Enchanted Glass (28 page)

“
Errant king
,” he thundered, “
you have fed in this field too long. Take your followers and your wives and the followers of your wives and return to your own country and live there in peace. Do not try to take this field for your own.
” He found Mabel Brown in the roped enclosure and Titania somewhere near the bouncy castle and swung his foliage to point at them too. “
Now go!
”

They went. They had no choice. With a strange hollow moaning, all the creatures swept up into the air in three smokelike swirls. Titania went with them, and Mabel Brown and, last of all, with a contemptuous shout of pure annoyance, went Mr Brown. Like dead leaves in a wind they went spiralling away, and away, crying out their sorrow and their protest as they went. Andrew thought he saw all three swirls of them plunge into the side of Mel Tump and disappear.

Now that’s odd, he thought. I can’t even
see
Mel Tump from here!

This made him realise that the great oak presence had left him. It had left him charged up and enlarged. He knew he would never be quite the same again.

To everyone else it seemed as if a tremendous
blue-purple flash of lightning struck down near Aidan and Rolf, followed almost instantly by a bellow of thunder. Then the rain came down, in heavy white rods, mixed with what seemed to be hail. Nearly everyone ran for shelter in the tents. Mrs Stock put up her big umbrella. The field emptied except for those in the enclosures or on the platform.

Then it stopped. Yellow sunlight blazed on wet grass and on wet, steaming ponies and bedraggled fancy dress. The hats on the platform dripped. Out on the field, Aidan shook his singed and soaking hair and tried to clean his glasses. He was kneeling in a ring of sooty-smelling burnt grass. There was no sign of Groil. Aidan was miserable about that. It stood to reason that when Andrew sent all the creatures away he would have to send Groil off too, and Aidan had lost a friend. But Rolf was still there, burnt brown down one side and trying to limp on all four paws. Rolf was, very cautiously, hobbling to sniff at a melted silvery lump nearby.

“Leave it, Rolf,” Aidan said sadly. “It’s only my charm. The lightning struck it, but I suppose I don’t need it now.”

On the platform, Andrew handed the microphone politely back to the vicar and bent to help Ronnie Stock to his feet. Apart from being soaking wet, Ronnie seemed none the worse. “That was a storm and a half!” he said to
Andrew. “Thanks. You’re that Hope fellow from Melstone House, aren’t you? Pleased to meet you.”

As Ronnie stood up, he and Andrew both stumbled on things that crunched. The platform was covered with fallen acorns. Andrew bent again and gathered up a handful, but no one else seemed to notice. The vicar was irritably tapping at the microphone and getting no sound at all. It seemed to be broken.

Like my computer when it gets a charge of magic, Andrew thought, putting the acorns in his pocket.

“Never mind,” Ronnie Stock said cheerfully. “I’m used to yelling at riders on my gallops.” He strutted into the centre of the platform and shouted, “Ladies and gentlemen!” When enough people had emerged from tents, he shouted again, “Ladies and gentlemen, I
was
going to make a speech, but in view of the weather, I think I’ll just declare this Fete well and truly open. Thank you.”

The band, in a shaken way, emerged from the beer tent and started to play. Ronnie looked past them across the field, to where Snowy was now rolling on the ground, tangled in wet blue cloth. “Somebody rescue my horse!” he bellowed.

Stashe was trying to. The trouble was Snowy was not being in the least helpful. Stashe would never have got the horse on his feet if somebody had not come up and helped
her heave. “Thanks, Dad,” she panted, thinking it was Tarquin. But when she looked, it was somebody very like Tarquin, but without the beard. “Oh,” she said. “Sorry. Thank you anyway.”

“You’re welcome,” said the Puck and vanished beside the roundabout.

Andrew quietly jumped down from the side of the platform and made his way to Tarquin, who looked white as a sheet. “Come back to my house,” Andrew said. “I’m leaving now. You look as if you could use a drink.”

“I could use a cup of tea,” Tarquin admitted. “I’ve the devil’s own headache, so I have. What
was
that thing?”

