| Gracias: a novel
in progress by Susan Wetherall |
| Susan Wetherall has been a recipient
of a fellowship in fiction from the Massachusetts Arts' Council. GRACIAS
is her third novel. The past has no existence except as a succession of present mental states. A disciple of David Hume. Quoted in The Perfect Heresy by Stephen O’Shea CHAPTER ONE England had not dropped below the horizon before the princess had cleared the deck of all her attendants, all save my own humble person. First the ladies in waiting were dispatched to the noisome darkness below decks, then the archers went the way of the damsels, then the lords, those few who had not already succumbed to seasickness. And then, amidst loud lamentations, that great tub of English Lard, the dowager dragon Lady Adelaide, may her toes shrivel up and cause her to walk on her knees. Now, on this the last day of the voyage, there are still only the two of us, apart from the sailors, in possession of the deck. In truth only the beautiful Princess remains in possession. I, Gracias de Gyville, who can hardly be said to possess anything apart from my instruments, the clothes I stand in, and the good graces of his highness, Prince Pedro of Castile, am but leasing a tiny, sun-struck space between the mast and a pile of coiled rope where I am all but invisible. The price of this security is a song, or two, the melody soft and soothing, though the language, well, the beautiful princess does not yet know Castilian. Save for the pilot calling out the river’s depth, mine is the only voice to be heard. We entered the estuary at noon yesterday, and almost immediately the wind dropped to a whisper, the sails sagged, the ship’s timbers ceased to quarrel and a heavy silence closed in upon us. And now that we are well into the Garonne, no sailors call to each other, no mate shouts an order, there is not even a muttered consultation between captain and mate to break the hot stillness. The ship itself seems unable to creak in these turgid waters. Occasionally one of the oxen drawing the ship lows, or the faint rhythm of their pace is broken by a shout and the cracking of a whip. The few bedraggled attendants who have dared come from below, huddle in the stern, anxiously watching the princess out of the corners of their eyes, as though her beauty alone, or youth, or virtue might save them from the horror that lies ahead. “After all,” they seem to say, “God would never bring disaster upon a wedding party. Or on a princess so beautiful. Would he?” Silly fools! You will understand that as a princess, the lady merits the title of beautiful. As a princess she has wealth and power enough to make her beautiful were she a toad. Which she is not. Indeed, the princess has all the accoutrements of legend, blue eyes, a complexion of the strawberries in cream, long golden tresses, the slender figure of a child just turned wench, or just about to, which to all men is a moment of pure exquisitrie. And yet though all others find her beautiful, I am not of their number. As an example those greatly celebrated eyes are not the blue of poetry, they are the blue of an English autumn sky in its final defeat, pale and watery. As to the cream and the strawberries, when the wrath is upon them as it has been these last seven days, they resemble nothing so much as a cow’s udder gone poxy. Of which I have seen a great many when as a child it was my lot to tend the scurvy village cows one day in every seven. “What is that you are singing, Sir?” The princess’s shadow looms above me and I bounce to my knees, hoping to wipe all traces of the poxy udders and icy eyes from my face. But of course, the princess has the advantage, for the sun is behind her, turning that enormous mop of hair into a bright halo that all but extinguishes her face. In defense I start to push myself up. “Stay, I asked a question.” “It is a…a ballad…about a fisherman’s daughter…who falls in love with a prince.” “Oh.” And she is gone, to pace the deck again like a caged lion. I can almost see the tail swishing behind her. Well, I piss upon your pretensions, young lady. I sigh, shake my head free of all unworthy thoughts and crouch again among the warm ropes. After all, it is a truth beyond charity that any young female may be of uncertain temper whilst on a journey to an unknown stallion in an unknown pasture, and without the company of her dam or sire. Still, I do think she ought not to have shouted at dona Luisa for having the presumption to ask that she cover her hair before the sailors. That was not well done. It is not dona Luisa’s fault the princess was born to be a royal breeder, nor that her only recourse for well-being in a strange court is to achieve