by Joan Aiken
"That was why your dad pinched the lake, then?" she said. "So you couldn't be thrown in? He guessed the queen musta got you?"
"Did he steal the lake?" A warm ripple of affection came into Elen's voice. "Clever father! He knew that would put a stone in her shoe!"
"So then she called in the British Navy," said Windward. "I begin to see.... But how could she hope to make King Mabon return the lake so long as she held you, Princess?"
"Because," said Dido, "she hoped as I'd let on to be the princess, and that King Mabon'd be fooled. That was why she didn't make me into porridge. Though I reckon she was fair itching to. But why were you left in that cave, ma'am? Princess?"
"Oh, pray call me Elen. All the girls at Miss Castlereagh's Academy did so. I was left in the cave because the sacrifice has to be made at a particular time of the month, when the new moon holds the old one in its arms. Lady Ettarde and those other women put me there. And the guardian used to come every day or so to feed me ... when he remembered. He will not be best pleased when he finds that I have escaped. Ginevra will probably have him thrown in the lake. Oh, no, I forget—there is no lake. She must have been growing desperate."
Elen's eyes widened. The fire had now burned up into a good blaze and, for the first time, she had noticed Mr. Holystone, who stood gazing at the flames with a puzzled frown creasing his brow, as if he were groping in his mind for the verse of some ancient rhyme which continually escaped him.
Elen said, "But why is my cousin Gwydion with you? And why is he so silent?"
"Gwydion?" said Dido. Her eyes followed Elen's to the silent figure by the fire.
"Gwydion," repeated Elen. "I recognized him at once. Though he has grown a beard, which suits him very well—and it is a long time since we used to play as children. He used to carve me dolls from sigse wood. He is the son—the adopted son—of my uncle Huayna Ccapac. Atahallpa, they called him in Hy Brasil, but father always called him Gwydion. How are you, cousin?"
"No, madam," said a new voice, which made them all, Holystone included, turn hastily toward the doorway. "He is not your cousin. He is of more ancient lineage than you reckon."
Framed in the entrance stood a strange figure—what seemed at first sight to be a walking snowball, but proved, when he had shaken himself, to be a dwarfish little man, hardly more than three feet high, with white hair and deep, dark eyes and a long hooked nose. He threw off the snow-caked toga which he had wrapped round him, and stumped forward, giving his unbidden guests some very unwelcoming looks, and stopping in front of Mr. Holystone to launch at him a stare of particular dislike while apparently making an inventory of every detail of his appearance: from the gold-brown beard, bronzed skin, and quiet gray eyes to the birthmark on his right forearm and the hand which still clasped the hilt of the sword Caliburn. Splitting the rock had cleaned the rust from the sword blade; it now shone green and deadly, and more light than was reflected from the fire seemed to play up and down its length.
"I beg your pardon—are you the guardian—Caradog?" broke in Lieutenant Windward briskly, feeling that some explanation was owing to their reluctant host. "Ahem! Excuse me! I have a permit here, signed by Queen Ginevra, for travel through the Gate of Nimue and on to Lyonesse."
"Yes, yes, yes, I know all about that," testily answered the guardian. "I was expecting you last night; my sister had informed me of your intentions."
He spoke as if their journey seemed to him a tiresome fidget about a trifle, and went on, ignoring Windward and addressing Holystone. "But why trouble King Mabon about the lake, my lord, since you are already returned to us? What need to visit Lyonesse? Will you not rather return to your capital of Bath Regis?"
"Gwydion's capital?!" exclaimed Elen. "Gracious me, whom do you take him for?"
"Why, who should he be but the Pendragon? He is Mercurius Artaius, true son of Uther. Let me be the first to salute you, lord, Rex Quondam et vivens, High King of New Cumbria, Lyonesse, and Hy Brasil," said Caradog, not sounding in the least pleased about it, but going rather creakily and grumpily down on one knee, nevertheless, to kiss Mr. Holystone's hand, which still rested on the hilt of the sword Caliburn. "Ave rege! Vivat rex!"
The party from the Thrush stared at one another, dumbstruck.
Elen exclaimed, "Gwydion? Can this be true? Or is the old man joking? Are you—can you really be the Pendragon?"
Holystone looked down at the sword in his hand. He said slowly, "Yes, it is true. I am beginning to remember it all—the battle by the winter sea, and how the queens came in a boat across the lake, and carried me away, and cast me into a sleep."
