Zacharias hated any reference to his illness, as Sir Stephen ought to have known. Sir Stephen had scarcely begun to say, “I beg you will tell Leofric he must restrain himself,” when Zacharias turned away.
“The chaise will be waiting,” he said. “I had best have a word with Turrill.”
“Zacharias!”
“It will not happen again,” said Zacharias, in a voice iced over with a thin layer of frost. “Of that you may be certain.”
•••
ASZacharias approached his conveyance, the scope of the undertaking to which he had agreed began to dawn upon him.
The chaise that was to bear him and Prunella to Fobdown Purlieu was indeed waiting. It was doubtful whether it was capable of doing anything else.
Turrill was a good-humoured man on the whole, whose anxieties about driving the Sorcerer Royal had been eased by Mr. Wythe’s being as pleasant-spoken and openhanded a gentleman as he had ever met (“Even if he is black as coal, I am sure that is none of his fault, and it would be a dull world if God had cut us all from the same pattern”). It was no wonder he felt hardly used upon this occasion, however, and Zacharias was not surprised to be addressed in terms of reproach.
“You hadn’t ought to have done it, sir,” said the coachman. “You may turn me into a frog for it, but I must speak my mind, and I say you hadn’t ought to have done it. If I had not given satisfaction, you had only to say the word and I should have hopped to it, not wishing tooffend any gentleman of such a liberal disposition as yourself, and not being such a fool as to desire to vex a sorcerer besides. There was no call to go a-magicking the chaise—and where you got the squashes for it out of season, I am sure I don’t know.”
“Neither do I,” said Zacharias, bending down to examine what had previously been a wheel, and was now an enormous squash.
All four wheels of the chaise had suffered this curious fate. The body of the carriage rested precariously upon its new bearings.
“Good gracious!” said Prunella behind him, in a peculiar throbbing voice. “Isthatwhat has happened?”
Her face worked convulsively, and Zacharias saw that in a moment she would burst into laughter. He glanced at the irate Turrill, who was in no mood to deal with giggling females, and pulled Prunella aside for a conference.
“May I ask what possessed you to wreak such wanton destruction upon my conveyance?” he said in an indignant whisper. “I cannot conceive how you think I will contrive to take you to London in a chaise that has no wheels.”
Prunella tried to look solemn, but her delight would keep breaking out. Her countenance was so bright that Zacharias caught a smile tugging at his own lips. He made up for the lapse with a disapproving frown.
“I beg your pardon!” said Prunella. “I did not mean to at all! It was only that I thought I ought to guard against your running off without me, so I cast a spell to secure our conveyance till I had stepped into it. I had no notion it would have such a conspicuous effect. I wonder where the squashes did come from, out of season!”
She was about to tip over into laughter, but Zacharias fixed her with a penetrating glower until she sobered up.
“Pray do not look so cross!” she begged. “Does not it divert you even a little? I have never seen anything so ridiculous in my life! I amglad the spell took effect before we started, for it would have been unfortunate if it had seized upon the chaise when we were coasting along, would it not?”
“I cannot see that we are in a better position to have our chaise put out of action before we have begun,” said Zacharias. He hardly knew what to make of such whimsical conduct. Sir Stephen’s warning seemed now to assume an ominous significance. Could an anxiety for learning really be the motivation for such pains as Miss Gentleman had taken?
“Of course we are. If it had happened later, we would be sure to be upset, and our horses would have fled, and highwaymen would have set upon us, and we should have been very uncomfortable,” argued Prunella. “Whereas now it will take but the work of a moment to reverse it.”
She was determined to show not the least uncertainty as she strode up to the chaise. In fact Prunella had no notion whether her spell would comply with the strictures she had imposed upon it. She had thought merely to freeze the chaise in place for a time, as a precaution. She did not really think Mr. Wythe would abandon her, but Prunella had lost a great deal of her faith in humanity over the past few days, and she meant to leave nothing to chance.
The squashes were a piece of absurdity she had not calculated upon. Magic had never been so refractory before. She had always found it biddable, and in any case she would never have conceived that she had sufficient magic to transform matter in such a dramatic fashion. As she clambered into the chaise, helped by a sullen Turrill, it occurred to Prunella to wonder whether this unexpected turn had anything to do with the seven blue stones nestled in the depths of her valise.
“Well! If it was to be fixed so easily I do not know why he did not just say so, instead of putting me all in a pucker,” grumbled Turrill’s voice by the door. “A sorcerer likes his joke as well as the next fellow, I suppose. I can’t say as it amuses me, but it ain’t my chaise.”
Raising his voice, he addressed Zacharias:
“Seems the wheels have been set aright, sir, so we can be on our way as soon as suits you.”
Prunella poked her head out of the window. She was nearly as relieved as the coachman to see that there was nothing of the vegetable about the wheels now.
Zacharias boarded the chaise in foreboding silence, but fortunately they had not enough time to be awkward. Mrs. Daubeney emerged from the building, approaching the chaise at a run.
“You never meant to go away without a fare-thee-well?” she cried.
“Mr. Wythe is in a terrible hurry,” said Prunella. Zacharias, who had been opening his mouth to say something civil, cast a look of outrage at her. “We waited quite as long as we could. Did you persuade Cook not to give notice?”
“Oh, she is beyond anything! I am sure the kitchen chimneys are vastly trying, but there is nothing to be done about their smoking, for we simply cannot support any further expenditure after”—after the expense of the Sorcerer Royal’s visit, Mrs. Daubeney meant, but she stopped herself just in time. “If we are not all poisoned at our dinners it will be a miracle. What shall I do without you, Prunella? Cook would never attend to me, and now she will be worse than ever, for she knows I will be wholly dependent upon her when you are gone.”
