Chapter 3
The Valley o'the Green
Below lies the third chapter of the full-length novel, The Girl with the Strawberry Eyes. If you’ve not read the first three parts, I strongly suggest you go back and do so. You’ve the option of choosing either an EPUB file or a PDF, or reading the work in the space below. New chapters will be added every Wednesday. Cheers and Happy Reading.
The Valley o’the Green
Mr. Frost “I must admit,” Frost said as she settled into her seat. “I’m very excited about this trip.”
“Trust me,” said Paginelle flatly, “there’s nothing to get excited about.”
“I’m afraid,” said Frost, her eyes blazing, “that I must disagree. Respectfully.”
“Of course you must,” Paginelle muttered. Suddenly, fifteen minutes seemed like far too long for a car ride.
“What I’m trying to say,” Frost said as the car smoothly started forward, “is that this is going to be the first instance of my actually having been … anywhere, really.”
Paginelle narrowed her eyes. “You’ve never been anywhere?”
Frost thought for a moment. “Hmm, no, not really.”
“Your father bought you a horse for your birthday, but he doesn’t take you on, like, trips?” Paginelle knew it was bad form to be so presumptuous, but she had plenty of wealthy relatives, and it seemed that all they did was travel. Nobody said rich people were a monolith, of course. Perhaps the Frost family blew all of the money that would have been put towards travel on horses. Whatever their circumstance might have been, Paginelle didn’t care enough to spend too much time thinking about it.
“Trips?” said Frost. “Oh, we go on plenty of trips. Papa has taken me all over the world, but, you know … oddly enough … the thing that I always seem to remember best about those many dozens of countries is … the hotel rooms.”
Paginelle’s eyes narrowed further. “Hotel rooms?”
“I kid you not. Whenever we leave the hotel and walk through the cities, or ruins, or museums or whatever, I feel as if”—her shoulders slumped slightly—“as if I’m just moving through a hall of photographs. I really do hate sounding so ungrateful, but I cant help it. There’s no depth in any of these places. I mean, sure there’s plenty of depth—an abundance, even—for the people living there, but how am I supposed to derive anything substantial from Paris, or Caracas, or São Paulo, or wherever, if I’m only there for a week, two at the most? It takes nearly a week just to develop a tolerance against the onslaught of colors and sounds, you know?”
“I don’t, actually,” said Paginelle.
“Which is exactly why you ought to come with us to the Maldives!”
“That isn’t going to happen, Alexandra. It doesn’t matter how many times you ask.”
Frost’s overbite poked over her lip. “You can’t blame a girl for trying, right?”
Paginelle grunted but otherwise remained silent.
The car descended the Frost family hill in full, and, after a few lugubrious turns through several crunchy, curvy forest roads, it crawled into a tree-dotted valley that was steep and deep and dark.
“Golly!” said Frost, pressing her face against the glass. “I didn’t know this part of the forest existed. Is this really where you live?”
The lower the car crawled, the darker the valley became. It was so dark, in fact, that enormous lanterns had been hung from a number of the lower-situated trees, and they filled the space with wisps of eerie green light. The car crept lower still and rolling clouds of fog began to rise from the valley depths. It was so thick, this fog, that when it entangled itself with the car’s undercarriage, the vehicle lurched, and actually struggled to continue its descent.
“There’s really nothing exciting about where I live,” Paginelle muttered. “It’s just … home. And not an impressive one either.” Her words sounded as if from very far away because all she could think about was her father. About … how he was going to be surprised by her early return. And the fact that she had brought a guest, too! It didn’t matter if said guest happened to be helping with the bills; the sight of her—unexpected, uninvited—might sour his mood for a solid week.
And that unexpected, uninvited guest, incidentally, didn’t seem to have the slightest inclination of the turmoil she might be on the verge of bringing upon the House of Babineaux. It was, of course, absurd to think that Frost would know anything about Paginelle’s home life that she hadn’t already been told. But Paginelle was nonetheless unable to keep from feeling a thick, knotty resentment towards the girl.
—Because of how she always seemed overly enthusiastic about everything.
—Because of how oblivious she seemed about her own beauty.
—Because of how she could peer out of the window with genuine innocence, and not see anything of the misery splayed out below.
