UPS AND DOWNS
We left Lucy in tears and Philip in the grasp of the hateful
Pretenderette, who, seated on the Hippogriff, was bearing him away
across the smooth blueness of the wide sea.
'Oh, Mr. Noah,' said Lucy, between sniffs and sobs, 'how _can_ she! You
_did_ say the Hippogriff could only carry one!'
'One ordinary human being,' said Mr. Noah gently; 'you forget that dear
Philip is now an earl.'
'But do you really think he's safe?' Lucy asked.
'Yes,' said Mr. Noah. 'And now, dear Lucy, no more questions. Since your
arrival on our shores I have been gradually growing more accustomed to
being questioned, but I still find it unpleasant and fatiguing. Desist,
I entreat.'
So Lucy desisted and every one went to bed, and, for crying is very
tiring, to sleep. But not for long.
Lucy was awakened in her bed of soft dry seaweed by the sound of the
castle alarm bell, and by the blaring of trumpets and the shouting of
many voices. A bright light shone in at the window of her room. She
jumped up and ran to the window and leaned out. Below lay the great
courtyard of the castle, a moving sea of people on which hundreds of
torches seemed to float, and the sound of shouting rose in the air as
foam rises in the wind.
'The Fear! The Fear!' people were shouting. 'To the ark! to the ark!'
And the black night that pressed round the castle was loud with the wild
roar of waves and the shriek of a tumultuous wind.
Lucy ran to the door of her room. But suddenly she stopped.
'My clothes,' she said. And dressed herself hastily. For she perceived
that her own petticoats and shoes were likely to have better wearing
qualities than seaweed could possess, and if they were all going to take
refuge in the ark, she felt she would rather have her own clothes on.
'Mr. Noah is sure to come for me,' she most sensibly told herself. 'And
I'll get as many clothes on as I can.' Her own dress, of course, had
been left at Polistopolis, but the ballet dress would be better than the
seaweed tunic. When she was dressed she ran into Philip's room and
rolled his clothes into a little bundle and carried it under her arm as
she ran down the stairs. Half-way down she met Mr. Noah coming up.
'Ah! you're ready,' he said; 'it is well. Do not be alarmed, my Lucy.
The tide is rising but slowly. There will be time for every one to
escape. All is in train, and the embarkation of the animals is even now
in progress. There has been a little delay in sorting the beasts into
pairs. But we are getting on. The Lord High Islander is showing
remarkable qualities. All the big animals are on board; the pigs were
being coaxed on as I came up. And the ant-eaters are having a late
supper. Do not be alarmed.'
'I can't help being alarmed,' said Lucy, slipping her free hand into Mr.
Noah's, 'but I won't cry or be silly. Oh, I do wish Philip was here.'
'Most unreasonable of girl children,' said Mr. Noah; 'we are in danger
and you wish him to be here to share it?'
'Oh, we _are_ in danger, are we?' said Lucy quickly. 'I thought you said
I wasn't to be alarmed.'
'No more you are,' said Mr. Noah shortly; 'of course you're in danger.
But there's me. And there's the ark. What more do you want?'
'Nothing,' Lucy answered in a very small voice, and the two made their
way to a raised platform overlooking the long inclined road which led up
to the tower on which the ark had been built. A long procession toiled
slowly up it of animals in pairs, urged and goaded by the M.A.'s under
the orders of the Lord High Islander.
The wild wind blew the flames of the torches out like golden streamers,
and the sound of the waves was like thunder on the shore.
Down below other M.A.'s were busy carrying bales tied up in seaweed.
Seen from above the busy figures looked like ants when you kick into an
ant-hill and the little ant people run this way and that way and every
way about their little ant businesses.
The Lord High Islander came in pale and serious, with all the calm
competence of Napoleon at a crisis.
'Sorry to have to worry you, sir,' he said to Mr. Noah, 'but of course
your experience is invaluable just now. I can't remember what bears eat.
Is it hay or meat?'
'It's buns,' said Lucy. 'I beg your pardon, Mr. Noah. Of course I ought
to have waited for you to say.'
