Where one of the figures had been there was something dreadful. [Tompkins] blacked out.
Crowley restored himself to his favorite shape.
"I hate having to do that," he murmured. "I'm always afraid I'll forget how to change back. And it can ruin a good suit."
"I think the maggots were a bit over the top, myself," said Aziraphale, but without much rancor.
"I don't see why you're so shocked," said Crowley. "He wanted a real gun. Every desire in his head was for a real gun."
"But you've turned him loose on all those unprotected people!" said Aziraphale.
"Oh, no," said Crowley. "Not exactly. Fair's fair."
"The way I see it," said Crowley, "no one has to pull the trigger."
"Well, that's just it, isn't it? They're doing it themselves. It's what they really want to do. I just assisted them. Think of it as a microcosm of the universe. Free will for everyone. Ineffable, right?"
Aziraphale glared.
"Oh, all right," said Crowley wretchedly. "No one's actually going to get killed. They're all going to have miraculous escapes. It wouldn't be any fun otherwise."
Aziraphale relaxed. "You know, Crowley," he said, beaming, "I've always said that, deep down inside, you're really quite a—"
"All right, all right," Crowley snapped. "Tell the whole blessed world, why don't you?"
"Good"—Crowley glanced at his watch—"morning, ma'am," he said, in a sing-song voice. "We're just a couple of supernatural entities and we were just wondering if you might help us with the whereabouts of the notorious Son of Satan." He smiled coldly at the angel. "I'll wake her up again, shall I? And you can say it."
"How much experience do you think I've got in these matters? Armageddon only happens once, you know. They don't let you go around again until you get it right."
"All the higher life forms scythed away, just like that."
"Terrible."
"Nothing but dust and fundamentalists."
"That was nasty."
"Sorry. Couldn't resist it."
Crowley's London flat was the epitome of style. It was everything that a flat should be: spacious, white, elegantly furnished, and with that designer unlived-in look that only comes from not being lived in.
This is because Crowley did not live there.
Crowley had been extremely impressed with the warranties offered by the computer industry, and had in fact sent a bundle Below to the department that drew up the Immortal Soul agreements, with a yellow memo form attached just saying: "Learn, guys..."
He had heard about talking to plants in the early seventies, on Radio Four, and thought it an excellent idea. Although talking is perhaps the wrong word for what Crowley did.
What he did was put the fear of God into them.
More precisely, the fear of Crowley.
In addition to which, every couple of months Crowley would pick out a plant that was growing too slowly, or succumbing to leaf-wilt or browning, or just didn't look quite as good as the others, and he would carry it around to all the other plants. "Say goodbye to your friend," he'd say to them. "He just couldn't cut it . . ."
Then he would leave the flat with the offending plant, and return an hour or so later with a large, empty flower pot, which he would leave somewhere conspicuously around the flat.
The plants were the most luxurious, verdant, and beautiful in London. Also the most terrified.
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