“I am afraid we must disappoint you. Though I am loath to disoblige the Government, I would rather risk its offence than offer France’ssorcieresan invitation to join the war. I am obliged for your confidence in me, however, and you may trust it has not been misplaced.”
Edgeworth took his umbrella from the stand in icy silence.
“Then I do not see that there is any need for me to detain you,” he said. “I will see you at the Spring Ball, I suppose.”
“If I return in time,” said Zacharias. At Edgeworth’s look of surprise, he added, “I am leaving town tomorrow, though I shall try my best to attend the Ball, of course.”
“I should have thought you were so taken up with your duties that you could not spare any time for rusticating,” said Edgeworth, all freezing astonishment.
“It is my duties that call me out of London,” said Zacharias, but Edgeworth’s suspicious expression spurred him on to add, “I am going to address a school of gentlewitches, in fact. The headmistress is a great friend of the Threlfall family.”
“It is no great odds,” said Edgeworth, losing interest at such a tediously unexceptionable reason for a trip. “You will hear what occurs at the Ball whether you are there or not. I expect there will be a great deal of talk of it this year.”
“There always is,” said Zacharias tranquilly.
But England’s crisis of magical resource would not be one of the subjects talked of if Zacharias had anything to say to it. He would travel to Fobdown Purlieu, to the border that separated Britain fromFairyland. As Fairy was the source of Britain’s magic, so it must be the source of its difficulties—and where he might find a solution.
He had hoped to have more time to perfect his spells for extracting magic from the border, but the experiment could not wait. By the time the Society opened its doors for its annual Spring Ball, it would have sufficient magic with which to dazzle all its guests, even the most fastidious, most disbelieving representatives of Government. Zacharias would see to that.
4
TWODAYSBEFOREthe Sorcerer Royal was due to arrive at Mrs. Daubeney’s School for Gentlewitches, Prunella Gentleman was shaken awake at four in the morning. Mrs. Daubeney stood over her, holding a taper aloft and looking like Lady Macbeth in a lace cap.
“Prunella, the worst has come to pass!” she said in a tragical whisper.“He is come!”
A zephyr had knocked upon Mrs. Daubeney’s window to inform her that the Sorcerer Royal’s journey had proceeded more swiftly than expected. He would be upon them, not in two days, but—that very morning!
“I do not see that it makes any great odds,” said Prunella, in no very complaisant spirit. She was no lark in any event, and Mrs. Daubeney had woken her at an unpropitious time. The night before the schoolgirls had fallen to talking of the parties and balls they had been to, or glimpsed through the banisters, at home. As a result Prunella had been dreaming of improbable glories: herself, dressedenchantingly, wafting around a glittering ballroom upon the arm of a faceless gallant.
Waking brought with it the reminder that she had been up till midnight the night before, not dancing, but polishing the silver at Mrs. Daubeney’s insistence. The cold dark of early morning scored into Prunella’s bones how unlikely it was that she would ever see a ballroom or go to a dance, save in her dreams.
Only her affection for Mrs. Daubeney enabled her to suppress her impatience and moderate her impulse to snap. She said mildly, “I am sure the school has never been so clean, and all the girls have been told what they must say and how they must look, and Clara has practised her curtsey a thousand times, and told she must not lisp when she gives Mr. Wythe his posey. There is scarcely anything more to be done, and Cook will be sure to have something to set on the table—she has been deep in preparations for weeks.”
“But Prunella, think of the state of the attics!” said Mrs. Daubeney. “You know I said we should be sorry if we did not make haste to clear out the attics, and now here we are, with the Sorcerer Royal nearly upon us, and the attics uncleared!”
It was a curious contradiction that even as the rest of England languished for want of magic, the school was afflicted with more than it knew what to do with. Being a school for gentlewitches, it did not, of course, instruct its students in practical thaumaturgy. Mrs. Daubeney knew just what parents desired her to inculcate in their inconveniently magical daughters: pretty manners, a moderate measure of education and, above all, a habit of restraint.
But despite the mistresses’ vigilance, they could not prevent forty high-spirited girls from breaking out in spells on occasion, and the garrets, tucked away beneath the roof and rarely visited, were an ideal location for mischief. A scent of leftover chantments lingered always about the attics, making the more susceptible servants sneeze as they passed.
“I am sure no one has looked in the attics for years, and there is bound to be some dreadful spell or talisman hidden there by one of the girls,” Mrs. Daubeney continued. “That is just what I should do if I were a careless girl, with no notion of the trouble I was likely to cause.”
“But I do not see why it should cause any trouble, even if it were true,” Prunella objected. “The Sorcerer Royal is only here for half a day, and he will hardly wish to see our attics.”
“Prunella, I am surprised at you!” cried Mrs. Daubeney. “Do not you realise the Sorcerer Royal’s visit may be the making of this establishment? He is acquainted with every thaumaturge in England, and need only say a word to persuade them that they should send their daughters to this school. Only consider what Mr. Wythe would think of us if he smelt magic from the attics! Like as not he would insist on going up to see them, and stumble upon some magical hoard left by an old girl! Then he will accuse us of harbouring witches, and the girls’ parents will take them away, and we shall have to sell the building and send away the servants, and we will end our days in the poorhouse!”
Prunella flung off her sheet. “If that is to be the consequence, I suppose I had better clean the attics!”
“Blessed girl!” said Mrs. Daubeney, brightening. “I don’t know what I would do without you. You will know just what to do to rid us of these emanations. I need not worry about you, I know, where magic is concerned.”
Prunella was accustomed to Mrs. Daubeney’s swiftly changing moods. Still, it is provoking to be told you must clean an attic within half a day, to which you had intended to devote a week. When Henrietta Stapleton found her in the attic, Prunella was too hot and vexed to receive with patience the news that Miss Liddiard had retreated to bed, felled by an illness. Miss Liddiard taught the eldest class, and it was inconsiderate of her to be poorly on this of all days.
“A plague on all Miss Liddiards, and all Sorcerers Royal!” said Prunella.
“I am sure Miss Liddiard would rather not be ill, Prunella,” said Henrietta in a tone of mild reproof. “She has a horror of giving trouble.” At seventeen Henrietta was as good as out, and really too old for the school, but she had been sent back for another term by her mamma, who fretted about her continuing tendency to levitate in her sleep.
“But that is just what she is doing,” said Prunella. She had stubbed her toe twice already, and been alarmed by the appearance of the largest rat she had ever seen.Shewould not mind a return to bed—not that anyone would offer her the opportunity! “A female may be poor or delicate or a spinster, but it does seem ill-advised of Miss Liddiard to combine all three.”
This was an indelicate way for a young female to talk, but Henrietta was accustomed to the wild things Prunella said. It seemed to the schoolgirls that Prunella had been with the school forever: darting from Mrs. Daubeney’s boudoir to the kitchen, chivvying the little ones through their baths, and substituting for the mistresses at times.
