Miss Dibdin muttered something indistinctly because her mouth was full of hairpins.
‘Ah, I’ve known some broomsticks in my time,’ said Mrs Cantrip. ‘I had one once – McShuttle it was called – made of the best Scottish heather. A beautiful, smooth movement it had.’ Her eyes had a faraway look in them, and she went on in a singsong voice, ‘From Pole to Pole we went once, in a single night, without so much as a jolt or jar, and obedient –’
‘Oh, I know!’ interrupted Miss Dibdin crossly. ‘It singed its tail in the Northern Lights, and you never knew till you got home again. You’ve told me dozens of times. I’m sure I said all the things over my broom you told me to, when I bound the twigs on, and I used all the Flying Philtre there was. There’s not a drop left. Now if only the rocking chair –’
‘The rocking chair!’ said Mrs Cantrip with withering scorn. ‘Armchair flying! Soft, all you young witches nowadays! Do you think I’d be seen dead in it if I had not gone out of business? Not I! Now, when I was young –!’
‘Ladies, ladies!’ broke in the voice of Queen Grisana. It was a soft languid voice. ‘Let us have no unpleasantness! There is nothing I dislike so much. Now let us have a cosy little chat together and I will tell you why I have summoned you.’
The voice seemed always to have a slight purr behind it, but the green eyes flashed hard and brilliant from one to the other.
‘It seemed to me that we might strike a bargain. I can be frank, because there is no danger of our being overheard. I have forbidden my people to use this high place tonight. It can be reached only by two paths which are closely guarded. My sentries will give instant warning if they see anything unusual. These children you mentioned, have you any reason to suspect that they know anything of our meeting?’
‘The meddlesome brats are the only ones who could get here. They’ve stolen my Flying Chair. I’m uneasy in my bones. Reliable my bones is, as a rule,’ said Mrs Cantrip.
‘Then let us be quick in what we have to say,’ purred the grey cat. She lowered her voice, so that the children had to lean forward to hear her. ‘And what we say must never go further than this clump of trees. Now listen carefully!’
Mrs Cantrip and Miss Dibdin, their argument forgotten, craned forward. Grisana continued, ‘My dear husband is getting old. A better king and husband you could never find, but he has no ambition. Ambition!’ she repeated, lingering lovingly on the word. ‘My son, my handsome Gracilis for whom this scheme is planned, is in many ways like his dear father – he must hear no whisper of this – but I, I have enough ambition for the three of us.’
There was no purr behind her words now. Rosemary blinked. It was hard to believe that the steely voice they heard belonged to the same animal.
‘Fallowhithe and Broomhurst in a few days will be as one town,’ she rapped out. ‘One town, one King! And that shall not be Carbonel but Castrum, and I shall be Queen!’
She threw back her head, and a strangely triumphant, wailing cry rose on the night air, and sank again to a throaty murmur.
‘For your dear son’s sake, of course!’ said Mrs Cantrip dryly.
‘For my dear son’s sake!’ repeated Grisana, and once more her voice was soft and purring.
‘Well, I’m with you on anything that means trouble for Carbonel. We’re old enemies!’ said Mrs Cantrip. ‘I hate him!’
‘I rather thought you did!’ said the grey cat sweetly.
The old woman rubbed the side of her nose with a bony finger.
‘What do you want us to do?’
‘Just this,’ went on Grisana. ‘If, on the day that the last wall of the last house goes up between the two towns, you could see to it that Queen Blandamour – disappears – no violence of course – there will be such confusion in Fallowhithe that, when my armies pour into the town, they will meet with little or no resistance. No bloodshed, and a minimum of unpleasantness. I do so dislike unpleasantness.’
‘It’s lucky for you that the Kings are out of the way answering the Summons. If you succeed, what will your husband do when he returns?’
‘What I tell him!’ purred Grisana very sweetly. ‘I told you he was growing old!’
‘And Carbonel’s kittens? I hear there are two of ’em,’ said Mrs Cantrip. ‘They might prove a rallying point for the Fallowhithe cats even without Blandamour.’
