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diff --git a/837-0.txt b/837-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..e343b60 --- /dev/null +++ b/837-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,9455 @@ +The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Story of the Amulet, by E. Nesbit + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and +most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions +whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms +of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at +www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you +will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before +using this eBook. + +Title: The Story of the Amulet + +Author: E. Nesbit + +Release Date: March, 1997 [eBook #837] +[Most recently updated: April 7, 2021] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: UTF-8 + +Produced by: Jo Churcher and David Widger + +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE STORY OF THE AMULET *** + + + + +The Story of the Amulet + +by E. Nesbit + + +Contents + + CHAPTER I. THE PSAMMEAD + CHAPTER II. THE HALF AMULET + CHAPTER III. THE PAST + CHAPTER IV. EIGHT THOUSAND YEARS AGO + CHAPTER V. THE FIGHT IN THE VILLAGE + CHAPTER VI. THE WAY TO BABYLON + CHAPTER VII. “THE DEEPEST DUNGEON BELOW THE CASTLE MOAT” + CHAPTER VIII. THE QUEEN IN LONDON + CHAPTER IX. ATLANTIS + CHAPTER X. THE LITTLE BLACK GIRL AND JULIUS CAESAR + CHAPTER XI. BEFORE PHARAOH + CHAPTER XII. THE SORRY-PRESENT AND THE EXPELLED LITTLE BOY + CHAPTER XIII. THE SHIPWRECK ON THE TIN ISLANDS + CHAPTER XIV. THE HEART’S DESIRE + + +TO + +Dr Wallis Budge +of the British Museum as a +small token of gratitude for his +unfailing kindness and help +in the making of it + + + + +CHAPTER I. +THE PSAMMEAD + + +There were once four children who spent their summer holidays in a +white house, happily situated between a sandpit and a chalkpit. One day +they had the good fortune to find in the sandpit a strange creature. +Its eyes were on long horns like snail’s eyes, and it could move them +in and out like telescopes. It had ears like a bat’s ears, and its +tubby body was shaped like a spider’s and covered with thick soft +fur—and it had hands and feet like a monkey’s. It told the +children—whose names were Cyril, Robert, Anthea, and Jane—that it was a +Psammead or sand-fairy. (Psammead is pronounced Sammy-ad.) It was old, +old, old, and its birthday was almost at the very beginning of +everything. And it had been buried in the sand for thousands of years. +But it still kept its fairylikeness, and part of this fairylikeness was +its power to give people whatever they wished for. You know fairies +have always been able to do this. Cyril, Robert, Anthea, and Jane now +found their wishes come true; but, somehow, they never could think of +just the right things to wish for, and their wishes sometimes turned +out very oddly indeed. In the end their unwise wishings landed them in +what Robert called “a very tight place indeed”, and the Psammead +consented to help them out of it in return for their promise never +never to ask it to grant them any more wishes, and never to tell anyone +about it, because it did not want to be bothered to give wishes to +anyone ever any more. At the moment of parting Jane said politely— + +“I wish we were going to see you again some day.” + +And the Psammead, touched by this friendly thought, granted the wish. +The book about all this is called _Five Children and It_, and it ends +up in a most tiresome way by saying— + +“The children _did_ see the Psammead again, but it was not in the +sandpit; it was—but I must say no more—” + +The reason that nothing more could be said was that I had not then been +able to find out exactly when and where the children met the Psammead +again. Of course I knew they would meet it, because it was a beast of +its word, and when it said a thing would happen, that thing happened +without fail. How different from the people who tell us about what +weather it is going to be on Thursday next, in London, the South Coast, +and Channel! + +The summer holidays during which the Psammead had been found and the +wishes given had been wonderful holidays in the country, and the +children had the highest hopes of just such another holiday for the +next summer. The winter holidays were beguiled by the wonderful +happenings of _The Phœnix and the Carpet_, and the loss of these two +treasures would have left the children in despair, but for the splendid +hope of their next holiday in the country. The world, they felt, and +indeed had some reason to feel, was full of wonderful things—and they +were really the sort of people that wonderful things happen to. So they +looked forward to the summer holiday; but when it came everything was +different, and very, very horrid. Father had to go out to Manchuria to +telegraph news about the war to the tiresome paper he wrote for—the +_Daily Bellower_, or something like that, was its name. And Mother, +poor dear Mother, was away in Madeira, because she had been very ill. +And The Lamb—I mean the baby—was with her. And Aunt Emma, who was +Mother’s sister, had suddenly married Uncle Reginald, who was Father’s +brother, and they had gone to China, which is much too far off for you +to expect to be asked to spend the holidays in, however fond your aunt +and uncle may be of you. So the children were left in the care of old +Nurse, who lived in Fitzroy Street, near the British Museum, and though +she was always very kind to them, and indeed spoiled them far more than +would be good for the most grown-up of us, the four children felt +perfectly wretched, and when the cab had driven off with Father and all +his boxes and guns and the sheepskin, with blankets and the aluminium +mess-kit inside it, the stoutest heart quailed, and the girls broke +down altogether, and sobbed in each other’s arms, while the boys each +looked out of one of the long gloomy windows of the parlour, and tried +to pretend that no boy would be such a muff as to cry. + +I hope you notice that they were not cowardly enough to cry till their +Father had gone; they knew he had quite enough to upset him without +that. But when he was gone everyone felt as if it had been trying not +to cry all its life, and that it must cry now, if it died for it. So +they cried. + +Tea—with shrimps and watercress—cheered them a little. The watercress +was arranged in a hedge round a fat glass salt-cellar, a tasteful +device they had never seen before. But it was not a cheerful meal. + +After tea Anthea went up to the room that had been Father’s, and when +she saw how dreadfully he wasn’t there, and remembered how every minute +was taking him further and further from her, and nearer and nearer to +the guns of the Russians, she cried a little more. Then she thought of +Mother, ill and alone, and perhaps at that very moment wanting a little +girl to put eau-de-cologne on her head, and make her sudden cups of +tea, and she cried more than ever. And then she remembered what Mother +had said, the night before she went away, about Anthea being the eldest +girl, and about trying to make the others happy, and things like that. +So she stopped crying, and thought instead. And when she had thought as +long as she could bear she washed her face and combed her hair, and +went down to the others, trying her best to look as though crying were +an exercise she had never even heard of. + +She found the parlour in deepest gloom, hardly relieved at all by the +efforts of Robert, who, to make the time pass, was pulling Jane’s +hair—not hard, but just enough to tease. + +“Look here,” said Anthea. “Let’s have a palaver.” This word dated from +the awful day when Cyril had carelessly wished that there were Red +Indians in England—and there had been. The word brought back memories +of last summer holidays and everyone groaned; they thought of the white +house with the beautiful tangled garden—late roses, asters, marigold, +sweet mignonette, and feathery asparagus—of the wilderness which +someone had once meant to make into an orchard, but which was now, as +Father said, “five acres of thistles haunted by the ghosts of baby +cherry-trees”. They thought of the view across the valley, where the +lime-kilns looked like Aladdin’s palaces in the sunshine, and they +thought of their own sandpit, with its fringe of yellowy grasses and +pale-stringy-stalked wild flowers, and the little holes in the cliff +that were the little sand-martins’ little front doors. And they thought +of the free fresh air smelling of thyme and sweetbriar, and the scent +of the wood-smoke from the cottages in the lane—and they looked round +old Nurse’s stuffy parlour, and Jane said— + +“Oh, how different it all is!” + +It was. Old Nurse had been in the habit of letting lodgings, till +Father gave her the children to take care of. And her rooms were +furnished “for letting”. Now it is a very odd thing that no one ever +seems to furnish a room “for letting” in a bit the same way as one +would furnish it for living in. This room had heavy dark red stuff +curtains—the colour that blood would not make a stain on—with coarse +lace curtains inside. The carpet was yellow, and violet, with bits of +grey and brown oilcloth in odd places. The fireplace had shavings and +tinsel in it. There was a very varnished mahogany chiffonier, or +sideboard, with a lock that wouldn’t act. There were hard chairs—far +too many of them—with crochet antimacassars slipping off their seats, +all of which sloped the wrong way. The table wore a cloth of a cruel +green colour with a yellow chain-stitch pattern round it. Over the +fireplace was a looking-glass that made you look much uglier than you +really were, however plain you might be to begin with. Then there was a +mantelboard with maroon plush and wool fringe that did not match the +plush; a dreary clock like a black marble tomb—it was silent as the +grave too, for it had long since forgotten how to tick. And there were +painted glass vases that never had any flowers in, and a painted +tambourine that no one ever played, and painted brackets with nothing +on them. + +“And maple-framed engravings of the Queen, +The Houses of Parliament, the Plains of Heaven, +And of a blunt-nosed woodman’s flat return.” + + +There were two books—last December’s _Bradshaw_, and an odd volume of +Plumridge’s _Commentary on Thessalonians_. There were—but I cannot +dwell longer on this painful picture. It was indeed, as Jane said, very +different. + +“Let’s have a palaver,” said Anthea again. + +“What about?” said Cyril, yawning. + +“There’s nothing to have _anything_ about,” said Robert kicking the leg +of the table miserably. + +“I don’t want to play,” said Jane, and her tone was grumpy. + +Anthea tried very hard not to be cross. She succeeded. + +“Look here,” she said, “don’t think I want to be preachy or a beast in +any way, but I want to what Father calls define the situation. Do you +agree?” + +“Fire ahead,” said Cyril without enthusiasm. + +“Well then. We all know the reason we’re staying here is because Nurse +couldn’t leave her house on account of the poor learned gentleman on +the top-floor. And there was no one else Father could entrust to take +care of us—and you know it’s taken a lot of money, Mother’s going to +Madeira to be made well.” + +Jane sniffed miserably. + +“Yes, I know,” said Anthea in a hurry, “but don’t let’s think about how +horrid it all is. I mean we can’t go to things that cost a lot, but we +must do _something_. And I know there are heaps of things you can see +in London without paying for them, and I thought we’d go and see them. +We are all quite old now, and we haven’t got The Lamb—” + +Jane sniffed harder than before. + +“I mean no one can say ‘No’ because of him, dear pet. And I thought we +_must_ get Nurse to see how quite old we are, and let us go out by +ourselves, or else we shall never have any sort of a time at all. And I +vote we see everything there is, and let’s begin by asking Nurse to +give us some bits of bread and we’ll go to St James’s Park. There are +ducks there, I know, we can feed them. Only we must make Nurse let us +go by ourselves.” + +“Hurrah for liberty!” said Robert, “but she won’t.” + +“Yes she will,” said Jane unexpectedly. “_I_ thought about that this +morning, and I asked Father, and he said yes; and what’s more he told +old Nurse we might, only he said we must always say where we wanted to +go, and if it was right she would let us.” + +“Three cheers for thoughtful Jane,” cried Cyril, now roused at last +from his yawning despair. “I say, let’s go now.” + +So they went, old Nurse only begging them to be careful of crossings, +and to ask a policeman to assist in the more difficult cases. But they +were used to crossings, for they had lived in Camden Town and knew the +Kentish Town Road where the trams rush up and down like mad at all +hours of the day and night, and seem as though, if anything, they would +rather run over you than not. + +They had promised to be home by dark, but it was July, so dark would be +very late indeed, and long past bedtime. + +They started to walk to St James’s Park, and all their pockets were +stuffed with bits of bread and the crusts of toast, to feed the ducks +with. They started, I repeat, but they never got there. + +Between Fitzroy Street and St James’s Park there are a great many +streets, and, if you go the right way you will pass a great many shops +that you cannot possibly help stopping to look at. The children stopped +to look at several with gold-lace and beads and pictures and jewellery +and dresses, and hats, and oysters and lobsters in their windows, and +their sorrow did not seem nearly so impossible to bear as it had done +in the best parlour at No. 300, Fitzroy Street. + +Presently, by some wonderful chance turn of Robert’s (who had been +voted Captain because the girls thought it would be good for him—and +indeed he thought so himself—and of course Cyril couldn’t vote against +him because it would have looked like a mean jealousy), they came into +the little interesting criss-crossy streets that held the most +interesting shops of all—the shops where live things were sold. There +was one shop window entirely filled with cages, and all sorts of +beautiful birds in them. The children were delighted till they +remembered how they had once wished for wings themselves, and had had +them—and then they felt how desperately unhappy anything with wings +must be if it is shut up in a cage and not allowed to fly. + +“It must be fairly beastly to be a bird in a cage,” said Cyril. “Come +on!” + +They went on, and Cyril tried to think out a scheme for making his +fortune as a gold-digger at Klondyke, and then buying all the caged +birds in the world and setting them free. Then they came to a shop that +sold cats, but the cats were in cages, and the children could not help +wishing someone would buy all the cats and put them on hearthrugs, +which are the proper places for cats. And there was the dog-shop, and +that was not a happy thing to look at either, because all the dogs were +chained or caged, and all the dogs, big and little, looked at the four +children with sad wistful eyes and wagged beseeching tails as if they +were trying to say, “Buy me! buy me! buy me! and let me go for a walk +with you; oh, do buy me, and buy my poor brothers too! Do! do! do!” +They almost said, “Do! do! do!” plain to the ear, as they whined; all +but one big Irish terrier, and he growled when Jane patted him. + +“Grrrrr,” he seemed to say, as he looked at them from the back corner +of his eye—“_You_ won’t buy me. Nobody will—ever—I shall die chained +up—and I don’t know that I care how soon it is, either!” + +I don’t know that the children would have understood all this, only +once they had been in a besieged castle, so they knew how hateful it is +to be kept in when you want to get out. + +Of course they could not buy any of the dogs. They did, indeed, ask the +price of the very, very smallest, and it was sixty-five pounds—but that +was because it was a Japanese toy spaniel like the Queen once had her +portrait painted with, when she was only Princess of Wales. But the +children thought, if the smallest was all that money, the biggest would +run into thousands—so they went on. + +And they did not stop at any more cat or dog or bird shops, but passed +them by, and at last they came to a shop that seemed as though it only +sold creatures that did not much mind where they were—such as goldfish +and white mice, and sea-anemones and other aquarium beasts, and lizards +and toads, and hedgehogs and tortoises, and tame rabbits and +guinea-pigs. And there they stopped for a long time, and fed the +guinea-pigs with bits of bread through the cage-bars, and wondered +whether it would be possible to keep a sandy-coloured double-lop in the +basement of the house in Fitzroy Street. + +“I don’t suppose old Nurse would mind _very_ much,” said Jane. “Rabbits +are most awfully tame sometimes. I expect it would know her voice and +follow her all about.” + +“She’d tumble over it twenty times a day,” said Cyril; “now a snake—” + +“There aren’t any snakes,” said Robert hastily, “and besides, I never +could cotton to snakes somehow—I wonder why.” + +“Worms are as bad,” said Anthea, “and eels and slugs—I think it’s +because we don’t like things that haven’t got legs.” + +“Father says snakes have got legs hidden away inside of them,” said +Robert. + +“Yes—and he says _we’ve_ got tails hidden away inside _us_—but it +doesn’t either of it come to anything _really_,” said Anthea. “I hate +things that haven’t any legs.” + +“It’s worse when they have too many,” said Jane with a shudder, “think +of centipedes!” + +They stood there on the pavement, a cause of some inconvenience to the +passersby, and thus beguiled the time with conversation. Cyril was +leaning his elbow on the top of a hutch that had seemed empty when they +had inspected the whole edifice of hutches one by one, and he was +trying to reawaken the interest of a hedgehog that had curled itself +into a ball earlier in the interview, when a small, soft voice just +below his elbow said, quietly, plainly and quite unmistakably—not in +any squeak or whine that had to be translated—but in downright common +English— + +“Buy me—do—please buy me!” + +Cyril started as though he had been pinched, and jumped a yard away +from the hutch. + +“Come back—oh, come back!” said the voice, rather louder but still +softly; “stoop down and pretend to be tying up your bootlace—I see it’s +undone, as usual.” + +Cyril mechanically obeyed. He knelt on one knee on the dry, hot dusty +pavement, peered into the darkness of the hutch and found himself face +to face with—the Psammead! + +It seemed much thinner than when he had last seen it. It was dusty and +dirty, and its fur was untidy and ragged. It had hunched itself up into +a miserable lump, and its long snail’s eyes were drawn in quite tight +so that they hardly showed at all. + +“Listen,” said the Psammead, in a voice that sounded as though it would +begin to cry in a minute, “I don’t think the creature who keeps this +shop will ask a very high price for me. I’ve bitten him more than once, +and I’ve made myself look as common as I can. He’s never had a glance +from my beautiful, beautiful eyes. Tell the others I’m here—but tell +them to look at some of those low, common beasts while I’m talking to +you. The creature inside mustn’t think you care much about me, or he’ll +put a price upon me far, far beyond your means. I remember in the dear +old days last summer you never had much money. Oh—I never thought I +should be so glad to see you—I never did.” It sniffed, and shot out its +long snail’s eyes expressly to drop a tear well away from its fur. +“Tell the others I’m here, and then I’ll tell you exactly what to do +about buying me.” + +Cyril tied his bootlace into a hard knot, stood up and addressed the +others in firm tones— + +“Look here,” he said, “I’m not kidding—and I appeal to your honour,” an +appeal which in this family was never made in vain. “Don’t look at that +hutch—look at the white rat. Now you are not to look at that hutch +whatever I say.” + +He stood in front of it to prevent mistakes. + +“Now get yourselves ready for a great surprise. In that hutch there’s +an old friend of ours—_don’t_ look!—Yes; it’s the Psammead, the good +old Psammead! it wants us to buy it. It says you’re not to look at it. +Look at the white rat and count your money! On your honour don’t look!” + +The others responded nobly. They looked at the white rat till they +quite stared him out of countenance, so that he went and sat up on his +hind legs in a far corner and hid his eyes with his front paws, and +pretended he was washing his face. + +Cyril stooped again, busying himself with the other bootlace and +listened for the Psammead’s further instructions. + +“Go in,” said the Psammead, “and ask the price of lots of other things. +Then say, ‘What do you want for that monkey that’s lost its tail—the +mangy old thing in the third hutch from the end.’ Oh—don’t mind _my_ +feelings—call me a mangy monkey—I’ve tried hard enough to look like +one! I don’t think he’ll put a high price on me—I’ve bitten him eleven +times since I came here the day before yesterday. If he names a bigger +price than you can afford, say you wish you had the money.” + +“But you can’t give us wishes. I’ve promised never to have another wish +from you,” said the bewildered Cyril. + +“Don’t be a silly little idiot,” said the Sand-fairy in trembling but +affectionate tones, “but find out how much money you’ve got between +you, and do exactly what I tell you.” + +Cyril, pointing a stiff and unmeaning finger at the white rat, so as to +pretend that its charms alone employed his tongue, explained matters to +the others, while the Psammead hunched itself, and bunched itself, and +did its very best to make itself look uninteresting. + +Then the four children filed into the shop. + +“How much do you want for that white rat?” asked Cyril. + +“Eightpence,” was the answer. + +“And the guinea-pigs?” + +“Eighteenpence to five bob, according to the breed.” + +“And the lizards?” + +“Ninepence each.” + +“And toads?” + +“Fourpence. Now look here,” said the greasy owner of all this caged +life with a sudden ferocity which made the whole party back hurriedly +on to the wainscoting of hutches with which the shop was lined. “Lookee +here. I ain’t agoin’ to have you a comin’ in here a turnin’ the whole +place outer winder, an’ prizing every animile in the stock just for +your larks, so don’t think it! If you’re a buyer, _be_ a buyer—but I +never had a customer yet as wanted to buy mice, and lizards, and toads, +and guineas all at once. So hout you goes.” + +“Oh! wait a minute,” said the wretched Cyril, feeling how foolishly yet +well-meaningly he had carried out the Psammead’s instructions. “Just +tell me one thing. What do you want for the mangy old monkey in the +third hutch from the end?” + +The shopman only saw in this a new insult. + +“Mangy young monkey yourself,” said he; “get along with your blooming +cheek. Hout you goes!” + +“Oh! don’t be so cross,” said Jane, losing her head altogether, “don’t +you see he really _does_ want to know _that!_” + +“Ho! does ’e indeed,” sneered the merchant. Then he scratched his ear +suspiciously, for he was a sharp business man, and he knew the ring of +truth when he heard it. His hand was bandaged, and three minutes before +he would have been glad to sell the “mangy old monkey” for ten +shillings. Now— + +“Ho! ’E does, does ’e,” he said, “then two pun ten’s my price. He’s not +got his fellow that monkey ain’t, nor yet his match, not this side of +the equator, which he comes from. And the only one ever seen in London. +Ought to be in the Zoo. Two pun ten, down on the nail, or _hout_ you +goes!” + +The children looked at each other—twenty-three shillings and fivepence +was all they had in the world, and it would have been merely three and +fivepence, but for the sovereign which Father had given to them +“between them” at parting. + +“We’ve only twenty-three shillings and fivepence,” said Cyril, rattling +the money in his pocket. + +“Twenty-three farthings and somebody’s own cheek,” said the dealer, for +he did not believe that Cyril had so much money. + +There was a miserable pause. Then Anthea remembered, and said— + +“Oh! I _wish_ I had two pounds ten.” + +“So do I, Miss, I’m sure,” said the man with bitter politeness; “I wish +you “ad, I’m sure!” + +Anthea’s hand was on the counter, something seemed to slide under it. +She lifted it. There lay five bright half sovereigns. + +“Why, I _have_ got it after all,” she said; “here’s the money, now +let’s have the Sammy,... the monkey I mean.” + +The dealer looked hard at the money, but he made haste to put it in his +pocket. + +“I only hope you come by it honest,” he said, shrugging his shoulders. +He scratched his ear again. + +“Well!” he said, “I suppose I must let you have it, but it’s worth +thribble the money, so it is—” + +He slowly led the way out to the hutch—opened the door gingerly, and +made a sudden fierce grab at the Psammead, which the Psammead +acknowledged in one last long lingering bite. + +“Here, take the brute,” said the shopman, squeezing the Psammead so +tight that he nearly choked it. “It’s bit me to the marrow, it have.” + +The man’s eyes opened as Anthea held out her arms. “Don’t blame me if +it tears your face off its bones,” he said, and the Psammead made a +leap from his dirty horny hands, and Anthea caught it in hers, which +were not very clean, certainly, but at any rate were soft and pink, and +held it kindly and closely. + +“But you can’t take it home like that,” Cyril said, “we shall have a +crowd after us,” and indeed two errand boys and a policeman had already +collected. + +“I can’t give you nothink only a paper-bag, like what we put the +tortoises in,” said the man grudgingly. + +So the whole party went into the shop, and the shopman’s eyes nearly +came out of his head when, having given Anthea the largest paper-bag he +could find, he saw her hold it open, and the Psammead carefully creep +into it. + +“Well!” he said, “if that there don’t beat cockfighting! But p’raps +you’ve met the brute afore.” + +“Yes,” said Cyril affably, “he’s an old friend of ours.” + +“If I’d a known that,” the man rejoined, “you shouldn’t a had him under +twice the money. ’Owever,” he added, as the children disappeared, “I +ain’t done so bad, seeing as I only give five bob for the beast. But +then there’s the bites to take into account!” + +The children trembling in agitation and excitement, carried home the +Psammead, trembling in its paper-bag. + +When they got it home, Anthea nursed it, and stroked it, and would have +cried over it, if she hadn’t remembered how it hated to be wet. + +When it recovered enough to speak, it said— + +“Get me sand; silver sand from the oil and colour shop. And get me +plenty.” + +They got the sand, and they put it and the Psammead in the round bath +together, and it rubbed itself, and rolled itself, and shook itself and +scraped itself, and scratched itself, and preened itself, till it felt +clean and comfy, and then it scrabbled a hasty hole in the sand, and +went to sleep in it. + +The children hid the bath under the girls’ bed, and had supper. Old +Nurse had got them a lovely supper of bread and butter and fried +onions. She was full of kind and delicate thoughts. + +When Anthea woke the next morning, the Psammead was snuggling down +between her shoulder and Jane’s. + +“You have saved my life,” it said. “I know that man would have thrown +cold water on me sooner or later, and then I should have died. I saw +him wash out a guinea-pig’s hutch yesterday morning. I’m still +frightfully sleepy, I think I’ll go back to sand for another nap. Wake +the boys and this dormouse of a Jane, and when you’ve had your +breakfasts we’ll have a talk.” + +“Don’t _you_ want any breakfast?” asked Anthea. + +“I daresay I shall pick a bit presently,” it said; “but sand is all I +care about—it’s meat and drink to me, and coals and fire and wife and +children.” With these words it clambered down by the bedclothes and +scrambled back into the bath, where they heard it scratching itself out +of sight. + +“Well!” said Anthea, “anyhow our holidays won’t be dull _now_. We’ve +found the Psammead again.” + +“No,” said Jane, beginning to put on her stockings. “We shan’t be +_dull_—but it’ll be only like having a pet dog now it can’t give us +wishes.” + +“Oh, don’t be so discontented,” said Anthea. “If it can’t do anything +else it can tell us about Megatheriums and things.” + + + + +CHAPTER II. +THE HALF AMULET + + +Long ago—that is to say last summer—the children, finding themselves +embarrassed by some wish which the Psammead had granted them, and which +the servants had not received in a proper spirit, had wished that the +servants might not notice the gifts which the Psammead gave. And when +they parted from the Psammead their last wish had been that they should +meet it again. Therefore they _had_ met it (and it was jolly lucky for +the Psammead, as Robert pointed out). Now, of course, you see that the +Psammead’s being where it was, was the consequence of one of their +wishes, and therefore was a Psammead-wish, and as such could not be +noticed by the servants. And it was soon plain that in the Psammead’s +opinion old Nurse was still a servant, although she had now a house of +her own, for she never noticed the Psammead at all. And that was as +well, for she would never have consented to allow the girls to keep an +animal and a bath of sand under their bed. + +When breakfast had been cleared away—it was a very nice breakfast with +hot rolls to it, a luxury quite out of the common way—Anthea went and +dragged out the bath, and woke the Psammead. It stretched and shook +itself. + +“You must have bolted your breakfast most unwholesomely,” it said, “you +can’t have been five minutes over it.” + +“We’ve been nearly an hour,” said Anthea. “Come—you know you promised.” + +“Now look here,” said the Psammead, sitting back on the sand and +shooting out its long eyes suddenly, “we’d better begin as we mean to +go on. It won’t do to have any misunderstanding, so I tell you plainly +that—” + +“Oh, _please_,” Anthea pleaded, “do wait till we get to the others. +They’ll think it most awfully sneakish of me to talk to you without +them; do come down, there’s a dear.” + +She knelt before the sand-bath and held out her arms. The Psammead must +have remembered how glad it had been to jump into those same little +arms only the day before, for it gave a little grudging grunt, and +jumped once more. + +Anthea wrapped it in her pinafore and carried it downstairs. It was +welcomed in a thrilling silence. + +At last Anthea said, “Now then!” + +“What place is this?” asked the Psammead, shooting its eyes out and +turning them slowly round. + +“It’s a sitting-room, of course,” said Robert. + +“Then I don’t like it,” said the Psammead. + +“Never mind,” said Anthea kindly; “we’ll take you anywhere you like if +you want us to. What was it you were going to say upstairs when I said +the others wouldn’t like it if I stayed talking to you without them?” + +It looked keenly at her, and she blushed. + +“Don’t be silly,” it said sharply. “Of course, it’s quite natural that +you should like your brothers and sisters to know exactly how good and +unselfish you were.” + +“I wish you wouldn’t,” said Jane. “Anthea was quite right. What was it +you were going to say when she stopped you?” + +“I’ll tell you,” said the Psammead, “since you’re so anxious to know. I +was going to say this. You’ve saved my life—and I’m not ungrateful—but +it doesn’t change your nature or mine. You’re still very ignorant, and +rather silly, and I am worth a thousand of you any day of the week.” + +“Of course you are!” Anthea was beginning but it interrupted her. + +“It’s very rude to interrupt,” it said; “what I mean is that I’m not +going to stand any nonsense, and if you think what you’ve done is to +give you the right to pet me or make me demean myself by playing with +you, you’ll find out that what you think doesn’t matter a single penny. +See? It’s what _I_ think that matters.” + +“I know,” said Cyril, “it always was, if you remember.” + +“Well,” said the Psammead, “then that’s settled. We’re to be treated as +we deserve. I with respect, and all of you with—but I don’t wish to be +offensive. Do you want me to tell you how I got into that horrible den +you bought me out of? Oh, I’m not ungrateful! I haven’t forgotten it +and I shan’t forget it.” + +“Do tell us,” said Anthea. “I know you’re awfully clever, but even with +all your cleverness, I don’t believe you can possibly know how—how +respectfully we do respect you. Don’t we?” + +The others all said yes—and fidgeted in their chairs. Robert spoke the +wishes of all when he said— + +“I do wish you’d go on.” So it sat up on the green-covered table and +went on. + +“When you’d gone away,” it said, “I went to sand for a bit, and slept. +I was tired out with all your silly wishes, and I felt as though I +hadn’t really been to sand for a year.” + +“To sand?” Jane repeated. + +“Where I sleep. You go to bed. I go to sand.” + +Jane yawned; the mention of bed made her feel sleepy. + +“All right,” said the Psammead, in offended tones. “I’m sure _I_ don’t +want to tell you a long tale. A man caught me, and I bit him. And he +put me in a bag with a dead hare and a dead rabbit. And he took me to +his house and put me out of the bag into a basket with holes that I +could see through. And I bit him again. And then he brought me to this +city, which I am told is called the Modern Babylon—though it’s not a +bit like the old Babylon—and he sold me to the man you bought me from, +and then I bit them both. Now, what’s your news?” + +“There’s not quite so much biting in our story,” said Cyril +regretfully; “in fact, there isn’t any. Father’s gone to Manchuria, and +Mother and The Lamb have gone to Madeira because Mother was ill, and +don’t I just wish that they were both safe home again.” + +Merely from habit, the Sand-fairy began to blow itself out, but it +stopped short suddenly. + +“I forgot,” it said; “I can’t give you any more wishes.” + +“No—but look here,” said Cyril, “couldn’t we call in old Nurse and get +her to say _she_ wishes they were safe home. I’m sure she does.” + +“No go,” said the Psammead. “It’s just the same as your wishing +yourself if you get some one else to wish for you. It won’t act.” + +“But it did yesterday—with the man in the shop,” said Robert. + +“Ah yes,” said the creature, “but you didn’t _ask_ him to wish, and you +didn’t know what would happen if he did. That can’t be done again. It’s +played out.” + +“Then you can’t help us at all,” said Jane; “oh—I did think you could +do something; I’ve been thinking about it ever since we saved your life +yesterday. I thought you’d be certain to be able to fetch back Father, +even if you couldn’t manage Mother.” + +And Jane began to cry. + +“Now _don’t_,” said the Psammead hastily; “you know how it always +upsets me if you cry. I can’t feel safe a moment. Look here; you must +have some new kind of charm.” + +“That’s easier said than done.” + +“Not a bit of it,” said the creature; “there’s one of the strongest +charms in the world not a stone’s throw from where you bought me +yesterday. The man that I bit so—the first one, I mean—went into a shop +to ask how much something cost—I think he said it was a concertina—and +while he was telling the man in the shop how much too much he wanted +for it, I saw the charm in a sort of tray, with a lot of other things. +If you can only buy _that_, you will be able to have your heart’s +desire.” + +The children looked at each other and then at the Psammead. Then Cyril +coughed awkwardly and took sudden courage to say what everyone was +thinking. + +“I do hope you won’t be waxy,” he said; “but it’s like this: when you +used to give us our wishes they almost always got us into some row or +other, and we used to think you wouldn’t have been pleased if they +hadn’t. Now, about this charm—we haven’t got over and above too much +tin, and if we blue it all on this charm and it turns out to be not up +to much—well—you see what I’m driving at, don’t you?” + +“I see that _you_ don’t see more than the length of your nose, and +_that’s_ not far,” said the Psammead crossly. “Look here, I _had_ to +give you the wishes, and of course they turned out badly, in a sort of +way, because you hadn’t the sense to wish for what was good for you. +But this charm’s quite different. I haven’t _got_ to do this for you, +it’s just my own generous kindness that makes me tell you about it. So +it’s bound to be all right. See?” + +“Don’t be cross,” said Anthea, “Please, _please_ don’t. You see, it’s +all we’ve got; we shan’t have any more pocket-money till Daddy comes +home—unless he sends us some in a letter. But we _do_ trust you. And I +say all of you,” she went on, “don’t you think it’s worth spending +_all_ the money, if there’s even the chanciest chance of getting Father +and Mother back safe _now?_ Just think of it! Oh, do let’s!” + +“_I_ don’t care what you do,” said the Psammead; “I’ll go back to sand +again till you’ve made up your minds.” + +“No, don’t!” said everybody; and Jane added, “We are quite mind +made-up—don’t you see we are? Let’s get our hats. Will you come with +us?” + +“Of course,” said the Psammead; “how else would you find the shop?” + +So everybody got its hat. The Psammead was put into a flat bass-bag +that had come from Farringdon Market with two pounds of filleted plaice +in it. Now it contained about three pounds and a quarter of solid +Psammead, and the children took it in turns to carry it. + +“It’s not half the weight of The Lamb,” Robert said, and the girls +sighed. + +The Psammead poked a wary eye out of the top of the basket every now +and then, and told the children which turnings to take. + +“How on earth do you know?” asked Robert. “I can’t think how you do +it.” + +And the Psammead said sharply, “No—I don’t suppose you can.” + +At last they came to _the_ shop. It had all sorts and kinds of things +in the window—concertinas, and silk handkerchiefs, china vases and +tea-cups, blue Japanese jars, pipes, swords, pistols, lace collars, +silver spoons tied up in half-dozens, and wedding-rings in a red +lacquered basin. There were officers’ epaulets and doctors’ lancets. +There were tea-caddies inlaid with red turtle-shell and brass +curly-wurlies, plates of different kinds of money, and stacks of +different kinds of plates. There was a beautiful picture of a little +girl washing a dog, which Jane liked very much. And in the middle of +the window there was a dirty silver tray full of mother-of-pearl card +counters, old seals, paste buckles, snuff-boxes, and all sorts of +little dingy odds and ends. + +The Psammead put its head quite out of the fish-basket to look in the +window, when Cyril said— + +“There’s a tray there with rubbish in it.” + +And then its long snail’s eyes saw something that made them stretch out +so much that they were as long and thin as new slate-pencils. Its fur +bristled thickly, and its voice was quite hoarse with excitement as it +whispered— + +“That’s it! That’s it! There, under that blue and yellow buckle, you +can see a bit sticking out. It’s red. Do you see?” + +“Is it that thing something like a horse-shoe?” asked Cyril. “And red, +like the common sealing-wax you do up parcels with?” + +“Yes, that’s it,” said the Psammead. “Now, you do just as you did +before. Ask the price of other things. That blue buckle would do. Then +the man will get the tray out of the window. I think you’d better be +the one,” it said to Anthea. “We’ll wait out here.” + +So the others flattened their noses against the shop window, and +presently a large, dirty, short-fingered hand with a very big diamond +ring came stretching through the green half-curtains at the back of the +shop window and took away the tray. + +They could not see what was happening in the interview between Anthea +and the Diamond Ring, and it seemed to them that she had had time—if +she had had money—to buy everything in the shop before the moment came +when she stood before them, her face wreathed in grins, as Cyril said +later, and in her hand the charm. + +It was something like this: + +[Illustration] + +and it was made of a red, smooth, softly shiny stone. + +“I’ve got it,” Anthea whispered, just opening her hand to give the +others a glimpse of it. “Do let’s get home. We can’t stand here like +stuck-pigs looking at it in the street.” + +So home they went. The parlour in Fitzroy Street was a very flat +background to magic happenings. Down in the country among the flowers +and green fields anything had seemed—and indeed had been—possible. But +it was hard to believe that anything really wonderful could happen so +near the Tottenham Court Road. But the Psammead was there—and it in +itself was wonderful. And it could talk—and it had shown them where a +charm could be bought that would make the owner of it perfectly happy. +So the four children hurried home, taking very long steps, with their +chins stuck out, and their mouths shut very tight indeed. They went so +fast that the Psammead was quite shaken about in its fish-bag, but it +did not say anything—perhaps for fear of attracting public notice. + +They got home at last, very hot indeed, and set the Psammead on the +green tablecloth. + +“Now then!” said Cyril. + +But the Psammead had to have a plate of sand fetched for it, for it was +quite faint. When it had refreshed itself a little it said— + +“Now then! Let me see the charm,” and Anthea laid it on the green +table-cover. The Psammead shot out his long eyes to look at it, then it +turned them reproachfully on Anthea and said— + +“But there’s only half of it here!” + +This was indeed a blow. + +“It was all there was,” said Anthea, with timid firmness. She knew it +was not her fault. + +“There should be another piece,” said the Psammead, “and a sort of pin +to fasten the two together.” + +“Isn’t half any good?”—“Won’t it work without the other bit?”—“It cost +seven-and-six.”—“Oh, bother, bother, bother!”—“Don’t be silly little +idiots!” said everyone and the Psammead altogether. + +Then there was a wretched silence. Cyril broke it— + +“What shall we do?” + +“Go back to the shop and see if they haven’t got the other half,” said +the Psammead. “I’ll go to sand till you come back. Cheer up! Even the +bit you’ve got is _some_ good, but it’ll be no end of a bother if you +can’t find the other.” + +So Cyril went to the shop. And the Psammead to sand. And the other +three went to dinner, which was now ready. And old Nurse was very cross +that Cyril was not ready too. + +The three were watching at the windows when Cyril returned, and even +before he was near enough for them to see his face there was something +about the slouch of his shoulders and set of his knickerbockers and the +way he dragged his boots along that showed but too plainly that his +errand had been in vain. + +“Well?” they all said, hoping against hope on the front-door step. + +“No go,” Cyril answered; “the man said the thing was perfect. He said +it was a Roman lady’s locket, and people shouldn’t buy curios if they +didn’t know anything about arky—something or other, and that he never +went back on a bargain, because it wasn’t business, and he expected his +customers to act the same. He was simply nasty—that’s what he was, and +I want my dinner.” + +It was plain that Cyril was not pleased. + +The unlikeliness of anything really interesting happening in that +parlour lay like a weight of lead on everyone’s spirits. Cyril had his +dinner, and just as he was swallowing the last mouthful of +apple-pudding there was a scratch at the door. Anthea opened it and in +walked the Psammead. + +“Well,” it said, when it had heard the news, “things might be worse. +Only you won’t be surprised if you have a few adventures before you get +the other half. You want to get it, of course.” + +“Rather,” was the general reply. “And we don’t mind adventures.” + +“No,” said the Psammead, “I seem to remember that about you. Well, sit +down and listen with all your ears. Eight, are there? Right—I am glad +you know arithmetic. Now pay attention, because I don’t intend to tell +you everything twice over.” + +As the children settled themselves on the floor—it was far more +comfortable than the chairs, as well as more polite to the Psammead, +who was stroking its whiskers on the hearth-rug—a sudden cold pain +caught at Anthea’s heart. Father—Mother—the darling Lamb—all far away. +Then a warm, comfortable feeling flowed through her. The Psammead was +here, and at least half a charm, and there were to be adventures. (If +you don’t know what a cold pain is, I am glad for your sakes, and I +hope you never may.) + +“Now,” said the Psammead cheerily, “you are not particularly nice, nor +particularly clever, and you’re not at all good-looking. Still, you’ve +saved my life—oh, when I think of that man and his pail of water!—so +I’ll tell you all I know. At least, of course I can’t do that, because +I know far too much. But I’ll tell you all I know about this red +thing.” + +“Do! Do! Do! Do!” said everyone. + +“Well, then,” said the Psammead. “This thing is half of an Amulet that +can do all sorts of things; it can make the corn grow, and the waters +flow, and the trees bear fruit, and the little new beautiful babies +come. (Not that babies _are_ beautiful, of course,” it broke off to +say, “but their mothers think they are—and as long as you think a +thing’s true it _is_ true as far as you’re concerned.)” + +Robert yawned. + +The Psammead went on. + +“The complete Amulet can keep off all the things that make people +unhappy—jealousy, bad temper, pride, disagreeableness, greediness, +selfishness, laziness. Evil spirits, people called them when the Amulet +was made. Don’t you think it would be nice to have it?” + +“Very,” said the children, quite without enthusiasm. + +“And it can give you strength and courage.” + +“That’s better,” said Cyril. + +“And virtue.” + +“I suppose it’s nice to have that,” said Jane, but not with much +interest. + +“And it can give you your heart’s desire.” + +“Now you’re talking,” said Robert. + +“Of course I am,” retorted the Psammead tartly, “so there’s no need for +you to.” + +“Heart’s desire is good enough for me,” said Cyril. + +“Yes, but,” Anthea ventured, “all that’s what the _whole_ charm can do. +There’s something that the half we’ve got can win off its own bat—isn’t +there?” She appealed to the Psammead. It nodded. + +“Yes,” it said; “the half has the power to take you anywhere you like +to look for the other half.” + +This seemed a brilliant prospect till Robert asked— + +“Does it know where to look?” + +The Psammead shook its head and answered, “I don’t think it’s likely.” + +“Do you?” + +“No.” + +“Then,” said Robert, “we might as well look for a needle in a bottle of +hay. Yes—it _is_ bottle, and not bundle, Father said so.” + +“Not at all,” said the Psammead briskly-, “you think you know +everything, but you are quite mistaken. The first thing is to get the +thing to talk.” + +“Can it?” Jane questioned. Jane’s question did not mean that she +thought it couldn’t, for in spite of the parlour furniture the feeling +of magic was growing deeper and thicker, and seemed to fill the room +like a dream of a scented fog. + +“Of course it can. I suppose you can read.” + +“Oh yes!” Everyone was rather hurt at the question. + +“Well, then—all you’ve got to do is to read the name that’s written on +the part of the charm that you’ve got. And as soon as you say the name +out loud the thing will have power to do—well, several things.” + +There was a silence. The red charm was passed from hand to hand. + +“There’s no name on it,” said Cyril at last. + +“Nonsense,” said the Psammead; “what’s that?” + +“Oh, _that!