Cart and Cwidder (9 page)

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.”

6

In the late afternoon Markind seemed to be deserted. As they clattered northward through its shuttered, respectable streets, Moril was ready to swear that there was no one around to notice even such a noticeable cart as theirs. Nevertheless, Dagner was as tense as if he were giving a performance. He did not relax even when they were out of Markind. Instead of looking for a main road, he struck into the first small lane that went north and kept turning round uneasily as he drove to see if Ganner was following them.

Olob clattered along with a will, with his ears gaily pricked. The lane, and then the other lanes they took after it, led through apple orchards where the trees were bursting into bloom. The sun was mild and warm. Moril sat smiling sleepily and happily, listening to the familiar beat of Olob's hooves, the wine sloshing about in the great jar behind him, and the blackbirds singing in the apple trees. This was the life! He was sure they could manage, whatever Lenina thought. A cuckoo sang out, cutting across the songs of the blackbirds.

“O—oh!” said Brid. Tears began rolling down her cheeks. “Father said to me—by the lake—he hadn't heard a cuckoo yet this year. And he was sorry he was going to miss it.” Her face screwed up, and her tears ran faster than ever. “He told me to listen for him, on the way North. And Mother goes and drives straight off to Markind! How could she!”

“Shut up, Brid,” said Dagner uncomfortably.

“I shan't! I can't!” cried Brid. “How could she! How could she! Ganner's so stupid. How
could
she!”

“Will you be quiet!” said Dagner. “You don't understand.”

“Yes, I
do
!” Brid cried. “Ganner and Mother arranged to have Father murdered—that's what happened!”

“Don't talk such blinking nonsense!” Kialan said sharply. “That had nothing to do with either of them.”

“How do
you
know?” Brid wept. “Why did she go straight off to Ganner like that?”

“Because she's always wanted to, of course!” said Dagner. “Only she couldn't, because she thought it wasn't honorable. I
told
you you didn't understand,” he went on, in an odd, agitated way. “You're too young to notice. But I've seen—oh, enough to know Mother hated living in a cart. She wasn't brought up to it like we are. It was all right while we were in the Earl of Hannart's household—we had a roof over our heads and that wasn't too bad for her—but—I suppose you don't remember.”

“Not very well,” Brid admitted, sniffing. “I was only three when we left.”