Patrick deWitt - Undermajordomo Minor

Agnes emitted an actual gasp. “She cannot.”

“She is coming, Agnes.”

“She must not. You will write her at once and explain the impossibility of it.”

“She is travelling, and so unreachable. I’m sorry, but it is down to us.” He folded the letter into the envelope. “And I’m afraid that’s not the worst of it.”

Agnes blanched. “Don’t you say it.”

Mr Olderglough nodded. “We will be entertaining.”

Here Agnes hung her head.

“The guests will arrive two days after the Baroness,” said Mr Olderglough.

“Who?”

“The Duke and Duchess, Count and Countess.”

Mr Olderglough and Agnes shared a look of dire understanding.

“And for how long?” she asked.

“Until the end of the month.”

Agnes was quiet as she took this in. “Well,” she said at last, “obviously the Baroness doesn’t understand the state of things here, otherwise she wouldn’t be returning. Certainly not with thoughts of entertaining she wouldn’t.”

“I believe she does understand,” Mr Olderglough replied, and he read a line from the letter: “I ask that the Baron be made to look presentable, so much as is possible in his current state of mind.”

“She’s after ruin, then,” Agnes declared. “Or else she’s gone mad as well.”

“She appears sanguine.” Mr Olderglough glanced at the letter. “Her penmanship is as elegant as ever.” This proved a small comfort, though, and Agnes all but fell into the chair, looking as one succumbing to witless panic.

“It’s beyond me,” she admitted. “Where might we begin, even?”

“I won’t deny it seems a task.”

“A task ?” said Agnes wonderingly.

“Task is the word I used.”

She looked to Lucy. “We are living in a graveyard!”

Mr Olderglough moved to stand before her, resting a hand on her shoulder. He spoke firmly, but not without tenderness. “Take hold of yourself, Agnes,” he said. “The castle has been dormant; we must bring it back to life. Why do you act like we haven’t been through it before?”

“Never so bad as this, though.”

“I shan’t disagree with you there. And it may well come to pass that we fail. But we have only two choices: to try, or not to try. And I know that you will try, my dear, just as you know that I will.”

Agnes sighed the sigh of the damned, then trudged from the room. She had much planning to do, she said, but wanted to spend some time alone before starting out, that she might wallow stoutly, and without intrusion or distraction. After she’d gone, Mr Olderglough turned to Lucy; all the kindness had left his face. “Now, boy, let us talk about tomorrow,” he said.

“Tomorrow, sir?”

“Tomorrow, yes.” Mr Olderglough cleared his throat. “Tomorrow is not going to be a day where we will be visited with thoughts of praising God on his throne.”

“No, sir?”

“Tomorrow will not be a day we’ll later cherish or clasp particularly close to our bosom.”

“Will it not, sir?”

“Tomorrow will be a not-pleasing day for us.”

“But why is it so, sir?”

Mr Olderglough tucked the letter away in his breast pocket. “Tomorrow we must locate, apprehend, and restore to normality the Baron.”

The process of locating the Baron was an unusual experience for Lucy; for whereas before he had thought of this person as one to avoid no matter the cost, now he was actively seeking the man out, albeit fruitlessly, at least at the start.

It was held that the Baron slept in the daytime, and so during the sunlit hours they were hopeful of catching him dozing in this or that nook. But they found no evidence to support any nocturnal habits, however — indeed, they found no evidence he existed at all, save for the occasional discreet puddle or pile. But his chambers remained untouched, and there was not so much as a pinch of salt unaccounted for in the larder. In the night-time, galvanized by Agnes’s bitter coffee and an often not-unpleasant sleepless befuddlement, they roamed the halls by candlelight and in stockinged feet, this last at Mr Olderglough’s insistence, for he believed it stealthy. Lucy was disinclined to praise the tactic, as the stone floor was cold, and so his feet were also cold; when he became sullen, Mr Olderglough loaned him an extra pair of stockings, which Lucy pulled over his own, and which allayed his discomfort so that peace was restored between them. Mr Olderglough, it should be said, was enjoying this outing to the utmost, and he wondered at his unrealized potential as an adventurer.

Alas, three full days and nights passed them by, and they were no closer to accomplishing their goal than when they’d begun. With only the minimum of sleep shared between them, then did a weariness set in, followed by the chilling shade of doubt, which soon gave way to a sense of outright futility. At last Mr Olderglough deemed the Baron unlocatable, and was for abandoning the project altogether. Lucy disliked seeing his superior in this state of dejection; pondering the angles, he suggested they were only going about things incorrectly.

“How do you mean?” said Mr Olderglough.

“Bumbling about in the darkness, sir. In his darkness. Would it not make more sense to lure him into the light?”

Mr Olderglough squinted. “You’re suggesting we entrap him?”

“Why not?” said Lucy.

Mr Olderglough was intrigued, and retired to his chambers to blueprint the stratagem. Lucy was well pleased to have hit upon a possible solution but soon wished he’d never shared his notion, as it steered Mr Olderglough towards the thought of using Lucy as bait. It was described thus: “You will take to your bed at your usual hour, and all will be as is normal except that your door will be not just unlocked, but fully open.”

“Will it, sir?” Lucy asked.

“Indeed it will.”

“And where will you be situated?”

“I shall be standing behind the door,” said Mr Olderglough, rather proudly.

“And what will you be doing there?”

“I will be waiting for the Baron to walk into the room.”

“And what will commence when this occurs, sir?”

“I will step away from my hiding place and tap my employer atop the skull with a stubby switch of birch wood.”

“Is that so?”

“You may count on it, boy.”

“And what next, I wonder?”

“After he’s been knocked unconscious, then shall we bring him to his chambers and manacle him to his bed. Next we will force-feed him, and bathe him, and shave him, and cut his hair and strive to resurrect his interest in sophisticated society.” Mr Olderglough rubbed his hands together. “Now, what do you think of it?”

Lucy said, “I think it is somewhat far-fetched, sir.”

“Are you not up for it?”

“I’m not, actually, no. And to be frank, sir, I don’t believe you are, either.”

“What sort of attitude is that? Let us rally, boy.”

“Let us come up with another plan.”

“Let us look within ourselves and search out the dormant warrior.”

“Mine is dormant to the point of non-existence, sir. There is no part of me that wishes to lay nakedly abed and await that man’s arrival.”

“I tell you you will not be alone.”

“And yet I shall surely feel alone, sir.”

Mr Olderglough looked down the length of his nose. “May I admit to being disappointed in you, boy.”

“You may write a lengthy treatise on the subject, sir, and I will read it with interest. But I highly doubt there will be anything written within those pages which will alter my dissatisfaction with the scheme.”

“Well I’m sorry to have to tell you this, boy, but it must come to pass, and it will.”