In Which The Worm Turns At Dumcruckle

Thomas Crowder to Lynde Falconer:

Well, don’t be too upset with me, darling. You are shaking your head as you read this, I know, because you know what I’m about to say – and you are right, of course. We are going to go into the foothills exactly as I said we wouldn’t, and – ye gods – the success of the mission will be up to me.

We had made up our minds to wait out the siege, as you know, but it was Katti who precipitated matters as she so often has. More accurately, it was Moss who precipitated matters – the most skilled sheepdog I have ever seen, but changed by his association with Katti into as stubborn and self-willed an animal as ever consented graciously to work for humans when he wasn’t too busy with his own affairs.

Of course he slipped out. To think that Moss would treat a closed gate as anything but a challenge is an insult to the dog. Nobody will admit to opening the watch-gate, but it was certainly found open. The messengers go in and out under cover of darkness, and are very particular about leaving things secure, but I have no doubt that some of the young and indestructible cubs around the place have been slipping out after them to lark about and taunt the hand of danger. By the time Moss discovered it, it was morning, and Katti and I were able to see him in the very act of slipping out.

We were carrying water from the well to the kitchens, and we only just managed not to drop it, knowing that our only chance to save the dog from harm was to call him back quietly before our tormentors were aware of us. A lone sheepdog sniffing about the forecourt would always be a gift to a saboteur – and so it proved.

We tiptoed silently to the watch-gate and peered out. Naturally Moss had gotten himself well out into the open before he started dallying about. We both called him, but it had to be low, which made it easy for him to ignore. Katti had that look of concentration which meant she was calling with her mind as well as her voice, but it made no difference to Moss. It was just around the tenth call that he decided to look up at us enquiringly, and that’s when the first stone got him.

He was lucky that it wasn’t an arrow – and so, frankly, were the Marshweathrians, because if Moss had been killed, Katti would have torn each one of their throats out with her bare hands and thought herself moderate. As it was, they gave him (and us) an uncomfortable few minutes of it, hurling their stones with such accuracy as to keep him from running away in either direction. He finally decided he couldn’t move anymore (we discovered later that it was a broken leg) and curled himself up to await his doom. Seeing Moss give up like that aroused the wrath of a thousand fiery suns in Katti, and she snatched up three rocks that had fallen close to the gate, ran out into the forecourt and flung them one by one with murderous force and deadly aim at the scrub on the other side. At least one of them must have hit home, because I heard an agonized grunt, and it kept the man sufficiently occupied that she was able to put her arms around Moss and lug him to safety before anything more could be done.

Once Katti got Moss inside, she was red-faced and shaking, and although she had tears in her eyes, they were what we have always called Katti’s Angry Tears, so angry this time that I was sure they would dry immediately into puffs of steam.

“Those brutes,” she hissed, the gentleness of her hands as she looked over Moss’ wounds a startling contrast with the violence of her manner. “Those beastly, beastly--” I thought she had run out here, but it turned out she was just casting about for the most shocking word she could think of “—bastards!”

Poor Moss lay there between us, very limp of limb and pathetic of eye. Timothy arrived at this juncture with a basket of apples and exclaimed in horror.

“He’s all right,” I said hastily, in case Timothy took it into his mind to go into a rage like his sister’s, although he has always been the more phlegmatic of the two as a rule.

“He’s not all right,” Katti cried. “He’s bruised, and stoned, and I think he broke a leg.” She was holding the leg, and as though to give punctuation to her statement, Moss gave a moan of distress.

“Well, he’s alive,” I amended, “and I’m sure his wounds can be mended.”

Timothy shouted at one of the porters to fetch Rolfe here, this minute, we had a dog in trouble, damn it – and when the man ran off, Katti seized her brother by the wrist with her left hand and me by the shoulder with her right.

“They need to pay for this,” she said between her teeth. “I don’t care a bit what Mother and Father have to say about it. These bastards --” she had obviously discovered an affinity to the word “--have to pay.”

