by Edith Nesbit
‘Fishing,’ said Kenneth, because it was the only thing he could think of.
‘Make toffee,’ said Conrad.
‘Build a great big house with all the bricks,’ said George.
‘We can’t make toffee,’ Alison explained gently but firmly, ‘because you know what the pan was like last time, and cook said, “never again, not much.” And it’s no good building houses, Georgie, when you could be out of doors. And fishing’s simply rotten when we’ve been at it all day. I’ve thought of something.’
So of course all the others said, ‘What?’
‘We’ll have a pageant, a river pageant, on the moat. We’ll all dress up and hang Chinese lanterns in the trees. I’ll be the Sunflower lady that the Troubadour came all across the sea, because he loved her so, for, and one of you can be the Troubadour, and the others can be sailors or anything you like.’
‘I shall be the Troubadour,’ said Conrad with decision.
‘I think you ought to let Kenneth because he’s the visitor,’ said George, who would have liked to be it immensely himself, or anyhow did not see why Conrad should be a troubadour if he couldn’t.
Conrad said what manners required, which was:
‘Oh! all right, I don’t care about being the beastly Troubadour.’
‘You might be the Princess’s brother,’ Alison suggested.
‘Not me,’ said Conrad scornfully, ‘I’ll be the captain of the ship.’
‘In a turban the brother would be, with the Benares cloak, and the Persian dagger out of the cabinet in the drawing-room,’ Alison went on unmoved.
‘I’ll be that,’ said George.
‘No, you won’t, I shall, so there,’ said Conrad. ‘You can be the captain of the ship.’
(But in the end both boys were captains, because that meant being on the boat, whereas being the Princess’s brother, however turbanned, only meant standing on the bank. And there is no rule to prevent captains wearing turbans and Persian daggers, except in the Navy where, of course, it is not done.)
So then they all tore up to the attic where the dressing-up trunk was, and pulled out all the dressing-up things on to the floor. And all the time they were dressing, Alison was telling the others what they were to say and do. The Princess wore a white satin skirt and a red flannel blouse and a veil formed of several motor scarves of various colours. Also a wreath of pink roses off one of Ethel’s old hats, and a pair of pink satin slippers with sparkly buckles.
Kenneth wore a blue silk dressing-jacket and a yellow sash, a lace collar, and a towel turban. And the others divided between them an eastern dressing-gown, once the property of their grandfather, a black spangled scarf, very holey, a pair of red and white football stockings, a Chinese coat, and two old muslin curtains, which, rolled up, made turbans of enormous size and fierceness.
On the landing outside cousin Ethel’s open door Alison paused and said, ‘I say!’
‘Oh! come on,’ said Conrad, ‘we haven’t fixed the Chinese lanterns yet, and it’s getting dark.’
‘You go on,’ said Alison, ‘I’ve just thought of something.’
The children were allowed to play in the boat so long as they didn’t loose it from its moorings. The painter was extremely long, and quite the effect of coming home from a long voyage was produced when the three boys pushed the boat out as far as it would go among the boughs of the beech-tree which overhung the water, and then reappeared in the circle of red and yellow light thrown by the Chinese lanterns.
‘What ho! ashore there!’ shouted the captain.
‘What ho!’ said a voice from the shore which, Alison explained, was disguised.
‘We be three poor mariners,’ said Conrad by a happy effort of memory, ‘just newly come to shore. We seek news of the Princess of Tripoli.’
‘She’s in her palace,’ said the disguised voice, ‘wait a minute, and I’ll tell her you’re here. But what do you want her for? (“A poor minstrel of France”) go on, Con.’
‘A poor minstrel of France,’ said Conrad, ‘(all right! I remember,) who has heard of the Princess’s beauty has come to lay, to lay — —’
‘His heart,’ said Alison.
‘All right, I know. His heart at her something or other feet.’
‘Pretty feet,’ said Alison. ‘I go to tell the Princess.’
Next moment from the shadows on the bank a radiant vision stepped into the circle of light, crying —
‘Oh! Rudel, is it indeed thou? Thou art come at last. O welcome to the arms of the Princess!’
