Dunstan gets a look

The last words of Dunstan’s prayer had scarcely faded when Anna looked at her plate and declared, “Chicken on a Tuesday! Isn’t that fine!”

Dunstan saw the corners of Britamund’s mouth turn up, but her eyes were engaged in a careful observation of her own plate of chicken.

“I don’t know but I guess the Tuesday chicken is on account of the ladies,” Bertie told his wife. “It wasn’t like this when it was just Dunstan and I.”

“No? What did you eat?”

“Ahhh… pig’s feet in jelly.”

Dunstan knew—and apparently Bertie knew—that this was a dish Anna could not stomach. But before she could wrinkle her nose prettily and declare her disgust, Britamund leaned towards her and confided, “Blackberry jelly.”

“Ewwww!” Anna put down her knife and laughed.

Dunstan laughed too, but the Princess turned her attention back to her plate.

Anna shook her finger at her husband. “No wonder you’re so skinny!”

“You’ll fatten me up in no time, though, sweetie. You’re almost as good a cook as my Ma.”

“Not that I cook any longer,” she said hastily to Britamund. “My sister-​in-​law likes to, but I tell her it is not the thing. Bertie means that, being a good cook, I know how to manage my own cook.”

Bertie turned to Dunstan and laughed, “I guess that means your mother was some kind of dreadful cook! Remember how we used to eat? That old cook you had!”

“She made good gravy,” Dunstan said automatically, and he looked up at Britamund to see whether she would smile.

He remembered any number of dinners when they had been seated together at the children’s table in his father’s hall. They had been too young then to possess the sense of irony required to appreciate Cook’s cooking in the manner in which the Duke intended it. However, Cook’s messes did make excellent building materials, and he remembered particularly a few dinners during which they had erected mottes and baileys on their plates and launched peas at one another’s fortifications, making catapults of their spoons. If only she would look up at him he would remind her of that. Oh, the gravy that had filled those moats!

Britamund only turned to Anna and said, “That’s where we get the recipe for pig’s feet in blackberry jelly.”

“Ewwww!”

“With gravy,” Bertie added.

“And honey,” Britamund countered.

“And vinegar.”

Anna flapped her hands and squirmed in her chair. “Stop it!” she squealed.

“Want the recipe, sweetie?” Bertie asked. “I swear, you can’t taste the pork under all that.”

“No! Bertie!” Anna leaned closer to the Princess and said, “I have all but banned pork from my house, you know. It is simply not the thing.”

“Luckily I ate a whole herd of swine in my first eighteen years,” Bertie said.

“They weren’t possessed by devils, were they?” Britamund asked him.

Bertie smacked his hand on the table. “You know—that would explain my infernal desire to throw myself off a cliff.”

“Oh, that’s from the Bible!” Anna laughed. “I shouldn’t laugh!”

“Why shouldn’t you? I think it must have been funny—all those piggies running to the cliff as fast as their little trotters could trot them, and oink-​oinking all the way down into the sea.”

“I know, but, Bertie! The Bible!”

“Don’t you think the Lord has a sense of humor? What is that part…” Bertie waved his hand at Dunstan. “With the gnat and the camel?”

“‘Ye blind guides, which strain at a gnat, and swallow a camel,’” Dunstan quoted.

“Now, that’s funny, isn’t it? Just picture it. Those Pharisees sure made life hard for themselves, walking around with beams in their eyes and camels in their bellies.”

“I know, but Bertie! Laughing about the Bible! It simply isn’t the thing.”

There was that mysterious “thing” again that so many things were not. Dunstan bobbed his head, trying to get Britamund to notice him, but she was busy cutting her Tuesday chicken. He was certain he could share a sly laugh with her if only she would look up at him.

“You should see what happens when Father Brandt and the Duke get together and drink,” Bertie said. “They quote the Bible at each other all out of context, and the rest of us laugh until we cry.”

“How shocking!” Anna flushed, but she smiled a little too. “Fortunately I can’t imagine how I ever could see it.”

“Father Brandt comes out here sometimes,” Bertie shrugged. “He doesn’t like to ride so far any longer, but he’s so afraid Dunstan’s damning himself out here alone without me to keep him honest…”

“Bertie!” Dunstan cried. He did not want Britamund thinking about what might have been going on in this castle with him alone in it. And anyway, it wasn’t going on any longer.

“What?” Bertie wailed. “Listen here—next time the Lord sends Father Brandt and your own esteemed father your way, you had better invite us. And see that there’s wine.”

“Oh, Bertie!” Anna whispered. “Inviting yourself to dine with His Grace!”

“What?” he wailed in her direction. “Didn’t he say I was like a son to him? When he cried at our wedding? ‘The tallest son he never had!’”

“Yes, but Bertie! It is not the thing.”

Britamund would not look up at him!

“Don’t worry, sweetie. He will surely invite himself to dine with us the next time he comes out this way. He’s anything but shy. And he likes pretty girls,” he winked.

“Oh!” Anna shook a scolding finger at her husband. “But I won’t be fooled. I know some men are just awful flirts, and they don’t mean anything by it.”

“Don’t act so scandalized!” Bertie laughed. “I know you girls will forgive a man anything except for not flirting with you.”

At last the Princess looked up at Dunstan—the briefest glance from beneath her lashes, and perhaps unintentional. But it was not the sort of glance he was hoping to get. There had been no sly, complicit smile.

She sat at the far end of the long table, in the chair that would be hers in two years, when at last they were married. He already called it “Brit’s chair” to himself, and only the most esteemed guests were permitted to sit in it. However, it made her seem so out of reach. It was not like the intimacy of the children’s table, where they had sat side-​by-​side and jabbed each other with their bony children’s elbows, or else across the table from one another, launching peas between turnip fortresses.

From where he sat, he could scarcely see—much less read—the expression on her face. From where he sat, she was only a beautiful stranger, laughing at times, but not with him. The very table seemed as long as the two years that separated them.

“Well!” Anna sighed in contentment after swallowing a bite of her Tuesday chicken. “I’m certain I never dreamt when I painted the tiles for this hall that I should be invited one day to dine in it!”

“Did you paint these tiles?” Britamund asked.

“I did indeed! Back when I had to work to help my poor papa, of course.”

Now Dunstan had to hope the Princess would not look at him. However, he found that he could not take his eyes from her face. What was she thinking?

“They’re quite colorful,” Britamund said.

“Thank you! I wish I had made a few of the animal ones for myself, though. I think they would be so sweet in a little boy’s room.” She sighed across the table at her grinning husband.

“That is precisely what I thought when I saw them.”

Britamund spoke with such determination that Dunstan knew it was true—and knew that she was secretly pleased to have found an honest compliment for them while actually finding them dreadful.

“Did you?” Anna cried. “It must be so, then!”

“But you could paint a few for us, sweetie,” Bertie said. “When we need some, that is.”

“Oh, Bertie!” she scoffed. “Painting tiles, I’m certain! That would not at all be the thing.”

“I think it would be just the sweetest thing, Anna. I wish you would. When we need some, that is.”

“Well… for you,” she smiled. “If you are nice to me meanwhile. I’ll have to borrow your brother’s book again, Dunstan.”

Britamund’s gaze dropped from Anna’s face and slowly glided down the long table, down the two years that had already passed them by, until it was lifted again. At last she was looking at him.