'In my ark,' said Mr. Noah, 'buns were unknown and bears were fed
entirely on honey, the providing of which kept our pair of bees fully
employed. But if you are sure bears _like_ buns we must always be
humane, dear Lucy, and study the natural taste of the animals in our
charge.'
'They love them,' said Lucy.
'Buns and honey,' said the Lord Islander; 'and what about bats?'
'I don't know what bats eat,' said Mr. Noah; 'I believe it was settled
after some discussion that they don't eat cats. But what they _do_ eat
is one of the eleven mysteries. You had better let the bats fast.'
'They _are_, sir,' said the Lord High Islander.
'And is all going well? Shall I come down and lend a personal eye?'
'I think I'm managing all right, sir,' said the Lord High Islander
modestly. 'You see it's a great honour for me. The M.A.'s are carrying
in the provisions, the boys are stowing them and also herding the
beasts. They are very good workers, sir.'
'Are you frightened?' Lucy whispered, as he turned to go back to his
overseeing.
[Illustration: A long procession toiled slowly up it of animals in
pairs.]
'Not I,' said the Lord High Islander. 'Don't you understand that I've
been promoted to be Lord Vice-Noah of Polistarchia? And of course the
hearts of all Vice-Noahs are strangers to fear. But just think what a
difficult thing Fear would have been to be a stranger to if you and
Philip hadn't got us the ark!'
'It was Philip's doing,' said Lucy; 'oh, _do_ you think he's all right?'
'I think his heart is a stranger to fear, naturally,' said the Lord High
Islander, 'so he's certain to be all right.'
When the last of the animals had sniffed and snivelled its way into the
ark--it was a porcupine with a cold in its head--the islanders, the
M.A.'s, Lucy and Mr. Noah followed. And when every one was in, the door
of the ark was shut from inside by an ingenious mechanical contrivance
worked by a more than usually intelligent M.A.
You must not suppose that the inside of the ark was anything like the
inside of your own Noah's ark, where all the animals are put in anyhow,
all mixed together and wrong way up as likely as not. That, with live
animals and live people, would, as you will readily imagine, be quite
uncomfortable. The inside of the ark which had been built under the
direction of Mr. Noah and Mr. Perrin was not at all like that. It was
more like the inside of a big Atlantic liner than anything else I can
think of. All the animals were stowed away in suitable stalls, and there
were delightful cabins for all those for whom cabins were suitable. The
islanders and the M.A.'s retired to their cabins in perfect order, and
Lucy and Mr. Noah, Mr. Perrin and the Lord High Islander gathered in the
saloon, which was large and had walls and doors of inlaid
mother-of-pearl and pink coral. It was lighted by glass globes filled
with phosphorus collected by an ingenious process invented by another of
the M.A.'s.
'And now,' said Mr. Noah, 'I beg that anxiety may be dismissed from
every mind. If the waters subside, they leave us safe. If they rise, as
I confidently expect them to do, our ark will float, and we still are
safe. In the morning I will take soundings and begin to steer a course.
We will select a suitable spot on the shore, land and proceed to the
Hidden Places, where we will consult the oracle. A little refreshment
before we retire for what is left of the night? A captain's biscuit
would perhaps not be inappropriate?' He took a tin from a locker and
handed it round.
'That's A1, sir,' said the Lord High Islander, munching. 'What a head
you have for the right thing.'
'All practice,' said Mr. Noah modestly.
'Thank you,' said Lucy, taking a biscuit; 'I wish. . . .'
The sentence was never finished. With a sickening suddenness the floor
of the saloon heaved up under their feet, a roaring surging battering
sound broke round them; the saloon tipped over on one side and the whole
party was thrown on the pink silk cushions of the long settee. A shudder
seemed to run through the ark from end to end, and 'What is it? Oh! what
is it?' cried Lucy as the ark heeled over the other way and the
unfortunate occupants were thrown on to the opposite set of cushions.
(It really _was_, now, rather like what you imagine the inside of your
Noah's ark must be when you put in Mr. Noah and his family and a few
hastily chosen animals and shake them all up together.)
