fast and snaky way.
This made Mary feel a little lonely for the rest of the afternoon, until she was eating her own dinner that evening – which was vegetable stew and then more vegetable stew – and noticed that the glow of two red eyes was blinking out from under her napkin.
‘Oh,’ she said out loud and then, because her mother and father had turned to look at her, she had to continue. ‘What lovely stew. Yes. Oh. What lovely stew.’ She did this because she realised that her parents might well wave their arms about and scream a lot if she said out loud, ‘Oh, I have a beautiful snake called Lanmo under my napkin. He has come back to see me again and so maybe he is going to be my friend.’
Lanmo, faster than a silky whisper, slipped into the pocket of her dress and she could feel him moving very slightly in a way that might mean he was giggling. This made her smile and she had to turn her smile into one that looked as if it could be about stews and not snakes.
Later, when Mary was by herself in the bathroom, getting ready for bed, she looked in her pocket, but there was no one there. Lanmo had gone again. She guessed, correctly, that he had done this so she could change into her pyjamas and brush her teeth in private. When she opened her bedroom door, there was the snake, curled on her pillow, tasting the air with his forked tongue and looking at her with his sharp red eyes. They shone in the tiny, dim room, which had no window because it was really a cupboard. He was trying to look domestic. ‘Hello, Mary. I am going to watch over you until you are asleep. I will keep away your nightmares.’
‘But I don’t have nightmares.’
‘You might now – you have a snake on your pillow.’ Lanmo grinned and rippled over so that Mary could get into bed and be snug. Then he lay very flat on top of her covers so that he could look into her eyes. ‘You will always be safe when I am here. Because I am your friend and I will come and visit you many, many times.’
‘Good,’ said Mary into her blankets, because she was very drowsy. She thought that Lanmo’s eyes reminded her of sunsets and somehow this made her very really extremely sleepy.
And the snake watched her until he knew she was dreaming safely and then he told her again, ‘I will visit you many, many times.’ He nodded his head sadly. ‘And then I will visit you one time more.’ He licked the air to be sure that she was happy and he tasted truth and bravery and toothpaste and soap that smelled of flowers and it made him sneeze one short, snake sneeze. ‘Pffs.’ And he could taste that in her dream she was already canoeing down a mighty river that wound between tall jungle trees with a pet lion at her feet. He felt a little jealous that she wasn’t imagining him with her in the canoe.
But then again, the snake was not any kind of pet.
Once Mary was fast asleep, the snake travelled invisibly and quicker than a thought across the city until he was in the basement of a man called Mr Meininger. The basement stretched away for miles in many directions. It was the most magnificent and impressive of all the city’s millionaire caverns and had taken two hundred imported Bolivian miners a year to excavate. It had a lake for swimming, although Mr Meininger couldn’t swim, and it had many ice cream machines, although Mr Meininger didn’t like ice cream. It had wonderful statues and fountains, although Mr Meininger wasn’t especially interested in art or in dancing water. It had an orchard that was supplied with electric light so the apples and plums and peaches planted in it had to grow all the time and could never rest in darkness. They could never feel the little feet of animals, or birds, or insects tickling them, because no living things were allowed in the basement without Mr Meininger’s permission. He had only ever given his permission to the two hundred imported Bolivian miners, the trees, his many servants and the tumblers and comedians he sometimes paid to try to make him smile.
He didn’t smile. He thought it was a foolish waste of effort and almost as stupid as wanting to make someone else smile. He also thought it was a good punishment for the tumblers and comedians if they had to keep on balancing and falling and doing tricks and telling him funny stories and jokes while he stared at them like a giant, solemn frog in a big silk dressing gown. He made them keep on and on until they cried, and if they didn’t cry he refused to pay them.
All this meant that Mr Meininger was both surprised and irritated when he looked up from reading a report on how fast his wealth was growing and saw the face of our friend the snake.
I think we can call him our friend, because we are surely Mary’s friends and her friends must therefore be our friends, as long as they are nice and kind.
‘Ugh,’ said Mr Meininger. (He was too fat to wave his arms about and too dignified to scream.) ‘A snake.’
‘I know,’ said the snake and flickered his tongue and slipped around the sleeve of Mr Meininger’s dressing gown like a gold braid decoration – except with teeth.
‘Ugh,’ said Mr Meininger. ‘A talking snake.’
The snake blinked. ‘I know that, too.’ He angled his head to one side, as if he were studying Mr Meininger very hard indeed. ‘Now, perhaps you could tell me something I don’t know.’
Mr Meininger was used to being surrounded by extremely respectful servants and sad, exhausted trees. When he met people beyond his cavern they were deferential and gave him gifts, because you will always be given gifts if you already have too much. And if he wasn’t bowed to and petted and coddled he would usually go very red in the face and bellow, or go very white in the face and growl that everyone should be fired at once. And everyone would be. This happened even if the people being fired were prime ministers, film stars or kings. Mr Meininger practised his growl sometimes when he was in the bathroom and would look at himself in the mirror to make sure he had perfected his chilling stare. An unauthorised animal in his cavern would usually have been the cause of bellows and stares and all kinds of redundancies. But Mr Meininger couldn’t say a word and it seemed to him that his skin was becoming clammy and too tight.
‘Well . . . ?’ asked the snake and waited politely.
And even though the snake’s voice was like buttered velvet and even though the snake was being very quiet and courteous, Mr Meininger found that he was very frightened of that sleek golden body and that delicate golden head.
‘I have come a long way to meet you,’ said the snake. His tongue tested the air and allowed him to taste Mr Meininger’s cramped, dark thoughts and his shallow, dim heart and his calculating brain. He could also taste fear that was thick as fog. ‘You might at least tell me your name.’
And Mr Meininger couldn’t help but say, ‘Karl Otto Meininger’. If you had been there to hear him you would have noticed he sounded as if he were answering a schoolteacher or filling in a form. Then he blurted out, ‘I am the third wealthiest man in the world.’ He mentioned this because it had always impressed people before, although he already felt that he knew the snake was not people and would not be impressed.
‘No,’ the snake murmured in his sweetest voice. ‘You are only the fourth wealthiest. Ten minutes ago the copper mines of Lembit Quartak made him the third wealthiest.’ The snake eased higher up Karl’s sleeve. (We can call Mr Meininger Karl, now that he has told us his name.) Lanmo’s body came to rest on Karl’s left shoulder and he whispered, ‘And it really doesn’t matter, anyway. It never did.’
Karl swallowed while the gentle breath of the snake pressed against his neck. ‘Please.’ Karl hadn’t said please for years and years – there had been no one he’d thought it was worth saying to.
‘Please what?’ asked the snake and the question made Karl’s skin shiver from head to foot. ‘What would you
