Count Karlstein Page 5

  More kissing….

  They won’t look for the girls, I thought; they’ll spend all day mooning up and down with their arms round each other. I don’t think they’d have seen me then if I’d jumped out in the road in front of them, pulling faces, waggling my fingers in front of my nose, and blowing raspberries.

  No, there was only one person who could help Lucy and Charlotte, and that was me.

  And all I could do was wonder when I’d be able to go up the mountain with some food and a tinderbox, between all the other chores I had to do; for there’s no one busier than a maidservant.

  No sooner had I reached the castle, for instance, than Frau Muller snapped at me, “Where’ve you been? How am I supposed to run a staff of servants if they all take the morning off whenever they feel like it? There’s a lady come to see the count and no one to wait on them. Get out of that filthy old cloak and take them some wine—hurry up, girl!”

  “Who is it?” I said, dropping my cloak over the back of Frau Wenzel’s chair and smoothing my hair down. “I thought he was out with the hounds?”

  “What’s it to do with you? He went out and came back again. Your trouble is, you don’t know your place. Too friendly with those two little perishers who ran off—good riddance, says I. You’ve got ideas above your station, Hildi Kelmar. Get on up to the drawing-room, and don’t keep them waiting any longer.”

  I hastened up there nervously. Count Karlstein was standing by the fireplace, and a plump, warmly dressed woman of about thirty-five or so sat very upright in the best chair. I wasn’t sure who she was yet, but something about her reminded me of the girls—some foreign air—and something else reminded me of Meister Haifisch: some steely toughness in her eyes; and she was distinctly pretty in a brisk kind of way. She looked at me with bright curiosity, as if she was about to speak and thinking better of it. What’s more, she looked at ease and the count didn’t.

  “Can I offer you some refreshment, Miss Davenport?” he said.

  Of course! I thought. Miss Davenport!

  “How kind,” she said. “I am exhilarated by the walk on this fine morning. I shall take a little mineral water, thank you so much.”

  Her accent was strong, but although some of her phrases sounded odd, she spoke confidently. The count seemed a little taken aback at the idea of anyone wanting to drink water, and he couldn’t help making a face as she said it—rude man. I curtsied, but before I could go out, she said, “Perhaps the maid could summon the girls, for me to greet them? I shall not be long in the district, after all.”

  I looked at Count Karlstein.

  “I’m very sorry,” he said harshly. “That’s out of the question. They’re ill, both of them.” He looked uneasy as he said it. Strange that such a villain could be such a poor liar! She knew he was lying, too. I could see her sit a little forward on her chair, and her eyes sparkled.

  “I’m sorry to hear that, Count Karlstein. What are they suffering from?”

  “A fever,” said the count.

  “Then you must let me look at them. I have no medical degree, of course, but I have studied privately under Professor Wurmhoell of Heidelberg. Tell me, who is supervising their treatment, Count Karlstein? Allow me to see their physician. I shall wait for refreshment until I have examined the girls. The maid can take me to their chamber,” she said, sweeping to her feet and bearing down on me.

  Good for you! I thought, but then the count leaped forward as if he’d stepped in the fire by mistake.

  “No! No! Out of the question! I could not possibly allow it! Their condition is perfectly safe, but they must not be allowed any contact from outside the valley. To expose them to the influence of travelers, even learned ones, Miss Davenport, who have passed through less healthy places on their journeys—no, no, I cannot allow it. A great pity—but there you are. I would be failing in my duty if I let you see them.”

  Miss Davenport was watching him closely. He looked in need of medical treatment himself: deathly pale, bristling with nerves, his face silvered by a light panicky sweat. Miss Davenport looked at him as if he were a specimen of some new tropical plant. He tried to outface her, and had to turn away; and she demurely sat down again.

  “Of course, you’re right, Count Karlstein,” she said. “Quite the best thing to do.” She folded her hands on her lap and looked at me. The count had his back to me, and I was able to shake my head vigorously for a moment. Then he turned and saw me.

  “Go and fetch the water, girl,” he said, waving his hand to dismiss me.

