The Children of the King (10 page)

“Listen to it.” The wife rolled her eyes.

“There’s something to be said for stoicism,” said Heloise, who’d never had to learn it herself. “You don’t simply run away from what doesn’t suit you. If we all did that, well . . . who would fight the war?”

“That’s sense,” said the wife, and it was; so much so that the grocer pretended not to hear. But feeling generously disposed towards all children, and particularly to their representative May, before he shelved the jar of liquorice mice he invited her to extend a paw and pluck from amid the sin-black rodents a particularly bulky specimen.

The day-trippers returned to the street and walked it in silence — a silence that caused Cecily physical pain. For the entire length of the road she battled to keep the story of the brothers in Snow Castle from hissing out like air from a tyre.
Mama!
she craved to say.
I’ve met some runaway children, I’ve talked to them, they’re hiding in Snow Castle, I can take you to them!
But May was marching along tight-lipped, and Cecily understood that if she ever hoped to be as bold and devious as her newfound sister — if, for that matter, she wished to remain on speaking terms with her — then the tale was not to be told. It was an agonising situation, for Cecily did relish gossip, and the brothers had been so appalling that it would be a pleasure to tell. . . . Yet she also knew that she would never tell. She would keep a thousand secrets rather than lose the sister she’d gained.

May Bright was definitely a Bad Influence.

Home at Heron Hall, they found Jeremy with the day’s newspapers spread out on the dining table. “Reading again!” sighed Cecily. “You read too much, Jem. There’s only sad bad things in the newspapers. Horrible things.”

“Unlike you, I don’t want to live in a play-world and pretend the war isn’t happening.”

“I know it’s happening.” Her brother was being unfair. “I just wish it wasn’t.”

“Did you sweep the chimneys?” asked May.

Because the evacuee had such a charming way about her, Jeremy laughed. “No, not today. But I went out to have a look at Snow Castle. I wanted to see it up close before Uncle Peregrine tells us its history.”

Cecily swung a worried glance to May, but the girl merely nodded. “What did you see?”

“I saw a plate, with the remains of breakfast on it. A raven was pecking at it, but it flew off when it saw me, carrying a piece of toast in its beak. What was a piece of toast doing out at Snow Castle, I wonder?”

May smiled. “Cecily and I went to the castle after breakfast. We wanted a close look too. We took some scraps for the birds. But we didn’t see a raven, just some slugs and stones.”

“I saw slugs and stones, the raven, and two red butterflies.” The girls eyed him watchfully, but Jeremy said nothing further. “I like ravens,” May said finally, and gave him the liquorice mouse.

The war was a sprawling, catastrophic thing, an event that would change lives, and end them; change cities, and raze them; and mar forever the story of humankind’s history. Every minute, all around the world, countless decisions were shaped by the war, from when a woman swept a path to when a man pressed a button to release a bomb. One of the smallest and most insignificant of decisions was made at Heron Hall soon after the arrival of Mrs Lockwood and the children, and this was that adults and children would dine together, rather than at separate sittings. The arrangement was easier for the depleted domestic staff, but it also suited Peregrine. He could think of nothing worse than supping with his sister-in-law, just he and she. He wouldn’t have been surprised to know that Heloise felt the same way. They had things in common, as smart cynical people always do, but one of the things common to them was an awkwardness around each other. Welcome, then, was the company of the children, whose chatter filled the spaces which would otherwise yawn over the dining room.

Peregrine had spoken to his brother on the telephone that afternoon, while Heloise and the girls were in town. “Did you say hello to Daddy for me?” asked an anguished Cecily.

“No,” said her uncle. “But he sends his regards to you. He tells you not to talk with your mouth full and not to bother your uncle.”

“Did he say anything about — what will happen next?”

Jeremy knew from his newspapers that the war continued badly for the Allies. He also knew that, no matter what his father had said, his uncle would remember the girls at the table and tailor his answer accordingly. Yet he couldn’t help asking the question anyway, because frustration chewed ceaselessly at his elbow. Trapped out here in the country he was a wild beast chained, a dog of war muzzled, a worthy warrior lamed. He roamed the corridors of Heron Hall in a simmering fury of helplessness. So he asked, knowing the answer may be dilute, but craving to hear it regardless.

Peregrine looked up from his plate. Dinner that night was leek soup followed by beef, vegetables and dumplings. There was fresh bread on the table, and plenty of butter, and both Heloise and Peregrine had wine. Still to come was plum pudding and cream. One day the stingy fingers of the war might reach into the kitchen of Heron Hall, but that day wasn’t today. Peregrine’s glance went round the table, returned to his nephew. “France, the Netherlands and Belgium have fallen,” he said. “They are occupied countries now, and largely powerless. The Germans are massing their aircraft on the coast of France, noses pointed in our direction. Their army is preparing to cross the Channel for a ground invasion. Our beaches are being strung with barbed wire, but this probably won’t inconvenience the tanks for long. The outlook is poor, as you see. Some people are saying it’s time to hand London over while she’s still standing. Give Hitler the jewel he wants for his crown.”

Although Jeremy already knew this and more, it rattled him to hear it spoken aloud by someone he trusted. It was Cecily who filled the silence.
“Hand London over,”
she said. “You mean, surrender?”

“We can’t.” May spoke stonily. “If we surrender, all those soldiers who’ve died would be
wasted
. . .”