‘True,’ said Grisana. ‘Perhaps they too had better… disappear! The sooner the better. That will spread a little alarm in advance. Most useful. The dear little things!’
John could hear Rosemary breathing hard with indignation, and he put out a restraining hand.
Mrs Cantrip chuckled. It was not a nice noise. She clapped her hands on her bony knees. ‘It’s as nice a bit of mischief as I’ve come across in a week of wet Wednesdays. In plain English, you want the three of them kidnapped? All right. We’ll do it!’ said Mrs Cantrip.
‘That’s all very well, but what do I get out of it?’ said Miss Dibdin huffily. ‘I haven’t been consulted!’
‘Ah, but just think, dear!’ the old woman wheedled. ‘You’ll maybe put all you’ve learned into practice! What a chance! Poor old Mother Cantrip can do no more magic now!’
‘And you shall have your pick of all the kittens in the two towns to bring up as your cat!’ said Queen Grisana.
‘That’s generous, dear! Don’t turn it down. I always say a good cat can make or mar a young witch’s magic.’
‘Very well,’ said Miss Dibdin grudgingly. ‘I’ll help. But I think you might have consulted me a little sooner.’
‘Then that’s settled,’ said Mrs Cantrip. ‘Well, we’d better be off.’
‘I do hope the broom will behave better on the return journey,’ said Miss Dibdin, licking her lips nervously.
‘Better launch from the edge of the roof. It’ll be easier,’ said the old woman.
‘I must go, too,’ said Grisana. ‘My son will be curious if I stay longer, and that would never do. What we parents must put up with for the sake of our children!’ she purred affectedly.
John and Rosemary crouched among the valerian. The crushed leaves smelt evilly, but they dared not lift their heads to watch, so what happened next they could only hear. There was a pause during which they imagined that Her Royal Greyness and her attendants must have gone their silent way.
Then they heard Mrs Cantrip say, ‘She’s gone. As wicked a piece of cat flesh as I’ve had the pleasure of meeting. Very satisfactory. “All for my dear son’s sake!”’ she mimicked. Then, in reply to a remark from Miss Dibdin which they did not hear, she added, ‘Not likely! It’s your broom, you can lead it!’
They heard the receding sound of a stick swishing through the grass. Cautiously they looked up. Miss Dibdin was leading the broom which alternately whipped around and lagged behind, like an unwilling dog on a lead.
‘Better duck,’ whispered John, ‘in case the broom should circle above us when it’s launched.’
They crouched in the grass once more.
There was a distant exclamation and a low laugh from Mrs Cantrip, and after a few moments’ pause there was a whirr above them.
‘They’re off!’ said John. ‘That’s funny, I thought I heard two things whizzing by!’
‘So did I!’ said Rosemary.
Both children sat up and gazed into the sky. Lurching down the wind was Miss Dibdin, clinging to the bucking broom for dear life. But beside her, travelling smoothly and easily, flew something else.
‘The rocking chair! Quick!’ said John. Together they dashed up the grassy slope over which they had crept with such caution. They scrambled up the little tree-crowned hill and peered anxiously over the other side.
‘It’s gone!’ said John. ‘They’ve taken the rocking chair!’
There was a dreadful pause. Then Rosemary said in a very small voice, ‘How are we going to get home?’
13
Stranded
‘How are we going to get home? My good girl, I don’t know any more than you do!’ said Joh
n, and because he was a little scared, he sounded cross. Then he was sorry. He thumped Rosemary on the back. ‘Here, borrow my hankie,’ he said, and untied it from his grazed knee.
Rosemary sniffed hard, looked at the handkerchief, shook her head and wiped her cheeks on the back of her hand.
‘I’m all right now,’ she said jerkily. ‘We’d better explore. Perhaps we shall find a way down.’
‘What about the two paths Grisana talked about?’ said John. ‘She said they were the only ways up here. Why don’t you go round that side, and I’ll go round the other.’
‘No fear!’ said Rosemary, ‘I’m coming with you!’
