Читать книгу The Chrestomanci Series: Entire Collection Books 1-7 - Diana Wynne Jones - Страница 41

Tonino woke up feeling chilly and puzzled. The light was pale and yellow because his sheet seemed to be over his face. Tonino gazed up at it, thinking it was a surprisingly flat, stiff sheet. It had large black letters on it too. His eyes travelled along the letters. DECLARATION OF WAR (Duplicate Copy), he read.

Then he knew, with a jump, that he was nine inches high and lying in a drawer in the Palace. And it was light! Someone would find them. In fact, someone nearly had. That was what had woken him. He could hear someone moving about the room, making obscure thumps and shuffles, and occasionally whistling a snatch of the Angel of Caprona.

Whoever it was had reached the drawer now. Tonino could hear the floor creak under him and a dress rustling, loud and near. He moved his head, gently and stiffly, and found Angelica’s frightened face resting on crumpled paper an inch or so away. The rustling dress proved the person was a woman. It must be the Duchess looking for them.

“That Duke!” said the person, in a voice no Duchess would use. “There never was such an untidy man!” Her breathing came suddenly nearer. Before either Tonino or Angelica could think what to do, the drawer moved. Helplessly, they were shunted inwards, feet first into darkness, and the drawer shut with a bang behind their heads.

“Help!” whispered Angelica.

“Ssh!”

The maid was still in the room. They could hear her move something, and then a tinkle of notes as she dusted a piano. Then a bump. And finally nothing. When they were quite sure she was gone, Angelica whispered, “What do we do now?”

There was room to sit up in the drawer, but not much else. Above their heads was a slit of light where the drawer met the desk, or whatever it was, and no way of opening it. But they could see quite well. Light was coming in at the back, beyond their feet. They tried bracing their hands against the wood overhead and heaving, but the drawer was made of solid, spicy-smelling wood and they could not budge it.

“We keep being shut in places without doors!” Angelica cried out. And she went floundering through the papers to the back of the drawer, where the light came in. Tonino crawled after her.

As soon as they got there, they realised this was the way out. The end of the drawer was lower than the front, and it did not reach the back of the wooden desk it was part of. There was quite a big gap there. When they put their heads into the space, they could see the ends of the other drawers above theirs going up like a ladder, and a slit of daylight at the top.

They squeezed through into the gap and climbed, side by side. It was as easy as climbing a ladder. They were one drawer away from the slit of daylight – which was going to be a tight squeeze – when they heard someone else in the room.

“They came down here, madam,” said a lady’s voice.

“Then we’ve caught them,” replied the Duchess. “Look very carefully.”

Tonino and Angelica hung from the back of the drawers by their fingers and toes, not daring to move. Silk dresses rustled as the Duchess and her lady moved round the room. “There’s nothing this end at all, madam.”

“And I swear this window hasn’t been opened,” said the Duchess. “Open all the drawers in the desk.”

There was a sharp rumble above Tonino’s head. Dusty white light flooded down from the open top drawer. Papers were loudly tossed over. “Nothing,” said the lady. The top drawer slammed in again. Tonino and Angelica had been hanging on to the second drawer. They climbed down to the next as fast and quietly as they could. The second drawer rumbled open, and slammed shut, nearly deafening them. The drawer they were on jerked. Luckily, it was stiff. The lady tugged and rattled at it, and that gave Tonino and Angelica just time to climb frantically up to the second drawer again and cling there. And there they hung, in the dark narrow space, while the lady opened the third drawer, slammed it shut, and pulled out the bottom drawer. They craned over their arms and watched the white light flood in from below.

“Look at this!” cried the lady. “They’ve been here! It’s like a mouse-nest!”

Silks rustled as the Duchess hurried over. “Curse it!” she said. “Not long ago too! I can smell them even through the cigars. Quick! They can’t be far away. They must have got out before the room was cleaned.”

The drawer rumbled in, bringing dusty darkness with it. There was a flurry of silks as the two women hurried away up the steps to the room with the armchairs, and the quiet, firm clap of the door closing.

“Do you think it’s a trap?” Angelica whispered.

“No,” said Tonino. He was sure the Duchess had not guessed where they were. But they were shut in this room now, by the sound, and he had no idea how they would get the door open.

All the same, even a shut room was great open spaces compared with the narrow slit at the back of the drawers. Angelica and Tonino pushed and squeezed and forced themselves through the narrow daylight slit, and finally crawled out on the top of a writing-desk. Before their eyes had got used to the light, Tonino stubbed his toe on a vast pen like a telegraph pole and then tripped over a paper-knife like an ivory plank. Angelica bumped into a china ornament standing at the back of the desk. It swayed. She swayed. She flung her arms round it. When her eyes stopped watering, she found she was hugging a china Mr Punch, nose, red nightgown and all, about the same height as she was. There was a china Judy standing at the other end of the desk.