"In the Isle of Avilion," confirmed Caradog. He added rather sourly, "Your lady wife will be very happy to have you restored to her. She has waited and sorrowed for you these many hundreds of years."
"Wife?" exclaimed Dido in horror. "D'you mean that Mr. Holystone is married to that murdering old hag of a queen in Bath? Who's been killing off girls right, left, and rat's ramble, just so she could stay alive longer than ordinary folk?"
"Finis coronat opus," said Caradog.
"What's that mean, Mr. Guardian?"
"It means, the end justifies the means."
"No, it certainly don't! What do you think, Mr. Holy? King Whatsyourname? If you really are him? Do you think it's right for that fat queen to stay alive by having poor girls chucked into the lake? Why, she was fixing to chuck Elen here, if we hadn't turned up!"
Mr. Holystone appeared deeply troubled. Frowning perplexedly at Dido, he said, "Who are you, child? Why do I seem to know you? And what can you know of these high matters?"
It was evident that the three separate parts of his existence had not yet dovetailed together.
"Oh, blimey!" said Dido, hurt and cross. She felt extremely upset, but tried not to show it. She couldn't help adding, however, "When I think of all the times I fed Dora—and taught you the Battersea Basket—and how you used to put cockroach lotion on my toes—"
At the same instant Elen exclaimed in a tone of horror, as though the reality had been gradually dawning on her, "You mean my cousin Gwydion is married to that wicked woman—to Queen Ginevra?"
"Was—was, in a former life," corrected Caradog fussily. "And as, although he has been reborn, she has remained alive, of course the marriage is still valid. Any court of law would uphold it. Not to mention the ties of honor and obligation—since she has faithfully waited for him so many hundreds of years."
"I don't see how honor could tie him to someone who's been eating people's bones all that time!"
"Really, Miss Twite, I feel this is none of your—of our business!" exclaimed Lieutenant Windward.
"Our business is to fetch the lake back and have Cap'n Hughes let out of the pokey," pointed out Mr. Multiple matter-of-factly. "And then to get hell-for-leather out o' this infernal country," he added under his breath, rattling the diamonds in his pocket.
"If you are committed to reclaim the lake for Queen Ginevra, of course you must do so," Caradog said suavely. "The storm will abate very soon; you may set out at daybreak."
Dido thought she noticed a calculating gleam in his eye. There's one as'll bear watching, she thought; cunning as an old weasel or my name ain't Twite. Had poor Elen shut in a cave, was going to chuck her in the lake—but we don't hear anything about that now, oh, no! Butter wouldn't melt on his whiskers. If Mr. Holy is King Arthur come back, what's it matter to Old Nibs there whether the lake is put back or not? And who does he remind me of? Who else has a long neb like that?
Her reflections were interrupted at this point by a tremendous fanfare of bocinas and bamboo trumpets outside the door, together with shouts of "Guardian, there! Ho, Guardian! Open up!"
"Who is it?" demanded Caradog suspiciously.
"Sextus Lucius Trevelyan, officer in command, second division, Wandesborough Frontier Patrol. You know my voice, you old spider! Come on, open up! We've heard a tale that you have the princess Elen with you."
"And who in the name of Nodens told you that?" mu
ttered old Caradog, hobbling to unbar the door, which he had bolted behind him.
9
On the second day of Captain Hughes's captivity a new prisoner was thrust, cursing and struggling, through the door that led into the circular series of rooms at the top of the Wen Pendragon tower.
To the captain's surprise the newcomer turned out to be none other than Silver Taffy, who was equally startled at finding his commanding officer in the town jail.
"By jings, sir, I never expected to see you in such a place, and that's a fact! What reason did those sons of pigs fetch out for casting you in the lock-up?"
The discovery of the captain's incarceration seemed to have done a certain amount toward reconciling Silver Taffy to his own; he grinned broadly, displaying most of his well-polished teeth.
