The Truth-Teller's Tale (19 page)

I waited for that clarion blast to sound in my head, the insistent bleat of
liar, liar.
But it did not come. Odd as it must be to him as well as to me, Gregory was speaking the truth.

 

 

The dancing lessons continued on exactly this way for the next full week. Every session would begin with us paired up in some way that suited none of us, and Adele was usually the reason for that; every session ended with the arrangement of partners that seemed to make everyone happiest. I don't know what the men discussed among themselves, but never, not once, did Adele or I make any comments about our dancing partners.

That left Roelynn to rhapsodize about Alexander's multiplicity of charms. He was handsome; he was funny; he was graceful; he was generous. Generous? How did one discover a trait like that on a dance floor? It turned out that she and Alexander had spent some time together, on the odd afternoon here or the cool evening there, as the week unfolded. “And he bought me some flavored ice at the booth that's gone up at the edge of town, and he paid to gain us admittance into the tent where the singers were performing,” she said. “Oh! And he bought me the sweetest doll with a painted porcelain face and hair that I think is
real
hair. I hope it didn't come from a dead person.”

“Generous indeed,” Adele said, predictably amused. “Just how much money do you think a dancing master's apprentice has to waste on pretty girls? Not much, I would think.”

“No,” Roelynn said sunnily. “Which makes me think he is spending it on no one but me.”

It was clear that Roelynn had fallen in love with yet one more ineligible young man. I was in no position to criticize the time she spent with him, however, since I seemed to be committing the same indiscretion myself. Not that I was off dallying with Alexander—oh no. I was spending pleasant hours outside the makeshift ballroom with the dancing master himself.

It seemed strange to me, considering how many hours of his day were booked with lessons, how much free time Gregory managed to find. When I was working in the kitchen, he frequently came in for an informal cup of tea. When I was bringing in wood or weeding the garden, he joined me more often than not and contributed his own strength to the chore. Many times when I had errands to run, he found some excuse to come along, and then he carried my packages home or sometimes—like Alexander—treated me to some sweet offered by the streetside vendors.

I particularly remember one stroll down the main boulevards of Merendon after we had had six days of lessons. The town was not yet as crowded as it would be in the final days before Summermoon, but it was starting to fill up. Jugglers practiced their routines in the green spaces; singers offered up their voices on the street corners; vendors set up carts in any convenient cul-de-sac and sold everything from meat to ale to pastries. The weather was so fine and the collective mood was so good that it seemed as if the festival had already arrived and merely stretched itself out to accommodate a season instead of a day.

I was accosted probably eight different times during the hour we took to pace down one street and up another.

First I was approached by a clutch of young boys, maybe eleven or twelve, who came running up and calling my name. “Eleda! Eleda!” they cried. Children this age never bothered asking tricky questions to discover which twin was which. They just grabbed my fingers and squeezed to see how much power I could put in the return grip, or tossed me a ball to see which hand I instinctively used to catch it. This always satisfied them. They were always right.

“Eleda, he was cheating!”

“I was not!”

“He said his marble knocked mine out of the circle, but it
didn't.
He moved it with his foot.”

Disputes of this nature, I'd found, were always glaringly obvious to me. As soon as their voices sounded, the timbre of the lie jarred against my internal sensors. “Robbie didn't cheat, but Martin did,” I said coolly, causing howls of fury to be directed at Martin. “You'd better take back your original marbles and replay those last few games.”

There were a number of harmless blows rained on the unrepentant Martin, and then the whole group moved off like one migratory swarm. We hadn't gone more than half a block down the street when a woman named Constance hurried out through the door of our finest restaurant.

“Eleda! Wonderful! I was wanting to talk to you. I need to—” She paused and gave me a doubtful look. “That is, is it safe to tell you something in confidence?”

I laughed. “No!”

Constance broke into a smile. “Oh, good. It
is
you. Come inside and tell me what you think of this. I want to start serving it during Summermoon week, and I think it's quite tasty, but you will tell me if it is or not.”

