Winter came and went. Despite the cold, it has been the happiest time of my life. Strange to say that with youth gone and all the pains of age very much with me, but it is true. Giles is a loving, dear companion, a sweet and kindly friend.
A few days ago I decided I wanted to see Westfaire. I told Giles just enough for him to help me, and we went through the water gate together, floating on pigs’ bladders, for neither of us is strong enough to push through that deep water. Inside it is just as I left it. We climbed slowly up to the tower, me holding the cloak, Giles clutching the boots to keep us from falling asleep. As we climbed, he paused often to catch his breath. He was not this weak when we were searching for Snowdrop. It must be a very recent thing.
Beloved is still there in the tower, still lovely, still sleeping.
“How long?” Giles wanted to know, reaching out to touch her face. “How long will you sleep?”
“You.” Not “she.” Oh, Giles. Giles.
Well, according to Joyeause, she will sleep thirty more years, until kissed by a handsome prince, though, according to Carabosse, that wasn’t the real curse at all. Supposing that both of them are right (and I do not take Aunt Joyeause so lightly as old Carabosse does), at the end of a hundred years, someone may be able to take Beloved out of Westfaire and kiss her awake. If I am to see that event, I must live to be one hundred and sixteen years old. Looking at myself in the glass, I don’t think I’ll make it. Still, if and when that day comes, Beloved will know it was all worth it, being my friend. She’ll have the best of it then.
I wrote her a note. “Beloved, you are Beauty. And Beauty is gone, long ago. Live her life as well as she would have lived it, or even better.”
As I turned toward the stair, I saw my mysterious thing, still sitting upon the chest. It’s a clock, of course. One of Carabosse’s clocks. The hand has moved to half past fifteen. It does not measure hours but centuries. It ends, as the world will end, with the twenty-second. I leaned close and listened to the sound. The faint ticking. The tiny crepitation of time moving past. On the face of the clock is the word “Carabosse,” entwined with the numbered centuries. She cursed me. But she left me this gift. Sometimes I wish it was all she had left me.
It was easier climbing down. When we got back to the lake shore, we were thoroughly chilled through. Such a stupid thing to do at our age!
LATER
Giles is very ill. I know what he has. He has pneumonia. I could get to the twentieth in an instant, I could steal penicillin, I could be back before he knows I am gone. Maybe. I don’t know if I could. I could try!
I told him that. His being sick is all my fault. He would be all right if I hadn’t dragged him through the water and up that tower. He must let me help him.
But he won’t. He shook his head at me, smiling. “I saw you sleeping in that tower, just the way you were. If I die, let me die remembering that, sweet girl. I want you here, not off somewhere with your boots.”
“Giles, we could have years, yet.”
“Don’t want years that badly,” he whispered to me. “I’ve had years. More years alone than I ever wanted. Don’t leave me alone now. I’m tired. It’s enough.”
He went off to sleep.
Oh, God in Heaven, I could not let him go. I wept and screamed and threw myself about, while he went on sleeping, more deeply, more deeply.
It was that gave me the idea. I called Puck and Fenoderee and put on the boots, and we held him while all of us went, holding onto him we went, through the thorns, through the roses, into Westfaire. Oh, I could have used the boots anytime. So foolish. So stupid. I let my love go through that cold water when we could have used the boots. If they would go through time, what were a few thorns!
I put him in Aunt Lav’s bed. I took the boots away. He fell even more deeply asleep. He slept, as all in Westfaire sleep. He will not die. Nothing in Westfaire can die. I know it! That was the curse Carabosse put upon Westfaire. Sleep! Not for a hundred years, but forever! It has to be. It’s the only thing that makes sense of everything that’s happened!
I asked Puck if I was right, and he nodded, shuffling his toes in the dust as though embarrassed. I asked him why, and he said he didn’t know.
