CHAPTER XXV.
ONE evening late, Daffodil was sitting, weary and sorrowful, in her Speaker’s chair. Every now and then the gloom around the lonely House of Parliament was changed into coloured glows reflected from waterworks, and the acclamations of all Grachidichika rang into the silence where she sat; for a great and happy event had taken place, and this was the winding‐up festivity of a series such as the Matrimonial Estate and Independent Kingdom had not known for centuries. King Brekekex had had twin sons born to him. And there was added to this immense cause of rejoicing a brilliant incident of much importance to the honour of the Grachidichikan Monarchy and the country: the King and Queen were, on the morrow, to make a Royal journey to Croäxaxica and be there welcomed, with no incognito and make‐believe devices, but as Sovereigns on a visit, in their own persons, to the King and Queen of the inimitable Croäxaxicans. The straitened circumstances of the Matrimonial dynasty had made such a display of their sovereign rights out of the question, even if Croäxaxican Royalty had been formerly disposed to encourage page: 377 ambition in the allied but lowlier family: but, now that the Matrimonial King was the possessor of a revenue which, besides paying the expenses, might have raised the position of any Matrimonial King so much as to call for such public honour from the Court of Croäxaxica, and that he was a son of very Croäxaxican Royalty itself, this Royal Visit of Sovereign to Sovereign, for the presentation of the Heir Apparent of the throne of Grachidichika by his lofty parents the King and Queen of Grachidichika to his still loftier Grand Parents the King and Queen of Croäxaxica, was desirable for everybody’s glory, and in fact a matter of international necessity. No wonder that Grachidichika was jubilant that evening. But Daffodil had become so disappointed that she could not rouse herself to enjoy her share in the public entertainment. Indeed, small as it was, it seemed too much for her; she would rather not have seen the reflections of the lights and heard the shouts, for they reminded her of her own never ending isolation. Suddenly some one in a hurry, as if pursuers for his life were at his heels, appeared in the portal and bounded to her side. It was the Regius Professor of Everything.
“I don’t think anybody can have seen me,” he said nervously. “They’re all so intent on the waterworks.”
“I hope no one has,” she said. “Why did you run the risk? Too much risk has to be run for me at any rate.”
“I don’t believe there can be a creature but our two selves on this side of Grachidichika,” he said, encouraging himself, “Even our own inimitable page: 378 Croäxaxicans are almost all gathered into the places where they can see some of the waterworks shooting up above the great wall of Grachidichika.”
“It is a comfort to feel that for once somebody can venture to me in safety,” she said.
“Quite in safety. Oh, certainly quite in safety,” reiterated the Professor, evidently pleased at the comfortable sound of the words. “But, your defunct Pre‐eminence, do sit stiffer. And don’t forget that, if anybody did come by some awkward chance, I can only be considered as making an official communication to the Speaker—But dear me what about? The Regius Professor of Everything of Croäxaxica can’t be considered to be making an Official Communication to the Speaker of the Parliament of Grachidichika about anything. Oh do sit stiffer.”
Daffodil assumed extra rigidity in order to set her visitor at his ease, and he found himself able to proceed with the story he had come to tell. “Of course your defunct Pre‐eminence has been building great hopes on the researches confided to me by Their Matrimonial Majesties and your former Plenipotentiaryship,” he began.
“Not very great,” faltered Daffodil, sorry to disappoint him. But fortunately he did not hear her. Struck by a sudden thought of the danger there would be if she were heard, he had rushed on with “By the way, my dear defunct Pre‐eminent Madam, pray do not speak. If anybody did chance to come near, you know, and had very sharp ears they might catch the sound, and your voice is not so like mine as we could both wish.”
page: 379Having thus brought her to complete stillness and silence, he told her—at considerable length, for his story interested him and hushed his fears—of the studies into which he had plunged in his researches on her behalf and the other irrelevant, but profound, studies into which those had incidentally led him. “I am now,” he wound up, “in a position to conclude with still more authority than at first that I shall eventually completely verify the truth of my hypothesis that there is no trace of such an event as what your defunct Pre‐eminence desires ever having occurred. And that is cheering in the extreme; for, when I have made certain that no such exit has ever occurred since the Great Separation which secured Croäxaxica and this neighbouring state of Grachidichika their enjoyment of their undisturbed exaltation above the inferior races, and that no means for such an exit has, as yet existed, I shall be able to turn my mind to the more merely practical question of whether any means for it could exist in the future, and thus exhaust the whole subject.”
