by Joan Aiken
“Yehimelek!” cried Arabis, who had gathered the gist of this. “It is all right! I am safe! Go back, go back quickly to your caves before any of Lord Malyn’s people come through here and find you!”
At the sight of Arabis the little Pit People raised a shout which, though joyful, was somewhat shaky and weak, as many of them were still hardly more than convalescent from their illness. They began to gather round her, bowing, smiling, and patting her hands.
“Lady,” said Yehimelek gravely, “from the bottom of my heart I rejoice that you are safe. I, Tabut Elulaois Yehimelek, Hereditary Foreman and leader of the Children of the Pit—’
“Yehimelek!” cried the Seljuk.
Throughout this exchange he had stood silent in wonder, gazing at the gallant little group shakily flourishing their gold weapons. Two great tears had gathered in his large brown eyes and rolled unnoticed down past his lopped-off moustaches. Now he could restrain himself no longer. He stepped forward.
“Yehimelek!” he cried again in his own tongue. “Brave leader of your exiled tribe, I salute you! Honour be yours, and may your name be written for ever in the annals of our people. Do you know who I am? I am your Seljuk, come to carry you to glory and joy in your long-lost homeland, the Kingdom of Rum!”
At first Yehimelek and his people made no reply. Silent, amazed, and doubtful, they gaped at the Seljuk, while the sense of his words sank in. One reason for their hesitation was the fact that his language, after so many generations apart, was a bit different from theirs. The Seljuk, eager and anxious, gazed back at them, waiting for their reaction.
Slowly it came. Wondering murmurs began to rise, as one and then another worked out the meaning of what they had heard.
“The Seljuk!”
“He says he is our Seljuk!”
“At last he has come!”
“He will carry us home to Rum!”
With a broken cry, Yehimelek tottered forward and fell on his knees before the Seljuk.
“Lord, forgive me! I am an old man and my wits are slow! Oh, what have I ever done, unworthy, that I should have lived to see this day? Happy, happy Yehimelek! I shall tread the streets of Sa’ir and Taidon, I shall see the green mountains of Sur! Lord, we are indeed your people. Never, never did we doubt that one day you would come for us.”
Greatly moved, the Seljuk raised him up and embraced him.
Arabis, who had been crying unashamedly while she watched the reunion of the Pit People with their rightful lord, now glanced back the way they had come.
“There’s happy I am also, to see this day,” she said, blowing her nose, “but I am thinking we had best all clear out of here, and pretty fast too. Sounds up above, I believe I can hear.”
She ran back to the door from which they had just emerged, tried all Garble’s keys, found one that fitted, and locked it.
“Indeed, lady, you are right,” said Yehimelek. And he said to the Seljuk, “Lord, I am proud to offer you and your friends the hospitality of our poverty-stricken quarters.”
“There’s kind you are!” said Arabis warmly. “But easy in my mind I shall not be until I know what has become of Abipaal and Owen and the Harp of Teirtu. No offence, but I think I shall just be following on in the direction of Nant Agerddau.”
Since in fact Yehimelek, the Seljuk, old Mr. Hughes, and Brother Ianto were all equally anxious to learn what was going on, they agreed to set forward without further delay, and Yehimelek provided camels for the party. The rest of the Pit People tottered thankfully back to their beds.
During all the preceding scene Mr. Hughes had maintained a silence of astonishment. Still silent, he mounted on the diminutive black camel allotted to him, and urged it into a rapid shamble behind that of Brother Ianto.
“Are you all right, sir, with you?” Arabis asked him solicitously.
“Yes, yes, child!” he replied in his usual somewhat testy manner. “I have bestridden plenty of camels before this, I assure you, when we were taking on water at the port of Alexandria. You need not concern yourself about me.”
Arabis, therefore, went ahead to listen to the Seljuk, who, as he rode along, was endeavouring to give his retrieved subject a brief account of what had been happening in the Kingdom of Rum during the past two thousand years.
“Somewhat changed you may find it, I fear,” he admitted. “But still, a royal welcome we shall give you, and a special valley is already set aside for you, full of fruit trees, peach and fig and apricot, where your people can rest and grow strong in the sun.”
