The Ickabog

by J. K. Rowling

  Bert took another handful of earth and smeared it over his face. Then he got to his feet and, crouching low, darted into a dark doorway across the street. A soldier ran past, but Bert was now so filthy that he was well camouflaged against the dark door, and the man noticed nothing. When the soldier had disappeared, Bert ran barefooted from doorway to doorway, carrying his shoes, hiding in shadowy alcoves and edging ever closer to the City-Within-The-City gates. However, when he drew near, he saw a guard keeping watch, and before Bert could think up a plan, he had to slide behind a statue of King Richard the Righteous, because Roach and another soldier were approaching.

  “Have you seen Bert Beamish?” they shouted at the guard.

  “What, the pastry chef’s son?” asked the man.

  Roach seized the front of the man’s uniform and shook him as a terrier shakes a rabbit. “Of course, the pastry chef’s son! Have you let him through these gates? Tell me!”

  “No, I haven’t,” said the guard, “and what’s the boy done to have you lot chasing him?”

  “He’s a traitor!” snarled Roach. “And I’ll personally shoot anyone who helps him, understood?”

  “Understood,” said the guard. Roach released the man and he and his companion ran off again, their torches casting swinging pools of light on all the walls, until they were swallowed once more by the darkness.

  Bert watched the guard straighten his uniform and shake his head. Bert hesitated, then, knowing this might cost him his life, crept out of his hiding place. So thoroughly had Bert camouflaged himself with all the earth, that the guard didn’t realize anyone was beside him until he saw the whites of Bert’s eyes in the moonlight, and let out a yelp of terror.

  “Please,” whispered Bert. “Please … don’t give me away. I need to get out of here.”

  From beneath his sweater, he pulled his father’s heavy silver medal, brushed earth from the surface, and showed the guard.

  “I’ll give you this — it’s real silver! — if you just let me out through the gates, and don’t tell anyone you’ve seen me. I’m not a traitor,” said Bert. “I haven’t betrayed anyone, I swear.”

  The guard was an older man, with a stiff gray beard. He considered the earth-covered Bert for a moment or two before saying:

  “Keep your medal, son.”

  He opened the gate just wide enough for Bert to slide through.

  “Thank you!” gasped Bert.

  “Stick to the back roads,” advised the guard. “And trust no one. Good luck.”

  While Bert was slipping out of the city gates, Mrs. Beamish was being shunted into a cell in the dungeons by Lord Spittleworth. A cracked, reedy voice nearby sang the national anthem in time to hammer blows.

  “Be quiet!” bellowed Spittleworth toward the wall. The singing stopped.

  “When I finish this foot, my lord,” said the broken voice, “will you let me out to see my daughter?”

  “Yes, yes, you’ll see your daughter,” Spittleworth called back, rolling his eyes. “Now, be quiet, because I want to talk to your neighbor!”

  “Well, before you get started, my lord,” said Mrs. Beamish, “I’ve got a few things I want to say to you.”

  Spittleworth and Flapoon stared at the plump little woman. Never had they placed anyone in the dungeons who looked so proud and unconcerned at being slung in this dank, cold place. Spittleworth was reminded of Lady Eslanda, who was still shut up in his library, and still refusing to marry him. He’d never imagined a cook could look as haughty as a lady.

  “Firstly,” said Mrs. Beamish, “if you kill me, the king will know. He’ll notice I’m not making his pastries. He can taste the difference.”

  “That’s true,” said Spittleworth, with a cruel smile. “However, as the king will believe that you’ve been killed by the Ickabog, he’ll simply have to get used to his pastries tasting different, won’t he?”

  “My house lies in the shadow of the palace walls,” countered Mrs. Beamish. “It will be impossible to fake an Ickabog attack there without waking up a hundred witnesses.”

  “That’s easily solved,” said Spittleworth. “We’ll say you were foolish enough to take a nighttime stroll down by the banks of the river Fluma, where the Ickabog was having a drink.”

  “Which might have worked,” said Mrs. Beamish, making up a story off the top of her head, “if I hadn’t left certain instructions, to be carried out if word gets out that I’ve been killed by the Ickabog.”

