5

By that afternoon Moril was wondering if it was only that morning they had left Clennen buried by the lake. It felt like last century. There had been so many changes. After a good breakfast, followed by the attentions of a tailor, a bootmaker, and Ganner’s old nurse, followed in turn by an astonishingly good lunch, Moril scarcely knew himself. He looked in a mirror—it was a thing he seldom had the chance of doing, so he looked long and often—and he saw a smoothly combed red-haired boy in a suit of good blue cloth and a pair of soft rust-colored boots. The boots, to tell the truth, pleased him enormously. But he did not look in the least like his idea of himself. Dagner and Kialan had become spruce, gentlemanly figures in the same kind of blue clothes, and Brid a young lady in bright cherry color. They were all four behaving very soberly and politely, not because Ganner insisted on it—because he did not—but simply because Markind was the sort of place where you could behave in no other way.

The biggest change was to Lenina. She was splendidly dressed, too, and she had done her hair the way ladies did. Her cheeks were pinker than usual, and she laughed and chattered and hurried about with Ganner on a hundred errands. Moril had not often seen her laugh, and he had certainly never seen her so talkative. She was like a different person. That troubled him. It troubled him far more than learning she was going to marry Ganner that same evening.

Moril quite liked Ganner. Ganner told Moril he could do just what he liked and go anywhere he wanted, and obviously meant it. He was a very good-natured man. Moril quite liked the other people in the house, too. He liked Ganner’s old nurse specially. She fussed rather, and she said rather too often that she had always known Lenina Thornsdaughter would come back to them, but she called Moril “my duck” and said he was a “blessing.” And while she was dressing him, she told Moril a story about a lord of Markind who had been outlawed. Moril had not heard the story before, and he drank it up. But he felt strange. Everything felt strange.

Moril took Ganner at his word and explored the house. He found two gardens and the kitchens. He looked at the cellars and the small rooms under the roof, but in between each exploration he found himself drifting into the stableyard. The cart had been put away in a coach house there, just as it was, wine jar, cwidders, and all, down to the string of onions under the driving seat. It was just the same, yet somehow it already looked smaller and dustier and a little faded. Moril spent a lot of time talking to Olob, who was standing dejectedly in a stall nearby and seemed glad of his company. Moril stole sugar for him from the kitchen, which was easy to do because everyone there was in a great bustle, preparing for the wedding feast. Olob ate it politely, but he looked sad, and he was sweating rather.

“Poor fellow,” Moril said sadly. “I’m hot, too. It’s being in a house.”

As the afternoon drew on, Moril became hotter still. Being between walls so oppressed him that he wondered whether to go out and walk in the town. But Markind had not inspired him with any wish to see more of it. He wandered to the stableyard and then into one of the gardens. Brid was there. She was feeling much the same, for she had taken off her cherry-colored boots and was sitting with her feet in one of the goldfish ponds.

They exchanged sad, polite smiles, and Moril went on into the second garden. Behind him he heard Ganner’s voice.

“My dear little girl! You’ll catch your death like that! Do please dry your feet and put your boots on. You’ll worry your mother.”

Moril felt sorry for Brid. Then he suddenly felt even more—desperately—sorry for himself. He needed to be somewhere else, out in the open. He looked round wildly, upward, everywhere. And a sturdy creeper growing up the thick yellow wall of the house gave him an idea. He slung himself onto it and started to climb.

It was extremely easy, except for the last bit, which needed a long stride and a heave across some crumbly stonework. Then he was on the wide, leaded roofs. It was splendid. Moril looked round, into the town, out across the valley, and over to valleys beyond. He turned north and looked at the misty blue peaks there, where he had so longed to go, and Kialan—lucky Kialan!—was going soon. But that made him sad. So, presently, Moril began to patter about across the leads and among the chimneys. He skirted courtyards and looked down into the gardens. Then he ran along a narrow part to another wing and looked down into another court.

And there was Ganner, horrified and gesturing below. “Come down! Come down at once!”

