This was quite a heavy thought for so light a head, but she got the idea that it was important to keep her pride under control, so she practiced for the rest of the afternoon.
That night at dinner, she had to leave the table several times to go hide behind a potted rhododendron as she grew an elephant’s trunk or a set of moose antlers. This was because people were always reminding her how lovely she was and, however hard she fought it, the compliments would eventually go to her head, in more ways than one.
Within a few days the novelty wore off and she was exhausted from having to run and hide all the time. “This has got to stop,” she thought. She was leaning on the balcony railing, having waved away the last herd of princes, and looking dreamily at the sunset. “I must find out what true beauty is. And fast.”
All at once her soliloquy was interrupted by the tinkling chime of a child’s innocent voice. “Hey! Cowlips!”
Who could it have been but Butch. And so it was. He had climbed up a tree outside the wall and was sitting in the crook of a branch whittling a stick.
“Are you talking to me?” said the Princess in disbelief.
“Who else, Your Royal Hineyness?”
“I could have you flogged for your insolence, you know,” she said haughtily. But, frankly, she found it refreshing.
“I saw you turn into a toad,” said Butch flatly.
“What?!”
“Sure I did. Last night. I was here and you was there and you just turned into a toad.”
Eleanor cast furtive glances about the premises. “You’re not going to tell anyone, are you?”
Butch held the stick up to his eyes and examined it closely. Quality was crucial to Butch. “Me? Why should I? I think it was an improvement.”
Eleanor felt like she should be offended, but she wasn’t.
There was a brief silence as they entertained their own thoughts. “So,” said Butch at last, waving the stick enticingly, “you wanna fetch?”
Tempting as it was, Eleanor suppressed the thrill of excitement that tripped up her spine. “I think not,” she said. “I think I’ve got to go on a quest.”
“A what?”
“A quest,” Eleanor replied a little icily. “How could you not know what a quest is? It’s in all the books.”
“I can’t read,” said Hobson, which is what Butch’s mother called him when calling him Butch failed to elicit the desired response.
“Oh,” said the Princess apologetically. “Well, it’s kind of like a journey. A trip in Search of Something.”
“In search of what?”
“I’m not sure. The general sketch seems to be that you never know ’til you find it.”
“You better hope it’s brains then,” said Butch.
“I wonder . . . where should I begin my quest? In the garden? In the towers? In the dungeon?”
“Hey!” said Butch. He started most of his sentences this way, and it seemed to produce the desired results. “If what you was lookin’ for was in there, you’d’ve found it already. You gotta come out here.”
“Out where?”
“Outside the palace. Out in the Real World.”
“Where’s that?”
Butch thought. “It’s anywhere the palace ain’t,” he decided at last. “Outside the walls.”
Now it was Eleanor’s turn to think. “Oh, no!” she protested. “You’re not getting me out there. There’s nothing but princes as far as the eye can see, drooling all over the place, telling me how lovely I am. Who knows what I might turn into, hearing all that flattery!”
Butch was undaunted. “You need a disguise, is what you need.”
Eleanor endorsed this notion at once. “A disguise! You mean, like a masquerade ball? That’s brilliant! What shall I go as? Desdemona? Louis the X-I-V?”
Butch shook his head. He was running out of patience. “You gotta dress like a crone so nobody’ll notice ya.”
“A crone?”
“You got it, Dog Ears.”
A little chill trebled up Eleanor’s spine, joining that which had previously ascended. “But,” she said, “crones are ugly.”
“With a capital Ugh,” said Butch. Then he sat back on his haunches and waited for the lights to come on.
“Hey!” said Eleanor at last. “I think you’ve got something there, Butch, and not just a bad complexion. If people think I’m just an ugly old lady, they’ll leave me alone!”
“So you can go find your chest,” said Butch helpfully.
“Quest!” Eleanor corrected emphatically. “Quest.”
