On the Garden Strawberries
The strawberries of the Garden are perhaps that rarest of rare things. Gnomes, both young and old, will ask me: “What is the magic of strawberries?” To which I reply: “Strawberries are the magic.” As soon as they disappear, they reappear. And yet, paradoxically, whey they disappear, they reappear. Who can resist a strawberry on a summer’s day? And how can it not be summer on a strawberry day?
From Mr. Whizz’s Notebook: Concerning the Garden: a thing rarum.
A wolf lay upon the path.
It was not dead.
The Mistress bent over it and pulled the arrow from its side.
The wolf whimpered and the Mistress tried to calm it, speaking soft words into its ear.
“Cyril,” she said eventually, turning to the gnome, “what are you doing here? – I thought I sent you to guard the gates. More importantly, what is SHE doing here?”
The Mistress swung around and pointed the blood-stained arrow at Laila, who cried out:
“Don’t shoot!”
Cyril was trembling as he spoke.
“Mistress Dido, please don’t get in a bate.”
Ignoring the gnome, the Mistress took a patch bathed in a honey like liquid[1] from her belt and put it over the wolf’s wound.
“Cyril, why did you do it? Why did you bring an outsider here, and a CHILD?”
“But Mistress.”
“Cyril, you know the rules!”
“It’s not Cyril’s fault,” said Laila. “I wanted to come, too.”
But the Mistress was furious, and Laila did not escape her sarcasm.
“You may be a child, but you should know not to listen to a gnome.”
“If it was anyone’s fault, it was my fault. It was I who chose to come here. Cyril didn’t make me walk through the gate.”
“What is your name, child?”
“Laila?”
“And where do you live, Laila?”
“Dad says I mustn’t give my address to strangers.”
“Your father is prudent, but I am not asking you for your address, nor am I asking you to show me where you live.”
While they were speaking, the wolf had picked itself up. It snarled at the Mistress as she showed it her bow arm.
They watched it as it took a few tentative steps and hobbled off into the trees.
The Mistress had relaxed her bow and her tone softened. “Laila,” she said, “you may find this hard to believe. But you are not at all safe here.”
“I know that,” said Laila. “I know all about the smarmers and Smarm.”
“What do you know about Smarm?”
“Well, for starters,” said Laila, “I know he is not a man, nor is he a wolf. He has power over the wolves, and so do his men, the smarmers.”
At first, Laila had been rather intimidated by the Mistress, but now she began to grow in confidence, telling her all about getting lost in the woods; climbing the tree so the wolves could not get to her, and being rescued by Cyril and Mr. Whizz.
At the mention of the wizard’s name, the Mistress looked anxious.
“Where is Mr. Whizz?”
“I don’t know,” said Laila. “The last time we saw him was when Smarm attacked us on the path.”
“How dare he!”
The Mistress huffed and stamped her foot:
“Never trust a man who plays you a turn on a fiddle,
Never trust a man whose eyebrows meet in the middle.”
“Mistress,” said Cyril, “it was one of his paths.”
“A pathless path?”
Cyril nodded.
The Mistress frowned.
“Well, Laila,” she said, “it appears you have had a very lucky escape.”
“As for you, Cyril,” she said, turning to the gnome, “you know very well the consequences of failing to guard the gate.”
Cyril’s head dropped.
“Yes, Mistress.”
“Cyril,” said Laila, “what is going to happen to you?”
“I’ll be sent to the Tree of Nothing.”
“What is the Tree of Nothing?”
“It’s a gnome place, near the Bole Hall,” said Cyril. “They put you in there and you can’t speak to anyone.”
“Oh, no,” said Laila, “that sounds worse than being sent to Coventry.”
“You stay there from morning till dusk. Gnomes come and throw sticks and stones at you.”
“But that’s not fair,” said Laila.
“Who said anything was ever fair?” said the Mistress. “Cyril knows he is in the wrong. He must accept the punishment. It is gnome lore.”
“Well,” said Laila, “I don’t know if I like gnome lore very much.”
Cyril shrugged.
