Part 3 (2/2)
”To launch it, I think if you found three big trees in your forest that grew in a triangle, and cut the tops off, they could serve to support the balloon until the air inside is warm It should be launched only in a dead calray dawn”
”That sees of this before you leave, won't you?”
”Yes, my lord Would it be too much to ask if you tethered the balloon for safety? Tied it to a tree with a long rope?”
”Well at first, of course After that, we'll see”
”Count Las You don't knohere you'll come down Do you really want to fall into Frederick the Second's outhouse?”
”Ha! That would stuper his rittedelse that I could do
I had Kotcha put up with a couple of Count Lambert's ladies-they were only five years older than her-and intended to get in an hour of drawing before I sacked out Such things ”gang aft agley” at Okoitz Natasha was all she was cracked up to be Lord, what an enthusiastic young lady! We went to bed early and I really didn't getthe next , with dile panel required an awful lot ofhand, without a calculator of tables or anything but h, I found that I was doing everything in deciht everybody else I have always had the darndest ti over this diary, so in base-twelve and when in base-ten So far as the balloon was concerned, I completed the calculations in base-ten and then translated the whole thing into base twelve
And there were all the detail drawings How to do a tent stitch, how to fasten the ropes to the basket, the is I wasn't done until noon the next day
Natasha stayed with an to realize that there was a good mind in that pretty little head
After dinner, I explained s to Count Lambert, because he couldn't read
”Excellent, Sir Conrad! I think we can make short work of it You seem to have taken a fancy to o, she sported a maidenhead?”
”That's hard to believe, h But I can certify it since I relieved her of that liability myself She has a pure natural talent See here I've kept you half a day past our agreed tiive her to you in coive her to me?”
”If you wish As I said, she's only been here a week There's months and months of use in her yet”
She'd probably be a lot happier and healthier at Three Walls than at Okoitz, anyway ”I'll take her, my lord”
So I headed back to Three Walls with Kotcha riding in front of e wolf skin cape thrown around all three of us Anna didn't even notice the extra weight
Once ho Janina about the death of her family That cast a pall over the household for several days But life continues and these people were used to death
They saw so much of it
Kotcha took her job as Anna's servant quite seriously, and soet her out of the stables and into school
Natasha, well, Natasha was re our records, the bank, and the payroll took up most of her time Natasha became my personal assistant, not that I'd realized that I needed any such person
But she was quite capable of sitting for hours sewing or knitting, withouton Then if I needed an errand run, which was fairly often in these telephoneless ti and run it And she always did a co stupid about her Just absolutelycoranted that solected to disht In fact, once I was in bed with Yawalda and actually in the middle of the sex act when I realized that there was another person in the roo to do but invite her in
All told, a strange, interesting, and re wo increasingly feisty
FROM THE DIARY OF PIOTR KULCZYNSKI
Sir Conrad had drawn up a table of organization for his people at Three Walls This was a chart shoorked for hichThis chart wasroom, where all could see it Further, the name of every adult in the city ritten on little pieces of wood that could be rasp the significance of this Here was a place where a ifts to us
It also defined the status and pay of each person, and I was surprised to discover myself near the top, directly below Sir Conrad himself, and an equal to the foremen and my love Krystyana I was now paid three pence a day, an excellent su, my work clothes, my horse and expenses were all paid in addition to this My net was easily five tiht to spend it at but the inn, which I did
The Pink Dragon Inn was a re The coood cheer, with good beer at reasonable prices The waitresses were all very pretty and is They wore a hat with rabbit ears and a sort of loincloth with a rabbit's tail And that was all When it was cold outside, the innkeeper kept the fires high in the two big fireplaces to keep the waitresses warm but unclothed Their bodies and breasts were bare This had the effect of attracting the h most of the ladies stayed away, for fear of the competition
Most of the people at Three Walls were from Cieszyn, except for the Pruthenians, and they were still children The people of Sir Conrad's household were mainly from Okoitz, my hometown, but they rarely came to the inn I usually drank with Ilya, the blacksmith foreman
”Aren't you supposed to be with your family, Ilya?” It is pleasant to talk as an equal with soress ”I distinctly remember that you promised to spend half an hour a day with them when Sir Conrad allowed you space in the bachelors' quarters”
”I spent all night with her Sunday last, That's four of these new hours, so I'ood for the week If you don't like it, I'll stuff one of your ledger books up your arse”
”But my wishes hardly matter What if your wife doesn't like it?”
”Then I'll stuff one of theet married, but Count Laue with him?”
”That's hardly the question It's-”
”Count Laary and he beds down half the girls in Silesia!
But et saddled with a silly wo brats! Sir Conrad doesn't want to marry, so does anybody force hishot nobleman, so of course not!”
”And I pray that never happens”
”More the fool, you! You have a silly little boy's attitude about things! You think you can marry your princess and live happily ever after' That happens in fireside stories, but it doesn't happen in life In the first place, she'll never have you She's set on getting herself a full belted knight, just like her friend Annastashi+a did In the second, if you did get her, she'd make your life miserable, the same way every woh to want an afternoon snack”
”There can be true love, er listening He was staring over ht shoulder I turned to see what it was about, and was shocked No one else in the place would know her except Ilya and me, for ere the only ones here from Okoitz But the absolutely beautiful and nearly naked serving wench tending the table behind us was Francine, the wife of the priest, Father John, at Okoitz!
”What do we do?” 1 whispered to Ilya It was hard taking , except e tables so she waits on us!” He whispered back, not even looking at me ”It's none of our business What she does and what the priest does are up to them”
”But ould Sir Conrad say?”
”What he says is up to him Would you want her blood on your hands? This could come to that!”
She was back at the bar now, but I said, ”Doesn't the inn require that every waitress be a true intact virgin?
But she's been married for years!”