Tinsel and Temptation

by Eileen Rendahl

  After another bracing drink of elderberry cordial I asked, “And what, may I ask, are you, a thespian, doing here?”

  Roman sighed. “It was ardor that ruined me, for I am a man of animal magnetism.”

  I guffawed, thinking that this was yet another performance, much like his pretending to be the tired Swede farmer Lars Oppenheim. But Roman was not joking. He patiently continued. “You may doubt it, but I have the most beautiful woman in the world for a wife.” He gestured toward his children. “Of course, you need only look at them to see what she must have brought to our union.”

  Lugar was back to vacantly staring at the fire, tapping his thighs methodically. Sinta smiled at me with sharp teeth, as if to dare me to say anything.

  Roman continued, “I draw women to me, through no fault of my own.” A pause. “It has happened before, it will happen again,” he added sadly, as though Roman were anticipating bloodletting or perhaps an attack of gout. He went on: “Lugar, Sinta, Deka and I were touring with a masterful troupe—twenty-four of the most accomplished actors this side of the Platte River—to perform Shakespeare’s Midsummer. Unfortunately, the wife of the director formed a desire for me and as a result the director kicked us out, right here, pushed me from my own caravan, sent my children after me and my mother as well, deep in the middle of nothing.” Roman was as incredulous as if the director had ostracized him for breathing.

  I thought about the situation. “But where is your beautiful wife?”

  “She is home, waiting for me. Oh, she will be furious when she finds out what the director has done. In any case I expect she will come to fetch us soon.”

  I thought perhaps that it was true his wife would not be happy but wasn’t sure it was going to be the director she was furious with, considering something more substantial than desire seemed almost certain to have taken place no matter Roman’s protestations.

  I nodded. “I also have someone waiting for me. My sweetheart, Phaegin.” I stood and again said I must go.

  Roman said, of course. He understood, and gave me brief directions to Fiji.

  I tipped my hat and made my goodbyes, then departed into the frigid night, now devoid of stars. I wondered if it was going to snow, and wished I could see the moon for some point to reference direction.

  I hoped if I gave the mule reign he would find our way home. I went to the lee side of the house but neither the mule nor the wagon were there. I circumlocuted the house, looking one way and another, praying, calling “Mule! Mule!” as if the animal had ever or would ever come when called. The damned creature likely did head home without me and I swore I would cause misery to the beast next I saw him.

  The chill from the air give way to a heated desperation. I ran around the building again, still disbelieving my failure to sight the wagon. After the third time around I burst back into the house. “My mule and wagon, they’re gone!”

  Roman stood up and shouted, “No!”

  “Yes!” I returned.

  Roman went out with me to ascertain that there really wasn’t a mule where I had left one.

  “What could have happened?”

  Roman wrapped his arms around himself. “It must have been wolves. The winter has been harsh and they are desperate and clever creatures, luring an animal into the darkness for their ravening dinner.”

  I eyed the man; he seemed truly horrified and the emotion was catching. Roman put his arm around me and led me back into the house. “The scourge of the county. Killed a man’s oxen last week, one snatched a baby from a sunporch mid June.

  Though I cautioned myself not to panic, it was too much not to. Not only had I lost the mule that Wraque would certainly over-bill me for and the money I’d earned on the cordials that had been hidden under the buckboard seat, but in doing so I had lost my right to ask Phaegin to be my wife. I slumped onto the creaking cot and stuttered, “Oh my Lord.”

  Roman slapped me on the shoulder and guffawed. “Of course the wolves didn’t get your mule, Ned! There are no wolves in South Dakota. You have to go to the far reaches of Canada for that. Or maybe even Russia. I put your mule in the barn.”

  Sinta grinned with her pointy teeth while Roman soothed me. “The poor animal needed some oats and a rest. What kind of host would I be if I hadn’t settled your mule for you?”

  “Did you?” I wondered when he had accomplished such a thing. “There are no wolves?”

