Page 59 - The Grotesque Children's Book

setting of the sun, you must select one of the eight corners of my palace, hoist
it high above your head, and then stipulate in your most loudest and proudest
voice your best guess for my method of turning things into gold. As I've
promised your father, if you manage to guess, you'll be free, and I'll have to
find some other way to keep my palace from collapsing. So! Come! Who shall
be first?”

It was decided that the children would make their attempts beginning
with the eldest who, it turned out, was tall, stately and somber; practically
already a pillar even without the aid of any demonic transformation. Her name
was Licia.

Diavolo d'Oro made a sly, slow come-hither gesture with his shoulders,
and led the girl into the gold palace which interior, apparently, didn't need
pillars to hold it up; very strange that the outside was collapsed in a heap but
the inside was held sturdily, it makes you suspicious about the need for
caryatids, but such are the workings of demons. He led her down, down, a
long, long gold corridor with many small rooms leading off to the left and to the
right. The rooms appeared to be offices of some sort. About halfway down the
corridor, Diavolo d'Oro stopped and gestured for Licia to enter the room on
their left.

“Here's the Transmutation Room I told you about, where I do the actual
changing of objects into gold. Come in, look your fill! Try to notice everything.
Can you guess the room's secret? Tapestries, sculptures, paintings?”

Licia the Eldest entered the room. She saw it was octagonal in shape,
just like the palace itself; an octagon within an octagon. In this room were
many objects and curiosities, some gold, some not yet gold; some ordinary
objects such as shoes and combs, or candles or books, or thimbles or bells;
some extraordinary objects such as mechanical dolls or skeletons of animals
and fish. There were shelves and cabinets, tapestries, sculptures and

59