第章琥珀宫 《银椅》第8章:哈方宫

《银椅》第8章:哈方宫  

"Go on
Pole
do your stuff
" whispered Scrubb.
Jill found that her mouth was so dry that she couldn't speak a word. She nodded savagely at Scrubb.
Thinking to himself that he would never five her (or Puddleglum either)
Scrubb licked his lips and shouted up to the King giant.
"If you please
Sire
the Lady of the Green Kirtle salutes you by us and said you'd like to have us for your Autumn Feast."
The giant King and Queen looked at each other
nodded to each other
and smiled in a way that Jill didn't exactly like. She liked the King better than the Queen. He had a fine
curled beard and a straight eagle-like nose
and was really rather good-looking as giants go. The Queen was dreadfully fat and had a double chin and a fat
powdered face - which isn't a very nice thing at the best of times
and of course looks much worse when it is ten times too big. Then the King put out his tongue and licked his lips. Anyone might do that: but his tongue was so very large and red
and came out so unexpectedly
that it gave Jill quite a shock.
"Oh
what good children!" said the Queen. ("Perhaps she's the nice one after all
" thought Jill.)
"Yes indeed
" said the King. "Quite excellent children. We wele you to our court. Give me your hands."
He stretched down his great right hand - very clean and with any number of rings on the fingers
but also with terrible pointed nails. He was much too big to shake the hands which the children
in turn
held up to him; but he shook the arms.
"And what's that?" asked the King
pointing to Puddleglum.
"Reshpeckobiggle
" said Puddleglum.
"Oh!" screamed the Queen
gathering her skirts close about her ankles. "The horrid thing! It's alive."
"He's quite all right
your Majesty
really
he is
" said Scrubb hastily. "You'll like him much better when you get to know him. I'm sure you will."
I hope you won't lose all interest in Jill for the rest of the book if I tell you that at this moment she began to cry. There was a good deal of excuse for her. Her feet and hands and ears and nose were still only just beginning to thaw; melted snow was trickling off her clothes; she had had hardly anything to eat or drink that day; and her legs were aching so that she felt she could not go on standing much longer. Anyway
it did more good at the moment than anything else would have done
for the Queen said:
"Ah
the poor child! My lord
we do wrong to keep our guests standing. Quick
some of you! Take them away. Give them food and wine and baths. Comfort the little girl. Give her lollipops
give her dolls
give her physics
give her all you can think of - possets and fits and caraways and lullabies and toys. Don't cry
little girl
or you won't be good for anything when the feast es."
Jill was just as indignant as you and I would have been at the mention of toys and dolls; and
though lollipops and fits might be all very well in their way
she very much hoped that something more solid would be provided. The Queen's foolish speech
however
produced excellent results
for Puddleglum and Scrubb were at once picked up by gigantic gentlemen-in-waiting
and Jill by a gigantic maid of honour
and carried off to their rooms.
Jill's room was about the size of a church
and would have been rather grim if it had not had a roaring fire on the hearth and a very thick crimson carpet on the floor. And here delightful things began to happen to her. She was handed over to the Queen's old Nurse
who was
from the giants' point of view
a little old woman almost bent double with age
and
from the human point of view
a giantess small enough to go about an ordinary room without knocking her head on the ceiling. She was very capable
though Jill did wish she wouldn't keep on clicking her tongue and saying things like "Oh la
la! Ups-adaisy" and "There's a duck" and "Now we'll be all right
my poppet". She filled a giant foot-bath with hot water and helped Jill into it. If you can swim (as Jill could) a giant bath is a lovely thing. And giant towels
though a bit rough and coarse
are lovely too
because there are acres of them. In fact you don't need to dry at all
you just roll about on them in front of the fire and enjoy yourself. And when that was over
clean
fresh
warmed clothes were put on Jill: very splendid clothes and a little too big for her
but clearly made for humans not giantesses. "I suppose if that woman in the green kirtle es here
they must be used to guests of our size
" thought Jill.
She soon saw that she was right about this
for a table and chair of the right height for an ordinary grown-up human were placed for her
and the knives and forks and spoons were the proper size too. It was delightful to sit down
feeling warm and clean at last. Her feet were still bare and it was lovely to tread on the giant carpet. She sank in it well over her ankles and it was just the thing for sore feet. The meal - which I suppose we must call dinner
though it was nearer tea time - was cock-a-leekie soup
and hot roast turkey
and a steamed pudding
and roast chestnuts
and as much fruit as you could eat.
The only annoying thing was that the Nurse kept ing in and out
and every time she came in
she brought a gigantic toy with her - a huge doll
bigger than Jill herself
a wooden horse on wheels
about the size of an elephant
a drum that looked like a young gasometer
and a woolly lamb. They were crude
badly made things
painted in very bright colours
and Jill hated the sight of them. She kept on telling the Nurse she didn't want them
but the Nurse said:
"Tut-tut-tut-tut. You'll want 'em all right when you've had a bit of a rest
I know! Te-he-he! Beddy bye
now. A precious poppet!"
