The People in the Castle: Selected Strange Stories

by Joan Aiken

  At last the end came out.

  “Can you speak now?” he asked, rather anxiously.

  She seemed to be clearing her throat, and presently said with some difficulty:

  “A little. My throat is sore.”

  “Here’s something to suck. I’ll give you a prescription for that condition—it’s a result of pulling out the wool, I’m afraid. This will soon put it right. Get it made up as soon as you can.”

  He scribbled on a form and handed it to her. She looked at it in a puzzled manner.

  “I do not understand.”

  “It’s a prescription,” he said impatiently.

  “What is that?”

  “Good heavens—where do you come from?”

  She turned and pointed through the window to the castle, outlined on its hill against the green sky.

  “From there? Who are you?”

  “My name is Helen,” she said, still speaking in the same husky, hesitant manner. “My father is King up there on the hill.” For the first time the doctor noticed that round her pale, shining hair she wore a circlet of gold, hardly brighter than the hair beneath. She was then a princess?

  “I had a curse laid on me at birth—I expect you know the sort of thing?” He nodded.

  “A good fairy who was there said that I would be cured of my dumbness on my eighteenth birthday by a human doctor.”

  “Is it your birthday today?”

  “Yes. Of course we all knew about you, so I thought I would come to you first.” She coughed, and he jumped up and gave her a drink of a soothing syrup, which she took gratefully.

  “Don’t try to talk too much at first. There’s plenty of time. Most people talk too much anyway. I’ll have the prescription made up”—“and bring it round,” he was going to say, but hesitated. Could one go and call at the castle with a bottle of medicine as if it was Mrs. Daggs?

  “Will you bring it?” she said, solving his problem. “My father will be glad to see you.”

  “Of course, I’ll bring it tomorrow evening.”

  Again she gravely inclined her head, and turning, was gone, though whether by the door or window he could not be sure.

  He crossed to the window and stood for some time staring up at the black bulk of the castle on the thorn-covered hill, before returning to his desk and the unfinished sentence. He left the curtains open.

  Next morning, if it had not been for the prescription lying on his desk, he would have thought that the incident had been a dream. Even as he took the slip along to the pharmacist to have the medicine made up, he wondered if the white-coated woman there would suddenly tell him that he was mad.

  That evening dusk was falling as the last of his patients departed. He went down and locked the large gates and then, with a beating heart, started the long climb up the steps to the castle. It was lighter up on the side of the knoll. The thorns and brambles grew so high that he could see nothing but the narrow stairway in front of him. When he reached the top he looked down and saw his own house below, and the town with its crooked roofs running to the foot of the hill, and the river wriggling away to the sea. Then he turned and walked under the arch into the great hall of the castle.

  The first thing he noticed was the scent of lime. There was a big lime tree which, in the daytime, grew in the middle of the grass carpeting the great hall. He could not see the tree, but why was a lime tree blossoming in October?

  It was dark inside, and he stood hesitating, afraid to step forward into the gloom, when he felt a hand slipped into his. It was a thin hand, very cool; it gave him a gentle tug and he moved forward, straining his eyes to try to make out who was leading him. Then, as if the pattern in a kaleidoscope had cleared, his eyes flickered and he began to see.

  There were lights grouped around the walls in pale clusters, and below them, down the length of the hall, sat a large and shadowy assembly; he could see the glint of light here and there on armor, or on a gold buckle or the jewel in a headdress as somebody moved.

  At the top of the hall, on a dais, sat a royal figure, cloaked and stately, but the shadows lay so thick in between that he could see no more. But his guide plucked him forward; he now saw that it was Helen, in her white dress with a gold belt and bracelets. She smiled at him gravely and indicated that he was to go up and salute the King.

  With some vague recollection of taking his degree he made his way up to the dais and bowed.

  “I have brought the Princess’s cordial, Sire,” he said, stammering a little.

  “We are pleased to receive you and to welcome you to our court. Henceforth come and go freely in this castle whenever you wish.”

  The doctor reflected that he always had come and gone very freely in the castle; however, it hardly seemed the same place tonight, for the drifting smoke from the candles made the hall look far larger.

  He lifted up his eyes and took a good look at the King, who had a long white beard and a pair of piercing eyes. Helen had seated herself on a stool at his feet.

  “I see you are a seeker after knowledge,” said the King suddenly. “You will find a rich treasure-house to explore here—only beware that your knowledge does not bring you grief.”

  The doctor jumped slightly. He had indeed been thinking that the King looked like some Eastern sage and might have information which the doctor could use in his study on occult medicine.

  “I suppose all doctors are seekers after knowledge,” he said cautiously, and handed Helen her bottle of medicine. “Take a teaspoon after meals—or—or three times a day.” He was not sure if the people in the castle had meals in the ordinary way, though some kind of feast seemed to be in progress at the moment.

  From that time on the doctor often made his way up to the castle after evening had fallen, and sat talking to the King, or to some of the wise and reverend knights who formed his court, or to Helen. During the daytime the castle brooded, solitary and crumbling as always, save for some occasional archaeologist taking pictures for a learned monthly.

