The Chrestomanci Series: Entire Collection Books 1-7

“I can’t understand Benvenuto,” Paolo said despairingly.

Marco sat on the table beside him. “Then he’ll have to find some other way of telling us what he wants,” he said. “He’s a clever cat – the cleverest I’ve ever known. He’ll do it.”

He put out a hand and Benvenuto let him stroke his head. “Your ears,” said Marco, “Sir Cat, are like sea-holly without the prickles.”

Rosa perched on the table too, on the other side of Paolo. “What is it, Paolo? Tonino?”

Paolo nodded. “Nobody will believe me that the enemy enchanter’s got him.”

“We do,” said Marco.

Rosa said, “Paolo, it’s just as well he’s got Tonino and not you. Tonino’ll take it much more calmly.”

Paolo was a little bewildered. “Why do you two believe in the enchanter and no one else does?”

“What makes you think he exists?” Marco countered.

Even to Rosa and Marco, Paolo could not bring himself to tell of his embarrassing encounter with a Petrocchi. “There was a horrible fog at the end of the fight,” he said.

Rosa and Marco jumped round delightedly. Their hands met with a smack over Paolo’s head. “It worked! It worked!” And Marco added, “We were hoping someone would mention a certain fog! Did there seem to have been a large-scale cancel-spell with it, by any chance?”

“Yes,” said Paolo.

“We made that fog,” Rosa said. “Marco and me. We were hoping to stop the fighting, but it took us ages to make it, because all the magic in Caprona was going into the fight.”

Paolo digested this. That took care of the one piece of proof that did not depend on the word of a Petrocchi. Perhaps the enchanter did not exist after all. Perhaps Tonino really was at the Casa Petrocchi. He remembered that Renata had not said Angelica was missing until the fog cleared and she knew who he was. “Look,” he said. “Will you two come to the Casa Petrocchi with me and see if Tonino’s there?”

He was aware that Rosa and Marco were exchanging some kind of look above his head.

“Why?” said Rosa.

“Because,” said Paolo. “Because.” The need to persuade them cleared his wits at last. “Because Guido Petrocchi said Angelica Petrocchi was missing too.”

“I’m afraid we can’t,” Marco said, with what sounded like real regret. “You’d understand, if you knew how pressing our reasons are, believe me!”

Paolo did not understand. He knew that, with these two, it was not cowardice, or pride, or anything like that. That only made it more maddening. “Oh, nobody will help!” he cried out.

Rosa put her arm around him. “Paolo! You’re just like Father. You think you have to do everything yourself. There is one thing we can do.”

“Call Chrestomanci?” said Marco.

Paolo felt Rosa nod. “But he’s in Rome,” he objected.

“It doesn’t matter,” said Marco. “He’s that kind of enchanter. If he’s near enough and you need him enough, he comes when you call.”

“I must cook!” said Rosa, jumping off the table.

Just before the second supper was ready, Rinaldo came back, in great good spirits. Uncle Umberto and old Luigi Petrocchi had had another fight, in the dining-hall of the University. That was why Uncle Umberto had not turned up to see how Old Niccolo was. He and Luigi were both in bed, prostrated with exhaustion. Rinaldo had been drinking wine with some students who told him all about the fight. The students’ supper had been ruined. Cutlets and pasta had flown about, followed by chairs, tables and benches. Umberto had tried to drown Luigi in a soup tureen, and Luigi had replied by hurling the whole of the Doctors’ supper at Umberto. The students were going on strike. They did not mind the fight, but Luigi had shown them that the Doctors’ food was better than theirs.

Paolo listened without truly attending. He was thinking about Tonino and wondering if he dared depend on the word of a Petrocchi.

(#ulink_f8f582b2-518a-5f2d-bbfb-de5739325647)

After a while, someone came and picked Tonino up. That was unpleasant. His legs and arms dragged and dangled in all directions, and he could not do anything about it. He was plunged somewhere much darker. Then he was left to lie amid a great deal of bumping and scraping, as if he were in a box which was being pushed across a floor. When it stopped, he found he could move. He sat up, trembling all over.

