Black Queen (4 page)

“Feed him, keep an eye out for him. That sort of thing. Would you do it for me? I guess I could put him in the cat home, but I wouldn’t feel right about it. He’d just hate being all shut up like that. He’d curl up and die, I know he would.”

“OK,” I said. If I was thinking at all when I said it, I suppose I must have been thinking that one good turn deserves another. All I know is that I had no idea what I was letting myself in for. I was about to find that out.

“You’re a real nice kid, Billy,” she said, as we went down the steps into the garden. “But there’s a little problem. Like I told you, Rambo doesn’t take too kindly to strangers. He’s kind of wild, I guess. The only person in the entire world he gets on with is me. I mean, he’s sort of real fixated on me. Hates everyone else, loves me. So if you’re going to feed him for me, you’ve got to
pretend
to be me, else he’ll just run off some place, and then of course he won’t have anything to eat at all. So, Billy, do you think you could do that?”

“How do you mean?” I asked.

“Well,” she said, “I guess you’ve just got to sound like me a little. And of course you’ve got to look like me too.”

“You mean I’ve got to dress up? Like you?” I simply could not believe what I was being asked to do.

“Well, it worked just fine before. I had a friend who came over a while back, when I was real sick. I had the flu pretty bad. He just put on my hat and my glasses and my coat and then he
called
him just like I do. Rambo never knew the difference. Came running for it, sweet as pie.”

“I don’t know,” I said. “I’m not sure.”

“You’ll do just fine,” she went on. “Just once a day for a few days, a couple of weeks. What d’you say?”

I was in so far now that I didn’t know how to get out. “All right,” I said, weakly.

She ruffled my hair. “I knew you were a great kid. I saw it in your eyes, first time I met you – that’s the kind of kid I can trust, I thought. I’ve only got to look in a person’s eyes and I know just what they’re thinking, just what they’re going to do next.” Now she was being scary again. “But the thing is, Billy,” she went on, lowering her voice confidentially, “I don’t want anyone in the neighbourhood to know I’ve gone, that you’re feeding my cat for me. If word gets about a place is empty, you
can
get burglarized, vandalized. So you’ll be the only neighbour who’ll know I’m not here. No-one else, right? You hear what I’m saying? Best if you say nothing to nobody, right? Our little secret.”

I nodded.

“Promise me then?”

“I promise,” I said, and at once wished I hadn’t. Desperately, I sought for a way out, a way not to have to do it, any of it. “What about the cat food? What about the clothes?”

We were outside in the garden by now. She crouched down and lifted up an empty flower pot by the sundial. “I’ll leave the key right here, Billy. How’ll that be? Then you can let
yourself
in. I’ll leave out his bowl and all the cat food you’ll need on the kitchen table, and a can opener with it. There’ll be some milk left in the ice-box. When it’s finished you can give him water instead. He’ll be fine. I’ve got an old hat and coat that’ll do the trick. I’ll leave them in the kitchen for you, OK? I feed him right here. You just come down these steps tap-tapping away at his bowl with a spoon, and calling him like this: ‘Rammy Rambo! Rammy Rambo!’ He’ll come, no problem. But don’t ever let him inside the house, OK? First off, he loves it in there, you’d never get him out again. Second, he tears my curtains to pieces with his claws; and third, he makes messes – if you get my meaning.”

I did. But the cat seemed the least of my worries as I ran down the garden to climb back over. I just wanted to get away before she asked me to do anything more. Already I had promised
to
keep a secret I didn’t want to keep, dress up like some mad old witch,
and
feed a cat that I didn’t like the look of, not one bit.

“Hey, Billy,” she called after me, “aren’t you forgetting something?”

For a moment I had no idea what she was talking about. Then I saw Matey hopping towards me through the long grass. I bent to pick him up.

She was chuckling. “The day after tomorrow, Billy. Don’t you go forgetting now.”

Forget? I only wished I could.

Chapter 5

Sometimes It’s Hard to Be a Woman

I LAY IN
bed that night quite unable to sleep. The more I thought about it the worse it became – everything I had let myself in for. And what about the Black Queen herself? Who on earth was she? What was she? I just couldn’t get it out of my head that she really might be some kind of witch. She certainly had powers. Hadn’t she healed my bee sting? Hadn’t she bewitched me into promising to do all sorts of things I didn’t want to? At best she was strange; at worst . . . it made me shiver to think of it.

All the next day I kept thinking that I should tell my mother all about her, about what the Black Queen had asked me to do. But I said nothing. To be honest, it wasn’t because I had promised to keep quiet about it; it was because I had it in my mind – and I know it sounds silly – that the Black Queen might do something terrible to me if she ever found out. Maybe she’d turn me into a bee. Maybe all those bees were spellbound spirits she had punished, condemning them to live out their days in the beehive at the bottom of her garden. My mind was in a constant whirl of terror. I longed to tell all, and that evening I very nearly did too.

After supper I was playing chess with my father. Rula was watching and fidgeting as usual. I just couldn’t concentrate, but it wasn’t Rula’s fault. Every time I looked at the black queen on the chessboard my mind drifted back
to
Number 22. I kept wondering why there should be so many chessboards there. And why have boards without the pieces? Could they be part of some mysterious and dreadful witch’s rite?

My father had me checkmate in ten minutes.

“You’re miles away, Billy,” he said. “Anything the matter? You don’t look too good.”

I should have spoken up. I had the chance, but I didn’t. “Not in the mood,” I said, and left it at that.

I had another sleepless night, thinking how hard it was going to be to pretend to be a woman, dreading everything I had to do the next day. I drifted in and out of nightmarish dreams – dreams full of killer bees and haunted houses and cackling witches, and a prowling black jaguar with orange eyes which chased me through the jungle.

By the next morning I really did not want to go and feed Rambo at all. I kept trying to convince myself that promises didn’t matter. Rambo could manage by himself – he’d catch a few mice, he’d murder a few robins. He didn’t need me to feed him, he’d be fine. But when I went out into the garden and heard him yowling pitifully on the
other
side of the fence, I knew I couldn’t just leave him to starve. I had to do it, I had no choice.

My father was out at work, and the others had gone shopping. It was now or never. I scrambled over the fence and dropped down into the long grass the other side. Rambo hissed horribly at me from the top of the sundial. He even swiped his claws at me as I crouched down to see if the key was under the flower pot, where the Black Queen had said it would be. It was.

Quick as a flash I was up the steps and inside the house. My heart was pounding in my ears. I wanted to get it all over as quickly as possible. The black coat and the floppy black hat were ready and waiting. She’d left some glasses too. I put them on and got dressed up. I opened a tin of cat food and scooped it out into the bowl, all the while trying to remember how exactly she had called for Rambo. I practised out loud in the kitchen, imitating her accent, her tone of voice. “Rammy Rambo!” I called out. “Rammy Rambo!” It didn’t sound at all convincing to me.