  I hurried away. When I came back they were talking politely about the weather, or something. I heard the count ask where she was going to stay and I pricked up my ears before I was sent out again; but all I heard was something to the effect that since she’d come equipped for a journey of scientific exploration (and had only broken her travels here for a day or so) she was perfectly happy to camp, like a Red Indian, I supposed, the tavern being full and the village barred to her by Sergeant Snitsch. Then the count glared at me, and I curtsied and left.

  I must speak to her, I thought. But some evil power (I was becoming convinced) was frustrating all my good intentions. Because when I got back to the kitchen, I was met by Frau Wenzel the cook, beside herself with excitement and weeping with joy.

  “Oh, Hildi! Oh, Hildi! Isn’t it wonderful?” she sobbed.

  “What? For goodness’ sake, what is it?”

  “They’ve found Miss Charlotte! They’ve brought her back, all safe and sound!”

  I sat down, astonished. No, it wasn’t wonderful at all. I was furious. I knew what had happened—they’d left the hut, stupid things, and she’d been caught.

  “Where is she now?” I said. “I’ll go and see her. She’ll want—”

  “Kelmar!” said the voice of Frau Muller, and her goose-shaped figure swept into the kitchen like a cold draft. “That brat’s been found. She’s in the tower, and she’s not to be seen to, d’you hear? You’re not to go near her.”

  “But where’s she been? What happened? And why—”

  “Just do as you’re told!” she snapped. “I think you know more than you pretend. If you go near that child, I’ll have you tanned, don’t think I won’t. And it won’t stop there.” She cast a suspicious look around the kitchen, and swept out as swiftly as she’d swept in.

  “Why mustn’t I go up to her?” I said to Frau Wenzel, who was fanning her face weakly with the day’s menus.

  “Oh, dear, oh, dear, I wouldn’t argue with her—she’s got a terrible temper, and it’s me’ll get the rough edge of her tongue. It’s not fair, Hildi, what I have to put up with in here—I wouldn’t get it anywhere else, not treatment like this….” A sniff or two, another sob, and she was over the worst of that; and while she stirred a pot of stew, I sat at the table and chopped up some carrots and got the story out of her.

  It seemed that while Miss Davenport had been upstairs with Count Karlstein, a very watery gentleman had turned up at the castle gate, dripping and shivering and leaking badly—and clinging tightly to a chilly little girl. Herr Snivelwurst, clambering painfully out of the rocky torrent I’d shoved him into, had seen Charlotte emerging from the woods. He’d never have caught her if he’d given chase; but he had the presence of mind (and absence of decency) to lie down and yell….

  And she, seeing what looked like a sorely distressed traveler at the side of the road, remembered the story of the Good Samaritan and came up to help; and found a fishy hand tight around her wrist and an oily grin of triumph leering up at her. And so he’d brought her back—but apparently she’d said nothing about where Lucy might be, or about why they’d gone in the first place. And Herr Snivelwurst was now sitting with his bony feet in a bowl of hot water by the fire in Frau Muller’s private parlor, with a blanket around his skinny shoulders, bright-eyed with heroism and brandy. Pity I didn’t push him under with a stick, I thought, while I had the chance.

  Charlotte had been locked in the lumber room beneath the count’s study—as
a punishment, Frau Wenzel said, for wickedness. And did I have a moment to get up there? I did not. Frau Muller kept me busy all the rest of the morning. My spirits lowered with every minute that passed, and as soon as lunch was over she set me the task of cleaning all the silver—even the great soup tureen, ornamented with lumpy dolphins and fat little mermaids, that had never been used since I’d been at the castle. It all came out of its baize and sat depressingly on the kitchen table, and I sat in front of it and rubbed away with the fine sand until every little speck of tarnish had disappeared. I knew where it had gone, too—my heart was as dull and dark as the silver itself had been, by the time I’d finished.

  And when I’d wrapped the silver up and put it away again, there was Frau Muller’s parlor to dust and sweep; and then she pretended she’d got to sort through all the last year’s menus, and gave me the job of putting them in order—scrappy, dusty, tom things, of no use to anyone. I could see quite plainly what she was doing: keeping me busy, of course, and away from Charlotte. All afternoon she stood over me, while thoughts of Charlotte locked in the tower and Lucy wandering over the mountains on her own, and Miss Davenport close enough to help but quite ignorant of their trouble, went round and round in my head like cats fighting in a bag.

