continued, ‘we are here, are we not?’
Isabel looked down at the fan in her hands, peeking up at Percival now and then.
‘Yes, we are here,’ Percival said, ‘and here we are.’
Isabel unfolded her fan and studied the elephant drawn on its opened expanse. The elephant had its trunk upraised as if trumpeting. Isabel wondered what kind of noise an elephant made when it was trumpeting. Was it like a trumpet? Was that why the word trumpeting was used? What kind of word was trumpeting anyway?
‘Isabel,’ Percival said, ‘there comes a time when a man must decide on questions of the utmost seriousness. This is a momentous occasion, a time of solemnity, a collision of destinies.’ He paused to take a deep breath.
Isabel thought that the phrase a collision of destinies wasn’t bad. She hadn’t heard that one before. She thought that a momentous occasion was an over-used phrase, though, so Percival lost marks there.
‘There comes a time in the life of a man, Isabel,’ Percival continued, obviously reaching into his memory for a rehearsed set of words, ‘when the pleasures and comforts of the day are not enough, when his soul thirsts for something of which he knows not, when beyond what he sees and understands he hears the call of the unknown seeking an answering call to a question he dares not ask.’
Isabel was very pleased with all this. It was excellent. Percival was doing very well. At this rate, she would give him very high marks for his performance.
‘You understand me all too well, I fear, my sweetest Isabel,’ Percival said, looking at her closely. ‘Do you not, my sweetest Isabel?’
Isabel noticed that he had called her my sweetest Isabel twice in the same breath. She could tell he was not far away from his proposal by now.
‘I am all at a loss to understand you, Percival,’ she said hesitantly, folding up her fan. ‘You speak of such high and lofty things that my head spins merely to dare to comprehend matters of such deep import. Oh, you must help me to understand these matters of which you speak. On my own I cannot.’
Percival stroked his magnificent moustache while he pondered her reply. This wasn’t the answer he had hoped for. He had hoped that she would have gotten the drift by now, thus helping him over the last hurdle of actually proposing. It was still going to be uphill for a while longer, Percival realised. But the blood of kings, adulterous archbishops and countless counts flowed in his veins, and he manfully squared up to the challenge. ‘It falls to my duty to do that which I gladly take up with a shout of joy,’ he said.
Isabel wondered if Percival had got that right. Hadn’t he misquoted Courtlyn? It didn’t sound right, somehow. ‘Your eloquence is beyond compare, Percival,’ Isabel said in a tone of the deepest admiration. ‘How do you express your thoughts with such a fluid and elegant turn of phrase?’
‘Ah,’ Percival said meaningfully, ‘my words fly on wings sent from the deepest least wayward impulses of my heart.’
Well, he got that quote right, Isabel thought, recognising the line from Dacian’s epic poem of the love between the mermaid and the doorkeeper of the great castle by the sea.
‘So that is why,’ Isabel commented. ‘But still I cannot understand what it is that you wish me to understand.’
Percival swallowed back the annoyance which had momentarily arisen on hearing her words. How many times, he thought, did he have to use such phrases as impulses of my heart before his beloved comprehended the import of his discourse? ‘What it is that you must understand,’ he said, ‘is that however we fly on the wings of our mind, it is the earth that pulls us downward.’
Lorene, Isabel noted, another quote which Percival had actually got right. ‘You must think very badly of me,’ Isabel said, ‘but still I do not understand.’
‘Isabel, dearest, my dearest sweetest Isabel, sweet, sweet Isabel, I wish you to be mine, I want to travel hand in hand with you along the great journey of life, together, your hand in mine, I am yours for all of eternity, dearest Isabel, will you grant me that which is in your keeping and all that I desire?’
Isabel realised she couldn’t play dumb for much longer. She thought that the sentence I want to travel hand in hand with you along the great journey of life was actually not too bad. She memorised it in order to tell her friends later. She wondered if Percival had thought it up by himself or if he’d had help.
‘Goodness!’ Isabel gasped, raising her hand to her mouth, ‘can it be so? But what are you saying, Percival? Surely I mistake what you say!’
‘No, beloved Isabel,’ Percival assured her, ‘I wish you to marry me and be mine for ever.’
So he had finally got to it, Isabel observed. He had used the word marry which as far as she was concerned was the actual proposal itself. She noted that he hadn’t actually gotten onto his knee and proffered a ring, which brought his marks down as far as she was concerned, because she always liked that touch; she liked to see a man on his knees before her. Still, she reflected, he hadn’t done too badly. Even his nervousness had been an artistic enhancement of the overall presentation, even if unintentional. She liked to see a man tremble at the thought of asking her to marry him, because, after all, she expected no less.
Now came Isabel’s favourite part, namely her refusal of the proposal. A well-made proposal deserved a gracious refusal; a proposal less deserving of her favour called forth a much blunter response. Percival, she decided, had earned a gracious refusal.
‘This is all so sudden and unexpected!’ Isabel gasped, unfolding her fan and raising it in front of her face. ‘I am caught by surprise. I do not know what to say.’
‘Say yes, sweetest Isabel,’ Percival urged her.
Isabel said immediately, ‘Oh, but you give me no time! Surely I may have time to think.’
‘You may have all the time in the world, sweetest Isabel,’ Percival told her, ‘for what are the minutes you take now, compared with all the years to come?’
Isabel noted that he had given her only minutes, which she thought mean of him; also, she couldn’t help but note that he had equated minutes with all the time in the world, which hardly seemed logical. She also couldn’t help but feel that the phrase the years to come had the slightly depressing connotation of a prison sentence to it, at least to her ears.
‘But how can I say yes when I do not love you?’ she said. ‘Surely it is on the foundations of love that marriage is built?’
Percival took this in his stride. He was prepared for this one. ‘Love will grow in time, sweet Isabel. We will grow to love each other as the plant grows towards the sun.’
Isabel approved of that line. It wasn’t too bad. ‘But in darkness the plant shrivels and dies,’ she said. ‘And what then?’
Percival was thrown by this. He had no idea what to say. He wasn’t prepared for this response. Isabel gazed wide-eyed at him while he thought this one over. ‘The plant is just a metaphor,’ he said eventually, obviously wishing he had chosen another metaphor. ‘Never mind plants. We will come to love each other anyway.’
‘Percival, you have granted me the greatest honour I could ever have wished for,’ Isabel said admiringly, in tones of the deepest sympathy she could reach for as she warmed up for the kill. ‘You
