From a High Tower Page 11

  By now, she was ravenous. It had been a very long time since the bit of bread and cheese that had served as her luncheon.

  As if he could read her mind (or, perhaps, hear her growling stomach), Cody checked his pocket watch and gabbled something. Kellerman translated that simply enough. “We’re going to eat now, and we must eat quickly to be ready in time for the evening performance.”

  They led her to a big tent full of benches and trestle tables, not unlike a Festzelt, or beer tent at a big Oktoberfest celebration. The venues for eating and drinking at a Maifest tended to be smaller than the big beer tents at Oktoberfest, so this was the first time she had ever seen a place where people ate that was so very large. At least sixty people could be seated here at once! This was where the aroma of stew had been coming from.

  At one end of the tent were men in aprons ladling tin bowls full of stew and handing them over to the performers and workers. Cody led her to the queue, and she got a bowl full of stew that smelled so rich and good her stomach began complaining that she wasn’t eating it right then, plus a huge chunk of bread and butter and a wedge of pie on a second tin plate and an empty tin mug. She got settled at a table, her tin cup poured full of coffee, and then Cody stood up and whistled shrilly, bringing all conversation to a halt.

  He gestured grandly at her and launched into a speech. She recognized her name in it and that was about all. Then there was a pause, and Cody made a little beckoning motion with his hand, so she stood up and gave a little bow, feeling suddenly very shy. I had better get over that, and quickly! she told herself. I am going to be a performer, I cannot be shy!

  That elicited a round of enthusiastic, but brief, applause. It looked to her as if many people were glad to hear what Cody had to say, but also were in a hurry to get their suppers. She was glad the applause was brief; she wanted to eat.

  The stew was delicious, just as good as anything Mother had made, and that was high praise indeed. The bread, she thought, was probably local, since it would be difficult to transport bread ovens. The coffee was very strong and bitter, but after her first taste—and wry face—Kellerman went over to the end of the table and brought back a tin full of sugar lumps, which made it quite good. Mother had never made coffee, but she decided that she quite liked it. The pie was nothing like anything Mother made, but it was excellent, nevertheless. On the whole, when she finished her meal and brought the dishes to the front to go in a dry washing tub with the rest, she was more than content.

  But her day was not yet complete, it seemed. Cody said something and bowed a little, and then left, taking Leading Fox with him. Kellerman took her elbow and she allowed him to guide her out of the mess tent. As she paused, confronted by the mass of tents of differing kinds, their sides moving slightly in the evening breeze, he let go of her and gestured toward a sort of path between the tents.

  “As you heard, we have an evening performance that I must get to, but first I will show you to your new wagon,” he told her. “We’ve had all your personal belongings brought there, and by now I am sure at least some, if not all, of your costumes are there as well. Cody also left orders that some spare American garb be altered and given to you. Some of us—Leading Fox at least, and I—will be back after the show.”

  “This is more than kind,” she said, and would have added more, but he would hear none of it.

  “You are one of us, now, fraulein,” he said, with one of his courteous little bows. “We are a family, now more than ever, and you are doing us a great favor by joining us.”

  They threaded their way across the camp to an area set aside for wagons. It appeared that the members of the show, on the whole, preferred a tent to a wagon, for there were only half a dozen living wagons lined up in a neat row. Kellerman took her to a small bow-topped wagon of a uniform brown color, quite plain, unlike the beautifully painted and carved Romany vardos that had camped beside the abbey several times (with Mother’s blessing). It was also a bit smaller than the vardos, which were, after all, intended to serve an entire family. There was a green door with a glass window in it at the front, and a glass bow window at the rear. It, like the others, had been parked so that the evening light fell upon the blank side, and not through either window. Kellerman opened the door for her with a flourish, and she went up the steps to survey her new home.

