by Don Wilcox
She hurried through the house to seek other evidences of plundering. None of the jewels had been touched. The silver knife was what the thief wanted, and that was what he had taken.
She hastily dressed in street clothes.
She made certain that Neeka and Aunt Friel were still sleeping. Then she slipped out of the house and ran down the long grade to the plaza to tell the sentry what had happened.
The night bell softly tinkled the hour, to break the. plaza stillness. The faint sounds of chasing rivulets echoed dimly from distant caves.
“Guard!” Muriel called. “Guard! Where are you?”
Her own voice frightened her, echoing back from the ghostly white palace steps. She had never seen the city so empty.
Where was the guard? The roof station over the sentry house was not occupied. This was strange. Muriel knew that either Ubolt or one of the other guards was supposed to be always on duty.
Now someone within the palace brought a light to the front entrance and stared out to see who was calling.
“What’s the matter, out there?”
The voice was familiar, but for a moment Muriel couldn’t think whose it was. She talked rapidly, almost incoherently. She needed a guard to keep some mysterious marauder away.
When the man at the head of the steps replied, she realized she was talking with Noskin, the, record keeper, be was annoyed over being awakened.
“There are plenty of guards to take care of your troubles,” Noskin growled “Take your troubles to the sentry house and quit bothering the palace. Who are you, anyhow?”
“I’m Muriel.” She ascended a few steps so that the torchlight revealed her face.
Noskin’s anger melted. “Oh—you!’
“I’ll try at the sentry house again,” she said. “Sorry I wakened you.”
“Not at all, not at all. Don’t go away. I’ll be back in a moment. I’ll be delighted—delighted.”
“No, thank you.”
As she hurried back across the city alone, this conversation with Noskin kept disturbing her. She hadn’t meant to be unkind. But her refusal of his courtesy must have angered him again? All in all, she doubted whether he could be relied upon to report this matter to the palace authorities. She would try to find Ubolt after the new day’s torches were lighted.
The front door of her house was open. She couldn’t remember whether she had left it that way.
Aunty Friel was slumbering peacefully. But Neeka—where was Neeka?
She wasn’t in her bed. She wasn’t in the house. Muriel, with torchlight in hand, ran from one room to another. “Neeka! Neeka! Where are you?” Aunt Friel roused up, and her sleepy face at once reflected Muriel’s terror.
Two next door neighbors came over to see what the fuss was all about.
“I knew something was wrong when I heard that child’s voice,” one of them said. “But I didn’t have the presence of mind to see what was up.”
“You heard Neeka? Where? When? What did she say?”
“She was crying,” said the neighbor. “It sounded like someone was taking her away in an awful hurry. They went south on the cliff path.”
“What does this all mean?” Muriel gasped.
“It means,” said Aunt Friel, “that our little Neeka has been kidnaped.”
CHAPTER VI
Breakfast with the Dobberking
A lost child! Of all the terrors that beset the cavernous world of the Dobberines, none was so much dreaded as this. For the caves spread their hundreds of arms farther than any explorer knew, and in any cave there were literally thousands of places where a child might hide away and fall asleep.
“You know these tragedies are not uncommon, Miss Muriel,” the Dobberking said the following morning. “Only last year two children strayed away and stumbled into a pitfall.”
“But this is different, your majesty.” With tears in her eyes, Muriel pleaded her case to the Dobberking. “Neeka wasn’t a child to stray away by herself. I tell you she was kidnaped.”
The Dobberking munched his cheese-moss breakfast thoughtfully. He looked out across the roof garden, southward along the dimly lighted valley. He was not in a good humor. His sleep had been disturbed. Grudgingly he had admitted her for this breakfast conference.
“Please, your majesty,” Muriel tried to restrain her imploring voice. “If you’ll allow some of your guards to question my neighbors, they will confirm what I have told you. They heard Neeka being led away. They heard her cry along the cliff path.”
