Mercedes Lackey - Fairy Godmother

"What has been going on?" asked Blanche, at the same time as Fleur burst out with "Where are they going?"

"To LeTours for now, and if necessary, right out of the Kingdom entirely," Elena told them. "And," she continued sourly, "as soon as the creditors find out, I expect them to come for the furniture."

Both little rosebud mouths formed identical, shocked "o's."

"I didn't know it was that bad," Fleur said, after a moment. "She kept it all very quiet! What are you going to do?"

"They can't claim the house, of course, since it was willed in equal shares to all of us, and I haven't run up any debts," Elena continued. "So at least I will have a place to stay for the moment."

"But what will you do? How will you manage?" Blanche asked at last. And "Why did they leave?" asked a more bewildered Fleur. "All they would have had to do to discharge the debts would have been to sell some jewels, live more frugally — "

Then Fleur stopped as both Elena and Blanche favored her with sardonic looks. "Oh," the old woman said, and grimaced. "I forgot. This is Madame and her daughters we are speaking of."

Blanche shrugged. "She still could have lived frugally," the elder sister said. "She could have decided to lose those airs of hers, and act her station, instead of miles above it."

Elena just shook her head. "There are a great many things she could have done. None of them suited her.

The old women tittered, and Blanche took Elena's elbow. "Come, dear," she said, in a kindly tone of voice. "I would guess that Madame didn't leave you so much as a crumb in that house, and Daphne ate everything that had been saved out of the cart before they left. Come over to our house, and we'll give you breakfast. I always enjoy cooking for you."

Just at that moment, a clatter of wooden wheels and a rattle of hooves made all three of them look up —

But it wasn't the carriage returning. It was Monsieur Rabellet. His wife was the town's most fashionable dressmaker, and there was still a mighty outstanding bill from Madame and her daughters at that establishment.

He was driving a commodious cart, and he had a very determined and angry expression on his face.

"Word spreads quickly," Elena sighed. "Thank you, Madame Blanche; I am hungry, and I gratefully accept your invitation. I would rather not be there as the corpse is stripped."

They heard more carts arriving as they worked together in the kitchen, and soon voices were raised in angry argument on the other side of the fence. Presumably those who had arrived were just now finding out how little had been left behind that was of any value at all. The heavy, old-fashioned furniture that had been in Elena's family for generations was not only hard to move, it wasn't worth a great deal. Most of the fashionable items that had been left would need repair — Madame and her daughters were not easy on their possessions. There tended to be a lot of fighting between the sisters; teacups were hurled, tables upset, and the delicate legs of the new-fashioned furniture didn't hold up well to such mistreatment.

Elena tried to ignore the shouting. There was one thing that she was certain of, there was nothing in her little garret room that was worth taking. If they even bothered to go up there.

When her father had remarried and brought home his bride and her two daughters, the first thing that Delphinium had done was to claim Elena's room. Daphne had taken the next-best chamber, and Madame had made over the remaining rooms into sitting rooms for the three of them, except for the one that went to her very superior lady's maid. Elena had taken a little garret room at the top of the stairs; at least, with the chimney running through the middle of it, it was warm in the winter. When her father had died, they had actually tried to force her out of her garret, claiming that it was needed for Madame's new assistant lady's maid, and for a hideously uncomfortable several years, she'd been forced to sleep on the kitchen hearth, giving her a permanently smudged appearance and the nickname in the town of "Ella Cinders."

But the maid had eventually decided that a garret room did not suit her lofty standards, and Daphne had to give up her sitting room. Elena got her garret back, and as the family fortune was burned away in a funeral pyre of gowns and fripperies, the servants began to leave.

"What would you like in your omelette, my dear?" asked Blanche, breaking into Elena's reverie. Elena flushed, realizing that she had been standing there, lost in memory, staring at the blank garden wall across from the kitchen door.

"Oh, please, Madame, let me — "

"Nonsense," Blanche said firmly. "You have been on your feet since before dawn. Now just sit down and let us feed you, and then perhaps we can help you make some plans."

"Mushrooms, then, please?" she replied, "If you have them."

Fleur laughed. "Elena, please! Fancy us, without mushrooms!" And the two women set about making a handsome breakfast for all three of them. There were only three servants in their household — a man-of-all-work, a housekeeper, and a little maid to help the housekeeper. No cook — Blanche liked to cook — no lady's maid, no coachman, no great state at all. Certainly nothing like the small army that Madame had thought needful, an army that Elena had eventually come to replace all by herself. Then again, their little house was half the size of Elena's.

Madame Blanche was an excellent cook; her husband had been a very plump and happy man with her as his wife. It was, by far, the best meal that Elena had tasted since the last time that Fleur and Blanche had smuggled her over to eat with them.

An ugly shouting match began on the other side of the wall as they were finishing their tea. "Oh, my," Fleur said, cocking her head to one side. "I believe Monsieur Beavrais has discovered that he has come too late. I hope this doesn't put my chickens off laying."

"And speaking of chickens," Blanche said, firmly taking the reins of conversation into her hands. "If you're going to be left with nothing, as good neighbors, I cannot even think of allowing you to starve. I think we could spare you three hens and a rooster, which would give you three eggs a day. I doubt that the creditors will bother to tear up your kitchen garden, so once that begins to produce, you will have eggs and vegetables."

"You can probably trade the vegetables for bread," Fleur added helpfully. "And perhaps you could take in washing? With no one there but you, there won't be nearly as much work. Everyone knows what a hard worker you are, and that you were the one that has done everything in that house that Jacques wouldn't do."

"Perhaps," Elena agreed, although she already had ideas of her own on that score. But she let them rattle on, reveling in the fact that here it was midmorning, and she was actually sitting down in a cozy kitchen, with a cup of tea in her hand, and nothing whatsoever in front of her to do!

And when the last rattle and bang from next door had died away, the last set of boots clumped off, the last dust settled, she took her leave of her kind friends, and went to see what the vultures had left her.

Elena paused at the gate to take a good long look at the house she had lived in all of her life, seeing it, really seeing it, for the first time in a very long time. She tried to look at it as if she was a stranger. It was a handsome place, which Jacques had miraculously kept in good repair — but then, since it was made of the same beautiful golden-grey stone as the wall around it, and had a stout slate roof, perhaps that hadn't been all that difficult a proposition. Once in a great while, a slate would slip and need to be replaced, or a windowpane crack, but that was all.