“I'll give my opinion, too,” Gregory volunteered.

She gave him a rather harried smile. She was about my mother's age, though she had grayed earlier, and her face was perpetually flushed from hours spent in the kitchen. “Naturally, I'd like to hear what you think,” she said politely. I didn't think she had the faintest idea who he was.

We followed her through the darkened front room with its carefully set tables and went back into the hot, crowded, extremely aromatic kitchen. “I like the way it smells, anyway,” I said, taking a sniff. Beef and onions and bread. Constance appeared to have made some kind of meat pie that was more sophisticated than the traditional dish.

“Yes, I got the recipe from my sister, who lives in Wodenderry. Here's a small portion for each of you.”

We serve fairly plain fare at the inn, so I don't know much about fancy foods, but I instantly loved the mix of flavors that exploded on my tongue. I could identify wine and a few spices in addition to the main ingredients, and the bread of the crust was rich with butter. “Constance! This is delicious!” I exclaimed.

“Oh, good, you like it.”

“You got this from someone in Wodenderry?” Gregory asked, holding his plate out for another taste. “Not from any household or restaurant I was ever invited to.”

“So you like it, too?”

“I'll come back tonight for a full portion if you're going to practice the recipe again.”

Constance laughed, her pink cheeks even pinker with pleasure. “What do you think I should call it—the Royal Dish? The Perfect Pie? Can I tell everyone you gave it your approval?”

We discussed possible names for the new menu item, I gave permission to use my name, and Gregory and I were on our way again.

“This is proving to be even more enjoyable than I thought it would,” he said, amused. “Though I find myself wondering how the promenade down the street would differ if I was with your sister instead of you.”

I laughed. “Oh, people would be creeping up from the sides of buildings, having waited in the shadows for her to walk by. And then they would tug surreptitiously on her sleeve, and whisper something in her ear, and she would nod and whisper back. Tell them a time and place to meet her, usually, though sometimes she'll go off with them right that very moment if their story is desperate and doesn't take much time to tell.”

“And she never repeats the tales?”

“Never a word.”

“That's a hard job,” he commented.

I grimaced. “I couldn't do it.”

We stopped next at the dressmaker's shop. I was sure Gregory would wait for me outside, because it wasn't the sort of place a man usually likes to enter, but he stepped right through the door behind me. When I gave him a look of surprise, he grinned.

“I thought I might order a new waistcoat,” he said. It was a lie, I could tell, but a harmless one. I shrugged.

I was here to pick up the frocks my mother, Adele, and I had ordered for Summermoon. Even though Summermoon was a working holiday for us, it was a holiday nonetheless, and my mother firmly believed that everyone deserved new clothing on such occasions. Every year for as long as I could remember, all three of us had gotten new wool or velvet gowns at Wintermoon, and cotton and linen dresses at Summermoon. My father, less interested in fashion, consented to a new vest or jacket about once every five years. This was not one of those years.

I had barely stepped three feet inside the door when Eileen Dawson and her mother came up to me. Eileen was a much more sober girl these days than she'd been a few years ago, but in some ways kinder. At any rate, she was always friendlier to my sister and me than she had been back when we were in school together. I suppose personal tragedy often has that effect—it makes you think more carefully about the way you treat other people. Or it makes you hate everyone else more than you ever thought possible. One of the two.

“Eleda,” she said. “Or is it Adele?”

“Eleda,” I answered, but the shopkeeper called to us from across the room.

“That's not the right question to ask!” Lissette said. “You must ask her if she would keep your secret!”

Eileen looked at me, her eyebrows arched over her beautiful face. I sighed. How much easier my life would have been if Adele had not been so capricious. “No,” I said. “I wouldn't.”

“Eleda,” Eileen said, satisfied. “What do you think of this material? My mother wants to buy it for my wedding dress.”