“We can’t get away from these things!” she said.

The desk was covered in smooth red leather, very easy on the feet, and held a huge white blotter, which was even more comfortable to walk on. A chair with a matching red seat stood in front of the desk. Tonino saw they could easily jump down on to it. Even more easily, they could climb down the handles of the drawers. On the other hand, the piano the maid had dusted stood right beside the desk, and the window was round the corner from the piano. To reach the window was only a long stride from the piano. Though the window was shut, it had quite an easy-looking catch, if only they could reach it.

“Look!” said Angelica, pointing disgustedly.

A whole row of Punch and Judys stood along the top of the piano. Two were puppets on stands, very old and valuable by the look of them; two more were actually made of gold; and two others were rather arty clay models, which made Punch look like a leering ordinary man and Judy uncomfortably like the Duchess. And the music which was open on the piano was headed Arnolfini – Punch and Judy Suite.

“I think this is the Duke’s study,” said Angelica. And both of them got the giggles.

Still giggling, Tonino stepped on to the piano and started to walk to the window. Do – ti – so – fa, went the piano.

“Come back!” Angelica laughed.

Tonino came back – fa – so – ti – do – nearly in hysterics.

The door of the room opened and someone hurried down the steps. Angelica and Tonino could think of nothing better to do than stand stiffly where they were, hoping to be taken for more Punch and Judys. And, luckily, the man who came in was busy and worried. He slapped a pile of papers on the desk, without so much as glancing at the two new puppets, and hurried out again, gently closing the door behind him.

“Phew!” said Angelica.

They walked round to the front of the papers and looked at them curiously. The top one said:

Report of Campaign at 08.00 hours. Summary:

Troops advancing on all fronts to repel invasion.

Heavy Artillery and Reservists moving up in support.

Pisan front reports heavy losses. Fleet sighted—

Pisan? – steaming for mouth of Voltava.

“We’re at war!” said Tonino. “Why?”

“Because the Duchess has got us, of course,” said Angelica. “And our families daren’t make war-spells. Tonino, we must get out. We must tell them where the words to the Angel are!”

“But why does the Duchess want Caprona beaten?” Tonino said.

“I don’t know,” said Angelica. “There’s something wrong about her, I know that. Aunt Bella said there was an awful fuss when the Duke decided to marry her. Nobody likes her.”

“Let’s see if we can open the window,” said Tonino. He set off along the piano again. Do-ti-so-fa-me-re—

“Quiet!” said Angelica.

Tonino discovered that, if he put each foot down very slowly, the notes did not sound. He was halfway along the keyboard, and Angelica had one foot stretched out to follow, when they heard someone opening the door again. There was no time to be careful. Angelica fled back to the desk. Tonino, with a terrible discord, scrambled across the black notes and squeezed behind the music on the stand.

He was only just in time. When he looked – he was standing with his feet and head sideways, like an Ancient Egyptian – the Duke of Caprona himself was standing in front of the desk. Tonino thought the Duke seemed both puzzled and sad. He was tapping the Report of Campaign against his teeth and did not seem to notice Angelica standing between the Punch and Judy on his desk, although Angelica’s eyes were blinking against the glitter from the Duke’s buttons.

“But I didn’t declare war!” the Duke said to himself. “I was watching that puppet-show. How could I—?” He sighed and bit the Report worriedly between two rows of big shiny teeth. “Is my mind going?” he asked. He seemed to be talking to Angelica. She had the sense not to answer.

“I must go and ask Lucrezia,” the Duke said. He flung the Report down at Angelica’s feet and hurried out of the study.

Tonino slid cautiously down the piano-lid on to the keys again – ker-pling. Angelica was now standing at the end of the piano, pointing at the window. She was speechless with horror.

Tonino looked – and for a moment he was as frightened as Angelica. There was a brown monster glaring at him through the glass, wide-faced, wide-eyed and shaggy. The thing had eyes like yellow lamps.

Faintly, through the glass, came a slightly irritable request to pull himself together and open the window.

“Benvenuto!” shouted Tonino.

“Oh – it’s only a cat,” Angelica quavered. “How terrible it must feel to be a mouse!”

“Just a cat!” Tonino said scornfully. “That’s Benvenuto.” He tried to explain to Benvenuto that it was not easy to open windows when you were nine inches high.

Benvenuto’s impatient answer was to shove Tonino’s latest magic exercise book in front of Tonino’s mind’s eye, open at almost the first page.

“Oh, thanks,” Tonino said, rather ashamed. There were three opening-spells on that page, and none of them had stuck in his head. He chose the easiest, shut his eyes so that he could read the imaginary page more clearly, and sang the spell.

