The Power and the Glory

Book 2 Chapter V: Confession

"What do you want to tell her?" asked one of the guards on the opposite side of the gate.

"That I'm responsible for it."

Once again the four of them gazed helplessly at their co-workers. Irímé distinctly heard the one who'd spoken last say in a loud whisper, "Do you think he's mad?" He received a summary thump on the head from the guard beside him for his trouble.

The first guard turned to the one stationed with her on the left side of the gates. "Go and call the captain."

Instead of leaving the other guard said, "Do you think he'll know what to do? Shouldn't I tell the seneschal?"

"She's bound to be asleep," the first guard said. "The captain can wake her if he has to."

The second guard opened the gate just enough to get through. She disappeared into the gloom beyond the small circle of light cast by the streetlamps. Irímé and the other guards waited. And waited. And waited. Eventually she returned with the captain of guard in tow. He listened to Irímé's story with the expression of someone who didn't believe it but didn't know what to do.

"I was ordered to follow every lead," he said, apparently to himself, when Irímé finished. "All right, young man. Come with me and we'll see if some of the council members think your story's worth disturbing her Majesty at this time. Though I doubt if they'll be happy to be woken in the middle of the night."

~~~~

It had been centuries since Abihira lived in her parents' palace. The last month hadn't given her enough time to get used to it again. Certainly she hadn't yet found all the best ways to get in and out. When she said she would go through the pantry she was relying on vague memories of using it as an entrance many years ago. She expected to find it empty. And indeed it was. The problem was that it had only two doors. One opened onto the kitchen garden and was meant to be a convenient way to take spoilt food to the compost heap. The other opened out into the kitchen itself. The kitchen which was full of servants setting out food for tomorrow's breakfast.

Abi stepped into the pantry, heard loud voices and the clatter of dishes outside the door in front of her, and quickly revised her plan. She turned and walked out of the pantry again. In the dark she didn't dare risk running in case she bumped into something and made a noise. She walked slowly and carefully over to the doors leading down into the coal cellar. Those doors were rarely locked, because who would ever try to get in that way? They'd trip over coal and make a tremendous racket within minutes.

She opened the doors and peered in. The moonlight fell on a tall silver bucket sitting at the top of the slope leading down to the coal. Carefully she picked it up. That bucket was used to carry coal from the cellar to the kitchen. But the children who grew up in the palace had long ago discovered it had another use. It was light enough for them to carry and so tall that they could stand on it to pick fruit from branches out of their reach. An adult who stood on it would have no trouble climbing in a window. The downstairs bathroom window, for example.

Questions might be asked about where the bucket had gone. Still, it was summer. Late summer, but not cold enough yet to need fires in every room. In all likelihood the bucket wouldn't be needed until dinnertime. Abi could replace it before then.

The downstairs bathroom window had a broken latch. Abi stood on the bucket, pulled the window open, and climbed in through it.

Someone should fix that before a burglar discovers it, she thought.

Amazingly her parents had stopped arguing. The house was as silent as a grave. She ran upstairs and tiptoed towards her room. With luck she could get there without disturbing anyone, then in the morning claim she'd gone for a walk in the grounds if someone had noticed her absence.