184. Tales in Blue

184. Tales in Blue

“Aunt Aureabel, I‘m Gentlerain. Do you remember me?”

The grand old lady said, “Of course I do, treasure! You’re the only serious friend Henny ever had. The only one worth having. The only one I trusted to take him places. Where have you been?”

“Here and there,” said Uncle Gen. “How is Henny? Is he here?”

“Not yet. But he’s walking towards us. Coming on foot, you know. What happened to you? You were the only one of Henny’s friends I could respect.”

“The respect was and is mine for you, Aunt.”

 “You were so good.”

“A saint,” nodded Uncle Gen.

“And then what happened? Why did you become a…What did you become?”

“A demon,” nodded Uncle Gen.

 “Some kind of a wandering ruffian, I was told.”

The group of elderly ladies sitting with Mrs. Parry began to murmur as if they wanted to join in the conversation. But not one of them dared.

“I never could even imagine that, dear. How is this possible?”

“Things happen,” said Uncle Gen."Pathetic ones."

 “We have to go,” said Mum, coming up behind her brother Gentlerain and taking him by the arm. “Say goodbye to Aunt Arueabel. Goodbye, Aureabel. I have to steal Gen for a while, but we’ll be back. Tell Henny to wait for us. He’ll be wanting to see Gen. We´ll be back in time for Fi’s birthday cake. We’ll sing and all that. Out of my way, darlings, we´re in a hurry,” said Mum, pushing through a crowd of ladies with Gen securely held by the arm.

“Uncle Gen, where is your wife?” asked Thistle, seeing how all the ladies around him were leering at him.

“I have a wife?” asked Uncle Gen.

“Mum says you do.”

“Then she knows more than I do,” said Uncle Gen.

“Mum says her name is Mabel,” said Heather.

“Ah! Yes. Mabel and I made a kind of arrangement. But…does that still hold?”

This question Gen asked of Mum, who hit him with her fan but said nothing.

“Do you have children?”

“I have two daughters. You know them. Belle and Bella. Blue fairies, like their mother. But with different interests. You know how blue fairies are. Some are like the Muses. Interested only in the humanities. They make it their business to inspire artists and scholars and such. Others are like the Graces, only interested in partying and nice clothes. And others are like the Erotes, love and marriage and matchmaking.”

“We had no idea Belle and Bella are your daughters,” said Heather.”They’re very pretty.”

“Mabel and I found them one night when we were reading Pliny by moonlight. They take after their grandmother, with whom they live. They are not at all like Mabel or like me. Mabel is a rigorous historian.”

I thought I understood what he meant. Upon meeting Belle and Bella at a Christmas party years before, the first thing they asked me was if I had a girlfriend. Before I could answer, they said, “We´re both taken, but we can find you a nice one.”  Fortunately or unfortunately, I was courting Rosina Redhood at that time, so nothing came of it.

“Mum, why didn’t you tell us those girls were our cousins?”

“Very well. I will tell you about this. You had better hear it from me than from someone else. Gen showed up on the night of his seventh birthday with two chattering baby girls in his little arms, wet and blue from the cold. You can imagine how shocked we all were. He said he and Mabel had found them exposed almost inside Campanula Fountain and how could he leave them there? Fortunately their other grandmother took them to live with her. She was delighted with them because her daughter, who didn’t look like she would ever find anyone good enough for her, had caught the prize fish.” Mum looked at Uncle Gen. “We had plans for you!” she cried  and then swatted him again with her fan. “It´s this penchant your uncle has for doing everything himself. This man never learns. I’ve warned you kids a thousand times that if you ever spot a baby out there all by itself  you are to call an adult ipso facto. Never ever touch it!”

Fairies are spirits, and I think I may have explained before how, unlike humans and other animals, they are born simply by appearing somewhere. They can appear because a flower has bloomed, or because a child has laughed, or a bell has rang or an arrow has been shot and so on. Once you touch a baby that springs out of nowhere before your eyes or that you find exposed all by itself, the child is yours. You can give it to someone else to care for, but it will always be yours. And Mum says that if two are involved in the process of acquiring a child, the child in question becomes a link between the two forever. Fairy babies don’t appear before everyone. Some fairies never get to see a newborn fairy child in their eternal lives. Neither Heather nor Thistle nor I have ever come across a fairy baby. Not even an abandoned mortal one. I doubt we could have left a baby to its fate if we had.

