Chapter 31: Greta’s Winter Blanket and the Pot Customer
IT got cold in Marlais in December. Arthur quickly chopped wood, which Olivia steadily used up in the stove.
“It’s done! Now Greta can be both warm and cute!” said Olivia one day, looking with satisfaction at the horse blanket she held up in her hands. It was for Lara’s horse, Greta, and made of a patchwork of square pieces of cloth cut from old clothes. It was filled with a thin lining of cotton and even had a backing to it.
“Thank you for making one for Greta, too!” exclaimed Lara. “You didn’t have to. I’m sure she would’ve been fine as she was, but it does make me happy. Thank you so much!”
“Well, Annie has her fancy horse blanket, while Greta only has an old throw. I’m sure Greta wished she could be as cute as Annie.”
“Maybe. I wonder if horses get envious like that.”
“Oh, they do.”
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ON the first day of winter, Lara and Olivia had gone to change out the straw laid on the floor of the horse barn, where they heard the horses have a lengthy back-and-forth of neighs and whinnies.
It was nothing but noise to Lara, but Olivia could hear what they were talking about.
Olivia made me clothes. My clothes cute, said Annie, bragging to Greta about her horse blanket.
This warm. I no need clothes, said Greta, brushing off what Annie said by claiming she was satisfied.
That’s when Olivia realized she’d let something slip because she’d been so busy with other things. She had made a warm horse blanket for Annie, but nothing for Greta, and now she felt bad that Greta only had an old throw blanket.
I want to let Lara study as much as she possibly can, so I’ll just go ahead and sew Greta a new horse blanket, she thought. She only worked on it after Lara had gone to the outbuilding, since she thought Lara would feel bad about making Olivia do it and insist things were fine as they were if she found out she was working on it.
The cloth for the patchwork came from the large box overflowing with cloth. Olivia stared into the box and took out squares of fabric as she thought about a color scheme.
The cloth was from her old clothing as a child or used-up pieces from her grandparents’ clothes, garments that held a lot of memories. She thought of things that happened when she was wearing those clothes or what her grandparents said to her when they were cutting up the old cloth to be used for patches.
One vivid red cloth had been the lining of a coat Marguerite had when she’d worked as an apothecary for Louise in the neighboring kingdom. “I was planning on giving it to you once you’d gotten big enough, but the bugs got to it at some point,” her grandmother had said, seeming a little sad. “Bit of a shame, but we’ll use it for patches.”
A navy cloth was from Jenkins’s uniform when he was a knight. “It was a training uniform from when I was young. I got the cuffs and elbows fixed so many times, but one day, the maid told me, ‘Sir, this is at the end of its life.’” Olivia’s grandfather had been whittling skewers for drying mushrooms when he told her that.
“Oh, and this one…” said Olivia, picking up a high-quality yellow cloth. It had been a sundress she’d received as a gift for her tenth birthday. Her grandmother had spent so much time sewing it.
“Once you grow out of this dress,” she’d said, “set it aside and give it to your daughter.”
Olivia treasured it. But, one day, she went running into the forest chasing after a bright blue butterfly, and the dress caught on some thorns. By the time she’d realized what she’d done, the front had already been torn wide open.
She cried all the way home, but her grandmother said, “Don’t cry, Olivia. I’ll sew it back up. You can wear it as everyday clothing, and then, once you can’t wear it anymore, we’ll put it in the patchwork box.”
“Oh, it brings back memories every single time I look in here. But I need to sew, not get lost down memory lane. What color suits Greta?”
Annie was a warm brown color, so Olivia had made her blanket a base of green with pops of yellow, brown, and white.
“Greta’s a dark, dark brown, nearly black, so maybe I’ll do a red base.”
There were burning crimsons, deep burgundies, and the russet color of fallen leaves. The broad palette of reds with white turned into a lovely color combination for a horse blanket.
She diagonally cut an old sheet into strips to make bias tape which she sewed around the edges of the blanket, then attached a long cord to the section that would fall at Greta’s middle. It was the sort of horse blanket that you tied up on the left flank of the horse.
“I wonder if Greta will like it,” said Olivia, once finished.
“I’m sure she will,” said Lara. “Should we go put it on her now?”
“Yeah, let’s go.”
Lara had seemed the happiest out of everyone when she wondered if horses got envious, and that made Olivia smile.
The two of them went out to the barn. Dale, Snow, and Rob followed like there was no reason they wouldn’t.
“Greta, Olivia made you a horse blanket. Want to put it on?” asked Lara.
“Neeeeigh!” But this warm.
