The Eyes of the Dragon

69

The dollhouse arrived on the thirtieth day of Thomas the Light-Bringer’s reign. By then modils, those first harbingers of Spring (which we call bluets) were coming up in pretty little roadside bunches. Also by then Thomas the Light-Bringer had signed into law the Farmers’ Tax Increase, which quickly became known as Tom’s Black Tax. The new joke told in the meadhouses and wineshops was that the King would soon be changing his royal name to Thomas the Tax-Bringer. The increase was not eight percent, which might have been fair, or eighteen percent, which might have been bearable, but eighty percent. Thomas had had some doubts about it at first, but it hadn’t taken Flagg long to convince him.

“We must tax them more on what they admit they own, so we can collect at least some of what’s due us on all they hide from the tax collector,” Flagg said. Thomas, his head fuddled by the wine that now flowed constantly in the court chambers of the castle, had nodded with what he hoped was a wise expression on his face.

For his part, Peter had begun to fear that the dollhouse had been lost after all these years-and that was almost the truth. Ben Staad had commissioned Dennis to find it. After several days of fruitless searching, Dennis had confided in his good old Da’-the only person he dared trust with such a serious matter. It had taken Brandon another five days to find the dollhouse in one of the minor storage rooms on the ninth floor, west turret, where its cheerful pretend lawns and long, rambling wings were hidden under an ancient (and slightly moth-eaten) dustcloth that was gray with the years. All of the original furnishings were still in the house, and it had taken Brandon and Dennis and a soldier handpicked by Peyna three more days to make sure all the sharp things were removed. Then, at last, the dollhouse was delivered by two squire boys, who toiled up the three hundred stairs with the heavy, awkward thing spiked to a board between them. Beson followed closely behind, cursing and threatening terrible reprisals if they should drop it. Sweat rolled down the boys’ faces in rivers, but they made no reply.

When the door of Peter’s prison opened and the dollhouse was brought in, Peter gasped with surprise-not just because the dollhouse was finally here, but because one of the two boys carrying it was Ben Staad.

Give not a sign! Ben’s eyes flashed.

Don’t look at me too long! Peter’s flashed back.

After the advice he had given, Peyna would have been stunned to see Ben here. He had forgotten that the logic of all the wise old men in the world cannot often stand against the logic of a boy’s heart, if the boy’s heart is large and kind and loyal. Ben Staad’s was all three.

It had been the easiest thing in the world to exchange places with one of the squires meant to carry the dollhouse to the top of the Needle. For a guilder-all the money Ben had in the world, as a matter of fact-Dennis had arranged it.

“Don’t tell your father of this,” Ben cautioned Dennis.

“Why not?” Dennis had asked. “I tell my old Da’ almost everything… don’t you?”

“I did,” Ben said, remembering how his father had forbidden him to mention Peter’s name anymore in the house. “But when boys grow up, I think that sometimes changes. However that may be, you mustn’t tell him this, Dennis. He might tell Peyna, and then I’d be in a hot pot on a high-fire.”

“All right,” Dennis promised. It was a promise he kept. Dennis had been cruelly hurt when his master, whom he had loved, had been first accused and then convicted of murder. In the last few days, Ben had gone a long way toward filling the empty place in Dennis’s heart.

“That’s good,” Ben said, and punched Dennis playfully on the shoulder. “I only want to see him a minute, and refresh my heart.”

“He was your best friend, wasn’t he?”

“Still Is.”

Dennis had stared at him, amazed. “How can you claim a man who murdered his own father as your best friend?”

“Because I don’t believe he did it,” Ben said. “Do you?”

To Ben’s utter amazement, Dennis burst into wretched tears. “All my heart says the same, and yet-”

“Listen to it, then,” Ben said, and gave Dennis a large rough hug. “And dry off your mug before someone sees you bawling like a kid.”

“Put it in the other room,” Peter said now, distressed at the slight tremble in his voice. Beson didn’t notice; he was too busy cursing the two boys for their slowness, their stupidity, their very existence. They carried the dollhouse into the bedroom and set it down. The other boy, who had a very stupid face, dropped his end too quickly and too hard. There was the tiny sound of something breaking inside. Peter winced. Beson cuffed the boy -but he smiled as he did it. It was the first good thing that had happened to him since these two lads had appeared with the accursed thing.

The stupid boy stood up, wiping the side of his face, which was already starting to swell, and staring at Peter with frank wonder and fear, his mouth wide open; Ben remained on his knees a moment longer. There was a small rattan mat in front of the house’s front door-what we would call a welcome mat, I suppose. For just a moment Ben allowed his thumb to move over the top of this, and his eyes met Peter’s.

“Now get out!” Beson cried. “Get out, both of you! Go home and curse your mothers for ever bringing such slow, clumsy fools as yourselves into the world!”

The boys passed Peter, the loutish one shrinking away as if the prince might have a disease he could catch. Ben’s eyes met Peter’s once more, and Peter trembled at the love he saw in his old friend’s gaze. Then they were gone.

“Well, you have it now, my good little princeling,” Beson said. “What shall we be bringing you next? Little ruffly dresses? Silk underpants?”

Peter turned slowly and looked at Beson. After a moment, Beson dropped his eyes. There was something frightening in Peter’s gaze, and Beson was forced to remember again that, sissy or not, Peter had beaten him so badly that his ribs had ached for two days and he had had dizzy spells for a week.

“Well, it’s your business,” he muttered. “But now that you have it, I could find a table for you to put it on. And a chair to sit in while you… “He grimaced. “While you play with it.”

“And how much would this cost?”

“A mere three guilders, I should think.”

“I have no money.”

“Ah, but you know powerful people.”

“No more,” Peter said. “I traded a favor for a favor, that’s all.”

“Sit on the floor, then, and get chilblains on your arse, and be damned to you!” Beson said, and strode from the room. The little flood of guilders he had enjoyed since Peter came to the Needle had apparently dried up. It put Beson in a foul mood for days.

Peter waited until he had heard all the locks and bolts go rattling home before lifting the rattan mat Ben had rubbed with his thumb. Beneath he found a square of paper no larger than the stamp on a letter. Both sides had been written on, and there were no spaces between the words. The letters were tiny in-deed-Peter had to squint to read them, and guessed that Ben must have made them with the aid of a magnifying glass.

Peter-destroy this after you have read it. I don’t believe you did it. Others feel the same I am sure. I am still your friend. I love you as I always did. Dennis does not believe it, either. If I can ever help get to me through Peyna. Let your heart be steadfast.

As he read this, Peter’s eyes filled with warm tears of gratitude. I think that real friendship always makes us feel such sweet grat-itude, because the world almost always seems like a very hard desert, and the flowers that grow there seem to grow against such high odds. “Good old Ben!” he whispered over and over again. In the fullness of his heart, he couldn’t think to say any-thing else. “Good old Ben! Good old Ben!”

For the first time he began to think that his plan, wild and dangerous as it was, might have a chance of succeeding.

Next he thought of the note. Ben had put his life on the line to write it. Ben was noble-barely-but not royal; thus not immune from the headsman’s axe. If Beson or one of his jackals found this note, they would guess that one or the other of the boys who had brought the dollhouse must have written it. The loutish one looked as if he couldn’t read even the large letters in a child’s book, let alone write such tiny ones as these. So they would look for the other boy, and from there to the chopping block might be a short trip for good old Ben.

He could think of only one sure way to get rid of it, and he didn’t hesitate; he crumpled the little note up between the thumb and forefinger of his right hand and ate it.