He was in the same room as before, but it seemed to be much smaller. He could tell that, if he stood up, his head would brush the little lighted chandelier in the ceiling. So he was larger now; where he had been three inches tall before, he must now be more like nine. The puppets must be too big for their scenery, and the false villa meant to look as if it was some distance away. And, with the Duchess suddenly taken ill, none of her helpers had bothered what size Tonino was. They had simply made sure he was shut up again.

“Tonino,” whispered Angelica.

Tonino whirled round. Half the room was full of a pile of lax puppet bodies. He scanned the cardboard head of the policeman, then his enemy the Hangman, and the white sausage of the baby, and came upon Angelica’s face halfway up the pile. It was her own face, though swollen and tearstained. Tonino clapped his hand to his nose. To his relief, the red beak was gone, though he still seemed to be wearing Mr Punch’s scarlet nightgown.

“I’m sorry,” he said. His teeth seemed to be chattering. “I tried not to hurt you. Are your bones broken?”

“No – o,” said Angelica. She did not sound too sure. “Tonino, what happened?”

“I hanged the Duchess,” Tonino said, and he felt some vicious triumph as he said it. “I didn’t kill her though,” he added regretfully.

Angelica laughed. She laughed until the heap of puppets was shaking and sliding about. But Tonino could not find it funny. He burst into tears, even though he was crying in front of a Petrocchi.

“Oh dear,” said Angelica. “Tonino, stop it! Tonino – please!” She struggled out from among the puppets and hobbled looming through the room. Her head banged the chandelier and sent it tinkling and casting mad shadows over them as she knelt down beside Tonino. “Tonino, please stop. She’ll be furious as soon as she feels better.”

Angelica was wearing Judy’s blue cap and Judy’s blue dress still. She took off the blue cap and held it out to Tonino. “Here. Blow on that. I used the baby’s dress. It made me feel better.” She tried to smile at him, but the smile went hopelessly crooked in her swollen face. Angelica’s large forehead must have hit the floor first. It was now enlarged by a huge red bump. Under it, the grin looked grotesque.

Tonino understood it was meant for a smile and smiled back, as well as he could for his chattering teeth.

“Here.” Angelica loomed back through the room to the pile of puppets and heaved at the Hangman. She returned with his black felt cape. “Put this on.”

Tonino wrapped himself in the cape and blew his nose on the blue cap and felt better.

Angelica heaved more puppets about. “I’m going to wear the policeman’s jacket,” she said. “Tonino – have you thought?”

“Not really,” said Tonino. “I sort of know.”

He had known from the moment he looked at the Duchess. She was the enchanter who was sapping the strength of Caprona and spoiling the spells of the Casa Montana. Tonino was not sure about the Duke – probably he was too stupid to count. But in spite of the Duchess’s enchantments, the spells of the Casa Montana – and the Casa Petrocchi – must still be strong enough to be a nuisance to her. So he and Angelica had been kidnapped to blackmail both houses into stopping making spells. And if they stopped, Caprona would be defeated. The frightening part was that Tonino and Angelica were the only two people who knew, and the Duchess did not care that they knew. It was not only that even someone as clever as Paolo would never think of looking in the Palace, inside a Punch and Judy show: it must mean that the two of them would be dead before anyone found them.

“We absolutely have to get away,” said Angelica. “Before she’s better from being hanged.”

“She’ll have thought of that,” said Tonino.

“I’m not sure,” said Angelica. “I could tell everyone was startled to death. They let me see you being put through the floor, and I think we could get out that way. It will be easier now we’re bigger.”

Tonino fastened the cape round him and struggled to his feet, though he felt almost too tired and bruised to bother. His head hit the chandelier too. Huge flickering shadows fled round the room, and made the heap of puppets look as if they were squirming about. “Where did they put me through?” he said.

“Just where you’re standing,” said Angelica.

Tonino backed against the windows and looked at the place. He would not have known there was any opening. But, now Angelica had told him, he could see, disguised by the painted swirls of the carpet and confused by the swinging light, the faintest black line. The outline made an oblong about the size of the shoddy dining-table. The tray of supper must have come through that way too.

“Sing an opening spell,” Angelica commanded him.