The Confessions of Thomasina
Mar. 30th, 2005 02:22 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
pjthompsonan experiment in diaryeal fiction
32nd Meckellan, the Year of Our Suffrage, 1882
Dear Diary:
Well, here it is again: All Chuckles Eve, the night when the He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named-Or-Else Trickster God is in His Ascendancy. I do not know if I will be allowed to write in you tomorrow, 1st Luminor, All Solemn Day, when we must sit quietly contemplating the mischief we did throughout the year—especially on All Chuckles Eve—and feeling solemnly guilty for it, followed by the Ritual of Saving Our Skins wherein we ask the forgiveness of Her Majesty and of the Great Goddess Grimas.
Rather a ridiculous exercise, if you ask me. It is not as if we shall have a proper All Chuckles Eve at all, since we are in a formal state of mourning for Uncle Charles. Not that I object to being in mourning for Uncle Charles—he was such a jolly fellow—but we will not have any fun at all on All Chuckles Eve. No lighting of the Bonny Fires, wherein caricatures of all the handsomest lads and comeliest lasses are thrown into the inferno during the Ritual of Spite and Envy; no chucking of firebrands onto the porches of wealthy houses that will not pay the sweet tax to the poor children of the parish; no buckets of water poured over the heads of the unsuspecting constabulary and dusting them with Trickster Flour (even though Cook makes the most wondrous itchy flour with the perfect blend of hot spices); no sneaking off to the shire's giant aphrodi bush maze to get horribly lost and infatuated and act riotously.
All right, I will admit that Grandmama and Grandpapa have not yet let me sneak off to the shire's maze. They guard me like Tarmagan Banshees on All Chuckle's Eve and place locks upon my windows and my bedroom door. I am happy to report I am not held prisoner in such a manner for most of the year, just for the high riotous holidays.
So here I am locked in my room, gazing wistfully at the fires burning in the nighttime distance, hearing the occasional piercing scream or low, repetitive moan. I feel completely left out. Although everyone on the estate is supposed to be in mourning, I suspect some of the servants have gotten up to High Chuckling. Otherwise, how would I be able to hear the screams and moans? Our estate house is quite a distance from the shire road. At least because of the state of mourning, with the black acadia vines strung across the gate and the ritual skull with the arrow through it as signs of our grief, we have little worry of our porch being torched by the poor children of the parish.
Listening to the moaning down below (I really do believe it is coming from that selfsame porch!) puts me in an oddly petulant state. I must distract myself. Therefore, I shall describe the remarkable person who arrived with Uncle Charles's letter yesterday. Not Major Fitzmins-Smytton, but the man Oolomo.
Mr. Oolomo is not a tallish sort of person. His stature is no more than a few inches greater than my own. He appears, however, to be quite strong. I cannot quite determine his age. He could be twenty, he could be thirty... I do not like to think of him as overmuch above thirty as it would be nice to have someone around the estate closer to my own age of eighteen.
Mr. Oolomo attires himself all over in green silk, and one cannot help but notice the stretch of muscles across his back when he hefts heavy objects—such as the box Uncle Charles sent—and the tautness of his, uh, other back muscles when he bends over to pick objects up. One should, of course, have looked away rather than subjecting oneself to such an inappropriate physical display, but one may have peeked between the lacework of one's fan. His skin is beautiful and smooth, a creamy brown, his hair as silky as his wardrobe although black in color, and he has quite remarkable eyes: large, luminous, and a compelling brown. Indeed, being unaware of the formalities of society, he looked quite openly and forcefully into my own eyes. I experienced a sensation . . .
I have no words for it. I have felt nothing like it before. It seemed to move through my body in most peculiar ways, as if some of my lower extremities might be melting. And yet my tummy held the most extraordinary tension.
I am afraid that when he looked at me thus I blushed furiously and hid behind my fan before Grandpapa took Mr. Oolomo by the elbow and said, "There, there, chappy, one mustn't stare at the ladies so. Bad form, you know."
