King of the Scepter'd Isle (Song of Earth) (33 page)

It is remembered that there was a grasshopper who lived in a green meadow. The meadow sloped down to a winding stream overhung with willow trees. In the meadow it was always summer. It was a beautiful place in which to live, yet the grasshopper was not satisfied. He dozed through the sunny days when he should have been working, so that he could stay awake at night and gaze at the moon. “Oh, what a beautiful place that must be.” He sighed. “See how silvery it shines. Oh, how I would love to live on the moon.”

One day it occurred to him that if he could learn to jump high enough, he could reach the moon. It was only a matter of practice. So practice he did, every day, measuring his growing prowess against the willow trees until he could clear them with a single bound. And as is the way with fables, his perseverance was rewarded. The day came when he leapt so high that he escaped from Earth’s gravitational field and found himself gliding through space.

“Whoopee!” he cried.

Soon he
met a bat. “Where are you going, Grasshopper?” asked the bat.

“I am flying to the moon, which is the most beautiful place in the solar system, and where I will live my days in everlasting joy,” replied the grasshopper.

“Stay with me,” said the bat. “You may not like what you find on the moon.”

“Who would want to live in empty space?” The grasshopper sneered and glided on by.

“More people than you can imagine!” the bat called after him. “It’s not so bad, if you find a good home here!” But the grasshopper paid no attention.

Finally the grasshopper touched down on the moon and received a terrible disappointment. The moon was not silver, after all. That was a cruel deception perpetrated by the sun. The moon was covered with a fine, choking black dust. There was no food, no water, no willow trees. In fact, the whole place was thoroughly objectionable. The grasshopper tried to jump off the moon to get back to Earth, but he was belly-deep in dust and could get no leverage.

“Woe is me!” he cried, struggling. “Why did I ever leave my meadow?”

The bat heard his cries and swooped low. “I’ll help you,” he said, and he dragged the grasshopper out of the dust and flew with him into space.

“Mark my words,” said the bat, “a world always looks more beautiful from the other side of the void. If you travel to strange places, you must allow for the possibility of disappointment. And you must always,
always
make sure you have a means of getting home again. Now take a look over there at Earth.”

“That dull old place?”

“Just look,” said the bat.

So the grasshopper looked, and to his amazement, Earth resembled a big, beautiful silver coin. “Go,” said the bat, and gave him a push, and set him gliding home.

The grasshopper returned to his meadow and lived there happily, singing and hopping, but never hopping higher than the willow trees
in case he should accidentally leave Earth’s gravity again and not be able to get back. He hadn’t yet worked out a way to travel safely, and another time the bat might not be around to help him. But he thought about what the bat had told him, and toward the end of his days he did discover a safe way to travel. That, however, is another story. …

“That, however, is another story,” concluded Fang.

“That bat is too smug,” said Lady Duck. “He reminds me of my mother, telling me I should be satisfied with my lot.” She looked proudly at King Bison. “I wouldn’t be where I am now, if I’d followed her advice. Come now, Bison. We have work to do. We don’t have time to listen to stories.” And she left, Bison following with some reluctance.

“I think …” said Fang slowly, “I think the story is intended to tell gnomes not to leave Earth until the right time. It was the first fable ever told. It just possibly might have been told by the kikihuahua to the first Mara Zion Memorizer. The bat could have been the spacebat.”

“And the grasshopper?”

“Well, gnomedom, of course. But it could also refer to our route off Earth. You see, there’s the end of the fable: ‘Toward the end of his days he did discover a safe way to travel.’ “

“I thought it referred to him dying and going to heaven. …” Wal the Bottle’s voice trailed away.

“What is it?”

“I’m not sure. Just an odd thought. Have you ever wondered why people swear by the Great Grasshopper? It’s just a saying, but could there be a connection?”

“The Great Grasshopper …” Fang repeated thoughtfully. That evening he tried to track down the origin of the phrase, but without success. It seemed the gnomes had always sworn by the Great Grasshopper. He translated the words into the ancient gnomish tongue, but it didn’t make any difference.