_” said Cyril, “it’s not reading. It looks like pictures of +chickens and snakes and things.” + +This was what was on the charm: + +[Illustration] + +“I’ve no patience with you,” said the Psammead; “if you can’t read you +must find some one who can. A priest now?” + +“We don’t know any priests,” said Anthea; “we know a clergyman—he’s +called a priest in the prayer-book, you know—but he only knows Greek +and Latin and Hebrew, and this isn’t any of those—I know.” + +The Psammead stamped a furry foot angrily. + +“I wish I’d never seen you,” it said; “you aren’t any more good than so +many stone images. Not so much, if I’m to tell the truth. Is there no +wise man in your Babylon who can pronounce the names of the Great +Ones?” + +“There’s a poor learned gentleman upstairs,” said Anthea, “we might try +him. He has a lot of stone images in his room, and iron-looking ones +too—we peeped in once when he was out. Old Nurse says he doesn’t eat +enough to keep a canary alive. He spends it all on stones and things.” + +“Try him,” said the Psammead, “only be careful. If he knows a greater +name than this and uses it against you, your charm will be of no use. +Bind him first with the chains of honour and upright dealing. And then +ask his aid—oh, yes, you’d better all go; you can put me to sand as you +go upstairs. I must have a few minutes’ peace and quietness.” + +So the four children hastily washed their hands and brushed their +hair—this was Anthea’s idea—and went up to knock at the door of the +“poor learned gentleman”, and to “bind him with the chains of honour +and upright dealing”. + + + + +CHAPTER III. +THE PAST + + +The learned gentleman had let his dinner get quite cold. It was mutton +chop, and as it lay on the plate it looked like a brown island in the +middle of a frozen pond, because the grease of the gravy had become +cold, and consequently white. It looked very nasty, and it was the +first thing the children saw when, after knocking three times and +receiving no reply, one of them ventured to turn the handle and softly +to open the door. The chop was on the end of a long table that ran down +one side of the room. The table had images on it and queer-shaped +stones, and books. And there were glass cases fixed against the wall +behind, with little strange things in them. The cases were rather like +the ones you see in jewellers’ shops. + +The “poor learned gentleman” was sitting at a table in the window, +looking at something very small which he held in a pair of fine +pincers. He had a round spy-glass sort of thing in one eye—which +reminded the children of watchmakers, and also of the long snail’s eyes +of the Psammead. + +The gentleman was very long and thin, and his long, thin boots stuck +out under the other side of his table. He did not hear the door open, +and the children stood hesitating. At last Robert gave the door a push, +and they all started back, for in the middle of the wall that the door +had hidden was a mummy-case—very, very, very big—painted in red and +yellow and green and black, and the face of it seemed to look at them +quite angrily. + +You know what a mummy-case is like, of course? If you don’t you had +better go to the British Museum at once and find out. Anyway, it is not +at all the sort of thing that you expect to meet in a top-floor front +in Bloomsbury, looking as though it would like to know what business +_you_ had there. + +So everyone said, “Oh!” rather loud, and their boots clattered as they +stumbled back. + +The learned gentleman took the glass out of his eye and said—“I beg +your pardon,” in a very soft, quiet pleasant voice—the voice of a +gentleman who has been to Oxford. + +“It’s us that beg yours,” said Cyril politely. “We are sorry to disturb +you.” + +“Come in,” said the gentleman, rising—with the most distinguished +courtesy, Anthea told herself. “I am delighted to see you. Won’t you +sit down? No, not there; allow me to move that papyrus.” + +He cleared a chair, and stood smiling and looking kindly through his +large, round spectacles. + +“He treats us like grown-ups,” whispered Robert, “and he doesn’t seem +to know how many of us there are.” + +“Hush,” said Anthea, “it isn’t manners to whisper. You say, Cyril—go +ahead.” + +“We’re very sorry to disturb you,” said Cyril politely, “but we did +knock three times, and you didn’t say ‘Come in’, or ‘Run away now’, or +that you couldn’t be bothered just now, or to come when you weren’t so +busy, or any of the things people do say when you knock at doors, so we +opened it. We knew you were in because we heard you sneeze while we +were waiting.” + +“Not at all,” said the gentleman; “do sit down.” + +“He has found out there are four of us,” said Robert, as the gentleman +cleared three more chairs. He put the things off them carefully on the +floor. The first chair had things like bricks that tiny, tiny birds’ +feet have walked over when the bricks were soft, only the marks were in +regular lines. The second chair had round things on it like very large, +fat, long, pale beads. And the last chair had a pile of dusty papers on +it. + +The children sat down. + +“We know you are very, very learned,” said Cyril, “and we have got a +charm, and we want you to read the name on it, because it isn’t in +Latin or Greek, or Hebrew, or any of the languages _we_ know—” + +“A thorough knowledge of even those languages is a very fair foundation +on which to build an education,” said the gentleman politely. + +“Oh!” said Cyril blushing, “but we only know them to look at, except +Latin—and I’m only in Caesar with that.” + +The gentleman took off his spectacles and laughed. His laugh sounded +rusty, Cyril thought, as though it wasn’t often used. + +“Of course!” he said. “I’m sure I beg your pardon. I think I must have +been in a dream. You are the children who live downstairs, are you not? +Yes. I have seen you as I have passed in and out. And you have found +something that you think to be an antiquity, and you’ve brought it to +show me? That was very kind. I should like to inspect it.” + +“I’m afraid we didn’t think about your liking to inspect it,” said the +truthful Anthea. “It was just for _us_—because we wanted to know the +name on it—” + +“Oh, yes—and, I say,” Robert interjected, “you won’t think it rude of +us if we ask you first, before we show it, to be bound in the +what-do-you-call-it of—” + +“In the bonds of honour and upright dealing,” said Anthea. + +“I’m afraid I don’t quite follow you,” said the gentleman, with gentle +nervousness. + +“Well, it’s this way,” said Cyril. “We’ve got part of a charm. And the +Sammy—I mean, something told us it would work, though it’s only half a +one; but it won’t work unless we can say the name that’s on it. But, of +course, if you’ve got another name that can lick ours, our charm will +be no go; so we want you to give us your word of honour as a +gentleman—though I’m sure, now I’ve seen you, that it’s not necessary; +but still I’ve promised to ask you, so we must. Will you please give us +your honourable word not to say any name stronger than the name on our +charm?” + +The gentleman had put on his spectacles again and was looking at Cyril +through them. He now said: “Bless me!” more than once, adding, “Who +told you all this?” + +“I can’t tell you,” said Cyril. “I’m very sorry, but I can’t.” + +Some faint memory of a far-off childhood must have come to the learned +gentleman just then, for he smiled. “I see,” he said. “It is some sort +of game that you are engaged in? Of course! Yes! Well, I will certainly +promise. Yet I wonder how you heard of the names of power?” + +“We can’t tell you that either,” said Cyril; and Anthea said, “Here is +our charm,” and held it out. + +With politeness, but without interest, the gentleman took it. But after +the first glance all his body suddenly stiffened, as a pointer’s does +when he sees a partridge. + +“Excuse me,” he said in quite a changed voice, and carried the charm to +the window. + +He looked at it; he turned it over. He fixed his spy-glass in his eye +and looked again. No one said anything. Only Robert made a shuffling +noise with his feet till Anthea nudged him to shut up. + +At last the learned gentleman drew a long breath. + +“Where did you find this?” he asked. + +“We didn’t find it. We bought it at a shop. Jacob Absalom the name +is—not far from Charing Cross,” said Cyril. + +“We gave seven-and-sixpence for it,” added Jane. + +“It is not for sale, I suppose? You do not wish to part with it? I +ought to tell you that it is extremely valuable—extraordinarily +valuable, I may say.” + +“Yes,” said Cyril, “we know that, so of course we want to keep it.” + +“Keep it carefully, then,” said the gentleman impressively; “and if +ever you should wish to part with it, may I ask you to give me the +refusal of it?” + +“The refusal?” + +“I mean, do not sell it to anyone else until you have given me the +opportunity of buying it.” + +“All right,” said Cyril, “we won’t. But we don’t want to sell it. We +want to make it do things.” + +“I suppose you can play at that as well as at anything else,” said the +gentleman; “but I’m afraid the days of magic are over.” + +“They aren’t _really_,” said Anthea earnestly. “You’d see they aren’t +if I could tell you about our last summer holidays. Only I mustn’t. +Thank you very much. And can you read the name?” + +“Yes, I can read it.” + +“Will you tell it us?” + +“The name,” said the gentleman, “is Ur Hekau Setcheh.” + +“Ur Hekau Setcheh,” repeated Cyril. “Thanks awfully. I do hope we +haven’t taken up too much of your time.” + +“Not at all,” said the gentleman. “And do let me entreat you to be +very, very careful of that most valuable specimen.” + +They said “Thank you” in all the different polite ways they could think +of, and filed out of the door and down the stairs. Anthea was last. +Half-way down to the first landing she turned and ran up again. + +The door was still open, and the learned gentleman and the mummy-case +were standing opposite to each other, and both looked as though they +had stood like that for years. + +The gentleman started when Anthea put her hand on his arm. + +“I hope you won’t be cross and say it’s not my business,” she said, +“but do look at your chop! Don’t you think you ought to eat it? Father +forgets his dinner sometimes when he’s writing, and Mother always says +I ought to remind him if she’s not at home to do it herself, because +it’s so bad to miss your regular meals. So I thought perhaps you +wouldn’t mind my reminding you, because you don’t seem to have anyone +else to do it.” + +She glanced at the mummy-case; _it_ certainly did not look as though it +would ever think of reminding people of their meals. + +The learned gentleman looked at her for a moment before he said— + +“Thank you, my dear. It was a kindly thought. No, I haven’t anyone to +remind me about things like that.” + +He sighed, and looked at the chop. + +“It looks very nasty,” said Anthea. + +“Yes,” he said, “it does. I’ll eat it immediately, before I forget.” + +As he ate it he sighed more than once. Perhaps because the chop was +nasty, perhaps because he longed for the charm which the children did +not want to sell, perhaps because it was so long since anyone cared +whether he ate his chops or forgot them. + +Anthea caught the others at the stair-foot. They woke the Psammead, and +it taught them exactly how to use the word of power, and to make the +charm speak. I am not going to tell you how this is done, because you +might try to do it. And for you any such trying would be almost sure to +end in disappointment. Because in the first place it is a thousand +million to one against your ever getting hold of the right sort of +charm, and if you did, there would be hardly any chance at all of your +finding a learned gentleman clever enough and kind enough to read the +word for you. + +The children and the Psammead crouched in a circle on the floor—in the +girls’ bedroom, because in the parlour they might have been interrupted +by old Nurse’s coming in to lay the cloth for tea—and the charm was put +in the middle of the circle. + +The sun shone splendidly outside, and the room was very light. Through +the open window came the hum and rattle of London, and in the street +below they could hear the voice of the milkman. + +When all was ready, the Psammead signed to Anthea to say the word. And +she said it. + +Instantly the whole light of all the world seemed to go out. The room +was dark. The world outside was dark—darker than the darkest night that +ever was. And all the sounds went out too, so that there was a silence +deeper than any silence you have ever even dreamed of imagining. It was +like being suddenly deaf and blind, only darker and quieter even than +that. + +But before the children had got over the sudden shock of it enough to +be frightened, a faint, beautiful light began to show in the middle of +the circle, and at the same moment a faint, beautiful voice began to +speak. The light was too small for one to see anything by, and the +voice was too small for you to hear what it said. You could just see +the light and just hear the voice. + +But the light grew stronger. It was greeny, like glow-worms’ lamps, and +it grew and grew till it was as though thousands and thousands of +glow-worms were signalling to their winged sweethearts from the middle +of the circle. And the voice grew, not so much in loudness as in +sweetness (though it grew louder, too), till it was so sweet that you +wanted to cry with pleasure just at the sound of it. It was like +nightingales, and the sea, and the fiddle, and the voice of your mother +when you have been a long time away, and she meets you at the door when +you get home. + +And the voice said— + +“Speak. What is it that you would hear?” + +I cannot tell you what language the voice used. I only know that +everyone present understood it perfectly. If you come to think of it, +there must be some language that everyone could understand, if we only +knew what it was. Nor can I tell you how the charm spoke, nor whether +it was the charm that spoke, or some presence in the charm. The +children could not have told you either. Indeed, they could not look at +the charm while it was speaking, because the light was too bright. They +looked instead at the green radiance on the faded Kidderminster carpet +at the edge of the circle. They all felt very quiet, and not inclined +to ask questions or fidget with their feet. For this was not like the +things that had happened in the country when the Psammead had given +them their wishes. That had been funny somehow, and this was not. It +was something like _Arabian Nights_ magic, and something like being in +church. No one cared to speak. + +It was Cyril who said at last— + +“Please we want to know where the other half of the charm is.” + +“The part of the Amulet which is lost,” said the beautiful voice, “was +broken and ground into the dust of the shrine that held it. It and the +pin that joined the two halves are themselves dust, and the dust is +scattered over many lands and sunk in many seas.” + +“Oh, I say!” murmured Robert, and a blank silence fell. + +“Then it’s all up?” said Cyril at last; “it’s no use our looking for a +thing that’s smashed into dust, and the dust scattered all over the +place.” + +“If you would find it,” said the voice, “You must seek it where it +still is, perfect as ever.” + +“I don’t understand,” said Cyril. + +“In the Past you may find it,” said the voice. + +“I wish we _may_ find it,” said Cyril. + +The Psammead whispered crossly, “Don’t you understand? The thing +existed in the Past. If you were in the Past, too, you could find it. +It’s very difficult to make you understand things. Time and space are +only forms of thought.” + +“I see,” said Cyril. + +“No, you don’t,” said the Psammead, “and it doesn’t matter if you +don’t, either. What I mean is that if you were only made the right way, +you could see everything happening in the same place at the same time. +Now do you see?” + +“I’m afraid _I_ don’t,” said Anthea; “I’m sorry I’m so stupid.” + +“Well, at any rate, you see this. That lost half of the Amulet is in +the Past. Therefore it’s in the Past we must look for it. I mustn’t +speak to the charm myself. Ask it things! Find out!” + +“Where can we find the other part of you?” asked Cyril obediently. + +“In the Past,” said the voice. + +“What part of the Past?” + +“I may not tell you. If you will choose a time, I will take you to the +place that then held it. You yourselves must find it.” + +“When did you see it last?” asked Anthea—“I mean, when was it taken +away from you?” + +The beautiful voice answered— + +“That was thousands of years ago. The Amulet was perfect then, and lay +in a shrine, the last of many shrines, and I worked wonders. Then came +strange men with strange weapons and destroyed my shrine, and the +Amulet they bore away with many captives. But of these, one, my priest, +knew the word of power, and spoke it for me, so that the Amulet became +invisible, and thus returned to my shrine, but the shrine was broken +down, and ere any magic could rebuild it one spoke a word before which +my power bowed down and was still. And the Amulet lay there, still +perfect, but enslaved. Then one coming with stones to rebuild the +shrine, dropped a hewn stone on the Amulet as it lay, and one half was +sundered from the other. I had no power to seek for that which was +lost. And there being none to speak the word of power, I could not +rejoin it. So the Amulet lay in the dust of the desert many thousand +years, and at last came a small man, a conqueror with an army, and +after him a crowd of men who sought to seem wise, and one of these +found half the Amulet and brought it to this land. But none could read +the name. So I lay still. And this man dying and his son after him, the +Amulet was sold by those who came after to a merchant, and from him you +bought it, and it is here, and now, the name of power having been +spoken, I also am here.” + +This is what the voice said. I think it must have meant Napoleon by the +small man, the conqueror. Because I know I have been told that he took +an army to Egypt, and that afterwards a lot of wise people went +grubbing in the sand, and fished up all sorts of wonderful things, +older than you would think possible. And of these I believe this charm +to have been one, and the most wonderful one of all. + +Everyone listened: and everyone tried to think. It is not easy to do +this clearly when you have been listening to the kind of talk I have +told you about. + +At last Robert said— + +“Can you take us into the Past—to the shrine where you and the other +thing were together. If you could take us there, we might find the +other part still there after all these thousands of years.” + +“Still there? silly!” said Cyril. “Don’t you see, if we go back into +the Past it won’t be thousands of years ago. It will be _now_ for +us—won’t it?” He appealed to the Psammead, who said— + +“You’re not so far off the idea as you usually are!” + +“Well,” said Anthea, “will you take us back to when there was a shrine +and you were safe in it—all of you?” + +“Yes,” said the voice. “You must hold me up, and speak the word of +power, and one by one, beginning with the first-born, you shall pass +through me into the Past. But let the last that passes be the one that +holds me, and let him not lose his hold, lest you lose me, and so +remain in the Past for ever.” + +“That’s a nasty idea,” said Robert. + +“When you desire to return,” the beautiful voice went on, “hold me up +towards the East, and speak the word. Then, passing through me, you +shall return to this time and it shall be the present to you.” + +“But how—” + +A bell rang loudly. + +“Oh crikey!” exclaimed Robert, “that’s tea! Will you please make it +proper daylight again so that we can go down. And thank you so much for +all your kindness.” + +“We’ve enjoyed ourselves very much indeed, thank you!” added Anthea +politely. + +The beautiful light faded slowly. The great darkness and silence came +and these suddenly changed to the dazzlement of day and the great soft, +rustling sound of London, that is like some vast beast turning over in +its sleep. + +The children rubbed their eyes, the Psammead ran quickly to its sandy +bath, and the others went down to tea. And until the cups were actually +filled tea seemed less real than the beautiful voice and the greeny +light. + +After tea Anthea persuaded the others to allow her to hang the charm +round her neck with a piece of string. + +“It would be so awful if it got lost,” she said: “it might get lost +anywhere, you know, and it would be rather beastly for us to have to +stay in the Past for ever and ever, wouldn’t it?” + + + + +CHAPTER IV. +EIGHT THOUSAND YEARS AGO + + +Next morning Anthea got old Nurse to allow her to take up the “poor +learned gentleman’s” breakfast. He did not recognize her at first, but +when he did he was vaguely pleased to see her. + +“You see I’m wearing the charm round my neck,” she said; “I’m taking +care of it—like you told us to.” + +“That’s right,” said he; “did you have a good game last night?” + +“You will eat your breakfast before it’s cold, won’t you?” said Anthea. +“Yes, we had a splendid time. The charm made it all dark, and then +greeny light, and then it spoke. Oh! I wish you could have heard it—it +was such a darling voice—and it told us the other half of it was lost +in the Past, so of course we shall have to look for it there!” + +The learned gentleman rubbed his hair with both hands and looked +anxiously at Anthea. + +“I suppose it’s natural—youthful imagination and so forth,” he said. +“Yet someone must have... Who told you that some part of the charm was +missing?” + +“I can’t tell you,” she said. “I know it seems most awfully rude, +especially after being so kind about telling us the name of power, and +all that, but really, I’m not allowed to tell anybody anything about +the—the—the person who told me. You won’t forget your breakfast, will +you?” + +The learned gentleman smiled feebly and then frowned—not a cross-frown, +but a puzzle-frown. + +“Thank you,” he said, “I shall always be pleased if you’ll look in—any +time you’re passing you know—at least...” + +“I will,” she said; “goodbye. I’ll always tell you anything I _may_ +tell.” + +He had not had many adventures with children in them, and he wondered +whether all children were like these. He spent quite five minutes in +wondering before he settled down to the fifty-second chapter of his +great book on _The Secret Rites of the Priests of Amen Rā_. + +It is no use to pretend that the children did not feel a good deal of +agitation at the thought of going through the charm into the Past. That +idea, that perhaps they might stay in the Past and never get back +again, was anything but pleasing. Yet no one would have dared to +suggest that the charm should not be used; and though each was in its +heart very frightened indeed, they would all have joined in jeering at +the cowardice of any one of them who should have uttered the timid but +natural suggestion, “Don’t let’s!” + +It seemed necessary to make arrangements for being out all day, for +there was no reason to suppose that the sound of the dinner-bell would +be able to reach back into the Past, and it seemed unwise to excite old +Nurse’s curiosity when nothing they could say—not even the truth—could +in any way satisfy it. They were all very proud to think how well they +had understood what the charm and the Psammead had said about Time and +Space and things like that, and they were perfectly certain that it +would be quite impossible to make old Nurse understand a single word of +it. So they merely asked her to let them take their dinner out into +Regent’s Park—and this, with the implied cold mutton and tomatoes, was +readily granted. + +“You can get yourselves some buns or sponge-cakes, or whatever you +fancy-like,” said old Nurse, giving Cyril a shilling. “Don’t go getting +jam-tarts, now—so messy at the best of times, and without forks and +plates ruination to your clothes, besides your not being able to wash +your hands and faces afterwards.” + +So Cyril took the shilling, and they all started off. They went round +by the Tottenham Court Road to buy a piece of waterproof sheeting to +put over the Psammead in case it should be raining in the Past when +they got there. For it is almost certain death to a Psammead to get +wet. + +The sun was shining very brightly, and even London looked pretty. Women +were selling roses from big baskets-full, and Anthea bought four roses, +one each, for herself and the others. They were red roses and smelt of +summer—the kind of roses you always want so desperately at about +Christmas-time when you can only get mistletoe, which is pale right +through to its very scent, and holly which pricks your nose if you try +to smell it. So now everyone had a rose in its buttonhole, and soon +everyone was sitting on the grass in Regent’s Park under trees whose +leaves would have been clean, clear green in the country, but here were +dusty and yellowish, and brown at the edges. + +“We’ve got to go on with it,” said Anthea, “and as the eldest has to go +first, you’ll have to be last, Jane. You quite understand about holding +on to the charm as you go through, don’t you, Pussy?” + +“I wish I hadn’t got to be last,” said Jane. + +“You shall carry the Psammead if you like,” said Anthea. “That is,” she +added, remembering the beast’s queer temper, “if it’ll let you.” + +The Psammead, however, was unexpectedly amiable. + +“_I_ don’t mind,” it said, “who carries me, so long as it doesn’t drop +me. I can’t bear being dropped.” + +Jane with trembling hands took the Psammead and its fish-basket under +one arm. The charm’s long string was hung round her neck. Then they all +stood up. Jane held out the charm at arm’s length, and Cyril solemnly +pronounced the word of power. + +As he spoke it the charm grew tall and broad, and he saw that Jane was +just holding on to the edge of a great red arch of very curious shape. +The opening of the arch was small, but Cyril saw that he could go +through it. All round and beyond the arch were the faded trees and +trampled grass of Regent’s Park, where the little ragged children were +playing Ring-o’-Roses. But through the opening of it shone a blaze of +blue and yellow and red. Cyril drew a long breath and stiffened his +legs so that the others should not see that his knees were trembling +and almost knocking together. “Here goes!” he said, and, stepping up +through the arch, disappeared. Then followed Anthea. Robert, coming +next, held fast, at Anthea’s suggestion, to the sleeve of Jane, who was +thus dragged safely through the arch. And as soon as they were on the +other side of the arch there was no more arch at all and no more +Regent’s Park either, only the charm in Jane’s hand, and it was its +proper size again. They were now in a light so bright that they winked +and blinked and rubbed their eyes. During this dazzling interval Anthea +felt for the charm and pushed it inside Jane’s frock, so that it might +be quite safe. When their eyes got used to the new wonderful light the +children looked around them. The sky was very, very blue, and it +sparkled and glittered and dazzled like the sea at home when the sun +shines on it. + +They were standing on a little clearing in a thick, low forest; there +were trees and shrubs and a close, thorny, tangly undergrowth. In front +of them stretched a bank of strange black mud, then came the +browny-yellowy shining ribbon of a river. Then more dry, caked mud and +more greeny-browny jungle. The only things that told that human people +had been there were the clearing, a path that led to it, and an odd +arrangement of cut reeds in the river. + +They looked at each other. + +“Well!” said Robert, “this _is_ a change of air!” + +It was. The air was hotter than they could have imagined, even in +London in August. + +“I wish I knew where we were,” said Cyril. + +“Here’s a river, now—I wonder whether it’s the Amazon or the Tiber, or +what.” + +“It’s the Nile,” said the Psammead, looking out of the fish-bag. + +“Then this is Egypt,” said Robert, who had once taken a geography +prize. + +“I don’t see any crocodiles,” Cyril objected. His prize had been for +natural history. + +The Psammead reached out a hairy arm from its basket and pointed to a +heap of mud at the edge of the water. + +“What do you call that?” it said; and as it spoke the heap of mud slid +into the river just as a slab of damp mixed mortar will slip from a +bricklayer’s trowel. + +“Oh!” said everybody. + +There was a crashing among the reeds on the other side of the water. + +“And there’s a river-horse!” said the Psammead, as a great beast like +an enormous slaty-blue slug showed itself against the black bank on the +far side of the stream. + +“It’s a hippopotamus,” said Cyril; “it seems much more real somehow +than the one at the Zoo, doesn’t it?” + +“I’m glad it’s being real on the other side of the river,” said Jane. + +And now there was a crackling of reeds and twigs behind them. This was +horrible. Of course it might be another hippopotamus, or a crocodile, +or a lion—or, in fact, almost anything. + +“Keep your hand on the charm, Jane,” said Robert hastily. “We ought to +have a means of escape handy. I’m dead certain this is the sort of +place where simply anything _might_ happen to us.” + +“I believe a hippopotamus is going to happen to us,” said Jane—“a very, +very big one.” + +They had all turned to face the danger. + +“Don’t be silly little duffers,” said the Psammead in its friendly, +informal way; “it’s not a river-horse. It’s a human.” + +It was. It was a girl—of about Anthea’s age. Her hair was short and +fair, and though her skin was tanned by the sun, you could see that it +would have been fair too if it had had a chance. She had every chance +of being tanned, for she had no clothes to speak of, and the four +English children, carefully dressed in frocks, hats, shoes, stockings, +coats, collars, and all the rest of it, envied her more than any words +of theirs or of mine could possibly say. There was no doubt that here +was the right costume for that climate. + +She carried a pot on her head, of red and black earthenware. She did +not see the children, who shrank back against the edge of the jungle, +and she went forward to the brink of the river to fill her pitcher. As +she went she made a strange sort of droning, humming, melancholy noise +all on two notes. Anthea could not help thinking that perhaps the girl +thought this noise was singing. + +The girl filled the pitcher and set it down by the river bank. Then she +waded into the water and stooped over the circle of cut reeds. She +pulled half a dozen fine fish out of the water within the reeds, +killing each as she took it out, and threading it on a long osier that +she carried. Then she knotted the osier, hung it on her arm, picked up +the pitcher, and turned to come back. And as she turned she saw the +four children. The white dresses of Jane and Anthea stood out like snow +against the dark forest background. She screamed and the pitcher fell, +and the water was spilled out over the hard mud surface and over the +fish, which had fallen too. Then the water slowly trickled away into +the deep cracks. + +“Don’t be frightened,” Anthea cried, “we won’t hurt you.” + +“Who are you?” said the girl. + +Now, once for all, I am not going to be bothered to tell you how it was +that the girl could understand Anthea and Anthea could understand the +girl. _You_, at any rate, would not understand _me_, if I tried to +explain it, any more than you can understand about time and space being +only forms of thought. You may think what you like. Perhaps the +children had found out the universal language which everyone can +understand, and which wise men so far have not found. You will have +noticed long ago that they were singularly lucky children, and they may +have had this piece of luck as well as others. Or it may have been +that... but why pursue the question further? The fact remains that in +all their adventures the muddle-headed inventions which we call foreign +languages never bothered them in the least. They could always +understand and be understood. If you can explain this, please do. I +daresay I could understand your explanation, though you could never +understand mine. + +So when the girl said, “Who are you?” everyone understood at once, and +Anthea replied— + +“We are children—just like you. Don’t be frightened. Won’t you show us +where you live?” + +Jane put her face right into the Psammead’s basket, and burrowed her +mouth into its fur to whisper— + +“Is it safe? Won’t they eat us? Are they cannibals?” + +The Psammead shrugged its fur. + +“Don’t make your voice buzz like that, it tickles my ears,” it said +rather crossly. “You can always get back to Regent’s Park in time if +you keep fast hold of the charm,” it said. + +The strange girl was trembling with fright. + +Anthea had a bangle on her arm. It was a sevenpenny-halfpenny trumpery +thing that pretended to be silver; it had a glass heart of turquoise +blue hanging from it, and it was the gift of the maid-of-all-work at +the Fitzroy Street house. + +“Here,” said Anthea, “this is for you. That is to show we will not hurt +you. And if you take it I shall know that you won’t hurt us.” + +The girl held out her hand. Anthea slid the bangle over it, and the +girl’s face lighted up with the joy of possession. + +“Come,” she said, looking lovingly at the bangle; “it is peace between +your house and mine.” + +She picked up her fish and pitcher and led the way up the narrow path +by which she had come and the others followed. + +“This is something like!” said Cyril, trying to be brave. + +“Yes!” said Robert, also assuming a boldness he was far from feeling, +“this really and truly _is_ an adventure! Its being in the Past makes +it quite different from the Phœnix and Carpet happenings.” + +The belt of thick-growing acacia trees and shrubs—mostly prickly and +unpleasant-looking—seemed about half a mile across. The path was narrow +and the wood dark. At last, ahead, daylight shone through the boughs +and leaves. + +The whole party suddenly came out of the wood’s shadow into the glare +of the sunlight that shone on a great stretch of yellow sand, dotted +with heaps of grey rocks where spiky cactus plants showed gaudy crimson +and pink flowers among their shabby, sand-peppered leaves. Away to the +right was something that looked like a grey-brown hedge, and from +beyond it blue smoke went up to the bluer sky. And over all the sun +shone till you could hardly bear your clothes. + +“That is where I live,” said the girl pointing. + +“I won’t go,” whispered Jane into the basket, “unless you say it’s all +right.” + +The Psammead ought to have been touched by this proof of confidence. +Perhaps, however, it looked upon it as a proof of doubt, for it merely +snarled— + +“If you don’t go now I’ll never help you again.” + +“_Oh_,” whispered Anthea, “dear Jane, don’t! Think of Father and Mother +and all of us getting our heart’s desire. And we can go back any +minute. Come on!” + +“Besides,” said Cyril, in a low voice, “the Psammead must know there’s +no danger or it wouldn’t go. It’s not so over and above brave itself. +Come on!” + +This Jane at last consented to do. + +As they got nearer to the browny fence they saw that it was a great +hedge about eight feet high, made of piled-up thorn bushes. + +“What’s that for?” asked Cyril. + +“To keep out foes and wild beasts,” said the girl. + +“I should think it ought to, too,” said he. “Why, some of the thorns +are as long as my foot.” + +There was an opening in the hedge, and they followed the girl through +it. A little way further on was another hedge, not so high, also of dry +thorn bushes, very prickly and spiteful-looking, and within this was a +sort of village of huts. + +There were no gardens and no roads. Just huts built of wood and twigs +and clay, and roofed with great palm-leaves, dumped down anywhere. The +doors of these houses were very low, like the doors of dog-kennels. The +ground between them was not paths or streets, but just yellow sand +trampled very hard and smooth. + +In the middle of the village there was a hedge that enclosed what +seemed to be a piece of ground about as big as their own garden in +Camden Town. + +No sooner were the children well within the inner thorn hedge than +dozens of men and women and children came crowding round from behind +and inside the huts. + +The girl stood protectingly in front of the four children, and said— + +“They are wonder-children from beyond the desert. They bring marvellous +gifts, and I have said that it is peace between us and them.” + +She held out her arm with the Lowther Arcade bangle on it. + +The children from London, where nothing now surprises anyone, had never +before seen so many people look so astonished. + +They crowded round the children, touching their clothes, their shoes, +the buttons on the boys’ jackets, and the coral of the girls’ +necklaces. + +“Do say something,” whispered Anthea. + +“We come,” said Cyril, with some dim remembrance of a dreadful day when +he had had to wait in an outer office while his father interviewed a +solicitor, and there had been nothing to read but the _Daily +Telegraph_—“we come from the world where the sun never sets. And peace +with honour is what we want. We are the great Anglo-Saxon or conquering +race. Not that we want to conquer _you_,” he added hastily. “We only +want to look at your houses and your—well, at all you’ve got here, and +then we shall return to our own place, and tell of all that we have +seen so that your name may be famed.” + +Cyril’s speech didn’t keep the crowd from pressing round and looking as +eagerly as ever at the clothing of the children. Anthea had an idea +that these people had never seen woven stuff before, and she saw how +wonderful and strange it must seem to people who had never had any +clothes but the skins of beasts. The sewing, too, of modern clothes +seemed to astonish them very much. They must have been able to sew +themselves, by the way, for men who seemed to be the chiefs wore +knickerbockers of goat-skin or deer-skin, fastened round the waist with +twisted strips of hide. And the women wore long skimpy skirts of +animals’ skins. The people were not very tall, their hair was fair, and +men and women both had it short. Their eyes were blue, and that seemed +odd in Egypt. Most of them were tattooed like sailors, only more +roughly. + +“What is this? What is this?” they kept asking touching the children’s +clothes curiously. + +Anthea hastily took off Jane’s frilly lace collar and handed it to the +woman who seemed most friendly. + +“Take this,” she said, “and look at it. And leave us alone. We want to +talk among ourselves.” + +She spoke in the tone of authority which she had always found +successful when she had not time to coax her baby brother to do as he +was told. The tone was just as successful now. The children were left +together and the crowd retreated. It paused a dozen yards away to look +at the lace collar and to go on talking as hard as it could. + +The children will never know what those people said, though they knew +well enough that they, the four strangers, were the subject of the +talk. They tried to comfort themselves by remembering the girl’s +promise of friendliness, but of course the thought of the charm was +more comfortable than anything else. They sat down on the sand in the +shadow of the hedged-round place in the middle of the village, and now +for the first time they were able to look about them and to see +something more than a crowd of eager, curious faces. + +They here noticed that the women wore necklaces made of beads of +different coloured stone, and from these hung pendants of odd, strange +shapes, and some of them had bracelets of ivory and flint. + +“I say,” said Robert, “what a lot we could teach them if we stayed +here!” + +“I expect they could teach us something too,” said Cyril. “Did you +notice that flint bracelet the woman had that Anthea gave the collar +to? That must have taken some making. Look here, they’ll get suspicious +if we talk among ourselves, and I do want to know about how they do +things. Let’s get the girl to show us round, and we can be thinking +about how to get the Amulet at the same time. Only mind, we must keep +together.” + +Anthea beckoned to the girl, who was standing a little way off looking +wistfully at them, and she came gladly. + +“Tell us how you make the bracelets, the stone ones,” said Cyril. + +“With other stones,” said the girl; “the men make them; we have men of +special skill in such work.” + +“Haven’t you any iron tools?” + +“Iron,” said the girl, “I don’t know what you mean.” It was the first +word she had not understood. + +“Are all your tools of flint?” asked Cyril. + +“Of course,” said the girl, opening her eyes wide. + +I wish I had time to tell you of that talk. The English children wanted +to hear all about this new place, but they also wanted to tell of their +own country. It was like when you come back from your holidays and you +want to hear and to tell everything at the same time. As the talk went +on there were more and more words that the girl could not understand, +and the children soon gave up the attempt to explain to her what their +own country was like, when they began to see how very few of the things +they had always thought they could not do without were really not at +all necessary to life. + +The girl showed them how the huts were made—indeed, as one was being +made that very day she took them to look at it. The way of building was +very different from ours. The men stuck long pieces of wood into a +piece of ground the size of the hut they wanted to make. These were +about eight inches apart; then they put in another row about eight +inches away from the first, and then a third row still further out. +Then all the space between was filled up with small branches and twigs, +and then daubed over with black mud worked with the feet till it was +soft and sticky like putty. + +The girl told them how the men went hunting with flint spears and +arrows, and how they made boats with reeds and clay. Then she explained +the reed thing in the river that she had taken the fish out of. It was +a fish-trap—just a ring of reeds set up in the water with only one +little opening in it, and in this opening, just below the water, were +stuck reeds slanting the way of the river’s flow, so that the fish, +when they had swum sillily in, sillily couldn’t get out again. She +showed them the clay pots and jars and platters, some of them +ornamented with black and red patterns, and the most wonderful things +made of flint and different sorts of stone, beads, and ornaments, and +tools and weapons of all sorts and kinds. + +“It is really wonderful,” said Cyril patronizingly, “when you consider +that it’s all eight thousand years ago—” + +“I don’t understand you,” said the girl. + +“It _isn’t_ eight thousand years ago,” whispered Jane. “It’s _now_—and +that’s just what I don’t like about it. I say, _do_ let’s get home +again before anything more happens. You can see for yourselves the +charm isn’t here.” + +“What’s in that place in the middle?” asked Anthea, struck by a sudden +thought, and pointing to the fence. + +“That’s the secret sacred place,” said the girl in a whisper. “No one +knows what is there. There are many walls, and inside the insidest one +_It_ is, but no one knows what _It_ is except the headsmen.” + +“I believe _you_ know,” said Cyril, looking at her very hard. + +“I’ll give you this if you’ll tell me,” said Anthea taking off a +bead-ring which had already been much admired. + +“Yes,” said the girl, catching eagerly at the ring. “My father is one +of the heads, and I know a water charm to make him talk in his sleep. +And he has spoken. I will tell you. But if they know I have told you +they will kill me. In the insidest inside there is a stone box, and in +it there is the Amulet. None knows whence it came. It came from very +far away.” + +“Have you seen it?” asked Anthea. + +The girl nodded. + +“Is it anything like this?” asked Jane, rashly producing the charm. + +The girl’s face turned a sickly greenish-white. + +“Hide it, hide it,” she whispered. “You must put it back. If they see +it they will kill us all. You for taking it, and me for knowing that +there was such a thing. Oh, woe—woe! why did you ever come here?” + +“Don’t be frightened,” said Cyril. “They shan’t know. Jane, don’t you +be such a little jack-ape again—that’s all. You see what will happen if +you do. Now, tell me—” He turned to the girl, but before he had time to +speak the question there was a loud shout, and a man bounded in through +the opening in the thorn-hedge. + +“Many foes are upon us!” he cried. “Make ready the defences!” + +His breath only served for that, and he lay panting on the ground. + +“Oh, _do_ let’s go home!” said Jane. “Look here—I don’t care—I _will!