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I went into the kitchen
and lit off the stove, bottled gas, which is good in the winter, since the
new oil furnace doesn t work
without electric power.
While the milk and chocolate were heating, I turned on the oven and took
the pork loin from the
refrigerator. I managed to get it sliced, stuffed, rolled, and in the oven
by the time the chocolate was
ready.
Llysette took the chocolate, and I set a tray with biscuits on the hearth
by her feet.
Biscuit?
Yes, thank you.
I ate two biscuits to her every one and was back in the kitchen for refills
before I finished half my
chocolate. That might have been because I hadn t bothered to eat since
breakfast.
Another biscuit?
Llysette took two.
No lunch, either?
No. I was sleeping.
I let that lie, and had another biscuit and took another sip from my mug,
finally feeling warm from the
chocolate and the growing heat from the woodstove.
What about tomorrow?
A working lunch with Doktor Geoffries I must have, and the afternoon
session with the choir, and
we begin the opera rehearsals in the evening, until ten. And I must
complete the schedules for Herr
Wustman. Arranging the students and their accompanists, it is difficult.
Most nights this week, except
Thursday, I am busy. And you?
Thursday, I am going to Columbia once more. I was asked to a presidential
dinner. I laughed. A
gesture for old times sake, I guess.
She lowered the mug from her lips. Do you want to attend this
dinner?
I have very mixed feelings, but I think I should.
Pourquoi?
For the consulting it helps to maintain a profile in high circles within
government. And this sort of
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thing allows me to do it without living anywhere near the Federal
District Besides, I imagine that it will
give Dean Er Recchus something else to boast about.
That woman ... Llysette snorted, then bit into a biscuit.
I take it that you are not enamored of our dean.
Would I consider developing a new course? A course in singing for
instrumentalists and actors, she
asked.
Instrumentalists and actors?
Gregor, he wanted a course in singing for actors. That I understand. But
she, she felt that the
instrumentalists, especially those of the strings, should also be
included.
I shook my head.
That also, I understand. But now, she wants to share my next recital.
She had Dr. Geoffries suggest
that I ask the dean to play for me. She sounds like ... like a dance
fiddler.
Clank. Her cup almost bounced off the stone hearth, so hard had she set it
down.
She does scheme a lot.
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Llysette glared at me. Like saying the hog is sometimes not so neat,
that is.
While I wasn t sure of the comparison or the metaphor I got the idea.
What does Doktor Geoffries think?
Llysette squared her shoulders, letting the blanket slip away. He says
that if there is any way to
make the dean happy, it would be better. Better for him, I think.
I nodded. I wonder why they all bow and scrape.
Because they are men.
You re saying I m not? I raised an eyebrow.
Different you are.
I decided not to pursue that line of inquiry further. Excuse me. I need
to finish working on dinner.
With you I will come. So she dragged the blanket into the kitchen and
sat at the table while I
worked.
I sliced some of the fresh apples and set them aside in a pan to make fried
apples better than
applesauce any day, and chunky, not pureed baby food. Then I dragged out
the butter, some cinnamon
and nutmeg, and the raw sugar.
You cook well.
Experience helps. So did growing up in a household without sisters and
a mother who insisted that
no man should be slave to helplessness and his stomach. That had worked
fine for food, but not so well
in other areas.
Beans from the lower garden, via the root cellar, with almonds from
McArdles , were the vegetable,
and I d mixed batter for some drop biscuits.
Cooking I did little of, she admitted.
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I know.
Johan!
I grinned. I m not primarily interested in your cooking.
Men! No better are you than ... than all the others.
In some things, I m better. I tried a leer, but she wasn t looking. So
I dug a pale cream linen cloth
from the butler s pantry, not that we d ever had butlers, and spread it on
the dining room table. I even
used the bayberry candles and silver instead of stainless.
Then I dropped the biscuits into the oven, and fried up the apples. After
the biscuits came out, and
the apples went into the covered bone china dish, I dashed back down to the
cellar for a bottle of
Sebastopol. Somehow I got all the food on the table warm, and both wine
glasses filled.
In France, you would have been a chef, a great chef, Llysette said
after several bites and half of her
wine.
Mais non, point moi, I protested in bad French.
If you did not speak, that is.
We all might be in less trouble if we did not speak, I sometimes
think.
But life, it would be dull.
Dullness can be a virtue, I reflected. Especially compared to the
alternatives.
At times. She lifted her glass and drained the rest of the Sebastopol.
We have seen such times.
I refilled her glass, and tried the apples, just crunchy enough to give my
teeth some resistance, soft
enough to eat easily, and cinnamon-tart-tangy enough to offset the
richness of the stuffed pork. Some
biscuits? The honey is in the small pitcher there.
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