The Palace of Laughter (11 page)

“I'm not sure if she's my friend, exactly,” said Miles, thinking back to their conversation by the stream. “She'll be leaving soon, anyway.”

“A friendship should be judged by its depth, not by its length,” said the tiger. “And not many adventures are better followed alone, unless of course you are a tiger.”

“Do you always travel alone?” asked Miles. “Didn't you arrive with the Circus Oscuro?”

The tiger snorted. “I would sooner eat a putrid
donkey than perform tricks for that outfit.”

“But you were once with a circus yourself, weren't you?”

The tiger gave a low growl. “That was a long time ago, tub boy, and another story entirely. Now if you have any more questions you will have to swallow them again, because I don't care much for talking, and tonight I've done enough to last me through the winter and into next summer.”

The tiger settled his head between his paws, and the crickets wound down gradually in the darkness. Miles sat beneath the roof of stone with his arms wrapped around his knees, gazing into the embers of the fire. Tales of acrobats, rolling roads and tiger-striped revenge played themselves out in glowing shapes before his tired, smoke-stung eyes, until at last he drifted into sleep.

M
iles Wednesday, dawn-chilled and hungry, woke with a pale sun peering at him from just above the horizon. Little was kneeling by the lake, splashing cold water onto her face. The tiger was gone.

His first thought was to build up the fire, but then he remembered that they had nothing to cook on it. His stomach was as empty as the pocket where Tangerine lived. He put his hand in the inside pocket anyway, as if by some miracle he might find Tangerine back in his accustomed place. There was nothing there but the silver ticket. He sat up and shaded his eyes. The pale snake of the road looped
down the wooded flank of the mountain, visible here and there between the trees. It was the trail down which Genghis had passed the day before with teeth marks in his hand and Tangerine in his pocket—a trail growing colder with each passing hour.

“Where did the tiger go?” he asked Little as she returned from the water's edge.

“I don't know. He was gone when I woke up.”

“Then we'd better get going. We must be at least half a day behind Genghis as it is.”

When Miles had quenched his thirst they left the lake and started down in the direction of the road. The slope of the mountain was covered with patchy forest giving way to frequent clearings. They scrambled down a steep slope of mossy boulders and tree roots onto the road. On the far bank the tiger sat, looking down on them with an air of mild amusement.

“You're going to walk all the way? You'd better get a move on.”

“We will,” said Miles. As he strode down the road he called back over his shoulder, “I can see you're too busy licking your paws to offer us a ride.”

There was a soft thump as the tiger's weight landed on the packed earth of the road, and a
moment later he was walking beside them.

“As it happens, tub boy, I am also headed this way. And before you ask, it's none of your business. I might consider letting you ride today, especially if your little friend with the better manners were to ask me.”

Little laughed. “Please, King of Cats, lend us your speed and strength, and may the world turn ever toward you,” she said.

The tiger stopped. “You see?” he said to Miles. “A little poetry goes a long way. Now climb on before I change my mind.”

Once on the tiger's back, Miles felt as though he had been riding tigers all his life. Little sat in front again, and the tiger set off at a steady pace down the center of the road. They ran in silence for a while. The morning sun began to warm the air, and soon it was abuzz with insects. From time to time they caught a glimpse of the mountain's foothills between the knotty trunks of the tall pines.

“Shouldn't we get off the road?” asked Miles.

“No need,” said the tiger. “After all, what stringy peasant would dare stand up to the king of cats?”

“One with a blunderbuss,” said Miles.

He could feel the tiger's muscles stiffen beneath him. “Some day you'll be bitten by your own mouth,
tub boy,” he said, but all the same he left the road a little farther on and entered the cover of the trees.

They made good speed through the patchy forest. The tiger bounded over twisted roots and dodged between trees with obvious enjoyment. Sometimes he almost seemed to be flying. The clearings became larger and more frequent, and as they reached the lower slopes the woods dwindled into isolated copses rising from the long grass. Here the tiger went more cautiously, threading a path through the longest grasses and pausing before leaving the cover of each copse.

Below them they could see a range of low, gently rounded hills stretching to the horizon. The road wound between the hills like a dusty river. Not far ahead of them it swung to the right and climbed a small hill that was crowned by a village of whitewashed, red-roofed houses.

“We need to get something to eat,” said Miles.

“If you're thinking of going to that village,” said the tiger, “you'll be going on your own.”

“That's what I plan to do. There's an olive grove on the slope, just below that tower. You and Little can wait for me there.”

