On this particular Sanday - their sixth since coming to Hambry - Cuthbert was in the upper market (lower market was cheaper, by and large, but too fishy-smelling for his liking), looking at brightly colored scrapes and trying not to cry. For his mother had a serape, it was a great favorite others, and thinking of how she would ride out sometimes with it flowing back from her shoulders had filled him with homesickness so strong it was savage. "Arthur Heath," Roland's ka-mai, missing his mama so badly his eyes were wet! It was a joke worthy of... well, worthy of Cuthbert Allgood.
As he stood so, looking at the serapes and a hanging rack of dolina blankets with his hands clasped behind his back like a patron in an art gallery (and blinking back tears all the while), there came a light tap on his shoulder. He turned, and there was the girl with the blonde hair.
Cuthbert wasn't surprised that Roland was smitten with her. She was nothing short of breathtaking, even dressed in jeans and a farmshirt. Her hair was tied back with a series of rough rawhide hanks, and she had eyes of the brightest gray Cuthbert had ever seen. Cuthbert thought it was a wonder that Roland had been able to continue with any other aspect of his life at all, even down to the washing of his teeth. Certainly she came with a cure for Cuthbert; sentimental thoughts of his mother disappeared in an instant.
"Sai," he said. It was all he could manage, at least to start with.
She nodded and held out what the folk of Mejis called a corvette - "little packet" was the literal definition; "little purse" was the practical one. These small leather accessories, big enough for a few coins but not much more, were more often carried by ladies than gentlemen, although that was not a hard-and-fast rule of fashion.
"Ye dropped this, cully," she said.
"Nay, thankee-sai." This one well might have been the property of a man - plain black leather, and unadorned by foofraws - but he had never seen it before. Never carried a corvette, for that matter.
"It's yours," she said, and her eyes were now so intense that her gaze felt hot on his skin. He should have understood at once, but he had been blinded by her unexpected appearance. Also, he admitted, by her cleverness. You somehow didn't expect cleverness from a girl this beautiful; beautiful girls did not, as a rule, have to be clever. So far as Bert could tell, all beautiful girls had to do was wake up in the morning. "It is."
"Oh, aye," he said, almost snatching the little purse from her. He could feel a foolish grin overspreading his face. "Now that you mention it, sai - "
"Susan." Her eyes were grave and watchful above her smile. "Let me be Susan to you, I pray."
"With pleasure. I cry your pardon, Susan, it's just that my mind and memory, realizing it's Sanday, have joined hands and gone off on holiday together - eloped, you might say - and left me temporarily without a brain in my head."
He might well have rattled on like that for another hour (he had before; to that both Roland and Alain could testify), but she stopped him with the easy briskness of an older sister. "I can easily believe ye havenocontrol over yer mind, Mr. Heath - or the tongue hung below it - but perhaps ye'll take better care of yer purse in the future. Good day." She was gone before he could get another word out.
5
Bert found Roland where he so often was these days: out on the part of the Drop that was called Town Lookout by many of the locals. It gave a fair view of Hambry, dreaming away its Sanday afternoon in a blue haze, but Cuthbert rather doubted the Hambry view was what drew his oldest friend back here time after time. He thought that its view of the Delgado house was the more likely reason.
This day Roland was with Alain, neither of them saying a word. Cuthbert had no trouble accepting the idea that some people could go long periods of time without talking to each other, but he did not think he would ever understand it.
He came riding up to them at a gallop, reached inside his shirt, and pulled out the corvette. "From Susan Delgado. She gave it to me in the upper market. She's beautiful, and she's also as wily as a snake. I say that with utmost admiration."
Roland's face filled with light and life. When Cuthbert tossed him the corvette, he caught it one-handed and pulled the lace-tie with his teeth. Inside, where a travelling man would have kept his few scraps of money, there was a single folded piece of paper. Roland read this quickly, the light going out of his eyes, the smile fading off his mouth.
"What does it say?" Alain asked.
Roland handed it to him and then went back to looking out at the Drop. It wasn't until he saw the very real desolation in his friend's eyes that Cuthbert fully realized how far into Roland's life - and hence into all their lives - Susan Delgado had come.
Alain handed him the note. It was only a single line, two sentences:
It's best we don't meet. I'm sorry.
Cuthbert read it twice, as if rereading might change it, then handed it back to Roland. Roland put the note back into the corvette, tied the lace, and then tucked the little purse into his own shirt.