hunter of butterflies

[mestika]

She stumbles into the garden as if she'd fallen from somewhere else, and scrambles quickly to her feet, her hair wild around her, a butterfly net clutched in one hand. Then she stops and looks at the garden, her dark eyes cautious

Comments

[sir_palomides]

Ooooh, she has got a butterfly net. This is Palomides's most interested look. "What winged fauna have you been capturing with that particular apparatus?"

[sir_palomides]

"Very good! By golly, yours truly had been led to believe himself and his countrymen unique animals."

[mestika]

"No. There are many. And in Burma also, and Africa."

[sir_palomides]

"Very good! And women like yourself?"

[mestika]

A small hesitation. "I am half-blood."

[sir_palomides]

"Very beautiful for it," he remarks matter-of-factly, as though she is a piece of sculpture. "Well-formed physiognomy."

[mestika]

"I do not know the word," almost shyly. It's been a while since someone approved of her mixed race. Where by a while we mean never.

[sir_palomides]

But he is from a land of conquest, of expanding territory, of cultural mixing; mixed-race people are common, even if they are still darker than she. "It refers to the shape of the bones of your face."

[mestika]

"That they are pleasing?"

[sir_palomides]

"Quite pleasing," he agrees.

[mestika]

"Thank you," with a small smile.

[sir_palomides]

He smiles in return, broad and glad. For once, he really has nothing to say; he is just glad to meet a beautiful woman who hunts butterflies and who knows people who look like him.

[mestika]

Jewel is feeling more comfortable with him than a lot of people; he reminds her of no one she knows, but he isn't threatening and he isn't disapproving. She shifts the net. "Help me?"

[sir_palomides]

"Gladly. What technique do you use?" He reaches out to take the net; if she gives it, he will swish it about--at first curiously, then vigorously.

Typist: Off to bed now. Sleep well, when you do!

[mestika]

She does, letting it pass out of her hand a little reluctantly at first, but seeming more easy once he holds it. "I come upon them in a still manner, and drop the net upon them swiftly."

[sir_palomides]

"And then, when you have them securely netted?"