a first step, we will merge the two words for ever.
How does "fartinancially" sound to you?'
Incredibly, it was worse than I thought. It was as if the paint factories had
decided to deal direct with the art galleries.
'But the books!' I cried. 'They'll be terrible!'
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'Within a few years no one will notice,' replied Libris. 'Mr Bellman, do you
go with us on this or not?'
'I would sooner die!' he exclaimed, trembling with rage.
'As you wish,' replied Libris.
There was a short crackling noise and I saw the Bellman stiffen slightly.
'Now,' said Libris, 'let's finish this all up. Bellman, would you refute Miss
Next's points one by one?'
'I should be delighted,' he said slowly and without emotion. I turned to him
in shock, and could see how his features were less defined than before  like
an out-of-focus photograph. The smell of melons once more drifted across the
stage.
'Friends!' began the Bellman. 'Miss Next is entirely mistaken & '
I turned to Libris and he smiled triumphantly. I reached into my bag for my
gun but it had been changed to marmalade.
'Tch, tch,' said Libris in a whisper. 'That's a BookWorld gun and now under
our control. What a shame you lost your Outlander Browning in the struggle
with Tweed!'
I had only one card left. I pulled out my TravelBook and opened it, flicking
past the TextMarker and
Eject-O-Hat and on towards the glass panel covering a red-painted handle. A
note painted on the glass read:
IN UNPRECEDENTED EMERGENCY, BREAK GLASS
. If this wasn't an unprecedented emergency, I
didn't know what was. I smashed the glass, grabbed the handle and pulled it
down with all my strength.
34
Loose ends
'Contrary to Text Grand Central's claims, there were no new plots using
UltraWord. Ex-
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WordMaster Libris had become so obsessed with the perfection of his operating
system that nothing else had mattered to him and he lied repeatedly to cover
up its failings.
BOOK V8.3 remained the operating system for many years to come, although one
of the
UltraWord copies of
The Little Prince can be viewed in the Jurisfiction museum. To avoid a repeat
of this near-disaster, the Council of Genres took the only course of action
open to them to ensure TGC would be too inefficient and unimaginative to pose
a threat. They appointed a committee to run it.'
MILTON DE FLOSS

UltraWord  the Aftermath
It was nearly morning when the BookWorld Awards party finished. Heathcliff was
furious that in all the excitement the final award of the night had been
forgotten; I saw him talking angrily to his personal imaginator an hour after
the appearance of the Great Panjandrum. There would be next year, of course,
but his seventy-seven-year record had been broken and he didn't like it. I
thought he might take it out on
Linton and Catherine when he got home, and he did.
No one had been more surprised than me by the arrival of the Great Panjandrum
when I pulled the
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Jasper Fforde - Thursday Next 03 - The Well of Lost Plots emergency handle.
For the non-believers it was something of a shock, and no less so for the
faithful. She had been so long a figure of speech that seeing her in the flesh
was startling. I thought she had seemed quite plain and in her mid-thirties,
but Humpty Dumpty told me later he had been shaped like an egg. In any event,
the marble statue that now stands in the lobby of the Council of Genres
depicts the Great
Panjandrum as Mr Price the stonemason saw him  with a leather apron and
carrying a mallet and stone chisel.
When she arrived the Great Panjandrum read the situation perfectly. She froze
all the text within the room, locked the doors and decreed that a vote be
taken there and then. She summoned the head of the [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]