Drowned Ammet (31 page)

“We could get down,” Ynen said. “Next window along. There's a drain that goes right down to the yard wall. We'd better wait till there are fewer people and then try.”

Mitt cautiously forced open the window over the drain and tried if he could get his head through between the bars. He found he just could. And, he knew from experience, where his head would go, the rest of him could follow, sideways on. Since he was bigger than Ynen, that meant that Ynen could certainly get through, and probably Hildy, too. So they settled down to wait until there were fewer people about.

The time came about an hour later. Mitt put his head through, turned his shoulders sideways, and shoved. He could hardly do it. He thought he must have grown. His stomach stuck. By the time he finally forced himself through onto the high sill outside, his stomach felt as if it had been pulled down near his knees. He turned round, hanging on to the bars, to help Ynen and Hildy through.

But Ynen could not get through. He was too well nourished. His shoulders were just too thick. He pushed and squirmed and squeezed, and Mitt pulled him perilously from outside, but it was simply no good. Ynen had to give up, bruised and miserable. Hildy was even worse. She was bigger than Mitt all over and could barely even get her head through. They stood unhappily against the window, while Mitt crouched outside with his knees aching from the strain, feeling both unsafe and obvious, wondering what they were going to do now.

“Do I come in or what?” Mitt said angrily.

“Could you come back up and unlock the door for—” Ynen began to say.

“Oh, ye gods!” said Hildy. “There's Father! Look!” Her face was suddenly bright red, and she looked as if she was going to cry again.

Mitt swiveled himself round on the sill to look. The man trudging along the shingle of the causeway was wearing farmer's clothes and big boots, but he was certainly Navis. Mitt knew him by the way he walked and, even at that distance, by the face that was so like Harchad's and Hildy's. “It is, too!” Mitt said. “You lot have the luck of Old Ammet!”

“It's not lucky at all,” said Ynen.

“Mitt, go down and warn him, quick!” said Hildy. “Tell him we're prisoners and it's not safe for him here. Quickly, before Al sees him!”

“But he'll know me,” Mitt objected.

Hildy shook the bars in her anxiety. “He can't possibly—not in those clothes. If you won't go, I'll have to shout, and someone will hear!”

“All right, all right!” said Mitt. “I'll tell him. I'll tell him to keep back on the mainland, and then I'll have a go at letting you out. Tireless Mitt does all the work again.”

“Oh shut up!” said Ynen.

“And hurry up!” said Hildy.

Mitt made a face at both of them and slid down the drainpipe. Mitt to the rescue! he thought. He reached the yard wall without anyone noticing him at all. Nobody seemed particularly interested when he shot down from the wall and raced to the gate.

Navis was just about to come through it. Close to, Mitt saw that he looked tired and not very well shaved. The big boots were caked with mud. But Navis took no notice of Mitt as Mitt darted out of the gate to meet him. That encouraged Mitt. Navis did not remember him. He could only have seen Mitt for half a minute on the day of the Festival, after all.

“Hey!” Mitt said to him. “Don't come in here. It's not safe.”

Mitt had reckoned without two things. Navis had been a fugitive, living on his wits, for days now. And he had Ynen's memory for faces. Or perhaps not only for faces, for he recognized Mitt mainly by his build and the way he ran. And since Navis had no reason to think Mitt would do him a good turn, he simply looked at Mitt as people do when they are surprised to find themselves addressed by a total stranger and walked past him into the courtyard.

Mitt was so annoyed by this haughtiness that he would have let Navis alone had it not been for Ynen and Hildy watching from above. He ran after Navis and took hold of his sleeve. Navis shook Mitt's hand off and walked on. Mitt was forced to trot beside him, trying to explain.

“See here, it's not safe for you here. Lithar's wrong in the head, and the fellow who shot Hadd got hold of him and made him take Hildy and Ynen prisoner. They're up there, in that room with bars. Take a look.”