_” + +She held up the charm. Fortunately all the strange, fair people were +too busy to notice _her_. She held up the charm. And nothing happened. + +“You haven’t said the word of power,” said Anthea. + +Jane hastily said it—and still nothing happened. + +“Hold it up towards the East, you silly!” said Robert. + +“Which _is_ the East?” said Jane, dancing about in her agony of terror. + +Nobody knew. So they opened the fish-bag to ask the Psammead. + +And the bag had only a waterproof sheet in it. + +The Psammead was gone. + +“Hide the sacred thing! Hide it! Hide it!” whispered the girl. + +Cyril shrugged his shoulders, and tried to look as brave as he knew he +ought to feel. + +“Hide it up, Pussy,” he said. “We are in for it now. We’ve just got to +stay and see it out.” + + + + +CHAPTER V. +THE FIGHT IN THE VILLAGE + + +Here was a horrible position! Four English children, whose proper date +was A.D. 1905, and whose proper address was London, set down in Egypt +in the year 6000 B.C. with no means whatever of getting back into their +own time and place. They could not find the East, and the sun was of no +use at the moment, because some officious person had once explained to +Cyril that the sun did not really set in the West at all—nor rise in +the East either, for the matter of that. + +The Psammead had crept out of the bass-bag when they were not looking +and had basely deserted them. + +An enemy was approaching. There would be a fight. People get killed in +fights, and the idea of taking part in a fight was one that did not +appeal to the children. + +The man who had brought the news of the enemy still lay panting on the +sand. His tongue was hanging out, long and red, like a dog’s. The +people of the village were hurriedly filling the gaps in the fence with +thorn-bushes from the heap that seemed to have been piled there ready +for just such a need. They lifted the cluster-thorns with long +poles—much as men at home, nowadays, lift hay with a fork. + +Jane bit her lip and tried to decide not to cry. + +Robert felt in his pocket for a toy pistol and loaded it with a pink +paper cap. It was his only weapon. + +Cyril tightened his belt two holes. + +And Anthea absently took the drooping red roses from the buttonholes of +the others, bit the ends of the stalks, and set them in a pot of water +that stood in the shadow by a hut door. She was always rather silly +about flowers. + +“Look here!” she said. “I think perhaps the Psammead is really +arranging something for us. I don’t believe it would go away and leave +us all alone in the Past. I’m certain it wouldn’t.” + +Jane succeeded in deciding not to cry—at any rate yet. + +“But what can we do?” Robert asked. + +“Nothing,” Cyril answered promptly, “except keep our eyes and ears +open. Look! That runner chap’s getting his wind. Let’s go and hear what +he’s got to say.” + +The runner had risen to his knees and was sitting back on his heels. +Now he stood up and spoke. He began by some respectful remarks +addressed to the heads of the village. His speech got more interesting +when he said— + +“I went out in my raft to snare ibises, and I had gone up the stream an +hour’s journey. Then I set my snares and waited. And I heard the sound +of many wings, and looking up, saw many herons circling in the air. And +I saw that they were afraid; so I took thought. A beast may scare one +heron, coming upon it suddenly, but no beast will scare a whole flock +of herons. And still they flew and circled, and would not light. So +then I knew that what scared the herons must be men, and men who knew +not our ways of going softly so as to take the birds and beasts +unawares. By this I knew they were not of our race or of our place. So, +leaving my raft, I crept along the river bank, and at last came upon +the strangers. They are many as the sands of the desert, and their +spear-heads shine red like the sun. They are a terrible people, and +their march is towards us. Having seen this, I ran, and did not stay +till I was before you.” + +“These are _your_ folk,” said the headman, turning suddenly and angrily +on Cyril, “you came as spies for them.” + +“We did _not_,” said Cyril indignantly. “We wouldn’t be spies for +anything. I’m certain these people aren’t a bit like us. Are they now?” +he asked the runner. + +“No,” was the answer. “These men’s faces were darkened, and their hair +black as night. Yet these strange children, maybe, are their gods, who +have come before to make ready the way for them.” + +A murmur ran through the crowd. + +“No, _no_,” said Cyril again. “We are on your side. We will help you to +guard your sacred things.” + +The headman seemed impressed by the fact that Cyril knew that there +_were_ sacred things to be guarded. He stood a moment gazing at the +children. Then he said— + +“It is well. And now let all make offering, that we may be strong in +battle.” + +The crowd dispersed, and nine men, wearing antelope-skins, grouped +themselves in front of the opening in the hedge in the middle of the +village. And presently, one by one, the men brought all sorts of +things—hippopotamus flesh, ostrich-feathers, the fruit of the date +palms, red chalk, green chalk, fish from the river, and ibex from the +mountains; and the headman received these gifts. There was another +hedge inside the first, about a yard from it, so that there was a lane +inside between the hedges. And every now and then one of the headmen +would disappear along this lane with full hands and come back with +hands empty. + +“They’re making offerings to their Amulet,” said Anthea. “We’d better +give something too.” + +The pockets of the party, hastily explored, yielded a piece of pink +tape, a bit of sealing-wax, and part of the Waterbury watch that Robert +had not been able to help taking to pieces at Christmas and had never +had time to rearrange. Most boys have a watch in this condition. + +They presented their offerings, and Anthea added the red roses. + +The headman who took the things looked at them with awe, especially at +the red roses and the Waterbury-watch fragment. + +“This is a day of very wondrous happenings,” he said. “I have no more +room in me to be astonished. Our maiden said there was peace between +you and us. But for this coming of a foe we should have made sure.” + +The children shuddered. + +“Now speak. Are you upon our side?” + +“_Yes_. Don’t I keep telling you we are?” Robert said. “Look here. I +will give you a sign. You see this.” He held out the toy pistol. “I +shall speak to it, and if it answers me you will know that I and the +others are come to guard your sacred thing—that we’ve just made the +offerings to.” + +“Will that god whose image you hold in your hand speak to you alone, or +shall I also hear it?” asked the man cautiously. + +“You’ll be surprised when you _do_ hear it,” said Robert. “Now, then.” +He looked at the pistol and said— + +“If we are to guard the sacred treasure within”—he pointed to the +hedged-in space—“speak with thy loud voice, and we shall obey.” + +He pulled the trigger, and the cap went off. The noise was loud, for it +was a two-shilling pistol, and the caps were excellent. + +Every man, woman, and child in the village fell on its face on the +sand. + +The headman who had accepted the test rose first. + +“The voice has spoken,” he said. “Lead them into the ante-room of the +sacred thing.” + +So now the four children were led in through the opening of the hedge +and round the lane till they came to an opening in the inner hedge, and +they went through an opening in that, and so passed into another lane. + +The thing was built something like this, and all the hedges were of +brushwood and thorns: + +[Illustration] + +“It’s like the maze at Hampton Court,” whispered Anthea. + +The lanes were all open to the sky, but the little hut in the middle of +the maze was round-roofed, and a curtain of skins hung over the +doorway. + +“Here you may wait,” said their guide, “but do not dare to pass the +curtain.” He himself passed it and disappeared. + +“But look here,” whispered Cyril, “some of us ought to be outside in +case the Psammead turns up.” + +“Don’t let’s get separated from each other, whatever we do,” said +Anthea. “It’s quite bad enough to be separated from the Psammead. We +can’t do anything while that man is in there. Let’s all go out into the +village again. We can come back later now we know the way in. That +man’ll have to fight like the rest, most likely, if it comes to +fighting. If we find the Psammead we’ll go straight home. It must be +getting late, and I don’t much like this mazy place.” + +They went out and told the headman that they would protect the treasure +when the fighting began. And now they looked about them and were able +to see exactly how a first-class worker in flint flakes and notches an +arrow-head or the edge of an axe—an advantage which no other person now +alive has ever enjoyed. The boys found the weapons most interesting. +The arrow-heads were not on arrows such as you shoot from a bow, but on +javelins, for throwing from the hand. The chief weapon was a stone +fastened to a rather short stick something like the things gentlemen +used to carry about and call life-preservers in the days of the +garrotters. Then there were long things like spears or lances, with +flint knives—horribly sharp—and flint battle-axes. + +Everyone in the village was so busy that the place was like an ant-heap +when you have walked into it by accident. The women were busy and even +the children. + +Quite suddenly all the air seemed to glow and grow red—it was like the +sudden opening of a furnace door, such as you may see at Woolwich +Arsenal if you ever have the luck to be taken there—and then almost as +suddenly it was as though the furnace doors had been shut. For the sun +had set, and it was night. + +The sun had that abrupt way of setting in Egypt eight thousand years +ago, and I believe it has never been able to break itself of the habit, +and sets in exactly the same manner to the present day. The girl +brought the skins of wild deer and led the children to a heap of dry +sedge. + +“My father says they will not attack yet. Sleep!” she said, and it +really seemed a good idea. You may think that in the midst of all these +dangers the children would not have been able to sleep—but somehow, +though they were rather frightened now and then, the feeling was +growing in them—deep down and almost hidden away, but still +growing—that the Psammead was to be trusted, and that they were really +and truly safe. This did not prevent their being quite as much +frightened as they could bear to be without being perfectly miserable. + +“I suppose we’d better go to sleep,” said Robert. “I don’t know what on +earth poor old Nurse will do with us out all night; set the police on +our tracks, I expect. I only wish they could find us! A dozen policemen +would be rather welcome just now. But it’s no use getting into a stew +over it,” he added soothingly. “Good night.” + +And they all fell asleep. + +They were awakened by long, loud, terrible sounds that seemed to come +from everywhere at once—horrible threatening shouts and shrieks and +howls that sounded, as Cyril said later, like the voices of men +thirsting for their enemies’ blood. + +“It is the voice of the strange men,” said the girl, coming to them +trembling through the dark. “They have attacked the walls, and the +thorns have driven them back. My father says they will not try again +till daylight. But they are shouting to frighten us. As though we were +savages! Dwellers in the swamps!” she cried indignantly. + +All night the terrible noise went on, but when the sun rose, as +abruptly as he had set, the sound suddenly ceased. + +The children had hardly time to be glad of this before a shower of +javelins came hurtling over the great thorn-hedge, and everyone +sheltered behind the huts. But next moment another shower of weapons +came from the opposite side, and the crowd rushed to other shelter. +Cyril pulled out a javelin that had stuck in the roof of the hut beside +him. Its head was of brightly burnished copper. + +Then the sound of shouting arose again and the crackle of dried thorns. +The enemy was breaking down the hedge. All the villagers swarmed to the +point whence the crackling and the shouting came; they hurled stones +over the hedges, and short arrows with flint heads. The children had +never before seen men with the fighting light in their eyes. It was +very strange and terrible, and gave you a queer thick feeling in your +throat; it was quite different from the pictures of fights in the +illustrated papers at home. + +It seemed that the shower of stones had driven back the besiegers. The +besieged drew breath, but at that moment the shouting and the crackling +arose on the opposite side of the village and the crowd hastened to +defend that point, and so the fight swayed to and fro across the +village, for the besieged had not the sense to divide their forces as +their enemies had done. + +Cyril noticed that every now and then certain of the fighting-men would +enter the maze, and come out with brighter faces, a braver aspect, and +a more upright carriage. + +“I believe they go and touch the Amulet,” he said. “You know the +Psammead said it could make people brave.” + +They crept through the maze, and watching they saw that Cyril was +right. A headman was standing in front of the skin curtain, and as the +warriors came before him he murmured a word they could not hear, and +touched their foreheads with something that they could not see. And +this something he held in his hands. And through his fingers they saw +the gleam of a red stone that they knew. + +The fight raged across the thorn-hedge outside. Suddenly there was a +loud and bitter cry. + +“They’re in! They’re in! The hedge is down!” + +The headman disappeared behind the deer-skin curtain. + +“He’s gone to hide it,” said Anthea. “Oh, Psammead dear, how could you +leave us!” + +Suddenly there was a shriek from inside the hut, and the headman +staggered out white with fear and fled out through the maze. The +children were as white as he. + +“Oh! What is it? What is it?” moaned Anthea. “Oh, Psammead, how could +you! How could you!” + +And the sound of the fight sank breathlessly, and swelled fiercely all +around. It was like the rising and falling of the waves of the sea. + +Anthea shuddered and said again, “Oh, Psammead, Psammead!” + +“Well?” said a brisk voice, and the curtain of skins was lifted at one +corner by a furry hand, and out peeped the bat’s ears and snail’s eyes +of the Psammead. + +Anthea caught it in her arms and a sigh of desperate relief was +breathed by each of the four. + +“Oh! which _is_ the East!” Anthea said, and she spoke hurriedly, for +the noise of wild fighting drew nearer and nearer. + +“Don’t choke me,” said the Psammead, “come inside.” + +The inside of the hut was pitch dark. + +“I’ve got a match,” said Cyril, and struck it. The floor of the hut was +of soft, loose sand. + +“I’ve been asleep here,” said the Psammead; “most comfortable it’s +been, the best sand I’ve had for a month. It’s all right. Everything’s +all right. I knew your only chance would be while the fight was going +on. That man won’t come back. I bit him, and he thinks I’m an Evil +Spirit. Now you’ve only got to take the thing and go.” + +The hut was hung with skins. Heaped in the middle were the offerings +that had been given the night before, Anthea’s roses fading on the top +of the heap. At one side of the hut stood a large square stone block, +and on it an oblong box of earthenware with strange figures of men and +beasts on it. + +“Is the thing in there?” asked Cyril, as the Psammead pointed a skinny +finger at it. + +“You must judge of that,” said the Psammead. “The man was just going to +bury the box in the sand when I jumped out at him and bit him.” + +“Light another match, Robert,” said Anthea. “Now, then quick! which is +the East?” + +“Why, where the sun rises, of course!” + +“But someone told us—” + +“Oh! they’ll tell you anything!” said the Psammead impatiently, getting +into its bass-bag and wrapping itself in its waterproof sheet. + +“But we can’t see the sun in here, and it isn’t rising anyhow,” said +Jane. + +“How you do waste time!” the Psammead said. “Why, the East’s where the +shrine is, of course. _There!_” + +It pointed to the great stone. + +And still the shouting and the clash of stone on metal sounded nearer +and nearer. The children could hear that the headmen had surrounded the +hut to protect their treasure as long as might be from the enemy. But +none dare to come in after the Psammead’s sudden fierce biting of the +headman. + +“Now, Jane,” said Cyril, very quickly. “I’ll take the Amulet, you stand +ready to hold up the charm, and be sure you don’t let it go as you come +through.” + +He made a step forward, but at that instant a great crackling overhead +ended in a blaze of sunlight. The roof had been broken in at one side, +and great slabs of it were being lifted off by two spears. As the +children trembled and winked in the new light, large dark hands tore +down the wall, and a dark face, with a blobby fat nose, looked over the +gap. Even at that awful moment Anthea had time to think that it was +very like the face of Mr Jacob Absalom, who had sold them the charm in +the shop near Charing Cross. + +“Here is their Amulet,” cried a harsh, strange voice; “it is this that +makes them strong to fight and brave to die. And what else have we +here—gods or demons?” + +He glared fiercely at the children, and the whites of his eyes were +very white indeed. He had a wet, red copper knife in his teeth. There +was not a moment to lose. + +“Jane, _Jane_, QUICK!” cried everyone passionately. + +Jane with trembling hands held up the charm towards the East, and Cyril +spoke the word of power. The Amulet grew to a great arch. Out beyond it +was the glaring Egyptian sky, the broken wall, the cruel, dark, +big-nosed face with the red, wet knife in its gleaming teeth. Within +the arch was the dull, faint, greeny-brown of London grass and trees. + +“Hold tight, Jane!” Cyril cried, and he dashed through the arch, +dragging Anthea and the Psammead after him. Robert followed, clutching +Jane. And in the ears of each, as they passed through the arch of the +charm, the sound and fury of battle died out suddenly and utterly, and +they heard only the low, dull, discontented hum of vast London, and the +peeking and patting of the sparrows on the gravel and the voices of the +ragged baby children playing Ring-o’-Roses on the yellow trampled +grass. And the charm was a little charm again in Jane’s hand, and there +was the basket with their dinner and the bathbuns lying just where they +had left it. + +“My hat!” said Cyril, drawing a long breath; “that was something like +an adventure.” + +“It was rather like one, certainly,” said the Psammead. + +They all lay still, breathing in the safe, quiet air of Regent’s Park. + +“We’d better go home at once,” said Anthea presently. “Old Nurse will +be most frightfully anxious. The sun looks about the same as it did +when we started yesterday. We’ve been away twenty-four hours.” + +“The buns are quite soft still,” said Cyril, feeling one; “I suppose +the dew kept them fresh.” + +They were not hungry, curiously enough. + +They picked up the dinner-basket and the Psammead-basket, and went +straight home. + +Old Nurse met them with amazement. + +“Well, if ever I did!” she said. “What’s gone wrong? You’ve soon tired +of your picnic.” + +The children took this to be bitter irony, which means saying the exact +opposite of what you mean in order to make yourself disagreeable; as +when you happen to have a dirty face, and someone says, “How nice and +clean you look!” + +“We’re very sorry,” began Anthea, but old Nurse said— + +“Oh, bless me, child, I don’t care! Please yourselves and you’ll please +me. Come in and get your dinners comf’table. I’ve got a potato on +a-boiling.” + +When she had gone to attend to the potatoes the children looked at each +other. Could it be that old Nurse had so changed that she no longer +cared that they should have been away from home for twenty-four +hours—all night in fact—without any explanation whatever? + +But the Psammead put its head out of its basket and said— + +“What’s the matter? Don’t you understand? You come back through the +charm-arch at the same time as you go through it. This isn’t tomorrow!” + +“Is it still yesterday?” asked Jane. + +“No, it’s today. The same as it’s always been. It wouldn’t do to go +mixing up the present and the Past, and cutting bits out of one to fit +into the other.” + +“Then all that adventure took no time at all?” + +“You can call it that if you like,” said the Psammead. “It took none of +the modern time, anyhow.” + +That evening Anthea carried up a steak for the learned gentleman’s +dinner. She persuaded Beatrice, the maid-of-all-work, who had given her +the bangle with the blue stone, to let her do it. And she stayed and +talked to him, by special invitation, while he ate the dinner. + +She told him the whole adventure, beginning with— + +“This afternoon we found ourselves on the bank of the River Nile,” and +ending up with, “And then we remembered how to get back, and there we +were in Regent’s Park, and it hadn’t taken any time at all.” + +She did not tell anything about the charm or the Psammead, because that +was forbidden, but the story was quite wonderful enough even as it was +to entrance the learned gentleman. + +“You are a most unusual little girl,” he said. “Who tells you all these +things?” + +“No one,” said Anthea, “they just happen.” + +“Make-believe,” he said slowly, as one who recalls and pronounces a +long-forgotten word. + +He sat long after she had left him. At last he roused himself with a +start. + +“I really must take a holiday,” he said; “my nerves must be all out of +order. I actually have a perfectly distinct impression that the little +girl from the rooms below came in and gave me a coherent and graphic +picture of life as I conceive it to have been in pre-dynastic Egypt. +Strange what tricks the mind will play! I shall have to be more +careful.” + +He finished his bread conscientiously, and actually went for a mile +walk before he went back to his work. + + + + +CHAPTER VI. +THE WAY TO BABYLON + + +“How many miles to Babylon? + Three score and ten! +Can I get there by candle light? + Yes, and back again!” + + +Jane was singing to her doll, rocking it to and fro in the house which +she had made for herself and it. The roof of the house was the +dining-table, and the walls were tablecloths and antimacassars hanging +all round, and kept in their places by books laid on their top ends at +the table edge. + +The others were tasting the fearful joys of domestic tobogganing. You +know how it is done—with the largest and best tea-tray and the surface +of the stair carpet. It is best to do it on the days when the stair +rods are being cleaned, and the carpet is only held by the nails at the +top. Of course, it is one of the five or six thoroughly tip-top games +that grown-up people are so unjust to—and old Nurse, though a brick in +many respects, was quite enough of a standard grown-up to put her foot +down on the tobogganing long before any of the performers had had half +enough of it. The tea-tray was taken away, and the baffled party +entered the sitting-room, in exactly the mood not to be pleased if they +could help it. + +So Cyril said, “What a beastly mess!” + +And Robert added, “Do shut up, Jane!” + +Even Anthea, who was almost always kind, advised Jane to try another +song. “I’m sick to death of that,” said she. + +It was a wet day, so none of the plans for seeing all the sights of +London that can be seen for nothing could be carried out. Everyone had +been thinking all the morning about the wonderful adventures of the day +before, when Jane had held up the charm and it had turned into an arch, +through which they had walked straight out of the present time and the +Regent’s Park into the land of Egypt eight thousand years ago. The +memory of yesterday’s happenings was still extremely fresh and +frightening, so that everyone hoped that no one would suggest another +excursion into the past, for it seemed to all that yesterday’s +adventures were quite enough to last for at least a week. Yet each felt +a little anxious that the others should not think it was afraid, and +presently Cyril, who really was not a coward, began to see that it +would not be at all nice if he should have to think himself one. So he +said— + +“I say—about that charm—Jane—come out. We ought to talk about it, +anyhow.” + +“Oh, if that’s all,” said Robert. + +Jane obediently wriggled to the front of her house and sat there. She +felt for the charm, to make sure that it was still round her neck. + +“It _isn’t_ all,” said Cyril, saying much more than he meant because he +thought Robert’s tone had been rude—as indeed it had. “We ought to go +and look for that Amulet. What’s the good of having a first-class charm +and keeping it idle, just eating its head off in the stable.” + +“_I’m_ game for anything, of course,” said Robert; but he added, with a +fine air of chivalry, “only I don’t think the girls are keen today +somehow.” + +“Oh, yes; I am,” said Anthea hurriedly. “If you think I’m afraid, I’m +not.” + +“I am though,” said Jane heavily; “I didn’t like it, and I won’t go +there again—not for anything I won’t.” + +“We shouldn’t go _there_ again, silly,” said Cyril; “it would be some +other place.” + +“I daresay; a place with lions and tigers in it as likely as not.” + +Seeing Jane so frightened, made the others feel quite brave. They said +they were certain they ought to go. + +“It’s so ungrateful to the Psammead not to,” Anthea added, a little +primly. + +Jane stood up. She was desperate. + +“I won’t!” she cried; “I won’t, I won’t, I won’t! If you make me I’ll +scream and I’ll scream, and I’ll tell old Nurse, and I’ll get her to +burn the charm in the kitchen fire. So now, then!” + +You can imagine how furious everyone was with Jane for feeling what +each of them had felt all the morning. In each breast the same thought +arose, “No one can say it’s _our_ fault.” And they at once began to +show Jane how angry they all felt that all the fault was hers. This +made them feel quite brave. + +“Tell-tale tit, its tongue shall be split, +And all the dogs in our town shall have a little bit,” + + +sang Robert. + +“It’s always the way if you have girls in anything.” Cyril spoke in a +cold displeasure that was worse than Robert’s cruel quotation, and even +Anthea said, “Well, _I’m_ not afraid if I _am_ a girl,” which of +course, was the most cutting thing of all. + +Jane picked up her doll and faced the others with what is sometimes +called the courage of despair. + +“I don’t care,” she said; “I _won’t_, so there! It’s just silly going +to places when you don’t want to, and when you don’t know what they’re +going to be like! You can laugh at me as much as you like. You’re +beasts—and I hate you all!” + +With these awful words she went out and banged the door. + +Then the others would not look at each other, and they did not feel so +brave as they had done. + +Cyril took up a book, but it was not interesting to read. Robert kicked +a chair-leg absently. His feet were always eloquent in moments of +emotion. Anthea stood pleating the end of the tablecloth into folds—she +seemed earnestly anxious to get all the pleats the same size. The sound +of Jane’s sobs had died away. + +Suddenly Anthea said, “Oh! let it be ‘pax’—poor little Pussy—you know +she’s the youngest.” + +“She called us beasts,” said Robert, kicking the chair suddenly. + +“Well,” said Cyril, who was subject to passing fits of justice, “we +began, you know. At least you did.” Cyril’s justice was always +uncompromising. + +“I’m not going to say I’m sorry if you mean that,” said Robert, and the +chair-leg cracked to the kick he gave as he said it. + +“Oh, do let’s,” said Anthea, “we’re three to one, and Mother does so +hate it if we row. Come on. I’ll say I’m sorry first, though I didn’t +say anything, hardly.” + +“All right, let’s get it over,” said Cyril, opening the +door.“Hi—you—Pussy!” + +Far away up the stairs a voice could be heard singing brokenly, but +still defiantly— + +“How many miles (sniff) to Babylon? + Three score and ten! (sniff) +Can I get there by candle light? + Yes (sniff), and back again!” + + +It was trying, for this was plainly meant to annoy. But Anthea would +not give herself time to think this. She led the way up the stairs, +taking three at a time, and bounded to the level of Jane, who sat on +the top step of all, thumping her doll to the tune of the song she was +trying to sing. + +“I say, Pussy, let it be pax! We’re sorry if you are—” + +It was enough. The kiss of peace was given by all. Jane being the +youngest was entitled to this ceremonial. + +Anthea added a special apology of her own. + +“I’m sorry if I was a pig, Pussy dear,” she said—“especially because in +my really and truly inside mind I’ve been feeling a little as if I’d +rather not go into the Past again either. But then, do think. If we +don’t go we shan’t get the Amulet, and oh, Pussy, think if we could +only get Father and Mother and The Lamb safe back! We _must_ go, but +we’ll wait a day or two if you like and then perhaps you’ll feel +braver.” + +“Raw meat makes you brave, however cowardly you are,” said Robert, to +show that there was now no ill-feeling, “and cranberries—that’s what +Tartars eat, and they’re so brave it’s simply awful. I suppose +cranberries are only for Christmas time, but I’ll ask old Nurse to let +you have your chop very raw if you like.” + +“I think I could be brave without that,” said Jane hastily; she hated +underdone meat. “I’ll try.” + +At this moment the door of the learned gentleman’s room opened, and he +looked out. + +“Excuse me,” he said, in that gentle, polite weary voice of his, “but +was I mistaken in thinking that I caught a familiar word just now? Were +you not singing some old ballad of Babylon?” + +“No,” said Robert, “at least Jane was singing ‘How many miles,’ but I +shouldn’t have thought you could have heard the words for—” + +He would have said, “for the sniffing,” but Anthea pinched him just in +time. + +“I did not hear _all_ the words,” said the learned gentleman. “I wonder +would you recite them to me?” + +So they all said together— + +“How many miles to Babylon? + Three score and ten! +Can I get there by candle light? + Yes, and back again!” + + +“I wish one could,” the learned gentleman said with a sigh. + +“Can’t you?” asked Jane. + +“Babylon has fallen,” he answered with a sigh. “You know it was once a +great and beautiful city, and the centre of learning and Art, and now +it is only ruins, and so covered up with earth that people are not even +agreed as to where it once stood.” + +He was leaning on the banisters, and his eyes had a far-away look in +them, as though he could see through the staircase window the splendour +and glory of ancient Babylon. + +“I say,” Cyril remarked abruptly. “You know that charm we showed you, +and you told us how to say the name that’s on it?” + +“Yes!” + +“Well, do you think that charm was ever in Babylon?” + +“It’s quite possible,” the learned gentleman replied. “Such charms have +been found in very early Egyptian tombs, yet their origin has not been +accurately determined as Egyptian. They may have been brought from +Asia. Or, supposing the charm to have been fashioned in Egypt, it might +very well have been carried to Babylon by some friendly embassy, or +brought back by the Babylonish army from some Egyptian campaign as part +of the spoils of war. The inscription may be much later than the charm. +Oh yes! it is a pleasant fancy, that that splendid specimen of yours +was once used amid Babylonish surroundings.” + +The others looked at each other, but it was Jane who spoke. + +“Were the Babylon people savages, were they always fighting and +throwing things about?” For she had read the thoughts of the others by +the unerring light of her own fears. + +“The Babylonians were certainly more gentle than the Assyrians,” said +the learned gentleman. “And they were not savages by any means. A very +high level of culture,” he looked doubtfully at his audience and went +on, “I mean that they made beautiful statues and jewellery, and built +splendid palaces. And they were very learned—they had glorious +libraries and high towers for the purpose of astrological and +astronomical observation.” + +“Er?” said Robert. + +“I mean for—star-gazing and fortune-telling,” said the learned +gentleman, “and there were temples and beautiful hanging gardens—” + +“I’ll go to Babylon if you like,” said Jane abruptly, and the others +hastened to say “Done!” before she should have time to change her mind. + +“Ah,” said the learned gentleman, smiling rather sadly, “one can go so +far in dreams, when one is young.” He sighed again, and then adding +with a laboured briskness, “I hope you’ll have a—a—jolly game,” he went +into his room and shut the door. + +“He said ‘jolly’ as if it was a foreign language,” said Cyril. “Come +on, let’s get the Psammead and go now. I think Babylon seems a most +frightfully jolly place to go to.” + +So they woke the Psammead and put it in its bass-bag with the +waterproof sheet, in case of inclement weather in Babylon. It was very +cross, but it said it would as soon go to Babylon as anywhere else. +“The sand is good thereabouts,” it added. + +Then Jane held up the charm, and Cyril said— + +“We want to go to Babylon to look for the part of you that was lost. +Will you please let us go there through you?” + +“Please put us down just outside,” said Jane hastily; “and then if we +don’t like it we needn’t go inside.” + +“Don’t be all day,” said the Psammead. + +So Anthea hastily uttered the word of power, without which the charm +could do nothing. + +“Ur—Hekau—Setcheh!” she said softly, and as she spoke the charm grew +into an arch so tall that the top of it was close against the bedroom +ceiling. Outside the arch was the bedroom painted chest-of-drawers and +the Kidderminster carpet, and the washhand-stand with the riveted +willow-pattern jug, and the faded curtains, and the dull light of +indoors on a wet day. Through the arch showed the gleam of soft green +leaves and white blossoms. They stepped forward quite happily. Even +Jane felt that this did not look like lions, and her hand hardly +trembled at all as she held the charm for the others to go through, and +last, slipped through herself, and hung the charm, now grown small +again, round her neck. + +The children found themselves under a white-blossomed, green-leafed +fruit-tree, in what seemed to be an orchard of such trees, all +white-flowered and green-foliaged. Among the long green grass under +their feet grew crocuses and lilies, and strange blue flowers. In the +branches overhead thrushes and blackbirds were singing, and the coo of +a pigeon came softly to them in the green quietness of the orchard. + +“Oh, how perfectly lovely!” cried Anthea. + +“Why, it’s like home exactly—I mean England—only everything’s bluer, +and whiter, and greener, and the flowers are bigger.” + +The boys owned that it certainly was fairly decent, and even Jane +admitted that it was all very pretty. + +“I’m certain there’s nothing to be frightened of here,” said Anthea. + +“I don’t know,” said Jane. “I suppose the fruit-trees go on just the +same even when people are killing each other. I didn’t half like what +the learned gentleman said about the hanging gardens. I suppose they +have gardens on purpose to hang people in. I do hope this isn’t one.” + +“Of course it isn’t,” said Cyril. “The hanging gardens are just gardens +hung up—_I_ think on chains between houses, don’t you know, like trays. +Come on; let’s get somewhere.” + +They began to walk through the cool grass. As far as they could see was +nothing but trees, and trees and more trees. At the end of their +orchard was another one, only separated from theirs by a little stream +of clear water. They jumped this, and went on. Cyril, who was fond of +gardening—which meant that he liked to watch the gardener at work—was +able to command the respect of the others by telling them the names of +a good many trees. There were nut-trees and almond-trees, and apricots, +and fig-trees with their big five-fingered leaves. And every now and +then the children had to cross another brook. + +“It’s like between the squares in _Through the Looking-glass_,” said +Anthea. + +At last they came to an orchard which was quite different from the +other orchards. It had a low building in one corner. + +“These are vines,” said Cyril superiorly, “and I know this is a +vineyard. I shouldn’t wonder if there was a wine-press inside that +place over there.” + +At last they got out of the orchards and on to a sort of road, very +rough, and not at all like the roads you are used to. It had cypress +trees and acacia trees along it, and a sort of hedge of tamarisks, like +those you see on the road between Nice and Cannes, or near +Littlehampton, if you’ve only been as far as that. + +And now in front of them they could see a great mass of buildings. +There were scattered houses of wood and stone here and there among +green orchards, and beyond these a great wall that shone red in the +early morning sun. The wall was enormously high—more than half the +height of St Paul’s—and in the wall were set enormous gates that shone +like gold as the rising sun beat on them. Each gate had a solid square +tower on each side of it that stood out from the wall and rose above +it. Beyond the wall were more towers and houses, gleaming with gold and +bright colours. Away to the left ran the steel-blue swirl of a great +river. And the children could see, through a gap in the trees, that the +river flowed out from the town under a great arch in the wall. + +“Those feathery things along by the water are palms,” said Cyril +instructively. + +“Oh, yes; you know everything,” Robert replied. “What’s all that +grey-green stuff you see away over there, where it’s all flat and +sandy?” + +“All right,” said Cyril loftily, “_I_ don’t want to tell you anything. +I only thought you’d like to know a palm-tree when you saw it again.” + +“Look!” cried Anthea; “they’re opening the gates.” + +And indeed the great gates swung back with a brazen clang, and +instantly a little crowd of a dozen or more people came out and along +the road towards them. + +The children, with one accord, crouched behind the tamarisk hedge. + +“I don’t like the sound of those gates,” said Jane. “Fancy being inside +when they shut. You’d never get out.” + +“You’ve got an arch of your own to go out by,” the Psammead put its +head out of the basket to remind her. “Don’t behave so like a girl. If +I were you I should just march right into the town and ask to see the +king.” + +There was something at once simple and grand about this idea, and it +pleased everyone. + +So when the work-people had passed (they _were_ work-people, the +children felt sure, because they were dressed so plainly—just one long +blue shirt thing—of blue or yellow) the four children marched boldly up +to the brazen gate between the towers. The arch above the gate was +quite a tunnel, the walls were so thick. + +“Courage,” said Cyril. “Step out. It’s no use trying to sneak past. Be +bold!” + +Robert answered this appeal by unexpectedly bursting into “The British +Grenadiers”, and to its quick-step they approached the gates of +Babylon. + +“Some talk of Alexander, + And some of Hercules, +Of Hector and Lysander, + And such great names as these. +But of all the gallant heroes...” + + +This brought them to the threshold of the gate, and two men in bright +armour suddenly barred their way with crossed spears. + +“Who goes there?” they said. + +(I think I must have explained to you before how it was that the +children were always able to understand the language of any place they +might happen to be in, and to be themselves understood. If not, I have +no time to explain it now.) + +“We come from very far,” said Cyril mechanically. “From the Empire +where the sun never sets, and we want to see your King.” + +“If it’s quite convenient,” amended Anthea. + +“The King (may he live for ever!),” said the gatekeeper, “is gone to +fetch home his fourteenth wife. Where on earth have you come from not +to know that?” + +“The Queen then,” said Anthea hurriedly, and not taking any notice of +the question as to where they had come from. + +“The Queen,” said the gatekeeper, “(may she live for ever!) gives +audience today three hours after sunrising.” + +“But what are we to do till the end of the three hours?” asked Cyril. + +The gatekeeper seemed neither to know nor to care. He appeared less +interested in them than they could have thought possible. But the man +who had crossed spears with him to bar the children’s way was more +human. + +“Let them go in and look about them,” he said. “I’ll wager my best +sword they’ve never seen anything to come near our little—village.” + +He said it in the tone people use for when they call the Atlantic Ocean +the “herring pond”. + +The gatekeeper hesitated. + +“They’re only children, after all,” said the other, who had children of +his own. “Let me off for a few minutes, Captain, and I’ll take them to +my place and see if my good woman can’t fit them up in something a +little less outlandish than their present rig. Then they can have a +look round without being mobbed. May I go?” + +“Oh yes, if you like,” said the Captain, “but don’t be all day.” + +The man led them through the dark arch into the town. And it was very +different from London. For one thing, everything in London seems to be +patched up out of odds and ends, but these houses seemed to have been +built by people who liked the same sort of things. Not that they were +all alike, for though all were squarish, they were of different sizes, +and decorated in all sorts of different ways, some with paintings in +bright colours, some with black and silver designs. There were +terraces, and gardens, and balconies, and open spaces with trees. Their +guide took them to a little house in a back street, where a kind-faced +woman sat spinning at the door of a very dark room. + +“Here,” he said, “just lend these children a mantle each, so that they +can go about and see the place till the Queen’s audience begins. You +leave that wool for a bit, and show them round if you like. I must be +off now.” + +The woman did as she was told, and the four children, wrapped in +fringed mantles, went with her all about the town, and oh! how I wish I +had time to tell you all that they saw. It was all so wonderfully +different from anything you have ever seen. For one thing, all the +houses were dazzlingly bright, and many of them covered with pictures. +Some had great creatures carved in stone at each side of the door. Then +the people—there were no black frock-coats and tall hats; no dingy +coats and skirts of good, useful, ugly stuffs warranted to wear. +Everyone’s clothes were bright and beautiful with blue and scarlet and +green and gold. + +The market was brighter than you would think anything could be. There +were stalls for everything you could possibly want—and for a great many +things that if you wanted here and now, want would be your master. +There were pineapples and peaches in heaps—and stalls of crockery and +glass things, beautiful shapes and glorious colours, there were stalls +for necklaces, and clasps, and bracelets, and brooches, for woven +stuffs, and furs, and embroidered linen. The children had never seen +half so many beautiful things together, even at Liberty’s. + +It seemed no time at all before the woman said— + +“It’s nearly time now. We ought to be getting on towards the palace. +It’s as well to be early.” + +So they went to the palace, and when they got there it was more +splendid than anything they had seen yet. + +For it was glowing with colours, and with gold and silver and black and +white—like some magnificent embroidery. Flight after flight of broad +marble steps led up to it, and at the edges of the stairs stood great +images, twenty times as big as a man—images of men with wings like +chain armour, and hawks’ heads, and winged men with the heads of dogs. +And there were the statues of great kings. + +Between the flights of steps were terraces where fountains played, and +the Queen’s Guard in white and scarlet, and armour that shone like +gold, stood by twos lining the way up the stairs; and a great body of +them was massed by the vast door of the palace itself, where it stood +glittering like an impossibly radiant peacock in the noon-day sun. + +All sorts of people were passing up the steps to seek audience of the +Queen. Ladies in richly-embroidered dresses with fringy flounces, poor +folks in plain and simple clothes, dandies with beards oiled and +curled. + +And Cyril, Robert, Anthea and Jane, went with the crowd. + +At the gate of the palace the Psammead put one eye cautiously out of +the basket and whispered— + +“I can’t be bothered with queens. I’ll go home with this lady. I’m sure +she’ll get me some sand if you ask her to.” + +“Oh! don’t leave us,” said Jane. The woman was giving some last +instructions in Court etiquette to Anthea, and did not hear Jane. + +“Don’t be a little muff,” said the Psammead quite fiercely. “It’s not a +bit of good your having a charm. You never use it. If you want me +you’ve only got to say the name of power and ask the charm to bring me +to you.” + +“I’d rather go with you,” said Jane. And it was the most surprising +thing she had ever said in her life. + +Everyone opened its mouth without thinking of manners, and Anthea, who +was peeping into the Psammead’s basket, saw that its mouth opened wider +than anybody’s. + +“You needn’t gawp like that,” Jane went on. “I’m not going to be +bothered with queens any more than IT is. And I know, wherever it is, +it’ll take jolly good care that it’s safe.” + +“She’s right there,” said everyone, for they had observed that the +Psammead had a way of knowing which side its bread was buttered. + +She turned to the woman and said, “You’ll take me home with you, won’t +you? And let me play with your little girls till the others have done +with the Queen.” + +“Surely I will, little heart!” said the woman. + +And then Anthea hurriedly stroked the Psammead and embraced Jane, who +took the woman’s hand, and trotted contentedly away with the Psammead’s +bag under the other arm. + +The others stood looking after her till she, the woman, and the basket +were lost in the many-coloured crowd. Then Anthea turned once more to +the palace’s magnificent doorway and said— + +“Let’s ask the porter to take care of our Babylonian overcoats.” + +So they took off the garments that the woman had lent them and stood +amid the jostling petitioners of the Queen in their own English frocks +and coats and hats and boots. + +“We want to see the Queen,” said Cyril; “we come from the far Empire +where the sun never sets!” + +A murmur of surprise and a thrill of excitement ran through the crowd. +The door-porter spoke to a black man, he spoke to someone else. There +was a whispering, waiting pause. Then a big man, with a cleanly-shaven +face, beckoned them from the top of a flight of red marble steps. + +They went up; the boots of Robert clattering more than usual because he +was so nervous. A door swung open, a curtain was drawn back. A double +line of bowing forms in gorgeous raiment formed a lane that led to the +steps of the throne, and as the children advanced hurriedly there came +from the throne a voice very sweet and kind. + +“Three children from the land where the sun never sets! Let them draw +hither without fear.” + +In another minute they were kneeling at the throne’s foot, saying, “O +Queen, live for ever!” exactly as the woman had taught them. And a +splendid dream-lady, all gold and silver and jewels and snowy drift of +veils, was raising Anthea, and saying— + +“Don’t be frightened, I really am _so_ glad you came! The land where +the sun never sets! I am delighted to see you! I was getting quite too +dreadfully bored for anything!” + +And behind Anthea the kneeling Cyril whispered in the ears of the +respectful Robert— + +“Bobs, don’t say anything to Panther. It’s no use upsetting her, but we +didn’t ask for Jane’s address, and the Psammead’s with her.” + +“Well,” whispered Robert, “the charm can bring them to us at any +moment. _It_ said so.” + +“Oh, yes,” whispered Cyril, in miserable derision, “_we’re_ all right, +of course. So we are! Oh, yes! If we’d only _got_ the charm.” + +Then Robert saw, and he murmured, “Crikey!” at the foot of the throne +of Babylon; while Cyril hoarsely whispered the plain English fact— + +“Jane’s got the charm round her neck, you silly cuckoo.” + +“Crikey!” Robert repeated in heart-broken undertones. + + + + +CHAPTER VII. +“THE DEEPEST DUNGEON BELOW THE CASTLE MOAT” + + +The Queen threw three of the red and gold embroidered cushions off the +throne on to the marble steps that led up to it. + +“Just make yourselves comfortable there,” she said. “I’m simply dying +to talk to you, and to hear all about your wonderful country and how +you got here, and everything, but I have to do justice every morning. +Such a bore, isn’t it? Do you do justice in your own country?” + +“No,” said Cyril; “at least of course we try to, but not in this public +sort of way, only in private.” + +“Ah, yes,” said the Queen, “I should much prefer a private audience +myself—much easier to manage. But public opinion has to be considered. +Doing justice is very hard work, even when you’re brought up to it.” + +“We don’t do justice, but we have to do scales, Jane and me,” said +Anthea, “twenty minutes a day. It’s simply horrid.” + +“What are scales?” asked the Queen, “and what is Jane?” + +“Jane is my little sister. One of the guards-at-the-gate’s wife is +taking care of her. And scales are music.” + +“I never heard of the instrument,” said the Queen. “Do you sing?” + +“Oh, yes. We can sing in parts,” said Anthea. + +“That _is_ magic,” said the Queen. “How many parts are you each cut +into before you do it?” + +“We aren’t cut at all,” said Robert hastily. “We couldn’t sing if we +were. We’ll show you afterwards.” + +“So you shall, and now sit quiet like dear children and hear me do +justice. The way I do it has always been admired. I oughtn’t to say +that, ought I? Sounds so conceited. But I don’t mind with you, dears. +Somehow I feel as though I’d known you quite a long time already.” + +The Queen settled herself on her throne and made a signal to her +attendants. The children, whispering together among the cushions on the +steps of the throne, decided that she was very beautiful and very kind, +but perhaps just the least bit flighty. + +The first person who came to ask for justice was a woman whose brother +had taken the money the father had left for her. The brother said it +was the uncle who had the money. There was a good deal of talk and the +children were growing rather bored, when the Queen suddenly clapped her +hands, and said— + +“Put both the men in prison till one of them owns up that the other is +innocent.” + +“But suppose they both did it?” Cyril could not help interrupting. + +“Then prison’s the best place for them,” said the Queen. + +“But suppose neither did it.” + +“That’s impossible,” said the Queen; “a thing’s not done unless someone +does it. And you mustn’t interrupt.” + +Then came a woman, in tears, with a torn veil and real ashes on her +head—at least Anthea thought so, but it may have been only road-dust. +She complained that her husband was in prison. + +“What for?” said the Queen. + +“They _said_ it was for speaking evil of your Majesty,” said the woman, +“but it wasn’t. Someone had a spite against him. That was what it was.” + +“How do you know he hadn’t spoken evil of me?” said the Queen. + +“No one could,” said the woman simply, “when they’d once seen your +beautiful face.” + +“Let the man out,” said the Queen, smiling. “Next case.” + +The next case was that of a boy who had stolen a fox. “Like the Spartan +boy,” whispered Robert. But the Queen ruled that nobody could have any +possible reason for owning a fox, and still less for stealing one. And +she did not believe that there were any foxes in Babylon; she, at any +rate, had never seen one. So the boy was released. + +The people came to the Queen about all sorts of family quarrels and +neighbourly misunderstandings—from a fight between brothers over the +division of an inheritance, to the dishonest and unfriendly conduct of +a woman who had borrowed a cooking-pot at the last New Year’s festival, +and not returned it yet. + +And the Queen decided everything, very, very decidedly indeed. At last +she clapped her hands quite suddenly and with extreme loudness, and +said— + +“The audience is over for today.” + +Everyone said, “May the Queen live for ever!” and went out. + +And the children were left alone in the justice-hall with the Queen of +Babylon and her ladies. + +“There!” said the Queen, with a long sigh of relief. “_That’s_ over! I +couldn’t have done another stitch of justice if you’d offered me the +crown of Egypt! Now come into the garden, and we’ll have a nice, long, +cosy talk.” + +She led them through long, narrow corridors whose walls they somehow +felt, were very, very thick, into a sort of garden courtyard. There +were thick shrubs closely planted, and roses were trained over +trellises, and made a pleasant shade—needed, indeed, for already the +sun was as hot as it is in England in August at the seaside. + +Slaves spread cushions on a low, marble terrace, and a big man with a +smooth face served cool drink in cups of gold studded with beryls. He +drank a little from the Queen’s cup before handing it to her. + +“That’s rather a nasty trick,” whispered Robert, who had been carefully +taught never to drink out of one of the nice, shiny, metal cups that +are chained to the London drinking fountains without first rinsing it +out thoroughly. + +The Queen overheard him. + +“Not at all,” said she. “Ritti-Marduk is a very clean man. And one has +to have _someone_ as taster, you know, because of poison.” + +The word made the children feel rather creepy; but Ritti-Marduk had +tasted all the cups, so they felt pretty safe. The drink was +delicious—very cold, and tasting like lemonade and partly like penny +ices. + +“Leave us,” said the Queen. And all the Court ladies, in their +beautiful, many-folded, many-coloured, fringed dresses, filed out +slowly, and the children were left alone with the Queen. + +“Now,” she said, “tell me all about yourselves.” + +They looked at each other. + +“You, Bobs,” said Cyril. + +“No—Anthea,” said Robert. + +“No—you—Cyril,” said Anthea. “Don’t you remember how pleased the Queen +of India was when you told her all about us?” + +Cyril muttered that it was all very well, and so it was. For when he +had told the tale of the Phœnix and the Carpet to the Ranee, it had +been only the truth—and all the truth that he had to tell. But now it +was not easy to tell a convincing story without mentioning the +Amulet—which, of course, it wouldn’t have done to mention—and without +owning that they were really living in London, about 2,500 years later +than the time they were talking in. + +Cyril took refuge in the tale of the Psammead and its wonderful power +of making wishes come true. The children had never been able to tell +anyone before, and Cyril was surprised to find that the spell which +kept them silent in London did not work here. “Something to do with our +being in the Past, I suppose,” he said to himself. + +“This is _most_ interesting,” said the Queen. “We must have this +Psammead for the banquet tonight. Its performance will be one of the +most popular turns in the whole programme. Where is it?” + +Anthea explained that they did not know; also why it was that they did +not know. + +“Oh, _that’s_ quite simple,” said the Queen, and everyone breathed a +deep sigh of relief as she said it. “Ritti-Marduk shall run down to the +gates and find out which guard your sister went home with.” + +“Might he”—Anthea’s voice was tremulous—“might he—would it interfere +with his meal-times, or anything like that, if he went _now?