“They don’t all throw sticks and stones. Not if they like you.”
“They do like you, don’t they, Cyril.”
Cyril did not answer but stared glumperly into space.
“Surely,” said Laila, “the Mistress can stop them. They can’t put you in that horrible place if she says so.”
“What’s lore is lore.”
Her friend continued to look as dejected as a holy jumper, but Laila was determined to do something to help him. She decided she would talk again to the Mistress on Cyril’s behalf – reasoning, not unreasonably, that she was not unlike the Headmistress at school who always made a point of hearing your point of view as long as you articulated it primly and properly. At the moment, however, the Mistress had other, more pressing things on her mind when one of the flutterbyes flew into her midst.
“Mistress!”
“Not now, Utterly!”
“But Mistress, it’s Totally, not Utterly and it’s the pannies!”
“I don’t care if it’s the big bad wolf who blew down the houses of all the little piggies in the row.”
“Oh, but it is!”
“Utterly, enough!”
“Totally, Mistress!”
“Totally, Utterly, whoever you are! Anyway, I thought you said it was the pannies.”
“You weren’t paying attention, Mistress, when I said pannies.”
“Totally, I always pay attention!”
“Mistress, the pannies have something to tell.”
“Well, as long as they are decent.”
“One of them has got a waistcoat.”
“With some braid I hope.”
Two pannies stepped forward.
If one of them did indeed look quite decent in his braided waistcoat, the other had a rather messy appearance with a long mane of matted and dirty hair down his back. Though she would have never dreamed of saying it to his face, Laila thought he wore a rather stupid expression with his mouth wide open and unblinking eyes.
“What is it?” said the Mistress.
“It’s the straw-ba.”
“Strawberries?!”
“Yes, straw-ba.”
“You pannies are mad!”
“Gone!”
“Gone mad!”
The indecent panny closed his eyes and went boo.
“Boo gone, Mistress!” said the decent panny.
“No more straw-ba.”
“The strawberries can never go. They are everywhere.”
“Not!” said the indecent panny.
“Not, not!” went his companion with the waistcoat.
“Oh, honestly, you dunderheads!”
“What they mean,” said Totally, fluttering by the Mistress’s raised eyebrow, “is that someone has stolen the strawberries.”
“Stolen the strawberries? – It’s just not possible.”
“But they have. And now the pannies can’t make their straw-ba.”
“Frankly,” said the Mistress. “That is not such a bad thing when they’re always rolling around in it or doing that ridiculous dance.”
“But, Mistress, I thought you liked the straw-ba.”
“Today I’ve had enough straw-ba, pannies and gnomes. Most of all I’ve had enough of Smarm. Where is my chair?”
She clapped her hands.
A large panny came trundling up the path with the bits of the chair in question strapped to his back.
The two other pannies came to his assistance, and they began to put the chair together.
Laila watched as they assembled the various pieces of the chair. From time to time they scratched their heads and muttered to each other. “Not that bit, Ton. The other bit!” “What do you know, Tin! It’s that other pointy bit you want.” It seemed far more complicated than one of those flatpacks Dad was always trying to put together in the front room and losing the screws under chairs.
“Mistress!”
“Oh, what is now, Totally?”
“Oh, Mistress, it isn’t Totally. It is Utterly, Totally’s sister.”
The Mistress looked from one flutterbye to the other.
“This is totally and utterly ridiculous,” she said. “What do you want, Utterly?”
“It’s Chuck, Mistress,” said Utterly. “He’s gone totally, I mean utterly mad. Now he’s taken to thrashing the trees with his antlers.”
“Honestly, Chuck is a complete and utter chump.”
“Oh, Mistress, but you promised to come and see him flex.”
“Utterly, I thought I gave that job to you! Or do I have to do everything around here? – I want my chair to sit in.”
The Mistress was once again very cross, but her irritation seemed to spur on the pannies in their task. They managed to get all the bits of wood to go in the right holes and the chair was ready.
It was a straight-backed chair decorated with carvings. Laila noticed the rests were shaped and bent like bows. The feet of the chair ended in hooves.
