White Time

  ‘Like a pond of golden-eel.’ In fact, I’d had no small difficulty hiding all the new wealth, swirling golden in its live-water. I’d had to lay my bed-plank across cask-tops to make room for it all. For a change, I was glad I was an only daughter, with a room of my own.

  ‘And all else is well?’ I could almost believe Rustle was seeing me rather than a cogwheel in his nuisance-machine.

  ‘Why yes, unless you count Purl’s dying of grief as mattering much.’

  There was some kindness in his smile. ‘While Chirrup lives, she will live. It’s a tough old bird, that bird Hope.’

  ‘Hmph. Maybe. I don’t see the harm in telling her our plan, myself.’

  ‘Which does not mean there is none.’ He reached across the weighing-hall map, touched my arm and looked into my eyes. My pulse sprang erratic at his touch. ‘Take my word, Rill. I know where danger is.’

  I cleared my throat. ‘So what will be in the gift?’ I said while I had him. ‘A smell, an itch? Indelible paint?’

  He looked blank for a moment, then smiled a smile to disguise some other expression. ‘You need not know,’ he said. ‘You need not worry your head.’ And his gaze moved over my bare scalp for a moment before reading in my eyes whether he needed to go on.

  ‘No, I’ve never thought of growing it,’ I said bluntly. Which was true enough – it had occurred to me I’d make a better rebel disguised as a neat, poll-headed, down-trodden Ord. But I wasn’t going to tell him that; I had some pride. I wanted him to ask me. He could force me to do this first job, but he’d have to properly ask me for anything further.

  He didn’t. ‘Pity,’ he said, so breathily, so airily, I hardly trusted myself to have heard it. I felt a great hollowness between us, as if we were regarding each other across a deep, wide chasm, the world’s noise making it impossible to speak. And Rustle got up from the table and was going to the door, which he would open and stand beside as he always did, to show me our meetings were over.

  ‘Four days?’ Purl thrust the card from her, then snatched it back to glare at it.

  ‘As you see, Grandmother,’ I said.

  ‘Are you mad? Who is this? A high doctor! What in all the red-headed blazing heavens is this?’

  ‘A friend got me in to him.’

  ‘A friend? With whom have you been mixing?’

  ‘Why do you send me to that college, then?’

  ‘For appearances, fool-girl. What is this?’

  ‘I want the full four days solitary, for my bleeding and all the ceremony around it.’

  ‘Bleeding and ceremony? Now? When all the high-born want their laps full of tamsins at the weighing?’

  ‘Am I not entitled, whenever?’

  ‘Well, entitled is one thing. But whoever takes those four days?’

  ‘People who need them, maybe.’

  She looked up at me, hearing the strain in my voice that came from lying but could be read as something else.

  ‘You have been very strange.’

  ‘Maybe I have.’

  ‘Have you been with a man or something?’

  ‘No!’

  ‘Are you in lust?’

  ‘No! Stop it!’

  She watched my long blushing. She took a deep breath in through her nose and released it out her mouth. She tucked the pass-card into her sleeve.

  ‘Take the four days – why should I care? But don’t think you’ll get it every month.’

  ‘I don’t. I won’t. Just this once.’ And I slouched away.

  Two days I clambered about my room, which was more cask-room than sleeping-room now. I used the middle-day, when Purl was at the workshop, to do the heavy cask moving and emptying and water carting. Mornings and evenings were for selection.

  Boy-hair was so straight and coarse and round, so different from tamsins’ ∞-profiled strands, which sometimes split down the middle, whole batches at a time ruined. At first I thought there were no discards, each strand looked so robust and shining.

  But after a while of working, my eye began to discern differences. I could just give Lar more wealth, or I could give him, by taking some care, spectacular wealth in degree of shine, in strength and straightness. It was bulk he wanted, but I would not give him more of what he already had; I would give him bulk that screamed richesse, that blinded the Leets’ eyes when the weighing-room lamps hit it. I worked my own eyes and my fingers red and sore those two days – and nights I gave too, as much as I could without falling asleep into the selection-tub.

  Late the second night I had it all as I needed, the wealth draped in a great shining semicircle from the cask onto sheets on the floor, the instruments in their boiling-cases, several sets for safety. All the other casks were put back behind the shop; all the discarded wealth was drained and sold, discreetly, to a dealer in the Vines, one with no connection to our usual buyer of tamsin-wealth. And I sat for several minutes, my hands empty, my eyes full of wealth-glister, in a state of bewilderment at myself, before my practical brain sent me to bed.

  * * *

  ‘Oh, my wealth!’ gasped Lar when he came in next morning. ‘That’s it? That’s mine?’

  ‘Sit down.’ I was tired, I was fed up looking at the stuff. I wanted to get started so that I could get done.

  He went and bent over the cask. ‘But it’s fantastic! This is from my wealth?’

  ‘Sit down. We must get started.’

  I tell you, I earned my money and more in just that day. And not only in the setting of that great crop of wealth in Master Lar’s scalp.

  ‘You must not cry,’ I said. ‘You will ruin your eyes for tomorrow.’

  ‘But it so hurts! With every hair! Ow!’ And he pulled away from me so that the hair I had just set came uprooted, and there was a bead of blood.

  We came to an agreement; he would not cry or move if, after every seven hairs, I paused for him to complain and recover. And apart from a couple of stormy moments, he held good. He had to; we had only one day and night, and there was enormous effort in this, despite the ease of setting such big-toy hair. Just keeping the long hair free of tangles as I worked necessitated so much careful combing, so much more than a tamsin’s!

  I was soon thoroughly sick of Lar’s hard golden-brown scalp and the whimpering coming from underneath it. It wasn’t until evening, when we stopped our second time for food and drink, that the excitement took me, seeing the way the old hair was puffed out by the new. The effects of my two days’ careful selection took fire in the dim light.

  ‘You’ll love it!’ I whispered, for Purl was home from work and moving about downstairs by then. ‘Your mother will be so happy!’

  Lar chewed and looked at me sidelong. ‘It had better work,’ he almost snarled. He looked exhausted, but there was nothing a little sleep, a little paint could not correct.

  Deep in the night, we finished. He would not let me comb it all straight. ‘Just put it in a bag loose. I can’t stand this any longer.’ So I did, not even knowing how to plait or order such long hair; I straightened it out as best I could, the armfuls of it, and put it in a loose knot in a makeshift snood of sheeting.

  ‘Get me out of here.’ He stood up and scraped his chair back.

  ‘Ssh! You’ll wake my grandmother.’

  ‘Screw your grandmother.’

  ‘My, my – somebody’s a little tetchy.’

  Lar gave me a savage look and held out the waistbands of the snood for me to tie.

  It was an hour beyond midnight. We stood in silence on the doorstep until our eyes shed the golden light of my room, then hurried to Modern Square, where Lar’s house equipage waited. His mother burst from the carriage door as we crossed the square. ‘The volume is good,’ she said in a hard voice.

  ‘Oh, it’s so heavy!’ whined Lar. ‘Heavier than the padding.’

  ‘Relish it, boy.’ She reached up and pulled back the sheet. My work on the hairline, interspersing Lar’s thinner, duller hair with the very best of the new-grown strands, showed even in the moonlight – fat
growth of gleaming wealth.

  ‘Look at that! Not a mark or a blood-bead to be seen. This is good work, honest girl!’ She grinned so evilly at me, I could not take it for a compliment. ‘I will recommend you. Do you want that? This could be profitable business for you.’

  ‘If you see fit,’ I said. Formality is so handy, for filling a gaping mouth.

  She laughed some more, stroking her son’s forehead. Then, ‘Into the car,’ she snapped.

  As Lar hauled himself and his new wealth away, she handed me a big pocket of coin. ‘Here is half, in gilden. The bronze is in a pack in the carriage – too heavy for any but an Ordinary.’

  When I had shouldered it, she pulled back from fussing Lar into the car, and she kissed me! ‘Bless you,’ she said. ‘You have made history tonight.’ Then she climbed up, and the carriage drew away.

  I struggled home and stuffed the bronze-pack into my clothes-chest, then emptied the gilden onto my bed and counted them, twice. One hundred gilden, five times over. I shook my head over it, I laughed in awe. Why had I done this? I would absolutely not do it, I had said to Lar – but then I had wavered, and Rustle had trapped me so that I could not waver back, and now it was done, all but Rustle’s little job, after which I would be my own person again. And stronger for having wavered this once, and found out what it led to.

