by Enid Blyton
He heard voices from a room further on whose opening was hidden by the same kind of purple curtains that hung in other places. He tiptoed back to the others.
‘We’ll wait for a bit. There’s somebody talking in the room beyond this one. This is the king’s bedroom, I should think.’
They waited, peeping through the curtains every now and then. They all began to feel terribly hungry. They were very relieved when the voices stopped and there was silence. They tiptoed through the bedroom and into the room beyond.
They stopped in delight – not at the strange beauty of the room – but at the gorgeous food on the table!
19
The king of the mountain
‘Look at that!’ said Jack. ‘Somebody’s been having a meal here – three people – and look at what they’ve left!’
‘Can’t we have some?’ said Lucy-Ann, eyeing a great bowl of fresh strawberries and a jug half full of cream. Near by was a plate of cooked lobsters, and two dishes of mixed salads.
It was clear that three people had been having a meal there, judging by the plates and glasses, all of which were really beautiful.
‘I call this a feast – a royal feast!’ said Dinah, and she picked up a cake with cream icing on the top in the shape of a rose, and dug her teeth into it. ‘I don’t know who this stuff belongs to – but there’s nobody to ask permission to share it – and I’m too hungry to wait!’
‘So am I! We’ll get Bill to pay for it if anyone objects,’ said Jack, and set to work on a lobster. There were dishes of things the children had never seen before. They tasted one or two, but they were spiced in a way they disliked.
There were peaches and nectarines, pineapples and plums of all kinds. ‘The helicopter must be pretty busy bringing all these!’ said Philip, biting into the sweetest peach he had ever tasted in his life. ‘I must say the King of this mountain does himself proud!’
Nobody came to interrupt them at all. Kiki feasted well, enjoying the food as much as the children. Snowy ate all the salad offered him, and for a treat was allowed to be on Philip’s knee, with his forefeet on the table. He badly wanted to get on the table itself, and could not understand why Kiki was allowed there when he wasn’t.
‘If you eat any more, Kiki, you’ll get the hiccups properly!’ said Jack. ‘Stuffing yourself like that! Greedy!’
‘Pop goes Polly,’ agreed Kiki, and would have given a cackle of laughter if Jack hadn’t shushed her.
‘Well – what about trying to find our way out again?’ said Jack at last. ‘I don’t know whether it’s anything to do with that strange feeling we had when the floor of the big pit was pushed back, and we saw that extraordinary mass of brilliance below – but I feel rather don’t-carish now – not scared any more. I don’t even feel that it’s terribly urgent to get out of here, though I know it is!’
‘It was a very unusual feeling,’ said Philip. ‘I thought I was going to float up into the air the next minute! I hung on to that balcony for dear life!’
They had all felt the same – and now they felt as Jack did – very ‘don’t-carish’. But that wouldn’t do at all – it was imperative that they should find their way out as soon as possible.
They left the curious dining-room, with its laden table. They went into a passage that was much more brightly lit than the others they had walked down. Hangings decorated the rocky walls, great curtains that swayed a little in the draught that ran through the passages.
‘This must be the king’s own quarters,’ said Jack. ‘Maybe we shall come to the throne-room soon.’
He was quite right. They did. But this time the throne-room was not empty. It was full!
Men stood there silently. There were all kinds, and a tough-looking lot they were! They were of many nationalities. Some had the maroon beret that paratroopers have when in uniform. The peeping children thought that probably they were all old paratroopers. There were about twenty of them. Sam was there too, and Philip gave a little start when he saw him. Now it would be known that he, Philip, had escaped! Whoever had gone to bring Sam down here would have seen the unbolted door and found that he was gone.
Blow! Now he would be carefully hunted for, and it would be very difficult to escape. He nudged Jack and pointed out Sam to him. Jack, peeping through the curtains that hung before them, nodded and frowned. The same thought occurred to him as had occurred to Philip.