  “Not a one, a few bears perhaps. Further, I wouldn’t actually be able to tell you how to get back to Fiji. I could better direct you to Minsk as this country is alien as the moon to me. It is a far more sensible idea for you to stay here with us tonight.”

  I felt somewhat weak with the pendulum of emotions I was experiencing threatening to bowl me over.

  Roman patted me on the back. “Sit down, Ned, you look like you’ve seen a ghost.” He chuckled, “You are the most credulous man I’ve ever met.” He turned to his family and said, “It’s our turn to give our new friend Ned a Christmas gift. Don’t you think?

  Deka said it was a fine idea as Sinta twirled and agreed. Lugar nodded.

  I made one more attempt at escape, standing from my seat. But Roman pushed me back down insisting “Tut, you won’t insult us for a half hour, would you? You’ve given us a gift, Ned, and now you must allow us to give one to you.”

  Deka shouted, “Vermin!”

  Roman swiped another pebble, releasing it in one inexorable movement. There was a thud and squeak, almost simultaneous, and another mouse met its end.

  Deka drew out a knife and stabbed it into the writing surface of the desk, causing the pebbles to rattle.

  It seemed I should stay.

  I finished my bottle and gave a dispirited smile. “What gift am I to expect?”

  Roman wagged a fat finger. “It’s a surprise. What would Christmas be without a surprise?”

  “Just another day, I guess,” I said weakly, wishing for just that.

  Deka motioned me over to her. She picked up the knife and carved a shape into the surface of the desk that looked something like an egg with spines. She directed me to place my hand over the egg. My palm landed on the egg, each finger dropped on a spine. What luck, I thought, for her have to fashioned the symbol to fit my hand so perfectly.

  Deka, with no warning, repeatedly stabbed the desktop between my fingers with such rapidity it was as if she were chopping onions. Indeed, it made my eyes water. Then it was over and when she told me to remove my hand from the table, I was almost unable to do so.

  Deka peered at the marks made by her knife on the wooden surface. “You have a fine future ahead of you, boy. Many good things.”

  I realized this was to be a fortune telling and, feeling it wasn’t the sort of thing that merited knife play, replied curtly, “I must say I am relieved to be meeting them with all my digits.”

  Deka scratched at the marks she’d made with the knife, apparently reading the language therein. “It says you will find a loving wife, you will find a vast fortune. Yes…”

  She stared into my future intently and I mumbled, “But will I get home?”

  “Ask me a question worthy of my skills, Edward. Something of love.”

  So I asked her for the date of my future marriage, figuring one that was in the near future would almost certainly have to be to Phaegin.

  Deka nodded sagely. “I must go into my trance to see the date.” She closed her eyes and hummed. I waited. In a few minutes the hum shifted to snoring and Deka slumped gently to the desktop.

  Roman smiled a tender smile. “My mother is old, but an exceptional soothsayer. No doubt she will tell you your wedding day when she wakes.”

  He turned and addressed his son. “Lugar, take the stage.”

  Lugar was sucking on his peppermint. I raised an eyebrow as I’d noted the children had finished their candies a good half hour ago. I glanced at Sinta and she too was enjoying more peppermint. I conjectured that she’d been in my valise and as if to corroborate, she gave another wicked smile.
I grabbed at my pocket and was relieved to find Phaegin’s ring still there and was glad that I’d left my cash fortune in the wagon rather than in my bag. I glared at the girl with no little ire, not caring that she was just a child; she had the heart of a thief.

  Lugar stuck the rest of his candy into his teeth and crunched it loudly as he trudged to the kerosene lamp and carried it close to the wall. The boy stood there and flapped his hands. I was saddened for this poor child and tried to put on an air of interest in whatever clumsy performance he was trying to give. He waved, he flapped, he curled his hands one over the other in what could only be a macabre dance.

  Then I caught sight, beyond his hands, at the shadows that Lugar cast with his oddly positioned hands on the far wall. I saw Lugar conjure a wolf there. It opened its jaws and howled a long silent howl. Somehow Lugar made the animal’s ears tremble, the throat undulate. The wolf then bent its head, the tongue came out and lapped at an invisible body of water.

