The Fabulous Phartlehorn Affair

by M. L. Peel

  “Yeah, Mister Zimmerframe,” moaned Humbert. “How much longer till we get to Phartesia? All these waterfalls are making me want to pee!”

  The man with the handlebar moustache was not amused. “My name,” he insisted, “is Zidler. Monsieur Zachary Zidler. Otherwise known as The Great Producer, Talent Scout Extraordinaire and Master of Your Destiny. And what Monsieur Zidler can personally guarantee is that children who whinge do not become famous!”

  A worse fate could not be imagined. Natasha and Xanadu stopped their complaining. Humbert crossed his legs.

  Bruno and Grace could not resist a little smirk.

  As it turned out, the children did not have much longer to wait. Soon the car rounded a bend in the road and an enormous stone gateway appeared among the trees. As they approached the gates, Bruno noticed that Grace seemed to be finding something very amusing. Two penny-sized dimples cut into her cheeks before she gave way to a fit of giggles.

  “What’s so funny?” asked Bruno.

  “Look at that statue!” said Grace, pointing.

  All the children craned their necks to see. One by one, they began to laugh. Perched atop the gateway was the bust of a man’s head, which possessed an even more impressive moustache than Monsieur Zidler’s. Each carved whisker spiralled down a full three metres to the ground, forming an archway through which visitors might enter.

  The gates themselves were cast from solid gold and decorated with silver stars. Painted across them in swirling black letters was the word Phartesia.

  Monsieur Zidler slowed the engine to a crawl, then pulled up beside a gold and white striped sentry box. The children’s merriment turned to surprise as the door to the sentry box swung open and out popped two men in uniform. Like Monsieur Zidler and the statue, both of the sentries sported vast handlebar moustaches. Their uniform did not resemble the heavy armour you see in storybooks, nor was it like the camouflage gear you see modern soldiers wearing. Instead they were dressed in blue-and-white silk doublets, with ruffed collars and turquoise silk tights. On their heads they wore purple hats shaped like flower pots. On their feet they wore hefty wooden clogs decorated with brightly coloured pompoms. The only thing about their attire that linked them to the knights the children had learnt about at school were the sharp swords glinting at their sides.

  “Holy baloney,” whispered Bruno to no one in particular, “these must be the Knights Trumplar!”

  Monsieur Zidler beamed with pleasure. “Bravo! Well guessed, young man!”

  The knights did not smile. They simply nodded at Monsieur Zidler, who rolled down his window and cried out in a strange hurdy-gurdy language, “Al halicus ye Duck di Phartesia!” (Or at least that’s what it sounded like to the children.)

  Trumpet barked, then raised one white paw in the air.

  “Al halicus ye Duck di Phartesia!” echoed the knights and pushed back the heavy metal gates.

  As they passed beneath the mighty stone moustache, Natasha turned to Grace with a sly look on her face.

  “So, Little Miss Scholarship, if you’re so great at languages, why don’t you translate?”

  Grace tucked her fringe behind her ear and spoke with quiet conviction.

  “If you really want to know, they’re speaking a Latinate language with influences of German and Sanskrit. What they said was: All hail the duck of Phartesia.”

  “Cool, man,” enthused Xanadu.

  Natasha let out a snort of derision.

  “You can’t seriously expect us to believe that,” said Humbert scornfully.

  “You can believe what you want,” Grace replied with a shrug. “That’s the translation.”

  The car rumbled on down the road. So this was Phartesia! Birds flittered in and out of the trees, thrushes and warblers and cuckoos and finches, all of them singing. Sprouting from among the gnarled roots of larch and elder trees were buttercups and bright purple orchids.

  “I think we’re going to like it here,” said Bruno, smiling at Grace.

  Not everyone was so impressed. Dotted among the trees were ramshackle huts. Ragged peasants crouched in the doorways, averting their eyes from the car as it passed.

  “I hope Monsieur Zimmerframe realizes I won’t stay anywhere that’s not five-star,” Natasha muttered to Humbert.

  The words came out just a little louder than she had hoped.

