July 6, 1183
As a rule, noble widows with mostly older children were not exceptionally busy--or if they were, it was in the company of similarly-aged women of their class, and Riona saw no sign of any such companion upon arriving at her daughter's house, and given her horse's presence in its usual stall, Laralita wasn't out calling on someone else. Indeed, the housekeeper had ushered Riona to the sitting room and told her to wait.But it had been Lily, not Laralita, who came to receive her--not that Riona hadn't wanted to see her granddaughter, but when she called at Laralita's house, she expected Laralita. Lily had clued into this and told her that her mother was in the back garden, but instead of having Laralita called in, she'd sent Riona outside.
Why hadn't she predicted that going outside would only raise more questions? "Laralita? Is that you?"The plainly-dressed woman working in the dirt patch raised the hoe to a standing position and glanced over her shoulder. Sure enough, there were Laralita's sparkling eyes and pouty lips, as out of place against the worker's dress and apron as Riona's aging, arthritic lapdog would have been in the Sahara. "Hello, Mother."
"So you're... breaking earth." Not the sort of thing she'd ever thought she'd say about a woman who couldn't bear to break a nail.
"Well, more of it. It's been a matter of phases; I kind of wanted to get some seeds in right away."Riona peered over the fence and down at the dirt. Sure enough, there were a few sprouts poking up already... though anything that wasn't a flower or a tree or a shrub had always looked like a weed to her. "What are those?"
"They're tomatoes. The cook said they're an easy plant to start with, and they were a reasonable price at the market." Since when did Laralita go to the market? "I'll send one of the boys to Valcria with some once they're ripe, all right?"
Well, she supposed Laralita's tomatoes couldn't possibly be worse than whatever tomatoes her cooks were using presently. Odd as it was that Laralita had tomatoes. "All right...""And who knows? Maybe next year, I'll have strawberries. Or cucumbers. Assuming the tomatoes are all right, that is."
"Yes, yes, that sounds lovely." But Riona privately doubted this would be a hobby that stuck. It was just some passing fancy, perhaps--or some need to bring forth new life now that her husband was gone and the change would be upon her soon? Even sheer sexual frustration was a possibility, for all it was an uncomfortable thought; why else would she have mentioned cucumbers? She'd never liked the taste of them. "Really... lovely."
"Oh, good! But you probably just came for an afternoon visit?"Riona nodded. "That was the idea, yes."
"All right." But instead of dropping the hoe, Laralita just lowered it and resumed poking at the soil. "I'll just finish another row, then I'll be right in. Be a dear and tell my maid to lay out a clean dress for me?"NEXT CHAPTER:
