Lionboy: the Chase

by Zizou Corder

  ‘Go on,’ he said, though he knew she didn’t understand. ‘Take me off, then. Wherever you want.’

  It was his best bet. All he had to do was remember his way around this huge building, and then, when Lavinia had gone, he would just sneak out again and go to find the Lions himself. So what was a cortile? Perhaps there’d be a cat there to talk to.

  From the window of the Chinese room, strings of electric lights and high flares illuminated the scene around the ruins of San Giorgio Maggiore. It looked more like hell than ever in the dark: swamped, flooded, ruined, industrial, and scattered with fragments of destroyed beauty. Charlie didn’t look for long.

  On the window ledge he noticed his phone, which he’d put there earlier to recharge in the last rays of the sun.

  The message icon was flashing.

  Since he’d been away, this sight had come to mean nothing but nastiness for him. Only one person had been ringing him.

  He stared at it, and then out of the window again.

  But he couldn’t leave it. He was a curious boy, and he couldn’t leave it.

  ‘Goodnight, Lavinia,’ he said firmly, and pushed her gently out of the room.

  So that was how he got Rafi’s message.

  Listening to it, his heart sank slowly and steadily. A lot of what Rafi said … Police. Train. Maccomo. His parents … Oh, lord. There was a lot of danger out there for him and the Lions. A lot of powers gathering against them …

  He bit his lip.

  But now I am here, he said to himself, protected by Edward and King Boris. Nobody is going to find us if we stay here and keep quiet. I just have to make sure that I find my parents quickly, and move on before Rafi gets better and before the police work out that King Boris is hiding us. And keep my head down.

  He was deeply grateful that they had this safe, comfortable place to hide.

  The people sat in circles on big fur-style cushions on the polished wooden floor. (At least, the floor looked wooden. In fact it was a particular type of material made out of wood, that looked quite like wood, but was guaranteed to wear out more quickly. In many parts of the world this kind of material had been banned because it was a waste of good trees. But the Corporacy had invented it in the first place, thinking they could sell it all over the world and make huge profits because people would have to keep buying more, so they had lots left over. They didn’t want to lose money on it, so they used it to furnish their Communities around the world.)

  They were eating and drinking, and breathing the sweet cool air of the Corporacy Community Education Centre.

  ‘It’s true money doesn’t make you happy,’ intoned a melodious and sympathetic voice. ‘How could it?’

  The people smiled at each other. They all knew that money didn’t make you happy. Of course it didn’t. They were more intelligent than to think that.

  ‘But how much more comfortable it can make you!’ said the voice happily. ‘What makes you happy? Your loved ones. And how much happier you can make them if you are comfortably off!’

  The people thought complacently about their families. Most of them lived here in the Corporacy Gated Village Community. They thought it a wonderful place, with its genuine fake-grass village green, a school just for Community children, shops (selling only Corporacy products) and, best of all, a high wall around it so no scary poor people or foreigners or outside children could come in to disturb Community life. Of course there weren’t any really poor people even outside the walls, because the really poor people lived in the Poor World, but sometimes poor people were let in from the Poor World to do the jobs nobody in the Rich World wanted to do, and it was those people who were not allowed in (except to do the dirty jobs, of course). If they tried to get in, the security guards would see them off.

  There were lots of Gated Communities. Some of the most popular banned children as well as poor people. Older people could go and live there and never be bothered again by bicycles and football games and pop music and laughing and yelling. Some banned foreigners or different-coloured people – they had to lie about it though, and pretend it was something else they were banning. They all found ways to make sure that only people exactly like the people already there were allowed in. ‘Scared pathetic people with no heart, no brain, no imagination and nothing to recommend them at all,’ Charlie’s mother called them, witheringly. ‘Life-haters. Just as well to keep them all locked up together – keeps the rest of the world nice and interesting for the rest of us!’ At least, that’s what she said when she was herself, at home.

  Now, in the Corporacy Community Education Centre, her hair was flat and her head stuffed up and she didn’t know what she thought about anything.