The Mistress sat down upon the chair.
Her attendants waited. For she was a long time still and in offish thought. Laila began to suspect she had fallen asleep.
Suddenly they heard someone calling in a loud voice:
“Company, make ready!”
On one side of the path there was a raised bank before a line of trees. And this was where the voice was coming from.
“Company, present!”
The Mistress sprang to the edge of the path and raised her bow.
“Fire!”
A salvo of musket shots rang out.
Laila heard the unicorn neigh. It was a long high-pitched whistle. Then she saw it bursting down the bank and onto the path.
“Mr. Whizz!”
For it was indeed the wizard.
“I apologize, Mistress Dido, for the delay. As you can see, I have been detained.”
“You are lucky I suppose Smarm’s Guard do not know how to shoot.”
“I believe, Mistress Dido, they have been practising hard, but Beautifully and I know one or two moves that seemed to put them off their stride.”
“Who are Smarm’s Guard?” asked Laila in a whisper.
“His shooters,” said Cyril.
“You mean the smarmers?”
“The ones who know how to shoot.”
“So they don’t all know how to shoot?”
But Cyril did not respond. There was now more urgent business between the Mistress and the wizard.
“I have need of your wisdom, Mr Whizz.”
Mr Whizz began to stroke his beard.
“What appears to be the trouble, Mistress Dido?”
“Someone has stolen all the strawberries. And now the pannies cannot make their straw-ba.”
“That cannot be possible,” said the wizard. “The Garden may be a thing rarum, but it thrives on fragaria ananassa.”
“Nevertheless, it appears we have a problem.”
The wizard scratched his beard.
“Well,” he said, “this does appear to be an unusual case. The case of the missing strawberries…When could everyone want to eat strawberries together?”
“At the end of a feast, of course.”
“That’s what we’ll do then. Call a feast to tame the beast.”
“How can we have a feast without strawberries, or beasts for that matter?”
“The feast may not have fragaria ananassa, but it will fetch the thief.”
“Mr. Whizz, don’t speak in riddles. What do you mean?”
“Everyone must bring food to the feast including the beast.”
“But what if the beast or thief doesn’t bring the strawberries?”
“There can be no secrets at the feast. If the garden is robbed of its strawberries, we will at least be able to digest the truth that they have been stolen.”
The wizard’s explanation seemed to satisfy the Mistress, who clapped her hands. After a pause, she began to click her tongue rapidly and loudly.
“What’s she doing?” asked Laila.
“Summoning the Butter Girls.”
Shortly, at the prompting of the Mistress’s clicking tongue, they came. First one, then two, then three more until there were five buttery looking creatures in white chiffon wafting above the path.
“Are they ghosts?”
Cyril looked blank-faced.
“Ghosts? – Ghosts don’t exist.”
“But they float like ghosts.”
“They always do that when they have to leave the pool.”
“I see,” said Laila, although obviously she did not.
“You called, Mistress Dido?”
“Tonight, we shall have a feast at the Great Clearing. Spread the word. Everyone must come.”
The Butter Girls began to intone the Mistress’s words, and as they did, it seemed to Laila they became even more untethered from themselves.
Once again, the Mistress clapped her hands and the Butter Girls scattered – ghosts-like – to the winds.
“Everyone must come,” they cried.
“To make the feast
With food and fun
To tame the beast!”
The feast party set off: pannies and flutterbyes sped down the path on the tail of the Butter Girls. Several pannies had come to the fore – grunting and pushing each other as they ran.
Laila was caught up in their indecent haste.
“Come! Don’t be shy!
Try your luck,
Lord Smarm
Use your charm
On Lady Muck!”
Sang the Butter Girls as they soared over the path.
Suddenly the pannies became excited.
“Boars!” they shouted. “Boars!”
“This definitely isn’t boring,” Laila said. “Keep up, Cyril.”
Through the chattering trees, they came upon three wild boars drinking at a pool.
When the boars saw them, they started to run. The pannies came around behind them and drove them back towards the feast party.
The first boar looked up and began to protest.
