 This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to find out how you can volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. The Enchanted Castle by E. Nesbitt. Recorded by Peter Eastman. Chapter 6 Johnson was the hero of the hour. It was he who had tracked the burglars, laid his plans, and recovered the lost silver. He had not thrown the stone. A public opinion decided that Mabel and her aunt must have been mistaken in supposing that there was a stone at all. But he did not deny the warning letter. It was Gerald who went out after breakfast to buy the newspaper, and who read aloud to the others the two columns of fiction which were the Little's Bee Observer's report of the facts. As he read, every mouth opened wider and wider, and when he ceased with, this gifted fellow townsman with detective instincts which outrival those of Monsieur's Lacochin homes and whose promotion is now assured, there was quite a blank silence. Well, said Jimmy, breaking it, he doesn't stick it on, neither, does he? I feel, said Kathleen, as if it was our fault, as if it was us had told all these whoppers, because if it hadn't been for you they couldn't have, Jerry. How could he say all that? Well, said Gerald, trying to be fair, you know, after all, the chap had to say something. I'm glad I— He stopped abruptly. You're glad you what? No matter, said he, with an air of putting away affairs of state. Now, what are we going to do today? The faithful Mabel approaches. She will want her ring. And you and Jimmy want it too. Oh, I know. Mademoiselle hasn't had any attention paid to her for more days than our hero likes to confess. I wish you wouldn't always call yourself our hero, said Jimmy. You aren't mine anyhow. You're both of you mine, said Kathleen hastily. Good little girl. Gerald smiled annoyly. Keep baby brother in a good temper till nurse comes back. You're not going out without us, Kathleen asked in haste. I haste away, tis market day, sank Gerald, and in the market there by roses for my fare. If you want to come to, get your boots on, and look slippy about it. I don't want to come, said Jimmy, and sniffed. Kathleen turned a despairing look on Gerald. Oh, James, James, said Gerald sadly. How difficult you make it for me to forget that you're my little brother. If ever I treat you like one of the other chaps and rot you like I should turn her or moberly or any of my pals, well this is what comes of it. You don't call them your baby brothers, said Jimmy, and truly. No, and I'll take precious good care I don't call you it again. Come on, my hero and heroine, the devoted messurer is your salaming slave. The three met Mabel, opportunity, at the corner of the square, where every Friday the stalls and the awnings and the green umbrellas were pitched, and poultry, pork, pottery, vegetables, drapery, sweets, toys, tools, mirrors, and all sorts of other interesting merchandise were spread out on trestle tables, piled on carts whose horses were stabled and whose shafts were held in place by piled wooden cases, or laid out, as in the case of crockery and hardware, on the bare flagstones of the market place. The sun was shining with great goodwill, and as Mabel remarked, all nature looked smiling and gay. There were a few bunches of flowers among the vegetables, and the children hesitated, balanced in choice. Minionette is sweet, said Mabel. Roses are roses, said Kathleen. Carnations are tuppence, said Jimmy, and Gerald, sniffing among the bunches of tightly tied tea roses, agreed that this settled it. So the carnations were bought, a bunch of yellow ones like sulfur, a bunch of white ones like clotted cream, and a bunch of red ones like the cheeks of the doll that Kathleen never played with. They took the carnations home, and Kathleen's green hair ribbon came in beautifully for tying them up, which was hastily done on the doorstep. Then discreetly Gerald knocked at the door of the drawing-room, where Mademoiselle seemed to sit all day. Entrez came her voice, and Gerald entered. She was not reading as usual, but bent over a sketchbook. On the table was an open-colour box of un-English appearance, and a box of that slate-coloured liquid so familiar alike to the greatest artist in watercolours, and to the humblest child with a six-penny paint-box. "'With all of our loves,' said Gerald, laying the flowers down suddenly before her. "'But it is that you are a dear child. For this it must that I embrace you, no.' And before Gerald could explain that he was too old, she kissed him with little quick French pecs on the two cheeks. "'Are you painting?' he asked hurriedly, to hide his annoyance at being treated like a baby. "'I achieve a sketch of yesterday,' she answered. And before he had time to wonder what yesterday would look like in a picture, she showed him a beautiful and exact sketch of Yolding Towers. "'Oh, I say! Ripping!' was the critic's comment. "'I say! May the others come and see?' The others came, including Mabel, who stood awkwardly behind the rest, and looked over Jimmy's shoulder. "'I say! You are clever,' said Gerald respectfully. "'To what good to have the talent when one must pass one's life at teaching the infants?' said Madame Moselle. "'It must be fairly beastly,' Gerald owned. "'You too, see the design?' Madame Moselle asked Mabel, adding, "'A friend from the town, yes?' "'How do you do?' said Mabel politely. "'No, I'm not from the town. I live at Yolding Towers. The name seemed to impress Madame Moselle very much. Gerald anxiously hoped in his own mind that she was not a snob.' "'Yolding Towers,' she repeated. "'But this is very extraordinary. Is it possible that you are then of the family of Lord Yolding?' "'He hasn't any family,' said Mabel. He's not married.' "'I would say, are you—how you say—cousin, sister, niece?' "'No,' said Mabel, flushing hotly. "'I'm nothing grand at all. I'm Lord Yolding's housekeeper's niece.' "'But you know Lord Yolding, is it not?' "'No,' said Mabel, I've never seen him. He comes then never to his chateau. Not since I've lived there, but he's coming next week.' "'Why lives he not there?' Madame Moselle asked. "'Auntie says he's too poor,' said Mabel, and proceeded to tell the tale as she had heard it in the housekeeper's room. How Lord Yolding's uncle had left all the money he could leave away from Lord Yolding to Lord Yolding's second cousin, and poor Lord Yolding had only just enough to keep the old place in repair and to live very quietly indeed somewhere else, but not enough to keep the house open or to live there, and how he couldn't sell the house because it was in-tail.' "'What is it then, in-tail?' asked Madame Moselle. "'In a tale that the lawyers write out,' said Mabel, proud of her knowledge, and flattered by the deep interest of the French governess, and when once they've put your house in one of their tales you can't sell it or give it away, but you have to leave it to your son even if you don't want to.' "'But how his uncle could be so cruel to leave him the chateau and no money?' Madame Moselle asked. And Kathleen and Jimmy stood amazed at the sudden keenness of her interest in what seemed to them the dullest story. "'Oh, I can tell you that, too,' said Mabel. Lord Yolding wanted to marry a lady his uncle didn't want him to, a barmaid or a ballet lady or something, and he wouldn't give her up, and his uncle said, well then, and left everything to the cousin. "'And you say he is not married?' "'No, the lady went into a convent. I expect she's bricked up alive by now.' "'Bricked?' "'In a wall, you know,' said Mabel, pointing explainingly at the pink and gilt roses of the wallpaper. "'Shut up to kill them. That's what they do to you in convents.' "'Not at all,' said Madame Moselle. "'In convents are very kind, good women. There is but one thing in convents that is detestable, the locks on the doors. Sometimes people cannot get out, especially when they are very young, and the relations have placed them there for their welfare and happiness. "'But, Brick, how you say it, and walling ladies to kill them?' "'No, it does itself never.' "'And this Lord, he did not then seek his lady?' "'Oh, yes, he sought her right enough.' Mabel assured her. "'But there are millions of convents, you know, and he had no idea where to look and he sent back his letters from the post-office and— "'C'ye,' cried Madame Moselle. "'But it seems that one knows all in the housekeeper's saloon.' "'Pretty well all,' said Mabel simply. "'And you think he will find her? No.' "'Oh, he'll find her all right,' said Mabel, when he's old and broken down, you know, and dying, and then a gentle sister of charity will soothe his pillow, and just when he's dying