12
NETZNEGON CITY; A ZIGRANER FESTIVAL
After he had gone, Lalette cried a little, but the widow pretended not to notice, busying herself with sewing on one of the festival masks, a task at which the girl was presently helping, so far as she could, for she was no great artist with the needle, nor wished to be. When they began talking again it was about the robe they were working on, grey silk velvet which had been artfully torn here and there to a pretense of raggedness, through which the slashes were being backed with flame-color. Lalette passed her hands across the lovely fabric (longing to be gay and courted in such a gown, though it left so much of the leg bare that she would have felt a little shame to wear it). Who was it made for?
“The Countess Aiella of Arjen, for the festival ball at Sedad Vix. The younger Countess, that is, the unmarried one. I designed it especially for her. The mask is there.” She nodded.
It hung on one of the standards, empty of eye and mouth, but no one could mistake the provenance of the high-bridged nose and the cheekbones from which the full rumpled beard flowed down. “Why,” said Lalette, “it is Prince Pavinius when he was Prophet of Mancherei; I thought you were—” and stopped.
“Amorosians?” The widow Domijaiek smiled. “I am a follower of that doctrine, though not yet perfected in it. But in spite of what you have been told, it is not one of gloomy reverence. It does not prohibit joy, nor even keep us away from the world, only declares that the joys of the world are false beside those that come to us when we learn how we have been deceived by the flesh. You, who are newly married, have the other kind of love now, and will not know what I mean, but in the end you will come to see that kind of love as sin.”
“I am not married,” said Lalette, letting her needle fall (but doubting that her feeling toward Rodvard were indeed the love the poets carolled, and of which Dame Domijaiek spoke), “except in what we who have the Art call the great marriage.”
“I would as soon not speak as to that,” said the widow, “but in our church we are taught that to love a person is to love the world, which is a deception due to the God of evil.”
II
Rodvard did not come back that evening, nor the next, and no word from him of any kind. Lalette felt unhappy and listless after so long indoors; above her she could hear from time to time Mme. Kaja’s footsteps come and go, and when the door was opened, often one of her pupils in song, flatted usually and more frequently than not, off key. The boy Laduis soon held little more for her, and in any case with the spring festival now rushing on so fast, had to be taken from his academy to run errands for his mother, who now worked late every night. The widow said the court had gone down to Sedad Vix, the doubled guards at the city gates were withdrawn, and the provosts somewhat relaxing in vigilance as to their search for the girl.
It might be safe to leave her refuge, if she had any place to go. Surely, not to her mother’s, who would still be watched by Uncle Bontembi the priest if by no other, and it seemed to Lalette there was no friend of her own age near enough to be trusted, now that all the world knew her for a witch. It was a box. For the present, one was able to pay in some sort for food and shelter by labor on the festival costumes, but that would soon be done. Ah, Rodvard, are you detained or faithless—which? She wished him there before her for an explanation that would also be the clue to her new life; and asked herself why a partnership of half an hour and not altogether of her own will, should bind her for life. Hold him she thought she could, and though hating the dependency into which she was thrown, hating the bond that made dependency her only resort, there was nothing to do but go see Dr. Remigorius, knowing that man hated her, and through him, try to find her lover. Oh, if I could ever be my own, not my mother’s nor any his, she wished desperately, and though not a word of this was put into voice, the widow seemed to know her whole mind when Lalette said she thought it might be worth going forth on festival eve to seek tidings.