‘What do I do now?’ whispered Rudel (who was Kenneth) in the boat, and at the same moment Conrad and George said, as with one voice —
‘My hat! Alison, won’t you catch it!’
For at the end of the Princess’s speech she had thrown back her veils and revealed a blaze of splendour. She wore several necklaces, one of seed pearls, one of topazes, and one of Australian shells, besides a string of amber and one of coral. And the front of the red flannel blouse was studded with brooches, in one at least of which diamonds gleamed. Each arm had one or two bracelets and on her clenched hands glittered as many rings as any Princess could wish to wear.
So her brothers had some excuse for saying, ‘You’ll catch it.’
‘No, I sha’n’t. It’s my look out, anyhow. Do shut up,’ said the Princess, stamping her foot. ‘Now then, Ken, go ahead. Ken, you say, “Oh Lady, I faint with rapture!”’
‘I faint with rapture,’ said Kenneth stolidly. ‘Now I land, don’t I?’
He landed and stared at the jewelled hand the Princess held out.
‘At last, at last,’ she said, ‘but you ought to say that, Ken. I say, I think I’d better be an eloping Princess, and then I can come in the boat. Rudel dies really, but that’s so dull. Lead me to your ship, oh noble stranger! for you have won the Princess, and with you I will live and die. Give me your hand, can’t you, silly, and do mind my train.’
So Kenneth led her to the boat, and with some difficulty, for the satin train got between her feet, she managed to flounder into the punt.
‘Now you stand and bow,’ she said. ‘Fair Rudel, with this ring I thee wed,’ she pressed a large amethyst ring into his hand, ‘remember that the Princess of Tripoli is yours for ever. Now let’s sing Integer Vitae because it’s Latin.’
So they sat in the boat and sang. And presently the servants came out to listen and admire, and at the sound of the servants’ approach the Princess veiled her shining splendour.
‘It’s prettier than wot the Coventry pageant was, so it is,’ said the cook, ‘but it’s long past your bed times. So come on out of that there dangerous boat, there’s dears.’
So then the children went to bed. And when the house was quiet again, Alison slipped down and put back Ethel’s jewelry, fitting the things into their cases and boxes as correctly as she could. ‘Ethel won’t notice,’ she thought, but of course Ethel did.
So that next day each child was asked separately by Ethel’s mother who had been playing with Ethel’s jewelry. And Conrad and George said they would rather not say. This was a form they always used in that family when that sort of question was asked, and it meant, ‘It wasn’t me, and I don’t want to sneak.’
And when it came to Alison’s turn, she found to her surprise and horror that instead of saying, ‘I played with them,’ she had said, ‘I would rather not say.’
Of course the mother thought that it was Kenneth who had had the jewels to play with. So when it came to his turn he was not asked the same question as the others, but his aunt said:
‘Kenneth, you are a very naughty little boy to take your cousin Ethel’s jewelry to play with.’
‘I didn’t,’ said Kenneth.
‘Hush! hush!’ said the aunt, ‘do not make your fault worse by untruthfulness. And what have you done with the amethyst ring?’
Kenneth was just going to say that he had given it back to Alison, when he saw that this would be sneakish. So he said, getting hot to the ears, ‘You don’t suppo
se I’ve stolen your beastly ring, do you, Auntie?’
‘Don’t you dare to speak to me like that,’ the aunt very naturally replied. ‘No, Kenneth, I do not think you would steal, but the ring is missing and it must be found.’
Kenneth was furious and frightened. He stood looking down and kicking the leg of the chair.
‘You had better look for it. You will have plenty of time, because I shall not allow you to go to the picnic with the others. The mere taking of the jewelry was wrong, but if you had owned your fault and asked Ethel’s pardon, I should have overlooked it. But you have told me an untruth and you have lost the ring. You are a very wicked child, and it will make your dear mother very unhappy when she hears of it. That her boy should be a liar. It is worse than being a thief!’
At this Kenneth’s fortitude gave way, and he lost his head. ‘Oh, don’t,’ he said, ‘I didn’t. I didn’t. I didn’t. Oh! don’t tell mother I’m a thief and a liar. Oh! Aunt Effie, please, please don’t.’ And with that he began to cry.
