‘Keep under cover, Peter,’ Kay said. ‘There are your bird enthusiasts. The plot thickens. I see it all. They scrobbled that old man thinking that he’d got something which they wanted. They released the old man when they found he hadn’t got it. Now they think that he’s dropped it in the snow and they are looking for it. They won’t find it in this slush, I’ll bet. What d’you make of the two men?’
‘They look like two curates to me,’ Peter said.
‘They’re the two who were in the train with me yesterday, and I’ve a very shrewd suspicion that they picked my pockets.’
‘You think that curates’ clothes are a disguise?’
‘Yes.’
‘Golly!’ Peter said. ‘Well, let’s watch.’
Presently, the two men wearied of their search and decided that it was no good searching longer. They went off down the hill. With some little trouble, the boys followed, unobserved (as they hoped). The two curates went downhill to the road, where a big, dark, shabby car was waiting for them: they got into the car and drove off. They went, as Kay noticed, in a north-westerly direction. Presently, as he chanced to look in that direction, he saw some bright, moving speck in the sky, which he judged to be an aeroplane.
‘I wonder,’ he thought to himself, ‘if that motor car could turn into an aeroplane.’
‘I wonder what it was,’ Peter said, ‘I wonder what it was that the men were hoping to find?’
Kay knew very well what it was that they were hoping to find, but he did not feel that he had a right to say.
‘Oh, these gangs,’ he said airily, ‘they always try to get each other’s codes and passwords.’
‘I shouldn’t think they’d bother about those,’ Peter said. ‘They could always torture a prisoner till he told them all the passwords. I should think they were rival gangs of jewel thieves, after the same diamond necklace, and one of the gangs has got it and is trying to get it out of the country, and the other gang is trying to waylay it.’
‘That’s an idea,’ Kay said. He was afraid that that might be the explanation. ‘When I get in,’ he thought, ‘I will hide, and look at this Box. If it is a diamond necklace I’ll take it straight to the Police Inspector.’ They went home.
Now, at last, Kay felt that he was free to look at the Box of Delights. He went up to his bedroom. He was very anxious not to be spied upon, and, remembering how those three spies had been peering in at the window the night before, and how the repulsive Rat had crept about in the secret passages finding out all sorts of things, he was not sure that he could guard himself from being seen. His bedroom had two doors in it opening on to different landings. He locked both doors and hung caps over the keyholes: he drew down the window blinds and pulled the curtains: he looked under the beds. Then, as in the past, when he had wished to hide from his governess, he crept under the valance of his dressing-table: no one could possibly see him there.
The Box was of some very hard wood of a dense grain. It had been covered with shagreen, but the shagreen was black with age and sometimes worn away so as to show the wood beneath. Both wood and shagreen had been polished until they were as smooth as a polished metal. On the side of it there was a little countersunk groove, in the midst of which was a knob. ‘I press this to open,’ he repeated. ‘If I push it to the right I can go small, whatever that may mean. If I push it to the left I can go swift, and that I’ve tried. I do want to see what’s inside it. I wonder, is this wood that it’s made of lignum-vitæ wood?’
‘It’s the wood the Phœnix builds in,’ the Box said.
‘Is it really?’ Kay said. ‘No wonder it smells like spice.’
Then he saw that the groove was inlaid with gold and that the golden knob within the groove had been carven into the image of a rosebud, which was extraordinarily fragrant. ‘I say,’ Kay said to himself, ‘this is a wonderful Box. Now I’ll open it.’
