The Merry Spinster: Tales of Everyday Horror(11)

“Dress yourselves. Attempt to do so without humiliating me” was all the godmother said in response, and they were dismissed, Gomer flinging her roundest eyes over her shoulder at Paul as she went.

“And will Paul go tonight?” the godmother asked. “Will Paul turn wife or husband?”

“I would go,” Paul said, “if for nothing else than to see another family’s house; beyond that I have no thought.”

“Paul will marry,” the godmother said. “Paul would marry her own pride, if no one else sought her out.”

There was very little Paul could say to that that would not be called a lie, and Paul would rather be called ungrateful than a liar, as long as she had to choose between the two.

“To Paul,” the godmother said, drawing herself up from her seat, “who loves her labor above all things, I give an extra gift: more work, and more solitude.” She scattered two handfuls of black lentils over the dying fire, until they were mixed in with the ashes. “Pick them all out in an hour, and I will dress you myself.” There was a touch on Paul’s shoulder. “Mind you do not burn your hands. I could not stand to see them ruined.” Then she was gone.

Before Paul could move toward the hearth, two gray pigeons alighted on the kitchen window, cocking their heads this way and that, and jumped down onto the floor, strutting smartly and kicking up their red heels. They moved like heartbeats under the table, and were quickly joined by a pair of turtledoves, then two great black crows, shiny as beetles. Then the sky opened up in a great whirring swarm, and the floor came alive with the mumbling and rustling of wings. The pigeons nodded their heads and surged up to the hearth’s edge and began to pick, pick, pick. And the others also began to pick, pick, pick, and Paul could not move for the soft press of feathers against her.

*

The godmother had said nothing when Paul had pressed a fist-warm bundle of lentils into her hands, merely wiped the ash away tidily and looked over all three of the girls. Gomer, who still had not bathed, made a concession to the public good and wore her best work clothes, and a new coat over them. Robin’s eyes were bright, though it was difficult to tell if this came from anticipation of an unusual event or merely her customary anxiety. They were to keep their eyes to themselves on the walk to the priest’s house. They were to speak to no one before they reached the priest’s gate. They were to eat and speak once inside as they pleased, and Paul was to be home by matins.

The godmother had kept her word and dressed Paul herself, bringing in three heavily wrapped bundles from the garden and laying them at Paul’s feet. The first she muttered over and tapped at before opening. She pulled out a fine white shirt, and carefully laced Paul’s arms through it, and fastened each button to the throat. “I have made this for only you,” she said in Paul’s ear as she fixed the collar. “I have put such power in it, engendered it with such virtue as could make even a stone heart happy.”

Paul began to recite the first part of the Invocation to Combat Ungratefulness, but the godmother placed a hand on her chin and searched her face with unsparing eyes. “Not that tonight, love,” she said softly. “The mothering-psalm first, before you go.”

“Where can I go from your Spirit? Where can I flee from your presence?” Paul said, and swayed backward only a very little. “If I ascend to the heavens, you are there; if I make my bed in hell, you are there also. If I take the wings of the morning, and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea, even there your hand shall lead me, and your right hand shall hold me. If I say, ‘Surely the darkness will cover me,’ even the night shall be light around me. The night shines as day, the darkness and the light are both alike to you.”

The godmother pointed at the remaining two bundles, which speedily unwrapped themselves. Two bobbing, jerking figures rose up and danced out the front door to the first gatepost, where they swayed brokenly under the lamplight.

“Follow them to the priest’s house,” she said. “Let them go first. Do not let them get behind you.”

*

The priest’s son was attentive—and more than attentive, amiable; and more than amiable, kind. He made Gomer laugh twice and kept Robin awake all through dinner. To Paul, he had spoken of fence repair and drought and how to best tend gospel-trees, and smiled as he spoke in his mild and pleasant voice. She found herself unwilling to abandon his conversation, even as Gomer had displayed increasingly concerned faces from across the room as the night wore on. Once she got up to leave, and he said, “Oh, must you? Only I’d rather you didn’t,” and so she stayed.

It wasn’t until well after Night Office concluded that she realized Gomer and Robin were nowhere to be found, that dawn was already smearing itself across the sky, that her face was quite flushed, and that she had made a spectacle of herself. “I am sorry,” she said as she dipped her head politely and downed the remaining water in her cup. “I’ll go now. I do like you, priest’s son.”

“I like you too, Paul, who is twice mothered,” he said, trying to remain grave. “You might consider marrying me, if you have thoughts of marrying.”

“I might,” she said, and left her chair. “You might be worth marrying.”

There were no bobbing figures waiting for her by the garden gate, and she tore down the path toward home guideless.

“You are late, you are late, you are late,” the godmother cried out in a pinched voice as Paul rushed through the door. “I did not fetch up those guides from their sleep to see you come home late.”