The Ozark trilogy (34 page)

“I believe,” said Lincoln Parradyne through clenched teeth, “that I had better explain this to you gentlemen just one more time before we leave for Castle Brightwater. You do not appear to me to have it straight in your minds. Not at all.”

“Now, Linc-”

“Be still!” thundered the Magician of Rank. “You listen to what I say, you listen with both ears for once! Do I have your attention?”

The silence indicated that he did, and he went on.

“It is true that the Granny has magic of her own, surely; you’d be in sorry shape if she didn’t. Your girls would be born and given names at hazard, the way it was done on Old Earth, if the Granny weren’t at hand to choose a Proper Name. Your crops would fail and your goats would go dry. There would be rot and mildew and dirt and vermin inside the Castle, and there’d be blight and ignorance and dirt and vermin outside it. There’d be nobody to heal your sick-I give you my word neither the Magicians nor the Magicians of Rank have time these days to see to your sniffles and your bellyaches. But as for there being a contest between us, between myself and Granny Gableframe . . . think of a contest between twelve grown men and one four-year-old boy, and you’ll have something to compare! The odds are about the same.”

“Well,” said Delldon Mallard, tugging at his bottom lip, “I think we’d need an interpretation on that. I wouldn’t want anybody saying as how I wasn’t fair. It might could be that you know a few tricks the Grannys don’t, Lincoln, I’m willing to grant you that. But I do believe your ego has a tendency to run away with you.” He chuckled softly, all tolerance and indulgence, and his brothers echoed him; and the Granny lying helpless under the counterpane closed her eyes as if she could bear no more.

Lincoln Parradyne stared at the man, oldest of the Smith boys, Master of Castle Smith, and wondered whether he could control himself. I keep your Mules flying, he thought. Without my help a Mule could no more fly than it could knit. I see to your weather, so that no rain falls except where it’s needed, and I control the snow and the wind and all things that have to do with the heat and the cold, with wet and with dry . . . Because of the Magicians of Rank you have never known a blizzard or a drought or an earthquake. Or a disease that lasts more than a week, and even those we could shorten to minutes if we didn’t feel that the week was good for your coddled little characters. We see to

He stopped, suddenly, in the middle of his silent recital, feeling foolish. There was some question as to just who it was he was trying to convince, since nobody could hear him. And if anyone could have, he’d of been guilty of spreading knowledge allowed only to the other Magicians of Rank and that accursed girl at Brightwater.

“No point in arguing with him,” said the handsome brother. “No point atall. Delldon sets his mind to a thing, there’s no changing it. And his mind is for sure set on this.”

“You’re quite right,” said Lincoln Parradyne grimly. “If Delldon Mallard has his mind set to do something he knows is wrong, there’s no hope of swaying him from whatever excuse he comes up with to justify that wrongdoing.”

“You think we’re doing something wrong?” Leroy Fortnight turned on his oldest brother. “Think he’s right? If he’s right, I’m here to tell you, I’m not going to go through with this, Delldon Mallard.”

Lincoln Parradyne walked out of the room and left them listening attentively to their brother’s endless explanation of why what might be wrong at some other time, if somebody else were doing it, in some other situation,
was perfectly
justified at this time, in this situation, with the brothers Smith doing it. He had no doubt that Delldon Mallard would be able to convince them; their consciences were no more tender than their manners, and they were accustomed to giving in to Delldon’s arguments. They had spent their
lives
giving in to Delldon’s arguments. He himself had no stomach for listening to it again, however, and he felt a certain twinge of his own conscience at the thought that the Granny had no choice but to endure it in silence.

If she had known what a mire of ignorance and ineptitude she would spend her time dealing with, would she have chosen this Castle as her residence, he wondered? Though someone had to, and Gableframe was a good deal tougher and better fit to manage it than most. For himself, if it were not that to leave would have meant abandoning his own kin . . .

Outside the door, he nearly fell over a cluster of the Smith women, all hovering there wringing their hands-always excepting Dorothy, who was convinced that her father’s plan was a brilliant stroke. She smiled at Lincoln Parradyne, and then curtsied slowly, a deep court curtsy ending in a wobble that turned her face a dusky red.

