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SOME CONSEQUENCES DO not manifest until those responsible are dead and gone.
—Von of the Elsics
* * *
GILLY LEANED DOWN UNTIL her face was so close, her breath warmed Gwen’s flushed cheeks. “You’re a miserable, jealous little witch who thinks she can do whatever she wants, no matter who gets hurt. What did he ever do to you?”
Gwen could feel the stares of the other girls who had encircled her and Gilly.
“Go on. Tell me.” Gilly glared.
Though the top of her head reached only as high as Gilly’s shoulders, Gwen stood as erect as she could and refused to answer.
“Miserable coward. What happened to you? You were my friend, and we delighted in each other’s happiness. But now you’ve done your best to ruin any chance of me being happy. I hope that fortune-teller was wrong. All of the Greatland is lost if you’re its only hope. There is no love in your heart, Gwendolin Ahlgren, and I pity you.”
“Pity?” Gwen lashed out. “You’re the one who deserves pity. You’re so desperate for love that you’d take it from that lump of dough Thomlin.”
A couple of the girls standing in the circle giggled.
“Plump Thomlin Frank. Remember the songs you sang about him? Remember how you said the sight of him made you want to never eat another piece of pie again in your whole life? What happened to you, Gilly?”
Gilly’s face grew redder, and Gwen could hear teeth grinding. Gilly backed away and shook her head. “I grew up. You didn’t.”
“Ladies! Come inside. Your break is over,” Madame Gabaldi called from the doorway.
“I’m warning you, Gwen. Leave him alone,” Gilly said before she turned her back on Gwen and headed toward the schoolhouse, the circle of girls parting to let her through.
The other girls followed her, and Gwen was left standing alone. She was the last to reenter the building. The only desk left unoccupied was in the back of the room, and Gwen thanked her lucky stars she didn’t have to walk past everyone and sit in the front of the class.
Master Gabaldi stood beside his wife next to the large oak desk. “There’s been news from the south. Foreign ships have been scouting the coastline.”
One of the boys raised a hand, and Master Gabaldi nodded at him.
“Aren’t there a lot of Greatland ships that could chase them away?”
“Yes, of course.”
“Then what does it matter to us?” the boy asked.
His gaunt face crumpled into a frown, and Master Gabaldi glowered at the boy. “It matters because the Greatland is surrounded by water. What’s to prevent those ships from sailing around from the south to the Westland? And what would you do, boy? Defend your home and family?”
The boy stiffened. “Well, yeah. That’s exactly what I’d do.”
Master Gabaldi smirked and nodded. “With what? You’re the son of a farmer. Are you going to use a hay fork against swords and bows?”
The room erupted with chuckles, and the schoolmistress’s husband stretched out an arm. Pointing at another boy who had laughed, he asked, “And you? What strategy will you use to turn back a throng of foreign soldiers? Will you herd them into a barn like your father’s cows?”
The second boy slunk down in his chair. As Master Gabaldi glowered at each of the other boys, they, in turn, also sank into their chairs. Gwen liked the schoolmistress’s husband less and less with each glare.
“Lucky for you, I have some expertise and can take you to those who know how to train even the least warlike among you,” he said as he looked directly at Thomlin Frank, “to defend your homeland, yourselves, and your loved ones.”
Thomlin bolted out of his chair. “I’ll go with you!”
“You’ll have to untangle yourself from Gilly’s apron strings first,” Gwen said.
Disorder broke out. Raucous laughter erupted, and the students lobbed teasing insults at each other, but one voice rose above the rest, demanding to be heard. “Gwendolin Ahlgren!”
She’d thought it was Madame Gabaldi beginning a stern reprimand until she looked to her left and saw Gilly stomping toward her. Before Gwen could get out of the chair, her cheek felt the sting from Gilly’s palm.
When neither girl would explain what had brought on the outburst and retribution, Madame Gabaldi had sent both Gwen and Gilly home with wax-sealed notes. “I’ll see the two of you in a week. I trust you’ll have resolved your differences by then.”