'It's the sea,' cried the Lord High Islander; 'it's the great Fear come
upon us! And I'm not afraid!' He drew himself up as well as he could in
his cramped position, with Mr. Noah's elbow pinning his shoulder down
and Mr. Perrin's boot on his ear.
With a shake and a shiver the ark righted itself, and the floor of the
saloon got flat again.
'It's all right,' said Mr. Perrin, resuming control of his boot; 'good
workmanship, it do tell. She ain't shipped a drop, Mr. Noah, sir.'
'It's all right,' said Mr. Noah, taking his elbow to himself and
standing up rather shakily on his yellow mat.
'We're afloat, we're afloat
On the dark rolling tide;
The ark's water-tight
And the crew are inside.
'Up, up with the flag
Let it wave o'er the sea;
We're afloat, we're afloat--
And what else should we be?'
'_I_ don't know,' said Lucy; 'but there isn't any flag, is there?'
'The principle's the same,' said Mr. Noah; 'but I'm afraid we didn't
think of a flag.'
'_I_ did,' said Mr. Perrin; 'it's only a Jubilee hankey'--he drew it
slowly from his breast-pocket, a cotton Union Jack it was--'but it shall
wave all right. But not till daylight, I think, sir. Discretion's the
better part of--don't you think, Mr. Noah, sir? Wouldn't do to open the
ark out of hours, so to speak!'
'Just so,' said Mr. Noah. 'One, two, three! Bed!'
The ark swayed easily on a sea not too rough. The saloon passengers
staggered to their cabins. And silence reigned in the ark.
* * * * * *
I am sorry to say that the Pretenderette dropped the wicker cage
containing the parrot into the sea--an unpardonable piece of cruelty and
revenge; unpardonable, that is, unless you consider that she did not
really know any better. The Hippogriff's white wings swept on; Philip,
now laid across the knees of the Pretenderette (a most undignified
attitude for any boy, and I hope none of you may be placed in such a
position), screamed as the cage struck the water, and, 'Oh, Polly!' he
cried.
'All right,' the parrot answered; 'keep your pecker up!'
'What did it say?' the Pretenderette asked.
'Something about peck,' said Philip upside down.
'Ah!' said the Pretenderette with satisfaction, 'he won't do any more
pecking for some time to come.' And the wide Hippogriff wings swept on
over the wide sea.
Polly's cage fell and floated. And it floated alone till the dawn, when,
with wheelings and waftings and cries, the gulls came from far and near
to see what this new strange thing might be that bobbed up and down in
their waters in the light of the new-born day.
'Hullo!' said Polly in bird-talk, clinging upside down to the top bars
of the cage.
'Hullo, yourself,' replied the eldest gull; 'what's up? And who are you?
And what are you doing in that unnatural lobster pot?'
'I conjure you,' said the parrot earnestly, 'I conjure you by our common
birdhood to help me in my misfortune.'
'No gull who _is_ a gull can resist that appeal,' said the master of the
sea birds; 'what can we do, brother-bird?'
'The matter is urgent,' said Polly, but quite calmly. 'I am getting very
wet and I dislike salt water. It is bad for my plumage. May I give an
order to your followers, bird-brother?'
'Give,' said the master gull, with a graceful wheel and whirl of his
splendid wings.
'Let four of my brothers raise this detested trap high above the waves,'
said the parrot, 'and let others of you, with your brave strong beaks,
break through the bars and set me free.'
'Delighted,' said the master gull; 'any little thing, you know,' and his
own high-bred beak was the first to take hold of the cage, which
presently the gulls lifted in the air and broke through, setting the
parrot free.
'Thank you, brother-birds,' the parrot said, shaking wet wings and
spreading them; 'one good turn deserves another. The beach yonder was
white with cockles but yesterday.'
'Thank you, brother-bird,' they all said, and flew fleetly cocklewards.
And that was how the parrot got free from the cage and went back to the
shore to have that little talk with the blugraiwee which I told you
about in the last chapter.