  ‘Just think,’ the voice was continuing. Magdalen tried to think. She couldn’t remember quite what thinking was. ‘If you can give your loved ones the things they need, how happy they will be. If you can provide for them, feed them and give them the lifestyle they deserve – the security, and the prosperity. Aren’t they worth it? Of course they are!’

  One or two people at the seminar thought, at the dim backs of their minds, that surely all loved ones deserved comfort and security – and people who weren’t loved deserved them too, maybe even more … But the idea slipped away.

  ‘Aren’t you worth it?’ said the voice persuasively. ‘Of course you are! You can have the things your parents were never lucky enough to be able to give you.’ Sympathy dripped from the words. ‘You can give those things to your children. You can make the choice about the life you want to lead! Embrace your aspirations! There’s nothing to be ashamed of. Fulfil your dream! Be the self you always dreamed of being!’

  Everyone was smiling now. That sounded good.

  ‘Money is good, money is worth it, and it is great that you can get as much as you want! The harder we all work for the Corporacy, the more money we will all have! With the Corporacy, you can work hard and play hard and know that your efforts are doing the best for your family. You can be the best! Challenge yourself! Reach that target! Make those sales figures! Build that business! Grow your share! You can make good money and lead a stylish life. There’s no need to be afraid of embracing your aspirations!’

  The voice went on.

  Magdalen was frowning. A low voice deep in her heart was answering back: ‘Those aren’t my aspirations. I don’t want lots of money and a stylish life made of fake things, cut off from the real world. I don’t want the Corporacy to make money out of me while outside in the world children can’t afford medicine … I want to be left alone … I want Charlie … I’m afraid … I’m afraid they’re sucking my brain out …’ But the voice was slow and weak.

  Aneba thought: God, I’m tired. I’m tired. I want a drink.

  Magdalen looked at him. He looks bored, she thought. Perhaps he doesn’t love me any more.

  Then the little voice in her shrieked out loud, and she fell forward clutching her head. ‘Aneba!’ she cried. ‘Aneba – wake up, wake up! Darling, Aneba, they’re killing us, they’re killing us …’ She shouted and wept.

  Aneba stared at her.

  She was disturbing the Profit Motive Seminar.

  A manager from the Wellness Unit came and took her away. They gave her some medicine and then she was quiet. While she was quiet they gave her some more. ‘You can visit her soon,’ they told Aneba.

  He stared.

  After about ten minutes, Charlie listened at his bedroom door to check if Lavinia was still lurking about. Gently, he pulled the door open.

  She was lying curled in a heap in the corridor, fast asleep. Charlie smiled and stepped quietly over her. Daft place to kip. He slipped down the cool-tiled corridor. His feet made a soft padding noise, and he was grateful for the fact that the flat smooth floors didn’t creak.

  He found his way easily enough down to the dining room on the first floor. Low voices were murmuring inside, talking Italian. It was Edward and Signora Battistuta, and another voice, a man’s, deep and flowing. Out of curiosity, Charlie listened,
but he couldn’t make much sense of what was being said – except for one word: Leoni.

  Why were they talking about the Lions? What were they saying?

  Suddenly he heard chairs being pushed back, and the change of breathing that denotes people standing up and starting to move. He slipped into the shadows and waited.

  Three figures emerged from the dining room, still talking softly. They crossed the big chamber and went out through an arched doorway to the stairs. Silent and quick like a millipede on a wall, without even knowing why he was doing it, Charlie followed them.

  Downstairs, across the lily chamber, through another arch, down a vaulted corridor, and then they emerged into the purple light of night. Charlie hung back in the doorway. The three stood on one side of a courtyard, a sort of cloister with arches on each side, and a fountain in the middle. It was lit up by moonlight, and the scent of roses and jasmine hung on the cool night air, reminding Charlie of his garden at home in London. The scent gave him a pang of pain.

  From his safe spot in the dimness of the doorway, Charlie could see the Lions moonlit at the other end of the arcade. They were lying about, as they did, under the arcade, and the sight of them in their friendly pile filled him with affection. Only the Young Lion was prowling about at the back. Charlie could well understand why.

  The Lions were behind a heavy metal grille. The moonlight reflected dully off its grey bars.

