The Young Dictator Read online

  Gran and the Queen huffed and puffed as they lowered her slowly into the narrow pit. Jenny went down and landed on the soft carpet again and found herself back in the cavern that was like a market. She searched the stalls until she found the skargill. He was reading a newspaper with two of his hands and scratching his purple body with the other two. He didn’t even look at her as he said:

  “I’m closed. Come back next year.”

  “But I’m from the upper world!” cried Jenny. The skargill folded the newspaper and scrutinised her.

  “Yes, I remember you. What do you want now?”

  “It’s about the year you sold me. It has stopped working. I want you to repair it for me, free of charge.”

  His nostrils widened and he inserted a finger into the left one, pulled out something purple and flicked it at her. “Sorry. I’m an honest skargill and I don’t care for opportunists.”

  “I’m not one of those,” said Jenny helpfully, “but a dictator.”

  “Bah! You tried to cheat me!”

  Jenny narrowed her eyes. “What do you mean?”

  The skargill sighed. “Are you trying to mock me, young lady? You paid in pounds instead of euros! I didn’t notice until after you had gone. We stopped dealing in pounds years ago, down here.”

  “How was I supposed to know that?” protested Jenny.

  The skargill shrugged. “Let the buyer beware.”

  “Well, anyway,” said Jenny reasonably, “the pound is stronger than the euro and worth more. The last time I checked, the exchange rate was something like €1.198 for every £1. So in fact I paid more for the year than I should have and you owe me money!”

  The skargill shook his head. “That might have been the rate a few months ago, but since this country has been a dictatorship the value of the pound has dropped relative to other currencies, especially the euro. Dictatorships aren’t good for the economy, you see.”

  Jenny was alarmed. “What’s the current exchange rate?”

  The skargill picked up his newspaper and scanned the financial pages. Then he pursed his lips. “One euro is equal to just under £700. Because you short-changed me, the contract became void, in other words the year 2016 no longer belongs to you. It has returned to me and I intend to make it part of a rollover offer with 2017. So I’m closed for business until the first day of January. Goodbye.”

  Jenny was frantic. “Wait! I have access to plenty of funds now. I can make up the deficit easily. Wait here for me and I’ll fetch the missing cash. I’ll give you as much money as you ask for and more!”

  The skargill gritted his teeth and clenched his fists at this offer. His sense of honour was clearly offended.

  “What’s the matter?” asked Jenny.

  “Young lady!” he roared. “I told you before: I’m an honest skargill. I have a sense of pride in my work. I care more about a job well done than about money. I must refuse your offer and bid you farewell. If you refuse to leave this cavern I’ll summon guards to throw you out.” He folded his four arms and jutted his chin at an angle, but Jenny didn’t go yet. “Some of those guards have tentacles!” he added.

  Jenny decided to return to the upper world, but she was very upset and she dragged her feet. When Gran and the Queen had hauled her back to the secret room, she told them the bad news.

  “Oh dear,” said the Queen. “It seems I backed the wrong horse.”

  Jenny shook with rage. “I’m not a horse!”

  Gran said, “It’s too late to punish the Queen for that insult. The Middle Classes are already outside the Houses of Parliament and they are trying to break the door down. The militia were rubbish at defending you and most of them are dead. The streets are slippery with blood. And guts. And other slimy things. Yuck! We ought to decide what to do now. Shall we make a last stand or shall we surrender?”

  Despite what she had said earlier about never surrendering, Jenny felt too tired to continue the struggle. “I suppose we should give up.” With tears in her eyes she left the room and began climbing the stairs back to the surface level. Somehow she had snatched defeat from the jaws of victory, but she didn’t remember seeing any jaws. Maybe it was just a metaphor. She was too miserable to care.

  The army of the Middle Classes entered the Houses of Parliament and went in search of valuable paintings and decanters of brandy to loot and take home as spoils of war – souvenirs, Gran called them. Jenny and Gran were arrested. The Queen was allowed to return to Buckingham Palace in shame. Nobody enjoys arresting Queens.