Mr. Oolomo blinked at Grandpapa in incomprehension, then nodded once and dropped his eyes. One may have peeked often at him from behind one's fan. And every time one did, Mr. Oolomo was looking one's way from beneath hooded lids. It had a most disturbing effect on one's composure.
All of this came to pass while Grandpapa was questioning Mr. Oolomo about his travels with Uncle Charles.
"So," Grandpapa said, "you are from Rangunar?"
"I am not from Rangunar, Sir," Mr. Oolomo said. Did I mention his voice is like the low note of a chetchinar, the bow drawn slowly across the bass string? As Charles said, he speaks our tongue in quite an agile manner.
"But I say," said Grandpapa, "my son said in his letter that you were with him in Rangunar."
"Indeed, Sir, that is where he found me, but I came there from Calcuna."
"Ah, so you are Calcuni?"
"No, I am not Calcuni."
"Then where the deuce are you from?"
Mr. Oolomo smiled and bowed from the waist. "I am from many places, Sir. Many, many places."
Since Mr. Oolomo would say nothing further on the subject except other like riddleistic phrases, Grandpapa pretended to lose interest in order to maintain his dignity.
"Well," he huffed, "shall we get about the business of examining this Key of Providence?"
I would dearly have loved to stay in the sitting room for that revelation! Alas, Grandpapa said it was men's business and asked Grandmama and I to leave. The raptor-like stare she gave Grandpapa would have made a lesser man turn to goosey pudding, but Grandpapa has had much practice standing up to Grandmama's stare. She was forced to withdraw to the drawing room, as was I.
When Grandpapa and Mr. Oolomo exited from the sitting room and emerged into the drawing room, Grandpapa looked pale and tight-lipped, but he would tell us nothing about the Key. Most vexing!
Good gods! You will scarcely credit what I have just glimpsed beneath my locked window. Green silk caught in the torchlight! And if I am not very much mistaken, Mr. Oolomo hand in hand with Molly the scullery maid, sneaking off in the direction of the shire's maze!
I am in such a state of peak I can write no more!
Yours,
Thomasina
Read Thomasina's entries from the beginning here:
http://pjthompson.dreamwidth.org/635375.html
32nd Meckellan, the Year of Our Suffrage, 1882
Dear Diary:
Well, here it is again: All Chuckles Eve, the night when the He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named-Or-Else Trickster God is in His Ascendancy. I do not know if I will be allowed to write in you tomorrow, 1st Luminor, All Solemn Day, when we must sit quietly contemplating the mischief we did throughout the year—especially on All Chuckles Eve—and feeling solemnly guilty for it, followed by the Ritual of Saving Our Skins wherein we ask the forgiveness of Her Majesty and of the Great Goddess Grimas.
Rather a ridiculous exercise, if you ask me. It is not as if we shall have a proper All Chuckles Eve at all, since we are in a formal state of mourning for Uncle Charles. Not that I object to being in mourning for Uncle Charles—he was such a jolly fellow—but we will not have any fun at all on All Chuckles Eve. No lighting of the Bonny Fires, wherein caricatures of all the handsomest lads and comeliest lasses are thrown into the inferno during the Ritual of Spite and Envy; no chucking of firebrands onto the porches of wealthy houses that will not pay the sweet tax to the poor children of the parish; no buckets of water poured over the heads of the unsuspecting constabulary and dusting them with Trickster Flour (even though Cook makes the most wondrous itchy flour with the perfect blend of hot spices); no sneaking off to the shire's giant aphrodi bush maze to get horribly lost and infatuated and act riotously.
All right, I will admit that Grandmama and Grandpapa have not yet let me sneak off to the shire's maze. They guard me like Tarmagan Banshees on All Chuckle's Eve and place locks upon my windows and my bedroom door. I am happy to report I am not held prisoner in such a manner for most of the year, just for the high riotous holidays.
So here I am locked in my room, gazing wistfully at the fires burning in the nighttime distance, hearing the occasional piercing scream or low, repetitive moan. I feel completely left out. Although everyone on the estate is supposed to be in mourning, I suspect some of the servants have gotten up to High Chuckling. Otherwise, how would I be able to hear the screams and moans? Our estate house is quite a distance from the shire road. At least because of the state of mourning, with the black acadia vines strung across the gate and the ritual skull with the arrow through it as signs of our grief, we have little worry of our porch being torched by the poor children of the parish.
