The Witch of Clatteringshaws (11 page)

“Hnh?”

“To right or left or straight ahead. Not diagonally. The king is captured by being surrounded by enemy pieces on all four sides.”

“How many squares can a piece move?”

“As many as are empty.”

“I see. It sounds simple enough,” said Simon dubiously.

The pieces were set out on the board. They were made of bone, and the king piece, the
hnefi
, had a gold crown round his stomach. Two stools were brought from the Wendish camp for Simon and King Albert. They tossed a Wendish pfennig for color, and King Albert won and
chose white. (Afterward Simon discovered that the Wendish pfennigs had heads on both sides.)

Simon’s black king was in the center of the board and the black pieces were ranged in a formal pattern round him. The white pieces were placed in a more open diamond pattern outside the black ones.

“Black has the first move,” Firebrace muttered in Simon’s ear.

Simon moved one of his king’s attendant pieces sideways, to give the
hnefi
an exit hole. At once King Albert moved in one of his white men as close to the black king as he could come. He shifted his pieces with a quick pouncing movement and his black eyes sparkled.

“Hah!”
he said.

Simon guessed that he played this game a great deal and was expert at it.

“Ve play best of nine games, yes?” said King Albert.

“As you wish, Your Majesty.”

“You vin, I take my army back to Vendland. I vin, you find us Vends nize home in beautiful English countryside—yes so? Not too far from my cousin Bloodarrow of Bernicia.”

“Very well,” said Simon.

I wish Dido were here, he thought. I bet she’d be good at this game.

“Don’t play with a straw before an old cat,” said the parrot.

Dido was hunting for Fred.

As soon as she and Piers got back from their conference with Malise, she went to the greenhouse, for the house was still locked up. But there was no trace of Fred, only the crumpled sack where he had lain.

Back in front of the house, she said to Piers: “You go and hunt for him down by the lochside … I’ll go back into the town.”

“But why should he have gone to either of those places?”

“Dear knows! But he’s got to be
somewhere
.”

Before she had gone far, Dido encountered Mrs. McClan and Desmond. He was plainly the worse for liquor, and was dancing and singing, or at least attempting to dance and sing, while being dragged furiously along by his mother.

Dido recognized one of her father’s songs:

“
Will
you come along, Desmond! And stop making that disgraceful racket!”

“
Desmond!
Whisht! Ye’ll wake the Residents!”

“Some of them seem to be awake already, ma’am,” said Dido.

Faint cries were coming from the Eagles.

“
Dido!
What in the waurld are ye doing up so late?”

“I’m looking for Fred, ma’am. He’s not in the greenhouse.”

“Saints save us! What does it matter where Fred has chosen to pit himself? You go to bed directly, girl, or ye’ll never be up in time tae make the Residents’ breakfast. What should we care where Fred has got to? He’ll turn up in the morning.”

Mrs. McClan briskly unlocked the front door and dragged Desmond through it.

Dido went on her way toward the main street of Clatteringshaws. A pale quarter-moon had risen, and the wet cobblestones under her feet shone like a silk counterpane.

A small gleam caught her eye; as she stooped to pick
up whatever it was, a hand grasped her arm, an alcoholic breath engulfed her, and she looked up into the wine-reddened face of Sir Fosby Killick.

“Well, well,
well
, if it isn’t the lovely Miss Dido Twite! My little fairy fay! And what might
you
be doing in the streets of Clatteringshaws at midnight past? What do you suppose she’s doing here, eh, Angus, old friend?”

Sir Fosby was with his constant companion, Sir Angus MacGrind; they had just emerged from the tall derelict building called Mackintosh’s Rents. They were scanning the ground as if one of them had dropped something of value, but now they abandoned their search for whatever it was and concentrated on Dido.

“What are you two gentlemen doing here, for the matter of that?” Dido retorted. “And what were ye looking for? Lost a ha’penny?”

“Lost a ha’penny, yes indeed,” vaguely replied Sir Fosby. “Now you come with us, my dearie. You are the very person to tell us something about these mysterious letters from hereabout that Lady Titania and our revered Father Sam have been receiving. Not from the illiterate Desmond—certainly not from Fred—?”