* * * * * *
The ark was really very pleasant by daylight with the sun shining in at
its windows. The sun shone outside as well, of course, and the Union
Jack waved cheerfully in the wind. Breakfast was served on the terrace
at the end of the ark--you know--that terrace where the boat part turns
up. It was a very nice breakfast, and the sea was quite smooth--a quite
perfect sea. This was rather fortunate, for there was nothing else. Sea
on every side of the ark. No land at all.
'However shall we find the way,' Lucy asked the Lord High Islander,
'with nothing but sea?'
'Oh,' he answered, 'that's all the better, really. Mr. Noah steers much
better when there's no land in sight. It's all practice, you know.'
'And when we come in sight of land, will he steer badly then?'
'Oh, anybody can steer then,' said Billy; 'you if you like.' So it was
Lucy who steered the ark into harbour, under Mr. Noah's directions. Arks
are very easy to steer if you only know the way. Of course arks are not
like other vessels; they require neither sails nor steam engines, nor
oars to make them move. The very arkishness of the ark makes it move
just as the steersman wishes. He only has to say 'Port,' 'Starboard,'
'Right ahead,' 'Slow' and so on, and the ark (unlike many people I know)
immediately does as it is told. So steering was easy and pleasant; one
just had to keep the ark's nose towards the distant domes and pinnacles
of a town that shone and glittered on the shore a few miles away. And
the town grew nearer and nearer, and the black streak that was the
people of the town began to show white dots that were the people's
faces. And then the ark was moored against a quay side, and a friendly
populace cheered as Mr. Noah stepped on to firm land, to be welcomed by
the governor of the town and a choice selection of eminent citizens.
'It's quite an event for them,' said Mr. Perrin. 'They don't have much
happening here. A very lazy lot they be, almost as bad as Somnolentia.'
'What makes them lazy?' Lucy asked.
'It's owing to the onions and potatoes growing wild in these parts, I
believe,' said the Lord High Islander. 'They get enough to eat without
working. And the onions make them sleepy.'
They talked apart while Mr. Noah was arranging things with the Governor
of the town, who had come down to the harbour in a hurry and a flurry
and a furry gown.
'I've arranged everything,' said Mr. Noah at last. 'The islanders and
the M.A.'s and the animals are to be allowed to camp in the public park
till we've consulted the oracle and decided what's to be done with them.
They must live somewhere, I suppose. Life has become much too eventful
for me lately. However there are only three more deeds for the Earl of
Ark to do, and then perhaps we shall have a little peace and quietness.'
'The Earl of Ark?' Lucy repeated.
'Philip, you know. I do wish you'd try to remember that he's an earl
now. Now you and I must take camel and be off.'
And now came seven long days of camel travelling, through desert and
forest and over hill and through valley, till at last Lucy and Mr. Noah
came to the Hidden Place where the oracle is, and where that is I may
not tell you--because it's one of the eleven mysteries. And I must not
tell you what the oracle is because that is another of the mysteries.
But I may tell you that if you want to consult the oracle you have to go
a long way between rows of round pillars, rather like those in Egyptian
tombs. And as you go it gets darker and darker, and when it is quite
dark you see a little, little light a very long way off, and you hear
very far away, a beautiful music, and you smell the scent of flowers
that do not grow in any wood or field or garden of this earth. Mixed
with this scent is the scent of incense and of old tapestried rooms,
where no one has lived for a very long time. And you remember all the
sad and beautiful things you have ever seen or heard, and you fall down
on the ground and hide your face in your hands and call on the oracle,
and if you are the right sort of person the oracle answers you.
Lucy and Mr. Noah waited in the dark for the voice of the oracle, and at
last it spoke. Lucy heard no words, only the most beautiful voice in the
world speaking softly, and so sweetly and finely and bravely that at
once she felt herself brave enough to dare any danger, and strong enough
to do any deed that might be needed to get Philip out of the clutches of
the base Pretenderette. All the tiredness of her long journey faded
away, and but for the thought that Philip needed her, she would have
been content to listen for ever to that golden voice. Everything else in
the world faded away and grew to seem worthless and unmeaning. Only the
soft golden voice remained and the grey hard voice that said, 'You've
got to look after Philip, you know!' And the two voices together made a
harmony more beautiful than you will find in any of Beethoven's sonatas.