  “What instructions, and whom have you given them to?” said Flapoon.

  “Her son, I daresay,” said Spittleworth, “but he’ll soon be in our power. Make a note, Flapoon — we only kill the cook once we’ve killed her son.”

  “In the meantime,” said Mrs. Beamish, pretending she hadn’t felt an icy stab of terror at the thought of Bert falling into Spittleworth’s hands, “you might as well equip this cell properly with a stove and all my regular implements, so I can keep making cakes for the king.”

  “Yes … Why not?” said Spittleworth slowly. “We all enjoy your pastries, Mrs. Beamish. You may continue to cook for the king until your son is caught.”

  “Good,” said Mrs. Beamish, “but I’m going to need assistance. I suggest I train up some of my fellow prisoners who can at least whisk the egg whites and line my baking trays.

  “That will require you to feed the poor fellows a little more. I noticed as you marched me through here that some of them look like skeletons. I can’t have them eating all my raw ingredients because they’re starving.

  “And lastly,” said Mrs. Beamish, giving her cell a sweeping glance, “I shall need a comfortable bed and some clean blankets if I’m to get enough sleep to produce cakes of the quality the king demands. It’s his birthday coming up too. He’ll be expecting something very special.”

  Spittleworth eyed this most surprising captive for a moment or two, then said:

  “Doesn’t it alarm you, madam, to think that you and your child will soon be dead?”

  “Oh, if there’s one thing you learn at cookery school,” said Mrs. Beamish, with a shrug, “burned crusts and soggy bases happen to the best of us. Roll up your sleeves and start something else, I say. No point moaning over what you can’t fix!”

  As Spittleworth couldn’t think of a good retort to this, he beckoned to Flapoon and the two lords left the cell, the door clanging shut behind them.

  As soon as they’d gone, Mrs. Beamish stopped pretending to be brave and dropped down onto the hard bed, which was the only piece of furniture in the cell. She was shaking all over and for a moment, she was afraid that she was going to have hysterics.

  However, a woman didn’t rise to be in charge of the king’s kitchens, in a city of the finest pastry makers on earth, without being able to manage her own nerves. Mrs. Beamish took a deep, steadying breath and then, hearing the reedy voice next door break into the national anthem again, pressed her ear to the wall, and began to listen for the place where the noise was coming into her cell. At last she found a crack near the ceiling. Standing on her bed, she called softly:

  “Dan? Daniel Dovetail? I know that’s you. This is Bertha, Bertha Beamish!”

  But the broken voice only continued to sing. Mrs. Beamish sank back down on her bed, wrapped her arms around herself, closed her eyes, and prayed with every part of her aching heart that wherever Bert was, he was safe.

  At first, Bert didn’t realize that the whole of Cornucopia had been warned by Lord Spittleworth to watch out for him. Following the guard’s advice at the city gates, he kept to country lanes and back roads. He’d never been as far north as Jeroboam, but by roughly following the course of the river Fluma, he knew he must be traveling in the right direction.

  Hair matted and shoes clogged with mud, he walked across plowed fields and slept in ditches. Not until he sneaked into Kurdsburg on the third night, to try and find something to eat, did he come face-to-face for the first time with a picture of himself on a WANTED poster, taped up in a cheesemonger’s window. Lucki
ly, the drawing of a neat, smiling young man looked nothing like the reflection of the grubby tramp he saw staring out of the dark glass beside it. Nevertheless, it was a shock to see that there was a reward of one hundred ducats on his head, dead or alive.

  Bert hurried on through the dark streets, passing skinny dogs and boarded-up windows. Once or twice he came across other grubby, ragged people who were also foraging in bins. At last he managed to retrieve a lump of hard and slightly moldy cheese before anyone else could grab it. After taking a drink of rain-water from a barrel behind a disused dairy, he hurried back out of Kurdsburg and returned to the country roads.

  All the time he walked, Bert’s thoughts kept scurrying back to his mother. They won’t kill her, he told himself, over and over again. They’ll never kill her. She’s the king’s favorite servant. They wouldn’t dare. He had to block the possibility of his mother’s death from his mind, because if he thought she’d gone, he knew he might not have the strength to get out of the next ditch he slept in.