_” + +“Of course he shall go now. He may think himself lucky if he gets his +meals at any time,” said the Queen heartily, and clapped her hands. + +“May I send a letter?” asked Cyril, pulling out a red-backed penny +account-book, and feeling in his pockets for a stump of pencil that he +_knew_ was in one of them. + +“By all means. I’ll call my scribe.” + +“Oh, I can scribe right enough, thanks,” said Cyril, finding the pencil +and licking its point. He even had to bite the wood a little, for it +was very blunt. + +“Oh, you clever, clever boy!” said the Queen. “_do_ let me watch you do +it!” + +Cyril wrote on a leaf of the book—it was of rough, woolly paper, with +hairs that stuck out and would have got in his pen if he had been using +one, and ruled for accounts. + +“Hide IT most carefully before you come here,” he wrote, “and don’t +mention it—and destroy this letter. Everything is going A1. The Queen +is a fair treat. There’s nothing to be afraid of.” + +“What curious characters, and what a strange flat surface!” said the +Queen. “What have you inscribed?” + +“I’ve “scribed,” replied Cyril cautiously, “that you are fair, and +a—and like a—like a festival; and that she need not be afraid, and that +she is to come at once.” + +Ritti-Marduk, who had come in and had stood waiting while Cyril wrote, +his Babylonish eyes nearly starting out of his Babylonish head, now +took the letter, with some reluctance. + +“O Queen, live for ever! Is it a charm?” he timidly asked. “A strong +charm, most great lady?” + +“_Yes_,” said Robert, unexpectedly, “it _is_ a charm, but it won’t hurt +anyone until you’ve given it to Jane. And then she’ll destroy it, so +that it _can’t_ hurt anyone. It’s most awful strong!—as strong +as—Peppermint!” he ended abruptly. + +“I know not the god,” said Ritti-Marduk, bending timorously. + +“She’ll tear it up directly she gets it,” said Robert, “That’ll end the +charm. You needn’t be afraid if you go now.” + +Ritti-Marduk went, seeming only partly satisfied; and then the Queen +began to admire the penny account-book and the bit of pencil in so +marked and significant a way that Cyril felt he could not do less than +press them upon her as a gift. She ruffled the leaves delightedly. + +“What a wonderful substance!” she said. “And with this style you make +charms? Make a charm for me! Do you know,” her voice sank to a whisper, +“the names of the great ones of your own far country?” + +“Rather!” said Cyril, and hastily wrote the names of Alfred the Great, +Shakespeare, Nelson, Gordon, Lord Beaconsfield, Mr Rudyard Kipling, and +Mr Sherlock Holmes, while the Queen watched him with “unbaited breath”, +as Anthea said afterwards. + +She took the book and hid it reverently among the bright folds of her +gown. + +“You shall teach me later to say the great names,” she said. “And the +names of their Ministers—perhaps the great Nisroch is one of them?” + +“I don’t think so,” said Cyril. “Mr Campbell Bannerman’s Prime Minister +and Mr Burns a Minister, and so is the Archbishop of Canterbury, I +think, but I’m not sure—and Dr Parker was one, I know, and—” + +“No more,” said the Queen, putting her hands to her ears. “My head’s +going round with all those great names. You shall teach them to me +later—because of course you’ll make us a nice long visit now you have +come, won’t you? Now tell me—but no, I am quite tired out with your +being so clever. Besides, I’m sure you’d like _me_ to tell _you_ +something, wouldn’t you?” + +“Yes,” said Anthea. “I want to know how it is that the King has gone—” + +“Excuse me, but you should say ‘the King may-he-live-for-ever’,” said +the Queen gently. + +“I beg your pardon,” Anthea hastened to say—“the King +may-he-live-for-ever has gone to fetch home his fourteenth wife? I +don’t think even Bluebeard had as many as that. And, besides, he hasn’t +killed _you_ at any rate.” + +The Queen looked bewildered. + +“She means,” explained Robert, “that English kings only have one +wife—at least, Henry the Eighth had seven or eight, but not all at +once.” + +“In our country,” said the Queen scornfully, “a king would not reign a +day who had only one wife. No one would respect him, and quite right +too.” + +“Then are all the other thirteen alive?” asked Anthea. + +“Of course they are—poor mean-spirited things! I don’t associate with +them, of course, I am the Queen: they’re only the wives.” + +“I see,” said Anthea, gasping. + +“But oh, my dears,” the Queen went on, “such a to-do as there’s been +about this last wife! You never did! It really was _too_ funny. We +wanted an Egyptian princess. The King may-he-live-for-ever has got a +wife from most of the important nations, and he had set his heart on an +Egyptian one to complete his collection. Well, of course, to begin +with, we sent a handsome present of gold. The Egyptian king sent back +some horses—quite a few; he’s fearfully stingy!—and he said he liked +the gold very much, but what they were really short of was lapis +lazuli, so of course we sent him some. But by that time he’d begun to +use the gold to cover the beams of the roof of the Temple of the +Sun-God, and he hadn’t nearly enough to finish the job, so we sent some +more. And so it went on, oh, for years. You see each journey takes at +least six months. And at last we asked the hand of his daughter in +marriage.” + +“Yes, and then?” said Anthea, who wanted to get to the princess part of +the story. + +“Well, then,” said the Queen, “when he’d got everything out of us that +he could, and only given the meanest presents in return, he sent to say +he would esteem the honour of an alliance very highly, only +unfortunately he hadn’t any daughter, but he hoped one would be born +soon, and if so, she should certainly be reserved for the King of +Babylon!” + +“What a trick!” said Cyril. + +“Yes, wasn’t it? So then we said his sister would do, and then there +were more gifts and more journeys; and now at last the tiresome, +black-haired thing is coming, and the King may-he-live-for-ever has +gone seven days’ journey to meet her at Carchemish. And he’s gone in +his best chariot, the one inlaid with lapis lazuli and gold, with the +gold-plated wheels and onyx-studded hubs—much too great an honour in my +opinion. She’ll be here tonight; there’ll be a grand banquet to +celebrate her arrival. _She_ won’t be present, of course. She’ll be +having her baths and her anointings, and all that sort of thing. We +always clean our foreign brides very carefully. It takes two or three +weeks. Now it’s dinnertime, and you shall eat with me, for I can see +that you are of high rank.” + +She led them into a dark, cool hall, with many cushions on the floor. +On these they sat and low tables were brought—beautiful tables of +smooth, blue stone mounted in gold. On these, golden trays were placed; +but there were no knives, or forks, or spoons. The children expected +the Queen to call for them; but no. She just ate with her fingers, and +as the first dish was a great tray of boiled corn, and meat and raisins +all mixed up together, and melted fat poured all over the tray, it was +found difficult to follow her example with anything like what we are +used to think of as good table manners. There were stewed quinces +afterwards, and dates in syrup, and thick yellowy cream. It was the +kind of dinner you hardly ever get in Fitzroy Street. + +After dinner everybody went to sleep, even the children. + +The Queen awoke with a start. + +“Good gracious!” she cried, “what a time we’ve slept! I must rush off +and dress for the banquet. I shan’t have much more than time.” + +“Hasn’t Ritti-Marduk got back with our sister and the Psammead yet?” +Anthea asked. + +“I _quite_ forgot to ask. I’m sorry,” said the Queen. “And of course +they wouldn’t announce her unless I told them to, except during justice +hours. I expect she’s waiting outside. I’ll see.” + +Ritti-Marduk came in a moment later. + +“I regret,” he said, “that I have been unable to find your sister. The +beast she bears with her in a basket has bitten the child of the guard, +and your sister and the beast set out to come to you. The police say +they have a clue. No doubt we shall have news of her in a few weeks.” +He bowed and withdrew. + +The horror of this threefold loss—Jane, the Psammead, and the +Amulet—gave the children something to talk about while the Queen was +dressing. I shall not report their conversation; it was very gloomy. +Everyone repeated himself several times, and the discussion ended in +each of them blaming the other two for having let Jane go. You know the +sort of talk it was, don’t you? At last Cyril said— + +“After all, she’s with the Psammead, so _she’s_ all right. The Psammead +is jolly careful of itself too. And it isn’t as if we were in any +danger. Let’s try to buck up and enjoy the banquet.” + +They did enjoy the banquet. They had a beautiful bath, which was +delicious, were heavily oiled all over, including their hair, and that +was most unpleasant. Then, they dressed again and were presented to the +King, who was most affable. The banquet was long; there were all sorts +of nice things to eat, and everybody seemed to eat and drink a good +deal. Everyone lay on cushions and couches, ladies on one side and +gentlemen on the other; and after the eating was done each lady went +and sat by some gentleman, who seemed to be her sweetheart or her +husband, for they were very affectionate to each other. The Court +dresses had gold threads woven in them, very bright and beautiful. + +The middle of the room was left clear, and different people came and +did amusing things. There were conjurers and jugglers and +snake-charmers, which last Anthea did not like at all. + +When it got dark torches were lighted. Cedar splinters dipped in oil +blazed in copper dishes set high on poles. + +Then there was a dancer, who hardly danced at all, only just struck +attitudes. She had hardly any clothes, and was not at all pretty. The +children were rather bored by her, but everyone else was delighted, +including the King. + +“By the beard of Nimrod!” he cried, “ask what you like girl, and you +shall have it!” + +“I want nothing,” said the dancer; “the honour of having pleased the +King may-he-live-for-ever is reward enough for me.” + +And the King was so pleased with this modest and sensible reply that he +gave her the gold collar off his own neck. + +“I say!” said Cyril, awed by the magnificence of the gift. + +“It’s all right,” whispered the Queen, “it’s not his best collar by any +means. We always keep a stock of cheap jewellery for these occasions. +And now—you promised to sing us something. Would you like my minstrels +to accompany you?” + +“No, thank you,” said Anthea quickly. The minstrels had been playing +off and on all the time, and their music reminded Anthea of the band +she and the others had once had on the fifth of November—with penny +horns, a tin whistle, a tea-tray, the tongs, a policeman’s rattle, and +a toy drum. They had enjoyed this band very much at the time. But it +was quite different when someone else was making the same kind of +music. Anthea understood now that Father had not been really heartless +and unreasonable when he had told them to stop that infuriating din. + +“What shall we sing?” Cyril was asking. + +“Sweet and low?” suggested Anthea. + +“Too soft—I vote for ‘Who will o’er the downs’. Now then—one, two, +three. + +“Oh, who will o’er the downs so free, + Oh, who will with me ride, +Oh, who will up and follow me, + To win a blooming bride? + +Her father he has locked the door, + Her mother keeps the key; +But neither bolt nor bar shall keep + My own true love from me.” + + +Jane, the alto, was missing, and Robert, unlike the mother of the lady +in the song, never could “keep the key”, but the song, even so, was +sufficiently unlike anything any of them had ever heard to rouse the +Babylonian Court to the wildest enthusiasm. + +“More, more,” cried the King; “by my beard, this savage music is a new +thing. Sing again!” + +So they sang: + +“I saw her bower at twilight gray, + ’Twas guarded safe and sure. +I saw her bower at break of day, + ’Twas guarded then no more. + +The varlets they were all asleep, + And there was none to see +The greeting fair that passed there + Between my love and me.” + + +Shouts of applause greeted the ending of the verse, and the King would +not be satisfied till they had sung all their part-songs (they only +knew three) twice over, and ended up with “Men of Harlech” in unison. +Then the King stood up in his royal robes with his high, narrow crown +on his head and shouted— + +“By the beak of Nisroch, ask what you will, strangers from the land +where the sun never sets!” + +“We ought to say it’s enough honour, like the dancer did,” whispered +Anthea. + +“No, let’s ask for _It_,” said Robert. + +“No, no, I’m sure the other’s manners,” said Anthea. But Robert, who +was excited by the music, and the flaring torches, and the applause and +the opportunity, spoke up before the others could stop him. + +“Give us the half of the Amulet that has on it the name UR HEKAU +SETCHEH,” he said, adding as an afterthought, “O King, live-for-ever.” + +As he spoke the great name those in the pillared hall fell on their +faces, and lay still. All but the Queen who crouched amid her cushions +with her head in her hands, and the King, who stood upright, perfectly +still, like the statue of a king in stone. It was only for a moment +though. Then his great voice thundered out— + +“Guard, seize them!” + +Instantly, from nowhere as it seemed, sprang eight soldiers in bright +armour inlaid with gold, and tunics of red and white. Very splendid +they were, and very alarming. + +“Impious and sacrilegious wretches!” shouted the King. “To the dungeons +with them! We will find a way, tomorrow, to make them speak. For +without doubt they can tell us where to find the lost half of _It_.” + +A wall of scarlet and white and steel and gold closed up round the +children and hurried them away among the many pillars of the great +hall. As they went they heard the voices of the courtiers loud in +horror. + +“You’ve done it this time,” said Cyril with extreme bitterness. + +“Oh, it will come right. It _must_. It always does,” said Anthea +desperately. + +They could not see where they were going, because the guard surrounded +them so closely, but the ground under their feet, smooth marble at +first, grew rougher like stone, then it was loose earth and sand, and +they felt the night air. Then there was more stone, and steps down. + +“It’s my belief we really _are_ going to the deepest dungeon below the +castle moat this time,” said Cyril. + +And they were. At least it was not below a moat, but below the river +Euphrates, which was just as bad if not worse. In a most unpleasant +place it was. Dark, very, very damp, and with an odd, musty smell +rather like the shells of oysters. There was a torch—that is to say, a +copper basket on a high stick with oiled wood burning in it. By its +light the children saw that the walls were green, and that trickles of +water ran down them and dripped from the roof. There were things on the +floor that looked like newts, and in the dark corners creepy, shiny +things moved sluggishly, uneasily, horribly. + +Robert’s heart sank right into those really reliable boots of his. +Anthea and Cyril each had a private struggle with that inside +disagreeableness which is part of all of us, and which is sometimes +called the Old Adam—and both were victors. Neither of them said to +Robert (and both tried hard not even to think it), “This is _your_ +doing.” Anthea had the additional temptation to add, “I told you so.” +And she resisted it successfully. + +“Sacrilege, and impious cheek,” said the captain of the guard to the +gaoler. “To be kept during the King’s pleasure. I expect he means to +get some pleasure out of them tomorrow! He’ll tickle them up!” + +“Poor little kids,” said the gaoler. + +“Oh, yes,” said the captain. “I’ve got kids of my own too. But it +doesn’t do to let domestic sentiment interfere with one’s public +duties. Good night.” + +The soldiers tramped heavily off in their white and red and steel and +gold. The gaoler, with a bunch of big keys in his hand, stood looking +pityingly at the children. He shook his head twice and went out. + +“Courage!” said Anthea. “I know it will be all right. It’s only a dream +_really_, you know. It _must_ be! I don’t believe about time being only +a something or other of thought. It _is_ a dream, and we’re bound to +wake up all right and safe.” + +“Humph,” said Cyril bitterly. And Robert suddenly said— + +“It’s all my doing. If it really is all up do please not keep a down on +me about it, and tell Father—Oh, I forgot.” + +What he had forgotten was that his father was 3,000 miles and 5,000 or +more years away from him. + +“All right, Bobs, old man,” said Cyril; and Anthea got hold of Robert’s +hand and squeezed it. + +Then the gaoler came back with a platter of hard, flat cakes made of +coarse grain, very different from the cream-and-juicy-date feasts of +the palace; also a pitcher of water. + +“There,” he said. + +“Oh, thank you so very much. You _are_ kind,” said Anthea feverishly. + +“Go to sleep,” said the gaoler, pointing to a heap of straw in a +corner; “tomorrow comes soon enough.” + +“Oh, dear Mr Gaoler,” said Anthea, “whatever will they do to us +tomorrow?” + +“They’ll try to make you tell things,” said the gaoler grimly, “and my +advice is if you’ve nothing to tell, make up something. Then perhaps +they’ll sell you to the Northern nations. Regular savages _they_ are. +Good night.” + +“Good night,” said three trembling voices, which their owners strove in +vain to render firm. Then he went out, and the three were left alone in +the damp, dim vault. + +“I know the light won’t last long,” said Cyril, looking at the +flickering brazier. + +“Is it any good, do you think, calling on the name when we haven’t got +the charm?” suggested Anthea. + +“I shouldn’t think so. But we might try.” + +So they tried. But the blank silence of the damp dungeon remained +unchanged. + +“What was the name the Queen said?” asked Cyril suddenly. +“Nisbeth—Nesbit—something? You know, the slave of the great names?” + +“Wait a sec,” said Robert, “though I don’t know why you want it. +Nusroch—Nisrock—Nisroch—that’s it.” + +Then Anthea pulled herself together. All her muscles tightened, and the +muscles of her mind and soul, if you can call them that, tightened too. + +“UR HEKAU SETCHEH,” she cried in a fervent voice. “Oh, Nisroch, servant +of the Great Ones, come and help us!” + +There was a waiting silence. Then a cold, blue light awoke in the +corner where the straw was—and in the light they saw coming towards +them a strange and terrible figure. I won’t try to describe it, because +the drawing shows it, exactly as it was, and exactly as the old +Babylonians carved it on their stones, so that you can see it in our +own British Museum at this day. I will just say that it had eagle’s +wings and an eagle’s head and the body of a man. + +It came towards them, strong and unspeakably horrible. + +“Oh, go away,” cried Anthea; but Cyril cried, “No; stay!” + +The creature hesitated, then bowed low before them on the damp floor of +the dungeon. + +“Speak,” it said, in a harsh, grating voice like large rusty keys being +turned in locks. “The servant of the Great Ones is _your_ servant. What +is your need that you call on the name of Nisroch?” + +“We want to go home,” said Robert. + +“No, no,” cried Anthea; “we want to be where Jane is.” + +Nisroch raised his great arm and pointed at the wall of the dungeon. +And, as he pointed, the wall disappeared, and instead of the damp, +green, rocky surface, there shone and glowed a room with rich hangings +of red silk embroidered with golden water-lilies, with cushioned +couches and great mirrors of polished steel; and in it was the Queen, +and before her, on a red pillow, sat the Psammead, its fur hunched up +in an irritated, discontented way. On a blue-covered couch lay Jane +fast asleep. + +“Walk forward without fear,” said Nisroch. “Is there aught else that +the Servant of the great Name can do for those who speak that name?” + +“No—oh, _no_,” said Cyril. “It’s all right now. Thanks ever so.” + +“You are a dear,” cried Anthea, not in the least knowing what she was +saying. “Oh, thank you thank you. But _do_ go _now!_” + +She caught the hand of the creature, and it was cold and hard in hers, +like a hand of stone. + +“Go forward,” said Nisroch. And they went. + +“Oh, my good gracious,” said the Queen as they stood before her. “How +did you get here? I _knew_ you were magic. I meant to let you out the +first thing in the morning, if I could slip away—but thanks be to +Dagon, you’ve managed it for yourselves. You must get away. I’ll wake +my chief lady and she shall call Ritti-Marduk, and he’ll let you out +the back way, and—” + +“Don’t rouse anybody for goodness’ sake,” said Anthea, “except Jane, +and I’ll rouse her.” + +She shook Jane with energy, and Jane slowly awoke. + +“Ritti-Marduk brought them in hours ago, really,” said the Queen, “but +I wanted to have the Psammead all to myself for a bit. You’ll excuse +the little natural deception?—it’s part of the Babylonish character, +don’t you know? But I don’t want anything to happen to you. Do let me +rouse someone.” + +“No, no, no,” said Anthea with desperate earnestness. She thought she +knew enough of what the Babylonians were like when they were roused. +“We can go by our own magic. And you will tell the King it wasn’t the +gaoler’s fault. It was Nisroch.” + +“Nisroch!” echoed the Queen. “You are indeed magicians.” + +Jane sat up, blinking stupidly. + +“Hold _It_ up, and say the word,” cried Cyril, catching up the +Psammead, which mechanically bit him, but only very slightly. + +“Which is the East?” asked Jane. + +“Behind me,” said the Queen. “Why?” + +“Ur Hekau Setcheh,” said Jane sleepily, and held up the charm. + +And there they all were in the dining-room at 300, Fitzroy Street. + +“Jane,” cried Cyril with great presence of mind, “go and get the plate +of sand down for the Psammead.” + +Jane went. + +“Look here!” he said quickly, as the sound of her boots grew less loud +on the stairs, “don’t let’s tell her about the dungeon and all that. +It’ll only frighten her so that she’ll never want to go anywhere else.” + +“Righto!” said Cyril; but Anthea felt that she could not have said a +word to save her life. + +“Why did you want to come back in such a hurry?” asked Jane, returning +with the plate of sand. “It was awfully jolly in Babylon, I think! I +liked it no end.” + +“Oh, yes,” said Cyril carelessly. “It was jolly enough, of course, but +I thought we’d been there long enough. Mother always says you oughtn’t +to wear out your welcome!” + + + + +CHAPTER VIII. +THE QUEEN IN LONDON + + +“Now tell us what happened to you,” said Cyril to Jane, when he and the +others had told her all about the Queen’s talk and the banquet, and the +variety entertainment, carefully stopping short before the beginning of +the dungeon part of the story. + +“It wasn’t much good going,” said Jane, “if you didn’t even try to get +the Amulet.” + +“We found out it was no go,” said Cyril; “it’s not to be got in +Babylon. It was lost before that. We’ll go to some other jolly friendly +place, where everyone is kind and pleasant, and look for it there. Now +tell us about your part.” + +“Oh,” said Jane, “the Queen’s man with the smooth face—what was his +name?” + +“Ritti-Marduk,” said Cyril. + +“Yes,” said Jane, “Ritti-Marduk, he came for me just after the Psammead +had bitten the guard-of-the-gate’s wife’s little boy, and he took me to +the Palace. And we had supper with the new little Queen from Egypt. She +is a dear—not much older than you. She told me heaps about Egypt. And +we played ball after supper. And then the Babylon Queen sent for me. I +like her too. And she talked to the Psammead and I went to sleep. And +then you woke me up. That’s all.” + +The Psammead, roused from its sound sleep, told the same story. + +“But,” it added, “what possessed you to tell that Queen that I could +give wishes? I sometimes think you were born without even the most +rudimentary imitation of brains.” + +The children did not know the meaning of rudimentary, but it sounded a +rude, insulting word. + +“I don’t see that we did any harm,” said Cyril sulkily. + +“Oh, no,” said the Psammead with withering irony, “not at all! Of +course not! Quite the contrary! Exactly so! Only she happened to wish +that she might soon find herself in your country. And soon may mean any +moment.” + +“Then it’s your fault,” said Robert, “because you might just as well +have made ‘soon’ mean some moment next year or next century.” + +“That’s where you, as so often happens, make the mistake,” rejoined the +Sand-fairy. “_I_ couldn’t mean anything but what _she_ meant by ‘soon’. +It wasn’t my wish. And what she meant was the next time the King +happens to go out lion hunting. So she’ll have a whole day, and perhaps +two, to do as she wishes with. She doesn’t know about time only being a +mode of thought.” + +“Well,” said Cyril, with a sigh of resignation, “we must do what we can +to give her a good time. She was jolly decent to us. I say, suppose we +were to go to St James’s Park after dinner and feed those ducks that we +never did feed. After all that Babylon and all those years ago, I feel +as if I should like to see something _real_, and _now_. You’ll come, +Psammead?” + +“Where’s my priceless woven basket of sacred rushes?” asked the +Psammead morosely. “I can’t go out with nothing on. And I won’t, what’s +more.” + +And then everybody remembered with pain that the bass bag had, in the +hurry of departure from Babylon, not been remembered. + +“But it’s not so extra precious,” said Robert hastily. “You can get +them given to you for nothing if you buy fish in Farringdon Market.” + +“Oh,” said the Psammead very crossly indeed, “so you presume on my +sublime indifference to the things of this disgusting modern world, to +fob me off with a travelling equipage that costs you nothing. Very +well, I shall go to sand. Please don’t wake me.” + +And it went then and there to sand, which, as you know, meant to bed. +The boys went to St James’s Park to feed the ducks, but they went +alone. + +Anthea and Jane sat sewing all the afternoon. They cut off half a yard +from each of their best green Liberty sashes. A towel cut in two formed +a lining; and they sat and sewed and sewed and sewed. What they were +making was a bag for the Psammead. Each worked at a half of the bag. +Jane’s half had four-leaved shamrocks embroidered on it. They were the +only things she could do (because she had been taught how at school, +and, fortunately, some of the silk she had been taught with was left +over). And even so, Anthea had to draw the pattern for her. Anthea’s +side of the bag had letters on it—worked hastily but affectionately in +chain stitch. They were something like this: + +[Illustration] + +She would have put “travelling carriage”, but she made the letters too +big, so there was no room. The bag was made _into_ a bag with old +Nurse’s sewing machine, and the strings of it were Anthea’s and Jane’s +best red hair ribbons. + +At tea-time, when the boys had come home with a most unfavourable +report of the St James’s Park ducks, Anthea ventured to awaken the +Psammead, and to show it its new travelling bag. + +“Humph,” it said, sniffing a little contemptuously, yet at the same +time affectionately, “it’s not so dusty.” + +The Psammead seemed to pick up very easily the kind of things that +people said nowadays. For a creature that had in its time associated +with Megatheriums and Pterodactyls, its quickness was really wonderful. + +“It’s more worthy of me,” it said, “than the kind of bag that’s given +away with a pound of plaice. When do you propose to take me out in it?” + +“I should like a rest from taking you or us anywhere,” said Cyril. But +Jane said— + +“I want to go to Egypt. I did like that Egyptian Princess that came to +marry the King in Babylon. She told me about the larks they have in +Egypt. And the cats. Do let’s go there. And I told her what the bird +things on the Amulet were like. And she said it was Egyptian writing.” + +The others exchanged looks of silent rejoicing at the thought of their +cleverness in having concealed from Jane the terrors they had suffered +in the dungeon below the Euphrates. + +“Egypt’s so nice too,” Jane went on, “because of Doctor Brewer’s +Scripture History. I would like to go there when Joseph was dreaming +those curious dreams, or when Moses was doing wonderful things with +snakes and sticks.” + +“I don’t care about snakes,” said Anthea shuddering. + +“Well, we needn’t be in at that part, but Babylon was lovely! We had +cream and sweet, sticky stuff. And I expect Egypt’s the same.” + +There was a good deal of discussion, but it all ended in everybody’s +agreeing to Jane’s idea. And next morning directly after breakfast +(which was kippers and very nice) the Psammead was invited to get into +his travelling carriage. + +The moment after it had done so, with stiff, furry reluctance, like +that of a cat when you want to nurse it, and its ideas are not the same +as yours, old Nurse came in. + +“Well, chickies,” she said, “are you feeling very dull?” + +“Oh, no, Nurse dear,” said Anthea; “we’re having a lovely time. We’re +just going off to see some old ancient relics.” + +“Ah,” said old Nurse, “the Royal Academy, I suppose? Don’t go wasting +your money too reckless, that’s all.” + +She cleared away the kipper bones and the tea-things, and when she had +swept up the crumbs and removed the cloth, the Amulet was held up and +the order given—just as Duchesses (and other people) give it to their +coachmen. + +“To Egypt, please!” said Anthea, when Cyril had uttered the wonderful +Name of Power. + +“When Moses was there,” added Jane. + +And there, in the dingy Fitzroy Street dining-room, the Amulet grew +big, and it was an arch, and through it they saw a blue, blue sky and a +running river. + +“No, stop!” said Cyril, and pulled down Jane’s hand with the Amulet in +it. + +“What silly cuckoos we all are,” he said. “Of course we can’t go. We +daren’t leave home for a single minute now, for fear that minute should +be _the_ minute.” + +“What minute be _what_ minute?” asked Jane impatiently, trying to get +her hand away from Cyril. + +“The minute when the Queen of Babylon comes,” said Cyril. And then +everyone saw it. + +For some days life flowed in a very slow, dusty, uneventful stream. The +children could never go out all at once, because they never knew when +the King of Babylon would go out lion hunting and leave his Queen free +to pay them that surprise visit to which she was, without doubt, +eagerly looking forward. + +So they took it in turns, two and two, to go out and to stay in. + +The stay-at-homes would have been much duller than they were but for +the new interest taken in them by the learned gentleman. + +He called Anthea in one day to show her a beautiful necklace of purple +and gold beads. + +“I saw one like that,” she said, “in—” + +“In the British Museum, perhaps?” + +“I like to call the place where I saw it Babylon,” said Anthea +cautiously. + +“A pretty fancy,” said the learned gentleman, “and quite correct too, +because, as a matter of fact, these beads did come from Babylon.” + +The other three were all out that day. The boys had been going to the +Zoo, and Jane had said so plaintively, “I’m sure I am fonder of +rhinoceroses than either of you are,” that Anthea had told her to run +along then. And she had run, catching the boys before that part of the +road where Fitzroy Street suddenly becomes Fitzroy Square. + +“I think Babylon is most frightfully interesting,” said Anthea. “I do +have such interesting dreams about it—at least, not dreams exactly, but +quite as wonderful.” + +“Do sit down and tell me,” said he. So she sat down and told. And he +asked her a lot of questions, and she answered them as well as she +could. + +“Wonderful—wonderful!” he said at last. “One’s heard of +thought-transference, but I never thought _I_ had any power of that +sort. Yet it must be that, and very bad for _you_, I should think. +Doesn’t your head ache very much?” + +He suddenly put a cold, thin hand on her forehead. + +“No thank you, not at all,” said she. + +“I assure you it is not done intentionally,” he went on. “Of course I +know a good deal about Babylon, and I unconsciously communicate it to +you; you’ve heard of thought-reading, but some of the things you say, I +don’t understand; they never enter my head, and yet they’re so +astoundingly probable.” + +“It’s all right,” said Anthea reassuringly. “_I_ understand. And don’t +worry. It’s all quite simple really.” + +It was not quite so simple when Anthea, having heard the others come +in, went down, and before she had had time to ask how they had liked +the Zoo, heard a noise outside, compared to which the wild beasts’ +noises were gentle as singing birds. + +“Good gracious!” cried Anthea, “what’s that?” + +The loud hum of many voices came through the open window. Words could +be distinguished. + +“’Ere’s a guy!” + +“This ain’t November. That ain’t no guy. It’s a ballet lady, that’s +what it is.” + +“Not it—it’s a bloomin’ looney, I tell you.” + +Then came a clear voice that they knew. + +“Retire, slaves!” it said. + +“What’s she a saying of?” cried a dozen voices. + +“Some blamed foreign lingo,” one voice replied. + +The children rushed to the door. A crowd was on the road and pavement. + +In the middle of the crowd, plainly to be seen from the top of the +steps, were the beautiful face and bright veil of the Babylonian Queen. + +“Jimminy!” cried Robert, and ran down the steps, “here she is!” + +“Here!” he cried, “look out—let the lady pass. She’s a friend of ours, +coming to see us.” + +“Nice friend for a respectable house,” snorted a fat woman with marrows +on a handcart. + +All the same the crowd made way a little. The Queen met Robert on the +pavement, and Cyril joined them, the Psammead bag still on his arm. + +“Here,” he whispered; “here’s the Psammead; you can get wishes.” + +“_I_ wish you’d come in a different dress, if you _had_ to come,” said +Robert; “but it’s no use my wishing anything.” + +“No,” said the Queen. “I wish I was dressed—no, I don’t—I wish _they_ +were dressed properly, then they wouldn’t be so silly.” + +The Psammead blew itself out till the bag was a very tight fit for it; +and suddenly every man, woman, and child in that crowd felt that it had +not enough clothes on. For, of course, the Queen’s idea of proper dress +was the dress that had been proper for the working-classes 3,000 years +ago in Babylon—and there was not much of it. + +“Lawky me!” said the marrow-selling woman, “whatever could a-took me to +come out this figure?” and she wheeled her cart away very quickly +indeed. + +“Someone’s made a pretty guy of you—talk of guys,” said a man who sold +bootlaces. + +“Well, don’t you talk,” said the man next to him. “Look at your own +silly legs; and where’s your boots?” + +“I never come out like this, I’ll take my sacred,” said the +bootlace-seller. “I wasn’t quite myself last night, I’ll own, but not +to dress up like a circus.” + +The crowd was all talking at once, and getting rather angry. But no one +seemed to think of blaming the Queen. + +Anthea bounded down the steps and pulled her up; the others followed, +and the door was shut. + +“Blowed if I can make it out!” they heard. “I’m off home, I am.” + +And the crowd, coming slowly to the same mind, dispersed, followed by +another crowd of persons who were not dressed in what the Queen thought +was the proper way. + +“We shall have the police here directly,” said Anthea in the tones of +despair. “Oh, why did you come dressed like that?” + +The Queen leaned against the arm of the horse-hair sofa. + +“How else can a queen dress I should like to know?” she questioned. + +“Our Queen wears things like other people,” said Cyril. + +“Well, I don’t. And I must say,” she remarked in an injured tone, “that +you don’t seem very glad to see me now I _have_ come. But perhaps it’s +the surprise that makes you behave like this. Yet you ought to be used +to surprises. The way you vanished! I shall never forget it. The best +magic I’ve ever seen. How did you do it?” + +“Oh, never mind about that now,” said Robert. “You see you’ve gone and +upset all those people, and I expect they’ll fetch the police. And we +don’t want to see you collared and put in prison.” + +“You can’t put queens in prison,” she said loftily. + +“Oh, can’t you?” said Cyril. “We cut off a king’s head here once.” + +“In this miserable room? How frightfully interesting.” + +“No, no, not in this room; in history.” + +“Oh, in _that_,” said the Queen disparagingly. “I thought you’d done it +with your own hands.” + +The girls shuddered. + +“What a hideous city yours is,” the Queen went on pleasantly, “and what +horrid, ignorant people. Do you know they actually can’t understand a +single word I say.” + +“Can you understand them?” asked Jane. + +“Of course not; they speak some vulgar, Northern dialect. I can +understand _you_ quite well.” + +I really am not going to explain _again_ how it was that the children +could understand other languages than their own so thoroughly, and talk +them, too, so that it felt and sounded (to them) just as though they +were talking English. + +“Well,” said Cyril bluntly, “now you’ve seen just how horrid it is, +don’t you think you might as well go home again?” + +“Why, I’ve seen simply nothing yet,” said the Queen, arranging her +starry veil. “I wished to be at your door, and I was. Now I must go and +see your King and Queen.” + +“Nobody’s allowed to,” said Anthea in haste; “but look here, we’ll take +you and show you anything you’d like to see—anything you _can_ see,” +she added kindly, because she remembered how nice the Queen had been to +them in Babylon, even if she had been a little deceitful in the matter +of Jane and Psammead. + +“There’s the Museum,” said Cyril hopefully; “there are lots of things +from your country there. If only we could disguise you a little.” + +“I know,” said Anthea suddenly. “Mother’s old theatre cloak, and there +are a lot of her old hats in the big box.” + +The blue silk, lace-trimmed cloak did indeed hide some of the Queen’s +startling splendours, but the hat fitted very badly. It had pink roses +in it; and there was something about the coat or the hat or the Queen, +that made her look somehow not very respectable. + +“Oh, never mind,” said Anthea, when Cyril whispered this. “The thing is +to get her out before Nurse has finished her forty winks. I should +think she’s about got to the thirty-ninth wink by now.” + +“Come on then,” said Robert. “You know how dangerous it is. Let’s make +haste into the Museum. If any of those people you made guys of do fetch +the police, they won’t think of looking for you there.” + +The blue silk coat and the pink-rosed hat attracted almost as much +attention as the royal costume had done; and the children were +uncommonly glad to get out of the noisy streets into the grey quiet of +the Museum. + +“Parcels and umbrellas to be left here,” said a man at the counter. + +The party had no umbrellas, and the only parcel was the bag containing +the Psammead, which the Queen had insisted should be brought. + +“_I’m_ not going to be left,” said the Psammead softly, “so don’t you +think it.” + +“I’ll wait outside with you,” said Anthea hastily, and went to sit on +the seat near the drinking fountain. + +“Don’t sit so near that nasty fountain,” said the creature crossly; “I +might get splashed.” + +Anthea obediently moved to another seat and waited. Indeed she waited, +and waited, and waited, and waited, and waited. The Psammead dropped +into an uneasy slumber. Anthea had long ceased to watch the swing-door +that always let out the wrong person, and she was herself almost +asleep, and still the others did not come back. + +It was quite a start when Anthea suddenly realized that they _had_ come +back, and that they were not alone. Behind them was quite a crowd of +men in uniform, and several gentlemen were there. Everyone seemed very +angry. + +“Now go,” said the nicest of the angry gentlemen. “Take the poor, +demented thing home and tell your parents she ought to be properly +looked after.” + +“If you can’t get her to go we must send for the police,” said the +nastiest gentleman. + +“But we don’t wish to use harsh measures,” added the nice one, who was +really very nice indeed, and seemed to be over all the others. + +“May I speak to my sister a moment first?” asked Robert. + +The nicest gentleman nodded, and the officials stood round the Queen, +the others forming a sort of guard while Robert crossed over to Anthea. + +“Everything you can think of,” he replied to Anthea’s glance of +inquiry. “Kicked up the most frightful shine in there. Said those +necklaces and earrings and things in the glass cases were all +hers—would have them out of the cases. Tried to break the glass—she did +break one bit! Everybody in the place has been at her. No good. I only +got her out by telling her that was the place where they cut queens’ +heads off.” + +“Oh, Bobs, what a whacker!” + +“You’d have told a whackinger one to get her out. Besides, it wasn’t. I +meant _mummy_ queens. How do you know they don’t cut off mummies’ heads +to see how the embalming is done? What I want to say is, can’t you get +her to go with you quietly?” + +“I’ll try,” said Anthea, and went up to the Queen. + +“Do come home,” she said; “the learned gentleman in our house has a +much nicer necklace than anything they’ve got here. Come and see it.” + +The Queen nodded. + +“You see,” said the nastiest gentleman, “she does understand English.” + +“I was talking Babylonian, I think,” said Anthea bashfully. + +“My good child,” said the nice gentleman, “what you’re talking is not +Babylonian, but nonsense. You just go home _at once_, and tell your +parents exactly what has happened.” + +Anthea took the Queen’s hand and gently pulled her away. The other +children followed, and the black crowd of angry gentlemen stood on the +steps watching them. It was when the little party of disgraced +children, with the Queen who had disgraced them, had reached the middle +of the courtyard that her eyes fell on the bag where the Psammead was. +She stopped short. + +“I wish,” she said, very loud and clear, “that all those Babylonian +things would come out to me here—slowly, so that those dogs and slaves +can see the working of the great Queen’s magic.” + +“Oh, you _are_ a tiresome woman,” said the Psammead in its bag, but it +puffed itself out. + +Next moment there was a crash. The glass swing doors and all their +framework were smashed suddenly and completely. The crowd of angry +gentlemen sprang aside when they saw what had done this. But the +nastiest of them was not quick enough, and he was roughly pushed out of +the way by an enormous stone bull that was floating steadily through +the door. It came and stood beside the Queen in the middle of the +courtyard. + +It was followed by more stone images, by great slabs of carved stone, +bricks, helmets, tools, weapons, fetters, wine-jars, bowls, bottles, +vases, jugs, saucers, seals, and the round long things, something like +rolling pins with marks on them like the print of little bird-feet, +necklaces, collars, rings, armlets, earrings—heaps and heaps and heaps +of things, far more than anyone had time to count, or even to see +distinctly. + +All the angry gentlemen had abruptly sat down on the Museum steps +except the nice one. He stood with his hands in his pockets just as +though he was quite used to seeing great stone bulls and all sorts of +small Babylonish objects float out into the Museum yard. But he sent a +man to close the big iron gates. + +A journalist, who was just leaving the museum, spoke to Robert as he +passed. + +“Theosophy, I suppose?” he said. “Is she Mrs Besant?” + +“_Yes_,” said Robert recklessly. + +The journalist passed through the gates just before they were shut. He +rushed off to Fleet Street, and his paper got out a new edition within +half an hour. + +MRS BESANT AND THEOSOPHY + +IMPERTINENT MIRACLE AT THE +BRITISH MUSEUM. + + +People saw it in fat, black letters on the boards carried by the +sellers of newspapers. Some few people who had nothing better to do +went down to the Museum on the tops of omnibuses. But by the time they +got there there was nothing to be seen. For the Babylonian Queen had +suddenly seen the closed