Because Lucy knew that she should follow the grey voice, and remember
the golden voice as long as she lived.
But something was tiresomely pulling at her sleeve, dragging her away
from the wonderful golden voice. Mr. Noah was pulling her sleeve and
saying, 'Come away,' and they turned their backs on the little light and
the music and the enchanting perfumes, and instantly the voice stopped
and they were walking between dusky pillars towards a far grey speck of
sunlight.
It was not till they were once more under the bare sky that Lucy said:
'What did it say?'
'You must have heard,' said Mr. Noah.
'I only heard the voice and what it meant. I didn't understand the
words. But the voice was like dreams and everything beautiful I've ever
thought of.'
'I thought it a wonderfully straight-forward business-like oracle,'
said Mr. Noah briskly; 'and the voice was quite distinct and I remember
every word it said.'
(Which just shows how differently the same thing may strike two people.)
'What did it say?' Lucy asked, trotting along beside him, still
clutching Philip's bundle, which through all these days she had never
let go.
And Mr. Noah gravely recited the following lines. I agree with him that,
for an oracle, they were extremely straightforward.
'You had better embark
Once again in the Ark,
And sailing from dryland
Make straight for the Island.'
'Did it _really_ say that?' Lucy asked.
'Of course it did,' said Mr. Noah; 'that's a special instruction to me,
but I daresay you heard something quite different. The oracle doesn't
say the same thing to every one, of course. Didn't you get any special
instruction?'
'Only to try to be brave and good,' said Lucy shyly.
'Well, then,' said Mr. Noah, 'you carry out your instructions and I'll
carry out mine.'
'But what's the use of going to the island if you can't land when you
get there?' Lucy insisted. 'You know only two people can land there,
and we're not them, are we?'
'Oh, if you begin asking what's the use, we shan't get anywhere,' said
Mr. Noah. 'And more than half the things you say are questions.'
* * * * * *
I'm sorry this chapter is cut up into bits with lines of stars, but
stars are difficult to avoid when you have to tell about a lot of
different things happening all at once. That is why it is much better
always to keep your party together if you can. And I have allowed mine
to get separated so that Philip, the parrot and the rest of the company
are going through three sets of adventures all at the same time. This is
most trying for me, and fully accounts for the stars. Which I hope
you'll excuse. However.
We now come back by way of the stars to Philip wrong way up in
the clutches of the Pretenderette. She had breathed the magic word
in the Hippogriff's ear, but she had not added any special order.
So the Hippogriff was entirely its own master as far as the choice
of where it was to go was concerned. It tossed its white mane after
circling three times between air and sky, made straight for the
Island-where-you-mayn't-go. The Pretenderette didn't know that it was
the Island-where-you-mayn't-go, and as they got nearer and she could
see plainly its rainbow-coloured sands, its palms and its waterfalls,
its cool green thickets and many tinted flowers and glowing fruits, it
seemed to her that she might do worse than land there and rest for a
little while. For even the most disagreeable people get tired
sometimes, and the Pretenderette had had a hard day of it. So she made
no attempt to check the Hippogriff or alter its course. And when the
Hippogriff was hovering but a few inches from the grass of the most
beautiful of the island glades, she jerked Philip roughly off her knee
and he fell all in a heap on the ground. With great presence of mind
our hero--if he isn't a hero by now he never will be--picked himself
up and bolted into the bushes. No rabbit could have bolted more
instantly and fleetly.
'I'll teach you,' said the furious Pretenderette, preparing to alight.
She looked down to find a soft place to jump on. And then she saw that
every blade of grass was a tiny spear of steel, and every spear was
pointed at her. She made the Hippogriff take her to another glade--more
little steel spears. To the rainbow sands--but on looking at them she
saw that they were quivering quicksands. Wherever green grass had grown
the spears now grew; and wherever the sand was it was a terrible trap of
quicksand. She tried to dismount in a little pool, but fortunately for
her she noticed in time that what shone in it so silvery was not water
but white-hot molten metal.
