"Very well, sir," Hughes said. He did something with his crystal ball, and when we stepped outside there was a flying carpet waiting for us.
That beat the pumpkin coach I'd imagined. "It's a nice enough day for a convertible, and this gets us past traffic better than some of the other options," Selwyn explained. "Hop on."
The flying rug hovered a few feet off the ground, so getting on board while wearing a skirt wasn't going to be easy. I had a flashback to my high school years, when I had to find a way to get into my dates' pickup trucks while wearing date-appropriate clothes. As I did back then, I stood with my back to the rug and boosted myself up so I was sitting on the edge, then swung my legs around. Next I had to figure out how to sit politely, since flying carpets don't have bucket seats. My skirt was slim and knee-length, so I couldn't sit Indian style. I settled for sitting with my legs folded to the side.
Selwyn hopped on easily, with the grace I expected from his species, even if most of what I guessed about him I'd got from books and movies. He "drove" by gesturing with his hands, and the rug took off, rising above the traffic as it flew uptown. I was glad I wasn't afraid of heights, for there weren't any seat belts on this thing. I wondered if it had any safety measures built into it, like maybe a field to keep us from being thrown off. There wasn't even anything to hold onto. Selwyn seemed to be a pro at this, but he was also the kind of guy who tries to take comers on two wheels in his sports car to scare and impress his date.
"You'd think I would have noticed one of these things," I said as we swooped up Broadway.
"How often do you look up?" he asked. He had a point. That had been part of the safety lecture Marcia and Gemma gave me when I first moved here, and since I knew they weren't trying to scare me away from the city, I'd listened. Staring up at the skyscrapers was a sure way to brand yourself as a tourist and was an open invitation to pickpockets. No matter how much I wanted to gawk at all the tall buildings, I forced myself to keep my eyes straight ahead.
"We also have designated routes to take," he continued. "That lowers the chances of anyone seeing us." Once I got him started by asking a question, he talked nonstop through the rest of the journey telling me about all the retailers who'd tried to pull one over on him. The way he talked, you'd think he didn't even need a verifier. We came to a stop on the Upper East Side, in a neighborhood that looked pretty ritzy. Once we'd both climbed off the carpet, Selwyn rolled it up, tucked it under his arm, and led the way to a gift store.
It was the kind of place that sells cards for every occasion, gift wrap, and things classified as "gifts" because they had no other discernible purpose. But this store had a rack labeled "Special Occasion Cards" in which there were items that didn't quite look like greeting cards.
They were shrink-wrapped booklets with labels on the front, grouped under headings like Household Spells, Transportation, Workplace Convenience, and Masking Illusions. So, that's what a spell looked like on the market. Selwyn had me read all the headers off to him, and he nodded. "Okay, looks like they're in good shape. There isn't anything else?"
"Like what?"
"Oh, just anything different. Anything that doesn't look like it belongs." He didn't look me in the eye as he said this, which made me wonder what was going on.
I shook my head. "I don't think so. Everything has a similar look to it, like it's all from the same company."
"Good. Good." He looked more relieved than seemed reasonable in that situation, but after a moment he got the same blandly pleasant salesman's look on his face and pulled a notepad and pen out of his pocket. "Give me a count of what's in each category."
I noticed that the pen wrote the numbers without any help from him, and that made me lose count in the Household Spells category. Just as I was finishing the last category, a woman came from around the cash register and said, "Selwyn! What brings you here?"
"Madeline, you're lovelier than ever," he said, bowing to kiss her hand. "I'm just making sure you have everything you need."
"Oh, I don't know about everything," she said with a saucy wink, "but I'm well stocked on spells. The subway summoner is doing particularly well. I may need a restock on that one soon."
While they talked I looked around the store to see if there was anything else that should be out of place in a small gift shop, but it all looked pretty normal to me, mostly ceramic cat sculptures and candle holders shaped like angels. Once Selwyn and I were back outside, he shook the rug out until it hovered in place and we climbed on for the trip back to the office.