  On Christmas Eve the doctor climbed up with a box of throat tablets for Helen, who still had to be careful of her voice, and a jar of ointment for the King who had unfortunately developed chilblains as a result of sitting in the chill and draughty hall.

  “You really should get him away from here, though I’d miss him,” he told Helen. “I don’t know how old he is—”

  “A thousand—”she interjected.

  “—Oh,” he said, momentarily taken aback. “Well in any case it really is too damp and cold for him here. And you should take care of your throat too; it’s important not to strain it these first months. The castle really is no place for either of you.”

  She obediently flung a fold of her gray cloak around her neck.

  “But we are going away tomorrow,” she said. “Didn’t you know? From Christmas to Midsummer Day my father holds his court at Avignon.”

  The doctor felt as if the ground had been cut from under his feet.

  “You’re going away? You mean you’ll none of you be here?”

  “No,” she answered, looking at him gravely.

  “Helen! Marry me and stay with me here. My house is very warm—I’ll take care of you, I swear it—” He caught hold of her thin, cold hand.

  “Of course I’ll marry you,” she said at once. “You earned the right to my hand and heart when you cured me—didn’t you know that either?”

  She led him to her father and he formally asked for her hand in marriage.

  “She’s yours,” said the King, “I can’t prevent it though I don’t say I approve of these mixed marriages. But mind you cherish her—the first unkind word, and she’ll vanish like a puff of smoke. That’s one thing we don’t have to put up with from mortal man.”

  As soon as Helen married the doctor and settled in his
house she became a changed creature. The people in the town were surprised and charmed to find what a cheerful, pretty wife their hermit-like doctor had found himself. She left off her magic robes and put on checked aprons; she learned to cook and flitted around dusting and tidying; moreover as her newly won voice gathered strength she chattered like a bird and hummed the whole day long over her work.

  She abolished the buzzer in the office because she said it frightened people. She used to look through the door herself and say:

  “The doctor will see you now, Mrs. Jones, and will you try not to keep him waiting please—though I know it’s hard for you with your leg. It is any better, do you think? And how’s your husband’s chest?”

  “She’s like a ray of sunshine, bless her,” people said.

  The doctor was not sure about all this. What he had chiefly loved in her was the sense of magic and mystery; she had been so silent and moved with such stately grace. Still it was very pleasant to have this happy creature in his house attending to his comfort—only she did talk so. In the daytime it was not so bad, but in the evenings when he wanted to get on with his writing it was trying.

  By and by he suggested that she might like to go to the cinema, and took her to a Disney. She was enchanted, and after that he was ensured peace and quiet on at least two evenings a week, for she was quite happy to go off by herself and leave him, only begging him not to work too hard.

  One night he had nearly finished the chapter on Magic and Its Relation to Homeopathic Medicine, and was wishing that he could go up and discuss it with the King. He heard her come in and go to the kitchen to heat the soup for their late supper.

  Soon she appeared with a tray.

  “It was a Western,” she said, her eyes sparkling. “The hero comes riding into this little town, you see, and he pretends he’s a horse-dealer but really he’s the D.A. in disguise. So he finds that the rustling is being run by the saloon keeper—”

  “Oh, for goodness’ sake, must you talk all the time,” snapped the doctor. Then he stopped short and looked at her aghast.

  A dreadful change had come over her. The gay print apron and hair ribbon dropped off her and instead he saw her clad in her white and gray robes and wreathed about with all her magic. Even as she held out her hands to him despairingly she seemed to be drawn away and vanished through the thick curtains.

  “Helen!” he cried. There was no answer. He flung open the door and ran frantically up the steps to the castle. It was vacant and dark. The grass in the great hall was stiff with frost and the night sky showed pale above him in the roofless tower.

  “Helen, Helen,” he called, until the empty walls re-echoed, but no one replied. He made his way slowly down the steps again and back to his warm study where the steam was still rising from the two bowls of soup.

  From that day the townspeople noticed a change in their doctor. He had been hermit-like before; now he was morose. He kept the castle gates locked except for the office hours and disconnected his telephone. No longer was there a pretty wife to tell them that the doctor would see them now; instead they were confronted by a closed door with a little grille, through which they were expected to recite their symptoms. When they had done so, they were told to go around by an outside path to another door, and by the time they reached it they found the necessary pill or powder and written instructions lying outside on the step. So clever was the doctor that even with this unsatisfactory system he still cured all his patients, and indeed it seemed as if he could tell more about a sick person through a closed door than other doctors could face to face; so that although people thought his treatment strange, they went on coming to him.

  There were many queer tales about him, and everyone agreed that night after night he was heard wandering in the ruined castle calling “Helen! Helen!” but that no one ever answered him.

  Twenty years went by. The doctor became famous for his books, which had earned him honorary degrees in all the universities of the world. But he steadfastly refused to leave his house, and spoke to no one, communicating with the tradespeople by means of notes.

