“The cat! Of course! What a dismal old fool I am! Well, don’t stand there, Mumbo – ask him!”
Mumbo starting making meowing noises, and the cat answered. The King jumped to his feet and wrung his hands in impatience.
“Well? Well? What does he say? Did they come here?”
“Yes,” reported the mumbo. “They came. They came right into this room. There was a big golden statue here, and a little man with a pointed nose who fell down in a faint at the sight of Wuzzy.”
“Fell down in a faint!”
“Don’t be too rough on him, she probably did her turn-you-to-jelly-if-you-look-at-me bit. Anyway then she worked a spell so that the statue got light enough for her to carry, and she was just going to load it onto the broomstick when the owl hooted.”
“What owl? Not the one in her cave?”
“Yes. She could hear it at any distance, and it warned her that we were about to escape. She was furious. She said –” He stopped. “Well, I’d rather not repeat it. I’m afraid Acky learnt some rather bad words from the witch, but anyway she left everything here and leapt back on her broomstick – Acky says he barely scrambled on in time – and zoomed away, threatening to return as soon as she’d settled our hash. But then we settled hers instead.”
“So where’s my daughter? Where is she?”
He stopped, thought, banged his head with his hand. Thought harder. And at last, got an idea.
“Follow me!”
He panted along the long corridors again and down the wide staircase, across the baronial hall and into the dining-room, where, only the day before yesterday, he had broken his teeth on a golden apple and begun to learn his lesson.
There was everything just as he had left it, and the Mumbo goggled. The golden table, the golden objects, the golden food. And the golden dog.
Whipping out the de-spelling fluid, Midas dropped some on Spray’s back. In a second he was alive again, jumping up on the King trying to lick his face and barking a frantic welcome-home. Acky-backy arched his back, made a diamond-shaped mouth like a viper, hissed snakily and retreated under the golden cloth.
“Good old boy, good dog!” cried Midas joyfully. And then: “Where’s Delia, Stray? Find that girl! Find her!”
Stray took off. He dashed out of the room, with the other three after him.
The dog seemed so full of purpose that the King’s hopes rose again. He dashed upstairs to the Princess’s bedroom, into her playroom, downstairs again into the conservatory-bathroom, onto the terrace. By that time the King had begun to realise the dog had no more notion where to look for the Princess than he had, but as Stray continued to tear from room to room there seemed nothing for it but to follow, though they were all desperately out of breath.
“I’ve heard about dogs!” puffed the mumbo, trailing smoke from his chest-fire. “They go by smell! If she’s still made of gold, she won’t have left a scent … he’ll never find her!”
Sure enough, after going through all the rooms the Princess usually used, Stray came to a baffled stop. He sank onto his haunches and scratched his ear.
“Can’t you talk to him?” asked Midas.
“Me? I’ve never seen a dog before. I can only speak Cat because I grew up with Acky. It’s no use, we’ll never find her.”
But now it was the King who wouldn’t give up. He crouched beside Stray.
“Find Biffpot,” he ordered slowly and clearly.
Stray cocked his head. He had never been asked this before.
“Stray, old friend, be clever now! Biffpot, Biffpot, you know, my valet?” And as Stray still looked blank, the King lost patience.
“BIFFPOT!” he roared.
They were all electrified by a faint answering shout, like an echo:
“Sire!”
The King leapt up. Stray took off again, as if after a rabbit, yipping with excitement. They followed him. He tore to the back of the palace, and, rounding a corner, they saw him scratching and whining at a green baize door.
“The cellars!”
The King wrenched the door open. Stray streaked down the steps ahead of them.
The palace cellars were quite extensive. They were spread out beneath the whole palace. Some were used for storing wine, others for works of art, and still others for food. It was quite dark but the King was used to the dark by now.
“Mumbo, turn on your luminosity!”
The baby dragon huffed and puffed till he glowed green and red. At the far end of the main central passage they could see Stray, pawing at the base of a door.
They hurried to him. The King tried to open the door, but it was locked from the inside. He put his ear against it and thought he heard a faint sound.
“Are you in there, Biffpot?”
“Is th-that you, Y-your M-majesty?” asked a faint and trembling voice from the other side of the door.
“Biffpot, you blithering idiot! Open this door at once! Do you hear me?” roared the King.
There was a creak as the key slowly turned. The door opened a crack, and by the light of a candle Biffpot’s pointed nose and one eye could be seen.
“Has she g-gone, Sire?”
“Gone? Yes, gone, gone, Biffpot! And you let her be stolen!”
“Stolen, Sire? I? Let the witch be stolen?”
“Who’s talking about the witch, man? It’s my daughter I mean! She has been stolen, and you, who were left to guard her as the most precious treasure in my kingdom, I find skulking down here in hiding while—”
“She is here, Sire!”
The King stopped short in the midst of his tirade. “What!”
“I have Her Highness here with me, Sire, safe and sound, though … in rather a peculiar condition, if you will excuse the liberty of a personal remark.”
He opened the door all the way, and stood aside.
“Mumbo, stay out of sight,” ordered the King.
The room was a little whitewashed larder, filled with smoked hams and chickens, barrels of flour and potatoes and pickled herrings, big chests of tea and rows of jars of jam.
At first the King couldn’t see the Princess, but then he saw Biffpot’s eyes rolling upward towards the ceiling. The King glanced up – and his jaw dropped.
There she was – just as he had last seen her, still bent over to tuck him into bed, still looking like solid gold – only now she was floating among the strings of herbs and the smoked hams. A piece of rope dangled from her waist.
Slowly and silently the King pulled on the rope and brought her down to the ground. He touched her. She was still made of gold, but, thanks to the witch’s spell, at the same time she was lighter than air. He tied the rope to a convenient barrel, and then turned to Biffpot.
“Biffpot, my friend. How can I apologise for my rash words? I have been cured of one curse, but the curse of my quick temper I must still conquer … I see it all now. The witch came in my absence, and you – left to face her alone—”
Biffpot shuddered. “Horrible it was, Sire. She came towards the palace like a rocket, making a terrible whirring, fizzling noise. Frightened out of my wits I was. And her face as she burst in through the window! Never saw anything to touch it, Sire. Enough to freeze a man’s blood.
“Next thing I know, there I am lying on the floor, and the witch is getting on her broomstick and threatening to be back in two ticks, and Her Highness bobbing about near the ceiling, Sire!
“So I fetched a rope and a ladder and went up after her. Then I brought her down here. Thinking it was the safest place. Towed her, rather. Extremely awkward it was, Sire, trying not to bump her, and her so buoyant, and yet so – brittle, if you take my meaning, Sire.”
“Biffpot,” said the King soberly. “I am deeply proud of you. Pray go down on one knee. I am going to make you a Knight.”
Biffpot blushed with pleasure and obeyed. The King remembered too late that he hadn’t got his sword with him, but rather than spoil the moment he picked up a large ham, and, holding it tight with both hands, touche
d Biffpot first on one shoulder and then on the other.
“Arise, Sir Biffpot!” he said, mopping his brow. “And now – and now—!”
Carefully and with trembling hands, the King opened the witch’s bottle for the third time, dipped his fingers in, and threw a few drops on to Delia’s golden curls.
As they watched breathlessly, the deathly gold receded, and in its place her own human colouring returned. For the King, it was almost like watching his sweet queen returning to life – the summery hair, warm tender skin, bright brown eyes opening again on this world, and meeting his own that were spilling tears of joy.
“Oh, my dear darling!” he choked out, clasping her in his arms. “Forgive me! Forgive me!”
“Daddy—”
The King cuddled her close, and knew for certain that he had never been so happy in his life.
Chapter Eleven
Return of the Magician
There were some difficulties about the addition of the mumbo and Acky-backy to the palace household.
Stray and Acky took one look at each other and declared total war. They chased one another from end to end of the palace and all around the grounds, until both fell to the floor in exhaustion. Acky recovered first, and leapt onto a high piece of furniture, from where he gazed down upon the recumbent Stray, waiting for him to be ready for another chase.