26
JUNE 1418,
SOME SAINTS DAY OR OTHER
With Giles gone from me, nothing seems worth it, somehow. Not that we were recent lovers, in a physical sense. All that sort of thing leaves you. You remember it, but your body doesn’t urge you toward it. Your body wants comfort and affection and the sweetness of companionship. We weren’t lonely, not so long as we were together, but now I am. I go to Westfaire often and sit there, talking to him as he sleeps. Sometimes I pretend he answers me.
It seems to me his breathing is easier. Is he healing? While he sleeps? It would be so easy to summon him up, not really him, you understand, but an enchantment of him. But I don’t. I won’t. It wouldn’t be fair to him. It would be like Chinanga, all a dream, my creation, not really him at all. An enchantment Giles would be incapable of surprising me. He who always surprised me.
It was unfair of him to go before me. I believe I will probably live quite some time yet. Despite all the aches and pains, my heart sounds steady and strong and I breathe easily. I may have years yet to get through.
• • •
When I was a child, my legs used to hurt often. Aunt Terror, I think it was she, used to say it was growing pains. I have the same pain now. Perhaps now they are ungrowing pains. Whenever the pain wakes me in the night, I think of going back to Faery where I don’t feel pain.
I called Fenoderee a day or so ago, and he didn’t come. He always came before when I called. What’s going on in Faery?
I need to talk to Carabosse. What’s she going to do with this thing inside me? I would like to see Mama, too, to tell her how sorry I am for what happened to her. Besides, in Faery, I would at least look and feel young.
Remembering the condition I was in when I returned last time, I’ll need to make some provision for staying healthy and clean. Going to Faery will do no good if my human flesh is starved while I’m there. I’ll have to figure something out.
The solution to staying healthy and clean in Faery is to come out of it every now and then, into the mortal world, and eat, bathe, and reclothe myself. I have hired a woman from the nearby village to go each evening to the kitchen of the ruined manor of Wellingford, to set out food and drink, to build a fire, and to heat water over it. Though the rest of the manor is dilapidated, the kitchen is whole and the roof over it is in good repair. The woman’s name is Odile Kent.
Of course, she wants to know why. I have told her it was a promise I had made my husband before he died. A kind of memorial. Service for a ghost. Though the explanation makes no sense, she accepts it. People in this age believe in ghosts, and people in all ages do odd things in memory of loved ones. I told her, also, that the matter was secret, not something to be rumored about the countryside to bring beggars to eat the food she puts out. I called God to witness our contract and bring down fire upon her if she fails me. She looked suitably impressed. My agent in East Sawley will pay her, year on year. My agent in London will check to be sure that he does. Ever since Chinanga, I have put watchers to watch the watchers.
I have also instructed Odile to put a mark on the chimney face at each full of the moon, thirteen marks in a row, starting the next row beneath. In that way I will know how much time has passed. She’s a sensible woman, strong and stout and still quite young. She should last longer than I do. I have already carried a pile of clothing over to the kitchen and stored it in a locked chest together with Mama’s box. Looking through the box, I came upon that last hank of thread. When I see Mama, I must ask her what it is for.
The key to the chest is around my neck on a ribbon. As soon as I have taken care of a few things here, I am ready to go. I have told Odile to stay in readiness, that I will let her know when she is to start.
LATE JUNE
Surprise! Just as I was about to leave
for Faery this very morning, I received a messenger with a letter from King Zot. He says Snow is very pregnant. He says he’s much afraid the father may not be the mad young prince, but he’s making nothing of that, because it may be for the best. The messenger who brought the letter is the putative father of Snow’s baby: that nice young courtier, Vincent, the one who tried so hard to keep his young master in check.
“Well, this is a fine thing,” I said, waving the letter at him so the seals and ribbons flapped. “Why on earth?”
He shrugged, blushing. “I didn’t mean to,” he said weakly. “She’s so lovely. And she has no sense of the fitness of things. And her husband was away, hunting, and I was rather drunk. And she gets prettier and prettier.”
I should have brought her back and locked her up in a monastery. I know I should. “She’s not intelligent, you know.”
