THE KING'S TOWER
Freddie was very ill. He was so ill that after a week the King gave up
all hope, and believed he would die. The Queen wept bitterly; she
scarcely left his side; at night she did not sleep for weeping, and by
day she sat by his bed and watched his cold white face. His friends were
not allowed to see him, and of these it appeared that Mr. Hanlon had
been gone for some days up the Tower.
All that the best doctors in the city could do had been done, but the
Chevalier was no better. He lay under the blankets, cold as ice and
motionless as stone; and his eyes, big round eyes like the eyes of a
child, stared up strangely out of deep sockets. They looked up at the
King, who was bending down over the bed and smiling encouragingly. The
Queen and her three children, Robert, Genevieve, and James, were
standing close by, but they could not smile.
"Come, Chevalier," said the King, "you will be well soon, I am sure."
A faint voice came from the pale lips; not the voice of a grown man, but
the voice of a child.
"That isn't my name," it said, "my name is--Fweddie."
The King went away, and took his children with him; and after they had
gone the Queen heard the childish voice again from the bed.
"I want to see Aunt Amanda."
The Queen went to him, and stood beside the bed. He looked up at her.
"You aren't Aunt Amanda," he said. "I want to see Aunt Amanda."
"I think that was my name once," said the Queen. "Will you talk to me?"
He looked at her again, and she saw that he did not know her.
"My farver sent me," he said. "Mr. Toby has gone to the barber-shop, and
my farver he wants a pound of Cage-Roach Mitchner."
"Mr. Toby is here in the palace now, and I'm sure he--"
"I don't know about any palace. I can't wait long. My farver told me to
hurry."
The Queen said no more, and Freddie appeared to go to sleep. The night
came on, and the Queen still sat by his side. It grew very late; her
children had long since gone to bed, and even the King was asleep in his
own apartments. The palace was silent, and there was scarcely a light
anywhere in the great place except the light of a taper on a table in
Freddie's room. The Queen was bending forward, watching the face on the
pillow. The eyes were closed, the lips were together, and there was no
sign of breathing. She knew that it could not be much longer; she buried
her face in her hands and wept bitterly.
A gentle tap upon the door aroused her. She rose and admitted Mr. Toby
and Mr. Punch, Thomas the Inferior, and Mr. Hanlon.
"Quick, ma'am," said Mr. Hanlon. "There's not a minute to be lost. If
you plase, I'll ask ye to put on yer bonnet in a hurry, ma'am. We're off
on a journey, and the poor sick young lad's coming along with us. If
you'll just be in a hurry with the bonnet, ma'am!"
The Queen, scarcely realizing what she was doing, left the room, and
went first to the nursery, where she bent over her three sleeping
children and kissed them each, and murmured a loving good-bye above
them, as if she were going to leave them; and for a long, long time she
gazed at each rosy face, as if to fix it in her memory forever.
When she returned to the room, wearing a shawl over her head and
shoulders, she was startled to see that the sick youth was sitting
upright in a chair, thickly wrapped in blankets. His round childlike
eyes were wide open, and to her surprise a faint smile seemed to hover
about his lips.
She looked at the others. Each held, in his hand an empty hour-glass.
"Plase to get your hour-glass, ma'am," said Mr. Hanlon, "and Freddie's
too."
Freddie's hour-glass was soon found in a drawer in the same room; the
Queen's she brought in a moment from another room.
Mr. Hanlon picked up from the floor, where he had previously laid it, a
small canvas bag, and placed it on the table under the candle. All of
the empty hour-glasses he placed upon the table, and unscrewed the part
of each by which it was designed to receive its load of sand. He lifted
his bag, and out of it poured into each glass a quantity of fine white
sand. "A little more or less won't matter a mite," said he, when he had
filled them all. "A foine time I've had getting the sand, 'tis sure, but
it's the true article, straight from the hand of the old crayture
himself, and 'tis him we're going to this very minute, and the young lad
with us. By the sand in the hour-glasses we'll get back to the old
crayture in one-tinth the time it took me to find him without it, and by
the same we'll get him to save for us the poor lad's life, or me name's
not Michael."
Each now took his hour-glass in his hand. They were the same
hour-glasses they had bought of Shiraz the Persian, and the sand which
was now in them was the same sort of fine white sand which had been in
them before their ordeal in the fire.