Sir Biffpot got the fright of his life – well, almost – when he first saw the mumbo, and refused to come anywhere near him.
“It’s a mumbo, Sire! A genuine, live mumbo!” he kept jibbering.
“I know it’s a mumbo, Biffpot. A friendly one – a baby one.”
“Baby my foot, Sire, if you’ll pardon me! I have made quite a little study of dragons and I know what I’m talking about. That is a well-grown adolescent mumbo, on the very verge of doing its shoot. A year from now, Sire, you won’t recognise it, Sire, its head will be through the roof and its wingspan will stretch from one side of the throne-room to the other! Take my word for it!”
The mumbo preened himself and smirked with pride.
“Not quite that big,” he murmured. “Still, I will be gi-normous, I won’t deny that.”
“AAAAAGH! It talks!” shrieked Biffpot, turning to flee.
The King caught him. “He was stolen at birth and brought up by the witch,” he explained soothingly. “She taught him human language.”
Biffpot goggled at the King.
“And that won’t be all she taught it, I have no doubt! It’ll be putting spells on us all next, if it doesn’t burn us alive in our beds or make a meal of us!”
The mumbo was sniggering in his rude way at poor Biffpot’s antics. “No, I won’t, honestly I won’t. I never learnt any of her rotten spells. Listen, I want to live here with you lot, I’m not likely to do anything that would make you kick me out.”
At this moment Delia, who had been watching the mumbo from a doorway, stepped forward. She shook the mumbo’s paw without the slightest fear.
“How do you do?” she said politely. “My teacher says there are practically no dragons left, so I think I’m very lucky to meet one.”
The King was watching carefully. Would the mumbo find her irresistibly fanciable, and want to cut his new teeth on her? He was certainly sniffing at her, and now the tip of his forked tongue came out and gave her chin a lick. Was he – tasting her?
“Mumbo!” Midas said sternly. “That Princess is not for eating!”
“Couldn’t choke down all that hair, anyway, though I must say … she is very sweet …” He ran the tongue around her face, making her giggle. “Hmmm! Almost as superscrumptious as a flandy-bake! I bet she’d taste even better toasted!” And he blew a little puff of smoke into her face.
“You’d better be joking,” said the King sternly. “One nibble, just one – and you’re out – to face the big, cold, hunter-filled, flandy-bake-less world.”
The mumbo sighed gustily, and rested his head on the Princess’s shoulder.
“Oh … All right then,” he said. “I won’t if you insist. I could only eat her once, after all, and after that I couldn’t have her to play with.” Delia giggled again and tickled him behind the ear.
It was a very happy party that gathered round the table at lunchtime.
It was a plain wooden table, with a plain linen cloth. On it were plain china dishes and plain stainless steel knives and forks; plain pewter drinking mugs and a glass bowl of plain red roses. There were wax candles in brass stands, and as much good plain food as anyone could eat.
The King looked round at all this and said, “I. wouldn’t change one thing for all the gold in the world!” His hand strayed to the locket at his neck, and he thought, This holds the only gold that I need for the rest of my life.
Sir Biffpot and Midas between them had made the lunch. Luckily Biffpot had once been a cook-general. It was some time since the King had visited his kitchens, and he was surprised by how much he enjoyed cooking.
“We’ll have to engage a whole new staff,” he said to Biffpot. “But perhaps we’ll manage on fewer servants, Biffpot, what do you think? It’s time I stopped wasting my life and took more interest in things. Real things.”
“You’ve always taken a great interest in the roses, Sire.”
“The roses … Ah well, that’s different.” Fleetingly he thought of the Midas rose, his great creation, now lost, but after all, he could start work on a new one – a yellow one, perhaps. No. No. Not yellow! Too like gold. A white one, then. Or a striped one. Ever since he’d seen the flandy-bakes he’d had the idea of a rose striped pink and white like them.