“Oh, I know.” He sounded guilty about that, too, as he well might. “One is constantly aware of that. It is like making love to a beautiful talking doll. She keeps saying, ‘Oooh, that’s so nice.’”
“What’s the King doing about her?”
“He’s sent me away,” he said, shamefaced. “And he’s appointed all women to look after them from now on. Old women. You know. Past the age when…”
“I know,” I snarled at him. “What will the King do when the baby arrives?”
“The King plans to send it here to be fostered and educated. The King doesn’t want the baby around the prince, just on the chance that … I mean…”
“I know what you mean,” I said. “The child, if it’s a boy, might by some chance get into the succession, and the King doesn’t want him to be infected with madness. If madness is infectious.” It was no time to give Vincent a lesson in genetics. “What are you going to do now?”
“The King heard that your friend died.” (I had given it about that Giles had died.) “So I’m to stay here and look after you,” he said. “For my sins.”
Well! This postpones my return to Faery for a time. I can’t wait to see the baby. Also, it will be nice to have a man around again.
FALL 1418
The baby arrived today. King Zot said I was to see to the naming of him and the rearing of him. The King is getting even with me for Snow, I’m sure of it. The baby’s name will be Giles Edward Vincent Charming, honoring everyone who deserves to be honored and at least one who doesn’t.
Since I knew the baby was coming, I’ve a wet nurse already hired. The one who came with him wants to go back to Nadenada. I also have a nursery maid and a pleasant young boy who will play with him when he gets a bit older. It isn’t good for boys to have only women around them.
Since it is also not good for a young man to be alone, exposed to the temptations of the world, I have arranged a marriage for Vincent. She is the daughter of a local baron, fallen upon hard times, but of impeccable lineage. Her name is Elizabeth. She is quite pretty, extremely intelligent, and, thanks to her father, well-educated. We took her without a dowry, since the poor man had none to offer, and both she and Vincent feel grateful and relieved to be so well arranged for.
Since the Dower House is large enough for all of us, young Giles will grow up in a house with two parents and one old aunt!
CHRISTMASTIDE 1418
I am having such fun with the baby! Elizabeth is a treasure, such a sweet, helpful girl. I hope Vincent loves her as much as I already do. Both of them are quite sweet with baby Giles, almost as though he were their own. I feel fortunate that they are here.
WINTER 1419
Today, while I was telling cook at some length what I wanted prepared for dinner, I surprised upon Elizabeth’s face an expression which was so familiar and yet so elusive that I spent a good part of the morning figuring it out. It came to me at last. With considerable shock I realized it is the same expression that I used to feel upon my own face when one of the aunts did something so outrageous that I could not believe it, yet had no recourse but to accept it. It is an expression of bemused fury.
Well, during my converse with the cook, I had changed my mind several times about the menu. I really had. There was a time when that would have annoyed me. The implication is inevitable. I am merely tolerated in my own house! The idea makes me waver between amusement and fury and grief. I have done everything for Elizabeth that a loving mother might have done. I thought she liked me. Well, she does. She simply wishes I were not so much about. If I were at a distance, she could probably like me quite well, or she could hate me without hindrance, whichever she was minded to do at the moment. When I realized this, I cried, then I thought vindictively of sending her and Vincent away—they are living here at my invitation, after all—then I cried again. Oh, I wish Giles had not died! It is only with our own loves that we are more than mere burdens. Neither of a mated pair should ever die first! Or even, as he has done, go to sleep!
Finally, after much weeping and self-examination, I decided that it is time for me to do what I had planned before Vincent arrived: return to Faery. The baby is not mine. He’ll be happier if there is no dissention in his home. Tonight I will tell Vincent I am going on a journey. A pilgrimage. I will give him title to the Dower House and surrounding lands, which I purchased some time ago. I will advise him of the income he may expect to receive per annum. My investments, however, remain my own against my return. Unless I do not return.
LATER
“When will you be back?” Vincent asked. “Who are you going with?”
