The King and Queen of Mountcastle were sitting quietly by the fireside. They were sitting quietly because Princess Marzipan was in bed. Mountcastle was never quiet while the Princess was awake.
The King was fat and jolly. When Princess Marzipan was in bed, he was no fatter, but considerably more jolly. “What bliss!” he exclaimed, as he arranged his stamp collection for the hundredth time. “Just listen!”
The Queen looked up from her reading. “I can’t hear anything.”
“Exactly,” nodded the King. “No screaming, no crying, no tantrums, no out-of-tune singing. Isn’t it wonderful!”
“You’d better make the most of it while it lasts,” replied the Queen. “Don’t forget, Marzipan is on her school holidays for a week, starting from tomorrow.”
The King’s jollity went down a couple of notches. “Oh yes. I’d forgotten that.”
“Perhaps you’ve also forgotten the last time our dear daughter was on her school holidays,” said the Queen, darkly.
The King gave a shudder. “That carpet has never been the same since. And when I think of the state visit of the Prince of Humbria…” The King quite forgot what he was doing, licked one of his precious stamps, and stuck it to the table in front of him. “Oh bother! Now see what I’ve gone and done! That was a rare threepenny blue! With the gum still intact!” He tried to peel the stamp off the tabletop. It tore.
The King was no longer jolly. He threw down his stamp album. It nearly went in the fire. “See what she’s made me do!” he cried, glaring at the ceiling. “Even when she’s asleep, that girl causes trouble.”
“You can’t blame Marzipan for your own absent-mindedness,” said the Queen.
“No, you’re quite right, that’s not fair of me,” said the King. “But I can blame her for putting paint in the castle moat, frightening the horses with her singing, digging holes in the lawn, picking my roses…” The King went on listing some of the bad things that Princess Marzipan had done. If he’d listed all of them, he would have been there all night. And most of the following day.
Princess Marzipan was sound asleep, and dreaming pleasant dreams. They were not dreams of golden castles in the sky, or handsome princes, or giant ice creams, or any of the other dreams you might expect a princess to have. Princess Marzipan was dreaming about punching Vanity Fudge on the nose.
Vanity Fudge was Princess Marzipan’s best friend and sworn enemy, depending on what day of the week it was, and what sort of mood the Princess was in. In her dream, the Princess had punched Vanity’s nose so hard it had gone completely flat, and Vanity Fudge was trying to bend it back into shape, as though it was made of plasticene, which, knowing Vanity Fudge, it probably was.
“Here, Vanity, let me help you,” said the Princess. Taking hold of Vanity’s squashed nose, she began to pull. The Princess pulled and pulled until Vanity’s nose was long and pointy and looked exactly like a carrot.
“Stop it, Marzipan, stop it!” squeaked Vanity Fudge.
“There, I think you look much better that way,” said the Princess. “Now, let’s see what we can do about your ears. They look to me as if they could do with a good tweaking…”
And so the dream went on.
Princess Marzipan was small, and pretty, with dark red hair and enormous green eyes. She was quite the prettiest thing in all of Mountcastle, and that was saying something. The castle was full of paintings, and priceless ornaments, and gold and silver. None of it was as nice to look at as Princess Marzipan. And that was the whole trouble.
Everyone told the Princess how gorgeous she was. Including the Princess herself. Each morning, she would look in the mirror and say to herself: “Just look at that lovely princess. I wonder who it can be? Oh, it’s me!” She was quite conceited, even for a princess.
The Princess was at her loveliest when she was asleep. Sometimes, the King would look into her bedroom late at night, and see that shining head of red hair lying on a feather pillow, those pretty eyes with their long lashes tight shut, and her little strawberry mouth curled up in such a lovely smile.
When she was awake, and in one of her moods, things looked very different. Those strawberry lips would sulk and pout, her eyes would flicker angrily, and her dainty little feet would stamp the floor so hard that it shook Mountcastle to its very foundations.
She wasn’t bad all of the time, of course. Marzipan was sometimes so funny she had the whole of the castle in stitches. She had jokes, and stories, and silly faces for every occasion. But she also had pranks and practical jokes that were a lot less amusing. Once, she melted a chocolate bar into the shape of a dog pooh, then left it on the floor until someone came along. “Oh, look,” cried the Princess, “pooh, my favourite food.” Then she picked up the chocolate dog pooh and ate it.
