The King of the Land of Flopdoodle

By Peter Calvert

The rather old fashioned kingdom of Flopdoodle exists in a world which in some respects is vaguely like ours decades or even centuries ago, but in others is oddly different. When its young King decides to take a safari holiday, it turns out to be rather more challenging than he had expected. But this turns out to be only the start of a series of exciting and often comic episodes. For, when he gets back home, he finds that, while he has been away, his country has been plunged into a major crisis on a totally absurd pretext. It is not long before he also realizes that he faces a personal threat to his life from a mysterious and sinister conspirator, who will stop at nothing to get rid of him.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Peter Calvert
• Release date: Apr 15, 2012
• ISBN: 9781476073811

Peter Calvert

Peter Calvert was born in Northern Ireland in 1936 and grew up there. In 1948, on the first day of the school holidays, it was raining, so he sat down at his father's old typewriter and began to write The King of the Land of Flopdoodle. It took a long time, as every time he made a mistake he tore the page up and started again. When the story was finished, in 1950, he began a sequel, which eventually became Revolution in Flopdoodle and The Flopdudlian 'Forty-Five'. Peter Calvert is author or joint author of more than thirty books. He was Professor of Comparative and International Politics at the University of Southampton from 1984 until his retirement in 2002. He was educated at Campbell College, Belfast, and Queens' College, Cambridge. He then worked for a year as a Teaching Fellow at the University of Michigan, before returning to Cambridge to study for his doctorate. In 1964 he joined the newly founded department of Politics at Southampton. He later held visiting appointments at the University of California, Santa Barbara, Harvard University, Birkbeck College, London, and the University of Portsmouth. He has written and published extensively on Comparative and International Politics, especially that of Latin America and the USA, as well as on aspects of the theory of Comparative Politics, in particular revolution, class and development. His new history of modern Mexico focuses on the story of the years since 1910, setting it in the context of the nation's past.

Book preview

The King of the Land of Flopdoodle

By Peter Calvert

Smashwords Edition

Copyright 2012 Peter Calvert

Published by Owlwood Books

The moral right of the author has been asserted

Smashwords Edition, License Notes

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you are reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your own use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

Cover design by Malcolm C. McCoull

For Bill Clements

THE KING OFTHE LAND OF FLOPDOODLE

Chapter 1

His Majesty was simmering happily in his bath. It was the biggest bath in Flopdoodle, and it was truly enormous. Although it was scooped out of a single block of marble, there was room in it for at least four people and two dogs. And it had ten taps. All the others had only two.

It had a hot water tap, a cold water tap, a hot drinking-water tap, a cold drinking-water tap, a hot shower tap, a cold shower tap, a hot milk tap, a cold milk tap, and taps for hot coffee and iced tea.

His Majesty had the hot shower tap turned on, while lying in hot drinking-water - and drinking it too! He had had the drinking-water taps put in specially, for his mother had told him not to drink bathwater. At last he yawned, stretched, got up and stepped out on to the Royal Bathmat, which was embroidered with golden fruit. This was supposed to give him an appetite for breakfast, but that was not normally a problem.

Varlet! he called. Fetch me a towel, and clean out the bath.

His valet came in with a Royal Blue towel in one hand and a rag in the other. He had been up rather late the night before as the King had been out at a gala performance at the Opera. As a result he was in such a dither that he handed the rag to His Majesty and started to clean out the bath with the towel. His Majesty was a bit annoyed.

Do wake up! he said sharply. The valet dropped the towel with astonishment. His Majesty picked it up and threw it at him. The rag followed. Bring me another towel. And then I'll have my robes (the scarlet ones today, I think). And my crown. A new towel came and he rubbed himself furiously with it, dropping it on the floor when he had finished. His valet sighed.

Meanwhile the Court were waiting in the Dining Hall. A small gold throne, studded with diamonds and amethysts, was ready for His Majesty at the right hand end of the High Table. Portraits of various of His Majesty's forebears lined the wall. On the throne there were silk cushions. Suddenly there was a trumpet call which broke off in the middle and ended up as a shrill squeak

Silence! His Majesty approaches, announced a Palace Guard. Everyone fell silent (more or less).

In came His Majesty wearing the scarlet robe trimmed with ermine, and a small gold crown. He sat down, took off his crown, and placed it on his side plate. There was the usual rumble as everyone else sat down also. In came a footman, carrying a sparkling, cut-glass egg-cup, heralded by a flourish of trumpets. It was placed in front of His Majesty, while another footman put a golden egg-spoon by his hand. The egg-cup contained a large brown egg, which had a small paper crown on top to show whose egg it was.