gates, had felt the threat of them, and had +said— + +“I wish we were in your house.” + +And, of course, instantly they were. + +The Psammead was furious. + +“Look here,” it said, “they’ll come after you, and they’ll find _me_. +There’ll be a National Cage built for me at Westminster, and I shall +have to work at politics. Why wouldn’t you leave the things in their +places?” + +“What a temper you have, haven’t you?” said the Queen serenely. “I wish +all the things were back in their places. Will _that_ do for you?” + +The Psammead swelled and shrank and spoke very angrily. + +“I can’t refuse to give your wishes,” it said, “but I can Bite. And I +will if this goes on. Now then.” + +“Ah, don’t,” whispered Anthea close to its bristling ear; “it’s +dreadful for us too. Don’t _you_ desert us. Perhaps she’ll wish herself +at home again soon.” + +“Not she,” said the Psammead a little less crossly. + +“Take me to see your City,” said the Queen. + +The children looked at each other. + +“If we had some money we could take her about in a cab. People wouldn’t +notice her so much then. But we haven’t.” + +“Sell this,” said the Queen, taking a ring from her finger. + +“They’d only think we’d stolen it,” said Cyril bitterly, “and put us in +prison.” + +“All roads lead to prison with you, it seems,” said the Queen. + +“The learned gentleman!” said Anthea, and ran up to him with the ring +in her hand. + +“Look here,” she said, “will you buy this for a pound?” + +“Oh!” he said in tones of joy and amazement, and took the ring into his +hand. + +“It’s my very own,” said Anthea; “it was given to me to sell.” + +“I’ll lend you a pound,” said the learned gentleman, “with pleasure; +and I’ll take care of the ring for you. Who did you say gave it to +you?” + +“We call her,” said Anthea carefully, “the Queen of Babylon.” + +“Is it a game?” he asked hopefully. + +“It’ll be a pretty game if I don’t get the money to pay for cabs for +her,” said Anthea. + +“I sometimes think,” he said slowly, “that I am becoming insane, or +that—” + +“Or that I am; but I’m not, and you’re not, and she’s not.” + +“Does she _say_ that she’s the Queen of Babylon?” he uneasily asked. + +“Yes,” said Anthea recklessly. + +“This thought-transference is more far-reaching than I imagined,” he +said. “I suppose I have unconsciously influenced _her_, too. I never +thought my Babylonish studies would bear fruit like this. Horrible! +There are more things in heaven and earth—” + +“Yes,” said Anthea, “heaps more. And the pound is the thing _I_ want +more than anything on earth.” + +He ran his fingers through his thin hair. + +“This thought-transference!” he said. “It’s undoubtedly a Babylonian +ring—or it seems so to me. But perhaps I have hypnotized myself. I will +see a doctor the moment I have corrected the last proofs of my book.” + +“Yes, do!” said Anthea, “and thank you so very much.” + +She took the sovereign and ran down to the others. + +And now from the window of a four-wheeled cab the Queen of Babylon +beheld the wonders of London. Buckingham Palace she thought +uninteresting; Westminster Abbey and the Houses of Parliament little +better. But she liked the Tower, and the River, and the ships filled +her with wonder and delight. + +“But how badly you keep your slaves. How wretched and poor and +neglected they seem,” she said, as the cab rattled along the Mile End +Road. + +“They aren’t slaves; they’re working-people,” said Jane. + +“Of course they’re working. That’s what slaves are. Don’t you tell me. +Do you suppose I don’t know a slave’s face when I see it? Why don’t +their masters see that they’re better fed and better clothed? Tell me +in three words.” + +No one answered. The wage-system of modern England is a little +difficult to explain in three words even if you understand it—which the +children didn’t. + +“You’ll have a revolt of your slaves if you’re not careful,” said the +Queen. + +“Oh, no,” said Cyril; “you see they have votes—that makes them safe not +to revolt. It makes all the difference. Father told me so.” + +“What is this vote?” asked the Queen. “Is it a charm? What do they do +with it?” + +“I don’t know,” said the harassed Cyril; “it’s just a vote, that’s all! +They don’t do anything particular with it.” + +“I see,” said the Queen; “a sort of plaything. Well, I wish that all +these slaves may have in their hands this moment their fill of their +favourite meat and drink.” + +Instantly all the people in the Mile End Road, and in all the other +streets where poor people live, found their hands full of things to eat +and drink. From the cab window could be seen persons carrying every +kind of food, and bottles and cans as well. Roast meat, fowls, red +lobsters, great yellowy crabs, fried fish, boiled pork, beef-steak +puddings, baked onions, mutton pies; most of the young people had +oranges and sweets and cake. It made an enormous change in the look of +the Mile End Road—brightened it up, so to speak, and brightened up, +more than you can possibly imagine, the faces of the people. + +“Makes a difference, doesn’t it?” said the Queen. + +“That’s the best wish you’ve had yet,” said Jane with cordial approval. + +Just by the Bank the cabman stopped. + +“I ain’t agoin’ to drive you no further,” he said. “Out you gets.” + +They got out rather unwillingly. + +“I wants my tea,” he said; and they saw that on the box of the cab was +a mound of cabbage, with pork chops and apple sauce, a duck, and a +spotted currant pudding. Also a large can. + +“You pay me my fare,” he said threateningly, and looked down at the +mound, muttering again about his tea. + +“We’ll take another cab,” said Cyril with dignity. “Give me change for +a sovereign, if you please.” + +But the cabman, as it turned out, was not at all a nice character. He +took the sovereign, whipped up his horse, and disappeared in the stream +of cabs and omnibuses and wagons, without giving them any change at +all. + +Already a little crowd was collecting round the party. + +“Come on,” said Robert, leading the wrong way. + +The crowd round them thickened. They were in a narrow street where many +gentlemen in black coats and without hats were standing about on the +pavement talking very loudly. + +“How ugly their clothes are,” said the Queen of Babylon. “They’d be +rather fine men, some of them, if they were dressed decently, +especially the ones with the beautiful long, curved noses. I wish they +were dressed like the Babylonians of my court.” + +And of course, it was so. + +The moment the almost fainting Psammead had blown itself out every man +in Throgmorton Street appeared abruptly in Babylonian full dress. + +All were carefully powdered, their hair and beards were scented and +curled, their garments richly embroidered. They wore rings and armlets, +flat gold collars and swords, and impossible-looking head-dresses. + +A stupefied silence fell on them. + +“I say,” a youth who had always been fair-haired broke that silence, +“it’s only fancy of course—something wrong with my eyes—but you chaps +do look so rum.” + +“Rum,” said his friend. “Look at _you_. You in a sash! My hat! And your +hair’s gone black and you’ve got a beard. It’s my belief we’ve been +poisoned. You do look a jackape.” + +“Old Levinstein don’t look so bad. But how was it _done_—that’s what I +want to know. How _was_ it done? Is it conjuring, or what?” + +“I think it is chust a ver’ bad tream,” said old Levinstein to his +clerk; “all along Bishopsgate I haf seen the gommon people have their +hants full of food—_goot_ food. Oh yes, without doubt a very bad +tream!” + +“Then I’m dreaming too, sir,” said the clerk, looking down at his legs +with an expression of loathing. “I see my feet in beastly sandals as +plain as plain.” + +“All that goot food wasted,” said old Mr Levinstein. A bad tream—a bad +tream.” + +The Members of the Stock Exchange are said to be at all times a noisy +lot. But the noise they made now to express their disgust at the +costumes of ancient Babylon was far louder than their ordinary row. One +had to shout before one could hear oneself speak. + +“I only wish,” said the clerk who thought it was conjuring—he was quite +close to the children and they trembled, because they knew that +whatever he wished would come true. “I only wish we knew who’d done +it.” + +And, of course, instantly they did know, and they pressed round the +Queen. + +“Scandalous! Shameful! Ought to be put down by law. Give her in charge. +Fetch the police,” two or three voices shouted at once. + +The Queen recoiled. + +“What is it?” she asked. “They sound like caged lions—lions by the +thousand. What is it that they say?” + +“They say ‘Police!’,” said Cyril briefly. “I knew they would sooner or +later. And I don’t blame them, mind you.” + +“I wish my guards were here!” cried the Queen. The exhausted Psammead +was panting and trembling, but the Queen’s guards in red and green +garments, and brass and iron gear, choked Throgmorton Street, and bared +weapons flashed round the Queen. + +“I’m mad,” said a Mr Rosenbaum; “dat’s what it is—mad!” + +“It’s a judgement on you, Rosy,” said his partner. “I always said you +were too hard in that matter of Flowerdew. It’s a judgement, and I’m in +it too.” + +The members of the Stock Exchange had edged carefully away from the +gleaming blades, the mailed figures, the hard, cruel Eastern faces. But +Throgmorton Street is narrow, and the crowd was too thick for them to +get away as quickly as they wished. + +“Kill them,” cried the Queen. “Kill the dogs!” + +The guards obeyed. + +“It _is_ all a dream,” cried Mr Levinstein, cowering in a doorway +behind his clerk. + +“It isn’t,” said the clerk. “It isn’t. Oh, my good gracious! those +foreign brutes are killing everybody. Henry Hirsh is down now, and +Prentice is cut in two—oh, Lord! and Huth, and there goes Lionel Cohen +with his head off, and Guy Nickalls has lost his head now. A dream? I +wish to goodness it was all a dream.” + +And, of course, instantly it was! The entire Stock Exchange rubbed its +eyes and went back to close, to over, and either side of seven-eights, +and Trunks, and Kaffirs, and Steel Common, and Contangoes, and +Backwardations, Double Options, and all the interesting subjects +concerning which they talk in the Street without ceasing. + +No one said a word about it to anyone else. I think I have explained +before that business men do not like it to be known that they have been +dreaming in business hours. Especially mad dreams including such +dreadful things as hungry people getting dinners, and the destruction +of the Stock Exchange. + +The children were in the dining-room at 300, Fitzroy Street, pale and +trembling. The Psammead crawled out of the embroidered bag, and lay +flat on the table, its leg stretched out, looking more like a dead hare +than anything else. + +“Thank Goodness that’s over,” said Anthea, drawing a deep breath. + +“She won’t come back, will she?” asked Jane tremulously. + +“No,” said Cyril. “She’s thousands of years ago. But we spent a whole +precious pound on her. It’ll take all our pocket-money for ages to pay +that back.” + +“Not if it was _all_ a dream,” said Robert. “The wish said _all_ a +dream, you know, Panther; you cut up and ask if he lent you anything.” + +“I beg your pardon,” said Anthea politely, following the sound of her +knock into the presence of the learned gentleman, “I’m _so_ sorry to +trouble you, but _did_ you lend me a pound today?” + +“No,” said he, looking kindly at her through his spectacles. “But it’s +extraordinary that you should ask me, for I dozed for a few moments +this afternoon, a thing I very rarely do, and I dreamed quite +distinctly that you brought me a ring that you said belonged to the +Queen of Babylon, and that I lent you a sovereign and that you left one +of the Queen’s rings here. The ring was a magnificent specimen.” He +sighed. “I wish it hadn’t been a dream,” he said smiling. He was really +learning to smile quite nicely. + +Anthea could not be too thankful that the Psammead was not there to +grant his wish. + + + + +CHAPTER IX. +ATLANTIS + + +You will understand that the adventure of the Babylonian queen in +London was the only one that had occupied any time at all. But the +children’s time was very fully taken up by talking over all the +wonderful things seen and done in the Past, where, by the power of the +Amulet, they seemed to spend hours and hours, only to find when they +got back to London that the whole thing had been briefer than a +lightning flash. + +They talked of the Past at their meals, in their walks, in the +dining-room, in the first-floor drawing-room, but most of all on the +stairs. It was an old house; it had once been a fashionable one, and +was a fine one still. The banister rails of the stairs were excellent +for sliding down, and in the corners of the landings were big alcoves +that had once held graceful statues, and now quite often held the +graceful forms of Cyril, Robert, Anthea, and Jane. + +One day Cyril and Robert in tight white underclothing had spent a +pleasant hour in reproducing the attitudes of statues seen either in +the British Museum, or in Father’s big photograph book. But the show +ended abruptly because Robert wanted to be the Venus of Milo, and for +this purpose pulled at the sheet which served for drapery at the very +moment when Cyril, looking really quite like the Discobolos—with a gold +and white saucer for the disc—was standing on one foot, and under that +one foot was the sheet. + +Of course the Discobolos and his disc and the would-be Venus came down +together, and everyone was a good deal hurt, especially the saucer, +which would never be the same again, however neatly one might join its +uneven bits with Seccotine or the white of an egg. + +“I hope you’re satisfied,” said Cyril, holding his head where a large +lump was rising. + +“Quite, thanks,” said Robert bitterly. His thumb had caught in the +banisters and bent itself back almost to breaking point. + +“I _am_ so sorry, poor, dear Squirrel,” said Anthea; “and you were +looking so lovely. I’ll get a wet rag. Bobs, go and hold your hand +under the hot-water tap. It’s what ballet girls do with their legs when +they hurt them. I saw it in a book.” + +“What book?” said Robert disagreeably. But he went. + +When he came back Cyril’s head had been bandaged by his sisters, and he +had been brought to the state of mind where he was able reluctantly to +admit that he supposed Robert hadn’t done it on purpose. + +Robert replying with equal suavity, Anthea hastened to lead the talk +away from the accident. + +“I suppose you don’t feel like going anywhere through the Amulet,” she +said. + +“Egypt!” said Jane promptly. “I want to see the pussy cats.” + +“Not me—too hot,” said Cyril. “It’s about as much as I can stand +here—let alone Egypt.” It was indeed, hot, even on the second landing, +which was the coolest place in the house. “Let’s go to the North Pole.” + +“I don’t suppose the Amulet was ever there—and we might get our fingers +frost-bitten so that we could never hold it up to get home again. No +thanks,” said Robert. + +“I say,” said Jane, “let’s get the Psammead and ask its advice. It will +like us asking, even if we don’t take it.” + +The Psammead was brought up in its green silk embroidered bag, but +before it could be asked anything the door of the learned gentleman’s +room opened and the voice of the visitor who had been lunching with him +was heard on the stairs. He seemed to be speaking with the door handle +in his hand. + +“You see a doctor, old boy,” he said; “all that about +thought-transference is just simply twaddle. You’ve been over-working. +Take a holiday. Go to Dieppe.” + +“I’d rather go to Babylon,” said the learned gentleman. + +“I wish you’d go to Atlantis some time, while we’re about it, so as to +give me some tips for my _Nineteenth Century_ article when you come +home.” + +“I wish I could,” said the voice of the learned gentleman. + + +“Goodbye. Take care of yourself.” + +The door was banged, and the visitor came smiling down the stairs—a +stout, prosperous, big man. The children had to get up to let him pass. + +“Hullo, Kiddies,” he said, glancing at the bandages on the head of +Cyril and the hand of Robert, “been in the wars?” + +“It’s all right,” said Cyril. “I say, what was that Atlantic place you +wanted him to go to? We couldn’t help hearing you talk.” + +“You talk so _very_ loud, you see,” said Jane soothingly. + +“Atlantis,” said the visitor, “the lost Atlantis, garden of the +Hesperides. Great continent—disappeared in the sea. You can read about +it in Plato.” + +“Thank you,” said Cyril doubtfully. + +“Were there any Amulets there?” asked Anthea, made anxious by a sudden +thought. + +“Hundreds, I should think. So _he’s_ been talking to you?” + +“Yes, often. He’s very kind to us. We like him awfully.” + +“Well, what he wants is a holiday; you persuade him to take one. What +he wants is a change of scene. You see, his head is crusted so thickly +inside with knowledge about Egypt and Assyria and things that you can’t +hammer anything into it unless you keep hard at it all day long for +days and days. And I haven’t time. But you live in the house. You can +hammer almost incessantly. Just try your hands, will you? Right. So +long!” + +He went down the stairs three at a time, and Jane remarked that he was +a nice man, and she thought he had little girls of his own. + +“I should like to have them to play with,” she added pensively. + +The three elder ones exchanged glances. Cyril nodded. + +“All right. _Let’s_ go to Atlantis,” he said. + +“Let’s go to Atlantis and take the learned gentleman with us,” said +Anthea; “he’ll think it’s a dream, afterwards, but it’ll certainly be a +change of scene.” + +“Why not take him to nice Egypt?” asked Jane. + +“Too hot,” said Cyril shortly. + +“Or Babylon, where he wants to go?” + +“I’ve had enough of Babylon,” said Robert, “at least for the present. +And so have the others. I don’t know why,” he added, forestalling the +question on Jane’s lips, “but somehow we have. Squirrel, let’s take off +these beastly bandages and get into flannels. We can’t go in our +unders.” + +“He _wished_ to go to Atlantis, so he’s got to go some time; and he +might as well go with us,” said Anthea. + +This was how it was that the learned gentleman, permitting himself a +few moments of relaxation in his chair, after the fatigue of listening +to opinions (about Atlantis and many other things) with which he did +not at all agree, opened his eyes to find his four young friends +standing in front of him in a row. + +“Will you come,” said Anthea, “to Atlantis with us?” + +“To know that you are dreaming shows that the dream is nearly at an +end,” he told himself; “or perhaps it’s only a game, like ‘How many +miles to Babylon?’” + +So he said aloud: “Thank you very much, but I have only a quarter of an +hour to spare.” + +“It doesn’t take any time,” said Cyril; “time is only a mode of +thought, you know, and you’ve got to go some time, so why not with us?” + +“Very well,” said the learned gentleman, now quite certain that he was +dreaming. + +Anthea held out her soft, pink hand. He took it. She pulled him gently +to his feet. Jane held up the Amulet. + +“To just outside Atlantis,” said Cyril, and Jane said the Name of +Power. + +“You owl!” said Robert, “it’s an island. Outside an island’s all +water.” + +“I won’t go. I _won’t_,” said the Psammead, kicking and struggling in +its bag. + +But already the Amulet had grown to a great arch. Cyril pushed the +learned gentleman, as undoubtedly the first-born, through the arch—not +into water, but on to a wooden floor, out of doors. The others +followed. The Amulet grew smaller again, and there they all were, +standing on the deck of a ship whose sailors were busy making her fast +with chains to rings on a white quay-side. The rings and the chains +were of a metal that shone red-yellow like gold. + +Everyone on the ship seemed too busy at first to notice the group of +newcomers from Fitzroy Street. Those who seemed to be officers were +shouting orders to the men. + +They stood and looked across the wide quay to the town that rose beyond +it. What they saw was the most beautiful sight any of them had ever +seen—or ever dreamed of. + +The blue sea sparkled in soft sunlight; little white-capped waves broke +softly against the marble breakwaters that guarded the shipping of a +great city from the wilderness of winter winds and seas. The quay was +of marble, white and sparkling with a veining bright as gold. The city +was of marble, red and white. The greater buildings that seemed to be +temples and palaces were roofed with what looked like gold and silver, +but most of the roofs were of copper that glowed golden-red on the +houses on the hills among which the city stood, and shaded into +marvellous tints of green and blue and purple where they had been +touched by the salt sea spray and the fumes of the dyeing and smelting +works of the lower town. + +Broad and magnificent flights of marble stairs led up from the quay to +a sort of terrace that seemed to run along for miles, and beyond rose +the town built on a hill. + +The learned gentleman drew a long breath. “Wonderful!” he said, +“wonderful!” + +“I say, Mr—what’s your name,” said Robert. + +“He means,” said Anthea, with gentle politeness, “that we never can +remember your name. I know it’s Mr De Something.” + +“When I was your age I was called Jimmy,” he said timidly. “Would you +mind? I should feel more at home in a dream like this if I—Anything +that made me seem more like one of you.” + +“Thank you—Jimmy,” said Anthea with an effort. It seemed such a cheek +to be saying Jimmy to a grown-up man. “Jimmy, _dear_,” she added, with +no effort at all. Jimmy smiled and looked pleased. + +But now the ship was made fast, and the Captain had time to notice +other things. He came towards them, and he was dressed in the best of +all possible dresses for the seafaring life. + +“What are you doing here?” he asked rather fiercely. “Do you come to +bless or to curse?” + +“To bless, of course,” said Cyril. “I’m sorry if it annoys you, but +we’re here by magic. We come from the land of the sun-rising,” he went +on explanatorily. + +“I see,” said the Captain; no one had expected that he would. “I didn’t +notice at first, but of course I hope you’re a good omen. It’s needed. +And this,” he pointed to the learned gentleman, “your slave, I +presume?” + +“Not at all,” said Anthea; “he’s a very great man. A sage, don’t they +call it? And we want to see all your beautiful city, and your temples +and things, and then we shall go back, and he will tell his friend, and +his friend will write a book about it.” + +“What,” asked the Captain, fingering a rope, “is a book?” + +“A record—something written, or,” she added hastily, remembering the +Babylonian writing, “or engraved.” + +Some sudden impulse of confidence made Jane pluck the Amulet from the +neck of her frock. + +“Like this,” she said. + +The Captain looked at it curiously, but, the other three were relieved +to notice, without any of that overwhelming interest which the mere +name of it had roused in Egypt and Babylon. + +“The stone is of our country,” he said; “and that which is engraved on +it, it is like our writing, but I cannot read it. What is the name of +your sage?” + +“Ji-jimmy,” said Anthea hesitatingly. + +The Captain repeated, “Ji-jimmy. Will you land?” he added. “And shall I +lead you to the Kings?” + +“Look here,” said Robert, “does your King hate strangers?” + +“Our Kings are ten,” said the Captain, “and the Royal line, unbroken +from Poseidon, the father of us all, has the noble tradition to do +honour to strangers if they come in peace.” + +“Then lead on, please,” said Robert, “though I _should_ like to see all +over your beautiful ship, and sail about in her.” + +“That shall be later,” said the Captain; “just now we’re afraid of a +storm—do you notice that odd rumbling?” + +“That’s nothing, master,” said an old sailor who stood near; “it’s the +pilchards coming in, that’s all.” + +“Too loud,” said the Captain. + +There was a rather anxious pause; then the Captain stepped on to the +quay, and the others followed him. + +“Do talk to him—Jimmy,” said Anthea as they went; “you can find out all +sorts of things for your friend’s book.” + +“Please excuse me,” he said earnestly. “If I talk I shall wake up; and +besides, I can’t understand what he says.” + +No one else could think of anything to say, so that it was in complete +silence that they followed the Captain up the marble steps and through +the streets of the town. There were streets and shops and houses and +markets. + +“It’s just like Babylon,” whispered Jane, “only everything’s perfectly +different.” + +“It’s a great comfort the ten Kings have been properly brought up—to be +kind to strangers,” Anthea whispered to Cyril. + +“Yes,” he said, “no deepest dungeons here.” + +There were no horses or chariots in the street, but there were +handcarts and low trolleys running on thick log-wheels, and porters +carrying packets on their heads, and a good many of the people were +riding on what looked like elephants, only the great beasts were hairy, +and they had not that mild expression we are accustomed to meet on the +faces of the elephants at the Zoo. + +“Mammoths!” murmured the learned gentleman, and stumbled over a loose +stone. + +The people in the streets kept crowding round them as they went along, +but the Captain always dispersed the crowd before it grew uncomfortably +thick by saying— + +“Children of the Sun God and their High Priest—come to bless the City.” + +And then the people would draw back with a low murmur that sounded like +a suppressed cheer. + +Many of the buildings were covered with gold, but the gold on the +bigger buildings was of a different colour, and they had sorts of +steeples of burnished silver rising above them. + +“Are all these houses real gold?” asked Jane. + +“The temples are covered with gold, of course,” answered the Captain, +“but the houses are only oricalchum. It’s not quite so expensive.” + +The learned gentleman, now very pale, stumbled along in a dazed way, +repeating: + +“Oricalchum—oricalchum.” + +“Don’t be frightened,” said Anthea; “we can get home in a minute, just +by holding up the charm. Would you rather go back now? We could easily +come some other day without you.” + +“Oh, no, no,” he pleaded fervently; “let the dream go on. Please, +please do.” + +“The High Ji-jimmy is perhaps weary with his magic journey,” said the +Captain, noticing the blundering walk of the learned gentleman; “and we +are yet very far from the Great Temple, where today the Kings make +sacrifice.” + +He stopped at the gate of a great enclosure. It seemed to be a sort of +park, for trees showed high above its brazen wall. + +The party waited, and almost at once the Captain came back with one of +the hairy elephants and begged them to mount. + +This they did. + +It was a glorious ride. The elephant at the Zoo—to ride on him is also +glorious, but he goes such a very little way, and then he goes back +again, which is always dull. But this great hairy beast went on and on +and on along streets and through squares and gardens. It was a glorious +city; almost everything was built of marble, red, or white, or black. +Every now and then the party crossed a bridge. + +It was not till they had climbed to the hill which is the centre of the +town that they saw that the whole city was divided into twenty circles, +alternately land and water, and over each of the water circles were the +bridges by which they had come. + +And now they were in a great square. A vast building filled up one side +of it; it was overlaid with gold, and had a dome of silver. The rest of +the buildings round the square were of oricalchum. And it looked more +splendid than you can possibly imagine, standing up bold and shining in +the sunlight. + +“You would like a bath,” said the Captain, as the hairy elephant went +clumsily down on his knees. “It’s customary, you know, before entering +the Presence. We have baths for men, women, horses, and cattle. The +High Class Baths are here. Our Father Poseidon gave us a spring of hot +water and one of cold.” + +The children had never before bathed in baths of gold. + +“It feels very splendid,” said Cyril, splashing. + +“At least, of course, it’s not gold; it’s or—what’s its name,” said +Robert. “Hand over that towel.” + +The bathing hall had several great pools sunk below the level of the +floor; one went down to them by steps. + +“Jimmy,” said Anthea timidly, when, very clean and boiled-looking, they +all met in the flowery courtyard of the Public, “don’t you think all +this seems much more like _now_ than Babylon or Egypt—? Oh, I forgot, +you’ve never been there.” + +“I know a little of those nations, however,” said he, “and I quite +agree with you. A most discerning remark—my dear,” he added awkwardly; +“this city certainly seems to indicate a far higher level of +civilization than the Egyptian or Babylonish, and—” + +“Follow me,” said the Captain. “Now, boys, get out of the way.” He +pushed through a little crowd of boys who were playing with dried +chestnuts fastened to a string. + +“Ginger!” remarked Robert, “they’re playing conkers, just like the kids +in Kentish Town Road!” + +They could see now that three walls surrounded the island on which they +were. The outermost wall was of brass, the Captain told them; the next, +which looked like silver, was covered with tin; and the innermost one +was of oricalchum. + +And right in the middle was a wall of gold, with golden towers and +gates. + +“Behold the Temples of Poseidon,” said the Captain. “It is not lawful +for me to enter. I will await your return here.” + +He told them what they ought to say, and the five people from Fitzroy +Street took hands and went forward. The golden gates slowly opened. + +“We are the children of the Sun,” said Cyril, as he had been told, “and +our High Priest, at least that’s what the Captain calls him. We have a +different name for him at home.” + +“What is his name?” asked a white-robed man who stood in the doorway +with his arms extended. + +“Ji-jimmy,” replied Cyril, and he hesitated as Anthea had done. It +really did seem to be taking a great liberty with so learned a +gentleman. “And we have come to speak with your Kings in the Temple of +Poseidon—does that word sound right?” he whispered anxiously. + +“Quite,” said the learned gentleman. “It’s very odd I can understand +what you say to them, but not what they say to you.” + +“The Queen of Babylon found that too,” said Cyril; “it’s part of the +magic.” + +“Oh, what a dream!” said the learned gentleman. + +The white-robed priest had been joined by others, and all were bowing +low. + +“Enter,” he said, “enter, Children of the Sun, with your High +Ji-jimmy.” + +In an inner courtyard stood the Temple—all of silver, with gold +pinnacles and doors, and twenty enormous statues in bright gold of men +and women. Also an immense pillar of the other precious yellow metal. + +They went through the doors, and the priest led them up a stair into a +gallery from which they could look down on to the glorious place. + +“The ten Kings are even now choosing the bull. It is not lawful for me +to behold,” said the priest, and fell face downward on the floor +outside the gallery. The children looked down. + +The roof was of ivory adorned with the three precious metals, and the +walls were lined with the favourite oricalchum. + +At the far end of the Temple was a statue group, the like of which no +one living has ever seen. + +It was of gold, and the head of the chief figure reached to the roof. +That figure was Poseidon, the Father of the City. He stood in a great +chariot drawn by six enormous horses, and round about it were a hundred +mermaids riding on dolphins. + +Ten men, splendidly dressed and armed only with sticks and ropes, were +trying to capture one of some fifteen bulls who ran this way and that +about the floor of the Temple. The children held their breath, for the +bulls looked dangerous, and the great horned heads were swinging more +and more wildly. + +Anthea did not like looking at the bulls. She looked about the gallery, +and noticed that another staircase led up from it to a still higher +storey; also that a door led out into the open air, where there seemed +to be a balcony. + +So that when a shout went up and Robert whispered, “Got him,” and she +looked down and saw the herd of bulls being driven out of the Temple by +whips, and the ten Kings following, one of them spurring with his stick +a black bull that writhed and fought in the grip of a lasso, she +answered the boy’s agitated, “Now we shan’t see anything more,” with— + +“Yes we can, there’s an outside balcony.” + +So they crowded out. + +But very soon the girls crept back. + +“I don’t like sacrifices,” Jane said. So she and Anthea went and talked +to the priest, who was no longer lying on his face, but sitting on the +top step mopping his forehead with his robe, for it was a hot day. + +“It’s a special sacrifice,” he said; “usually it’s only done on the +justice days every five years and six years alternately. And then they +drink the cup of wine with some of the bull’s blood in it, and swear to +judge truly. And they wear the sacred blue robe, and put out all the +Temple fires. But this today is because the City’s so upset by the odd +noises from the sea, and the god inside the big mountain speaking with +his thunder-voice. But all that’s happened so often before. If anything +could make ME uneasy it wouldn’t be _that_.” + +“What would it be?” asked Jane kindly. + +“It would be the Lemmings.” + +“Who are they—enemies?” + +“They’re a sort of rat; and every year they come swimming over from the +country that no man knows, and stay here awhile, and then swim away. +This year they haven’t come. You know rats won’t stay on a ship that’s +going to be wrecked. If anything horrible were going to happen to us, +it’s my belief those Lemmings would know; and that may be why they’ve +fought shy of us.” + +“What do you call this country?” asked the Psammead, suddenly putting +its head out of its bag. + +“Atlantis,” said the priest. + +“Then I advise you to get on to the highest ground you can find. I +remember hearing something about a flood here. Look here, you”—it +turned to Anthea; “let’s get home. The prospect’s too wet for my +whiskers.” + +The girls obediently went to find their brothers, who were leaning on +the balcony railings. + +“Where’s the learned gentleman?” asked Anthea. + +“There he is—below,” said the priest, who had come with them. “Your +High Ji-jimmy is with the Kings.” + +The ten Kings were no longer alone. The learned gentleman—no one had +noticed how he got there—stood with them on the steps of an altar, on +which lay the dead body of the black bull. All the rest of the +courtyard was thick with people, seemingly of all classes, and all were +shouting, “The sea—the sea!” + +“Be calm,” said the most kingly of the Kings, he who had lassoed the +bull. “Our town is strong against the thunders of the sea and of the +sky!” + +“I want to go home,” whined the Psammead. + +“We can’t go without _him_,” said Anthea firmly. + +“Jimmy,” she called, “Jimmy!” and waved to him. He heard her, and began +to come towards her through the crowd. + +They could see from the balcony the sea-captain edging his way out from +among the people. And his face was dead white, like paper. + +“To the hills!” he cried in a loud and terrible voice. And above his +voice came another voice, louder, more terrible—the voice of the sea. + +The girls looked seaward. + +Across the smooth distance of the sea something huge and black rolled +towards the town. It was a wave, but a wave a hundred feet in height, a +wave that looked like a mountain—a wave rising higher and higher till +suddenly it seemed to break in two—one half of it rushed out to sea +again; the other— + +“Oh!” cried Anthea, “the town—the poor people!” + +“It’s all thousands of years ago, really,” said Robert but his voice +trembled. They hid their eyes for a moment. They could not bear to look +down, for the wave had broken on the face of the town, sweeping over +the quays and docks, overwhelming the great storehouses and factories, +tearing gigantic stones from forts and bridges, and using them as +battering rams against the temples. Great ships were swept over the +roofs of the houses and dashed down halfway up the hill among ruined +gardens and broken buildings. The water ground brown fishing-boats to +powder on the golden roofs of Palaces. + +Then the wave swept back towards the sea. + +“I want to go home,” cried the Psammead fiercely. + +“Oh, yes, yes!” said Jane, and the boys were ready—but the learned +gentleman had not come. + +Then suddenly they heard him dash up to the inner gallery, crying— + +“I _must_ see the end of the dream.” He rushed up the higher flight. +The others followed him. They found themselves in a sort of +turret—roofed, but open to the air at the sides. + +The learned gentleman was leaning on the parapet, and as they rejoined +him the vast wave rushed back on the town. This time it rose +higher—destroyed more. + +“Come home,” cried the Psammead; “_that’s_ the _last_, I know it is! +That’s the last—over there.” It pointed with a claw that trembled. + +“Oh, come!” cried Jane, holding up the Amulet. + +“I _will see_ the end of the dream,” cried the learned gentleman. + +“You’ll never see anything else if you do,” said Cyril. + +“Oh, _Jimmy!_” appealed Anthea. “I’ll _never_ bring you out again!” + +“You’ll never have the chance if you don’t go soon,” said the Psammead. + +“I _will_ see the end of the dream,” said the learned gentleman +obstinately. + +The hills around were black with people fleeing from the villages to +the mountains. And even as they fled thin smoke broke from the great +white peak, and then a faint flash of flame. Then the volcano began to +throw up its mysterious fiery inside parts. The earth trembled; ashes +and sulphur showered down; a rain of fine pumice-stone fell like snow +on all the dry land. The elephants from the forest rushed up towards +the peaks; great lizards thirty yards long broke from the mountain +pools and rushed down towards the sea. The snows melted and rushed +down, first in avalanches, then in roaring torrents. Great rocks cast +up by the volcano fell splashing in the sea miles away. + +“Oh, this is horrible!” cried Anthea. “Come home, come home!” + +“The end of the dream,” gasped the learned gentleman. + +“Hold up the Amulet,” cried the Psammead suddenly. The place where they +stood was now crowded with men and women, and the children were +strained tight against the parapet. The turret rocked and swayed; the +wave had reached the golden wall. + +Jane held up the Amulet. + +“Now,” cried the Psammead, “say the word!” + +And as Jane said it the Psammead leaped from its bag and bit the hand +of the learned gentleman. + +At the same moment the boys pushed him through the arch and all +followed him. + +He turned to look back, and through the arch he saw nothing but a waste +of waters, with above it the peak of the terrible mountain with fire +raging from it. + +He staggered back to his chair. + +“What a ghastly dream!” he gasped. “Oh, you’re here, my—er—dears. Can I +do anything for you?” + +“You’ve hurt your hand,” said Anthea gently; “let me bind it up.” + +The hand was indeed bleeding rather badly. + +The Psammead had crept back to its bag. All the children were very +white. + +“Never again,” said the Psammead later on, “will I go into the Past +with a grown-up person! I will say for you four, you do do as you’re +told.” + +“We didn’t even find the Amulet,” said Anthea later still. + +“Of course you didn’t; it wasn’t there. Only the stone it was made of +was there. It fell on to a ship miles away that managed to escape and +got to Egypt. _I_ could have told you that.” + +“I wish you had,” said Anthea, and her voice was still rather shaky. +“Why didn’t you?” + +“You never asked me,” said the Psammead very sulkily. “I’m not the sort +of chap to go shoving my oar in where it’s not wanted.” + +“Mr Ji-jimmy’s friend will have something worth having to put in his +article now,” said Cyril very much later indeed. + +“Not he,” said Robert sleepily. “The learned Ji-jimmy will think it’s a +dream, and it’s ten to one he never tells the other chap a word about +it at all.” + +Robert was quite right on both points. The learned gentleman did. And +he never did. + + + + +CHAPTER X. +THE LITTLE BLACK GIRL AND JULIUS CAESAR + + +A great city swept away by the sea, a beautiful country devastated by +an active volcano—these are not the sort of things you see every day of +the week. And when you do see them, no matter how many other wonders +you may have seen in your time, such sights are rather apt to take your +breath away. Atlantis had certainly this effect on the breaths of +Cyril, Robert, Anthea, and Jane. + +They remained in a breathless state for some days. The learned +gentleman seemed as breathless as anyone; he spent a good deal of what +little breath he had in telling Anthea about a wonderful dream he had. +“You would hardly believe,” he said, “that anyone _could_ have such a +detailed vision.” + +But Anthea could believe it, she said, quite easily. + +He had ceased to talk about thought-transference. He had now seen too +many wonders to believe that. + +In consequence of their breathless condition none of the children +suggested any new excursions through the Amulet. Robert voiced the mood +of the others when he said that they were “fed up” with Amulet for a +bit. They undoubtedly were. + +As for the Psammead, it went to sand and stayed there, worn out by the +terror of the flood and the violent exercise it had had to take in +obedience to the inconsiderate wishes of the learned gentleman and the +Babylonian queen. + +The children let it sleep. The danger of taking it about among strange +people who might at any moment utter undesirable wishes was becoming +more and more plain. + +And there are pleasant things to be done in London without any aid from +Amulets or Psammeads. You can, for instance visit the Tower of London, +the Houses of Parliament, the National Gallery, the Zoological Gardens, +the various Parks, the Museums at South Kensington, Madame Tussaud’s +Exhibition of Waxworks, or the Botanical Gardens at Kew. You can go to +Kew by river steamer—and this is the way that the children would have +gone if they had gone at all. Only they never did, because it was when +they were discussing the arrangements for the journey, and what they +should take with them to eat and how much of it, and what the whole +thing would cost, that the adventure of the Little Black Girl began to +happen. + +The children were sitting on a seat in St James’s Park. They had been +watching the pelican repulsing with careful dignity the advances of the +seagulls who are always so anxious to play games with it. The pelican +thinks, very properly, that it hasn’t the figure for games, so it +spends most of its time pretending that that is not the reason why it +won’t play. + +The breathlessness caused by Atlantis was wearing off a little. Cyril, +who always wanted to understand all about everything, was turning +things over in his mind. + +“I’m not; I’m only thinking,” he answered when Robert asked him what he +was so grumpy about. “I’ll tell you when I’ve thought it all out.” + +“If it’s about the Amulet I don’t want to hear it,” said Jane. + +“Nobody asked you to,” retorted Cyril mildly, “and I haven’t finished +my inside thinking about it yet. Let’s go to Kew in the meantime.” + +“I’d rather go in a steamer,” said Robert; and the girls laughed. + +“That’s right,” said Cyril, “_be_ funny. I would.” + +“Well, he was, rather,” said Anthea. + +“I wouldn’t think, Squirrel, if it hurts you so,” said Robert kindly. + +“Oh, shut up,” said Cyril, “or else talk about Kew.” + +“I want to see the palms there,” said Anthea hastily, “to see if +they’re anything like the ones on the island where we united the Cook +and the Burglar by the Reverend Half-Curate.” + +All disagreeableness was swept away in a pleasant tide of +recollections, and “Do you remember...?” they said. “Have you +forgotten...?” + +“My hat!” remarked Cyril pensively, as the flood of reminiscence ebbed +a little; “we have had some times.” + +“We have that,” said Robert. + +“Don’t let’s have any more,” said Jane anxiously. + +“That’s what I was thinking about,” Cyril replied; and just then they +heard the Little Black Girl sniff. She was quite close to them. + +She was not really a little black girl. She was shabby and not very +clean, and she had been crying so much that you could hardly see, +through the narrow chink between her swollen lids, how very blue her +eyes were. It was her dress that was black, and it was too big and too +long for her, and she wore a speckled black-ribboned sailor hat that +would have fitted a much bigger head than her little flaxen one. And +she stood looking at the children and sniffing. + +“Oh, dear!” said Anthea, jumping up. “Whatever is the matter?” + +She put her hand on the little girl’s arm. It was rudely shaken off. + +“You leave me be,” said the little girl. “I ain’t doing nothing to +you.” + +“But what is it?” Anthea asked. “Has someone been hurting you?” + +“What’s that to you?” said the little girl fiercely. “_You’re_ all +right.” + +“Come away,” said Robert, pulling at Anthea’s sleeve. “She’s a nasty, +rude little kid.” + +“Oh, no,” said Anthea. “She’s only dreadfully unhappy. What is it?” she +asked again. + +“Oh, _you’re_ all right,” the child repeated; “_you_ ain’t agoin’ to +the Union.” + +“Can’t we take you home?” said Anthea; and Jane added, “Where does your +mother live?” + +“She don’t live nowheres—she’s dead—so now!” said the little girl +fiercely, in tones of miserable triumph. Then she opened her swollen +eyes widely, stamped her foot in fury, and ran away. She ran no further +than to the next bench, flung herself down there and began to cry +without even trying not to. + +Anthea, quite at once, went to the little girl and put her arms as +tight as she could round the hunched-up black figure. + +“Oh, don’t cry so, dear, don’t, don’t!” she whispered under the brim of +the large sailor hat, now very crooked indeed. “Tell Anthea all about +it; Anthea’lll help you. There, there, dear, don’t cry.” + +The others stood at a distance. One or two passers-by stared curiously. + +The child was now only crying part of the time; the rest of the time +she seemed to be talking to Anthea. + +Presently Anthea beckoned Cyril. + +“It’s horrible!” she said in a furious whisper, “her father was a +carpenter and he was a steady man, and never touched a drop except on a +Saturday, and he came up to London for work, and there wasn’t any, and +then he died; and her name is Imogen, and she’s nine come next +November. And now her mother’s dead, and she’s to stay tonight with Mrs +Shrobsall—that’s a landlady that’s been kind—and tomorrow the Relieving +Officer is coming for her, and she’s going into the Union; that means +the Workhouse. It’s too terrible. What can we do?” + +“Let’s ask the learned gentleman,” said Jane brightly. + +And as no one else could think of anything better the whole party +walked back to Fitzroy Street as fast as it could, the little girl +holding tight to Anthea’s hand and now not crying any more, only +sniffing gently. + +The learned gentleman looked up from his writing with the smile that +had grown much easier to him than it used to be. They were quite at +home in his room now; it really seemed to welcome them. Even the +mummy-case appeared to smile as if in its distant superior ancient +Egyptian way it were rather pleased to see them than not. + +Anthea sat on the stairs with Imogen, who was nine come next November, +while the others went in and explained the difficulty. + +The learned gentleman listened with grave attention. + +“It really does seem rather rough luck,” Cyril concluded, “because I’ve +often heard about rich people who wanted children most awfully—though I +know _I_ never should—but they do. There must be somebody who’d be glad +to have her.” + +“Gipsies are awfully fond of children,” Robert hopefully said. “They’re +always stealing them. Perhaps they’d have her.” + +“She’s quite a nice little girl really,” Jane added; “she was only rude +at first because we looked jolly and happy, and she wasn’t. You +understand that, don’t you?” + +“Yes,” said he, absently fingering a little blue image from Egypt. “I +understand that very well. As you say, there must be some home where +she would be welcome.” He scowled thoughtfully at the little blue +image. + +Anthea outside thought the explanation was taking a very long time. She +was so busy trying to cheer and comfort the little black girl that she +never noticed the Psammead who, roused from sleep by her voice, had +shaken itself free of sand, and was coming crookedly up the stairs. It +was close to her before she saw it. She picked it up and settled it in +her lap. + +“What is it?” asked the black child. “Is it a cat or a organ-monkey, or +what?” + +And then Anthea heard the learned gentleman say— + +“Yes, I wish we could find a home where they would be glad to have +her,” and instantly she felt the Psammead begin to blow itself out as +it sat on her lap. + +She jumped up lifting the Psammead in her skirt, and holding Imogen by +the hand, rushed into the learned gentleman’s room. + +“At least let’s keep together,” she cried. “All hold hands—quick!” + +The circle was like that formed for the Mulberry Bush or Ring-o’-Roses. +And Anthea was only able to take part in it by holding in her teeth the +hem of her frock which, thus supported, formed a bag to hold the +Psammead. + +“Is it a game?” asked the learned gentleman feebly. No one answered. + +There was a moment of suspense; then came that curious upside-down, +inside-out sensation which one almost always feels when transported +from one place to another by magic. Also there was that dizzy dimness +of sight which comes on these occasions. + +The mist cleared, the upside-down, inside-out sensation subsided, and +there stood the six in a ring, as before, only their twelve feet, +instead of standing on the carpet of the learned gentleman’s room, +stood on green grass. Above them, instead of the dusky ceiling of the +Fitzroy Street floor, was a pale blue sky. And where the walls had been +and the painted mummy-case, were tall dark green trees, oaks and ashes, +and in between the trees and under them tangled bushes and creeping +ivy. There were beech-trees too, but there was nothing under them but +their own dead red drifted leaves, and here and there a delicate green +fern-frond. + +And there they stood in a circle still holding hands, as though they +were playing Ring-o’-Roses or the Mulberry Bush. Just six people hand +in hand in a wood. That sounds simple, but then you must remember that +they did not know _where_ the wood was, and what’s more, they didn’t +know _when_ then wood was. There was a curious sort of feeling that +made the learned gentleman say— + +“Another dream, dear me!” and made the children almost certain that +they were in a time a very long while ago. As for little Imogen, she +said, “Oh, my!” and kept her mouth very much open indeed. + +“Where are we?” Cyril asked the Psammead. + +“In Britain,” said the Psammead. + +“But when?” asked Anthea anxiously. + +“About the year fifty-five before the year you reckon time from,” said +the Psammead crossly. “Is there anything else you want to know?” it +added, sticking its head out of the bag formed by Anthea’s blue linen +frock, and turning its snail’s eyes to right and left. “I’ve been here +before—it’s very little changed.” + +“Yes, but why here?” asked Anthea. + +“Your inconsiderate friend,” the Psammead replied, “wished to find some +home where they would be glad to have that unattractive and immature +female human being whom you have picked up—gracious knows how. In +Megatherium days properly brought-up children didn’t talk to shabby +strangers in parks. Your thoughtless friend wanted a place where +someone would be glad to have this undesirable stranger. And now here +you are!” + +“I see we are,” said Anthea patiently, looking round on the tall gloom +of the forest. “But why _here?