Gwen walked straight to the butcher shop, all the while thinking there was absolutely no way she’d make up with Gilly Bastwick. At the shop, she found her father plucking a turkey while he sat on a low stool and hummed a merry melody.
“I’ll be right with you.”
He stopped humming when he looked over his shoulder and saw it was Gwen. His expression turned from pleasant, which it always was when a customer was in the shop, to surprise and just as rapidly to concern. “Are you ill?”
She shook her head and handed him the note.
His expressed concern at seeing her before the lessons should have ended for the day changed into a sour frown as he read the note, and a long sigh escaped his lips before he spoke. “What’s happened between you and Gilly, Gwen?”
Gwen shrugged.
“It must be something. The two of you have been inseparable since you were wee tots. Go on, then. Tell me. I’ve never known Gilly Bastwick to raise a hand to any living thing.” He looked back down at the turkey dangling from one of his hands and with the other continued to yank out the feathers, which fell to the floor in a pile that shifted with the air currents her father’s meticulous movements stirred.
The answer burst out of her in an uncontrolled stream, along with tears of humiliation. “How can you say that, Father? She’s vicious and cruel. She’s taken up with plump Thomlin Frank and forgotten we were ever friends. She thinks she’s going to marry him just because some stupid gypsy told her so. He paid that awful woman to tell Gilly it was her destiny. I’m sure of it! I hate him! I hate them both! They deserve each other!”
Jacob Ahlgren’s fingers let go of the base of a feather he was about to pull out. He lowered the half-plucked bird onto the pile of feathers at his feet and spun around on his stool to face Gwen. “I remember your mother saying something like that when Gilly’s father started courting Mignon. That was when your mother and I became friends, you know. It was when I fell in love with her, and it was the start of the life we’d share, the life that graced us with you, my dearest one.”
Gwen sniffled and wiped her tears with the flowing sleeve of her dress before looking into her father’s eyes. They bore a duality she’d seen on rare occasions, sadness and joy at the same time, the double-edged sword of memories of her mother. “But she pretends like I don’t exist. And I heard them talking when they couldn’t see me. She told Thomlin that I was selfish.” Her passion deflated by the lingering thought of her mother, she all but whispered the most painful part of what had become of her friendship with Gilly. “She betrayed my trust. She told him something I didn’t want anyone else to know.”
Her father put his hands on his knees and leaned forward. “That you went to the carnival without permission and spoke with a fortune-teller?”
Gwen blushed and shook her head. “Something more personal than that, Father, and I don’t want to talk about it.”
“I see. Your mother said something like that too. But she and Mignon made up, and they were best friends until the day your mother—What I’m saying is that true friends don’t give up on their friendships, even when one of them has done something they shouldn’t have. They work it out.”
Gwen didn’t know what to say. Part of her longed to be friends with Gilly again, and part of her couldn’t find forgiveness for Gilly’s betrayal.
Her father reached out and took her hand in his. “Have you considered that perhaps Gilly told Thomlin something private to earn his trust, and that maybe she was so caught up that she didn’t stop to think about how you might feel about it? Look. It was a mistake. We all make mistakes. Sometimes we act selfishly, and that includes both you and Gillian.” He kissed his daughter’s hand and turned back around on his stool, resuming his work.
Gwen stood there next to him and thought about what he’d said. After a few minutes, she put her hand on his shoulder. “Maybe you’re right. I feel awful we’re not friends, and I don’t really hate her or want anything but the best for her. If she’d just spend a little time with me and not every moment she has with him.”
Her father chuckled. “So how about you take a delivery for me out to the Bastwick cottage and talk this out with Gilly?”
“I doubt she’ll talk to me at all.”
“Did Madame Gabaldi send a note home with Gilly too?”
“Yes.”
Her father chuckled again. “I suspect Gilly will be a captive audience, then. Mignon will be beside herself about this.”