  A quick trial was held and Gran whispered to Jenny that this was a ‘kangaroo court’ but Jenny didn’t see any kangaroos and the judge looked more like an accountant than a marsupial with a pocket in his stomach. It took hours before a verdict was delivered.

  Mr Zosimus was found guilty of war crimes, and also of making life more difficult than it already was, in other words of being a nuisance, and it was agreed to execute him by hanging, the sentence to be carried out immediately. The driver, Tubbs, was found guilty of being a collaborator and sentenced to work as a galley slave for the rest of his life.

  Gran was too old to merit the death sentence or the galleys, and Jenny was too young, so they were merely exiled.

  They were forced to return to Carrington…

  They were escorted to a train that left Victoria Station and headed southwest. During the entire journey, Jenny didn’t feel like speaking. The train moved very slowly, even more slowly than it normally did, and finally she could keep silent no longer.

  “Why is it moving so slowly?” she asked.

  Gran grinned. “Because of the recent war. During wartime, things like fuel and sugar are in short supply and are rationed. When I was your age, trains ran on sugar instead of coal, but that was mostly because they were pulled by horses. I once travelled to Scotland on a train pulled by giraffes but they fell over in a strong wind.”

  Jenny nodded. “Thanks. I’m always grateful for your wisdom.”

  “No problem, dude,” said Gran.

  “What do you think Mum and Dad will say?”

  Gran considered this question very carefully. “I imagine they will be furious, but I’m sure they’ll get over it eventually. Just smile sweetly at them and try to play them off against each other.”

  “How can I do that?” Jenny wondered.

  “Read Machiavelli and you’ll learn how,” winked Gran.

  The afternoon crawled past and the sun went down. It was midnight before the train pulled into Carrington station. Gran and Jenny got off and began walking back to the house. It was cool and the stars were bright above them. Somewhere an owl hooted.

  “With luck they’ll be in bed and we can sneak in,” said Jenny, “without them knowing that we’re back.”

  Gran shook her head. They were approaching the house and they saw that Mum, Dad and Chairman Meow were waiting for them on the lawn. Even Boris the neighbour was leaning over his garden fence. There was no way to escape a telling off!

  But just before they went to face the music, Gran halted Jenny by tugging on her elbow. “Don’t look so glum, Jenny! Don’t you know that all that happened to us was just a dry run? A practice for the real thing, for a much bigger and better prize!”

  “What do you mean?” asked Jenny.

  Gran pointed up at the sky. “The stars, Jenny, the stars! Why conquer one little country when we can rule the cosmos? There are millions of planets out there, billions of them, all waiting for a strong leader to come and take over and squeeze them dry!”

  Then she taught Jenny a new gesture. She reached up with her long arm and pretended to grasp the twinkling constellations in her fist, pulling them down to the level of her face, as if she would eat them. She repeated the action many times. Uncertainly at first, but with mounting enthusiasm, Jenny copied her. Then they both opened their mouths very wide and laughed as hard as they could.

  Genghis Kan’t

  Jenny was still in disgrace six weeks later and she wasn’t even allowed to visi
t Gran on her own. It was utterly tedious. Mum fed her, washed her clothes and spoke to her infrequently. Dad did less than that. Couldn’t she prosecute them both for overreacting?

  But it turned out that overreacting wasn’t actually a crime and most of the neighbours held the incredible view that Jenny wasn’t being punished enough for what she had done. It was so unfair! At least Chairman Meow remained loyal, purring when stroked.

  So bored was Jenny by living in these conditions that she managed to read the author that Gran had kept recommending to her, the dead fellow called Machiavelli. Although his books weren’t exciting, they did appear to be full of useful, if unoriginal, ideas.

  “But he was only a theorist,” she said to herself.

  The closed book seemed to throb.

  “Just like Gran told me, he says it’s better for a ruler to be feared than loved. But the major problem I had when I controlled this country,” she added with a thoughtful frown, “is that I wasn’t feared by everyone. With hindsight, my regime was too lenient.”