It was little wonder the King and Queen had christened their daughter Marzipan. Because, like the marzipan that you put on cakes, she was very sweet, but too much of her could make you very sick.
Part One
MUD DAY
Mountcastle was a mountain, and a castle, and a town all in one. The people who lived there were happy and contented for most of the time. If anyone was ever unhappy or discontented, it was usually because of one person. That person was Prince Finnegan.
Prince Finnegan was tall and lanky, with a high, domed forehead and quite the maddest eyes you’ve ever seen. He always dressed in black; a black cloak, black tunic, black tights and black boots. He didn’t wear black because he wanted to look impressive, or menacing. He wore it because he couldn’t think of any other colour to wear.
Prince Finnegan was the King’s brother. He did not live in Mountcastle with the rest of his family, but far away in the forest in an old, black tower. That was actually its name: ‘Old Black Tower.’ Prince Finnegan had no imagination. When he did any thinking, it was always on the same subject; how he could claim the throne of Mountcastle. None of his plans ever came to anything, but it didn’t stop him from thinking up new ones. After months of thinking, Finnegan had come up with his greatest plan to date. He knew it was a great plan because of the amount of paper he had used drawing it up. Quite a lot of the paper went in the wastebasket because Prince Finnegan wasn’t very good at drawing.
At long last the plan was finished, and the Prince pinned it up on the wall. It fell down. The Prince pinned it up again, and stepped back to admire his handiwork. The plan was upside down. Finnegan tore it down in a rage and screwed it into a little ball, then drop-kicked it into the fire. Then he realised what he’d done.
Dudd, the Prince’s Butler, looked on with a sigh. It was always like this when Finnegan was working on a new plan.
After sitting up all night re-drawing his plan, Finnegan was finally ready. This time, it stayed on the wall, and it was the right way up. Dudd gave a little round of applause as the Prince unveiled it. Finnegan glared at him. “Don’t be sarcastic.”
“I wasn’t,” said Dudd.
“Good. Now sit down and I will explain how we, or rather I am going to sieze the throne of Mountcastle.” Finnegan grabbed a long, pointy stick, and jabbed at the plan. The stick went through the paper and made a hole. Finnegan growled angrily while Dudd went to find some sticky tape. Five minutes later, the hole was fixed and Finnegan began again: “Here you see our tower,” he said, pointing at a very bad drawing of Old Black Tower, “and here, to the west, lies Mountcastle. In between, is the forest.” Finnegan’s stick pointed to a line of green squiggles.
“Are those supposed to be trees?” asked Dudd.
Finnegan glared. “Don’t interrupt. Of course they’re trees.”
“What’s that wiggly thing underneath them?”
“That’s my plan!” said Finnegan, impressively.
“A wiggly line?” Dudd peered at the plan. “Is that it?”
Finnegan’s eyes gleamed. “It is indeed, Dudd. And pray tell me what you think that wiggly line is supposed to represent?”
Dudd thought hard for a moment. “A worm?”
Finnegan stared at the ceiling and sighed. “No Dudd, it is not a worm!”
“Is it a snake, then? Are we going to attack Mountcastle on a giant snake?”
Finnegan shook his head. “I don’t know why I bother sometimes.” He jabbed at the plan with his stick. “This, Dudd, is a tunnel! A tunnel! Now is that, or is it not a plan of rare brilliance?”
“You’re going to dig a tunnel under the castle?” asked Dudd.
“Precisely!”
“But Mountcastle is built into a mountain,” said Dudd. “It’s solid rock underneath. It’ll take years to dig through that. You’d need dynamite and…”
Prince Finnegan silenced him with a wave of his stick. “I’ve thought of all that. Naturally we can’t tunnel through the rock. But we don’t need to, because someone has already done it for us. There are sewers below the castle, leading away from the mountain and into the forest. All we have to do is dig a tunnel in the forest until we reach the sewers. Then we simply crawl through the sewers and enter the castle.”
“Won’t that be a bit smelly?”
Finnegan sniffed. “Smelly? Is that all you can think of?”
“There’ll be pooh down there and all kinds.”