That afternoon,
however, the gnomes soon tired of speculation. Flasks were passed around, and a few eyes closed in contemplation. “Tell us another story!” shouted Clubfoot.

“Another story!” The gnomes took up the cry.

Fang eyed them, a sinking feeling in his stomach. This was it. This was the crucial moment. And they all looked so happy and relaxed, drinking beer with little thought for the future and the terrible unknown. If he went ahead with what he planned, he might well save the race from extinction, but he would be committing these gnomes to finding a route off Earth within the next fifteen years. If they didn’t find it, they would die.

And yet he had no alternative.

He forced his face into an ingratiating expression. “It’s a little poem,” he said. “It comes right from the earliest days of gnomedom, when Avalona first taught us this language. It’s probably translated from the language before that,” he continued, improvising.

“A poem!” they cried happily. Poems were fun. They didn’t take a gnome long to learn. “What’s the poem about, Fang?”

“It’s about gnomes.” And taking a deep breath, Fang recited a poem composed by the Princess.

“And that’s it,” he said. “It’s not much, but it’s a piece of gnomish culture.”

“It sounds a little suspect to me,” said Spector.

But the gnomes were busy muttering. He heard snatches of the poem,
then they fell silent. It was safely in their memory lobes.

“The Memorizing session will now begin,” he said. “Bring me your memories.”

He noticed Jack o’ the Warren smiling at Bluebelle but was unable to decide whether the smile contained any element of lust. The other gnomes watched one another, waiting for the first memory to be suggested so they could dispute its validity in time-honored fashion. The Memorizing session commenced.

At one point Fang fancied that Elmera leered at him, but he hoped it was his imagination.

A
RTHUR
CAME TO CAMELOT IN LATE JUNE. IT WAS
midnight when he arrived, but his bedchamber was kept ready for such occasions. After making sure the rest of his small party was taken care of, he retired for the night.

“Shall I tell Queen Guinevere you’re here, Sire?” asked the chambermaid.

“No. She’ll be asleep. I’ll see her in the morning.”

He lay back in bed staring at the vaulted ceiling, his head pillowed on his hands. Strange, how a man could be afraid of meeting his own wife. But it was almost two years since he’d last seen Gwen; two years of fighting and peacemaking around England. It was over now, for the time being. But within months someone would be plotting against him, and he’d have to go to Cirencester.

Cirencester … What a stinking hole it was. Crowded streets, people everywhere, the river a veritable sewer. How good it was to be back in Cornwall! The journey had taken’ over a fortnight because of the various calls he’d been obliged to make on the way: to pacify a ruffled Baron here, to settle a boundary dispute there.

But gradually, as he rode, the countryside had changed in character. The sandstone Cotswold hills had given way to the rolling hills of Devon until, quite suddenly, he was riding across the moors. The very air smelled different. The sun shone more brightly, the wind blew more keenly. He felt the most
extraordinary tightness in his throat when the massive outcrop of Pentor came into view. Then he topped a rise and saw the familiar river with Camelot tucked under its elbow. He was home.

Nyneve …

Better not to think of Nyneve. Better to think of Gwen and the good times they were going to have that summer. They would take a boat on the river and sail down to the sea. They would climb to the top of Pentor and drink wine. They would walk the forest paths to Mara Zion village and see the people there; those who hadn’t moved to Camelot when Torre and Governayle and the others moved. There were many happy days ahead for Gwen and him. He’d earned these days, and so had she. This was the reward.

So why was he frightened to meet her?

Two years was a long time. A woman could change her mind about a man in two years. There had been signs that she was becoming dissatisfied before his last departure. She’d complained of the loneliness, but then she’d always been a complainer. It didn’t necessarily mean anything. And she’d found other interests to occupy herself: praiseworthy interests like championing the cause of the gnomes.

Lancelot supported her in that. Lancelot, whose name was so often connected with Gwen’s. It seemed he’d heard little else in Cirencester. “Why didn’t you bring Sir Lancelot du Lac with you, Sire?” And from the more powerful nobles: “I’m surprised you’ve left Lancelot and Guinevere back at Camelot together, Arthur.”