Mr. Hughes looked after Arabis. “That is a most unusual young gal,” he remarked to Brother Ianto. “Seems uncommonly well-informed and full of sense on a number of subjects. Must confess I did her an injustice when young Owen brought her and her father to the museum last week; thought they were after the Harp of Teirtu.”
Brother Ianto, as was often his wont, chuckled quietly but made no answer.
“Well, you have to be careful with that gypsyish sort of customer,” Mr. Hughes added rather defensively. “Gracious knows what sort of man her father is.”
“Not the sort of man to take what does not belong to him, I assure you,” Brother Ianto said. “Tom is a poet. Sooner write a good poem than wear the crown of England he would.”
“Tsk, tsk! Head-in-the-clouds sort of customer! All very fine, no doubt, but somebody ought to look out for the gal—see she gets a decent eddication,” muttered Mr. Hughes disapprovingly.
Arabis, meanwhile, was full of curiosity to hear about Owen’s encounter with the Children of the Pit. Yehimelek explained that Tennes and Strato, who were just setting out to go in search of Abipaal at Nant Agerddau, had heard voices coming from the underwater cave, and had seen Abipaal emerge from it, wet and gasping. From his confused, and not at all grateful, account, they deduced that someone had saved him who was still in there; they had pulled out Owen, now in a very exhausted condition, and taken him to Yehimelek. Owen had immediately recognized the beribboned crwth and asked where Arabis was; the fact that he knew her had reassured Yehimelek. Owen was dried off and given seaweed broth; what he really needed was sleep but there had been no time for that; Shishak and Ipshemi arrived in great alarm, crying out that while on watch duty in the upper caves they had heard the voice of Arabis coming from Lord Malyn’s dungeons. Since the Pit People had taken care that no tunnel directly connected their abode with the dungeons, Owen had decided that his quickest way to go to the rescue would be to climb up the cliff face; he had been followed by Abipaal, intent on recovering his cherished harp.
“Fancy his having had it all the time!” Arabis said. “Now he has taken such a liking to the harp, I am wondering how we can persuade him to give it up.”
“Worry about those three scoundrels of Lord Malyn’s first, is it?” Brother Ianto suggested. “Not to mention Lord Malyn himself.”
“Oh, my dada will have come up with the Prince of Wales by this time,” Arabis said confidently. “And sure it is, old Prince Deio will be able to deal with that pack of adynod!”
14
Tom Dando, silent, absent, and broody from the poem that was growing inside him, and Tom Dando with the weight of that poem safely transferred to paper were two very different people. Now that he had slept and woken again and knew that his poem was still just as good as he had thought it when he wrote down the last line, he would not have changed places with the Tsar of all the Russias.
“Stir your shaggy stumps, Galahad, my little one!” he shouted joyfully, when he had clipped all the pages of his poem together with mountain-ash clothespegs, and made sure that Ribaddi was securely tucked into one of the bunks. “Terrible old night it is, indeed, but at least the wind is behind us; see if you can’t go a bit faster than that wind, eh, my old ceffyl?”
Galahad, fresh from a day’s rest, required no urging; striking sparks from stones with his great hairy hoofs he thundered along, powerful as the locomotive engine Puffing Billy, and a great deal faster. His mane streamed behind like cirrus clo
ud, he neighed and snorted and blew out long jets of steam, while the wagon swayed, rattling, from side to side; luckily Ribaddi had fallen into a deep sleep or he might have been alarmed at this helter-skelter method of covering the ground. Tom Dando, seated on the box with an old blanket flung round him, sang at the top of his powerful tenor voice every song and hymn he could remember; the “March of the Men of Harlech,” “Cwm Rhondda,” “Hyfrydol,” and “All Through the Night”; when his memory gave out he started over again, or set words from his poem to tunes of his own invention, while Galahad whinnied in response and galloped even faster. And all the time the wind howled furiously behind them and ribbons of snow flew after them, but the way ahead was still clear enough; they were just keeping abreast of the blizzard.
“Not so nice for anybody travelling behind us, though, I am thinking,” said Tom cheerfully, and he sang,
“The cold wind doth blow, and we have got snow,
And what will the robin do now, poor thing?