“A party of pilgrims,” I told him. “At my age, I may not be back, my boy, but that is no concern of yours. If I do not return in—oh, thirty years, let us say—my great-grandson Giles Edward Vincent Charming will fall heir to what I have. Thirty is a good age to inherit property. One is still young enough to enjoy it, but old enough to have acquired elementary prudence.”
“I don’t want you to go,” he said. “I don’t want you to go.” Vincent’s face was troubled, part duty, part affection. The larger part affection, I think, though one is never sure, is one? Elizabeth had merely said farewell, without protestation.
“But I want to go,” I told him with a smile.
I think I really do want to go. Before, when I was in Faery, I knew too little. Now, I may know too much, but I want to see it again. I keep worrying about what Carabosse may be doing. I keep thinking of Mama. “I have lived long enough, having seen one thing, that love hath an end.” My favorite poet said that. He was right. Before my end, I need to make it right with her.
I will take my cloak, boots, and book with me. The only thing left to do is to send word to Odile Kent that she is to begin her daily journey to the Wellingford kitchen.
“When are you going?” Vincent asks. “Soon?”
I will be gone before he knows it. One need not pack for Faery.
FAERY, NO TIME, NO DATE
Most things done in Faery have no meaning in the world. However, as I know from when I was last here, words written here are really written. When I go out of this place, they will come with me into the other world. Promises made here are transferable. Songs sung here can be sung out there. Meaning is meaning, whether in the world or in Faery. Only our outward seeming does not go from one place to the other. Here I am young again, and very beautiful. Here I am Beauty once again.
It would be easy to forget to go back. Suppose my mortal half died here, in Faery. Wouldn’t my fairy half go on? Perhaps I would be dwindled, as Puck says, but still immortal. Free to dance here, and dine here, and while the endless time away with hunts and feasts. Dwindle. Ride mice. Sleep in flowers. Become one with the origin of my creation.
It is tempting. Enticing. Seductive. I try to summon what Father Raymond would have called my conscience and determine that, whatever happens, I will go back, at intervals, to wash and eat and dress myself and see what time has passed. Perhaps I can remember to do it. Perhaps not.
As I was leaving, I stood by the ruined hulk of Wellingford and peered back through the trees to see the Dower House well-peopled behi
nd me. Its windows were alight and its chimneys sent up fine coils of smoke toward heaven. Let the smoke carry my prayer: pray God that Vincent and Elizabeth stay well, and so baby Giles.
27
WELLINGFORD: ONE STROKE
ON THE CHIMNEYPIECE
A month already? I would have said a day or two. I am famished. I ate all the bread and cheese and drank most of the beer. After I have a bath, I will have the rest of the beer and the meat. My dress is a bit ragged, but it will do a while longer. I must have a clean underbodice. This one is covered with something dreadful along the sleeves.
Mama had returned to Faery, as Puck had told me. My boots took me to the flowery meadow at the center of that world. I put on my shoes and began walking toward the distant castles, and there she was, standing all alone. “Hello, daughter,” she said, not at all surprised as she turned to walk beside me. “You’ve come back.” She said not another word, nor did I, until we reached the castle. She kissed me on the cheek, an unmeaning kiss, like the kiss of an aunt, then pointed to a door and said, “Your room is there.” How could one describe her manner? Neither warm nor chill. Neither welcoming nor forbidding. Merely neutral. As though it made no difference. As though I had been noticed, but only that. I did not know how to break through to her. All the words I had been saving were useless. I felt despair, but then something stubborn in me said to stay and keep trying. So.
Oberon noticed me, too—but only that. He bowed and swept his hat widely, almost a satire upon himself, but did not invite my company on his couch, nor did any of the others. Not that I’d have consented, but it would have been nice to be asked. After a few days of this treatment by all of them, I decided to find out why, not caring greatly except that I like to know what is going on. I thought Puck would tell me, so I wandered off into a copse of lacy trees and called him up. He did not want to tell me, but did, finally. He says I smell differently now. Mortality, he says. Before, I was in the juice and fat of life, but now I know what age is, I have a scent of sootiness, like a candle burned down to its end.