“I was hoping you might have remembered who purchased the book I have? Are you sure you don’t know?”
He finds the spinning wheel and begins to drag it back, but I am in his way. He turns and faces me.
“What do you want me to tell you?” he asks.
“Only the truth.”
“You know the truth, though you may prefer the lie.”
I do know the truth. I’ve known from the moment I entered the palace, maybe before. I knew the truth, but I wanted to believe Karl cared about me, did not just view me as a plaything. I nod.
He laughs. “Poor fool I was! Ugly fool. For months, I saw you at the market reading the books. Every Thursday, you came, every Thursday for months, and I waited for you. It was the high point of my week. I wanted to speak to you. Of course I was an idiot. One as lovely as you would never look at one like me, a nobody with no family, no name. I know I am not handsome. I know that. But I thought, perhaps, if I brought the book, we could talk about that, at least. I imagined you would know I sent it. After all, we had discussed it. I asked after you until I learned who you were, where you lived. I hoped we could be friends—a fool’s fantasy. I left the book upon your doorstep and hid behind some trees to watch you find it. You did, on the way back from the chicken house.”
I nod, imagining him doing this, remembering. “It was I who was a fool,” I whisper.
He goes on as if he has not heard me. “And all the next week, I waited for the day that you would come. I waited for Thursday, for you.”
“You wanted merely to be friends?” I ask.
“I did not hope for anything more. I wanted someone with whom to discuss books.”
“Then why not Kendra? Or any one of the men who walked into the stall? You could not discuss books with them?”
A sad smile. “Maybe I hoped for more.”
And I had ignored him that Thursday like all the others, intent only upon finding Karl. “I wish I had known it was you.” I feel tears in my eyes, for I suspect it would have made little difference, had I known. I would likely still have been enchanted by Karl, the liar. I would still have overlooked this kind, clever, shy man. Nothing would have been different.
I say, “I don’t think I can accept your offer, your offer to spin the straw in exchange for a favor by my husband. It wouldn’t be right, because I do not think I will be marrying Karl.”
He smiles. “Really?”
“Really. He does not love me. He put me here in a barn on the hard floor overnight, with barely enough food, to spin straw to please his father. I cannot imagine he really wants me.”
He hunches his shoulders as if trying to retreat into a shell. But he cannot make himself any smaller than he already is. I think I hear him murmur something, but I cannot make it out.
Finally, he says, “I want you.”
“You would not if you knew the entirety of my situation.” I turn away from him, surveying the room. If only there was a way out. If only I did not have to face him in the morning without the work done.
“You asked me if I was angry at my mother for leaving me.”
I turn to him, surprised by the change of subject.
“I am not angry at her. I am angry at my father, the man who left her in a situation where she felt she had no choice but to abandon her baby.”
I turn toward him. He knows.
I say, “I want to have choices. I want to go home, but I do not know how to leave or what I will do if I go, what I will tell my father. Father does not even know where I am at this moment. I have no choices—persuade Karl to marry me or throw myself in the river. Those are my choices.”
“You want choices. Here is one: The lady I work for, Kendra, is a kind lady, but lonely. She could adopt your baby, say she got it from her sister who died. Then you could go back to your life as it was.”
That is a choice, but not one I like very much. I hated my life as it was.
“Or, on the other hand, you could marry me.” He takes my hand and draws me toward him. “You could move into my flat and read all day and play with the baby, and other babies when we have them. And, when I come home, we could talk of books. Someday, I will have my own stall at the market. Not a bookseller, for Kendra has that, but something else. I am learning to be a businessman. You could help me.” He holds out his hand as if pointing it out, and his eyes are shining as he says this.
“Could it be a bakery?” I say, caught up in his fantasy. “I am very good at baking cookies and cakes and bread. And you should taste my apple cake.”
“A bakery!” He laughs, a great laugh, larger than he is. “Of course it can be a bakery. Do you want that?”
He is still holding my hand. I squeeze his. “I wanted the man who sent me the book, for he is the man who understands me, who knows what is important to me.”
“What do you want now?”
“I want you to take me home, but I don’t know how to leave. I cannot spin a golden rope to escape.”