“It really is marvelous, isn’t it,” Frost said, her voice hushed. “I can’t believe I lived so close to this place and had absolutely no idea about it. This”—she excitedly looked over her shoulder at Paginelle—“is exactly what I desire.”
Paginelle blinked. “Come again?”
“I want to visit here as often as I can,” Frost gibbered. “It’s close enough not to be a nuisance to travel to, but different enough to be sort of … you know. Foreign.”
Paginelle issued yet another grunt but otherwise remained silent.
Frost babbled on: “I intend to become as entrenched in the culture of this place as possible.”
“It’s just a cruddy little valley,” Paginelle grumbled. “There’s nothing to get ‘entrenched’ in.”
“I disagree! Respectfully. Every single community on this planet, regardless of how backwards they ostensibly may seem, has something of value to offer. And the majority of the time, said ‘something’ tends to be a person. Or people. Which is actually perfect because it is my intention to become as intimate as possible with as many of the people in this valley as I can.” She cocked her head to the side then, and the lips under her overbite became a little less mirthful. “You’re looking at me in a queer way,” she said, “as if I’ve said something untoward.” She swallowed. “Have I … said something untoward?”
“No,” Paginelle said stiffly. “I’d just … never noticed how much you like to talk. These past two years, I’d been … I’d been so focused on making fudge that I never realized how much you like to talk.”
“Oh, I blame it on my schooling environment entirely,” Frost said, sounding relieved. Before she could expound on what she meant, she cried, “Oh! Are those people’s homes?” She was referring to several squat, rectangular buildings that littered the valley floor. They were mostly identical, these buildings, each one completely covered by grass and moss.
“Yes, people live in those,” Paginelle grumped.
“How utterly unique!” Frost cried. “Oh my, and what is that?” She wriggled over to Paginelle’s end of the car, leaned over Paginelle’s lap and peered out of Paginelle’s window. “What on earth is that? A castle?”
Paginelle nodded wearily. “Yes, it’s a castle, but you’re making it sound way more impressive than it actually is.” It was called Breffenwood, and was little more than a stubby tower. It sat nestled at the top of a slippery gray cliff, which itself stood at the far end of the valley.
“Fascinating,” Frost said, shaking her head. “To think that something so quaint has been so close to home all this time. I suppose it goes to show just how much one can miss when one becomes locked in one’s daily routines.”
“Uh huh.”
“Who lives there, I wonder,” said Frost. “A princess?”
Paginelle frowned. “A princess? In Pennsylvania?”
“Very well, not a princess per se,” said Frost, furrowing her brow, “but perhaps … perhaps some minor aristocrat who fled her country due to love or danger.”
“You’re letting your imagination run away with you.”
“How can I not?” said Frost. “I’m staring at a castle. In Pennsylvania! Not exactly a common sight, you know. So who lives there? Please tell me it’s somebody spectacular.”
“Not even a little. It’s just the landlady.”
“The land … lady?” Frost echoed. The concept seemed alien to her.
“Yes,” Paginelle said, struggling to hide her impatience. “Lady Drusilla—”
“Ooo, a lady.”
“The title means nothing,” Paginelle grunted. “That’s just what she calls herself.”
Frost wrinkled her nose. “One can just do that? Call oneself a lord or lady, and nobody bats an eye?”
“Apparently,” Paginelle said, shifting in her seat. Frost was still leaning over her lap, so as to stare at the castle. “If ‘one’ has enough money and power, then ‘one’ can do whatever ‘one’ wants. Calling yourself ‘lord’ or ‘lady’ is just the tip of the iceberg.”
Frost blinked. “You truly believe this?”
“I believe it because it’s true.”
“Listen,” Frost said, finally straightening up and sitting back in her own seat, “I might not know everything, but I know that somebody with enough classical flair to call herself a lady can’t be all that bad.”
“I hate to burst your bubble,” said Paginelle, “but yes, she can. And she is. She owns this entire valley and everything in it, and makes sure that nobody here forgets that.”
For the first time, Frost didn’t seem to have anything with which to respond. She merely folded her hands on her lap and quietly hummed to herself.
The car eventually reached the bottom of the valley, and once it had, Paginelle instructed the driver on how to reach her house.
