“Very nearly, I think, my lord,” replied the Butler. “If I understand Mr. Cawson aright, the Master and his guests wont be disposed to linger once they know youre here. Shall I take the coffee tray?”
“Damn you, Shuter, you careless old fool! Look what youve done!”
They were still for a moment, the girl twisted in pain but grimacing to prevent herself from crying out louder, the man bent over her frowning like thunder.
Then came a crash of glass and the glug of spilled liquid.
“Thats right, Shuter,” said Lord Asriel. “Bring them both in and put them down by the table.”
“Just clear up the mess.”
“All good things pass away. Leave the tray here beside me. Oh, ask the Porter to send up the two cases I left in the Lodge, would you?”
“Thatll be the Porter,” said Lord Asriel. “Back in the wardrobe. If I hear the slightest noise, Ill make you wish you were dead.”
As the Porter began to mop the wine from the carpet, the Butler knocked and came in with Lord Asriels manservant, a man called Thorold. They were carrying between them a heavy case of polished wood with brass handles. They saw what the Porter was doing and stopped dead.
“Wren, youre forgetting your place,” said Lord Asriel. “Dont question me; just do as I tell you.”
“Very good, my lord,” said the Butler. “If I may suggest it, I should perhaps let Mr. Cawson know what youre planning, my lord, or else hell be somewhat taken aback, if you see what I mean.”
The old man put the box down carefully and began to apologize.
“Good evening, Wren,” said Lord Asriel. Lyra always heard that harsh voice with a mixture of pleasure and apprehension. “I arrived too late to dine. Ill wait in here.”
“Since youre in there, you can make yourself useful. Watch the Master closely when he comes in. If you tell me something interesting about him, Ill keep you from getting further into the trouble youre already in. Understand?”
As hed said, it was the Porter.
The Butler trimmed the wick, and put another log on the fire as well, and then listened carefully at the hall door before helping himself to a handful of leaf from the smoking stand. He had hardly replaced the lid when the handle of theother door turned, making him jump nervously. Lyra tried not to laugh. The Butler hastily stuffed the leaf into his pocket and turned to face the incomer.
Then Lord Asriel stood up and turned away from the fire. She saw him fully, and marveled at the contrast he made with the plump Butler, the stooped and languid Scholars. Lord Asriel was a tall man with powerful shoulders, a fierce dark face, and eyes that seemed to flash and glitter with savage laughter. It was a face to be dominated by, or to fight: never a face to patronize or pity. All his movements were large and perfectly balanced, like those of a wild animal, and when he appeared in a room like this, he seemed a wild animal held in a cage too small for it.
“What did you say?” he said more quietly.
Lord Asriel stood by the fire sipping the last of the coffee and watching darkly as Thorold opened the case of the projecting lantern and uncapped the lens before checking the oil tank.
She sat up and put her eye to the crack of the door. It was the Butler, coming to trim the lamp as the Master had ordered him to. The common room and the library were lit by anbar-ic power, but the Scholars preferred the older, softer naphtha lamps in the Retiring Room. They wouldnt change that in the Masters lifetime.
Lyra realized that she would be able to see the screen and whatever was on it through the crack in the door, and wondered whether her uncle had arranged it like that for the purpose. Under the noise the manservant made unrolling the stiff linen and setting it up on its frame, she whispered:
“It might be,” Pantalaimon said austerely, in his tiny moth voice. “And it might not.”
With a slight bow, the Butler took the tray and left, and Thorold went with him.
“Very good, my lord.”
He let go. She sank to the floor, and Pantalaimon fluttered anxiously to her shoulder. Her uncle looked down with a restrained fury, and she didnt dare meet his eyes.
“You should rest.”
“No harm in that. You might bring me some coffee.”
“Not yet. Lord Asriel wouldnt be dining here if it was going to break out in the next week or so.” “Thats what I thought. But later?” “Shh! Someones coming.”
“That wine is poisoned,” she muttered between clenched teeth. “I saw the Master put some powder in it.”
“Whos there?”
The Butler looked uncomfortable. Guests entered the Retiring Room at the Masters invitation only, and Lord Asriel knew that; but the Butler also saw Lord Asriel looking pointedly at the bulge in his pocket, and decided not to protest.
“Ive just saved your life!”
“No!”
“Yes, here, man. And I shall need a screen and a projecting lantern, also here, also now.”
She couldnt help herself. She tumbled out of the wardrobe and scrambled up to snatch the glass from his hand. The wine flew out, splashing on the edge of the table and the carpet, and then the glass fell and smashed. He seized her wrist and twisted hard.
As soon as the door closed, Lord Asriel looked across the room directly at the wardrobe, and Lyra felt the force of his glance almost as if it had physical form, as if it were an arrow or a spear. Then he looked away and spoke softly to his dasmon.