  One day as he sat writing he heard a knock on the outer gate, and something prompted him to go down and open it. Outside stood a curious looking little woman in black academic robes and hood, who nodded to him.

  “I am Dr. Margaret Spruchsprecher, Rector of the University of Freiherrburg,” she said, walking composedly up the path before him and in at his front door. “I have come to give you the degree of Master of Philosophy at our University, as you would not come to us or answer our letters.”

  He bowed awkwardly and took the illuminated parchment she offered him.

  “Would you like a cup of coffee?” he said, finding his voice with difficulty. “I am most honored that you should come all this way to call on me.”

  “Perhaps now that I have come so far I can help you,” she said. “You are seeking something, are you not? Something besides knowledge? Something that you think is in the castle, up there on the hill?”

  He nodded, without removing his gaze from her. The keen, piercing look in her old eyes reminded him vividly of the King.

  “Well! Supposing that all this time what you seek is not inside, but has gone outside; supposing that you have been sitting at the mouth of an empty mousehole; what then?” There was something brisk, but not unkindly, in her laugh as she turned and made off down the path again, clutching the voluminous black robes around herself as the wind blew them about. The gate slammed behind her.

  “Wait—” the doctor called and ran after her, but it was too late. She was lost in the crowded High Street.

  He went out into the town and wandered distractedly about the streets staring into face after face, in search of he hardly knew what.

  “Why, it’s the doctor, isn’t it?” a woman asked. “My Teddy’s been a different boy since that medicine you gave him, Doctor.”

  Someone else came up and told him how thankful they were for his advice on boils.

  “My husband’s never forgotten how you cured his earache when he thought he’d have to throw himself out of the window, the pain was so bad.”

  “I’ve always wanted to thank you, Doctor, for what you did when I was so ill with the jaundice—”

  “You saved my Jennifer that time when she swallowed the poison—”

  The doctor felt quite ashamed and bewildered at the chorus of thanks and greeting which seemed to rise on every side. He finally dived into a large doorway which seemed to beckon him, and sank relieved into a dark and sound-proof interior—the cinema.

  For a long time he took no notice of the film which was in progress on the screen, but when he finally looked up his attention was attracted by the sight of galloping horses; it was a Western. All of a sudden the memory of Helen came so suddenly and bitterly into his mind that he nearly cried aloud.

  “Excuse me, sir, that’s the one and nine’s you’re sitting in. You should be in the two and three’s.”

  He had no recollection of having bought any ticket, but obediently rose and followed his guide with her darting torch. His eyes were full of tears and he stumbled; she waited until he had caught up with her and then gave him a hand.

  It was a thin hand, very cool; it gave him a gentle tug. He stood still, put his other hand over it and muttered:

  “Helen.”

  “Hush, you’ll disturb people.”

  “Is it you?”

  “Yes. Come up to the back and we can talk.”

  The cinema was pitch dark and full of people. As he followed her up to the rampart at the back he could feel them all about him.

  “Have you been here all these years?”

  “All these years?” she whispered, mocking him. “It was only yesterday.”

  “But I’m an old man, Helen. What are you? I can’t see you. Your hand feel
s as young as ever.”

  “Don’t worry,” she said soothingly. “We must wait until this film ends—this is the last reel—and then we’ll go up to the castle. My father will be glad to see you again. He likes your books very much.”

  He was too ashamed to ask her to come back to him, but she went on:

  “And you had better come up and live with us in the castle now.”

  A feeling of inexpressible happiness came over him as he stood patiently watching the galloping horses and feeling her small, cool hand in his.

  Next day the castle gates were found standing ajar, and the wind blew through the open doors and windows of the doctor’s house. He was never seen again.

  Watkyn, Comma

  When Miss Harriet Sibley, not in her first youth, received an unexpected legacy from a great-uncle she had never met, there was not a single moment’s hesitation in her mind. I shall give up my job at the bank, she thought, and live by making cakes.

  Miss Sibley had never baked a cake in her life, nor was she even a great cake eater; once in a while, perhaps, she might nibble a thin slice of Madeira, or a plain rice bun; but rice buns were becoming exceedingly hard to find.

  All the more reason why I should start up a little baking business, thought Miss Sibley triumphantly. I need not have a shop. I can do it from home. Word about good cakes very soon gets passed around.

  And she began hunting for suitable premises.

  Due to soaring house prices, she encountered difficulty in finding anything that lay within her means. For months every Saturday and Sunday was passed in the search. From cottages she turned to warehouses, from warehouses to barns. Even a ruined barn, these days, fetched hundreds of thousands.

  But at last she came across exactly what she wanted, and the price, amazingly, was not unreasonable. Miss Sibley did not waste any time investigating possible disagreeable reasons for this; if there are drawbacks, I will deal with them as they come up, she decided in her usual swift and forthright way, and she made an offer for the ruins of Hasworth Mill. Her offer was instantly accepted, and she engaged a firm of local builders to render the ruins habitable.