Aladdin ?"
Mrs. Romford nodded mutely. There was nothing to be said. Some of the children from the audience were still being counselled.
"So you see, old girl," said Romford, stretching out his legs and looking through the haze of smoke at his slippers, "there comes a case in every copper's life when he knows precisely the identity of the criminal, he knows the man is as guilty as sin, and yet he decides that the purpose of a higher law than any set down in the statute books is better served if he turns a blind eye. This is, for me, that case."
"Then all that business about the swords – I was right, wasn't I?"
He leaned forward and patted her comfortably on the knee. "Absolutely right. Total baloney. It was what I was meant to believe. The conspirators knew precisely the nature of the weapons they were holding. They were doing a public service for the sake of the good folk of Bridhampton and its environs. Ideally they'd have gone for Dora herself, but then of course young Clarence would have inherited – and that would probably have been even worse. So they did what they could."
"But what about the Reverend Harcourt-Fruitcake?"
"Whose hobby is swordsmithery ..."
"And Dr. Smithee?"
"Those swords were driven in with anatomical precision. It takes expert training before a man can do that. I imagine that even now the good doctor is preparing a suitably anodyne death certificate – ghastly accident, couldn't be helped, you know the sort of thing."
Mrs. Romford drew a deep sigh and stared resolutely at the transitory castles of brightness the flames of the gas fire were building. "And what shall you do, darling?"
"Nothing," said Romford. "Nothing at all. Blast it, this pipe's gone out again."
Mrs. Romford gave another deep sigh, and pulled herself wearily to her feet. "Would you like your cocoa now, dear?"
I Could Have a General Be /
In the Bright King's Arr-umm- ee
Every time I hear them sing the song, wondering am I if it could be for me, about me, my sorry tale; and then I say no, for my tale is littletold, save by me – and who would listen to me? (Though it is true: I could have been a General in the Bright King's arr-umm- ee . And that is the tale.)
Ten cold seasons gone now, those times I do not forget (and in one case can not forget), when the old king, Durblediabolo, was athronèd still, and the people loth under his sway. O the rumors swept like ladies' eyelashes: Did he eat small children for his tiffin? Was there a wench unassaulted in all the land left by his dark and horny body? Blood he drank in banquet cups – the old idlemen, in cups of their own, assured it truth was, told me so themselves, they who had it from a grandchild's friend. The Queen, fair Galinea of the springbreeze smile: she was burnt, or rackt, or walled away, or long decades back all three – another matter the idlemen knew. Her daughter – Durblediabolo 's daughter – was the villainess who sucked her mother's blood, dried fair Galinea. Dark-eyed, dark-haired, dark-skinned, dark-garbed, dark-souled, dark-everythinged LoChi: we saw her, all the palace guards and I (Qinmeartha), leader of them, as she paraded daily – here to the bath, there to the sewing-room, and somewhere to the chamber which no man upon pain of death must think the thought of. We saw her evilness, albeit evil disguised into invisibility.
So we said, so all knew. All knew that, worse than her father even, LoChi was a blooddrinker, a semensucker, a throatbiter: vargr, lamia or succubus, the words all combined in her unregal form. All knew it, but what they knew (what Qinmeartha knew) was that her father's taxes made them sweat, the sternness of his royalty them tremble (as well they might, for gibbets strained e'en more then than now, when we are ajoyed under the benevolence of the Bright King our savior, bless his belch). All knew, too – and here they were rightly thinking (this also Qinmeartha knew) – that the days of the Aranthons, the House whose
Mrs. Romford nodded mutely. There was nothing to be said. Some of the children from the audience were still being counselled.
"So you see, old girl," said Romford, stretching out his legs and looking through the haze of smoke at his slippers, "there comes a case in every copper's life when he knows precisely the identity of the criminal, he knows the man is as guilty as sin, and yet he decides that the purpose of a higher law than any set down in the statute books is better served if he turns a blind eye. This is, for me, that case."
"Then all that business about the swords – I was right, wasn't I?"
He leaned forward and patted her comfortably on the knee. "Absolutely right. Total baloney. It was what I was meant to believe. The conspirators knew precisely the nature of the weapons they were holding. They were doing a public service for the sake of the good folk of Bridhampton and its environs. Ideally they'd have gone for Dora herself, but then of course young Clarence would have inherited – and that would probably have been even worse. So they did what they could."
"But what about the Reverend Harcourt-Fruitcake?"
"Whose hobby is swordsmithery ..."
"And Dr. Smithee?"
"Those swords were driven in with anatomical precision. It takes expert training before a man can do that. I imagine that even now the good doctor is preparing a suitably anodyne death certificate – ghastly accident, couldn't be helped, you know the sort of thing."
Mrs. Romford drew a deep sigh and stared resolutely at the transitory castles of brightness the flames of the gas fire were building. "And what shall you do, darling?"
"Nothing," said Romford. "Nothing at all. Blast it, this pipe's gone out again."
Mrs. Romford gave another deep sigh, and pulled herself wearily to her feet. "Would you like your cocoa now, dear?"
I Could Have a General Be /
In the Bright King's Arr-umm- ee
Every time I hear them sing the song, wondering am I if it could be for me, about me, my sorry tale; and then I say no, for my tale is littletold, save by me – and who would listen to me? (Though it is true: I could have been a General in the Bright King's arr-umm- ee . And that is the tale.)
Ten cold seasons gone now, those times I do not forget (and in one case can not forget), when the old king, Durblediabolo, was athronèd still, and the people loth under his sway. O the rumors swept like ladies' eyelashes: Did he eat small children for his tiffin? Was there a wench unassaulted in all the land left by his dark and horny body? Blood he drank in banquet cups – the old idlemen, in cups of their own, assured it truth was, told me so themselves, they who had it from a grandchild's friend. The Queen, fair Galinea of the springbreeze smile: she was burnt, or rackt, or walled away, or long decades back all three – another matter the idlemen knew. Her daughter – Durblediabolo 's daughter – was the villainess who sucked her mother's blood, dried fair Galinea. Dark-eyed, dark-haired, dark-skinned, dark-garbed, dark-souled, dark-everythinged LoChi: we saw her, all the palace guards and I (Qinmeartha), leader of them, as she paraded daily – here to the bath, there to the sewing-room, and somewhere to the chamber which no man upon pain of death must think the thought of. We saw her evilness, albeit evil disguised into invisibility.
So we said, so all knew. All knew that, worse than her father even, LoChi was a blooddrinker, a semensucker, a throatbiter: vargr, lamia or succubus, the words all combined in her unregal form. All knew it, but what they knew (what Qinmeartha knew) was that her father's taxes made them sweat, the sternness of his royalty them tremble (as well they might, for gibbets strained e'en more then than now, when we are ajoyed under the benevolence of the Bright King our savior, bless his belch). All knew, too – and here they were rightly thinking (this also Qinmeartha knew) – that the days of the Aranthons, the House whose
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