At one point, when Marina brought a tray with drinks, Becky left with her to find a place to change. Johnny was pleased she did. In jeans and sweatshirt, she looked far less a part of the lethal sisterhood. She looked more like Becky.
From time to time desultory conversation would occur: theories, possibilities, reflections, but nothing new at all. It was talk for the sake of talk, for the alternative silence was too terrible to bear. Underneath this nervous give and take were the two awful questions: when would the knock at the door come? and slightly more worrying who would knock at the door first?
In the event it was Faunus and, seeing him once more, Johnny was uncertain whether to be relieved or alarmed. There was a fiendish intensity about him that was quite scary. He’s in his unhinged mode, thought Johnny, unsure what this meant.
They had not heard the knock, indeed if there had been a knock. The first indication that Faunus had arrived was the door’s suddenly bursting open and a frightened Marina being pushed through in front of a grim-looking Faunus and a grinning Silenus armed with his great bow.
Faunus, addressing the old king first, made a great show of obsequious courtesy that was worse in its falseness than outright insolence would have been.
‘Your Majesty,’ he announced with honeyed sarcasm and bowing low, ‘my earnest and humble greetings; it has been so long since I have been in a position to pay you the homage you so richly deserve.’
The old king, perhaps having no choice, accepted this at face value. ‘It is a long time, Faunus,’ he replied, ‘since we have received you and it is pleasing to see you looking so well.’
‘Is it?’ said Faunus. ‘But not so pleasing to others, I’ll warrant.’
Silenus laughed.
‘Silenus!’ the old king said sharply. ‘I note that you have come into our presence armed and without acknowledging our person. What does this lack of grace mean?’
Faunus turned and frowned at the goatherd, who recovered himself in some confusion, fell to one knee and paid his homage, as clumsy as it was insincere. When he stumbled to his feet again, Faunus said to him coldly, ‘Wait outside. We will not be long.’
Silenus backed out, nodding and bowing to all in the room. Marina followed him and closed the door.
His formalities dispensed with, Faunus then turned to Johnny and Becky.
‘We may overlook your disobedience,’ he said to Johnny. ‘Sylvester has explained the reasons and I will consider them.’
Johnny nodded. His mouth was dry. This was not quite as understanding as he had hoped for.
‘Rebecca,’ said Faunus. ‘I cannot tell you how pleased I am to see you once more. It would only please me more were you to be in possession of your flute.’
He waited. Becky shook her head. ‘I don’t have it,’ she said.
‘I feared as much,’ said Faunus. ‘It would have been too much to expect. But, of course, you know where it is? I cannot begin to explain how important this is to me.’
Again Becky shook her head. ‘I don’t know where it is. I’ve no idea.’
Faunus frowned. ‘You must. It is with the nymph Hesteria.’
‘She doesn’t have it,’ said Becky. ‘I know she doesn’t. She made me go to get it for her from the cottage, but you and Johnny had taken it first. She was angry when we couldn’t find it. She believes you have it.’
Johnny could see how this news made Faunus flush with anger and instinctively he stepped back.
‘Enough!’ Faunus shouted. ‘Enough of this! Either Hesteria is playing foolish games, or you are!’
‘I’m not,’ protested Becky.
‘Silence!’ cried Faunus. ‘We shall find out soon enough!’ He turned once more to Basilius. ‘If you, Gracious Majesty, have been a knowing party to this deception, then I swear your foolishness will be remembered!’
‘You were ever a hothead, Faunus,’ said Basilius sadly. ‘Your passion is blinding you to sense again as ever.’
Faunus snorted. ‘We’ll see!’ he said, making it sound like a threat. Then he said, ‘I shall take my leave, my liege, and take these creatures with me. We have pressing business ahead!’
Dusk was falling as they reached the villa. They were heading west into the sunset and the sky was suffused with red and orange. The late light was eerie and the olive trees cast long tangled shadows.