Gently and easily, the window swung open, letting in a gust of cold wind. And Benvenuto came in with the wind, almost as lightly. As Benvenuto trod gently up the scale towards him, Tonino had another moment when he knew how mice felt. Then he forgot it in the gladness of seeing Benvenuto. He stretched his arms wide to rub behind Benvenuto’s horny ears.

Benvenuto put his sticky black nose to Tonino’s face, and they both stood, delighted, holding down a long humming discord on the piano.

Benvenuto said that Paolo was not quick enough; he could not make him understand where Tonino was. Tonino must send Paolo a message. Could Tonino write this size?

“There’s a pen on the desk here,” Angelica called. And Tonino remembered her saying she could understand cats.

Rather anxiously, Benvenuto wanted to know if Tonino minded him talking to a Petrocchi.

The question astonished Tonino for a moment. He had clean forgotten that he and Angelica were supposed to hate one another. It seemed a waste of time, when they were both in such trouble. “Not at all,” he said.

“Do get off that piano, both of you,” said Angelica. “The humming’s horrible.”

Benvenuto obliged, with one great flowing leap. Tonino struggled after him with his elbows hooked over the piano-lid, pushing himself along against the black notes. By the time he reached the desk, Benvenuto and Angelica had exchanged formal introductions, and Benvenuto was advising them not to try getting out of the window. The room was three floors up. The stonework was crumbling, and even a cat had some trouble keeping his feet. If they would wait, Benvenuto would fetch help.

“But the Duchess—” said Tonino.

“And the Duke,” said Angelica. “This is the Duke’s study.”

Benvenuto considered the Duke harmless on his own. He thought they were in the safest place in the Palace. They were to stay hidden and write him a note small enough to carry in his mouth.

“Wouldn’t it be better if we tied it round your neck?” Angelica asked.

Benvenuto had never submitted to anything round his neck, and he was not going to start now. Anyway, someone in the Palace might see the message.

So Tonino put one foot on the Report of Campaign and succeeded, by heaving with both hands, in tearing off a corner of it. Angelica passed him the huge pen, which he had to hold in both hands, with the end resting on his shoulder. Then she stood on the paper to keep it steady while Tonino wielded the pen. It was such hard work, that he kept the message as short as possible. In Duke’s Palace. Duchess enchantress. T.M. & A.P.

“Tell them about the words to the Angel,” said Angelica. “Just in case.”

Tonino turned the paper over and wrote Words to Angel on Angel over gate. T & A. Then, exhausted with heaving the pen up and down, he folded the piece of paper with that message inside and the first one outside, and trod it flat. Benvenuto opened his mouth. Angelica winced at that pink cavern with its arched wrinkly roof and its row of white fangs, and let Tonino place the message across Benvenuto’s prickly tongue. Benvenuto gave Tonino a loving glare and sprang away. He struck one ringing chord from the piano, around middle C, made the slightest thump on the windowsill, and vanished.

Tonino and Angelica were staring after him and did not notice, until it was too late, that the Duke had come back.

“Funny,” said the Duke. “There’s a new Punch now, as well as a new Judy.”

Tonino and Angelica stood stiff as posts, one on each end of the blotter, in agonisingly uncomfortable attitudes.

Fortunately, the Duke noticed the open window. “Blessed maids and their fresh air!” he grumbled, and went over to shut it. Tonino seized the opportunity to stand on both feet, Angelica to uncrick her neck. Then they both jumped. An unmistakable gunshot cracked out, from somewhere below. And another. The Duke bent out of the window and seemed to be watching something. “Poor pussy,” he said. He sounded sad and resigned. “Why couldn’t you keep away, puss? She hates cats. And they make such a din, too, shooting them.” Another shot cracked out, and then several more. The Duke stood up, shaking his head sadly. “Ah well,” he said, as he shut the window. “I suppose they do eat birds.”

He came back across the study. Tonino and Angelica could not have moved if they tried. They were both too stricken.

The Duke’s face folded into shiny wrinkles. He had noticed the corner torn from the Report. “I’ve been eating paper now!” he said. His sad, puzzled face turned towards Tonino and Angelica. “I think I do forget things,” he said. “I talk to myself. That’s a bad sign. But I really don’t remember you two at all. At least, I remember the new Judy, but,” he said to Tonino, “I don’t remember you at all. How did you get here?”

Tonino was far too upset about Benvenuto to think. After all, the Duke really was speaking to him. “Please, sir,” he said, “I’ll explain—”

“Shut up!” snapped Angelica. “I’ll say a spell!”

“—only please tell me if they shot my cat,” said Tonino.