The bed was not a giant bed but only a big four-poster
like what you might see in an old-fashioned hotel; and very small it looked in that enormous room. She was very glad to tumble into it.
"Is it still snowing
Nurse?" she asked sleepily.
"No. Raining now
ducky!" said the giantess. "Rain'll wash away all the nasty snow. Precious poppet will be able to go out and play tomorrow!" And she tucked Jill up and said good night.
I know nothing so disagreeable as being kissed by a giantess. Jill thought the same
but was asleep in five minutes.
The rain fell steadily all the evening and all the night
dashing against the windows of the castle
and Jill never heard it but slept deeply
past supper time and past midnight. And then came the deadest hour of the night and nothing stirred but mice in the house of the giants. At that hour there came to Jill a dream. It seemed to her that she awoke in the same room and saw the fire
sunk low and red
and in the firelight the great wooden horse. And the horse came of its own will
rolling on its wheels across the carpet
and stood at her head. And now it was no longer a horse
but a lion as big as the horse. And then it was not a toy lion
but a real lion
The Real Lion
just as she had seen him on the mountain beyond the world's end. And a smell of all sweet-smelling things there are filled the room. But there was some trouble in Jill's mind
though she could not think what it was
and the tears streamed down her face and wet the pillow. The Lion told her to repeat the signs
and she found that she had fotten them all. At that
a great horror came over her. And Aslan took her up in his jaws (she could feel his lips and his breath but not his teeth) and carried her to the window and made her look out. The moon shone bright; and written in great letters across the world or the sky (she did not know which) were the words UNDER ME. After that
the dream faded away
and when she woke
very late next morning
she did not remember that she had dreamed at all.
She was up and dressed and had finished breakfast in front of the fire when the Nurse opened the door and said: "Here's pretty poppet's little friends e to play with her."
In came Scrubb and the Marsh-wiggle.
"Hullo! Good morning
" said Jill. "Isn't this fun? I've slept about fifteen hours
I believe. I do feel better
don't you?"
"1 do
" said Scrubb
"but Puddleglum says he has a headache. Hullo! - your window has a window seat. If we got up on that
we could see out." And at once they all did so: and at the first glance Jill said
"Oh
how perfectly dreadful!"
The sun was shining and
except for a few drifts
the snow had been almost pletely washed away by the rain. Down below them
spread out like a map
lay the flat hill-top which they had struggled over yesterday afternoon; seen from the castle
it could not be mistaken for anything but the ruins of a gigantic City. It had been flat
as Jill now saw
because it was still
on the whole
paved
though in places the pavement was broken. The criss-cross banks were what was left of the walls of huge buildings which might once have been giants' palaces and temples. One bit of wall
about five hundred feet high
was still standing; it was that which she had thought was a cliff. The things that had looked like factory chimneys were enormous pillars
broken off at unequal heights; their fragments lay at their bases like felled trees of monstrous stone. The ledges which they had climbed down on the north side of the hill - and also
no doubt the other ledges which they had climbed up on the south side - were the remaining steps of giant stairs. To crown all
in large
dark lettering across the centre of the pavement
ran the words UNDER ME.
The three travellers looked at each other in dismay
and
after a short whistle
Scrubb said what they were all thinking
"The second and third signs muffed." And at that moment Jill's dream rushed back into her mind.
"It's my fault
" she said in despairing tones. "I - I'd given up repeating the signs every night. If I'd been thinking about them I could have seen it was the city
even in all that snow."
"I'm worse
" said Puddleglum. "I did see
or nearly. I thought it looked unmonly like a ruined city."
"You're the only one who isn't to blame
" said Scrubb. "You did try to make us stop."
"Didn't try hard enough
though
" said the Marshwiggle. "And I'd no call to be trying. I ought to have done it. As if I couldn't have stopped you o with one hand each!"
"The truth is
" said Scrubb
"we were so jolly keen on getting to this place that we weren't bothering about anything else. At least I know I was. Ever since we met that woman with the knight who didn't talk
we've been thinking of nothing else. We'd nearly fotten about Prince Rilian."
"I shouldn't wonder
" said Puddleglum
"if that wasn't exactly what she intended."
"What I don't quite understand
" said Jill
"is how we didn't see the lettering? Or could it have e there since last night. Could he - Aslan - have put it there in the night? I had such a queer dream." And she told them all about it.
"Why
you chump!" said Scrubb. "We did see it. We got into the lettering. Don't you see? We got into the letter E in ME. That was your sunk lane. We walked along the bottom stroke of the E
due north - turned to our right along the upright - came to another turn to the right - that's the middle stroke - and then went on to the top left-hand corner
or (if you like) the north-eastern corner of the letter
and came back. Like the bally idiots we are." He kicked the window seat savagely
and went on
"So it's no good
Pole. I know what you were thinking because I was thinking the same. You were thinking how nice it would have been if Aslan hadn't put the instructions on the stones of the ruined city till after we'd passed it. And then it would have been his fault
not ours. So likely
isn't it? No. We must just own up. We've only four signs to go by
and we've muffed the first three."