At first Captain Hughes felt inclined to stand on his dignity with this rogue, who had virtually gone absent without leave and who was, after all, originally a pirate. On the other hand, the captain was becoming heartily impatient with his confinement; Mr. Brandywinde made a miserable fellow inmate, for he could do nothing but sit rocking back and forth, lamenting over his wife and child and his limp, paralyzed hands. At least Silver Taffy, though ruffianly, was lively and quick-witted, and might become a possible ally in a scheme that the captain was turning over in his mind; so, very much more amiably than might have been expected, he replied:
"The queen—who, I am persuaded, has windmills in her head—is holding me hostage while Lieutenant Windward undertakes a mission for her to King Mabon of Lyonesse. It is a perfectly disgraceful outrage that an officer of His Majesty's Navy should be used so—after all, I have ambassadorial status! But what use to protest? The woman is clearly unhinged. What of yourself, fellow? I trust that you are not incarcerated here for criminal activities?"
His voice did not suggest that he expected his hopes to be fulfilled.
Silver Taffy shrugged and winked.
"No, sir—but it's something of a different case from yourself. I've always been in the free-trading line, you know, fetching butter and astrolabes and woolen goods and such stuff from Lyonesse to Cumbria without troubling the customs! For Queen Ginevra, she levies a crool high rate of duty on all merchandise as comes in."
"You were a smuggler, in other words," snapped the captain.
"If you choose to call it so, sir," said Silver Taffy with dignity. "We prefers to call them benefactors."
"Very well!"
"I was a benefactor, bringing goods through the mountains by a secret way. But them Cumbrian customs guards, with those damned red-and-white hell hounds of theirs"—here Mr. Brandywinde gave a shuddering whimper—"grew so active and fidgety that it became harder and harder to dodge 'em. So me and my mates got us a brig and took to sea, running up and down the coast from Santa Genista to the port o' Tenby. Well, then, by an' by, my auntie, she got in touch with me."
"Your auntie?"
"My auntie Ettarde, she as is first lady o' the bedchamber and mistress o' the queen's robes. My family is quality, Captain, I'd have you know," said Silver Taffy with dignity, "though for myself I've always been partial to a roving life." His teeth flashed again as he grinned, wearing the sly expression that had always made Dido mistrust him. "My auntie, she said to me, 'You've got a ship, David, and if you do a private errand for Her Mercy, I daresay she will be prepared to overlook certain activities of yours which are otherwise liable to get you dropped into the Severn River one o' these days for the pescadilloes to scrunch up.' 'Any way I can serve Her Mercy,' says I, 'o' course I'll be proud and willing.' So then she told me as how King Mabon's daughter fresh from boarding school had sailed out o' Bristol, England, on the Maypole, and how it'd be worth her weight in gold bezants to me if I could see this princess conveyed safe to Queen Ginevra, who would love her like an auntie."
"You abducted the princess, you villain?" exclaimed Captain Hughes. "So King Mabon was right in his suspicions! The queen did have the princess all along! But to what purpose?"
"As to that," said Silver Taffy cautiously, "he that asks no questions don't get his tongue chopped out, like those poor gray ghosts o' sentries round the palace. Yes, I did pick up the princess, an' I had her conveyed to my auntie Ettarde. Well, just after that, I got tempted northeast'ards by a very pretty prize that was coming up from Patagonia—a Hanoverian merchantman. I thought I'd slip her in my pocket afore traveling up to Bath City for to claim my reward from Her Mercy. But blow me, Cap'n Hughes, if I don't run up agin you in the Thrush, an' all my plans go aggly. And I get took prisoner and lose my ship and have to work as a common seaman. But then, what happens? Why, the old Thrush herself runs down to Tenby, and I hear you're a-going to visit Queen Ginevra your own self. So all I have to do is sit tight, and I have a free passage to my own front door."
"And then, you rogue?" inquired the captain, interested in spite of his strong disapproval.
"Why, when I did get to see my auntie Ettarde, she and I had a difference as to fee. I found out she was a-keeping four fifths o' what the queen had paid her, and passing on to me only a measly one fifth. 'If I was to pass word to King Mabon about what you did,' says I to her, '—for I'm in Lyonesse as often as not, and could easy drop word along, annie-nonnie-mousily—if King Mabon was to learn what you did, your life wouldn't be worth a lead bezant. He'd send his agents over into Cumbria somehow, and have you tressicated!'"
"Why, you treacherous dog!" said the captain indignantly. "You yourself were implicated just as deeply in the plot to steal Mabon's daughter."