Moril looked. There was a lead pipe and an easy flight of windows. Obediently he swung his legs over the edge of the roof.

Ganner stopped him with a hoarse shriek. “No! Stop! Do you want to break your neck? Wait!” He ran away and presently ran back with a crowd of men carrying a ladder. With them ran a group of horrified maids, and the old nurse, wringing her hands.

“My duck! Oh my duck!”

Moril sat sadly on the edge of the roof, swinging his legs and watching them all pothering with the ladder. He knew what was wrong with Ganner now. He was a fusspot.

The ladder finally thumped against the wall beside him. “You can come down now,” Ganner called. “Go very carefully.”

Moril sighed and got onto the ladder. He came down rather slowly out of sheer perverseness. He decided when he got near enough he would say to Ganner, “But you told me I could go anywhere I wanted.” When he judged he was low enough for it to be most effective, he turned round to say it.

A man was just coming in through the door to the courtyard—a fair man with light, untrustworthy eyes, who checked for a moment when he saw Moril twenty feet up a long ladder, staring at him. Shrugging slightly, the man strolled over to Ganner and said something to him. Ganner replied. The man shrugged again, said another word or so to Ganner, and strolled out of the courtyard.

Moril forgot what he intended to say. Instead, as soon as he was down on the ground, he said, “Who was that man here just now? The fair one, who spoke to you.”

Ganner looked uneasy, so uneasy that Moril’s chest went tight and he felt sick. “Oh—er—just someone who’s my guest here,” said Ganner. “Now you are absolutely not to get on the roof again! It’s extremely high, and the leads are quite unsafe. You might have been killed!”

“Killed, my duck!” said his nurse.

Moril bore with a long scold from both Ganner and the nurse, without listening to a word. Both of them would have scolded anyway, but Moril was fairly sure that Ganner was scolding mostly as an excuse not to discuss the fair man. Moril did not want to discuss him. His one desire was to get away and find Lenina.

Lenina was in the great hall of the house. Presumably it was the same place where Clennen had sung and then played the trick on Ganner seventeen years before. Lenina was gaily organizing the tables for the wedding feast, and doing it as if she had done nothing else all her life. Moril had to pull her sleeve to get her to attend to him.

“Mother! One of the men who killed Father! He’s staying here.”

“Oh, Moril, don’t interrupt me with stupid stories!” Lenina said impatiently.

“But I saw him,” said Moril.

“You must have made a mistake,” said Lenina. She pulled her sleeve away and went back to the tables.

Moril stood, shocked and troubled, in the middle of the hall. He saw quite clearly that his mother did not want to believe him. She had put Clennen and all that part of her life behind her and she did not want to be reminded of it. Yet if Ganner had had a hand in killing Clennen, this was the last place she ought to be—the last place any of them ought to be. Moril looked at gay, busy Lenina, shook his head desolately, and hurried away to find Brid.

Brid was hurrying through the garden in the opposite direction. “Moril—!”

“One of the men who killed Father,” said Moril. “He’s staying here.”

“I know. I saw him,” said Brid. “Did you try to tell Mother?”

“Yes. She wouldn’t listen.”

“She wouldn’t listen to me either,” said Brid. “She doesn’t want to know, I think. Moril, what are we going to do? We can’t stay here, can we? Do you think Ganner had Father killed?”

Moril thought about it. He remembered that though Ganner had obviously been very pleased to see Lenina, he had not perhaps been entirely surprised. And he did not like it at all. “I don’t know. He could have done. Only he’s a bit too feeble to think of it, isn’t he?”

“And why not do it years ago if he felt that bad about Father stealing Mother off him?” said Brid. “But I don’t care whether he did or not. I’m not staying here, and that’s final!”

“Mother is staying,” said Moril. “I’m afraid that’s final, too.”

“Then we’ll have to do without her,” said Brid. “I can cook, and we’ve got good clothes now. The only thing is, I’m not very good on the hand organ.”

