

A Fairy Tale from the Clock, or How the World Began

There was once a girl — excuse me, a young woman, you decide — who on account of having no excuse at all for an episode of bad behaviour, bad language, and bad attitude, was sent to her room. Not straight to her room, which is to say, without dinner, because none of the behaviour, language, or attitude were irredeemably atrocious or outrageous — but the whole package, considered together, was of the type about which grown-ups eventually, and quite rightfully, come to the conclusion that they have just had enough. And this was behaviour which really could not be ignored; there would be a cleaning bill to countenance, and apologies to make, and eyes to roll during the retelling, and so the girl was given over to the servants. And before the jugglers and the clowns and the singers, and even the dancing Syrians (who said they were Sufis, but who could be sure?), had begun — before in fact, any of the King's birthday celebrations had begun; as soon as the fruit pureed with ice from the peaks of the Urals and dusted with honeyed pollen brushed from the wings of Baalbek doves had been served — yes, dinner having been done, the miscreant was sent to her room. Now, you are curious as to the nature of the trouble, I know. I can hear your restlessness from here; it reminds me of the way the archers from the palace guard grumble as they practice in the courtyard early on a cold morning, far below my window. But I am not going to tell you; not because I don't want to, particularly — you see, I have no agenda and can be trusted implicitly — but because she and I, we have made a deal, and a good deal it is; in exchange for my silence on certain matters, and the reasons for the transgressions of the evening in question are the least of them (and I must admit that too much education of some people can be just as injurious as too little or none at all; so I am being careful about what I tell you — but please don't take offence; I mean none of this personally) — I have been told that I can tell you the following. * The next day, she sought me out, while the mead hall was being returned to its normal immaculate state after the King's birthday celebrations, which had apparently gone on all night, and were fit to keep even the monsters in their lairs on the marshes awake and grumbling — but let us not get started on monsters, for if we do that, we shall be here indefinitely... The child (and I persist in thinking of her as a child; I think because of my own age, and the difference between us, rather than just her youth, which in itself is just a thing, and of no great importance; but also because if my own daughter had lived, she would be of the same order of age as the Princess; perhaps that has something to do with it, as well...) ...the child, as I say... pressed upon me that I should put down my bucket and mop and follow her, so I did, because of course you do not refuse the Princess; none of us would ever think of it, and so I followed the Princess, and she led me — and do I need to describe my consternation, the ice which wrapped itself around my heart, the tightening of my lips, so that for several moments no words could part them, when I saw that she had led me to the door, heavy with chains and locks, shut fast with dire warnings and old rumours, sealed with whispers and averted eyes — you know of course, which door; I refer to that door, huge and unused for so long — she had led me to the room that had been sealed for as many years as the Princess is old (and you shall see how that works). The tapestry that had concealed it since the day of the young Princess's arrival lay in a convulsed pile on the floor where she had dropped it sometime during the night, when she should have been sleeping, and the guard outside her room should not; a mountain and attending foothills of brocaded skies and forest, and nymphs and satyrs, and a huge naked Artemis, lying sprawled and wanton across the floor.