Fade to Grey (9 page)

“This is just a bear I began. I suppose it will be a polar bear when I’m done.” He sat the piece back on the table. “Here. Turn your back to the fireplace. I’ll add more wood to the fire and start a lamp. We can talk about the scrimshaw while I paint the dye on your hair.”

“All right.” Donna had been used to several very good male hairdressers in Chicago, but never one two hundred years in the past. She was used to paying top dollar for hair treatments, but desperate times called for desperate measures, she had always heard.

“How will you blend it in?” Donna looked at her hair in a mirror she had taken off the wall before Royce arrived.

“I’ve got some brushes I used for the scrimshaw. They’ve already been stained with blank ink, so it doesn’t matter. This won’t hurt them. How did you know it was whalebone? Most women don't know that.”

“Oh, I read a lot.” Donna laughed. “And I know scrimshaw is sometimes made out of whale ivory. Besides they used to make women’s corsets out of whalebone.”

“Used to? They still do. But yes, that's right. Let your hair down, please.”

Donna took the remaining pins and clips out of her hair. As she shook her hair to free it of the small metal and bone pieces, some of them fell to the slate floor with a tinkling sound. She would have bent to pick them up, but Royce was now detangling her hair with his fingertips. She sat still to feel the slow and sure movement of his fingers in her hair and on her scalp. She shut her eyes for a minute and enjoyed the sensation. It helped alleviate some of the fright she had felt since arriving at Fallow Field.

Royce had to admit, it had been a long time since he'd caressed a woman's hair like this. Too many years to admit and too long for his liking. With his job being where it was and the cottage in which he lived, it was difficult to meet many women of marrying age. His usual encounters with womenfolk had been in town and that was usually only in passing. He tended to keep to himself, and he wasn't pursued by many females either. Perhaps it was his eye patch or perhaps his handyman’s job. Either way, he was content with his life and didn't hold to much soothsaying as to his future, either married or single. Whatever lot he fell into, that was the end of it. He neither sought out nor went out of his way to make many changes. Whatever happened, happened, was his motto.

“Your hair is thick and healthy…very thick. In fact, instead of me trying to dye your hair, I could just thin it out and nobody would be the wiser. Many times I've had to thin a horse’s tail. Sometimes the Bradentons buy a new horse and he will arrive all full of burs and twigs and in an outright mess. Rather than try to detangle the mess, we just thin it out carefully with a sharp knife. If you do it neatly, it makes the whole tail fine and tidy looking.”

Donna knew she had a thick head of hair, it ran in her family. She had it professionally thinned before during her college days. But lately she had grown it longer and thicker and she knew she had plenty to spare.

“Your idea is good. Let's do that.”

“I will, but first you'll have to tell me how you got these stripes in here in the first place. They’re so even, perhaps you had a portrait painter add them in, but why would you have that done?” Royce asked.

“Do you want the truth?” Donna asked.

“Yes, you might as well tell me. I have a feeling it’ll be strange.” Royce replied.

“It’s commonplace to me, but strange to you in your time.” She waited but he said nothing.

“Where I am from, women go to beauty shops. We go to them to fix our hair, to paint our nails, to wax our legs.” She heard Royce’s steady breathing.

“Wax your legs? Why would a woman rub candle wax on her legs?”

“It's not candle wax, its
bees
wax, well never mind. I don't want to get off the subject. Let's stick to hair,” Donna said.

Royce looked at her quizzically. “When a woman wants to fix her hair in a different style she simply has her maid do it or another woman in the family. I can't imagine going to a shop to have this done.”

“There are shops that specialize in things where I'm from. You know how styles change.”

“Yes, women are always looking in the magazines and newspapers to see how women in Paris and New York are fixing their hair. Each year Missus Bradenton is doing something new. The maids seem to keep theirs about the same.”

Donna could feel Royce’s knife slicing gently. “Your knife is sharp.”

“You never know when you'll need a good cutting edge around a farm.”

“The stripes are made with chemicals the stylist paints on your hair.”

“Chemicals?”

“Yes, many women just want the stripes to contrast. Blonde is a favorite color.” She thought he would be surprised to see how many women wanted to be blondes in the future.

“A few years back they even called them skunk stripes.”

