In the poem, Auld MacDougall described the precise sequence of events as they had occurred: the beautiful woman, the highwaymen, the hidden pistol, the double-cross, the kiss.
Ethan had decidednotto write the tale as himself. Partially because his chosen poetic form, the dramatic monologue, required him to adopt a persona. Partially because he didn’t wish hisladraharm. If the world merely thought the poem a fanciful story, then no one would issue an arrest warrant for a lovely dark-haired thief operating in the Dolomites ofSüdtirol.
But mostly, Ethan had chosen to tell the tale from another’s perspective because he wished to treasure the memory instead of selling out every last aspect of it.
When the world owned so much of you, it was lovely to hold a piece back. A brilliant happenstance that sparkled like a jewel in his mind’s eye alone.
Granted, Ethan did share the physical details of hisladrathrough Auld MacDougall’s point of view:
“Should I describe her as the poet doth?
With hair of darkest jet, quicksilver eyes,
And lips vermilion red? A fairytale
Bound in tight-cut silk. Yet such pedantry
Would mock her beauty. She appear’d a siren
Of the night, and I, the helpless traveler,
Caught in her snare . . .”
As usual, the words conjured her in his memory—the animated spark in her gray eyes as they bantered in the carriage, the haughty toss of her head as she turned his revolver on him, the startling press of her mouth to his—
Had she been born a lady? Or had that, too, been a fiction?
Truly, Ethan thought about her far more than was wise. Far more than those brief hours of conversation warranted.
And yet . . .
Perhaps it was the romantic in him, but the events of that afternoon felt momentous. A portent of sorts.
Had he the money, Ethan would hire an investigator to find hisladra. To assuage his curiosity and ensure that she had actually existed, that she had a name and a history. That those hours in thevetturinihadn’t been some dazzling fever dream—a hallucination that he had confused for reality.
The poem continued onward. He described the wit of bantering with hisladrato a scattering of laughter and more female sighs. The arrival of the highwaymen elicited gasps.
He recited how hisladrasnatched the revolver from his waistband—
“The metal, cold and firm, pressed to my spine
In her fair grip did find a hold . . .”
His eyes wandered back to the rows of the audience he could see, unerringly guided by Kendall’s tall, gray head.
And there . . .
As if conjured by some meddling divinity—
Hisladra.
In the very flesh.
Seated beside the Duke of Kendall.
Her dark hair was curled in the latest fashion, shoulders creamy-white above the violet silk of her evening gown.
Her wide eyes bored into his.
