<h2 id="c5"><span class="h2line1">4</span> <br/><span class="h2line2">DAYLIGHT; REFUGE</span></h2>
<p>Lalette sat up sleepily and sipped a little wine; there was nothing
to eat but the end of a loaf, most of which Rodvard devoured,
surprised to find that he was hungry, (and a tingle running down his
veins as he thought of the evening under the cedars). Remigorius
did not even wait for the end of the meager breakfast before breaking
out with; “Hark, the provosts are already forth. This must be
hurried, and you two must leave. I have arranged matters to the
least peril. There’s an inn on King Crotinianus’ Square, at the north
end, called the Sign of the Limping Cat, where the north-going
coaches halt to pick up travellers from that side of the city. Go
there; you can wait on the bench outside and had better, to avoid
talking with someone who might be a spy. I trust you, demoiselle,
to keep your face as much covered as possible; Rodvard, you shall
use that devil-stone to know the purpose of any who approach.</p>
<div class="pagenum" id="Page_251">251</div>
<p>“There will be a blue-painted coach which goes to Bregatz by
way of Trandit and Liazabon. The driver’s name is Morsens; inquire.
Before Trandit you should make an argument for the benefit
of others in the coach, you being a young couple just wed, so joyous
in the bridal that the new dame’s trunk has been forgot. At Trandit,
then, Ser Rodvard will descend to return for it, while Demoiselle
Asterhax rides on to Bregatz in the care of Morsens the coachman
and reaches those of the Center there. Are you players enough to
play these parts? . . . It will thus not be strange when Morsens protects
her, which he will gladly do. But you must give him a gold
scuderius, for he is not one of ours, and his danger is very great.”</p>
<p>Lalette, who had begun to take down her hair with fingers swift
and sure in order to do it up into the bridal braids, stopped with
pursed mouth. “But I do not have a scuderius,” she said. “I have
hardly any money at all.”</p>
<p>An expression of furious indignation held the doctor’s face as it
turned toward Rodvard. “You?” But the young man, flushing, reached
in his jacket-pocket for a handful of coppers and one single silver
spada. “Perhaps we can make it up together,” he said. “They are so
deep in arrears of pay at the office where I’m employed . . . or if
we can find a Zigraner with his shop open early, I might pledge my
wage . . .”</p>
<p>“Or if we find a kind-hearted provost with scudi instead of bilboes
for those he pursues!” cried Remigorius. “Madam, you will
need all the witchcraft you can muster, for you are surely the most
improvident fool that ever tried an evasion with what did not belong
to her. I’ve no money, either.” He tugged at his beard, looking at
her from anger-filled eyes, but before Lalette could more than begin
the sound of a hot retort, changed expression, shrugged, and spread
his hands:</p>
<p>“There’s a night’s work gone glimmering, then. But I’ll not send
you back to Cleudi and the Deacons’ Court, even though you were
other than friend Rodvard’s mistress.” He mused (and Rodvard,
catching his eye as the head turned, saw in it a flash of deadly acquisitiveness
for the Blue Star, no real interest in Lalette’s fate
whatever). The young man started as from a blow; Remigorius spoke
again:</p>
<p>“You must hide in the city, then, till somehow transport’s found.
Would be welcome to this abode, but too many come here for
physic; the matter would be bruited about. Nor your place, neither,
Rodvard. The Queen’s provosts will not be long in finding your connection
with this demoiselle, no. Your mother know of it?”</p>
<div class="pagenum" id="Page_252">252</div>
<p>Said Lalette; “If you mean of Rodvard, I—I do not think so. We
met always while she was at the Service. He never came to the
house and there was only my gossip, Avilda Brekoff, who was ever
with us.”</p>
<p>“Then we may have a few days before they come on the scent.
Were you seen coming here last night?”</p>
<p>“Only by a watch of two from a distance, and by the doorman
where I live,” said Rodvard, but Lalette; “I had to give the man a
silver spada to call Rodvard and there was some slight bargle over
whether I might enter. I fear I was not only seen, but noted. I regret.”</p>
<p>“You may well. Here’s the few days lost again. If the matter’s
pressed, they will surely question the doorman of every pensionnario
in the city.” Remigorius swung knit brows to Rodvard; “You
had best go to your working place today, for the absence might be
noted. But I will let you return to your pensionnario for only the
once, and then to bring away nothing but your most intimate needs.