“What’s a bit of pooh compared to the throne of Mountcastle? Think of it Dudd! Soon you and I will be masters of this Kingdom. Well, not you, obviously, you’ll still be my butler. But you’ll be butler in a royal castle instead of this filthy hovel.”
“I quite like it here,” said Dudd.
“Well I don’t,” snapped Finnegan, “and I shall be master of Mountcastle if it’s the last thing you do.”
“Me?”
“Who do you think is digging this tunnel? Now go and get a shovel and get on with it!” Prince Finnegan watched as Dudd scuttled away. Then he looked lovingly at his plan. There was no doubt about it: he was a genius.
* * *
All this had taken place some little while ago. Since then, Prince Finnegan had been digging his tunnel. Not that Finnegan did any of the digging himself. That was left to Dudd, and a few scruffy workmen that Finnegan had found in the forest. Prince Finnegan watched as they beavered away, shifting great mounds of dirt in wheelbarrows. He strutted around the tunnel entrance, tapping the ground with his stick as heaps of soil and rubble were brought out by his army of diggers. “Dig, my friends, dig!” he cried, “at the appointed hour, Mountcastle will be ours!”
After a week of digging, Dudd came to Finnegan’s study in the Old Black Tower to report that the tunnel was nearly finished. “We’ve just reached the sewer wall,” said Dudd. “All we’ve got to do now is take out a few bricks.”
Prince Finnegan rubbed his hands together with glee. “Excellent work, Dudd. Tomorrow, we shall be masters of Mountcastle!”
* * *
Tomorrow, as it happened, was Monday, and the first day of Princess Marzipan’s school holiday. The trouble started early. The King was at his writing desk, going through a big pile of official papers when he heard a voice wailing in the corridor outside. “She’s dead, she’s dead!” wailed the voice. “Her head’s come off and she’s dead!” The King leaped up from his desk in alarm. Who was dead? Whose head had come off? He dashed out of his study and into the corridor. There stood Princess Marzipan, her big, green eyes full of tears. She was clutching a broken doll. Its head had come off.
“Marzipan!” sighed the King. “I might have known it was you! What a lot of fuss to make over an old doll.”
“But she’s dead!” sobbed the Princess, “her head’s come off!” She held up the doll in one hand and its head in the other. The doll’s clothes were in rags, and its head was almost bald.
“You’ve got other dolls,” said the King. “They’re much nicer than that tatty old thing.”
“My other dolls don’t cry and wee!”
“They don’t what?”
“Cry and wee,” said the Princess, holding out the doll so that the King could see a damp patch on its knickers. “This is my crying-weeing doll. That’s her name. I’ve had her forever and she’s my favourite! You put water in her and she cries and wets herself, look.” The Princess pressed a button on the back of the crying-weeing doll, and a trickle of water sprayed onto the carpet.
The King looked annoyed. “Don’t do that, Marzipan!”
“It’s not real wee,” giggled the Princess. “It’s just water, look.” She pressed the button again and the doll weed in the King’s face.
“Marzipan, stop it!” cried the King. “And stop making so much fuss! All over a silly old doll. I thought someone was really dead.”
“Poor dolly,” said the Princess. “I expect my head would come off if I did nothing but cry and wee all day.”
The King gave Marzipan a funny look. “I thought that’s all you did do!”
Marzipan looked shocked. “What a horrible thing to say! I do not cry and wee all day. Well, some of the day, but not all of the day!” She pranced off down the corridor. “I think I shall go and bury my doll. That’s what we did when my hamster died.”
The King shook his head and returned to his study.
* * *
Deep in the forest, in Prince Finnegan’s Old Black Tower, final plans for the invasion of Mountcastle were being made. Prince Finnegan had drawn up a timetable of events, and was handing round copies to the members of his army. There were eight of them in all. Apart from Dudd, the butler, there was Jawkins, a fat, red-faced man, Gritby, who was small and had a shock of carroty hair, Peck, tall and sharp-nosed, Botherby, Peeves, Turnip and Gripe. They’d all helped dig the Mountcastle tunnel, and this was their reward.
“Mountcastle, as you know, is the strongest fortification in these lands,” explained Prince Finnegan. “It was constructed in the third year of the reign of King Humbert the fourth …”
Dudd interrupted with a cough. “Beggin’ your pardon, your ‘ighness, but can we skip the ‘istory lesson?”
