The Amulet of Samarkand

attempts to locate his amulet. I wondered idly whether Faquarl and Jabor had suffered for letting me escape. One could only hope.
    On the morning of the third day, a soft coo of approval broke my concentration. A small, well-presented pigeon had appeared on the guttering to my right and was looking at me with a distinctly interested tilt of the head. Something about it made me suspect it was female. I gave what I hoped was a haughty and dismissive coo and looked away. The pigeon gave a coquettish hop along the guttering. Just what I needed: an amorous bird. I edged away. She hopped a little closer. I edged away again. Now I was right at the end of the gutter, perched above the opening to the drainpipe.
    It was tempting to turn into an alley cat and frighten her out of her feathers, but it was too risky to make a change so close to the villa. I was just about to fly elsewhere, when at long last I spotted something leaving Simon Lovelace's compound.
    A small circular hole widened in the shimmering blue nexus and a bottle-green imp with bat's wings and the snout of a pig issued through it. The hole closed up; the imp beat his wings and flew down the road at streetlamp height.
    He carried a pair of letters in one paw.
    At that moment, a purring coo sounded directly in my ear. I half turned my head—and looked directly into the beak of that benighted she-pigeon. With devious feminine cunning she'd seized the opportunity to snuggle right up close.
    My response was eloquent and brief. She got a wingtip in the eye and a kick in the plumage. And with that I was airborne, following the imp.
    It was clear to me that he was a messenger of some kind, probably entrusted with something too dangerous or secret for telephone or mail. I had seen creatures of his kind before.[2] Whatever he was carrying now, this was my first opportunity to spy on Lovelace's doings.
     
    [2] Some societies I had known made great use of messenger imps. The rooftops and date palms of old Baghdad (which had neither telephone nor e-mail) used to swarm with the things after breakfast and shortly before sundown, which were the two traditional times for messages to be sent.
     
    The imp drifted over some gardens, soaring on an updraft. I followed, laboring somewhat on my stubby wings. As I went I considered the situation carefully. The safest and most sensible thing to do was to ignore the envelopes he was carrying and concentrate instead on making friends with him. I could, for instance, adopt the semblance of another messenger imp and start up a conversation, perhaps winning his confidence during the course of several "chance" meetings. If I were patient, friendly and casual enough, he would no doubt eventually spill some beans....
    Or I could just beat him up instead. This was a quicker and more direct approach and all in all I favored it. So I followed the imp at a discreet distance and jumped him over Hampstead Heath.
    When we were in a remote enough area, I made the change from pigeon to gargoyle; then I swooped down upon the unlucky imp, and bundled us to earth among some scrubby trees. This done, I held him by a foot and gave him a decent shaking.
    "Leggo!" he squealed, flailing back and forth with his four clawed paws. "I'll have you! I'll cut you to ribbons, I will!"
    "Will you, my lad?" I dragged him into a thicket and fixed him nicely under a small boulder. Only his snout and paws protruded.
    "Right," I said, sitting myself cross-legged on top of the stone and plucking the envelopes from a paw. "First I'm going to read these, then we can talk. You can tell me what and all you know about Simon Lovelace."
    Affecting not to notice the frankly shocking curses that sounded up from below, I considered the envelopes. They were very different. One was plain and completely blank: it bore no name or mark and had been sealed with a small blob of red wax. The other was more showy, made of soft yellowish vellum, its seal had been pressed with the shape of the magician's monogram, SL. It was addressed to someone named R. Devereaux, Esq.
    "First question," I said. "Who's R. Devereaux?"
    The imp's voice was muffled but insolent. "You're kidding! You don't know who Rupert Devereaux is? You stupid or something?"
    "A small piece of advice," I said. "Generally speaking, it isn't wise to be rude to someone bigger than you, especially when they've just trapped you under a boulder."
    "You can stick your advice up—" * * * * * * * * * *[3]
     
    [3] These polite