Listening to the moaning down below (I really do believe it is coming from that selfsame porch!) puts me in an oddly petulant state. I must distract myself. Therefore, I shall describe the remarkable person who arrived with Uncle Charles's letter yesterday. Not Major Fitzmins-Smytton, but the man Oolomo.
Mr. Oolomo is not a tallish sort of person. His stature is no more than a few inches greater than my own. He appears, however, to be quite strong. I cannot quite determine his age. He could be twenty, he could be thirty... I do not like to think of him as overmuch above thirty as it would be nice to have someone around the estate closer to my own age of eighteen.
Mr. Oolomo attires himself all over in green silk, and one cannot help but notice the stretch of muscles across his back when he hefts heavy objects—such as the box Uncle Charles sent—and the tautness of his, uh, other back muscles when he bends over to pick objects up. One should, of course, have looked away rather than subjecting oneself to such an inappropriate physical display, but one may have peeked between the lacework of one's fan. His skin is beautiful and smooth, a creamy brown, his hair as silky as his wardrobe although black in color, and he has quite remarkable eyes: large, luminous, and a compelling brown. Indeed, being unaware of the formalities of society, he looked quite openly and forcefully into my own eyes. I experienced a sensation . . .
I have no words for it. I have felt nothing like it before. It seemed to move through my body in most peculiar ways, as if some of my lower extremities might be melting. And yet my tummy held the most extraordinary tension.
I am afraid that when he looked at me thus I blushed furiously and hid behind my fan before Grandpapa took Mr. Oolomo by the elbow and said, "There, there, chappy, one mustn't stare at the ladies so. Bad form, you know."
Mr. Oolomo blinked at Grandpapa in incomprehension, then nodded once and dropped his eyes. One may have peeked often at him from behind one's fan. And every time one did, Mr. Oolomo was looking one's way from beneath hooded lids. It had a most disturbing effect on one's composure.
All of this came to pass while Grandpapa was questioning Mr. Oolomo about his travels with Uncle Charles.
"So," Grandpapa said, "you are from Rangunar?"
"I am not from Rangunar, Sir," Mr. Oolomo said. Did I mention his voice is like the low note of a chetchinar, the bow drawn slowly across the bass string? As Charles said, he speaks our tongue in quite an agile manner.
"But I say," said Grandpapa, "my son said in his letter that you were with him in Rangunar."
"Indeed, Sir, that is where he found me, but I came there from Calcuna."
"Ah, so you are Calcuni?"
"No, I am not Calcuni."
"Then where the deuce are you from?"
Mr. Oolomo smiled and bowed from the waist. "I am from many places, Sir. Many, many places."
Since Mr. Oolomo would say nothing further on the subject except other like riddleistic phrases, Grandpapa pretended to lose interest in order to maintain his dignity.
"Well," he huffed, "shall we get about the business of examining this Key of Providence?"
I would dearly have loved to stay in the sitting room for that revelation! Alas, Grandpapa said it was men's business and asked Grandmama and I to leave. The raptor-like stare she gave Grandpapa would have made a lesser man turn to goosey pudding, but Grandpapa has had much practice standing up to Grandmama's stare. She was forced to withdraw to the drawing room, as was I.
When Grandpapa and Mr. Oolomo exited from the sitting room and emerged into the drawing room, Grandpapa looked pale and tight-lipped, but he would tell us nothing about the Key. Most vexing!
Good gods! You will scarcely credit what I have just glimpsed beneath my locked window. Green silk caught in the torchlight! And if I am not very much mistaken, Mr. Oolomo hand in hand with Molly the scullery maid, sneaking off in the direction of the shire's maze!
I am in such a state of peak I can write no more!
Yours,
Thomasina
Read Thomasina's entries from the beginning here:
http://pjthompson.dreamwidth.org/635375.html