The Half-a-Moon Inn (6 page)

Was she actually going to leave, then? Aaron jumped on the floor with all his might and pounded on the walls with his fists.

“Without a moment's delay,” Miss Grackle replied. “You can depend on it.”

He could hear steps moving across the floor, felt the front door close and heard the neigh of a horse. Hadn't she heard him? Why was she leaving him? He pounded against the door until he was exhausted. What was the matter with her?

He stopped to listen, and caught the sound of hooves fading away. He pounded at the door one last time and crumpled down on the floor, tears silently moving down his cheeks. A half hour later Miss Grackle unlocked the door and fetched him downstairs.

“Strike flint, boy, and hoist the flames up high!” She flung a shawl over her shoulders and clutched it tight. “Take the ice out of this chillful air, Sam, and then hop to the potatoes.”

Miss Grackle bustled about the room, stepped out onto the porch for a minute and returned with a shiver.

“Curse the wind!” she hissed. “Could have just cost us some royal company.”

Aaron looked up at her quizzically.

“Hurry up with the blaze, boy—it's nothing. Just the sign out front. Wind blew it down during the night.”

Aaron stopped what he was doing, and suddenly knew what had happened. The sign must have fallen facedown on the ground—his mother had never seen it.

All day long Aaron wandered sullenly about the house like a homeless spirit. He looked out the window while he tended to his chores, watching the wind drive the clouds across the sky.

Would his mother ever bother to search this road again? Was that the last look he'd ever get of her, the last time he'd ever hear the sound of her voice? Somehow he had to slip out of Miss Grackle's grasp, or she'd have him striking flint to her fires for the rest of his days.

That evening, while Aaron was serving the guests, wagon wheels creaked to a halt outside, footsteps thumped heavily up onto the porch, Aaron turned to look as the door swung open—and there stood the ragman.

“Bless me bats!” he burst out. “It's me quiet little friend.”

Aaron's eyes lit up and suddenly he felt weightless with joy and relief. At last he'd been rescued! Why, he'd be home straightaway—in a few days at the most!

He trembled with excitement, and in his haste to run to the ragman he spilled a bowl of hot soup and dumplings down the front of a guest, a huge man who promptly let out a cry.

“
Curse
you, you clumsy scamp!” he shouted. He wore a leather eye patch and focused all his anger into a fearsome one-eyed glare.

“On purpose, was it?” he snarled, staring straight at Aaron. “I ought to have your
head
for it, boy—and maybe I will!”

“Quick, boy!” barked Miss Grackle. “Fetch a rag and clean the worthy gentleman's clothes.” He did as she said while the man muttered ominously to himself. Then Aaron brought him another bowl of soup and fled to the ragman.

“Well met, me lad,” said the ragman with a smile. “Well met indeed.” He sat himself down at a table and Aaron served him his dinner.

“Decided to stay on as an errand boy, have you? Fine choice, me lad. Excellent choice.” Aaron strenuously shook his head no, but the ragman seemed not to notice.

“Fine training, it is. Good experience for a boy—aye, and I'm sure your mistress is grateful indeed to have a polite and well-mannered lad such as yourself. One that knows how to hold his tongue before his elders.”

Hold his tongue? Would the man never understand that Aaron was mute, and that he was trying to escape from the inn? Aaron tugged on the ragman's sleeve, desperate to get the truth into his head before Miss Grackle should intervene, but the man's mind was as impenetrable as stone.

“Aye, I worked at an inn once meself, as a boy. That I did, with the travelers always coming and going, and the stories of all the places they've seen. No better place for a boy to learn about life.”

Aaron struggled to make himself understood by the ragman, shaking his head back and forth, making faces of pain, pointing fearfully toward Miss Grackle. But before he could get his point across, Miss Grackle called him away and set him to clearing the tables. Somehow he had to get back to the ragman, but the moment Aaron finished one chore Miss Grackle gave him another, and he watched in dismay as the first of the guests began tramping upstairs—the ragman among them.