Any doubts Aunt Effie might have had were settled by this outbreak. It was now quite plain to her that Kenneth had really intended to keep the ring.
‘You will remain in your room till the picnic party has started,’ the aunt went on, ‘and then you must find the ring. Remember I expect it to be found when I return. And I hope you will be in a better frame of mind and really sorry for having been so wicked.’
‘Mayn’t I see Alison?’ was all he found to say.
And the answer was, ‘Certainly not. I cannot allow you to associate with your cousins. You are not fit to be with honest, truthful children.’
So they all went to the picnic, and Kenneth was left alone. When they had gone he crept down and wandered furtively through the empty rooms, ashamed to face the servants, and feeling almost as wicked as though he had really done something wrong. He thought about it all, over and over again, and the more he thought the more certain he was that he had handed back the ring to Alison last night when the voices of the servants were first heard from the dark lawn.
But what was the use of saying so? No one would believe him, and it would be sneaking anyhow. Besides, perhaps he hadn’t handed it back to her. Or rather, perhaps he had handed it and she hadn’t taken it. Perhaps it had slipped into the boat. He would go and see.
But he did not find it in the boat, though he turned up the carpet and even took up the boards to look. And then an extremely miserable little boy began to search for an amethyst ring in all sorts of impossible places, indoors and out. You know the hopeless way in which you look for things that you know perfectly well you will never find, the borrowed penknife that you dropped in the woods, for instance, or the week’s pocket-money which slipped through that hole in your pocket as you went to the village to spend it.
The servants gave him his meals and told him to cheer up. But cheering up and Kenneth were, for the time, strangers. People in books never can eat when they are in trouble, but I have noticed myself that if the trouble has gone on for some hours, eating is really rather a comfort. You don’t enjoy eating so much as usual, perhaps, but at any rate it is something to do, and takes the edge off your sorrow for a short time. And cook was sorry for Kenneth and sent him up a very nice dinner and a very nice tea. Roast chicken and gooseberry pie the dinner was, and for tea there was cake with almond icing on it.
The sun was very low when he went back wearily to have one more look in the boat for that detestable amethyst ring. Of course it was not there. And the picnic party would be home soon. And he really did not know what his aunt would do to him.
‘Shut me up in a dark cupboard, perhaps,’ he thought gloomily, ‘or put me to bed all day to-morrow. Or give me lines to write out, thousands, and thousands, and thousands, and thousands, and thousands, of them.’
The boat, set in motion by his stepping into it, swung out to the full length of its rope. The sun was shining almost level across the water. It was a very still evening, and the reflections of the trees and of the house were as distinct as the house and the trees themselves. And the water was unusually clear. He could see the fish swimming about, and the sand and pebbles at the bottom of the moat. How clear and quiet it looked down there, and what fun the fishes seemed to be having.
‘I wish I was a fish,’ said Kenneth. ‘Nobody punishes them for taking rings they didn’t take.’
And then suddenly he saw the ring itself, lying calm, and quiet, and round, and shining, on the smooth sand at the bottom of the moat.
He reached for the boat-hook and leaned over the edge of the boat trying to get up the ring on the boat-hook’s point. Then there was a splash.
‘Good gracious! I wonder what that is?’ said cook in the kitchen, and dropped the saucepan with the welsh rabbit in it which she had just made for kitchen supper.
Kenneth had leaned out too far over the edge of the boat, the boat had suddenly decided to go the other way, and Kenneth had fallen into the water.
The first thing he felt was delicious coolness, the second that his clothes had gone, and the next thing he noticed was that he was swimming quite easily and comfortably under water, and that he had no trouble with his breathing, such as people who tell you not to fall into water seem to expect you to have. Also he could see quite well, which he had never been able to do under water before.
‘I can’t think,’ he said to himself, ‘why people make so much fuss about your falling into the water. I sha’n’t be in a hurry to get out. I’ll swim right round the moat while I’m about it.’
