The Stolen Lake

by Joan Aiken

The captain's brow clouded. 'He is not certain; he believes it possible that the man is merely suffering from altitude sickness and hopes that a day or two should show some improvement in his condition. I must say,' Captain Hughes said aggrievedly, 'it is deuced inconvenient having him laid up just now. Mr Multiple, pray mount guard over Miss Twite's door while she is being apparelled. We want no untoward incidents.'

  Dido went glumly to her room, where a surly black-haired girl was waiting to help. She had also brought up a nuncheon-tray on which was a beefsteak as large as a paving-stone, enough pepper-and-potato stew to feed a choir, and a dozen peaches.

  'Blimey! I can't eat all that,' said Dido, who was full of Bath Bun. 'I'd get the hiccups while I was making my curtsey to Her Royally. I'll eat the peaches – would you like the rest?'

  Waiting for no second invitation, the chambermaid swallowed the soup in three gulps, and the steak in six enormous bites. Thawing, then, somewhat, in her manner, she helped Dido don petticoat, dress, slippers and stockings.

  'I don't half look a sight,' Dido said, viewing herself uncertainly in the mildewed glass, as the chambermaid brushed her hair.

  'You go see Su Merced – Queen Ginevra?' inquired the girl timidly, pronouncing it Huineffra.

  'Yes – worse luck! It wouldn't be so bad if I didn't have to curtsey.' Dido attempted a bob, but since she was wholly unaccustomed to long skirts, the attempt was a complete failure; she fell over sideways, and her tiara rolled under the bed. Curiously enough, the chambermaid did not find this in the least amusing. She was gazing at Dido in something like horror. She made the sign that Silver Taffy had on the Thrush — a figure-eight like a pair of spectacles in the air, done with fingers and thumbs.

  'Go see Queen,' said the girl hoarsely, 'she look at you through her glasses, you get caught by Aurocs soon after. In two, five days.'

  'How do you know?' Dido tried to sound calm about it, but she had a nasty crawling sensation down her backbone.

  'Everyone know. Nemine dissentientae. Everyone say.'

  'Everyone say.' Despite her fear, Dido could not help feeling impatient too – the girl's excited whisper and staring eyes made what she said seem less, not more, believable. 'Who says?'

  'Many, many people.'

  'Have you ever seen an Auroc?'

  'Jeeminy! No me!' For the first time, the chambermaid looked cheerful. 'When I am five my mater and pater send me work in silver-mines. No Aurocs there! I stay work underground till I am fifteen. Work in silver-mines is not nice – ' she exhibited her hands and arms, blackened and scarred from heavy work – 'but is better than Aurocs.'

  'Young 'uns of five work in the mines?'

  The girl nodded.

  'Many, many! Safe there – if no get squashed by truck.'

  'How many get squashed by truck?'

  The girl shrugged. 'Some. Suum cuique periculum. Danger anywhere.'

  Here the conversation was interrupted by a melancholy mew. It seemed to come from under the bed.

  'That's funny,' said Dido. 'Everywhere I go, I keep hearing cats. Thought I heard one all night. ..'

  She knelt down to retrieve her fallen tiara, and found herself looking into a pair of desperate golden eyes.

  'Well I'll be bothered! It's another like Dora. Where the blue blazes do they all come from? Well, step along out then; no sense lurking in under there!' said Dido, and put down the plate with the gristly end of the beefsteak.

  In four famished bites the cat had demolished the unappetising fragment, and then eagerly licked out the peppery stew-bowl.

  'Ay – ay – ay!' whispered the chambermaid, watching this with starting eyes. 'Old Grandmother Sul herself be watching over you, gringo puella!'

  'Who? Who is Grandmother Sul?'

  The girl, without answering, bent over the cat, which was still engaged in pushing the soup-bowl over the cactus-matting, and deftly twitched out a long, silvery whisker from each cheek.

  'What d'you do that to the poor thing for?'

  But the chambermaid, knotting and twisting the whiskers together, plaited them into a loop and slipped it over Dido's index finger. 'There! You keep on under glove, not nohow take off, maybe you safe. Maybe not! Cum grano salis – ' And, making the figure-eight sign again, she snatched up the dishes and ran from the room.