Since there were so few people about, Mitt risked pointing. But Navis would not demean himself to look. He trudged on, trying to decide why this murdering brat should spin him a yarn like this and taking no notice of Mitt at all.

“Father's not listening!” Hildy said, with her head pushed against the bars. “Isn't that just like him!”

“He may only be pretending not to listen because it's safest,” Ynen suggested hopefully.

Mitt hoped Navis was pretending, too. “Hildy and Ynen sent me,” he explained, feeling sure this would convince Navis. But Navis tramped through the main doorway of the mansion into a large stone room without appearing to have heard. The room was full of people. Mitt hung back in the doorway, wondering whether he dared follow Navis in. They were mostly island people. The singsong of their talk rang round the room. Mitt decided that it was safe enough and ran after Navis to make one more attempt.

“Do come out of here,” he said, dodging about near Navis's shoulder. “They'll sell you to Harl to kill. Honest.”

Navis looked at someone beyond Mitt's head and called out loudly, “Will one of you take this offensive child away, please!”

Mitt sensed a movement in the crowd and got ready to run. “Can't you
listen
to me, you pigheaded idiot!” he said.

“Will you shut your unpleasing mouth?” said Navis. “Guard! Remove this, will you!”

Mitt turned and ran. But the guard was nearer than he thought. Two big men seized him as he turned. Mitt lost his temper then. He kicked and struggled and called Navis a number of names he had learned on the waterfront.

“Oh, him again,” Al said from behind Mitt. “Not to worry, sir. I'll take care of him, sir.”

Upstairs in the barred nursery, Hildy and Ynen waited and waited. For a long time they were sure that whatever had happened between Mitt and their father, Mitt would come and unlock the nursery door any moment. They had great faith in Mitt's resourcefulness. But when the island women came and brought them lunch for two, even Ynen gave up hope.

“I don't think Mitt was even trying to make Father understand,” Hildy said angrily. “And now he's just forgotten us. His kind are all the same!”

“I don't think he would forget,” Ynen said.

“Yes, he would. He had a perfect chance to escape on his own, and he took it,” said Hildy.

“I thought he felt he owed us—” Ynen began uncomfortably.

“He didn't feel anything of the kind,” said Hildy. “His whole idea was that we owed him everything, because of his rotten life in Holand!”

This was so exactly the kind of thing Mitt had said himself that Ynen could not argue any longer.

Long hours later they were trying to play I Spy. Hildy was far too dejected to concentrate. “I give up,” she said. “There's nothing beginning with
T
in this room.”

“Table,” Ynen said drearily.

The door opened just then, and Lithar shambled in. Hildy did not realize. “How was I to know it was something as stupid as that!” she snapped, thoroughly bad-tempered.

Lithar stared at her, shocked. “I don't think I want to marry you,” he said.

“That goes for me, too!” Hildy retorted. “I hate the sight of you!”

Lithar turned plaintively to Al, who had followed him in. Behind Al came two of the large men, with Navis between them. “Al,” said Lithar, “I don't have to marry her, do I? She's not womanly.” Al laughed and patted him on the back.

“There, Hildrida. You have just received your first compliment,” said Navis. “Possibly your last, too.”

“Where's Mitt?” Ynen said to Al. Al laughed and shrugged. “You do know, don't you?” said Ynen. “Have you killed him?”

Al chuckled. “Say hallo to your pa like a good boy.”

“Not until I've told you what a foul brute you are,” said Ynen.

“He's not very nice either,” Lithar complained. “Let's go away.”

“After you,” said Al, and everyone went out of the room again, leaving Navis standing by the locked door.

Hildy and Ynen stared at Navis. He looked tired, dirty, and depressed. Hildy felt sorry for him. She was almost certain she was glad to see him. She went toward Navis to tell him so. But she did not quite dare and stopped. Then she somehow ran at him without thinking and threw her arms around him. For just a second Navis looked surprised. Then Hildy found herself being hugged, picked up, and swung round, and her father looking more pleased and more upset than she had ever seen him. When Ynen came shyly up, Navis spared an arm for him, too, so that they all hung together in a bundle.

