Amelia Dee and the Peacock Lamp (17 page)

‘I’m sure Amelia will let us see it,’ said Amelia’s father.

‘I hope so, Armando,’ said Amelia’s mother.

Amelia couldn’t keep herself from smiling. Just slightly.

Amelia really didn’t know what she was going to do with the story. She thought about it a lot that night, lay in bed wondering after she turned the light out. It wasn’t like the other story, horrible and angry and spiteful, trying to take a revenge it could never take. Maybe having written it was enough, maybe this one was like all the others and she could put it with them in the drawer and it wouldn’t try to get out. But it wasn’t meant to stay in the drawer, she knew that. Maybe she could show it to her parents. She wanted to. Now that she had told them, it seemed ridiculous that she had never told them about her stories before. She had always thought it would be so complicated to explain it, and yet it turned out to have been so simple. All her fears proved to be empty. But this story wouldn’t mean anything special to them. It would just be a story. There was only one person for whom it would be more than that.

Yet it was one thing to realise that, and another thing actually to give it to the Princess. Had she really written it
for
the Princess? Amelia tried to remember what Mr Vishwanath had said in the conversation that had set off the idea for the story in her mind. Had he said that he thought she could write something better for the Princess, or had he just said that he thought she could write something better? Or both? Or neither? Amelia tried to remember Mr Vishwanath’s exact words. But even if she could, she knew, they wouldn’t give her the answer. She had to decide for herself. Amelia had come to understand that Mr Vishwanath only asked questions. He never gave answers. Or if he did, even his answers were just another kind of question. The whole point was that his questions were clever enough to make you want to think of an answer for yourself.

Amelia sighed. She knew what she had to do. Deep down, she had known it from the moment she started writing. It was just that the Princess was so haughty, and so stern, and so . . . rude. That was the only word for her. Rude. She had made Amelia feel so small, and she had done it on purpose. Twice. She’d think the story was silly. She’d think that telling a story from inside a lamp was a
fancy
. Amelia could just hear the way the Princess would say it, full of contempt. In her accent. A
fenceee
. Even though Amelia knew perfectly well it wasn’t a
fenceee
at all.

The thought of giving the story to the Princess was too scary. Maybe she wouldn’t give it to her. Maybe she just wouldn’t.

Or maybe there was another way. Mr Vishwanath. He could give it to the Princess for her. Of course! Why not? He saw the Princess all the time.

Amelia was glad she could stop thinking about that and think about the story itself. That was much more fun. She put on the light beside her bed and read it again. When she turned off the light, the sentences ran through her head, almost as if she could see them on a page in front of her. She was so excited about it she couldn’t sleep. There were all kinds of things she wanted to improve, all kinds of details, a word here or a sentence there, which is always the way it goes with a story. In fact, the better the story is, and the more you care about it, the more you want to work on it to make it better. And Amelia wanted to work on it, work and work on it, more than anything else she had ever written.

But it needed a title. Amelia thought about that. One possibility after the other ran through her mind, but none of them was quite right. They ran through her mind, over and over, until somehow she fell asleep, still thinking about it. And in the morning, it was the first thing that came into her head as she woke up. But something must have happened in her mind during the night. Because now she knew.

She opened her window and felt the cool morning air on her face. She leaned out and looked at the carved lady. The carved lady looked back with her sightless eyes. Her expression this morning seemed very tranquil, very understanding. Amelia felt very close to the carved lady at that moment. She felt bad that she had ever thought the carved lady looked blank and silly. She wished she could take that back. It had been her anger speaking, it wasn’t what she really thought. But she sensed that the carved lady knew it, and had even forgiven her.

‘What do you think about the title?’ she murmured.

The carved lady stared encouragingly.

‘Yes.’ Amelia nodded. She went to her desk and picked up her pen. Above the first line of the story she wrote three words.

The Happy Lamp

She gazed at the title for a moment, and then nodded again. Perfect.

She went onto the landing and turned on the lamp. She looked at the glowing metalwork, the two peacocks with their feathers fanning out around the bottom, golden light streaming out of thousands of tiny slivers of space.

‘Happy lamp . . .’ murmured Amelia Dee, and she smiled.

CHAPTER 22

Mr Vishwanath was in the garden, dressed in his yoga nappy, holding one of his one-legged poses in the sunlight near the lamp sculpture. After a couple of minutes he changed to a different pose, and then held that one. Amelia sat on her chair and waited. There was no way to hurry Mr Vishwanath, she knew.

