Karil wiped the egg yolk off his trousers and said, “She’s a sort of cousin of mine. She has ringlets and wears white dresses and smiles a lot.”
“Do you like her?”
“I’ve never met her.”
But now, for the first time since the death of his father, he thought about where he might be going if he reached England safely, and it seemed as though it must be his grandfather’s house in London.
“She lives with my grandfather.” And then wearily: “I suppose that is where I shall have to live if I get across the border. It’s full of my relations.”
“No, you don’t have to,” said Tally. “Not unless you want to. You can come to Delderton with us. You’d like it.”
The others nodded.
“There’s lots going on. You could have an animal to keep,” said Barney. “I’ve got an axolotl.” He was about to say that the axolotl’s name was Zog and then thought better of it. After all, Karil himself was now a sort of Zog.
“We’re going to do a play of Persephone next term,” said Verity.
“Matteo gives amazing biology lessons,” said Tod.
“And there’s a river with otters,” said Tally. “It’s almost as nice as your dragonfly pool. And even the awful lessons are quite funny, like when you have to be a fork or boil up motherwort.”
She described the gentle countryside, the cedar tree in which a thrush sang every morning, the white-painted rooms, one for each child, which they could decorate in any way they liked. “Of course, being free can be exhausting, but you soon get used to it.”
“I can’t imagine being free,” said Karil, “being allowed to do what you want.”
Kit, however, felt that something should be made clear. “We don’t play cricket. Not ever. You’d have to put up with that.”
But Karil did not mind about cricket, which was not played much in Bergania.
“Would they let me come?”
“Of course.” As far as Tally was concerned the matter was settled. “Even if you haven’t got any money, the headmaster will probably give you a scholarship. I’m on a scholarship, so why not you?”
“You wait till you see Clemmy,” said Barney. “She teaches art and she’s the best cook in England.”
The train steamed on toward the border and Karil closed his eyes, dreaming of a place where one could wake each morning among friends, and choose one’s day. And Matteo would be there — the man who had been his father’s friend.
Tally, on the other hand, was thinking of Carlotta.
Should I smile more? she wondered. But it wouldn’t really help. There was still the question of the ringlets. Aunt May had tried to curl her hair once and the results had been disastrous.
And she had never in her life worn a white dress, let alone owned one.
It had not taken long for the people in the palace to realize that the prince was not in a safe place for his own protection, but quite simply missing, and a great search had begun.
The Countess Frederica had rampaged through the rooms, lifting the lids of chests, opening cupboard doors, scouring basements and attics. The king’s turnip-shaped aunts searched, too, calling and imploring. So did Uncle Fritz and those of the servants who had not run away in terror after the assassination — for order and discipline were breaking down fast.
After a few hours the countess had swallowed her pride and gone to see the Baroness Gambetti.
“If you know anything about the prince, please tell me,” she begged. “The king put him in my charge, as you know.”
But the Baroness Gambetti knew nothing. “The wretched boy’s hiding somewhere, I suppose,” she said. “As though there wasn’t enough trouble. Poor Philippe is at the end of his tether.”
And indeed Gambetti could be heard in the bathroom, groaning and being sick.
When the countess returned to her room in the palace she found two army officers who informed her that she would be put on a train and sent back to England first thing in the morning.
“British subjects are no longer welcome in this country,” they said.
“I’m not leaving without the prince,” she had said. “It’s out of the question.”
The officers belonged to the new order: men who supported Stiefelbreich.
“You can take one suitcase,” was all they said, and left, locking her into her room.
The countess fought all the way to the station. Her shoes were as spiky as her elbows and her nose; one of the officers who manhandled her had thin legs. Now, sitting in her compartment, the countess allowed herself a sour smile as she recalled his yelps of pain.
Even on the platform she went on struggling. Then, in the crowd of children making their way to the train, she saw a boy wearing an absurd ivy-wreathed hat and surrounded by a group of hooligans who seemed familiar. And at that point she had ceased to struggle and allowed herself to be escorted to a first-class compartment at the front of the train and locked in.
“The guard will open the door when the train is under way,” said one of the officers. “But I warn you: if you attempt to return to Bergania it will cost you your life.”
The door slid open and, looking up, the countess saw the bandit who now had Karil in his charge.
“What happened?” Matteo wanted to know. And when she told him: “What about the bloodhounds? Were they out for the boy?”
“Yes. There are two lackeys of Stiefelbreich’s — vile-looking men who look as though they will stop at nothing. They set them off.”
“Can you describe them?”
“One is huge, with a missing ear. But the other one is worse — a slimy little worm of a man with a scar on his lip and a gold tooth.”
Matteo nodded. It was what he had expected.
“But at least they still think that Karil is somewhere close, which gives us a little time.” He turned to the countess. “You do realize, don’t you, that once they suspect that the boy is fleeing the country you will be followed. They know how close you were to the prince.”
The countess drew her fierce eyebrows together. “Thank you, it is not necessary for you to tell me this. I am perfectly aware that it would not be wise for me to be seen with the prince when other people are nearby. But whenever it is safe for me to do so I shall appear and do my duty toward him as I have always done. Even on a short journey it is possible for a boy to get into bad habits, and this I shall prevent with all the power that I have. You may expect to see me again in Zurich.”
Left alone again, the Scold allowed herself to lean back against the cushions. She was not a woman who gave in to her feelings, but now she closed her eyes and permitted a few tears to well up behind her lids. She wept for Bergania and the dead king, for old von Arkel, who had been taken away for questioning… Above all she wept for the boy who was now an orphan and eating egg sandwiches among children who walked without clothes on toward the showers.
But she did not weep for long, for it was clear that she had one overriding duty and that was to take Karil to Rottingdene House, where his grandfather would keep him safe. Things were done properly there; there was no place where rules were stricter or etiquette was enforced more strongly — and the boy would be surrounded by nobly born relations to make sure that he did not lapse. In Rottingdene House, with dear Carlotta at his side, Karil would be safe until this nonsense was over and he could return to Bergania to be crowned as the country’s rightful king.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE