Mrs. Beast (6 page)

    
"You smell smoke?
 
Me neither, so relax, she's not around here."

    
Beauty groans, she can't help herself; the mirror has been snatched again.

    
"She's coming to.
 
Cripes, Gunnard, you pulled out one of her ta-ta's.
 
Put that puppy back in before she wakes up and figures we're perverts."

    
"I got the mirror; you put it back."

    
Beauty discreetly tucks the escaped breast into her bodice, sits up, and faces the dwarfs.
 
They stand with hands clasped behind their backs.
 
"Hey, lady.
 
Are you okay?"

    
"My feet hurt," Beauty moans.

    
"Those are some vile-looking sores.
 
We got salve back at the commune.
 
I'm Gunnard and this is my brother, Ojars."

    
"Pleased to meet you.
 
My name is Beauty.
 
Do you know if Glass Mountain is near?"

    
"Nope.
 
I know where Gold Mountain is.
 
We work there with our five brothers:
 
Max, Wolfgang, Lars, Pieter, and Herman," Gunnard answers.
 
"Maybe one of the wives knows.
 
Anywho, those feet need looking after.
 
We'll take you home with us."

    
Ojars removes a reed whistle from his shirt pocket and tweedles a tune.
 
A dragonfly the size of a Fokker tri-plane zips through the sky and lands on a rise above the river.
 
They progress five short steps up the river bank then Ojars stops, thrust his ample nostrils into the air and sniffs deeply.
 
"I smell smoke.
 
It's Queen Vanita!"

    
"We gotta skedaddle!" Gunnard yaps, and the brothers lift Beauty, Gunnard taking her shoulders, Ojars her ankles.
 
They gallop to the dragonfly, hoist Beauty aboard, and soar upward.

    
Beauty looks down to see a tall, gaunt woman whirling along the river's edge in a danse macabre. Her face and hands are streaked with soot; the hair is burnt from her head and a gold crown jiggles upon her scalp. She raises her feet waist-high like a lizard in the desert at high noon, her iron shoes glowing red hot.

Chapter Three

Who's The Fairest of Us All

   
Miles and miles of dense, foggy forest whiz beneath Beauty in the blur and whirl of giant dragonfly wings. Muck dries like plaster of Paris on her skin.
 
The itching makes her want to scream, but she won't release her grip on Gunnard's belt in order to scratch.
 
After what seems an eternity, the dragonfly slows and descends into a clearing. Grey shafts of light illuminate a sprawling structure of eight distinctive houses, attached one to the other and built between a small whitewashed cottage at one end and a larger cottage with a single tower at the other end.

    
Running and laughing through the yard are at least a dozen dwarf children.
 
Scrubbing clothes, sweeping doorways, and feeding chickens while chatting over fences, are seven dwarf women.
 
And standing on a ladder, washing second story windows, is a woman with hair as black as ebony wood and skin as white as snow.

    
As the kiddies shuffle their bare baby feet to investigate the stranger, Gunnard warns, "You bitsy yard apes watch your step.
 
This lady's feet are sore."

    
The children form a circle around Beauty.
 
She's captivated by their bright eyes and apple cheeks.
 
She'd like to embrace each one, but she won't because she's filthy with dried muck and because she has learned a lesson about mothers.
 
One morning last month, she was picking roses from the castle garden when a peasant woman and her daughter passed by. The child turned to smile at Beauty, and Beauty offered a pink rose from her basket.
 
The girl skipped to Beauty's side; her mother plodded close behind with her face scrunched like an irritated brown bat.
 
Holding the rose to her sweet little nose, the girl stared up at Beauty and said,
You're so beautiful.
 
I wish you were my mother
.
 
The peasant woman yanked her daughter's braid so sharply the child dropped the rose and ran like a flushed quail.

    
"Hello, mate, and who’s brought you home from the mines at midday?"
  
A woman steps forward and Ojars plants a kiss on her cheek.

    
"Me and Gunnard went down to the river to eat lunch, and we found this lady lying in the muck with leeches on her feet.
 
Then Herself came dancing her smoky arse up the river bank, so we lit outta there."

    
"Yeah, and Beauty had a mir . . ."

    
Gunnard jabs Ojars in the ribs.
 
The dwarf woman takes Beauty by the hand and guides her toward the small white cottage.
 
"Beauty is your name?"

    
Beauty nods her head and her chestnut locks clack together.

    
"That dried mud must itch dreadfully.
 
I'm Helga.
 
Come inside and we'll make you comfortable."

    
Beauty glances up the ladder at the woman washing windows.
 
"That's Snow White," says Helga.
 
"She's a bit shy."

*
  
   
*
     
*

    
Wrapped in a quilt beside the hearth, Beauty is content. Gerda had filled a bathing tub with warmed rosewater, and Beauty soaked until her skin was pink.
 