Finnegan glared at him. “Learning is wasted on the likes of you, Dudd. But for the benefit of these oafs, I shall explain why we are about to take Mountcastle by force.” He looked at the eager faces of his army. “Men, I have been the victim of an injustice. My father, King Herrick, always promised that I would inherit Mountcastle and all its lands. But when he died, the castle fell into the hands of my idiot brother, Prince Rudolph, and I was left with this apology of a castle.” He looked around him at the damp, crumbling walls of the Old Black Tower.
“It seems quite nice to me,” muttered Jawkins.
“Be quiet, I’m explaining my plan.” The Prince strode across to a blackboard. “Now, then, this is the timetable for the invasion. I’ve given it the codename ‘Operation Invade Mountcastle.’”
“Beg’ pardon,” piped up Jawkins, “but that’s hardly a codename is it? A codename is supposed to be a secret way of saying what you’re going to do. You should call it ‘operation trousers’ or something.”
“Operation underpants!” cried Turnip.
Finnegan glared at them. “It doesn’t matter what we call it, the outcome will be the same. Before the day is out, we will be masters of Mountcastle!”
“Hooray!” shouted everyone.
Finnegan called for silence. “Right. Let’s go through the plan once more. We shall begin by crawling through the tunnel that leads to the Mountcastle sewers. Once we have reached the sewers, I will give the signal to attack!”
“What signal will you give?” asked Dudd.
“Oh, I don’t know. How about if I hoot like an owl?”
“What if a real owl hoots?” asked Botherby. “How will we know it’s not you?”
Prince Finnegan looked annoyed. “All right, all right, I won’t hoot like an owl. I’ll make some other sort of bird noise.”
“But how will we know it’s not a real bird?” asked Peck.
Prince Finnegan sighed. “Because you’ll all be underground and there aren’t any birds in the Mountcastle sewers! All right?”
“So what bird noise are you going to make?” asked Dudd.
Prince Finnegan thought for a moment. “How about if I go ‘cuckoo’. Can you remember that?”
Dudd nodded. “You go cuckoo, we invade the castle.”
“Pre-cisely!” Prince Finnegan rapped the floor with his pointy stick. “And now, if you’re all quite ready, we shall begin!”
* * *
Princess Marzipan skipped through the Mountcastle gardens. The sun was shining and the sky was a brilliant blue. The Princess looked at her doll. “I’ll find a nice place to bury you, dolly,” she said. “Right in the middle of the rose bushes, where you can smell their lovely perfume.”
The Princess walked down a crazy paving path and into the flower beds where all the yellow roses were in bloom. One of the rose bushes caught her dress with its thorns. The Princess tugged herself free. Now there was a hole in her dress. The Queen would have something to say about that. She walked on until she was right in the middle of the flower bed, then got down on her hands and knees and began to dig a hole in the soil.
Into the hole went crying-weeing doll. The Princess looked at it, sitting there all forlorn. She felt quite sad. It was enough to make you cry, or even wee, for that matter. There seemed something missing. The Princess thought for a second. Of course! It was the doll’s head. She’d left it in the castle. She turned and began to follow her footprints back through the flower bed. Her feet sank into the sticky earth, and the rose bushes tugged at her from every side. It was almost as if the bushes were saying to her: ‘don’t go, Marzipan! Stay and smell our lovely perfume!”
“Stupid bushes!” cried the Princess, struggling to free herself from their thorny clutches. “Will you let go of me!” Her tights snagged and laddered from top to toe. “Oh bother!” grumbled the Princess. “Now look what you’ve done, you silly bushes!” Then her shoe came off and she had to bend down to pull it out of the mud. The shoe was full of mud, but she put it on all the same. Then her other shoe came off. It was just too much! The Princess got down on her hands and knees and pulled at her shoe. With a squelch and a shower of mud, it came free. Now there was mud in her face and mud in her hair as well! “Rotten mud! Rotten bushes! Stop making such a mess of me!” cried the Princess.
By the time she got back to the path, the Princess was in a terrible mess. Her dress and blouse were full of holes, there was mud all over her and mud in her shoes.