“I’m honestly surprised that you can even find your way around,” Frost said to Paginelle. “All of these buildings look even more identical, now that we’re closer.”
“If that’s a complaint,” said Paginelle, “you’ll have to take it up with Lady Drusilla.”
“I very well may!”
“Right.”
“Ooo, look at that!” Frost cried, pressing her face against the glass. “Is that what I think it is?”
She was referring to the passenger railcar that sat at the middle of the valley. It was covered with as much moss as everything else, but its original maroon color still peeked out in places.
Frost’s face crinkled with amusement. “Somebody just … left a railcar here?”
Paginelle shrugged. “Rail tracks used to run through the valley. During the 1800s?”
“Right, but then the railway company just forgot about that railcar? What, did they not see it?” Frost let out a squealing chuckle and snorted like a pig.
“If you have complaints about the scenery,” said Paginelle, “you know where you can take them.”
“And I very well may!” Frost said, perking back up a little. “You look at me with skepticism, but when I say I’m going to do something, I tend to commit.”
“Uh huh. Well, nobody’s stopping you, so you can commit to your heart’s content.”
“You’ll see,” Frost said, arching an eyebrow playfully.
“I can’t wait.”
After a few more minutes of being driven through countless identical structures, Paginelle instructed the driver to stop in front of one building in particular. It looked like the dozens of others, of course, but none of those other dozens could make Paginelle’s stomach twist like the mere sight of this one.
“So this is me,” Paginelle said, quickly unbuckling her seatbelt. “I, um … thanks. You really didn’t have to do this, but, um … yeah, thanks.”
“Believe me when I say,” said Frost, her overbite stretched into a wide smile, “the pleasure was entirely mine. It was an absolute treat, speaking with you. Finally, right? After two years!” She blinked, and her eyes seemed to grow in size and brightness, which made Paginelle far more uncomfortable than she already felt.
“So, I guess I’ll see you tomorrow?” she said. “Okay? Good. Bye.”
“Wait,” said Frost, “you don’t want me to walk you to your door?”
“What? Of course not. Why would I? My door is literally right over there.”
Frost seemed confused. “But … I thought it would be the polite thing to do.”
“You’ve already done enough,” Paginelle said. “More than enough. I promise I’ll be fine. I think I can walk three feet without a tree falling on me or whatever.”
“But what if your parents aren’t home?” Frost tried. “Will you be able to get inside?”
“No ‘parents’,” said Paginelle. “Just my father. And he’s always there.”
“Oh,” Frost said with a little frown. After a moment, she brightened again. “In that case, I’d like to meet him.”
Panic seized Paginelle’s heart. “What? Why?”
“Well, why not? He’s your father, no? And I’m trying to make a real effort to know you on a deeper level. What better way than to become acquainted with your father?”
“You could try just … talking to me. Like you did today. When I come tomorrow, just talk. You obviously like to talk, so, you know, just talk. More. I promise I won’t stand in your way. Not that I’ll have much of a choice in the matter, but you know what I mean.”
“Oh, don’t you worry,” Frost said, her eyes assuming a faraway look, “the words to be shared between us will rival the stars in number—”
“Great!” said Paginelle. “We can get started tomorrow. There’s no point in wasting your time coming to meet my father.”
“Regardless,” said Frost, “I’d still like to meet him.”
“But why?”
“It all comes back to the flight I took in my Cloudskipper today,” Frost said importantly. “Because, you see, it was only today in the sky that I truly realized what it means to live in three dimensions.”
“I don’t understand what that has to do with meeting my father.”
“It has more to do with you, actually,” Frost explained, “because I’d like to be able to perceive you as three-dimensionally as possible.”
“Yeah, but—”
“We’re each and every one multifaceted, Nelle,” Frost went on. “And whether or not any of us wants to admit it, our parents comprise at least one of our facets. If I were to not talk to your father … that would be like taking a step backwards, wouldn’t it. And that’s something a true Vauxhallian absolutely must not do.”
Paginelle sighed, inches away from defeat. “Can we just … pretend I don’t understand?”
“But that,” said Frost, “would be to submit to dishonesty. And this is yet another thing that a true Vauxhallian must absolutely not do.”