“Whatever,” said Butch. Once again he waved the stick in the air. “One for the road?” He heaved the stick into the duck pond and Eleanor, tempted beyond endurance, was off like corked wine.
“What do you think of reality, Cummings?” Rat asked, nibbling the crust off his toast.
Cummings had materialized with breakfast some minutes before and, having disbursed the elements thereof in keeping with the requirements of the butlery code, proceeded to straighten up the bed from which Rat had recently risen. In response to the unexpected question he stood and, turning his eyeballs loose to cavort in the pasture of their sockets, plumbed the inward compartments of his personal philosophy. “Once in my history,” he said deliberately, “I would have defined it as that which is apparent to the senses.”
“If that were the case, Cummings, a rock in the desert, if not falling within the sensory radar of the cognoscenti, would not be real.”
“I said once in my history. My arrival upon the island, sir, and its sequelae, have prompted a revision of my assessment. The subject is still under review.”
“Allow me to assist,” said Rat. “I have a new definition that I shall release into the public domain for the edification of all. It is succinct and about as pithy as a helmet can hold. It could also be put to music, which will enable its retention by the preschool set. Lest I excite your anticipation beyond endurance, it runs thus: “Reality is that which is.”
Cummings held the slogan up to the light of his intellect and detected a flaw. “I would suggest, sir, that a more comprehensive definition would have to add: ‘or appears to be.’”
“I trust you have a ready metaphor?”
“As a matter of fact, I do, sir. Allow me to propose the following situation: A horse-drawn carriage is moving along a country lane when, suddenly, the wind dislodges a cluster of leaves or similar detritus from the bracken, sending it hurtling across the road. The horses rear in alarm. The driver applies the brakes. The passengers are thrown about the compartment, the fluids of alarm surging through their bodies. The delicate linen rosebud in the softly swelling décolletage of the young lady in the corner falls to the floor where it is trodden under foot. As she bends to retrieve it, the silken folds of her bodice . . .”
Rat raised a quizzical eyebrow, looking at Cummings in a new light. “Let us not follow that particular rabbit, Cummings. Edit the scenario for family consumption. Clip the verbiage.”
Cummings returned abruptly from a reverie, at once bittersweet and sublime, that had caught him unaware. “Yes, sir. Forgive me.”
“You’ve been a long while on this island, have you not?”
“Yes, sir. A very long while. I have no complaints, in general terms; ample provision has been made for creature comforts. Nevertheless, one does long for . . .”
Rat held up his hand. “I understand, Cummings. It is a subject I have learned to force from my mind. Though, having been an assortment of women in my recent peregrinations, my perspective has altered considerably.
“Now, back to your story. We shall take the occupants of the carriage as signifying a heap of humanity, without dwelling upon the individuals of which the heap is comprised. Noteworthy for her absence in the residue of your telling will be the young lady in the corner.”
“Yes, sir. Thank you, sir,” said Cummings, sighing deeply. “The point is this: there was no animal, as the horse and driver had supposed. They were reacting to detrit
us which they imagined to be other than it was. Nonetheless, their response was real and intruded upon the reality very sharply in regards to the supporting characters within the carriage.”
“None of which alters the fact that of the fox or dog of your metaphor not so much as a hair exists, or ever did exist. Was never suckled or whelped. Occupied no space in any dimension apart from the imaginations of the horses and driver. That misapprehension produced empirical results is ancillary.”
“I take your point, sir. You will allow me to maintain, however, a conviction that the capacity of the unreal to thus impact the real makes it, at least in some part, however paradoxically, real.”
“The contention is, I believe, embodied in my original axiom.”
Cummings tilted his head three degrees in acquiescence.
“The nub, as it were, is this,” said Rat, for whom butlerian repartee had become a pleasant pastime, “that one may learn real lessons from the unreal.”
“As from an improving work of fiction, sir?”
“Exactly! A work of fiction may produce enlightened thoughts in the mind of the reader who, if he amends his thoughts and actions accordingly, will alter reality.”
