The Ickabog Read online

  Before an hour had passed, a huge crowd had congregated around Tubby’s empty house, all examining the monstrous footprints, the smashed-in door, and the wrecked furniture. Panic set in, and within a few hours, news of the Ickabog’s raid on a Baronstown butcher’s house was spreading north, south, east, and west. Town criers rang their bells in the city squares, and within a couple of days, only the Marshlanders would be ignorant of the fact that the Ickabog had slunk south overnight and carried off two people.

  Spittleworth’s Baronstown spy, who’d been mingling with the crowds all day to observe their reactions, sent word to his master that his plan had worked magnificently. However, in the early evening, just as the spy was thinking of heading off to the tavern for a celebratory sausage roll and a pint of beer, he noticed a group of men whispering together as they examined one of the Ickabog’s giant footprints. The spy sidled over.

  “Terrifying, isn’t it?” the spy asked them. “The size of its feet! The length of its claws!”

  One of Tubby’s neighbors straightened up, frowning.

  “It’s hopping,” he said.

  “Excuse me?” said the spy.

  “It’s hopping,” repeated the neighbor. “Look. It’s the same left foot, over and over again. Either the Ickabog’s hopping, or …”

  The man didn’t finish his sentence, but the look on his face alarmed the spy. Instead of heading for the tavern, he mounted his horse again, and galloped off toward the palace.

  Little knowing of the new threat to their schemes, Spittleworth and Flapoon had just sat down to one of their usual sumptuous late-night dinners with the king. Fred was most alarmed to hear of the Ickabog’s attack on Baronstown, because it meant that the monster had strayed closer to the palace than ever before.

  “Ghastly business,” said Flapoon, lifting an entire black pudding onto his plate.

  “Shocking, really,” said Spittleworth, carving himself a slice of pheasant.

  “What I don’t understand,” fretted Fred, “is how it slipped through the blockade!”

  For, of course, the king had been told that a division of the Ickabog Defense Brigade was permanently camped round the edge of the marsh, to stop the Ickabog escaping into the rest of the country. Spittleworth, who’d been expecting Fred to raise this point, had his explanation ready.

  “I regret to say that two soldiers fell asleep on watch, Your Majesty. Taken unawares by the Ickabog, they were eaten whole.”

  “Suffering Saints!” said Fred, horrified.

  “Having broken through the line,” continued Spittleworth, “the monster headed south. We believe it was attracted to Baronstown because of the smell of meat. While there, it gobbled up some chickens, as well as the butcher and his wife.”

  “Dreadful, dreadful,” said Fred with a shudder, pushing his plate away from him. “And then it slunk off back home to the marsh, did it?”

  “So our trackers tell us, sire,” said Spittleworth, “but now that it’s tasted a butcher full of Baronstown sausage, we must prepare for it trying to break through the soldiers’ lines regularly — which is why I think we should double the number of men stationed there, sire. Sadly, that will mean doubling the Ickabog tax.”

  Luckily for them, Fred was watching Spittleworth, so he didn’t see Flapoon smirk.

  “Yes … I suppose that makes sense,” said the king.

  He got to his feet and began roaming restlessly around the dining room. The lamplight made his costume, which today was of sky-blue silk with aquamarine buttons, shine beautifully. As he paused to admire himself in the mirror, Fred’s expression clouded.

  “Spittleworth,” he said, “the people do still like me, don’t they?”

  “How can Your Majesty ask such a thing?” said Spittleworth, with a gasp. “You’re the most beloved king in the whole of Cornucopia’s history!”

  “It’s just that … riding back from hunting yesterday, I couldn’t help thinking that people didn’t seem quite as happy as usual to see me,” said King Fred. “There were hardly any cheers, and only one flag.”

  “Give me their names and addresses,” said Flapoon through a mouthful of black pudding, and he groped in his pockets for a pencil.

  “I don’t know their names and addresses, Flapoon,” said Fred, who was now playing with a tassel on the curtains. “They were just people, you know, passing by. But it upset me, rather, and then, when I got back to the palace, I heard that the Day of Petition has been canceled.”