  Count Karlstein went out later, with the hounds; which lowered my spirits still further. Then, in the late afternoon, Frau Muller told me to take some logs up to the drawing-room and trim the lamps. I thought this would give me a chance to run up to the lumber room, but again I was thwarted, for I found Herr Snivelwurst snoring sulkily by the ghost of the drawing-room fire and I dropped a heavy pair of tongs on the stone hearth to wake him up with a start.

  He jerked and snorted and sat up suddenly, then saw who it was and sank back into the chair again—and then woke up fully.

  “Where were you when I fell in the river? I thought you’d gone to get help?”

  “I had, sir! I ran and ran! I was so worried about you—”

  “I might very easily have drowned, I suppose you realize. I’m a remarkably strong swimmer—many have said how powerfully I swim—but the force of the current was overwhelming. I was near carried to my death—” Here he broke off for a fit of sneezing. I turned away and made as if to leave. “Here, I haven’t finished!” he said. “I was going to tell you how I trapped that little minx—you’ll enjoy that.”

  “I’m busy, Herr Snivelwurst,” I said. “I expect I’ll hear it again.”

  He sneezed once more and sank back, grumbling. I left.

  But then, at last, came the chance I’d been waiting for. They’d relented; or Frau Muller’s stony heart had softened to the extent of allowing that Charlotte might, at least, be fed in her imprisonment, and so Frau Wenzel had prepared a tray with a bowl of soup, some bread, and an apple, and I was to take it—not to the tower, indeed, but to Frau Muller herself, who was presently in the hall on some business and who would take it up to the prisoner. I took the tray and went up the stone steps from the kitchen, while Frau Wenzel clattered away behind me at some pots and pans. The passage to the hall led past Frau Muller’s parlor, and there, I knew, hung a full set of duplicate keys for all the rooms in the castle except the count’s study.

  It only took a moment. I slipped into the room, set the tray on the table, turned to the great board behind the door and ran my eyes feverishly up and down until I saw the key; and then I put it into the bowl. Frau Wenzel’s soup was good and thick, thank goodness, and the key was completely hidden.

  I picked up the tray again as the door opened, and in came Frau Muller. I stood, frozen. She said nothing, but her eyes glittered with a sly triumph. Without a word she took the tray from me and waited for me to leave the room. “Wait in the hall,” she said, with a nasty edge to her voice, and disappeared in the gloom of the stairway.

  I stood by the hall fire, crushed with misery. I nearly wept; the only thing that stopped me was the thought of the pleasure she’d take in my tears. After what seemed an age her footsteps came down the stairs again and I turned to face her.

  But before she could speak, the main door of the castle was flung open, and Count Karlstein himself, the cold air swirling around him like an army of Visigoths, stood there on the threshold. The wind flung up cinders and ash from the hearth and made the lamplight flare and sink, and even the heavy, sagging tapestries stirred uneasily out from the walls before the count slammed the door, shutting out the wind. Frau Muller was at his side, speaking swiftly, pointing at me. He looked up and his eyes seemed to flicker, like the mountains in summer when a storm’s about to break, with enormous undischarged anger.

  He took three swift strides, and raised the short stick in his hand to strike at me. I stepped back, but the blow caught me on my shoulder; even through my dress it stung fiercely, and I cried out in fear and scrambled away as he aimed another blow. It cut me across the neck, and I turned and ran. He was mad. He shouted at me—a stream of abuse that turned me cold to hear it—and flung something; I don’t know what it was, but it struck me in the back just before I reached the door to the servants’ quarters. It was hard and heavy, and the spot was tender for weeks afterward. I flung myself into the kitchen and sobbed and sobbed—and Frau Wenzel, instead of comforting me, turned away, her face tight and shut with fear, and clattered some buckets in the scullery.