He debated whether to go off straight away now and try to find the way out. But either they would have to go back the way they had just come, which obviously would not take them to the entrance they knew – or else they would have to go into the throne-room – where they would certainly be seen. No – they would have to stop where they were till this meeting, or whatever it was, was over.
Besides the paratroopers there were guards, men who looked like soldiers standing in an elaborate uniform down each side of the great hall. The throne was empty. There was no sign of the man Meier.
But suddenly there came a whispering among the men gathered there. The great curtains near the throne were flung back by two soldiers and the king of the mountain entered!
He seemed very tall, for he had a great crown that stood up from his head, embroidered with glittering stones. His wore a rich suit and cloak, and looked more like an Indian prince at some splendid festival than anything else. His yellowish face looked out impassively from below his great crown, and a mass of black hair swung down on each side. He sat down on the throne.
Beside him stood two men. Philip was sure that one was Meier. He didn’t know the other, but he didn’t like the ape-like face and enormous, burly figure. Meier’s hawk-like eyes swept the room. He began to speak in a penetrating, most incisive voice, in a language that the children did not know. Then he paused and spoke in English.
The children listened, spell-bound. Meier spoke of the king and the wonderful gift he was giving to mankind – the gift of flying. He spoke of the grand men who were helping them in their experiment – the paratroopers willing to try the ‘wings’. He spoke of the great wealth the men would receive, the honours that would be piled on them. Then he said it all again in a third language and then in a fourth.
He seemed to hypnotize everyone as he spoke. Jack could not help feeling that a lot he said was sheer nonsense – but he couldn’t do anything but believe it whilst he heard it, and it was obvious that all the men there drank every word in, whether it was spoken in their own language or not. What a spell-binder, thought Jack!
Then volunteers were called for. All the men stepped forward at once. The king then rose and, apparently at random, picked out two or three. He spoke a few inaudible words in an unexpectedly thin, reedy voice that didn’t seem to go at all with his kingly presence.
Then Meier took charge again. He said that these men, among the first to fly with wings, would be sent back to their own countries after the experiment, with wealth enough to last them for a lifetime. All the others who had tried out the wings were now safely back in their homes, and were rich and honoured men.
‘I don’t think!’ muttered Jack to Philip, remembering what Sam had related.
The king then walked majestically out and Meier and the other man followed. The guards ushered the paratroopers away and soon the great throne-room was empty.
When everyone had gone and there was complete silence, Jack whispered to Philip, ‘We know the way out from here. Come on!’
They went to the huge laboratory, where the wheels and wires were still at their secret work. The children stood in the gallery above the big work-room and looked down at the strange lamp in the middle. Dinah suddenly clutched Jack and made him jump. He looked at her.
She pointed to where there was a great cluster of glass jars, with tubes running from one to the other. Jack saw somebody there.
It was an old man with a very large forehead, larger and rounder than any forehead Jack had seen in his life. The man was quite bald, which made his head seem more curious than ever. He bent over the glass
jars and looked searchingly into them.
‘Come on before he sees us,’ whispered Jack, and pulled the others towards the passages that would lead them to the entrance. They went along them and at last came to the little chamber where the pitchers of water and the mugs were. Now to get down the rope-ladder and escape!
‘What about Snowy?’ whispered Dinah. ‘How can we get him down?’
‘I wonder how he got up before?’ said Philip. ‘And the dogs too. I never thought of that. I was just pushed up in the dark, and I was so scared I didn’t think of Snowy or the dogs. They couldn’t have climbed that ladder!’
‘There’s probably some hole somewhere that they went into,’ said Dinah. ‘A hole outside, I mean – too small for us, but big enough for Snowy and the dogs.’
As it turned out afterwards, Dinah was right. There was a small hole near the crack, and it was through this and up a narrow little tunnel that Snowy had passed with the dogs, who knew the way very well. The dogs’ tunnel led eventually into one of the passages, and that was how Snowy had got into the mountain but had not been imprisoned with Philip.