“Who warned you to get away?” said Navis. “How did you manage in that fearsome storm?”

“Nobody. It was an accident. Mitt and Libby Beer and Old Ammet helped,” they said, and they tried to tell him about their adventures in
Wind's Road.
After a little, Navis let go of them and sat down to listen, pressing two fingers to the corners of his eyes as if he had a headache. They could not help noticing that he frowned and seemed to press harder every time they mentioned Al or Mitt.

“Why did you come here?” Ynen asked him at last. “Was—is Al in your pay? I saw you talking to him in Holand.”

Navis looked up at Ynen in surprise. “Of course not. You must have seen him the time he came to offer—for a large sum of money, naturally—to tell me of a plot against the Earl. You can't imagine how often people did that,” Navis said. He sounded very depressed. “I found Al very uncongenial. But I mentioned the matter to Harchad, and, ironically, I remember Harchad telling me in return that he had put an agent in the Holy Islands to keep Lithar in line, in case the North attacked. If I had known it was this same Al, I would have stayed well away. I came because there are boats here—prepared to pay high for being taken North—and trying not to hope there might be news of you two. But it seems that Al has decided that Harl would pay more for us than I would pay for a boat—which I'm sure is true—so we are being sold back to Holand.”

There was a wretched silence.

“Wouldn't Uncle Harl let us go,” Hildy asked, “if we all signed something to say we didn't want to be earls?”

Navis shook his head, with his two fingers lodged hard above his nose. “He doesn't trust me. He never has. Besides, I kicked him in the stomach when he came to arrest me. He was so annoyed that he came out in the Flate after me himself, in spite of the storm. He nearly trod on me while I was lying in a ditch. By which I knew he wouldn't easily forgive me.”

Ynen laughed, though he was sure it was no joke. “But didn't Mitt try to warn you?”

He saw his father's forehead crease. “If Mitt is the boy who tried to blow up the Sea Festival—yes, he did. I thought he was lying and asked the guards to take him away. Al took charge of him after that. Is this one more mistake I've made?”

“Yes,” said Ynen.

“You didn't know,” said Hildy. “I never trust Mitt either. His ideas are all in a muddle. But if Al's killed him, I'm going to call on Old Ammet and Libby Beer for vengeance.”

“I sincerely hope they answer you quickly,” said Navis.

But when, about an hour before sunset, Al came into the nursery with a number of the largest guards, he was as sturdy and carefree as ever and rather more pleased with himself than usual.

“Up you get, sir,” he said, “and you, guvnor. Bence is back from a little job I sent him on. The old
Wheatsheaf
is all ready, the tide's right, and we're going sailing again. It's not what I'd have chosen, being a landsman and inclined to queasiness, but we reckoned you'd not be able to give us the slip so easy at sea.”

Navis stood up slowly. “You mean you're taking us back to Holand.”

“Quick on the uptake, your pa,” Al remarked to Hildy. “That's right, sir. We're taking you and the boy, and leaving the girl here.”

“Why are you leaving my daughter?” said Navis.

Al looked at Hildy. Hildy wanted to hit him, to scream, to make a fuss in every way she could think of, but she felt she could not when her father was behaving so calmly. “Be reasonable, sir,” said Al. “She's betrothed to Lithar. We've got to have a bargaining point. The money Harl offers has got to go up, and up again, and she'll be the reason. And if he won't offer enough, you may find we come sailing back here with you in a day or so. Look on the bright side, sir.”

“Oh, is there a bright side?” said Navis.

“For some of us,” Al answered genially. “I'll trouble you to step along now.”

They said good-bye stiffly. None of them wanted to say anything important with Al there. Navis and Ynen were marched out by the guards. Hildy stood by herself in the middle of the room, with her hands clenched into useless fists, watching the door close behind them. She was determined not to cry till it shut.