The Stolen Lake Read Online Free Page B

think you fit to attend the queen's court if he sees you like that. Here—" and he anointed Dido's countenance with a most evil-smelling paste of shark's liver and seaweed, ordering her to lie in her bunk for three hours, and meanwhile occupy the times usefully by reciting a litany that went:
We clean three tweed beads a week with Maltese seaweed;
    Lady Jane Grey, pray do not stray to Mandalay on market day.
    Dido found this very unfair. She flung herself crossly on her bunk.
    "We clean three tweed beads a week ... Oh, butter my brogans, what rubbish!"
    Luckily, before she had time to become too annoyed, Dido fell fast asleep; the cockroaches had been particularly troublesome the previous night, rustling around with a noise like toast crumbs being shaken inside a paper bag; they had kept her awake for hours.
    When she next woke, evening had come; the air was cooler and the light was dim. Yawning, she rolled off her bunk—the weight that had settled on her chest proved to be El Dorado—and went up on deck with the cat for a breath of fresh air, keeping a wary eye out for Silver Taffy.
    She found Mr. Holystone on the foredeck, scraping mussels, which he took from a wicker hamper and dropped, when clean, into a cauldron. Dido squatted down to help him, and he exclaimed with satisfaction on the healing work already accomplished by the shark paste.
    "Miss Dido," he went on in a lower tone, "I cannot sufficiently express my obligation to you for saving my poor Dora from that ruffian. Young Multiple told me the whole while you were asleep. I had thought you must have been teasing Dora—I might have known I was wrong."
    Dido kindly forgave his unjust suspicions. "Anyhows, if you thought I'd been pulling Dora's tail, Mr. Holy, it was right kind of you to doctor me. But why is that Silver Taffy so down on poor Dora?"
    "When we were at Nombre de Dios a fortune-teller came along the dock, telling fortunes by dropping a spoonful of soot into people's hands. She told Taffy that the lines in his hand foretold that a cat would be the end of him. He is a very superstitious fellow," said Mr. Holystone, shrugging.
    "No wonder he's so tarnal mean to Dora. I'm surprised you let her up on deck."
    "Oh, she can usually look after herself. The El Dorado cats have a superior degree of intelligence."
    "Are there others like her, then?"
    "Indeed yes. Where I come from in Hy Brasil and in Lyonesse such cats are not uncommon."
    "With such long tails?"
    "Many longer still. They can swing on trees as nimbly as any ape. I have heard it said that there were such cats in the lost garden where our forefathers walked with the gods."
    "Fancy!" said Dido. Looking thoughtfully at Mr. Holystone, she asked, after a moment, "Is it a nice place, that land of Hy Brasil? Where you come from?"
    A cloud appeared to pass over the steward's brow. He began to say something, checked himself, and, after a moment, merely remarked, "Yes; it is a pleasant place." Then he stood up, easily lifting the heavy cauldron of cleaned mussels.
    "Captain Hughes has invited the British agent to dinner. See, there is the pinnace, putting out to fetch him. Bring down the basket, Miss Dido, if you will be so kind."
    Mr. Brandywinde, the British agent, proved, when he came on board, to be a blotchy-faced, wandering-eyed, seedy-looking individual. He wore a tricorne hat, snuffcolored suit, silver-buckled shoes; his sandy, thinning hair was dressed in a style long out of date, tied at the back with a small grosgrain bow. Dido, peering through the galley doorway as he passed, thought how untrustworthy he looked, and she guessed that Captain Hughes felt the same, for his voice, when he greeted Brandywinde, was noticeably quiet and dry.
    "Claret, sir, or ship's grog—or would you care for a cup of tea?"
    "Grog, sir—grog will do capitally, thankee, Captain," Mr. Brandywinde replied, in a tone that was both eager and creaking, like a rusty handle cranked at an uneven rate. "Grog, now, is