Tacroy’s face flushed a sudden red. Christopher could feel sweat on it under his fingers. Very surprised, he asked, “Where is the rest of you?”
He saw Tacroy’s eyes swivel towards his, imploringly. “Series Eleven – don’t ask any more! Don’t ask me!” he said. “Under these spells I’d have to tell you and then we’d all catch it!”
He sounded so desperate that Christopher considerately did not ask any more – though he could not resist exchanging a look with the Goddess – and worked until he got that knot undone at last. It proved to be the key knot. The rest of the spell at once fell away in dissolving strands round Tacroy’s handmade boots. Tacroy stood up stiffly and stretched.
“Thanks,” he said. “What a relief! You can’t imagine how vile it feels having a net bag round your spirit. What now?”
“Start running,” said Christopher. “Do you want me to break the spells round the grounds for you?”
Tacroy’s arms stopped in the middle of a stretch. “Now you stow it!” he said. “From what you said, there’s no one apart from you two youngsters and me in this Castle with any magic worth speaking of, and your uncle could come back any minute. And you expect me just to walk out?”
“Well—”
But at that moment, Miss Rosalie came in with Dr Simonson and most of the rest of Gabriel’s staff crowding behind her. “Why, Mordecai!” she said brightly. “Do I actually hear you uttering a noble sentiment?”
Tacroy took his arms down and folded them. “Strictly practical,” he said. “You know me, Rosalie. Have you come to lock me up again? I can’t see you doing it without your magic, but you’re welcome to try.”
Miss Rosalie drew herself up to a majestic five feet. “I wasn’t coming to see you at all,” she said. “We were looking for Christopher. Christopher, we’re going to have to ask you to take over as the next Chrestomanci, at least for the moment. The Government will probably appoint some other enchanter in the end, but this is such a crisis. Do you think you can do it, dear?”
They were all staring at Christopher appealingly, even Dr Simonson. Christopher wanted to laugh. “You knew I’d have to,” he said, “and I will on two conditions. I want Mordecai Roberts set free and not arrested again afterwards. And I want the G—Millie as my chief helper and she’s to be paid by being sent to a boarding school.”
“Anything you want, dear,” Miss Rosalie said hastily.
“Good,” said Christopher. “Then let’s go back to the hall.”
In the hall, people were gathering dejectedly under the green-stained dome. The butler was there and two men in cook’s hats, and the housekeeper with most of the maids and footmen. “Tell them to get the gardeners and the stable people too,” Christopher said, and went to look at the five-pointed star where Throgmorten sat watching. By screwing up his eyes and forcing his witch-sight to its utmost, he could see a tiny round space in the middle of the star – a sort of ghostly mousehole – which Throgmorten never took his eyes off. Throgmorten had quite impressive magic. On the other hand, Throgmorten would be only too pleased if Uncle Ralph came back. “How do we stop someone coming through?” Christopher asked.
Tacroy ran to a cupboard under the staircase and came back with an armful of queer candles in star-shaped holders. He showed Christopher and the Goddess where to put them and what words to say. Then he had Christopher stand back and conjure all the candles to flame. Tacroy was, Christopher realised, among other things, a fully-trained magician. As the candles flared up, Throgmorten’s tail twitched scornfully.
“The cat’s right,” Tacroy said. “This would stop most people, but with the amount of dragon’s blood your uncle has stored away, he could break through any time he wants.”
“Then we’ll catch him when he does,” Christopher said. He knew what he would do himself, if he knew Throgmorten was lying in wait, and he was fairly sure Uncle Ralph would do the same. He suspected their minds worked the same way. If he was right, it would take Uncle Ralph a little time to get ready.
By this time, quite a crowd of people had come into the hall through the big front door, where they were standing clutching their caps and awkwardly brushing earth off their boots. Christopher went to stand a little way up the staircase, looking down on the long, limp remains of Gabriel de Witt and everyone’s faces, anxious and depressed, lit half by the flames of the strange candles. He knew just what needed saying. And he was surprised to find he was enjoying himself hugely.
He shouted, “Hands up everyone who can do magic.”
