The Box of Delights (27 page)

‘It’s the same with magic,’ Abner said. ‘You don’t believe in magic, I think, but perhaps this may convince you. Watch, now . . .’

He lifted his hand in a strange way and uttered some foreign words in a loud, clear voice. Instantly, the figure of a boy, with a bony, unintelligent and unpleasant face appeared through
Abner’s desk.

‘What d’ye want me for now?’ he growled.

‘No pertness,’ Abner said. ‘Tell the gentleman what Cole Hawlings did with his Box.’

‘He gave it to somebody to keep for him,’ The Boy said. ‘I told you that before.’

‘Learn civility,’ Abner said. ‘To whom did he give it?’

‘I don’t know. He put spells round it. I couldn’t see the person. Let me go.’

‘If you’re not careful and civil I’ll peg you into the waterfall,’ Abner said. ‘Am I nearer to getting the Box than I was?’

‘Yes. You’re very near to it,’ The Boy said.

‘Shall I get it?’

‘You’ll have it under your hand today. Now I want to go – I’ve told you everything.’

‘Don’t try to dictate to me,’ Abner said. ‘The gentleman would like to ask you something. Ask him anything you want to know, Joe.’

Joe did not much relish speaking to The Boy, but at last asked:

‘What is in this Box?’

‘The way into the Past. I will not be questioned by you.’

‘Yes, you will,’ Abner said. ‘Anything else, Joe?’

‘Yes,’ Joe said, ‘there is. If Cole Hawlings had hold of this Box, why couldn’t he go into the Past by it and escape from Abner here?’

‘The Master there put spells on it. Shut your mouth now and let me go,’ The Boy said angrily.

‘You shall suffer for this,’ Abner said. ‘Is there anything more you wish to ask, Joe?’

‘Yes,’ Joe said. ‘What will win the National?’

‘Kubbadar, by seven lengths. Now I’m going.’

‘Wait, my young insolent friend,’ Abner said. ‘You will have a little lesson before you go. Come here.’

As The Boy approached, Abner tapped him on the top of his head with a timetable. The head at once telescoped into the chest, and the legs telescoped into his body.

‘Off, now,’ Abner said. ‘You’ll stay plugged under the waterfall for seven weeks for insolence. Perhaps that may teach you . . .’

The Boy vanished into the desk, howling loudly from the middle of his chest.

‘A general tendency to mutiny, it seems,’ Abner said. ‘I must take steps, I see. Now come on down to the Zoo.’

Kay was peering from his little cranny to see exactly what was done. Abner touched something (Kay could not see what) in the corner over his head; then he went to the hearthrug and stamped upon
it with some force. There came a clicking, clacking noise. Kay saw the fireplace slide open like a door, revealing a lift lit with an electric light.

‘Come on, then,’ Abner said.

The two men stepped into the lift. Kay, who was only two feet from the door of it, darted into it after them as the fireplace closed-to upon them. Abner pressed a red button in the lift wall and
the lift slowly began to move down. Kay counted and tried to guess how far down it went. It went slowly. It passed two different possible landings. When at last it stopped it did so with a jolt as
though it were at the bottom of its shaft. The Chief opened the door; as he and Joe stepped out, Kay followed.

He was in a wide, high cavern or gallery in the rock. It stretched out to right and to left. It was not less than fourteen feet high by ten broad. It had every sign of being a natural cavern
worn by water and smoothed underfoot by man. In the main, it was now a dry cavern. The walls glistened with wet here and there; in some places they shone as from some quartz-crystal in the rock.
There was a little pause and silence when they left the lift. Kay heard water dropping, drop by drop, like the tick of a very slow clock. Far, far away, too, water was running over a fall.

The two men turned to the right; Kay followed. At every ten yards or so Abner would stop, turn out the light and turn on another to light the way ahead. When they had gone perhaps forty yards
from the lift, Kay saw what seemed like a range of ships’ cabins stretching along the side of the gallery. Abner went to the door of the first of these, pulled aside a shutter, turned on a
light to light the cell within and spoke through the opening:

‘And how is the dear Bishop?’ he said. ‘Christmas sermon getting on well? Well, well, well! And will you tell me where the package is?’

‘I tell you, ruffian,’ the Bishop answered, ‘that I know nothing of any package. These pleasantries had better cease.’

‘Tell me where the package is,’ Abner said, ‘and they shall cease, and starvation shall cease. You shall have a savoury omelet and coffee and rolls and honey. What, you
won’t? Water from the well, then, and darkness to meditate upon it.’

