In et Arcadia Ego.
He loved three things in life:
Evensong, white peacocks
And old maps of America.
He hated it when children cried,
He hated tea with raspberry jam
And women's hysterics.
...And I was his wife.
- Akhmatova, 1910.
The lilacs glowed against the sloping wooden fence. Woman was leaning on a gloved graceful hand. The fingers held a letter. The deafening cry of the dove broke the enchantment of summer evening. A tall narrow hat that looks just like the cream cake was set at an oblique angle on a slender head. The setting sun highlighted molten honey-colored hair.
Narrow high-heeled shoes crushed the road dust on the reddish side.
Only one thing was on a woman's mind the letter was forced to find its recipient, too many years had passed without a word. As if the years could roll back to time before. Before everything fell apart, false accusations, world events that were in a downward spiral, or at least it felt like it. It is always easier to look from the outside when it is not about your own happiness, but still.
The address of the letter was written in beautiful clear but intricate calligraphy; Ingelside, Glen St Mary, Prince Edward Island Canada.
In the twilight of the evening, even small things seem bigger than they are and vice versa. The honey-haired woman stepped forward resolutely down the narrow path humming in a half-voice in a bright voice the aria of Saint-Saens Dalila, that fatal but so catchy melody.
A thousand times why acting as a courier, woman wondered, especially when potentially bad news never comes alone, especially in these times of the world. Some kind of solution is better than a vague emptiness.
The Blythe and the Meredith clan, they know that hope is tenacious. No miracles happen today. Sometimes it feels like God has abandoned humanity
The woman was once called Little Elizabeth, a red-haired laughing woman, a neighbour the principal of the school, called her, and she opened to the girl at that time a world other than fear, rules, or anonymous fear and silence.
Little Elizabeth raised her chin and walked more resolutely on the path that led away from the Future, towards her own partial Past.