Now Royce laughed loudly. “I'm sorry—women would want stripes in her hair resembling a common skunk? That
is
strange. You must tell me about the place you come from. I don't think it’s Chicago like you said. Perhaps you hail from Europe.”

“No, I'm from Chicago, Royce. I'm from Chicago…in the future…the year two-thousand and ten.” She waited for his reply. “I don't expect you to believe me,” she continued, “but it's the truth.”

“I don't know what to say. How did you get here?” Royce's voice remained flat and emotionless.

“You think I'm joking with you, don’t you?” Donna held her head in her hands. “I don't know what else to tell you but the truth.”

“I’ll listen,” Royce said. “I have seen some strange and wondrous things in my life and some had no explanation. Once I saw a comet and no one could explain it to me. They said great scholars had charted the heavens and predicted its course. How could I doubt them? I am an uneducated man. I know a lot of sailing and fishing and brewery work and I know the moon has a pull on the tides and they say the earth is round. Many men did not believe this so many years ago.”

“I came here traveling through time, I guess you would say. It was on Halloween night, the year two-thousand and ten. I was in the tack room, the very room you found me in. I had come from a costume shop.”

“Another shop?” Royce asked.

“Yes, a shop that rents party costumes to the public. I sat on the old saddle stand in my complete costume. I wanted to bring back happy memories of my childhood and my grandmother.”

“Go on,” Royce said. “I’m listening.” He now took a large toothed comb and ran it through her hair.

“I took out my silver brooch and accidentally stuck myself in the finger. When I saw the blood I fainted. I have a weak stomach when it comes to things like that.”

“Aye, many women do…and some men do, too, though they won't admit it.”

“That's pretty much it. When I came to, you were picking me up as if I was a sack of potatoes. I had to think quickly, to tell you something, anything.”

“So that's why you acted so strange about the train and the lost luggage and all.”

“Yes. I had no explanation ready for my lack of clothing. I just had to make things up as they were happening to me.”

“That explains a lot of things. Now what would you like me to do to help you out?”

“I need to think how to travel back. I mean my family and job are in the future and here I sit in the past.” She turned to give him a searching look.

“I see. You’re saying you can’t stay here forever as a guest of my time?”

“I can for a while. I know in this time you are in, people go visit and stay for months at a time. But eventually that time will be up and I have to go…somewhere. At that point what will I do? I have no money, no connections.”

“Let me think on it and perhaps we can work out a plan. Are you sure you don't want to stay here in this time? Doesn't it suit you? You could just stay in town, get a job.”

“No, that wouldn't work. The Bradentons think I’m related to them. In a way I am, but in future generations. They will expect me to leave and go back to my family in Chicago. They are already asking questions about Chicago and inviting me to go shopping. Do you understand?

There is no family to go back to in Chicago, no house, no address.”

“I understand better now. There would be a lot of explaining to do and they could have you thrown in jail.”

“I know, and I don't want that. So for the present I’ll play along. They may think I’m strange, but I know no other way.”

“All right now, let's brush on some color.” He reached over to his window and took some kind of bottle with a dark liquid in it.

“What's that?”

“A new kind of dye I've been experimenting with.” He uncorked the stopper on the bottle and dipped his brush in it. Donna saw him withdraw the bristles and wipe off the mahogany colored excess inside the lip. “It's some distilled color I made up from hickory shells. I'm trying to find some new stains for the scrimshaw that are not indigo ink or burnt charcoal. This I can make up myself and not have to buy more in town. You might want to remove your jacket.”

The wood sputtered and sparked in the fireplace. Royce threw some more kindling and another chunk of maple on top of the already smoldering chunks. The warmer the room was the faster Donna’s hair would dry.

Donna gathered up her long locks and held them on top of her head. Small tendrils dipped down and curled around her ears.

“What are you waiting for?” she asked. “We need to hurry.”

“Nothing, I apologize for letting my imagination run wild with me. I should place something on your shoulders in case the dye drips. I don't know if it’ll wash out of your clothing.”

“Oh, right.” Donna hadn't thought about that.

Royce took one of his old flannel nightshirts and draped it gently around her neck.