“Why don’t you ask Father Sam hisself?” suggested Dido.

“Ah, well, Father Sam is a trifle elusive, my pretty. But now, just you come with us. I feel sure that you can tell us more than that wretched McClan woman and her sottish son.”

Dido had not the least intention of going with them. She dropped onto hands and knees, twitched sideways, pushed herself up vigorously with her hands, giving Sir
Fosby a sharp shove with her elbow as she did so—and was away, scooting down a narrow dark alleyway between two tall buildings.

“Odds cuss it! Come back, you! Grab her, Angus!”

Both men started heavily after her, but, now that she was free, Dido could easily outrun them; she flew down the alley, turned left, then right, then left again; and then she knew she was safe from them. They would never find her.

She was in a pitch-dark network of alleys but calculated that if she kept going in one direction, ignoring side turns, she must soon come out on the waterfront.

After a while, though, she began to think that her sense of direction must have got muddled, for, instead of coming out, she seemed to be plunging deeper and deeper into a maze of passageways so narrow that her shoulders brushed the walls on either side. Every now and then she stumbled over objects that lay scattered on the ground. Looking back, she could see only a thread of sky.

It’s almost as if I was indoors, she decided. Which is mighty queer, as I didn’t go in no doorway. It’s these spooky little passages, they seem to dig right into the hill that’s behind the town. And there’s a smell of timber. Like Mrs. M’s log store.

That’s it! she realized. That’s what these things are that I’ve been tripping over. They’re logs.

Perhaps I
am
in Mrs. M’s wood store?

That explained the smell. A great rampart of logs was piled up on her left side. Once or twice she knocked against one, and a few came tumbling and clattering down to the floor.

Better take care, thought Dido; if a whole slew of them
came rolling down on me I’d be stuck here. And squashed flat, likely.

Now she remembered that she was still holding the small round thing she had picked up off the cobbles when Sir Fosby had grabbed her. Thin. Flat. About the size of her thumbnail.

Surely it was a button. One of the horn buttons off Fred’s shirt? And something else she had grabbed as she ducked to evade Sir Fosby’s clutch. But she found it difficult to guess what
that
was. It was hard—with a sharp edge—curved—one end was pointed. A hook? A claw?

Why would a claw be lying in the street?

Now the passage widened. On her right side Dido could feel nothing.

But if I go right, she thought, I’ll go deeper into the cave. If I go on ahead, I’ll maybe come out in Mrs. M’s greenhouse.

But what about Fred?

Where is he?

Softly, warily, she called, “Fred? Are you in here? Can you hear me?”

And thought that somewhere, in all that darkness, she could hear a faint “Halloo?”

And she thought also that, far ahead, she could see a speck of faint greenish light, like the face of a luminous clock.

King Albert the Bear was evidently an old hand at the
hnefatefl
game and won three rounds in quick succession. But by then Simon was beginning to get the hang of it,
and now he began to win. When he had won four games running, King Albert suddenly said:

“I now getting again this bad, bad cramp pain in my leg. Ve must stop playing! At vunce!”

“Oh, I’m so sorry about that, Your Majesty. Shall we fight a duel, then? Or would you rather have a battle?”

“I tell you vot,” said King Albert. “Vot you say I get my men to vote. Vuns that vant to stay in Engel-land, you let them stay. I think I go home. Men that vish to go home, they go home vith me. Vot you say?”

“Sounds all right,” said Simon cautiously. “If we can find a place that’s big enough for the ones that want to stay. What do you think, Firebrace?”

“It might be arranged,” said Firebrace with equal caution. “When the train stopped at Northallerton, I remember hearing talk of an unoccupied valley in Yorkshire. That might do for some of your men, Your Majesty. What do you think?”

“Goot enough. Let them vote. Bring two baskets.”

Massive Wendish baskets were used to carry arrows and bullets. Their contents were all tipped out onto the heather.

“Men who vish to go back to Vendland put cheese in basket. Those who vish to stay in Engel-land put egg in basket. Understand?”

