So, when the front-door of the Chanticleers was opened for him, he was greeted by sounds of uproarious laughter proceeding from the parlour.
The Polydore Vigils were spending the evening there, and the whole party was engaged in trying to catch a moth—flicking at it with their pocket-handkerchiefs, stumbling over the furniture, emulating each other to further efforts in the ancient terms of stag-hunting.
“Come and join the fun, Ambrose,” shouted Master Nathaniel, crimson with exertion and laughter.
But Master Ambrose began to see red.
“You … you … heartless, gibbering idiots!” he roared.
The moth-hunters paused in amazement.
“Suffering Cats! What’s taken you, Ambrose?” cried Master Nathaniel. “Stag-hunting, they say, was a royal sport. Even the Honeysuckles might stoop to it!”
“Don’t the Honeysuckles consider a moth a stag, Ambrose?” laughed Master Polydore Vigil.
But that evening the old joke seemed to have lost its savour.
“Nathaniel,” said Master Ambrose solemnly, “the curse of our country has fallen upon you and me … and you are hunting moths!”
Now, curse happened to be one of the words that had always frightened Master Nathaniel. So much did he dislike it that he even avoided the words that resembled it in sound, and had made Dame Marigold dismiss a scullery-maid, merely because her name happened to be Kirstie.
Hence, Master Ambrose’s words sent him into a frenzy of nervous irritation.
“Take that back, Ambrose! Take that back!” he roared. “Speak for yourself. The … the … the cur … nothing of that sort is on me!”
“That is not true, Nathaniel,” said Master Ambrose sternly. “I have only too good reason to fear that Moonlove is stricken by the same sickness as Ranulph, and …”
“You lie!” shouted Master Nathaniel.
“And in both cases,” continued Master Ambrose, relentlessly, “the cause of the sickness was … fairy fruit.”
Dame Dreamsweet Vigil gave a smothered scream, Dame Marigold blushed crimson, and Master Polydore exclaimed, in a deeply shocked voice, “By the Milky Way, Ambrose, you are going a little too far—even if there were not ladies present.”
“No, Polydore. There come times when even ladies must face facts. You see before you two dishonoured men—Nathaniel and myself. One of our statutes says that in the country of Dorimare each member of a family shall be the master of his own possessions, and that nothing shall be held in common but disgrace. And before you are many days older, Polydore, your family, too, may be sharing that possession. Each one of us is threatened in what is nearest to us, and our chief citizen—hunts moths!”
“No, no, Nathaniel,” he went on in a louder and angrier voice, “you needn’t glare and growl! I consider that you, as Mayor of this town, are responsible for what has happened today, and …”
“By the Sun, Moon and Stars!” bellowed Master Nathaniel, “I haven’t the slightest idea what you mean by ‘what has happened today,’ but whatever it is, I know very well I’m not responsible. Were you responsible last year when old Mother Pyepowders’s yapping little bitch chewed up old Matt’s pet garters embroidered by his first sweetheart, and when …”
“You poor, snivelling, feebleminded buffoon! You criminal nincompoop! Yes, criminal, I say,” and at each word Master Ambrose’s voice grew louder. “Who was it that knew of the spread of this evil thing and took no steps to stop it? Whose own son has eaten it? By the Harvest of Souls you may have eaten it yourself for all I know …”
“Silence, you foul-mouthed, pompous, brainless, windbag! You … you … foul, gibbering Son of a Fairy!” sputtered Master Nathaniel.
And so they went at it, hammer and tongs, doing their best to destroy in a few minutes the fabric built up by years of fellowship and mutual trust.
And the end of it was that Master Nathaniel pointed to the door, and in a voice trembling with fury, told Master Ambrose to leave his house, and never to enter it again.
IX
Panic and the Silent People
The following morning Captain Mumchance rode off to search Miss Primrose Crabapple’s Academy for fairy fruit. And in his pocket was a warrant for the arrest of that lady should his search prove successful.
But when he reached the Academy he found that the birds had flown. The old rambling house was empty and silent. No light feet tripped down its corridors, no light laughter wakened its echoes. Some fierce wind had scattered the Crabapple Blossoms. Miss Primrose, too, had disappeared.
A nameless dread seized Captain Mumchance as he searched through the empty silent rooms.
He found the bedrooms in disorder—drawers half opened, delicately tinted clothing heaped on the floor—indicating that the flitting had been a hurried one.
Beneath each bed, too, he found a little pair of shoes, very down at heel, with almost worn-out soles, looking as if the feet that had worn them must have been very busy.
He continued his search down to the kitchen premises, where he found Mother Tibbs sitting smiling to herself, and crooning.
“Now, you cracked harlot,” he cried roughly, “what have you been up to, I’d like to know? I’ve had my eye on you, my beauty, for a very long time. If I can’t make you speak, perhaps the judges will. What’s happened to the young ladies? Just you tell me that!”
But Mother Tibbs was more crazy than usual that day, and her only answer was to trip up and down the kitchen floor, singing snatches of old songs about birds set free, and celestial flowers, and the white fruits that grow on the Milky Way.
Mumchance was holding one of the little shoes, and catching sight of it, she snatched it from him, and tenderly stroked it, as if it had been a wounded dove.
“Dancing, dancing, dancing!” she muttered, “dancing day
