The Serial Garden: The Complete Armitage Family Stories (34 page)

"Oh, Mother! How
could
you? Why, it's our old Walrus, that we've had ever since he was a kitten—"

"Well, you'll have to approach Miss Pursey. Ask her to change him back. But be tactful—I don't want you changed to owls or weasels...."

"You'd think that Miss Pursey might be glad to change him back, actually,” said Harriet. “He does quite as much damage in his wolf shape."

Certainly Walrus no longer tried to climb the little tree. Timberwolves do not climb trees; which was just as well, for two hundred fifty pounds of wolf-Walrus would have done for the tree completely. But wolves dig a lot; and Miss Pursey was often to be seen throwing furious stones after Walrus, who had just scooped out a large cavity in her hemlock bed, or among her poison ivy.

Mark went around the bungalow, as he had not yet had conflict with Miss Pursey, and put the case to her politely.

"I expect he's got over his tree habit by now. Walrus has quite a short memory. He's quite a stupid cat. Couldn't you see your way to change him back?"

But Miss Pursey was unapproachable.

"Why should I?” she snapped. “I have just about lost my patience with your family. You give me nothing but trouble. Get out of my garden and don't let me see you in it again."

Mark left before she lost any more patience.

"We'll have to think of something else,” he said to Harriet.

"I've had an idea,” she said. “There's a new stall at the fair this year. Janie Perrow was telling me—it's a magician. Janie says he's marvelous. He can cure all sorts of illnesses and change spring onions into diamonds—I bet he can change a wolf back into a cat. Though it does seem rather a pity,” she added, wrapping an arm around Walrus's huge gray bulk. He snapped at her hand in his sleep. They were sitting on the hearthrug after tea.

"Let's go down to the fair now,” said Mark, jumping up. “Have you any money?"

"A pound saved from hop-picking."

"I've got two. Perhaps Father will give us something. A magician might be expensive."

Mr. Armitage was cautious. “First find out if the chap will do it. Then find out how much it costs. Then I'll see.” He added gloomily, “It would be more useful if he could find some way of removing Miss Pursey. However, do your best."

Mark and Harriet ran down to the village fair, which was spread all over the village green. It was called the Slow-Fair, happened once a year, and lasted for two weeks, from six to midnight every night. The stalls and sideshows were all terribly expensive, so Mark and Harriet usually waited until the last night, which was always the gayest and wildest, when pigs and coconuts were being auctioned off, and the fair people, having made a good deal of money, were more inclined to let customers onto the swings and roundabouts at half price, if half price was all they could afford, rather than let them go home with any money left unspent.

The roundabout, perched slantways on the hillside, was a particularly good one, with dragons and cockatrices, griffins, unicorns, hydras, camelopards, and Tasmanian devils, all painted in brilliant and luminous colors. It made a tremendous noise of bawling music and grinding machinery. Before getting down to business with the magician, Mark and Harriet each had one ride on it; he chose a dragon and she a cockatrice. It really felt like flying as one swung out over the tremendous drop on the lower side.

Close by the roundabout stood a very small stall indeed. It was hardly larger than a horse box and had a sign on top, very brightly painted, illuminated by lightbulbs all around, which said, MAESTRO CAPPODOCCIO, Leech to the Old Man of the Mountains, Tooth Puller to Prester John, Chirurgeon to the Grand Lama, Hakkim to the Bey of Tunis, and his Superb Assistant, Alicia Morgiana, Queen of the Sorceresses. Not to mention Lupus, the Wisest Beast in Christendom.

"This must be our man,” said Mark. “There doesn't seem to be much going on in his van, though."

Indeed, the little van, which was on wheels, seemed dark and silent enough. The door was closed. A small window on one side gave out a dim gleam of light.

Harriet stood on tiptoe and peered through the window. “I can see someone in there sitting on a stool,” she reported. So she went around to the end, climbed up the two steps, and tapped on the door. After considerable pause, it was slowly pulled back.

Inside stood a pale girl with lanky fair hair and a good many spots. She wore a sagging skirt, a draggled cardigan, trodden-over shoes, and a lot of mascara. She was chewing gum. She hardly looked like the Queen of the Sorceresses.

"Is Maestro Cappodoccio about?” said Harriet.

"I couldn't say, I'm sure,” said the girl, as if she didn't care, either. She had a flat, uninterested voice.

"When will he be back?"

