by Trevor Veale
“Everyone assumes that my late wife and I conceived Prince Angus on our wedding night at Calliper, the proper time for such an event. But I hereby confess that Her Highness Princess Dawna was still a virgin when we left for Barbados, which is where we consummated the marriage, not on Melorian soil.”
“If this is true, and can be proved to be true,” Dripe said, a little anxiously, “it means your son will lose his right to the crown and the succession will pass to – “
“– my brother, Anton, which is okay by me.”
“No!” Dripe’s voice rang out, setting Catheter’s teeth on edge. “The second son rule, you’re forgetting the second rule!”
Catheter’s face darkened, then he exploded. “Oh my God, you mean that stupid business…! So it’ll skip Anton and pass to... Father’s brother-in-law?”
“Not necessarily!” Dripe said fiercely. “You’re running ahead of yourself! The succession will pass first to any male child of the last reigning monarch, lawful or unlawful, and be prohibited to the brother-in-law if such a child be presented to an officer of the law within five days of a national proclamation.”
Catheter began blinking furiously. As Dripe droned on, he was thinking of the article in the Sunday paper about one of the maids who claimed her bastard son was the king’s. He started to imagine the boy as the next King of Melloria. The alternative, other than admitting that he had just told a lie, was totally unthinkable – letting King Slobodan take the crown and Slobodia take the country.
“There is such a child,” he told Dripe, who suspected as much. But Dripe had no intention of letting Catheter escape the full rigors of the law.
“First you must furnish proof to substantiate your claim. Are there any witnesses or documentary evidence of your, um, overseas consummation?”
Catheter winced at the thought of peeping tom servants who had eavesdropped on his marital thrashings being called to give evidence.
“None, my Lord, except a tape recording I made of our first sexual encounter.”
Dripe’s forehead wrinkled alarmingly. “You made a tape recording of your marital consummation…?”
“Well, yes, it’s my hobby,” Catheter said, getting up. “I’ll have a copy of the tape, on which you can hear tropical noises in the background, fedexed to your office. I’m also prepared to swear on the Holy Bible that I’m speaking the truth. Now, if you’ll excuse me, my Lord, I have several urgent phone calls to make.”
“We’ll see, we’ll see,” Dripe said, somewhat bemused. He did not get up from his chair. Turning at the door, Catheter gave the bewildered bishop a happy smile, his cheerful mood returned. Dripe did not smile back.
Chapter 65
The Boy King
Realizing that there was not much time to spare, and fearing that news of the extraordinary turn of events would reach them in a garbled form from some other source, Catheter phoned his parents in a taxi on his way to the palace.
As luck would have it, Godfrey and Letitia were breakfasting late when the call came through. The phone rang on Godfrey’s side of the breakfast room and Agatha Armstrong-Pitt, who was standing in for an absent maid, brought it to him. He lifted the receiver casually. Letitia was buttering toast and Agatha was bustling around them.
A loud gasp from Godfrey made them both pause. Godfrey looked shocked, and glanced worriedly at Letitia.
“It’s Catheter,” he said, but could say nothing more. He passed the phone to Letitia, who muttered briefly into the receiver. Catheter’s voice was loud enough for Agatha to hear. “Oh my God!” Letitia and Agatha both said almost simultaneously. For a few seconds there was no sound but the chirpy voice from the phone, then Godfrey snatched the receiver and roared.
“Why didn’t you tell me you were going to destroy the House of Gorm, you little turd!”
“Godfrey, your language…!” Letitia whispered in astonishment.
Her nose had gone red and tears were starting down her cheeks.
“I think His Royal Highness has been most indiscrete – ” Agatha began indignantly.
“I think you’d better go now,” Letitia told her, just before she broke down and wept.
Agatha bustled out just as Catheter’s cab drew up at the palace. He walked in and looked at his parents’ devastated faces, and went over to comfort his mother. Her face streaked with tears, she looked at him angrily. She was outraged that he had lied about Angus’s conception to save his adulterous liaison with Lucinda.