“I think so,” said the Duke. “It looked as if they got it.” Here he took a deep breath and turned his eyes carefully to the ceiling, before he looked at Tonino and Angelica again. Neither of them moved. Angelica was glaring at Tonino, promising him spells unimaginable if he said another word. And Tonino knew he had been an utter idiot anyway. Benvenuto was dead and there was no point in moving – no point in anything.

The Duke, meanwhile, slowly pulled a large handkerchief out of his pocket. A slightly crumpled cigar came out with it and flopped on the desk. The Duke picked it up and put it absent-mindedly between his glistening teeth. And then he had to take it out again to wipe his shiny face. “Both of you spoke,” he said, putting the handkerchief away and fetching out a gold lighter. “You know that?” he said, putting the cigar back into his mouth. He gave a furtive look round, clicked the lighter, and lit the cigar. “You are looking,” he said, “at a poor dotty Duke.” Smoke rolled out with his words, as much smoke as if the Duke had been a dragon.

Angelica sneezed. Tonino thought he was going to sneeze. He drew a deep breath to stop himself and burst out coughing.

“Ahah!” cried the Duke. “Got you!” His large wet hands pounced, and seized each of them round the legs. Holding them like that, firmly pinned to the blotter, he sat down in the chair and bent his triumphant shiny face until it was level with theirs. The cigar, cocked out of one side of his mouth, continued to roll smoke over them. They flailed their arms for balance and coughed and coughed. “Now what are you?” said the Duke. “Another of her fiendish devices for making me think I’m potty? Eh?”

“No we’re not!” coughed Tonino, and Angelica coughed, “Oh, please stop that smoke!”

The Duke laughed. “The old Chinese cigar-torture,” he said gleefully, “guaranteed to bring statues to life.” But his right hand moved Tonino, stumbling and swaying, across the blotter to Angelica, where his left hand gathered him in. His right hand took the cigar out of his mouth and laid it on the edge of the desk. “Now,” he said. “Let’s have a look at you.”

They scrubbed their streaming eyes and looked fearfully up at his great grinning face. It was impossible to look at all of it at once. Angelica settled for his left eye, Tonino for his right eye. Both eyes bulged at them, round and innocent, like Old Niccolo’s.

“Bless me!” said the Duke. “You’re the spell-makers’ children who were supposed to come to my pantomime! Why didn’t you come?”

“We never got an invitation, Your Grace,” Angelica said. “Did you?” she asked Tonino.

“No,” Tonino said mournfully.

The Duke’s face sagged. “So that’s why it was. I wrote them myself too. That’s my life in a nutshell. None of the orders I give ever get carried out, and an awful lot of things get done that I never ordered at all.” He opened his hand slowly. The big warm fingers peeled damply off their legs. “You feel funny wriggling about in my hand,” he said. “There, if I let you go, will you tell me how you got here?”

They told him, with one or two forced pauses when he took a puff at his cigar and set them coughing again. He listened wonderingly. It was not like explaining things to a huge grown-up Duke. Tonino felt as if he was telling a made-up story to his small cousins. From the way the Duke’s eyes popped, and the way he kept saying “Go on!” Tonino was sure the Duke was believing it no more than the little Montanas believed the story of Giovanni the Giant Killer.

Yet, when they had finished, the Duke said, “That Punch and Judy show started at eight-thirty and went on till nine-fifteen. I know, because there was a clock just over you. They say I declared war at nine o’clock last night. Did either of you notice me declaring war?”

“No,” they said. “Though,” Angelica added sourly, “I was being beaten to death at the time and I might not have noticed.”

“My apologies,” said the Duke. “But did either of you hear gunfire? No. But firing started around eleven and went on all night. It’s still going on. You can see it, but not hear it, from the tower over this study. Which means another damn spell, I suppose. And I think I’m supposed to sit here and not notice Caprona being blown to pieces around me.” He put his chin in his hands and stared at them miserably. “I know I’m a fool,” he said, “but just because I love plays and puppet-theatres, I’m not an idiot. The question is, how do we get you two out of here without Lucrezia knowing?”

Tonino and Angelica were almost too surprised and grateful to speak. And while they were still trying to say thank you, the Duke jumped upright, staring pop-eyed.

“She’s coming! I’ve got an instinct. Quick! Get in my pockets!”

He turned round sideways to the desk and held one pocket of his coat stretched against it, between two fingers. Angelica hastily lifted the pocket-flap and slid down between the two layers of cloth. The Duke stubbed out his cigar on the edge of the desk and popped it in after her. Then he turned round and held the other pocket open for Tonino. As Tonino crouched down in fuzzy darkness, he heard the door open and the voice of the Duchess.

“My lord, you’ve been smoking cigars in here again.”