He’ll sit in the cwpwrdd until he’s discovered,
And tie up his trousers with string, poor thing!”
“Careful with the feet, Galahad, my little gafr, and keep a bit of a lookout for the old snowdrifts, just the same, is it?”
Now that Tom was guiding Galahad they went by the most direct route, and so covered the distance to Nant Agerddau in less than one-third of the time it had taken them in the opposite direction; about an hour before dawn they had reached the Boar’s Head Inn and Tom was banging on its shutters and demanding to know if the Prince of Wales was staying in the town.
“Dear, dear! What a time to come rousing honest folk!” said Mr. Davy Thomas, crossly opening up. “Gracious to goodness, is it you, then, Mr. Dando, and what can I be doing for you?”
“Is Prince Deio under your roof, friend, or if not, can you tell me where I can be laying my hands on him? Urgent it is to have speech with him, see!”
“Staying here he was,” said Mr. Thomas fretfully, “but delirious from a wound, and most peculiar behaviour with it! Asked for a bowl of picws with a dram of wine in it about midnight, and then nothing would serve but he must go out, he and that gaggle of young rapscallions from Pennygaff, to look for one of them that was lost. Lame as a three-legged chair, he was, with his wound, and the boys obliged to carry him on two benches, and Dr. Jenkins most put out.”No responsibility do I take if your highness will be having your death by this,” he says. “O go dive in one of your own possets, man,” says the prince and off he goes, though dear knows you’d think he’d not miss one boy out of the lot that’s been eating me out of house and home!”
“Lost boy?” said Tom. “Fancy that! Where would he be lost, then, and why hunt for him at such an hour of night?”
“Off to the Devil’s Leap cave they were going, but what I say is, no sense in looking for young scamps that wish to cheat the town of its money by sneaking in at night without paying their sixpence; leave them find their own way out and a lesson in honest behaviour, I hope!”
“Devil’s Leap cave? Much obliged to you, Mr. Thomas my little one, and I will just be stepping along that way, then.”
“O, no trouble,” said Mr. Thomas, for poets bring good custom to inns and one must be civil to them. Then, as it was no use going back to bed, he stomped indoors to scrub the tankards. Tom drove on through the town, and straight into the Devil’s Leap ante-cave, which he found lit by dozens of candles but empty. Dismounting—for the next cave was lower and would not accommodate the wagon—he rubbed Galahad dry and gave him his blanket and nosebag; glanced inside to make sure Ribaddi was asleep and the precious poem safe; then proceeded on foot to the inner cave, where he could hear somebody whistling.
When Tom reached the Devil’s Leap cave itself, and looked down into its great bowl, he perceived a solitary man lying on a sort of couch composed of two beaches, near the edge of the central well. From the benches, and the fact that his leg was bandaged, Tom guessed this person to be the Prince of Wales, so he made his way down until he was close enough to bid him a civil good morning.
“And a gude morn tae ye too, sir, whoe’er ye be,” the prince replied, ceasing to whistle. “Have ye by any chance obsairved a wheen laddies roaming ayont this ill-faured cavern?”
Tom regretted that he had not, but added, “Glad I will be to go in search of them if your worship wishes?”
“Oh, no, no,” replied the prince peevishly, “‘tis best they should gae on sairching for the lad that’s lost, but ’tis unco” wearifu” work waiting here for ane or tither to turn up, sin” I can only stoit aboot sae dot-and-gae-one. I suppose ye would not hae the time to sit down and have a crack wi” me?”
Nothing could have suited Tom’s purpose better. He sat down on the rock and, without pausing a moment, launched into the whole tale of the Harp of Teirtu, from its earliest origins up to the present day. Some of this tale, of course, Prince David had heard before from Owen, but much of it was new to him, and such was Tom’s skill as a narrator, that he listened to the whole in silent amazement, only occasionally murmuring, “Losh!” or “Weel, who’d ha” thocht it?”
“So you see, your highness,” Tom ended, “there is a proper scoundrel that Marquess of Malyn, and causing a lot of trouble and inconvenience to many innocent persons.”