Stop for no meal, where there’s talk—at least, till we can be sure of
this doorman. What’s his name?”</p>
<p>“Krept or something like it, I do not know for sure. We call him
Udo the crab. I have one or two books I would not willingly lose.”</p>
<p>“Would you rather lose your life?” The doctor scrabbled for a
piece of paper and began to write. “This is more dreadful than you
know of. Demoiselle, you can be secure for a little time with a
friend of ours, a certain Mme. Kaja, who used to be a singer in the
opera. She lives on the top floor of an old goat’s nest in the Street
Cossao and has young girls visiting her all the time for instruction
in music, so there’ll be no comment at your appearance.” His pen
scratched, he stood up, threw sand on the paper and let it slide to
the floor. “This be your passport. Your lover—” (the word was accompanied
by a lip-turn that made Lalette shiver) “—can join you
there this twilight. But wait—you may be known in the street.”</p>
<p>He bustled into the shop-room and returned with a pair of
quills. “Up your nose, one on either side. So. I’d like it better if
there were another cloak for you, but leave the hood of this one
down; with your hair changed, and your face . . .”</p>
<h3>II</h3>
<p>It would be the morning after his wedding breakfast on new
wine and old bread with fear for a sauce, that <i>she</i> should come to
the Office of Pedigree again—with her bands of light hair, fine chin
line and cheekbones, and the pointed coronet badge in her hat that
showed her a baron’s daughter. All morning Rodvard had been
dozing and drowsing; she greeted him gaily; “Have you found more
of this matter with which the stem of Stojenrosek is to confound
Count Cleudi, or has the weather been too fine for work indoors?”</p>
<div class="pagenum" id="Page_253">253</div>
<p>“No, demoiselle.” (There was a twist in his chest, he could barely
get the words out.) He passed the chair where she showed a turn
of ankle, to one of the tall dark wall-files, and took out a parchment.
“One of the recorders lighted on this—see, it is from the reign of
King Crotinianus the Second, the great king, and bears his seal of
the boar’s head, with that of his Chancellor. It is a series of decisions
on inheritance and guardianship for the province of Zenss. At the
eleventh year of the reign there is one here—” he handled the pages
over carefully “—giving the son of Stojenrosek leave to wed with
one Luedecia and pass the inheritance to their daughters, though
she’s but a bowman’s daughter herself, there being no heiresses female
to take the estate, which would thus have fallen to the
crown.”</p>
<p>She had stood up to look at the old crabbed chancery hand of
the document where he spread it on the table and her shoulder
brushed his. Said she; “Did they wed, then?”</p>
<p>“Alas, demoiselle, I cannot tell you.” (Shoulder did not withdraw.)
“So many of the records of that time were destroyed in the
great fire at Zenss a quadrial of years ago. But I will search.”</p>
<p>“Do so . . . I cannot read it,” she said. “What does this say?” Her
fingers touched his in a small shock, where they were outspread to
hold the parchment, and the contact rested as she bent to look, in
the spring light filtering through the dusty panes. The inner door
to the cabinet adjoining was closed; down the corridor outside,
someone was whistling as he walked, she turned her head to face
him slowly, he felt the witch-stone cold as ice over his heart, and to
shut out what he feared was coming, Rodvard croaked chokingly;</p>
<p>“What is your name?”</p>
<p>“My name is Maritzl.” (No use; it came over sharply—if he kiss
me, I will not stay him, I will marry him, I will take him into my
father’s house, I will even be his mistress if he demands it . . . this
disappearing in the lightning-flash of Lalette saying, “If you are ever
unfaithful—” and flash on flash what would happen if he lost the
Blue Star for which he had sacrificed so much. Sold, sold.)</p>
<p>She caught her breath a little. He disengaged the parchment
from her hand. “I will have it copied for you in a modern hand,” he
said.</p>
<h3>III</h3>
<p>Under Remigorius’ order, Rodvard did not go home to the pensionnario
at sun-turning as usual, but took his repast for a pair of
coppers on small beer and cheese at a tavern near his labor. He had
been there not often, but it seemed to him that the place bubbled
with talk beyond custom, and he wondered if the cause were some
tale of Count Cleudi’s witching and Lalette’s escape, a speculation
dispelled on his return, for there came to him young Asper Poltén
from the next cabinet with:</p>
<div class="pagenum" id="Page_254">254</div>
<p>“Did you know that girl you squired to the harvest festival turned
out to be a witch? She has witched Count Cleudi, and stolen all his
money; they say he’s going to die. They have closed the city gates
and set a price on her. Your fortune that you carried matters no further
with one like that.”</p>
<p>Rodvard shuffled papers. Some reply was necessary. “Why are
they so urgent over a foreigner? People have been witched before
without having all the paving stones in Netznegon City torn up
about it.”</p>
<p>“Do you forever live in dreams? He’s the new favorite—named
director of the lottery only yesterday. Perhaps that’s the reason the
witch rode him—for jealousy more than the scudi. She’s not to be
blamed if, as I hear, he’s more than a proper man in the parts that
matter most to women. They say Cleudi and the Florestan held an
exhibition for Her Majesty and the Tritulaccan was longer. Speaking
of which, Ser Rodvard, you are not far from fortune yourself.