“As you wish,” said the tiger.

Miles and Little dismounted from the tiger as
they approached the village. An occasional donkey cart appeared on the road, rocking through the potholes and moving with no apparent hurry, and once a tractor chugged by with a train of beige dust. They kept their distance from the road, and when anyone passed by, the tiger simply froze like a statue, so that even from a few paces he was invisible in the tall grass.

They reached the olive grove, which lay at the foot of the village in broad terraces. Rows of olive trees stood on twisted trunks in welcome pools of shade. Not a breath of wind stirred the leaves. Built into the wall of the second terrace was a sort of man-made cave where the olive pickers could rest and eat in the shade. The tiger stood at the mouth of the cave, his whiskers twitching as he investigated it with his nose. Once he was satisfied he disappeared inside.

“I'll come with you,” said Little. Miles shook his head.

“It's better if I go alone,” he said. “You wait here with the tiger. I won't be long.”

The road wound steeply up into the village. It was lined with a parade of crooked houses, with small windows and little courtyards with electric-blue walls and shady trees. He came to a long high
wall on his right-hand side. Behind that wall, although he couldn't see it, was a small apple orchard. What Miles could see was the long branch of an apple tree hanging right out over the wall, weighed down by a handful of ripe green apples. If you've ever traveled for miles on a dusty road in the hot sun with a Bengal tiger and a four-hundred-year-old girl, you will be able to imagine just how cool and tasty those apples looked. He stopped in his tracks and stared up at the branch, trying to figure out a way to reach them. He felt in his pockets for something to throw. The apples looked ready to fall at the slightest touch.

“It'll never work,” said a voice behind him, making him jump. “They don't fall off so easy.”

A plump boy about his own age sat on a low wall across the street. He had close-cropped hair and eyes that looked too small for his face. He smiled, and tossed a large apple butt over his shoulder.

“How did you get that one?” asked Miles.

“Easy,” said the boy. “I can tell you how to get a sackload of them without breaking a sweat. He's got so many he doesn't know what to do with them.”

“Who has?”

“Old Baltinglass of Araby,” said the boy. “That house with the apple orchard belongs to him. He
used to be a famous explorer, or so he says, but he's been blind as a bat ever since I can recall. He's lived in that house for years, with no one but a dozen chickens and a garden full of apple trees.”

The boy jumped down from the wall and crossed the road. He lowered his voice. “All you've got to do is knock on the door and say you're Rufus and you've come about the apples. That's my name, Rufus Weedle. My mam sent me to pick up a bag of apples from old Baltinglass, but if you pretend to be me he won't know any different.”

“Why don't you get them yourself?” asked Miles suspiciously.

“Well,” said the boy, putting his plump arm around Miles's shoulder as though they'd been friends for years, “there's a small snag. Baltinglass's chickens have the run of the orchard, and they lay their eggs wherever they like. Baltinglass likes his eggs, but he can't go and collect them himself, on account of he's as blind as a bat, like I said. If he went looking for them he'd only step on them, and end up with a load of scrambled eggs, wouldn't he?”

“I suppose so.”

“Exactly. So usually my mam picks them up for him on her way to the bakery, and he gives her a bag of apples in return, only today she says her knee is
giving her hell and her kidneys feel like they've switched places, so she sent me instead, even though she knows I can't go near chickens.”

“Why not?”

Rufus took a step backward and stared at Miles as though he had two heads. “Why
not
? Cause they're 'orrible, that's why not. The way they walk, like little broken machines with feathers, pecking at your ankles. And crawling with vermin too. They give me the creeps! But if you tell him you're Rufus Weedle you can pick up the eggs and be out of there in no time. My mam says there's only a dozen to find, and it never takes more than five minutes. Then we'll split the apples between us, because if I go home to my mam on a bad-kidney day with no apples, I might as well be going home to a crocodile without a dead pig under my arm.”

Miles shrugged. “All right,” he said. “But I don't see why I can't just tell him that your mam sent me instead.”

“Because he's expecting me, not you, dummy!” said the boy in a loud whisper. “And he's not just as blind as a bat, he's as batty as one too. He thinks foreign agents are combing the land for him, looking for some priceless treasures he brought back from
the Orient. He once chased the new postman halfway down the street with a sword because no one remembered to tell him that the old one had died. As long as he thinks you're me, he won't slice you in half, will he?”