He pressed the tiny, golden rosebud and, at once, from within the box, there came a tiny crying of birds. As he listened he heard the stockdove brooding, the cuckoo tolling, blackbirds, thrushes, the nightingale singing. Then a far-away cock crowed thrice and the Box slowly opened. Inside he saw what he took to be a book, the leaves of which were all chased and worked with multitudinous figures, and the effect that it gave him was that of staring into an opening in a wood. It was lit from within and multitudinous, tiny things were shifting there. Then he saw that the things which were falling were the petals of may-blossom from giant hawthorn trees covered with flowers. The hawthorns stood on each side of the entrance to the forest, which was dark from the great trees yet dappled with light. Now, as he looked into it, he saw deer glide with alert ears, then a fox, motionless at his earth, a rabbit moving to new pasture and nibbling at a dandelion, and the snouts of the moles breaking the wet earth. All the forest was full of life: all the birds were singing, insects were humming, dragonflies darting, butterflies wavering and settling. It was so clear that he could see the flies on the leaves brushing their heads and wings with their legs. ‘It’s all alive and it’s full of summer. There are all the birds singing: there’s a linnet; a bullfinch; a robin; that’s a little wren.’ Others were singing too: different kinds of tits; the woodpecker was drilling; the chiffchaff repeating his name; the yellowhammer and garden warbler were singing, and overhead, as the bird went swiftly past, came the sad, laughing cry of the curlew. While he gazed into the heart of summer and listened to the murmur and the singing, he heard another noise like the tinkling of little bells. As he wondered what these bells could be he decided that they were not bells, but a tinkling like the cry of many little long-tailed tits together. ‘Where did I hear that noise before quite recently?’ Kay said to himself. It was not the noise of long-tailed tits: it was the noise of little chains chinking. He remembered that strange rider who had passed him in the street the day before. That rider, who seemed to have little silver chains dangling from his wrists, had jingled so. ‘Oh,’ Kay said, as he looked, ‘there’s someone wonderful coming.’
At first he thought that the figure was one of those giant red deer, long since extinct: it bore enormous antlers. Then he saw that it was a great man, antlered at the brow, dressed in deerskin and moving with the silent, slow grace of a stag; and, although he was so like a stag, he was hung about with little silver chains and bells.
Kay knew at once that this was Herne the Hunter, of whom he had often heard. ‘Ha, Kay,’ Herne the Hunter said, ‘are you coming into my wild wood?’
‘Yes, if you please, sir,’ Kay said. Herne stretched out his hand. Kay took it and at once he was glad that he had taken it, for there he was in the forest between the two hawthorn trees, with the petals of the may-blossom falling on him. All the may-blossoms that fell were talking to him, and he was aware of what all the creatures of the forest were saying to each other: what the birds were singing, and what it was that the flowers and trees were thinking. And he realised that the forest went on and on for ever, and all of it was full of life beyond anything that he had ever imagined: for in the trees, in each leaf, and on every twig, and in every inch of soil there were ants, grubs, worms; little, tiny, moving things, incredibly small yet all thrilling with life.
‘Oh dear,’ Kay said, ‘I shall never know a hundredth part of all the things there are to know.’
‘You will, if you stay with me,’ Herne the Hunter said. ‘Would you like to be a stag with me in the wild wood?’
Now, next to being a jockey, Kay had longed to be a young stag. Now he realised that he had become one. He was there in the green wood beside a giant stag, so screened with the boughs that they were a part of a dappled pattern of light and shade, and the news of the wood came to him in scents upon the wind.
Presently the giant stag gave a signal. They moved off out of the green wood into a rolling grassland, where some fox cubs were playing with a vixen. They passed these and presently came down to a pool, where some moorhens were cocking about in the water; a crested grebe kept a fierce eye upon them. They went out
into the water. It was lovely, Kay thought, to feel the water cool upon the feet after running, and to be able to go paddling, although it had been winter only a minute before. ‘And it’s lovely, too,’ he thought, ‘to have hard feet and not get sharp bits of twig into one’s soles.’ They moved through the water towards some reeds. Looking through the stalks of the reeds Kay saw that there were a multitude of wild duck. ‘Would you like to be a wild duck, Kay?’ Herne asked.
Now, next to being a jockey and a stag, Kay had longed to be a wild duck, and, at once, with a great clatter of feathers, the wild duck rose more and more and more, going high up, and, oh joy! Herne and Kay were with them, flying on wings of their own, and Kay could just see that his neck was glinting green. There was the pool, blue as a piece of sky below them, and the sky above brighter than he had ever seen it.