  Well, it was small. But although clearly second- or thirdhand, it was stoutly built; the roof seemed to be tin over a wooden frame, and the rest was made of golden-brown wood the same color as the crust of a loaf of bread. There was a curtained platform bed under the window, with a storage cupboard underneath. Just inside the door was a tiny cast-iron stove—she wouldn’t be using that much in the summer, but if the show was, indeed, planning on continuing to perform into November, she certainly would need it then. On the right wall was a chest of drawers, and a little bit of a bench seat with a cushion on it and more storage beneath. On the left wall was a bit of fold-down table with shelves above, and a stool, and a bit of storage beneath. And that was fundamentally all there was room for.

  But really, what more did she need?

  “I believe your belongings are on the bed,” said Kellerman from the door. “There should be linens, a washbasin and pitcher, and assorted bits and pieces from the last person who had it in the cupboard under the bed. That would have been Fraulein Ado Ellie, who was our former lady trick-shooter. A most amiable lady, but nothing near as good a shot as you.” She turned to see him smiling in the doorway. “However, she was, if I may say so, both stunningly beautiful and sweet-natured, so much was forgiven of her.”

  “She seems to have been a good housekeeper,” Giselle replied, opening the cupboard beneath the bed and surveying with relief the neatly folded linens and a number of things that would make life very comfortable in this wagon.

  “She was, and I hope this pleases you.” Kellerman looked a little anxious at that. “We had been using it for costume storage, and occasionally as a place for some of the troupe to sleep in extremely bad weather.”

  “This will be most satisfactory, thank you,” she replied.

  He beamed as if it had been his hands that had constructed the wagon. “In that case I shall leave you to settle in and await Fox, and possibly the Captain.”

  He left the door open, and she climbed over the mattress to open the window over the bed to allow air through. With the curtains pulled, and the door open, and a little teasing of the air, there was soon a gentle breeze wafting through, smelling of hay, trampled grass, and faintly of food. The mattress was satisfactory; the linens she got out to make it up were, like the wagon, old but very clean, and there were some sturdy woolen blankets in there that were a welcome sight, and a great many cushions and pillows. There was even a fine spirit lamp that she could heat water over, and a kettle for making tea. Turning to her own belongings, she discovered that the previous owner had had proper gun racks installed above the bench seat, so her old rifle went up there, although she was hoping she would be given that sweet carbine to use. The music from the show rang out over the encampment, and though the wagon section of the campground was empty except for her, it didn’t feel lonely.

  Darkness fell and she lit the lamp she had found in the cupboard, giving a cheerful glow to her new home. Bit by bit she settled her possessions and her new costumes into places that suited her, taking care and thought about it. When the show was on the move, anything that might fall would have to be stowed carefully, so she needed to leave places for those things to go.

  When at last she had everything put away, she checked around the outside of the wagon. There wasn’t much there, but someone had left a small water barrel up by the front axle. Good, that means I won’t have to go hunting for water, she thought with relief. She fetched and filled a pitcher and a small covered bucket, and brought both back into the wagon. Someone was going around the camp, lighting lanterns and torches; when he—for it was a he, a weathered, bow-legged
fellow in canvas trousers and a checkered shirt—came by and lit a lantern at the front of her wagon, they nodded agreeably to each other. Then he touched two fingers to the brim of his battered bowler hat and moved on.

  And then, having nothing else to do, she went back inside, pulled off her boots, moved the lantern to a hook just over the bed, and took out one of her two precious books. A Karl May Winnetou book, of course. Within moments she was lost in its pages, coming out only now and again to marvel that here she was, in the midst of the very people she was reading about.

  She was in the middle of a descriptive passage of a herd of buffalo when a tap on the frame of the open door made her look up, as she realized that the music from the show was no longer sounding from the big tent. Kellerman and Leading Fox stood at the doorway, waiting politely for an invitation to come in.

  “Please,” she said, swinging her feet and legs over the side of the bed. “Come in!” Although technically she was “entertaining” in her “bedroom,” somehow she did not feel shy or self-conscious about the situation. Perhaps that was due to the demeanor of Leading Fox, who was so solemn and dignified she could not imagine him even thinking anything improper.