“I agree,” said Jeremy. “We mustn’t surrender, not ever. No matter what happens.”

“Daddy won’t let them win.”

Cecily said it with such well-fed certainty that the conversation stopped as if at a trench. Annoyance flew across Jeremy’s face; he asked, “What will happen if they do come here, Uncle?”

“They won’t. Daddy will keep them out.”

“Shut up, Cecily!” Her brother actually kicked the underside of the table. “Uncle? What will happen if they come here? What will happen if they win?”

He asked it with vehemency, wanting the truth from this man with whom he’d spent many of his life’s happiest hours, who had always treated him with the respect due somebody older. But, “You’re a boy of imagination,” Peregrine replied. “What do you imagine will happen?”

Jeremy’s gaze wobbled over the table and met for a moment the sapphire eyes of May which looked back steadily, steelishly. She looked ready to take up arms and confront the Führer all by herself. It was Heloise, however, who spoke. “For goodness sake, Peregrine, can we talk of something other than the war? I fail to see how turning the subject over like compost can do anything except raise its stink.”

“It’s important . . .”

“It’s utterly drab. What will happen will happen. Discussing it at the dinner table will make no difference to our fate at all. For the moment, the war is far away. It hasn’t touched any of us terribly. So let us spare ourselves while we can.”

An observer, watching closely, would have seen both Jeremy and May lower their eyes in a withdrawing way, the behaviour of secret-keepers who feel themselves alone. But no one was watching closely, and,
Daddy will protect us,
Cecily told herself,
sotto voce.

“‘Very well, what shall we talk of instead?” asked Peregrine. “While the war rages across Europe, what subject fits our preference for lightness and joy?”

“Don’t mock, Peregrine.”

“I do not mean to.”

“I think you do.”

“No arguing at the table!” warned Cecily.

May looked up. “Snow Castle?” she said.

“Yes!” Cecily yiked. “The story!”

“After supper,” said Peregrine, “not during it.”

“What story is this?” asked Heloise.

Jeremy explained, “Uncle Peregrine is going to tell us the story of Snow Castle. It’s history —”

“It’s gruesome!”

“It’s certainly not lightness and joy.”

“— so it’s not really
storytelling,
it’s
teaching,
isn’t it? And if Uncle Peregrine is
teaching
us, then we needn’t go to school in the village, need we, Mother?”

Heloise sipped from her glass — one of many sips she’d taken so far — and considered her son with a cool eye. Perhaps she remembered the conversation in the grocery shop, the mention of riff-raff and unruliness in the village classrooms. Heloise Lockwood had invested in the slight frame of her boy all her hopes and ambitions; but Jeremy had reached a difficult age, and his mother’s dreams could easily become unstuck by months spent in a small room under the influence of malcontents. Nevertheless Heloise was not the type to give in easily: “I suppose it’s education of a sort — for now. Not for ever.”

The children hunched gleefully into themselves. “After supper,” Peregrine promised.

But, as is usual when children are longing for an adult to fulfil a promise, there was a drag of endless time to be fidgeted through before the obligation was met. The main course had to be finished, some digestion must be done, and dessert needed to be consumed as painstakingly as a last meal. The children were then sent off to Peregrine’s study, which was progress of a sort; but here, far from the dining room, they could not exert the pressure of their excitement, and had to sit among the rock samples and carriage clocks in a torment of impatience. The wine bottle must be drained, a subject brought to a close, the table vacated, the washroom visited. When Peregrine finally limped into the study, followed by Byron and eventually by his sister-in-law, he found three children quite bad-tempered with waiting; yet he made them wait further while the fire was stoked, the armchair repositioned, claret poured, a thin cigar lit. Heloise curled up close to the flames, Cecily and May lay on rugs beside Byron, and Jeremy sat on the floor with his back to his mother, near enough for her to occasionally reach out and stroke his glossy hair.

“You have been warned,” Peregrine began. “This story is not a pleasant one. In some ways it is like the fairytales of old, when fairies had a taste for the macabre. But it is not a fairytale: this story is true, and you can look up the facts in history books; and when the truth has been lost in secrecy the gaps are filled by rumours which may have been true, or may have been wishful thinking, or may have been barefaced lies. It’s a story you might think couldn’t happen now, when we have cars and telegrams and all kinds of modern ways. You might think it’s a story from a dark age. But the world is at war as we sit here, tearing itself up like a pack of wolves: maybe, hundreds of years from now, this era we live in will likewise appear a dark and ignorant age. At the end of the story you might find yourself judging some of its characters harshly, but always remember that the world was very different then — yet also, underneath, much the same.”

Cecily, not sure she followed all of what her uncle had said, glanced at her companions. May was cradling Byron’s paw, her face pinkened by the fire. She would understand everything — the bizarre thought came to Cecily that May already knew the story they were about to hear, that perhaps she was even
in
it. Cecily looked at the girl’s stockinged legs, her starfish hands, the bow in her hair that was falling loose; and was engulfed by a desire to protect her, as well as a wish to lock her and her elfy cleverness in a cupboard out of sight.

“Very well,” said Peregrine, reaching for his glass: “let it begin.”

“The boy was born into a time of mud and splendour. In most of the world people lived hard and simple lives, farming the land or sweating in occupations by which the worker came to be known — tanner, potter, cooper, wheeler — as if the work was more important than the person who did it. This was the world of hovels and shovels, dirt roads, fields and forests: a time of mud.