merino wool
kathryn paulsen (cont'd)
when she’d worn a hand-me-down while working. No, this was a dress for parties, for dancing, for delight, and she would use it as it deserved. She doubted that Dona Elena had been permitted to do the dress justice at embassy gatherings. Her Juan perhaps could dance, if he took the bamboo sticks out of his shirt - not just his shirt, his hide.
“When you have some time this morning,” Dona Elena had said. Well, she had some time now, and it would be cruel to make her mistress wait any longer for the man’s reply to the message, which was so obviously the reason for the gift of the dress. Estrella had blushed like a girl at this obviousness and at the extravagance of the gift, and fumbled for her thanks.
“It is too much,” she had said.
“It is nothing,” said Dona Elena.
She could almost wish - but, no, she was glad of the dress.
The envelope was unsealed. She opened and read - a harmless invitation: would the man and a friend favor Elena and Juan with their company for dinner in another week? Also present would be the man’s friend Carol and her fiancé. Perhaps there would be no reply, not yet anyway. Americans could be so crass. Although this man had seemed - gracious, well bred. Really it was too bad for Dona Elena’s plan. She, saddled with that stiff, was in such need of diversion, and nothing would have come of it, except perhaps a mild flirtation.
Dona Elena would know those limits at least, though how amazing that
she had been able to consider waxing the floor of a man not her husband.
Had the gesture not been so pathetic it would bave seemed amusing. Estrella
couldn’t help smiling as she knocked on the door.
But her face was still again by the time the man opened it. As she handed
him the note, she recited another message precisely as she had been instructed,
without imposing her own expression, “My mistress says we cannot
wax your floor because her husband cannot spare his sweaters. She begs
you to accept her very humble apology.”
She watched his expression as he opened the note: surprise - but then did not something disturb him? Was it that the woman Carol had been his lover? He shook his head as if getting rid of something, then looked up at her, oh, quickly but she felt him measuring her.
“Come in,” he said, stepping backward as he glanced over her shoulder then back at her eyes. “Please come in. won’t you have something to drink? Coffee, tea, juice? I was just making breakfast for myself.”
She stepped in after him. He had long arms and legs, this man, but carried them gracefully. He would make a good dancer. “It’s no trouble to make it for someone else,” he said, reaching behind her with his long arm to close the door. Not quite touching, they started into the room together. The floor felt smooth and warm beneath her feet. She leading, her following, they glided into each other’s arms. He would take her dancing tonight.