Lyra makes an important phone call.
Lyra lay on the big bed in Elsa's spare bedroom, crying anguished and bitter tears. So much had happened! They had gone to the car park and gotten into Elsa's car (she called it a Miata) and then they had shot off at a dizzying speed onto great huge roads full of other cars and trucks. Lyra had seen cars in Will's world and even ridden in a Rolls Royce (!) but this was different. It was noisy and frightening. She felt nauseous when Elsa parked the car and they got out.
Elsa Manchester lived in a great tall building (she called it a condo) but she only had a few rooms in it, on the fifteenth floor. They had to stand in a small room (she called it an elevator), which pressed against her feet and lifted her up to the fifteenth floor where Elsa lived.
Elsa gave Lyra a soda and some potato chips and a strawberry Pop Tart and then she turned on the TV. Lyra soon caught on that it was like the movies, only smaller, and she enjoyed watching it. Soon she was feeling at home. Elsa's apartment was full of greenly glowing anbaric boxes with names she didn't understand like AM/FM and DVD and VCR and CD and PC and Microwave. She was afraid to touch them in case she got an anbaric shock.
Lyra thought that the strawberry Pop Tart was the most disgusting thing that she had ever eaten, but she had learned to be a polite young lady at St Sophia's so she ate it.
"Ok," said Elsa, "Let's see if we can't find out a little more about you."
Lyra told Elsa about herself. It sounded like lying, she knew. Elsa looked as if she thought Lyra was telling her lies.
"So, honey, suppose you could talk to anyone in the whole world, who would you choose?"
"Will! I'd like to talk to Will!" gasped Lyra, breathlessly.
"What's his full name? Where does he live?"
Lyra told Elsa that Will's full name was Will Parry, but he might be living in Oxford with Mary Malone the scientist or in Winchester with Elaine, his paranoid mother.
Elsa picked up the phone and told the operator she wanted a person-to-person call to England. It took a long time, and Elsa used words that Lyra hadn't heard since she was on the gyptian ship, but soon she was connected.
"Go ahead, sweetheart," Elsa said, handing the phone to Lyra. She showed Lyra which end of the phone to talk into.
"Will! Will! It's me, Lyra. I'm here! I'm in your world at last! How I've missed you!"
It was Will! Lyra knew his voice!! But what he said clutched coldly at her heart.
"Lyra? Lyra who? I've never heard of any Lyra. Is this a practical joke?" he said.
"Will, it's me - Lyra Silvertongue. I'm back! I've found a way to reach your world!"
"You're bonkers!" said cruel Will. "I've never heard of you and I don't want to talk to you. Clear off!"
And the line went dead. So did Lyra's poor anguished heart.
Oh no! What's wrong with Will?