  Bert’s feet soon blistered, because he was walking miles out of his way to avoid meeting other people. The next night, he stole the last few rotting apples from an orchard, and the night after that, he took the carcass of a chicken from somebody’s dustbin, and gnawed off the last few scraps of meat. By the time he saw the dark gray outline of Jeroboam on the horizon, he’d had to steal a length of twine from a blacksmith’s yard, to use as a belt, because he’d lost so much weight that his trousers were falling down.

  All through his journey, Bert told himself that if he could only find Cousin Harold, everything would be all right: he’d lay down his troubles at the feet of a grown-up, and Harold would sort everything out. Bert lurked outside the city walls until it was growing dark, then limped into the winemaking city, his blisters now hurting terribly, and headed for Harold’s tavern.

  There were no lights in the window and when Bert drew near, he saw why. The doors and windows had all been boarded up. The tavern had gone out of business and Harold and his family seemed to have left.

  “Please,” the desperate Bert asked a passing woman, “can you tell me where Harold’s gone? Harold, who used to own this tavern?”

  “Harold?” said the woman. “Oh, he went south a week ago. He’s got relatives down in Chouxville. He’s hoping to get a job with the king.”

  Stunned, Bert watched the woman walk away into the night. A chilly wind blew around him, and out of the corner of his eye he saw one of his own WANTED posters fluttering on a nearby lantern post. Exhausted, and with no idea what to do next, he imagined sitting down on this cold doorstep and simply waiting for the soldiers to find him.

  It was then he felt the point of a sword at his back, and a voice in his ear said:

  “Got you.”

  There was a reward of one hundred ducats on his head, dead or alive.

  By Natalie, Age 11

  You might think Bert would be terrified at the sound of these words, but believe it or not, the voice filled him with relief. He’d recognized it, you see. So instead of putting up his hands, or pleading for his life, he turned around, and found himself looking at Roderick Roach.

  “What are you smiling about?” growled Roderick, staring into Bert’s filthy face.

  “I know you’re not going to stab me, Roddy,” said Bert quietly.

  Even though Roderick was the one holding the sword, Bert could tell the other boy was far more scared than he was. The shivering Roderick was wearing a coat over his pajamas and his feet were wrapped in bloodstained rags.

  “Have you walked all the way from Chouxville like that?” asked Bert.

  “That’s none of your business!” spat Roderick, trying to look fierce, though his teeth were chattering. “I’m taking you in, Beamish, you traitor!”

  “No, you aren’t,” said Bert, and he pulled the sword out of Roderick’s hand. At that, Roderick burst into tears.

  “Come on,” said Bert kindly, and he put his arm round Roderick’s shoulders and led him off down a side alley, away from the fluttering WANTED poster.

  “Get off,” sobbed Roderick, shrugging away Bert’s arm. “Get off me! It’s all your fault!”

  “What’s my fault?” asked Bert, as the two boys came to a halt beside some bins full of empty wine bottles.

  “You ran away from my father!” said Roderick, wiping his eyes on his sleeve.

  “Well, of course I did,” said Bert reasonably. “He wanted to kill me.”

  “But n-now he’s been — been killed!” sobbed Roderick.

  “Major Roach is dead?” said Bert, taken aback. “How?”

  “Sp-Spittleworth,” sobbed Roderick. “He c-came t-to our house with soldiers when n-nobody could find you. He was so angry Father hadn’t caught you — he grabbed a soldier’s gun … and he …”

  Roderick sat down on a dustbin and wept. A cold wind blew down the alleyway. This, Bert thought, showed just how dangerous Spittleworth was. If he could shoot dead his faithful head of the Royal Guard, nobody was safe.

  “How did you know I’d come to Jeroboam?” Bert asked.

  “C-Cankerby from the palace told me. I gave him five ducats. He remembered your mother talking about your cousin owning a tavern.”

  “How many people d’you think Cankerby’s told?” asked Bert, now worried.

  “Plenty, probably,” said Roderick, mopping his face with his pajama sleeve. “He’ll sell anyone information for gold.”

  “That’s rich, coming from you,” said Bert, getting angry. “You were about to sell me for a hundred ducats!”

