Amelia Dee and the Peacock Lamp (8 page)

‘Well? This lamp?’ The Princess said it as if Amelia had no right even to mention it.

‘It’s just a lamp,’ murmured Amelia.

‘How do you know about it? With the monkey with the face of a man. With the peacocks on the bottom. The two peacocks. How do you know about the two peacocks? How do you know about this lamp?’

‘I’ve seen it,’ said Amelia.

The Princess stared. Now Amelia saw the Princess’s face as it had been before, when Amelia had been reading. The old woman’s eyes were full of amazement and disbelief.

‘Where have you seen it?’ asked the Princess.

‘It’s . . .’

‘Where?’ demanded the Princess. ‘Where is it?’

‘In my house,’ whispered Amelia. ‘Outside my room.’

The Princess stared at her again. Then her face flickered with a kind of tremor of horror. She turned away. She got up, holding her hand to the side of her face so Amelia couldn’t see her expression, and went quickly to the door.

CHAPTER 10

‘I can’t see the point of it,’ said Amelia to Mr Vishwanath later, when they were sitting under the verandah. ‘Why did you want me to meet her? She didn’t care about anything I said. And then she just got up and walked out!’

Mr Vishwanath didn’t respond. He continued to gaze at the garden, where Amelia’s father was moving the statues of her mother’s thin-white-faces phase down the back.

Or trying to. His improvements to the mover-and-stacker machine still needed some work. The winch was larger, which helped with the bigger statues, but that made the machine top-heavy, and it had developed a tendency to topple over when lifting the sculptures. It had already toppled over half a dozen times. But that didn’t disturb Amelia’s father, who knew that any improvement takes a number of attempts to get right. In fact, he would have been more disturbed had the machine not toppled over. Or at least that’s what he claimed, calling out to them cheerfully as the machine toppled over on its side for the seventh time.

Mr Vishwanath smiled encouragingly at him.

Amelia didn’t how much Mr Vishwanath had heard when she met the Princess. He had been there all the time, sitting on the other side of the room in one of his yoga positions. He was still sitting there in his yoga position when the Princess rushed out, and even after that he continued to sit for another couple of minutes. He certainly would have heard if he had been listening, but it was possible that he wasn’t listening. Anyone else would have, but not Mr Vishwanath. He had once told Amelia that when he held one of his yoga poses he emptied his mind completely. Which was harder to do than it sounded, Amelia knew, because she had tried.

‘Mr Vishwanath,’ said Amelia, ‘you don’t understand.’ Her voice dropped to a whisper, even though her father was too far away to hear, and even if he hadn’t been, was too preoccupied with his machine to listen. ‘I wrote a story. I read it to her.’

Amelia gazed at Mr Vishwanath, waiting to see how he would react. Just admitting it made her feel all the humiliation again. The Princess had called her story a fancy. A
fancy
! And then she had called it a stupid story. Amelia felt all the hurt once more. The Princess had made her feel so small, so foolish, like someone who didn’t matter at all.

‘Mr Vishwanath? Did you hear me?’

Mr Vishwanath nodded.

‘She could at least have been polite, Mr Vishwanath. Even if she didn’t like the story, she could have thanked me. She could have said she enjoyed it. But no. All she could say was it was a fancy.’ Amelia forced out the word between gritted teeth, she could hardly bear to say it. ‘All she cared about was the lamp! Did you hear her, Mr Vishwanath? All she wanted to know about was the lamp. And then she gets upset, and looks at me as if I don’t even have the right to have a lamp. Why shouldn’t I have a lamp? It’s my lamp. She should get her own lamp!’ Amelia folded her arms in outrage. ‘I’ll never write a story for anyone else again,’ she muttered. ‘Never. Do you hear me, Mr Vishwanath? Never!’

Mr Vishwanath didn’t seem to have anything to say to that. Amelia turned angrily back to the garden, breathing heavily. Her father had managed to keep the machine upright with the latest sculpture and was wheeling it slowly towards the back. There were only a couple of the white sculptures left now. Amelia wasn’t going to miss them when they were gone.

‘Why is it important to you that the Princess cared about your story?’

Amelia looked at Mr Vishwanath in disbelief. Wasn’t it obvious? He was still looking at the garden, and had spoken in that tone he sometimes had, that kind of murmur that made you wonder whether you really had heard anything at all or whether it was all in your own mind.

‘Is it because you want to feel important?’

Mr Vishwanath’s lips had hardly moved.