Aaron worked his mind feverishly, determined not to let the chance slip through his fingers. Yet Miss Grackle seemed suspicious, never letting him out of her sight, and when they entered the guests' room to sift through their dreams, it was Miss Grackle who pulled up next to the ragman, sitting Aaron down by the man who'd cursed him earlier.

He felt restless and jumpy, with no patience for searching for silks and jewels, but he tried to pretend that nothing was out of the ordinary. He pulled the lid back from the man's uncovered eye—and instantly a chill shot up his spine like lightning. The man was dreaming of creeping slowly down a hall, entering a room where a boy slept in a bed, and with a vengeful smile, driving a knife into his back. And the boy was none other than Aaron himself!

Aaron looked closer, trembling with fear, and saw that the man had no patch over his eye in the dream, and sported a wild red beard, just like Lord Tom's. Aaron looked again, and gaped in horror. It
was
Lord Tom he was dreaming of—and suddenly Aaron began to shake. The eye he was looking at was brown. Carefully he lifted up the patch over the other eye, and let it down again in a hurry. The eye behind it was perfectly normal—and as blue as the sea. Lord Tom himself was lying before him!

Aaron's heart began racing like a runaway horse. Of all the people to spill a bowl of soup onto, why had he picked Lord Tom? He must have shaved off his beard and strapped on an eye patch so as not to be spotted, and left Bingham Woods for lands where he wasn't yet known. Aaron stared at his face, imagining it with a beard, and recognized it as the face that had haunted him so.

Was he planning to put an end to Aaron for his clumsiness this very night? He'd killed men for less, Aaron was certain of that. Or since he'd know just where to find him, would he save Aaron for the future, and murder him at his leisure? Somehow he had to see that the man was locked up, and in a desperate hurry.

There was no hope of getting the guests to understand. And Miss Grackle herself had never heard of the man. Suddenly an idea burst into his head.

He shot up from his chair, ran to Miss Grackle and tugged on her arm, pointing excitedly toward Lord Tom.

“What is it, me little bedbug? Did you see something, Sam?”

Aaron nodded his head wildly, and pantomimed a man admiring rings on his fingers.

“Well, what is it then, lad—have you struck noble blood?”

Aaron nodded his head, and Miss Grackle jumped to her feet in a flash.

“Quick, Sam, what manner of man have you found us? A duke, is it, boy?”

Aaron shook his head no, and quickly imitated a man walking with a great full-length robe trailing behind him.

“By the gods!” Miss Grackle exclaimed, her eyes bulging with greedy excitement. “Can it be you've uncovered a prince?”

Aaron shook his head again, and pretended to place a glittering crown on his head.

“Great heavens, boy—is it a king, then?”

Frantically Aaron nodded his head yes.

“A king under me own roof?” Miss Grackle burst out. “Impossible!” She scrambled madly across the room, bent over Lord Tom a moment and straightened up again.

“It's gone, boy—the dream's changed.” She grabbed Aaron by the shoulders and scrutinized his face.

“But you say you saw it for yourself?” she asked, her eyes wide and alert.

Aaron nodded wildly, straining to look as excited as he could.

“And you're certain he had a crown, are you, Sam?”

He nodded again.

“Well now, maybe you've struck something after all, boy.” Her eyes sparkled hungrily, and a calculating smile spread over her face. “What did I tell you, lad, but there's all manner of royalty just waiting to be found. And a king at that!”

She hovered over the man like a hawk, trembling with visions of wagons full of gold. “Oh, you've done well, you have, and I'm right proud of you, Sam. And I'll see to it that you get a wing all to yourself when we get us a castle. You can depend on it, lad.”

Aaron tried to look as greedy and pleased as she, and watched as she pawed through the man's possessions, picked out his pistol and stuck it in her apron pocket.