  “I won’t be staying,” Kellerman said, as Leading Fox entered the wagon and carefully took a seat on the bench. “Unless you would prefer me to. Leading Fox told me that you and he will be able to converse by means of your familiar spirits.”

  Well, that was less than accurate, but she let it pass. “I believe that we can,” she replied, “And I am perfectly comfortable in the presence of Leading Fox, if you have work you need to do.”

  “Alas, yes, I do,” Kellerman replied, with regret. “A bugle will wake the camp, and a second bugle call will announce when breakfast is ready in the mess tent. It will not be much like the breakfasts that you and I are used to, but it is quite good. You will meet with the Captain then and go to rehearsal, and he will integrate you into the show.”

  Well, how he was to do that without any shared language she had no idea. Still, wasn’t that supposed to be what Leading Fox was going to address?

  She thanked him, and Kellerman hurried away, vanishing immediately into the night and the camp, which had gone suddenly very quiet. These people went to bed at country hours, it seemed, no lingering at bedtime over a book or a beer. . . .

  She turned to the Indian, who nodded, and whistled—not shrilly as Cody had, but softly. It sounded like a bird call, but it was answered by two winged creatures, flying in the open door. One was the Indian’s little owl, the other a night-sylph. The owl flew to the Indian’s shoulder, while the sylph balanced atop the cold stove. Her wings were a pale blue, very moth-like, and folded down her back as soon as she had landed, like a stiff cloak.

  “You speak to me,” the sylph, an imperious little black-haired beauty said. “I will speak to the owl, who will tell his man what you said. And the other way around.”

  Giselle nodded, and folded her hands in her lap. “Well . . . obviously Herr Leading Fox is an Elemental Master of Air?”

  The sylph inclined her head to the owl, and silently conveyed what Giselle had said. The owl turned to the Indian and the same silent colloquy passed between them. It all happened in mere moments of course, in much less time than it had taken her to speak the words, and then the sylph had the reply.

  “Leading Fox says that yes, he is very like that, and he is going to make it possible for you to learn English and Pawnee, as he promised.”

  She was going to ask how that could be possible, but evidently the sylph already had the answer. “His owl spirit is to spend the night here, and if you command it, I am to spend the night in his teepee, and the owl will put English and Pawnee into your mind while you sleep, while I do the same for Leading Fox and our tongue.”

  She blinked. “And all I have to do is tell—I mean, ask you to do this?”

  The sylph lost a little of her imperious demeanor. “You—would ask me, rather than order me?” she said in astonishment.

  Giselle blinked again. “Well, of course. It is always better to be friends, is it not? The only time I might give an order to one of you is if there is no time to be polite about it. And then I would apologize for being so rude afterward.”

  Now the sylph unbent entirely. “You are much nicer than the one who was here before. He was rude, always ordering us about, and threatening if we did not obey immediately! You are as nice as the Bruderschaft are said to be! Thank you!” She beamed at Giselle, who smiled back. Out of the corner of her eye she noticed that Leading Fox was smiling ever so slightly.

  “Well, if you don’t mind, would you please remain with Leading Fox and teach him German?” she said, with punctilious politeness. “I would very much appreciate it.”

  “I would be happy to!” the sylph crowed, standing on one foot in glee.

  “But—” She frowned for a moment. “Couldn’t Leading Fox have asked for himself?”

  “He did not wish to offend us, since he is from so far away, and his Elementals are so unlike us,” the sylph replied, and shrugged. “Humans. I do not understand the rules you make for yourselves.”

  “Sometimes, neither do I,” Giselle sighed, and through the sylph, offered the Indian a cup of tea, but he declined politely and got up to leave. The owl spirit lofted over to a shelf running along the very top of the left-hand wall and made itself at home; the night-sylph flitted out the door, following Leading Fox. The Indian walked as softly as Winnetou did in the books; she could not hear a single footfall as he vanished into the night.