Marzipan made her way back to the castle. The big windows in the lounge were open, so she went in that way, leaving her shoes at the door. Even without her shoes on, the Princess left a long trail of muddy footprints across the carpet. Just then, the Queen came into the lounge and gave a shriek of alarm. “Marzipan!’ How dare you walk in here in those muddy shoes!”
“I haven’t got any shoes on,” explained the Princess.
“Look at the state of you!” cried the Queen. “Holes in your dress, holes in your tights, mud all over you! Have you been digging in the flowerbeds again?”
“I’m burying my crying-weeing doll. But I forgot its head.”
“Honestly, Marzipan, you may think it’s all right to go trailing through the flowerbeds in your best clothes, but I do not. Go and clean that mud off yourself at once!”
Marzipan skipped back out into the garden, showering the carpet with more mud as she went. There was a tap in the garden, with a hosepipe connected to it and the Princess had fun squirting water at her feet, rinsing away the caked-on mud. When she’d finished, she looked around for something else she could squirt with the hose; or better still, someone else. There was no one else about. “Typical,” thought Marzipan. “I’ve got this lovely hosepipe and there’s no one I can squirt with it.” She looked up at the castle walls. The windows looked in need of a wash. Marzipan aimed the hosepipe into the air and watched the water cascade down the castle walls. “The King will be pleased with me,” she thought, as she directed the jet of water onto each of the windows in turn. Just then, she head an angry voice cry out. Too late, she noticed that one of the windows was open. From it emerged the head of her brother, Prince Jelly.
“Marzipan! It had to be you! What do you think you’re doing?”
“Cleaning the windows,” replied Marizpan, innocently.
“Ruining my homework, more like,” cried Prince Jelly. “Look what you’ve done!” He held out an exercise book. It was dripping wet, and the pages were covered in a runny mess of blue ink.
“You shouldn’t have had the window open,” said Marzipan. “Anyway, I don’t think the water has spoiled your picture. It’s made it even better.”
“It’s not meant to be a picture, it’s a page of maths problems.”
“Oh. I thought it was a picture of the sea, all blue and wavy.”
“Well it’s not. Now I shall have to do it all over again,” moaned Prince Jelly. “And put down that hosepipe!”
The Princess put down the hose. It was still turned on. The jet of water sprayed across the path, and over the door into the castle. At that moment, the King came through the door. The jet of water hit him full in the face and knocked his crown right off his head. The King spluttered with rage. “Marzipan, what on earth are you doing? Turn off that hose at once!”
Marzipan struggled with the garden tap. “It’s stuck!” she cried.
The King came over and turned off the tap. A great big drip of water fell from the tip of his nose and splashed onto the ground at his feet. He glared at Marzipan. “What’s going on here? How did you get that mud all over you?” The King cast a worried look towards the rose garden.
Marzipan knew the King would be furious if he found out she’d been digging in the flower beds, so she fluttered her eyelashes, smiled sweetly and said nothing.
The King gave her a suspicious look. “You haven’t been digging in my rose garden have you?”
Marzipan gave the King her best innocent expression. “Of course I haven’t,” she lied.
“Well just make sure you don’t,” said the King. He marched off down the path towards the rose beds. Marzipan watched him until he was out of sight. Then she remembered something. She’d left crying-weeing doll in the flower bed! It was still sitting in the hole she’d dug for it. If the King found it, he would be very, very angry.
The Princess listened for a moment. She could hear the ‘snip-snip’ of the secateurs as the King pruned his roses on the other side of the garden. If she was careful, she could sneak through the rose bushes and find her doll without the King seeing her.
At that moment, Finnegan’s invasion party was making its way down the long, dark tunnel beneath the forest. The tunnel seemed never-ending. Here and there, the roots of trees poked through the walls. Prince Finnegan led the way, carrying a flaming torch. “You might have made the tunnel a bit wider,” he moaned. “My back will be killing me after this.”
At last, they came to a brick wall. “That’s the sewer,” explained Jawkins, pointing to a large hole in the wall. “Took a lot of shifting, them bricks.”
From the hole came a revolting smell. Prince Finnegan held his nose in disgust. To his surprise, all the other members of the invasion party took clothes pegs from their pockets and fixed them onto their noses.