“Oh, no, please don’t hurt us,” he said. “Besides, we’re very tough.”
“Wow! A talking boar!” cried Laila.
“There are more than enough bores who talk around here,” said Cyril.
More by luck than judgement, the pannies had brought the boars to heel. They stood abjectly in a huddle when the Mistress pressed through the throng.
“Is she going to shoot them with her bow?” said Laila, turning to Mr. Whizz, who had ridden up on the unicorn.
“It remains to be seen,” said the wizard. “It might be a law of nature. Here, in the Garden, things do not always happen according to the laws of Nature.”
Suddenly one of the boars broke away from the others and began to run.
A panny tried to tackle it. It dodged round the panny with a very neat side-step, and the panny fell flat on his face, but the Mistress was equal to it.
It stopped in its tracks as she raised her bow.
Then she began to speak.
“Mi bedaŭras vundi vin. Vundi vin ĉu ne mia intenco…”
The Mistress went on in the strange, tricky tongue that was trickier than Madame Trudeau’s tricky French.
“What is she saying, Mr. Whizz?”
“I believe,” he said, “she is asking forgiveness.”
“Forgiveness?”
“All creatures of the Garden fall under her responsibility. She does not wish to kill the boars but explains the greater need and urgency of the moment.”
“Mr. Whizz,” said Laila. “You must do something to stop her from hurting the boars.”
For it did not seem to right to her. Not only were the boars defenceless before the pannies, but they also talked like people. How could one sacrifice a talking boar, or a person for that matter?
“Mistress,” said the boar. “Although you speak to us in the old tongue, I hear you in the new tongue. I and my two brothers have a proposition.”
“Speak, Master Boar.”
“My brothers and I are not only tough, but we are also gruff. Therefore, in our toughness and gruffness, I propose that we sing for your supper.”
“Funny bore,” said Laila.
“He’s not funny. He’s my brother,” said another boar, who began to croon.
“Hello, my baby! Hello, my honey!
Hello, my ragtime girl,
Send me a kiss!”
“Yuck!” said Laila. “Don’t want to kiss a boar.”
The Mistress sighed.
“Master Boar, there will be many of us at the feast. If we can’t eat you for supper, what are we going to eat?”
“We have sausages!”
“How did you get those?”
“Fred fell asleep and we were bored.”
“Fred fell asleep and we were bored,” she cried. “That’s too silly.”
The Mistress began to laugh, as did the flutterbyes, Utterly and Totally. It seemed for the first time in quite a while their Mistress was enjoying herself.
“Fred fell asleep and we were bored,” she repeated in stitches. “What do you think, Mr. Whizz?”
“Indeed,” said the wizard, “it is rather humorous line. I must say I could not have bettered myself.”
The pannies, who were muttering to each other in the background, pushed one of their number forward. It was Tin with the braided waistcoat.
“Pannies like boar meat,” he said. “However, bangers is alright. In fact, bangers is best.”
The pannies stamped their hooves and cried as one:
“Forget the rest,
Bangers is best!”
“There you have it,” said the Mistress, turning to the three boars, “it is agreed we shall have your sausages, but not your tough old meat for the feast.”
She clapped her hands and the Butter Girls sang:
“Everyone must come,
To make the feast
With food and fun
To tame the beast!”
And they were off down the path, pannies and flutterbyes in pursuit.
The Mistress was about to follow them when she happened to see Cyril lurking under Beautifully.
She frowned.
“I thought I told you to go to Nothing.”
Cyril’s head dropped.
He turned on his heels and began to shuffle off down the path in the opposite direction.
“Where are you going, Cyril?”
“You heard her.”
“I am sure she didn’t mean it. – I mean if she did, she would take you to the Tree of Nothing herself.”
“Laila, you don’t understand,” said Cyril. “She can’t interfere with gnome lore.”
“What am I going to do now?” he sighed. “How am I going to get back in Twang’s good books?”
[1]Pine sap is known to be a powerful natural anaesthetic, not only to the dwellers of the Garden, but also, once upon a time, to the tribes of Ancient Briton.