  “I d-didn’t want the g-gold,” said Roderick. “It was for my m-mother and brothers. I thought I might be able to g-get them back if I turned you in. Spittleworth t-took them away. I escaped out of my bedroom window. That’s why I’m in my pajamas.”

  “I escaped from my bedroom window too,” said Bert. “But at least I had the sense to bring shoes. Come on, we’d better get out of here,” he added, pulling Roderick to his feet. “We’ll try and steal you some socks off a washing line on the way.”

  But they’d taken barely a couple of steps when a man’s voice spoke from behind them.

  “Hands up! You two are coming with me!”

  Both boys raised their hands and turned round. A man with a dirty, mean face had just emerged from the shadows, and was pointing a rifle at them. He wasn’t in uniform and neither Bert nor Roderick recognized him, but Daisy Dovetail could have told them exactly who this was: Basher John, Ma Grunter’s deputy, now a full-grown man.

  Basher John took a few steps closer, squinting from one boy to the other. “Yeah,” he said. “You two’ll do. Gimme that sword.”

  With a rifle pointed at his chest, Bert had no choice but to hand it over. However, he wasn’t quite as scared as he might have been, because Bert — whatever Flapoon might have told him — was actually a very clever boy. This dirty-looking man didn’t seem to realize he’d just caught a fugitive worth one hundred gold ducats. He seemed to have been looking for any two boys, though why, Bert couldn’t imagine. Roderick, on the other hand, had turned deathly pale. He knew Spittleworth had spies in every city, and was convinced they were both about to be handed over to the Chief Advisor, and that he, Roderick Roach, would be put to death for being in league with a traitor.

  “Move,” said the blunt-faced man, gesturing them out of the alley with his rifle. With the gun at their backs, Bert and Roderick were forced away through the dark streets of Jeroboam until, finally, they reached the door of Ma Grunter’s orphanage.

  “I know you’re not going to stab me, Roddy,” said Bert quietly.

  By Anabelle, Age 9

  The kitchen workers in the palace were most surprised to hear from Lord Spittleworth that Mrs. Beamish had requested her own, separate kitchen, because she was so much more important than they were. Indeed, some of them were suspicious, because Mrs. Beamish had never been stuck up, in all the years they’d known her. However, as her cakes and pastries were still appearing regular
ly at the king’s table, they knew she was alive, wherever she was, and like many of their fellow countrymen, the servants decided it was safest not to ask questions.

  Meanwhile, life in the palace dungeons had been utterly transformed. A stove had been fitted in Mrs. Beamish’s cell, her pots and pans had been brought down from the kitchens, and the prisoners in neighboring cells had been trained up to help her perform the different tasks that went into producing the featherlight pastries that made her the best baker in the kingdom. She demanded the doubling of the prisoners’ rations (to make sure they were strong enough to whisk and fold, to measure and weigh, to sift and pour) and a ratcatcher to clean the place of vermin, and a servant to run between the cells, handing out different implements through the bars.

  The heat from the stove dried out the damp walls. Delicious smells replaced the stench of mold and dank water. Mrs. Beamish insisted that each of the prisoners had to taste a finished cake, so that they understood the results of their efforts. Slowly, the dungeon started to be a place of activity, even of cheerfulness, and prisoners who’d been weak and starving before Mrs. Beamish arrived were gradually fattening up. In this way she kept busy, and tried to distract herself from her worries about Bert.

  All the time the rest of the prisoners baked, Mr. Dovetail sang the national anthem, and kept carving giant Ickabog feet in the cell next door. His singing and banging had enraged the other prisoners before Mrs. Beamish arrived, but now she encouraged everyone to join in with him. The sound of all the prisoners singing the national anthem drowned out the perpetual noises of his hammer and chisel, and the best of it was that when Spittleworth ran down into the dungeons to tell them to stop making such a racket, Mrs. Beamish said innocently that surely it was treason, to stop people singing the national anthem? Spittleworth looked foolish at that, and all the prisoners bellowed with laughter. With a leap of joy, Mrs. Beamish thought she heard a weak, wheezy chuckle from the cell next door.