In Which Princess Dulcie Writes About Lynde, and Tom Crowder Writes About Dumcruckle

From the diary of Dulcie, Crown Princess of Bentlefay:

Well! My new bodyguard is quite an addition to the menagerie and no mistake! She came in at breakfast this morning and I thought it was a statue from the town square come to life! Her name is Lynde Falconer and she is the largest woman I have ever seen, taller than any man at court except the Earl of Swingleberry who has to duck when he comes through doorways but is as thin and hollow as a chewed leaf. She has muscles like a war horse and is well-fleshed to boot, as round about the waist as a tree and with arms and legs as massive and smooth as beech boughs.

She is beautiful, too. She has the face of a marble goddess, clear-cut and magisterial. Her hair is a rich chestnut, and her eyes are sea-gray turning to green. If we do tableaux again this year at Midwinter, she would be the most impressive goddess ever, even more so than Mother, who would be glad to lay down the burden and be in the audience for once. She is also very sensible, to the point of coming out the other side and being amusing, as when Ellen left the sewing-room for a moment and she said “Even the most unlikely people would benefit from a serious occupation,” and I shot part of my tisane out my nose

The effect that Lynde has on the court has to be seen to be believed, and these are the stolid ones – I cackle in glee to think what Mother’s hangers-on will make of her. Her first appearance in the hall for the receiving caused a silence as loud as an avalanche, culminating in Father knocking over his cup of mead on account of reaching for it with his eyes on her. This allowed everybody to fuss over the king, so we all got back to normal, but for the rest of the evening nobody looked at each other – they would carry on quite complex conversations about other things with their eyes on Lynde.

Apparently, she is betrothed to a young man of Dumcruckle – a librarian or a schoolmaster or something at the manor house there. Some sort of boy-and-girl affair; it seems they were raised together. She has only taken on the bodyguard post here so that she can earn enough money for them to buy a farm. It all sounds very idyllic -- the kind of thing two children might think of. I wonder if being at court will broaden her horizons a little -- she certainly made an impact today!

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Thomas Crowder to Lynde Falconer:

Dearest Lynde,

I knew you would do it! You have always been the most skilled of any of us in the martial arts. Not that being able to beat me in a fair fight is saying much, but Timothy Dumcruckle swept the matches at the Iddington fete just last week, and you have always been able to win any contest you liked from him.

Your father is doing well, and was very glad to hear of your good fortune. I visit him every night after dinner, since I can't think of any other excuse to give him an arm back to his rooms and he would be appalled if he thought that was the reason. In any case, we have plenty to talk about: how much children are allowed to get away with these days, how sadly amateur the new arms-master is, the unfortunate weakness of Sir Roger's constitution in comparison with his own -- and you, of course. I am sure you will be pleased to learn that I now know all about the series of nightmares you had about fuzzy green caterpillars when you were seven. I always thought you treated fuzzy green caterpillars with a little more formality than the rest of us; I am sure that this new knowledge will be crucial to the success of our married life!

It sounds as though life at court is very different from the life to which you are accustomed. I never thought that Princess Dulcie would turn out to be an object of pity; she has so much that others can only wish for. But I can’t imagine a fate more likely to drive a person slowly mad than being trapped that way: never to walk freely in public, never to have a moment's solitude, never to be met on one's own terms. It sounds as though you are certainly needed there, and if you manage to bring some fresh air and freedom into the princess' sadly circumscribed life, your experiment will bring happiness to others as well as profit to yourself.

You are kind and tactful in the matter of my great work, but the truth is that it is just too easy to put aside work that is important to nobody but myself when there is work to be done that is important to others. The school is a place where I can be of real use, since only I and Lady Dumcruckle know enough of learning that we can also teach, and she is so busy. Sir Roger has been told to eat simple food, get plenty of rest and exercise moderately if he expects to see his grandchildren grow up, and you can imagine how he took that news. Lady Dumcruckle has to haunt his footsteps to keep him from doing too much, and bully the cook on pain of physical violence to make the necessary alterations in his diet. I am also going out with the harvesters whenever I can, so that I may bring some knowledge of farming to our life together, and not just good faith.

In any case, my life seems very full when I think about working on my book, and very empty when I think about how far away you are. Your letters seem to bring you closer, so never feel as though you are writing too often. We will be seeing each other every day when we are married, after all!

All my love,
Tom

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