“My guards are all busy,” said the stony-faced Dobberking. “This comes at a very bad time. The Evil Heart Ceremony must be ready. The flood may rush down on us any day. I have much on my mind.”
“Could you spare Jaff? I know he’d be glad to help me. He’s so swift—”
“I’ll need Jaff every minute to bring the weather reports from the surface.”
“Yes, of course.” Muriel wept softly. “Do you think they will kill her, your majesty?”
“Of course not. Nobody has any reason to harm her. It’s absurd. I’m not convinced that she was kidnaped. I think you’ve been carried away by a case of nerves.”
The Dobberking looked at her with stern, cold eyes. “Listen to me, Muriel. The rumor came to me, before you won the contest, that you claim to have seen something very fanciful in the old Lava Man’s cave—something about skulls that float around and sing.”
“Oh!” These words struck her like an accusation of a crime. So that rumor had gone the rounds! Had Neeka told? No, it must have been Aunt Friel; for Muriel had never confided that strange happening to anyone else.
“You see,” the Dobberking drove the cruel point home, “anything you think you’ve seen or heard is subject to some doubt. You’re capable of having delusions. This kidnaping notion is just another of your silly fancies. The child will probably return before night.
Muriel rose weak with anger. “So, you’re not going to help me?”
“Young lady, I believe you failed to appear for the Evil Heart rehearsal recently.”
“Oh, that was because—”
“No excuses, please. Ubolt has already told me how you conducted yourself when he gave you a private rehearsal. You’d better pull yourself together. You’ve got to get over this faint-heartedness before the Ceremony. We intend to appease the Flood God with a perfect sacrifice.”
“I understand.”
“And while we’re speaking of your conduct,” the Dobberking drubbed his fingers on the table. “Noskin, my recorder, complains that you’re not being too friendly to palace officials. In fact, you’ve been somewhat snobbish. This is not becoming a new beauty queen.” Uncontrollable emotions filled Muriel’s throat. Without meaning to, she clutched the Dobberking’s arm, clung to him as if she were drowning.
“I don’t want to be the beauty queen,” she cried. “I hate being the beauty queen. All I want is Neeka. I want Neeka!”
“Shut up, you little baby. You’ve got to be beauty queen.” A strange light glittered in his eyes! He caught her by the shoulders, his cruel fingers tightened over her arms like a vise. “You’re the beauty queen because I said so. Understand? I made you the beauty queen.”
Brutally he jerked her into his grasp, pressed his face against hers, forced his sensual kiss upon her. She tried to draw back, but she was too horrified to fight. It was a hideous thing for him to do, when her whole heart was crying for Neeka.
He flung her aside, then, and she fell to the floor. For a few moments she lay there, listening to the gutteral laugh with which he taunted her.
The servant who had witnessed this scene from his station now helped her to her feet and led her away.
CHAPTER VII
Irlinza Bestows a Favor
Volunteer groups scoured the valleys. Jaff, before leaving for his day’s journey, had stopped by to give Muriel what comfort he could.
“I’ll tell every moss-gatherer I meet,” he promised. “Take heart, Muriel. We’ll pick up her trail.”
“Do you believe me, Jaff, when I tell you she must have been kidnaped? She would never stray away.”
“I believe whatever you say,” said Jaff. “But why should anyone do it? If the jewels haven’t been touched, there must be some reason. Is there anyone you suspect?”
“Irlinza,” said Muriel. “I don’t dare accuse her, because she’s a favorite of the Dobberking. Already he refuses to help me.”
Jaff shook his head slowly. “A person in Irlinza’s, position wouldn’t dare do such a thing.”
“You’re so unsuspecting, Jaff. Do you remember the silver knife the Dobberking gave me?”
“Of course.”
“I was told that Irlinza wanted it. She tried to get it before the contest. Does it mean anything to you that it disappeared last night? About an hour before Neeka was taken away, someone entered the house and took that knife.”
“Did you tell the Dobberking this?”
“I tried to. He wouldn’t listen. He thinks that I have delusions. ‘A case of nerves,’ he says, and lets it go at that.” Jaff frowned. “You say someone entered your house an hour before the kidnaping?”