Faunus had strode ahead fuelled by his anger; Silenus had followed with Becky slung awkwardly under one arm. Johnny had hurried along behind, aware of his apparent irrelevance. Had he wanted, he could have sat on the ground and neither Silenus nor Faunus would have cared one way or the other or made any attempt to retrieve him. Becky was their focus; Becky and the prospect of seizing the flute from the maidens in the villa.
There was not even any pretence of ceremony at this stage. Faunus roared as he had the day before, if anything even more loudly, while Silenus crashed his huge fist against the door, with Becky still clutched under his arm.
The commotion was so great that within seconds the door was flung open and a furious Hester Nye emerged, followed this time, possibly for safety reasons by numbers of other nymphs.
Her first sight was that of Silenus clutching the wriggling Becky.
‘Put her down, you great ox!’ she ordered.
Silenus merely laughed, but he did back away to join Faunus.
‘I want the flute!’ roared Faunus.
‘You have the flute!’
‘Give it to me!’
‘We do not have the flute. How many times do we have to tell you?’ said Hesteria coldly. ‘What kind of ridiculous game are you playing? You have the cursed thing.’
This response simply enraged Faunus. Johnny, crouched on the ground well to one side, saw the way he danced up and down on his cloven feet in fury, his beaked nose and his long pointed beard jerking with the movement. He looks just like a devil, he thought, a cartoon devil. The ever reddening sky and ever blackening hills were a weird devilish backdrop.
‘If I had the flute, you witch,’ Faunus cried, ‘why would I be here shouting at you?’
‘I have no idea,’ said Hesteria. ‘You always were quite beyond logic.’
Faunus looked around desperately, as if seeking leverage. He saw the struggling body of Becky still gripped beneath Silenus’s arm.
‘Hold her up!’ he ordered. Obediently Silenus manoeuvred Becky from under his arm and then thrust her into the air. ‘The flute, Hesteria,’ he shouted. ‘Or the girl-child dies! Silenus, will tear her in two!’
Johnny’s heart lurched.
Hesteria stared at Faunus, her initial astonishment turning quickly to ironical laughter.
‘You are a fool! You are not beyond logic; you are aeons from it! Kill the girl! Go on! What good will your precious flute be then?’
Faunus stopped then shook himself.
‘Put her down!’ he roared. ‘The nymph is right. Seize the boy!’
‘Kill the boy!’ another nymph shouted. ‘Kill him!’
A chant began then swelled: ‘Kill the boy! Kill the boy! Kill the boy!’
Silenus, who had snatched the terrified Johnny and held him up by his wrists, glanced enquiringly at Faunus, who shook his head. There was no point. Killing the boy-child it seemed would not lever the nymphs; it would only gratify them.
‘When will you understand, you dolt, that we do not have the flute!’ demanded Hesteria.
Becky, who had been thrown to the ground when Silenus had snatched Johnny, climbed painfully to her feet. She glanced around wildly between the furious Faunus and the band of angry nymphs. Was escape possible?
The sky was now a deep vermilion, the scatter of clouds a shot-silk scarlet.
Apparently not, for seeing her untrammelled the nymph Althea pointed at her and shrieked. ‘The girl! The girl! She must have the flute! She must have had it all along!’
Faunus wheeled to Becky, his face torn and confused.
‘Kill her!’ screamed Althea.
‘No!’ cried Johnny desperatel
y. ‘It’s another trick!’
This almost certainly saved Becky, for the increasingly conflicted Faunus turned on Althea wildly. ‘Seize her!’ he demanded of Silenus, who strode directly to Althea and roughly forced her arm up her back. There was a shriek of pain. ‘Perhaps now,’ cried Faunus, ‘we have somebody you do not want to see dead! If you don’t produce the flute immediately, this nymph will die!’
It may have been a trick of the sunset, but at these words the entire sky seemed to glow red with the intensity of flames, and in this flaming atmosphere came an eerie music, so loud and so penetrating that all covered their ears and fell kneeling to the ground.
The sound was the sound of a flute, but a flute magnified beyond all measure, and the melody so strange and wonderful the world stopped still.