she'll reveal herself and say, my own lost love, and his face will light up with a wonderful joy, and he'll expire with her beloved name on his parched lips.' Madame Moselle's was the silence of sheer astonishment. "'You do the prophecy, it appears?' she said at last. "'Oh, no,' said Mabel. "'I got that out of a book. "'I can tell you lots more fatal love stories any time you like.' The French governess gave a little jump, as though she had suddenly remembered something. "'It is nearly dinner time,' she said. "'Your friend, Mabel, yes, will be your convivial, and in her honour we will make a little feast. "'My beautiful flowers, put them to the water, Kathleen. "'I run to buy the cakes. "'Wash the hands all and be ready when I return.' Smiling and nodding to the children, she left them and ran up the stairs. "'Just as if she was young,' said Kathleen. "'She is young,' said Mabel. "'Heaps of ladies have offers of marriage when they're no younger than her. "'I've seen lots of weddings, too, with much older brides. "'And why didn't you tell me she was so beautiful?' "'Is she?' asked Kathleen. "'Of course she is. "'And what a darling to think of cakes for me, and calling me a convivial.' "'Look here,' said Gerald. "'I call this jolly decent of her. "'You know, governesses never have more "'than the meanest pittance, just enough to sustain life. "'And here she is spending her little all on us. "'Supposing we just don't go out today, "'but play with her instead. "'I expect she's most awfully bored, really.' "'Would she really like it?' Kathleen wondered. "'On Emily says grown-ups never really like playing. "'They do it to please us.' "'They little know,' Gerald answered. "'How often we do it to please them.' "'We've got to do that dressing up "'with the Prince's clothes anyhow. "'We said we would,' said Kathleen. "'Let's treat her to that.' "'Rather near tea-time,' urged Jimmy, "'so that there'll be a fortunate interruption "'and the play won't go on forever.' "'I suppose all the things are safe,' Mabel asked. "'Quite. I told you where I put them. "'Come on, Jimmy. Let's help lay the table. "'We'll get Eliza to put out the best china.' "'They went.' "'It was lucky,' said Gerald, "'struck by a sudden thought, "'that the burglars didn't go for the diamonds "'in the treasure chamber.' "'They couldn't,' said Mabel, almost in a whisper. "'They didn't know about them. "'I don't believe anybody knows about them except me, "'and you, and you're sworn to secrecy.' "'This, you will remember, "'had been done almost at the beginning. "'I know Aunt doesn't know. "'We just found out the spring by accident. "'Lord Yalding's kept the secret well.' "'I wish I'd got a secret like that to keep,' said Gerald. "'If the burglars do know,' said Mabel, "'it'll all come out at the trial. "'Lawyers make you tell everything you know at trials, "'and a lot of lies besides.' "'There won't be any trial,' said Gerald, "'kicking the leg of the piano thoughtfully.' "'No trial?' "'It's said in the paper,' Gerald went on slowly. "'The miscreants must have received warning "'from a confederate for the admirable preparations "'to arrest them as they returned "'for their ill-gotten plunder were unavailing, "'but the police have a clue.' "'What a pity,' said Mabel. "'You needn't worry. "'They haven't got any old clue,' said Gerald, "'still attentive to the piano leg.' "'I didn't mean the clue. I meant the confederate.' "'It's a pity you think he's a pity, because he was me,' said Gerald, standing up and leaving the piano leg alone. "'He looked straight before him, "'as the boy on the burning deck may have looked.' "'I couldn't help it,' he said. "'I know you'll think I'm a criminal, "'but I couldn't do it. "'I don't know how detectives can. "'I went over a prison once with father, "'and after I'd given the tip to Johnson I remembered that, "'and I just couldn't. "'I know I'm a beast and not worthy to be a British citizen.' "'I think it was rather nice of you,' said Mabel kindly. "'How did you warn them?' "'I just shoved a paper under the man's door, "'the one that I knew where he lived, to tell him to lie low.' "'Oh, do tell me. What did you put on it exactly?' Mabel warmed to this new interest. "'It said, the police know all except your names. "'Be virtuous, and you are safe. "'But if there's any more burgling, I shall split, "'and you may rely on that from a friend.' "'I know it was wrong, but I couldn't help it. "'Don't tell the others. They wouldn't understand why I did it. "'I don't understand it myself.' "'I do,' said Mabel. "'It's because you've got a kind and noble heart.' "'Kind fiddlestick, my good child,' said Gerald, "'suddenly losing the burning boy expression "'and becoming in a flash entirely himself. "'Cut along and wash your hands. You're as black as ink.' "'So are you,' said Mabel, "'and I'm not. It's dye with me.' "'Andy was dying a blouse this morning. "'It told you how in home drivel, "'and she's as black as ink too, and the blouse is all streaky. "'Pity, the ring won't make just parts of you invisible. "'The dirt, for instance.' "'Perhaps,' Gerald said unexpectedly, "'it won't make even all of you invisible again.' "'Why not? You haven't been doing anything to it, have you?' Mabel sharply asked. "'No, but didn't you notice you were invisible twenty-one hours?' "'I was fourteen hours invisible and Eliza only seven. "'That's seven less each time, and now we've come to... "'How frightfully good you are at sums,' said Mabel, aww, struck. "'You see, it's got seven hours less each time, "'and seven from seven is not. "'It's got to be something different this time. "'And then afterwards, it can't be minus seven "'because I don't see how, unless it made you more visible, "'thicker, you know.' "'Don't,' said Mabel. "'You make my head go round.' "'And there's another odd thing,' Gerald went on. "'When you're invisible, your relations don't love you. "'Look at your aunt, and Kathy never turning a hair "'at me going burgling. "'We haven't got to the bottom of that ring yet. "'Crikey, here's mademoiselle with the cakes. "'Run, bold bandits! Wash for your lives!' They ran. "'It was not cakes only. "'It was plums and grapes and jam tarts "'and soda water and raspberry vinegar "'and chocolates in pretty boxes "'and pure, thick, rich cream in brown jugs. "'Also, a bunch of roses.' "'Mademoiselle was strangely merry, for a governess. "'She served out the cakes and tarts with a liberal hand, "'made wreaths of the flowers for all their heads. "'She was not eating much herself. "'Dreamt the health of Mabel as the guest of the day "'in the beautiful pink drink "'that comes from mixing raspberry vinegar and soda water "'and then she persuaded Jimmy to wear his wreath "'on the ground that the Greek gods, "'as well as the goddesses, always wore wreaths at a feast. "'There never was such a feast "'provided by any French governess "'since French governesses began. "'There were jokes and stories and laughter. "'Jimmy showed all those tricks "'with forks and quarks and matches and apples "'which are so deservedly popular. "'Mademoiselle told them stories of her own school days "'when she was a quite little girl with two tight tresses. "'So?' "'And when they could not understand the tresses "'called for paper and pencil "'and drew the loveliest little picture of herself "'when she was a child with two short fat pigtails "'sticking out from her head "'like knitting needles from a ball of dark worsted. "'Then she drew pictures of everything they asked for. "'Tom Abel pulled Gerald's jacket and whispered, "'The acting. "'Draw us the front of a theater,' said Gerald tactfully, "'a French theater. "'They are the same thing as the English theaters,' "'Mademoiselle told him. "'Do you like acting? "'The theater, I mean. "'But yes, I love it. "'All right,' said Gerald briefly, "'we'll act a play for you. "'Now, this afternoon if you like.' "'Elisa will be washing up,' Kathy whispered, "'and she was promised to see it.' "'Or this evening,' said Gerald, "'and please, Mademoiselle, may Eliza come in and look on.' "'But certainly,' said Mademoiselle, "'amuse yourselves well, my children.' "'But it's you,' said Mabel suddenly, "'that we want to amuse, because we love you very much. "'Don't we, all of you?' "'Yes,' the chorus came unhesitatingly. "'Though the others would never have thought "'of saying such a thing on their own account. "'Yet, as Mabel said it, "'they found to their surprise that it was true.' "'Dear,' said Mademoiselle, "'you love the old French governess? "'Impossible.' And she spoke rather indistinctly. "'You're not old,' said Mabel. "'At least not so very,' she added brightly, "'and you're as lovely as a