  Chairman Meow rubbed his big fluffy head against her bare leg, as if to agree with her analysis. Jenny sighed.

  “The next time I achieve power, I’ll make you chief advisor,” she said to him, then she remembered that Gran ought to be given that role again. And yet, a cat’s perspective might be more fresh and original than that of any human being, especially an old one.

  “No,” she finally decided, “the job belongs to Gran. Tell you what, I’ll put you in charge of public relations…”

  Chairman Meow jumped onto her lap and purred.

  Was it acceptable for a dictator to give a cat such responsibility? Why not! Many of her Fascbook friends, Adolf in particular, were very fond of animals and always had the highest praise for their abilities. Caligula had even made his own horse into a senator.

  The simple fact of the matter was that those who had remained loyal deserved a reward and Jenny vowed to give Chairman Meow one when she regained power. But would she ever regain it? She had been banned from going back into politics and she wasn’t even allowed to keep more than 10 pounds or run her own business. These restrictions were there to ensure she remained a harmless girl.

  The sun had set. It was twilight. She crept out of her bedroom, down the stairs and slipped into the garden.

  She wasn’t permitted to leave the house alone.

  She liked the garden in the darkness. She enjoyed looking up at stars and repeating the gesture Gran had showed her, grasping those twinkling lights with her fist and pretending to stuff them into her mouth. But she never practised the laugh that went with the action. She didn’t want Mum or Dad alerted to her presence out here.

  She looked back at the house and saw that Dad was in the attic again, still working on his matchstick model of Mum. So where was Mum? She heard a laugh from next door. Ah, yes!

  Mum was with Boris, the vegan. After the Civil War ended, they had resumed their affair. Jenny crouched.

  There was a hole in the fence and she peered through.

  The window of an upstairs room was open and Mum’s muffled voice floated out of it. “Thanks for that. Most gratifying not only in terms of duration but also method. Goodnight!”

  What were they talking about? It didn’t matter…

  “Until next time,” answered Boris.

  So Mum was coming back and the best way to avoid her would be to remain in the garden until an opportunity arose to sneak back inside and up the stairs undetected. No problem!

  Then Jenny remembered that Mum always watered the plants at dusk with a green watering can and that she was very thorough about making sure every flower had a decent drink. She was certain to catch Jenny out of the house and that would be a disaster!

  Where could Jenny hide? There was nowhere suitable.

  The only thing she could do was climb the fence and drop down into Boris’ garden and wait there until it was safe to return. The fence wasn’t too high and she was agile, so this was easily accomplished. She bent her knees as she landed, then rolled to absorb the impact. The grass here was longer and softer than in her own garden.

  She heard Boris singing through the open window.

  “I wonder if he left the back door unlocked?” she asked herself. It was worth a try, just for the sake of curiosity.

  She tiptoed across the unkempt lawn to the door.

  To her astonishment, it was unlocked!

  She stepped as quietly as possible into his kitchen. She could still hear him singing somewhere upstairs. It was a very strange song with words in a language she didn’t recognise. The best course of action she could take would be to investigate the kitchen cupboards and take all biscuits, cakes and sweets she might find in any of them.

  It was important to move fast, to plunder and flee!

  She didn’t dare switch the light on. She would have to use touch alone to probe the secret depths of each cupboard.

  She opened the nearest one and thrust in her hand, but her fingers felt nothing recognisable as food, only hard and cold shapes, cubes, pyramids and other smooth forms with so many sides she couldn’t guess how many they had. It was disappointing. She hadn’t been allowed to eat any tasty food since her defeat six weeks earlier…

  Just vegetables, fruit and other healthy things.

  The singing of Boris continued where it was, so she knew she was safe for the time being. She rummaged more.

  To her horror, the light suddenly snapped on!

  She turned and blinked and gasped.

  What stood in the entrance to the kitchen wasn’t a man.