  I’d be sensible, distance myself from all that rebel nonsense, hang onto the money, finish college, set myself up in a slow and modest-looking way. One of those speciality workshops between the Vines and the Keys, the ones with only a discreet name-board beside the door – one of those was mine, lying before me in the form of coin. It would be so easy now! I had seen the appeal of the lawless life – but I was stopping right here, of course. Purl, Chirrup, Rustle, Lar and his mother – what did I owe any of them? I didn’t truly care for Rustle’s cause, and I wasn’t going to join him just for the sake of belonging somewhere. Whatever I felt when I was near him, I wouldn’t let him turn my head. I would be strong, and lone, and rich, and keep quiet about it, keep my mouth shut and my nose clean, so I would.

  And with a huge yawn, I began stashing away my new wealth.

  I took twenty in gilden and the rest in bronze, so as not to arouse suspicion. I went early, before even the market people were abroad, when there was no colour in the world, only first light like grey sand swimming in the air.

  At the Wall they kept me waiting, as if they couldn’t bring themselves to touch my money. I sat there with the sack between my feet, while the jailers had long, idle conversations, casting me blank looks every now and again. I concentrated on not sighing or moving, not showing any irritation that would invite them to delay me longer.

  ‘Put your penalty on that table,’ a guard finally said to me. ‘And you may as well go through.’

  More waiting in another room. I began to worry about the time this was taking. I had things to do. I had a bag full of weigh-clothes to get into.

  Finally I heard them pour out the money and count through it, the musical chinking of the heavy gilden and the workaday rattle of the bronze. And then sooner than I expected, Chirrup came to the door.

  He gave a showy yawn. ‘What kind of hour is this to get a man out of bed?’

  ‘Go home and make Purl some breakfast,’ I said, getting up off the cold stone bench and slinging my bag onto my shoulder.

  ‘Why, what did she have to do?’

  I pushed past him to the outer door. ‘What do you care?’

  He stepped out into the street, which was more alive now, with early workers and a soft, fresh breeze. He put his hands on his hips and glanced around, looking pleased with himself.

  Then he registered that I was setting off townward. ‘Hey, where are you off to?’

  ‘Work.’

  ‘Huh?’ He was coming after me.

  ‘You go home. Make Purl’s day. It’s weigh-day – she’ll have time to spoil you.’

  He grabbed my arm. ‘Weigh-day already?’

  ‘Yes. Let go of me!’

  But he wanted an audience for his face, all gleeful and gratified. ‘Can I believe it? Can I believe my luck? Just in time for all the fun!’

  I pulled free and hurried on – and he kept after me!, laughing all the way.

  ‘Will you go home, please, Chirrup?’

  ‘There’s someone else I have to see first. Something I want to be in on.’

  I stopped in my tracks. Chirrup went on a few steps, then turned back to me. ‘And what do you mean, work? Shouldn’t you be in school? Or must you puff up someone’s pet at the last moment? What kind of Leet-licking have you graduated to, little sister?’

  I was eyeing the hard-packed street-earth in front of me, but I knew exactly what merry expression he was wearing. I scratched the side of my face. ‘Are you going to go and see Purl, Chirrup?’ I said softly.

  He laughed. ‘I’m a free man, now, aren’t I? I’ll go and see who I like.’

  I made sure my fist came out of the blue, backhanding his handsome head, hard. It worked better than I could have imagined, sending him sprawling. And the look on his face, the shock (and some fear!) – I have to tell you, it warmed my bitter heart.

  ‘Why, it was my pleasure to free you, Chirrup,’ I said. ‘No, no, don’t thank me! The joy of having you back at the heart of our family will be quite sufficient.’

  And I walked on. My hand felt like a bag of burning bone-shards, but even if I never set another hair in place, it was worth it.

  I went down to the beach, to one of the bathing huts, and changed into the weigh-clothes, and put on the make-up to cover my freckles. I unwound the false earlocks from the spoon handles I’d stored them on and taped them to my temples under the snood. Humming to myself, I stowed my Ord clothes under the floorboards of the hut, and set out for the weighing-hall.