  Lugar shifted, pulling his shirt hem over his left arm. The boy’s round belly shone in the light, but when Lugar lifted his other arm up into a right angle, a swan swam languidly along the wall, a wing magically fanned the air.

  A fish leapt out of the water shaking its fins, a cat with a snapping tail batted at the fish. Each turn of the shadow brought a more complex and impossible performance. When Lugar returned the kerosene lantern to the table I clapped and hooted, though Lugar seemed not at all aware of my appreciation, sitting back on the palette by the fire, his hands fluttering as if practicing a new shadow show.

  Roman kissed the top of Lugar’s head, murmuring to the boy, then turned and called Sinta to turn.

  I was growing a dislike for the girl, and when she pulled two puppets from behind her back, my dislike grew another size. She’d taken the mice that had met their end by Roman’s pebbles and dressed them up. It was an act that I found somewhat repugnant, not a fan of mice living or dead. But what made it worse was that I no longer had any question of if Sinta had been in my valise, for she had dressed the mice up in the silk ribbons I had purchased for Phaegin’s Christmas. I almost demanded she return the pilfered ribbons, but the knife blade still glittered in the writing table, and I wasn’t sure I wanted the ribbons back under the circumstances.

  One of the mice wore its ribboning like a cumberbund; the other was festooned in bows and streamers so that it looked like the rodent was wearing a red ball gown. I noted with a sickening lurch that a golden band graced the creature’s furry neck. Incredulous I hastily checked my pocket again and this time, sure as Sunday, Phaegin’s ring was gone.

  I stood and shouted, “That’s my ring!”

  Roman put his hand on my shoulder and pushed me back into sitting. “You will get it back, no mind.”

  I again narrowed my eyes at the girl, not swayed by the cleverness of the rodents’ costuming.

  Sinta, unfazed at my evil eye, sat behind the trunk and made the mice dance along the top surface. It was ridiculous, as could be expected. But then, though I fought recognizing it as such, it became overwhelmingly hilarious. Sinta twitched and turned the little mice, their black eyes still shiny and whiskers aquiver, into the most absurd postures. Bowing and curtseying, tripping over their own feet, Sinta returned the mice to life. The creatures stole kisses from each other, had a tiff and cried. The gowned mouse ran toward her mouse partner only to have him raise her above his head and give her a twirl as if they were Chinese gymnasts. The mice flicked their tails, wiggled their toes. It was an amazement.

  By the time the Sinta was finished my sides ached from laughter and I’d decided such thievery was a very good use of the ribbons, if not the ring.

  Sinta curtseyed, then gave me a peppermint-scented hug. “Merry Christmas, Turpentine.”

  I grinned, forgiving her everything. “Thank you, and a Merry Christmas to you, Sinta. Now, may I have the ring back?”

  Sinta motioned that I should help myself, but as I approached the vermin I could see that some of the twitching and flicking was due not to Sinta’s genius puppeteering, but to the mice’s return to consciousness. As soon as I touched the gowned mouse she squeaked and jumped up on stiff legs Apparently panicking at finding herself mummied with ribbons and choked with a gold band the mouse dashed to the center of the room.

  I shouted in a panic, seeing Phaegin’s ring escaping, “The mouse—it’s alive! Get it!”

  As the mouse zigged and zagged, amazingly agile with a ring and a goodly length of ribbon impeding its motion, we all stumbled around like oafish giants trying to grab a will-o’-the-wisp. Even Deka woke up and gamely tried to aid in the capture, though I wasn’t sure she knew of what. She was more of trial standing in the way of the mouse’s capture, yelling, “Where? Where?” while the mouse utilized her skirts as cover. Finally, just as I almost had my hands on it, the mouse scurried under the wood stove, to the back wall and into a small black hole in the timber behind

  I plunged my hand as far as I could reach into the hole, scraping the hell out of my knuckles, but to no good. The mouse was gone, the ring was gone. I slumped against the wall, my hopes broken. “It’s over. I can’t believe it, it’s over.”