  “What’s that?” snapped Monsieur Zidler, spinning round to face her. “Do I detect the sound of whingeing? Well, I think you’ll find that the Castle Mistral is luxurious enough to suit even the most spoilt children.”

  A castle! The children sat up tall in their seats, each hoping they’d be the first to spy it.

  12

  Investigations Commence

  Inspector Jacques Balzac stood looking at the TV screen with his hands knotted behind his back. He was a tall, thin man whose blond hair was slicked back in a single smooth wave. In his current posture he resembled a heron waiting patiently at the edge of a pond.

  The fish Inspector Balzac had come to hook was not a big one. It had been a routine call-out to the Hotel Magnificent. A rowdy guest had been detained by security guards after smashing crockery in the hotel dining room. Such acts of vandalism were not unusual during the film festival, when people were apt to drink too many cocktails and make a nuisance of themselves. So routine, in fact, did this crime seem to Inspector Balzac that he had decided to stop for a spot of lunch before pottering over to investigate. Now he was standing in the dusty office of Monsieur Petit, the hotel manager, suffused in the warm glow that comes from having a bellyful of snails and claret.

  He peered closely at the TV screen, scrutinizing every detail of the lone female suspect. Miss Goodwin, as he had already established the woman was named, had given up hammering at the walls and was now down on her hands and knees, feeling around the floor of her cell as if searching for a trapdoor.

  “See what I mean?” said Monsieur Petit with a note of satisfaction in his voice. “A raving nutcase!”

  But Inspector Balzac wasn’t so sure. There was something about this woman that didn’t add up. In his thirty-nine years of service to the French police force, Inspector Balzac had encountered every kind of criminal. From the bungling thief with bulging pockets to the cold-blooded killer who will never show remorse, Inspector Balzac had arrested them all. Somehow Miss Goodwin didn’t strike him as the criminal type. It wasn’t because she was pretty. Often the pretty ones were the worst. It was just an instinct he had about her face. What’s more, her cries of innocence struck him as genuine. He turned to the hotel manager.

  “Remind me, why am I supposed to arrest her?”

  Monsieur Petit cleared his throat. “It’s very straightforward, inspector. She disturbed the peace in my dining room, then threatened to assault two of my security staff.”

  “Two burly security guards?” Inspector Balzac raised an eyebrow. “Assault them how, exactly?”

  “Bite them,” replied the hotel manager matter-of-factly.

  The inspector let out a sigh as he took a pair of handcuffs from his pocket. “I suppose I shall have to bring her in for questioning.”

  “About time too,” huffed Monsieur Petit, smoothing down the creases in his jacket.

  Inspector Balzac paused in the doorway. “By the way, was there anything to prompt this outburst?”

  “Oh, nothing relevant,” said Monsieur Petit, ushering him out through the door. “Some hysterical nonsense about missing children. I checked with the other pupils and they’d only been gone an hour or so. Everyone knows kids go walkabout.”

  Inspector Balzac turned very slowly on his heel. His voice was dangerously soft.

  “Say that again,” he whispered.

  “Everyone knows kids go walkabout,” repeated the hotel manager, a hint of uncertainty creeping into his voice.

  “Not that, you idiot!” bellowed Inspector Balzac. “The bit about the missing children!”

  He barged back into the office and snatched at the calendar tha
t hung above Monsieur Petit’s desk. The dates were crossed off in red ink. Inspector Balzac paled.

  “The thirteenth of May,” he said, aghast. This was the date every policeman in Europe had learned to dread. “I don’t believe it. He’s struck again!”

  “What are you talking about?” asked the hotel manager. “What don’t you believe? Who’s struck again?”

  Inspector Balzac did not answer him. Instead he did something which took Monsieur Petit quite by surprise. He held out the handcuffs and slipped them around the hotel manager’s wrists.

  “Monsieur Petit,” he announced, “I’m arresting you for obstructing a police investigation and for the unlawful detention of an innocent woman. Now tell me where your keys are so I can go and unlock that poor teacher at once.”