Neither Becky nor Johnny could say where or how she arrived but all at once they saw that there was a woman before them, dressed in white like the nymphs, but in a gown that was at the same time more glowing and diaphanous. Almost as soon as they became aware of her she lowered the flute from her lips and gazed about the company with a look of rebuke.
‘Who or what is this?’ whispered Johnny, in awe.
He and Becky in all the excitement had ended up crouched close together to one side of the confronting camps.
Becky shook her head. She was trembling. ‘I’m not sure,’ she muttered, ‘but I have a feeling it must be the one Basilius called Artemis.’
‘Artemis?’
‘A goddess,’ she said. ‘She protects the nymphs.’
‘Faunus,’ said Artemis, ‘I have your flute. You meant to do great harm with it.’
Her voice, like the flute, rang so loudly it echoed about the hills.
‘Not really,’ said Faunus, chastened. ‘I merely wanted my life back.’
‘You had forfeited the life you had,’ said Artemis. ‘Your high spirits I always enjoyed, Faunus, but you never learnt when to stop.’
Faunus did not reply. All his bluster was gone.
Artemis turned to Silenus, who even in his crouching position still gripped the nymph Althea. ‘Silenus! Unhand that nymph!’
Immediately, Silenus released Althea, but Artemis had not finished with him yet. ‘And Silenus,’ she continued, ‘I have been concerned that your appetite for meat has become somewhat excessive, somewhat indiscriminate.’
‘Me?’ asked Silenus foolishly.
‘I would have thought,’ said Artemis, ‘that given your powers of future sight, you would have foreseen your own stupidity, and it seems to me also,’ she continued, ‘that you would be more suited to the vegetarian lifestyle.’
Silenus shook his head in disbelief. ‘Oh, no,’ he said. ‘A good nourishing stew washed down with …’
The goatherd got no further. With a relentless expression on her face, Artemis dramatically pointed the flute at Silenus and, in an instant, where Silenus had once stood, now stood a surprised-looking draught horse. It was a huge, shaggy horse and it gave a whimpering whinny, tossed its head sadly, then backed off, before it turned on its heels and trotted disconsolately away down the pathway that led to the bottom of the bluff.
‘Holy cow!’ muttered Johnny, his eyes wide with wonder.
‘Holy horse, more like,’ whispered Becky. ‘Johnny, I’m frightened. Let’s try and get out of here before she turns on us.’
Johnny couldn’t agree more.
They wriggled backwards, into the deepening gloom.
Artemis, meanwhile, had turned to the nymphs. She was sparing them little either, accusing them of infighting and a lack of charity. One by one, she had something to say. Each accusation rang about the hills and valleys and plunged the accused into frightened silence.
‘Where, though?’ muttered Johnny. ‘There’s nowhere.’
Becky whispered, ‘I’ve just had the craziest idea, so crazy it might just work. Are you game?’
Johnny looked about bleakly. ‘Of course,’ he said, ‘there’s no other game in town.’
‘Hold on then,’ whispered Becky. ‘It’ll mean getting back inside the villa.’
Johnny looked at her. ‘You are crazy,’ he said.
‘I may as well be,’ said Becky. ‘Everything else is.’
Somehow, the pair managed to wriggle, crawl and otherwise make their way behind the assembled nymphs. In this they were helped by the gathering darkness, for the sun had now disappeared completely and the shadows had joined into a blackness that seemed to hide everything except the shining raiment of Artemis.
By the time they reached the still open door, Artemis had turned once more to Faunus. Clearly he was about to receive his sentence, but neither Becky nor Johnny was inclined to hear it. Getting away was their only concern.
Once surrounded by the walls of the house they felt much safer. They stood up and hurried away from the doorway.
‘What’s the idea?’
‘I’ll tell you in a second.’
‘Where are we going?’
‘To the room they put us in.’
‘Why?’
‘Be patient. It probably won’t work but it’s the only thing I can think of that’s worth trying.’
They felt their way through the darkness and down the corridor. Becky felt for the door and opened it.
‘Hurry!’
Johnny followed her in, and Becky closed the door behind him.
‘Well?’
‘How did we get to this crazy place?’