princess.' "'Go then, flutterous,' said Mademoiselle, laughing, "'and Mabel went. "'The others were already halfway up the stairs.' Mademoiselle sat in the drawing-room as usual, and it was a good thing that she was not engaged in serious study, for it seemed that the door opened and shut almost ceaselessly all throughout the afternoon. Might they have the embroidered anti-McCassers and the sofa cushions? Might they have the clothesline out of the wash-house? Eliza said they mighted, but might they? Might they have the sheepskin hearthrug? Might they have tea in the garden, because they had almost got the stage ready in the dining-room, and Eliza wanted to set tea? Could Mademoiselle lend them any colored clothes, scarves or dressing-gowns or anything bright? Yes, Mademoiselle could, and did. Silk things, surprisingly lovely for a governess to have. Had Mademoiselle any rouge, they had always heard that French ladies, no, Mademoiselle hadn't. And to judge by the color of her face, Mademoiselle didn't need it. Did Mademoiselle think the chemists sold rouge, or had she any false hair to spare? At this challenge Mademoiselle's pale fingers pulled out a dozen hairpins, and down came the loveliest blue-black hair, hanging to her knees in straight, heavy lines. No, you terrible infants! She cried, I have not the false hair nor the rouge, and my teeth, you want them also without doubt? She showed them in a laugh. I said you were a princess, said Mabel, and now I know, you're a punzel. Do always wear your hair like that. May we have the peacock fans, please, off the mantelpiece, and the things that loop back the curtains and all the handkerchiefs you've got? Mademoiselle denied them nothing. They had the fans and the handkerchiefs and some large sheets of expensive drawing paper out of the school cupboard, and Mademoiselle's best sable paintbrush and her paint box. Who would have thought, murmured Gerald, pensively sucking the brush and gazing at the paper mask he had just painted, that she was such a brick in disguise? I wonder why Crimson Lake always tastes just like Liebig's extract. Everything was pleasant that day somehow. There are some days like that, you know, when everything goes well from the very beginning. All the things you want are in their places. Nobody misunderstands you, and all that you do turns out admirably. How different from those other days, which we all know too well. When your shoelace breaks, your comb is mislaid, your brush spins on its back on the floor and lands under the bed where you can't get at it. You drop the soap, your buttons come off, an eyelash gets into your eye. You have used your last clean handkerchief. Your collar is frayed at the edge and cuts into your neck. And at the very last moment, your suspender breaks and there is no string. On such a day as this, you are naturally late for breakfast and everyone thinks you did it on purpose. And the day goes on and on getting worse and worse. You mislay your exercise book, you drop your arithmetic in the mud, your pencil breaks, and when you open your knife to sharpen the pencil, you split your nail. On such a day, you jam your thumb in doors and muddle the messages you are sent on by grown-ups. You upset your tea and your bread and butter won't hold together for a moment. And when at last you get to bed, usually in disgrace, it is no comfort at all to you to know that not a single bit of it is your own fault. This day was not one of those days, as you will have noticed. Even the tea in the garden, there was a bricked bit of a rockery that made a steady floor for the tea table, was most delightful, though the thoughts of four out of the five were busy with the coming play. And the fifth had thoughts of her own that had nothing to do with tea or acting. Then there was an interval of slamming doors, interesting silences, feet that flew up and downstairs. It was still good daylight when the dinner bell rang. The signal had been agreed upon at tea time and carefully explained to Eliza. Mademoiselle laid down her book and passed out of the sunset yellowed hall into the faint yellow gaslight of the dining room. The giggling Eliza held the door open before her and followed her in. The shutters had been closed. Streaks of daylight showed above and below them. The green and black tablecloths of the school dining tables were supported on the clothesline from the backyard. The line sagged in a graceful curve, but it answered the purpose of supporting the curtains which concealed that part of the room which was the stage. Rows of chairs had been placed across the other end of the room, all the chairs in the house as it seemed, and Mademoiselle started violently when she saw that fully half a dozen of these chairs were occupied and by the queerest people too. An old woman with a poke bonnet tied under her chin with a red handkerchief, a lady in a large straw hat wreathed in flowers and the oddest hands that stuck out over the chair in front of her. Several men with strange clumsy figures and all with hats on. But, whispered Mademoiselle through the chinks of the tablecloths, you have then invited other friends. You should have asked me, my children. Laughter and something like a hurrah answered her from behind the folds of the courtoning tablecloths. All right, Mademoiselle Rapunzel, cried Mabel, turned the gas up, it's only part of the entertainment. Eliza, still giggling, pushed through the lines of chairs, knocking off the hat of one of the visitors as she did so, and turned up the three incandescent burners. Mademoiselle looked at the figure seated nearest to her, stooped to look more closely, half laughed, quite screamed, and sat down suddenly. Oh! she cried, they are not alive. Eliza, with a much louder scream, had found out the same thing and announced it differently. They ain't got no insides, said she. The seven members of the audience seated among the wilderness of chairs had indeed no insides to speak of. Their bodies were bolsters and rolled-up blankets. Their spines were broom handles. Their arm and leg bones were hockey sticks and umbrellas. Their shoulders were the wooden crosspieces that Mademoiselle used for keeping her jackets in shape. Their hands were gloves, stuffed out with handkerchiefs. And their faces were the paper masks painted in the afternoon by the untutored brush of Gerald, tied on to the round heads made of the ends of stuffed bolster cases. The faces were really rather dreadful. Gerald had done his best, but even after his best had been done you would hardly have known they were faces, some of them, if they hadn't been in the positions which faces usually occupy between the collar and the hat. Their eyebrows were furious with lamp-black frowns. Their eyes, the size, and almost the shape of five shilling-pieces and on their lips and cheeks had been spent much crimson lake and nearly the whole of a half pan of vermilion. You have made yourselves an auditor's, yes? Bravo!" cried Mademoiselle, recovering herself and beginning to clap. And to the sound of that clapping the curtain went up, or rather apart. A voice said in a breathless choked way, beauty and the beast, and the stage was revealed. It was a real stage, too. The dining-tables pushed close together and covered with pink and white counterpains. It was a little unsteady and creaky to walk on, but very imposing to look at. The scene was simple but convincing. A big sheet of cardboard bent square with slits cut in it and a candle behind represented, quite transparently, the domestic hearth. A round hat-tin of Eliza's, supported on a stool with a nightlight under it, could not have been mistaken save by willful malice for anything but a copper. A waste-paper basket with two or three school-dusters and an overcoat in it and a pair of blue pajamas over the back of a chair finishing touch to the scene. It did not need the announcement from the wings. The laundry at beauty's home. It was so plainly a laundry and nothing else. In the wings. They look just like a real audience, don't they? whispered Mabel. Go on, Jimmy, don't forget the merchant has to be pompous and use long words. Jimmy enlarged by pillows under Gerald's best overcoat, which had been intentionally bought with a view to his probable growth during the two years which it was intended to last him. A Turkish towel-turban on his head and an open umbrella over it opened the first act in a simple and swift soliloquy. I am the most unlucky merchant that ever was. I was once the richest merchant in Baghdad, but I lost all my ships and now I live in a poor house that is all two bits. You can see how the rain comes through the roof and my daughter's taken washing