  After all they had been through to win their freedom, they were back in a cage.

  Charlie’s fury jumped up within him, banging at his chest and rattling in his lungs. How dare Edward put them back behind bars? No one, thought Charlie, is going to keep me apart from these beasts. We’re a gang now. We’ve been through a lot. And this is not how it is meant to be.

  How he wished he knew Italian better! The low urgency with which the three were talking made it clear that what they were saying was important and secret. Edward seemed to be leading the conversation, with Signora Battistuta supporting him and the new man – a small, crumply figure with a rumbling voice, who was evidently quite alarmed by the presence of the Lions, even behind bars – asking questions. They were looking at the Lions, gesturing towards them. You would think, to watch them, that they were making plans.

  Charlie stared and wondered. Obviously, the presence of the Lions here had to be kept completely secret. It was so obvious it hadn’t even needed agreeing on.

  So who was this bloke? Turning up in the middle of the night? Without Charlie knowing anything about it?

  And why is Edward making plans with him? Involving the Lions?

  And why are the Lions back in a cage!

  How dare he? And – Charlie gulped as the thought hit him – did King Boris know about this? And which was worse? If he did – which meant he approved of it? Or if he didn’t – which meant that Edward was doing a bad thing behind the King’s back?

  The crumply man had something in his hand and was getting quite excitable. Edward seemed to be trying to calm him and persuade him to do something. The man, gesturing energetically towards the Lions, was refusing, but in a ‘I’m not doing this thing but I still want to be your friend’ kind of way. Charlie couldn’t work out what it was that he was refusing to do.

  Looking down the arcade, Charlie saw a pair of yellow eyes staring unblinking at him. He knew that, unlike most cats, lions can’t see very well in the dark, but these eyes could clearly see him. Which of them was it?

  Ah – it was Primo. A Smilodon could see in the dark, then. Charlie raised his hand, very gently, in a tiny wave.

  The yellow eyes blinked slowly, to return the greeting.

  Charlie felt reassured by this. He raised his hand again, made a patting gesture, meaning ‘be patient’, and slipped behind the door out of view.

  A few minutes later, the three grown-ups came back through, passing within inches of Charlie, and went back into the building. In seconds, Charlie was out of the door, down the arcade and lying alongside the bars, as near as he could be to his friends.

  The Lionesses turned their faces away from him. He could see just from the elegant, offended angles of their heads how deeply insulted they were. The Oldest Lion gazed at Charlie sorrowfully. Primo lay in silence. Elsina looked nervously from one to the other of her companions. It was the Young Lion who spoke out.

  ‘What’s going on?’ he hissed in a stony, furious voice. ‘Where’ve you been? We had to let them put us in here – we didn’t want to start mauling anybody – but good grief, Charlie! What’s happening?’

  ‘I don’t know!’ exclaimed Charlie miserably. ‘I wasn’t allowed to see you so I sneaked out, but they’re all talking Italian and I don’t know what they’re saying. I don’t know what’s happening. I don’t know and I don’t like it!’

  If the palazzo, their safe haven, was not safe, then they were really in trouble.

  Chapter Five

  ‘And so you shouldn’t like it,’ said the Yellowest Lioness. ‘It is bad,’ said the Silvery Lioness.

  ‘Edward has a plan that none of us would want,’ said the Bronze Lioness.

  The Lionesses hardly ever spoke. Charlie looked to them eagerly.

  ‘How do you know?’ he asked.

  ‘He was talking about it,’ said the Yellowest Lioness.

  ‘Do you understand Italian?’ exclaimed Charlie.

  ‘We’ve spent time in Abyssinia,’ said the Silvery Lioness, as if that explained everything.

  ‘So what is he saying?’ asked Charlie.

  The Lionesses looked a little embarrassed.

  ‘He’s talking about the Doge,’ said the Bronze Lioness, ‘and about wings, and how we’re not to be allowed out, and you’re not to see us, but not to be made suspicious either.’

  Charlie’s temper flared up again. Who did Edward think he was, putting them in a cage and saying Charlie couldn’t see them? Charlie was pretty sure this could not be the King’s idea.