"Ay, sir, but at least I'm an honest rogue," said Silver Taffy in an injured tone. "It was Auntie keeping four fifths of the takings when she's promised me half that I couldn't stomach. I'm a hard man to cheat, sir; I can't abear it. Howsumdever, my auntie Ettarde is a tough nut likewise, and deep as a well, furthermore. 'Oh,' says she, 'so that's your lay, is it? Well,' says she, 'I'll make a bargain. Fetch in that other lass, that young supercargo from the Thrush, liddie Miss Twiddletwite, and you shall have half the price for the pair.' 'Done, Auntie,' says I—sapskull that I am—and off I goes, thinking 'twould be an easy matter to pop Twite in the bag along with Mabon's lass. I had one try, and missed her; then, blow me if she didn't travel off into the wilds with Windward and the rest. And then blow me furder, if half a dozen o' them gray militia dummies don't grab me and sling me in here. And I know why, too—it's so Auntie don't have to pay me her lawful share. It's her doing! She has Queen Ginevra's ear—close as clams, they be. But I'll get even with her, so I will, when I'm out of the derwent house."
Captain Hughes looked at him thoughtfully.
"But how do you know you ever will get out?" he said. "Your aunt appears to be in a position of very great power. It might be in her interest to persuade the queen that you should stay here for a long time—perhaps for the rest of your life."
"Ay—don't think I haven't thought the same," said Silver Taffy. "But I'm a peevy man to diddle, as Auntie Ettarde will learn, and a hard man to fasten down. I'd not have stayed in the Thrush if it hadn't suited my book. It's odds but I'll find some way out o' the coop."
"If you are of that mind," said Captain Hughes, "you and I may yet be of service to one another. It's no use expecting aid or sense from that poor wretch"—he glanced exasperatedly at the lachrymose Mr. Brandywinde. "Your aunt seems to have bewitched him—or he thinks she has, which comes to the same thing. He has lost the use of his hands."
"Ay, she can play that sort o' trick on a poor softie like him," said Taffy scornfully. Nonetheless, Captain Hughes noticed that he made the figure-eight sign, glancing nervously over his shoulder. "The sooner we're out o' here, Cap'n, the better pleased I'll be. Did you have any special notion in mind?"
"Why, yes. I have been exercising my wits to some purpose. Come through here and I will show you."
And Captain Hughes led the way to the chamber where there were paints, paper, and drawing materials.
"Look!" He indicated a mathematical diagram on a large sheet of p
aper. "I have not been wasting my time in here! The design is done. But the construction requires two people—because these struts here have to be bent and held in shape while the fabric is stretched over them. And poor Brandywinde is quite useless for that."
Silver Taffy bent over the design, and presently a shimmering silver smile split his face.
"Why, Cap'n!" he said. "You were wasted aboard the Thrush! You ought to spend your days a-visiting poor coves in prison!"
The journey from Lake Arianrod to the court of King Mabon was achieved in a considerably shorter time than Lieutenant Windward had reckoned. This was due to the fact that King Mabon, grief-stricken at the loss of his child and requiring distraction, had undertaken a tour of his kingdom, and was, the travelers learned, about to preside over the quarterly assize sessions at his sheep capital of Wandesborough, hardly fifty miles from the frontier.
At the spanking pace set by the frontier patrol on their picked mountain mules, swift rangy beasts, short-tempered and surefooted, it took the party less than a day to reach the assize town. Wandesborough, like Bath, lay in a great upland basin, but its surroundings were green and fertile, kept temperate by balmy breezes from the slopes of Mount Catelonde. For this reason the last four hours of the journey were enlivened by the continuous bleating of sheep, which were pastured in enormous numbers on the high grassy slopes.
"What a deal of wool and mutton they must export," remarked Lieutenant Windward.
He said this to Dido, kindly trying to divert her mind, for he thought she looked very mopish and down-pin. Not even the friendly escort of the legionaries in their short red tunics and mule's-hair-plumed helmets, or being mounted on a crack cavalry mule, seemed to put any heart in her. She only muttered "I daresay" in reply to Windward's well-meant remark.
"Come, cheer up, little 'un," said Mr. Multiple. "I reckon when King Mabon hears he's got his daughter back, he'll hand over Queen Ginevra's lake without any round-aboutation, and we'll be posting back to Bath again in the twinkling of a pig's tail. And once she has her blessed piece of water back, not to mention her husband, if Mr. Holystone is really that—which I, for one, take with a bushel of salt—then she'll let Cap'n Hughes go, and we can all be on our way. And I tell you what," he added generously, "I'll go cahoots with you in some of my sparklers, for I've got enough to make us both into nabobs!"