The Silver Chair - Lewis Clive Staples (читать полные книги онлайн бесплатно .txt) 📗

“Two strangers, my lord,” said the Owl.

“Rangers! What d'ye mean?” said the Dwarf. “I see two uncommonly grubby man-cubs. What do they want?”

“My name's Jill,” said Jill, pressing forward. She was very eager to explain the important business on which they had come.

“The girl's called Jill,” said the Owl, as loud as it could.

“What's that?” said the Dwarf. “The girls are all killed! I don't believe a word of it. What girls? Who killed 'em?”

“Only one girl, my lord,” said the Owl. “Her name is Jill.”

“Speak up, speak up,” said the Dwarf. “Don't stand there buzzing and twittering in my ear. Who's been killed?”

“Nobody's been killed,” hooted the Owl.

“Who?”

“NOBODY.”

“All right, all right. You needn't shout. I'm not so deaf as all that. What do you mean by coming here to tell me that nobody's been killed? Why should anyone have been killed?”

“Better tell him I'm Eustace,” said Scrubb.

“The boy's Eustace, my lord,” hooted the Owl as loud as it could.

“Useless?” said the Dwarf irritably. “I dare say he is. Is that any reason for bringing him to court? Hey?”

“Not useless,” said the Owl. “EUSTACE.”

“Used to it, is he? I don't know what you're talking about, I'm sure. I tell you what it is, Master Glimfeather; when I was a young Dwarf there used to be talking beasts and birds in this country who really could talk. There wasn't all this mumbling and muttering and whispering. It wouldn't have been tolerated for a moment. Not for a moment, Sir. Urnus, my trumpet please—”

A little Faun who had been standing quietly beside the Dwarf's elbow all this time now handed him a silver eartrumpet. It was made like the musical instrument called a serpent, so that the tube curled right round the Dwarf's neck. While he was getting it settled the Owl, Glimfeather, suddenly said to the children in a whisper:

“My brain's a bit clearer now. Don't say anything about the lost Prince. I'll explain later. It wouldn't do, wouldn't do, Tu-Whoo! Oh what a to-do!”

“Now,” said the Dwarf, “if you have anything sensible to say, Master Glimfeather, try and say it. Take a deep breath and don't attempt to speak too quickly.”

With help from the children, and in spite of a fit of coughing on the part of the Dwarf, Glimfeather explained that the strangers had been sent by Aslan to visit the court of Narnia. The Dwarf glanced quickly up at them with a new expression in his eyes.

“Sent by the Lion Himself, hey?” he said. “And from m'm—from that other Place—beyond the world's end, hey?”

“Yes, my lord,” bawled Eustace into the trumpet.

“Son of Adam and Daughter of Eve, hey?” said the Dwarf. But people at Experiment House haven't heard of Adam and Eve, so Jill and Eustace couldn't answer this. But the Dwarf didn't seem to notice.

“Well, my dears,” he said, taking first one and then the other by the hand and bowing his head a little. “You are very heartily welcome. If the good King, my poor Master, had not this very hour set sail for Seven Isles, he would have been glad of your coming. It would have brought back his youth to him for a moment—for a moment. And now, it is high time for supper. You shall tell me your business in full council tomorrow morning. Master Glimfeather, see that bedchambers and suitable clothes and all else are provided for these guests in the most honourable fashion. And—Glimfeather—in your ear—”

Here the Dwarf put his mouth close to the Owl's head and, no doubt, intended to whisper: but, like other deaf people, he wasn't a very good judge of his own voice, and both children heard him say, “See that they're properly washed.”

After that, the Dwarf touched up his donkey and it set off towards the castle at something between a trot and a waddle (it was a very fat little beast), while the Faun, the Owl, and the children followed at a rather slower pace. The sun had set and the air was growing cool.

They went across the lawn and then through an orchard and so to the North Gate of Cair Paravel, which stood wide open. Inside, they found a grassy courtyard. Lights were already showing from the windows of the great hall on their right and from a more complicated mass of buildings straight ahead. Into these the Owl led them, and there a most delightful person was called to look after Jill. She was not much taller than Jill herself, and a good deal slenderer, but obviously full grown, graceful as a willow, and her hair was willowy too, and there seemed to be moss in it. She brought Jill to a round room in one of the turrets, where there was a little bath sunk in the floor and a fire of sweet-smelling woods burning on the flat hearth and a lamp hanging by a silver chain from the vaulted roof. The window looked west into the strange land of Narnia, and Jill saw the red remains of the sunset still glowing behind distant mountains. It made her long for more adventures and feel sure that this was only the beginning.

When she had had her bath, and brushed her hair, and put on the clothes that had been laid out for her—they were the kind that not only felt nice, but looked nice and smelled nice and made nice sounds when you moved as well—she would have gone back to gaze out of that exciting window, but she was interrupted by a bang on the door.

“Come in,” said Jill. And in came Scrubb, also bathed and splendidly dressed in Narnian clothes. But his face didn't look as if he were enjoying it.

“Oh, here you are at last,” he said crossly, flinging himself into a chair. “I've been trying to find you for ever so long.”

“Well, now you have,” said Jill. “I say, Scrubb, isn't it all simply too exciting and scrumptious for words.” She had forgotten all about the signs and the lost Prince for the moment.

“Oh! That's what you think, is it?” said Scrubb: and then, after a pause, “I wish to goodness we'd never come.”

“Why on earth?”

“I can't bear it,” said Scrubb. “Seeing the King Caspian—a doddering old man like that. It's—it's frightful.”

“Why, what harm does it do you?”

“Oh, you don't understand. Now that I come to think of it, you couldn't. I didn't tell you that this world has a different time from ours.”

“How do you mean?”

“The time you spend here doesn't take up any of our time. Do you see? I mean, however long we spend here, we shall still get back to Experiment House at the moment we left it—”

“That won't be much fun.”

“Oh, dry up! Don't keep interrupting. And when you're back in England—in our world—you can't tell how time is going here. It might be any number of years in Narnia while we're having one year at home. The Pevensies explained it all to me, but, like a fool, I forgot about it. And now apparently it's been about seventy years Narnian years—since I was here last. Do you see now? And I come back and find Caspian an old, old man.”

“Then the King was an old friend of yours!” said Jill. A horrid thought had struck her.

“I should jolly well think he was,” said Scrubb miserably. “About as good a friend as a chap could have. And last time he was only a few years older than me. And to see that old man with a white beard, and to remember Caspian as he was the morning we captured the Lone Islands, or in the fight with the Sea Serpent—oh, it's frightful. It's worse than coming back and finding him dead.”

“Oh, shut up,” said Jill impatiently. “It's far worse than you think. We've muffed the first Sign.” Of course Scrubb did not understand this. Then Jill told him about her conversation with Aslan and the four signs and the task of finding the lost prince which had been laid upon them.

“So you see,” she wound up, “you did see an old friend, just as Aslan said, and you ought to have gone and spoken to him at once. And now you haven't, and everything is going wrong from the very beginning.”

“But how was I to know?” said Scrubb.

“If you'd only listened to me when I tried to tell you, we'd be all right,” said Jill.