She extended her hands, buried in a length of cool, watered silk. Eileen was even fairer than I was, with extraordinarily blonde hair and pale, pale skin. Her eyes were a blue so light that at times they seemed colorless. She was so delicate that she possessed an ephemeral quality; you could imagine her vanishing into moonlight even as you watched.

“Hold it up to your face,” I said, though I didn't need to. I already thought it was a dreadful fabric for her, and the juxtaposition of skin and cloth only confirmed my impressions. I shook my head. “I think it makes you look like a ghost,” I said. “You need a fabric with a rosier tone to it.”

Her mother was instantly antagonized. “It's the most expensive silk in the shop!” she exclaimed. “Eileen deserves the best!”

“Eileen deserves to look her best, too,” I said quietly. “But buy what you want.”

Eileen instantly laid aside the fabric and turned to Lissette. “I don't like it, either,” she said. “Let's look at that figured silk again.”

The Dawsons moved up to the front of the store to confer with Lissette. Gregory sidled my way. “And now I'm almost afraid to ask what you think of this green satin,” he said in an undervoice. “I'm certain you'll say it's too showy for Summermoon. Should I opt for blue instead?”

I glanced at the bolts he indicated and smothered a laugh. They were both ghastly, the kind of cheap material you might use to line a cloak or a portmanteau, but not something most people would consider wearing. While his clothes were a touch outmoded, it was obvious they had once been of the highest pitch of fashion. I knew he was teasing me. “Why don't you buy some of each?” I said warmly. “Then you'll have a spare to wear if you spill something on one.”

He grinned, but before he could answer, another young girl came out from the back room where I had once hidden while Roelynn and her father brangled. She was a year or two younger than I was, awkward and gangly, but her father was a wealthy Merendon landowner, and I knew she had been invited to Karro's ball. I couldn't remember her name, but I more or less liked her. She wore now a wide smile and a hopeful expression as she paraded up to me in a gown so new that it still had pins holding some of the seams together.

“It's Eleda, right? That's what you told Eileen?” she asked. I nodded in confirmation, and she pressed on. “What do you think of my dress? Isn't it beautiful?”

It was, in fact, hideous. The cut was wrong for her, accentuating her bony shoulders and long, skinny arms, and the broad sash at the waist ended in a bow over her backside that did not enhance her body in the slightest. Her mother came trailing out behind her and cast me a rather frightened look. I read into that expression that she had tried to talk her daughter into something that would suit her better, but that her daughter had insisted on this cut, this color, and would be heartbroken now if anyone told her she had chosen wrongly. Plus, of course, the dress was nearly finished; there would be a great deal of expense involved if it was deemed improper now.

“What beautiful fabric,” I said in an admiring voice, reaching out a hand to touch one of the ruched shoulders. It was a gorgeous fuchsia that went well with her rich coloring. “And look what highlights it brings out in your hair! I can tell you are very happy with this dress.”

She laughed excitedly and spun around. Her mother mouthed the words “Thank you” at me. The girl said, “I'll be the belle of Mr. Karro's ball, don't you think?”

There was not a chance of that. Scores of young ladies would be at the ball, most of them more beautiful and sophisticated than this country nobody, but I had learned how to speak the truth with a modicum of tact. “I think there will be a lot of belles at this particular ball,” I said with a laugh. “But I'm sure plenty of young men will notice you.”

“It's my first ball,” she said.

“I hope it's wonderful,” I replied.

I managed to pick up my purchases and get out of the shop before one more person approached and asked for an opinion. “Nicely done,” Gregory murmured as he took the bundles from my arms. He directed me toward a street vendor selling watery and rather warm lemonade. But the day was hot and I was thirsty and I was glad for the treat. Clearly in no hurry, Gregory then plopped down on a nearby bench, the parcels piled up next to him, so I perforce took a seat as well.

For a moment, we sipped our drinks in silence. Then he said, “I can't help but notice that your friend Roelynn has taken rather a liking to my young assistant. What do you think of that?”