His Majesty coughed. The court looked anxious. Then he opened his egg, buttered a piece of toast, and began to eat, and the court murmured away quietly while His Majesty ate his egg, his companions ate buttered toast and the page boys played noughts-and-crosses.

********************

Quangle was the King's faithful adviser, friend, helper and assistant. He was a remote cousin of His Majesty so he lived at the Palace and, just as His Majesty was shouting for his robes, Quangle's luminous gold alarm-clock went off.

He jumped out of bed three times as quickly as usual, and dashed along to his private bathroom. He had a cold shower, which he greatly disliked, but he thought was good for him. He trod heavily on the bottle of shower gel, spilt the talcum powder all over the floor, and nearly tore his towel in two when it caught on the door-handle. He raced back into his bedroom, and while he was dressing in a black-and-white day robe he sat on his coronet and bent it, not however without hurting himself.

Then when he was coming down the marble staircase he slipped, and his descent was more like a laundry bundle than a high-ranking King's adviser.

He entered the dining-hall without further problems, and sat down to the accompaniment of several trumpet calls, played all at once, rather unsuccessfully. His Majesty looked rather irritated that he was late. However Quangle was immediately served with his plate of porridge. He had become rather tired of other foods so he usually began the day with a small plate of porridge -- extra supper-fine it is true, and specially made from the finest oats, but still porridge. When he had finished it a footman brought him a tomato omelette garnished with mushrooms and chives.

Meanwhile His Majesty had finished opening his egg. Pass the salt, please, he said." He was a young man (very young, as he was still in his teens) of simple tastes, and distastes. But it was not as easy as it might seem to pass the salt, since there was only one huge gold salt cellar right in the middle of the long table. So a small silver steam train was needed to bring a portion up to His Majesty's plate, and as usual it was being rather temperamental. So for a few minutes no one spoke, except the page-boys in the corner who were not at the table anyway. They had now given up playing noughts-and-crosses, which is a game of limited appeal, and most of them were playing Battleships instead, while a few were getting out a set of dominoes.

Tell me, said His Majesty, when the salt arrived in a small cloud of steam, what went on in Our Kingdom yesterday? The page boys stopped and listened.

Well, began Quangle, Parliament met and had a debate about government expenditure. As usual they thought the government was spending too much. On the other hand, they all wanted it to spend more on them, so savings, they say, will have to be made. Or not. Some of the members want to cut your entertainment allowance .....

Disgraceful! said His Majesty. Our Majesty is very annoyed.

He hurled a small gold plate at one of his five cooks, who happened to be looking round the kitchen door. If he had caught it, he would have been allowed to keep it. But it missed, hit the mantelshelf, and fell on Quangle, who said Oi! and had another glass of orange juice.

It really is shocking, His Majesty went on. It is the worst part of the job, entertaining all these people. Sometimes it makes my ears burn with embarrassment to listen to all the nonsense they talk.....

Speaking of burning, interrupted Quangle. They say an enormous dragon has been ravaging the Royal Vineyards, devastating parts of Doodledale and crushing the Mayor's kitchen-garden.

His Majesty went purple in the face. The court looked alarmed.

And the Kitchen Cavalry are hunting it with toasting forks, added Quangle hurriedly.

Have they caught it?

Not yet, but they've made a lot of toast.

His Majesty's face went from purple to blue, from blue to red, and then back to its normal colour.

Good, he said. Was there any other news? But before Quangle could answer, there was a loud popping noise, followed by a lot of angry shouting from the courtyard outside. His Majesty jumped, and the page-boys started muttering among themselves.

What on earth was that?

I've no idea, Your Majesty, I'll find out. It shouldn't take long. He turned round and beckoned to the nearest page-boy, who left his dominoes on the sideboard, and walked over to Quangle's side.

Yes sir, he said.Any idea what that noise was?

Yes sir. A man bought all his balloons from the balloon-seller in the front courtyard and then burst them.

Thank you, said Quangle. He repeated the information to His Majesty, and he said How very odd. I wonder what he's up to. I suppose we had better find out.

The man was ushered in by two Palace Guards. He was tall and thin, with glittering black eyes and dark hair. He looked rather nastily at His Majesty and then glared at everyone in the room in turn.

What is your name, asked His Majesty.

K.P. Dartrolioski.

Why are you holding him like that? What is the charge? His Majesty asked the Captain of the Guard, who was personally holding Dartrolioski