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to his bench even if he couldn’t invite them to his house. Nor would he himself sit down, but stood before them and answered their questions in a steady voice.
    ‘You have lived all your life in Trottle Towers?’ asked Cor.
    ‘Yes.’ A shadow spread for a moment over his face as though he was looking back on a childhood that had been far from happy .
    ‘And you have learnt to work, we can see that. But your schooling?’
    ‘Oh, yes; I go to school. It’s across the park in a different part of London.’
    Very different, he thought. Swalebottle Junior was in a rowdy , s habby street; the building was full of cracks and the teachers were often tired, but it was a good place to be. It was the holidays he minded, not the term.
    The ogre had managed to follow them to the bench with his eye shut, but the Prince’s voice pleased him so much that he now opened it. Cor frowned at him, Gurkie shook her head – they had been so careful not to startle the Prince and invisible ogres are unusual; there is nothing to be done about that. But the boy didn’t seem at all put out by a single blue eye floating halfway up the trunk of the tree.
    ‘Is he . . . or she . . . I don’t want to pry , b ut is he a friend of yours?’
    Hans was introduced and the visitors made up their minds. The Prince was entirely untroubled by magic; it was as though the traditions of the Island were in his blood even if he hadn’t been there since he was three months old. It was time to r eveal themselves and take him back.
    ‘Was that Mrs Trottle to whom you brought a cup of tea?’ asked Cor. ‘Because we have something to say to her.’
    The boy smiled. ‘Oh, goodness, no!’ he said. ‘Mrs Trottle lives upstairs. That was the cook.’
    Cor frowned. He was an old-fashioned man and a bit of a snob and he did not think it absolutely right that a prince should have to take morning tea to the cook.
    But Odge had had enough of talking.
    ‘I’ve brought you something,’ she said in her abrupt, throaty little voice. ‘A present. Something nice.’
    She put the suitcase down on the grass. The words ODGE GRIBBLE – HAG had been painted out. Instead she’d written THIS WAY UP . HANDLE WITH CARE .
    The boy crouched down beside her. He could hear the present breathing through the holes. Something alive, he thought, his eyes alight.
    It was at this moment that, on the first floor of Trottle Towers, someone began to scream.
    All of them were used to the sound of screaming. Odge’s sisters practically never stopped, banshees wailed through the trees of the Island, harpies yowled and the sound of bull seals calling to their mates sometimes seemed to shake the rafters. But this was not that sort of a scream. It was not the healthy scream of someone going about their business; it was a whining, self-pitying black-mailing sort of scream. Odge re-fastened the catch of her suitcase in a hurry; Gurkintrude put her arm round the Prince, and the Eye soared upwards as Hans got to his feet.
    ‘What is it, dear boy?’ asked Gurkie, and put her free hand up to her head as though to protect the beetroot from the dreadful noise.
    ‘Is it someone having an operation?’ said Cornelius. ‘I thought you had anaesthetics?’
    The boy shook his head. ‘No,’ he said. ‘It’s nothing like that. It’s Raymond.’
    A terrible silence fell.
    ‘What do you mean, it’s Raymond?’ asked Cor when he could speak again. ‘Surely you are Raymond Trottle, the supposed son of Mr and Mrs Trottle?’
    The boy shook his head once more. ‘No. Oh, goodness, no! I’m only the kitchen boy. I’m not anybody . My name is Ben.’
    As he spoke, Ben moved away and stood with his back to the visitors. It was over, then. It wasn’t him they’d come to see; he’d been an idiot. When he’d seen them standing there he’d had such a feeling of . . . homecoming, as though at last the years of drudgery were over. It was like that dream he had sometimes – the dream with the sea in it,