  'Humph! What'll we do with you, puss, eh? Poor thing, you're still half starved. Ribs like railings. Well, what do you know – you got a collar too? And another page from that pesky dictionary? New Cumbria,' muttered Dido, detaching the little packet, 'ain't half full of eddicated cats!'

  This cat's page, after informing Dido that a cough was a convulsion of the lungs, vellicated by some serosity, had another message in dark-brown ink.

  'For mercy's sake help me. Only air for 3 days, Elen.'

  Dido studied this appeal with compressed lips and knitted brow, then, as a double thump sounded on the door, tucked it into one of her white elbow-length gloves.

  'Miss Twite? Are you ready?' came Multiple's voice. 'The captain is calling for you!'

  'I'm a-coming, I'm a-coming,' said Dido hastily. 'Tell His Whiskers to keep calm.'

  And, hitching up her draperies of silver-spangled mull, she opened the door.

  'Reckon you'll have to help me downstairs, though, Mr Mully, or I'm liable to go tail-over-tip.'

  'Very proper,' approved Captain Hughes at the foot of the stairs, observing Dido's cautious descent, assisted by the midshipman. 'Now you look just as you ought! Mind those skirts! I have a carriage waiting.'

  He wrapped a shawl of white vicuna wool round Dido and put her in the carriage, where Mr Windward was already seated, looking stiff and uncomfortable. Both the captain and his first lieutenant were rigged up very fine in full-dress uniform, with knee-breeches, gold-laced jackets, epaulettes, cocked hats, feathers and swords, which clanked a great deal and tended to trip the wearers.

  'Glad J ain't coming,' murmured Mr Multiple with a grin, passing Dido her fan.

  'Keep an eye on Mr Holy! And feed the cat in my room!' she called, just before the footman slammed the door.

  6

  The short distance between the Sydney Hotel and the revolving palace on its island was swiftly accomplished, and the carriage drew up before a flight of black marble steps, flanked, on either side, by three grey-clad, silver-plumed sentries. The coachman opened the door, Dido was lifted out, and the small party from H. M. S. Thrush ascended the steps.

  'Oops!' said Dido. 'There ain't no front door.'

  'I reckon we have to wait here till it comes round,' said Lieutenant Windward.

  'Vexatious!' muttered the captain. 'It is hardly dignified to be obliged to stand on the doorstep like petitioners!'

  The rotating silver building had its back to them, and they were forced to wait five or six minutes until the entrance slowly crept round to where they were standing. Meanwhile Dido glumly studied her reflection in the glistening walls and hoped that the palace was not full of Aurocs; in her long skirts, she thought, it would be very hard to give them the slip.

  'Does the building come to a stop so that we may enter?' Captain Hughes asked one of the sentries. The man shook his head, and laid a finger on his lips. Irritably the captain put his question to another sentry, who made the same gesture.

  'I fancy they are all deaf-and-dumb,' murmured the lieutenant in an undertone. He shivered a little. All of Bath was cold, but a particularly icy wind seemed to whistle round the palace. Then he added, 'Here comes the entrance, sir – and I don't believe it is going to stop. We had best lose no time, or we shall have another ten minutes to wait while the plaguy thing takes another turn.'

  'Dem'd ridiculous arrangement!' grumbled Captain Hughes. However, pressing his lips together, he strode into one quadrant of the revolving door as it came opposite him, calling over his shoulder as he did so, 'Step lively, Miss Twite! Do as I do!'

  Dido skipped after him into the next quadrant, hitching up her skirts and losing a portion of her egret's-plume fan, which caug
ht in the door and snapped off. Better that than my finger, she thought. This twirling door don't half buzz round quick! It's like the giddy-go-round at the Battersea Fun-fair.

  Lieutenant Windward just had time to follow Dido before the whole entrance moved out of reach.

  'It is really a capital notion,' he remarked as he emerged on the inside. 'It means the queen never has more than about three visitors at one time. I wonder what motive power causes it to revolve?'

  'Maybe heat from Mount Damyake,' suggested Dido. 'Like the old cove at the Baths was telling us. Praps that's what drives the whole twiddledum palace round; and that's why folk reckon the queen's using up too much steam.'

  The lieutenant looked at her with surprise, and a touch of respect.

  'Well thought, young 'un! I believe you may have hit the nail on the head.'

  Captain Hughes was handing his credentials – a scroll tied with red ribbon – to a bearded white-robed official, who beckoned the visitors forward.