“Best not to ask,” Andrew said, as they both went over to Aidan. “Do you want to stay?” Andrew asked.

“No,” said Aidan. “Groil’s gone. But I think I’ll have to stay. Rolf can’t walk.”

Luckily, Mr Stock came up just then, trundling his barrow, in which reposed the vegetable zeppelin. “I’ll give the dog a ride,” he said. “You hold this.” He picked up the great marrow and seemed about to hand it to Andrew. Then it clearly struck him that Andrew was too importantly powerful now to carry produce about. He turned and dumped the mighty vegetable into Aidan’s arms instead. It was very heavy and still quite undamaged.

Rolf scrambled into the wheelbarrow in the greatest relief, where he lay and licked his paws, and they all set off home. They passed Mrs Stock, shaking out her umbrella. “Trixie and Shaun between them burst both her pillows,” she said to them. “And a good thing too! See you Monday, Professor.”

They came to Stashe, fiercely ripping blue cloth off Snowy. “Leaving?” she said. “I’ll be along when I’ve led Snowy back to the stables. I think he’s pulled a muscle. Ronnie can just
walk
back, and serve him right! Honestly, what an ass he made of himself!” She stopped, with the blue spiked visor in her hands. “Do you think anyone else here knows what really happened?”

“I doubt it,” Tarquin said. “I can’t see anyone believing they saw a giant, let alone all the other creatures. My guess is they’ll just remember that the Fete got interrupted by the father and mother of a thunderstorm. Or so I hope. I don’t want to spend the next ten years explaining to people like Mrs Blanchard-Stock. Do you?”

Whatever people believed, the Fete was in full swing as they left. The roundabout was turning and the bouncy castle was full. Cracks rang out from the rifle range and singing from the beer tent. In the distance, the scarlet figure of Ronnie Stock was to be seen, solemnly choosing
the tube of toothpaste as the winner of the Fancy Dress, before moving on to judge the dogs and the ponies.

And the sun shone.

A
idan continued to be miserable about Groil, although Andrew kept telling him that he was sure he had not sent Groil away with the rest. “I know I didn’t include him,” he said.

“Then why did he
go
?” Aidan protested. “I think he had to go because he was Shaun’s counterpart.”

Andrew tried to set Aidan’s mind at rest by heaving the giant marrow up on to the woodshed roof that night. But it was still there, untouched, on Sunday morning. “Well,” Andrew said, “the thing’s practically indestructible. Maybe even Groil couldn’t get his teeth into it.”

Wally Stock called that morning to tell Aidan he had won a bottle of sherry. This did not console Aidan in the least.

Trixie called in the afternoon to tell Andrew that he had
guessed her weight correctly. Andrew thanked her and politely gave her back the £50 prize. He was very absent-minded that day, sitting on the mower under the stained glass in the roof of the shed, working out just exactly what each colour did. By the evening, he felt he almost had it.

During Sunday night, the giant marrow fell off the roof and burst.

Rolf, meanwhile, was making much of his burnt feet. He lay all Sunday in everyone’s way on the kitchen floor, moaning gently. On the Monday, Mrs Stock got so annoyed with him that she made Shaun carry him out on to the lawn, where Rolf lay in the sun and continued to groan, until Aidan came out with a dish of dog food. Rolf sprang up eagerly and galloped towards it.

“You,” Aidan told him, “are just a big fraud.” An idea struck him. “Hey!” he said. “I wonder if Groil’s had burnt feet too!”

Andrew sent Shaun up into the loft to see if he could mend the roof. After seeing that Best Robot, Andrew had boundless faith in Shaun’s ability to mend anything. “Humph!” said Mrs Stock.

Andrew ignored her and opened the front door to Stashe and Tarquin, who had come to discuss the wedding. They had barely done more than fix the date, when they
were interrupted by tremendous roars from Mr Stock, followed by Mrs Stock screaming, “Don’t you go blaming our Shaun! He was only doing his best!”