Delia sat between the King and the mumbo. She ate heartily, even tasting a flandy-bake, though she didn’t like them as much as chocolate biscuits.
“Where’s Mumbo going to live, Daddy?”
“Well, I thought the conservatory.”
“You mean – my bathroom?”
“Yes, darling. There’s nowhere else for him, really. It’s nice and warm in there, and there’s plenty of room for him to grow.”
Biffpot shook his head gloomily. “Won’t hold him, Sire. Another six months—”
“I’ll have it enlarged, then!”
“The flandy-bakes will grow well in there I expect,” said the mumbo. “I’m going to plant lots of them in separate pots.”
“Good idea! A whole orchard of them! I wonder if you could cross a flandy-bake with a rose,” mused the King.
“But what about my bath?” asked the Princess.
“You can still use the pool for your bath, my love, I’m sure the mumbo won’t mind.”
“He’ll have to turn his back,” Delia said primly.
Speaking of backs reminded her of something she’d been thinking of ever since she saw the mumbo.
“When you’re full-grown and can fly,” she said, “could I have a ride on you?”
“Yes,” said the mumbo.
“No!” said the King at the same time. “Nobody is going to fly away with my girl!” Everyone laughed. Except Midas. He wasn’t laughing.
After lunch the King went round the palace by himself, quietly turning everything that had been gold back into its proper form. When he’d done that, he went out into the garden and did the same there, sprinkling the purple fluid over roses and statues, trees and stones, and even the gardener’s spade.
At last he came to his golden jacket, lying stiffly in the grass, and when he had changed that back to its old tweed self and put it on, it felt like the arm of an old friend around his shoulders.
Then he went to stand by the place where the Midas bush had grown, and quietly and solemnly said:
“Red rose, bloom again!”
There was a sound like somebody whistling. The King looked round quickly, and there was the little old magician himself, blowing one of his black cigars as if it were a flute, and producing a very jolly tune.
“Hallo,” said the King.
The old magician stopped playing and looked up, starting as if in grea
t surprise.
“Back already?” he said. “Find Old Gollop, did you?”
“Yes, no thanks to you,” said the King.
“Couldn’t help it if I got called away, could I?” asked Nandan.
“I think that was one of your tricks, to make me think out everything for myself,” said Midas shrewdly.
“One of my tricks!” echoed the old man peevishly. “Do you take me for a common conjuror?” He threw the cigar-flute down. The sound it made on hitting the ground was like a discordant blast on five different brass instruments.
“Please don’t be angry,” begged the King. “Everything’s wonderful now.”
“‘No thanks to me’ I suppose,” mimicked the old man, still annoyed. “Going to say the whole thing’s my fault, I wouldn’t wonder! Who taught you the meaning of real happiness, eh? Eh?”
“You did,” said the King, eager to put him in a good temper again. A picture came to him of Delia, grown into a tall and beautiful young woman, standing in her wedding dress beside this two-foot-high little man with a beard right to the ground and wrinkles all over his face …
As if reading his thoughts, the magician snapped: “Shouldn’t be a bit surprised if you told me I hadn’t earned my reward!”
“Oh, you’ve earned it all right,” said the King gloomily. “Only you won’t forget the proviso?”
“The proviso? You mean, that I can’t have her unless she wants me? And you don’t think she will want an old fellow like me, eh?” He lifted his beard on both withered hands and stared at it. “It’s a possibility … a distinct possibility,” he said, and now he, too, sounded gloomy. “Ah … If only Wuzzleflump—”
“You knew the witch?” asked the King interestedly.
Nandan dropped his beard. “Did you run into her, by any chance?”
“I did, indeed! She’s ‘no more’, you know.”
The magician’s face went suddenly white. “You mean—?”
“Yes. And I was the one who – er – well, at any rate, I happen to know she’s no more.”
He somehow thought Nandan would be pleased about this, but instead the old man threw his hands upward, turned his face to the sky and let out a howl of despair.
The Adventures of King Midas (Red Storybook) Page 8
