Nation

“Lions and tigers and elephants, I shouldn’t wonder, ” said Foxlip cheerfully. He raised his voice. “But there’s a hair trigger on this pistol, so if I even think I hear a sound out of place, missie will be put to considerable embarrassment. One footfall and she’s ready for the boneyard! ”

As soon as Daphne and the two trousermen had rounded a bend in the track and were out of sight, Mau stepped forward.

“We could rush them. The rain’s on our side, ” Pilu whispered.

“You heard the big one. I can’t risk her being killed. She saved my life. Twice. ”

“I thought you saved her life. ”

“Yes, but the first time I saved her life, I saved mine, too. Do you understand? If she hadn’t been here, I’d have held the biggest rock I could find and gone into the dark current. One person is nothing. Two people are a nation. ”

Pilu’s forehead wrinkled in puzzlement. “What are three people? ”

“A bigger nation. Let’s catch up to them… carefully. ”

And she saved me from Locaha a second time, he thought as they set off again, silent as ghosts in the rain. He’d woken up, his mind full of silver fishes, and the old woman had told him. He’d been running to the white city under the sea, and then Daphne had been there, pulling him up faster than Locaha could swim. Even the old woman had been impressed.

The ghost girl had a plan, and she couldn’t tell him what it was. All they could do, with their sticks and spears, was follow her —

No, they didn’t have to follow her. He knew where she was going. He stared at her, pale in the dusk, as she led the men down the sloping path to the Place.

Who would be in here now? Daphne wondered. She’d seen Mrs. Gurgle up at the cave, because everyone who could walk had been up there. There were some sick people in the far huts, though. She would have to be careful.

She lit some dry grass from the fire outside the hut and cautiously transferred the flame to one of the Judy’s lamps. She did it very carefully, thinking about each movement, because she did not want to think about what she would be doing next. She had to keep herself in two parts. Even so, her hand shook, but a girl had a right to tremble a bit when two men were pointing guns at her.

“Do sit down, ” she said. “The mats are not as bad as the ground, at least. ”

“Much obliged, ” said Polegrave, looking around the hut.

It almost broke her heart. Once upon a time some woman had taught the man his manners, but to thank her he’d grown up to be a weasel, thief, and murderer. And now, when he was worried and ill at ease, an actual bit of politeness drifted up from the depths, like a pure clear bubble from a swamp. It wasn’t going to make things any easier.

Foxlip just grunted, and sat down with his back to the inner wall, which was solid rock.

“This is a trap, right? ” he said.

“No. You asked me to swear on my mother’s life, ” said Daphne coldly, and thought: And that was a sin. Even if you have no god at all, that was a sin. Some things are a sin all by themselves. And I’m going to murder you, and that is a mortal sin, too. But it won’t look like murder.

She said: “Would you like some beer? ”

“Beer? ” said Foxlip. “You mean real beer? ”

“Well, it’s like beer. It’s the Demon Drink, anyway. I’ve always got some freshly made. ”

“You make it? But you’re a nob! ” said Polegrave.

“Perhaps I make ‘nobby’ beer, ” said Daphne. “Sometimes you have to do what needs doing. Do you want some? ”

“She’ll poison us! ” said Polegrave. “It’s all a trick! ”

“We’ll have some beer, princess, ” said Foxlip, “but we’ll watch you drink it first. ’Cause we were not born yesterday. ” He gave her an unpleasant wink, full of guile and mischief and with no humor in it at all.

“Yeah, you look after us, missie, an’ we’ll look after you when Cox’s cannibal chums come for a picnic! ” said Polegrave.

She heard Foxlip hissing at him for this as she stepped outside, but she’d never for one minute believed that they intended to “rescue” her. And Cox had found the Raiders, had he? Who should she feel sorry for?

She went next door to the beer hut and took three bubbling shells of beer off the shelf, taking care to brush all the dead flies off.

What I am about to do won’t be murder, she told herself. Murder is a sin. It won’t be murder.

Foxlip would make sure she drank some beer first, to prove it wasn’t poisoned, and up until now she had never drunk much, only a tiny amount when she had been experimenting with a new recipe.

Just one drop of beer would turn you into a madman, her grandmother had said. It made you defile yourself and neglect your children and break up families, among quite a lot of other things. But this was her beer, after all. It hadn’t been made in a factory somewhere, with who knew what in it. It was just made of good, honest… poison.

She came back balancing three wide, shallow clay bowls that she put down on the floor between the mats.

“Well now, you’ve got a lovely bunch of coconuts, ” said Foxlip in his disgustingly unfriendly friendly way, “but I’ll tell you what, missie, you’ll mix the beer up so’s we all get the same, right? ”

Daphne shrugged, and did as he said, with both men watching closely.

“Looks like horse piss, ” said Polegrave.

“Well, horse piss ain’t too bad, ” said Foxlip. He picked up the bowl in front of him, looked at the one in front of Daphne, hesitated for a moment, and then grinned his unpleasant grin.

“I reckon you’re too smart to put poison in your bowl and expect me to be daft enough to swap them over, ” he said. “Drink up, princess! ”

“Yeah, down the little red lane! ” said Polegrave. There it was again, another tiny arrow into her heart. Her own mother had said that to her when she wouldn’t eat her broccoli. The memory stung.

“The same beer is in every bowl. You made me swear, ” she said.

“I said drink up! ”

Daphne spat into her bowl and began to sing the beer song — the island version, not her own. “Baa, Baa, Black Sheep” just wouldn’t work now.

So she sang the Song of the Four Brothers, and because most of her mind was taken up with that, a smaller part took the opportunity to remind her: Air is the planet Jupiter, which we believe to be made of gases. Isn’t that a coincidence! And she faltered a moment before recovering herself, because some tiny part of her mind was worrying her with what she was about to do.

There was a stunned silence when she finished, and then Foxlip said, “What the hell was that all about? You gobbed in your drink! ”