The Flashman Papers: The Complete 12-Book Collection. George Fraser MacDonald

mean the difference between life and – horrible death.”

      “My G-d!” says I, sitting down weakly, and he patted me on the shoulder.

“There, my friend. I tell you these things to prepare you, so that you may have a better chance to … to survive. Now I must go. Try to remember what I’ve said. Meanwhile, I shall find out what I can about your wife – but for G-d’s sake, do not mention her existence to another living soul! That would be fatal to you both. And … do not give up hope.” He looked at me, and for a second the apprehension had died out of his face; he was a tough, steady-looking lad when he wanted to be.³⁶ “If I have frightened you – well, it is because there is much to fear, and I would have you on guard so far as may be.” He slapped my arm. “Bien. Dieu vous garde.”

      Then he was at the door, calling softly for the guard, but even as it opened he was back again, cat-footed, whispering.

      “One other thing – when you approach the Queen, remember to lick her feet, as a slave should. It will tell in your favour. But not if they are dusted with pink powder. That is poison.” He paused. “On second thoughts, if they are so dusted, lick them thoroughly. It will certainly be the quickest way to die. A bientôt!”

      If I had my head in my hands, do you wonder? It couldn’t be true – where I was, what I’d heard, what lay ahead. But it was, and I knew it, which was why I plumped down on my knees, blubbering, and prayed like a drunk Methodist, just on the offchance that there is a God after all, for if He couldn’t help me, no one else could. I felt much worse for it; probably Arnold was right, and insincere prayers are just so much blasphemy. So I had a good curse instead, but that didn’t serve, either. Whichever way I tried to ease my mind, I still wasn’t looking forward to meeting royalty.

      At least they didn’t keep me in suspense. At the crack of dawn they had me out, a file of soldiers under an officer to whom I tried to suggest that if I was going to be presented, so to speak, I’d be the better for a change of clothes. My shirt was reduced to a wisp, and my trousers no better than a ragged loin-cloth with one leg. But he just sneered at my sign-language, slashed me painfully with his cane, and marched me off up-hill through the streets to the great palace of Antan’, which I now saw properly for the first time.

      I wouldn’t have thought anything could have distracted my attention at such a time, but that palace did. How can I describe the effect of it, except by saying that it’s the biggest wooden building in the world? From its towering steepled roof to the ground is a hundred and twenty feet, and in between is a vast spread of arches and balconies and galleries – for all the world like a Venetian palazzo made of the most intricately-carved and coloured wood, its massive pillars consisting of single trunks more than one hundred feet long. The largest of them, I’m told, took five thousand men to lift, and they brought it from fifty miles away; all told, fifteen thousand died in building the place – but I guess that’s small beer to a Malagassy contractor working for royalty.

      Even more amazing though, is the smaller palace beside it. It is covered entirely in tiny silver bells, so that when the sun is on it, you can’t even look, for the blinding glare. As the breeze changes, so does the volume of that perpetual tingling of a million silver tongues; it’s indescribably beautiful to see and hear, like something in a fairy-tale – and yet it housed the cruellest Gorgon on earth, for that’s where Ranavalona had her private apartments.

      I’d little time to marvel, though, before we were inside the great hall of the main palace itself, with its soaring arched roof like a cathedral nave. It was thronged with courtiers bedecked in such a fantastic variety of clothing that it looked like a fancy-dress ball, with nothing but black guests. There were crinolines and saris, sarongs and state gowns, muslins and taffetas of every period and colour – I recall one spindly female in white silk with a powdered wig on her head à la Marie Antoinette, talking to another who seemed to be entirely hung in coloured glass beads. The contrast and confusion was bewildering: mantillas and loin-cloths, bare feet and high-heeled shoes, long gloves and barbaric feather headdresses – it would have been exotic but for the unfortunate fact that Malagassy women are d----d ugly, for the most part, tending to be squat and squashed, like black Russian peasants, if you can imagine. Mind you, I saw a lissom backside in a sari here and there, and a few pairs of plumptious bouncers hanging out of low corsages, and thought to myself, there’s a few here who’d repay care and attention – and they’d probably be glad of it, too, for a more sawn-off and runty collection than their menfolk I never did see. It’s curious that the male nobility are far poorer specimens than the common men; Dago blood somewhere, I suspect. They were got up as fantastically as the women, though, in the usual hotch-potch of uniforms, with knee breeches, buckled shoes, and even a stovepipe hat thrown in.

      There was a nigger orchestra pumping away abominably somewhere, and the whole throng were chattering like magpies, as Malagassies always do, bowing and scraping and leering and flirting in the most grotesque caricature of polite society – I couldn’t help thinking of apes that I’d seen at the circus in childhood, decked out in human clothes. A white man in rags cut no ice at all, and no one spared me more than a glance as I was marched up a side staircase, along a short passage, and into a small ante-room. Here, to my astonishment, I was left alone; they shut the door on me, and that was that.

      Steady, Flash, thinks I, what’s this? It looked an innocent room enough, overcrowded with artistically-carved native furniture, large pots containing reeds, some fine ornaments in ivory and ebony, and on the walls several prints depicting niggers in uniform which I wouldn’t have given house-room to, myself. I stood listening, and through a large muslin-screened inner window heard the murmur and music of the great hall; by standing on a table I could just peep over the sill and through the muslin observe the assembly below. My window was in a corner, and from beneath it a broad gallery ran clean across the top end of the hall, high above the crowd. There were a dozen Hova guardsmen in sarongs and helmets ranged along the balcony rail.

Somewhere deep in the palace a bell rang, and at once the chatter and music died, and the whole crowd below turned to stare up at the balcony. There was the wailing of what sounded like a native trumpet, and a figure stepped out on to the balcony almost directly beneath me – a stalwart black in a gold metal headdress and leopard-skin loin-cloth, with massive muscular arms stretched out before him, carrying a slender silver spear in ceremonial fashion.^a The assembled cream of Malagassy society gave him a good hand, and as he stepped aside four young girls in flowered saris appeared, carrying a kind of three-sided tent of coloured silk, but with no roof to it.

      Then, to the accompaniment of clashing cymbals and a low, sonorous chanting that made my hair stand on end, there came out a couple of old coves in black robes fringed with silver, swinging little packets on the ends of strings, but not making much of it; they stood to one side, and to a sudden thunderous yell from the crowd of “Manjaka! Manjaka!” four more wenches trooped out, carrying a purple canopy on four slender ivory poles. Beneath it walked a stately figure enveloped in a scarlet silk cloak, but I couldn’t see the face at all, for it was hidden by a tall sugar-loaf hat of golden straw, bound under the chin by a scarf. So this is Her Nibs, thinks I, and despite the warmth, I found myself shivering.

      She paced slowly to the front of the balcony and the sycophantic mob beneath went wild, clapping and calling and stretching out their hands. Then she stepped back, the girls with the silk tent contraption carried it round her, shielding her from all curious eyes except the two that were goggling down, unsuspected, from above; I waited, breathless, and two more girls went in beside her, and slipped the cloak from her shoulders. And there she was, stark naked except for her ridiculous hat.

      Well, even from above and through a muslin screen there was no doubt that she was female, and no need for stays to make the best of it, either; she stood like an ebony statue as the two wenches began to bathe her from bowls of water. Some vulgar lout grunted lasciviously, and realizing who it was I shrank back a trifle in sudden anxiety that I’d been overheard. They splashed her thoroughly, while I watched enviously, and then clapped the robe round her shoulders again. The screen was removed, and she took what looked like an inlaid ebony horn from one of her attendants and stepped