Grass

“I hope this will not cause you too much trouble,” the older of the two said in a steely voice which only seemed apologetic.

“No trouble at all, except one,” said Roald with an engaging smile. “And that’s knowing what the proper title is for you and the other gentleman. I know you’re some sort of religious folk, and I wouldn’t want to go astray with the lingo.”

The delicate gentleman nodded. “We are Old Catholics. I’m Father Sandoval, and my companion is Father James. Father James’ mother is sister to His Excellency, Roderigo Yrarier. We are usually called Father, if that wouldn’t offend you.” And if it would, his voice said, say it anyhow.

“I don’t stay in business being easily offended,” Roald assuredcthem. “If you wanted me to call you uncle. I’d do that, too. I might balk at aunt, but uncle I could manage ”

This brought a chuckle from the younger priest, and Roald nodded at him cheerfully as he left.

The smallest house was the most remote and the last on his list. It was there, in the empty summer quarter, that he met with Eugenie. He had not been with her for long before he knew everything about her. Everything, he thought to himself, that he needed to know.

“Pink,” she said. “Soft pink. And rose shades, all warm, like the inside of a flower. I miss flowers. Curtains to shut out the night and the sight of that awful grass. Soft curtains that drape and blow in the wind. Wide couches with pillows.” She moved her hands and her lips, sketching what she wanted on the compliant air, and he saw what she saw, a nest feathered in ivory and rose, sweet-scented as — so fable had it — a Terran morning. She was wearing a silky gown that flowed behind her on the air, fluttering with her movement as though she were accompanied by soft winds. Her hair was light brown, the great wealth of it piled high on her head with tiny curls escaping at her brow and the nape of her neck. Her eyes were an ageless blue, i

Roald Few sighed, silently, knowing all about it. This lady looked like the little porcelain woman his wife kept on the table at home. Poor Lady Westriding. She had interested him enormously, and now he pitied her as well. What was it had gone wrong there? he wondered. So many things could happen. He would tell Ki

“Rose pink,” he said to Eugenie as he noted it down. “And lots of soft cushions.”

When Roald returned home, his wife, Ki

Currently none of the children were fighting with their wives or husbands and none of the grandkids were in residence, so he and Ki

“I made goose with cabbage.” Ki

Roald licked his lips. Spring goose with cabbage was one of his favorite dishes, and Ki

“So, what good thing is going on?” he asked her.

“Marthamay’s pregnant.”

“Well, isn’t that wonderful! There for a bit she was worried.”

“She wasn’t really. It was just her sisters teasing her when the time went by after she and Alverd married and nothing happened.”

“Alverd getting ready to do a little digging, is he?”

“She says yes.” Ki

He told her, about the ambassador and about Marjorie and the other lady in her soon-to-be-pink nest.

“Ah,” said Ki

“So I thought,” he agreed. “His wife’s a lovely lady, but cool. Take a little wooing, that one.”

“And him, I suppose he’s too hot and impatient for that.”

Roald chewed as he thought. Yes. As usual, Ki

Not liking that idea, Roald changed the subject. “What does Marthamay think they’ll name the baby?”

Marjorie’s language instructor arrived two days later. He introduced himself as Persun Pollut. He sat beside her in what would become Marjorie’s study, just inside a large window warmed by an orange sun, while craftsmen came and went with crates and cartons, tools and ladders in the hall just outside. Watching the workers, Marjorie spoke of the strangeness of needing both winter quarters and summer quarters separate from one another.

“Winter is long,” he admitted, drooping his eyebrows at her. “It is so long we grow tired of looking at one another,” Persun had exceptionally long and sinuous eyebrows. He was young, though not callow; supple, though not yielding; determined, though not rigid. Marjorie felt Roald Few had selected well, particularly as Persun had shown good sense in not advertising the purpose of his presence. He had taken a room in the nearby village and a

“Winter is so long that one tires of thinking of it,” he said. “We grow tired of breathing the air which is not only cold but hostile to us. We go under the ground, like the Hippae, and wait for spring. Sometimes we wish we could sleep like them.”

“What on earth do you all do with yourselves?” Marjorie asked, thinking once more of what they would do with the horses during wintertime. If they were still on Grass. Anthony kept saying the Yrariers would be on their way home by then, but Anthony didn’t know why they had come.

“In Commons we visit and have games and do our work, and have winter festivals of drama and poetry writing and things of that sort. We go visit the animals in the barns. We have an orchestra. People sing and dance and train animals to do tricks. We have a winter university where most of us learn things we would never learn if it weren’t for winter. Sometimes we bring professors in from Semling for the cold season. We’re better educated than the bons, you’ll find, though we don’t let them know that. There are so many tu