Daffodil thought he had told her all he had come to tell, and wondered whether she might speak to thank him for the trouble he had taken. But as soon as she gave a little preparatory “Hem,” to try, he stopped her with “I entreat your former Plenipotentiaryship to listen. I have an incidental circumstance to relate—a matter which may possibly require your attention, for somebody appears to have sent you a communication.”
“Somebody?” she said, surprised.
“Oh don’t speak, don’t. Somebody or something. It was thus: In the course of my investiga‐ page: 380 tions I naturally became deeply interested in the perusal of my various treatises on the ancient communication of Croäxaxica with the bog, or pool. called the sea—the proof of which, as you are aware, still remains in the shape of an ancient tunnel extending beyond inhabited Croäxaxica and of the trickling into that tunnel, at its extremity, of the peculiar water which is so acceptable to our oysters and to various plants and animals for food said to have been originally imported from the sea. My accounts of this tunnel excited my curiosity concerning it, and the fancy came to me that I should like to see a place about which I had thought so profoundly and written so much. It was an odd freak for a frog of my years and ripened learning, and I took my journey alone, that it might not become a theme of comment throughout the world, and chose for it this period of preparation for the approaching Royal Visit, when it might be supposed that public attention would be less fixed upon me than usual. Yesterday, then, I traversed that once famous passage, now used only by the cultivators of the seaweed beds which border its narrow path, and, resolved to complete my scientific exploration in spite of all weariness, I arrived at its very termination. There, after I had been some time at rest, I discerned, where the sea water trickles down. a visible though trifling fissure, and, bent on research. I climbed up to it and gazed through it. I saw what appeared to be a vast pool and a roof of some blue filmy material, apparently a peculiar sort of water, but nothing of any interest. While I was busy at the fissure, I heard, from somewhere without, a voice page: 381 repeating a cry which my grammatical studies led me to recognise as possessing a similarity to your defunct Pre‐eminence’s name of Daffodil, as pronounced by yourself. I called to the creature (as I suppose it to have been) making this cry, and it responded with a variety of meaningless sounds which reminded me somewhat of those you have used when you have reproduced for me the accent of your tribe. I amused myself for a while with provoking these inarticulate replies and myself producing imitations of the cry which had at first attracted my attention, but, tiring of this amusement, I was about to descend from beside the fissure, when this shell, of an unknown species, was pushed through it, with what seemed to be, in the same strange pronunciation, the words ‘A message for Daffodil.’”
“A message!” exclaimed Daffodil, taking the shell, “Oh! will it speak to me?” She held it to her ear to catch its murmur, and she found it was saying over and over again “If Daffodil can find the elf‐cup that is child of her elf‐cup, she can come back through where she entered. But it must be the right day: to‐morrow, or the morrow seven years; to‐morrow, or the morrow seven years. Seven years, or its seven years, or else to‐morrow.”
The river people had learned from Keziah’s lamentations what had become of Daffodil. They had no means of access to Croäxaxica, but they knew of the fissure—which was near the mouth of their own river—and they had long been watching there and calling for Daffodil and trying to send her their message. They had sung it into many a shell; but the shells had fallen unheeded and got page: 382 broken. And the seaweed tillers in the tunnel, though the call had sometimes reached their ears, had never thought of a meaning for it.
