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such a large scale. It was an attempt to be undiminished.
    As I reached the Dauphin’s apartments, I heard the Duc de Montausier’s voice along with an all too familiar
swish-crack
as he brought his cane down upon the little boy’s body.
    ‘You’re a fool …
swish-crack
… an imbecile …
swish-crack
… an affront to His Majesty …
swish-crack
… you shame me …
swish-crack
… and yourself …
swish-crack
… stupid as any peasant boy …
swish-crack
…’
    I stood still, shaking, unable to move or speak. In the past two years, the memory of those dreadful years under the Marquis de Maulévrier’s care had slowly faded to a mere bruise. The sound of that
swish-crack
brought it all back to me. I hunched my shoulders and set my jaw. At last, the Duc stopped and came shouldering past me like an angry bull. I waited a while, but the sound of the boy within weeping broke my heart. I gently pushed open the door and went inside.
    The Dauphin was lying on his stomach on his bed, his curls all in disorder, his eyes swollen and red. His lacy shirt was only half-drawn over his shoulder. His thin back was covered in red weals. I took my handkerchief and dampened it in the bowl. ‘You know, my guardian used to beat me too. I don’t know why. Sometimes, he beat me because I spoke, and sometimes because I didn’t.’
    The boy looked towards me but did not speak. I offered him the damp handkerchief but he made no move towards it.
    ‘I never knew what I was meant to do. If I cried, he beat me harder. If I bit my lip and refused to cry, that only made him angrier and the beating would be even worse. Is that the same with you and the Duc?’
    He nodded his head slowly. I knelt beside the bed and passed him the handkerchief again. He took it and pressed it against his eyes.
    ‘I think being locked up in the cellar was worse than being beaten, though. It was so dark I couldn’t see my hand even if I held it right before my eyes. I was afraid of the spiders and the cockroaches too. And I heard squeaking and squealing and scritching and scratching, and thought there must be rats in there as well. Or maybe bats. Once, I saw little red eyes glowing in the darkness. They came closer and closer and closer …’
    The prince’s eyes were fixed on my face. When I paused, he said, ‘What did you do?’
    ‘I took off my boot and threw it at the eyes as hard as I could.’
    He smiled.
    ‘Worse than the spiders and the cockroaches, worse than the rats and the bats, though, was the ghost.’
    ‘A ghost?’
    I nodded. ‘You see, the cellar used to be a cave where a hermit lived. He was said to be so holy that when he was challenged by a heretic to prove his saintliness, he hung his cloak on a sunbeam.’
    The prince sat up on his elbow.
    ‘He lived in that cave for a great many years and eventually died there. His bones were found there, in the very cave where my guardian had locked me up.’
    ‘Weren’t you scared?’
    ‘Terrified. But in the end I thought that a man who was so good he could hang his cloak on a sunbeam wouldn’t hurt me and I’d rather be safe in his cave than where my guardian could get me.’ Then I told the Dauphin about the secret door into fairyland that I had imagined, and how it didn’tmatter how hard my guardian beat me or how cold and dark the cave was, I was always able to pretend I was somewhere else.
    By this time, the Dauphin was sitting up and his eyes were eager. ‘Do you think maybe you could find a door like that here?’ I asked, taking up his comb and tidying his hair for him. ‘It’s not a real door, you understand, just a pretend one. But it might make it easier to bear the Duc, at least until you’re grown up and you can have him banished.’
    ‘Or thrown in a dungeon,’ the Dauphin said. ‘With rats and bats.’
    ‘Don’t waste the secret door on thinking up awful punishments for him,’ I advised. ‘You want it to be a good place, the sort of place you can always go to,