  They were directed to wait in a gloomy windowless reception room lit by blue gas flares and furnished with hard chairs and a couple of ottomans covered in grey velvet. The room was stuffy and smelt rather disagreeably; of salt fish, Dido thought. Hanging on the walls, arranged in circles, squares and figure-eight patterns, were a number of objects the size and shape of coconuts; Dido, wandering over to inspect these (she did not like to sit down for fear of creasing her skirts), discovered that they were model heads, grey-brown and shiny, with the hair, on those that had any, braided into little tails, the whites of the eyes painted pink, silver rings set in ears and noses, and the lips sewn together by a kind of blanket stitch. Dido did not care for them at all; the pink-coloured eyes made them look very watchful. After studying them for a few minutes she murmured to Lieutenant Windward:

  'I reckon they're real heads! Mr Holy said summat about coves in the forest as shrinks people's heads.'

  Lieutenant Windward said distastefully, 'I have certainly heard of such practices, but is it likely the queen would display the objects in her palace? A most uncivilised adornment!'

  'Mr Holystone said the lips are sewn up to prevent the ghosts getting out and haunting anybody,' Dido told him.

  Lieutenant Windward threw up his eyes at such superstitious folly.

  Captain Hughes had time to become exceedingly impatient before they were summoned to the queen's presence; he strode up and down the small room a great many times, irritably kicking his sword aside. At last a grey-clad majordomo came to lead them to the throne-room. They had to ascend a high, wide stair, and walk along a very extensive, curving gallery which appeared to follow the outer circumference of the circular palace. At last they reached the entrance to a dimly lit, pillared hall, quite fifty yards long.

  In the middle of this chamber they were intercepted by a group of white-bearded, white-robed dignitaries, who bowed politely and introduced themselves.

  'Manuel Fluellen, at your service, Her Majesty's Vicar General.'

  'Daffyd Gomez, Her Majesty's Grand Inquisitor.'

  'José Glendower, Advocate of Her Majesty's Tribunal.'

  'Juan Jones, Her Majesty's Physician and Chirurgeon.'

  These men wore chaplets of silver oak-leaves, and carried white wands of office tipped with mistletoe.

  'Happy to meet you, gentlemen,' grunted Captain Hughes. 'I trust that Her Majesty is in good health and still prepared to enlighten me as to her wishes?'

  'She is so, yes indeed,' said Jones the Physician. 'But I should impress on you, sir, that Her Mercy, being now decidedly elderly, should on no account be thwarted, overset, crossed, distressed, or in any way unduly excited.'

  Captain Hughes grunted again. 'Ha! Hm! You need not agitate yourself on that head, sir – I know how to deal with elderly females; and persons of high degree.'

  'There is a further point, sir -' Now it was the turn of the Grand Inquisitor, whose beard was even longer and whiter than that of the physician. He drew Captain Hughes to one side and talked at some length and earnestly, in a low tone, his mouth very close to the captain's ear. Upon the face of the latter, as he listened, Dido began to observe an obstinate and wary expression, as if Captain Hughes intended to let nobody persuade him to do anything against his own judgment; and after a few minutes he said shortly,

  'Sir, I am here as the emissary of King James's Government, and must act as I believe His Majesty's Government would require me to. But do not be anxious – ' as the other man began to protest or remonstrate – 'I will not put Her Majesty into a fidget. I can be diplomatic when it is necessary, I assure you!'

  'It is not precisely that, sir,' the Grand Inquisitor said smoothly, as the captain began to turn away from him, 'It is just that, sometimes, Her Mercy's wishes do not accord with the best interests of the – '

  'Be easy, man! I will undertake no foolish capers, I promise you!'

  But the Grand Inquisitor was evidently by no means easy.

  Dido could see that. His face, as he moved after the captain, wore a dark expression of disappointment and

  calculation that boded little good to the success of the British mission.

  Best watch out for him, Dido thought. They all looks to me as if they'd come from a thieves' kitchen; I'd not buy three penn'orth of brass nails from any of them; but that Inquisitor's the loosest screw in the bunch, or my name ain't Dido Twite.

  Captain Hughes, now detaching himself from the court officials, strode hastily on ahead of them towards the end of the hall, so that Dido and the lieutenant had to hurry to keep up with him. Dido, glancing from side to side, observed that grey gauze draperies dangled in the gaps between the pillars all the way down the long room; the chamber appeared to be empty, but any number of persons could be hiding behind the curtains.