The Regius Professor of Everything was heartily pleased when Daffodil told him what news he had brought her. “Behold the value of Science,” he remarked. “No one but myself could have accomplished your release. I congratulate you from my heart on your escape from the dangers which surround you,—and, by the way,” he added, “your friends too. Oh, do sit stiff again.” For now he had done his story, his attention was re‐awakened to the danger of their being found out.
“From the Throne Hall of Croäxaxica!” she said. “And no later than to‐morrow!”
“You are right: it is indeed impossible for tomorrow,” replied the Professor. “But don’t be discouraged, your defunct Pre‐eminence; who knows what may happen before to‐morrow seven years?” And thereupon he took his leave hastily, eager to be anywhere where his presence could be better accounted for.
But Daffodil, left alone, decided that what was most impossible of all was to wait seven years. She managed, though the operation was difficult without assistance, to undo a seam of the Speaker and wriggle herself out. Then, after arraying herself in the last dress which the Head Royal and Matrimonial Lady’s‐maid had supplied her—dimmed and discoloured now by long keeping—she took the Speaker’s stuffing from her storeplace in the hollow of his seat, disposed it properly within him, and carefully reset the little needle‐stitches she had un‐ page: 383 picked. Whatever might be the result of the venture she contemplated, she felt sure she could never return to the Speaker; and she arranged him in complete order as he had been before he was put to her use. She also removed every trace of her occupation of the House of Parliament, burying and sinking all the articles that had been brought her for her needs. She had put the elf‐cup inside the shell, under the lip of which it instantly fixed its root, as the sea anemone fixes itself to a rock; she now placed the shell inside her pouch‐bag and with it a still unopened mussel‐shell of the lighting‐water for the nourishment of the elf‐cup—the last mussel‐full she possessed, for Brekekex and Croässaquagha had not yet been able to renew her supply, in answer to her supplications. Her preparations being thus completed, she hastened forth; for her purpose must be effected before the waterworks were over.
The bursts of variegated light that flashed on her as she hurried on showed her that the culminating splendours of the display were beginning; but still there was plenty of time for her journey, if she could accomplish it at all. All Grachidichika was, as the Professor had told her, absorbed by the waterworks, she met no one and saw no one. Soon she was in the canal which skirts Grachidichika inside its wall. She had expected to have to watch her moment for endeavouring to pass the Grachidichikan guard stationed at the inner portal of the tunnel through the wall while their gaze was fixed on the waterworks in the opposite direction, and her fear of failure here was great; but, on reaching the spot, she found there was no guard. It had been assumed page: 384 that no Grachidichikan could possibly want to slip out of the country for that night; and the Croäxaxicans were, of course, responsible for Croäxaxicans being kept in Croäxaxica. Egress through the tunnel was, however, not to be thought of by Daffodil: the Croäxaxican guard on the outer side was more likely to have been strengthened than withdrawn, and the faces of the soldiers would be turned towards Grachidichika and the glitter of the waterworks where they shot higher than the wall—her advancing figure would be sure to catch some one’s eye. She passed on along the canal to where a flight of steps ascended to the niche and window perforated for the sole use of the present King of Grachidichika, according to the agreement made with the King and Queen of Croäxaxica before his ascent to the throne. Here watch had been hitherto kept by night as well as by day to prevent any illegal attempts at peeping out, and again it was only on the attraction of the waterworks that Daffodil had built her hope of passing: but now she felt it no surprise to find the post deserted. To be sure no one would be wanting to peep out into the night dusks of Croäxaxica at present. She hopped up the tall stairs—no light stretch for her un‐frog‐like limbs—and reached the window. Its height from the canal alarmed her; but she could, by now, dive and swim, if not like one of the natives, as no human being had ever dreamt of being able to do; and escape hence was her only way. She waited a moment or two in silent preparation, and plunged into the depth. The Croäxaxican guard, just then looking into the air where the spray of orange and page: 385 purple jets was tossing, heard the splash and, as soon as their heads could be got the right way again, a detachment swam to the place whence it had sounded: but the ripples had disappeared and Daffodil had already passed under the water into the back ways through the Palace grounds. So the Croäxaxican guard, seeing nothing, became quite sure they had heard nothing, and hastened back to their contemplation of the tops of the distant waterworks.