  Giselle considered the little owl, who blinked at her. I should feed it. Or at least offer it something . . .

  She could spin little orbs of the magic of the Air, and her sylph friends would devour them with glee, as if they were sugared fruits. Would the owl like them too? Well, it was an Air Elemental, chances were it would like the same thing the sylphs did.

  She cupped her left hand, palm up, concentrated on seeing the currents of magic around her, twirled her finger in her palm, as Mother had taught her to gather some of that magic, and started to spin up a little orb. The wisps of magic followed the twirling motion of her finger, sparkling in the semidarkness of the wagon. The faster she twirled, the more the magic took on the shape of an orb about the size of a pebble, and the brighter the orb got. When it began to illuminate her palm, she held it up for the owl to see. The owl’s eyes widened and his beak parted a little; she blew on it and sent it gliding toward him, and he snapped at it and gulped it down eagerly, and looked to her for more.

  Well, if he was going to be giving her not one, but two languages, the least she could do was to feed him generously. She continued to spin up orbs and send them wafting to the little owl, who snapped them up with glee. When he seemed to have had enough, he flitted to another shelf just over the head of her bed, fluffed up his feathers, and settled down, eyelids drooping. Giselle took that as a sign she should be sleeping.

  She closed the window above the bed and pulled the curtains shut, then jumped down out of the bed and closed the door of the wagon and pulled the curtains on the window of the door. A few moments later she was in a night shift; a moment after that and she had blown out the lantern and was trying to get comfortable in a strange bed. It was not as soft as her featherbed at home, nor were the sounds of the encampment anything she was used to. Somewhere out there, someone was playing a harmonica, or trying to. There were murmurs of voices from the nearer two wagons. Still, it was a great deal more comfortable than sleeping in a haystack, though it wasn’t as nice as the bed in Tante Gretchen’s cottage . . .

  Her dreams were strange, colorful, scenes of Indians, including Leading Fox, out in some vast landscape that somehow looked nothing like what Karl May described. The sky was enormous, that was the only way to describe it. The scenes were all very disjointed, and didn’t form any sort of coherent story. Unlike her usual dreams, where she was an activ
e participant, she was a passive observer here. It was as if someone was opening a picture book at random places while she watched. There were scenes of hunting, of village life, of Indians with what she assumed to be American Cavalry, of dancing and feasting, and of . . . well, virtually anything that people could do. These people did not live in the teepees she had expected, nor the pueblos that Karl May had described Winnetou’s tribe as inhabiting—they lived in homes made of earth and wood, round mounds with a square tunnel for an entrance. This was . . . unexpected. In fact, as she flitted from scene to scene, there was a great deal that was unexpected. Finally she just stopped expecting things altogether and merely drank in the scenes as they were presented to her. Once she did that . . . she noticed there was a sort of voice murmuring in the wind, too soft for her to hear properly, but always present.

  Then she drifted off into true sleep, but still with that voice murmuring in the back of her mind.

  She woke up as she always did, at dawn, and the camp was already stirring. As she lay in her bed, listening to the unfamiliar voices and sounds, she smiled to herself. She thought she was going to get along well with these people. They all sounded amazingly friendly for so early in the morning.

  “Clem! Didja make sure the water barrel’s full fer that new liddle gal? The sharpshooter?” a female voice—an older female, Giselle thought—called.

  “Right an’ tight, Maisy!” called a nearer, male voice. “Topped her off a liddle bit ago.”

  And that was when her sleepy satisfaction turned to astonishment and wide-awakeness. She could understand them!

  Quickly, she looked above her, to the shelf where the owl spirit had perched last night, but it was gone. As she continued to listen to the early voices around her, she held her breath, almost unable to believe that what Leading Fox had promised last night had come true!

  Then a trumpet or bugle call sounded over the camp, and the sounds of the camp truly coming to life began. It sounded amazingly cheerful. People shouted questions about animals, about costumes or properties, teased each other about being lazy, swore they were going to douse them in cold water to wake them up—