The Grave Robber's Apprentice

by Allan Stratton

  Hans and Angela darted back to the room where they’d entered the passage. In seconds, they were out the door and racing to the spiral staircase. They zipped down—holding their breath by the banquet hall—and kept on going, down, down, down to the kitchen—where they ran straight into the housekeeper.

  The housekeeper seized each by an arm. “What are you monkeys up to?”

  “Looking for a chamber pot,” Angela babbled.

  “A likely story,” the housekeeper sniffed. “You’re circus thieves out to loot the palace. I’m calling the guards.”

  “No, please,” Hans said. “We heard a girl crying. We followed the sound up the stairs.”

  The housekeeper’s eyes went big as pies. “A girl? Did you see her?”

  “Yes.” Angela played along. “She was covered in worms, dripping milk. Her name is Georgina.”

  The housekeeper fell back against the woodpile. “Aaa! You didn’t see me! I didn’t see you. Tonight didn’t happen! Please!” She flew from the kitchen and into the storage area, where she hid in a barrel of chestnuts.

  Hans and Angela hurried to the laundry room, roused the Pandolinis, and told them their news.

  “The Necromancer could be here at any moment,” Hans said. “He knows our scent. We’re done for!”

  “We are never done for. We are Pandolinis,” the showman exclaimed.

  Signora Pandolini reached into her nibble bag and produced a dozen bulbs of garlic. “Rub cloves on your skin and chew the rest. Then let the devil try to sniff you out!”

  Hans and Angela lay awake all night, but the Necromancer never came. That meant only one thing. He was waiting to strike. But when?

  Chapter 36

  The Pandolini Transformatorium

  Shortly after dawn, town criers trumpeted the Necromancer’s prophecies. Waves of gossip roiled Market Square: Archduke Arnulf was destined to reign forever; resistance was futile.

  Inside the palace, soldiers escorted Hans, Angela, and the Pandolinis to the banquet hall to rehearse the evening’s entertainment. A platform had been erected on a dozen trestles opposite the archduke’s massive mahogany table. The bear cage had been rolled up the rear circular ramp and braced beside the stage.

  The company warmed up. Pandolini performed a series of hums, tongue rolls, and facial contortions; his wife rigged his magic coat with cards, scarves, and collapsible props; Maria, Giuseppe, and the Etceteras did stretching exercises; Hans and Angela laid out the marionettes; and Bruno, Balthazar, and Bianca groomed each other’s ears.

  Without warning, there was a fanfare of trumpets and Arnulf and the Necromancer were carried into the hall on golden litters. The company dropped to the floor. Arnulf clapped his iron hands. The boards shook on their trestles. “Rise.”

  Signor Pandolini bowed low. “Ciao e buongiorno!” he said with a sunny smile. “I am Signor Pandolini! May I present—”

  “No,” Arnulf interrupted coldly. “Unless you mean to present the two new additions to your troupe: a grave robber’s apprentice and a countess.”

  Hans, Angela, and the Pandolinis looked at each other and bolted for the doors. Guards leaped into position, swords drawn. The company jumped back.

  “There’s no escape,” Arnulf advised calmly. “Soldiers are double-ranked behind the curtains that circle this room, and an entire garrison is stationed at both front and rear entrances to the palace. Should you dream of leaping from windows or turrets, know that the windows are barred and the lowest turret is over one hundred feet above hard cobblestones.”

  Hans stepped forward. “I’m the one you’re after. These good people knew nothing of my past. Whatever you do to me, spare them.”

  “And your little friend, too?” the Necromancer asked slyly.

  “No,” Angela said, stepping to Hans’ side. “Do with me what you will as well, but release my parents.”

  “It’s rather early in the day for pretty speeches,” Arnulf replied. “And rather late to be giving orders.”

  Signor and Signora Pandolini knelt before the archduke. “Our children. Spare our children.”

  “That’s what they all say,” Arnulf yawned. He stroked the reliquary box on the chain around his neck. “Cheer up. I’d intended to kill you all before breakfast, but since I love the circus, I’m letting you live till after the performance. How fitting—the final curtain will be your own.”

  Pandolini leaped to his feet. “O Mightiest of the Mighty, if we’re to die, let our final act be the Pandolini Transformatorium!”