“Och, maircy, yes, the fause loon!” exclaimed Prince David. “I’m fashed to think I ever agreed to veesit the wretch, but hoo was I tae ken he was sic a black-hairted freebooter? But he and his joes shall be clappit in prison as soon as ever the morn’s morn has dawnit, on the word of Davie Jamie Charlie Neddie Geordie Harry Dick Tudor-Stuart! I’ll order the procurator-fiscal tae mak” the arrest afore breakfast Maybe ye’d wish tae gang back wi” yon offeecial tae Castle Malyn directly?”
“I am thinking that might be no bad notion,” Tom agreed. “But not too good the old weather just now, see? Go and have a look I will.”
He came back shaking his head.
“Blowing harder than Gabriel’s trumpet, it is, and enough snow already down to bury a whale, and as much more to follow! No one will get back to Caer Malyn yet awhile, I am thinking.”
“Hout-tout, there’s a peety,” said the prince. “I hope your lassie wisna come to harm at the hands o’ yon villain in the meantime.”
“O, as to that,” said Tom Dando comfortably, “fine sense my daughter Arabis has, and I am thinking she can take care of herself.”
“Then,” said the prince, “sit ye doon again, man, and mak” yerself comfortable. Tell me mair anent yon Harp o’ Teirtu. Gin it disna belong tae Lord Malyn (may the deil fly awa” wi” him) nor to yon Brither Ianto, i” maircy’s name, who maun be the richt owner?”
“Indeed,” said Tom Dando modestly, “I am thinking that I am.”
‘Dear sakes ava!” cried the prince, thoroughly startled. “Say ye so? Expound yon riddle, man?”
“Simple, it is,” Tom Dando said. “Miss Tegwyn Jones, to whom the monks returned the harp in exchange for a couple of tons of chilblain liniment, was the direct descendant of Teirtu, and she was my grandmother. Mrs. Davy Dando, she became. Fine old lady she was, when I knew her, and could cure a sheep of the scrapes quick as kiss your hand.”
“Ech, oich!” said the prince. “But if the harp was yours all along, man, wae’s me, why did ye no” lay claim to it?”
“Better things I had to do,” Tom Dando said, “than join in a lot of clack over an old harp, and me with my poem to write.”
“Poem? Are ye e‘en a poet? Fine I’d like to hear some of your verses, for I love a gude poem a’most as much as a gude hunt!” exclaimed Prince David, his eyes lighting up with enthusiasm.
Tom needed no further encouragement; he began reciting “The King at Caerleon,” which Prince David heard with extreme delight.
“Man!” he cried, when Tom paused for breath. “Yon are the noblest lines I hae heard this twel” month and more!”
“Indeed, I am thinking so too,” agreed Tom. “If I do never pen another
line, there is something the world will have to remember Tom Dando by.”
From talking poetry the two men presently moved on to swapping songs, and then it was not long before they were singing, or rather shouting duets, for the prince had a baritone as powerful as Tom’s tenor, and the resonance of the cave made it irresistible to sing as loud as they possibly could. A considerable amount of time passed in this manner.
They had just worked their way right through “Chevy Chase” when Tom Dando observed with some surprise that they were not alone. The prince, who sang with eyes tight shut, had not noticed, so Tom respectfully plucked his velvet sleeve to acquaint him of the fact that a small, fur-capped, grey-bearded, untidily dressed stranger was perched near them on the lip of rock, listening to their song with an expression of the most rapt and lively pleasure.
“O, excuse me, your highness,” Tom said, “but would this be the person that your highness’s people are searching for by here?”
Prince David opened his eyes.
“Losh, no!” he said in surprise. “I never laid eyes on yon wee callant in my life before. But, man! That harp he’s lugging on his back! Couldna yon be the harp that all the clamjamfry’s been aboot?”
“Indeed, that might be,” said Tom. Very civilly he addressed the small man. “Please to forgive the liberty, friend, but might I cast an eye over that harp of yours for a short moment?” And he held out his hand.
Owen and the tribe of Yehimelek would have been amazed, for Abipaal, instead of biting, kicking, and gnashing his teeth, made not the least resistance or objection, but sat watching, eager and attentive, while Tom took the harp and ran his hand across the strings with the touch of a master.