_ Why _now?_” + +“You don’t suppose anyone would want a child like that in _your_ +times—in _your_ towns?” said the Psammead in irritated tones. “You’ve +got your country into such a mess that there’s no room for half your +children—and no one to want them.” + +“That’s not our doing, you know,” said Anthea gently. + +“And bringing me here without any waterproof or anything,” said the +Psammead still more crossly, “when everyone knows how damp and foggy +Ancient Britain was.” + +“Here, take my coat,” said Robert, taking it off. Anthea spread the +coat on the ground and, putting the Psammead on it, folded it round so +that only the eyes and furry ears showed. + +“There,” she said comfortingly. “Now if it does begin to look like +rain, I can cover you up in a minute. Now what are we to do?” + +The others who had stopped holding hands crowded round to hear the +answer to this question. Imogen whispered in an awed tone— + +“Can’t the organ monkey talk neither! I thought it was only parrots!” + +“Do?” replied the Psammead. “I don’t care what you do!” And it drew +head and ears into the tweed covering of Robert’s coat. + +The others looked at each other. + +“It’s only a dream,” said the learned gentleman hopefully; “something +is sure to happen if we can prevent ourselves from waking up.” + +And sure enough, something did. + +The brooding silence of the dark forest was broken by the laughter of +children and the sound of voices. + +“Let’s go and see,” said Cyril. + +“It’s only a dream,” said the learned gentleman to Jane, who hung back; +“if you don’t go with the tide of a dream—if you resist—you wake up, +you know.” + +There was a sort of break in the undergrowth that was like a silly +person’s idea of a path. They went along this in Indian file, the +learned gentleman leading. + +Quite soon they came to a large clearing in the forest. There were a +number of houses—huts perhaps you would have called them—with a sort of +mud and wood fence. + +“It’s like the old Egyptian town,” whispered Anthea. + +And it was, rather. + +Some children, with no clothes on at all, were playing what looked like +Ring-o’-Roses or Mulberry Bush. That is to say, they were dancing round +in a ring, holding hands. On a grassy bank several women, dressed in +blue and white robes and tunics of beast-skins sat watching the playing +children. + +The children from Fitzroy Street stood on the fringe of the forest +looking at the games. One woman with long, fair braided hair sat a +little apart from the others, and there was a look in her eyes as she +followed the play of the children that made Anthea feel sad and sorry. + +“None of those little girls is her own little girl,” thought Anthea. + +The little black-clad London child pulled at Anthea’s sleeve. + +“Look,” she said, “that one there—she’s precious like mother; mother’s +“air was somethink lovely, when she “ad time to comb it out. Mother +wouldn’t never a-beat me if she’d lived ’ere—I don’t suppose there’s +e’er a public nearer than Epping, do you, Miss?” + +In her eagerness the child had stepped out of the shelter of the +forest. The sad-eyed woman saw her. She stood up, her thin face lighted +up with a radiance like sunrise, her long, lean arms stretched towards +the London child. + +“Imogen!” she cried—at least the word was more like that than any other +word—“Imogen!” + +There was a moment of great silence; the naked children paused in their +play, the women on the bank stared anxiously. + +“Oh, it _is_ mother—it _is!_” cried Imogen-from-London, and rushed +across the cleared space. She and her mother clung together—so closely, +so strongly that they stood an instant like a statue carved in stone. + +Then the women crowded round. + +“It _is_ my Imogen!” cried the woman. + +“Oh it is! And she wasn’t eaten by wolves. She’s come back to me. Tell +me, my darling, how did you escape? Where have you been? Who has fed +and clothed you?” + +“I don’t know nothink,” said Imogen. + +“Poor child!” whispered the women who crowded round, “the terror of the +wolves has turned her brain.” + +“But you know _me?_” said the fair-haired woman. + +And Imogen, clinging with black-clothed arms to the bare neck, +answered— + +“Oh, yes, mother, I know _you_ right ’nough.” + +“What is it? What do they say?” the learned gentleman asked anxiously. + +“You wished to come where someone wanted the child,” said the Psammead. +“The child says this is her mother.” + +“And the mother?” + +“You can see,” said the Psammead. + +“But is she really? Her child, I mean?” + +“Who knows?” said the Psammead; “but each one fills the empty place in +the other’s heart. It is enough.” + +“Oh,” said the learned gentleman, “this is a good dream. I wish the +child might stay in the dream.” + +The Psammead blew itself out and granted the wish. So Imogen’s future +was assured. She had found someone to want her. + +“If only all the children that no one wants,” began the learned +gentleman—but the woman interrupted. She came towards them. + +“Welcome, all!” she cried. “I am the Queen, and my child tells me that +you have befriended her; and this I well believe, looking on your +faces. Your garb is strange, but faces I can read. The child is +bewitched, I see that well, but in this she speaks truth. Is it not +so?” + +The children said it wasn’t worth mentioning. + +I wish you could have seen all the honours and kindnesses lavished on +the children and the learned gentleman by those ancient Britons. You +would have thought, to see them, that a child was something to make a +fuss about, not a bit of rubbish to be hustled about the streets and +hidden away in the Workhouse. It wasn’t as grand as the entertainment +at Babylon, but somehow it was more satisfying. + +“I think you children have some wonderful influence on me,” said the +learned gentleman. “I never dreamed such dreams before I knew you.” + +It was when they were alone that night under the stars where the +Britons had spread a heap Of dried fern for them to sleep on, that +Cyril spoke. + +“Well,” he said, “we’ve made it all right for Imogen, and had a jolly +good time. I vote we get home again before the fighting begins.” + +“What fighting?” asked Jane sleepily. + +“Why, Julius Caesar, you little goat,” replied her kind brother. “Don’t +you see that if this is the year fifty-five, Julius Caesar may happen +at any moment.” + +“I thought you liked Caesar,” said Robert. + +“So I do—in the history. But that’s different from being killed by his +soldiers.” + +“If we saw Caesar we might persuade him not to,” said Anthea. + +“_You_ persuade _Caesar_,” Robert laughed. + +The learned gentleman, before anyone could stop him, said, “I only wish +we could see Caesar some time.” + +And, of course, in just the little time the Psammead took to blow +itself out for wish-giving, the five, or six counting the Psammead, +found themselves in Caesar’s camp, just outside Caesar’s tent. And they +saw Caesar. The Psammead must have taken advantage of the loose wording +of the learned gentleman’s wish, for it was not the same time of day as +that on which the wish had been uttered among the dried ferns. It was +sunset, and the great man sat on a chair outside his tent gazing over +the sea towards Britain—everyone knew without being told that it was +towards Britain. Two golden eagles on the top of posts stood on each +side of the tent, and on the flaps of the tent which was very gorgeous +to look at were the letters S.P.Q.R. + +The great man turned unchanged on the newcomers the august glance that +he had turned on the violet waters of the Channel. Though they had +suddenly appeared out of nothing, Caesar never showed by the faintest +movement of an eyelid, by the least tightening of that firm mouth, that +they were not some long expected embassy. He waved a calm hand towards +the sentinels, who sprang weapons in hand towards the newcomers. + +“Back!” he said in a voice that thrilled like music. “Since when has +Caesar feared children and students?” + +To the children he seemed to speak in the only language they knew; but +the learned gentleman heard—in rather a strange accent, but quite +intelligibly—the lips of Caesar speaking in the Latin tongue, and in +that tongue, a little stiffly, he answered— + +“It is a dream, O Caesar.” + +“A dream?” repeated Caesar. “What is a dream?” + +“This,” said the learned gentleman. + +“Not it,” said Cyril, “it’s a sort of magic. We come out of another +time and another place.” + +“And we want to ask you not to trouble about conquering Britain,” said +Anthea; “it’s a poor little place, not worth bothering about.” + +“Are you from Britain?” the General asked. “Your clothes are uncouth, +but well woven, and your hair is short as the hair of Roman citizens, +not long like the hair of barbarians, yet such I deem you to be.” + +“We’re not,” said Jane with angry eagerness; “we’re not barbarians at +all. We come from the country where the sun never sets, and we’ve read +about you in books; and our country’s full of fine things—St Paul’s, +and the Tower of London, and Madame Tussaud’s Exhibition, and—” + +Then the others stopped her. + +“Don’t talk nonsense,” said Robert in a bitter undertone. + +Caesar looked at the children a moment in silence. Then he called a +soldier and spoke with him apart. Then he said aloud— + +“You three elder children may go where you will within the camp. Few +children are privileged to see the camp of Caesar. The student and the +smaller girl-child will remain here with me.” + +Nobody liked this; but when Caesar said a thing that thing was so, and +there was an end to it. So the three went. + +Left alone with Jane and the learned gentleman, the great Roman found +it easy enough to turn them inside out. But it was not easy, even for +him, to make head or tail of the insides of their minds when he had got +at them. + +The learned gentleman insisted that the whole thing was a dream, and +refused to talk much, on the ground that if he did he would wake up. + +Jane, closely questioned, was full of information about railways, +electric lights, balloons, men-of-war, cannons, and dynamite. + +“And do they fight with swords?” asked the General. + +“Yes, swords and guns and cannons.” + +Caesar wanted to know what guns were. + +“You fire them,” said Jane, “and they go bang, and people fall down +dead.” + +“But what are guns like?” + +Jane found them hard to describe. + +“But Robert has a toy one in his pocket,” she said. So the others were +recalled. + +The boys explained the pistol to Caesar very fully, and he looked at it +with the greatest interest. It was a two-shilling pistol, the one that +had done such good service in the old Egyptian village. + +“I shall cause guns to be made,” said Caesar, “and you will be detained +till I know whether you have spoken the truth. I had just decided that +Britain was not worth the bother of invading. But what you tell me +decides me that it is very much worth while.” + +“But it’s all nonsense,” said Anthea. “Britain is just a savage sort of +island—all fogs and trees and big rivers. But the people are kind. We +know a little girl there named Imogen. And it’s no use your making guns +because you can’t fire them without gunpowder, and that won’t be +invented for hundreds of years, and we don’t know how to make it, and +we can’t tell you. Do go straight home, dear Caesar, and let poor +little Britain alone.” + +“But this other girl-child says—” said Caesar. + +“All Jane’s been telling you is what it’s going to be,” Anthea +interrupted, “hundreds and hundreds of years from now.” + +“The little one is a prophetess, eh?” said Caesar, with a whimsical +look. “Rather young for the business, isn’t she?” + +“You can call her a prophetess if you like,” said Cyril, “but what +Anthea says is true.” + +“Anthea?” said Caesar. “That’s a Greek name.” + +“Very likely,” said Cyril, worriedly. “I say, I do wish you’d give up +this idea of conquering Britain. It’s not worth while, really it +isn’t!” + +“On the contrary,” said Caesar, “what you’ve told me has decided me to +go, if it’s only to find out what Britain is really like. Guards, +detain these children.” + +“Quick,” said Robert, “before the guards begin detaining. We had enough +of that in Babylon.” + +Jane held up the Amulet away from the sunset, and said the word. The +learned gentleman was pushed through and the others more quickly than +ever before passed through the arch back into their own times and the +quiet dusty sitting-room of the learned gentleman. + +It is a curious fact that when Caesar was encamped on the coast of +Gaul—somewhere near Boulogne it was, I believe—he was sitting before +his tent in the glow of the sunset, looking out over the violet waters +of the English Channel. Suddenly he started, rubbed his eyes, and +called his secretary. The young man came quickly from within the tent. + +“Marcus,” said Caesar. “I have dreamed a very wonderful dream. Some of +it I forget, but I remember enough to decide what was not before +determined. Tomorrow the ships that have been brought round from the +Ligeris shall be provisioned. We shall sail for this three-cornered +island. First, we will take but two legions. + +This, if what we have heard be true, should suffice. But if my dream be +true, then a hundred legions will not suffice. For the dream I dreamed +was the most wonderful that ever tormented the brain even of Caesar. +And Caesar has dreamed some strange things in his time.” + +“And if you hadn’t told Caesar all that about how things are now, he’d +never have invaded Britain,” said Robert to Jane as they sat down to +tea. + +“Oh, nonsense,” said Anthea, pouring out; “it was all settled hundreds +of years ago.” + +“I don’t know,” said Cyril. “Jam, please. This about time being only a +thingummy of thought is very confusing. If everything happens at the +same time—” + +“It _can’t!_” said Anthea stoutly, “the present’s the present and the +past’s the past.” + +“Not always,” said Cyril. + +“When we were in the Past the present was the future. Now then!” he +added triumphantly. + +And Anthea could not deny it. + +“I should have liked to see more of the camp,” said Robert. + +“Yes, we didn’t get much for our money—but Imogen is happy, that’s one +thing,” said Anthea. “We left her happy in the Past. I’ve often seen +about people being happy in the Past, in poetry books. I see what it +means now.” + +“It’s not a bad idea,” said the Psammead sleepily, putting its head out +of its bag and taking it in again suddenly, “being left in the Past.” + +Everyone remembered this afterwards, when— + + + + +CHAPTER XI. +BEFORE PHARAOH + + +It was the day after the adventure of Julius Caesar and the Little +Black Girl that Cyril, bursting into the bathroom to wash his hands for +dinner (you have no idea how dirty they were, for he had been playing +shipwrecked mariners all the morning on the leads at the back of the +house, where the water-cistern is), found Anthea leaning her elbows on +the edge of the bath, and crying steadily into it. + +“Hullo!” he said, with brotherly concern, “what’s up now? Dinner’ll be +cold before you’ve got enough salt-water for a bath.” + +“Go away,” said Anthea fiercely. “I hate you! I hate everybody!” + +There was a stricken pause. + +“_I_ didn’t know,” said Cyril tamely. + +“Nobody ever does know anything,” sobbed Anthea. + +“I didn’t know you were waxy. I thought you’d just hurt your fingers +with the tap again like you did last week,” Cyril carefully explained. + +“Oh—fingers!” sneered Anthea through her sniffs. + +“Here, drop it, Panther,” he said uncomfortably. “You haven’t been +having a row or anything?” + +“No,” she said. “Wash your horrid hands, for goodness’ sake, if that’s +what you came for, or go.” + +Anthea was so seldom cross that when she was cross the others were +always more surprised than angry. + +Cyril edged along the side of the bath and stood beside her. He put his +hand on her arm. + +“Dry up, do,” he said, rather tenderly for him. And, finding that +though she did not at once take his advice she did not seem to resent +it, he put his arm awkwardly across her shoulders and rubbed his head +against her ear. + +“There!” he said, in the tone of one administering a priceless cure for +all possible sorrows. “Now, what’s up?” + +“Promise you won’t laugh?” + +“I don’t feel laughish myself,” said Cyril, dismally. + +“Well, then,” said Anthea, leaning her ear against his head, “it’s +Mother.” + +“What’s the matter with Mother?” asked Cyril, with apparent want of +sympathy. “She was all right in her letter this morning.” + +“Yes; but I want her so.” + +“You’re not the only one,” said Cyril briefly, and the brevity of his +tone admitted a good deal. + +“Oh, yes,” said Anthea, “I know. We all want her all the time. But I +want her now most dreadfully, awfully much. I never wanted anything so +much. That Imogen child—the way the ancient British Queen cuddled her +up! And Imogen wasn’t me, and the Queen was Mother. And then her letter +this morning! And about The Lamb liking the salt bathing! And she +bathed him in this very bath the night before she went away—oh, oh, +oh!” + +Cyril thumped her on the back. + +“Cheer up,” he said. “You know my inside thinking that I was doing? +Well, that was partly about Mother. We’ll soon get her back. If you’ll +chuck it, like a sensible kid, and wash your face, I’ll tell you about +it. That’s right. You let me get to the tap. Can’t you stop crying? +Shall I put the door-key down your back?” + +“That’s for noses,” said Anthea, “and I’m not a kid any more than you +are,” but she laughed a little, and her mouth began to get back into +its proper shape. You know what an odd shape your mouth gets into when +you cry in earnest. + +“Look here,” said Cyril, working the soap round and round between his +hands in a thick slime of grey soapsuds. “I’ve been thinking. We’ve +only just _played_ with the Amulet so far. We’ve got to _work_ it +now—work it for all it’s worth. And it isn’t only Mother either. +There’s Father out there all among the fighting. I don’t howl about it, +but I _think_—Oh, bother the soap!” The grey-lined soap had squirted +out under the pressure of his fingers, and had hit Anthea’s chin with +as much force as though it had been shot from a catapult. + +“There now,” she said regretfully, “now I shall have to wash my face.” + +“You’d have had to do that anyway,” said Cyril with conviction. “Now, +my idea’s this. You know missionaries?” + +“Yes,” said Anthea, who did not know a single one. + +“Well, they always take the savages beads and brandy, and stays, and +hats, and braces, and really useful things—things the savages haven’t +got, and never heard about. And the savages love them for their kind +generousness, and give them pearls, and shells, and ivory, and +cassowaries. And that’s the way—” + +“Wait a sec,” said Anthea, splashing. “I can’t hear what you’re saying. +Shells and—” + +“Shells, and things like that. The great thing is to get people to love +you by being generous. And that’s what we’ve got to do. Next time we go +into the Past we’ll regularly fit out the expedition. You remember how +the Babylonian Queen froze on to that pocket-book? Well, we’ll take +things like that. And offer them in exchange for a sight of the +Amulet.” + +“A sight of it is not much good.” + +“No, silly. But, don’t you see, when we’ve seen it we shall know where +it is, and we can go and take it in the night when everybody is +asleep.” + +“It wouldn’t be stealing, would it?” said Anthea thoughtfully, “because +it will be such an awfully long time ago when we do it. Oh, there’s +that bell again.” + +As soon as dinner was eaten (it was tinned salmon and lettuce, and a +jam tart), and the cloth cleared away, the idea was explained to the +others, and the Psammead was aroused from sand, and asked what it +thought would be good merchandise with which to buy the affection of +say, the Ancient Egyptians, and whether it thought the Amulet was +likely to be found in the Court of Pharaoh. + +But it shook its head, and shot out its snail’s eyes hopelessly. + +“I’m not allowed to play in this game,” it said. “Of course I _could_ +find out in a minute where the thing was, only I mayn’t. But I may go +so far as to own that your idea of taking things with you isn’t a bad +one. And I shouldn’t show them all at once. Take small things and +conceal them craftily about your persons.” + +This advice seemed good. Soon the table was littered over with things +which the children thought likely to interest the Ancient Egyptians. +Anthea brought dolls, puzzle blocks, a wooden tea-service, a green +leather case with _Nécessaire_ written on it in gold letters. Aunt Emma +had once given it to Anthea, and it had then contained scissors, +penknife, bodkin, stiletto, thimble, corkscrew, and glove-buttoner. The +scissors, knife, and thimble, and penknife were, of course, lost, but +the other things were there and as good as new. Cyril contributed lead +soldiers, a cannon, a catapult, a tin-opener, a tie-clip, and a tennis +ball, and a padlock—no key. Robert collected a candle (“I don’t suppose +they ever saw a self-fitting paraffin one,” he said), a penny Japanese +pin-tray, a rubber stamp with his father’s name and address on it, and +a piece of putty. + +Jane added a key-ring, the brass handle of a poker, a pot that had held +cold-cream, a smoked pearl button off her winter coat, and a key—no +lock. + +“We can’t take all this rubbish,” said Robert, with some scorn. “We +must just each choose one thing.” + +The afternoon passed very agreeably in the attempt to choose from the +table the four most suitable objects. But the four children could not +agree what was suitable, and at last Cyril said— + +“Look here, let’s each be blindfolded and reach out, and the first +thing you touch you stick to.” + +This was done. + +Cyril touched the padlock. + +Anthea got the _Nécessaire_. + +Robert clutched the candle. + +Jane picked up the tie-clip. + +“It’s not much,” she said. “I don’t believe Ancient Egyptians wore +ties.” + +“Never mind,” said Anthea. “I believe it’s luckier not to really +choose. In the stories it’s always the thing the wood-cutter’s son +picks up in the forest, and almost throws away because he thinks it’s +no good, that turns out to be the magic thing in the end; or else +someone’s lost it, and he is rewarded with the hand of the King’s +daughter in marriage.” + +“I don’t want any hands in marriage, thank you.” said Cyril firmly. + +“Nor yet me,” said Robert. “It’s always the end of the adventures when +it comes to the marriage hands.” + +“_Are_ we ready?” said Anthea. + +“It _is_ Egypt we’re going to, isn’t it?—nice Egypt?” said Jane. “I +won’t go anywhere I don’t know about—like that dreadful big-wavy +burning-mountain city,” she insisted. + +Then the Psammead was coaxed into its bag. + +“I say,” said Cyril suddenly, “I’m rather sick of kings. And people +notice you so in palaces. Besides the Amulet’s sure to be in a Temple. +Let’s just go among the common people, and try to work ourselves up by +degrees. We might get taken on as Temple assistants.” + +“Like beadles,” said Anthea, “or vergers. They must have splendid +chances of stealing the Temple treasures.” + +“Righto!” was the general rejoinder. The charm was held up. It grew big +once again, and once again the warm golden Eastern light glowed softly +beyond it. + +As the children stepped through it loud and furious voices rang in +their ears. They went suddenly from the quiet of Fitzroy Street +dining-room into a very angry Eastern crowd, a crowd much too angry to +notice them. They edged through it to the wall of a house and stood +there. The crowd was of men, women, and children. They were of all +sorts of complexions, and pictures of them might have been coloured by +any child with a shilling paint-box. The colours that child would have +used for complexions would have been yellow ochre, red ochre, light +red, sepia, and indian ink. But their faces were painted already—black +eyebrows and lashes, and some red lips. The women wore a sort of +pinafore with shoulder straps, and loose things wound round their heads +and shoulders. The men wore very little clothing—for they were the +working people—and the Egyptian boys and girls wore nothing at all, +unless you count the little ornaments hung on chains round their necks +and waists. The children saw all this before they could hear anything +distinctly. Everyone was shouting so. + +But a voice sounded above the other voices, and presently it was +speaking in a silence. + +“Comrades and fellow workers,” it said, and it was the voice of a tall, +coppery-coloured man who had climbed into a chariot that had been +stopped by the crowd. Its owner had bolted, muttering something about +calling the Guards, and now the man spoke from it. “Comrades and fellow +workers, how long are we to endure the tyranny of our masters, who live +in idleness and luxury on the fruit of our toil? They only give us a +bare subsistence wage, and they live on the fat of the land. We labour +all our lives to keep them in wanton luxury. Let us make an end of it!” + +A roar of applause answered him. + +“How are you going to do it?” cried a voice. + +“You look out,” cried another, “or you’ll get yourself into trouble.” + +“I’ve heard almost every single word of that,” whispered Robert, “in +Hyde Park last Sunday!” + +“Let us strike for more bread and onions and beer, and a longer mid-day +rest,” the speaker went on. “You are tired, you are hungry, you are +thirsty. You are poor, your wives and children are pining for food. The +barns of the rich are full to bursting with the corn we want, the corn +our labour has grown. To the granaries!” + +“To the granaries!” cried half the crowd; but another voice shouted +clear above the tumult, “To Pharaoh! To the King! Let’s present a +petition to the King! He will listen to the voice of the oppressed!” + +For a moment the crowd swayed one way and another—first towards the +granaries and then towards the palace. Then, with a rush like that of +an imprisoned torrent suddenly set free, it surged along the street +towards the palace, and the children were carried with it. Anthea found +it difficult to keep the Psammead from being squeezed very +uncomfortably. + +The crowd swept through the streets of dull-looking houses with few +windows, very high up, across the market where people were not buying +but exchanging goods. In a momentary pause Robert saw a basket of +onions exchanged for a hair comb and five fish for a string of beads. +The people in the market seemed better off than those in the crowd; +they had finer clothes, and more of them. They were the kind of people +who, nowadays, would have lived at Brixton or Brockley. + +“What’s the trouble now?” a languid, large-eyed lady in a crimped, +half-transparent linen dress, with her black hair very much braided and +puffed out, asked of a date-seller. + +“Oh, the working-men—discontented as usual,” the man answered. “Listen +to them. Anyone would think it mattered whether they had a little more +or less to eat. Dregs of society!” said the date-seller. + +“Scum!” said the lady. + +“And I’ve heard _that_ before, too,” said Robert. + +At that moment the voice of the crowd changed, from anger to doubt, +from doubt to fear. There were other voices shouting; they shouted +defiance and menace, and they came nearer very quickly. There was the +rattle of wheels and the pounding of hoofs. A voice shouted, “Guards!” + +“The Guards! The Guards!” shouted another voice, and the crowd of +workmen took up the cry. “The Guards! Pharaoh’s Guards!” And swaying a +little once more, the crowd hung for a moment as it were balanced. Then +as the trampling hoofs came nearer the workmen fled dispersed, up +alleys and into the courts of houses, and the Guards in their embossed +leather chariots swept down the street at the gallop, their wheels +clattering over the stones, and their dark-coloured, blue tunics blown +open and back with the wind of their going. + +“So _that_ riot’s over,” said the crimped-linen-dressed lady; “that’s a +blessing! And did you notice the Captain of the Guard? What a very +handsome man he was, to be sure!” + +The four children had taken advantage of the moment’s pause before the +crowd turned to fly, to edge themselves and drag each other into an +arched doorway. + +Now they each drew a long breath and looked at the others. + +“We’re well out of _that_,” said Cyril. + +“Yes,” said Anthea, “but I do wish the poor men hadn’t been driven back +before they could get to the King. He might have done something for +them.” + +“Not if he was the one in the Bible he wouldn’t,” said Jane. “He had a +hard heart.” + +“Ah, that was the Moses one,” Anthea explained. “The Joseph one was +quite different. I should like to see Pharaoh’s house. I wonder whether +it’s like the Egyptian Court in the Crystal Palace.” + +“I thought we decided to try to get taken on in a Temple,” said Cyril +in injured tones. + +“Yes, but we’ve got to know someone first. Couldn’t we make friends +with a Temple doorkeeper—we might give him the padlock or something. I +wonder which are temples and which are palaces,” Robert added, glancing +across the market-place to where an enormous gateway with huge side +buildings towered towards the sky. To right and left of it were other +buildings only a little less magnificent. + +“Did you wish to seek out the Temple of Amen Rā?” asked a soft voice +behind them, “or the Temple of Mut, or the Temple of Khonsu?” + +They turned to find beside them a young man. He was shaved clean from +head to foot, and on his feet were light papyrus sandals. He was +clothed in a linen tunic of white, embroidered heavily in colours. He +was gay with anklets, bracelets, and armlets of gold, richly inlaid. He +wore a ring on his finger, and he had a short jacket of gold embroidery +something like the Zouave soldiers wear, and on his neck was a gold +collar with many amulets hanging from it. But among the amulets the +children could see none like theirs. + +“It doesn’t matter which Temple,” said Cyril frankly. + +“Tell me your mission,” said the young man. “I am a divine father of +the Temple of Amen Rā and perhaps I can help you.” + +“Well,” said Cyril, “we’ve come from the great Empire on which the sun +never sets.” + +“I thought somehow that you’d come from some odd, out-of-the-way spot,” +said the priest with courtesy. + +“And we’ve seen a good many palaces. We thought we should like to see a +Temple, for a change,” said Robert. + +The Psammead stirred uneasily in its embroidered bag. + +“Have you brought gifts to the Temple?” asked the priest cautiously. + +“We _have_ got some gifts,” said Cyril with equal caution. “You see +there’s magic mixed up in it. So we can’t tell you everything. But we +don’t want to give our gifts for nothing.” + +“Beware how you insult the god,” said the priest sternly. “I also can +do magic. I can make a waxen image of you, and I can say words which, +as the wax image melts before the fire, will make you dwindle away and +at last perish miserably.” + +“Pooh!” said Cyril stoutly, “that’s nothing. I can make _fire_ itself!” + +“I should jolly well like to see you do it,” said the priest +unbelievingly. + +“Well, you shall,” said Cyril, “nothing easier. Just stand close round +me.” + +“Do you need no preparation—no fasting, no incantations?” The priest’s +tone was incredulous. + +“The incantation’s quite short,” said Cyril, taking the hint; “and as +for fasting, it’s not needed in _my_ sort of magic. Union Jack, +Printing Press, Gunpowder, Rule Britannia! Come, Fire, at the end of +this little stick!” + +He had pulled a match from his pocket, and as he ended the incantation +which contained no words that it seemed likely the Egyptian had ever +heard he stooped in the little crowd of his relations and the priest +and struck the match on his boot. He stood up, shielding the flame with +one hand. + +“See?” he said, with modest pride. “Here, take it into your hand.” + +“No, thank you,” said the priest, swiftly backing. “Can you do that +again?” + +“Yes.” + +“Then come with me to the great double house of Pharaoh. He loves good +magic, and he will raise you to honour and glory. There’s no need of +secrets between initiates,” he went on confidentially. “The fact is, I +am out of favour at present owing to a little matter of failure of +prophecy. I told him a beautiful princess would be sent to him from +Syria, and, lo! a woman thirty years old arrived. But she _was_ a +beautiful woman not so long ago. Time is only a mode of thought, you +know.” + +The children thrilled to the familiar words. + +“So you know that too, do you?” said Cyril. + +“It is part of the mystery of all magic, is it not?” said the priest. +“Now if I bring you to Pharaoh the little unpleasantness I spoke of +will be forgotten. And I will ask Pharaoh, the Great House, Son of the +Sun, and Lord of the South and North, to decree that you shall lodge in +the Temple. Then you can have a good look round, and teach me your +magic. And I will teach you mine.” + +This idea seemed good—at least it was better than any other which at +that moment occurred to anybody, so they followed the priest through +the city. + +The streets were very narrow and dirty. The best houses, the priest +explained, were built within walls twenty to twenty-five feet high, and +such windows as showed in the walls were very high up. The tops of +palm-trees showed above the walls. The poor people’s houses were little +square huts with a door and two windows, and smoke coming out of a hole +in the back. + +“The poor Egyptians haven’t improved so very much in their building +since the first time we came to Egypt,” whispered Cyril to Anthea. + +The huts were roofed with palm branches, and everywhere there were +chickens, and goats, and little naked children kicking about in the +yellow dust. On one roof was a goat, who had climbed up and was eating +the dry palm-leaves with snorts and head-tossings of delight. Over +every house door was some sort of figure or shape. + +“Amulets,” the priest explained, “to keep off the evil eye.” + +“I don’t think much of your ‘nice Egypt’,” Robert whispered to Jane; +“it’s simply not a patch on Babylon.” + +“Ah, you wait till you see the palace,” Jane whispered back. + +The palace was indeed much more magnificent than anything they had yet +seen that day, though it would have made but a poor show beside that of +the Babylonian King. They came to it through a great square pillared +doorway of sandstone that stood in a high brick wall. The shut doors +were of massive cedar, with bronze hinges, and were studded with bronze +nails. At the side was a little door and a wicket gate, and through +this the priest led the children. He seemed to know a word that made +the sentries make way for him. + +Inside was a garden, planted with hundreds of different kinds of trees +and flowering shrubs, a lake full of fish, with blue lotus flowers at +the margin, and ducks swimming about cheerfully, and looking, as Jane +said, quite modern. + +“The guard-chamber, the store-houses, the queen’s house,” said the +priest, pointing them out. + +They passed through open courtyards, paved with flat stones, and the +priest whispered to a guard at a great inner gate. + +“We are fortunate,” he said to the children, “Pharaoh is even now in +the Court of Honour. Now, don’t forget to be overcome with respect and +admiration. It won’t do any harm if you fall flat on your faces. And +whatever you do, don’t speak until you’re spoken to.” + +“There used to be that rule in our country,” said Robert, “when my +father was a little boy.” + +At the outer end of the great hall a crowd of people were arguing with +and even shoving the Guards, who seemed to make it a rule not to let +anyone through unless they were bribed to do it. The children heard +several promises of the utmost richness, and wondered whether they +would ever be kept. + +All round the hall were pillars of painted wood. The roof was of cedar, +gorgeously inlaid. About half-way up the hall was a wide, shallow step +that went right across the hall; then a little farther on another; and +then a steep flight of narrower steps, leading right up to the throne +on which Pharaoh sat. He sat there very splendid, his red and white +double crown on his head, and his sceptre in his hand. The throne had a +canopy of wood and wooden pillars painted in bright colours. On a low, +broad bench that ran all round the hall sat the friends, relatives, and +courtiers of the King, leaning on richly-covered cushions. + +The priest led the children up the steps till they all stood before the +throne; and then, suddenly, he fell on his face with hands +outstretched. The others did the same, Anthea falling very carefully +because of the Psammead. + +“Raise them,” said the voice of Pharaoh, “that they may speak to me.” + +The officers of the King’s household raised them. + +“Who are these strangers?” Pharaoh asked, and added very crossly, “And +what do you mean, Rekh-marā, by daring to come into my presence while +your innocence is not established?” + +“Oh, great King,” said the young priest, “you are the very image of Rā, +and the likeness of his son Horus in every respect. You know the +thoughts of the hearts of the gods and of men, and you have divined +that these strangers are the children of the children of the vile and +conquered Kings of the Empire where the sun never sets. They know a +magic not known to the Egyptians. And they come with gifts in their +hands as tribute to Pharaoh, in whose heart is the wisdom of the gods, +and on his lips their truth.” + +“That is all very well,” said Pharaoh, “but where are the gifts?” + +The children, bowing as well as they could in their embarrassment at +finding themselves the centre of interest in a circle more grand, more +golden and more highly coloured than they could have imagined possible, +pulled out the padlock, the _Nécessaire_, and the tie-clip. “But it’s +not tribute all the same,” Cyril muttered. “England doesn’t pay +tribute!” + +Pharaoh examined all the things with great interest when the chief of +the household had taken them up to him. “Deliver them to the Keeper of +the Treasury,” he said to one near him. And to the children he said— + +“A small tribute, truly, but strange, and not without worth. And the +magic, O Rekh-marā?” + +“These unworthy sons of a conquered nation...” began Rekh-marā. + +“Nothing of the kind!” Cyril whispered angrily. + +“... of a vile and conquered nation, can make fire to spring from dry +wood—in the sight of all.” + +“I should jolly well like to see them do it,” said Pharaoh, just as the +priest had done. + +So Cyril, without more ado, did it. + +“Do more magic,” said the King, with simple appreciation. + +“He cannot do any more magic,” said Anthea suddenly, and all eyes were +turned on her, “because of the voice of the free people who are +shouting for bread and onions and beer and a long mid-day rest. If the +people had what they wanted, he could do more.” + +“A rude-spoken girl,” said Pharaoh. “But give the dogs what they want,” +he said, without turning his head. “Let them have their rest and their +extra rations. There are plenty of slaves to work.” + +A richly-dressed official hurried out. + +“You will be the idol of the people,” Rekh-marā whispered joyously; +“the Temple of Amen will not contain their offerings.” + +Cyril struck another match, and all the court was overwhelmed with +delight and wonder. And when Cyril took the candle from his pocket and +lighted it with the match, and then held the burning candle up before +the King the enthusiasm knew no bounds. + +“Oh, greatest of all, before whom sun and moon and stars bow down,” +said Rekh-marā insinuatingly, “am I pardoned? Is my innocence made +plain?” + +“As plain as it ever will be, I daresay,” said Pharaoh shortly. “Get +along with you. You are pardoned. Go in peace.” The priest went with +lightning swiftness. + +“And what,” said the King suddenly, “is it that moves in that sack? + +Show me, oh strangers.” + +There was nothing for it but to show the Psammead. + +“Seize it,” said Pharaoh carelessly. “A very curious monkey. It will be +a nice little novelty for my wild beast collection.” + +And instantly, the entreaties of the children availing as little as the +bites of the Psammead, though both bites and entreaties were fervent, +it was carried away from before their eyes. + +“Oh, _do_ be careful!” cried Anthea. “At least keep it dry! Keep it in +its sacred house!” + +She held up the embroidered bag. + +“It’s a magic creature,” cried Robert; “it’s simply priceless!” + +“You’ve no right to take it away,” cried Jane incautiously. “It’s a +shame, a barefaced robbery, that’s what it is!” + +There was an awful silence. Then Pharaoh spoke. + +“Take the sacred house of the beast from them,” he said, “and imprison +all. Tonight after supper it may be our pleasure to see more magic. +Guard them well, and do not torture them—yet!” + +“Oh, dear!” sobbed Jane, as they were led away. “I knew exactly what it +would be! Oh, I wish you hadn’t!” + +“Shut up, silly,” said Cyril. “You know you _would_ come to Egypt. It +was your own idea entirely. Shut up. It’ll be all right.” + +“I thought we should play ball with queens,” sobbed Jane, “and have no +end of larks! And now everything’s going to be perfectly horrid!” + +The room they were shut up in _was_ a room, and not a dungeon, as the +elder ones had feared. That, as Anthea said, was one comfort. There +were paintings on the wall that at any other time would have been most +interesting. And a sort of low couch, and chairs. + +When they were alone Jane breathed a sigh of relief. + +“Now we can get home all right,” she said. + +“And leave the Psammead?” said Anthea reproachfully. + +“Wait a sec. I’ve got an idea,” said Cyril. He pondered for a few +moments. Then he began hammering on the heavy cedar door. It opened, +and a guard put in his head. + +“Stop that row,” he said sternly, “or—” + +“Look here,” Cyril interrupted, “it’s very dull for you isn’t it? Just +doing nothing but guard us. Wouldn’t you like to see some magic? We’re +not too proud to do it for you. Wouldn’t you like to see it?” + +“I don’t mind if I do,” said the guard. + +“Well then, you get us that monkey of ours that was taken away, and +we’ll show you.” + +“How do I know you’re not making game of me?” asked the soldier. +“Shouldn’t wonder if you only wanted to get the creature so as to set +it on me. I daresay its teeth and claws are poisonous.” + +“Well, look here,” said Robert. “You see we’ve got nothing with us? You +just shut the door, and open it again in five minutes, and we’ll have +got a magic—oh, I don’t know—a magic flower in a pot for you.” + +“If you can do that you can do anything,” said the soldier, and he went +out and barred the door. + +Then, of course, they held up the Amulet. They found the East by +holding it up, and turning slowly till the Amulet began to grow big, +walked home through it, and came back with a geranium in full scarlet +flower from the staircase window of the Fitzroy Street house. + +“Well!” said the soldier when he came in. “I really am—!” + +“We can do much more wonderful things than that—oh, ever so much,” said +Anthea persuasively, “if we only have our monkey. And here’s twopence +for yourself.” + +The soldier looked at the twopence. + +“What’s this?” he said. + +Robert explained how much simpler it was to pay money for things than +to exchange them as the people were doing in the market. Later on the +soldier gave the coins to his captain, who, later still, showed them to +Pharaoh, who of course kept them and was much struck with the idea. +That was really how coins first came to be used in Egypt. You will not +believe this, I daresay, but really, if you believe the rest of the +story, I don’t see why you shouldn’t believe this as well. + +“I say,” said Anthea, struck by a sudden thought, “I suppose it’ll be +all right about those workmen? The King won’t go back on what he said +about them just because he’s angry with us?” + +“Oh, no,” said the soldier, “you see, he’s rather afraid of magic. +He’ll keep to his word right enough.” + +“Then _that’s_ all right,” said Robert; and Anthea said softly and +coaxingly— + +“Ah, _do_ get us the monkey, and then you’ll see some lovely magic. +Do—there’s a nice, kind soldier.” + +“I don’t know where they’ve put your precious monkey, but if I can get +another chap to take on my duty here I’ll see what I can do,” he said +grudgingly, and went out. + +“Do you mean,” said Robert, “that we’re going off without even _trying_ +for the other half of the Amulet?” + +“I really think we’d better,” said Anthea tremulously. + +“Of course the other half of the Amulet’s here somewhere or our half +wouldn’t have brought us here. I do wish we could find it. It is a pity +we don’t know any _real_ magic. Then we could find out. I do wonder +where it is—exactly.” + +If they had only known it, something very like the other half of the +Amulet was very near them. It hung round the neck of someone, and that +someone was watching them through a chink, high up in the wall, +specially devised for watching people who were imprisoned. But they did +not know. + +There was nearly an hour of anxious waiting. They tried to take an +interest in the picture on the wall, a picture of harpers playing very +odd harps and women dancing at a feast. They examined the painted +plaster floor, and the chairs were of white painted wood with coloured +stripes at intervals. + +But the time went slowly, and everyone had time to think of how Pharaoh +had said, “Don’t torture them—_yet_.” + +“If the worst comes to the worst,” said Cyril, “we must just bunk, and +leave the Psammead. I believe it can take care of itself well enough. +They won’t kill it or hurt it when they find it can speak and give +wishes. They’ll build it a temple, I shouldn’t wonder.” + +“I couldn’t bear to go without it,” said Anthea, “and Pharaoh said +‘After supper’, that won’t be just yet. And the soldier _was_ curious. +I’m sure we’re all right for the present.” + +All the same, the sounds of the door being unbarred seemed one of the +prettiest sounds possible. + +“Suppose he hasn’t got the Psammead?” whispered Jane. + +But that doubt was set at rest by the Psammead itself; for almost +before the door was open it sprang through the chink of it into +Anthea’s arms, shivering and hunching up its fur. + +“Here’s its fancy overcoat,” said the soldier, holding out the bag, +into which the Psammead immediately crept. + +“Now,” said Cyril, “what would you like us to do? Anything you’d like +us to get for you?” + +“Any little trick you like,” said the soldier. “If you can get a +strange flower blooming in an earthenware vase you can get anything, I +suppose,” he said. “I just wish I’d got two men’s loads of jewels from +the King’s treasury. That’s what I’ve always wished for.” + +At the word “_wish_” the children knew that the Psammead would attend +to _that_ bit of magic. It did, and the floor was littered with a +spreading heap of gold and precious stones. + +“Any other little trick?” asked Cyril loftily. “Shall we become +invisible? Vanish?” + +“Yes, if you like,” said the soldier; “but not through the door, you +don’t.” + +He closed it carefully and set his broad Egyptian back against it. + +“No! no!” cried a voice high up among the tops of the tall wooden +pillars that stood against the wall. There was a sound of someone +moving above. + +The soldier was as much surprised as anybody. + +“That’s magic, if you like,” he said. + +And then Jane held up the Amulet, uttering the word of Power. At the +sound of it and at the sight of the Amulet growing into the great arch +the soldier fell flat on his face among the jewels with a cry of awe +and terror. + +The children went through the arch with a quickness born of long +practice. But Jane stayed in the middle of the arch and looked back. + +The others, standing on the dining-room carpet in Fitzroy Street, +turned and saw her still in the arch. “Someone’s holding her,” cried +Cyril. “We must go back.” + +But they pulled at Jane’s hands just to see if she would come, and, of +course, she did come. + +Then, as usual, the arch was little again and there they all were. + +“Oh, I do wish you hadn’t!” Jane said crossly. “It _was_ so +interesting. The priest had come in and he was kicking the soldier, and +telling him he’d done it now, and they must take the jewels and flee +for their lives.” + +“And did they?” + +“I don’t know. You interfered,” said Jane ungratefully. “I _should_ +have liked to see the last of it.” + +As a matter of fact, none of them had seen the last of it—if by “it” +Jane meant the adventure of the Priest and the Soldier. + + + + +CHAPTER XII. +THE SORRY-PRESENT AND THE EXPELLED LITTLE BOY + + +“Look here, said Cyril, sitting on the dining-table and swinging his +legs; “I really have got it.” + +“Got what?” was the not unnatural rejoinder of the others. + +Cyril was making a boat with a penknife and a piece of wood, and the +girls were making warm frocks for their dolls, for the weather was +growing chilly. + +“Why, don’t you see? It’s really not any good our going into the Past +looking for that Amulet. The Past’s as full of different times as—as +the sea is of sand. We’re simply bound to hit upon the wrong time. We +might spend our lives looking for the Amulet and never see a sight of +it. Why, it’s the end of September already. It’s like looking for a +needle in—” + +“A bottle of hay—I know,” interrupted Robert; “but if we don’t go on +doing that, what ARE we to do?” + +“That’s just it,” said Cyril in mysterious accents. “Oh, _bother!