Chapter 29
Chapter twenty-nine
Ormdale
Violet was on the return trip, dodging a particularly tall tourist by the pond, clutching a violin case, when—
“Excuse me, ma’am,” interrupted the tourist. “Might you be the famous Miss Worms?”
Violet’s eyes tracked up the crisp suit and collar until they reached a squared face that clearly hailed from sunnier climes than Yorkshire.
“I’m James Anderson,” he said, slipping off his hat. “Are you George’s cousin?”
“Oh, you’re the real American!“ Violet cried in relief. Impulsively, she grabbed his hand and held it hard. “Come quick, you’ll want to see this!”
“Excuse me for saying so, but aren’t we headed in the wrong direction, ma’am?” he asked, bemused, as she dragged him out the gate and towards the steep path to the river. “We seem to be leaving the menagerie behind us, if I’m right?”
“Well, if you want to go fraternise with the tourists, please yourself,“ Violet said killingly. “I thought you’d want to see the real Ormdale.”
Belatedly, she hoped she wasn’t terrifying the man. Whatever George had told him, he probably hadn’t warned him about wild girls luring him into the bushes with stringed instruments.
To her relief, his face split into a grin that startled her with its whiteness.
“All right, you’ve got me curious now,” he admitted. “Lead on, Macduff!”
“It’s lay on, Macduff,“ Violet flung back as she ducked under a branch and slid down a muddy patch, righting herself quickly. “And it doesn’t mean what you think it means.”
His brow knotted at the mudslide she had just made for him. “What do I think it means?”
“I haven’t the least idea what Americans think Shakespeare means,” Violet said.
He jumped over the muddy part. “Then why—“
“Shut up for a bit. I don’t want you startling my sister.” She pushed him behind a tree. “Stay here. Got it?”
He stared at her hand on his waistcoat.
“I’m going ahead,” Violet said. She spoke firmly and slowly, in case he found her accent difficult to understand. “Stay and watch from here. I don’t want you getting swallowed—not first thing. George wouldn’t like it.”
His eyes snapped to hers. “George wouldn’t— Hang on! How am I to see anything from here?“ He gestured at the bushes around them.
She looked him up and down. As he was a lengthy person, this took longer than usual.
“Can’t climb a tree?” she scoffed. “I thought you Americans were all rough riders, like that jolly president you had a bit ago.”
The man glanced down at his suit with regret. Then his jaw squared—if possible—further, and he seized a nearby tree limb and gave it an experimental shake.
He took off his jacket, folded it lovingly, and draped it on a branch, after removing a small insect from its perch.
“For my country’s honour,” he muttered.
“Enjoy the show! And for heaven’s sake, keep quiet,” Violet warned, and left him.
Violet let out a short whistle to warn Una as she stepped out of the tree line.
Una shuddered with relief or gratitude as she took it. Opening the clasps, she handed the case back to Violet and began to pluck the strings to check the tuning.
Violet snorted in disbelief. “Do they care if it’s in tune?”
“Don’t,” clipped Una, then she addressed the twins. Her voice was clear now. “Right, just as we discussed, children! Iggy, you shine the torch—Dolly, nice, loud singing, please. Violet, you’re to take the rear.”
Una raised her bow and began to play a march from Gilbert and Sullivan. The children, now together on the creature’s back, joined in, singing a descant over it.
The serpent raised its head, swaying a little, as if the music interested it greatly.
Una moved around it, fiddling all the while, and approached the opening of the cave. Slowly, the creature began to move, circling to follow her, water spiralling and finding its natural course again, welling up to Violet’s knees.
Violet kept at the back, nudging its tail now and then to encourage it along.
Between undulations, she caught glimpses of Una—a luminous brushstroke poised between the inky serpent and the entrance to the underworld. The music soared and twisted, amplified by the cavern.
The shadow of the rocks closed over them—first Una, then the twins atop the creature, then it progressed over the long body until it reached Violet. She could hear the echoing song from the cave, and a murmur of shale dislodged by the slithering.
She stopped and waited there, sunshine on her back, realising, with a start, how utterly confident she was that Una could handle this omnibus-sized monster. Their father could never have done that, with all his bluster and high talk.
It was her father who had died in those caves. It was Una who came and went with a violin and a pair of children.
Then Violet remembered the American.
“Oh! You can come out now,” she called out to him. “Mr Anderson?”
There came a crack and a thud, and he rustled out into the shallows of the river, in his shirt sleeves, wild-eyed, his hazelnut skin a shade paler.
“Was that—was that—“
“Yes, that’s the famous quetzalcoatl.”
He pulled out a notebook and began to scribble in it, shaking his head and laughing. He didn’t seem to care that his shoes were getting wet or that he’d left his jacket behind.
Violet returned her attention to the cave. The music was fainter and had changed to the gently rocking metre of a lullaby.
Soon, she saw the beam of Iggy’s torch, and Una and the twins came out hand in hand, blinking.
“It’s gone back to bed now,” Iggy announced. “I told it schlaf gezunt like Hanna tells us.”
“It was a lot easier to put to bed than you are,” Dolly said. “Iggy, do stop splashing me with your boots.”
Violet hovered with the violin case. She wanted to throw her arms around Una, but Una didn’t like that sort of thing. Una reached out for the case herself.
“I’ll have a cow delivered tomorrow,” said Una as she put her violin away. “The warm weather roused it, I suppose, and then it was hungry. Poor thing.”
A sound came out of the American.
Una jumped, noticing the stranger on the riverbank for the first time.
Violet gestured at him. “Behold, the genuine article! As if anyone could fake that! I ran into him when I was fetching your fiddle.”
“Now, you must be Miss Violet!” the man declared, stepping forward eagerly. “George told me all about your gumption, ma’am. James Anderson of the Smithsonian, very much at your service!”
While he seized and shook Una’s hand, Violet and Una looked at each other in consternation.
Then Una straightened her shoulders and spoke.
“Mr Anderson, my sister and I—we are very happy to welcome you to our Menagerie of Dragons.”
Violet stilled. Had her sister just said our menagerie?
More importantly, had she meant it?