Magicians of Caprona - Diana Wynne Jones [67]
“With all due respect,” he said to Paolo and Lucia, “to the Angel of Caprona, it should not be this powerful on its own. I’m afraid this spell will just have to wear itself out.” And he said to Aunt Maria, “No wonder the enemy enchanter is so much afraid of the Casa Montana. Does this mean there won’t be any breakfast?”
“No, no. We’ll make it in the dining room,” Aunt Maria said, looking very flustered.
“Good,” said Chrestomanci. “There’s something I have to say to everyone, when they’re all there.”
And when everyone was gathered around the tables to eat plain rolls and drink black coffee made over the dining room fire, Chrestomanci stood in front of the fire, holding a coffee cup, and said, “I know few of you believe Tonino is not in the Casa Petrocchi, but I swear to you he is not, and that Angelica Petrocchi is also missing. I think you are quite right to stop making spells until they are found, but I want to say this: even if I found Tonino and Angelica this minute, all the spells of the Casa Montana and the Casa Petrocchi are not going to save Caprona now. There are three armies, and the fleet of Pisa, closing in on her. The only thing which is going to help you is the true words to the Angel of Caprona. Have you all understood?”
They all had. Everyone was silent. Nobody spoke for some time. Then Uncle Lorenzo began grumbling. Moths had got into his Reservist uniform. “Someone took the spell out,” he complained. “I shan’t be fit to be seen.”
“Does it matter?” asked Rinaldo. His face was very white and he was not having anything but coffee. “You’ll only be seen dead anyway.”
“But that’s just it!” said Uncle Lorenzo. “I don’t want to be seen dead in it!”
“Oh be quiet!” Domenico snapped at him. Uncle Lorenzo was so surprised that he stopped talking. Breakfast finished in gloomy murmurs.
Paolo got up and slid behind the bench where Chrestomanci was sitting. “Excuse me, sir. Do you know where Tonino is?”
“I wish I did,” said Chrestomanci. “This enchanter is good. So far, I have only two clues. Last night, when I was coming up through Siena, somebody worked two very strange spells somewhere ahead of me.”
“Tonino?” Paolo said eagerly.
Chrestomanci shook his head. “The first one was definitely Angelica. She has what you might call an individual style. But the other one baffled me. Do you think your brother is capable of working anything strong enough to get through an enchanter’s spells? Angelica did it through sheer weirdness. Could Tonino, do you think?”
“I shouldn’t think so,” said Paolo. “He doesn’t know many spells, but he always gets them right and they work—”
“Then it remains a mystery,” said Chrestomanci. He sighed. Paolo thought he looked tired.
“Thanks,” he said, and slipped off, carefully thinking careless thoughts about what would he do now school was closed. He did not want anyone to notice what he meant to do.
He slipped through the coach house, past the crumpled horses and coachman, past the coach, and opened the little door in the wall at the back. He was half through it, when Rosa said doubtfully, at the front of the coach house, “Paolo? Are you in there?”
No, I’m not, Paolo thought, and shut the little door after him as gently as he knew how. Then he ran.
By this time, there were hardly any soldiers in the streets, and hardly anyone else either. Paolo ran past yellow houses, heavily shuttered, in a quiet broken by the uneasy ringing of bells. From time to time, he thought he could hear a dull, distant noise—a sort of booming, with a clatter in its midst. Wherever the houses opened out and Paolo could see the hills, he saw soldiers—not as soldiers, but as crawling, twinkling lines, winding upwards—and some puffs