I saw the Demoiselle of Stojenrosek here again today. She’ll have
a shapelier body than Cleudi will ever press, and bring you a fortune
in addition.”</p>
<p>(“Did you see her indeed, curse you? and what business is it
of yours?” Rodvard wanted to cry; or “Mine’s the high destiny of
the witch.”) But aloud he could only say; “There’s nothing in that.
She’s only searching out some old family records. I must go to
Ser Habbermal’s cabinet; he has a project forward for me.”</p>
<p>He stood up with a trifling stagger, leg tingling with the pain
of the position in which he had cramped it. Asper Poltén made
offended eyes. “Ah, plah, you are too nice for anything but priesthood!”
He turned away, flung open the door to the next cabinet,
and could be heard uttering to the three within; “Bergelin again;
this time pretending he does not know what women carry between
their legs or what it’s used for—” with a whoop of merriment
from the rest.</p>
<div class="pagenum" id="Page_255">255</div>
<p>Rodvard himself, before they could all come in and begin their
usual sport of baiting, walked to the outer door, through it, and
without so much as pausing at the garderobe for his cap, straight
down the corridor to the street and away, the last steps running.
If there were stares at seeing him without headgear or mark of
condition, he did not return them, but hurried on to his own living-place.
The pensionnaria was at the foot of the stairs, the little black
hairs on her upper lip quivering as she administered some rebuke
to a maid who held a trayful of dirty dishes, but her eye lighted
as she turned to perceive a new victim.</p>
<p>“You are too late, Ser Bergelin. If we make a rule good for one,
it must stand for all, because it is only so that I can keep up a
place like this, as cheap as it is, and I simply can’t have you bringing
girls here late at night, I have told Udo. . . .” The end of it he
did not hear, as he broke past her up the stairs, bounding.</p>
<p>The extra set of hose must come, of course, but his best jacket
would not go on over the other, so he had to make a bundle with
underclothing and wrap it in the cloak that it was too fine a day to
wear. The festival-cap must stay behind, even though it might
bring some coppers from a dealer; also the pair of tiny southern-made
health-goblets for carrying at the waist on feast days, of
whose acquisition he had been so proud. At the last moment he
added the volume of Dostal’s ballads; of all the books, he could
spare that one least. There was a moment of fear when a glance
through the glass-windowed door showed callers closeted with
Udo the Crab, but side vision registered the fact that they were
only a pair of rough fellows in leather jackets, not blue-and-green
provosts.</p>
<p>He had been to Mme. Kaja’s only once before, and then at
night, for a meeting of the Sons of the New Day. Under this
more vivid light the Street Cossao showed as a dirty courtyard
with a running sore of gutter down the center, garbages piled
in the corners, yelling children underfoot and somewhere among
the upper stories a hand that practiced the violon monotonously,
playing the harvest-song, but always going sour on the same
double-stop passage. Rodvard elected the wrong house first, the
doorman did not know of Kaja, but the next one at the back
angle of the court was it; he went up a narrow dark winding
stair smelling of yesterday’s cabbage and knocked at the topmost
door.</p>
<p>Mme. Kaja herself answered, clad in an old dressing-gown,
pink silk, and dirty gray where it dragged along the floor, with
her hair packed untidily atop her head. Past her a space of floor
was visible, with light coming through a pair of dormer windows,
a keyed musical instrument and chairs. “Ser Rodvard!” she
squealed, her voice going into a high musical note. “You are sooo
welcome. We did not expect you this early. The dear girl is
waiting.”</p>
<div class="pagenum" id="Page_256">256</div>
<p>A door against the slant of the garret opened and Lalette came
