I joined Whimbrel, Garganey and Sanderling in the soft seats near the front. Brambling, Dotterel, Wryneck and Smew chose the row behind us. Then I watched with pride as Greylag took to the podium. Although he wore the imperial livery, which showed that he was a serf, he had all the bearing of an established conductor. At precisely seven thirty he primed the waiting orchestra and the music began.
Greylag’s overture lived up to all expectations. From the plaintive opening tones of the lone oboe, to the gigantic scrunched chords of the finale, it tirelessly swept the audience along in its wake. In some sections the music threatened to return the whole world to primordial chaos; in others it rose from modest simplicity to expressions of colossal stature. I eagerly awaited Greylag’s ‘deliberate mistake’ involving the discordant entry of the hunting horn. I was not disappointed: the effect on the unsuspecting audience was marked.
Only Garganey seemed to misunderstand, much to my annoyance.
‘Damn that horn!’ I heard him say. ‘He’s come in too early.’
I was quite pleased a moment later when Garganey was shushed from behind by Wryneck.
At the end came the applause, and Greylag thoroughly deserved it. One or two of my colleagues turned and politely congratulated me on ‘my’ composition. Wryneck even leaned over and told me I had ‘reached the bounds of absolute music’.
Nonetheless, there was no denying that this was Greylag’s evening. I allowed him to enjoy his brief period in the public gaze. Then, as the rapturous crowds departed, I went and joined him in the orchestra pit. The musicians were packing away their instruments.
‘You can have a rest tomorrow,’ I announced to all of them. ‘Rest for as long as you wish.’
Then I spoke quietly to Greylag.
‘I’ve got a treat in store for you tomorrow, Greylag,’ I said. ‘How would you like to go on a hike?’
‘I’d like that very much, sir,’ came the reply.
‘All right,’ I said. ‘I’ll call for you in the morning.’
Oddly enough, I didn’t sleep very well that night. I should have enjoyed the luxurious slumber of success, but I didn’t. Maybe it was the combined turmoil and excitement of the evening’s performance that kept me awake; or perhaps it was the prospect of public unrest when Wryneck and Smew were unmasked. Besides these larger considerations there was also that shrill piping sound which Whimbrel and I had heard coming from the east. I kept hearing it again in my mind as I drifted off to sleep, and it was almost as if it was trying somehow to obliterate all trace of Greylag’s music.
I met him in the half-light of early morning. He emerged from the cake wearing his usual black and scarlet frock coat and brass buckled boots. Clearly these were the only clothes he had. My plans for the hike were simple. I intended to head in the general direction of the plume of smoke. It didn’t really matter if we failed to find its source, but we could at least try. In addition, there was plainly some sort of encampment out there, so that would be worth investigating too. At first when we set off Greylag kept walking a few paces behind me, as though he was my servant. Only after my repeated insistence that we travelled side by side did he at last comply.
‘We’re equals today, Greylag,’ I said.
‘Thank you, sir,’ he replied.
The open air was very much a novelty for Greylag and he spent a lot of time ‘taking in the sights’. In truth, there wasn’t much to see. We wandered through the various postal districts before striking east into the hinterland beyond. Soon we were passing amongst brushwood and scrub, interspersed with marshes of reeds, rushes and sedge. There were fewer trees here than in the royal park; neither were there any footpaths to mark the way, though the proper wilderness still lay some miles ahead. Not that this seemed of any concern to Greylag. He was obviously delighting in every minute of his day out, so we just kept on going.
It was a mild day for the time of year, but I could tell that the weather in general was deteriorating. As we continued walking I wondered how long Wryneck and Smew had expected to bask in their glorious teatime sunsets. After all, the clocks could hardly be put forward in perpetuity; otherwise, every morning would eventually be lost in delayed darkness. Moreover, the sun was becoming increasingly pale by the day: even now it barely rose high enough to show its face through the gloom of late autumn. Judging by the sky there was little prospect of a decent sunset this evening, and I felt slightly sorry for Wryneck and Smew. At five o’clock (adjusted time) they would realise the futility of their deeds.
Meanwhile, the publication of counterfeit edicts had led them into very perilous territory. Even if they were acting for the good of the empire, which I didn’t doubt, there would now be a question mark hanging over each of them. I was especially surprised at Wryneck, who had appeared so anxious to curb even minor instances of ‘treason’. As for Smew, I’d long held the opinion that he was a vain and egotistical man. I wouldn’t have put it past him if he’d taken the ceremonial crown for himself, even if it was only a gold-painted replica. From what I could gather, nobody knew where the real crown was. Presumably it was locked safely away somewhere, and the only person who might know its whereabouts was the emperor himself; except that he wasn’t an emperor in the fully fledged sense because he’d never been crowned. He was a prince who for reasons of his own had failed to return from university. This in turn meant that Greater Fallowfields was not at present an empire. It wasn’t even a kingdom: it was only a principality.
I was snapped out of my reverie by a shrill piping sound in the near distance.
Greylag stopped in his tracks and listened.
‘G sharp,’ he announced.
‘Really?’ I said.
More shrill piping followed.
‘Definitely G sharp,’ said Greylag. ‘What a marvellously powerful instrument that must be.’
We resumed our hike. Ahead of us the scrub was starting to thicken into woodland. Further away lay great stands of forest, though I wasn’t sure whether we would get that far. I could feel rain approaching. We decided to call a halt while it was still dry. Greylag and I sat down and shared some ship’s biscuits that I’d obtained from Sanderling.
‘I don’t know for certain,’ I said, nodding towards the east, ‘but I think someone’s building a railway out there.’
‘Really, sir?’ said Greylag. ‘Is that allowed?’
‘Probably not,’ I said, ‘but if they’ve managed to come this far the question is beside the point.’
Indeed, the matter of who was ‘allowed’ to do what in this region had never previously arisen. Apart from those few attempts at forestry, we had chosen to ignore the ‘near east’ in exactly the same way as we did the ‘far east’. The wilderness had always been regarded as a natural frontier which therefore required no further development. It had evidently never occurred to anyone that there might be pioneers coming through from the other side. As Smew had mentioned in his recent talks, the empire assumed unceasingly that ‘the rest of the world’ could never impinge on our sphere of influence. He also seemed to suggest that there were some unspoken doubts surrounding this belief. Maybe, after all, he knew his subject better than I’d given him credit for.