“We’ll just have to go along with this,” Godfrey said suddenly and deliberately. Turning to Catheter, kneeling beside his mother’s chair, he said: “I want to thrash you for compromising your son’s rightful inheritance, but I’d infinitely rather the crown passed to a Mellorian, however low-born, than that cur Slobodan.”
Letitia had stopped weeping, and now looked at Godfrey in surprise. “Godfrey, that low-born Mellorian is your son!” she said.
“I’m sorry, you’re quite right,” Godfrey conceded. “I should welcome the boy with open arms.”
“Oh well,” Letitia sighed. “What’s done is done. As your father said, we’ll just have to go along with it.”
“Of course, Mummy,” Catheter said. Though he was not happy with himself for having reduced his mother to tears, he was relieved at the way things were going.
“Forgive me, Mummy,” he said with some genuine contrition. “What can I do to make it up to you?”
“Ditch Lucinda!” Letitia said at once. “No, I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have said that,” she amended. “You can make it up by making an honest woman of her and looking after your family.”
“You can also apologize to you father for upsetting him,” Letitia said, applying Cooper’s Oxford marmalade to her toast.
Oh all right,” Catheter said. “I’m sorry, Father, I shouldn’t have upset you.”
Godfrey grunted and picked up the Bugle. He turned to the travel page. “How about this?” he said. “Business class to Barbados, with a layover at Heathrow: Fifty thousand moons.”
“That may do quite nicely,” Letitia said, somewhat appeased.
“Tell you what,” Catheter said, after some hesitation. “I’ll pay for the flight.”
“Done!” Letitia said happily, her tears forgotten.
Calliper Palace operated as an efficient rumor mill. Whatever any of the Gorms said was passed from one wing to the other and down to the servants’ quarters. The servants were interlinked through ancestry, marriage, sexual liaisons, friendships and enmity and formed a single intersecting web of gossip with many strands connected to the outside world. Arabella Scott-Natterson was keyed into this web through her relationship with Mary and Agatha, and, to a lesser extent, with the recently-estranged Sharon. It was through Agatha’s breathless phone call that she was able to pass the news of her son’s elevation to Sharon, just before she opened her iMac and wrote a splashy article for the Bugle entitled The Prince and the Pauper.
Sharon had been trying to get her life back together on the day her life changed forever. As she explained to Arabella when the phone suddenly rang as she was on her way out.
“I’m trying not to think too far ahead, living each day as it comes.”
She had experienced mixed fortune since her big payout for the story of her brief encounter with King Godfrey and its consequence. Her relationship with Simpkins had finally come to a shuddering end. As she told Arabella: “He was having it off with the new maid at Calliper every chance he got, in the butler’s room, the linen closet, the conservatory…” in a way that was horribly reminiscent of her own workplace romance. Also, he had dropped out of his twelve-step program and had gone back to drinking a bottle of brandy a day.
Craig had been allowed back in school on condition that he attend a therapeutic program involving counseling and daily doses of Ritalin. In fact, she had been about to leave to pick Craig from school when Arabella had called.
“That’s fortunate,” Arabella said, “because you’re going to have to tell
him something mindblowing.”
“What’s that then?”
“For reasons that are too complicated to go into now, Craig must be the next king of Melloria.”
“You…! He’s…?” Sharon stopped in shock.
“Hello, are you still there?”
“Yeah.”
“Did you understand what I just said?”
“That Craig must be the next king of Melloria.”
“That’s right, Sharon, this isn’t a wind-up, and it’s very important that you listen carefully to what I’m going to tell you.”
“Okay.”
“Tomorrow morning a proclamation will be posted in every government office open to the public, like post offices, police stations, welfare offices and clinics. It will invite any male Mellorian related to King Godfrey by paternity to present himself within five business days to a panel of examiners, and if he passes their scrutiny he will become the next king.”