"You mean I have
" said Jill. "It's quite true. I've spoiled everything ever since you brought me here. All the same - I'm frightfully sorry and all that - all the same
what are the instructions? UNDER ME doesn't seem to make much sense."
"Yes it does
though
" said Puddleglum. "It means we've got to look for the Prince under that city."
"But how can we?" asked Jill.
"That's the question
" said Puddleglum
rubbing his big
frog-like hands together. "How can we now? No doubt
if we'd had our minds on our job when we were at the Ruinous City
we'd have been shown how - found a little door
or a cave
or a tunnel
met someone to help us. Might have been (you never know) Aslan himself. We'd have got down under those paving-stones somehow or other. Aslan's instructions always work: there are no exceptions. But how to do it now - that's another matter."
"Well
we shall just have to go back
I suppose
" said Jill.
"Easy
isn't it?" said Puddleglum. "We might try opening that door to begin with." And they all looked at the door and saw that none of them could reach the handle
and that almost certainly no one could turn it if they did.
"Do you think they won't let us out if we ask?" said Jill. And nobody said
but everyone thought
"Supposing they don't."
It was not a pleasant idea. Puddleglum was dead against any idea of telling the giants their real business and simply asking to be let out; and of course the children couldn't tell without his permission
because they had promised. And all three felt pretty sure that there would be no chance of escaping from the castle by night. Once they were in their rooms with the doors shut
they would be prisoners till morning. They might
of course
ask to have their doors left open
but that would rouse suspicions.
"Our only chance
" said Scrubb
"is to try to sneak away by daylight. Mightn't there be an hour in the afternoon when most of the giants are asleep? - and if we could steal down into the kitchen
mightn't there be a back door open?"
"It's hardly what I call a Chance
" said the Marshwiggle. "But it's all the chance we're likely to get." As a matter of fact
Scrubb's plan was not quite so hopeless as you might think. If you want to get out of a house without being seen
the middle of the afternoon is in some ways a better time to try it than the middle of the night. Doors and windows are more likely to be open; and if you are caught
you can always pretend you weren't meaning to go far and had no particular plans. (It is very hard to make either giants or grown-ups believe this if you're found climbing out of a bedroom window at one o'clock in the morning.)
"We must put them off their guard
though
" said Scrubb. "We must pretend we love being here and are longing for this Autumn Feast."
"That's tomorrow night
" said Puddleglum. "I heard one of them say so."
"I see
" said Jill. "We must pretend to be awfully excited about it
and keep on asking questions. They think we're absolute infants anyway
which will make it easier."
"Gay
" said Puddleglum with a deep sigh. "That's what we've got to be. Gay. As if we hadn't a care in the world. Frolicsome. You o youngsters haven't always got very high spirits
I've noticed. You must watch me
and do as I do. I'll be gay. Like this" - and he assumed a ghastly grin. "And frolicsome" - here he cut a most mournful caper. "You'll soon get into it
if you keep your eyes on me. They think I'm a funny fellow already
you see. I dare say you o thought I was a trifle tipsy last night
but I do assure you it was - well
most of it was - put on. I had an idea it would e in useful
somehow."
The children
when they talked over their adventures afterwards
could never feel sure whether this last statement was quite strictly true; but they were sure that Puddleglum thought it was true when he made it.
"All right. Gay's the word
" said Scrubb. "Now
if we could only get someone to open this door. While we're fooling about and being gay
we've got to find out all we can about this castle."
Luckily
at that very moment the door opened
and the giant Nurse bustled in saying
"Now
my poppets. Like to e and see the King and all the court setting out on the hunting? Such a pretty sight!"
They lost no time in rushing out past her and climbing down the first staircase they came to. The noise of hounds and horns and giant voices guided them
so that in a few minutes they reached the courtyard. The giants were all on foot
for there are no giant horses in that part of the world
and the giants' hunting is done on foot; like beagling in England. The hounds were also of normal size. When Jill saw that there were no horses she was at first dreadfully disappointed
for she felt sure that the great fat Queen would never go after hounds on foot; and it would never do to have her about the house all day. But then she saw the Queen in a kind of litter supported on the shoulders of six young giants. The silly old creature was all got up in green and had a horn at her side.
Twenty or thirty giants
including the King
were assembled
ready for the sport
all talking and laughing fit to deafen you: and down below
nearer Jill's level
there were wagging tails
and barking
and loose
slobbery mouths and noses of dogs thrust into your hand. Puddleglum was just beginning to strike what he thought a gay and gamesome attitude (which might have spoiled everything if it had been noticed) when Jill put on her most attractively childish smile
rushed across to the Queen's litter and shouted up to the Queen.
"Oh
please! You're not going away
are you? You will e back?"
"Yes
my dear
" said the Queen. "I'll be back tonight."
"Oh
good. How lovely!" said Jill. "And we may e to the feast tomorrow night
mayn't we? We're so longing for tomorrow night! And we do love being here. And while you're out
we may run over the whole castle and see everything
mayn't we? Do say yes."
The Queen did say yes
but the laughter of all the courtiers nearly drowned her voice.