“But—”
“Come come, it probably won’t be as nightmarish as you’re imagining.”
And before Paginelle could do a thing to stop her, Frost unbuckled her seatbelt and slid out of the car.wasn’t gone for even five minutes before none other than Alexandra herself came thundering down the stairs. Paginelle was surprised two-fold: 1.) Frost returned much earlier than expected, and 2.) she wasn’t wearing a dueling outfit. She wasn’t wearing her school uniform either. In fact, she wore clothes that Paginelle had never seen in the two years she had known her: a brown-leather jacket, leather flight goggles, stiff khaki slacks and leather gloves. Her cheeks were swirls of rose (as was her nose); her gray eyes bulged with excitement; her lips stretched helplessly into a smile. She took Paginelle by the fingertips and gazed at her with eyes that glowed like twin suns.
Paginelle swallowed. “Muh-Miss—?”
Frost silenced her with a raised finger. “Ah-ah!”
Paginelle sighed. “Fine. Alexandra.”
“Better! Now say what’s on your mind, please. You look as if questions are about to burn holes through your spleen. Well? Out with it! Don’t be shy! We’re friends here, are we not?”
Paginelle didn’t think a hired friend counted as a true friend, but she wasn’t about to raise the point. She wanted to stay hired, after all.
She cleared her throat as she gave Frost another up-and-down look. “It’s just that, um…. Well, what are you wearing? And, um … why … are you wearing it?”
“Oh, it’s the most extraordinary thing,” Frost gibbered. “I’ve been fantasizing about this day for nearly three years, and now that it’s come … oh, gosh, it was far more exhilarating than I ever could have imagined.”
Paginelle blinked. “I’m not…. What I mean is, um … I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Frost’s smile transformed from one of exhilaration to mischief. “Can you keep a secret?”
“I’ve … never been asked before, but I think I could. I mean, I guess.”
Frost’s eyes fluttered with disbelief. “You ‘think’? You ‘guess’? Pish! It’s an unspoken rule of the universe that you must be able to. Secret-keeping is a part of the friendship starter kit!”
Paginelle could barely keep herself from letting out a long, threadbare sigh. She didn’t know what was going on with the Frost family that day, but she was suddenly eager to return home. Which was unusual because she almost never wanted to return home. “Fine,” she said. “I can keep a secret.”
Frost’s eye burned even brighter. “Fantastic. So listen: from this very day forward, I am officially”—she lowered her voice to a hush—“an aeropilot!”
“An … an aeropilot?” said Paginelle. “Well, I guess that explains the outfit.”
“Yes!” Her grip on Paginelle’s fingertips tightened and she let out a chuckle. “Go ahead and ask.”
“Ask … what?”
“The question that continues to burn through your spleen!”
“Um….”
“I’ll just go ahead and ask the question myself,” Frost yammered. “How on earth can I be an aeropilot if I don’t have access to an aeroplane?”
“I don’t … know?”
“The answer,” said Frost, her voice growing softer and her smile wider, “is that I absolutely do have access to an aero! You’ll probably think me completely insane, but”—she let out a breath—“I bought one.”
“You bought … what?”
“An aero!”
“You bought an aero?”
“It’s just a dinky little Cloudskipper,” Frost clarified quickly, “but you had better believe it can get the job done.”
Paginelle was still having difficulty processing what shed just heard: “You bought an aeroplane.”
“It was this entire twisty plot, if you want the truth,” said Frost, nodding. “You see, I wanted to join the Aeroracing Club at school, but Papa wouldn’t hear of it. He was sure I’d crash into a tree or something, and was insistent that, if I wanted to learn how to fly, I would do so here at home under proper supervision.” She suddenly straightened up and offered a surprisingly accurate impersonation of her father’s voice: ‘Under proper supervision.’” She switched back to her normal voice: “And you know, I was fine with that because he promised to buy me an aero on my fifteenth birthday—so long as I kept my GPA above a 4.0. Now, the GPA business wasn’t any kind of serious challenge, naturally, but when fifteen came knocking, wouldn’t you know: Papa changed his mind! Instead of an aero, he bought me a horse. A horse! I wanted to go zipping through the open sky, not moseying about on some great, stinking beast. Such an insult!”