  Half an hour later Miss Goodwin sat across a desk from Inspector Balzac at police headquarters. Monsieur Petit was also present, handcuffed and snivelling in the corner. Most of one wall was covered with a large white board, upon which lists of names and dates were scrawled in black marker pen. The remaining walls were covered with a rogue’s gallery of criminals thought to be operating in the area.

  Inspector Balzac took a slurp of coffee. “Let’s go over your statement from the top, shall we, mademoiselle?”

  Miss Goodwin nodded. Dark circles had appeared around her eyes. Her hands were bruised from hours of hammering.

  “Five of your pupils are missing. You last saw them at nine o’clock yesterday evening when you tucked them safely into their beds. When the children failed to appear at breakfast this morning, you checked their rooms and found they were empty. You asked for help, but instead Monsieur Petit had you incarcerated. Is that all correct?”

  Miss Goodwin confirmed that this was indeed all quite correct. Inspector Balzac rose from his chair. He strode over to the far side of the room.

  “Now I need to know something from you, Monsieur Petit.” He pointed at one of the mugshots pinned to the wall. “This man here. Do you recognize him?”

  The mugshot was not a photograph but a sketched artist’s impression. It showed a man with oiled hair and a handlebar moustache. It was not a perfect likeness. The nose was a bit bigger, the eyes a little closer together, and the forehead just a fraction too high. But still I’m sure you would have recognized the man as being none other than Monsieur Zachary Zidler. That was not, however, the name under which he had checked into the Hotel Magnificent. He had chosen instead to use an alias, keeping his real identity secret. (Perhaps it should give us pause for thought that he had been so bold as to tell the children his real name.)

  Monsieur Petit looked flustered. “You can’t mean Count Von Winkler? It looks a bit like him, yes, but he’s one of our most esteemed guests. Been staying with us for three weeks now. I know because I gave permission for his dog to sleep in his room. Great big white monster of a creature it is too.”

  Inspector Balzac bent forward, cradling his head in his hands. “Just as I’d feared,” he said, and sank back down into his chair.

  “Would somebody mind telling me what is going on?” demanded Miss Goodwin. “These are my pupils. I insist on knowing what’s happened to them!”

  Inspector Balzac felt the sweat prickling on his forehead. The schoolteacher had a nasty habit of making him feel like he was the one under interrogation.

  “It seems,” he began cautiously, “that every year, somewhere in mainland Europe a group of schoolchildren go missing on this date. Each time, sightings have been reported of a man with a handlebar moustache and a large white dog.”

  “W-w-hat?” stammered Miss Goodwin. “But that’s outrageous! Why have I never read about this in the papers?”

  Inspector Balzac shifted nervously in his seat. “This kind of thing is always top secret. Our governments would never allow the press to print it. Think what it would do to tourism. Every parent in Europe would be up in arms.”

  Miss Goodwin paled, struck by a horrible thought. “Oh, my giddy aunt! The parents I’m going to have to tell them.”

  The fear whistled up through her stomach like steam rising in a kettle.

  “They’ll annihilate me!” she wailed.

  13

  The Chateau Mistral

  “There it is! Look! Crikey … it’s enor—mous!”

  In the end it was Bruno who spotted the castle first. All the other children had been peering in the wrong direction. Now they jostled in their seats as they fought for a view of it.

  “Where?”

  “Let me see!”

  “I can’t see it!”

  “It’s right in front of you, dingbats,” said Bruno. “Just look up!”

  One by one, each child lifted his or her gaze to the mountain peak and fell silent. There, jutting out from the bare grey rock, was the most majestic castle any of them had ever seen. It loomed over them, a vast glittering structure that shone more brightly than the sun. The children gaped at the sight, awestruck by the scale of its architectural extravagance. The castle must have boasted at least a thousand archers’ windows. Silken banners fluttered from its turrets. The domed roofs of its towers were painted a brilliant sky blue and seemed to reach right up into the clouds. Strange gargoyles, carved in the shapes of mythical monsters, leered down from the solid-gold gutters.

  Whoever ruled Phartesia must be stinking rich to live in a palace like this, Bruno thought to himself.