Miles looked doubtfully at the weathered door of the old house. It was studded with square iron nails. A worn horseshoe hung in the center, and a knotted rope hung to the right of the door. He thought about Little, waiting in the olive grove, and pulled the rope. A jangling din came from inside the house, as though there were a few pots and pans instead of a doorbell on the other end of the bell rope.

A muffled shout came from within the house, and after a minute a tap-tap-tapping could be heard on the other side of the door. A bolt rattled, and the door opened abruptly.

“Whaddya want?” barked Baltinglass of Araby. His wrinkled head stuck horizontally out of his shirt on a neck like a cluster of ropes. He wore a knitted hat despite the heat. On either side of a large beaky nose his milky eyes stared, in slightly different directions, into the fog of his blindness.

“I'm Rufus Weedle,” said Miles, hoping he had remembered the name right. “I've come about the apples.”

“Ah, Weedle junior!” said Baltinglass. “I used to know your grandfather, though I don't think my life was richer for it.” He stepped back once, twice. His house was dim inside. The small high windows were filthy and let in hardly any light. Miles could just make out a cluster of pots and pans hanging on the end of the bell rope.

“Well, step inside and be quick about it,” said Baltinglass sharply, “before all the air gets out.”

Miles took a deep breath and stepped across the stone lintel. The old man slipped around behind him and slammed the door, locking it with a key that he produced from a chain around his scraggy neck. As the door shut, Miles caught a glimpse of the real Rufus Weedle making a mock salute, a funny little smile on his face.

“Now!” barked Baltinglass of Araby, in the dimness of his musty hallway. “The mightiest task begins with a hitch of the trousers, young Rufus. You get stuck in right away and work like a bull ant's nephew, and you should be finished and free in three days flat!”

M
iles Wednesday, apple-hungry and self-kidnapped, stared in dismay at the wrinkled features and toothless grin of Baltinglass of Araby.

“Did you say three
days
?” he asked, hoping he had misheard.

“That's what I said, boy. Three days. Sun comes up, sun goes down again!” He swished his cane up and over his head as he said this, hitting the candle-less chandelier and showering himself with dust. “Up again! Down again! Up one more time, and if you're still working like a team of mules you'll be all done by sundown on the third day, barring sand
storm and snakebite. But if you're going to stand there gawping like a fish, it'll be four days at the least, so put your best boot forward, young Weedle.”

He turned and stumped away into the darkness. Miles followed, his head spinning. He could dimly see an impressive collection of swords, crossbows, and grimacing masks arranged on the walls of the drawing room. A human skull with ornate silver decorations sat on a small round table. Yellowed newspaper cuttings hung in crooked frames near the French windows. One showed a picture of a much younger Baltinglass standing by a rectangular hole in a rocky bank. The headline read
GULLIVER P. BALTINGLASS DEFIES THE CURSE OF THE EMPEROR'S TOMB
. They stepped out into the blinding light of the orchard.

“How can it take three days to find a dozen eggs?” asked Miles.

Baltinglass stopped in his tracks and swung around to face him, his sightless eyes staring at the source of Miles's voice. “Are you trying to be funny, Weedle?” he bellowed.

“No sir!”

“Where would I be getting eggs from, since you stole my prize-laying chickens and wrung their necks?”

“But Ru…but I can't go near chickens!” said Miles in surprise.

“Listen to me, young Weedle,” said Baltinglass, stabbing his cane in Miles's direction. “We may not have crossed swords before, but it's my eyes that are blind, not my wits, and if you take me for a fool you might just end up on a wooden plaque on my wall. I've heard all about your lies and your trickery. You were caught red-handed selling my chickens for boilers. How you got your thieving little hands on them I don't know, but it's time to settle your debt and you ain't going to worm out of it.”

He marched into a corner of the orchard and pulled out a rickety wooden stepladder. “There's nine trees here, and at least two hundred apples on each. That's eighteen hundred apples, as you'd know if you ever bothered to show up at school. You've got to pick every last one by nightfall. Tomorrow you'll peel and core 'em. Day after that you'll be boiling them up for Baltinglass's Famous Homemade Apple and Thyme Jelly. If I had my way you'd be laying eggs for me too, but Justice O'Hooey felt that'd be a bit too much to ask of a young lad, so count yourself lucky.”

He shook the old stepladder open as though he were wrestling a crocodile, his cane clamped
between his teeth like a hunting knife. “Grab a basket and up you go, lad. I've got blades to polish, and it's time for my gin and tonic. Keeps the malaria away, you know.” He leaned toward Miles like a blind turtle and shouted in his face, “If the malaria jumps on my back you'd better run and hide, boy. Tends to make me lose my calm demeanor altogether.”