“Some girls don’t get anything for their birthdays,” Paginelle said dazedly. “Not a single thing. You got a horse.”
“Right, but that’s not the point, is it,” said Frost. “It’s not even an issue of my not getting what I asked for. The issue here, clearly, is that Papa doesn’t trust my ability. He probably thinks that I’m harboring some type of debilitating incompetence; that I’m too much of a lummox to pilot an aero and not end up as a ball of fire.”
“Or … or maybe he just cares about you,” Paginelle said, frowning. “Some fathers actually care about their daughters.” Her frown deepened.
“Be that as it may,” said Frost, “I can’t live my entire life being coddled. I’m not going to sit here, uttering mendacious things about how I despise having everything provided for me. I don’t have muffins for brains, Paginelle; I realize how fortunate I am. But how am I ever supposed to grow into something substantial if I don’t break free now?”
“You’re fifteen,” Paginelle pointed out.
“Yes, and? Michaela del Bosque flew her first aeroplane at fourteen.”
“I don’t know who that is,” Paginelle said stiffly.
“Only one of the greatest aeropilots of all time—a true World War II Wunderkind. Her memoirs literally changed my life. But, ah, I suppose that’s not really the point, is it.” She grinned sheepishly, putting her overbite on full display. “Listen, Paginelle,” she said after a few moments of thought, “I took a big step today by flying. An enormous one. And I truly believe it was a step in the right direction. I’m a completely different person now! Why, just consider the fact that you and I have known each other for two years, and yet have never had an actual conversation.”
“Before today,” said Paginelle. She hoped she didn’t sound too weary.
“Yes,” said Frost with a small nod, “before today. And you know, the Alexandra Frost before today would have been perfectly fine with our weird little arrangement: you come over and make the fudge; I eat said fudge; you scamper home. The Alexandra Frost who has been liberated by the skies realizes this arrangement was pretty nonsensical.”
“I don’t see what’s so nonsensical about it,” Paginelle muttered. “You are paying me.”
“Which, rest assured, I feel awfully conflicted about. Because who actually pays for friends? It’s demeaning to all parties involved, no? But what am I to do?” she said with a small shrug. “Papa insists.”
I could just stop coming; I could quit.
The words were at the very tip of Paginelle’s tongue but she did not say them. It had been silly to even think them: of course she couldn’t quit.
“I’m rambling,” said Frost, the red in her cheeks deepening a little, “admittedly. But the important thing is, I want for us to be friends.” She frowned. “No, that’s not right. It doesn’t matter what I want. I think we were meant to be friends. Why, I might even go so far as to call it destiny. Our situation is so blasted unique, how can it be anything but?”
“Um….”
“And yes, yes, I am very much aware of just how tacky it is to actually say these things out loud, but … but my gosh do I feel good about this. I hadn’t realized just how much of a … just how much of a harridan I’d been by being so businesslike with you previously. I never should have disregarded the human element to our circumstance, and, ah…. Oh, I’m rambling again. The more I speak, the less I say!” She straightened up again and drew a deep breath. “I’m an aeropilot now,” she said with a renewed smile. “Consequently, my perspective has changed. That’s all I needed to say, really.”
“Um….”
“Enough talk,” said Frost, releasing Paginelle’s fingertips and starting up the stairs. “Time for action.”
“Action?”
“Yes! We’re off to see my brand new aero. It’s only a one-seater, so we can’t take it up for a ride, but it’s nonetheless quite the wonder to behold. To be honest, Paginelle, I think you might become inspired just by looking at it. Would that not be amazing, if you decided to completely change your life just because you looked at a machine?”
“But what about the fudge?”
“I think I’ve had enough fudge for one lifetime, don’t you think? I reckon I’ve had enough for three lifetimes with some left over.”
Paginelle frowned. “I … see.”
“Nothing against your recipe, of course,” Frost said quickly. “It’s beyond marvelous. But, hmm, you know, one can’t spend one’s entire life scarfing down fudge. Especially when one has been transformed by the open sky! Now, come come: I think the journey to the aero will be something of an adventure itself. I’ve hidden it in the grove behind our house, under a tarp. All our land, of course, but Papa never goes there in winter, and—”
“I’m sorry,” Paginelle cut in. “I—I can’t go.”
