Jack Vance Elder Isles Suldrun's Garden

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When the music stopped, Carfilhiot led Suldrun to the side of the room, and
somewhat apart. "I hardly know what to say to you,"
Carfilhiot remarked. "Your manner is so glacial as to seem menacing."
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- - - - Vance uses many footnotes in this volume
Suldrun replied in her most formal voice: "Sir, I am unaccustomed to grand
affairs, and in all truth they do not amuse me."
"So that you would prefer to be elsewhere?" Suldrun looked across the chamber
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to where Casmir stood among the grandees of his court.
"My preferences, whatever they may be, seem to be of consequence only to
myself. So I have been given to understand."
"Surely you are mistaken! I, for one, am interested in your preferences. In
fact I find you most unusual."
Suldrun's only response was an indifferent shrug and Carfilhiot's airy
whimsicality for a brief moment became strained, even a trifle sharp.
"Meanwhile, your opinion of me is a person ordinary, drab and perhaps
something of a bore?" So much said in the hope of exciting a tumble of
embarrassed disclaimers.
Suldrun, looking off across the room, responded in an absentminded voice:
"Sir, you are my father's guest; I would not presume to form such an opinion,
or any opinion whatever." Carfilhiot uttered a soft strange laugh, so that
Suldrun turned in startled puzzlement, to look as through a rift into
Carfilhiot's soul, which quickly made itself whole. Once more debonair,
Carfilhiot held out his hands, to express polite and humorous frustration.
"Must you be so aloof? Am I truly deplorable?"
Suldrun once more used cool formality. "Sir, certainly you have given me no
reason to form such judgments."
"But is that not an artificial pose? You must know that you are admired. I for
one am anxious to gain your favorable opinion."
"Sir, my father wants to marry me away. That is well-known. He pushes me
faster than I want to go; I know nothing of love or loving."
Carfilhiot took both of her hands and compelled her to face him.
"I will reveal some arcane facts. Princesses seldom marry their lovers. As for
loving, I would willingly teach a pupil so
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- - - - Vance uses many footnotes in this volume innocent, and so beautiful.
You would learn overnight, so to speak."
Suldrun pulled her hands away. "Let us rejoin the others."
Carfilhiot escorted Suldrun to her place. A few minutes later she informed
Queen Sollace that she felt unwell, and slipped quietly from the chamber. King
Casmir, elevated by drink, failed to notice.
On Derfwy Meadow, two miles south of Lyonesse Town, King Casmir ordained a
pageant and pleasure fair, to celebrate the presence of his honored guest:
Faude Carfilhiot, Duke of Vale Evander and Lord of Tintzin Fyral. Preparations
were elaborate and bountiful.
Bullocks had been turning over coals since the preceding day, with good
bastings of oil, onion juice, garlic and syrup of tamarind;
now they were done to a turn and exuded a tantalizing waft across all the
meadow. Trays nearby were heaped high with loaves of white bread, and to the
side six tuns of wine awaited only a starting of the bungs.
Villages of the neighborhood had sent young men and women in festival
costumes; to the music of drums and pipes, they danced jigs and kick-steps,
until sweat beaded their foreheads. At noon clowns fought with bladders and
wooden swords; and somewhat later, knights of the royal court jousted with
lances tipped with leather pillows.*
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*'The tournament in which armored knights jousted with lances, or fought mock
battles, had not yet evolved. Contests of this time and place were relatively
mild events:
competitions at wrestling, horse-racing, vaulting:
events in which the aristocracy seldom if ever competed. [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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