A Tale Without a Name (6 page)

“What can this mean?” he enquired, baffled and dazed.

The Prince took a few steps around the room; he then went back to the King.

“It means, father, that this letter was intended for Cunningson. It means that Faintheart is not only a blackguard, but also a traitor, and that in a few days, a few hours, perhaps, the armies of the King our Royal Uncle could be invading our State. It also means another thing: that he appears to know things that we ourselves ignore, for instance the fact that we have no army, and that there will be no resistance at the borders.”

“What nonsense and fiddlesticks!” said the King uneasily. “No army, he says! Drivel and twaddle, I say! I can throw into my uncle’s kingdom thousands of soldiers, whenever and however I wish to. And a hundred ironclad fighting vessels the river shall carry southwards, at my slightest command! We have no army, he says! I shall hang the first man who dares say so again, and I’ll throw his corpse to the vultures, that they may feast upon it!”

And, livid with rage, the King shoved this crown back to the top of his head, and with long strides marched twice, thrice, up and down the room.

The Prince glanced with forlorn eyes at the donkey’s head, which gazed with derision at them all from above the gold-leaf cabinet, its tin crown perched impertinently between its ears.

“Father,” he said at last, “call the Supreme Commander of the Army. He will give us the information we need.”

The King rang the bell, and immediately Polydorus the equerry appeared before him.

“Summon the Supreme Commander of the Army at once,” commanded the King, and resumed his nervous pacing up and down the room.

The equerry bowed, and made as though to leave. But at the door he stopped.

“My lord…” he muttered, “I do not know who the Supreme Commander is.”

“You do not know?” cried his sovereign with rage. “You do not know?”

And changing tone:

“Hmmm… I do not know myself any more what his name is… Blast and bebother that idiot Cunningson, why did he have to go and kill himself just when I need him? He took care of everything, and knew everything like the back of his hand!… Well, then, summon my chamberlain, Cartwheeler.”

Polydorus bowed deeply, and left.

A few minutes later he returned with the Lord Chamberlain.

Master Cartwheeler was short and fat, with swollen, sagging cheeks, and such an enormous belly that he could never go through a doorway or near a piece of furniture without stumbling and bumping.

“Cartwheeler,” said the King imperiously, “call immediately the General-in-Chief.”

“My lord,” Cartwheeler replied, struggling in vain to bend at the waist in order to bow. “My lord, we have not had a General-in-Chief for these past two years.”

The King almost choked with furious indignation. The blood flooded to his head, he turned a deep, dark purple.

“What are you saying?… What are you saying?” he faltered, before his voice broke, and he could not utter another word.

“My lord,” Cartwheeler repeated, unperturbed, “our last General-in-Chief was Master Rogue. It has been two years now since he sold his house and went abroad, where he is known to everyone as the most prosperous banker.”

“And where might he have got the florins to do that?” bellowed the King.

“A great mystery, that, my lord.”

“Summon the Admiral-in-Chief, then,” ordered the King nervously. And again he began to pace up and down the room.

But as he made to turn, with hands crossed, his forehead bowed and clouded, he instantly collided with the
barrel-shaped belly of Cartwheeler, who had had no time to remove himself from his path.

“So what are you standing there for? Summon, I said, the Admiral-in-Chief!” he said angrily.

His equanimity intact, the Lord Chamberlain attempted once again to bow.

“We have no Admiral-in-Chief, my lord,” he said calmly.

The King collapsed upon the sofa. His knees had buckled under him, his voice too was broken, and he remained there utterly devastated.

“What became of the Admiral-in-Chief?” asked the Prince.

“He is a mighty merchant abroad, my lord,” answered the Lord Chamberlain. “He trades in iron.”

“And how did he come upon so many florins as well?” asked the King, fuming with rage.

“He came upon them only recently.”

“But by what means? Tell me that!”

“With the iron from the naval fleet.”

The King received the news with a great staggering shock. He sprang up with a leap, and ran to the door.

“Mad! Mad, they are all mad! All of them!” he yelled. And seeing Polydorus the equerry at the door:

“Sound the call to arms immediately,” he commanded. “Muster the troops at once, from every corner of the kingdom!”

And he rushed out running, his mantle flying behind him like the swelling sails of a ship.

The Prince followed him; far behind, panting and round as a ball, scampered the Lord Chamberlain. From the highest turret Polydorus sounded the call to arms with the great trumpet.

The King and his son ran without stopping to the barracks.

By the doorway, they found the old garrison commander, only half-awake and half-dressed, stupefied and bewildered. He struggled to make sense of the purpose of the trumpet call, which he had not heard for so very many years.

“Where are the soldiers? Summon them all here at once!” ordered the King. The knees of the old garrison commander buckled under him, and he landed sitting squarely upon the ground.

A second time the equerry sounded the call to arms from high up on the turret. And then, all of a sudden, from the corner of the square, out of a tavern, there came a single, solitary, one-legged man, who hurried to the barracks, drew from under a mattress a rusty lance with no head, and hobbled his way to where the King and the Prince stood; pulling himself up to attention before them, he presented arms.

“Who is he?” asked the King.

“The army, my lord,” answered the one-legged man.

“I am in no mood for pleasantries,” said the King. “Do you know whom you are addressing?”

“My liege and king,” replied the one-legged man, without changing his position.

“Well, then, be lost with you, before I have time to get cross. The troops will be coming out any time now, and ragamuffins such as yourself have no place in their midst.”

“But I am the troops, I am the army, my lord,” said the one-legged man again.

“Is he insane, or insolent?” asked the King, turning to the garrison commander, who still sat exactly where he had landed, his feet sockless inside his worn slippers. Immobile, the old man replied as though in a daze:

“He is neither insane nor insolent. He is the troops; he is the army.”

“Where is the royal guard? Where are the cavalry and the lancers?” enquired the Prince quietly, thinking that perhaps the garrison commander had been struck dumb with fright.

But the old man stretched out his hand and pointed to the one-legged man.

“
There
is the guard,
there
is the army too,” he replied. “I have no other troops, my lords. You may go up to the dormitories, if you wish, and see for yourselves whether I am lying or not.”

And because the King and the Prince remained still, unwilling to believe, the old man continued:

“You remember the old times, my good lords. Gone are those times, nor will they ever return again.”

Just then, Cartwheeler finally arrived, flushed red and sweating, hot from running.

The King pointed to the old garrison commander, who was still sitting on the ground, and with one hand made a sign to indicate that the man was not entirely right in the head.

“He is not all there,” he said in a hushed tone.

“He is all there, my lord,” replied the Lord Chamberlain, “and he is telling you the truth. There are no troops—”

“What is all this nonsense, for heaven’s sake!” interrupted the King, who was beginning to become angry once again. “Let him summon the officers and I shall show you then where my army is.”

And turning to the old man:

“Fetch at once General… General… what’s his name? Never mind the name,” he screamed, enraged.

“There is no general here, my lord,” replied the garrison commander, trembling and shaking.

“Well, then, call the Commander of the Corps!”

“There is no Commander of the Corps!”

“Then call whomever you like, but call someone!” yelled the King, quite beside himself.

“We are all of us here, my lord!” said the old man, with a most pitiful expression on his face.

“But then the army…”

“There is no army any longer, long gone is the army, finished—you seek it in vain, my lord! There are just the two of us, my cook and myself!”

The King seized his head with both hands.

“Is it I who am going mad? Perhaps I do not understand?… You talk utter nonsense!” he burst out angrily again. “I know well that I have an army, for I pay for it every year…”

And, changing his tone:

“In fact, what do I pay for it exactly?” he asked the Lord Chamberlain.

“I do not know, my lord. You managed such accounts with the High Chancellor. I never laid eyes on them…”

“I pay… um… Well, I pay a great deal!” the King continued nervously. “And I also pay for my navy… well, an equal amount. Where is the navy? The soldiers must be on the ships! Where are the ships?”

No one knew.

With the corner of his mantle he wiped the perspiration that had formed strings of beads on his forehead.

“Let us go to the naval base,” he ordered.

And with his son he hastened to the river, while farther behind, far away, tumbling at every step, followed the miserable Lord Chamberlain.

They reached the river, which ran its course, tranquil and transparent, between the green wooded riverbanks where no house could be seen, no matter how far one strained one’s eye.

There were only two shabby old feluccas there, moored to the shore by a long rope, rocking away lazily on the silvery waters; a wide plank, nailed to the sides at each end, joined them together at the middle and held one next to the other.

Sprawled across the prow of one of the boats there slept a one-armed man, his mouth agape.

The King gazed up and down the river, yet he saw nothing but lush green grass, many trees, and some stones, fallen from some old derelict wall, black and begrimed by time and humidity.

“Let us go farther south,” he said, and walked a few paces forward.

He found, however, no ships, no naval base.

“Would you yourself know where they are?” asked the King of Cartwheeler, who was only just then catching up with them, half-dead from the unfamiliar matinal exertion.

“I do not know, my lord, I have never been this far abroad,” he replied, gasping for breath. “But maybe we could ask this sleeping bargeman.”

And placing his hands in front of his mouth so as to form a cone, he cried out:

“Hey there!… Bargeman!… Wake up!…”

The one-armed man twitched his single hand ever so slightly and slowly, but did not wake up.

“Wait,” said the Prince.

And, tugging at the rope, he pulled the two boats close to the riverbank.

“Ahoy there, bargeman! Hey, bargeman!” Cartwheeler cried out once more.

The one-armed man sat up and rubbed his eyes.

“What is the matter?” he asked in a sleepy voice.

“Where are the navy and the naval base?” enquired the King.

With a brisk jump, the one-armed man stood up and gave a sharp military salute.

“Present and correct!” he cried out.

“
Where are the navy and the naval base
?” asked the King again, thinking that the man had not understood him the first time.

“
Present and correct!
” repeated the one-armed man a little more loudly, without breaking off his salute.

“He does not understand!” said the King, disheartened. “My good man, can you listen to what I am saying to you?
Where are the ships and the sailors?
”

“
Present! Present and present again
,” screamed the
one-armed
man, with such energy that the veins of his throat swelled to bursting point, while standing hard as a board he continued to present his military salute.

The Prince tried to make him understand in turn.

“We are looking for the King’s ships,” he explained.

“
Prrrresent!
” repeated the one-armed man. “The Royal Navy, comprising of the vessels
Fright
and
Turmoil
, present and correct! The navy of His Majesty the King present and correct!”

King Witless jumped.

“What’s that?” he cried out, mortified. “What names did you say?”

“
Fright
and
Turmoil
, my dining room and bedroom. At your disposal, should you desire to visit them,” said the one-armed man, with a smile that split his face from one ear to the other.

The Prince turned ashen.

“And the naval base? Where is the naval base?” he asked.

“Prrrresent!” replied again the one-armed man, indicating the blackened stones that lined the rock face all the way down to the very edge of the riverbank.