[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

Da opened his mouth, but then shut it again. He gave his hostess a
disbelieving stare. Kareen hoped it would not occur to him to inquire closely
into Mark's method for winning this fortune.
"Mark has invested it in an interesting variety of more and less speculative
enterprises," Tante Cordelia went on kindly. "The family backs him - I've just
bought some shares in his butter bug scheme myself - and we'll always be here
for emergencies, but
Mark doesn't need an allowance."
Mark looked both grateful and awed to be so maternally defended, as if...
well... just so. As if no one had ever done so before.
"If he's so rich, why is he paying my daughter in IOUs?" demanded Da. "Why
can't he just draw something out?"
"Before the end of the period?" said Mark, in a voice of real abhorrence. "And
lose all that interest
?"
"And they're not IOUs," said Kareen. "They're shares!"
"Mark doesn't need money," said Tante Cordelia. "He needs what he knows money
can't buy. Happiness, for example."
Mark, puzzled but pliable, offered, "So... do they want me to pay for Kareen?
Like a dowry? How much? I
will
- "
"No, you twit!" cried Kareen in horror. "This isn't Jackson's Whole - you
can't buy and sell people
. Anyway, dowries were what the girl's family gave the fellow, not the other
way around."
"That seems very wrong," said Mark, lowering his brows and pinching his chin.
"Backwards. Are you sure?"
"Yes."
"I don't care if the boy has a million marks," Da began, sturdily and, Kareen
suspected, not quite truthfully.
"Betan dollars," Tante Cordelia corrected absently. "Jacksonians do insist on
hard currencies."
"The galactic exchange rates on the Barrayaran Imperial mark have been
improving steadily since the War of the Hegen Hub,"
Mark started to explain. He'd written a paper on the subject last term; Kareen
had helped proofread it. He could probably talk for a couple of hours about
it. Fortunately, Tante Cordelia's raised finger staunched this threatened flow
of nervous erudition.
Da and Mama appeared lost in a brief calculation of their own.
"All right," Da began again, a little less sturdily. "I don't care if the boy
has four million marks. I care about Kareen."
Tante Cordelia tented her fingers thoughtfully. "So what is it that you want
from Mark, Kou? Do you wish him to offer to marry Kareen?"
"Er," said Da, caught out. What he wanted
, near as Kareen could tell, was for Mark to be carried off by predators,
possibly even along with his four million marks in nonliquid investments, but
he could hardly say so to Mark's mother.
"Yes, of course I'll offer, if she wants," Mark said. "I just didn't think she
wanted to, yet. Did you?"
"No," said Kareen firmly. "Not... not yet, anyway. It's like I've just started
to find myself, to figure out who I really am, to grow. I don't want to stop
."
Tante Cordelia's brows rose. "Is that how you see marriage? As the end and
abolition of yourself?"
Kareen realized belatedly that her remark might be construed as a slur on
certain parties here present. "It is for some people.
Why else do all the stories end when the Count's daughter gets married? Hasn't
that ever struck you as a bit sinister? I mean, have you ever read a folk tale
Page 220
ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
where the Princess's mother gets to do anything but die young? I've never been
able to figure out if that's supposed to be a warning, or an instruction."
Tante Cordelia pressed her finger to her lips to hide a smile, but Mama looked
rather worried.
"You grow in different ways, afterward," Mama said tentatively. "Not like a
fairy tale. Happily ever after doesn't cover it."
Da's brows drew down; he said, in an odd, suddenly uncertain voice, " thought
we were doing all right..."
I
Mama patted his hand reassuringly. "Of course, love."
Mark said valiantly, "If Kareen wants me to marry her, I will. If she doesn't,
I won't. If she wants me to go away, I'll go - "
This last was accompanied by a covertly terrified glance her way.
"No!" cried Kareen.
"If she wants me to walk downtown backwards on my hands, I'll try. Whatever
she wants," Mark finished up.
The thoughtful expression on Mama's face suggested that at least she liked his
attitude.... "Is it that you wish to just be betrothed?" she asked Kareen.
"That's almost the same as marriage, here," said Kareen. "You give these
oaths."
"You take those oaths seriously, I gather?" said Tante Cordelia, with a flick
of her eyebrow toward the occupants of the mystery couch.
"Of course
."
"I think it's down to you, Kareen," said Tante Cordelia with a small smile.
"What do you want?"
Mark's hands clenched on his knees. Mama sat breathless. Da looked as if he
was still worrying about the implications of that happily-ever-after remark.
This was Tante Cordelia. That wasn't a rhetorical question. Kareen sat silent,
struggling for truth in confusion. Nothing less or else than truth would do.
Yet where were the words for it? What she wanted was simply not a traditional
Barrayaran option... ah.
Yes. She sat up, and looked Tante Cordelia, and then Mama and Da, and then
Mark in the eye.
"Not a betrothal. What I want... what want - is an
I
option on Mark."
Mark sat up, brightening. Now she was speaking a language they both
understood.
"
That's not Betan," said Mama, sounding confused.
"This isn't some weird Jacksonian practice, is it?" Da demanded suspiciously.
"No. It's a new Kareen custom. I just now made it up. But it fits." Her chin
lifted.
Tante Cordelia's lips twitched up in amusement. "Hm. Interesting. Well.
Speaking as Mark's, ah, agent in the matter, I would point out that a good
option is not infinitely open-ended, nor all one-way. They have time limits.
Renewal clauses.
Compensation."
"Mutual," Mark broke in breathlessly. "Mutual option!"
"That would appear to cover the problem of compensation, yes. What about time
limits?"
"I want a year," said Kareen. "To next Midsummer. I want at least a year, to
see what we can do. I don't want anything from anybody," she glared at her
parents, "but to back off
!"
Mark nodded eagerly. "Agreed, agreed!"
Da jerked his thumb at Mark. "He'd agree to anything!"
Page 221
ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
"No," said Tante Cordelia judiciously. "I think you'll find he won't agree to
anything that would make Kareen unhappy. Or smaller. Or unsafe."
Da's frown took on a serious edge. "Is that so? And what about her safety from
him? All that Betan therapy wasn't for no reason!"
"Indeed not," agreed Tante Cordelia. Her nod acknowledged that seriousness. [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]