  At least, no normal kind of man!

  It was purple and scaly and had five eyes. In one tentacle it gripped a mask and this mask was the face of Boris. But still his voice sang above them, far away in an upstairs room. Then Jenny noticed that a tube as thin as a string hung down from the creature’s chin and trailed out of the door. The creature laughed and tugged it hard.

  And the other end of the string jerked into the kitchen. And fixed to its end was a mouth and this mouth was still singing with the voice of Boris. Then the purple creature reeled it in and positioned it over a blank space in the lower half of its face. And it said:

  “Good evening, Jenny! So my secret is out at last!”

  Mum and Dad sat Jenny at the breakfast table the following morning and smiled at her in a way that was similar to how they used to smile at her a long time ago, before the bloodshed.

  Jenny accepted the cake that was presented to her and she attacked it with a knife and fork. Strawberry jam spurted, but not as far as the wall. Dad grimaced but Mum smiled tolerantly. Sunbeams slanted through the window and buttered the tablecloth.

  “Well,” said Mum, “today’s the big day.”

  “The big day for what?” asked Jenny with a full mouth.

  “Your punishment is over,” said Dad.

  Jenny almost choked in surprise. “Really? I thought—”

  Mum patted her on the head.

  “Yes, yes, I know we said it would be indefinite, but we’ve had some professional advice that has made us change our minds. Actually, a letter arrived this morning that warned us of the detrimental effects that being too harsh might have on your sanity.”

  “A letter?” questioned Jenny, slurping lemonade.

  “From a famous psychologist…”

  “May I see this letter for myself?” asked Jenny.

  Mum and Dad exchanged glances.

  “Very well,” said Mum.

  “Here it is,” added Dad, waving an envelope.

  Jenny took it, opened it slowly and read it aloud. “Jenny Khan must be allowed full freedom immediately. This is my professional judgment and I am the best psychologist in the world. I cured the Queen of some phobia or other only last week, so I know what I am talking about. If you disobey my advice, Jenny will certainly go mad from the strain and might literally explode. This has happened before.”

  “Just see who it’s signed by!” blurted Mum.

&
nbsp; Jenny frowned at the signature. “Sir Doctor Professor Narg, Ph.D. He does sound very important, I agree.”

  “We want to do the right thing,” said Dad.

  “You’re much too young to go exploding,” added Mum.

  “They might prosecute us if you did.”

  “And that would look bad…”

  “Narg?” wondered Jenny to herself. “That name is familiar, but why? I just wish I could ask Gran about it.”

  Then it occurred to her that she could. She was free!

  “I’m glad you’ve seen sense,” she said.

  She finished her cake with great deliberation. Then she drank a second glass of lemonade, wiped her lips with her sleeve and left the table. In the hallway, on the bannister, was draped her coat. She put it on and went out and Mum and Dad didn’t shout at her to be home early, in fact they didn’t say a single word, so she kept walking.

  The house of Mr Zosimus on the other side of the street was a boarded up ruin. As she glanced at it, Jenny felt a pang of nostalgia for the good times when she had launched a coup with his help. What had happened to the other alkies of Alchemists Anonymous?

  Thinking too much about former glories makes a bittersweet feeling in the heart and Jenny carried this emotion into her Gran’s house. Gran was delighted to see her and moved her body in a peculiar way, swaying from side to side and kicking her feet high.

  “Is that a traditional dance?” asked Jenny.

  “Yes, but one I invented just now. When I was a little girl we were too poor to afford proper traditions, so we had to make our own, and the habit is fortunately still with me,” puffed Gran.

  “It looks like hard work and tough on the knees.”

  “That’s right, Jenny my dear, but it does express my joy that my latest scheme worked and they set you free!”

  “Your latest scheme?” frowned Jenny.

  Gran stopped dancing and nodded. “I’ve been thinking of ways to get you out of that house for ages, ever since we lost the war and came back to Carrington. I tried kidnapping you.”

  “I don’t remember that incident!” objected Jenny.