  “What, pray, is the Pandolini Transformatorium?”

  “Only the greatest circus act the world has ever seen!” Pandolini declaimed. “And yet . . .” He paused dramatically. “I must deny you.”

  “Who are you to deny me?”

  “Alas, Your Highness, the Transformatorium must be constructed. We lack both tools and materials.”

  “What do you need?”

  “Two dozen wooden slats, a bolt of cheesecloth, a hammer, a saw, and nails.”

  Arnulf laughed. “That’s nothing.”

  “Please, Your Highness, refuse him,” Signora Pandolini pleaded. “Let us die in peace. Spare us the terror of the Transformatorium!”

  Arnulf cocked an eyebrow. “I delight in terror.” He turned to a soldier. “Bring the materials forthwith.” He snapped his fingers. The clang reverberated around the vaulted ceiling. Attendants sprang to the litters and conveyed the archduke and the Necromancer from the hall.

  Pandolini winked at Hans and Angela. “Remember we said we once turned a Hapsburg prince into a parrot? The Tranformatorium did the trick. Tonight, it will do one better. At my signal, our entire circus will disappear!”

  Chapter 37

  A Night at the Circus

  All day, the banquet hall was a hive of activity. The Etceteras draped fabric around the bottom of the stage, hung circus banners at the back and sides, and decorated the adjoining bear cage with bunting; Hans and Giuseppe hammered and sawed behind screens; and Angela and Maria made costumes and marionettes. Whenever soldiers came up to inspect, Signor and Signora Pandolini wailed prayers more passionate than opera and invited them to dance with Bianca.

  At last it was time for the banquet. The company clustered under a row of lamps at the foot of the trestle stage, while Arnulf and the Necromancer feasted opposite by torchlight at the mahogany table. Between them, soldiers squatted on low stools in a swath of gloom.

  Arnulf rose. The room stilled. “As all the land knows, last night the spirit world blessed me with three prophecies: I shall reign till the great forest marches on the capital; till an eagle rises from stone; and till these dead hands sail over a sea of bones!” He waved the reliquary box above his head in triumph.

  “Long live Arnulf, Archduke of Waldland!” his soldiers cheered.

  “To celebrate, I give you the Pandolini Circus!” Arnulf exulted. “Proceed, mountebanks.”

  The company took their places. The shutters on the lamps downstage were opened wide. Signor Pandolini trod the boards, his cheeks painted red, his eyelids indigo, his mustache waxed and bristling.

  “Ciao e buonasera. I am Signor Pandolini, and this is the Pandolini Circus of Dancing Bears.” (Theatrical “Oohs” from the Pandolinis in the wings.) “Tonight, you will see jugglers and acrobats.” (Theatrical “Aahs” from the backstage Pandolinis.) “Dancing bears.” (Theatrical “Grrs” from Bruno, Balthazar, and Bianca.) “Last, but not least, you will thrill to the magical Pandolini Transformatorium!” (Boisterous “Huzzahs” from the soldiers.)

  “First—acrobati! Maria, Giuseppe, and the Etceteras!” The children tumbled onstage. They juggled torches and tambourines, did cartwheels and backflips, and contorted themselves like pretzels. For their climax, they leaped on each other’s shoulders and formed three columns; the moppets on top somersaulted from one to the other. The soldiers hollered themselves hoarse.

  Pandolini flourished his cape. “Now, amici, the dancing bears!” The children scampered offstage as
Bruno, Balthazar, and Bianca roused from their lethargy. They stood on their hind paws and performed a series of pavanes, pirouettes, and promenades, while Signora Pandolini, wearing a hat of ostrich plumes and glass beads, played ballroom music on a fiddle.

  Next, Pandolini swallowed a dagger, a side sword, and a rapier. Signora Pandolini levitated a rope from a bucket. And then—

  Archduke Arnulf clapped his iron hands. “Enough. We would see the Transformatorium.”

  “Have mercy!” Pandolini begged. “It is the final act before we die. Perhaps a card trick?”

  The archduke drummed his fingers on the table. The cutlery rattled. “No.”

  Pandolini motioned his family downstage, as Hans and Angela placed the troupe’s collapsible puppet theater upstage behind them.