Moril did not feel as if they had come to a decision. It was as if he had known all along that they would leave. “But can we manage?” he said. “Give shows and all without even Dagner?”

“Dagner will have to come, too,” stated Brid. “He’ll have to. He’s Father’s heir, and he ought to. Besides, he shouldn’t stay here even more than us. If it was old days, he’d have to avenge Father.”

Moril was dubious. Wherever Brid thought Dagner’s duty lay, Moril knew Dagner would want to stay with Lenina. He knew, without knowing how he knew, that Dagner had always been closer to his mother than to Clennen. And how could Dagner take up the singer’s trade when he was terrified and nervous at every show? “But would Dagner do it—on his own? I mean—”

“I know just what you mean,” said Brid. “But I can manage Dagner. I can always manage him when there aren’t any parents around to interfere.”

“Let’s go and find him then,” said Moril.

Neither of them had seen Dagner for a considerable while. Since they had not the least idea where to start looking, they drifted quite naturally to the stableyard first, to have a look at Olob and the cart.

Dagner was in the stableyard, polishing Olob’s harness, and Kialan was helping him. Both of them looked a little blank when Moril and Brid came in.

“Do you two haunt this yard, or something?” Kialan said irritably.

Moril decided to take the bull by the horns. “We’re taking the cart and leaving,” he said. “Are you two coming?” Kialan was clearly astonished and stared at Moril with all the annoyance of someone who cannot believe his ears.

“I’ve got to go anyway,” said Dagner. “Father asked me to take Kialan to Hannart. But there’s no need for you two to come.”

“Oh, yes, there is!” said Brid. “One of the men who killed Father is in this house, and if that isn’t a reason for going, give me a better one!”

Dagner and Kialan exchanged glances, and Kialan screwed his mouth up. “True?” Dagner said to Moril.

“I saw him,” said Moril. “The fair one with queer eyes. But you didn’t see them, did—”

“Yes, I did,” said Dagner. “We were only in the woods. That one was the leader. Kialan, I think that settles it, don’t you? We’d better leave at once, as soon as I’ve said good-bye to Mother.”

“Don’t be an idiot!” said Moril. “If you tell Mother we’re going, she’ll tell Ganner. And he’s such a big fusspot that he’s bound to say it’s dangerous and stop us going.”

Kialan and Dagner looked at one another again. “He’s got a point there, Dagner,” Kialan said. “Ganner is an awful old woman. He’s bound to come after us, anyway. What do you say to waiting until the wedding feast has started and he’s too busy to notice we’re missing?”

Dagner pondered anxiously. He looked purple and bent with worry. “No,” he said at length. “No, we daren’t. Not if this other fellow’s here.” He jerked his head to the end of the yard. There was a big old gate in the wall there, bolted and peeling. “We’ve found out that leads to a back street. You two get those bolts back while I harness Olob, but don’t open it till I’m ready.”

Kialan helped Dagner pull out the cart and back Olob between its shafts, so they were ready almost as soon as Brid and Moril had done their part. The bolts were very stiff and rusty. Brid wanted to fetch the oil from the cart, but Moril would not let her. “No,” he said. “I’ve an idea to fool Ganner.” It took them quite a while, and cost Brid a pinched finger, to waggle the bolts back without.

“Ready,” said Dagner. Olob came toward the gate, almost dancing with pleasure at being at the work he was used to. Brid and Moril swung the gate creaking open. Brid went up into the cart, with the easy spring of long practice, and sat down to get her boots off. The cart rumbled through and crunched on the gravel of the lane outside, which was so narrow that Olob for a moment seemed likely to run into the shuttered house opposite. Moril stayed inside the stableyard and carefully bolted the gate again. It looked, to his satisfaction, as if it had never been opened at all. He took a running jump at it and managed to hook his fingers in the top, where the gate did not quite meet the wall above. From there, he swarmed up onto the thick top of the wall itself. Kialan stood up in the cart to help him jump down.

“Good idea,” he said. “Let’s hope Ganner wastes a lot of time trying to find out which way we went.”