Most of the gardeners’ hands went up and so did a couple of the stable lads’. When he looked at the indoor people, he saw the butler’s hand was up and one of the cooks’. There was the boot-boy who had worked the scoreboard and three of the maids, one of whom was Erica. Tacroy’s hand was up and so was the Goddess’s. Everyone else was looking at the floor, dismally.
Christopher shouted, “Now hands up anyone who can do woodwork or metalwork.”
Quite a number of the dismal people put their hands up, looking surprised. Dr Simonson was one, Flavian was another. All the stable people had their hands up, and the gardeners too. Good. Now all they needed was encouragement.
“Right,” said Christopher. “We’ve got two things to do. We’ve got to keep my uncle out of here until we’re ready to catch him. And we’ve got to get Gabriel de Witt back.”
The second thing made everyone murmur with surprise, and then with hope. Christopher knew he had been right to say it, even though he was not sure it could be done – and as far as his own feelings went, Gabriel could stay in eight limp pieces for the rest of both their lives. He found he was enjoying himself more than ever.
“That’s what I said,” he said. “My uncle didn’t kill Gabriel. He just scattered all his lives. We’ll have to find them and put them together. But first—” he looked at the greened glass of the dome and the chandelier that hung from it on its long chain “—I want a birdcage-thing made, big enough to cover the pentacle, and hung from there, so that it can be triggered by a spell to come down over anything that tries to get through.” He pointed to Dr Simonson. “You’re in charge of making it. Collect everyone who can do woodwork and metalwork, but make sure some of them can do magic too. I want it reinforced with spells to stop anyone breaking out of it.”
Dr Simonson’s beard began to jut in a proud, responsible way. He gave a slightly mocking bow. “It shall be done.”
Christopher supposed he deserved that. The way he was behaving would have had the Last Governess accusing him of having a swelled head. But then he was beginning to suspect that he worked best when he was feeling bumptious. He was annoyed with the Last Governess for stopping him realising this before.
“But before anyone starts on the birdcage,” he said, “the spells round the ground need reinforcing, or my uncle will try to bring the Wraith organisation in that way. I want everyone except T—Mordecai and the G—Millie to go all round the fences and walls and hedges casting every spell they can think of that will keep people out.”
That made a mixed murmur. Gardeners and housemaids looked at one another doubtfully. One of the gardeners’ hands went up. “Mr McLintock, Head Gardener,” he announced himself. “I’m not questioning your wisdom, lad – just wishing to explain that our speciality is growing things, green fingers, and the like, and not any too much to do with defence.”
“But you can grow cactuses and bushes with long spines and ten-foot nettles and so on, can’t you?” Christopher said.
Mr McLintock nodded, with a pawky sort of grin. “Aye. Thistles too and poison ivy.”
This emboldened the cook to put his hand up. “Je suis chef de cuisine,” he said. “A cook only. My magic is with the good food.”
“I bet you can reverse it,” said Christopher. “Go and poison the walls. Or if you can’t, hang rotten steaks and mouldy soufflées on them.”
“Not since my student days have I—” the cook began indignantly. But this seemed to bring back memories to hi
m. A wistful look came over his face, which was followed by a gleeful grin. “I will try,” he said.
Now Erica’s hand was up. “If you please,” she said, “me and Sally and Bertha can only really do little things – charms and sendings and the like.”
“Well go and do them – as many as you can,” Christopher said. “A wall is built brick by brick after all.” That expression pleased him. He caught the Goddess’s eye. “If you can’t think what charms to work, consult my assistant, Millie. She’s full of ideas.”
The Goddess grinned. So did the boot-boy. From the look on his face, he was full of appalling notions which he could hardly wait to try. Christopher watched the boot-boy troop out with the gardeners, the cook and the maids, and rather envied him.
He beckoned Flavian over. “Flavian, there’s still loads of magic I don’t know. Would you mind standing by to teach me things as they come up?”
“Well, I—” Flavian gave an embarrassed sideways look at Tacroy leaning on the banisters below Christopher. “Mordecai could do that just as well.”
“Yes, but I’m going to need him to go into trances and look for Gabriel’s lives,” said Christopher.