Lady Dumcruckle arrived panting just then with Rolfe, so Katti couldn’t go on, but she gave us both a meaning look as the five of us busied ourselves with getting Moss onto a barrow without further harm to his leg, so that Rolfe could spirit him away to the kennels for a great deal more coddling than the wretched animal deserved.

We told Sir Roger and Lady Dumcruckle all about the incident at breakfast. Sir Roger got the familiar gleam in his eye when Katti said passionately that the beasts must pay – you see even Katti won’t say “bastard” in front of her mother – but her ladyship gave everyone a quelling glance and said she was sure that the defects in their characters would be punishment enough for the poor benighted souls in the long run.

Of course this satisfied nobody, but everyone knows that when Lady Dumcruckle starts talking high about things like defects in character and poor benighted souls there is no use arguing with her. Sir Roger subsided, and Timothy only complained “Oh, Mother,” preparatory to subsiding in his turn. But Katti said “Any men of defective character who would torment an innocent animal are too dangerous just to leave outside our front gate like that. You never know what the poor benighted souls might do.”

Lady Dumcruckle took it well. “Perhaps,” she admitted, “but we have no fighting men here except for Timothy, and to take on professional soldiers in this kind of setting would be a far greater risk than I am prepared to countenance.”

Katti glared at her, but she went on – this time, gazing straight at me, of all people. “If anyone can think of a trick, now…something that would teach the poor benighted souls a lesson without risking our resources…” and she trailed off, still looking me in the eye before swirling out with a “Come now, Roger, it’s time for your drops.”

So you see I have my orders, so to speak, and in the spirit of justice, I have allowed all my indignation to surge in the hopes that it will bring inspiration in its train. I have been torn since this started between regret for your absence and gratitude for your safety, but today I want nothing more than to have you here so that I may strut peremptorily before my womenfolk like a cockerel. I never thought myself susceptible to that sort of nonsense, but for the first time in our lives the threads are in my hands, and the salvation of Dumcruckle is for me to grasp or let fall. I will try not to let it affect my sense of humor too badly!

Yours insufferably,
Tom

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Lynde Falconer to Thomas Crowder:

Dearest Tom,

I will do you the honor of supposing you know best, and of course I defer to Lady Dumcruckle in every way where the defense of the manor is concerned. But I can’t pretend to approve at all of playing any kind of trick against armed men for the sake of what seems to be nothing but temper. However, I would be the last person to want to keep you from a responsibility that you have taken to yourself, and of course I know the satisfaction of protecting those who have been given to you to protect.

I don’t suppose I am making any sense. I take risks every day – my very position here is a risk, if you like. Of course it is hypocritical of me not to want you to have that right. I suppose it is more difficult for me to accept the risks of those I love, that is all. I won’t say anything else about it.

We have been having a difficult time of it here; the princess has been behaving very worrisomely. She is still mourning for Rafe – worse than she would if he were actually dead – and it has made her attitude toward Marshweather understandably bitter and vengeful. The problem, of course, is that pure punishment is a very unsound basis from which to design foreign policy, and bound to fail more often than any other, in my observation. So her mother has taken over the running of the tactics, and the king is able to spend most of his time in the town and the barracks. He is a very inspiring presence, and I do believe that he has managed to meet and put heart into every citizen in the capital, right down to the youngest apprentice in the smallest basket-shop in the meanest back street.

We, on the other hand, do nothing, and it is becoming very onerous indeed. The princess’ wit has turned sour, and she wastes her powers of observation on the foibles of the court. We walk outdoors when we can, but it is too cold to go every day, so there is a great deal of pacing back and forth in the solar. I’m afraid I don’t set a very good example myself – we are both too restless to make good use of our idle hands.

Do take the best care you can for yourself, Tom dearest. I won’t try to tell you not to take risks – I know how maddening that would be in your current mood. But do take them sensibly. A failed coup is the most ignominious thing there is, if that sentiment has more weight with you.

Your loving,
Lynde

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