and the paws might have seemed long, but Gerald rustled in, elegant in Mademoiselle's pink dressing gown and the character of the eldest daughter. A nice drying day, he minced. Padir put the umbrella the other way up. It'll save us going out in the rain to fetch water. Come on, sisters, dear fathers got us a new wash tub. Here's luxury! Round the umbrella, now held the wrong way up, the three sisters knelt and washed imaginary linen. Kathleen wore a violet skirt of Eliza's, a blue blouse of her own, and a cap of knotted handkerchiefs. A white nightdress, hurt with a white apron and two red carnations in Mabel's black hair, left no doubt as to which of the three was beauty. The scene went very well. The final dance with waving towels was all that there is of charming, Mademoiselle said, and Eliza was so much amused that, as she said, she got quite a nasty stitch along of laughing so hardy. You know pretty well what beauty and the beast would be like acted by four children who had spent the afternoon in arranging their costumes and so had left no time for rehearsing what they had to say. Yet it delighted them and it charmed their audience. And what more can any play do, even Shakespeare's? Mabel, in her princess clothes, was a resplendent beauty, and Gerald, a beast who wore the drawing-room hearthrugs with an air of indescribable distinction. If Jimmy was not a talkative merchant, he made it up with a stoutness practically unlimited, and Kathleen surprised and delighted even herself by the quickness with which she changed from one to the other of the minor characters— fairies, servants, and messengers. It was at the end of the second act that Mabel, whose costume, having reached the height of elegance, could not be bettered, and therefore did not need to be changed, said to Gerald, sweltering under the weighty magnificence of his beast's skin. I say you might let us have the ring back. I'm going to, said Gerald, who had quite forgotten it. I'll give it you in the next scene. Only, don't lose it or go putting it on. You might go out altogether and never be seen again. Or you might get seven times as visible as anyone else so that all the rest of us would look like shadows beside you. You'd be so thick. Or— Ready, said Kathleen, bustling in, once more a wicked sister. Gerald managed to get his hand into his pocket under his heart-rug, and when he rolled his eyes in agonies of sentiment and said, Fair well, dear beauty, return quickly, for if you remain long absent from your faithful beast he will assuredly perish. He pressed a ring into her hand and added, This is a magic ring that will give you anything you wish. When you desire to return to your own disinterested beast put on the ring and utter your wish. Instantly you will be by my side. Beauty Mabel took the ring, and it was the ring. The curtains closed to warm applause from two pairs of hands. The next scene went splendidly. The sisters were almost too natural in their disagreeableness, and Beauty's annoyance when they splashed her princess's dress with real soap and water was considered a miracle of good acting. Even the merchant rose to something more than mere pillows, and the curtain fell on his pathetic assurance that in the absence of his dear beauty he was wasting away to a shadow. And again two pairs of hands applauded. Here Mabel catch hold, Gerald appealed, from under the weight of a towel-horse, the tea-earn, the tea-tray, and the Green Bay's apron of the boot-boy, which together with four red geraniums from the landing the pompous grass from the drawing-room fireplace and the India rubber-plants from the drawing-room window were to represent the fountains and garden of the last act. The applause had died away. I wish, said Mabel, taking on herself the weight of the tea-earn, I wish those creatures we made were alive, we should get something like applause then. I'm jolly glad they aren't, said Gerald, arranging the bay's into the towel-horse. Brutes, it makes me feel quite silly when I catch their paper eyes. The curtains were drawn back. There lay the hearth-rug-coated beast in flat abandonment among the tropic beauties of the garden, the pompous grass shrubbery, the India rubber-plant bushes, the geranium trees, and the urn fountain. Beauty was ready to make her great entry in all the thrilling splendor of despair. And then, suddenly, it all happened. Mademoiselle began it. She applauded the garden scene with hurried little clappings of her quick French hands. Eliza's fat-red palms followed heavily. And then, someone else was clapping, six or seven people, and their clapping made a dull padded sound. Nine faces instead of two were turned towards the stage, and seven out of the nine were painted, pointed paper faces. And every hand and every face was alive. The applause grew louder as Mabel glided forward. And as she paused and looked at the audience, her unstudied pose of horror and amazement drew forth applause louder still. But it was not loud enough to drown the shrieks of Mademoiselle and Eliza as they rushed from the room, knocking chairs over and crashing each other in the doorway. Two distant doors banged. Mademoiselle's door and Eliza's door. Curtain, curtain, quick! cried Beauty Mabel in a voice that wasn't Mabel's or the beauty's. Jerry, those things have come alive. Oh, whatever shall we do? Gerald in his hearth rugs leaped to his feet. Again that flat padded applause marked the swish of clothes on clothesline as Jimmy and Kathleen drew the curtains. What's up? they asked as they drew. You've done it this time, said Gerald to the pink perspiring Mabel. Oh, bother these strings. Can't you bust them? I've done it, retorted Mabel. I like that. More than I do, said Gerald. Oh, it's all right, said Mabel. Come on, we must go and pull the things to pieces then they can't go on being alive. It's your fault anyhow, said Gerald with every possible absence of gallantry. Don't you see? It's turned into a wishing ring. I knew something different was going to happen. Get my knife out of my pocket. The strings in a knot. Jimmy, Kathy, those ugly wugglies have come alive because Mabel wished it. Cut out and pull them to pieces. Jimmy and Kathy peeped through the curtain and recoiled with white faces and staring eyes. Not me, was the brief rejoinder of Jimmy. Kathy said, Not much! And she meant it. Anyone could see that. And now, as Gerald, almost free of the hearthrugs, broke his thumbnail on the stiffest blade of his knife, a thick rustling and a sharp, heavy stumping sounded beyond the curtain. They're going out! screamed Kathleen, walking out on their umbrella and broomstick legs. You can't stop them, Jerry. They're too awful. Everybody in the town will be insane by tomorrow night if we don't stop them, cried Gerald. Here, give me the ring. I'll unwish them. He caught the ring from the unresisting Mabel, cried, I wish the uglies weren't alive, and tore through the door. He saw, in fancy, Mabel's wish undone. And the empty hall strewed with limp bolsters, hats, umbrellas, coats, and gloves, prone, abject properties, from which the brief life had gone out forever. But the hall was crowded with live things, strange things. All horribly short as broomsticks and umbrellas are short. A limp hand gesticulated. A pointed white face with red cheeks looked up at him, and wide red lips said something he could not tell what. The voice reminded him of the old beggar down by the bridge who had no roof to his mouth. These creatures had no roofs to their mouths, of course. They had no A u re o me mi u a u a l, said the voice again. And it had said it four times, before Gerald could collect himself sufficiently to understand that this horror, alive and most likely quite uncontrollable, was saying with a dreadful, calm, polite persistence, can you recommend me to a good hotel? End of chapter 6. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information, or to find out how you can volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. The Enchanted Castle by E. Nesbitt. Recorded by Peter Eastman. Chapter 7 Can you recommend me to a good hotel? The speaker had no inside to his head. Gerald had the best of reasons for knowing it. The speaker's coat had no shoulders inside it. Only the cross-bar that a jacket is slung on by careful ladies. The hand raised in interrogation was not a hand at all. It was a glove, lumpily stuffed with pocket anchor-chiefs. And the arm attached to it was only Kathleen's school umbrella. Yet the whole thing was alive and was asking a definite, and for anybody else, anybody who really was a body, a reasonable question. With a sensation of inward sinking, Gerald realized that now or never was the time for him to rise to the occasion. And at the thought, he inwardly sank more deeply than before. It seemed impossible to rise in the very smallest degree. I beg your pardon, was absolutely the best he could do. And the painted, pointed paper face turned to him once more, and once more said, A u re o me mi u a u a l? You want a hotel? Gerald repeated stupidly. A good hotel? A u o l, reiterated the painted lips. I'm awfully sorry, Gerald went on. One can always be polite, of course, whatever happens, and politeness came natural to him. But all our hotels shut so early, about eight, I think. Ock-a-mer, said the ugly wugly. Gerald even now does not understand how that practical joke, hastily wrought of hat, overcoat, paper face, and limp hands, could have managed, by just being alive, to become perfectly respectable, apparently about fifty years old, and obviously well-known and respected in his own suburb, the kind of man who travels first-class, and smokes expensive cigars. Gerald knew this time, without need of repetition, that the ugly wugly had said, Knock him up. You can't, Gerald explained. They're all stone deaf. Every single person who keeps a hotel in this town, it's... He wildly plunged. It's a county council law. Only deaf people are allowed to keep hotels. It's because of the hops in the beer, he found himself adding. You know, hops are so good for earache. I owe I aloo, said the respectable ugly wugly, and Gerald was not surprised to find that the thing did not quite follow him. It is a little difficult at first, he said. The other ugly wuglies were crowding round. The lady in the poke bonnet said. Gerald found he was getting quite clever at understanding the conversation of those who had no roofs to their mouths. If not a hotel, a lodging. My lodging is on the cold ground, sang itself unbidden and unavailing in Gerald's ear. Yet stay. Was it unavailing? I do know a lodging, he said slowly, but... The tallest of the ugly wuglies pushed forward. He was dressed in the old brown overcoat and top hat, always hung on the school hat stand to discourage possible burglars by deluding them into the idea that there was a gentleman of the house and that he was at home. He had an heir at once more sporting and less reserved than that of the first speaker, and anyone could see that he was not quite a gentleman. While I was all he began, but the lady ugly wugly and the flower wreathed hat interrupted him. She spoke more distinctly than the others, owing, as Gerald found afterwards, to the fact that her mouth had been drawn open and the flap cut from the aperture had been folded back so that she really had something like a roof to her mouth, though it was only a paper one. What I want to know, Gerald understood her to say, is where are the carriages we ordered? I don't know, said Gerald, but I'll find out. But we ought to be moving, he added. You see, the performance is over and they want to shut up the house and put the lights out. Let's be moving. Eh, a ki ue, repeated the respectable ugly wugly and stepped towards the front door. Ua-mu, said the flower wreathed one, and Gerald assures me that her vermilion lips stretched in a smile. I shall be delighted, said Gerald with earnest courtesy, to do anything, of course. Things do happen so awkwardly when you least expect it. I could go with you and get you a lodging if you'd only wait a few moments in the, in the yard. It's quite a superior sort of yard, he went on, as a wave of surprised disdain passed over their white paper faces. Not a common yard, you know. The pump, he added madly, has just been painted green all over, and the dustbin is enameled iron. The ugly wuglies turned to each other in consultation, and Gerald gathered that the greenness of the pump and the enameled character of the dustbin made, in their opinion, all the difference. I'm awfully sorry, he urged eagerly, to have to ask you to wait, but you see, I've got an uncle who's quite mad, and I have to give him his gruel at half-past nine. He won't feed out of any hand but mine. Gerald did not mind what he said. The only people one is allowed to tell lies to are the ugly wuglies. They are all clothes, and have no insides, because they are not human beings, but only a sort of very real visions, and therefore cannot be really deceived, though they may seem to be. Through the back door that has the blue, yellow, red, and green glass in it, down the iron steps into the yard, Gerald led the way, and the ugly wuglies trooped after him. Some of them had boots, but the ones whose feet were only broomsticks or umbrellas found the open-work iron stairs very awkward. If you wouldn't mind, said Gerald, just waiting under the balcony, my uncle is so very mad, if he were to see any strangers, I mean even aristocratic ones, I couldn't answer for the consequences. Perhaps, said the flower-hatted lady nervously, it would be better for us to try and find a lodging ourselves. I wouldn't advise you to, said Gerald, as grimly as he knew how. The police here arrest all strangers. It's the new law the Liberals have just made, he added convincingly, and you'd get the sort of lodging you wouldn't care for. I couldn't bear to think of you in a prison dungeon, he added tenderly. I awoo or papers, said the respectable ugly wugly, and added something that sounded like disgraceful state of things. However, they ranged themselves under the iron balcony. Gerald gave one last look at them, and wondered in his secret heart why he was not frightened, though in his outside mind he was congratulating himself on his bravery. For the things did look rather horrid. In that light it was hard to believe that they were really only clothes and pillows and sticks with no insides. As he went up the steps he heard them talking among themselves in that strange language of theirs, all ooze and oz. And he thought he distinguished the voice of the respectable ugly wugly, most gentlemanly lad. And the wreathe had a lady answering warmly, Yes, indeed. The colored glass door closed behind him. Behind him was the yard, peopled by seven impossible creatures. Before him lay the silent house, peopled as he knew very well by five human beings, as frightened as human beings could be. You think, perhaps, that ugly wugglies are nothing to be frightened of. That's only because you have never seen one come alive. You must make one. Any old suit of your father's and a hat that he isn't wearing, a bolster or two, a painted paper face, a few sticks and a pair of boots will do the trick. Get your father to lend you a wishing ring, give it back to him when it has done its work, and see how you feel then. Of course, the reason why Gerald was not afraid was that he had the ring. And as you have seen, the wearer of that is not frightened by anything unless he touches that thing. But Gerald knew well enough how the others must be feeling. That was why he stopped for a moment in the hall to try and imagine the most soothing to him if he had been as terrified as he knew they were. Cathy, I say, what hope, Jimmy? Mabel, ahoy! He cried in a loud, cheerful voice that sounded very unreal to himself. The dining-room door opened a cautious inch. I say, such larks! Gerald went on, shoving gently at the door with his shoulder. Look out, what are you keeping the door shut for? Are you alone? asked Kathleen in hushed, breathless tones. Yes, of course, don't be a duffer. The door opened, revealing three scared faces and the disarranged chairs where that odd audience had sat. Where are they? Have you unwished them? Have you heard them talking? Horrible! They're in the yard, said Gerald, with the best imitation of joyous excitement that he could manage. It is such fun. They're just like real people, quite kind and jolly. It's the most ripping lark. Don't let on to Mademoiselle and Eliza. I'll square them. Then Kathleen and Jimmy must go to bed and I'll see Mabel home and as soon as we get outside we must find some sort of lodging for the ugly wugglies. They are such fun, though. I do wish you could all go with me. Fun? echoed Kathleen, dismoly and doubting. Perfectly killing, Gerald asserted resolutely. Now you just listen to what I say to Mademoiselle and Eliza and back me up for all your worth. But, said Mabel, you can't mean that you're going to leave me alone directly we get out and go off with those horrible creatures. They look like fiends. You wait till you've seen them close, Gerald advised. Why, they're just ordinary. The first thing one of them did was to ask me to recommend it to a good hotel. I couldn't understand it at first because it has no roof to its mouth, of course. It was a mistake to say that. Gerald knew