‘It’s not because I want to feel important.’ Amelia’s voice dropped again. ‘Mr Vishwanath, you don’t understand. I’ve never written a story for anyone before. I’ve never shown one to anyone. I’ve never even
told
anyone.’ Amelia shook her head in frustration. ‘Do you understand, Mr Vishwanath? Not one of my own stories.’

‘How was the Princess to know this? Did you tell her?’

‘It doesn’t matter. She could have been polite, that’s all. At least she could have said she enjoyed it.’

‘What if she didn’t enjoy it?’

‘At least she could have thanked me for trying.’

‘What if she didn’t want you to try?’

‘Mr Vishwanath, please. Sometimes when you do this . . . It just doesn’t help.’

‘When I do what, Amelia?’

‘You know what I mean.’

‘But I don’t understand, Amelia. Would you prefer a person to lie just so you can feel important?’

Of course she didn’t want someone to lie. But that wasn’t the point. This wasn’t about her feeling important. Somehow she couldn’t get across to Mr Vishwanath how hurt she felt, how much that story had meant to her.

‘When we need other people to tell us we are important,’ said Mr Vishwanath, ‘we have lost sight of who we are. We do not know ourselves. We only know ourselves by what other people tell us.’

Why did Mr Vishwanath keep going on about that? It wasn’t about being important!

Or was it? Amelia frowned. Suddenly she was starting to wonder. What
was
it about?

Really, why did it matter so much to her whether the Princess liked or disliked her story? What difference did that make to her, Amelia Dee? She was still Amelia Dee, and the story she had written was still exactly the same story that she had written, whether one particular princess happened to have disliked it. Another princess might have liked it, yet it would still be the same story, no better or worse, and she would still be the same Amelia Dee, and the other princess’s opinion wouldn’t matter either.

It was a good story, Amelia knew that, whatever anyone said. She didn’t need to show it to anyone. She could have kept it hidden away, just like her mother kept her sculptures hidden in the garden, and it would be just as good. And she herself would be just as important – or just as unimportant – for having written it.

Amelia looked up at Mr Vishwanath. He was watching her.

‘According to what you just said,’ said Amelia, ‘the Princess doesn’t know herself.’

‘What do you mean?’ asked Mr Vishwanath.

‘All she cares about is making sure everyone else treats her like she’s an important person. I had to call her Your Serenity and she wasn’t happy until I did. Why? Because that showed I wasn’t as important as she is. If I was as important as her I could have used her real name. And that’s what she wanted to prove.’

Mr Vishwanath didn’t say anything to that.

‘It’s unfair!’ said Amelia.

‘To who?’ asked Mr Vishwanath.

‘To me! To anyone! To . . .’ Amelia stopped. Suddenly, she wasn’t sure.

Mr Vishwanath smiled. He turned back to look at the garden, where Amelia’s father was very slowly, very carefully, beginning to winch another sculpture up on the machine.

‘You’re right about the Princess,’ said Mr Vishwanath. ‘She only cares about making sure she is treated importantly enough.’

‘See?’ said Amelia. ‘That’s unfair, isn’t it?’

‘It’s much worse than unfair. It’s a tragedy.’

Amelia wasn’t sure about that. Calling it a tragedy might be taking it a
bit
far.

‘It’s the Princess’s tragedy, Amelia.’

Amelia looked at Mr Vishwanath doubtfully. How could it be someone’s tragedy that all they cared about was being treated importantly? If it was such a tragedy, why didn’t they just stop caring about it?

Mr Vishwanath didn’t explain.

Amelia thought about the Princess. She didn’t like her, which made it hard to think of her as tragic. When you think of someone as tragic, you feel sympathy for them. But it was hard to think sympathetically of someone as unfriendly and ungrateful as the Princess. Amelia tried to. She tried hard. It wasn’t easy.

‘I just don’t know why you wanted me to meet her,’ she said at last.

Mr Vishwanath shrugged. ‘It’s like a door. Sometimes you open a door, and maybe something will happen. Yes, Amelia?’

‘And sometimes it doesn’t.’

‘Exactly,’ replied Mr Vishwanath. ‘One cannot tell.’

Amelia shook her head. ‘You must have known what she’d be like, Mr Vishwanath. She’s so spoiled! She wouldn’t care about someone like me. I bet she lives in a
huge
palace with a whole
army
of servants and she gets
everything
she wants.’

Mr Vishwanath was silent.

Amelia stole a glance at him. Mr Vishwanath gazed imperturbably at the garden.

