Ozark Trilogy 2: The Grand Jubilee (6 page)

“There,” he said, “will that do it?”

“That’s proper, sir,” said the Attendant.

“Then will you go along and pass the message to the rest of our group? Tell them to meet me by the front gate and look sharp about it-it’ll be late in the Second Day before we reach the Jubilee, even if we have fair winds all the way.” Which he’d see that they did; it was going to be crucial for them to arrive at
exactly
the right moment in the proceedings.

“I’ll do that,” said the man. “But I do think it’s a shame Granny Gableframe went on ahead of the rest of you. It would of pleasured her a good deal to ride in the lizzy and give youall whatfor the whole way to Brightwater on the ship. Granny Gableframe’s partial to water and to company, that’s also known.”

“The Granny would of been uncomfortable on this trip,” said Lincoln Parradyne casually. “At her age and with her rheuma
tism?” He clucked his tongue. “It was much better for her to have me fly her in on the Mule, and avoid all that commotion.”

The Attendant had known the Granny a long time. He gave him a look that couldn’t exactly be described as disrespectful, but let Lincoln Parradyne know what the man’s opinion was of his estimate of the old lady’s constitution; and the Magician of Rank snapped at him to get a move on, before things could become more complicated than they were already. It was a fine kettle when the staff of a Castle had more brains than the Family they were hired to serve, and he sincerely hoped the situation wasn’t widespread. When he got back he’d review the whole bunch, and any that showed signs-like this man-of being sharper than they needed to be to carry out their duties would have to be replaced.

And then he sighed, and went quickly to his rooms to fill in the final character of a Transformation he’d had ready and waiting for completion these last three days. He wasn’t eager to do it, but it was necessary. The Granny was going to have his hide in small scraps for the work that had deprived her of movement and of speech, that could be counted on already. What she would do about this last task of his, the one that would provide the Castle temporarily with a new cat-of origin unknown, but much too beautiful not to be spoiled and watched over-he didn’t even care to contemplate. If things went as he hoped, she might forgive him; on her deathbed, maybe, she might forgive him. If the Smith brothers, or one of their nervous women, made some mistake that put a kink in the plan-which was likely-she would never forgive him.

And
then
Delldon Mallard Smith the 2nd would have a chance to see his “contest”! Years of it. Years of the Granny doing her Charms and Spells, setting them against him with her little mouth puckered tight as her heart must be in her chest; and years of him, Lincoln Parradyne Smith the 39th, canceling out each and every one of them. The chance of the Granny getting one past him was too small to be worth considering, but the amount of time he was going to have to spend in the feud would pile up into a respectable amount of misery over the years. Grannys lived to a formidable old age, and he’d never known one to mellow.

It would have made things so much simpler if they could of brought her around to see things their way and cooperate with them-if not to help them, at least not to interfere. But she had told them flat out what she thought
of
Delldon Maliard’s great plan.

“Flumdiddle!” she’d said. “Goatwallow! Cowflop!” And a halfhour string of more of the same with a persistent refrain on how they’d all taken leave of what pitiful supply of sense they’d been born with, and the litany of ancient oaths for coda and elaboration.

Lincoln Parradyne didn’t agree with the Granny. Every means of foreseeing he had at his disposal had been clear: the road would be a tad bumpy for what they had in mind, and its duration would depend on the skill of those carrying it out--but they would bring it off. That was enough for him; the potential once it was done was everything he had ever wanted and had thought hopelessly out of his reach. Well worth the risk, and the problems could be faced as they came along. He was only anxious to begin.

Opening Day dragged on, and Responsible dragged on through it, up in the balcony. The breeze through the windows of the Independence Room was heavy with the smell of early summer flowers, and the soft hum of the red Ozark bees on whose ministrations those flowers depended, and the combination was an effective sedative. Nothing that was going on inside did anything to lessen its effectiveness, either. She supposed she must have heard worse speeches and more boring ones, somewhere, sometime, but she could not during that interminable day think of an example. If the overdose of tedium didn’t take any of the starch out of the Traveller delegation, it could only be due to their bizarre practice of spending all of every Sundy listening to a single extended sermon,
with
elaborate developments and codas and commentaries and extrapolations, and emendations on the extrapolations, and scattering slightly truncated versions of the same throughout the rest of the week. They were calloused to this kind of thing, both ears and rears, and could of endured a lot more of it, she supposed. Everyone else, however, including their allies the Farsons and the Guthries, was exhausted long before the Closing Prayer. The way some of the delegates had slumped down in their seats by midafternoon had all twenty-seven Grannys still presentand for sure still straight as spikes in
their
seats-clicking their tongues fit to drown out their knitting needles.

Responsible was satisfied with the effect. She much doubted that the population had stayed glued to the comsets to watch the proceedings of
this
day, and she figured to of lost the majority of them well before noon. She doubted even more that they’d tune in their sets to more of the same tomorrow, and that suited her purposes. If there was going to be a battle on the floor of the Independence Room, the fewer Ozarkers that knew about it and had time to get excited about it, the better. And she had seen to it that there were plenty of other ways to spend your time than sit at the comsets, or even in the balcony, while the days of the Grand Jubilee went passing by.