“But we´re over seven,” protested Thistle.

“Bah!” said Mum.

“Listen, Arley,” said Uncle Gen, “before I forget. If anyone ever asks you again  what Alpin’s war cost us, all you have to say is NOTHING. Your querents already know that is the answer.They’re only trying to harass you, thinking you might not know. Fairy wars are all fought by volunteers. Fortunately, these volunteers know they have to cooperate to win and are easy to organize when the occasion arises. They are also fiercely loyal to a chief they respect or to a cause they believe in. You know we have no such thing as a permanent army. No organized warfare. People freely choose to fight or not and contribute what they wish to contribute to a war effort. They spend what they want to, nothing more. Because of the antidote, there may be a shortage of certain herbs for a while from the usual providers, but these herbs can be found elsewhere for sure. Don’t let anyone bullshit you into believing you owe them something you don’t. We´ve had enough of that here.”

“There he goes!” cried Mum. “Hiding himself behind his work! He can’t even speak of anything personal!”  

“Personal is personal,” said Uncle Gen.

Mum then made us hush because she was in a hurry and wanted no distractions. She had to drop by the four fairy rings in Apple Island in record time and say hello to everyone there. And she had to be back before Uncle Fi blew out his birthday candles, just as she had promised to be.

At the first fairy ring, all went well. There was a stage set up there and on it a choir of bards singing May songs. We only got to hear the last two, because this show was almost over. Mum said hi to everyone as soon as the singers were done, everyone cheered and gave her a standing ovation even greater than the one the bards had received and we left for the second fairy ring, where  everyone was dancing round an enormous Maypole. Everyone included the Nine Queens.

“From a distance!” warned Mum. “Wave hi from a distance and if we are lucky hi will also be goodbye. Let yourself be seen Gen, but not recognized before we can run.” 

We left before the dance was over because Mum said that we wouldn’t get out of that ring till late June if we let anyone there come near us. There were queens enough present there anyway.

When we got to the thrid fairy ring, we saw this field was full of booths hosted by different fairy associations.

At the  booth of the Leprechaun Republic,  we found Michael O’Toora and his father Fergus MacLob. With them were Don Alonso and Doña Estrella.

“Faith and begorra!” exclaimed Fergus when he saw our uncle.

“¿Qué ha dicho de Gora Begoña?” Don Alonso asked Doña Estrella.

“¡Ha dicho que se ponga usted la gorra!” said Doña Estrella.

“¡Ah!” said Don Alonso, and he put on a Phrygian cap.

“Don Alonso!” cried Mum. “I thought you were a monarchist!”

Don Alonso removed his cap and bowed profusely to Mum. He explained that he was a republican when in Rome and Ireland, out of respect for the local customs, but nowhere else. Not even sweet France.

“My father didn’t say to put on that cap,” explained Michael. “He said Faith and by God! That’s a way of expressing surprise. In this case, at the sight of Gentlerain.”

“You see?” said Don Alonso. “You are going to have to teach me Irish. So far I have only learned to dance a jig.”

“This lady is the only queen I respect,” said Fergus, saluting Mum. “She never meddles with the Irish republic.”

Mum smiled graciously. “I wouldn’t respect any other queen but myself too,” said Mum. “I don’t like feeling bossed around or being made less of.”

“Irish coffee? Black tea cake?” a smiling, blue-eyed and red-haired colleen offered us.

And then things began to get out of hand.

There was in front of us  a booth where beer and bangers and  Cornish pasties were  being given out to anyone who would have some by miner dwarfs, small even for those of their kind and true little people if ever there were, all dressed in bright kobold blue.

“Augustus!” suddenly yelled someone at that stand. And the dwarfs in kobold blue began to point at Uncle Gentlerain and yell deafeningly, “Auggie, Auggie, Auggie! Oy, oy, oy!”

“Horrors!” gasped Uncle Gentlerain very softly through his teeth.

And all three of us whispered in unison, “The pesky mannekens?”

There is nothing more dangerous than a rabid sprite of this breed. They are so small and so quick  you never see them coming. And they love to make roofs cave in on their enemies.

Simultaneously, in Garth’s now fruitless little orchard, a sprite woke from a dream of peace, stretched and yawned and hollered “Whoopeee!”

But though both these incidents promised to be explosive, they were not what had frightened Uncle Gen.