She looks up at the sky. Is that a castle?
“It is definitely a corbelled turret,” says Bryce. “White battlements.”
A War in Heaven? Today?
It must be the fixative she’s spraying. Another scotoma.
“I need a respirator,” thinks Bryce.
[:]
A pink and gold motorcycle is gliding silently up the street. Agnes squints. No, it is a red and purple bicycle rickshaw. Could it be? Dragomir! He is wearing a black suit and a blue tie. He has a little mustache. He has turned into quite a dashing young man. It helps that he is carrying a red rose.
“Happy birthday Mrs. Borage,” says Dragomir.
“Nut mix,” says Agnes. She is an aggressive hostess. Dragomir takes the handful of nuts. He takes another handful of nuts. He and Mrs. Borage stroll over to admire the dogs. Dragomir tells Mrs. Borage of his recent divorce from a cabriolet driver in Central Park. Mrs. Borage remembers Central Park.
“The golden gates,” she says, wisely. She remembers the heavy fog, how she sat beneath the shade trees in winter, drinking lavender chocolate, the golden cables lashed to the clouds.
[:]
Bryce sways on the ladder. Her palms tickle. She stares at Dragomir. The unhealthy man from the pinochle deck! His cheeks are filled with pistachios, and he looks unexpectedly robust, but it is he. Bryce holds up her palm. The little mustache — identical! He is a divorcee without many prospects, but at least he is not a member of the Romanian police. He is not a professor of the polynomial rings. He has his rickshaw. He has his independence. He’s grown up. No wonder Agnes didn’t recognize him.
“What do I have?” thinks Bryce.
“Glorious detritus,” thinks Bryce. “Patience.”
[:]
Of course Mr. Fibonacci is asleep at the wheel. Driving is so monotonous. The Misses Fibonacci hang their heads out the window. They think they just saw a motorcycle shoot past in the sky, surrounded by cockatoos.
“More ghosts?” wonder the Misses Fibonacci. They’ve been passing many ghosts on the highway, more than usual. The World’s Smallest Boy exhales a black cloud of smoke. He sees a distant pink arrow flash through the smoke. It’s now or never. He jumps from the dashboard and clings to the wheel. The wheel turns.
[:]
Mrs. Scattergood sits alone in the library. She goes to the reference section and opens a book. She flips through the pages. They are blank. The library has undergone another devaluation. Mrs. Scattergood shakes her head. Every day the Western Canon diminishes in relevance.
“What am I doing here?” thinks Mrs. Scattergood. She decides to close the library early and play her glass harmonica. Mrs. Scattergood leaves the library doors unlocked. She glances at Dorothy Canfield Fisher defiantly. Is Dorothy Canfield Fisher sitting in judgment?
Dorothy Canfield Fisher is wearing a Russian hat. She is smiling. She looks as though she might hurl down her book and go stomping off across the frozen sea.
Up in the sky, there is a bright star. It is argent, like the moon, but smaller and more concentrated. It burns like the sun.
“The morning star,” says Mrs. Scattergood. “The evening star.” Luckily, her glass harmonica has little wheels. She pushes it up the road.
[:]
“Mr. Zimmer is wearing a girdle!” cries Dorcas. Mr. Zimmer is wearing blue trousers and a blue shirt and a wide, black girdle. Could it be considered a noble girdle? Dorcas thinks yes.
“May I see your coat of arms?” asks Dorcas, politely.
Mr. Zimmer blinks at Dorcas.
“Will you sign here?” he says, also politely.
It’s bothersome, the courtesies that get in the way of real conversation. Mr. Zimmer needs a drink. Luckily, Ms. Kidney is heaving metal buckets of frosty schnapps through the trees. Does the schnapps taste vaguely of clay?
“Potter’s schnapps!” calls Ms. Kidney.
[:]
Dorcas is wearing Fiona’s Trafalgar jacket. Dorcas is much bigger than Fiona. She has ripped the jacket at the seams and the epaulettes have fallen off. She doesn’t look like Vice Admiral Horatio Nelson. She resembles disgraced Rear Admiral Husband E. Kimmel. No matter! Today, even disgraced Rear Admiral Husband E. Kimmel will have a place at the table.
[:]
The guests are congregating in the backyard. The backyard has the highest concentration of nut mixes. Agnes has put a platter of toast out front, on a stool by the funerary craft. The toast is less popular. The Crisco and calf’s mugget toast, certainly, but even the cinnamon.
“There’s no accounting for guests,” thinks Agnes, “in the final analysis.” She is feeling more sagacious by the second and her nerves have stopped jangling. The schnapps.
“Marred schnapps,” thinks Agnes. “Miry schnapps.”
Mrs. Scattergood hasn’t brought a gift. Should she slink away? Suddenly she brightens. She points to the pyre.
“I am waiving the fine,” says Mrs. Scattergood. It is a signifi cant gift. There are at least a hundred books on the pyre, probably more. Mrs. Scattergood starts to play her glass harmonica immediately, so there can be no awkward thank yous.
[:]
Beneath the stairs, Hildegard is dreaming. Through a crack in the alpine peaks, she sees a tall woman. The woman is singing in a sunny dorf, wearing something silken, a bright-white kirtle. There is a deep, dark gap between her two front teeth. Hildegard sits up. She has walkman cords around her neck. She holds the phone against her heart.
[:]
The Fibonacci Flyers have arrived! There is a guardrail plastered to the grill of the truck and the pink trailers are painted all over with pineapples. Mr. Fibonacci has grown a short, dramatic beard. The stars have moved into Capricorn.
“Where’s the old goat?” cries Ms. Kidney.
“Dear Ms. Kidney,” says Mr. Fibonacci. Smoke is rising from his top hat. He doffs the hat. The World’s Smallest Boy is sitting on his head, in the lotus position. He smokes regular-sized cigars, of course.
Esmeraldina is Esmeralda now. Her contortions have become semi-permanent, but she doesn’t seem to mind. She sorts through the nut mix with her toes, looking for peanuts. Not for her. For Helena. Helena’s trunk is arthritic. The Misses Fibonacci tie their trapezes to the oak boughs. The metal bars are corroded but they’ll hold. They always do.
[:]
Mr. Dykes and Mr. Hephaistos give the first slices of the frozen pies to the fire-swallowers. Mrs. Borage doesn’t mind. It makes sense. Besides, she is listening to Irish Love Poems. A truck driver is telling her about a crystal fountain.
“The pure crystal fountain,” says the truck driver. “That stands in the vale of Tralee.”
“The vale of Tralee,” thinks Mrs. Borage. “I hadn’t considered it.”
The children, of course, go straight for fried potatoes. Mr. Hephaistos hands out greasy paper baskets. Some of the potatoes have strange carvings, symbols from a magic alphabet!
Bryce doesn’t get a dagger. She gets a peacock; every feather has a heart. She fills the hearts with ketchup.
“I don’t remember carving these,” thinks Bryce. “I must have done it in ecstasis.”
[:]
There is never any good reason for guests to be on the second floor of the house during an outdoor party. Are they looking for pearls? Ace Reporter Duncan Michaels doesn’t want pearls. He is rifling through Mrs. Borage’s dresser, as would any unauthorized biographer. Mr. Zimmer is in the hallway, admiring Bryce’s wallpaper. Japanese maples. His favorite. He is less impressed with the punch. It seems to be pixie stix dissolved in water.
Dorcas is on her fifth cup. Every cup goes straight to her Theta-brain. She is armwrestling Helena. It’s an even match. Helena brings more raw tonnage to the table, but Dorcas is in her prime. The trunk crashes down on the glass harmonica. Dorcas raises a fist in victory.