She got up when he had finished.

‘Mr Vishwanath,’ she said, as he came towards her, ‘I’ve got something for you.’ Amelia held out the pages of the story.

‘Is this something else for me to read?’

‘No. It’s for the Princess.’

‘Oh, I thought you said it is for me,’ said Mr Vishwanath, and he continued towards the door to his studio.

‘Mr Vishwanath!’

He stopped.

‘I wondered if you would give it to the Princess,’ said Amelia.

Mr Vishwanath smiled. ‘Now I understand.’

Amelia smiled as well. She held out the pages again. But Mr Vishwanath didn’t take them.

‘If you have something to give the Princess, Amelia, you should give it yourself.’

‘You mean you won’t do it?’

‘Why should I do what you can do yourself?’

‘Well, it’s just the Princess isn’t very . . . I mean . . . Mr Vishwanath, you see her anyway. I thought you could just give it to her and say it’s from me.’

Mr Vishwanath didn’t reply.

‘I thought . . .’

Mr Vishwanath shook his head.

Amelia frowned. Deep down, perhaps, she had known this wasn’t going to work. She tried one more time. ‘Won’t you give it to her, Mr Vishwanath? It won’t take you long.’

‘This isn’t the way, Amelia,’ said Mr Vishwanath quietly.

‘But you don’t even know what I’m giving her!’

Mr Vishwanath raised an eyebrow.

‘Sorry,’ said Amelia. ‘It’s just . . .’

‘What, Amelia?’

‘She’s so scary!’

Mr Vishwanath smiled. ‘No one is truly scary, Amelia. And the most scary people, they themselves are the ones who are the most scared inside.’

Not half as scared as she herself was, thought Amelia. She looked at Mr Vishwanath doubtfully. ‘You took the other story, Mr Vishwanath.’

‘That was to read, not to give to the Princess. I will gladly read this one if you want. But I think you don’t need me to do that, do you?’

Amelia shook her head.

‘No.’ Mr Vishwanath chuckled. ‘Be brave,’ he said, and he went inside, leaving Amelia under the verandah.

She stood there, clutching the pages of the story. From inside the invention shed came a loud pop, followed by a shout of ‘Yes!’ Then there was another pop, even louder, and this time a shout of ‘No!’

Amelia tried to be brave. The next time she saw the cream-coloured car coming down the street she took the story and ran down the stairs and opened the door a fraction and waited for the Princess to appear. But when the Princess actually got out of the car, when Amelia actually saw her there on the pavement, marching past her driver towards the door of Mr Vishwanath’s studio with her nose in the air and her black eyebrows fixed in a hawk-like scowl and not the slightest thought for anything around her, Amelia’s nerve failed. She could almost hear the words the Princess would utter. ‘This is a
fenceeee!
A stupid, stupid story! Why do you give it to me?’ Before Amelia knew it, the Princess had gone by and her driver had scurried past her to open the door to Mr Vishwanath’s studio, and Amelia herself hadn’t even come out of the house.

She felt terrible. She had let herself down. Again. She was a coward.

She hesitated, still peering out the door as the driver passed her on the way back to the car.

‘Amelia!’

Amelia jumped. It was Mrs Ellis, in the hall behind her.

‘What are you doing there, Amelia? Are you coming in or going out?’

‘I’m just . . .’

‘Well? Make up your mind.’

‘Ummm . . .’

‘In or out? Quickly . . . Alright, out you go, then! Go on. Out you go!’

Amelia stepped outside. A moment later, Mrs Ellis closed the door behind her.

Amelia stood there, not knowing what to do next. Was she going to wait here for an hour until the Princess came out? And then what? Run away again?

The cream-coloured car was in front of her. Inside waited the driver, Asha, as he always did.

Of course. Asha . . .

Amelia walked around the car and knocked on the window.

The driver gave a start, but didn’t respond.

‘I have to talk to you,’ said Amelia, pointing at him. For some reason, she mouthed the words, as if he couldn’t possibly hear her, although there was only a thin window between them.

Asha shook his head.

‘Me . . . You . . .’ mouthed Amelia again, pointing. ‘Please . . .’

The old man was starting to look very perturbed.

‘Pleeeeeeeeease . . .’

Asha looked away in agitation. Amelia watched him beseechingly. She leaned over the front of the car until she caught his eye again. She wouldn’t let him ignore her. Finally he opened the door. Amelia stepped back and he got out. Asha straightened up – as much as he could – and very carefully, before he said anything, he put on his hat. Only then, when it was properly adjusted on his head, did he address Amelia.