“Well said, sir.”
“In witness of which, I am in the midst of being a princess.” Rat scanned the image of his soul in the full-length mirror, suspended by wires from the vaulted ceiling of the tower bedroom.
“That explains the decor,” Cummings observed. “You do not feel the episode concluded?”
Rat shook his head. “A definite two-parter. Too many threads left dangling tantalizingly. I await the dénouement with interest.”
“As do I, sir.”
Cummings wondered what alterations Rat perceived in the reflection of his soul in the mirror, an interest he must have subtly communicated by a twitch of an eyebrow or the wayward waggle of an earlobe, for Rat picked up on it.
“The transformation is nearly complete, Cummings,” he said, lobbing a nod at the mirror.
“Indeed, sir?” said Cummings with feigned disinterest. “And how do you view the prospect?”
Rat cogitated deeply. “I began to suspect some time ago,” he said, without reference to that which he suspected, “and was, not to put too fine a point on it, horrified at the possibility. Over time, however, chiefly as the result of the lives I have lived, I have become comfortable with that which I am becoming. I think, however, you may be in for a surprise.”
“Indeed, sir?” said Cummings. As happened preparatory to each adventure, he was gently arranging the bedclothes over Rat’s recumbent form, in this instance a silk sheet with satin ruffles.
“All things must pass,” Rat said, his tongue lazy and inebriated with sleep, “to quote a couple of your countrymen.”
“So they must, sir,” Cummings replied. “May I be of any further assistance before I retire?”
“We had a pleasant day, frolicking and gamboling as the deer who, having extinguished its thirst for frivolity, panteth for the stream?”
“It was a day such a deer would envy, sir.”
“Glad to hear it,” said Rat, succumbing once again to the consciousness, such as it was, of the Princess Eleanor. “By the way,” he added. “You’re completely invisible from the waist down.”
Now in the matter of a really convincing disguise, Eleanor put her trust in one of her fairy godmothers and, let me tell you, this trust was not misplaced. The old woman rolled up her sleeves and dug deep into her ugly bucket. In fact, so ugly was the Princess that, when she came downstairs, she was promptly taken in hand by a couple of palace guards and, her protestations notwithstanding, thrown off the grounds. And when we say “thrown” we’re not employing a figure of speech. They gave her a toss that would have done a Frenchman proud, and they’re famous for cavalierly tossing the modified remains of royalty about the countryside.
“And stay out, you hideous excrescence!” they yelled, slamming the drawbridge behind her.
She didn’t know what “hideous excrescence” is any more than you or I do, but she gathered from the tone in which it was delivered that it wasn’t meant as a term of endearment. “I’ll not forget this,” she muttered to herself, Matthew 5:44 having flown, for the time being, from her mind.
And so it was that Eleanor found herself outside the palace grounds for the first time in her life.
She passed an uncomfortable night in a pig sty, the occupants of which didn’t seem to mind the intrusion, though they did keep their distance.
Next morning—sore, smelly, and hungry—she stumbled into town, and was she shocked! The city streets were dirty and crowded, which could just as easily be said of the populace. There were no parks or fountains, no courtyards or marble staircases; in short, beauty seemed to have been effectively discouraged wherever it raised its head. Worse yet, there was no one to wait on her hand and foot, which was probably for the best since, had anyone had her foot in hand and a predisposition to exercise, she’d likely have been flung over another wall or two.
However, she needn’t have gone hungry long, since owners of food stalls would chuck over-ripened veggies and fruit at her whenever she drifted within range.
About two in the afternoon a crowd of princes, who apparently kept mostly to the suburbs after business hours, began filtering into town and jostling one another for position at the 3:00 o’clock. Princess Viewing, and it quickly became apparent to Eleanor that, taken as a whole, princes were about as rude a clump of humanity as you’re likely to find. Even the poorest of them had an attitude problem, and would routinely abuse those beneath them, beneathest of whom was poor P.E., who got a lifetime’s abuse in a single afternoon. And it wasn’t just the princes who were liberal with scurrility: their coachmen, footmen, and assorted retainers—not to mention their horses—showed imagination in devising ways in which to express their contempt.