“Oh dear God!” Sharon exclaimed. She faltered, not knowing what to say next.
“I realize what a terrific shock this must be to you, Sharon,” Arabella said, “but I think you ought to prepare Craig as soon as possible for what lies ahead for him. Do you want me to come with you, when you go to pick him up?”
“No thanks, Arabella, I can manage it,” Sharon said quickly. “I better be on my way now.”
She put the phone down thinking, We look after our own in this family – don’t need no snoopy journalists hanging out with us.
She steeled herself for the journey to the school. Not since her abortive attempt to tell Arabella about her brief encounter with King Godfrey had she felt so apprehensive. She decided to take the subway, and strode toward the station with fierce determination, grateful for the warm summer weather – it made the going easier. As she traveled slowly down the escalator, with people bobbing all around her, she sifted Arabella’s words in her mind like a gold prospector panning silt in a stream, searching for glints of insight.
He must be king. He must be king. That’s what she said. But why must he? Damn, I forgot to ask her. What if he didn’t want to? Still, the law is the law, I suppose. Craig as king. It seems too fantastic for words. Never in my wildest dreams did I think… that Craig would one day be king. I never expected Godfrey… I just wanted him to pay for what he done, saddling me with a kid and all…although sometimes I wished he’d make me his queen, instead of that old bitch… After all, she was born a commoner, and a foreigner at that, so my being crowned queen wasn’t so far-fetched. But Craig…? It’s gonna change his life! The poor bastard, getting the shit kicked out of him every day at school. No friends except a couple of runts just like him!
Hey, it’s gonna change my life and all, and I’m certainly tired of straining to make ends meet. Maybe this’ll give Craig the means to do something for himself, though God knows whether he gets more of his character from Dad’s bad genes or from his father’s side. Oh-oh, this is my stop.
Walking into the school’s dusty building, Sharon’s knees began to turn rubbery. In the corridor outside Craig’s home room, which was beginning to fill with jostling children, she slumped against the wall. She looked through the half-open door at the classroom. Among the scuffed plastic-backed chairs she saw Craig’s backpack. He’d left it where it could be stolen, the stupid little…
Suddenly Craig appeared, solemn-faced among his classmates, and stood in front of her.
“What?” he said.
“I got something important to tell you – we’ll have to go outside.”
Why?”
“’Cause I don’t want nobody to hear us, that’s why.”
He stood his ground, though the stream of bodies going past pushed and buffeted him.
“Class’ll be starting in a minute. I don’t want to get into no trouble for being late.”
She felt a shiver of compassion for him. He was trying to make a go of his new school, and she didn’t want to blow it for him. What was she thinking of? This was going to blow it sky-high!
“Look,” she said, lowering her voice. “You gotta come home now, You’re gonna be the next king!”
His face clouded over.
“I don’t wanna be king.”
He met her eye for the first time, causing a shiver to hurtle down her spine.
“Well, you go to, ‘cause that’s the law.”
She didn’t feel like mollycoddling him any longer. She was angry at his stubborn refusal to face reality.
“Fuck the law.”
Without thinking, she let fly. Her hand caught him on the side of his face and made a smack like wood on leather. He stood looking at her, in a state of violent shock, a red strawberry mark spreading up his face. The he took off down the corridor, leaving her horror-stricken and wishing she could turn back the clock.
At a quarter to midnight, Craig stood in the doorway with a thunderous look on his face. He also had an ugly purple bruise. Having finished off the cigarettes and brandy, Sharon was sitting in front of the TV eating her way through a packet of chocolate chip cookies.
“All right, I know I’m late,” he said, striding over to plonk himself on the couch. He snatched the packet of cookies with barely a murmur. Sharon looked into his hard brown eyes as he munched furiously.
“I’ve decided I want to be king,” he said at last.
“That’s good,” she said, feigning nonchalance.
When the packet was almost finished, she retrieved it and took a cookie for herself. Craig grabbed the remote and began switching channels.