_” + +Old Nurse had come in with the tray of knives, forks, and glasses, and +was getting the tablecloth and table-napkins out of the chiffonier +drawer. + +“It’s always meal-times just when you come to anything interesting.” + +“And a nice interesting handful _you’d_ be, Master Cyril,” said old +Nurse, “if I wasn’t to bring your meals up to time. Don’t you begin +grumbling now, fear you get something to grumble _at_.” + +“I wasn’t grumbling,” said Cyril quite untruly; “but it does always +happen like that.” + +“You deserve to _have_ something happen,” said old Nurse. “Slave, +slave, slave for you day and night, and never a word of thanks. ...” + +“Why, you do everything beautifully,” said Anthea. + +“It’s the first time any of you’s troubled to say so, anyhow,” said +Nurse shortly. + +“What’s the use of _saying?_” inquired Robert. “We _eat_ our meals fast +enough, and almost always two helps. _That_ ought to show you!” + +“Ah!” said old Nurse, going round the table and putting the knives and +forks in their places; “you’re a man all over, Master Robert. There was +my poor Green, all the years he lived with me I never could get more +out of him than ‘It’s all right!’ when I asked him if he’d fancied his +dinner. And yet, when he lay a-dying, his last words to me was, ‘Maria, +you was always a good cook!’” She ended with a trembling voice. + +“And so you are,” cried Anthea, and she and Jane instantly hugged her. + +When she had gone out of the room Anthea said— + +“I know exactly how she feels. Now, look here! Let’s do a penance to +show we’re sorry we didn’t think about telling her before what nice +cooking she does, and what a dear she is.” + +“Penances are silly,” said Robert. + +“Not if the penance is something to please someone else. I didn’t mean +old peas and hair shirts and sleeping on the stones. I mean we’ll make +her a sorry-present,” explained Anthea. “Look here! I vote Cyril +doesn’t tell us his idea until we’ve done something for old Nurse. It’s +worse for us than him,” she added hastily, “because he knows what it is +and we don’t. Do you all agree?” + +The others would have been ashamed not to agree, so they did. It was +not till quite near the end of dinner—mutton fritters and blackberry +and apple pie—that out of the earnest talk of the four came an idea +that pleased everybody and would, they hoped, please Nurse. + +Cyril and Robert went out with the taste of apple still in their mouths +and the purple of blackberries on their lips—and, in the case of +Robert, on the wristband as well—and bought a big sheet of cardboard at +the stationers. Then at the plumber’s shop, that has tubes and pipes +and taps and gas-fittings in the window, they bought a pane of glass +the same size as the cardboard. The man cut it with a very interesting +tool that had a bit of diamond at the end, and he gave them, out of his +own free generousness, a large piece of putty and a small piece of +glue. + +While they were out the girls had floated four photographs of the four +children off their cards in hot water. These were now stuck in a row +along the top of the cardboard. Cyril put the glue to melt in a jampot, +and put the jampot in a saucepan and saucepan on the fire, while Robert +painted a wreath of poppies round the photographs. He painted rather +well and very quickly, and poppies are easy to do if you’ve once been +shown how. Then Anthea drew some printed letters and Jane coloured +them. The words were: + +“With all our loves to shew +We like the thigs to eat.” + + +And when the painting was dry they all signed their names at the bottom +and put the glass on, and glued brown paper round the edge and over the +back, and put two loops of tape to hang it up by. + +Of course everyone saw when too late that there were not enough letters +in “things”, so the missing “n”was put in. It was impossible, of +course, to do the whole thing over again for just one letter. + +“There!” said Anthea, placing it carefully, face up, under the sofa. +“It’ll be hours before the glue’s dry. Now, Squirrel, fire ahead!” + +“Well, then,” said Cyril in a great hurry, rubbing at his gluey hands +with his pocket handkerchief. “What I mean to say is this.” + +There was a long pause. + +“Well,” said Robert at last, “_what_ is it that you mean to say?” + +“It’s like this,” said Cyril, and again stopped short. + +“Like _what?_” asked Jane. + +“How can I tell you if you will all keep on interrupting?” said Cyril +sharply. + +So no one said any more, and with wrinkled frowns he arranged his +ideas. + +“Look here,” he said, “what I really mean is—we can remember now what +we did when we went to look for the Amulet. And if we’d found it we +should remember that too.” + +“Rather!” said Robert. “Only, you see we haven’t.” + +“But in the future we shall have.” + +“Shall we, though?” said Jane. + +“Yes—unless we’ve been made fools of by the Psammead. So then, where we +want to go to is where we shall remember about where we did find it.” + +“I see,” said Robert, but he didn’t. + +“_I_ don’t,” said Anthea, who did, very nearly. “Say it again, +Squirrel, and very slowly.” + +“If,” said Cyril, very slowly indeed, “we go into the future—after +we’ve found the Amulet—” + +“But we’ve got to find it first,” said Jane. + +“Hush!” said Anthea. + +“There will be a future,” said Cyril, driven to greater clearness by +the blank faces of the other three, “there will be a time _after_ we’ve +found it. Let’s go into _that_ time—and then we shall remember _how_ we +found it. And then we can go back and do the finding really.” + +“I see,” said Robert, and this time he did, and I hope _you_ do. + +“Yes,” said Anthea. “Oh, Squirrel, how clever of you!” + +“But will the Amulet work both ways?” inquired Robert. + +“It ought to,” said Cyril, “if time’s only a thingummy of whatsitsname. +Anyway we might try.” + +“Let’s put on our best things, then,” urged Jane. “You know what people +say about progress and the world growing better and brighter. I expect +people will be awfully smart in the future.” + +“All right,” said Anthea, “we should have to wash anyway, I’m all thick +with glue.” + +When everyone was clean and dressed, the charm was held up. + +“We want to go into the future and see the Amulet after we’ve found +it,” said Cyril, and Jane said the word of Power. They walked through +the big arch of the charm straight into the British Museum. They knew +it at once, and there, right in front of them, under a glass case, was +the Amulet—their own half of it, as well as the other half they had +never been able to find—and the two were joined by a pin of red stone +that formed a hinge. + +“Oh, glorious!” cried Robert. “Here it is!” + +“Yes,” said Cyril, very gloomily, “here it is. But we can’t get it +out.” + +“No,” said Robert, remembering how impossible the Queen of Babylon had +found it to get anything out of the glass cases in the Museum—except by +Psammead magic, and then she hadn’t been able to take anything away +with her; “no—but we remember where we got it, and we can—” + +“Oh, _do_ we?” interrupted Cyril bitterly, “do _you_ remember where we +got it?” + +“No,” said Robert, “I don’t exactly, now I come to think of it.” + +Nor did any of the others! + +“But _why_ can’t we?” said Jane. + +“Oh, _I_ don’t know,” Cyril’s tone was impatient, “some silly old +enchanted rule I suppose. I wish people would teach you magic at school +like they do sums—or instead of. It would be some use having an Amulet +then.” + +“I wonder how far we are in the future,” said Anthea; the Museum looks +just the same, only lighter and brighter, somehow.” + +“Let’s go back and try the Past again,” said Robert. + +“Perhaps the Museum people could tell us how we got it,” said Anthea +with sudden hope. There was no one in the room, but in the next +gallery, where the Assyrian things are and still were, they found a +kind, stout man in a loose, blue gown, and stockinged legs. + +“Oh, they’ve got a new uniform, how pretty!” said Jane. + +When they asked him their question he showed them a label on the case. +It said, “From the collection of—.” A name followed, and it was the +name of the learned gentleman who, among themselves, and to his face +when he had been with them at the other side of the Amulet, they had +called Jimmy. + +“_That’s_ not much good,” said Cyril, “thank you.” + +“How is it you’re not at school?” asked the kind man in blue. “Not +expelled for long I hope?” + +“We’re not expelled at all,” said Cyril rather warmly. + +“Well, I shouldn’t do it again, if I were you,” said the man, and they +could see he did not believe them. There is no company so little +pleasing as that of people who do not believe you. + +“Thank you for showing us the label,” said Cyril. And they came away. + +As they came through the doors of the Museum they blinked at the sudden +glory of sunlight and blue sky. The houses opposite the Museum were +gone. Instead there was a big garden, with trees and flowers and smooth +green lawns, and not a single notice to tell you not to walk on the +grass and not to destroy the trees and shrubs and not to pick the +flowers. There were comfortable seats all about, and arbours covered +with roses, and long, trellised walks, also rose-covered. Whispering, +splashing fountains fell into full white marble basins, white statues +gleamed among the leaves, and the pigeons that swept about among the +branches or pecked on the smooth, soft gravel were not black and +tumbled like the Museum pigeons are now, but bright and clean and sleek +as birds of new silver. A good many people were sitting on the seats, +and on the grass babies were rolling and kicking and playing—with very +little on indeed. Men, as well as women, seemed to be in charge of the +babies and were playing with them. + +“It’s like a lovely picture,” said Anthea, and it was. For the people’s +clothes were of bright, soft colours and all beautifully and very +simply made. No one seemed to have any hats or bonnets, but there were +a great many Japanese-looking sunshades. And among the trees were hung +lamps of coloured glass. + +“I expect they light those in the evening,” said Jane. “I _do_ wish we +lived in the future!” + +They walked down the path, and as they went the people on the benches +looked at the four children very curiously, but not rudely or unkindly. +The children, in their turn, looked—I hope they did not stare—at the +faces of these people in the beautiful soft clothes. Those faces were +worth looking at. Not that they were all handsome, though even in the +matter of handsomeness they had the advantage of any set of people the +children had ever seen. But it was the expression of their faces that +made them worth looking at. The children could not tell at first what +it was. + +“I know,” said Anthea suddenly. “They’re not worried; that’s what it +is.” + +And it was. Everybody looked calm, no one seemed to be in a hurry, no +one seemed to be anxious, or fretted, and though some did seem to be +sad, not a single one looked worried. + +But though the people looked kind everyone looked so interested in the +children that they began to feel a little shy and turned out of the big +main path into a narrow little one that wound among trees and shrubs +and mossy, dripping springs. + +It was here, in a deep, shadowed cleft between tall cypresses, that +they found the expelled little boy. He was lying face downward on the +mossy turf, and the peculiar shaking of his shoulders was a thing they +had seen, more than once, in each other. So Anthea kneeled down by him +and said— + +“What’s the matter?” + +“I’m expelled from school,” said the boy between his sobs. + +This was serious. People are not expelled for light offences. + +“Do you mind telling us what you’d done?” + +“I—I tore up a sheet of paper and threw it about in the playground,” +said the child, in the tone of one confessing an unutterable baseness. +“You won’t talk to me any more now you know that,” he added without +looking up. + +“Was that all?” asked Anthea. + +“It’s about enough,” said the child; “and I’m expelled for the whole +day!” + +“I don’t quite understand,” said Anthea, gently. The boy lifted his +face, rolled over, and sat up. + +“Why, whoever on earth are you?” he said. + +“We’re strangers from a far country,” said Anthea. “In our country it’s +not a crime to leave a bit of paper about.” + +“It is here,” said the child. “If grown-ups do it they’re fined. When +we do it we’re expelled for the whole day.” + +“Well, but,” said Robert, “that just means a day’s holiday.” + +“You _must_ come from a long way off,” said the little boy. “A +holiday’s when you all have play and treats and jolliness, all of you +together. On your expelled days no one’ll speak to you. Everyone sees +you’re an Expelleder or you’d be in school.” + +“Suppose you were ill?” + +“Nobody is—hardly. If they are, of course they wear the badge, and +everyone is kind to you. I know a boy that stole his sister’s illness +badge and wore it when he was expelled for a day. _He_ got expelled for +a week for that. It must be awful not to go to school for a week.” + +“Do you _like_ school, then?” asked Robert incredulously. + +“Of course I do. It’s the loveliest place there is. I chose railways +for my special subject this year, there are such splendid models and +things, and now I shall be all behind because of that torn-up paper.” + +“You choose your own subject?” asked Cyril. + +“Yes, of course. Where _did_ you come from? Don’t you know _anything?_” + +“No,” said Jane definitely; “so you’d better tell us.” + +“Well, on Midsummer Day school breaks up and everything’s decorated +with flowers, and you choose your special subject for next year. Of +course you have to stick to it for a year at least. Then there are all +your other subjects, of course, reading, and painting, and the rules of +Citizenship.” + +“Good gracious!” said Anthea. + +“Look here,” said the child, jumping up, “it’s nearly four. The +expelledness only lasts till then. Come home with me. Mother will tell +you all about everything.” + +“Will your mother like you taking home strange children?” asked Anthea. + +“I don’t understand,” said the child, settling his leather belt over +his honey-coloured smock and stepping out with hard little bare feet. +“Come on.” + +So they went. + +The streets were wide and hard and very clean. There were no horses, +but a sort of motor carriage that made no noise. The Thames flowed +between green banks, and there were trees at the edge, and people sat +under them, fishing, for the stream was clear as crystal. Everywhere +there were green trees and there was no smoke. The houses were set in +what seemed like one green garden. + +The little boy brought them to a house, and at the window was a good, +bright mother-face. The little boy rushed in, and through the window +they could see him hugging his mother, then his eager lips moving and +his quick hands pointing. + +A lady in soft green clothes came out, spoke kindly to them, and took +them into the oddest house they had ever seen. It was very bare, there +were no ornaments, and yet every single thing was beautiful, from the +dresser with its rows of bright china, to the thick squares of +Eastern-looking carpet on the floors. I can’t describe that house; I +haven’t the time. And I haven’t heart either, when I think how +different it was from our houses. The lady took them all over it. The +oddest thing of all was the big room in the middle. It had padded walls +and a soft, thick carpet, and all the chairs and tables were padded. +There wasn’t a single thing in it that anyone could hurt itself with. + +“What ever’s this for?—lunatics?” asked Cyril. + +The lady looked very shocked. + +“No! It’s for the children, of course,” she said. “Don’t tell me that +in your country there are no children’s rooms.” + +“There are nurseries,” said Anthea doubtfully, “but the furniture’s all +cornery and hard, like other rooms.” + +“How shocking!” said the lady; “you must be _very_ much behind the +times in your country! Why, the children are more than half of the +people; it’s not much to have one room where they can have a good time +and not hurt themselves.” + +“But there’s no fireplace,” said Anthea. + +“Hot-air pipes, of course,” said the lady. “Why, how could you have a +fire in a nursery? A child might get burned.” + +“In our country,” said Robert suddenly, “more than 3,000 children are +burned to death every year. Father told me,” he added, as if +apologizing for this piece of information, “once when I’d been playing +with fire.” + +The lady turned quite pale. + +“What a frightful place you must live in!” she said. + +“What’s all the furniture padded for?” Anthea asked, hastily turning +the subject. + +“Why, you couldn’t have little tots of two or three running about in +rooms where the things were hard and sharp! They might hurt +themselves.” + +Robert fingered the scar on his forehead where he had hit it against +the nursery fender when he was little. + +“But does everyone have rooms like this, poor people and all?” asked +Anthea. + +“There’s a room like this wherever there’s a child, of course,” said +the lady. “How refreshingly ignorant you are!—no, I don’t mean +ignorant, my dear. Of course, you’re awfully well up in ancient +History. But I see you haven’t done your Duties of Citizenship Course +yet.” + +“But beggars, and people like that?” persisted Anthea “and tramps and +people who haven’t any homes?” + +“People who haven’t any homes?” repeated the lady. “I really _don’t_ +understand what you’re talking about.” + +“It’s all different in our country,” said Cyril carefully; and I have +read it used to be different in London. Usedn’t people to have no homes +and beg because they were hungry? And wasn’t London very black and +dirty once upon a time? And the Thames all muddy and filthy? And narrow +streets, and—” + +“You must have been reading very old-fashioned books,” said the lady. +“Why, all that was in the dark ages! My husband can tell you more about +it than I can. He took Ancient History as one of his special subjects.” + +“I haven’t seen any working people,” said Anthea. + +“Why, we’re all working people,” said the lady; “at least my husband’s +a carpenter.” + +“Good gracious!” said Anthea; “but you’re a lady!” + +“Ah,” said the lady, “that quaint old word! Well, my husband _will_ +enjoy a talk with you. In the dark ages everyone was allowed to have a +smoky chimney, and those nasty horses all over the streets, and all +sorts of rubbish thrown into the Thames. And, of course, the sufferings +of the people will hardly bear thinking of. It’s very learned of you to +know it all. Did _you_ make Ancient History your special subject?” + +“Not exactly,” said Cyril, rather uneasily. “What is the Duties of +Citizenship Course about?” + +“Don’t you _really_ know? Aren’t you pretending—just for fun? Really +not? Well, that course teaches you how to be a good citizen, what you +must do and what you mayn’t do, so as to do your full share of the work +of making your town a beautiful and happy place for people to live in. +There’s a quite simple little thing they teach the tiny children. How +does it go...? + +“I must not steal and I must learn, +Nothing is mine that I do not earn. +I must try in work and play +To make things beautiful every day. +I must be kind to everyone, +And never let cruel things be done. +I must be brave, and I must try +When I am hurt never to cry, +And always laugh as much as I can, +And be glad that I’m going to be a man +To work for my living and help the rest +And never do less than my very best.” + + +“That’s very easy,” said Jane. “_I_ could remember that.” + +“That’s only the very beginning, of course,” said the lady; “there are +heaps more rhymes. There’s the one beginning— + +“I must not litter the beautiful street +With bits of paper or things to eat; +I must not pick the public flowers, +They are not _mine_, but they are _ours_.” + + +“And ‘things to eat’ reminds me—are you hungry? Wells, run and get a +tray of nice things.” + +“Why do you call him ‘Wells’?” asked Robert, as the boy ran off. + +“It’s after the great reformer—surely you’ve heard of _him?_ He lived +in the dark ages, and he saw that what you ought to do is to find out +what you want and then try to get it. Up to then people had always +tried to tinker up what they’d got. We’ve got a great many of the +things he thought of. Then ‘Wells’ means springs of clear water. It’s a +nice name, don’t you think?” + +Here Wells returned with strawberries and cakes and lemonade on a tray, +and everybody ate and enjoyed. + +“Now, Wells,” said the lady, “run off or you’ll be late and not meet +your Daddy.” + +Wells kissed her, waved to the others, and went. + +“Look here,” said Anthea suddenly, “would you like to come to _our_ +country, and see what it’s like? It wouldn’t take you a minute.” + +The lady laughed. But Jane held up the charm and said the word. + +“What a splendid conjuring trick!” cried the lady, enchanted with the +beautiful, growing arch. + +“Go through,” said Anthea. + +The lady went, laughing. But she did not laugh when she found herself, +suddenly, in the dining-room at Fitzroy Street. + +“Oh, what a _horrible_ trick!” she cried. “What a hateful, dark, ugly +place!” + +She ran to the window and looked out. The sky was grey, the street was +foggy, a dismal organ-grinder was standing opposite the door, a beggar +and a man who sold matches were quarrelling at the edge of the pavement +on whose greasy black surface people hurried along, hastening to get to +the shelter of their houses. + +“Oh, look at their faces, their horrible faces!” she cried. “What’s the +matter with them all?” + +“They’re poor people, that’s all,” said Robert. + +“But it’s _not_ all! They’re ill, they’re unhappy, they’re wicked! Oh, +do stop it, there’s dear children. It’s very, very clever. Some sort of +magic-lantern trick, I suppose, like I’ve read of. But _do_ stop it. +Oh! their poor, tired, miserable, wicked faces!” + +The tears were in her eyes. Anthea signed to Jane. The arch grew, they +spoke the words, and pushed the lady through it into her own time and +place, where London is clean and beautiful, and the Thames runs clear +and bright, and the green trees grow, and no one is afraid, or anxious, +or in a hurry. + +There was a silence. Then— + +“I’m glad we went,” said Anthea, with a deep breath. + +“I’ll never throw paper about again as long as I live,” said Robert. + +“Mother always told us not to,” said Jane. + +“I would like to take up the Duties of Citizenship for a special +subject,” said Cyril. “I wonder if Father could put me through it. I +shall ask him when he comes home.” + +“If we’d found the Amulet, Father could be home _now_,” said Anthea, +“and Mother and The Lamb.” + +“Let’s go into the future _again_,” suggested Jane brightly. “Perhaps +we could remember if it wasn’t such an awful way off.” + +So they did. This time they said, “The future, where the Amulet is, not +so far away.” + +And they went through the familiar arch into a large, light room with +three windows. Facing them was the familiar mummy-case. And at a table +by the window sat the learned gentleman. They knew him at once, though +his hair was white. He was one of the faces that do not change with +age. In his hand was the Amulet—complete and perfect. + +He rubbed his other hand across his forehead in the way they were so +used to. + +“Dreams, dreams!” he said; “old age is full of them!” + +“You’ve been in dreams with us before now,” said Robert, “don’t you +remember?” + +“I do, indeed,” said he. The room had many more books than the Fitzroy +Street room, and far more curious and wonderful Assyrian and Egyptian +objects. “The most wonderful dreams I ever had had you in them.” + +“Where,” asked Cyril, “did you get that thing in your hand?” + +“If you weren’t just a dream,” he answered, smiling, you’d remember +that you gave it to me.” + +“But where did we get it?” Cyril asked eagerly. + +“Ah, you never would tell me that,” he said, “You always had your +little mysteries. You dear children! What a difference you made to that +old Bloomsbury house! I wish I could dream you oftener. Now you’re +grown up you’re not like you used to be.” + +“Grown up?” said Anthea. + +The learned gentleman pointed to a frame with four photographs in it. + +“There you are,” he said. + +The children saw four grown-up people’s portraits—two ladies, two +gentlemen—and looked on them with loathing. + +“Shall we grow up like _that?_” whispered Jane. “How perfectly horrid!” + +“If we’re ever like that, we sha’nn’t know it’s horrid, I expect,” +Anthea with some insight whispered back. “You see, you get used to +yourself while you’re changing. It’s—it’s being so sudden makes it seem +so frightful now.” + +The learned gentleman was looking at them with wistful kindness. “Don’t +let me undream you just yet,” he said. There was a pause. + +“Do you remember _when_ we gave you that Amulet?” Cyril asked suddenly. + +“You know, or you would if you weren’t a dream, that it was on the 3rd +December, 1905. I shall never forget _that_ day.” + +“Thank you,” said Cyril, earnestly; “oh, thank you very much.” + +“You’ve got a new room,” said Anthea, looking out of the window, “and +what a lovely garden!” + +“Yes,” said he, “I’m too old now to care even about being near the +Museum. This is a beautiful place. Do you know—I can hardly believe +you’re just a dream, you do look so exactly real. Do you know...” his +voice dropped, “I can say it to _you_, though, of course, if I said it +to anyone that wasn’t a dream they’d call me mad; there was something +about that Amulet you gave me—something very mysterious.” + +“There was that,” said Robert. + +“Ah, I don’t mean your pretty little childish mysteries about where you +got it. But about the thing itself. First, the wonderful dreams I used +to have, after you’d shown me the first half of it! Why, my book on +Atlantis, that I did, was the beginning of my fame and my fortune, too. +And I got it all out of a dream! And then, ‘Britain at the Time of the +Roman Invasion’—that was only a pamphlet, but it explained a lot of +things people hadn’t understood.” + +“Yes,” said Anthea, “it would.” + +“That was the beginning. But after you’d given me the whole of the +Amulet—ah, it was generous of you!—then, somehow, I didn’t need to +theorize, I seemed to _know_ about the old Egyptian civilization. And +they can’t upset my theories”—he rubbed his thin hands and laughed +triumphantly—“they can’t, though they’ve tried. Theories, they call +them, but they’re more like—I don’t know—more like memories. I _know_ +I’m right about the secret rites of the Temple of Amen.” + +“I’m so glad you’re rich,” said Anthea. “You weren’t, you know, at +Fitzroy Street.” + +“Indeed I wasn’t,” said he, “but I am now. This beautiful house and +this lovely garden—I dig in it sometimes; you remember, you used to +tell me to take more exercise? Well, I feel I owe it all to you—and the +Amulet.” + +“I’m so glad,” said Anthea, and kissed him. He started. + +“_That_ didn’t feel like a dream,” he said, and his voice trembled. + +“It isn’t exactly a dream,” said Anthea softly, “it’s all part of the +Amulet—it’s a sort of extra special, real dream, dear Jimmy.” + +“Ah,” said he, “when you call me that, I know I’m dreaming. My little +sister—I dream of her sometimes. But it’s not real like this. Do you +remember the day I dreamed you brought me the Babylonish ring?” + +“We remember it all,” said Robert. “Did you leave Fitzroy Street +because you were too rich for it?” + +“Oh, no!” he said reproachfully. “You know I should never have done +such a thing as that. Of course, I left when your old Nurse died +and—what’s the matter!” + +“Old Nurse _dead?_” said Anthea. “Oh, _no!_” + +“Yes, yes, it’s the common lot. It’s a long time ago now.” + +Jane held up the Amulet in a hand that twittered. + +“Come!” she cried, “oh, come home! She may be dead before we get there, +and then we can’t give it to her. Oh, come!” + +“Ah, don’t let the dream end now!” pleaded the learned gentleman. + +“It must,” said Anthea firmly, and kissed him again. + +“When it comes to people dying,” said Robert, “good-bye! I’m so glad +you’re rich and famous and happy.” + +“_Do_ come!” cried Jane, stamping in her agony of impatience. + +And they went. Old Nurse brought in tea almost as soon as they were +back in Fitzroy Street. As she came in with the tray, the girls rushed +at her and nearly upset her and it. + +“Don’t die!” cried Jane, “oh, don’t!” and Anthea cried, “Dear, ducky, +darling old Nurse, don’t die!” + +“Lord, love you!” said Nurse, “I’m not agoin’ to die yet a while, +please Heaven! Whatever on earth’s the matter with the chicks?” + +“Nothing. Only don’t!” + +She put the tray down and hugged the girls in turn. The boys thumped +her on the back with heartfelt affection. + +“I’m as well as ever I was in my life,” she said. “What nonsense about +dying! You’ve been a sitting too long in the dusk, that’s what it is. +Regular blind man’s holiday. Leave go of me, while I light the gas.” + +The yellow light illuminated four pale faces. + +“We do love you so,” Anthea went on, “and we’ve made you a picture to +show you how we love you. Get it out, Squirrel.” + +The glazed testimonial was dragged out from under the sofa and +displayed. + +“The glue’s not dry yet,” said Cyril, “look out!” + +“What a beauty!” cried old Nurse. “Well, I never! And your pictures and +the beautiful writing and all. Well, I always did say your hearts was +in the right place, if a bit careless at times. Well! I never did! I +don’t know as I was ever pleased better in my life.” + +She hugged them all, one after the other. And the boys did not mind it, +somehow, that day. + +“How is it we can remember all about the future, _now?_” Anthea woke +the Psammead with laborious gentleness to put the question. “How is it +we can remember what we saw in the future, and yet, when we _were_ in +the future, we could not remember the bit of the future that was past +then, the time of finding the Amulet?” + +“Why, what a silly question!” said the Psammead, “of course you cannot +remember what hasn’t happened yet.” + +“But the _future_ hasn’t happened yet,” Anthea persisted, “and we +remember that all right.” + +“Oh, that isn’t what’s happened, my good child,” said the Psammead, +rather crossly, “that’s prophetic vision. And you remember dreams, +don’t you? So why not visions? You never do seem to understand the +simplest thing.” + +It went to sand again at once. + +Anthea crept down in her nightgown to give one last kiss to old Nurse, +and one last look at the beautiful testimonial hanging, by its tapes, +its glue now firmly set, in glazed glory on the wall of the kitchen. + +“Good-night, bless your loving heart,” said old Nurse, “if only you +don’t catch your deather-cold!” + + + + +CHAPTER XIII. +THE SHIPWRECK ON THE TIN ISLANDS + + +“Blue and red,” said Jane softly, “make purple.” + +“Not always they don’t,” said Cyril, “it has to be crimson lake and +Prussian blue. If you mix Vermilion and Indigo you get the most +loathsome slate colour.” + +“Sepia’s the nastiest colour in the box, I think,” said Jane, sucking +her brush. + +They were all painting. Nurse in the flush of grateful emotion, excited +by Robert’s border of poppies, had presented each of the four with a +shilling paint-box, and had supplemented the gift with a pile of old +copies of the _Illustrated London News_. + +“Sepia,” said Cyril instructively, “is made out of beastly cuttlefish.” + +“Purple’s made out of a fish, as well as out of red and blue,” said +Robert. “Tyrian purple was, I know.” + +“Out of lobsters?” said Jane dreamily. “They’re red when they’re +boiled, and blue when they aren’t. If you mixed live and dead lobsters +you’d get Tyrian purple.” + +“_I_ shouldn’t like to mix anything with a live lobster,” said Anthea, +shuddering. + +“Well, there aren’t any other red and blue fish,” said Jane; “you’d +have to.” + +“I’d rather not have the purple,” said Anthea. + +“The Tyrian purple wasn’t that colour when it came out of the fish, nor +yet afterwards, it wasn’t,” said Robert; “it was scarlet really, and +Roman Emperors wore it. And it wasn’t any nice colour while the fish +had it. It was a yellowish-white liquid of a creamy consistency.” + +“How do you know?” asked Cyril. + +“I read it,” said Robert, with the meek pride of superior knowledge. + +“Where?” asked Cyril. + +“In print,” said Robert, still more proudly meek. + +“You think everything’s true if it’s printed,” said Cyril, naturally +annoyed, “but it isn’t. Father said so. Quite a lot of lies get +printed, especially in newspapers.” + +“You see, as it happens,” said Robert, in what was really a rather +annoying tone, “it wasn’t a newspaper, it was in a book.” + +“How sweet Chinese white is!” said Jane, dreamily sucking her brush +again. + +“I don’t believe it,” said Cyril to Robert. + +“Have a suck yourself,” suggested Robert. + +“I don’t mean about the Chinese white. I mean about the cream fish +turning purple and—” + +“Oh!” cried Anthea, jumping up very quickly, “I’m tired of painting. +Let’s go somewhere by Amulet. I say let’s let _it_ choose.” + +Cyril and Robert agreed that this was an idea. Jane consented to stop +painting because, as she said, Chinese white, though certainly sweet, +gives you a queer feeling in the back of the throat if you paint with +it too long. + +The Amulet was held up. + +“Take us somewhere,” said Jane, “anywhere you like in the Past—but +somewhere where you are.” Then she said the word. + +Next moment everyone felt a queer rocking and swaying—something like +what you feel when you go out in a fishing boat. And that was not +wonderful, when you come to think of it, for it was in a boat that they +found themselves. A queer boat, with high bulwarks pierced with holes +for oars to go through. There was a high seat for the steersman, and +the prow was shaped like the head of some great animal with big, +staring eyes. The boat rode at anchor in a bay, and the bay was very +smooth. The crew were dark, wiry fellows with black beards and hair. +They had no clothes except a tunic from waist to knee, and round caps +with knobs on the top. They were very busy, and what they were doing +was so interesting to the children that at first they did not even +wonder where the Amulet had brought them. + +And the crew seemed too busy to notice the children. They were +fastening rush baskets to a long rope with a great piece of cork at the +end, and in each basket they put mussels or little frogs. Then they +cast out the rope, the baskets sank, but the cork floated. And all +about on the blue water were other boats and all the crews of all the +boats were busy with ropes and baskets and frogs and mussels. + +“Whatever are you doing?” Jane suddenly asked a man who had rather more +clothes than the others, and seemed to be a sort of captain or +overseer. He started and stared at her, but he had seen too many +strange lands to be very much surprised at these queerly-dressed +stowaways. + +“Setting lines for the dye shell-fish,” he said shortly. “How did you +get here?” + +“A sort of magic,” said Robert carelessly. The Captain fingered an +Amulet that hung round his neck. + +“What is this place?” asked Cyril. + +“Tyre, of course,” said the man. Then he drew back and spoke in a low +voice to one of the sailors. + +“Now we shall know about your precious cream-jug fish,” said Cyril. + +“But we never _said_ come to Tyre,” said Jane. + +“The Amulet heard us talking, I expect. I think it’s _most_ obliging of +it,” said Anthea. + +“And the Amulet’s here too,” said Robert. “We ought to be able to find +it in a little ship like this. I wonder which of them’s got it.” + +“Oh—look, look!” cried Anthea suddenly. On the bare breast of one of +the sailors gleamed something red. It was the exact counterpart of +their precious half-Amulet. + +A silence, full of emotion, was broken by Jane. + +“Then we’ve found it!” she said. “Oh do let’s take it and go home!” + +“Easy to say ‘take it’,” said Cyril; “he looks very strong.” + +He did—yet not so strong as the other sailors. + +“It’s odd,” said Anthea musingly, “I do believe I’ve seen that man +somewhere before.” + +“He’s rather like our learned gentleman,” said Robert, “but I’ll tell +you who he’s much more like—” + +At this moment that sailor looked up. His eyes met Robert’s—and Robert +and the others had no longer any doubt as to where they had seen him +before. It was Rekh-marā, the priest who had led them to the palace of +Pharaoh—and whom Jane had looked back at through the arch, when he was +counselling Pharaoh’s guard to take the jewels and fly for his life. + +Nobody was quite pleased, and nobody quite knew why. + +Jane voiced the feelings of all when she said, fingering _their_ Amulet +through the folds of her frock, “We can go back in a minute if anything +nasty happens.” + +For the moment nothing worse happened than an offer of food—figs and +cucumbers it was, and very pleasant. + +“I see,” said the Captain, “that you are from a far country. Since you +have honoured my boat by appearing on it, you must stay here till +morning. Then I will lead you to one of our great ones. He loves +strangers from far lands.” + +“Let’s go home,” Jane whispered, “all the frogs are drowning _now_. I +think the people here are cruel.” + +But the boys wanted to stay and see the lines taken up in the morning. + +“It’s just like eel-pots and lobster-pots,” said Cyril, “the baskets +only open from outside—I vote we stay.” + +So they stayed. + +“That’s Tyre over there,” said the Captain, who was evidently trying to +be civil. He pointed to a great island rock, that rose steeply from the +sea, crowned with huge walls and towers. There was another city on the +mainland. + +“That’s part of Tyre, too,” said the Captain; “it’s where the great +merchants have their pleasure-houses and gardens and farms.” + +“Look, look!” Cyril cried suddenly; “what a lovely little ship!” + +A ship in full sail was passing swiftly through the fishing fleet. The +Captain’s face changed. He frowned, and his eyes blazed with fury. + +“Insolent young barbarian!” he cried. “Do you call the ships of Tyre +_little?_ None greater sail the seas. That ship has been on a three +years’ voyage. She is known in all the great trading ports from here to +the Tin Islands. She comes back rich and glorious. Her very anchor is +of silver.” + +“I’m sure we beg your pardon,” said Anthea hastily. “In our country we +say ‘little’ for a pet name. Your wife might call you her dear little +husband, you know.” + +“I should like to catch her at it,” growled the Captain, but he stopped +scowling. + +“It’s a rich trade,” he went on. “For cloth _once_ dipped, second-best +glass, and the rough images our young artists carve for practice, the +barbarian King in Tessos lets us work the silver mines. We get so much +silver there that we leave them our iron anchors and come back with +silver ones.” + +“How splendid!” said Robert. “Do go on. What’s cloth once dipped?” + +“You _must_ be barbarians from the outer darkness,” said the Captain +scornfully. “All wealthy nations know that our finest stuffs are twice +dyed—dibaptha. They’re only for the robes of kings and priests and +princes.” + +“What do the rich merchants wear,” asked Jane, with interest, “in the +pleasure-houses?” + +“They wear the dibaptha. _Our_ merchants _are_ princes,” scowled the +skipper. + +“Oh, don’t be cross, we do so like hearing about things. We want to +know _all_ about the dyeing,” said Anthea cordially. + +“Oh, you do, do you?” growled the man. “So that’s what you’re here for? +Well, you won’t get the secrets of the dye trade out of _me_.” + +He went away, and everyone felt snubbed and uncomfortable. And all the +time the long, narrow eyes of the Egyptian were watching, watching. +They felt as though he was watching them through the darkness, when +they lay down to sleep on a pile of cloaks. + +Next morning the baskets were drawn up full of what looked like whelk +shells. + +The children were rather in the way, but they made themselves as small +as they could. While the skipper was at the other end of the boat they +did ask one question of a sailor, whose face was a little less unkind +than the others. + +“Yes,” he answered, “this is the dye-fish. It’s a sort of murex—and +there’s another kind that they catch at Sidon and then, of course, +there’s the kind that’s used for the dibaptha. But that’s quite +different. It’s—” + +“Hold your tongue!” shouted the skipper. And the man held it. + +The laden boat was rowed slowly round the end of the island, and was +made fast in one of the two great harbours that lay inside a long +breakwater. The harbour was full of all sorts of ships, so that Cyril +and Robert enjoyed themselves much more than their sisters. The +breakwater and the quays were heaped with bales and baskets, and +crowded with slaves and sailors. Farther along some men were practising +diving. + +“That’s jolly good,” said Robert, as a naked brown body cleft the +water. + +“I should think so,” said the skipper. “The pearl-divers of Persia are +not more skilful. Why, we’ve got a fresh-water spring that comes out at +the bottom of the sea. Our divers dive down and bring up the fresh +water in skin bottles! Can your barbarian divers do as much?” + +“I suppose not,” said Robert, and put away a wild desire to explain to +the Captain the English system of waterworks, pipes, taps, and the +intricacies of the plumbers’ trade. + +As they neared the quay the skipper made a hasty toilet. He did his +hair, combed his beard, put on a garment like a jersey with short +sleeves, an embroidered belt, a necklace of beads, and a big signet +ring. + +“Now,” said he, “I’m fit to be seen. Come along?” + +“Where to?” said Jane cautiously. + +“To Pheles, the great sea-captain, said the skipper, “the man I told +you of, who loves barbarians.” + +Then Rekh-marā came forward, and, for the first time, spoke. + +“I have known these children in another land,” he said. “You know my +powers of magic. It was my magic that brought these barbarians to your +boat. And you know how they will profit you. I read your thoughts. Let +me come with you and see the end of them, and then I will work the +spell I promised you in return for the little experience you have so +kindly given me on your boat.” + +The skipper looked at the Egyptian with some disfavour. + +“So it was _your_ doing,” he said. “I might have guessed it. Well, come +on.” + +So he came, and the girls wished he hadn’t. But Robert whispered— + +“Nonsense—as long as he’s with us we’ve got _some_ chance of the +Amulet. We can always fly if anything goes wrong.” + +The morning was so fresh and bright; their breakfast had been so good +and so unusual; they had actually seen the Amulet round the Egyptian’s +neck. One or two, or all these things, suddenly raised the children’s +spirits. They went off quite cheerfully through the city gate—it was +not arched, but roofed over with a great flat stone—and so through the +street, which smelt horribly of fish and garlic and a thousand other +things even less agreeable. But far worse than the street scents was +the scent of the factory, where the skipper called in to sell his +night’s catch. I wish I could tell you all about that factory, but I +haven’t time, and perhaps after all you aren’t interested in dyeing +works. I will only mention that Robert was triumphantly proved to be +right. The dye _was_ a yellowish-white liquid of a creamy consistency, +and it smelt more strongly of garlic than garlic itself does. + +While the skipper was bargaining with the master of the dye works the +Egyptian came close to the children, and said, suddenly and softly— + +“Trust me.” + +“I wish we could,” said Anthea. + +“You feel,” said the Egyptian, “that I want your Amulet. That makes you +distrust me.” + +“Yes,” said Cyril bluntly. + +“But you also, you want my Amulet, and I am trusting you.” + +“There’s something in that,” said Robert. + +“We have the two halves of the Amulet,” said the Priest, “but not yet +the pin that joined them. Our only chance of getting that is to remain +together. Once part these two halves and they may never be found in the +same time and place. Be wise. Our interests are the same.” + +Before anyone could say more the skipper came back, and with him the +dye-master. His hair and beard were curled like the men’s in Babylon, +and he was dressed like the skipper, but with added grandeur of gold +and embroidery. He had necklaces of beads and silver, and a glass +amulet with a man’s face, very like his own, set between two bull’s +heads, as well as gold and silver bracelets and armlets. He looked +keenly at the children. Then he said— + +“My brother Pheles has just come back from Tarshish. He’s at his garden +house—unless he’s hunting wild boar in the marshes. He gets frightfully +bored on shore.” + +“Ah,” said the skipper, “he’s a true-born Phoenician. ‘Tyre, Tyre for +ever! Oh, Tyre rules the waves!’ as the old song says. I’ll go at once, +and show him my young barbarians.” + +“I should,” said the dye-master. “They are very rum, aren’t they? What +frightful clothes, and what a lot of them! Observe the covering of +their feet. Hideous indeed.” + +Robert could not help thinking how easy, and at the same time pleasant, +it would be to catch hold of the dye-master’s feet and tip him backward +into the great sunken vat just near him. But if he had, flight would +have had to be the next move, so he restrained his impulse. + +There was something about this Tyrian adventure that was different from +all the others. It was, somehow, calmer. And there was the undoubted +fact that the charm was there on the neck of the Egyptian. + +So they enjoyed everything to the full, the row from the Island City to +the shore, the ride on the donkeys that the skipper hired at the gate +of the mainland city, and the pleasant country—palms and figs and +cedars all about. It was like a garden—clematis, honeysuckle, and +jasmine clung about the olive and mulberry trees, and there were tulips +and gladiolus, and clumps of mandrake, which has bell-flowers that look +as though they were cut out of dark blue jewels. In the distance were +the mountains of Lebanon. + +The house they came to at last was rather like a bungalow—long and low, +with pillars all along the front. Cedars and sycamores grew near it and +sheltered it pleasantly. + +Everyone dismounted, and the donkeys were led away. + +“Why is this like Rosherville?” whispered Robert, and instantly +supplied the answer. + +“Because it’s the place to spend a happy day.” + +“It’s jolly decent of the skipper to have brought us to such a ripping +place,” said Cyril. + +“Do you know,” said Anthea, “this feels more real than anything else +we’ve seen? It’s like a holiday in the country at home.” + +The children were left alone in a large hall. The floor was mosaic, +done with wonderful pictures of ships and sea-beasts and fishes. +Through an open doorway they could see a pleasant courtyard with +flowers. + +“I should like to spend a week here,” said Jane, “and donkey ride every +day.” + +Everyone was feeling very jolly. Even the Egyptian looked pleasanter +than usual. And then, quite suddenly, the skipper came back with a +joyous smile. With him came the master of the house. He looked steadily +at the children and nodded twice. + +“Yes,” he said, “my steward will pay you the price. But I shall not pay +at that high rate for the Egyptian dog.” + +The two passed on. + +“This,” said the Egyptian, “is a pretty kettle of fish.” + +“What is?” asked all the children at once. + +“Our present position,” said Rekh-marā. “Our seafaring friend,” he +added, “has sold us all for slaves!” + +A hasty council succeeded the shock of this announcement. The Priest +was allowed to take part in it. His advice was “stay”, because they +were in no danger, and the Amulet in its completeness must be somewhere +near, or, of course, they could not have come to that place at all. And +after some discussion they agreed to this. + +The children were treated more as guests than as slaves, but the +Egyptian was sent to the kitchen and made to work. + +Pheles, the master of the house, went off that very evening, by the +King’s orders, to start on another voyage. And when he was gone his +wife found the children amusing company, and kept them talking and +singing and dancing till quite late. “To distract my mind from my +sorrows,” she said. + +“I do like being a slave,” remarked Jane cheerfully, as they curled up +on the big, soft cushions that were to be their beds. + +It was black night when they were awakened, each by a hand passed +softly over its face, and a low voice that whispered— + +“Be quiet, or all is lost.” + +So they were quiet. + +“It’s me, Rekh-marā, the Priest of Amen,” said the whisperer. “The man +who brought us has gone to sea again, and he has taken my Amulet from +me by force, and I know no magic to get it back. Is there magic for +that in the Amulet you bear?” + +Everyone was instantly awake by now. + +“We can go after him,” said Cyril, leaping up; “but he might take +_ours_ as well; or he might be angry with us for following him.” + +“I’ll see to _that_,” said the Egyptian in the dark. “Hide your Amulet +well.” + +There in the deep blackness of that room in the Tyrian country house +the Amulet was once more held up and the word spoken. + +All passed through on to a ship that tossed and tumbled on a wind-blown +sea. They crouched together there till morning, and Jane and Cyril were +not at all well. When the dawn showed, dove-coloured, across the steely +waves, they stood up as well as they could for the tumbling of the +ship. Pheles, that hardy sailor and adventurer, turned quite pale when +he turned round suddenly and saw them. + +“Well!” he said, “well, I never did!” + +“Master,” said the Egyptian, bowing low, and that was even more +difficult than standing up, “we are here by the magic of the sacred +Amulet that hangs round your neck.” + +“I never did!” repeated Pheles. “Well, well!” + +“What port is the ship bound for?” asked Robert, with a nautical air. + +But Pheles said, “Are you a navigator?” Robert had to own that he was +not. + +“Then,” said Pheles, “I don’t mind telling you that we’re bound for the +Tin Isles. Tyre alone knows where the Tin Isles are. It is a splendid +secret we keep from all the world. It is as great a thing to us as your +magic to you.” + +He spoke in quite a new voice, and seemed to respect both the children +and the Amulet a good deal more than he had done before. + +“The King sent you, didn’t he?” said Jane. + +“Yes,” answered Pheles, “he bade me set sail with half a score brave +gentlemen and this crew. You shall go with us, and see many wonders.” +He bowed and left them. + +“What are we going to do now?” said Robert, when Pheles had caused them +to be left along with a breakfast of dried fruits and a sort of hard +biscuit. + +“Wait till he lands in the Tin Isles,” said Rekh-marā, “then we can get +the barbarians to help us. We will attack him by night and tear the +sacred Amulet from his accursed heathen neck,” he added, grinding his +teeth. + +“When shall we get to the Tin Isles?” asked Jane. + +“Oh—six months, perhaps, or a year,” said the Egyptian cheerfully. + +“A _year_ of this?” cried Jane, and Cyril, who was still feeling far +too unwell to care about breakfast, hugged himself miserably and +shuddered. + +It was Robert who said— + +“Look here, we can shorten that year. Jane, out with the Amulet! Wish +that we were where the Amulet will be when the ship is twenty miles +from the Tin Island. That’ll give us time to mature our plans.” + +It was done—the work of a moment—and there they were on the same ship, +between grey northern sky and grey northern sea. The sun was setting in +a pale yellow line. It was the same ship, but it was changed, and so +were the crew. Weather-worn and dirty were the sailors, and their +clothes torn and ragged. And the children saw that, of course, though +they had skipped the nine months, the ship had had to live through +them. Pheles looked thinner, and his face was rugged and anxious. + +“Ha!” he cried, “the charm has brought you back! I have prayed to it +daily these nine months—and now you are here? Have you no magic that +can help?” + +“What is your need?” asked the Egyptian quietly. + +“I need a great wave that shall whelm away the foreign ship that +follows us. A month ago it lay in wait for us, by the pillars of the +gods, and it follows, follows, to find out the secret of Tyre—the place +of the Tin Islands. If I could steer by night I could escape them yet, +but tonight there will be no stars.” + +“My magic will not serve you here,” said the Egyptian. + +But Robert said, “My magic will not bring up great waves, but I can +show you how to steer without stars.” + +He took out the shilling compass, still, fortunately, in working order, +that he had bought off another boy at school for fivepence, a piece of +indiarubber, a strip of whalebone, and half a stick of red sealing-wax. + +And he showed Pheles how it worked. And Pheles wondered at the +compass’s magic truth. + +“I will give it to you,” Robert said, “in return for that charm about +your neck.” + +Pheles made no answer. He first laughed, snatched the compass from +Robert’s hand, and turned away still laughing. + +“Be comforted,” the Priest whispered, “our time will come.” + +The dusk deepened, and Pheles, crouched beside a dim lantern, steered +by the shilling compass from the Crystal Palace. + +No one ever knew how the other ship sailed, but suddenly, in the deep +night, the look-out man at the stern cried out in a terrible voice— + +“She is close upon us!” + +“And we,” said Pheles, “are close to the harbour.” He was silent a +moment, then suddenly he altered the ship’s course, and then he stood +up and spoke. + +“Good friends and gentlemen,” he said, “who are bound with me in this +brave venture by our King’s command, the false, foreign ship is close +on our heels. If we land, they land, and only the gods know whether +they might not beat us in fight, and themselves survive to carry back +the tale of Tyre’s secret island to enrich their own miserable land. +Shall this be?” + +“Never!” cried the half-dozen men near him. The slaves were rowing hard +below and could not hear his words. + +The Egyptian leaped upon him; suddenly, fiercely, as a wild beast +leaps. “Give me back my Amulet,” he cried, and caught at the charm. The +chain that held it snapped, and it lay in the Priest’s hand. + +Pheles laughed, standing balanced to the leap of the ship that answered +the oarstroke. + +“This is no time for charms and mummeries,” he said. “We’ve lived like +men, and we’ll die like gentlemen for the honour and glory of Tyre, our +splendid city. ‘Tyre, Tyre for ever! It’s Tyre that rules the waves.’ I +steer her straight for the Dragon rocks, and we go down for our city, +as brave men should. The creeping cowards who follow shall go down as +slaves—and slaves they shall be to us—when we live again. Tyre, Tyre +for ever!” + +A great shout went up, and the slaves below joined in it. + +“Quick, the Amulet,” cried Anthea, and held it up. Rekh-marā held up +the one he had snatched from Pheles. The word was spoken, and the two +great arches grew on the plunging ship in the shrieking wind under the +dark sky. From each Amulet a great and beautiful green light streamed +and shone far out over the waves. It illuminated, too, the black faces +and jagged teeth of the great rocks that lay not two ships’ lengths +from the boat’s peaked nose. + +“Tyre, Tyre for ever! It’s Tyre that rules the waves!” the voices of +the doomed rose in a triumphant shout. The children scrambled through +the arch, and stood trembling and blinking in the Fitzroy Street +parlour, and in their ears still sounded the whistle of the wind, and +the rattle of the oars, the crash of the ships bow on the rocks, and +the last shout of the brave gentlemen-adventurers who went to their +deaths singing, for the sake of the city they loved. + +“And so we’ve lost the other half of the Amulet again,” said Anthea, +when they had told the Psammead all about it. + +“Nonsense, pooh!” said the Psammead. “That wasn’t the other half. It +was the same half that you’ve got—the one that wasn’t crushed and +lost.” + +“But how could it be the same?” said Anthea gently. + +“Well, not exactly, of course. The one you’ve got is a good many years +older, but at any rate it’s not the other one. What did you say when +you wished?” + +“I forget,” said Jane. + +“I don’t,” said the Psammead. “You said, ‘Take us where _you_ are’—and +it did, so you see it was the same half.” + +“I see,” said Anthea. + +“But you mark my words,” the Psammead went on, “you’ll have trouble +with that Priest yet.” + +“Why, he was quite friendly,” said Anthea. + +“All the same you’d better beware of the Reverend Rekh-marā.” + +“Oh, I’m sick of the Amulet,” said Cyril, “we shall never get it.” + +“Oh yes we shall,” said Robert. “Don’t you remember December 3rd?” + +“Jinks!” said Cyril, “I’d forgotten that.” + +“I don’t believe it,” said Jane, “and I don’t feel at all well.” + +“If I were you,” said the Psammead, “I should not go out into the Past +again till that date. You’ll find it safer not to go where you’re +likely to meet that Egyptian any more just at present.” + +“Of course we’ll do as you say,” said Anthea soothingly, “though +there’s something about his face that I really do like.” + +“Still, you don’t want to run after him, I suppose,” snapped the +Psammead. “You wait till the 3rd, and then see what happens.” + +Cyril and Jane were feeling far from well, Anthea was always obliging, +so Robert was overruled. And they promised. And none of them, not even +the Psammead, at all foresaw, as you no doubt do quite plainly, exactly +what it was that _would_ happen on that memorable date. + + + + +CHAPTER XIV. +THE HEART’S DESIRE + + +If I only had time I could tell you lots of things. For instance, how, +in spite of the advice of the Psammead, the four children did, one very +wet day, go through their Amulet Arch into the golden desert, and there +find the great Temple of Baalbec and meet with the Phœnix whom they +never thought to see again. And how the Phœnix did not remember them at +all until it went into a sort of prophetic trance—if that can be called +remembering. But, alas! I _haven’t_ time, so I must leave all that out +though it was a wonderfully thrilling adventure. I must leave out, too, +all about the visit of the children to the Hippodrome with the Psammead +in its travelling bag, and about how the wishes of the people round +about them were granted so suddenly and surprisingly that at last the +Psammead had to be taken hurriedly home by Anthea, who consequently +missed half the performance. Then there was the time when, Nurse having +gone to tea with a friend out Ivalunk way, they were playing “devil in +the dark”—and in the midst of that most creepy pastime the postman’s +knock frightened Jane nearly out of her life. She took in the letters, +however, and put them in the back of the hat-stand drawer, so that they +should be safe. And safe they were, for she never thought of them again +for weeks and weeks. + +One really good thing happened when they took the Psammead to a +magic-lantern show and lecture at the boys’ school at Camden Town. The +lecture was all about our soldiers in South Africa. And the lecturer +ended up by saying, “And I hope every boy in this room has in his heart +the seeds of courage and heroism and self-sacrifice, and I wish that +every one of you may grow up to be noble and brave and unselfish, +worthy citizens of this great Empire for whom our soldiers have freely +given their lives.” + +And, of course, this came true—which was a distinct score for Camden +Town. + +As Anthea said, it was unlucky that the lecturer said boys, because now +she and Jane would have to be noble and unselfish, if at all, without +any outside help. But Jane said, “I daresay we are already because of +our beautiful natures. It’s only boys that have to be made brave by +magic”—which nearly led to a first-class row. + +And I daresay you would like to know all about the affair of the +fishing rod, and the fish-hooks, and the cook next door—which was +amusing from some points of view, though not perhaps the cook’s—but +there really is no time even for that. + +The only thing that there’s time to tell about is the Adventure of +Maskelyne and Cooke’s, and the Unexpected Apparition—which is also the +beginning of the end. + +It was Nurse who broke into the gloomy music of the autumn rain on the +window panes by suggesting a visit to the Egyptian Hall, England’s Home +of Mystery. Though they had good, but private reasons to know that +their own particular personal mystery was of a very different brand, +the four all brightened at the idea. All children, as well as a good +many grown-ups, love conjuring. + +“It’s in Piccadilly,” said old Nurse, carefully counting out the proper +number of shillings into Cyril’s hand, “not so very far down on the +left from the Circus. There’s big pillars outside, something like +Carter’s seed place in Holborn, as used to be Day and Martin’s blacking +when I was a gell. And something like Euston Station, only not so big.” + +“Yes, I know,” said everybody. + +So they started. + +But though they walked along the left-hand side of Piccadilly they saw +no pillared building that was at all like Carter’s seed warehouse or +Euston Station or England’s Home of Mystery as they remembered it. + +At last they stopped a hurried lady, and asked her the way to Maskelyne +and Cooke’s. + +“I don’t know, I’m sure,” she said, pushing past them. “I always shop +at the Stores.” Which just shows, as Jane said, how ignorant grown-up +people are. + +It was a policeman who at last explained to them that England’s +Mysteries are now appropriately enough enacted at St George’s Hall. So +they tramped to Langham Place, and missed the first two items in the +programme. But they were in time for the most wonderful magic +appearances and disappearances, which they could hardly believe—even +with all their knowledge of a larger magic—was not really magic after +all. + +“If only the Babylonians could have seen _this_ conjuring,” whispered +Cyril. “It takes the shine out of their old conjurer, doesn’t it?” + +“Hush!” said Anthea and several other members of the audience. + +Now there was a vacant seat next to Robert. And it was when all eyes +were fixed on the stage where Mr Devant was pouring out glasses of all +sorts of different things to drink, out of one kettle with one spout, +and the audience were delightedly tasting them, that Robert felt +someone in that vacant seat. He did not feel someone sit down in it. It +was just that one moment there was no one sitting there, and the next +moment, suddenly, there was someone. + +Robert turned. The someone who had suddenly filled that empty place was +Rekh-marā, the Priest of Amen! + +Though the eyes of the audience were fixed on Mr David Devant, Mr David +Devant’s eyes were fixed on the audience. And it happened that his eyes +were more particularly fixed on that empty chair. So that he saw quite +plainly the sudden appearance, from nowhere, of the Egyptian Priest. + +“A jolly good trick,” he said to himself, “and worked under my own +eyes, in my own hall. I’ll find out how that’s done.” He had never seen +a trick that he could not do himself if he tried. + +By this time a good many eyes in the audience had turned on the +clean-shaven, curiously-dressed figure of the Egyptian Priest. + +“Ladies and gentlemen,” said Mr Devant, rising to the occasion, “this +is a trick I have never before performed. The empty seat, third from +the end, second row, gallery—you will now find occupied by an Ancient +Egyptian, warranted genuine.” + +He little knew how true his words were. + +And now all eyes were turned on the Priest and the children, and the +whole audience, after a moment’s breathless surprise, shouted applause. +Only the lady on the other side of Rekh-marā drew back a little. She +_knew_ no one had passed her, and, as she said later, over tea and cold +tongue, “it was that sudden it made her flesh creep.” + +Rekh-marā seemed very much annoyed at the notice he was exciting. + +“Come out of this crowd,” he whispered to Robert. “I must talk with you +apart.” + +“Oh, no,” Jane whispered. “I did so want to see the Mascot Moth, and +the Ventriloquist.” + +“How did you get here?” was Robert’s return whisper. + +“How did you get to Egypt and to Tyre?” retorted Rekh-marā. “Come, let +us leave this crowd.” + +“There’s no help for it, I suppose,” Robert shrugged angrily. But they +all got up. + +“Confederates!” said a man in the row behind. “Now they go round to the +back and take part in the next scene.” + +“I wish we did,” said Robert. + +“Confederate yourself!” said Cyril. And so they got away, the audience +applauding to the last. + +In the vestibule of St George’s Hall they disguised Rekh-marā as well +as they could, but even with Robert’s hat and Cyril’s Inverness cape he +was too striking a figure for foot-exercise in the London streets. It +had to be a cab, and it took the last, least money of all of them. They +stopped the cab a few doors from home, and then the girls went in and +engaged old Nurse’s attention by an account of the conjuring and a +fervent entreaty for dripping-toast with their tea, leaving the front +door open so that while Nurse was talking to them the boys could creep +quietly in with Rekh-marā and smuggle him, unseen, up the stairs into +their bedroom. + +When the girls came up they found the Egyptian Priest sitting on the +side of Cyril’s bed, his hands on his knees, looking like a statue of a +king. + +“Come on,” said Cyril impatiently. “He won’t begin till we’re all here. +And shut the door, can’t you?” + +When the door was shut the Egyptian said— + +“My interests and yours are one.” + +“Very interesting,” said Cyril, “and it’ll be a jolly sight more +interesting if you keep following us about in a decent country with no +more clothes on than _that!_” + +“Peace,” said the Priest. “What is this country? and what is this +_time?_” + +“The country’s England,” said Anthea, “and the time’s about 6,000 years +later than _your_ time.” + +“The Amulet, then,” said the Priest, deeply thoughtful, “gives the +power to move to and fro in time as well as in space?” + +“That’s about it,” said Cyril gruffly. “Look here, it’ll be tea-time +directly. What are we to do with you?” + +“You have one-half of the Amulet, I the other,” said Rekh-marā. “All +that is now needed is the pin to join them.” + +“Don’t you think it,” said Robert. “The half you’ve got is the same +half as the one we’ve got.” + +“But the same thing cannot be in the same place and the same time, and +yet be not one, but twain,” said the Priest. “See, here is my half.” He +laid it on the Marcella counterpane. “Where is yours?” + +Jane watching the eyes of the others, unfastened the string of the +Amulet and laid it on the bed, but too far off for the Priest to seize +it, even if he had been so dishonourable. Cyril and Robert stood beside +him, ready to spring on him if one of his hands had moved but ever so +little towards the magic treasure that was theirs. But his hands did +not move, only his eyes opened very wide, and so did everyone else’s +for the Amulet the Priest had now quivered and shook; and then, as +steel is drawn to the magnet, it was drawn across the white +counterpane, nearer and nearer to the Amulet, warm from the neck of +Jane. And then, as one drop of water mingles with another on a +rain-wrinkled window-pane, as one bead of quick-silver is drawn into +another bead, Rekh-marā’s Amulet slipped into the other one, and, +behold! there was no more but the one Amulet! + +“Black magic!” cried Rekh-marā, and sprang forward to snatch the Amulet +that had swallowed his. But Anthea caught it up, and at the same moment +the Priest was jerked back by a rope thrown over his head. It drew, +tightened with the pull of his forward leap, and bound his elbows to +his sides. Before he had time to use his strength to free himself, +Robert had knotted the cord behind him and tied it to the bedpost. Then +the four children, overcoming the priest’s wrigglings and kickings, +tied his legs with more rope. + +“I thought,” said Robert, breathing hard, and drawing the last knot +tight, “he’d have a try for _Ours_, so I got the ropes out of the +box-room, so as to be ready.” + +The girls, with rather white faces, applauded his foresight. + +“Loosen these bonds!” cried Rekh-marā in fury, “before I blast you with +the seven secret curses of Amen-Rā!” + +“We shouldn’t be likely to loose them _after_,” Robert retorted. + +“Oh, don’t quarrel!” said Anthea desperately. “Look here, he _has_ just +as much right to the thing as we have. This,” she took up the Amulet +that had swallowed the other one, “this has got his in it as well as +being ours. Let’s go shares.” + +“Let me go!” cried the Priest, writhing. + +“Now, look here,” said Robert, “if you make a row we can just open that +window and call the police—the guards, you know—and tell them you’ve +been trying to rob us. _Now_ will you shut up and listen to reason?” + +“I suppose so,” said Rekh-marā sulkily. + +But reason could not be spoken to him till a whispered counsel had been +held in the far corner by the washhand-stand and the towel-horse, a +counsel rather long and very earnest. + +At last Anthea detached herself from the group, and went back to the +Priest. + +“Look here,” she said in her kind little voice, “we want to be friends. +We want to help you. Let’s make a treaty. Let’s join together to _get_ +the Amulet—the whole one, I mean. And then it shall belong to you as +much as to us, and we shall all get our hearts’ desire.” + +“Fair words,” said the Priest, “grow no onions.” + +“_We_ say, ‘Butter no parsnips’,” Jane put in. “But don’t you see we +_want_ to be fair? Only we want to bind you in the chains of honour and +upright dealing.” + +“Will you deal fairly by us?” said Robert. + +“I will,” said the Priest. “By the sacred, secret name that is written +under the Altar of Amen-Rā, I will deal fairly by you. Will you, too, +take the oath of honourable partnership?” + +“No,” said Anthea, on the instant, and added rather rashly, “We don’t +swear in England, except in police courts, where the guards are, you +know, and you don’t want to go there. But when we _say_ we’ll do a +thing—it’s the same as an oath to us—we do it. You trust us, and we’ll +trust you.” She began to unbind his legs, and the boys hastened to +untie his arms. + +When he was free he stood up, stretched his arms, and laughed. + +“Now,” he said, “I am stronger than you and my oath is void. I have +sworn by nothing, and my oath is nothing likewise. For there _is_ no +secret, sacred name under the altar of Amen-Rā.” + +“Oh, yes there is!” said a voice from under the bed. Everyone +started—Rekh-marā most of all. + +Cyril stooped and pulled out the bath of sand where the Psammead slept. + +“You don’t know everything, though you _are_ a Divine Father of the +Temple of Amen,” said the Psammead shaking itself till the sand fell +tinkling on the bath edge. “There _is_ a secret, sacred name beneath +the altar of Amen-Rā. Shall I call on that name?” + +“No, no!” cried the Priest in terror. “No,” said Jane, too. “Don’t +let’s have any calling names.” + +“Besides,” said Rekh-marā, who had turned very white indeed under his +natural brownness, “I was only going to say that though there isn’t any +name under—” + +“There _is_,” said the Psammead threateningly. + +“Well, even if there _wasn’t_, I will be bound by the wordless oath of +your strangely upright land, and having said that I will be your +friend—I will be it.” + +“Then that’s all right,” said the Psammead; “and there’s the tea-bell. +What are you going to do with your distinguished partner? He can’t go +down to tea like that, you know.” + +“You see we can’t do anything till the 3rd of December,” said Anthea, +“that’s when we are to find the whole charm. What can we do with +Rekh-marā till then?” + +“Box-room,” said Cyril briefly, “and smuggle up his meals. It will be +rather fun.” + +“Like a fleeing Cavalier concealed from exasperated Roundheads,” said +Robert. “Yes.” + +So Rekh-marā was taken up to the box-room and made as comfortable as +possible in a snug nook between an old nursery fender and the wreck of +a big four-poster. They gave him a big rag-bag to sit on, and an old, +moth-eaten fur coat off the nail on the door to keep him warm. And when +they had had their own tea they took him some. He did not like the tea +at all, but he liked the bread and butter, and cake that went with it. +They took it in turns to sit with him during the evening, and left him +fairly happy and quite settled for the night. + +But when they went up in the morning with a kipper, a quarter of which +each of them had gone without at breakfast, Rekh-marā was gone! There +was the cosy corner with the rag-bag, and the moth-eaten fur coat—but +the cosy corner was empty. + +“Good riddance!” was naturally the first delightful thought in each +mind. The second was less pleasing, because everyone at once remembered +that since his Amulet had been swallowed up by theirs—which hung once +more round the neck of Jane—he could have no possible means of +returning to his Egyptian past. Therefore he must be still in England, +and probably somewhere quite near them, plotting mischief. + +The attic was searched, to prevent mistakes, but quite vainly. + +“The best thing we can do,” said Cyril, “is to go through the half +Amulet straight away, get the whole Amulet, and come back.” + +“I don’t know,” Anthea hesitated. “Would that be quite fair? Perhaps he +isn’t really a base deceiver. Perhaps something’s happened to him.” + +“Happened?” said Cyril, “not it! Besides, what _could_ happen?” + +“I don’t know,” said Anthea. “Perhaps burglars came in the night, and +accidentally killed him, and took away the—all that was mortal of him, +you know—to avoid discovery.” + +“Or perhaps,” said Cyril, “they hid the—all that was mortal, in one of +those big trunks in the box-room. _Shall we go back and look?_” he +added grimly. + +“No, no!” Jane shuddered. “Let’s go and tell the Psammead and see what +it says.” + +“No,” said Anthea, “let’s ask the learned gentleman. If anything _has_ +happened to Rekh-marā a gentleman’s advice would be more useful than a +Psammead’s. And the learned gentleman’ll only think it’s a dream, like +he always does.” + +They tapped at the door, and on the “Come in” entered. The learned +gentleman was sitting in front of his untasted breakfast. Opposite him, +in the easy chair, sat Rekh-marā! + +“Hush!” said the learned gentleman very earnestly, “please, hush! or +the dream will go. I am learning... Oh, what have I not learned in the +last hour!” + +“In the grey dawn,” said the Priest, “I left my hiding-place, and +finding myself among these treasures from my own country, I remained. I +feel more at home here somehow.” + +“Of course I know it’s a dream,” said the learned gentleman feverishly, +“but, oh, ye gods! what a dream! By Jove!...” + +“Call not upon the gods,” said the Priest, “lest ye raise greater ones +than ye can control. Already,” he explained to the children, “he and I +are as brothers, and his welfare is dear to me as my own.” + +“He has told me,” the learned gentleman began, but Robert interrupted. +This was no moment for manners. + +“Have you told him,” he asked the Priest, “all about the Amulet?” + +“No,” said Rekh-marā. + +“Then tell him now. He is very learned. Perhaps he can tell us what to +do.” + +Rekh-marā hesitated, then told—and, oddly enough, none of the children +ever could remember afterwards what it was that he did tell. Perhaps he +used some magic to prevent their remembering. + +When he had done the learned gentleman was silent, leaning his elbow on +the table and his head on his hand. + +“Dear Jimmy,” said Anthea gently, “don’t worry about it. We are sure to +find it today, somehow.” + +“Yes,” said Rekh-marā, “and perhaps, with it, Death.” + +“It’s to bring us our hearts’ desire,” said Robert. + +“Who knows,” said the Priest, “what things undreamed-of and infinitely +desirable lie beyond the dark gates?” + +“Oh, _don’t_,” said Jane, almost whimpering. + +The learned gentleman raised his head suddenly. + +“Why not,” he suggested, “go back into the Past? At a moment when the +Amulet is unwatched. Wish to be with it, and that it shall be under +your hand.” + +It was the simplest thing in the world! And yet none of them had ever +thought of it. + +“Come,” cried Rekh-marā, leaping up. “Come _now!_” + +“May—may I come?” the learned gentleman timidly asked. “It’s only a +dream, you know.” + +“Come, and welcome, oh brother,” Rekh-marā was beginning, but Cyril and +Robert with one voice cried, “_No_.” + +“You weren’t with us in Atlantis,” Robert added, “or you’d know better +than to let him come.” + +“Dear Jimmy,” said Anthea, “please don’t ask to come. We’ll go and be +back again before you have time to know that we’re gone.” + +“And he, too?” + +“We must keep together,” said Rekh-marā, “since there is but one +perfect Amulet to which I and these children have equal claims.” + +Jane held up the Amulet—Rekh-marā went first—and they all passed +through the great arch into which the Amulet grew at the Name of Power. + +The learned gentleman saw through the arch a darkness lighted by smoky +gleams. He rubbed his eyes. And he only rubbed them for ten seconds. + +The children and the Priest were in a small, dark chamber. A square +doorway of massive stone let in gleams of shifting light, and the sound +of many voices chanting a slow, strange hymn. They stood listening. Now +and then the chant quickened and the light grew brighter, as though +fuel had been thrown on a fire. + +“Where are we?” whispered Anthea. + +“And when?” whispered Robert. + +“This is some shrine near the beginnings of belief,” said the Egyptian +shivering. “Take the Amulet and come away. It is cold here in the +morning of the world.” + +And then Jane felt that her hand was on a slab or table of stone, and, +under her hand, something that felt like the charm that had so long +hung round her neck, only it was thicker. Twice as thick. + +“It’s _here!_” she said, “I’ve got it!” And she hardly knew the sound +of her own voice. + +“Come away,” repeated Rekh-marā. + +“I wish we could see more of this Temple,” said Robert resistingly. + +“Come away,” the Priest urged, “there is death all about, and strong +magic. Listen.” + +The chanting voices seemed to have grown louder and fiercer, and light +stronger. + +“They are coming!” cried Rekh-marā. “Quick, quick, the Amulet!” + +Jane held it up. + +“What a long time you’ve been rubbing your eyes!” said Anthea; “don’t +you see we’ve got back?” The learned gentleman merely stared at her. + +“Miss Anthea—Miss Jane!” It was Nurse’s voice, very much higher and +squeaky and more exalted than usual. + +“Oh, bother!” said everyone. Cyril adding, “You just go on with the +dream for a sec, Mr Jimmy, we’ll be back directly. Nurse’ll come up if +we don’t. _She_ wouldn’t think Rekh-marā was a dream.” + +Then they went down. Nurse was in the hall, an orange envelope in one +hand, and a pink paper in the other. + +“Your Pa and Ma’s come home. ‘Reach London 11.15. Prepare rooms as +directed in letter’, and signed in their two names.” + +“Oh, hooray! hooray! hooray!” shouted the boys and Jane. But Anthea +could not shout, she was nearer crying. + +“Oh,” she said almost in a whisper, “then it _was_ true. And we _have_ +got our hearts’ desire.” + +“But I don’t understand about the letter,” Nurse was saying. “I haven’t +_had_ no letter.” + +“_Oh!_” said Jane in a queer voice, “I wonder whether it was one of +those... they came that night—you know, when we were playing ‘devil in +the dark’—and I put them in the hat-stand drawer, behind the +clothes-brushes and”—she pulled out the drawer as she spoke—“and here +they are!” + +There was a letter for Nurse and one for the children. The letters told +how Father had done being a war-correspondent and was coming home; and +how Mother and The Lamb were going to meet him in Italy and all come +home together; and how The Lamb and Mother were quite well; and how a +telegram would be sent to tell the day and the hour of their +home-coming. + +“Mercy me!” said old Nurse. “I declare if it’s not too bad of you, Miss +Jane. I shall have a nice to-do getting things straight for your Pa and +Ma.” + +“Oh, never mind, Nurse,” said Jane, hugging her; “isn’t it just too +lovely for anything!” + +“We’ll come and help you,” said Cyril. “There’s just something upstairs +we’ve got to settle up, and then we’ll all come and help you.” + +“Get along with you,” said old Nurse, but she laughed jollily. “Nice +help _you’d_ be. I know you. And it’s ten o’clock now.” + +There was, in fact, something upstairs that they had to settle. Quite a +considerable something, too. And it took much longer than they +expected. + +A hasty rush into the boys’ room secured the Psammead, very sandy and +very cross. + +“It doesn’t matter how cross and sandy it is though,” said Anthea, “it +ought to be there at the final council.” + +“It’ll give the learned gentleman fits, I expect,” said Robert, “when +he sees it.” + +But it didn’t. + +“The dream is growing more and more wonderful,” he exclaimed, when the +Psammead had been explained to him by Rekh-marā. “I have dreamed this +beast before.” + +“Now,” said Robert, “Jane has got the half Amulet and I’ve got the +whole. Show up, Jane.” + +Jane untied the string and laid her half Amulet on the table, littered +with dusty papers, and the clay cylinders marked all over with little +marks like the little prints of birds’ little feet. + +Robert laid down the whole Amulet, and Anthea gently restrained the +eager hand of the learned gentleman as it reached out yearningly +towards the “perfect specimen”. + +And then, just as before on the Marcella quilt, so now on the dusty +litter of papers and curiosities, the half Amulet quivered and shook, +and then, as steel is drawn to a magnet, it was drawn across the dusty +manuscripts, nearer and nearer to the perfect Amulet, warm from the +pocket of Robert. And then, as one drop of water mingles with another +when the panes of the window are wrinkled with rain, as one bead of +mercury is drawn into another bead, the half Amulet, that was the +children’s and was also Rekh-marā’s,—slipped into the whole Amulet, +and, behold! there was only one—the perfect and ultimate Charm. + +“And _that’s_ all right,” said the Psammead, breaking a breathless +silence. + +“Yes,” said Anthea, “and we’ve got our hearts’ desire. Father and +Mother and The Lamb are coming home today.” + +“But what about me?” said Rekh-marā. + +“What _is_ your heart’s desire?” Anthea asked. + +“Great and deep learning,” said the Priest, without a moment’s +hesitation. “A learning greater and deeper than that of any man of my +land and my time. But learning too great is useless. If I go back to my +own land and my own age, who will believe my tales of what I have seen +in the future? Let me stay here, be the great knower of all that has +been, in that our time, so living to me, so old to you, about which +your learned men speculate unceasingly, and often, _he_ tells me, +vainly.” + +“If I were you,” said the Psammead, “I should ask the Amulet about +that. It’s a dangerous thing, trying to live in a time that’s not your +own. You can’t breathe an air that’s thousands of centuries ahead of +your lungs without feeling the effects of it, sooner or later. Prepare +the mystic circle and consult the Amulet.” + +“Oh, _what_ a dream!” cried the learned gentleman. “Dear children, if +you love me—and I think you do, in dreams and out of them—prepare the +mystic circle and consult the Amulet!” + +They did. As once before, when the sun had shone in August splendour, +they crouched in a circle on the floor. Now the air outside was thick +and yellow with the fog that by some strange decree always attends the +Cattle Show week. And in the street costers were shouting. “Ur Hekau +Setcheh,” Jane said the Name of Power. And instantly the light went +out, and all the sounds went out too, so that there was a silence and a +darkness, both deeper than any darkness or silence that you have ever +even dreamed of imagining. It was like being deaf or blind, only darker +and quieter even than that. + +Then out of that vast darkness and silence came a light and a voice. +The light was too faint to see anything by, and the voice was too small +for you to hear what it said. But the light and the voice grew. And the +light was the light that no man may look on and live, and the voice was +the sweetest and most terrible voice in the world. The children cast +down their eyes. And so did everyone. + +“I speak,” said the voice. “What is it that you would hear?” + +There was a pause. Everyone was afraid to speak. + +“What are we to do about Rekh-marā?” said Robert suddenly and abruptly. +“Shall he go back through the Amulet to his own time, or—” + +“No one can pass through the Amulet now,” said the beautiful, terrible +voice, “to any land or any time. Only when it was imperfect could such +things be. But men may pass through the perfect charm to the perfect +union, which is not of time or space.” + +“Would you be so very kind,” said Anthea tremulously, “as to speak so +that we can understand you? The Psammead said something about Rekh-marā +not being able to live here, and if he can’t get back—” She stopped, +her heart was beating desperately in her throat, as it seemed. + +“Nobody can continue to live in a land and in a time not appointed,” +said the voice of glorious sweetness. “But a soul may live, if in that +other time and land there be found a soul so akin to it as to offer it +refuge, in the body of that land and time, that thus they two may be +one soul in one body.” + +The children exchanged discouraged glances. But the eyes of Rekh-marā +and the learned gentleman met, and were kind to each other, and +promised each other many things, secret and sacred and very beautiful. + +Anthea saw the look. + +“Oh, but,” she said, without at all meaning to say it, “dear Jimmy’s +soul isn’t at all like Rekh-marā’s. I’m certain it isn’t. I don’t want +to be rude, but it _isn’t_, you know. Dear Jimmy’s soul is as good as +gold, and—” + +“Nothing that is not good can pass beneath the double arch of my +perfect Amulet,” said the voice. “If both are willing, say the word of +Power, and let the two souls become one for ever and ever more.” + +“Shall I?” asked Jane. + +“Yes.” + +“Yes.” + +The voices were those of the Egyptian Priest and the learned gentleman, +and the voices were eager, alive, thrilled with hope and the desire of +great things. + +So Jane took the Amulet from Robert and held it up between the two men, +and said, for the last time, the word of Power. + +“Ur Hekau Setcheh.” + +The perfect Amulet grew into a double arch; the two arches leaned to +each other Λ making a great A. + +“A stands for Amen,” whispered Jane; “what he was a priest of.” + +“Hush!” breathed Anthea. + +The great double arch glowed in and through the green light that had +been there since the Name of Power had first been spoken—it glowed with +a light more bright yet more soft than the other light—a glory and +splendour and sweetness unspeakable. + +“Come!” cried Rekh-marā, holding out his hands. + +“Come!” cried the learned gentleman, and he also held out his hands. + +Each moved forward under the glowing, glorious arch of the perfect +Amulet. + +Then Rekh-marā quavered and shook, and as steel is drawn to a magnet he +was drawn, under the arch of magic, nearer and nearer to the learned +gentleman. And, as one drop of water mingles with another, when the +window-glass is rain-wrinkled, as one quick-silver bead is drawn to +another quick-silver bead, Rekh-marā, Divine Father of the Temple of +Amen-Rā, was drawn into, slipped into, disappeared into, and was one +with Jimmy, the good, the beloved, the learned gentleman. + +And suddenly it was good daylight and the December sun shone. The fog +has passed away like a dream. + +The Amulet was there—little and complete in Jane’s hand, and there were +the other children and the Psammead, and the learned gentleman. But +Rekh-marā—or the body of Rekh-marā—was not there any more. As for his +soul... + +“Oh, the horrid thing!” cried Robert, and put his foot on a centipede +as long as your finger, that crawled and wriggled and squirmed at the +learned gentleman’s feet. + +“_That_,” said the Psammead, “was the evil in the soul of Rekh-marā.” + +There was a deep silence. + +“Then Rekh-marā’s _him_ now?” said Jane at last. + +“All that was good in Rekh-marā,” said the Psammead. + +“_He_ ought to have his heart’s desire, too,” said Anthea, in a sort of +stubborn gentleness. + +“_His_ heart’s desire,” said the Psammead, “is the perfect Amulet you +hold in your hand. Yes—and has been ever since he first saw the broken +half of it.” + +“We’ve got ours,” said Anthea softly. + +“Yes,” said the Psammead—its voice was crosser than they had ever heard +it—“your parents are coming home. And what’s to become of _me?_ I shall +be found out, and made a show of, and degraded in every possible way. I +_know_ they’ll make me go into Parliament—hateful place—all mud and no +sand. That beautiful Baalbec temple in the desert! Plenty of good sand +there, and no politics! I wish I were there, safe in the Past—that I +do.” + +“I wish you were,” said the learned gentleman absently, yet polite as +ever. + +The Psammead swelled itself up, turned its long snail’s eyes in one +last lingering look at Anthea—a loving look, she always said, and +thought—and—vanished. + +“Well,” said Anthea, after a silence, “I suppose it’s happy. The only +thing it ever did really care for was _sand_.” + +“My dear children,” said the learned gentleman, “I must have fallen +asleep. I’ve had the most extraordinary dream.” + +“I hope it was a nice one,” said Cyril with courtesy. + +“Yes.... I feel a new man after it. Absolutely a new man.” + +There was a ring at the front-door bell. The opening of a door. Voices. + +“It’s _them!_” cried Robert, and a thrill ran through four hearts. + +“Here!” cried Anthea, snatching the Amulet from Jane and pressing it +into the hand of the learned gentleman. “Here—it’s _yours_—your very +own—a present from us, because you’re Rekh-marā as well as... I mean, +because you’re such a dear.” + +She hugged him briefly but fervently, and the four swept down the +stairs to the hall, where a cabman was bringing in boxes, and where, +heavily disguised in travelling cloaks and wraps, was their hearts’ +desire—three-fold—Mother, Father, and The Lamb. + +“Bless me!” said the learned gentleman, left alone, “bless me! What a +treasure! The dear children! It must be their affection that has given +me these luminous _aperçus_. I seem to see so many things now—things I +never saw before! The dear children! The dear, dear children!” + + + + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE STORY OF THE AMULET *** + +***** This file should be named 837-0.txt or 837-0.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/8/3/837/ + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will +be renamed. + +Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright +law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, +so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the +United States without permission and without paying copyright +royalties. Special rules, set forth in the General Terms of Use part +of this license, apply to copying and distributing Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works to protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm +concept and trademark. 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