out, unaffectedly glad it was he, and this time not avoiding as he
ran forward to kiss her on the lips. The older woman; “I leave you
to your greetings, while I make myself beautiful.” She passed
through the door from which Lalette had come; the girl sat
down. After the door had closed behind Kaja, “Rodvard,” she
said, very still and looking at the floor.</p>
<p>“Lalette.”</p>
<p>“I have given you my Blue Star. Whether to marry you now
I do not know. I think not—it seems to me that you are not
altogether willing; I feel you are holding something back from
me. But this I say, and you may look into my heart and find
it true—” she raised her head in a blaze of grey eyes “—that I
want to be a good partner to you, Rodvard, and will honestly do
all in my power never to fail you.”</p>
<p>From the inner room came the sound of Mme. Kaja, running
scales in what was left of her voice (and what could he say?
thought Rodvard, who had won this loyalty for Remigorius’ reason
and not his own desire. Let conscience die, but not with a tear
at the heartstrings.) “I will do as much,” said he, and as her lip
quivered at his tone, “if we ever pass this peril with our lives.”</p>
<p>She lifted a hand and let it fall beside her. “It is life without
account of peril that I have offered,” she said. “I do not—”</p>
<p>“How do you know? Lalette, look at me. Will you lie with
me this night, in peril or whatever?”</p>
<p>But she would not meet the questioning eyes now (and he
thought, she thought, they both knew there had been somehow
a lack of communication). Lalette said; “You have come before
time.”</p>
<p>He shuddered slightly. “They picked at me till I must leave.
You will hardly believe how—how base—”</p>
<p>The inner door sprang open and Mme. Kaja emerged with
almost a dance-step, dressed to the eyes in withering finery.
“For a little while I must go forth,” she said, “but you will hardly
miss me, he, he. I’ll bring sup from the cook-shop, is there a
delicacy you desire or any other way I can lighten captivity for
my two caged birds?”</p>
<p>She beamed on them fondly. Rodvard thought of the cap left
at the office and prayed her for a new one, with the badge of his
condition, which took more of his slender store of coppers. The
door closed; and now they two had not much to say to each
other, having agreed that all that mattered should be left unsaid.</p>
<div class="pagenum" id="Page_257">257</div>
<p>The end of it was that Lalette in all her clothes lay down on
the bed in the corner to make up for some of the sleep lost last
night, while he undid his parcel and set out to lose himself in
Iren Dostal’s harmonies and tales—but that did not do very well
either, the poems he had always loved seemed suddenly pointless.
He fell into a kind of doze or waking dream, in which the
thought came to his mind that if he were really ready to let conscience
die in exchange for high destiny, he had only to give
this witch back her Blue Star, call for the provosts, and claiming
the price set on her, seek out Maritzl of Stojenrosek. A destiny
not high by the standards of the Sons of the New Day, no doubt.
But love and position, aye. Remigorius would approve; would
call it the act of a great spirit to seek an inner contentment, no
matter what others thought of how it was achieved, no matter
if others were hurt during the achievement. But Remigorius
thought the struggle more important than its end—and it might
be that the reason he, Rodvard, could see no high destiny, was
that he did not possess such a spirit, immune to scruple, willing
to serve any cause.</p>
<p>Now he fell on to wondering what was the tangle of ideas and
thoughts that made up himself, Rodvard Bergelin, where they
came from and how they were put together—could they be
altered?—and so drifted deeper into his daydream till it began
to grow dusk and Mme. Kaja came back with a covered dish
of fish and red beans.</p>
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