While the two leaders had been playing
hnefatefl
, a good deal of fraternization had been taking place among the troops. Simon’s army, who had been supplied with more hard-boiled eggs than they could use, had been happy to exchange these for the Wendish soldiers’ ration
of hard, round blue-veined cheeses the size of golf balls, which were found to be very tasty by the English troops.

“Made by adding the cream of one day to the entire milk of the next,” the Wendish quartermaster told them. “Makes cheese extra rich.”

When the vote was counted, it was found that three hundred men wished to remain in England. The rest preferred to go home.

“Good! Some go, some stay. I go home now, to Vendland. You come, Simon, you visit me sometime, we play more
hnefatefl
. You play not bad, not bad at all,” said King Albert.

So the arrows and bullets were bundled back into the baskets, the eggs and cheeses were distributed to those who wanted them, and the two armies prepared to go their ways.

“If I could borrow a horse,” said Firebrace, “I could ride down directly into Yorkshire and make arrangements about that valley. There may be a bit of rent to pay—”

“Vell, vell,” said King Albert, “ven you vant some rent, you let me know. No vorry! Goodbye. Ve go now. To the again-see!” And he mounted his horse and rode eastward with the main part of his army.

Simon, with his men and the rest of the Wendish army, turned back westward, singing Abednego Twite’s song “Raining, Raining All the Day,” which had a very catchy chorus:

“I reign, you reign, he reigns, they reign when the skies are gray.”

A large number of toads, which had been hesitating at the side of the road, now decided that it would be safe to cross.

* * *

Following the faint fleck of luminosity ahead, Dido made her way along the narrow passage to a little cave. It was dimly lit with a faint glow. The walls were shiny like the inside of a pomegranate rind. A scatter of faintly glittering objects lay about the floor. Crouched among these things, dark, alive, and trembling, was Fred. Dido knelt down beside him and gave him a hug.

“Fred! You’re all right! What happened to you? Was it those men?”

He was speechless with fright and simply clung to her.

“Never mind! Tell me later. Is this Tatzen’s cave?”

She felt his nod.

“Where is he now?”

To this Fred made no answer, but one was not needed. Dido could hear a scraping sound and see an indistinct but growing light coming toward them.

When Father Sam stepped off the train at Clatteringshaws, he was warmly greeted by Malise, who had the gray parrot Wiggonholt sitting on her shoulder.

“Sam! It’s good to see you!”

“Words and feathers the wind carries away. A third hand is better than two feet.”

“Oh, be quiet, Wiggonholt!”

“On the other hand,” Father Sam said to the parrot, “a word and a stone cannot be called back.”

“Kaaaaark!”

“Would you like to stay in my little hut by the coach park, Sam?”

“No, thank you, Malise,” said Father Sam very firmly.
“There are no chairs in your house, as I recall, let alone beds. I’ll go down to the Monster’s Arms. Where is Simon? And Dido? And Piers Crackenthorpe?”

“Simon is off fighting the Wends. The other two should be at the Eagles.”

“I’ll ask for them there. It is quite urgent about Piers. I have a letter for him.”

“I’ll come with you.”

They began walking down the steep zigzagging road.

On the way Malise said: “My penalty was a lot worse than yours.”

“Deservedly. You left a dying man alone. I had left him in your care.”

“
You
left him to go fishing!”

“And you to catch hold of a tune. Which is more irresponsible? Besides, would you want to be Archbishop?”

“No,” she said cheerfully. “Actually, I enjoy being Witch of Clatteringshaws!”

In front of the Monster’s Arms they found Mrs. McClan shrieking furiously at Sir Fosby Killick and Sir Angus MacGrind, who were looking angry and embarrassed. A group of townspeople was beginning to gather round them.

“Where’s my potwiper, Fred? Where’s my kitchen girl, Dido? Where’s my garden boy, Peter? Why have you made away with them? Where are they? You know where they are, don’t tell me differentways! For I’ll not believe ye! Ye were seen hustling Dido in the street—and that pair of gowks who work for ye were seen hauling young Fred along the street. How am I, a puir helpless forlorn woman,
supposit tae take care of all my Residents without any house-help? Answer me that!”