“Better practice that some more,” he said. As if he didn’t know how many hours she had spent practicing it, standing in front of the tall mirror in her bedroom. The flush on her cheeks deepened, and he thought for a moment that she would cry. She cried easily, fat tears always right at the surface and trembling in her eyes. It was a curious characteristic in a female like Dorothy, who was just plain
mean,
right down to the core; no doubt she’d outgrow it.

“How is Granny Gableframe?” asked one of the women, her voice tight as a banjo string in dry weather. “How does she feel?”

“She feels thoroughly miserable right now,” said the Magician of Rank, “as would you, if you were in a similar condition.”

“But she’s all right.”

Lincoln Parradyne sighed. They were so determined, these Smiths, to have all their cake, frosted and frilled on the shelf, while they savored it to the last bite.

“She is not `all right,”‘ he said crossly. “Of course not. There are perhaps a dozen different ways to cause a person to suffer
from motor paralysis, some of them more unpleasant than others, but none of them could be said to be precisely desirable. However, she’s in no danger, if that’s what you mean.”

“It must be terrible-not being able to move anything but her eyes.”

“No,” he said, making his way through them and answering her over his shoulder as he headed down the corridor. “On the contrary, it’s very restful. Good for the Granny to have a little holiday from tearing round the Castle tongue-lashing and nagging and fretting, in my opinion. Her major problem is that she refuses to relax and enjoy it.”

Her major problem, if he’d been able to explain it to them, was of course that she knew what he’d done and why, and was in a flaming rage because her own magic skills weren’t adequate to reverse such a simple process.

He could feel them staring after him, and he kept his back to them till he reached a corner he could turn. The Smith women, all but Dorothy, disapproved of what was going on, which showed considerable good sense on their part. Too bad they hadn’t exerted that good sense in marrying elsewhere, and left the four brothers to bachelor splendor and an end of the marred line.

They would be easier to manage once the whole group had left the Castle and was headed for the Jubilee-they’d take no chances of embarrassing their men in front of other people, whatever their personal opinions might be. He’d even considered letting the Granny go along, and manipulating her through the remaining days of the Jubilee; there were Formalisms & Transformations that would have made it possible for him to do that, and her absence was sure to create suspicion. But although her behavior would of passed well enough with the ordinary citizen, he was by no means sure that his control would not have been spotted by the other Grannys-or by Responsible of Brightwater. He had decided, finally, not to risk it, and to accept the consequences of the alternatives open to him.

In the corridor a Senior Attendant stopped him, to report that everything was ready for the Smith delegation’s journey to the Jubilee.

“You’re sure of that, now?” he asked the Attendant sharply. “If anything has been forgotten, it won’t be amusing-for us or for you.

“Twenty-seven trunks they loaded on the ship,” said the Attendant, stolid as always. You didn’t get to be a Senior Attendant in this Castle unless you learned to hide your emotions. “Checked the count myself to make certain sure of it. And I was most particular that the one you marked with the
x
, it got put on board early this morning, and well at the back. The lizzies are out front to take you all down to the dock, and in perfect order-I had the airjets seen to not ten minutes ago, and the batteries as well, in case the cloud cover doesn’t lift. Nary a thing on your list, sir, that
I haven’t
seen to.”

“Good man,” said Lincoln Parradyne. “I appreciate good service, and I remember it.”

“That’s known,” said the man. “And the drape of your cloak needs attention, if you don’t mind my saying so.”

The Magician of Rank glanced at his shoulder and murmured agreement: what was supposed to be seven neat folds in an orderly cascade was more like the casual pleating of a little girl’s skirt, and that would tell him something about allowing himself to be provoked by his cousins into flailing his arms around and shaking his fists at the ceiling. He adjusted the cape’s arrangement with swift fingers, and refastened the silver bar that drew the falls together and held them back out of the way of his right arm.

“There,” he said, “will that do it?”

“That’s proper, sir,” said the Attendant.

“Then will you go along and pass the message to the rest of our group? Tell them to meet me by the front gate and look sharp about it-it’ll be late in the Second Day before we reach the Jubilee, even if we have fair winds all the way.” Which he’d see that they did; it was going to be crucial for them to arrive at
exactly
the right moment in the proceedings.