He turned on his heel and disappeared into the gloom of his house. Miles picked up a large wicker basket and climbed the wobbly ladder. It was not the first time he had visited an orchard in his life, and he was something of an expert in twisting apples quickly from their stems. As he filled the basket, his mind worked overtime. What was he to do? He couldn't possibly stay here for three days. Little and the tiger were expecting him back at any moment, and with each passing hour his chances of finding Tangerine were growing slimmer.

He took a good look at the wall that surrounded the garden. It was high and smooth, and topped with nasty-looking spikes that curved inward and looked almost impossible to get over. He could try telling Baltinglass that he was not Rufus Weedle at all, but as the old man was busy polishing his swords, it might not be the best time to interrupt
him with this startling news. It was hard to tell if Baltinglass really was mad, or whether this had all been part of Rufus's ruse. His face flushed hot at the thought of the mock salute the chubby chicken thief had given him as Baltinglass slammed his front door. “I'll flatten his nose for him, if ever I see his fat face again,” he muttered to himself.

The basket was getting too heavy to hold. He climbed down the ladder and tipped the apples into a large barrel in the corner. Already his right arm and shoulder ached from picking the apples above his head, and it looked as though he had cleared less than a quarter of the first tree. The garden was filled with the drone of bees, but on listening closer he could hear that it was mixed with another sound. It was the sound of snoring, coming from inside the house. He put the basket down quietly and tiptoed to the open doors that led into the drawing room. Baltinglass of Araby sat in a high-backed cane chair, a straight-bladed Chinese sword across his lap and his head nodding onto his chest. His wide mouth hung open like a torn pocket, and long stretched-out snores escaped from it.

Miles stepped over to the barrel and filled his trouser pockets with as many apples as he could stuff into them. He crept back into the drawing
room and over to where Baltinglass slumped in his chair. One of his milky eyes was half open, and Miles had to remind himself that it could see nothing. He held his breath and reached for the silver chain that hung around the old man's neck, the one that held the key to the front door. He drew the key as softly as he could from Baltinglass's shirt. His snores didn't falter, and Miles allowed himself to take a breath. He paused for a moment before attempting to slip the chain over Baltinglass's woolly-hatted head. As he lifted the key the old man sprung like a bear trap, and Miles found his wrist caught in a surprisingly hard grip and the sharp tip of the Chinese sword pressed up under his chin.

“Hah!” bellowed Baltinglass, both eyes wide open now and inches from his own. “Thought you could catch me napping, eh, Weedle? I can grab a sand viper as he strikes, boy, and twist his head so he bites his own backside!”

“I didn't think snakes had backsides,” said Miles with difficulty. The pressure of the sword in his throat was making him feel sick.

“Ignorance is a wide sea,” said Baltinglass, flecks of spittle on his wrinkled lips, “and you're a very small fish.” He withdrew the sword and made a grab
for Miles's pocket. Two apples fell out and rolled across the dusty floorboards. “Just as I thought,” he bellowed. He struggled to his feet without loosening his grip on Miles's wrist. “Not content with pinching all my chickens—first chance you get you're trying to escape with an armload of my apples too. You're a slippery little savage, young Weedle, but you're not slippery enough to escape Baltinglass of Araby. Now give me one good reason why I shouldn't run you through here and now.”

Several good reasons flashed through Miles's mind: Justice O'Hooey was one, the mess that would have to be cleared up was another, and there were always the eighteen hundred apples waiting to be jellied. Instead he said simply, “I'm not Rufus Weedle.”

“Not Rufus Weedle, eh? Who are you then—the Sheikh of Djibouti? You told me who you were yourself, in case you've forgotten.”

“I lied,” said Miles, “My real name is Miles Wednesday.”

“And I'm the king of the baboons. You'll have to do better than that, my lad.” He let go of Miles's wrist, and opened a glass-fronted cabinet in a shadowy corner. He took out a large glass jar and held it out to Miles. “Know what this is, Weedle?” he
barked. “This is the finest apple jelly money can buy. You'll find jars of Baltinglass's apple jelly on the tables of all the world's royalty, the ones with any class at least. But it doesn't make itself. It's taken me years to perfect the recipe. One of the miracle ingredients is hard work, and this year you're going to do the hard work for me, whether you like it or not.”

