James Roy - The Gimlet Eye

‘Whatever are you talking about, my dear child?’

‘We saw you,’ Philmon said. ‘We saw that man with you.’

‘Yes, that stinky, stinky man. Who was he?’ asked Tab. ‘And what did he want?’

Fontagu gave a forced laugh. ‘Oh, that? That was nothing! That was just a… a fellow actor, a thespian such as I. We were practising a scene.’ He tried to smile.

Tab and Philmon simply frowned at him. ‘Do you always rehearse in the middle of the street?’ Philmon asked. ‘Or in dark doorways?’

‘Come on, Fontagu, we’re not complete idiots,’ Tab said.

Fontagu slumped a little. ‘You’re right, of course. He wasn’t a colleague.’

‘So who was he?’

Fontagu’s usual demeanour was already starting to return. He flicked back his cape, adopted his dramatic wide-legged stance. ‘You know, children, you don’t have to know everything about my affairs. I am, after all, a grown-up.’

‘We know,’ Tab replied. ‘It’s just -’

‘So don’t be so nosy! Goodness me, you’d think that you were my sainted parents, the way you follow me around, constantly spying on me!’

‘Did he have anything to do with your appointment at the court?’ Tab asked.

‘Or The Gimlet Eye?’ Philmon added.

For a moment Fontagu was completely lost for words. It was something they very rarely saw. ‘ The Gimlet… How would you know about The Gimlet Eye? You have been spying on me!’

Neither Tab nor Philmon felt that they were in a position to disagree. ‘It’s because we worry about you,’ Tab explained.

‘Worry? About me? Why would you worry about me?’

Tab began to count off on her fingers as she spoke. ‘You got ambushed by the Tolrushians, you betrayed Quentaris under so-called torture…’

‘It was torture!’

‘… you smuggled the Equen Queen onto Quentaris…’

‘Not to mention that you stole an icefire gem and uttered a spell that sent Quentaris spinning into one vortex after the next,’ Philmon said.

Fontagu’s eyes flashed indignantly. ‘You have never heard anyone accuse me of that!’ he said defiantly.

‘Only because the one person who saw you do it – me! – has never told any of the people she might have told.’ Tab raised her arms high, pointing to the masts, rigging and great sails overhead. ‘All of this is your doing, Fontagu. All of it! If anyone ever found out, they’d string you up in the Square of the People until the crows had pecked out your eyes, before throwing you to the scavenjaws.’

Fontagu winced. ‘Don’t say that. Please.’

‘All I’m saying is that you haven’t exactly been the perfect citizen up to now, so we worry about what you might get up to next. Or who might catch up with you,’ she added.

Fontagu’s chin was crumpling as he fought back tears. ‘I do appreciate your concern, children, most sincerely I do. I am ever so touched. But you must trust me when I say that everything is under control. And with that said, I must take my leave. I have a great deal of preparation to… to prepare. Yes, that’s right, to prepare. So goodbye now.’

He turned then, and with a clumsy flourish of his cape he strode away. But his stride lacked some of its usual arrogance, as if some of his pride had leaked out of a small rupture in his side.

‘“Trust me”, he says,’ Philmon muttered. ‘I wouldn’t trust that man as far as I could spit.’

‘Did you notice anything missing?’ Tab said.

‘Like what? Tab? Where are you going?’ He jogged after Tab, who had turned and was striding up the hill, back towards the palace.

‘Did you notice anything missing?’ Tab repeated when he’d caught up to her. ‘What was Fontagu carrying when he left the palace?’

‘Um… just his script.’

‘And did he have it just then?’

Philmon frowned as he tried to remember. ‘No, I don’t think so.’

‘So either he dropped his script, or Red-head took it. And I doubt that he’d drop something so precious. And did you notice how Fontagu managed to avoid telling us how he knew Red-head?’

‘So where are we going now?’

‘We’re going after Red-head, obviously.’

‘What are you going to say to him?’

Tab stopped and regarded Philmon for a long moment. ‘I’m going to ask him why he was so mean to our friend Fontagu,’ she said sarcastically. ‘Honestly, Philmon, you must think that I’m quite the idiot.’

‘I just wondered.’

‘All I’m going to do is follow him.’

‘Can I come?’

‘I’d be disappointed if you didn’t.’

Tab and Philmon ran. Red-head was out of sight, but they were well practised at spotting particular people in a crowd, and before too long they saw him, limping, but limping quickly.

‘I bet he’s going to the palace,’ Philmon said.

‘Of course he is. The only thing is, I didn’t see him there when I was mind-melding with that pigeon.’

‘That doesn’t mean anything. He might have been in another room.’

They followed Red-head at a safe distance, and eventually they saw that Philmon had been right. The man strode confidently – if slightly lop-sidedly – to the guards who stood at the front gate of the palace. He nodded to them in a very familiar manner, before simply strolling in.

‘I knew it!’ said Philmon.

‘Congratulations,’ Tab replied. ‘Come on, follow my lead.’ And without giving Philmon a chance to respond or refuse, she wandered over to one of the guards at the gate.

The soldier regarded them with a wary look. ‘What does you want?’ he asked in a strange, clipped accent.

‘Oh no, we’re perfectly all right,’ said Tab. She looked up at the front gate of the palace and whistled in awe.

The guard shook his head. ‘No, you no all right. You leaving, is what you are.’

‘But we’re tourists,’ Tab replied.

‘You no tourists,’ the guard argued. ‘They no have tourists in Quentaris since before the Spell of the Undoing.’

‘If we weren’t tourists, we’d know that already, wouldn’t we?’ Tab replied.

The guard frowned as he thought this over. It seemed like quite a lot for his brain to process. Then, suddenly, he lowered the tip of his halberd. ‘You must think I a complete eediot,’ he said.

‘Oh no, not at all. We don’t, do we?’ Tab asked Philmon, who simply shook his head. ‘So, you work here, do you?’ she went on.

The guard said nothing. Instead, he patted his halberd.

‘Of course,’ Tab giggled. ‘Silly me! So, you’re a real palace guard! I suppose you’d know everyone here, probably?’

The guard shrugged. ‘Pretty much.’

‘You see, we’re from out of town, like we said…’

‘Tourists,’ Philmon interjected.

‘Yes, and we thought we saw someone we knew.’

‘Really?’ The guard seemed rather disinterested. ‘Who you think you know?’

‘The man with the red hair who came through a couple of minutes ago. Short.’

‘Fat,’ said Philmon.

‘And with a limp.’

‘Hmm,’ the guard replied.

‘What was his name?’ Tab enquired.

‘I can no tell you that.’

‘Was it Asro Mendeley?’ she asked, plucking a random name out of her head.

The guard shook his head. ‘That’s no his name.’

‘But I’m close, right? Asro Melando?’

‘No.’

‘No, no. Astrin Nando?’ Tab clicked her fingers, then thumped her forehead with her fist. ‘Oh, it’s on the tip of my… Argo Nadro -’

‘Kalip Rendana.’

‘Ah!’ said Tab, slapping Philmon on the arm. ‘Of course! Kalip Rendana!’

‘I told you,’ Philmon said. ‘I told you it was Kalip Redondo!’

‘Rendana,’ Tab corrected him. ‘And he’s in charge of the kitchen in the palace, right?’