it at once. Mabel and Kathleen were holding hands in a way that plainly showed how a few moments ago they had been clinging to each other in an agony of terror. Now they clung again. And Jimmy, who was sitting on the edge of what had been the stage kicking his boots against the pink counterpane, shuddered visibly. It doesn't matter, Gerald explained. About the roofs, I mean. You soon get to understand. I heard them say I was a gentlemanly lad as I was coming away. They wouldn't have cared to notice a little thing like that if they'd been fiends, you know. It doesn't matter how gentlemanly they think you. If you don't see me home, you aren't. That's all. Are you going to? Mabel demanded. Of course I am. We shall have no end of a lark. Now for Mademoiselle. He had put on his coat as he spoke and now ran up the stairs. The others, hurting in the hall, could hear his light hearted. There's nothing unusual to matter whenever did you bolt like that for. Knock at Mademoiselle's door. The reassuring. It's only me, Gerald, you know. The pause. The opening of the door. And the low-voiced parley that followed. Then Mademoiselle and Gerald at Eliza's door. Voices of reassurance. Eliza's terror, bluntly voluble, tactfully soothed. Wonder what lies he's telling them? Jimmy grumbled. Oh, not lies, said Mabel. He's only telling them as much of the truth as it's good for them to know. If you'd been a man, said Jimmy witheringly, you'd have been a beastly Jesuit and hid up chimneys. If I were only just a boy, Mabel retorted, I shouldn't be scared out of my life by a pack of old coats. I'm so sorry you were frightened. Gerald's honeyed tones floated down the staircase. We didn't think about you being frightened and it was a good trick, wasn't it? There, whispered Jimmy, he's been telling her it was a trick of ours. Well, so it was, said Mabel stoutly. It was indeed a wonderful trick, said Mademoiselle. And how did you move the mannequins? Oh, we've often done it with strings, you know, Gerald explained. That's true, too, Kathleen whispered. Let us see you do once again this trick so remarkable, said Mademoiselle, arriving at the bottom stair mat. Oh, I've cleared them all out, said Gerald. So he has, from Kathleen aside to Jimmy. We were so sorry you were startled we thought you wouldn't like to see them again. Then, said Mademoiselle brightly, as she peeped into the untidy dining room and saw that the figures had indeed vanished, if we subbed and discoursed of your beautiful piece of theatre. Gerald explained fully how much his brother and sister would enjoy this. As for him, Mademoiselle would see that it was his duty to escort Mabel home, and kind as it was of Mademoiselle to ask her to stay the night, it could not be, on account of the frenzied and anxious affection of Mabel's aunt. And it was useless to suggest that Eliza should see Mabel home, because Eliza was nervous at night unless accompanied by her gentleman friend. So Mabel was hatted with her own hat and cloaked with a cloak that was not hers, and she and Gerald went out by the front door, amid kind last words and appointments for the morrow. The moment that front door was shut, Gerald caught Mabel by the arm and led her briskly to the corner of the side street, which led to the yard. Just round the corner he stopped. Now, he said, what I want to know is, are you an idiot or aren't you? Idiot yourself, said Mabel, but mechanically, for she saw that he was in earnest. Because I'm not frightened of the ugly wugglies, they're as harmless as tame rabbits, but an idiot might be frightened and give the whole show away. If you're an idiot, say so, and I'll go back and tell them you're afraid to walk home and that I'll go and let your aunt know you're stopping. I'm not an idiot, said Mabel, and she added, glaring round her with the wild gaze of the truly terror-stricken, I'm not afraid of anything. I'm going to let you share my difficulties and dangers, said Gerald. At least, I'm inclined to let you. I wouldn't do as much for my own brother, I can tell you. And if you queer my pitch, I'll never speak to you again or let the others either. You're a beast, that's what you are. I don't need to be threatened to make me brave, I am. Mabel, said Gerald, in low, thrilling tones, for he saw that the time had come to sound another note. I know you're brave, I believe in you. That's why I've arranged it like this. I'm certain you've got the heart of a lion under that black and white exterior. Can I trust you to the death? Mabel felt that to say anything but yes was to throw away a priceless reputation for courage. So yes, was what she said. Then wait here, you're close to the lamp, and when you see me coming with them, remember they're as harmless as serpents, I mean doves. Talk to them just like you would to anyone else, see? He turned to leave her, but stopped at her natural question. What hotel did you say you were going to take them to? Oh, Gemini. The harassed Gerald caught at his hair with both hands. There, you see Mabel, you're a help already. He had, even at that moment, some tact left. I clean forgot, I meant to ask you, isn't there any lodge or anything in the castle grounds where I could put them for the night? The charm will break, you know, sometime, like being invisible did, and there'll just be a pack of coats and things that we can easily carry home any day. Is there a lodge or anything? There's a secret passage, Mabel began, but at that moment the yard door opened and an ugly wugly put out his head and looked anxiously down the street. Righto, Gerald ran to meet it. It was all Mabel could do not to run in an opposite direction with an opposite motive. It was all she could do, but she did it and was proud of herself as long as ever she remembered that night. And now, with all the silent precaution necessitated by the near presence of an extremely insane uncle, the ugly wugglies, a grisly band, trooped out of the yard door. Walk on your toes, dear, the bonneted, ugly wugly whispered to the one with the wreath. And even at that thrilling crisis, Gerald wondered how she could, since the toes of one foot were but the end of a golf club and of the other the end of a hockey stick. Mabel felt that there was no shame in retreating to the lamppost at the street corner, but once there she made herself halt. And no one but Mabel will ever know how much making that took. Think of it. To stand there, firm and quiet, and wait for those hollow, unbelievable things to come up to her, clattering on the pavement with her stumpy feet, or born along noiselessly, as in the case of the flower-hatted lady, by a skirt that touched the ground, and had Mabel knew very well nothing at all inside it. She stood very still. The insides of her hands grew cold and damp, but still she stood, saying over and over again, They're not true. They can't be true. It's only a dream. They aren't really true. They can't be. And then Gerald was there, and all the ugly wugglies crowding round, Gerald saying, This is one of our friends. Mabel, the princess in the play, you know. Be a man, he added, in a whisper for her ear alone. Mabel, all her nerves stretched tight as banjo strings, had an awful instant of not knowing whether she would be able to be a man, or whether she would be merely a shrieking and running little mad girl. For the respectable ugly wuggly shook her limply by the hand. He can't be true, she told herself, and the rose-reathed one took her arm with a soft padded glove at the end of an umbrella arm, and said, You dear clever little thing, do walk with me in a gushing girlish way, and in speech almost wholly lacking in consonance. Then they all walked up the high street, as if, as Gerald said, they were anybody else. It was a strange procession, but Little Spee goes early to bed, and the Little Spee police, in common with those of most other places, wear boots that one can hear a mile off. If such boots had been heard, Gerald would have had time to turn back and head them off. He felt now that he could not resist a flush of pride in Mabel's courage, as he heard her polite rejoinders to the still more polite remarks of the amiable ugly wugglies. He did not know how near she was to the scream that would throw away the whole thing, and bring the police and the residents out to the ruin of everybody. They met no one, except one man, who murmured, Guy Fox, well, me, and crossed the road hurriedly. And when, next day, he told what he had seen, his wife disbelieved him, and also said it was a judgment on him, which was unreasonable. Mabel felt as though she were taking part in a very completely arranged nightmare. But Gerald was in it too. Gerald, who had