The legend had spread as far as Wroxeter and farther. It had distorted people’s view of the present, and it had aroused all kinds of unreasonable expectations of the future. He felt like the son of a famous father. The legend was impossible to live up to—and yet it had made things easier in some ways. It was so familiar to people that if he deliberately followed its course, he got very little opposition. On the other hand, if he acted contrary to the legend, he was met with outrage.

The legend said that Gwen and Lance were lovers, and so people
believed it. They wanted to believe it. The truest of his friends regarded him with sympathy, the most insincere with contempt.

Nobody felt the way he did about the pair. Lancelot, although a good friend and ally, was a prude. And Gwen, although reasonably beautiful and quite intelligent, was somewhat frigid. Furthermore, she enjoyed being queen and would not want to risk losing that status.

What unhappy reasons for being sure of one’s wife!

Pondering on this, Arthur fell asleep at last. …

“Hello, darling!” She was kissing him lightly on the forehead, the sunlight gilding her hair as it cascaded past her face. “You should have woken me up.”

“Let me look at you.” He held her at arm’s length. She looked back at him, clear-eyed. Yes, she was pretty. He hugged her to him and kissed her properly and was pleased to feel a definite stirring of affection within himself; and perhaps a little lust too. He laughed as the worries of the night began to fade. She hugged him back and climbed into bed beside him—whether out of a sense of duty or love, he didn’t know. And just for a few minutes it didn’t matter.

Afterward they sat drinking a local tea that he hadn’t tasted since leaving Camelot, while the sunlight lanced through the tall windows and specks of drifting dust looked like their personal stars.

“Tell me the news,” he said.

“There isn’t much to tell. While Torre was away fighting, Governayle looked after things and did a good job. He may not be much of a soldier, but he has a good head on him. The village of Mara Zion thrives. The Irish came twice, but they made no trouble, and brought some useful goods for barter. The gnomes have been making themselves useful, and they really seem to have settled down well at the beach. There was a slight problem with a high tide in the spring but we sorted that out. Ned Palomides has been keeping an eye on them recently, after I had a little disagreement with them.”

“Palomides? But isn’t he a bit of a rogue?”

“Probably,
but he always treats me with respect. And he seems to have the gnomes’ interests at heart.” She smiled at him. “And that’s about all the news from Camelot.”

“What about Lancelot?”

“Oh, him? He got all miserable and left, after my little dispute with the gnomes. I’m sorry, Arthur. I know you thought a lot of him, but I can’t stand people with long faces around me. And Lance was like that—always disapproving of this or that. Never satisfied. I don’t think I ever saw him laugh.”

“So where is he now?”

“I heard a rumor he went over to Trevarron Isle. A strange woman called Elaine lives there—she has a son, too, I believe. I expect Lance is living with her. She sounds the kind of woman he’d take pity on.”

“I’ll have to find time to visit him while I’m here.”

“Well, don’t worry about it now, darling. I’ve organized a welcoming party for you tonight. It’s short notice, but all Menheniot will be here, and I’m hoping some of your old friends from Mara Zion will be able to come too. I’ve invited the gnomes to entertain us, as a goodwill gesture.”

“It would have been nice to have had a quiet evening alone.”

“Nonsense, darling! People will be glad to see you back. You must give them a chance to celebrate a little. After all, you’re something of a stranger these days. …”

Alas for idealism. There was no Round Table in the Great Hall of Camelot. The tragedy of Mara Zion had been taken as a warning not to fly in the face of the natural order. And the natural order dictated that the leaders should be at the head table and the followers elsewhere. So the long tables were arranged in ranks; and Arthur, Gwen, Torre, Governayle, and a handful of other favorites sat at a table at right angles to the others.

To the west was a raised platform, and on this stood a miniature table. Gnomes sat in a row along the far side of this table, facing the guests. They had discarded their traditional conical caps and now wore forked hats with a tiny silver bell at each tip.