“Now what?” said Andrew.

They all hurried outside. “By the way,” Stashe said as they went. “Did you know that Melstone Manor’s up for sale now? Ronnie Stock’s thinking of buying it. He thinks the Grange isn’t grand enough for him.”

“Very fitting,” Andrew said.

Out on the lawn, they found the mower standing there and Mr Stock now arguing with Aidan. “I tell you it won’t start,” Mr Stock was saying. “That lobby lout has been and spoilt my knack!” He pulled at the starting handle in his special way. Nothing happened. “
See?
” Mr Stock roared at Aidan. “Let me at that Shaun!”

“No, I’ll do it,” Aidan said. “Look.” He pulled the handle and the mower throbbed sweetly into life. “See?”

“Stay with him, Aidan,” Andrew said, “and start it again whenever it runs over a thistle.”

Mr Stock glowered. He was so annoyed that, later that day, when the lawn had become brown and bristly, he marched into the kichen repeatedly to dump six boxes full of his Fête entries on the table. Mrs Stock complained loudly.

Later that day, Aidan scooped up the sad remains of the
marrow and helped Andrew load the woodshed roof with giant potatoes and vast tomatoes instead.

On Tuesday morning, while Andrew was getting breakfast, Aidan came dashing indoors with Rolf. “They’ve gone!” Aidan shouted. “Groil’s been here! He must just have had sore feet after all.”

“Good,” Andrew said, catching the kitchen door before it slammed. “Great. Now is there any chance that I can get on and write my book today?”

“Oh yes,” Aidan said happily. “Everything’s all right now.”

But it was not, or not exactly. In the middle of the morning the doorbell rang. As Mrs Stock was upstairs and Andrew’s computer had once more inexplicably gone down, Andrew went out into the hall to answer it. “It’s probably Tarquin,” he said to Aidan, who was nosily going to answer the door too. “His leg will need firming up, I expect.”

Andrew thought it
was
Tarquin for a second when he opened the door. But the little man standing there had two sturdy legs in floppy knee-length trousers and, though his leather jacket was very like Tarquin’s, this person was much plumper and had no beard. He held a large envelope out towards Andrew. “A letter from my master,” he said.

Aidan recognised the Puck and began to retreat at once.
Unfortunately, he backed straight into Mrs Stock, carrying an armload of plastic packets. “These were under your bed,” she said. “Did I or did I not tell you to put them in the bin? You come upstairs with me at once and collect all your rubbish properly.”

The Puck grinned.

“Yes, Aidan,” Andrew said. “Go along and face the music. Does this letter need an answer?” he asked the Puck.

The Puck, still grinning, watched Aidan hurry away after Mrs Stock. Then he said demurely, “I am to wait for your reaction, sir.”

“Indeed?” said Andrew, taking the big stiff envelope. It was addressed in the loopy, spiky writing that Andrew now felt he knew quite well to
A. Hope Esquire.
Rather self-conscious with the Puck standing there looking at him, he tore open the envelope and held the letter into the daylight to read it. It said:

“Well, I’ll be—!” Andrew muttered. He had no need to go hunting for photographs of himself at Aidan’s age. One of the traditional fixtures in the living room, which Mrs Stock always put exactly in the middle of the mantelpiece, was a silver-framed photo of Andrew when he was twelve.
The likeness was certainly there, if you allowed for the fact that Andrew had had fair hair and Aidan’s was brownish. In fact, Andrew rather thought that the reason that he had been so ready to have Aidan to live in Melstone House was that Aidan had a familiar, family sort of look about him “Well, I’ll be—!” he said again.

“Is that your reaction, sir?” the Puck asked from the doorstep.

“Not exactly,” Andrew said. “Tell your master that I am very grateful for both pieces of information.”

The Puck looked decidedly disappointed. “Very well,” he said and vanished from the porch.

Andrew reread the letter pensively. He wondered whether to tell Aidan. Stashe would have to help him decide.