Power of Three (21 page)

Mr. Masterfield almost smiled as he fetched a bottle of wine. “Ladies first,” he said to Ayna. “Wine?”

“Yes please,” said Ayna, feeling rather flustered. She could see Mr. Masterfield was trying to show he was grateful to her, but he frightened her rather.

“Oh no, Jerry,” Aunt Mary said anxiously. “Ayna, surely your mother doesn't allow you to drink wine?”

“Yes she does,” Ceri said, afraid of missing his share. “We all do.”

Aunt Mary looked worried. “You shouldn't. You're all far too small for your ages.”

Brenda let out a large, nervous wheeze. Ceri protested, “I grow all the time.”

“How old are you?” Mr. Claybury said teasingly to Ayna.

Ayna blushed. She suspected Mr. Claybury was thinking of her as a little girl, rather younger than Ceri, and she was afraid he was going to be disillusioned. “Nearly fourteen,” she admitted.

“That settles it,” said Mr. Masterfield, and he poured Ayna some wine in spite of Aunt Mary's frown.

Mr. Claybury, to Ayna's relief, threw back his bald head and laughed. “Would you believe it!” he said. “You're the same age as my little niece!” It was plain he thought his niece was wonderful, so that, Ayna thought thankfully, was all right. “And here was I thinking you were a bit young to be trusted with that great gold necklace of yours!” Mr. Claybury said, pointing to Ayna's collar. His face became thoughtful. Slow, Giant memories came into it. “I know what it's been reminding me of.” He looked at Mr. Masterfield. “Jerry old man, do you still have that gold collar that funny little fellow gave us for shifting that stone?”

Gair's heart bumped. He avoided looking at Ayna's and Ceri's startled, troubled faces, and looked at Mr. Masterfield instead. His face was blank, bitter and crafty. “What on earth are you talking about, George?” he said. Gair felt the pulsing of the collar strongly as he said it. It was working to make Mr. Masterfield cheat and lie, perhaps even kill, to keep the thing which could only do him harm.

Mr. Claybury's face became less pleasant, too. “Maybe you don't remember,” he said. “You were very drunk. But I'd like to know what became of that collar. It was half mine, after all.”

“I've no idea,” Mr. Masterfield said flatly, and went round the table with the wine. Mr. Claybury's mouth pursed up and he looked almost murderously at Mr. Masterfield's back. It was only too clear to Gair that the collar had destroyed any friendship there had been between them.

Gerald took a deep breath. “I think I know the collar you mean, Mr. Claybury. It's in the study.” Mr. Masterfield whirled round and glared at him, and Gair was not the only one who held his breath.

“There
is
a gold torque in the study,” Aunt Mary said nervously. “Torque is the word, Gerald. A very fine one.”

Mr. Claybury laughed and drank some wine. “I think I'll tell you a story,” he said suddenly.

“How kind,” Aunt Mary said uncertainly.

“The nippers'll like it anyway,” said Mr. Claybury. “It starts on a fine moonlit night, years ago. There were two young men called—well, let's call them Jerry and George, shall we? They had just come down from Oxford and Jerry was to be married the next day. George was going to be best man. And, the night before the wedding, the night I'm talking about, these two proceeded to get unbelievably, monstrously, extravagantly drunk—so drunk that they were never quite sure afterward what really happened. However, they did distinctly remember going to a farm called Marsh End—”

Brenda gasped from beside the sideboard. “My Auntie Marianne lives there!”

“Does she?” said Mr. Claybury. “She was a very comely young lady.” After that, he turned his chair to include Brenda as he told his story, and much of his good humor seemed to return. Gair kept an eye on Mr. Masterfield and thought he had seldom seen anyone, Giant or person, look more dangerous. He hoped Mr. Claybury knew what he was doing. “These young men,” Mr. Claybury said, “rollicked all over the Moor, and several times returned to sing songs under your auntie's window. And then, somehow, they ended up at a place where three roads met, on one of those little triangles of grass. There was a signpost there, and without that signpost they would have fallen down. They were as drunk as that. Shall I go on?”

