angry face. A new highway through London was being planned, and the Provost of Notting Hill refused to sell the land necessary for a right of way. Soon other provosts came in to second Mr. Buck’s complaint. They complained that the Provost of Notting Hill was taking his office much too seriously; the offer for the land was more than fair, and Notting Hill was little more than a slum anyway. In a puckish mood, the king upheld the independence of Notting Hill. He was interested to hear that the stubborn provost was Adam Wayne, once a nine-year-old boy with a wooden sword.

The difficulty arose from the fact that young Wayne had never been out of London, and he thought Notting Hill the most beautiful place in the world. Imbued with chivalric ideals, he had no intention of allowing a modern highway to run through his beloved narrow streets. To get help in his fight to preserve his domain, he visited the merchants in his territory. He found them apathetic to their peril. They were interested only in making money.

The one kindred spirit he found was Mr. Turnbull, who kept a toy shop. Mr. Turnbull had a collection of lead soldiers and a brick model of Notting Hill. Wayne sat down with the enthusiastic toy dealer to plan the defense of Notting Hill. Cooperation was easier to get because Wayne promised to make Turnbull a high officer in the army.

Mr. Buck calculated that Notting Hill could muster only two hundred defenders at best. If he could lead five or six hundred men against them, it was mathematically certain that the Notting Hill stronghold could be taken and the highway would go through. At dusk, he marched his men against the district, expecting an easy conquest. Wayne, however, had shut off the gas and plunged the streets into darkness. The cunning defenders of Notting Hill then fell on the attackers with halberds and swords.

After this defeat, the other provosts combined a larger force and in broad daylight attacked again. This time they could find no opposition. While they were searching everywhere for the small Notting Hill forces, Wayne again used superior strategy. He gave a half crown to all the boys he could find and ordered the urchins to hire hansom cabs and have the drivers come to the heart of Notting Hill. Then Wayne kept the horses and used the carriages to construct a barricade around the center of his district. Amply provisioned, the defenders prepared to sit out a siege.

As more attackers came to join battle, it looked at last as if Notting Hill must fall. Once again, Wayne was equal to the occasion. He sent out word that if the besiegers did not withdraw at once, he would open the reservoir and flood the narrow streets.

The men from the other districts sullenly acknowledged their defeat for the present time. Again, they prepared for a fresh attack. At last, all London was ready. With banners flying and with axes and halberds held high, the soldiers closed in on Notting Hill. Wayne knew his defeat was at hand. Admiring the resurgence of local pride, King Auberon went into the thick of things as a reporter. He was knocked down and left for dead on the ground. Wayne also fell mortally wounded; thus Notting Hill was taken.

Afterward, as disembodied voices, Auberon and Wayne compared notes. The king had brought laughter to London, and Wayne had brought love. They were content.

Walking to work on a wintry day in 1984, powerful bureaucrat James Barker, idler Wilfred Lambert, and prankster Auberon Quin meet the exiled president of Nicaragua, a country that has been swallowed up by more powerful nations. Despite the Nicaraguan’s argument that imperialists annihilate the customs of the conquered, Barker defends imperialism, insisting on the superiority of English civilization, which has evolved from democracy to despotism. He explains that the country needs neither a parliament nor a king; the latter, whose duty is simply to sign papers, is now chosen through a rotation system. The Nicaraguan, appalled by Barker’s words, dies three days later. Quin, meanwhile, is stirred by the Nicaraguan’s patriotism.

Quin, to Barker’s horror, is named king. Unlike Barker, he realizes that London’s people are sunk in a deadening, joyless routine. He mingles among common people to determine their needs. A child named Adam Wayne attacks him with a toy sword, and Quin, amused by this childish imitation of knighthood, decides, as a joke, to revive medievalism. He issues a Great Proclamation of the Charter of Free Cities. Suburbs become cities, each with a city wall, a guard, banners, official colors, and coats of arms. Their provosts are selected by a rotation system. Quin happily assigns the cities their official colors, garb, guards, heralds, and trumpeters.

The selected provosts, who include Barker and Red Buck, conspire to create, through bribery, purchase, and bullying, a road that will destroy five old stores on Pump Street in Notting Hill. Ten years later, negotiations for the road encounter an obstacle in Adam Wayne, who has become the provost of Notting Hill. Objecting to the destruction of the shops, he vows to preserve his city. The other provosts appeal to the king. Barker regards Wayne as a madman, since any sane man would accept the provosts’ financial offers. Having tried unsuccessfully to convince the king to force sale of the Notting Hill property or to have Wayne certified as insane, the provosts prepare for war. Quin notes that the provosts, obsessed with money, power, and respectability, are as mad as Wayne, but Quin is stunned that his joke has inspired Wayne’s passion and patriotism. He sadly expects Wayne to lose the war.

Wayne finds it difficult to inspire others to his cause. Notting Hill’s merchants conduct their transactions without interest or joy; Wayne cannot break through their torpor, until he reaches Mr. Turnbull. Turnbull is the proprietor of a toy or curiosity shop, a collector of toy soldiers, and a student of military history. While Buck is assuring the others on his side that their victory is certain—because battle, like everything else, is a matter of numbers—Turnbull becomes Wayne’s military strategist. From their Pump Street headquarters, Turnbull sends forty London boys for hansom cab rides. The boys bring the cabs to Turnbull; the horses, once properly fed, become cavalry horses, the cabs become barricades, and their drivers, soldiers.

Thanks to Turnbull’s genius, Wayne’s army defeats a far larger force. Still convinced that greater numbers inevitably win, Buck insists that the battle resume at night under the illumination of gaslights. Wayne’s forces cut off the gas, leaving their enemies to fight one another in the dark. Wayne’s opponents regroup. With an enormous army, they are certain of victory, until Wayne announces his capture of a water tower. Unless his enemies surrender, he will release the water and they will drown. His victory is complete.

Twenty years later, Notting Hill’s council has become imperialistic, and Wayne anticipates their inevitable defeat because their cause is unjust. Quin and Wayne survive. Quin admits he began the whole thing as a joke. Wayne explains that they need each other: Quin needs Wayne’s seriousness, and Wayne needs Quin’s humor. They are, Wayne says, two halves of the same brain. They go off together.