Snowy was still with them. He knew the way he had come in by, but he wasn’t going to leave the others. Jack switched on his torch and felt above for the rope-ladder.
‘Where is the wretched thing?’ he said. ‘Surely it was just here!’
Snowy came and pressed close to him, and nearly sent him headlong down to the black pool. ‘Hold Snowy!’ he said to Philip. ‘I almost went over then. I can’t seem to find the ladder. It should be hanging down somewhere about here.’
‘Let me look,’ said Philip, giving Snowy to Dinah. He felt about too, and Jack flashed his torch all round and about to see if he could spy the rope-ladder up which they had all come.
But it wasn’t there – or if it was, nobody could see it! Jack flashed his torch down into the hole as far as he could. No ladder at all!
‘What’s happened to it?’ he said, exasperated.
‘Perhaps someone has turned that little wheel in the pond the other way – and the ladder rolled up and put itself away,’ suggested Dinah.
This was a dreadful thought. Jack began to look round the little chamber to see if the rope-ladder had been pulled up by the machinery set in motion by the wheel – but he couldn’t see it anywhere.
His hand touched a spike on the wall. He focused his torch on it. ‘This may be a lever!’ he said to the others. ‘Look!’
He pulled and pressed at the spike, and it suddenly gave way, pulling downwards. A slab of rock was moved smoothly – and there behind was the rope-ladder! How it worked with the wheel below the children could not imagine.
It certainly wouldn’t work with them. It was evidently coiled or folded neatly in the hollow behind the rock – but how to get it from there nobody could make out. It needed some machinery put in motion to set it free. Then, Jack supposed, it would come sliding smoothly out of the place it was in, fall over the edge of the rock, and uncoil all the way to the bottom – hanging ready for any climber to come up.
‘How does it work from up here though?’ said Jack, for the twentieth time. All of them had pulled and twisted and tugged at the ladder, lying so snugly in its hiding-place – but it was quite impossible to move it.
‘Give it up!’ said Jack gloomily at last. ‘No good! We’re done for. It’s absolutely maddening, just when we are almost out of this beastly mountain.’
20
An amazing secret
They sat in the little room for some time, disappointed and puzzled. Time and again they tried to make the rope-ladder slide out of its secret place, but it wouldn’t. In the end they got very thirsty and very hungry. They drank all the water left in the jugs, and wondered where they could get something to eat.
They could only think of the room where they had feasted before. ‘Let’s go back to it and see if the remains of that meal are still there,’ said Jack. ‘I could do with another lobster or two!’
‘Poor Polly!’ remarked Kiki, who always seemed to know when food was being talked about. ‘Polly’s got a cold. Send for the doctor.’
‘Oh, you’ve found your tongue again, have you?’ said Jack. ‘I thought you’d lost it! Now don’t start screaming or cackling, for goodness’ sake, or you’ll have us caught!’
They found their way back to the throne-room, which was still empty, and then to the room where the meal had been.
There were still the remains of the meal there. The children’s eyes gleamed. Good! They felt better at once.
They sat down and reached for the food. Then suddenly Jack put his hand on Philip’s arm and frowned. A noise had come from the next room – the beautifully furnished bedroom! The children sat as still as mice. Was anybody there?
Kiki suddenly saw Snowy with his front hooves on the table, reaching for the salad. In anger she flew at the kid and screeched.
‘That’s done it!’ said Jack. And as he spoke, the hangings at the entrance to the room opened, and a face peered through.
It was the face they had seen down in the big work-room – the face with the enormous forehead. It had bulging eyes of a curious green-blue, a hooked nose, and sunken cheeks, yellowish in colour.
This face stared in silence at the four children, and they, in turn, stared back without a word. Who was this strange old man with the great forehead?