Frost almost stumbled on the stairs. “You can’t go? Or you’d prefer not to go?” The slight waver in her voice suggested that she might not want to know the answer.
Paginelle waggled her head. “N-no, I want to go”—she really did: she would have loved for nothing more than to become consumed by an adventure; to have an excuse to forget about all of the nonsense she had to deal with in the real world”—but I can’t. If … if there’s no work for me to do here, then I need to go home. There can’t really be any argument about that.”
For a moment, Frost looked so disappointed that she seemed on the verge of capitulation, but then she brightened again. “The point of your being here isn’t to make fudge, Paginelle. You’re here to be my companion. And today, ‘being my companion’ means coming to look at my new aero. I know that barely five minutes ago we both agreed that the whole ‘paying for friends’ thing is rather icky, but our situation is what it is. We may as well make the best of it, no?” She stood there blinking hopefully, but Paginelle could only shake her head a second time.
“My father…,” she started to say. She swallowed and tried again. She wanted to look Frost in the eye but couldn’t quite pull it off. “What I mean is that … I am expected to perform certain duties here, and … and if I don’t have to do any of those duties, then I must—must—return home and perform … other duties.”
“Oh, golly,” Frost groaned, her brow furrowing. “Are you speaking in euphemisms for something especially dastardly?”
“I’m not,” Paginelle said quickly. “I just … I mean, those are the rules, and I must follow them.”
Frost deflated a little and her overbite poked over her lip. “You’re certain?”
“That’s the way it is,” Paginelle said with a shrug. “We’re always … very busy at home. If your father wasn’t paying me, I probably wouldn’t be allowed out of the house … as much.”
“I see,” Frost said, pursing her lips. “In that case, I need to give you a ride home. Not in my aero, of course, but in a car.”
Paginelle’s eyes widened. “Th-that’s not necessary,” she sputtered.
“Oh, but I insist,” said Frost. “You can’t expect me to just sit idle whilst you walk all the way home, alone and in the cold. That would be inhumane!”
“But … that’s what I do every other night.”
Frost’s eyelashes fluttered with surprise. “Really?”
“Really.”
“My gosh!” Frost cried. “How was this allowed to happen?”
“It just … was?” Paginelle said with another shrug.
“You’re telling me that nobody has even bothered to offer?”
“They have,” said Paginelle evenly, “but I’ve always turned them down.”
“Paginelle! Why on earth?”
“Because I like the walk?” Which was nonsense. The walk was long and wobbly and generally very miserable. However, walking took about an hour plus, whereas a car would take about fifteen minutes. Paginelle much preferred the hour plus. The longer the journey, after all, the more time she had to clear her head. The more she cleared her head, the less of a migraine she would have at the end of the night.
“Oh, pish,” said Frost. “You’re just trying to alleviate some of my guilt. Which is very noble of you, but also, hmm, it isn’t working. Because”—she snapped her fingers—“I think I know the root of this disgrace: me!”
“You have nothing to do with it,” Paginelle said.
“Paginelle,” said Frost, closing her eyes like a pedantic schoolteacher, “I disagree. Respectfully. If I hadn’t, at the conclusion of each day’s fudge-scarfing session, waddled to my room and got cracking on the mound of homework awaiting, I would have been able to properly see through your return.”
“I’m telling you, it wasn’t necessa—”
“Perhaps back then,” Frost said, planting her hands on her hips. “But now? We’re friends. There isn’t room for even a sprig of argument.”
“But—”
“Come come,” Frost said, beckoning Paginelle to follow. “The car is waiting and we’ve got to get you home before it’s too late.”
Paginelle wanted to protest further, but where could any of this possibly lead? Was she going to make a break for it when Frost wasn’t watching and dash down the hill? Perhaps with one of the Frosts’ dark blue luxury sedans in close pursuit? Ridiculous.
Paginelle sighed and followed Frost up the stairs. She would just have to enjoy the falling snow from behind a glass. If nothing else, at least within the context of her life, the experience could be deemed an event most extraordinary.
Many thanks for reading(!) And now, on to Chapter 4….
Or,
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