Lyra saw the old man standing doubtfully in the doorway, and behind him, the corner of a large wooden box.
He bowed and left. Lyra watched as her uncle poured a cup of coffee, drained it at once, and poured another before sipping more slowly. She was agog: cases of specimens? A projecting lantern? What did he have to show the Scholars that was so urgent and important?
“Yes. Itll create less fuss than moving to the lecture theater. Theyll want to see the specimens too; Ill send for the Porter in a minute. This is a bad time, Stelmaria.”
“Thank you, Wren,” said Lord Asriel. “Is that the Tokay I can see on the table?”
“In here, my lord?”
There was a knock, and the Butler came in with a silver tray bearing a coffeepot and a cup.
Lord Asriels daemon, a snow leopard, stood behind him.
“Very good, my lord.”
“Take it and go.”
“Ill break your arm first. How dare you come in here?”
“Get something to clear this mess up. Go on, before it soaks into the carpet!”
Mr. Cawson was the Steward. There was an old and well-established rivalry between him and the Butler. The Steward was the superior, but the Butler had more opportunities to ingratiate himself with the Scholars, and made full use of them. He would be delighted to have this chance of showing the Steward that he knew more about what was going on in the Retiring Room.
“Let go of me and Ill tell you!”
“Shall I let the Master know youve arrived, my lord?”
The Butler could hardly prevent himself from opening his mouth in surprise, but managed to suppress the question, or the protest.
“Yes, it was the Tokay,” said Lord Asriel. “Too bad. Is that the lantern? Set it up by the wardrobe, Thorold, if you would. Ill have the screen up at the other end.”
She came to sit calmly at his side, alert and elegant and dangerous, her tawny eyes surveying the room before turning, like his black ones, to the door from the hall as the handle turned. Lyra couldnt see the door, but she heard an intake of breath as the first man came in.
“Yes. Tell him, then.”
“No. Ill do it myself. Thank you, Thorold. Have they finished dinner yet, Wren?”
“Lyra! What the hell are you doing?”
“Lord Asriel!” he said, and a shiver of cold surprise ran down Lyras back. She couldnt see him from where she was, and she tried to smother the urge to move and look.
The Porter hurried out. Lord Asriel moved closer to the wardrobe and spoke in an undertone.
“See? It was worth coming, wasnt it?”
“Here, my lord?”
He stretched out in one of the armchairs, so that Lyra could no longer see his face.
“I can only say once again, my lord, I do most earnestly beg your pardon; I dont know what—”
Lyra relaxed a little, and allowed herself to feel the pain in her shoulder and wrist. It might have been enough to make her cry, if she was the sort of girl who cried. Instead she gritted her teeth and moved the arm gently until it felt looser.
The quiet cry came before she could hold it back. Lord Asriel heard and turned at once.
There was a knock on the door.
“Are you going to show the projections in here?” she said quietly.
The Butler bowed and hastened out, his daemon trotting submissively at his heels. Lyras uncle moved across to the fire and stretched his arms high above his head, yawning like a lion. He was wearing traveling clothes. Lyra was reminded, as she always was when she saw him again, of how much he frightened her. There was no question now of creeping out unnoticed: shed have to sit tight and hope.
“Yes, yes. I should also change my clothes. Theres probably some ancient etiquette that allows them to fine me a dozen bottles for coming in here dressed improperly. I should sleep for three days. The fact remains that—”
“Make a noise in there and I wont help you. Youre on your own.”
Lyra could see, just. Her uncle had managed to knock the decanter of Tokay off the table, and made it look as if the Porter had done it.
“The Master ordered it decanted especially for you, my I lord,” said the Butler.
At the moment his expression was distant and preoccupied. His daemon came close and leaned her head on his waist, and he looked down at her unfathomably before turning away and walking to the table. Lyra suddenly felt her stomach lurch, for Lord Asriel had taken the stopper from the decanter of Tokay, and was pouring a glass.
“I came in just to see what the room was like,” she said. “I know I shouldnt have. But I was going to go out before anyone came in, except that I heard the Master coming and got ^ trapped. The wardrobe was the only place to hide. And I saw him put the powder in the wine. If I hadnt…”
“Theres plenty of oil, my lord,” he said. “Shall I send for a technician to operate it?”
She darted back there at once, and no sooner had she pulled the door shut than Lord Asriel called, “Come in.”
“Im truly sorry, my lord—I must have been closer than I thought—”
He moved away and stood with hisback to the fire again as the Porter came back with a brush and dustpan for the glass and a bowl and cloth.
“Yes, Uncle.”
“There are only three dozen bottles left I of the98.”