  Pandolini’s eyes bugged wide. “Many times I have called my children blockheads. Tonight, by means of the Pandolini Transformatorium, I shall transform them into that very thing: Blocks of wood. Marionettes.”

  Hans and Angela put a shuttered lantern on either side of the puppet theater; Signora Pandolini and her brood placed a wall of cheesecloth screens between the theater and the showman.

  “Maria! Giuseppe!” Pandolini called. Signora Pandolini and Hans opened the shutters of the upstage lanterns. As the area flooded with light, the cheesecloth seemed to disappear; Maria and Giuseppe were seen in red jerkins covered in blue ribbons.

  “Hello, Papà,” they said in unison.

  Pandolini waved a wand. “Become the blockheads you were meant to be!” The lanterns went dark; the screens became opaque. He waved the wand again. The light returned; the screens were transparent. But instead of Maria and Giuseppe, two marionettes in red jerkins with blue ribbons danced on the puppet proscenium.

  Angela pulled their strings and impersonated their pitiful voices. “Papà!” cried puppet Maria. “Papà!” cried puppet Giuseppe. The audience slapped its thighs and hooted.

  “Now, the rest of you rapscallions! Show yourselves!” Pandolini cried. The Etceteras ran onstage behind the transparent screens.

  “Begone!” Pandolini cried with a wave of his wand.

  The lights dimmed; the children vanished. A wave of the wand, and the lights returned. The children had been replaced by rows of marionettes that jumped and cavorted as Angela jiggled a grid of rods, and shrieked a babble of squeals. Even greater laughter and applause shook the hall.

  “May the newest members of my troupe present themselves,” Pandolini commanded.

  Angela stepped from behind the puppet theater in a swashbuckler’s costume. She joined Hans at center stage behind the gauze.

  “Worse than blockheads, you shall become kindling to light the archduke’s fires!” Pandolini declaimed. He scurried to the lamp abandoned by Hans. “Begone!” He and Signora Pandolini darkened the lamps. At once, the screens became opaque.

  The soldiers stared at the wall of cheesecloth. A pause became a silence.

  “Why the delay?” Arnulf called to Pandolini. “Show us their puppet selves.”

  “Un momento!” Pandolini called from behind the screens.

  More silence. The soldiers began to grumble.

  “Finish the trick!” Arnulf warned.

  “Un momento. Un momento.”

  The grumbling grew. The archduke rose. “Signor Pandolini!”

  “Sì. Un momento.” The voice was distant, muffled.

  Arnulf’s pupils twitched. “Guards!”

  Soldiers stormed the platform and ripped away the gauze screens.

  To Arnulf’s horror—the entire circus troupe had vanished!

  “What’s going on?” he cried.

  The soldiers smashed the puppet theater. They tore down the banners and threw open the curtains around the hall. There was no one there but the archduke’s troops, ringing the walls and cramming the staircases.

  “Where are they?” Arnulf screamed.

  The Necromancer polished his doorknobs. “They haven’t gone up, and they haven’t gone out. That can mean only one thing.”

  “What?” Arnulf shrieked.

  “They’ve gone down.”

  “Down?” Arnulf exploded. He threw over the dining table, strode to the stage, and yanked away the fabric that hung from the trestles. There, under the platform, he saw Signora Pandolini desperately trying to squash her husband’s rump through a hole in the floorboards.

  “They’ve sawed an exit beneath the stage!” Arnulf raged. “They’ve dropped into a secret passageway! They’re scurrying through my palace like rats!”

  A soldier grabbed Signora Pandolini by the elbows. Two more seized Signor Pandolini by the legs and tried to pry him from the hole.

  “The children are still trapped, Excellency,” the Necromancer soothed. “There’s a garrison at both front and rear gates, the windows are barred, and a leap from the turrets is death. Besides, the spirits have decreed that you shall reign till the great forest marches on the capital; till an eagle rises from stone; and till your severed hands sail over a sea of bones.”

  “Indeed. I’ve nothing to fear,” Arnulf murmured, an oily sweat dripping from his chin. He turned to a dozen of his soldiers. “Take the mountebanks to the dungeon. If they fail to reveal the children’s plans, toss them in the bear cage with their beasts and starve the monsters till they feed upon their masters.” He turned to the rest. “Block every corridor while the chancellor and I pop down the rabbit hole. We’ll find them as easily as eggs on an Easter hunt.”