asked if she was an idiot, well, she wasn't. But she soon would be, she felt. Yet she went on answering the courteous vowel talk of these impossible people. She had often heard her aunt speak of impossible people. Well, now she knew what they were like. Summer twilight had melted into summer moonlight. The shadows of the ugly wugglies on the White Road were much more horrible than their more solid selves. Mabel wished it had been a dark night, and then corrected the wish with a hasty shutter. Gerald, submitting to a searching interrogatory from the tall-headed ugly wuggly, as to his schools, his sports, pastimes, and ambitions, wondered how long the spell would last. The ring seemed to work in sevens. Would these things have seven hours life? Or fourteen? Or twenty-one? His mind lost itself in the intricacies of the seven-times table, a teaser at the best of times, and only found itself with a shock when the procession found itself at the gates of the castle grounds. Locked, of course. You see, he explained, as the ugly wugglies vainly shook the iron gates with incredible hands. It's so very late. There is another way, but you have to climb through a hole. The ladies, the respectable ugly wuggly, began objecting. But the ladies, with one voice, affirmed that they loved adventures. So frightfully thrilling, added the one who wore roses. So they went round by the road, and coming to the hole. It was a little difficult to find in the moonlight, which always disguises the most familiar things. Gerald went first with the bicycle lantern, which he had snatched as his pilgrims came out of the yard. The shrinking mable followed, and then the ugly wugglies, with hollow rattlings of their wooden limbs against the stone, crept through, and with strange vowel sounds of general amazement, manly courage and feminine nervousness, followed the light along the passage through the fern-hung cutting and under the arch. When they emerged on the moonlight enchantment of the Italian garden, a quite intelligible, oh, of surprised admiration broke for more than one painted paper lip. And the respectable ugly wuggly was understood to say that it must be quite a show-place by George Sir, yes. Those marble terraces and artfully serpentine and gravel walks surely never had echoed to steps so strange. No shadows so wildly unbelievable had, for all its enchantments, ever fallen on those smooth, grey, dewy lawns. Gerald was thinking this, or something like it, what he really thought was, I bet there never was such a do as this even here. When he saw the statue of Hermes leap from its pedestal and run towards him and his company, with all the lively curiosity of a street-boy eager to be in at a street-fight, he saw, too, that he was the only one who perceived that white advancing presence. And he knew that it was the ring that let him see that by others could not be seen. He slipped it from his finger. Yes, Hermes was on his pedestal, still as the snowman you make in the Christmas holidays. He put the ring on again, and there was Hermes, circling round the group and gazing deep in each unconscious ugly wuggly face. This seems a very superior hotel. The tall-headed ugly wuggly was saying, the grounds are laid out with what you might call taste. We should have to go in by the back door, said Mabel suddenly. The front doors locked at half past nine. A short stout ugly wuggly in a yellow and blue cricket cap who had hardly spoken muttered something about an escapade and about feeling quite young again. And now they had skirted the marble-edged pool where the goldfish swam and glimmered and where the great prehistoric beast had come down to bathe and drink. The water flashed white diamonds in the moonlight, and Gerald Lone of them all saw that the scaly-plated vast lizard was even now rolling and wallowing there among the lily-pads. They hastened up the steps of the Temple of Flora. The back of it, where no elegant arch opened to the air, was just one of those sheer hills, almost cliffs, that diversified the landscape of that garden. Mabel passed behind the statue of the goddess, fumbled a little, and then Gerald's lantern, flashing like a searchlight, showed a very high and very narrow doorway. The stone that was the door, and that had closed it, revolved slowly under the touch of Mabel's fingers. This way, she said, and panted a little. The back of her neck felt cold and goose-fleshy. You lead the way, my lad, with the lantern, said the suburban ugly-wugly, in his bluff agreeable way. I—I must stay behind to close the door, said Gerald. The princess can do that. We'll help her, said the wreathed one with the fusion, and Gerald thought her horribly officious. He insisted gently that he would be the one responsible for the safe shutting of that door. You wouldn't like me to get into trouble, I'm sure, he urged. And the ugly wugglies, for the last time kind and reasonable, agreed that this, of all things, they would most deplore. You take it, Gerald urged, pressing the bicycle lamp on the elderly ugly-wugly. You're the natural leader. Go straight ahead. Are there any steps? He asked Mabel in a whisper. Not for ever so long, she whispered back. It goes on for ages, and then twists round. Whispering, said the smallest ugly-wugly suddenly, ain't manners. He hasn't any anyhow, whispered the lady ugly-wugly. Don't mind him. Self-made man. And squeezed Mabel's arm with horrible, confidential flabbiness. The respectable ugly-wugly leading with the lamp, the others following trustfully, one and all disappeared into that narrow doorway. And Gerald and Mabel standing without, hardly daring to breathe, lest a breath should retard the procession, almost sobbed with relief. Prematurely, as it turned out, for suddenly there was a rush and a scuffle inside the passage, and as they strove to close the door, the ugly-wuglies fiercely pressed to open it again. Whether they saw something in the dark passage that alarmed them, whether they took it into their empty heads, that this could not be the back way to any really respectable hotel, or whether a convincing sudden instinct warned them that they were being tricked, Mabel and Gerald never knew. But they knew that the ugly-wuglies were no longer friendly and commonplace, that a fierce change had come over them. Cries of, No, no! We won't go on! Make him lead! Broke the dreamy stillness of the perfect night. There were screams from ladies' voices. The horse determined shouts of strong ugly-wuglies roused to resistance. And worse than all, the steady pushing open of that narrow stone door that had almost closed upon the ghastly crew. Through the check of it they could be seen, a writhing black crowd against the light of the bicycle lamp. A padded hand reached round the door. Stick-boned arms stretched out angrily towards the world that that door, if closed, would shut them off from forever. And the tone of their consonantless speech was no longer conciliatory and ordinary. It was threatening, full of the menace of unbearable horrors. The padded hand fell on Gerald's arm, and instantly all the terrors that he had so far only known in imagination became real to him. And he saw in the sort of flash that shows drowning people their past lives what it was that he had asked of Mabel and that she had given. Push! Push for your life! he cried, and setting his heel against the pedestal of Flora pushed manfully. I can't any more! Oh, I can't! moaned Mabel, and tried to use her heel likewise, but her legs were too short. They mustn't get out! They mustn't! Gerald panted. You'll know it only do! came from inside the door in tones which fury and mouth-rooflessness would have made unintelligible to any ears but those sharpened by the wild fear of that unspeakable moment. What's up there? cried suddenly a new voice, a voice with all its consonants comforting, clean-cut, and ringing. And abruptly a new shadow fell on the marble floor of Flora's temple. Come and help push! Gerald's voice only just reached the newcomer. If they get out, they'll kill us all! A strong, velveteen-covered shoulder pushed suddenly between the shoulders of Gerald and Mabel. A stout man's heel sought the aid of the goddess's pedestal. The heavy, narrow door yielded slowly. It closed, its spring clicked, and the furious, surging, threatening mass of ugly wugglies was shut in. And Gerald and Mabel, oh, incredible relief, were shut out. Mabel threw herself on the marble floor sobbing slow, heavy sobs of achievement and exhaustion. If I had been there, I should have looked the other way, so as not to see whether Gerald yielded himself to the same abandonment. The newcomer, he appeared to be a game-keeper, Gerald