Miles took the jar and read the label aloud: “Baltinglass's Famous Homemade Apple and Thyme Jelly. Excellent for fevers and disorders of the intestine, and a fine accompina…accompaniment to lamb dishes.”

Baltinglass raised his bushy eyebrows in surprise. “Well blow me down! You've been lighting your fires underwater, young Weedle. The judge told me you were as thick as yesterday's porridge and hadn't caught more than a fortnight's schooling in your life. Where'd you learn to read like that?”

“I told you, I'm not Rufus Weedle, I'm Miles Wednesday. A friend of mine called Lady Partridge taught me to read from her encyclopedias.”

At this Baltinglass's eyebrows disappeared altogether into his woolly hat, and he dropped his cane with a clatter.

“Lady Partridge? You mean Lady Gertrude
Partridge of Larde?” he barked. “How the devil do you know her?”

“I live near her. I once brought her a litter of abandoned kittens, and we became friends,” said Miles. “She found out that I couldn't read, so she decided to teach me.”

“Well skin me alive and cure me in salt!” said Baltinglass. “You mean to say you've
really
come all the way from Larde? You must be something of an explorer yourself, Master Wednesday. In that case I expect you'll know my nephew too, Radovan Flap.”

For a moment Miles could not imagine who he was referring to, then he realized that it must be Constable Flap. His ear could feel the skinny constable's hard pinch at the mere mention of the name.

“Yes, I know Constable Flap.” He thought about the nights he had spent locked in the cell at the back of the police station. “In fact I've accepted his hospitality several times.”

“Well well, young Miles. It seems we've got off on the wrong foot altogether. You had better tell me what you're doing here, and why the blazes you would ever want to be Rufus Weedle of Cnoc.”

They sat on a rough wooden bench in the sunny orchard, and Miles told Baltinglass of Araby his
story, but he was as brief as he could be, and left out many details. He made no mention of the tiger, nor did he say much about Little except that they were searching for a friend of hers, and that Little herself was waiting for him to return with some food so they could continue their journey. When he got to the part where Rufus had tricked him into changing places, Baltinglass snorted in disgust.

“Rufus Weedle, eh? Rufus Weasel, more like!” he said. “I'll say one thing for the little savage, for all his lack of schooling he has an agile mind. He's managed to stitch the two of us up like a pair of ballet slippers. But you're a bold lad, why didn't you just knock on my door and ask for a few apples yourself?”

“Because Rufus told me you might slice me in half with one of your swords.”

Baltinglass stroked his stubbly chin. “He's got a point there,” he said.

“Do you think I could have a few apples to bring with me?” asked Miles. He had mangaged to eat one as he picked them, but his stomach was still rumbling. Baltinglass leaped to his feet. “By the trousers of the Sphinx!” he bellowed. “Your friend is waiting, and the sands are running on your mission, while we're sitting here nattering in the sun like
two old men. Come to think of it, I am an old man, but you've got a fate to catch. By all means take as many apples as you can carry, my boy. You'll find a bag in that cupboard there, and while you're loading it I'll have a rummage in the supply depot and see what else I can provide you with. An ill-equipped explorer is like a camel with no hump….”

Miles took a bag and began to fill it with apples. He took as many as he could fit in.

“…and only three legs,” shouted Baltinglass from the darkness of the house, amidst the clattering of tins and the squeaking of corks in bottles.

He emerged after a while with an assortment of foods—dried sausage, bread, cheese and olives, a jar of his apple jelly and a bottle of elderflower wine. “Open up another one of those bags, my boy, and I'll drop these in. They should keep you going for a while.”

“Thank you,” said Miles.

“Not at all, not at all. I have a very fine Berber sword I could lend you too, with a hilt of black horn, or a Gurkha knife if that's more your size. Just in case you come across that Weedle lad. He'd get up to no more mischief if he were diced like a carrot.”

“I don't think that would be a very good idea,” said Miles.

“You don't, eh?” said Baltinglass, sounding slightly disappointed.

“You need him to pick and peel all those apples, for one thing.”

“Ah, you've got a point there. I used to do it all myself, you know, but I'm getting a little stiff around the joints for that sort of thing nowadays.”

“How did you manage to do it on your own?”

“Well the ladder's not hard to find, my boy. I fall over the blasted thing every day. The trees are always where I left them last, and the apples smell so sweet I can almost see them in front of my face. They have a green smell, Master Wednesday. The greenest smell there is.”