Magicians of Caprona - Diana Wynne Jones [62]
“But why does the Duchess want Caprona beaten?” Tonino said.
“I don’t know,” said Angelica. “There’s something wrong about her, I know that. Aunt Bella said there was an awful fuss when the Duke decided to marry her. Nobody likes her.”
“Let’s see if we can open the window,” said Tonino. He set off along the piano again. do-ti-so-fa-me-re—
“Quiet!” said Angelica.
Tonino discovered that, if he put each foot down very slowly, the notes did not sound. He was halfway along the keyboard, and Angelica had one foot stretched out to follow, when they heard someone opening the door again. There was no time to be careful. Angelica fled back to the desk. Tonino, with a terrible discord, scrambled across the black notes and squeezed behind the music on the stand.
He was only just in time. When he looked—he was standing with his feet and head sideways, like an Ancient Egyptian—the Duke of Caprona himself was standing in front of the desk. Tonino thought the Duke seemed both puzzled and sad. He was tapping the Report of Campaign against his teeth and did not seem to notice Angelica standing between the Punch and the Judy on his desk, although Angelica’s eyes were blinking against the glitter from the Duke’s buttons.
“But I didn’t declare war!” the Duke said to himself. “I was watching that puppet show. How could I—?” He sighed and bit the Report worriedly between two rows of big shiny teeth. “Is my mind going?” he asked. He seemed to be talking to Angelica. She had the sense not to answer. “I must go and ask Lucrezia,” the Duke said. He flung the Report down at Angelica’s feet and hurried out of the study.
Tonino slid cautiously down the piano lid onto the keys again—kerpling. Angelica was now standing at the end of the piano, pointing at the window. She was speechless with horror.
Tonino looked—and for a moment he was as frightened as Angelica. There was a brown monster glaring at him through the glass, wide-faced, wide-eyed and shaggy. The thing had eyes like yellow lamps.
Faintly, through the glass, came a slightly irritable request to pull himself together and open the window.
“Benvenuto!” shouted Tonino.
“Oh—it’s only a cat,” Angelica quavered. “How terrible it must feel to be a mouse!”
“Just a cat!” Tonino said scornfully. “That’s Benvenuto.” He tried to explain to Benvenuto that it was not easy to open windows when you were nine inches high.
Benvenuto’s impatient answer was to shove Tonino’s latest magic exercise book in front of Tonino’s mind’s eye, open at almost the first page.
“Oh, thanks,” Tonino said, rather ashamed. There were three opening-spells on that page, and none of them had stuck in his head. He chose the easiest, shut his eyes so that he could read the imaginary page more clearly, and sang the spell.
Gently and easily, the window swung open, letting in a gust of cold wind. And Benvenuto came in with the wind, almost as lightly. As Benvenuto trod gently up the scale towards him, Tonino had another moment when he knew how mice felt. Then he forgot it in the gladness of seeing Benvenuto. He stretched his arms wide to rub behind Benvenuto’s horny ears. Benvenuto put his sticky black nose to Tonino’s face, and they both stood, delighted, holding down a long humming discord on the piano.
Benvenuto said that Paolo was not quick enough; he could not make him understand where Tonino was. Tonino must send Paolo a message. Could Tonino write this size?
“There’s a pen on the desk here,” Angelica called. And Tonino remembered her saying she could understand cats.
Rather anxiously, Benvenuto wanted to know if Tonino minded him talking to a Petrocchi.
The question astonished Tonino for a moment. He had clean forgotten that he and Angelica were supposed to hate one another. It seemed a waste of time, when they were both in such trouble. “Not at all,” he said.
“Do get off that piano, both of you,” said Angelica. “The humming’s horrible.”
Benvenuto obliged, with one great flowing leap. Tonino struggled after him with his elbows hooked over the piano lid, pushing himself