Mr. Punch and Mr. Toby lifted the sick youth from his chair, and carried
him between them, in a sitting position, towards the door. Mr. Hanlon
looked at him anxiously, and commanded haste.
In a moment the whole party were in the hall, and in a few moments more
they were crossing the lawn towards King's Tower. It was a clear night,
and the sky was spangled with stars.
Mr. Hanlon opened the door of the Tower, and when they were all within
closed it again.
"Madam and gintlemen," said he, "we are going to the top of the Tower. I
have been there meself; and there's wan at the top who can bring back
our young frind to life, if he's a mind to do it."
"Oh!" gasped the Queen in terror. "I must not go to the top of this
tower. Ah!" she stopped suddenly and went on in a determined voice. "I
will, though. If it is to be, then it must be. Our young Chevalier came
here for me, and I will go with him! If my strength holds out, I will go
even to the top of the Tower, whatever evil may befall me there!"
"'Tis not strength that's needed, madam," said Mr. Hanlon, "for the old
crayture that give me the sand was willing to help us up to him, and the
sand will make the travellin' easy, or else the old haythen has much
desayved me. 'Twas all I could do to get to the top, belave me, and ye'd
niver do it without the sand in the glasses, let alone carry up the
young lad in your arms besides. Now we'll be going up the stairs, and if
the old crayture didn't desayve me, you're to hold your hour-glasses in
your hands, and see what happens."
Mr. Hanlon went up first; then came the Queen, and after her Mr. Punch
and Mr. Toby, bearing between them in an upright position the stiff cold
form of the young Chevalier; and last of all came Thomas the Inferior,
in his long brown gown and sandals.
Each climbed slowly, but the steps appeared to flow downward under their
feet with great rapidity. They were not conscious of selecting any
particular tread to step on; but while a foot was rising from one step
to the next, it seemed as if a thousand steps were passing downward,
until the foot came down and found itself on a perfectly motionless
tread. Undoubtedly they were mounting, without unusual exertion, a
thousand steps at a time.
Even at that rate of progress, the journey upward seemed an endless one.
They paused sometimes to go into one of the rooms on a landing for a
moment's rest, and at those times they looked out of a window. It was
not long before they were so high that on looking out, the City's lights
were no more than a glowing blur. At the last window on their upward
progress they looked up at the cloud; it was immediately above their
heads. After that there were no more windows. They went on upward in
silence, aware in the darkness of the swift flow of steps downward under
them as they raised their feet. Each observed that as he raised his foot
the sand in his hour-glass flowed downward a thousand times more
rapidly, as if time were suddenly running faster than it was used to
running.
The walls of the tower were by this time coming closer together, and the
stair was even steeper than before. They were panting for breath, and
Mr. Punch and Mr. Toby seemed to be all but exhausted. "We are almost at
the top," said Mr. Hanlon. "Keep on. Don't give up."
It was now, because there were no more rooms nor windows, completely
dark. The face of the sick youth could not be seen, and no one knew
whether he was still living. Even the sand in their hour-glasses they
were now unable to see.
"We are almost there," said Mr. Hanlon. "Only another minute or two.
'Tis easy work to what I had in coming up alone."
Mr. Punch gave a groan. "Hi carn't go another step," said he. "Hi'm
completely--"
At this moment Mr. Hanlon stopped upon a landing. It had been a long
while since there had been a landing, and they were all glad to rest
upon it. They crowded about Mr. Hanlon in the dark.
"The door is over there," said he. "Keep close to me."
He walked a few feet forward across the level floor, and came to a stop
again.
"'Tis the top of the tower," said he. "I hope we're not too late to save
the young lad's life. Stand close behind me."
He moved forward again, and stopped; he was evidently feeling a wall
with his hands.
"Ah!" said he. "'Tis the door itself. Now, thin, we'll see!"
He knocked upon the door with his knuckles.
There was no response.
He knocked again.
There was a sound upon the other side of the door, as of the rattling of
a chain and the sliding of a bolt.
A slit of light appeared up and down in the dark wall; it became wider;
it was apparent that the door was opening; and in another moment the
door was flung wide, and in the doorway stood an Old Man, holding up in
his right hand a lantern in which glimmered a candle.