The moon, round and full, sailed across a cloudless sky. It shone on the grassy plateau of the high place, touching each leafy branch and every blade of grass with silver. Though it was almost as light as day, the shadows were very dark. Presently Rosemary said, ‘I almost wish we could find Noggin or Swabber.’ But there was no sign of life anywhere.
They walked around the edge of the high place together. Beyond was a sheer drop. ‘What’s that?’ said John. ‘Down there! Don’t go too near the edge. Lie down and look over.’
They lay on their stomachs and peered over the edge. Six feet down there was a narrow ledge which might be a path. They could see it winding its way down.
‘Well, a cat could jump on to it with safety, but not a human,’ said John, ‘so that’s no good. Let’s find the other one.’
The second mountain path was no better. It wound away down what looked like a sheer wall of chalk. Rosemary turned away from the dizzying view. She could see what looked like cats moving busily about their affairs on the hills clustered below them.
‘I don’t think there is anything we can do except wait until daylight,’ she said.
They wandered back toward the tree-crowned hill where they had first landed. As they came to the little stream, Rosemary said, ‘It doesn’t look like water. It’s white! Do you think it could possibly be milk? I’m awfully thirsty!’
She knelt down, drank a little from her cupped hands, but I’m sorry to say she spat it out again.
‘What’s it like?’ asked John.
‘It’s milk all right, but it tastes like milk that’s had haddock boiled in it! Let’s sit down.’
She suddenly felt very, very tired, and they sat down with their backs against a tree trunk.
‘Mrs Cantrip said she would have to find out where the kittens are,’ she said sleepily. ‘I expect it will take her some time, but we ought to make some sort of plan.’
‘All right,’ said John, and he yawned. ‘Let’s think.’ But like Swabber, they both ‘thought’ with their eyes closed and in five minutes they were fast asleep.
It was John who woke first.
‘Rosie! Wake up! It’s morning!’ he said.
Rosemary sat up, rubbed the sleep from her eyes and looked around. No longer were they sitting on a grassy bank, but on a hard, zinc-covered roof, their backs against a ventilator shaft. It was a grey morning with a chill little breeze that found its way through Rosemary’s dressing gown. She shivered. John turned up the collar of his jacket. They looked about them, at the grey expanse of roof. Where the stream had chuckled along its weed-fringed way was a gutter; where the thicket of trees had stood was a group of television aerials.
‘Let’s have a look at the mountain paths!’ said John. ‘Perhaps they’ve turned into something useful.’
They ran to the edge of the roof. The ‘mountain paths’ had certainly turned into something useful for the occupiers of all the ten floors of offices below, but not to anyone unlucky enough to be stranded on the roof. The two fire escapes they had become stopped short at the top floor. Neither of the escapes went up as high as the roof itself.
‘If only we had a rope! We could let ourselves down,’ said John. ‘We might try tearing your nightdress into strips.’
‘We certainly might not!’ said Rosemary. ‘If you think I’m going home in nothing but a dressing gown –’ She stopped as a distant clock struck, and caught John’s arm. ‘We must get home somehow, it’s seven o’clock! Mother will be worried stiff if she finds we aren’t there, and we promised not to be inconsiderate. What shall we do?’
‘There simply must be some way up on to the roof,’ said John desperately. ‘What’s that triangular thing sticking up over there?’
They ran to look. In the side of a triangular erection, facing away from where they had been standing, was a door. They rattled the handle, but it was locked. They did not stop to argue. They hammered on it with their fists and shouted for all they were worth, and after what seemed an age, it opened outwards suddenly. They were nearly knocked off their feet. Just inside, at the top of a flight of stairs, stood a very fat woman in a sacking apron, holding a broom with both hands above her head, as if ready to defend herself against all comers. When she saw John and Rosemary, she lowered the broom.
‘Well, I don’t know! A couple of children! Are there any more of you?’ she asked suspiciously, peering around the door.
‘Only us two, John and Rosemary.’
‘You were making enough noise for twenty,’ said the old woman. ‘I’d just started scrubbing them top stairs when I heard a shouting and banging like the Day of Judgement. “Burglars!” I said to myself. “I’m off.” And then I said, “Sounds like kids’ voices. It’s them boys again, I’ll be bound. I’ll get even with ’em!” So up I comes. But whatever next! What are you doing up here?’
