Chapter 10 In Which Gretsella Encounters Some Unanticipated Plot Twists #2
“They’re sounding awfully royalist for a bunch of democracy fanciers,” Lady Cordelia said.
She was, perhaps, the biggest democracy skeptic in the whole group, though she was sensible enough to avoid emotional attachment to any particular form of government.
People with strongly held faith in any particular political system, in Lady Cordelia’s opinion, were to be viewed with the same gently pitying regard as a barmaid who thought that her young sailor would be coming back any day now.
“The people love their Good King Bradley,” Sir George said, and gazed lovingly at Bradley.
“They love keeping their heads attached,” Herman muttered.
Gretsella didn’t respond to this aloud—it sounded too much like skepticism about the plan that she’d been supporting—but she did take note of it.
The man had a point. It was a pretty bold thing to publicly support the overthrowal of a king, even if the king in question was suspiciously encouraging of the idea.
The election was two weeks later.
The people elected Bradley with 98 percent of the vote.
The next day, Bradley’s advisory council gathered to discuss the results of the election. “I sent some of the junior jesters among the people to ask them about it,” Janet said.
“And the people said that they loved their Good King Bradley?” Sir George asked.
“Well, some of them,” Janet said. “Most of them just picked the only name they recognized. The rest thought that the whole thing was some kind of elaborate loyalty test and that they’d have their heads chopped off for backing anyone but Bradley.
The people in that bunch were pretty proud of themselves for having figured it out. ”
“But that would be horrible!” Bradley said.
“A clever idea,” Gretsella said, impressed.
“The next democratically elected king should implement it to ruthlessly root out all of his political opponents and kill them before they dare run for office. Anyway, it sounds as if the real problem is that we need to pick someone to replace Bradley. We’ll just have to do it again but make the propaganda campaign about supporting whoever we’ve picked. ”
“We can’t just pick someone to replace him, Grandmother,” Janet said. “That’s not the way democracy works.”
“Of course it isn’t,” Gretsella said kindly. “Anyway, who will we pick?”
Everyone in attendance shifted around in their seats, not wanting to be the first to suggest a replacement for the king. Bradley sat up a bit straighter in his own chair. “Someone smart, I think,” he suggested, a bit tentatively. “Who do we know who’s smart?”
A few names were brought forward. All of them were noble, and all of them were awful. Gretsella waited for the tepid discussion to die down. Then she said, very firmly, “I think that we should pick Herman.”
A murmur went around the table. It started out as a “Hmm?!” and then turned into a “Hmm!!” From this, Gretsella surmised that soon after the onset of murmuring, those assembled had all come to see the strength and reasonableness of her proposal.
All except Herman himself, who went flying out of his chair like a spitball out of a straw and then stood near the door with the tense, coiled stance of a man prepared to make a break for it to save himself from a fate far worse than any that could befall him in the cozy, manure-scented haven of the stableyard.
“Begging your pardon, ma’am, and forgive me if I speak out of turn, but like hell you should. ”
“We all have to make sacrifices for the cause” was Gretsella’s serene rejoinder.
Gretsella was always fully prepared for other people to make noble sacrifices for her causes.
“You’re sensible, so you have to understand what a good idea it is.
You already know how we’ve been running things, so you’ll be able to carry on without any major disruptions.
You have a good relationship with the palace staff because you’re one of them, and with the knights because you take care of their horses.
You’re a man of the people, but you’re a white-haired old man who could manage to look kingly if we stuck a stupid gold hat on you. You’d be perfect.”
Bradley cleared his throat. “It’s called a crown, Mother.”
“You can call it what you like,” Gretsella said. “Only an idiot would wear a five-pound hat that gives you neck cramps and doesn’t even keep the rain off your head.”
“My thoughts exactly, ma’am,” Herman said. “You’ve hit the nail on the head there, as they say. Only an idiot would want to wear the crown, which is why I won’t do it. I’m happy with my current position, ma’am, but thanks very much all the same for considering me for the role, et cetera.”
“Your modest reluctance to claim the throne is exactly why the people will praise your name for generations to come,” Janet said with a look in her eye that suggested she was already coming up with at least half a dozen inspiring songs about the peace, prosperity, and exciting new tax write-offs that the people would enjoy during the long and glorious reign of Good King Herman.
“All in favor of Herman running for king, say aye.”
There was a chorus of ayes, the loudest of which came from Bradley, who looked genuinely delighted.
“You’ll make a wonderful king, Herman! You’re very wise, and you look wise too, which is more important to making a good king.
I think I would have done a much better job at it if I could have grown a mustache like yours.
People really respect a nice thick mustache. ”
There was a long, tense moment as everyone was forced to consider whether this was a ridiculous comment made by a charming but rather simple young hairstylist with an inflated idea of the importance of personal appearance in national politics or, rather, an astute and accurate observation about the importance of personal appearance in national politics.
Gretsella decided to resolve their collective cognitive dissonance by moving the discussion forward.
“That’s settled, then,” she said, and banged her hand on the table for lack of a mallet.
“Janet, we need the best propaganda campaign you can manage to make Mr. Herman into a king.”
With the initial pro-democracy educational campaign behind them, the team launched their Herman-for-king campaign with the smoothness of a more than usually oily political machine.
Articles were written. Sausages were grilled.
Janet gave Gretsella such detailed and regular reports about the pro-Herman poems and songs that she and her assistant jesters had been spreading throughout the land that Gretsella started using them as fire starters.
Herman gave a fairly well-received speech in one of the capital’s larger market squares, then gently patted the flanks of several babies as if they were skittish young colts.
The babies, fortunately, didn’t voice any particular objections.
The days hummed along. Gretsella mostly gave occasional orders and otherwise barely did anything to contribute to the electoral cause, which was just how she liked things.
It did not occur to her until a humiliatingly late stage in the game that things were running with a very suspicious smoothness.
The problem was Janet. Or, to be more precise, the problem wasn’t Janet, which was precisely the problem.
Janet was a witch, was the thing. Not in career, perhaps, but in essence.
One witch knew another, and Gretsella had had Janet pegged since the day they first met.
A reluctant witch, a witch in denial, but a witch all the same.
And if there was one thing Gretsella knew about witches, it was that there was nothing in the world a witch was less likely to do than wholeheartedly dedicate herself to furthering a cause from behind the scenes.
Witches didn’t believe in causes, and if they did, they would be the faces on the posters, not the modest, self-effacing personages who spent all day pasting the posters to lampposts.
A witch might bake bread and deliver it to an ailing neighbor twice a week every week for a year, but she wouldn’t volunteer to collect money for the Bread for Ailing Invalids Fund.
A witch did things with her own hands to make sure they were done right, and she did them in person so that everyone knew whose debt they were in.
A witch did not hold very well-organized meetings during which she reminded her junior staffers to make sure that they asked for receipts after working lunches so they could be promptly reimbursed, and that alcohol couldn’t be paid for with Propaganda Department funds.
Not, that is, unless the witch was doing an excellent job of diverting attention from a cunning and extremely wicked plot.
Janet was definitely up to something. Now Gretsella just had to figure out exactly what it was, and in Gretsella’s view, there was no better way to figure out what someone was up to than by taking a few minutes to reflect, composing a list of questions, transforming oneself into a small, charmingly scruffy little dog, and then following the suspect around until they inadvertently revealed their secrets.
The first half of the day was very dull.
Gretsella was forced to lie in the hallway outside Janet’s office with her head on her paws, waiting for Janet to do something interesting.
Nothing interesting happened for several days (in dog time, which counts differently).
Then, finally, Janet emerged, and Gretsella went trotting after her on dirty little feet.