“Yes. Neeka had heard the footsteps. I was afraid. I went to get the knife. The room was dark, but I knew exactly where I had hung the knife on the wall. Just as I placed my hand over it, someone drew it away. He rushed out of the house with it. I saw his shadowy form as he ran through the alley across to the cliff path. Then he as gone.”
“You’re sure it was a man?”
“From his size and the weight of his footsteps I’m sure.”
“And then you went to the palace to report, and when you came back—”
“Neeka had been taken away,” Muriel held back her tears.
“I’ll think it over every minute I’m gone,” Jaff said. “You let the others do the searching. You get some rest. And don’t be too suspicious of Irlinza. I’ll tell you why. I happen to know that she has gone out of her way to bestow a favor on you. She has organized a search party.”
“Irlinza is doing that for me?” Muriel was doubting her own ears.
“She didn’t want to known,” Jaff said. “Many people are that way about kindnesses they do. But it’s true. She’s already sent five servants out on an expedition to scour the southern caverns. So take courage, Muriel. And remember, you’re a champion.”
Muriel smiled, and the tears came to her eyes as Jaff kissed her. As soon as he was gone, she went to her room and pinned his winged badge of championship on her shoulder. Somehow it comforted her.
Then she looked out to the cliff path, for she could hear the voice of Aunt Friel calling. Aunt Friel was also on the search.
“Neeka! Neeka! Where are you, Neeka? I’ve got something for you.” It was heartbreaking and yet comical. Buxom Aunt Friel was carrying a tray of food that she had brought from the palace, and her plaintive call attracted a flock of silver birds. They fluttered down like a gang of thieves; they snatched at the food they almost upset the tray and Aunt Friel as well, which would have been a sizable upset.
“Go way, go way!” she cried; waving her free arm. “Go find Neeka and I’ll give you all the dinner you want.” She edged along the narrow cliff tottering like a fat lady on a tight rope, and her calls for Neeka soon blended with the other echoes from farther down the valley.
Muriel couldn’t rest. She couldn’t stay in her room. The neighbors who came in to comfort her did all that could be done. But Muriel’s mind was tortured with thoughts of Dobberking’s cruel rebuke, and with the awful uncertainty of Irlinza.
“You’d better stay here and rest,” her neighbors advised.
“I must see Irlinza,” said Muriel. “I’m going to her house.”
“You’ll quarrel with her if you do. She’s not a person to be trusted.”
“That’s what I intend to find out.”
When one suspects that an enemy has done him a favor, it does something to one’s heart. It melts the steel coating that one has built around it. The hardness is always quick to dissolve if the heart is steeped in grief, as Muriel’s was this morning.
Two acquaintances stopped her as she was crossing the city, both to tell her, in strictest confidence, that they had heard her rival, Irlinza, had sent out a party of servants to help with the search.
Irlinza was watching from her oval window as Muriel approached. Muriel tried to see a certain tenderness in Irlinza’s somewhat dissipated eyes with their long dark lashes. She was undoubtedly an attractive girl. For the first time Muriel stopped to wonder what brutality she may have suffered at the hands of the Dobberking during the past two years of her great popularity.
“Come in, Muriel,” Irlinza said as she opened the door. “I’m so sorry about what’s happened.”
“I came to thank you,” Muriel said, “for the generous thing you’ve done.”
“You’ve heard? It’s the least I could do.”
“Somehow I feel that I should apologize because—” Muriel groped for words. Just why did she feel apologetic toward Irlinza? “Because I’ve misjudged you so.”
Irlinza received this sentiment, with a smile and a careless remark. She made Muriel comfortable and brought her a drink. “We all make mistakes. But I think I can tell you something that will help you. That’s why I’m glad you’ve come. I know you have a great deal of trouble on your hands. And it isn’t all Neeka. Part of it is the Dobberking.”
“Oh—you’ve talked with him?”