  The quickest way would have been through the Vines, but a snooded Leet wouldn’t go there, so I went around by the avenues, trying not to hurry. Several people looked askance at me; I should have known I would look odd, moving on foot and alone.

  It was better when I reached the basement lane behind the weighing-hall. Several Leet families were there, doing the distance from their equipages on foot to avoid the crowd out front, and Ords were also going about their basement business with cloth and gift and message-box.

  Rustle’s man was there, dressed as a florist’s assistant. I strayed past him slowly, but his gaze glided over me and onward. The bouquet was a proper Leet one, crafted of acanthus and frail-hellebore, the stalks wrapped bulkily in fringed satin and ornamental paper.

  ‘It’s me,’ I muttered. ‘I am Rill.’ I held out my hands for the flowers.

  He drew them away in startlement. ‘I was expecting someone more Ordinary,’ he said almost accusingly.

  ‘Don’t muck about. Just give me the stuff. Hell’s fury, what’s among these stalks – lead?’

  ‘Sh! Just put it in the flower-wall with the others. Don’t let a flower-man do it, he’ll notice the weight. And try not to show it, the way you carry it. And here.’ He handed me a satin-wrapped box, also heavy, bound with glittering gift-cords. ‘See if you can’t place this well up against the girls’ corral. And then get out of there.’

  ‘Get out? But I thought I was there for the whole ceremony.’

  He blinked. He drew me aside as an emptied car went by, the way an Ord would draw aside a Leet.

  ‘What, will it start leaking then and there?’ I said.

  ‘Leaking?’

  ‘Leaking the smoke, or the smell, or whatever nuisance it is.’

  He looked up from securing my hands around the gift and flowers. Even for an Ord, he looked white. Even his lips were white, where they weren’t freckled.

  ‘What is it?’ I said.

  He lived again, a pale and trembling version of his former self. ‘Yes, it will start … leaking. But you do whatever Rus – whatever you’ve been told you should do. It’s not for me to go against his orders—’

  And he hur
ried from me. A family with a plain-snooded nubile man passed, and bowed to me, and I returned the bows, my face brushed by the petals of my lovely leaden flowers.

  Of course it was easy; everything is made easy for Leets. They are ushered here and there, welcomed everywhere; the door-guard did not even look at me, my garb and bearing were so convincing. I gave in my Key among the twittering nubiles and the graver voices of their parents. I passed from the key-arch into the gentle roar of the vast weighing-hall. I tried not to gawp like the awe-struck Ord I was.

  Musicians were already playing in the upper galleries, casting a web of gentle, echoing prettiness out over the sea of other sounds. The whole place was all plastered and gilded and encrusted with Leet embellishment, but they had been unable to disguise the good bones of the Ord temple it had once been. The central circle of the sun-pattern on the floor, in olden times a plain gold-foil disc, was crowded with equipment for the ceremony – two low-backed chairs, two mirror-silver scales-dishes behind them, silver trays of snowy white cards and ink-brushes to be used in influencing the marriage-matches.

  I descended the stairs from the entrance-gallery I followed another lone woman who was carrying a bouquet, past the girls’ corral, which was filling with white-gowned, bright-eyed, dazzling-haired nubiles. A curved metal flower-wall had been built around the central stone column in the far wall, of criss-crossed metal into which the stems of bouquets could be inserted.

  ‘Shall I place that for you?’ an attendant offered the woman in front of me.

  ‘Thank you, I would prefer to do it myself. It is for my nephew.’

  ‘And yours, miss?’

  ‘No, I will place mine too, thank you,’ I said in a faultless accent.

  ‘As you please. May I hold your gift while you place it?’

  ‘Why, thank you. But take care with it; it is verr-eh fragile.’

  ‘I will,’ he assured me.

  There was a space in the wall among several bouquets of pale orange lilies, at head-height. There I attempted to push the stalk-end of my bouquet. The grid opening seemed a little small – what would I do if it didn’t fit? I heard the wrapping tear, and nervously pulled the bouquet halfway out again – and pushed it straight back in, hearing the wrapper give further, sure the whole room had seen those glints of force-metal among the stalks, those braided wires.