  The last bit of road leading up to the castle was steep and winding. The children held their breath as Monsieur Zidler slipped the car into first gear and began the ascent. There was danger on all sides. Smashed boulders were piled up to the left of them, evidence of recent rock falls. To their right was a crumbling cliff edge. One false move and they would all go plunging into the forest below. Unable to look, the children covered their eyes with their hands.

  At last they heard the engine cut out as Monsieur Zidler brought the car to a halt near the summit of the mountain. The children tumbled out onto on the roadside. A cold wind howled in their ears.

  “Wow,” said Grace, pulling her blazer tight about her chest, “just look at this view! We’re even higher than the birds.”

  It was true. Below them, a flock of starlings was flying in formation over the forest. Seen from above, they looked just like a shoal of fish progressing through a deep green river. As far as the eye could see there were no towns or cities, just an occasional curl of wood smoke rising from the trees below.

  The castle was surrounded by a wide moat. Bruno peered down at the rushing water, wondering how you were supposed to get across. There was no sign of a bridge. Suddenly he felt his blood run cold. A dozen black triangles were sticking up out of the water.

  “Sharks!” he gasped, jumping back from the water’s edge.

  “So much better than a burglar alarm, don’t you think?” said Monsieur Zidler, appearing beside him.

  “Er, I guess so,” replied Bruno a little nervously.

  Monsieur Zidler reached into his pocket for a small tin whistle and gave a shrill two-note call. Almost at once there came a clank of heavy iron chains. Far above, a wooden drawbridge yawned open. So that was how you entered!

  “Last one over is a piece of fish food!” called Xanadu, bounding across the polished oak planks. When he reached the halfway point, he performed a couple of cartwheels for good measure. Somehow, throughout this gymnastic display, his sunglasses remained stuck to his head. Not wanting to be left behind, the others rushed after him.

  Monsieur Zidler brought up the rear with Trumpet, cane and tail swinging together in perfect time.

  Once they had crossed the drawbridge and passed through the castle gates, the children found themselves in a vast courtyard, the walls of which were covered in mosaics depicting dancers, actors and musicians. Unsure what to do next, the children hovered nervously in the shadow of an enormous stone balcony.

  “Don’t be shy!” cried Monsieur Zidler, prodding them forward with his cane. “Step out into the light, where you can be seen.” />
  Trumpet used her fleshy brown nose to help shepherd the children into the middle of the courtyard. Grace stayed close to Bruno’s side as, from somewhere deep inside the castle, there came the sound of drumming. Bruno shivered with anticipation. In addition to the drumming, a strange droning could also be heard. And this drumming and droning was getting louder by the second. Soon it felt as if they were standing right inside the humming heart of a beehive.

  The doors to the castle swung open and hundreds of moustachioed knights swarmed through. Their swords were drawn from their holsters and held tight to their chests. Their pompomed clogs lifted towards the sky as they goose-stepped round and round in a series of ever decreasing circles. Some of the knights’ moustaches were so long that they trailed along the ground behind them. Bruno noticed that the more medals a knight had pinned to his chest, the more impressive seemed to be his moustache. The knights with the longest moustaches of all were not carrying swords, but instruments on which they played a bombastic military tune.

  There was a terrific clash of cymbals and, as one, the knights stopped marching. They stomped their clogs together, then turned to face the centre of the courtyard. Bruno and Grace found themselves surrounded as Monsieur Zidler began to address the children in English.

  “Pray silence for the national anthem of Phartesia!”

  Clapping their hands over their hearts, the knights began to sing in lusty chorus:

  “Et volcanicus erupticus exquisiticus,

  In revengicus pharticus apocalypsum

  Plus ferocicus que un turnipum

  Childrenicus explodicus annulis.”

  “What does it mean?” Bruno whispered to Grace.

  “I couldn’t quite catch all of it,” she admitted, “but it had something to do with an exploding volcano and a ferocious turnip.”

  Bruno was beginning to doubt the true extent of Grace’s grasp of Phartesian.

  “Cool song!” said Xanadu, bopping along. “Perhaps I’ll cover it on my next album.”