  And only a moment later the door was flung wide, and there stood Frau Muller, leaning forward and craning her neck at me, white with anger—except for a little broken vein that stretched like a thread of scarlet cotton up the side of her nose. I stared hard at that to avoid looking into her eyes, and she said, “Get your cloak and your bags, and go. Get out! Leave the castle immediately, and don’t come back!”

  My head was reeling, but I managed to curtsy. I felt as if I was dreaming. She stood aside to let me pass, holding her skirt fastidiously out of the way.

  It was the work of a few minutes to gather my possessions; and then, sore, full of fear, and utterly defeated, I left Castle Karlstein as the snow began to fall, and stumbled down the road toward the village.

  No, we should never have left the hut. It was Folly. But we were so hungry and so cold that to stay there would have been Madness; and though we were certainly foolish, we were not yet mad. So we left.

  The second act of Folly was Charlotte’s. I tried to call to her in the voice of some woodland creature, since I was still hidden among the trees and did not wish to reveal my presence; but although I could see quite clearly that the stranded form on the bank was that of Herr Snivelwurst, my bird imitation failed to convey this knowledge to Charlotte, and I watched, squawking dismally, as she walked into the trap and was led off into captivity.

  For the rest of the morning and most of the afternoon I haunted the woods, in a state of horrible Indecision, and even more horrible Hunger; until at last, in desperation, I entered the village and made my way to the Jolly Huntsman. Despite Hildi’s misgivings, I thought that there would surely be some help to be found in that convivial spot. And so there was; but not of a kind I was expecting.

  I entered the parlor and found it deserted. But on a platform at the end stood the strangest object I had ever seen. It was a Cabinet, rather taller and broader than a man, and it was covered with all manner of projections, handles, eyepieces, nozzles, windows, curtains, knobs, and mystic signs. Struck with Curiosity, I wandered up to examine it; and suddenly the curtains were parted and a man appeared.

  He was tall, and quite unlike anyone I had seen before. He did not look Swiss at all, but somehow Italian, and he was exceedingly handsome. His eyes glittered disapprovingly as he looked down at me.

  “Have you seen my servant?” he said.

  “No, sir,” I faltered.

  “Max!” he called. “Oh, this is impossible. Where is that man? Max!”

  He opened the Cabinet and brought out a long robe, covered in the signs of the Zodiac, which he hung over one of the knobs on the door.

  “Excuse me, sir—” I began.

 
“What is it, little girl?”

  “Have you seen Hildi, sir?”

  “Never heard of her. Hold this.” And he handed me a Human Skull. I took it with trembling hands. “Don’t drop it,” he said. “It is the Skull of Apollonius, the great philosopher. Quite irreplaceable.”

  “What shall I do with it?”

  “Hold it up,” he said. “Gaze into its eyes. Look mysterious. Yes! Perfect! Just stand there. Don’t move an inch.”

  “But please—I’m in trouble—can I look for Hildi?”

  “Hush, child! You are treading on the edge of Mysteries.” He walked around me, scrutinizing me closely. “Yes,” he said finally. “You will make a perfect assistant.”

  Then I nearly did drop the Skull.

  “What?” I gasped. “An assistant? What do you mean, sir?”

  “You are running away, are you not?”

  “Well—yes—but how do you know?”

  “Easy to tell. What you need is somewhere to hide, and what I need is an assistant, since my servant has vanished. What is your name?”

  “It’s Lucy—but may I hide here? Will you not give me away? I am in great danger, and my sister—”

  “Give you away? A scandalous idea! As sure as my name is Dante Cadaverezzi, I shall not betray a fellow fugitive. The Skull, if you please.” He replaced Apollonius in the Cabinet, and began to arrange various mysterious articles on the stage nearby.

  “Are you running away as well, Mr. Cadaverezzi?” I said, feeling more at ease. He was a daunting figure, but I felt oddly safe with him.

  “Doctor Cadaverezzi, if you please. Yes, I am a mountebank, a vagabond,” he said. “An honorable calling, but an unstable one. Now, what did you say your name was? Lucy? No, that’s no good. You’ll have to be a princess….From India? Peru? No—I have it. Egypt, of course! And you shall prophesy—you shall tell fortunes!”

  “Shall I? What do you mean?”