“We'll lead him down in the cellar tomorrow morning, give him a shove and lock the door behind him. And you, Sam, can write out some proper ransom notes. Then it's just a matter of passing the time till the gold arrives and His Majesty goes free—and we begin living like kings ourselves!”

Aaron sighed with relief inside at the thought of Lord Tom locked safely away in the cellar, and hoped for once that her scheme went as planned. Now all he need do was to figure a way to escape before Miss Grackle discovered that it was a rogue she was boarding, rather than royalty. He worked his mind desperately while he was led to his room, and lay awake through the night, too restless to sleep.

Slowly the sky began to lighten in the east, and soon Miss Grackle marched down the hallway, unlocked his door and stuck her head inside.

“Into your clothes, and to the grates with you, Sam!” Aaron dressed in a hurry, hopping from one bare foot to the other on the icy floor. Suddenly he began to question his plan, wondering how long Lord Tom would stay cooped up in the cellar. There'd be no queens or princes to bail
him
out! Why, he'd be mad as fifty hornets and likely burst down the door himself—and leave knives in
both
their backs as payment for his keep.

Quickly Aaron scurried downstairs and set about kindling a fire, knowing he had to get free of the inn without a moment to spare.

“Give us a blaze now, Sam, and one fit for a king!” Miss Grackle whispered hoarsely. “Our guest of honor isn't used to waking up to a chill in the air—so raise up the flames and make him feel right at home.”

Aaron finished arranging the logs on the grate, struck a spark from the flint—but couldn't get the wood shavings to catch.

“Quick, Sam, a fire—I can already hear feet stirring above.”

Aaron struck at the flint time and again, but the tinder refused to burn.

“What is it now, me little termite?” Miss Grackle hissed with impatience. She stood over him clutching a shawl around her shoulders, her teeth chattering furiously. “The flames
always
come when you call 'em. Now bring 'em up, boy!”

Nervously, Aaron arranged the tinder anew, shifted the wood about and struck the flint again. The spark jumped forward into the wood shavings—and immediately died out.

“How can it be?” asked Miss Grackle in puzzlement. Then all of a sudden she swooped down upon him and yanked him up by the wrist.

“Unless it be the case that you've done something
dishonest!
”

She shook him by the arm and peered into his face. “Quick now, boy—explain yourself!”

Aaron squirmed in her grasp like a snake, his mind whirling in confusion—and then he remembered. The lie that he'd told her about Lord Tom's dream—
that's
why the wood wouldn't catch! There was no turning back now—he had to escape!

“Out with it, boy—before I squeeze it out of you meself!” She tightened her grip on his wrist till the bones were ready to snap.

“Stolen something, is it? Put poison in me food? Is it lies ye be telling, me ungrateful scamp?”

Aaron writhed in desperation, feverishly working his brain for an excuse—when the sound of footsteps on stairs echoed down from above.

“Enough—” whispered Miss Grackle, and she threw him down on the floor. “Quick now, to the potatoes with you, and keep still and out of the way. I'll finish with you in a moment!”

One by one the callers came clumping downstairs. Miss Grackle took up her post by the door, explained that the chimney flue wasn't working, lectured them on thieves as usual and bid them farewell.

“Well met, me lad,” called the ragman as he headed toward the door. “Aye, I can see you're working hard, and making your mistress right proud of you too. Just as quiet and polite a lad as they come, and never so much as a peep out of you. For me, it's homeward to Williford. Farewell now, me lad!”

Aaron waved good-bye, longing to dash out the door with him—but Miss Grackle flashed him a look that kept him bolted to his seat. But no sooner had the ragman stepped out the door than there was a commotion above, feet came crashing downstairs, and Lord Tom appeared in full fury.

“Where's me pistol, now!” he shouted in a rage. “Hand it over—brisk now!”

There were no other travelers left inside, and Miss Grackle looked at the man in surprise and stepped forward from the door.