“Why, Sigefrith! I was coming to tell you how we might cheer up our old friend Egelric, and I find a man who looks to need a little cheering up himself. What ails the old beast?”
Sigefrith smiled ruefully up at him. “I don’t suppose you want to talk about that.”
“What – have you come to grief, as I anticipated? Is Leofric on his way to kick in your teeth?”
“No, no, nothing of the sort. At least, I hope not! I simply don’t know how I shall pass the time until she returns. A week without Eadgith is like a week… is a very long week indeed!”
“Oh, Sigefrith,” he sighed. “You will never be a poet.”
“If she doesn’t inspire it in me, then nothing ever could,” he smiled fondly.
“It’s odd,” Alred snorted. “She’s a good woman and so on, but I can’t imagine her inspiring poetry in anyone.”
“Truly?” Sigefrith asked, astonished. “I had thought…”
“Where did she go, anyway?”
“Oh, only to her father. I let her take Brit. She wanted to see baby Liss, but she – ”
“Wait a moment! To her father? What?”
“Yes, to her father. What what? They shall return for Midsummer, but until then – ”
“Which Eadgith do you mean?”
“Which Eadgith?” Sigefrith laughed. “Eadgith the younger. Which did – ”
“Holy Juno mother of Mars!”
“Alred!”
“Jupiter! Don’t tell me I have just fallen into Matilda’s own – oh no! Damn!” he cringed.
“Alred, you don’t mean you thought I meant her mother!” Sigefrith roared. “Good God! She’s a good woman and all, as you say, but she certainly couldn’t inspire poetry in me!”
“Wait a moment, Sigefrith – I need to go back over the last month and try to figure out just how much of an ass I have made of myself.”
“Take your time!” Sigefrith cackled.
“But wait – what was this Leofric and Leila nonsense then?”
“You ninnyhammer! You’re the one who pointed out to me that Leofric is older than Leila by more than twenty years.”
“The age! Jupiter! But it’s true she’s only a girl, Sigefrith.”
“And you also told me she wasn’t only a girl! Besides, she will be fifteen tomorrow. And I shan’t even see her!” he added with a sigh.
“That’s young.”
“My mother was not quite fifteen when she married my father. And he was something like twenty-five years older than she.”
“Jupiter, Sigefrith, if that’s all! I thought you meant to engage in some sort of bizarre… something… between you and Eadgith and Leofric… oh God!”
“No wonder you looked at me the way you did!” Sigefrith laughed. “I thought you terribly hard-hearted, you know.”
“And Matilda thought me an old prude.”
“That must have been hard for you to bear!”
“Was it ever! After all these years! But, Sigefrith – do you have any idea how the girl feels?”
“She’s rather shy…”
Alred sighed. “I promised I wouldn’t tell, but perhaps I had better. And I must tell it all, for if I tell the least little part of it, you will guess.”
“What do you want to tell me?” Sigefrith asked, looking worried.
“She asked me for a little advice a few weeks ago. About Brede.”
“Brede? Ah… of course.”
“Perhaps I shouldn’t have mentioned it…”
“No, no. I think it was the right thing. Of course. I should have seen it…”
“Jupiter, Sigefrith! Don’t look like that!”
“It’s perfectly all right.”
“Now, just a moment. She didn’t actually say it was about Brede. I don’t believe so. Let me think… Damn! What did we say exactly?”
“Take your time,” Sigefrith said softly.
“Do you… when you kiss her hand, do you sometimes hold it in both of yours?”
“I don’t know… I suppose I have.”
“Do you ever say you would like to eat her?”
“Eat her!” he laughed. “I do when I’m pretending to be a dragon.”
“Damn, Sigefrith, and you’re calling me a ninnyhammer?”
“I can’t help it,” he shrugged.
“In that case I suppose she might have been speaking of you.”
“What else did she say?” he asked eagerly.
“Ah! That’s a lady’s secret, and I’ve already said too much.”
“Well, she didn’t ask for advice on how to rid herself of this pestilential creature whom she did not name, did she?”
“No, she did not.”
“That’s good enough for me,” Sigefrith said with satisfaction. “I’ve turned fifteen again, Alred! One day before she does!”
Alred shook his head.
“If you meant to cheer me up, you have largely succeeded. Now what’s this about our friend Egelric?”
Chapters
"Wait a moment, Sigefrith--I need to go back over the last month and try to figure out just how much of an ass I have made of myself."
LOL, I liked that line!!!