Though Greta was essentially saying she didn’t actually need it, Olivia could feel happiness flowing into her from the horse. She was a bit of a prideful princess, it seemed.
The three onlookers were observing the situation from their feet.
Rob said, I no need that.
Snow said, Greta not upfront.
Dale said, Clothes scary.
Olivia had to bite her lip to keep herself from laughing at the three of them chattering, especially from Dale’s, Clothes scary, comment. Dale had a particularly delicate ego which would likely be bruised if Olivia laughed.
Annie, who had been bragging about her own horse coat to Greta, was acting completely unconcerned with the entire thing. Olivia was impressed by the wide range of emotions horses have. They were practically like human girls.
“Right, we’ll probably have customers starting to come soon,” said Olivia.
“And today’s soup is my favorite. It’s so sweet and yummy,” said Lara.
It was pumpkin soup. The pumpkins would start going bad if they didn’t use them up soon. Olivia rehydrated dried clams in warm water, then simmered the water she got from soaking the clams with chicken stock and onions she sautéed with butter. The chicken stock, made from a chicken carcass, suited both the clams and the pumpkin well.
The soup was a hit at Soup Forest amongst both men and women for the pumpkin that crumbled at a touch, the clams with their hearty texture, the sweet onion, and the aroma of butter.
The bell above the door jingled and a man Olivia had never seen before came in. And, for some reason, he was carrying a pot.
“Hello. Feel free to sit anywhere that’s open,” said Olivia.
“Uh, actually, I didn’t come to eat. I was hoping you might sell me some soup. Or do you not sell it in that manner?”
“I do. I’ll go ahead and put the soup in your pot then, yeah? How many bowls’ worth would you like?”
“Um, well, there are three people in my home, and I have made the trip out here, so may I have six servings?”
“Of course. Take a seat here and wait a moment. Lara, could you give him some tea?”
“Yep!”
Lara served him a cup of today’s tea, apple, and Olivia went to put the soup in the pot. Seven servings, even though he’d asked for six. It might spill in the carriage like this… she thought. She hated the idea of the soup she worked so hard to make going to waste, so she put the lid on the pot then wrapped twine around it to keep the lid down.
“Here you go. It shouldn’t go splat all over the carriage even if it jerks and tilts about,” she said, bringing the pot back.
“Oh, you tied it down for me. Thank you. I also have a question. What is it that the other customers are getting in those bottles?”
“It’s a health tonic. My grandmother was an apothecary. She drank it every morning and night and lived a long life. The customers who knew about that wanted me to sell them the tonic.”
“A health tonic? That sounds wonderful. Right, I’d also like to purchase this tonic. Though, I have no bottles. Will that be a problem?”
“I have empty bottles. Here you are. The tonic does taste very bad, though.”
“It’s medicine. I wouldn’t expect it to taste nice.”
“Oh, all right. I do recommend drinking it after eating. It’s quite bitter and grassy.”
“Thank you for the advice.”
With that, the seemingly wealthy man of around thirty took his soup and tonic and left.
“Olivia, was that someone from Marlowe’s villa district?” asked Lara.
“I’m not sure.”
Their conversation ended there, and the man slipped from Olivia’s thoughts.
But three days later, he returned with his pot.
“Hello,” said Olivia. “Would you like soup?”
“Yes, I would. And I thought I’d also like to eat here first,” he said.
“Of course. Please take a seat here.”
“That pumpkin soup from before was wonderful. And the tonic tasted like it really did work.”
Olivia smiled wryly at the considerate wording, “It tasted like it works,” and served the man some tea. Apple, again today.
“I noticed last time, but this tea has an apple aroma, doesn’t it?” he said.
“Yes. I mix dried apple skin in with the tea leaves.”
“And you don’t charge your customers for it?”
“No. It’s free for anyone who purchases food.”
“Rather generous.”
Is it? wondered Olivia as she gave a polite smile and took the pot from him. “How many slices of bread would you like?” she asked.
“Two, please.”
The soup of the day was duck soup. Olivia first nicely browned the duck meat, then simmered it with loads of winter vegetables. She then added plenty of green onions, and the soft green onions entwined with the duck meat, making a tasty soup that warmed you from the inside out.
The side was a crudo dish made of raw trout (previously frozen), dried celery, onion, and carrot.
Olivia often went fishing now that the bears were asleep for winter. She’d hang the trout out the second-floor window to freeze overnight, then thaw them the next day to use in food. Marguerite drilled into her that you must not eat river fish raw, they must either be cooked or frozen first, and Olivia always followed that rule.
The man who brought the pot looked satisfied as he finished his lunch, then paid for the pot of duck soup and some tonic and left.