  At the far end of the throne-room was a day-bed set on a dais approached by three steps.

  The day-bed was hung about with more of the grey gauzy draperies, and on it, leaning against a great many cushions, lolled a lady whose plump and billowy shape was to some extent concealed by her loose white filmy garments.

  The four officials bowed almost to the ground.

  'Your Mercy – may I present Captain Hughes of the Britannic Navy,' said the Vicar General.

  The queen impatiently gestured Messrs Glendower, Gomez, Fluellen and Jones to retire out of earshot, which they did, looking disgruntled about it; then she said,

  'My dear Captain Hughes! So very kind of you to come all this way. I am delighted to meet you. Pray consider yourself quite at home in my capital.'

  Her voice was high, light, and fatigued.

  'Ma'am,' said Captain Hughes gruffly. He climbed the three steps, went down on one knee, and kissed the hand she extended. Then, rising, he added, 'I have the honour to present Lieutenant Windward, of His Majesty King James's sloop Thrush; and – harrumph – this is Miss Dido Twite from – er – Hattersea?

  Dido curtseyed. It was not one of her more successful efforts, but Queen Ginevra appeared to find no fault with it. She turned her protuberant light-grey eyes on Dido. The fixity of her stare made Dido wish to wriggle, but she could feel Captain Hughes's sharp and critical eye on her too, and tried to keep still.

  'A child from England!' breathed the queen. 'What a remarkable coincidence!' She did not explain her words, but continued to study Dido until even Captain Hughes became a trifle fidgety.

  'Er – ahem!' he said. 'Understand there is some way in which I can be of service to Your Majesty. Only too glad to oblige in whatever it is; do my possible, that is to say.'

  '. . . Ah . . . yes,' answered Queen Ginevra, on a faint sigh, as if she had dragged her thoughts back from some immense distance, from something that was very pleasantly occupying her attention. 'Yes, you can help me, Captain. Listen, and I will explain.'

  She did not invite the captain to be seated; indeed, there was nowhere to sit; so he and Lieutenant Windward continued standing in front of the dais. Dido, unbidden, squatted down on one of the steps, and earned a scow
l and a head-shake from the captain, but he did not dare interrupt what the queen was saying.

  'You must be aware – my dear Captain – of the history of New Cumbria's settlement; that the Founding Fathers sailed here after the unfortunate outcome of the Battle of Dyrham in A.D. 577?'

  Captain Hughes nodded, and the queen went on, 'In the course of that battle, as you will recall, my husband King Arthur received a number of wounds, one very dangerous, and was ferried away over the Water of Arianrod to be healed of his hurts in the Island of Avalon by his aunts, the Cornwall sisters.'

  At the queen's words Captain Hughes turned first extremely pale, then bright red. He cast one nerve-racked sideways glance at Lieutenant Windward, who was standing, equally red-faced, staring rigidly ahead.

  'Your h-h-husband, Ma'am? King Arthur? I'm afraid I don't quite – '

  'My husband: King Arthur,' she repeated. Her high, fatigued voice held a hint of irritation. 'To be healed of his wounds in the Isle of Avalon.'

  'But – but, good gad, Ma'am, that would make you -'

  'Thirteen hundred years old,' the queen said coldly. 'You do not think I would be such an undutiful wife as to die before my husband returned to me?'

  Captain Hughes did not look as if he had any thoughts on the subject at all. He stared at the queen with glazed eyes.

  Dido stared too. Never before had she seen a lady thirteen hundred years old. Queen Ginevra certainly was very fat. She must have been getting fatter and fatter all those hundreds of years, Dido reflected. Don't look as if she walked about much. Or went out in the fresh air.

  The queen's skin was pale and soft, like white bread-dough. She lolled back wearily against her pillows.

  Lucky she ain't bald, Dido thought.

  An abundance of limp, rather greasy yellowish-white hair was swept back from the queen's brow and confined by a diamond-studded snood. Like Queen Victoria she had very little chin, but her eyes, large as poached eggs, made up for that; they were extremely sharp and gave, the impression that they observed all that went on, not only in front of the queen but also to the side and behind her. They observed, but they held no expression; they were like birds' eyes. The short fingers of her small fat hands were loaded with rings.