“I just returned from there,” said Irlinza. “Let me begin with a question. Do you believe in dreams?”
“Why—I—I don’t know.”
“Well, you mustn’t. It’s a dangerous habit. It’s dangerous to believe in the things you dream while asleep. And far more dangerous to believe what you dream when you’re awake.”
“I—I don’t understand.”
“You will,” said Irlinza confidently. “I’ve heard about your experience down in the cave of the Lava Man. Yes, I got it straight from your dear Aunt. She was in quite a talkative and friendly mood one night. Not that I meant to pry—”
“She shouldn’t have told. That was our secret—Neeka’s and mine.”
“The Dobberking got it all. That’s why he understands you. That’s why you must take advice. You mustn’t believe that any such fanciful thing ever happened.”
“But it did. Neeka and I both saw it. There were skulls singing—”
“I can’t help you if you talk that way. You’re holding onto a delusion, Muriel. A delusion. Irlinza tapped her glass on the table to emphasize each syllable of the word. “Now let me ask you, what did Ubolt say to you last night when you came down to the plaza to announce that your silver knife had been stolen?”
“I didn’t find Ubolt,” said Muriel. “I called, but he wasn’t at his sentry post.”
“Another delusion,” said Irlinza. “He was there.”
“Oh, but he couldn’t have been.”
“I tell you, Ubolt was at his post,” Irlinza insisted. Any of a dozen people at the palace will tell you so. He saw you walk by, he heard you call, and he answered you. But you acted like you didn’t see him and walked on past.”
Muriel was trembling. This conversation had brought her to the point that she hardly believed her own senses. “What are you trying to tell me, Irlinza?”
“Simply that your whole story about hearing footsteps and feeling knives slip out of your hand, and hearing Neeka’s cry fading along the cliff path are more of the same thing. They’re all in your mind. If Neeka has strayed away it’s probably because she got tired of your wrought up nerves. I hope it’s nothing worse than that. If so, she’ll probably be back in a few days.”
A knock sounded at the door.
For a moment Irlinza was plainly disconcerted. She didn’t know what that knock might mean. But she recovered herself at once, and with supreme poise she said, “Who knows, maybe that’s the news that Neeka has already returned.”
“Is Muriel here?” ca
me a familiar voice from the front door. It was Aunty Friel. “I want to see Muriel at once.” Muriel crossed toward the door. Irlinza was responding in an uncertain voice. “You seem alarmed. Is there anything wrong?”
“Maybe murder,” said Aunty Friel, “but Muriel didn’t do it. They can’t say she did.”
Muriel’s heart stopped beating. Her words come breathlessly. “Aunt Friel I Has she been found? Is she dead?”
“Of course she isn’t dead.” It was Irlinza who answered; then, as if she had caught herself speaking out of turn, she stepped back.
Aunt Friel took Muriel by the hand. “No, she hasn’t been found. But I’ve got to talk with you in private. They can’t say these things about you.”
Muriel gave Irlinza a parting glance. There was a hint of a strange smile on Irlinza’s face. Perhaps it was only her amusement at Aunt Friel. Many persons smiled at Aunty’s comical manners.
But Aunt Friel was never more serious than now. She led Muriel away from the plaza toward the chasm where the noisy river all but swallowed up her words.
“They can’t say you did it, Muriel. But that’s what they are saying. It’s spreading all over the city. They say you’ve planned the whole thing. They say your schemes were laid before you ever became Neeka’s guardian. You had your eyes on her mother’s wealth—especially after your home was lost in the flood.”
“No,” Muriel cried. It was true that she and her aunt had moved in, but only after the insistence of the friends of Neeka’s parents.
“You wanted her jewels.”
“No, no, no.”
“But you’ve waited, they say, until you won all this new popularity, before taking the awful chance—”
“What chance?”
“To get rid of Neeka. To murder her for her wealth.”
Suddenly Muriel’s pounding heart turned to steel. “Where did this story come from?”
“I—I don’t know.”
“Did it come from the palace?”
