"Yes," said Eldric. "Most wicked."
We were all sitting now on the blanket. There came a strong smell of musk and salt. Leanne must have drowned herself in scent. For the first time, Eldric looked at her. He adjusted his position ever so slightly, opening the circle, letting her into the conversation.
"It might not always be wicked," I said. "What if in telling the person to keep the secret, you"re actually protecting her? What if she"ll do herself a harm if she tells?"
Was that what men liked, musk and salt?
"Quite right," said Leanne. "There are always two sides to every story."
"It is never acceptable to hurt somebody, or threaten to hurt him," said Eldric.
"But you punched somebody," I said. "I saw you."
"He was hurting someone else." Eldric ought to have looked at me. I was the person who"d been hurt. But he looked at Leanne. He was falling under her spell, wasn"t he? I had to remind him- I mustn"t allow him- "Was it only yesterday," I said, "that you asked me to give you credit for some brains?"
"I believe so." Eldric"s fidgety fingers reached for a bun. "How long ago it seems." He spread the jam very thin, piled the cream very thick.
"He was hurting someone else." I mimicked Eldric. "It"s always different when it comes to oneself, isn"t it? But just remember: You yourself admitted you"d been stupid."
"Touche!" Eldric handed me a creamy sunset of a bun: mounds of cream, a mere splash of pink.
"Eldric"s much too hard on himself," said Leanne.
"Thank you," I said, meaning the bun. "It"s just the way I like it."
"I know," said Eldric. "I"ll never come to grips with the thirteenth declension, but I do know what you like."
How lovely to eat a sunset, still warm and spread with clouds.
"Eldric is far from stupid," said Leanne. "He"s quite a genius in his way."
But that was my idea! I"d said he was a genius the night of the garden party. Leanne couldn"t try to kill me, and steal my idea too!
"He was truly stupid." I hadn"t said it aloud, though.
"You are unkind, Miss Larkin." Miss Larkin, ha! She couldn"t distinguish me from Rose.
"I think not," I said. "We are all stupid, aren"t we, from time to time?"
"But I more than most," said Eldric, smiling.
Leanne began to speak, but Rose interrupted.
"You can stop talking now. You are distracting me from a very difficult decision." She paused. "I need first to lay the groundwork."
"Lay away!" Eldric all but sang the words. He"d gone electric. "Shall I fix you a bun, Rose?"
Rose nodded. "Do you remember what Father used to call me?"
"Rosy Posy!" I said, which was the answer, but turned out to be more of an exclamation.
"He used to call you Briony Vieny."
Briony Vieny. "I remember."
But I wished I didn"t. How mortifying to remind Leanne of one"s childish pet name.
"Do you know how Briony and I match up?" It is sometimes unclear to whom Rose is speaking, because she looks all about, not into one"s eyes. This time, though, she made it clear to whom she wasn"t speaking: She had turned her back on Leanne.
"Your faces match up quite a bit," said Eldric.
"Faces are only genetic." Rose was really very clever in her own way. "But names aren"t genetic."
"May I make a guess on how you match up?" said Eldric.
"You may," said Rose, which was generous, because she"s fond of announcing her ideas.
"You match because a rose is a flower and so is a briony?"
"It"s a vine," said Rose.
"A poisonous vine," I said.
"I never can guess correctly," said Eldric. "It must be because I"m so stupid."
"Please, Eldric!" said Leanne.
I wanted to laugh, I wanted to fling my arms about Eldric. He was playing with me, he was playing against Leanne.
"Because we"re both plants," said Rose. "Our faces match up, and our names match up, but there"s something that doesn"t match up." And Horrors take me if she didn"t produce one of her collages.
"Do you like it?"
I did, actually. It was a riot of blues and purples, with a few splashes of peach and gold to give it life.
"I like it extremely," said Leanne, although she hadn"t been asked. "How did you know just what colors to use?"
"I have a gift." Rose sat rather closer to me than usual. "But it"s not the sort of gift you give someone. I have it all for myself, Eldric said so."
"I did the cutting and gluing," said Eldric. "Didn"t I do an excellent job?"
"Eldric"s the Administrative a.s.sistant of Scissors and Glue," said Rose.
As I looked at the collage, the colors resolved themselves into patterns, and the patterns resolved themselves into an image. "Do I see people?"
"Yes!" said Rose, and her voice actually managed an exclamation mark. "Who are the people?"
The people were rather abstract, mostly peach-colored blobs with eyes.
"Are they babies?" said Leanne.
"Yes!" said Rose, still sitting with her back to Leanne, which was wonderfully rude. "Who are the babies?"
I stared into the collage, but the baby-blobs did not give up their names.
"I don"t know," I said. "Who are they?"
"I can"t tell you," said Rose. "Because of the secret."
"But Rose," I said.
"I like Rosy Posy," said Rose.
"But Rosy Posy," I said.
"I prefer that you see it," said Rose. "Because then you"ll get better."
"But I"m no longer ill," I said.
"You"re ill in a different sort of way," said Rose.
"What way is that?" said Eldric.
"She"s ill in her thoughts," said Rose.
"I am not!"
"You are so," said Rose. "You think certain things about yourself and they don"t make you happy."
Eldric glanced at me, but I pretended not to notice. Shut up, Rose! "What makes you think I have unhappy thoughts?" I don"t tell Rose things like that-intimate things.
"Because you talk when you"re asleep."
Oh.
"May I hazard a guess?" said Eldric.
"A hazard is dangerous," said Rose.
"Hazard a guess about the babies, I mean. Are they you and Briony?"
"Yes!" Rose actually grew pink from all those exclamation marks.
"You"re ever so clever," said Leanne.
"This one"s you, Rose." Eldric pointed. "That one"s Briony."
"Yes!"
"How on earth can you tell?" I said.
"I"ve told you dozens of times that you and Rose are nothing alike," said Eldric.
"Eldric has an eye for art of all sorts," said Leanne. "Don"t you, darling?"
"If you say so," said Eldric.
Darling! Had they darlinged each other when they were here? I imagined them, magnificent on horseback, tossing darlings to and fro.
"You are not attending," said Rose.
I leaned closer. The babies were little more than oblongs of paper, yet they were clearly babies. How had she done that?
"It"s fantastic, Rose."
"I know," said Rose. "What else do you see?"
I looked, and Eldric looked, but we couldn"t make out anything else. "I prefer that you see it," said Rose.
"Perhaps Leanne can see it?" said Eldric.
Leanne gazed but finally shook her head. "I"m sorry."
"You see, Rose," said Eldric, "we haven"t your eye for color."
"You may call me Rosy Posy," said Rose. "Leanne, however, may not."
"Rose!" I said. "That was extremely rude."
"We didn"t ask her to come," said Rose.
I turned to Leanne to apologize, but Leanne smiled and shook her head. "Don"t let it trouble you. I quite understand."
"Don"t give up!" said Rose. "Briony must get better!"
I looked deeper into the collage, into an overlay of dark blues with spots of white and yellow.
"The night sky?" I said.
"Yes," said Rose. "Eldric has corroborated my theory that it"s all right to say yes when you guess correctly."
"I intend only to make correct guesses," I said.
The collage was divided into halves with a vertical line of black. At first glance, the halves were identical. A pale moon in each, and a pale peach baby with a single eye.
The babies were identical (unless you chose to believe Eldric), but the moons were not. The right-hand moon hung in the twelve o"clock position, but the left-hand moon had not yet risen so high.
"Hmm," I said.