  “Ah,” said Spittleworth, “yes, I was going to explain that to Your Majesty …”

  “There’s no need,” said Fred. “Lady Eslanda has already spoken to me about it.”

  “What?” said Spittleworth, glaring at Flapoon. He’d given his friend strict instructions never to let Lady Eslanda near the king, because he was worried what she might tell him. Flapoon scowled and shrugged. Really, Spittleworth couldn’t expect him to be at the king’s side every minute of the day. A man needed the bathroom occasionally, after all.

  “Lady Eslanda told me that people are complaining that the Ickabog tax is too high. She says rumors are flying that there aren’t even any troops stationed in the north!”

  “Piffle and poppycock,” said Spittleworth, though in fact it was perfectly true that there were no troops stationed in the north, and also true that there’d been even more complaints about the Ickabog tax, which was why he’d canceled the Day of Petition. The last thing he wanted was for Fred to hear that he was losing popularity. He might take it into his foolish head to lower the taxes or, even worse, send people to investigate the imaginary camp in the north.

  “There are times, obviously, when two regiments swap over,” said Spittleworth, thinking that he’d have to station some soldiers near the marsh now, to stop busybodies asking questions. “Possibly some foolish Marshlander saw a regiment riding away, and imagined that there was nobody left up there … Why don’t we triple the Ickabog tax, sire?” asked Spittleworth, thinking that this would serve the complainers right. “After all, the monster did break through the lines last night! Then there can never again be any danger of a scarcity of men on the edge of the Marshlands and everyone will be happy.”

  “Yes,” said King Fred uneasily. “Yes, that does make sense. I mean, if the monster can kill four people and some chickens in a single night …”

  At this moment, Cankerby the footman entered the dining room and, with a low bow, whispered to Spittleworth that the Baronstown spy had just arrived with urgent news from the sausage-making city.

  “Your Majesty,” said Spittleworth smoothly, “I must leave you. Nothing to worry about! A minor issue with my, ah, horse.”

  This had better be worth my while,” snapped Spittleworth five minutes later, as he entered the Blue Parlor, where the spy was waiting.

  “Your — Lordship,” said the breathless man, “they’re saying — the monster’s — hopping.”

  “They’re saying what?”

  “Hopping — my lord — hopping!” he panted. “They’ve noticed — all the prints — are made by the same — left — foot!”

  Spittleworth stood speechless. It had never occurred to him that the common folk might be clever enough to spot a thing like that. Indeed, he, who’d never had to look after a living creature in his life, not even his own horse, hadn’t stopped to consider the fact that a creature’s feet might not all make the same prints in the ground.

  “Must I think of everything?” bellowed Spittleworth, and he stormed out of the parlor and off to the Guard’s Room, where he found Major Roach drinking wine and playing cards with some friends. The major leapt to his feet at the sight of Spittleworth, who beckoned him to come outside.

  “I want you to assemble the Ickabog Defense Brigade immediately, Roach,” Spittleworth told the major, in a low voice. “You’re to ride north, and be sure to make plenty of noise as you go. I want everyone from Chouxville to Jeroboam to see you passing by. Then, once you’re up there, spread out, and mount a guard over the bo
rder of the marsh.”

  “But —” began Major Roach, who’d gotten used to a life of ease and plenty at the palace, with occasional rides around Chouxville in full uniform.

  “I don’t want ‘buts,’ I want action!” shouted Spittleworth. “Rumors are flying that there’s nobody stationed in the north! Go, now, and make sure you wake up as many people as possible as you go — but leave me two men, Roach. Just two. I have another small job for them.”

  So the grumpy Roach ran off to assemble his troops, and Spittleworth proceeded alone to the dungeons.

  The first thing he heard when he got there was the sound of Mr. Dovetail, who was still singing the national anthem.

  “Be quiet!” bellowed Spittleworth, drawing his sword and gesturing to the warder to let him into Mr. Dovetail’s cell.