Eva dressed her feet with herb poultices. Sigrid scrubbed the mud from her yellow gown and hung it out to dry.
 
Freya gave her a white blouse and a blue pinafore that fit perfectly.
 
Brunhilde had combed the tangles from Beauty's hair while Ingrid prepared a crock of barley soup and spread strawberry jam on thick slices of salt risen bread.

    
Throughout their gracious attentions, Beauty related her story, the abridged version, from her motherless childhood to her father's misfortune, meeting the Beast, his transformation, and her decision to change him back by finding Elora the Enchantress who dwelt atop Glass Mountain.
 
The women knew nothing of either Elora or Glass Mountain.

    
Beauty was hesitant to ask about the mirror. How could she phrase her words without accusing Gunnard and Ojars of stealing?
 
Would she have to explain the manner in which they procured the mirror?
 
Would their wives' eyes narrow and their lips tighten as all wives do when their husbands pay attention to Beauty?
 
Without the mirror, she couldn't find Elora, and without Elora she would never see her beloved Beast again, or live happily ever.
 
She screwed up her courage and said, "I had a magic mirror.
 
I need it to continue my quest.
 
Perhaps it was lost when I fainted."

    
"Most likely, Gunnard has buried it," Eva said.

    
"You'll notice there's not a mirror in this cottage," Freya said.

    
"Nor in the whole of our village," Ingrid added.

    
"Don't fret," Eva said.
 
"Your mirror will be returned when you're well enough to travel."

    
Beauty watches the women lounging on the floor, eating lunch from tiny plates and miniature spoons. She has not experienced such generosity of spirit since those first blissful days with the Beast, and she's never been treated so kindly by women.

    
Is it because of their kindness I find them exquisitely beautiful?
 
Naturally, Beauty doesn't stare, knowing how uncomfortable it feels to be gawked at.
 
She turns her head about nonchalantly and sneaks glances while sipping her tea.
 
These women are not slaves to fashion.
 
Eva's cotton caftan hugs her bosom and drapes over her pregnant belly.
 
Sigrid's herringbone jacket and trousers are tailored to perfection.
 
Ingrid wears a red felt cap and a green felt jumper.
 
Helga wears a three-piece knitted pantsuit.
Brunhilde's auburn hair dangles to her waist in Botticelli waves.
 
Freya's black hair brushes her jaw line on the right side and is shaved to stubble on the left; her baby runs his chubby hand back and forth over the stubble.
 
Gerda's left nostril is pierced with a gold ring and her front teeth are gold-plated.

    
"We are an eclectic lot," Gerda says, flashing her gold teeth in a wry smile. Beauty blushes at being caught.

    
"Style is one form of expression," Sigrid adds and lights a meerschaum pipe.
 
This is true, yet Beauty believes it's easy to be outlandish when you're surrounded by friends and isolated from the world.

    
"Here's Snow White," Helga announces.

    
Beauty turns, wearing her pleased-to-meet-you face: half-smile, eyebrows slightly raised, eyes wide open and earnest. The woman is a beauty.
 
Her hair is black as coal, her skin is white as Edelweiss, her eyes are ice blue, and her lips are redder than the reddest rose in the Beast's garden.
 
Snow White strides across the floor and halts before Beauty.
 
She gives her a slow, head-to-toe once-over, and then yanks back the quilt and shouts. "Those are my clothes!"

    
Freya's baby twitches and lets loose a wail.
 
Sigrid places herself firmly between Beauty and Snow White and speaks evenly.
 
"Her dress was soiled so we washed it. You left that outfit here in the trunk."

    
Snow White reaches over Sigrid's head, puts one white finger on Beauty's collar, and when Beauty looks down, the finger snaps her nose.

    
"Make sure it goes back there, and wash it first!"
 
Snow White turns on her heels and struts out the door.

*
     
*
     
*

    
"Mee-ow!" Elora vocalizes over her crystal ball.
 
"Somebody slap a bell around her snow white neck.
 
Uncle Walt was
way
off on this girl."

    
Croesus cocks his head.

    
"Disney, you dufus.
 
His Snow White was first released in 1937 and re-released every decade since.
 
The last time we watched it you left when Snow started warbling into the well."

    
Croesus throws up his chin and releases a modulating howl.
 
Elora grabs his jowls and squints one silver-flecked eye.
 
"Disney was a dangerous dude.
 
It's not that I object so much to his portrayal of Grimm Land as a Technicolor playground for preciously cute and helpful animals, and making Snow a saucer-eyed simp who treats the dwarfs like toddlers while pining,
Someday my prince will come
; pulled the same crap with Cinderella and Sleeping Beauty a few years later.
 
But his versions have led countless little girls down the primrose path."