Daffodil had no more difficulty in reaching her destination. The ways she took were deserted, for the Professor was right that the Croäxaxicans were gathered in the places where they could catch glimpses of the display in Grachidichika—which was still more fascinating from its novelty than from what they could see of it. And she only wanted to get into the Queen’s Royal Private Garden, close at hand. There she meant to wait for a chance next day of some one entering who might be got to convey to the Queen secret intelligence of her presence there and her entreaty for an interview; and, if that might not be, she would issue forth and surrender herself openly. It was now made quite certain that her reappearance could not reveal the secrets of her means of escape from the Boa Constrictor and her refuge since, and she could act with what boldness she needs must, and risk no one but herself.
Fortune favoured her next morning. Queen Raucacoäxine awoke early, full of excitement and pleasure at the approaching glories of the day; she could not stay in bed, and, when she was up, she page: 386 could not keep quiet. Among her many sources of satisfaction was one connected with the former object of her apprehensions, the Duke of Happypool. There had been a reconciliation. His Grace could never again have pretensions to the throne of Grachidichika; his every chance had disappeared in the moment when Croässaquagha, while the Queen of Croäxaxica was nominating her Dressmaker Plenipotentiary, stepped over the threshold of the Cathedral as Brekekex’s wife, and King Grenoulcrawk still breathed on. And not only his every chance but his children’s, for, even were it supposable that Brekekex would have no son, the younger sons of his brother, the Crown Prince, would be in the line of succession. And, not only was all annoyance at the Duke, on account of his nearness to the Crown of Grachidichika, removed, but Queen Raucacoäxine had recently learned that, so far from his ever having cherished disloyal feelings, all his unpleasant ways had come from its having been a hope of his youth to marry her and his not getting over the disappointment easily, and that he had, moreover, been embittered by never having been asked to one of her Private Sociable Evenings, when it was the most anxious desire he had to feast his eyes on her dancing at them. On learning all this, the Queen had magnanimously restored the Duke and his family to Court credit, and, more than that, had appointed a Private Sociable Evening to be held at the earliest possible date and had invited him to it. It was necessary to consider that the journey from Grachidichika would have been so fatiguing for Their Matrimonial Majesties, from its page: 387 length, that, after the ceremonial of the Royal State Reception, they would not be equal to other public enjoyments till the morrow: nothing therefore could be more appropriate than to have the Private Sociable Evening for the winding‐up of the first day. And now it struck Queen Raucacoäxine in her restlessness, that a good way to while away the time that was hanging on her hands would be to retire to her Royal Private Garden and secretly practise her steps to, if possible, an extra amazing pitch of perfection. She was working at the great Royal Raucacoäxine Slipping Step—the step she had founded on Daffodil’s glides—when Daffodil approached, and she was so engrossed in what she was doing that she forgot to feel any surprise on seeing her, but merely remarked “Oh is it you? Just dance this step a moment or two. I forget how I do this middle slide, and I’ll just look at your attempts.”
The two had practised their dancing together a little before the Queen remembered the strangeness of Daffodil’s being there at all. Then, throwing herself into a seat, she exclaimed, “But, Heigho My! Who can you be? Of course you’re not you, because the Boa Constrictor swallowed her, poor dear thing.”
“It couldn’t swallow me, Your Majesty,” said Daffodil.
“Then where have you been ever since you perished?” inquired the Queen.
“I have been hiding,” she replied.
