Read Online Midwinter Nightingale by Joan Aiken - Free Book Online Page B

King Dick— wherever he's lurking—and get Alfred's crown off of him—never mind if his head's in it or not, ha ha ha! The Burgundians are due to land any day now; we'll march on London. Hope the Dad's toe is better by then. It better be, ha ha! It'll all go easy as a greased slide.”
    What's in it for me? Jorinda wanted to ask, but did not. Instead she said, “Do you know the duke of Battersea?”
    “Simon Bakerloo? That snotty bastard? O' course I know him. A conceited, stuck-up, la-di-da fellow if ever there was one. He'll soon have the rug pulled from under him. The Dad has no use at all for any of that lot.”
    “Who pays for all this?” Jorinda asked shrewdly. “Burgundians don't come on tick, I bet?”
    “Oh, the Dad has plenty of mint sauce from Mid-sylvania. Also he plans to sell off Alfred's crown to some foreign excellency—the seljuk of somewhere; I forget who. It's a curiosity, d'you see—nearly a thousand years old. Someone has offered him a shovelful of dibs for it. All we have to do is find the old gager and take it off him.”
    “How d'you reckon to do that? Where
is
the king? Nobody seems to know.”
    “There's one that might.”
    “Who?”
    “Used to be a crony of my ma.” Lot's voice was loaded with spite. “Used to come calling round, all sorrow and smarm. 'Poor dear Adelaide,' all ducky-wucky and itsy-witsy. Carsluith, he was called in those days, till his dad the earl hopped it. Now he's Lord Herodsfoot.”
    “Oh, yes, I remember him. He knows about games. Collects rare games for the king.”
    “Ay. Rare games,” said Lothar, giggling. He left the room, singing, “Goodbye, little Pussy, your claws are so sharp. You made a fine snack for the pike and the carp.”
    Jorinda cried herself to sleep, curled in great discomfort on three chairs.

, the master of Edge Place, ate, every day, what he called a hunting breakfast. This served as a reminder of earlier times, when he had gone out hunting six days a week. Now Sir Thomas kept a manservant, Gribben, standing behind his chair, whose duty it was to blow on a hunting horn every five minutes. Gribben also tended a brandy-warmer, a large bulbous glass about the size of a football, half filled with cognac, perched in a silver cradle over a lighted candle. At breakfast time this stood by Sir Thomas's plate, ready to pour over the helpings of porridge, eggs, ham, fish curry and buttered toast that followed each other on the daily menu. When the brandy had been poured, it was Gribben's next duty to step forward smartly and set light to it with a burning taper; then Sir Thomas vigorously extinguished its blue blaze with his napkin and bolteddown each red-hot course in quick order. If Gribben did not step forward smartly enough, Sir Thomas lashed out at him with a hunting crop, which lay by his plate on the knife side.
    “Make haste, make
haste
! Hounds will be throwing off any minute now. Scent oughta be breast-high today, no time to lose.”
    “Yessir,” said Gribben, refilling the brandy-warmer, which he did three times at every breakfast, while Sir Thomas chomped on his flaming kedgeree.
    Hounds had not met at Edge Place for a score of years.
    “Hand me that second plateful of ham, Gribben; I'm sharp set. There's a chill in the air today; it may be a long run. I'll need extra rations.”
    “Excuse me, sir, Mrs. Smidge carved that plateful extra thin for Miss Jorinda. We're expecting her sometime today.”
    And indeed at that moment the sound of hooves and wheels clattering over cobblestones was heard down below.
    “That'll be Miss Jorinda now, I reckon,” said Gribben.
    “May the devil fly away with Miss Jorinda! She ought to be at school. Give me that plate of ham. Mrs. Smidge can carve another plateful, can she not? And why couldn't the gal get here in time for breakfast?”
    “It'll be on account of the floods, I daresay. Mortal bad, it's said they are between here and Distance EdgeJunction,” said Gribben, passing over the ham