It was a very much longer swim than he expected, and as he swam he noticed one or two things that struck him as rather odd. One was that he couldn’t see his hands. And another was that he couldn’t feel his feet. And he met some enormous fishes, like great cod or halibut, they seemed. He had had no idea that there were fresh-water fish of that size.
They towered above him more like men-o’-war than fish, and he was rather glad to get past them. There were numbers of smaller fishes, some about his own size, he thought. They seemed to be enjoying themselves extremely, and he admired the clever quickness with which they darted out of the way of the great hulking fish.
And then suddenly he ran into something hard and very solid, and a voice above him said crossly:
‘Now then, who are you a-shoving of? Can’t you keep your eyes open, and keep your nose out of gentlemen’s shirt fronts?’
‘I beg your pardon,’ said Kenneth, trying to rub his nose, and not being able to. ‘I didn’t know people could talk under water,’ he added very much astonished to find that talking under water was as easy to him as swimming there.
‘Fish can talk under water, of course,’ said the voice, ‘if they didn’t, they’d never talk at all: they certainly can’t talk out of it.’
‘But I’m not a fish,’ said Kenneth, and felt himself grin at the absurd idea.
‘Yes, you are,’ said the voice, ‘of course you’re a fish,’ and Kenneth, with a shiver of certainty, felt that the voice spoke the truth. He was a fish. He must have become a fish at the very moment when he fell into the water. That accounted for his not being able to see his hands or feel his feet. Because of course his hands were fins and his feet were a tail.
‘Who are you?’ he asked the voice, and his own voice trembled.
‘I’m the Doyen Carp,’ said the voice. ‘You must be a very new fish indeed or you’d know that. Come up, and let’s have a look at you.’
Kenneth came up and found himself face to face with an enormous fish who had round staring eyes and a mouth that opened and shut continually. It opened square like a kit-bag, and it shut with an extremely sour and severe expression like that of an offended rhinoceros.
‘Yes,’ said the Carp, ‘you are a new fish. Who put you in?’
‘I fell in,’ said Kenneth, ‘out of the boat, but I’m not a fish at all, really I’m not. I’m a boy, but I don’t suppose you’ll believe me.’
‘Why shouldn’t I believe you?’ asked the Carp
wagging a slow fin. ‘Nobody tells untruths under water.’
And if you come to think of it, no one ever does.
‘Tell me your true story,’ said the Carp very lazily. And Kenneth told it.
‘Ah! these humans!’ said the Carp when he had done. ‘Always in such a hurry to think the worst of everybody!’ He opened his mouth squarely and shut it contemptuously. ‘You’re jolly lucky, you are. Not one boy in a million turns into a fish, let me tell you.’
‘Do you mean that I’ve got to go on being a fish?’ Kenneth asked.
‘Of course you’ll go on being a fish as long as you stop in the water. You couldn’t live here, you know, if you weren’t.’
‘I might if I was an eel,’ said Kenneth, and thought himself very clever.
‘Well, be an eel then,’ said the Carp, and swam away sneering and stately. Kenneth had to swim his hardest to catch up.
‘Then if I get out of the water, shall I be a boy again?’ he asked panting.
‘Of course, silly,’ said the Carp, ‘only you can’t get out.’
‘Oh! can’t I?’ said Kenneth the fish, whisked his tail and swam off. He went straight back to the amethyst ring, picked it up in his mouth, and swam into the shallows at the edge of the moat. Then he tried to climb up the slanting mud and on to the grassy bank, but the grass hurt his fins horribly, and when he put his nose out of the water, the air stifled him, and he was glad to slip back again. Then he tried to jump out of the water, but he could only jump straight up into the air, so of course he fell straight down again into the water. He began to be afraid, and the thought that perhaps he was doomed to remain for ever a fish was indeed a terrible one. He wanted to cry, but the tears would not come out of his eyes. Perhaps there was no room for any more water in the moat.
The smaller fishes called to him in a friendly jolly way to come and play with them — they were having a quite exciting game of follow-my-leader among some enormous water-lily stalks that looked like trunks of great trees. But Kenneth had no heart for games just then.
He swam miserably round the moat looking for the old Carp, his only acquaintance in this strange wet world. And at last, pushing through a thick tangle of water weeds he found the great fish.