The marvellous land of Snergs
them up. When she had finished with them the effect was startling.
Sylvia had on a dress of white silk adorned with flowers and bees
worked in gold, and little red shoes with pom-poms on them. Her hair
was all fluffed out beneath a snow-white cap like a sugar loaf leaning
backwards. Joe had a bright crimson doublet and hose and a cap with a
white feather on it. His shoes wanted some getting used to for the toes
were so pointed and long that they had to be fastened to his knees with
tiny gold chains. In his belt he had a little dagger in an embroidered
sheath, and this he liked more than anything. He told Sylvia that he
had told her all along that things would come out all right and that
she needn’t worry.
“What do you think of Sir Giles?” asked the Lady Ermyntrude when the
children’s toilet was complete and they were sitting opposite to her on
two footstools.
“He’s not bad,” replied Joe. (After all, Sir Giles had looked after
them pretty well and given them breakfast.)
“He’s bossy,” said the lady (not the word she used of course, but the
nearest I can get to it).
“Is he, Miss?” Sylvia asked.
“Yes, with most people. But not with me.” Here she laughed scornfully.
“You’re going to marry him, aren’t you, Miss--I mean, my Lady?” asked
Sylvia timidly.
“In August.”
“Oh, so soon?” Sylvia got greatly interested. “Bridesmaids?”
“Six. Would you like to see my wedding-dress--as far as it’s gone?”
“I should _love_ it!”
So Joe had to wander about the room for half an hour while these two
thoroughly feminine females went into close details.
ANOTHER MEAL WITH ROYALTY
The evening meal was a matter of some ceremony and observance of old
customs. The public was admitted in moderate numbers on payment of
a small fee (which went to the poor) and it was quite the thing for
people who wanted to give country friends a treat to take them to the
palace in order to see from behind a railed-off space the royal party
feeding. Those who came on this particular evening had no reason to
complain that they had not had their money’s worth.
The jovial character of the King made him sometimes impatient of
ceremony, and once the trumpets had sounded to announce that he had
removed his outer robe and taken his seat, he would adopt a free
and easy manner calculated to put nervous guests at their ease. I
do not mean that Joe and Sylvia were nervous. They had been guests
of honour at the table of King Merse II and knew something of the
ways of courts--though this of course was on a much more magnificent
scale--and, in addition, they were upheld by the consciousness that
they were fitly attired. Those who know--as I confess I do--the great
gain in ease and self-respect due to a new suit of clothes will readily
understand this.
While the meal proceeded the King expressed sympathy with them for
their mislaying of Gorbo and comforted them by saying that he would
undoubtedly turn up safe and sound. He said he would have inquiries
made at once.
“It is indeed a gratification,” he said, “to hear that the Snergs are
nice and harmless and not at all fierce. I must try and arrange some
way of meeting their king, who I have no doubt is a very worthy man in
his way. It would be to clear up the misunderstandings of ages. And
I should especially like to see your faithful friend Gorbo. I trust I
shall shortly. In the meantime,” he went on with hospitable smiles,
“have another of these, Sylvia” (handing her a plate of confections
rather like muffins with fruit inside). “Little girls should build up
their systems with plenty of food, and these are full of vitamines.”
“Thank you, sire,” said Sylvia, taking one.
“But these are cold,” went on the King as he bit into another. “Let me
give you a hot one.” Then, for as I have said he despised ceremony in
small things, he rose and reached for a huge silver dish (with a hot
water arrangement beneath it) where the muffins were heaped.
I ask you to note that, the dish being at some distance from him, he
leant forward until he was almost prone on the table, the muffin he had
bitten to test its temperature being still between his teeth.
A STINGER
At that instant fearful shouts were heard, and to the bewildering
surprise and joy of Sylvia and Joe, they saw Gorbo bounding up the
hall. He wore instead of his close-fitting Snerg cap, a strange one of
filthy appearance. In his left hand he bore a pair of ragged shoes, and
in his right he held aloft a long whippy sapling.
He did not see them; even if he had he would not have recognized in
these splendidly-dressed children his travel-stained young friends; he
had eyes only for the alleged tyrant whose gold crown revealed his
identity and whose attitude as he leaned across the table was excellent
for the user of a magic sword. He leapt forward--remember all this
occupied but one or two seconds--and brought the sapling down on the
King’s person with a juicy smack that rang through the hall.
To say merely that things moved briskly after this is to confess--as
I must--inability to cope in words with so strange a situation. I
will, however, do my best to give a general impression of subsequent
happenings.
The King bounced upright--nay, more than upright--and with eyes
goggling and utterance impeded by the muffin in his mouth, glared
maniacally at his assailant. And all present were so paralysed with
amazement that for an instant there was utter silence. O moments big as
years!
The thoughts of Gorbo in that bitter speck of time might be expressed
as follows:--
“I have been cozened. This cap is not a cap of invisibility, because
everybody is looking at me. This sapling is not a sword of sharpness,
because just look at what’s happened! Therefore, for the love of Mike,
let these be shoes of swiftness, for I need them!”
He flung away the sapling, sprang into the shoes, and ran.
He ran into the arms of about twenty soldiers, each of whom grabbed a
bit of him somewhere.