‘Do I know who you are?’ asked the face, a puzzled look coming over it. ‘I forget, I forget.’ The curtains were swung further apart and the old man came right through. He was dressed in a kind of loose tunic of blue silk, and the children thought he looked a pathetic old thing. He had a thin high voice that Kiki immediately copied.
The old man looked astonished, especially as he could not see Kiki, who was behind a great vase of flowers. The children didn’t say anything. They were wondering if it was possible to make a dash and get away.
‘What are children doing here?’ said the old man, in a puzzled tone. ‘Have I seen you before? Why are you here?’
‘Er – we came to look for somebody who was lost,’ said Jack. ‘And now we can’t get out again. Could you tell us the way?’
The old man seemed so lost and wandering that it seemed to Jack that he might quite well be foolish enough to show them the way out. But he was wrong.
‘Oh no, oh no,’ said the old fellow at once, a cunning look coming over his yellow face. ‘There are secrets here, you know. My secrets. Nobody who comes in may go out – until my experiments are finished. I’m the king of this place – my brain runs it all!’
He finished up on a high shrill note that gave the children an odd feeling. Was the old fellow mad? Surely he couldn’t be the ‘king’ they had seen in the throne-room?
‘You don’t look like the king,’ said Lucy-Ann. ‘We saw the king in the throne-room – he was tall and had a great crown, and black hair round his face.’
‘Ah, yes. They make me appear like that,’ said the old man. ‘I want to be king of the world, you know, the whole world – because of my great brain. I know more than anyone else. Meier says I shall be ruler of the world as soon as my experiments are done. And they are nearly finished, very very nearly!’
‘Does Meier dress you up like a king then, when you appear in the throne-room?’ asked Jack, astonished. He turned to the others and spoke in an undertone. ‘That’s to impress the paratroopers, I suppose! He wouldn’t cut any ice with them if they saw him like this.’
‘I am a king,’ said the old man, with dignity. ‘Because of my great brain, you know. I have a secret and I am using it. You have seen my great laboratory, have you? Ah, my little children, I know how to use all the great powers of the world – the tides, the metals, the winds – and gravitation!’
‘What’s “Gravitation”?’ said Lucy-Ann.
‘It is the power that keeps you on the earth – that makes you come back to it when you jump, that brings a ball back when you have thrown it,’ said the old man. ‘But I – I have conquered gravitation
!’
This seemed a lot of nonsense to the children. They were quite sure the poor old man was mad. He might have had a marvellous brain at one time – but he couldn’t be much good now.
‘You don’t believe me?’ said the old fellow. ‘Well, I have discovered some rays that repel the pull of the earth. Do you understand that, my children? No, no, it is too difficult for you.’
‘It’s not,’ said Jack, interested. ‘What you mean is – you think you’ve got hold of some rays that, if we use them, will cancel out gravitation? So that if you used the rays, say, on a ball, it wouldn’t feel the pull of the earth to bring it back here, but would speed through the air and not fall to earth?’
‘Yes, yes – that is it – very very simply,’ said the old man. ‘And now, you see, I have invented these wings. I send the rays through them. I imprison them in the wings. And then, when a man jumps from an aeroplane, he presses a button to release the power of the rays – and he does not fall to earth! Instead he can glide and soar, flap his wings, and fly like a bird until he tires of it – then he can imprison the rays again and glide to earth!’
The children listened to all this in silence. It was the most extraordinary thing they had ever heard.
‘But – is it really true?’ asked Lucy-Ann at last. The idea of flying like that was very tempting!
‘Do you think we would have come here to this lonely mountain for our experiments, do you think Meier and Erlick would have poured out their money if they had not known I could do this?’ demanded the old man, looking rather angry.
‘Well – it just sounds so extraordinary, that’s all,’ said Lucy-Ann. ‘It sounds perfectly lovely, of course – I mean, I’d give anything to be able to fly like that. How clever you must be!’
‘I have the biggest brain in the world,’ said the old man solemnly. ‘I am the greatest scientist that ever lived. I can do anything, anything!’