He switched out the light, fastened the shutter and moved to another door.

‘Dean,’ he said, ‘still cheerful? Splendid! Can you tell me of the package yet? What, you don’t know anything about it? That won’t do for me, my Dean: think again.
Keep cheerful.’

He switched out the light and moved to another door.

‘Ha,’ he said, ‘the Precentor, I think.’ Here he began a song:

‘A strait-jacket’s on its way to you,’ the Precentor said, ‘and then you’ll sing another tune. What d’you mean by a “package” and
shutting us up here?’

‘Oh, a proud stomach, still?’ Abner said. ‘A little cold water is very cold Christmas fare you’ll find, and not one of you proud prelates will taste more until you tell
me where the package is.’

He went from cell to cell asking the inmates where the Box was. Some said, ‘We don’t know what you mean.’ Others said, ‘You are mad. The Police will soon run you down, to
be sure.’

‘Don’t be too sure,’ Abner said. ‘And here, I think, are the Canons Minor. How that brings back my Latin – major, minor, minimus! And are my Minor Canons going to
tell me of the package?’

‘A judge and jury will give you your package, and a heavy package it will be and you will carry it for a long time,’ said young Canon Doctrine, who had once been the famous
three-quarter.

By this time Abner had reached the end of the cells. He raised his voice so that he could be heard all along the gallery.

‘So you are all stubborn,’ he said. ‘You’ll find that I’m stubborn, and the rock is stubborn and not all the Police in Europe could find you where you are now. One
of you knows where this package is. Tell me and you shall be at home within the day. If not, I can last and the rock will last, but I don’t think you will.’

He then turned to Joe, who was at his side.

‘By the way, Joe,’ he said, still in his loud voice, ‘this cell at the end here – we put the Earl into it, you remember, because he wouldn’t pay the ransom. Seven
years ago, I think it was: you remember?’

‘I remember well,’ Joe said. ‘A dark, handsome man, the Earl: very well-dressed.’

‘That’s the man,’ Abner said, unlocking the cell door. ‘Just step in, will you, and see if his bones are still there? The ransom didn’t come, if you recollect, but
I expect the rats did, or am I wrong?’

Kay saw Joe step into the lighted cell and pretend to rummage in the corners.

‘Do you see any bones still?’ Abner asked.

‘Just the skull and a rib or two,’ Joe answered. ‘Oh, and his marriage ring.’

‘Quite so,’ Abner said, locking him into the cell and switching out the light. ‘And now, my dear Joe, with the made-up mind, meditate with these holy men on the errors of your
ways. Another time you may not be so brave as to tell me that I am making a mistake.’

Joe, who was a very strong man, leapt at the door and beat upon it. ‘Let me out, you hound,’ he cried. ‘Let me out, or I’ll wring your neck.’

‘You mean, “
and
I’ll wring your neck,”’ Abner said. ‘I’ll keep you there for the present, thank you, because I think you really might. Sleep
well, dear Joe. The floor of that cell is a little uneven, but you won’t notice it much after the first week.’

Joe continued to beat upon the door and to shout threats and curses. Abner moved away whistling a few bars of Schubert’s Unfinished Symphony. Kay, who was horror-struck, moved away after
him. Then suddenly, from a cell not yet visited, Peter’s voice piped up.

‘If you please,’ Peter said, ‘I think I know where the package that you want is.’

‘Ha,’ Abner said, ‘so! And where is the package?’

‘I can’t explain it,’ Peter said, ‘but I could take you there.’

‘Oh, could you?’ Abner said. ‘And give us the slip on the way, no doubt. We are not quite so green. Where is it?’

‘Please I can’t explain,’ Peter said.

‘I say that you can explain. Where is it? In Seekings House? In the garden? In the town? At the Inn? Where is it?’

‘I think it’s peeping out of a rabbit burrow somewhere on King Arthur’s Camp, please,’ Peter said.

‘Whereabouts on the Camp?’ Abner said.

‘I could take you to it,’ Peter said, ‘but I can’t explain just where.’

‘Oh yes, you can,’ Abner said. ‘You could mark the very place on a six-inch-to-the-mile map. When did you see it?’

‘If you please, I thought I saw a package just before they scrobbled the Punch and Judy man up on the Bottler’s Down.’

‘Ha,’ Abner said. ‘Well, you thought wrong, then; think again . . . And think of mushrooms for breakfast. Have you thought of them?’

‘Yes, please, sir,’ Peter said.