When he’d finished plucking the turkey, he laid the limp carcass on his butcher block and washed his hands before retrieving a burlap sack from the cold storage room. Handing it to Gwen, he said, “Give this to Mignon and tell her I hope it is smoked to her liking. Say it just that way. We’ll talk later about the rest of Madame Gabaldi’s note.”
“What else did she write?”
“Later, Gwen. For now, you go take care of what you need to. It’ll put your heart at ease and Gilly’s too, I suspect.”
“Yes, Father.”
Gwen’s walk to the Bastwick cottage was filled with fearful thoughts of Gilly rebuking her or refusing outright to see her. Uncertain if she could handle such horrible outcomes to a sincere effort, she fretted with every step. By the time the cottage came into sight, Gwen had worked herself into certainty that nothing she could say or do would dissuade Gilly from severing their friendship forever, and she was relieved when her rap on the door was answered by Mignon.
“Hello, Madame Bastwick. My father asked me to deliver this to you.” Gwen shoved the burlap bag toward Mignon, who took it. “He said to tell you he hopes it is smoked to your liking.”
Mignon nodded and smiled. “Did he now? Gillian, come here, girl.”
The command came without warning, and Gwen’s eyes widened as her stomach knotted.
Gilly peered over her mother’s shoulder but looked away when her eyes met Gwen’s.
“Invite our guest in, dear. She’s come from the butcher shop with smoked meat. The least we can do is offer her some tea.”
“That’s not necessary.”
“Of course it is, Gwen. You’ve come all this way.”
“Yes, ma’am, but—”
Her smile turned to a frown. “But nothing. Gilly, set the kettle to boil. And you get yourself in here and sit by the fire, Gwendolin Ahlgren.”
When Mignon spoke in the tone of voice she’d used, the result was imposing words not to be ignored, and everyone who knew her was aware of that fact. Neither girl dared to protest the commands. Gilly took a seat near the hearth once she’d put the kettle on the iron hook over the blazing fire, and both girls sat in unyielding silence while Mignon tucked away the burlap bag in the cupboard and busied herself preparing herb bags for the tea.
Once the water began to boil, Mignon retrieved the kettle and poured its contents into three mugs, each with its own bag of herbs. “We’ll let this steep and cool off a bit,” she said nonchalantly.
Gwen silently bemoaned that water didn’t cool as quickly as she wished it would. The moments already were ticking away interminably slowly.
“And while we wait,” Mignon continued as she took the only remaining free chair by the fire, “the two of you will tell me what foolishness has erupted between you.”
Gwen looked at Gilly, who was glaring back at her. “Madame Bastwick, I really should be going.”
“You’ll do no such thing.”
“My father and grandmother will be worried if I’m not home before dark.”
“You won’t be going home tonight.”
Gwen screwed up her face. “What do you mean?”
“Your father will tell your grandmother where you are.”
“But how would he know that?”
Mignon chuckled. “Your father sent a message with you.”
Gwen cocked her head. “The only message my father sent was that the meat was smoked to your liking.”
“Exactly, and while that may not mean anything to you two,” she said, giving each girl a haughty shake of her head, “it means a great deal to your father and me.”
“I’m sorry, Madame Bastwick, but I don’t understand.”
“Neither do I, Mother,” said Gilly.
“The tea should be cool enough to drink now.” Mignon got up as if they’d not been in the middle of a discussion, leaving Gwen and Gilly sitting there in confusion. She came back to the fire with the mugs on a wooden tray, which she offered to each girl before taking the remaining cup for herself and sitting back down again.
“Mother, what’s going on?”
Mignon raised the mug to her lips and took a sip, seemingly in no rush at all to respond to her daughter’s question. “Perfect,” she said. “Go on, girls, drink up. It’s going to be a long night.”
Gwen leaned forward and set the mug down on the low table around which the chairs were arranged. “I’m sorry, Madame Bastwick, I mean no disrespect, but I’m leaving right now,” said Gwen with a twinge of guilt for having spoken so harshly to the woman who had never been anything but kind to her.
“You’ll do no such thing, and if you’ll quell your impatience for a few minutes longer, I’ll tell you what’s going on.”