“Ooh, yes!” said Brenda.

But the question was aimed at Mr. Masterfield and, to Gair's astonishment, Mr. Masterfield laughed, and laughed quite naturally. “Why not?” he said. This had nothing to do with the collar. Gair could feel it pulsing as coldly and strongly as ever. Either Giants had some source of strength Gair did not know about, or Mr. Claybury had worked powerful magic.

“Very well,” Mr. Claybury said happily. And this was the story he told—and he told it very well, too, Gair thought, as well as Banot might.

George and Jerry were hanging onto that signpost and howling out a song about someone called Nelly Dean as hard as they could howl, when a strange little man suddenly hopped out of the ditch and came toward them.

“I wonder if you two could do me a favor,” he said.

They stopped their song and did their best to look at him. They found him rather hard to see in their state. His clothes kept melting into the moonlight, but they could discern that he was fair, with a fair beard, and that he was laughing at their condition. Jerry was somewhat incensed at this, and drew himself up with dignity. Unfortunately, he forgot to let go of the signpost. The post came out of the ground and George slid in a heap to the grass. But Jerry was never one to let details bother him. He simply cradled the signpost in his arms and demanded, “Who the devil are you, you funny little man?”

George thought the little man was rather annoyed at Jerry's tone, and also much impressed by his strength. But he was tired of being on the ground, so he said, “Put the signpost back, Jerry. I need it.”

Jerry seemed rather surprised to find he was carrying a signpost. “How did I get this, George?” he said. “It seems to be a signpost. Shall we take it home as a souvenir?”

“No,” said George. “I need it. Put it back.”

Jerry did his honest best to put the signpost back, and George did his best to help him, but they got into great difficulties, because George could not find the hole to put it in and Jerry found several, all over the place. Every time the signpost fell over it seemed funnier. The little man seemed to find it quite as funny. They were all helpless with laughter by the time the little man planted it himself in the right place. And the darned thing started to fall over again. But the little man was not having that. He said one or two strange words, rather severely, to the signpost, and it promptly stood as firm as a rock.

“I think it's the wrong way round,” George said, peering at the names on its arms, but, as nobody felt this mattered, he sat down to have a rest.

Jerry, meanwhile, had decided that the little man was one of his best friends. “Good old Titch!” he said, and made the little fellow utter a sort of croak by flinging an arm round him. “Didn't you want us to do you a favor?”

“That's right,” said the little man, sounding rather surprised that he should remember. And he pointed to something in the field beyond the hedge. “Would you mind very much moving that stone for me?”

Jerry hurt George's head by laughing. “Hey, George! Titch wants us to move the Gallows Stone!”

“Shan't,” said George. He was getting sleepy. “Don't hold with capital punishment.”

“Don't be a fool. It's not been used that way for centuries. Take a look.”

Titch kindly helped George flounder up beside Jerry, and he seemed to find it quite a strain when George leaned on him. This was quite odd, because, in actual fact, George and he were much the same size. It was just that Titch
seemed
smaller, if you see what I mean. Anyway, George was finally able to stare across at a mound, near the edge of the Moor, which had a huge boulder balanced on top of it. On a rough estimate, by moonlight, it was about half the size of a haystack. “We can't move that!” George protested.

“Not if we both heaved?” said Jerry, who was much taken with the idea.

George remembered that he had certain responsibilities toward Jerry. “Got to get you to church in one piece,” he said.

“True,” said Jerry. “Sorry, Titch. Home, George. I need a drink.” There was nothing he needed less just then.

Titch, at this, became curiously desperate. “Would you try to move it if I offered you a reward?” he said.

“George,” said Jerry, “Titch is now offering us a reward if we move the Gallows Stone.”

George woke up, feeling unmistakable interest. “How much?”

“This collar,” said Titch, and he put his hands to his neck. As far as they could see, he was not wearing any kind of collar. Titch seemed to realize he was not, too, and took his hands away again, looking rather at a loss. “I'll give you a solid gold collar,” he said. He seemed to mean it.

“I had a gold collar-stud once,” George said wistfully. “Mind you, I prefer my collars made of cloth, come to think of it.
Gold
, did you say?”

“Yes, a gold collar,” said Titch.

“It's no good, George,” said Jerry, who had been considering the matter. “It's too big. We couldn't move it for a whole gold suit. It would take a bulldozer.”

Here, both Jerry and George were struck with the same splendid idea. They turned to one another, swaying in the moonlight.

“Do you think we could?” said George. “I can't drive.”

“I can try,” said Jerry. “It would be a lark, and we haven't done anything yet tonight, have we?”

“The night is young!” shouted George. “Come on.”

Jerry shouted to Titch to come on, and they all three ran like madmen, down the branch of the road which the signpost now wrongly asserted led to Oxford. In fact, it led to Marsh End Farm. Now, it is one of the more remarkable things about being drunk that, even when you can hardly stand, you can run like the wind and even find breath to talk.

“We have to do something,” George explained to Titch as he sprinted. “We've just finished Finals, and Jerry's getting married tomorrow. Silly fool, isn't he?”

“You don't think I'm a silly fool, do you, Titch?” Jerry said plaintively.

Titch, who did not seem in the least out of breath, although his legs were fairly twinkling along, said that he did not think Jerry was a fool at all. “If you can move that stone,” he said, “I shall be married tomorrow, too.”

“Hear that, George?” Jerry panted. “Titch is getting married tomorrow, too!”

It occurred to George that Titch's family must have some very odd marriage customs, if they required bridegrooms to heave stones about, but before he could say so, they arrived in the dark and odorous farmyard of Marsh End Farm. They had, as I said, been there several times that night, and, as happened each time, a confounded dog stood up on the end of its chain and tried to eat them, making the air hideous with its barking. But Titch said something to it quietly, and it stopped, just like that, and lay down again. Which left Jerry and George free to hurl handfuls of farmyard at the upstairs window and yodel for Marianne.

After a while, the light went on, and this young lady's auntie stuck her tousled head out of the window. By this time, she was understandably irritated. “If it isn't you two again!” she said. “Go away. I've had about enough of your drunken yelling.”

They sang to soothe her. “Please, Marianne,” sang George. And Jerry caroled, “We want to borrow a tractor.”

“The idea!” said this young lady's auntie. “I'll have our dad come after you with his shotgun if I hear any more tonight!”

“A tractor!” they sang.

“Go away,” said Marianne, and she shut the window and turned out her light.

“How about that?” said George. He did not like shotguns.

“The old man's down at the pub still,” said Jerry. “We did ask, and she didn't say no.” And he boldly led the way to the shed where the old man kept a tractor. Titch, when he saw it, pulled his little fair beard and looked dubious, but he did not say anything. George said they would need some rope, too. “Chains,” said Jerry. “They're much stronger.” He found a whole lot in a corner of the shed and told Titch to put them in the back of the tractor. Titch carried them easily enough, but he seemed more doubtful than ever. They asked him why.

“You people put so much faith in iron,” he said. “I don't altogether trust it myself.”

“Carry them over and don't argue,” said Jerry.

Titch did so, but as soon as he reached the tractor he looked sick and asked why it smelled so horrible. Jerry told him it was only diesel oil. But, since Titch seemed on the way to getting really ill, and the sight affected George profoundly, too, Jerry told them to wait outside while he tried to start the tractor. Much relieved, they went and leaned on the gate, where the dog watched them placidly, and George became confiding.

“I'm going to be a great man, Titch,” he said. “I want you to believe that. One of these days, everyone's going to be talking about George Claybury, self-made man.” And he said many other absurd things as well, being young and foolish and, as I think I have remarked, very drunk besides. Titch, to do him credit, listened very patiently and did not try to interrupt with advice. And, fortunately, just as George had got onto his unhappy childhood and started to cry, he was interrupted by a vast, vibrant chugging. Jerry and the tractor came backward out of the farmyard at an unexpectedly high speed. It was halfway to the crossroads before either of them came to their senses.