“Whatcha been doing with yourself for the last ten hours?”
She kept her tone light, trying not to interrogate him.
“Gaming,” was all he said. The word was firm and adamant.
“That’s interesting,” she said and took a small bite from her cookie.
Sharon thought for a moment. “Were you playing WWII games like Day of Defeat, or did you play an RTS game like Civilization?
He looked at her curiously. “My friend’s got the Rise of Nations and we were playing Conquer the World. I picked the French civilization and I really got into making the economy work, buying and selling things, producing enough food and clothing for the people, and enough work for people to do, so the country had a big enough army… I had to defeat lots of different enemies. It made me realize what a king’s job is like – and I wanna do it.”
With Craig talking so candidly, she pressed her advantage.
“It’s a big step, though – being the king.”
“Yeah, I know.”
He ducked his head. He was finding it awkward to open up, though he’d made a good start.
“But you wanna do it anyway.”
“Yeah.”
Hope sprang within her, but she didn’t let her anticipation show.
“Well, it’s getting late. We’ll talk about it a bit more in the morning.”
She pushed the packet of cookies toward him, encouraging him to take another, which he did.
When they’d finished the last of the cookies, she brushed the crumbs from her fingers, reached across and gave his shoulder a squeeze.
“Night, Craig.”
“Night, Mum.”
Chapter 66
The Departure
In the drawing room, Lucinda hoisted herself up from the sofa with great difficulty. Although she was only seven months pregnant, she could pass for nine, with her bulging stomach and plump limbs.
“I’ll go see what’s keeping Letitia,” she said, waving Catheter back in his chair as he made to get up. “You stay and keep your Dad company.”
She climbed the stairs, huffing and puffing. Her mind, lately focused on childbirth, labor, chocolate ice cream with green olives and shrimp, began to dwell on her growing fondness for Catheter’s cantankerous mother. She had at first found Letitia’s sharp, acerbic manner almost as bad as her beloved’s nervous stuffiness – which she was sure he had inherited from his parents – but time and the familiarity of seeing he
r every day had softened her heart. She hoped that she would be able to stay in touch with her and Godfrey, whom she found charming, after they had settled into their new life.
She knocked on Letitia’s door, and when Letitia saw her she pushed down her jealous spasms.
“How do you manage to get about with all that weight you’re carrying?” she said.
“I don’t. I stay put most of the time,” Lucinda said with a chuckle. “Also, I have these really disgusting cravings, so I send Catheter out to get me seafood pizza and chocolate ice cream.”
Letitia smiled thinly. Her thoughts rolled on. With all that chocolate, she’s really starting to put on weight. Unlike Dawna, she seems almost devoid of self-doubt. She loves herself as much as she loves Catheter. She never seems anxious about her looks. Probably because they’re nothing to brag about. She clearly loves the fact that she’s voluptuous in her pregnancy. Now let’s get the hell out of here before she starts talking about her hemorrhoids.
Catheter and Lucinda waved goodbye as Godfrey and Letitia left in a taxi for the airport. After toing and froing about the merits and demerits of Barbados, Letitia and Godfrey had finally decided to live on Tobago, especially after Catheter had detailed his ghastly honeymoon experience. As the island was only thirty-two kilometers long by twelve wide, they considered it the perfect downsize. They were going to live in one of the villas that had caught Letitia’s eye in a brochure. The time was right for Godfrey and Letitia to make a new life.
They were also vacating the palace to allow the new occupants, the future King Craig and his mother, whom the government had ennobled and given the (to Letitia) absurd title of the Mother Queen. Catheter and Lucinda were also moving out, something Lucinda made light of, saying Calliper was much too big and drafty, to their love nest of a cottage, where little Angus could receive daily visits from Betty. Hernia took Anton back to Bulimia, where they went clubbing and to trendy bars and wild parties, until Anton declared himself too old for high jinks and introduced her to LARPing.