"
"The profits go to wages and to the business-I just sank a fortune into the new battering-mill!"
"Business, business, business! When I ask you to give a little something back to the community, to those in need, you act as if I wanted you to gouge out your eyes. Would you really rather see people die than to give a pittance to save them? Does money really mean more to you, Howard, than people's lives? Are you that cruel and unfeeling a man?"
Father hung his head for a time, and at last quietly agreed to send his man around with the gold. His voice came gentle again. He said he didn't want people to die, and he hoped the money would help. He told her it was time for bed.
"You've put me off, Howard, with your arguing. You couldn't just give charitably of yourself; it always has to be dragged out of you-when it's the right thing to do in the first place. You only agree now because of your lecherous needs. Honestly, do you think I have no principles?"
Father simply turned and headed for the door. He paused as he suddenly saw Nicci sitting on the floor, watching. The look on his face frightened her, not because it was angry, or fierce, but because there seemed to be so much in his eyes, and the weight of never being able to express it was crushing him. Raising Nicci was Mother's work, and he had promised her he would not meddle.
He swept his blond hair back from his forehead, then turned and picked up his coat. In a level voice he said to Mother that he was going to go see to some things at work.
After he was gone, Mother, too, saw Nicci, forgotten on the floor, playing with beads on a board, pretending to make chain mail. Her arms folded, she stood over Nicci for a long moment.
"Your father goes to whores, you know. I'm sure that's where he's off to now: a whore. You may be too young to understand, but I want you to know, so that you don't ever put any faith in him. He's an evil man. I'll not be his whore.
"Now, put away your things and come with Mother. I'm going to see my friends.
It's time you came along and began learning about the needs of others, instead of just your own wants."
At her friend's house, there were a few men and several women sitting and talking in serious tones. When they politely inquired after Father, Nicci's mother reported that he was off, "working or whoring, I don't know which, and can control neither." Some of the women laid a hand on her her arm and comforted her. It was a terrible burden she bore, they said.
Across the room sat a silent man, who looked to Nicci as grim as death itself.
Mother quickly forgot about Father as she became engrossed in the discussion her friends were having about the terrible conditions of people in the city. People were suffering from hunger, injuries, sickness, disease, lack of skill, no work, too many children to feed, elderly to care for, no clothes, no roof over their heads, and every other kind of strife imaginable. It was all so frightening.
Nicci was always anxious when Mother talked about how things couldn't go on the way they were for much longer, and that something had to be done.
Nicci wished someone would hurry up and do it.
Nicci listened as Mother's fellowship friends talked about all the intolerant people who harbored hate. Nicci feared ending up as one of those terrible people. She didn't want the Creator to punish her for having a cold heart.
Mother and her friends went on at great length about their deep feelings for all the problems around them. After each person said their piece, they would steal a glance over at the man sitting solemnly in a straight chair against the wall, watching with careful, dark eyes as they talked.
"The prices of things are just terrible," a man with droopy eyelids said. He was all crumpled down in his chair, like a pile of dirty clothes.
"It isn't fair. People shouldn't be allowed to just raise their prices whenever they want. The duke should do something. He has the king's ear."
"The duke. ." Mother said. She sipped her tea. "Yes, I've always found the duke to be a man sympathetic to good causes. I think he could be persuaded to introduce sensible laws." Mother glanced over the gold rim of her cup at the man in the straight chair.
One of the women said she would encourage her husband to back the duke.
Another spoke up that they would write a letter of support for such an idea.
"People are starving," a wrinkled woman said into a lull in the conversation. People eagerly mumbled their acknowledgment, as if this were an umbrella to run in under to escape the drenching silence. "1 see it every day. If we could just help some of those unfortunate people."
One of the other women puffed herself up like a chicken ready to lay an egg. "It's just terrible the way no one will give them a job, when there's plenty of work if it was just spread around."
"I know," Mother said with a tsk. "I've talked to Howard until I'm blue in the face. He just hires people who please him, rather than those needing the job the most. It's a disgrace."
The others sympathized with her burden.
"It isn't right that a few men should have so much more than they need, while so many people have so much less," the man with the droopy eyelids said. "It's immoral."
"Man has no right to exist for his own sake," Mother was quick to put in as she nibbled on a piece of dense cake while glancing again at the grimly silent man. "I tell Howard all the time that self-sacrifice in the service of others is man's highest moral duty and his only reason for being placed in this life.
"To that end," Mother announced, "I have decided to contribute five hundred gold crowns to our cause."
The other people gasped their delight, and congratulated Mother for her charitable nature. They agreed, as they sneaked peeks across the room, that the Creator would reward her in the next life, and talked about all they would be able to do to help those less fortunate souls.
Mother finally turned and regarded Nicci for a moment, and then said, "I believe my daughter is old enough to learn to help others."
Nicci sat forward on the edge of her chair, thrilled at the idea of at last putting her hand to what Mother and her friends said was noble work. It was as if the Creator Himself had offered her a path to salvation. "I would so like to do good, Mother."
Mother cast a questioning look at the man in the straight chair.
"Brother Narev?"
The deep creases of his face pleated to each side as the thin line of his mouth stretched in a smile. There was no joy in it, or in his dark eyes hooded beneath a brow of tangled white and black hairs. He wore a creased cap and heavy robes as dark as dried blood. Wisps of his wiry hair above his ears curled up around the edge of the cap that came halfway down on his forehead.