Finnegan glared at them. “Where’s my peg?”
Dudd shrugged. “I thought you’d have brought your own.”
“Well I haven’t!”
“We’re going into the sewer,” said Jawkins, “what did you expect? The scent of roses?”
Finnegan gave him a black look, then plucked the peg from Jawkins’ nose and stuck it onto his own. “Here, that’s not fair!” cried Jawkins. “Why should I have to put up with the stink?”
“What’s a stink compared to being ruler of Mountcastle?” said Finnegan. “Right, are we all set?” Everyone nodded. “Then let the invasion commence!”
Jawkins, Gripe, Peck and Turnip all rushed forward. Finnegan caught Jawkins by the collar and dragged him back. “Not yet, you fools! Wait for the signal!”
“What’s the signal?” asked Botherby.
“Cuckoo!”
Everyone rushed forward again. Prince Finnegan was almost trampled underfoot. “Stop, you idiots!” he cried. “That wasn’t the signal! That was just me telling you what the signal will be! I won’t give the signal until we’re in the castle grounds, all right?” He looked at the faces of his motley crew. “Now, the advance party will go on ahead and effect entry into the castle. I shall go first, and I’ll take Jawkins and Gripe with me. Then, I will give the signal and the rest of you will rush down the sewer to join me and take the castle.”
The invaders all looked at each other in the light from Finnegan’s torch. “Right,” said the Prince. “Let’s go.”
Princess Marzipan had got quite lost in the rose garden. There were paths leading this way and that, and the rose bushes were so high she couldn’t see over the tops of them. She hadn’t found crying-weeing doll and if she wasn’t careful she might run into the King, who was still busy pruning the roses.
Just then, someone sneezed and the Princess looked round in alarm, expecting to see the King coming along the path. There was nobody there. Then came a voice. It was an odd sort of voice, muffled and echoing. “Just here!” the voice cried.
“That’s it!” said another voice. “Try lifting it!”
“It’s heavy!” said the first voice.
The Princess looked around. “Who’s there?” No one answered. From somewhere nearby came a scraping sound, like someone moving a big slab or a heavy lump of metal. A little way along the path was a drain cover. As the Princess watched, the cover began to move. The Princess felt scared. Who, or what could be down in the drains? A monster? She crept into the rose bushes and watched as a pair of eyes appeared beneath the drain cover. Then the cover slammed shut again.
The Princess turned and ran as fast as she could. There was a monster in the drains, coming to eat everyone! She must warn Mountcastle! Turning a corner, she ran right into the King.
“Marzipan! What on earth are you doing?” cried the King.
“There’s a monster!” spluttered the Princess. “He’s coming to eat us!”
“What nonsense!” cried the King. “Now run along and don’t disturb me.”
“But I saw it! It’s down in the drain!”
The King looked at Marzipan for a moment. He’d been taken in before by her practical jokes, but this time she looked really scared. “What exactly did it look like, this monster?” he asked.
“I only saw its eyes.”
“Most intriguing,” said the King. “Show me where you saw it.”
The Princess took the King’s hand and led him back along the path. Just as they turned the corner, the scraping sound came again. The Princess stopped in her tracks and gazed up at the King with a terrified expression. “That’s him!” she cried. “He’s lifting up the hatch over the drain!” She pointed along the path towards the drain cover. As the King watched, the cover began to move again. “Now do you believe me?” said the Princess in a whisper.
The King nodded. “Of course I believe you. Now run along and fetch the hose pipe while I keep watch here.”
“But the monster will eat you!”
“I’ll be very careful. Now hurry and fetch the hose pipe. I think we’re going to need it.”
Marzipan raced off down the path while the King concealed himself in the rose bushes and watched as the drain cover slowly began to tilt upwards…
* * *
Down in the sewer, Finnegan looked at Jawkins. “You’re quite certain we’re in the castle grounds?” he asked.
“I think so.”
“Lift the cover again. What can you see?”
Jawkins pushed against the heavy metal drain cover and peered out. “Rose bushes. Loads of them.”
“Are they yellow?”
“Yes. And you can smell ‘em from here!” Jawkins dropped the cover down again. “What a stink!”
“Better than the stink in this sewer!” muttered Gripe.