They flew higher and higher in great sweeps, and, presently, they saw the sea like the dark blue on a map. Then they made a sweeping circle and there was the pool once more, blue like the sky. ‘Now for the plunge,’ Herne cried, and instantly they were surging down swiftly and still more swiftly, and the pool was rushing up at them, and they all went skimming into it with a long, scuttering, rippling splash. And there they all were paddling together, happy to be in water again.
‘How beautiful the water is,’ Kay said. Indeed it was beautiful, clear hill-water, with little fish darting this way and that and the weeds waving, and sometimes he saw that the waving weeds were really fish. ‘Would you like to be a fish, Kay?’ Herne asked.
And, next to being a jockey, a stag and a wild duck, Kay had always longed to be a fish. And then, instantly, Kay was a fish. He and Herne were there in the coolness and dimness, wavering as the water wavered, and feeling a cold spring gurgling up just underneath them and tickling their tummies.
While Kay was enjoying the water Herne asked, ‘Did you see the wolves in the wood?’
‘No,’ Kay said.
‘Well, they were there,’ Herne said; ‘that was why I moved. Did you see the hawks in the air?’
‘No,’ Kay said.
‘Well, they were there,’ Herne said; ‘and that was why I plunged. And d’you see the pike in the weeds?’
‘No,’ Kay said.
‘He is there,’ Herne said. ‘Look.’
Looking ahead up the stream Kay saw a darkness of weeds wavering in the water, and presently a part of the darkness wavered into a shape with eyes that gleamed and hooky teeth that showed. Kay saw that the eyes were fixed upon himself and suddenly the dark shadow leaped swiftly forward with a swirl of water. But Kay and Herne were out of the water. They were trotting happily together over the grass towards the forest: Herne a giant figure with the antlers of the red stag and himself a little figure with little budding antlers. And so they went trotting together into the forest to a great ruined oak tree, so old that all within was hollow, though the great shell still put forth twigs and leaves.
Somehow, the figure of Herne, which had been so staglike, became like the oak tree and merged into the oak tree till Kay could see nothing but the tree. What had been Herne’s antlers were now a few old branches and what had seemed silver chains dangling from Herne’s wrists were now the leaves rustling. Then the oak tree faded and grew smaller till it was a dark point in a sunny glade. The glade shrank and there was Kay standing between the two hawthorn trees, which were shedding their blossoms upon him. Then these shrank till they were as tiny as the works of a watch and then Kay was himself again under the valance in his room at Seekings looking at the first page in the Book of Delights contained within the Box. ‘My goodness,’ Kay said, ‘no wonder the old man treasured this Box and called it a Box of Delights. Now, I wonder,’ he said, ‘how long I have been in that fairyland with Herne the Hunter?’ He looked at his watch and found that he had been away only two minutes. It was now ten minutes to eleven. ‘My goodness,’ Kay said, ‘all that took only two minutes.’
Chapter V
He was just wondering whether he should hide the Box in his secret locker, when he remembered that Abner had told the Rat to report to him at eleven at the usual place. ‘I wonder,’ Kay thought, ‘if I could possibly be present when he reports.’
He took the Box of Delights in his hand and muttered, ‘If I push this to the right I can go small, and if I push it to the left I can go swift.’ He pushed the knob to the right and instantly found himself dwindling and dwindling, while the furniture in his room grew vaster and vaster, and there beside him, just beyond the edge of the carpet, was a little hole between two boards in the flooring. A mouse had once lived in the hole but had long since gone, and once Kay had dropped a sixpence there and had fished for it in vain with a bootlace smeared with cobbler’s wax. He could see it shining there still now. Without any hesitation he slipped himself down the crack and picked up the sixpence, which was now bigger than his head and much too big to go into any of his pockets. The wonderful thing was that down there, where the mouse had lived, was a most charming corridor all as bright as day. It ran on and opened into a great space which had once been, as Kay knew, a secret hiding-place made by his great-grandfather. This was now all laid out as a mouse’s recreation ground. There was a little tennis-court, and a charming bowling-green and a little, tiny red pole hung about with ropes for the giant-stride. Then, in one corner, a part had been specially polished and a mouse was roller-skating here.
‘Hullo, Kay,’ the Mouse said.