“That’s it!” thought Eleanor, extricating herself from a compost ditch. “Princes are off the menu. I wouldn’t marry one of those reprehensible, self-centered . . . self-centered, reprehensible,” (it was at this point Eleanor began to wish she’d paid stricter attention in vocabulary class; she was at a loss for words with which to express her pique, and she’d only just begun!), “self-centered, reprehensible . . . ooooo! And that goes double for retainers, and courtiers, and shop-keepers!”
“Do you hear me!” she said, raising her voice above the din of the crowd. All activity came to an abrupt halt. “Serve up the humble pie, and everybody help yourself to a biggish slice, if you wish to keep your head. I am the Princess Eleanor!”
She could see from the looks that greeted her that the assertion was going to require some backing up, so she stood and, assuming her proudest, most regal pose, the one that knocked ’em dead at state dinners, pulled off the disguise.
Well, imagine her surprise when, far from falling on their knees, the whole assembly burst into fits of laughter and scorn, to the accompaniment of projectiles of various kinds beneath which, in no time, Eleanor was completely buried. Fortunately for her, the old adage “out of sight, out of mind” proved worth its salt. The merry little riot tapered off, its participants slipping once more into the Slough of Despond to resume the business of the day.
What the Princess failed to take into account in making her plans was that, what with being tossed out of the palace and spending the night with pigs and so on, she cut just the kind of figure that begged to have something heaved at it. You could say she got her just desserts, except that what she really got was more in the category of side orders.
You may never know this from personal experience, but the bottom of a garbage pile is not a pleasant place to be, even on a nice day. It’s hot, and smelly, and slimy, and putrid, and even a Princess with little imagination begins to wonder what else might be in the pile with her.
Eleanor was wondering that very thing when, suddenly, something grabbed her ankle and began to pull her out.
Now, you might think she wanted to be pulled
out, but Eleanor was not one of those who live in the present. She was always thinking ahead and, given this propensity, was wondering who or what was doing the pulling, why they were doing it, and whether she might not be getting pulled out of one thing into another equally, or even more, unpleasant.
“Hey!” said a voice as she was dragged feet-first into the sunlight. “What was you doin’ in there?”
“Butch!” Eleanor cried, recognizing his voice despite the bananas in her ears. She stood up and, not even taking time to brush off, threw her arms around him.
“P-U!” he said, giving her a firm shove. “You sure stink bad.”
Eleanor turned a deaf ear to the critique, except that it reminded her how she had been treated by the masses, a contemplation that did not give rise to spiritual thoughts. “I could . . . I could . . . I should . . . I would . . . if I . . .” she sputtered, as if trying to recall the opening refrain of a favorite song. She shook her fist in the air, then, spying a stick on the ground, picked it up and heaved it toward the town in general. This was no good, of course, for as soon as she saw the stick flying through the air, well, it was irresistible. In an instant she hurtled off after it and, in so doing, propelled herself into a young blind man who happened around an intervening corner.
While blind people must be prepared for unknown obstacles cropping up suddenly, hurtling princesses are beyond the expectations of most. Such was the case in this instance, as evidenced by the individual’s complete collapse.
The resulting mass was part princess and part blind man and, for a time, it was not readily apparent where one ended and the other began.
“Why don’t you watch where I’m going!” Eleanor huffed indignantly as she untangled herself. “Are you blind?!”
“Well,” said the blind man, who was glad to have the last of the Princess out of his eye, “as a matter of fact . . .”
“Sure, he is!” said Butch, who had been laughing so hard he’d momentarily lost his breath. “Blind as a foot in a boot, ain’t you Jamesy?” Butch helped Jamesy to his feet.
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