'What a nasty place,' said the Pretenderette; 'I don't know that I could
have chosen a nastier place to leave that naughty child in. He'll know
who's master by the time I send to fetch him back to prison. Here, you,
get back to Polistopolis as fast as you can. See? Please, I mean,' she
added, and then she spoke the magic word.
Philip was peeping through the bushes close by, and he heard that magic
word (I dare not tell you what it is) and he saw for the first time the
face of the Pretenderette. And he trembled and shivered in his bushy
lurking-place. For the Pretenderette was the only really unpleasant
person Philip had ever met in the world. It was Lucy's nurse, the nurse
with the grey dress and the big fat feet, who had been so cross to him
and had pulled down his city.
'How on earth,' Philip wondered to himself, 'did she get _here_? And how
on earth shall I get away from her?' He had not seen the spears and the
quicksands and the molten metal, and he was waiting unhappily for her to
alight, and for a game of hide and seek to begin, which he was not at
all anxious to play.
Even as he wondered, the Hippogriff spread wings and flew away. And
Philip was left alone on the island. But what did that matter? It was
much better to be alone than with that Pretenderette. And for Philip
there were no white-hot metal and spears and snares of quicksand, only
dewy grass and sweet flowers and trees and safety and delight.
'If only Lucy were here,' he said.
When he was quite sure that the Pretenderette was really gone, he came
out and explored the island. It had on it every kind of flower and fruit
that you can think of, all growing together. There were gold oranges and
white orange flowers, pink apple-blossom and red apples, cherries and
cherry-blossom, strawberry flowers and strawberries, all growing
together, wild and sweet.
At the back of his mind Philip remembered that he had, at some time or
other, heard of an island where fruit and blossoms grew together at the
same time, but that was all he could remember. He passed through the
lovely orchards and came to a lake. It was frozen. And he remembered
that, in the island he had heard of, there was a lake ready for skating
even when the flowers and fruit were on the trees. Then he came to a
little summer-house built all of porcupine quills like Helen's pen-box.
And then he knew. All these wonders were on the island that he and Helen
had invented long ago--the island that she used to draw maps of.
'It's our very own island,' he said, and a glorious feeling of being at
home glowed through him, warm and delightful. 'We said no one else might
come here! That's why the Pretenderette couldn't land. And why they call
it the Island-where-you-mayn't-go. I'll find the bun tree and have
something to eat, and then I'll go to the boat-house and get out the
_Lightning Loose_ and go back for Lucy. I do wish I could bring her
here. But of course I can't without asking Helen.'
The _Lightning Loose_ was the magic yacht Helen had invented for the
island.
He soon found a bush whose fruit was buns, and a jam-tart tree grew near
it. You have no idea how nice jam tarts can taste till you have gathered
them yourself, fresh and sticky, from the tree. They are as sticky as
horse-chestnut buds, and much nicer to eat.
As he went towards the boat-house he grew happier and happier,
recognising, one after the other, all the places he and Helen had
planned and marked on the map. He passed by the marble and gold house
with _King's Palace_ painted on the door. He longed to explore it: but
the thought of Lucy drove him on. As he went down a narrow leafy
woodland path towards the boat-house, he passed the door of the dear
little thatched cottage (labelled _Queen's Palace_) which was the house
Helen had insisted that she liked best for her very own.
'How pretty it is; I wish Helen was here,' he said; 'she helped to make
it. I should never have thought of it without her. She ought to be
here,' he said. With that he felt very lonely, all of a sudden, and very
sad. And as he went on, wondering whether in all this magic world there
might not somehow be some magic strong enough to bring Helen there to
see the island that was their very own, and to give her consent to his
bringing Lucy to it, he turned a corner in the woodland path, and walked
straight into the arms of--Helen.
[Illustration: Walked straight into the arms of Helen.]