‘Well, that’s all the breakfast you’ll get,’ Abner said. ‘That may teach you not to try to deceive me another time. Now snivel.’

He moved away up the gallery so rapidly that Kay could hardly keep pace. As he came near Joe’s cell Joe cried: ‘Let me out, Abner, let me out, I say!’

Finding that his cries had no effect and that Abner was going past paying no attention, he changed his tone: ‘I say, old man,’ he said, ‘a joke’s a joke, but don’t
leave an old pal here in the dark: not old Joe, Abner.’

‘Yes, old Joe,’ Abner replied. He had gone past Joe’s cell when something seemed to strike him. ‘By the way, Joe,’ he said, ‘you don’t believe in magic,
do you?’

Instantly, out of the air, there came little faces, grinning and wicked. They had pointed ears and pointed teeth. These faces flitted swiftly through the bars of Joe’s cell; they buzzed
round Joe’s head, and spoke, sometimes in squeaky, sometimes in shrill and sometimes in very musical voices: ‘You don’t believe in magic, do you, Joe?’ Joe beat at them as
though they were wasps, but they were too quick to be hit.

Abner watched the effect of these imps with their words upon Joe’s terror-stricken face. ‘No, he doesn’t believe in magic, Joe doesn’t,’ he said. ‘However,
take your time. You will, presently, Joe,’ he said; and at that he switched out the light and marched on, turning swiftly up a gallery which Kay had not noticed. Kay followed, running, where
Abner’s footsteps led. Presently a light went up. Abner had opened the door into a lighted room; Kay slipped into the room behind Abner before the door closed.

It was a bare room carpeted with a thick red carpet. Certain strange magical symbols were painted on the walls in red. In the middle of the room on a pedestal was a bronze head which Kay had
seen before. Kay noticed that the bronze head’s eyelids were closed and the head drooped as though asleep when he entered the room, but, as Abner lifted his right hand, the eyelids opened,
the head raised itself, the lips moved and a voice from within it said, ‘Command me, Master.’

‘Tell me of our plans,’ Abner said.

The voice spoke from the head: ‘Your agents have now captured every clergyman attached to the Cathedral, as well as most of the Cathedral servants and staff.’

‘Is anything going wrong?’ Abner asked.

‘Yes,’ the bronze head replied. ‘You should have begun (as I told you) much later in the day. You have given them time to act against you.’

‘Don’t criticise me, Slave,’ Abner said; and the head at once cowered down upon the pedestal and began to whimper.

‘Stop that,’ Abner said. ‘Tell me, now, what are they trying to do against me?’

‘All sorts of things,’ the head said. ‘Mainly telephoning and telegraphing, trying to get substitutes.’

‘With what success?’ Abner said.

‘Not much yet,’ the head said. ‘It is Christmas. All clergy are busy in their own parishes. But substitutes will be found. There is a body of Friends of the Cathedral; I told
you of them: the Tatchester Trusties: they are the ones. They will rake up clergy from all sorts of places, you will see.’

‘Will I?’ Abner said. ‘Will they? We’ll try that.’

He raised his right hand in a peculiar manner. Instantly, a red-winged figure rose up out of the floor and bowed before him.

‘Cut all the Tatchester telephone wires and telegraph wires,’ he said. ‘Wait. Bring in those Tatchester Trusties.’

‘I go, sir,’ the winged figure said and disappeared through the ceiling.

‘That won’t see you very far,’ the brazen head said. ‘Some of the substitute clergy have already started.’

Abner raised his right hand again. Instantly, another red figure rose from the floor:

‘Command me, Master,’ it said.

‘Dislocate all railway traffic for twenty miles round Tatchester. Jam the points.’

‘I go, sir,’ the figure answered and disappeared through the ceiling.

‘That won’t be much use,’ the bronze head said. ‘They will come by road.’

Abner raised his hand again. A third red figure rose from the floor and asked for orders.

‘Make every road impassable for twenty miles round Tatchester,’ he said. ‘But stay, that won’t be enough. We must make the air impassable too. Stay here one
moment.’

He lifted his left hand in a strange way and, instantly, an old, old crone was thrust through the floor by little red hands, towards him. She looked so old that she might have been a thousand
years or more: nose and chin almost met; her face was the colour of old wood. She seemed terrified of Abner.

‘What d’you want with me, Master?’ she said.

‘I want a storm out of the north and the east,’ Abner said, ‘with snow.’

‘I can’t give it. I can’t give it,’ the old woman said. ‘You ask too much. I can only sell a storm for a great sum – a bag of amethysts.’