“I’ve got a better idea.” With this, Donna unbuttoned her blouse and unhooked the brassiere that bound her breasts. She tossed them onto Royce’s bed. She replaced the nightshirt, casually draping it over herself.

“There, now there won’t be
any
mysterious markings.” She smiled at Royce, watching the shocked expression flit across his face as he saw her bare-chested.

Gulping, he started working, beginning at the bottom of Donna’s hair and working upward and outward with his brush. He knew they were both in jeopardy now, but the very danger of it excited him.

Donna flinched as she felt the cold dye touch her scalp. Strand by strand, he patiently worked.

“Please, tell me about your scrimshaw.”

“As you can see, I wear an eye patch. You might think I've lost my eye or been born deformed, but it's not that way at all. I was born with two normal eyes. When I was in my early twenties, a white film of sorts began clouding over my eye.” He continued his painting. He was now on the outer layer of Donna's hair. “I think it started before that, perhaps when I was working on the fishing boat. It seemed like one eye began weakening, but to look in a mirror, or have my shipmates look in to it, we saw nothing.”

“How long did you work on the fishing boat?” Donna asked him.

“Almost five years. Finally, I got tired of the icy waters and began working at a brewery in Milwaukee. It was at that time I saw a slight white film on my eye. I saw three different doctors in the city, but none could help me. They said very old people get them. The third and last one said he'd seen a baby born that way once. The parents thought it was marked somehow and may have had an evil eye, but he said he persuaded them it was no such thing and not to harm the infant.”

He took his lantern and now walked around Donna, studying his handiwork. The room increased in warmth as the hardwood burned furiously. He felt a trickle of sweat run down his cheek.

“Now we need to dry it before you go out.” He pulled out a three-legged stool and motioned her to move closer with her back to fire.

“As any young man, I had to work for a living. Having one eye didn't bother me, but having people—women especially—stare at me began bothering me. So I went to a saddle shop and asked them to make me some leather eye patches. They measured my head to make the back strap snug so I don't have to tie and untie all the time.”

“I think you look very rakish,” Donna said. “Like a swarthy pirate. I never dated a man with an eye patch.”

“Thank you. I take it off at night when I'm alone in the cottage and nobody’s around.”

Donna nodded. She was busy lifting and fanning her hair in front of the heat, fingering the strands apart to make them dry faster. When she bent to flip her hair, her breasts swayed tantalizingly.

“I think it's dry now.” She stood and let Royce’s nightshirt fall to the floor, exposing herself again from the waist up. They stared at each other silently for a second.

“You can’t go now – you’ve tormented me with your body.” He stared at her as the fire backlit her hips and breasts.

“We both want each other, don’t we?” She licked her lips and took a step towards him.

“Yes. There is a physical attraction.” He felt suddenly weak in his knees, as if he’d never seen a woman half dressed before. He appraised her beauty and knew he had to have her, and quickly. She closed the distance between them and then stopped to turn.

“Unbutton my skirt. We don’t have much time.”

Royce did as she said, tugging the garment down around her hips. He stared in amazement at the blue dancing fairy that was inked into her skin. While he was puzzling over this, she stepped out of the confines of the skirt.

He then slid his hands slowly up her back, then down her sides. He let his fingers brush lightly over the sides of her breasts, hearing her breathing change. Next, he bent to kiss her hips. He then slid his hand up her arms for a few seconds, and then dropped them again, his fingers touching the edges of her breasts. He felt her shiver, and then she grabbed his hands and clasped them to her breasts.

“Kiss me again, the way you did in your room,” he breathed into the nape of her neck.

Donna turned slowly, sliding her hands up to encircle Royce’s neck. She stroked the back of his head, while he cradled her closer to his body. The sensation of her bare breasts rubbing against his coarse work shirt made her feel faint.

His head came down and he kissed her in a demanding, yet cool manner. She kissed him back, prodding his mouth with her tongue, blatantly wanting him and wanting him to know it. They edged their way towards his bed, one small step at a time. Their deliberate slow motion only enhanced the fact that she could feel his erection through his pants. She moved onto the edge of his bed, feeling the coverlet underneath her bare bottom. They disentangled their bodies hurriedly so he could undress and she took this time to kick off her shoes. She stared at him hungrily, eyeing his hard body and muscular build that she had only been able to imagine before.