  Roman seemed not at all concerned for me or the ring but that the incident didn’t impede his schedule of events. He merely announced, “There are more rings to be had. Now it is my turn to play.”

  What was I to do? I pulled my hand from the hole and brushed the cobwebs off my shirt. I sat down, unable to register the magnitude of what had just happened.

  Roman had the instrument case that I had seen in the gloomy corner in his hand. From it he took a strange sort of guitar with a scooped shoulder and a D-shaped hole in the front that gave the impression of the guitar smiling. The brass strings shone yellow where the lantern light caught them.

  Roman commenced playing the strange guitar, plucking the strings and crooning in a deep basso voice. The music was simple but chords in a minor key made the lyrics somehow deeply sad and I remembered Roman’s morose insistence that he drew women to him. It had happened before and it would happen again.

  He whistled and he sang ’til the green woods rang

  And he won the heart of a lady.

  She left her father’s castle gate

  Left her own true lover

  She left her servants and her estates

  To follow the gypsy rover.

  Her father saddled his fastest steed

  And roamed the valleys all over

  He searched for his daughter at great speed

  And the whistlin’ gypsy rover.

  He came at last to a mansion fine

  Down by the river Clady

  And there was music, and there was wine

  For the gypsy and his lady.

  Roman entered into an extended solo, his fingers flying along the frets as though they weren’t making the music, but dancing to it. I can’t say how, but for a time the languid song erased my despair. I closed my eyes to see the shadowed dioramas that Lugar drew on the wall, the leaping mice running into embrace, could hear Deka’s solemn assurance that love was mine and could see Phaegin’s blue eyes and red hair as clearly as if she stood before me, and all was well and warm.

  Roman strummed one final chorus of notes and I woke from the dream. Sinta sat cross-legged with her eyes closing, going limp into sleep aside her brother. Deka snored softly at the table, and Roman looked about him blushed with well-being. He walked about the room making his family comfortable with quilts and kisses.

  It was a beautiful sight and though I was yet within the dream of well-being Roman’s music had conferred, I wondered what would happen to the family tomorrow and the day after if the beautiful wife was as much a story as the mule-eating wolves. I wondered what story would be concocted to cover the dearth of presents. I wondered what they would eat. They were an amazement of a family, and though I’d lost the ring, I had to admit I’d had an amazement of a Christmas Eve.

  The bear like man and I sat together and ga
zed at the room. I was quickly falling to sleep myself, but managed to relay my thanks to Roman. “It has been a sort of magic.”

  Roman looked abashed and gratified.

  “Tomorrow I will return to my Phaegin,” I continued, “and I’d like you to come with me. You will share Christmas with us, and while I don’t want to insult you, I’d like to give you, lend if you like, half the money I’ve got to share. It should cover food, a few nights shelter and even something from Santa for the children-”

  Roman put out his hand to stop me. “You are a good man, but my wife will come. She’ll come with bells and toys and good food and kisses. I have no doubt.” He made show of dabbing his eyes, then clutching his heart with both hands. “It is an honor you would offer aid to me. Like a brother, never an insult.”

  I went to insist but again he stopped me. “Let us sleep. Tomorrow is the day of days. All will sort itself out then.”

  He fell to sleep before I did, leaving me in the cacophony of his snores to contemplate the evening and anticipate the morrow. But not for long. Soon, I followed him to dreams.

  The next morning I woke to chill and the fire in the stove having died down to a few lackluster embers. It was barely dawn but already the family was up. I wondered where they could be so early, and it took me a while to come out of a series of happy dreams to my senses to think clearly.

  And to realize that, of course, Roman was gone, as were Deka, Sinta, and Lugar. I trudged outside and across the wide expanse of frozen ground to the old barn. Yes, they had taken Wraque’s mule, and my wagon with the money I’d earned from the cordials still in it.

  I was broke, marooned, betrayed and humiliated.