“Are you indeed?” said Tacroy. “And Gabriel’s going to burst into tears of joy when he sees me, isn’t he?”
“I’ll go with you,” said Christopher.
“Quite like old times,” said Tacroy. “Gabriel’s going to burst into tears when he sees you too. What it is to be loved!” His eyes flickered over at Miss Rosalie. “If only I had my young lady who plays the harp now—”
“Don’t be absurd, Mordecai,” said Miss Rosalie. “You shall have everything you need. What do you want the rest of us to do, Christopher? Mr Wilkinson and I are no good at woodwork, and nor are Beryl and Yolande.”
“You can act as advisers,” said Christopher.
The next twenty-four hours were the busiest Christopher had ever spent. They held a council-of-war in Gabriel’s twilight office, where Christopher discovered that some of the dark panels rolled back to connect it with the rooms on either side. Christopher had the desks and the typewriting machines shoved to the walls and turned the whole space into one big operations room. It was much lighter like that, and became more and more crowded and busy as the various plans were set up.
There were, everyone told Christopher, many different ways of divining whether a living person was present in a world. Mr Wilkinson had whole lists of methods. It was agreed that they try to use these to narrow down Tacroy’s search for Gabriel. One of every kind was set up, but since nobody was sure if Gabriel’s separated lives quite counted as alive, they all had to be set to maximum strength, and it turned out that, apart from Christopher, only the Goddess had strong enough magic to activate them and tune them from Series to Series. But anyone could watch them. The room was soon full of tense helpers staring into globes, mirrors, pools of mercury or ink, and spare sheets coated with liquid crystal, while the Goddess was kept busy adjusting the various spells and making a chart, in her foreign writing, of the readings from all the devices.
Miss Rosalie insisted that the council-of-war should also decide how to tell the Ministry what was going on, but that never did get decided, because Christopher kept getting called away. First Dr Simonson called him down to the hall to explain how they planned to make the birdcage. Dr Simonson was taking it much more seriously than Christopher expected. “It’s highly unorthodox,” he said, “but who cares so long as it catches our man?”
Christopher was half-way upstairs again when the butler came to tell Christopher that they had done all they could think of to defend the grounds, and would Master Christopher come and see? So Christopher went – and marvelled. The main gates, and the other smaller ones, were hung with curses and dripping poison. Brambles with six-inch thorns had been grown along the walls, while the hedges put Christopher in mind of Sleeping Beauty’s castle, so high and thick with thorns, nettles and poison weeds were they. Ten-foot thistles and giant cactus guarded the fences, and every single weak place had been booby-trapped by the boot-boy.
He demonstrated, using his pet ferret, how anything that stepped here would become a caterpillar; or here would sink into bottomless sewage; or here would be seized by giant lobster-claws; or here – anyway, he had made nineteen, each one nastier than the last. Christopher ran back to the Castle thinking that if they did manage to get Gabriel back, he would have to ask him to promote the boot-boy. He was too good to waste on boots.
Back in the operations room, he had a set of magic mirrors set up, each focused on a different part of the defences, so that they would know at once if anyone tried to attack. Flavian was just showing him how to activate the spells painted on the backs of the mirrors, when it was the housekeeper’s turn to interrupt. “Master Christopher, this Castle isn’t supplied to stand a siege. How am I to get the butcher and the baker and the milk through? There’s a lot of mouths to feed here.”
Christopher had to make a list of when the deliveries arrived, so that he and the Goddess could conjure them through at the right moment. The Goddess pinned it up beside the mirror-watch rota, the divining charts, the duty rota, the patrol rota – the wall was getting covered with lists.
In the midst of all this, two ladies called Yolande and Beryl (whom Christopher still could not tell apart) sat themselves down at the typewriters and started to clatter away. “We may not be sorceresses any longer,” said Beryl (unless she was Yolande), “but that doesn’t stop us trying to keep the usual business running. We can deal with urgent enquiries or advice at least.”
Shortly they were calling Christopher away too. “The trouble is,” Yolande (unless her name was Beryl) confessed, “Gabriel usually signs all the letters. We don’t think you should forge his signature, but we wondered if you simply wrote Chrestomanci—?”