“I shall require fuller explanation,” remarked the Queen. “But never mind now—I’ve such a lot page: 388 on my mind. But, dear me! Now I come to think of it, this is very awkward. You’ve perished, so you’re nobody, and who am I talking to? I can’t talk to nobody, you know. And then, if I made you somebody, what a very dangerous precedent! People would suppose that, after they had perished for High Treason, instead of being swallowed by the Boa Constrictor in the proper way, they could just slink back again and be somebody else.”
“There are two ways to get over the difficulty of my setting that example, please Your Majesty,” said Daffodil. “One, of course, is to put me to death—”
“But that seems so difficult to do,” interrupted the perplexed Queen. “And, then, executing a person twice would seem so odd. And, besides, now you’re nobody, how can you have done anything to be put to death for? And really I am very glad you are alive; I have always been sorry you weren’t; and I don’t want in the least to put you to death now you have perished enough without it.”
“I am trusting in Your Majesty’s not wanting to be so cruel,” said Daffodil. “I will tell you the other way. You can let me pass out of Croäxaxica altogether—secretly—by the way I came; and so it need never be publicly known that you were not able to get me put to death when you tried. I have a flower that can open me a passage, if I am helped up to touch the roof of the Great Throne Hall with it. Only, Your Majesty, it must be done before to‐morrow begins, or it couldn’t be for page: 389 seven years, and that would not be the same thing at all.”
But the Queen remained in too much confusion of mind about Daffodil’s bewildering position to decide on any course of action. Daffodil repeated her suggestion thrice over without matters seeming to have become much clearer to her. And it had become necessary for her to return to her apartments to be dressed in her best Royal Robes to receive the King and Queen of Grachidichika. “I will come back again some time and give you instructions,” she said, with an air of relief at having, so far, come to a decision: but then her puzzled look returned. “Though what instructions can be given to anybody that’s nobody is past all comprehension,” she was murmuring as she went from the garden. Daffodil could not but fear that Her Majesty would come to no conclusion before tomorrow began, even if her memory of the interview were distinct enough to retain her attention amid the excitements of the day, concerning which she had anxious doubts.
But, after the Royal State Reception was over, it was to be considered that the Royal Guests had need of an interval of complete repose to refresh themselves from the fatigue of their journey, all the Royal Family of Croäxaxica took advantage of this interval too, and Queen Raucacoäxine, as she lay on her couch after a comfortable doze, found herself reflecting about Daffodil. The puzzle in her head now was, not as to Daffodil’s existence in the state of being nobody, for she had become accustomed to that, at first perplexing, idea, but as to what had page: 390 become of her from the time of her execution until now. Her Majesty felt that, if this defunct Dressmaker Plenipotentiary was a sort of person who could be somewhere without any one knowing it, she might as well go back there instead of causing damage to the ceiling of the Great Throne Hall by removing herself from observation through it. And her curiosity was aroused. She went again alone to the Royal Private Garden. But Daffodil would answer none of her inquiries. “Your Majesty,” she said, “if, as you say, your mind is made up that I must not pass out from your Kingdom without my telling you my history since my execution, you will have to keep me in your Kingdom, alive or dead. But I may tell you that I hid where another person could hide.”
“Oh! what an example!” groaned the Queen.
“I should like to be an example for people getting away from your Boa Constrictor,” said Daffodil.
“But just consider,” Queen Raucacoäxine urged, in despair at Daffodil’s stubbornness. “How can any Queen‐Manager of her Royal husband’s Kingdom allow somebody she has had executed to be somewhere for months and then let her slip through the very Throne Hall ceiling without knowing where she has been all the while and how it was managed? It would be most derogatory to me, even if I didn’t want to know.”
“But I am not somebody, Your Majesty,” Daffodil replied. “Your Majesty says I became nobody the moment I was executed. And it can’t matter where it was where nobody was, nor how the page: 391 being there was managed for nobody; and I am sure it cannot be derogatory to Your Majesty not to learn about it from nobody.”
“There is much in that argument,” said the Queen thoughtfully. “I think, after all, I had better hold a Secret Family Council about this matter.”