‘The Princess does live in a palace, doesn’t she?’ asked Amelia eventually. ‘I mean, in a house that’s as big as a palace?’

Mr Vishwanath shook his head.

‘But she’s got servants, hasn’t she? I mean, lots and lots?’

Mr Vishwanath shook his head again.

‘That old man who drives for her . . . he’s not the only one, is he?’

Mr Vishwanath didn’t reply.

Amelia frowned. She remembered the tone of bitterness in the Princess’s voice. She thought of the cream-coloured car that looked so impressive from a distance but so shoddy close up.

Somehow, Amelia realised, she had known what the answers to those questions would be, even as she asked them.

CHAPTER 11

In Eugenie’s opinion, it must have been Amelia’s fault. Amelia didn’t tell Eugenie and Kevin about everything that happened with the Princess, because that would have meant telling them about the story she wrote, but she told them enough. And one thing was immediately apparent. To Eugenie, at least.

‘You’ve ruined it! You realise that, don’t you, Amelia? Not only for you, but for everyone!’

Amelia didn’t know what she was talking about.

‘If the Princess had liked you,’ said Eugenie, ‘she’d have asked you to bring a friend next time.’

‘Like you, I suppose,’ said Kevin.

Amelia sighed. ‘Eugenie, there was never going to be a next time. Haven’t you heard a thing I told you? The Princess doesn’t normally meet children. She only did it because of Mr Vishwanath’s suggestion.’

‘But if she’d
liked
you, it would have been different, wouldn’t it?’

Amelia glanced at Kevin and rolled her eyes in frustration.

‘Did you do what I told you?’ demanded Eugenie. ‘Did you curtsy?’

Amelia shook her head.

‘Hah! See?’

‘And I didn’t call her Your Highness, either.’

‘Well, what do you
expect
?’ cried Eugenie.

‘She said I had to call her Your Serenity.’

‘Oh.’

Kevin grinned.

Eugenie ignored him. ‘And did you do that?’

‘Yes,’ said Amelia.

Eugenie narrowed her eyes. ‘Every time?’

‘Once or twice, anyway.’

‘Hah!’ cried Eugenie again. ‘You have to say it every time you say something.’

‘It wasn’t that,’ said Amelia.

‘Then what was it?’ demanded Eugenie. Suddenly she stopped, and gave Amelia a piercing glance. ‘Did you take a gift?’

‘She didn’t want a gift.’

‘But did you take one?’

Amelia frowned. She had no intention of saying anything about the story. It might have been different if the Princess had loved it, or even just liked it, or even just said something pleasant about it out of politeness. If that had happened, Amelia might have told Eugenie and Kevin about it, and even admitted that she had been writing stories for years. In a way, it would have been a relief to tell them, and she had sometimes thought about doing it. But not now. All she’d get was the Martin Martinez treatment. Or worse.

Eugenie was still watching her keenly. Amelia could see that she knew there was something Amelia wasn’t telling them.

‘She was rude, that’s all,’ said Amelia abruptly, and she marched off.

Eugenie and Kevin ran to catch up with her.

They went into the Froot Jus bar. Eugenie kept glancing at Amelia as they waited to be served.

‘What?’ whispered Amelia.

‘She was the rude one, was she?’ said Eugenie. ‘That was the problem, was it? Nothing
you
might have done?’

Obviously, for Eugenie Edelstein, a princess could do no wrong, and if there was ever a problem it had to be someone else’s fault.

‘Yes, she was,’ said Amelia. ‘Rude. She said she didn’t like meeting children because they behave disgracefully. She said it to my face without even waiting to see how I behaved!’

‘She’d already seen, I think.’

‘Once! That was only once, Eugenie. She was the one who behaved disgracefully this time.’

Eugenie glanced at Amelia pitifully, as if there were something very, very sad about a girl who could delude herself as to who was to blame in such a situation.

The man behind the counter was ready to serve them. Kevin got a mango and banana smoothie. Amelia got a blackcurrant, gooseberry and papaya crush. And Eugenie, after carefully examining every option on the board, got a cucumber juice.

They sat down.

‘It’s peculiar,’ said Amelia, staring thoughtfully at Eugenie’s drink.

‘No, it’s not! I love cucumber juice,’ retorted Eugenie, and she grimaced as she took a sip.

‘No, what Mr Vishwanath said to me afterwards. He said the Princess was always worried about whether people were treating her importantly enough, and that was her tragedy.’