‘I say,’ Kay said, ‘you know these underground places. Could I get to the Prince Rupert’s Arms underground?’
‘Why yes,’ the Mouse said, ‘but, of course, it’s a bit of what you might call a peradventure getting to the Rupert’s Arms. Parts of the way there are some very terrible fellows that lie in wait.’
‘D’you mean cats and dogs?’ Kay asked.
‘Oh, no, no,’ said the Mouse, ‘but a party that has only come here lately. Of course,’ he said, sinking his voice, ‘I don’t say anything against them. They’re awfully nice fellows and good citizens and all that, but they’ve been away a lot. They’ve got foreign ways that take some getting into.’
‘But, who are they?’ Kay said.
‘The chap who used to be cellarman here,’ the Mouse said: ‘I won’t mention names. He went away. He said he went as marine cellarman, but, if you ask me, he was on the Spanish Main under the skull and crossbones. But, come along, Kay: I can fit you out with weapons.’
He led Kay along a little passage and unlocked a door labelled ‘Armoury.’
Inside the armoury were some little light suits of chain mail. The Mouse pitched one over to Kay and took one for himself.
‘You see, these will do for the body,’ the Mouse said. ‘That is, they will do up to a point. I expect you’d like a sword or something.’
He opened a cupboard in which there were some long shining rapiers made out of bodkins and darning needles. Someone had put them on to a whetstone and had given them edge and point.
‘You see, these are very good,’ the Mouse said, ‘if you have time to use them; but the things that go for us are so sudden. And remember, when I put my finger to my lips that’ll mean that we are at the danger point.’
‘Tell me, before we start,’ Kay said, ‘what is the danger point?’
‘Well,’ the Mouse said, sinking his voice, ‘when that one whom we named came home from the Spanish Main, he did not come alone; no; he brought Benito’s crew with him, the Wolves of the Gulf they call themselves: and they’re all there, drinking rum and plotting devilry. They’ve brought a reign of terror into what we call the Underworld. Oh, terrible things go on; every night.’
‘Whereabouts are they usually?’ Kay asked.
‘The worst place is about two-thirds of the way there,’ the Mouse said, ‘in the old Powdering Cellar under William’s Vintry. We shall have to go right past it.’
‘Lead on, Macduff,’ Kay said. ‘If the worst comes to the worst, take my hand, for I think we shall be able to diddle them.’ He though
t that by pressing the knob on the Box he might be able ‘to go swift’ past any danger to which they came.
‘Now the best way is this way,’ the Mouse said.
Presently they reached the end of the Seekings cellar. Kay saw the barrels of cider and perry which they made in the orchard every year. The Mouse unlocked a little door out of the cellar into an underground passage. Someone had started digging under the door here. There was a mass of earth and rock and a pile of pickaxes.
‘You see there,’ the Mouse said: ‘those pickaxes. Those Wolves of the Gulf that I told you of were up here last night. They were going to break into Seekings – you can see how they dug – but then that one you named came up and said: “I’ll take you into Seekings by another way any time you like, but not yet,” he said. “There are two cats in Seekings,” he said, “which are just Doomsday in Fur. One of them is called Nibbins and the other is called Twiddles and they both ought to have their heads sawed off. And my advice is: don’t break into Seekings till we’ve poisoned both of them. That’s what.”’
‘And did they decide anything?’ Kay asked.
The Mouse began to tremble violently and turned quite white.
‘They did,’ the Mouse said. ‘They are going to poison the cats. I heard the whole plan.’
‘Well, what is it?’ Kay said. ‘Forewarned is forearmed.’
‘They said,’ the Mouse said, ‘they said “First, we’ll catch that Mouse when he comes along here and then we’ll bathe him good and rich in the ratsbane they put down for us. Then we’ll make him run across the room the two cats sleep in. Then the cats will pounce and eat him and then they’ll die. That’s what.” And that’s what they’re going to do.’
‘Well, we’ll see about that,’ Kay said.
‘Oh, but Master Kay, Master Kay!’ the Mouse said, ‘don’t tell them that I told you.’
‘Come now,’ Kay said, ‘and don’t be such a funk.’
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