‘You know as well as I do,’ said Johnny. ‘We jumped out of a bloody window.’
‘Right,’ said Becky. ‘And whose house were we in?’
Johnny immediately saw what she was getting at. ‘This used to be Faunus’s house,’ he whispered.
‘Exactly,’ said Becky. ‘Do you think it’s worth a shot?’
‘Why not?’ said Johnny. ‘There’s nothing to lose.’
Becky hurried to the casement and opened it wide. Outside she could just make out the deeper darkness of the great fig tree. ‘Let’s hold hands,’ she whispered. ‘We’ve been in this thing together so …’
Johnny reached for her hand, and then a little awkwardly they clambered up on to the sill.
‘All right?’ breathed Becky.
‘Okay,’ whispered Johnny, and squeezed her hand.
Then together they leapt from the window and into the darkness.
They landed in late afternoon sunshine. Shadows stretched from the trees bordering the fence line in front of them.
Awkwardly they picked themselves up. The lawn was soft and damp already from the first evening dew. Becky rubbed at a muddy patch on her jeans. Johnny looked around grinning. Then he punched the air. ‘Yee hah!’ he yelled.
Becky couldn’t help but laugh and gulp with relief. She looked behind her to find the bricks of Arcady House and the window they had jumped out of earlier. Oddly, it was closed. It didn’t matter. She had no intention of climbing back into the house.
‘Let’s get out of here!’ she whispered.
Johnny needed no second bidding. They hurried at first down the side of the house and when they saw the path beyond at the end of the lawn, with the avenue of blotch-barked plane trees, they broke into a run.
Dusk had still to fall when they reached Becky’s street.
‘I’ll come with you if you like,’ said Johnny.
Becky gave him a small grateful smile. ‘That’d be good.’
She was very worried, not only about her reception, but about how on earth they could explain their absence. She reckoned she had been away three nights, at least, although who really knew given the strange world they’d been in. Time could have been as dislocated as place. All the same, she cringed at what must have happened: the police would have been brought in and probably the media. Her photograph and Johnny’s would have been plastered all over the papers and on the TV. No doubt her father would have flown over. She corrected herself, possibly her father would have flown over.
The school principal would have been
on TV, too. That always happened. They probably would have talked to Mrs Barnard and she would have told them in the most hint hint kind of way about her outburst in the rehearsal and about stress and pressure and words like that which everybody would have understood to mean emotional instability or more crudely nutcase. And what would they have made of the fact that Johnny Cadman had disappeared at the same time? She didn’t even want to go in that direction. It would be all too humiliating.
But what of her mother? How would she be feeling, her mother who had had so much to put up with recently. What would she have made of her disappearance? Not knowing where Becky was would have been bad enough, but worse would have been that it looked like yet another betrayal.
Donna Pym would demand an explanation; she would deserve an explanation. But what possible explanation could they offer that wouldn’t sound as if they’d been chewing some mind-altering drugs for three days and nights?
Becky paused by the door and turned to Johnny, muttering, ‘This is going to be absolutely bloody awful.’
‘I reckon,’ whispered Johnny.
‘Hold your breath then,’ muttered Becky. ‘We’re going in.’
She turned the handle and opened the door.
She was not at all sure what to expect, except that the atmosphere would be charged in some way, perhaps the way it is after a funeral when grief seems to hang in the very air. She expected there would be a support team for her mother, Aunty Chris probably and some of the neighbours. They’d probably be in the living room, hands wrapped around cups of coffee.
However, there was none of this. Nothing seemed changed; the atmosphere was relentlessly normal.
Johnny, following her, seemed to have shrunk into himself again. She wanted to rebuke him. Somehow, while they were in Arcadia he’d gained confidence and lost this characteristic slumped manner.
‘Don’t worry about it,’ she whispered. ‘It’ll probably be bloody for a few minutes but it’ll be okay after that.’
Of course it would. Trumping all the worry and the anger would be Donna Pym’s relief, even joy, that Becky was back. That thought giving her more confidence, Becky pushed the door that led directly into the kitchen and dining room.
The Enchanted Flute Page 26