  The carpenter appeared quite different to the last time Lord Spittleworth had seen him. Since learning that he wasn’t to be let out of the dungeon to see Daisy, a wild look had appeared in Mr. Dovetail’s eye. Of course, he hadn’t been able to shave for weeks either, and his hair had grown rather long.

  “I said, be quiet!” barked Spittleworth, because the carpenter, who didn’t seem able to help himself, was still humming the national anthem. “I need another three feet, d’you hear me? One more left foot, and two right. Do you understand me, carpenter?”

  Mr. Dovetail stopped humming.

  “If I carve them, will you let me out to see my daughter, my lord?” he asked in a hoarse voice.

  Spittleworth smiled. It was clear to him that the man was going slowly mad, because only a madman would imagine he’d be let out after making another three Ickabog feet.

  “Of course I will,” said Spittleworth. “I shall have the wood delivered to you first thing tomorrow morning. Work hard, carpenter. When you’re finished, I’ll let you out to see your daughter.”

  When Spittleworth emerged from the dungeons, he found two soldiers waiting for him, just as he’d requested. Spittleworth led these men up to his private apartments, made sure Cankerby the footman wasn’t skulking about, locked the door, and turned to give the men their instructions.

  “There will be fifty ducats for each of you, if you succeed in this job,” he said, and the soldiers looked excited.

  “You are to follow the lady Eslanda, morning, noon, and night, you understand me? She must not know you are following her. You will wait for a moment when she is quite alone, so that you can kidnap her without anyone hearing or seeing anything. If she escapes, or if you are seen, I shall deny that I gave you this order, and put you to death.”

  “What do we do with her once we’ve got her?” asked one of the soldiers, who no longer looked excited, but very scared.

  “Hmm,” said Spittleworth, turning to look out of the window while he considered what best to do with Eslanda. “Well, a lady of the court isn’t the same as a butcher. The Ickabog can’t enter the palace and eat her … No, I think it best,” said Spittleworth, a slow smile spreading over his crafty face, “if you take Lady Eslanda to my estate in the country. Send word when you’ve got her there, and I’ll join you.”

  The carpenter appeared quite different to the last time Lord Spittleworth had seen him.

  By Bari, Age 11

  A few days later, Lady Eslanda was walking alone in the palace rose garden when the two soldiers hiding in a bush spotted their chance. They seized her, gagged her, bound her hands, and drove her away to Spittleworth’s estate in the country. Then they sent a message to Spittleworth, and waited for him to join them.

  Spittleworth promptly summoned Lady Eslanda’s maid, Millicent. By threatening to murder Millicent’s little sister, he forced her to deliver messages to all Lady Eslanda’s friends, telling them that her mistress had decided to become a nun.

  Lady Eslanda’s friends were all shocked by this news. She’d never mentioned wanting to become a nun to any of them. In fact, several of them were suspicious that Lord Spittleworth had had something to do with her sudden disappearance. However, I’m sad to tell you that Spittleworth was now so widely feared, that apart from whispering their suspicions to one another, Eslanda’s friends did nothing to either find her, or ask Spittleworth what he knew. Perhaps even worse was the fact that none of them tried to help Millicent, who was caught by soldiers trying to flee the City-Within-The-City, and imprisoned in the dungeons.

  Next, Spittleworth had set out for his country estate, where he arrived late the following evening. After giving each of Eslanda’s kidnappers fifty ducats, and reminding them that if they talked, he’d have them executed, Spittleworth smoothed his thin moustache in a mirror, then went to find Lady Eslanda, who was sitting in his rather dusty library, reading a book by candlelight.

  “Good evening, my lady,” said Spittleworth, sweeping her a bow.

  Lady Eslanda looked at him in silence.

  “I have good news for you,” continued Spittleworth, smiling. “You are to become the wife of the Chief Advisor.”

  “I’d sooner die,” said Lady Eslanda pleasantly, and turning a page in her book, she continued to read.

  “Come, come,” said Spittleworth. “As you can see, my house really needs a woman’s tender care. You’ll be far happier here, making yourself useful, than pining over the cheesemakers’ son, who in any case, is likely to starve to death any day now.”