‘Oh, please!’ said Rosemary. ‘Please let us out. We must get home! Mummy will be so worried. They left us and we couldn’t get down!’
‘Locked you up there? You poor little things. You ought to be ashamed of getting your little sister into trouble like this!’ the old woman said to John.
John opened his mouth to protest, but thought better of it, and she went on, ‘Well, you’d better come down, the pair of you.’
She took Rosemary by the hand, not unkindly. ‘Why, you’re starved, love! I’ve got a kettle on downstairs for a cup of cocoa. You’d better have a drop to warm you up. You’ll have to walk down – the lift don’t work till nine.’
She shut the door and shot the bolts home. Thankfully, the children followed her. There were ten floors to pass. She went down in front of them, telling them over her shoulder that she was getting her work done early because her son had been ‘took bad’, and she wanted to get home to him, and about the battle she waged against dirty footmarks on the stairs, and boys in general, and that she could not understand how in the world they could have got up to the roof. John made a half-hearted attempt to defend ‘them boys’. After all, they were not to blame this time, but the old woman swept his explanation on one side with an indignant ‘Don’t you tell me!’
At last she led them down to a little room in the basement. Here they found a sink, a metal cupboard, a chair and a table. On the table stood an electric kettle which was already blowing steam through its spout like an angry dragon. She got a mug and two cups from the cupboard, a tin of cocoa and another of condensed milk, and in each mug she made a rich, dark brew. It was not cocoa as they knew it, but it was sweet and comforting, and put new courage into them. They drank while sitting on two upturned buckets.
‘Lucky for you I was early,’ the old woman said, between gulps of scalding cocoa. ‘Now then, suppose you tell me all about it!’ Her eyes were shrewd over the rim of the mug.
‘Well,’ said John slowly. ‘We can’t tell you all about it, because of the others. But we got on to the roof when they were there, and then… well, they left us up there, on purpose I think, and we couldn’t get down.’
‘Well, I must say, I like a lad who won’t tell on his pals, but you can tell them from me that next time I catch hair or hide of ’em lurking on my roof, there’ll be real trouble. You’re a nicely spoken pair of little things, I’ll say that, but let this be a lesson to you. Steer clear of them boys! And if ever I find you up there again –’ She blew noisily on the hot cocoa
and left them to imagine the awfulness of the punishment that would be in store.
‘Then you won’t say anything to anyone this time?’ said Rosemary. ‘You are a darling! We’ll never do it again, and we shall never forget how kind you’ve been!’
The old woman’s eyes twinkled. ‘Well, I like a bit of fun myself. Always did! And believe it or not, I was young once myself. Where do you live?’
‘Fallowhithe,’ said Rosemary.
‘Fallow…?’
The old woman put down her mug with such a bump that the cocoa slopped over. She stared at Rosemary.
‘’Ere, don’t tell me you’re in your night things?’
Rosemary nodded.
‘You been up there all night?’
Rosemary nodded again.
‘Your poor ma will be frantic! Have you got your bus fares home? You haven’t? Well, I don’t know! ‘Ere you are.’ She took a worn black purse from her pocket and pushed a shilling into John’s hand. When they tried to thank her she seemed embarrassed.
‘All right, all right, you can send it back, dear. Flackett’s the name, Number 1 Adelaide Row. Now hop it, or I shan’t get my work done early after all.’
John and Rosemary did not have to be told twice. But before finally going out into the street, Rosemary tied up her nightdress with her dressing gown cord.
‘It’s a good thing your dressing gown has got too small,’ said John. ‘It looks like a coat.’
‘I hope everyone else will think so,’ said Rosemary doubtfully.
But people who travel on buses between seven and eight in the morning do not bother very much about what their fellow travellers are wearing. Apart from a wink and a ‘What’s this, the babes in the wood?’ from the driver, for there were no other children, they reached the end of Cranshaw Road without any more adventures.
The Kingdom of Carbonel Page 8
