CloudDancer enjoyed keeping him in suspense for a while, and then went on. “Yes, another man. He soon died, poor fellow, but she has a child by him, a boy.”
Dustfinger said nothing, listening to his own thudding heart. His stupid heart. “What about the girls?”
“Oh, the girls. Yes, them – I wonder who their father can have been?” CloudDancer was smiling again, like a little boy who has pulled off a mischievous trick. “Brianna’s as lovely as her mother already. Although she’s inherited your red hair.” “And Rosanna, the younger?” Her hair was dark, like her mother’s.
The smile on CloudDancer’s face disappeared as if Dustfinger had wiped it away. “The child has been dead a long time,” he said softly. “There was a fever, two winters after you went away.
Many died of it. Even Nettle couldn’t help them.”
Dustfinger drew bright, damp lines on the table with his forefinger, which was sticky from the wine. Dead. Much might be lost in the space often years. For a moment he tried desperately to remember her face, such a little face, but it blurred, as if he had spent too long over the attempt to forget it.
Amid all the noise, CloudDancer sat with him in silence for a long time. Then at last he rose, ponderously; it wasn’t easy to get up from the low bench with his stiff leg. “I must be off, my friend,” he said. “I still have three letters to deliver, two of them up there in Ombra. I want to be at the city gate before dark, or the guards will have their little joke again and refuse to let me in.”
Dustfinger was still drawing lines on the dark wood of the table. Two winters after you went away – the words stung like nettles in his head. “Where are the others camping at the moment?”
“Just outside the city wall of Ombra. Our prince’s beloved grandson celebrates his birthday soon.
Every entertainer and minstrel is welcome at the castle on that day.”
Dustfinger nodded without raising his head. “I’ll see. Maybe I’ll go along, too.” He abruptly rose from the hard bench. The girl by the hearth looked at them. His younger daughter would have been about her age now if the fever hadn’t carried her off. Together with CloudDancer, he made his way past the crowded benches and chairs to the door. It was still fine outside, a sunny autumn day, clad in bright foliage like a strolling player.
“Come to Ombra with me!” CloudDancer laid a hand on his shoulder. “My horse will carry two, and we can always find a place to sleep there.”
But Dustfinger shook his head.
“Later,” he said, looking down the muddy road. “It’s time I paid a visit.”
Chapter 7 – Meggie’s Decision
The idea hovered and shivered delicately, like a soap bubble, and she dared not even look at it directly in case it burst. But she was familiar with the way of ideas, and she let it shimmer, looking away, thinking about something else.
– Philip Pullman, Northern Lights
Mo came home just as they were all sitting down to breakfast, and Resa kissed him as if he’d been away for weeks.
Meggie hugged him harder than usual, too, relieved that he had come back safe and sound, but she avoided looking him straight in the eye. Mo knew her too well. He would have spotted her guilty conscience at once. And Meggie’s conscience was very guilty.
The reason was the sheet of paper hidden among her schoolbooks up in her room, closely written in her own hand, although the words were by someone else. Meggie had spent hours copying out what Orpheus had written. Every time she got something wrong she had begun again from the beginning, for fear that a single mistake could spoil everything. She had added just three words – where the passage mentioned a boy, in the sentences left unread by Orpheus, Meggie had added “and the girl.” Three nondescript, perfectly ordinary words, so ordinary that it was overwhelmingly likely that they occurred somewhere in the pages of Inkheart. She couldn’t check, however, because the only copy of the book she would have needed to do that was now in Basta’s hands. Basta .. the mere sound of his name reminded Meggie of black days and black nights. Black with fear.
Mo had brought her a present to make peace between them, as he always did when they had quarreled: a small notebook bound by himself, just the right size for her jacket pocket, with a marbled paper cover. Mo knew how much Meggie liked marbled patterns; she had been only nine when he had taught her how to color them for herself. Guilt went to her heart when he put the notebook down by her plate, and for a moment she wanted to tell him everything, just as she had always done. But a glance from Farid prevented her. That glance said, “No, Meggie, he won’t let you go there – ever.” So she kept quiet, kissed Mo, whispered, “Thank you,” and said no more, quickly bending her head, her tongue heavy with the words she hadn’t spoken.
Luckily, no one noticed her sad expression. The others were still anxious about Farid’s news of Basta. Elinor had gone to the police, on Mo’s advice, but her visit to them had done nothing to improve her mood.
“Just as I told you,” she said crossly, working away at the cheese with her knife as if it were the cause of all this trouble. “Those fools didn’t believe a word I said. A couple of sheep in uniform would have listened better. You know I don’t like dogs, but maybe I ought to get some after a couple of huge black brutes to tear Basta apart the moment he comes through my garden gate.
A Dobsterman dog, yes. A Dobsterman or two. Isn’t a Dobsterman the dog that eats people?”
“You mean a Doberman.” Mo winked across the table at Meggie.
It broke her heart. There he was winking at her, his deceitful daughter who was planning to go right away, to a place where he probably couldn’t follow her. Perhaps her mother would understand, but Mo? No, not Mo. Never.
Meggie bit her lip so hard that it hurt, while Elinor, still in a state of agitation, went on. “And I could hire a bodyguard. You can do that, can’t you? One with a pistol – no, not just a pistol, armed to the teeth: knives, rifles, everything, and so big that Basta’s black heart would stop at the mere sight of him! How does that sound?” Meggie saw Mo suppress a smile with difficulty.
“How does it sound? As if you’d been reading too many thrillers, Elinor.” “Well, I have read a lot of thrillers,” she said, injured. “They’re very informative if you don’t usually mix much with criminals. What’s more, I can’t forget seeing Basta’s knife at your throat.” “Nor can I, believe me.”
Meggie saw his hand go to his throat as if, just for a moment, he felt the sharp blade against his skin again. “All the same, I think you’re worrying unnecessarily. I had plenty of time to think it all over on the drive back, and I don’t believe Basta will come all the way here just to get revenge. Revenge for what? For being saved from Capricorn’s Shadow and by us? No. He’ll have had this Orpheus read him back by now. Back into the book. Basta never liked our world half as much as Capricorn did. Some things about it made him very nervous.” He spread jam on top of his bread and cheese. Elinor watched this, as usual, with horror, and Mo, also as usual, ignored her disapproving glance.
“So what about those threats he shouted after the boy?”
“Well, he was angry that he’d gotten away, wasn’t he? I don’t have to tell you the kind of things Basta says when he’s angry. I’m only surprised he was actually clever enough to find out that Dustfinger had the book. And I’d like to know where he found this man Orpheus, too. He seems to be better than me at reading aloud.”