“It’s Gorbo!” cried Sylvia in agony. “Oh, poor old Gorbo!”
“Gorbo, is it?” roared the King, sweeping away with his arms those who
rushed to tend him, and literally gnashing his teeth. “So _that’s_ your
Gorbo? Harmless, eh? Not fierce at all! Oh----!”
Here I must cease writing down his words.
THE MORNING AFTER
When the children woke next day the events of the evening came to them
with a shock. They had not been thrown into a dungeon, as they had not
unreasonably feared would be the case, but had been rather hurriedly
bundled out of the way by the Lady Ermyntrude and put to bed in a
fairly comfortable back room with two beds and told to go to sleep at
once, which they felt was rather a difficult thing to do under the
circumstances. They felt that they were losing their popularity, and
besides, they were greatly worried about their friend. Speculation as
to why he had behaved as he had and what would be his probable fate
kept them whispering for hours.
But when they were dressed by a maid (who brought them an early cup of
milk) and had gone downstairs, they found the situation easier. The
King had passed a good night. He had no temperature and was able to eat
a hearty breakfast. He did not express a wish to see the children, and
they were glad of this because they felt it would have been so awkward.
The Lady Ermyntrude gave them their breakfast and then took them out
for a walk in the garden, and Tiger had a run with some puppies that
belonged to her.
The King attended a council at which were discussed various suggestions
made by the nobles as to the ceremonies to be observed in the cutting
off of Gorbo’s head. It was finally decided that it should be done in
the market-place at 11.30, and, this being settled, the King proposed
(for the basis of his method of government was strict justice) that the
villain should receive a fair trial.
Gorbo was brought in, loaded with an almost unnecessary length of
chain, and stood before the Lord Chancellor, who was to conduct the
case.
“Your name, prisoner?” asked the Lord Chancellor.
“Gorbo, so please you, sir,” replied the unhappy Snerg.
“Your age, Gorbo?”
“Two hundred and seventy-three, sir.”
“Your occupation, Gorbo?”
“Potter, sir.”
“And why, Gorbo, did you leave the harmless calling of potting to come
to this land and give a fleshy cut to the King’s Grace?”
“Because----” He could say no more.
“The reason is inadequate, Gorbo. Think, for your time on earth is
short if you give no better bid for life.”
“Mother Meldrum told me to,” said Gorbo, his wits roused by the
extremity.
“Aha, now we get near it! But even then, Gorbo, the reason seems no
full one. Is it the foul custom of the Snergs to smite all, however
exalted, at the chance word of a witch?”
“She--she said that the King was a grievous tyrant--and that he needed
killing badly. But the chief reason was she said that if I didn’t kill
him, he’d kill Sylvia and Joe.”
The Lord Chancellor turned to the King. “In truth, sire, we seem to
have secured, at the cost of a stinger to your Majesty’s person, the
biggest numskull the world has ever known.”
“It would seem so,” agreed the King, with a half pitying look at Gorbo.
“I suggest, my lords, that he be allowed to tell his tale in his own
fashion and we will then see if it agrees in substance with the tale of
those little ones.”
“A noble idea and worthy of your Majesty’s brain capacity,” said the
Lord Chancellor. “Come, fellow, your tale, plainly told.”
With much faltering and stammering (for he feared he had proved the
truth of the prophecy that he was the biggest fool) Gorbo began his
account of all that had happened since he left Watkyns Bay. He warmed
up as he proceeded and got more at his ease, for he saw that all
listened with deep interest. He diplomatically stopped at the point
where he arrived at the palace gates on the previous evening.
“All agrees well with the tale of the children,” said the King. “I
think, my lords, we must let this oaf keep his head for the present.”
“Yes, sire,” said the Lord Chancellor, “and in my opinion----”
But his opinion was lost to the world, for at that instant there was
heard a clamour without and a sounding knock at the door.
THE INVASION
The door opened smartly and the Captain of the City Guard appeared
framed in the doorway, a stoutly-built man in a full suit of mail, with
a beard like a pound of coarse-cut tobacco and a rough but not unkindly
face.
“My liege,” he said, making a leg, “pray pardon my pushing in, but a
strange armed force has appeared suddenly, demanding the surrender of
the two foreign children and the Snerg.”
“An armed force, fellow!” cried the King with justifiable anger.
“Demanding of _me_--I mean us! You are surely talking through your
morion.”
“Nay, sire, it is but too true. Some two score of large men in quaint
boots and some ten score or more of small dwarfish men who may be
Snergs. They say that if the three they demand be given to them
uninjured they will go in peace.”
The King rose to the occasion with true dignity. “Admit them to the
City,” he said. “We will talk with their leader.”
“Well, sire,” said the Captain of the Guard, with a not unnatural
embarrassment, “the fact is, they have admitted themselves. You see, it
happened that I was athirst, and----”
“We will look into that later,” interrupted the King with a stern look.
“In the meantime, invite this force into our hall as soon as I have
taken my seat on the throne.”
AN HISTORIC MEETING
The force was drawn up in an orderly way in the hall; Snergs on
the right flank, four deep, and the Dutchmen on the left flank.
Vanderdecken knew something of the art of war--so useful to seamen
of his day--and he had trained his crew to do some simple military