“Before you conjure the mailbag down to the Post Office for us,” Beryl (or maybe Yolande) added.
They showed Christopher how to set the sign of a nine-lifed enchanter on the word Chrestomanci, to protect it from being used against him in witchcraft. Christopher had great fun developing a dashing style of signature, sizzling with the enchanter’s mark that kept it safe even from Uncle Ralph. It occurred to him then that he was enjoying himself more than he had ever done in his life. Papa had been right. He really was cut out to be the next Chrestomanci. But suppose he hadn’t been? Christopher thought, making another sizzling signature. It was simply luck that he was. Well then, he thought, something could have been done about it. There had been no need at all to feel trapped.
Someone called him from the other end of the room then. “I think I’ve got the most restful job,” Tacroy laughed up at him from the couch in the middle, where he was preparing to go into his first trance. They had agreed that Tacroy should try a whole lot of short trances, to cover as many worlds as possible. And Miss Rosalie had agreed to play the harp for him, despite not having any magic. She was sitting on the end of the couch. As Christopher passed, Tacroy shut his eyes and Miss Rosalie struck a sweet rippling chord. Tacroy’s eyes shot open. “For crying out loud, woman! Are you trying to clog my spirit in toffee or something? Don’t you know any reasonable music?”
“As I remember, you always object to anything I play!” Miss Rosalie retorted. “So I shall play something I like, regardless!”
“I hate your taste in music!” Tacroy snarled.
“Calm down, or you won’t go into a trance. I don’t want to have sore fingers for nothing!” Miss Rosalie snapped.
They reminded Christopher of something – of someone. He looked back on his way over to the pool of ink where Flavian was beckoning. Tacroy and Miss Rosalie were staring at each other, both making sure the other knew their feelings were deeply hurt. Who have I seen look like that before? Christopher wondered. Underneath, he could tell, Tacroy and Miss Rosalie were longing to stop being rude to one another, but both too proud to make the first move. Who was that like?
As Christopher bent over the pool
of ink, he got it. Papa and Mama! They had been exactly the same!
When the pool of ink was showing World C in Series Eight, Christopher went back past Miss Rosalie staring stormily ahead and playing a jig, to where Yolande and Beryl were typing. “Can I send someone an official letter of my own?” he asked.
“Just dictate,” Yolande (or possibly Beryl) said, with her fingers on the keys.
Christopher gave her Dr Pawson’s address. “Dear Sir,” he said, in the way all the letters he had signed went. “This office would be obliged if you would divine the whereabouts of Mr Cosimo Chant, last heard of in Japan, and forward his address to Mrs Miranda Chant, last heard of living in Kensington.” Blushing a bit, he asked, “Will that do?”
“For Dr Pawson,” Beryl (or perhaps Yolande) said, “you have to add, ‘The customary fee will be forwarded.’ Dr Pawson never works without a fee. I’ll put the request through Accounts for you. Mr Wilkinson needs you at the quicksilver bowl now.”
While Christopher rushed back across the room, the Goddess remembered that Proudfoot the kitten would be starving by then. She conjured her from the tower room, scarf, bottle and all. One of the helpers ran for milk. It took a while. Proudfoot, impatient with the delay, opened eyes like two chips of sapphire and glared blearily around. “Mi-i-i-i-ilk!” she demanded from an astonishingly wide pink mouth.
Even when an ordinary kitten opens its eyes for the first time, it is a remarkable moment. Since Proudfoot was an Asheth Temple cat, the effect was startling. She suddenly had a personality at least as strong as Throgmorten’s, except that it seemed to be just the opposite. She was passed from hand to hand for people to take turns at cooing over her and feeding her. Flavian was so besotted with her that he would not let go of her until Tacroy came out of his trance, very dejected because he had not been able to sense Gabriel in any of the three worlds he had visited. Flavian gave him Proudfoot to cheer him up. Tacroy put her under his chin and purred at her, but Miss Rosalie took her away in order to give Tacroy a strong cup of tea instead, and then spent the next half hour doting on Proudfoot herself.
The Chrestomanci Series Page 78