Gwen settled uneasily back in the chair.
“Drink your tea, child,” Mignon scolded as she handed the mug back to Gwen, who took it in hand and downed a hearty swig. “And you,” she said to Gilly, nodding at the mug in the girl’s hand. Like Gwen, Gilly obeyed.
“Good. Now I’ll tell you what’s going on. Long ago, when Margaretta and I were about your age, we had something of a falling out. It was the first and only time we ever had harsh words between us. For weeks, we didn’t speak to each other. We avoided being in the same place at the same time. Our other friends took sides too, and before long, what should have been a natural change in the way we expressed our friendship became a war between divided camps.”
“What were you fighting about, Mother?”
“Your father.”
“You both liked him?” asked Gwen.
Mignon laughed so unreservedly and for so long that Gwen and Gilly looked at each other and shrugged.
“Was that it, Mother?”
Mignon’s laughter died down to a chuckle, and she took another sip of her tea before shaking her head. “Quite the opposite. Margaretta despised him.”
Gwen’s mouth fell open. “But Mother never intimated such a thing. I distinctly remember her telling me he was honorable and had a nose talented at sniffing out lies.”
“That he did,” said Mignon, who gazed wistfully at the fire. “She wasn’t always that kind in her assessment of him, though. At first, she truly hated him, and I don’t blame her for it.”
“Mother. How can you say such a thing?”
Mignon looked down and swirled the mug so the tea sloshed in it before taking another sip and sighing. “It was our fault, your father’s and mine, but mostly mine, to be fair. When we met, he exuded such charm, worked so hard to impress me. I couldn’t resist him and wanted to be with him every moment, to wade in the river while he fished, to nibble apples under a tree while he braided hemp, to let him carry my herb basket when I made deliveries for my mentor. Before I knew what I was doing, he was the first thing I thought of in the morning, the only thing I thought of all day, and the last thing I thought of before I drifted off to sleep. I was smitten. With my head filled with your father’s sweet words and gallant gestures, I didn’t think of Margaretta or that my sudden obsession would leave her feeling abandoned and undesirable as my friend.”
In the brief silence that followed, Gwen looked down and put her mug to her lips, tilting it so the hot liquid barely touched them. She stared into the mug as if it held something mesmerizing and shouted in her head that she wasn’t going to cry. Her tightly closed eyelids squeezed out tears nonetheless upon hearing Mignon’s gentle tone again.
“Those who are wise say children who do not learn from the mistakes of their parents are doomed to repeat them.”
Gilly threw herself onto Gwen and sobbed, and Gwen sobbed along with her.
When the two girls finished apologizing and exchanging declarations of how much they’d missed each other, Mignon further explained that Jacob Ahlgren was responsible for quelling the quarrel between her and Margaretta. He had gone to Mignon’s house and told her that his mentor, a portly butcher in Vasterberg, needed to speak to her about collecting some herbs she would recommend for smoking a ham. He’d gone to Margaretta with the same story. At the appointed time, which was at the shop’s closing, both girls had arrived at the shop. Once inside, Jacob, who had already fallen hopelessly in love with Margaretta but hadn’t yet declared as much to her, had set out a spread of dried meat, cheese, and hard bread. Then he’d roundly scolded them for their childish behavior and locked them in the butcher shop, telling them he’d let them out when they’d resolved their differences. As he closed the door, he’d nodded to the spread atop the butcher’s chopping block and said, “I hope you find it smoked to your liking.”
“So that’s why he told me to say the words exactly that way,” Gwen said.
“Yes.” Mignon nodded and chuckled. “Your father was wise and crafty as a young man. He’s no less wise and crafty now.”
That evening, while the three of them ate and sat by the fire twisting twigs together to make a gathering basket, Gwen resolved to give her father an extra hug when she went home and not to doubt his wishes for her to have a happy life even if it wasn’t the life she would have chosen for herself. Maybe there was something he saw in her becoming a monk that she hadn’t yet seen, something truly fortuitous and joyful.