There were four different plays-one religious, one historical, one comedy, one adventure-going on in Capital City at all times, and enough different ones in their repertoires to be sure there’d be no repetition. Three dance troupes were on duty, two indoors and the other moving around the city, and ordered to make themselves available anywhere they were asked. Four sports exhibitions, including one laid on especially for the tadlings. Checkers tournaments everywhere she had a leftover corner. Two speech competitions, tours through the caves for the romantic of mind and tours through the farms for the practical. Mule races for the daring, and all-day nonstop sermons for the conservative. Down at the Landing there was an inexhaustible picnic, where you could sit and eat in comfort, passing your time in gossip and watching the ships come and go in the harbor. Outside the city borders the largest fair ever put on anywhere would be going on all five days, with every kind of game and exhibit and performance, every variety of food and drink, rides all the way from the sedatest of merry-gorounds to a thing called Circle-Of-Screams that was guaranteed to make you get off and sit down for half an hour to review your sins. She had something for everybody, something for every time, and comcrews everywhere to beam out the doings to those that couldn’t come to Brightwater. The doldrums on the channel given over to the Confederation Hall assembly were not going to be able to compete for attention.

There’d been plenty of opposition to the scope of the celebration, even from her grandfather, Jonathan Cardwell Brightwater the 12th, who didn’t as a rule care what
anybody
spent, so long as they extended him the same privilege.

“Are
you sure
all that’s needful, Responsible?”

She’d heard that till the time came when she suggested they get a sign made and save their throats. And she’d ignored it. Yes, it was needful, and furthermore it was the one and the only Jubilee she expected ever to be involved in; she’d not have it said that Brightwater stinted, or offered its guests anything less than the very best there was to offer.

“Pride, missy!” the Granny had said, shaking her finger. “Just
pure
pride! And where do you reckon it’ll lead you, one of these days?”

She took a deep breath, remembering, and then, finally, the Reverend said “Amen!” and it was over, and the delegations began to file out of the Hall. The band in the bandstand at the corner of the lawn struck up a rousing march at the sight of the first man stiff and blinking at the light and the air, and that did get them moving a bit more briskly. The Grannys and Responsible brought up the rear, everybody else having left the balcony hours before, and she made certain that the Grannys surrounded her on all sides. Invisibility was her goal, and she achieved it clear to the gates of Castle Brightwater and across the courtyard to the open front doors, where the Grannys scattered and forced her to hurry for cover. A narrow cramped corridor that ran the length of the Castle and was meant to give the staff a speedy way in or out of any of the rooms had served both her and her sister Troublesome well when they were children; it served her admirably now.

Nevertheless, when she finally reached her room on the third floor, she found that all her painstaking precautions had been a waste. She could of come straight up the front way and saved herself fifteen minutes of walking time, and had a herald before her crying, “Make way for Responsible of Brightwater!”-it wouldn’t of made any difference.

Lewis Motley Wommack the 33rd was waiting for her, sitting on the floor with his knees drawn up and his arms clasped around them, leaning back comfortably with his head against the wall beside her bedroom door.

“Oh, law,” she said, “wherever did you come from?”

“Afternoon, Responsible of Brightwater. Same place you didthat repository of hot wind and tiny minds we choose to call Confederation Hall.”

She ignored that, and said, “Good afternoon, Lewis Motley Wommack, and you’ll miss your supper if you don’t hurry. The delegates are intended for the first serving in the Great Hall . . . you want to end up eating with the children?”

He cocked his head and raised his eyebrows at her, and looked her up and down, and she took one step backward before she caught herself.

“You ran away from me once,” he said solemnly.

“So I did.”

“You plan to repeat that?”

“If I do, you’ll no doubt notice,” she snapped.

He smiled and leaned his head back. again and closed his eyes; it was clear he’d no intention of moving from her door. She could, of course, have. had
him,
removed-or removed him herself, if the commotion either would cause had seemed justified. It would of been an interesting problem of manners if it had not concerned her quite so personally.

It is called a Time Corner,
Granny Hazelbide had said, holding her tight between knees so bony they hurt her even then, in front of all the other five-year-olds,
and we cannot see around it. Could
she run away from a Time Comer twice?

And then there was the question of what, precisely,
he
knew. He had glanced at her when she sat exhausted on a bench in his Castle hall, and
for
sure, just as the Prophecy had said, he had known her and she had known him, in same way that she could not account for. But had some Tutor told him, years ago, that the day would come when there’d be hard times for the entire population of Ozark on account of his behavior with Responsible of Brightwater, and hers with him? No matter what she did, said the Prophecy, there’d be hard times-but nowhere did it say there was a way of escaping. It might could be that he sat there now, insolent by her door as if he’d been near kin, because he too had been told that what lay before them was not to be avoided, and he wanted to get it over with and put it behind him. And it might could be he knew nothing at all, that no gossip from those little girls had found its way to Castle Wommack over those eight years, and that he sat there for reasons he understood not at a11.

“Lewis Motley Wommack,” she said, watching him closely, “why are you here on my doorsill?”

“To see Responsible of Brightwater,” he answered, perfectly easy. “I’ve come for audience.”

“Audiences,” she said carefully, “are held with queens and kings. We’ve no such nonsense here, young Wommack.”

He opened his eyes then and looked at her, and Responsible turned her own eyes swiftly away and stared at the floorboards of the corridor, that were polished and gleaming for the Jubilee till she could see a dim reflection of herself staring back at her. She was in no hurry to look at him directly; one look into those eyes of his and the world had swung away from beneath her, once before. In the seconds it had lasted she had fallen endlessly, before she had managed to break free and run.

“You are a kind of royalty,” he said, and she could feel his smile like sunlight on her flesh. “I don’t know what kind, nor does anybody else-but I mean to find out.”

“You talk rubbish,” she said.

“And you tell lies-and we’re even. Look at me, Responsible of Brightwater, her that travels round the Castles on Solemn Quest, with boots of scarlet leather and whip and spurs of silver . . . her that can command a Magician of Rank as easily as I command an Attendant-oh, yes, my fine young lady, we
do
hear these things, and the servingmaids
will
talk, for all you caution them . . .
Look
at me!”