Grantville Gazette 38

Mirari couldn't help but smile. The Basque woman could think of at least a half dozen ways to get rid of an unwanted suitor. One or two would even leave his ego intact.

'You could always tell him that you were madly in love with that young navy man from Hamburg. The one with NCIS,' she suggested.

'Abelerd Gottschalk? He was kind of cute.' Betsy looked thoughtful. Then she shook her head. 'It wouldn't work. '

Just then one of the waitresses walked up to the table. 'Mirari? He's here. ' At those words Betsy went pale.

'Thank you,' Mirari said. 'Bring him right over. ' She turned to Betsy. 'I think I've got just the thing to take your mind off of Albert. '

****

The waitress led over a young man of perhaps thirteen years who was dressed in browns and grays. Like a good reporter, Betsy studied him while he approached. The first thing she noticed was his large, hawk-like nose. She actually thought it gave him a unique look. As he crossed the room, patrons stepped aside to avoid brushing the sword that hung from his belt. As he neared, his startling dark eyes zeroed in on Betsy. She flushed at being caught studying him so openly.

'Madam Semsa,' the young man turned to Mirari. 'It's a pleasure to see you again. '

'As it is to see you,' Mirari said and then turned to her friend. 'Betsy, I would like you to meet Cyrano de Bergerac.'

'Cyrano? Oh! They wrote plays about you!' All thoughts of Albert flew from her mind. Betsy stood to offer de Bergerac her hand. Rather than shake in the American style, he turned it and kissed her knuckles. If he had been a few years older, Betsy would have been flattered. As it was she thought it was cute. She could easily see where the older Cyrano would get his reputation for being a great romantic.

'I'm told they exaggerated the size of my nose, somewhat,' he said ruefully.

'You know what they say about a man's nose,' Betsy replied. Then her eyes grew wide as she realized what she had said.

Cyrano lifted a single eyebrow in question. He was obviously trying to appear worldly and cool, but a furious red blush darkened the back of his neck and cheeks. 'That would be where my other reputation comes from.'

'Mondemoiseau de Bergerac is taking a grand tour of Europe. He and his companion have traveled some way out of their way so that he can speak with you, Betsy.'

'Really? Where is your companion?' By the way that Mirari said the word, Betsy assumed that by 'companion,' Mirari actually meant 'guardian.'

Cyrano's eyes twinkled. 'Regrettably, my cousin was detained in Badenburg on pressing business. I decided not to wait on him.'

Betsy took an instant liking to Cyrano. Her favorite girlhood adventures were the ones she'd undertaken while the babysitter was 'detained on pressing business' elsewhere. 'So what can I do for you?' she asked.

'Mondemoiseau de Bergerac is interested in your knowledge of up-time cinema,' Mirari looked from Betsy to Cyrano in bemusement, as if she wasn't quite certain that introducing the two had been a good idea. 'He is a budding playwright and he wants to write a play based on an up-time movie in order to gain some notoriety.'

'Which one?' Betsy asked. She ran through a mental list of movies that could easily be converted into stage production. One that was adapted from a stage production, such as The Odd Couple or The Front Page, would be perfect, she thought.

'Have you ever heard of Our Miss Brooks?'

Betsy tilted her chair back and suppressed a laugh. 'As a matter of fact I have, but it wasn't a movie. It was a radio sitcom when my Grandpa was my age. They made a TV show of it when my dad was a little boy. We used to watch reruns together when I was a girl, Eve Arden played Miss Brooks. Of course, that was years before she was Principal McGee in Grease.'

'Greece?' de Bergerac tilted his head in confusion. 'What does the Balkan Peninsula have to do with it?'

'Don't ask,' said Mirari with a tone of warning in her voice that he apparently understood.

'You have seen the drama, which is the important thing!' The young playwright said in triumph. 'I want to write a play based on this story. While other up-timers I've talked to remember the name, none of them admit to having seen it. Which makes it all the more intriguing to me; a story so forbidden that even now people will not speak of it!'

'Our Miss Brooks? Forbidden?' Betsy snorted in an effort to hold in her laughter. 'I wouldn't call it scandalous. Just obscure.'

'Mirari said that if anyone in Grantville remembered classic up-time cinema, it would be you,' he continued as if he hadn't heard her.

'TV isn't exactly cinema, but it just so happens that I think I can help you anyway!' Betsy said.

Just then the bell over the door rang again. Betsy's head whipped around. She paled as a young man walked into the room, his eyes scanning the patrons intently. 'Oh no, Albert!' She dove under the table and then looked up at Mirari's bemused face. 'I was never here!'

****

'Tell me that it isn't really true,' Denis Semsa said when Betsy walked into the room at the back of the Grantville Times offices where he and the other staff artists did most of their work. The air in the room was heavy with the scent of freshly cut wood and long thin shavings were scattered all across the floor.

'Okay. It isn't true. What are we talking about?' Betsy stared down at the woodcut he had been working on. It showed a number of men and women sitting around a large table filled with piles of books and papers.

She picked the carving up and turned it upside down to stare at it. Then she righted it and looked again. 'What is this? One of the Committee of Correspondence gatherings?' She asked while obviously trying to make sense of the reverse image cut into a print block.

'No. It's a parliamentary subcommittee meeting,' said Denis. 'And don't try to change the subject.'

Betsy didn't look up at her companion. 'Then why do these guys look as if they like each other? That doesn't sound like most politicians that I know.'

'Trust me, the disagreements came quickly. But Mr. Kindrad wanted to show that the two sides can work together. It's in the spirit of . . . now what did he call it?' Denis broke off to search for the word while snapping his fingers in the air. 'Bipartyingship.'

The corners of Betsy's mouth twitched. Denis knew then that he'd made a mistake with the word. 'Bipartisanship,' she said slowly, 'is what I think you mean. '

Denis waved away her comment. 'That doesn't matter, you're dodging my question. So tell me that you didn't do it!'

Betsy drew a deep breath and smiled at him serenely. 'I really don't know what you're talking about.'

'Betsy, I've seen you change the subject on someone too many times to just let you get away with it. Tell me about what happened yesterday.'

Betsy picked up the woodcut and studied it again. She spent nearly a full minute ignoring him. Denis knew that she was doing it on purpose to goad him for being nosy.

'What did you hear?' she said finally.

'That you and Albert were seen out together, in fact that you were quite the pair of lovebirds. Is this becoming serious?'

She scoffed. 'No! It is not becoming serious! Not in any conceivable way, shape or form. If Albert has been telling tales like that, I will teach him the meaning of the words 'unending pain!''

'There are some people who would say that pain was a definition of marriage,' Denis mused. Seeing Betsy's scowl he held up his hands in a defensive pose. 'But I'm not one of those people. I also heard something about a table that you were hiding under.'

Betsy's eyes grew as big as coins and her face flushed red with embarrassment. 'Oh Lord! Please tell me that you heard that story from your cousin and not one of the town gossips!'

Seeing her distraught expression, Denis took pity on her. 'You can rest easy. I did hear that from Mirari. Did you meet with that playwright that she wanted to introduce you to?'