I nod. “The Mage said so, too.”
“Right,” Baz says, kneading his forehead, “the Magedefinitely, alwaystold you the truth. Philippa never got her voice back! She’s living in Smith’s compound, waiting for him to fix her.”
“You saw her?” Penny asks.
“Yes.” He looks at me. “We both did—the girl who answered the door, the one who doesn’t talk.”
“The cute one? With the short hair?”
Baz groans.
“I thought her name was Pippa,” I say.
“Philippa still can’t talk?” Penelope’s appalled. “Oh, that’s awful. That means her magic never came back.”
“Yeah, Iknow,” Baz says, like he’s in pain.
“Wait,” Shepard says to Penny, “you can’t do magic if you can’ttalk?”
“Well, you can’t go to Watford,” she explains. “In the old days, you couldn’t even get in with a stutter.”
Shepard shakes his head. “There must be magicians who do magic without speaking . . .”
“I’ve heard it’s possible. I’m surprisedyoudon’t know a whole crew of them.”
Baz is back to holding his head.
“Maybe Smith can help Philippa,” I say.
Baz hisses and stands up. “Ican help her.” He looks down at the tape recorder. “Fiona never took out the tape.”
I look at it, too. It’s got to be older than we are. “So Philippa’s magic is right there?”
“Her voice is.” He swallows. “I’m going to give it back to her—and then I’m going to let her spell me into oblivion.”
I stand up and take his arm. “Well, I’m not letting her spell you into anything.”
Penelope stands, too. “Me neither.”
“We’ll have to hurry,” I say, “if we want to catch Philippa before she leaves for Smith’s meeting at Watford.”
“ ‘We’?” Baz pulls away from me. “There’s no ‘we.’ You’re not all coming.”
“I can stay here,” Shepard offers.
Penelope frowns at him. “Oh no, I’m not letting anyone in this room out of my sight, ever again.”
“You know what? Fine. I don’t care anymore.” Baz leans over and lifts the tape recorder with both hands, cradling it like it’s a porcelain egg. “Let’s just go.”
He looks beaten. He’s standing there with his hair all matted down on one side, wearing a Watford hoodie I never gave back to Agatha and his “Clean as a whistle”-d pyjama trousers.
I clear my throat. “Don’t you want to, um . . . change?”
Baz looks down at himself and groans again.
Apparently this is another occasion that calls for a suit. Three pieces. A shade of brown that gleams red in the light. Baz buttons his white shirt all the way to the top, and puts on a shiny purple tie. (Why did he bring neckties and three-piece suits to my flat? What was he anticipating?) Then he dumps an entire duffel bag full of shoes onto the floor.
“Should we talk about this?” I ask.