“I’ll do that,” said the man. “But I do think it’s a shame Granny Gableframe went on ahead of the rest of you. It would of pleasured her a good deal to ride in the lizzy and give youall whatfor the whole way to Brightwater on the ship. Granny Gableframe’s partial to water and to company, that’s also known.”

“The Granny would of been uncomfortable on this trip,” said Lincoln Parradyne casually. “At her age and with her rheuma
tism?” He clucked his tongue. “It was much better for her to have me fly her in on the Mule, and avoid all that commotion.”

The Attendant had known the Granny a long time. He gave him a look that couldn’t exactly be described as disrespectful, but let Lincoln Parradyne know what the man’s opinion was of his estimate of the old lady’s constitution; and the Magician of Rank snapped at him to get a move on, before things could become more complicated than they were already. It was a fine kettle when the staff of a Castle had more brains than the Family they were hired to serve, and he sincerely hoped the situation wasn’t widespread. When he got back he’d review the whole bunch, and any that showed signs-like this man-of being sharper than they needed to be to carry out their duties would have to be replaced.

And then he sighed, and went quickly to his rooms to fill in the final character of a Transformation he’d had ready and waiting for completion these last three days. He wasn’t eager to do it, but it was necessary. The Granny was going to have his hide in small scraps for the work that had deprived her of movement and of speech, that could be counted on already. What she would do about this last task of his, the one that would provide the Castle temporarily with a new cat-of origin unknown, but much too beautiful not to be spoiled and watched over-he didn’t even care to contemplate. If things went as he hoped, she might forgive him; on her deathbed, maybe, she might forgive him. If the Smith brothers, or one of their nervous women, made some mistake that put a kink in the plan-which was likely-she would never forgive him.

And
then
Delldon Mallard Smith the 2nd would have a chance to see his “contest”! Years of it. Years of the Granny doing her Charms and Spells, setting them against him with her little mouth puckered tight as her heart must be in her chest; and years of him, Lincoln Parradyne Smith the 39th, canceling out each and every one of them. The chance of the Granny getting one past him was too small to be worth considering, but the amount of time he was going to have to spend in the feud would pile up into a respectable amount of misery over the years. Grannys lived to a formidable old age, and he’d never known one to mellow.

It would have made things so much simpler if they could of brought her around to see things their way and cooperate with them-if not to help them, at least not to interfere. But she had told them flat out what she thought
of
Delldon Maliard’s great plan.

“Flumdiddle!” she’d said. “Goatwallow! Cowflop!” And a halfhour string of more of the same with a persistent refrain on how they’d all taken leave of what pitiful supply of sense they’d been born with, and the litany of ancient oaths for coda and elaboration.

Lincoln Parradyne didn’t agree with the Granny. Every means of foreseeing he had at his disposal had been clear: the road would be a tad bumpy for what they had in mind, and its duration would depend on the skill of those carrying it out--but they would bring it off. That was enough for him; the potential once it was done was everything he had ever wanted and had thought hopelessly out of his reach. Well worth the risk, and the problems could be faced as they came along. He was only anxious to begin.

Opening Day dragged on, and Responsible dragged on through it, up in the balcony. The breeze through the windows of the Independence Room was heavy with the smell of early summer flowers, and the soft hum of the red Ozark bees on whose ministrations those flowers depended, and the combination was an effective sedative. Nothing that was going on inside did anything to lessen its effectiveness, either. She supposed she must have heard worse speeches and more boring ones, somewhere, sometime, but she could not during that interminable day think of an example. If the overdose of tedium didn’t take any of the starch out of the Traveller delegation, it could only be due to their bizarre practice of spending all of every Sundy listening to a single extended sermon,
with
elaborate developments and codas and commentaries and extrapolations, and emendations on the extrapolations, and scattering slightly truncated versions of the same throughout the rest of the week. They were calloused to this kind of thing, both ears and rears, and could of endured a lot more of it, she supposed. Everyone else, however, including their allies the Farsons and the Guthries, was exhausted long before the Closing Prayer. The way some of the delegates had slumped down in their seats by midafternoon had all twenty-seven Grannys still presentand for sure still straight as spikes in
their
seats-clicking their tongues fit to drown out their knitting needles.