  Chapter 38

  Escape of the Bambini

  Angela raced the Pandolini children along secret passageways and stairs to the fifth floor. The dark held no terror. The previous night had taught her how to measure distance, and the children could juggle axes blindfolded. Angela thought of Hans, off on a perilous mission of his own, and of the bravery of Signor and Signora Pandolini. Their plan to use the showman’s bottom to block Arnulf’s pursuit had bought her precious time.

  Angela scrambled out of a painting in the art gallery, a room filled with portraits and tapestries of the archduke’s wives: Georgina in a bathtub, Isabella leaning over a parapet, and the last archduchess tumbling toward a set of doors with bronze knobs like the archduke’s hands.

  “Rapidamente!” she called to the children. They dashed after her to the archway at the end of the gallery and up the stairs beyond. At the top was a door. Angela undid the bolts and threw it open. True to the map, they’d arrived on the roof of the east turret, well out of sight of the palace entrances.

  The stone railing was ringed with gargoyles. Angela leaned over. The cobblestones below looked as far away as home.

  The Pandolini children whipped magician’s scarves from their sleeves and knotted the ends together. Six feet of scarves from each of the twelve meant seventy-two feet of silk rope, far short of what was needed.

  Giuseppe saw the fear in Angela’s eyes and winked. He tied one end of the silk rope around a winged gargoyle. Then he threw the rest of the rope over the turret, made a loop for his arm, and slid down its length. He clung to the bottom while the largest of his brothers slid down after him. They hooked their legs together, Giuseppe’s brother now hanging below him, head to the cobblestones.

  The next in height followed, locking arms with Giuseppe’s brother; and then the next, locking legs with the third to make a chain of four. So it went by height and strength, the Pandolini children linking arms and legs, each body bringing the chain closer to the ground. The last on the chain swayed near the pavement.

  It was Angela’s turn. There was no time to lose. Giuseppe could barely hang on—and there were soldiers’ shouts coming from the gallery.

  Angela hopped over the turret roof and slipped down the rope, six brothers, and several of the sisters. Approaching the ground, she felt the little locked limbs begin to fail. She jumped, scraping her hands on the cobblestones.

  No matter. She hopped to her feet and stood beneath the chain of children. “Ora,” she cried to the tiniest Pandolini, who un
locked her legs and fell into Angela’s arms. The second and third followed suit. Angela linked arms with the trio and caught the fourth and fifth. Now the five Pandolinis on the ground pressed their backs to the palace wall and climbed on each other’s shoulders, the strongest on the bottom.

  The human pillar rose higher than the lowest child left dangling. The girl unlocked her legs and slid down her siblings to the ground. A brother followed. The pillar regrouped, with the stronger new arrivals at the base. Three more of the danglers slid down.

  There was a quick regroup as Arnulf and his soldiers poured onto the turret roof. No sooner had Giuseppe’s last brother let go of his legs and shimmied away than Arnulf raised his sword. He severed the rope as Giuseppe, too, slid down his siblings to safety.

  Arnulf watched the pillar of children melt from top to bottom. Enraged, he smashed a gargoyle with his fist. Chunks of stone crashed to the cobblestones, but all Arnulf heard was the sound of children’s laughter disappearing into the mist.

  Chapter 39

  Into the Dungeon

  Meanwhile, Hans was feeling every lurch and rumble as soldiers rolled the bear cage down the circular ramp from the banquet hall to the dungeon. With everyone focused on the Transformatorium, he’d slipped from the wings to the back of the bear cage. There, under cover of darkness and bunting, he’d fiddled the prop lock and petted his way into the wagon’s crawl space.

  Hans wished he were with Angela, but he had a role to play. Signor and Signora Pandolini had guessed that Arnulf would send them and their bears to the dungeon; Hans had volunteered to hide in the crawl space and rescue them. He had someone else to save as well: his other papa, Knobbe.

  Now, as the cage rattled into the fetid underworld, Hans seized his purpose: to forge from the terrible things he’d endured a life heroic. He’d save his friends and his papa. If he lived, he’d save the archduchy, too, and restore his father, Peter the Hermit—Archduke Fredrick—to the throne.