“He said ‘my family’,” Les whispered audibly to Hector, who scowled.
“Even Emperor Francis and his children perform,” Mona pointed out. “What is the problem?”
“The difference is that Emperor Francis doesn’t do it for a living, nor does he stand on a street corner like a beggar,” the Duke countered.
Lena shook her head. “The issue, clearly, is earning money. Unheard of for an aristocrat.” She got up to clear the table.
“Noblemen don’t work, you see,” Theo explained to the boys, who shook their heads with disapproval.
The Duke inclined his head coolly. “You may perform on an honorary basis, without receiving a wage.”
“But that’s unfair.” Theo glared at him. “Why should we perform for free?”
His Grace’s eyes narrowed to slits. “It is either that, or not at all.”
“Tyrant,” Theo muttered under his breath.
Lena pinched the bridge of her nose. This discussion was going nowhere. “Your Grace,” she began, her voice firm, "you can't forbid us to perform. It's at the heart of who we are. However, your main concern seems to be that we make a living. I understand that this is unheard of for a member of the high nobility, and you have your family name to consider. We shall donate all our earnings from the fair to the local parish. We won’t keep a singleKreuzerfor ourselves. Let us perform. Think of it as a glimpse into our family life, struggles and all. Remember, this is only temporary. After that, we'll discuss further arrangements.”
She knew that another letter to August, filled with colourful details, would secure some funds. They'd manage. A murmur of discontent rippled through the others.
“Very well,” the Duke said curtly, but judging from his clenched jaw, he clearly wasn’t pleased.
Chapter Eighteen
On the dayof the fair, they were all assembled outside, but the Duke was nowhere to be found.
“He’s not here, Mama,” Hecki said as he jumped down the stairs. He’d banged on the Duke’s bedroom door and found him gone.
“What can we do? We can’t wait for him to return.” Lena was irritated at the Duke’s inflexible attitude. She was adamant not to let this disrupt their day. “Let’s go.”
In the carriage, the children abused the Duke all the way to the fair, calling him everything from ‘rigid as a stone gargoyle’ to ‘starchier than an ironed collar’ to ‘as humourless as the dead eyes of a trout.’ When they all agreed that he was ‘a tyrant worse than Nero’, Lena lifted a hand to put an end to it.
“Children. He is an EnglishDuke. With his rank and name, he is accustomed to rules and behaviour that are quite alien to us. No doubt, our way of life must seem more than strange to him. He is like a fish tryingto adapt to life on land. While I don’t condone autocratic behaviour, we must understand that this is what he is used to: giving orders and having people do his bidding.”
“Maybe it is best that you don’t remember too much of him then, Mama,” Mona muttered under her breath.
“He’s just like Napoleon. And look what happened to him: he got crushed by the allies!” Les piped up.
Hecki nodded enthusiastically. “Yes. We are the Allies! Let’s banish him to Elba immediately.”
Lena rolled her eyes and leaned back in her seat, while Hecki and Les planned all the ways and means of banishing the Duke to Elba.
The fair was a vibrant event, the streets and stalls filled with people, smells, sounds, and lots of eating and dancing. Arriving late, they had no time to check on Kurt and Emma, who had arrived earlier to set up their stall. They immediately went up to the small wooden stage and started to perform.
Lena and Mona both wore blue dresses with fitted, sleeveless bodices, white blouses, full skirts, and red aprons. White stockings and buckled shoes completed their look. The boys, meanwhile, wore red and white chequered shirts andlederhosen.
As Lena’s pianoforte was too cumbersome to take to the fair, she played the recorder flute with the boys, while Theo played violin and Mona the viola. It was an unlikely combination of instruments, but strangely enough, it worked. They played cheerful pieces and soon people were dancing to their lively tunes.
In the middle of one piece, Lena almost dropped her recorder flute. Out of the corner ofher eye, she saw a man standing somewhat apart from the crowd with his arms crossed. Surely it couldn’t be him, standing there in simple leather breeches with suspenders, a linen shirt, and a short dark grey jacket—exactly the same clothes the farmers wore. A round hat with a wide brim shaded his eyes. After she blinked, once, twice, he was gone. Confused, she looked around, but the people had crowded around the stage and she could no longer see the man.
She shook her head. The Duke had been so much on her mind that now she saw him everywhere.
After the performance, Mona walked around with her tin box, collecting coins from the audience. A couple of young men, already drunk from too much wine, bumped into her and she dropped the box, spilling the coins on the ground. As she scrambled to collect the coins, one of them kicked the box away, forcing her to scramble after it, and just as she was about to grab it, one of them kicked it again, while the other picked up the coins and put them in his pocket. As she stumbled and fell on her knees, they burst out in raucous laughter as if it was the funniest thing ever.
“Stop it!” she cried, but one of the men just kicked the box again.
Lena, who was in the process of packing up the instruments, saw Mona on the floor scrambling for the coins and the two drunkards mocking her. Her mouth pressed to a thin, hard line, and she clenched her hands to fists. Then she turned to Theo. “There’s trouble with Mona.”