"I couldn't say. He'll be back sometime."

"Are you his assistant?"

"Yes,” the girl said, shifting her gum from one cheek to the other.

"Well, can you help us?"

"Nah. Not without the professor."

"Well, can we come in and wait?"

"Suppose so,” said the girl unenthusiastically, and went back to her stool. They edged inside. The van was about five foot by seven—large enough to accommodate four or five people standing, but not much more. At the far end was a stove with a black pot boiling. The walls were lined with shelves containing small pots and jars labeled Ac. Phen., Ol. Euc., Sod. Bic., etc. There were two pull-down bunks. The ceiling was painted with geometrical signs. The girl's stool was the only seat, and she had gone back to reading
Girl's Star Weekly
.

Mark and Harriet each stood facing a wall. Harriet's had the window in it. She discovered with surprise that it was not a window, but a picture. One-way glass? It had certainly been a window from the outside, but now, instead of the fairground, she saw, very far away, a garden with mossy lawns, weeping willows, a fountain, a stone seat—

"Gosh,” murmured Harriet half to herself. “It isn't a picture. It's real.” She had noticed that the weeping willow was swaying in the breeze.

She jogged Mark's elbow.

"Hey—look at this. It's a real garden—miles and miles away—"

"Sure it's not a TV screen?” murmured Mark, turning around cautiously so as not to knock any of the little pots. But as soon as he studied the framed garden, he went very pale—his eyes almost popped out of his head. “
Harriet!
Do you know what that is?"

"No, what?” she glanced warningly at the girl, but the girl was absorbed in an article about “Your Stars, Your Makeup, and You."

"That garden!” hissed Mark. “It's Mr. Johansen's garden. Wait here! I'm going to fetch him right away!"

And without wasting a moment he slipped out of the van and rushed off into the dusk.

Harriet had known immediately what he meant. Mark's music teacher, a kind, sad, white-haired man called Rudolph Johansen, had once, many years before, fallen in love with a German princess whom he had the misfortune to lose through a piece of drawing-room magic. Somewhere, folded up in an enchanted garden inside the pages of a book, the Princess Sophia Maria Louisa of Saxe-Hoffenpoffen-und-Hamster was still waiting for Mr. Johansen, but nobody knew where she was or where the book was. It had been lost. But now here, according to Mark, was a picture of her garden—no, the garden itself, Harriet thought—and Mark should know, for he had once cut it all carefully off the sides of six cereal packets and pasted it together, only to have it destroyed during some disastrous spring cleaning.

Harriet gazed at the garden as if it might melt away in front of her eyes.

Far in the distance, she saw a speck of silvery white, which slowly came closer and turned into a tiny, faraway lady, stiffly dressed in a white crinoline, with her powdered hair dragged high on top of her head. Miles away, at the far end of the lawn, she sat herself rather wearily down on a stone seat, laying her hand on the head of a big shaggy dog who sat down on the ground by her feet.

"That must be Princess Sophie! If only Mark can find Mr. Johansen, and only Mr. Johansen can remember his tune—” For entry to the garden could be achieved only by humming a tune that Mr. Johansen himself had made up.

"Hey,” said Alicia, the Queen of the Sorceresses, closing her magazine and standing up. “I can hear the professor coming, and he's got someone with him. Only one customer allowed at a time. You'd best wait outside."

"But we were here first,” Harriet protested.

"Can't help that,” said the girl, and jerked her head toward the door. Harriet went out and stood beside the van, in its shadow. She could hear voices and footsteps approaching, for the merry-go-round was temporarily at a standstill. Then, at her feet, she heard the rattle of a chain.

Rather startled, she looked down and saw a large paw extending from under the van.

It looked suspiciously like that of Walrus.

Harriet dropped on her knees. Her eyes were accustomed to the dim light; she found herself staring straight into the face of a large pale gray wolf.

Was it Walrus?

Very cautiously, she held out a hand. “Are you Walrus?” she whispered.

A low growl answered her.

The voices and footsteps had now arrived outside the van.

Harriet heard a man's voice—a dry, gentle, calm voice, rather like that of Mr. Garrett, her English master, who liked to recite such long poems that not infrequently he put the whole class to sleep.

"But, madam, I already have a wolf in my act,” he was saying. “As you can see from my sign. I have Lupus, the Wisest Beast in Christendom, who can tell gold from sham by touch and recognizes all the letters of the Greek alphabet.

"That's why I thought you'd like to have two.” The other voice was Miss Pursey's—Harriet recognized it at once. “Two would be better still. You could teach the second one the Russian alphabet—it's a Siberian wolf, actually—and how to tell butter from marge."

"Why do you wish to dispose of the animal?"

"It's a nuisance in the garden,” said Miss Pursey.

Harriet's blood boiled. “Oh, the monster!” she thought. “Not content with turning our poor Walrus into a wolf, she's now arranging to sell him into captivity."

"I'd have to see the animal before I could come to a decision,” the man—presumably Maestro Cappodoccio—said. “If you'd like to bring him here, I'll give you my answer."

"Oh, very well,” said Miss Pursey annoyedly, and her steps receded into the dark again.

The magician went into his van. Harriet followed him at once.

"That woman who just offered you a wolf,” she began in high indignation. “She's no right to. For a start, it isn't a wolf at all, but our cat, Walrus! And—"

Professor Cappodoccio looked at Harriet attentively. He was a plump, gray-haired man with kind but very compelling brown eyes. She had interrupted him in the act of putting on a black robe over his ordinary gray suit.

"You say the animal is not a wolf—"

At that moment, Mark and Mr. Johansen arrived with most unceremonious speed.

"May we come in, sir?” gasped Mark, and instantly did so. He was dragging Mr. Johansen by the arm. Both of them were out of breath. “Look!” panted Mark triumphantly to his music teacher. “Look—there she is!"

He pointed jerkily to the tiny telescoped garden where the ant-sized Princess Sophie was thoughtfully pulling her large dog's ears.

"
Ach!
” breathed Mr. Johansen joyfully. “
Ach
, yes! Zat is my Sophie!
Ach, himmel
, I never zesought zsee to see her once more!” He was terribly moved. Tears stood in his eyes. His chest, which was still heaving from the speed of their run, began to heave also with suppressed sobs.

"Can you call out to her, sir?” gulped Mark. “Attract her attention?"

Mr. Johansen shook his head. He was still too out of breath for that. But he handed Mark a tiny silver dog whistle. Mark, still very puffed, blew one short soft note on the whistle. It was quick, but it was enough for the dog in the garden to catch it. Up shot her head—and suddenly she was off at a gallop, careering like the wind along the length of the huge lawn. It was plain that she was barking in wild delight, but she was still so far away that no sound could be heard, until she reached the very edge of the frame, when, faintly, faintly, they could hear a faraway reverberation of tiny barks. She was running this way and that, obviously much puzzled.

And the princess, equally startled, had risen to her feet—was apparently calling to the dog—asking what was the matter.

"Am I to understand, sir,” inquired Professor Cappodoccio with sympathetic interest, “that you are acquainted with the lady and the dog in my wall hanging? I have long wondered—"

"
Ach
, szo zat is no wvall hanging—zat is ze
garten
of Princess Sophia of Saxe-Huffenpoffen.
Indeed
I am acqvainted wiz it! In one little minute, I sing a song wvich—"

But in one little minute a whole lot of other things happened, very unexpectedly. Miss Pursey reappeared, looking decidedly ruffled, with a set of parallel scratches on her face; she held both ends of a rope which she had passed under the collar of an equally angry-looking Walrus. Apparently once he had lost his cat form she had more control of him.

Observing that there were several people in the van—though the only one she could see from the step was Mr. Johansen—Miss Pursey tied Walrus's rope to the door handle and called out, “Dr. Cappodoccio! Can you come out here a moment?"

At the sound of her loud, peremptory voice, Dr. Cappodoccio's assistant, the pale, bored Alicia, reacted with startling speed. She leapt to her feet, dropping the
Girl's Star Weekly
, and darted to the doorway, moving through the group of people as fast as an adder shooting through a patch of dry grass. And her whole appearance changed; the look of languid discontent dropped away, replaced by malevolent purposefulness.

"Well, there!” she exclaimed triumphantly. “I didn't
think
I could mistake that voice! If it isn't our Playful Pearl, the pride of Beelzebub Training College! Dear old pushy Pearl, the most unpopular girl on the necromantic campus—Pal Pearl who wouldn't ever
dream
of cribbing another student's incantation or pinching someone else's spell tables or borrowing their six-pointed star-calculator and forgetting to return it, oh,
no!
"