  Lady Eslanda, who’d expected Spittleworth to mention Captain Goodfellow, had been preparing for this moment ever since arriving in the cold and dirty house. So she said, with neither a blush nor a tear:

  “I stopped caring for Captain Goodfellow a long time ago, Lord Spittleworth. The sight of him confessing to treason disgusted me. I could never love a treacherous man — which is why I could never love you.”

  She said it so convincingly that Spittleworth believed her. He tried a different threat, and told her he’d kill her parents if she didn’t marry him, but Lady Eslanda reminded him that she, like Captain Goodfellow, was an orphan. Then Spittleworth said he’d take away all the jewelry her mother had left her, but she shrugged and said she preferred books anyway. Finally, Spittleworth threatened to kill her, and Lady Eslanda suggested he get on with it, because that would be far better than listening to him talk.

  Spittleworth was enraged. He’d become used to having his own way in everything, and here was something he couldn’t have, and it only made him want it all the more. Finally, he said that if she liked books so much, he’d lock her up inside the library forever. He’d have bars fitted on all the windows, and Scrumble the butler would bring her food three times a day, but she would only ever leave the room to go to the bathroom — unless she agreed to marry him.

  “Then I shall die in this room,” said Lady Eslanda calmly, “or, perhaps — who knows? — in the bathroom.”

  As he couldn’t get another word out of her, the furious Chief Advisor left.

  A year passed … then two … then three, four, and five.

  The tiny kingdom of Cornucopia, which had once been the envy of its neighbors for its magically rich soil, for the skill of its cheesemakers, winemakers, and pastry chefs, and for the happiness of its people, had changed almost beyond recognition.

  True, Chouxville was carrying on more or less as it always had. Spittleworth didn’t want the king to notice that anything had changed, so he spent plenty of gold in the capital to keep things running as they always had, especially in the City-Within-The-City. Up in the northern cities, though, people were struggling. More and more businesses — shops, taverns, blacksmiths, wheelwrights, farms, and vineyards — were closing down. The Ickabog tax was pushing people into poverty, and as if that wasn’t bad enough, everyone feared being the next to receive a visit from the Ickabog — or whatever it was that broke down doors and left monsterlike tracks around houses and farms.

  People who voiced doubts about whether the Ickabog was really behind these attacks were usually next to receive a visit from the Dark Footers. That was the name Spittleworth and Roach had given to the squad
s of men who murdered unbelievers in the night, leaving footprints around their victims’ houses.

  Occasionally, though, the Ickabog doubters lived in the middle of a city, where it was difficult to fake an attack without the neighbors seeing. In this case, Spittleworth would hold a trial, and by threatening their families, as he had with Goodfellow and his friends, he made the accused agree that they’d committed treason.

  Increasing numbers of trials meant Spittleworth had to oversee the building of more jails. He also needed more orphanages. Why did he need orphanages, you ask?

  Well, in the first place, quite a number of parents were being killed or imprisoned. As everyone was now finding it difficult to feed their own families, they weren’t able to take in the abandoned children.

  In the second place, poor people were dying of hunger. As parents usually fed their children rather than themselves, children were often the last of the family left alive.

  And in the third place, some heartbroken, homeless families were giving up their children to orphanages, because it was the only way they could make sure their children would have food and shelter.

  I wonder whether you remember the palace maid, Hetty, who so bravely warned Lady Eslanda that Captain Goodfellow and his friends were about to be executed?

  Well, Hetty used Lady Eslanda’s gold to take a coach home to her father’s vineyard, just outside Jeroboam. A year later, she married a man called Hopkins, and gave birth to twins, a boy and a girl.

  However, the effort of paying the Ickabog tax was too much for the Hopkins family. They lost their little grocery store, and Hetty’s parents couldn’t help them, because shortly after losing their vineyard, they’d starved to death. Homeless now, their children crying with hunger, Hetty and her husband walked in desperation to Ma Grunter’s orphanage. The twins were torn, sobbing, from their mother’s arms. The door slammed, the bolts banged home, and poor Hetty Hopkins and her husband walked away, crying no less hard than their children, and praying that Ma Grunter would keep them alive.