decided later, looked down on, well, certainly on Mabel, and said, come on, don't be a little duffer. He may have said a couple of little duffers. Who is it, and what's it all about? I can't possibly tell you, Gerald panted. We shall have to see about that, shan't we? Said the newcomer amiably. Come on out into the moonlight and let's review the situation. Gerald, even in that topsy-turvy state of his world, found time to think that a game-keeper who used such words as that had most likely a romantic past. But at the same time he saw that such a man would be far less easy to square with an unconvincing tale than Eliza or Johnson or even Mademoiselle. In fact, he seemed with the only tale that they had to tell, practically unsquareable. Gerald got up. If he was not up already or still up, and pulled at the limp and now hot hand of the sobbing Mabel. And as he did so the unsquareable one took his hand and thus led both children out from under the shadow of Flora's dome into the bright white moonlight that carpeted Flora's steps. Here he sat down, a child on each side of him, drew a hand of each through his velveteen arm, pressed them to his velveteen sides in a friendly reassuring way and said, Now then, go ahead. Mabel merely sobbed. We must excuse her. She had been very brave. And I have no doubt that all heroines from Joan of Arc to Grace Darling have had their sobbing moments. But Gerald said, It's no use. If I made up a story you'd see through it. That's a compliment to my discernment anyhow, said the stranger. What price telling me the truth? If we told you the truth, said Gerald, you wouldn't believe it. Try me, said the velveteen one. He was clean shaven and had large eyes and sparkled when the moonlight touched them. I can't, said Gerald, and it was plain that he spoke the truth. You'd either think we were mad and get us shut up or else. Oh, it's no good. Thank you for helping us and do let us go home. I wonder, said the stranger musingly, whether you have any imagination. Considering that we invented them, Gerald hotly began and stopped with late prudence. If by them you mean the people whom I've helped you to imprison in yonder tomb, said the stranger, loosing Mabel's hand to put his arm round her, remember that I saw and heard them, and with all respect to your imagination I doubt whether any invention of yours would be quite so convincing. Gerald put his elbows on his knees and his chin in his hands. Collect yourself, said the one in Velveteen, and while you are collecting let me just put the thing from my point of view. I think you hardly realize my position. I come down from London to take care of a big estate. I thought you were a gamekeeper, put in Gerald. Mabel put her head on the stranger's shoulder. Hero in disguise then, I know. She sniffed. Not at all, said he. Bailiff would be nearer the mark. On the very first evening I go out to take the moodlet air and approaching a white building hear sounds of an agitated scuffle accompanied by frenzied appeals for assistance. Carried away by the enthusiasm of the moment I do assist and shut up goodness knows who behind a stone door. Now, is it unreasonable that I should ask who it is that I've shut up, helped to shut up I mean, and who it is that I've assisted? It's reasonable enough," Gerald admitted. Well then, said the stranger. Well then, said Gerald, the fact is— No, he added after a pause. The fact is I simply can't tell you. Then I must ask the other side, said Velveteens. Let me go. I'll undo that door and find out for myself. Tell him, said Mabel, speaking for the first time. Never mind if he believes or not. We can't have them let out. Very well, said Gerald. I'll tell him. Now look here, Mr. Bailiff. Will you promise us on an English gentleman's word of honour? Because, of course, I can see your that Bailiff or not. Will you promise that you won't tell anyone what we tell you? And that you won't have us put in a lunatic asylum, however mad we sound? Yes, said the stranger. I think I can promise that. But if you've been having a sham fight or anything and shoved the other side into that hole, don't you think you'd better let them out? They'll be most awfully frightened, you know. After all, I suppose they are only children. Wait till you hear, Gerald answered. They're not children, not much. Shall I just tell about them or begin at the beginning? The beginning, of course, said the stranger. Mabel lifted her head from his velveteen shoulder and said, Let me begin, then. I found a ring, and I said it would make me invisible. I said it in play, and it did. I was invisible twenty-one hours. Never mind where I got the ring. Now, Gerald, you go on. Gerald went on. For quite a long time he went on. For the story was a splendid one to tell. And so he ended. We got them in there, and when seven hours are over, or fourteen or twenty-one, or something with a seven in it, they'll just be old coats again. They came alive at half past nine. I think they'll stop being it in seven hours. That's half past four. Now will you let us go home? I'll see you home, said the stranger, in a quite new tone of exasperating gentleness. Come, let's be going. You don't believe us, said Gerald. Of course you don't. Nobody could. But I could make you believe if I chose. All three stood up, and the stranger stared in Gerald's eyes till Gerald answered his thought. No, I don't look mad, do I? No, you aren't. But come, you're an extraordinarily sensible boy. Don't you think you may be sickening for a fever or something? And Kathy and Jimmy and Mademoiselle and Eliza, and the man who said, Guy Fox, welts me? And you! You saw the move. You heard them call out. Are you sickening for anything? No, or at least not for anything but information. Come, and I'll see you home. Mabel lives at the towers, said Gerald, as the stranger turned into the broad drive that leads to the big gate. No relation to Lord Yalding, said Mabel hastily, housekeeper's niece. She was holding on to his hand all the way. At the surface entrance she put up her face to be kissed, and went in. Poor little thing, said the bailiff, as they went down the drive towards the gate. He went with Gerald to the door of the school. Look here, said Gerald at parting. I know what you're going to do. You're going to try to undo that door. Discerning, said the stranger. Well, don't. Or anyway, wait till daylight, and let us be there. We can get there by ten. All right, I'll meet you there by ten, answered the stranger. By George, you're the rummest kids I ever met. We are rum, Gerald owned, but so would you be if— Good night. As the four children went over the smooth lawn towards Flora's temple, they talked, as they had talked all the morning, about the adventures of last night, and of Mabel's bravery. It was not ten, but half past twelve, for Eliza, backed by Mademoiselle, had insisted on their clearing up, and clearing up very thoroughly, the litter of last night. You're a Victoria-crossed heroine, dear, said Cathy warmly. You ought to have a statue put up to you. It would come alive if you put it here, said Gerald grimly. I shouldn't have been afraid, said Jimmy. By daylight, Gerald assured him, everything looks so jolly different. I do hope he'll be there, Mabel said. He was such a dear Cathy, a perfect bailiff with the soul of a gentleman. He isn't there, though, said Jimmy. I believe you just dreamed him, like you did the statues coming alive. They went up the marble steps in the sunshine, and it was difficult to believe that this was the place where only in last night's moonlight fear had laid such cold hands on the hearts of Mabel and Gerald. Shall we open the door, suggested Kathleen, and begin to carry home the coats? Let's listen first, said Gerald. Perhaps they aren't only coats yet. They laid ears to the hinges of the stone door, behind which last night the ugly wugglies had shrieked and threatened. All was still as the sweet morning itself. It was as they turned away that they saw the man they had come to meet. He was on the other side of Floor's pedestal, but he was not standing up. He lay there, quite still, on his back, his arms flung wide. Oh, look! cried Kathy, and pointed. His face was a queer greenish color, and on his forehead there was a cut. Its edges were blue, and a little blood had trickled from it onto the white of the marble. At the same time Mabel pointed too, but she did not cry out as Kathy had done. And what she pointed at was a big glossy-leaved rhododendron bush, from which a painted, pointed paper face peered out, very white, very red in the sunlight, and as the children gazed, shrank back into the cover of the shining leaves. End of chapter 7