Finnegan rubbed his hands together in delight. “The yellow rose! The symbol of Mountcastle! We’re there, men, we’re there! The castle is ours for the taking! And soon, King Rudolph and all his ridiculous family will be flushed away along this very sewer!” He reached up and began to lift the drain cover.
“What about the signal?” asked Jawkins. “The invasion signal?”
“You do it,” snapped Finnegan. “I presume you’re capable of going cuckoo?”
Jawkins looked doubtful, then turned and cupped his hands around his lips and shouted at the top of his voice: “Cuck-oooo!”
Finnegan had the drain cover halfway up. The sound of Jawkins’ ‘cuckoo’ startled him and he dropped the cover on his head. “You fool!” he hissed. “Why do you have to make so much noise?”
“It’s a long way down the sewer. They won’t hear me unless I shout.” Jawkins cupped his hands and called again. Finnegan rubbed his head.
“Right, this is it. Those fools will be on their way by now. The invasion can begin!” Lifting the drain cover, Prince Finnegan emerged into the daylight. At last, he was inside the castle walls! “Mountcastle is mine!” cried the Prince. He was going to add something else, but his words were lost in a splutter and the sound of hissing water.
Jawkins looked up in surprise. “What did you say?”
Finnegan tumbled back into the hole, followed by a jet of water. The water hit Jawkins and Gripe and knocked them over. In the slippery sewer, it was hard to stand up again. More and more water gushed in through the hole. It was a torrent. “It’s a trap!” gasped Finnegan.
“They’ve been lying in wait for us! Retreat, retreat!”
“What’s the signal to retreat?” asked Jawkins.
“Probably the opposite of cuckoo,” replied Gripe.
“Will you idiots get out of my way!” yelled Prince Finnegan, scrambling around in the sewer. “I’m getting soaked here!” The three invaders scuttled back along the sewer, followed by a foaming torrent of water. Halfway along, they ran into the rest of Prince Finnegan’s army, who had heard him give the signal and were rushing to attack. There was a horrible muddle of arms and legs as everyone got tangled up in the sewer. “Stop, stop, you idiots!” cried the Prince. “Reverse!”
“Oo-cuck,” said Gripe, trying to be helpful.
“I’ll give you oo-cuck,” muttered the Prince.
* * *
Up above, Princess Marzipan turned off the hosepipe with a chuckle. The King looked at her and smiled. “I think that’s taken care of our ‘monster’, don’t you?”
“Who was it?” asked the Princess.
“Oh, just that idiot brother of mine with another of his schemes for taking the castle,” replied the King. “He never gives up.”
“He won’t get into Mountcastle while I’m around,” said the Princess, sending a final squirt of water into the drain.
“Quite,” replied the King. “In fact, if you hadn’t seen that drain cover moving, Finnegan might have taken us all by surprise. As it was, we managed to take him by surprise. For once, Marzipan, I think it’s fair to say you saved the day.”
“That rhymes,” said the Princess. “In fact, I think I’ll make it into a little song.” And she began to sing:
“It’s fair to say I saved the day
The evil Prince is washed away
His nasty plan’s gone down the drain
I bet he won’t try that again!”
She was still singing it at teatime, by which time everyone in Mountcastle was heartily sick of hearing it. No one complained, though, because they all knew that if it hadn’t been for Marzipan, Prince Finnegan might now be sitting on the Mountcastle throne.
Later that day, King Rudolph came in from the gardens where he’d just finished pruning the roses. Marzipan was reading a book by the fireside and looked up as the King came in. He was clutching something small and white and muddy. “Look what I found in the rose garden,” said the King.
The Princess’s eyes lit up. “It’s my crying-weeing doll!” she exclaimed.
“I won’t ask how it came to be in the flower bed,” said the King.
The Princess rushed up and took hold of the doll. “Oh, dolly, I’m so sorry! I shall find your head, wherever it is, and stick it back on your body, then you’ll be as good as new.” She hugged the doll and a small jet of water squirted out of it. The water hit the King in the face.
The King muttered something and left the room. Weeing dolls, hose pipes, invaders in the sewers – and this was only the first day of Marzipan’s holiday! What a week it was going to be!
The above is the first chapter from 'A Week of Marzipan' © 2008 Martin Cater