  ‘Don’t worry,’ said Charlie. ‘I’ll come and see you every moment I can, and I’ll get you out of here. Could you understand anything else?’

  ‘Just that it seems we’re to be here for a while. They’ve given us all these cushions, look, and hangings for shade at midday. They’re being very kind,’ she said, her voice full of sarcasm.

  Sure enough, within the iron bars there were large brocade cushions in gold and green lying about the Lions’ quarters, along with big brass bowls of cool water and some good fresh meat. The shades were brocade too, heavy and old and decorated with swirling flowers and leaves, with gold and silver threads running through them, smelling slightly of metal. They looked dusty, and Charlie’s nose twitched. Just the sight of them made him feel asthmatic.

  The Oldest Lion said, ‘We’ll keep our ears open. They don’t know we understand them. Come to us tomorrow, and perhaps we will all have found out more. Meanwhile you must concentrate on getting news of your parents.’

  Charlie lay on the cool stone floor alongside the Lions’ cage. He rubbed their ears through the iron bars and breathed in the deep sweet wild smell of them. Elsina tickled him a bit, teasing him. She was so young that her nose was still pink – later it would turn black, like the others’. It looked very sweet in the moonlight.

  The Young Lion would not settle down. ‘We must do something,’ he said. ‘We’re Lions, for goodness’ sake. We must fight, fighting is what we do. We should make a run for it …’

  Even he didn’t seem quite to believe what he was saying, but they all felt the strength of his feelings. Charlie was full of love for his Lion Gang, and desperately sorry that he hadn’t managed to keep them free.

  He couldn’t stay long though. He didn’t want to be caught down there. Looking up, he could see the windows of the upper storeys of the palazzo. Anybody could be peering out. Even here, he’d have to hide.

  The next morning, Edward had an early phone call. He heard that a crazy English boy was being held at the secure hospital in Paris with serious injuries that he was claiming had
been inflicted by a Lion. To begin with everybody had assumed he was mad or on drugs; but, as it turned out, a troupe of Lions was missing from the famous Circus of Major Thibaudet, and the youth’s story was now being reconsidered – though his allegation that the Lions had left Paris on the Orient Express was being put down to the fever that his injuries had induced.

  Edward thought about this for some time. He took a sip of his small strong black coffee. Then he took up his newspaper.

  Charlie came down late and helped himself to sweet cakes with a sort of delicious cream in them, and cherries, apricots and small dark figs.

  ‘Charlie,’ said Edward, putting down his newspaper and leaning forward, ‘we must have a chat.’

  ‘All right,’ said Charlie, who had learned that the more you could seem to be agreeing with people, the less suspicious they would be of you.

  ‘There’s a problem,’ he said. ‘I didn’t tell you – I didn’t want to worry you – but the fact of your Lions escaping has been in the news. I hoped it would die down but it hasn’t. In fact everybody knows about them, all across Europe. It’s – well, look.’

  He handed Charlie the newspaper: an Empire paper, published in English all over the world. On the front page was a small headline: ‘MISSING LIONS STILL NOT FOUND, see page 7’. And on page 7 it read as follows:

  MISSING LIONS: REWARD OFFERED

  ALPINE SIGHTING UNCONFIRMED

  Major Maurice Thibaudet of Thibaudet’s Royal Floating Circus and Equestrian Philharmonic Academy (better known as Tib’s Gallimaufry) has announced a reward of 15,000 dirhams for information leading to the recovery of the six lions that went missing from the Circus the night of their debut performance. Major Thibaudet himself made the announcement in Paris, where the show has been wowing the cognoscenti, despite the absence of the popular lion act.

  ‘The lions are very valuable, highly trained and extremely vulnerable creatures,’ said Major Thibaudet in a statement. ‘They need their medicine. They need to eat properly. They must be somewhere, and it is vital that they are returned to those who know how to care for them as soon as possible.’ Monsieur Maccomo, the lions’ trainer, has not been seen in public since their disappearance, and sources close to the Circus say that he is suffering considerably from stress and is too upset to speak. His assistant, Charlie Ashanti, went missing the same evening. It is not known if the two developments are connected.