‘Can I help you, Mademoiselle Amelia?’

‘You remember my name!’ said Amelia in surprise.

‘Of course I remember your name, Mademoiselle,’ said the old man. ‘I must remember all the names, because my mistress forgets.’

‘Do you remember my friends?’ asked Amelia.

‘Mademoiselle Eugenie and Master Kevin.’

Amelia grinned.

‘Can I help you, Mademoiselle?’ said Asha again. ‘This is not usual. I am supposed not to get out of the car. Only for you I do it, Mademoiselle Amelia. Because you insist.’

‘Oh.’ Amelia was serious again. ‘I have something I would like you to give to the Princess.’

Asha looked away uncomfortably.

‘Is that a problem?’

‘Mademoiselle,’ began the old man apologetically. ‘I must not take anything for the Princess. It is an iron rule.’

‘Sounds like you have a lot of rules.’

Asha shrugged. ‘This is a rule, Mademoiselle.’

‘Do a lot of people try to give her things?’

‘No.’

Amelia frowned. ‘Then . . .’

The old man sighed. ‘It is a custom from the days when things were different,’ he said quietly. ‘The Shan and Shanna, her parents, in Irafia they could not take a single step without people trying to give them gifts.’

Amelia understood. In the Princess’s world, in the prison she inhabited inside her head, nothing had changed since the moment before the revolution broke out. In reality, no one wanted to give her anything, but by giving instructions to her servant to refuse gifts, she could still pretend that they did.

‘It’s only a small thing that I want to give her,’ said Amelia.

The old man shook his head.

‘It’s not worth anything. I mean, to buy.’

‘I’m sorry,’ said the old man.

‘Please, sir.’

‘Don’t call me sir. I am not a sir, Mademoiselle Amelia. I am a servant.’

‘Please, Asha. Please.’ Amelia kept gazing at him, until he couldn’t help but meet her eye. ‘Please. For me.’

The old man frowned. ‘I have never broken this rule, Mademoiselle Amelia. But for you, because of what you have done . . .’

‘What have I done?’

‘You think my Princess feels nothing. You think she is as hard, as hard as stone.’

‘No,’ said Amelia quickly, although that was exactly the way she would have described her.

‘She is not like this. Please understand. From the moment she sees the lamp again, something is happening inside her.’

‘What?’ whispered Amelia.

‘I do not know, Mademoiselle. But she is harsh, harsh. Harsher than ever. I know her. For sixty years, I know her. I know what this means, Mademoiselle.’

‘Don’t call me Mademoiselle. I’m Amelia.’

‘But Mademoiselle . . .’

‘Amelia. Say it. Please.’

The old man hesitated. ‘Amelia. Something is happening inside my Princess.’

‘What?’

‘Something. I do not know. It is because she sees the lamp.’

Amelia stared. Nothing seemed more important now than to give the Princess the story. She thrust the pages into the old man’s hand. ‘Give this to her, Asha.’ ‘What is it?’

‘A story.’

The old man frowned.

‘Give it to her, Asha. Please. For me.’

CHAPTER 23

Amelia could see the scene clearly. She walked around the corner into Marburg Street. There was the cream-coloured car, and in it the Princess was waiting, as she had waited once before. Asha got out and opened the door for her, and then the Princess got out, and she greeted Amelia, and she was warm, and gentle, and polite, and grateful, and it was all because of the story Amelia had given her. The Princess had changed. It was perfect.

There was only one problem. It didn’t happen. The whole scene was in Amelia’s imagination. And that was where it stayed.

At first, Amelia really thought it might happen. Every time she came around the corner she expected to see the car waiting. The things Asha had said made her think that something actually was changing inside the Princess. But as the days passed, and the car didn’t appear, Amelia realised she was deluding herself. She wondered whether Asha had even given the Princess the story. Maybe he had taken it only in order to get rid of her, and then had thrown it away. Amelia wouldn’t have blamed him. After all, if the Princess was harsher than ever, maybe she would fire him if he broke the iron rule about taking gifts for her. And where would he get another job, an old servant like him? Still, Amelia didn’t really believe Asha wouldn’t keep his word. Much more likely that he had given the story to the Princess, and she had simply ignored it. It seemed ridiculous now to have expected anything else. The Princess had been angry and bitter for fifty-nine years. If something was happening inside her, it was probably just making her
more
angry and bitter.