an exquisite decorum and appearance that is universally acknowledged. Indeed, this is dona Luisa’s chief task, to wean the princess from those habits learned at a court well known for its laxity. Is it any wonder that all this royal pacing about the decks, this hair blowing free in the harsh salt air, this laughing and lifting of arms above her head to pull the frizzy haystack out into spikes and streamers, has smote dona Luisa sorely? I know she lies below girding her loins for the long weary hours and days and weeks it will take to bring that unruly haystack into some semblance of dignity. More time than the whole long journey overland from Bordeaux to Toledo will take I fear. All across the Pyrenees, we will have crying and screaming and fits and starts as each ugly knot is unraveled, and each hidden nit gives itself up to the comb. Dear God! For all the cozy delousing parties they indulged in back in England, I doubt not the princess has a full head of them. Vermin! Every soul on board ship bears the marks of their depredations. In my case, the nails of my right hand being so long for plucking strings, there are even open wounds. A painful irony for it is only the music itself that has saved me from flaying myself alive. In this last week alone, whole colonies, having established themselves upon my person, have pressed forward their own imperial intentions by spawning new hatcheries on fresher fields. Only this morning I found one such hatchery aborning smack on the gossamer web between arse-crack and testicle, not three inches due southeast from its mother-home. Decorum in the face of such agony is a figment of the imagination. Indeed, between the agony and my own filth, I do not know how I have remained sane during this voyage. Nor did I come aboard in any admirable state, given the nearly ten months of penance I suffered in chill England’s so called baths. Verily, my sanity hangs by a thread, and that thread leads but straight into the heart of Bordeaux, to the superb bathhouse near the cathedral square, run by a most excellent man by the name of Antoine. There is nothing quite so civilized as taking a bath in a civilized country. All places have soap and ash harsh enough to rid oneself of fleas and lice in the first washing. But for the second, there can be no joy to compare with that of scooping out the fug from the tender hollows behind one’s ears with a soap such as that concocted by Antoine, so gentle, so fragrant it would put sweet cicily to shame. Wash, scrape, rinse, scrape, wash again and rinse. Cold, warm, hot, warm, cold. The bathhouse of Antoine is a place of wonders, so far above the horror that is called a bath in England that there can be no comparison. To begin with, not in all of London is there anything that merits the name of bathhouse. The establishments that presumed to own the title, were called the Stews by those who partook in their ministrations. And so they were, a great broth of splinters, turgid water, and the scum and stink of sheep’s fat soap. A miasma of rank cunny, fetid armpit, and rancid breath floating above the surface, whilst beneath, old prostitutes brushed their floaty bums against ones pizzle, and salacious old men weighed whatever wares there were to hand. I owe it to my great agility, speed, and the dexterity of my juggler’s fingers that in all that time I was not ravished both fore and aft! The world may call me particular, but it is to be noted that we in Castile are very nice in our persons, despite the growing lack of fuel for the bathhouses. His highness, Prince Pedro, has a great loathing of lice. For a prince he is a frequent bather, sometimes as often as once a week, and he never smells but sweet. Judging upon brute evidence alone, there is little bathing at all in the Tower. As for smell, I pity those who are shut up below decks, adding their present sorry offerings to what must be months and years of miasma so thick and disgusting it should be gathered and offered to the infidel. The shadow looms above me again. There she stands, twirling a hank of hair between her fingers and though I know she cannot understand the words, they dry up in my mouth. “Your Highness?” Has no one taught her that to cast a shadow over another is to bring him bad luck? I start to rise but she marches away, her shoulders set as straight as a suit of armor. Her waist is tiny and her hips not much wider. She stops, her hands bunched into fists. Quicker than a flea, she bends down and takes her right shoe off. In one smooth motion, she hurls it overboard. The other follows and she walks forward to the prow. Shocked, I raise up far enough to see one shoe still floating on the thick estuary water. Spoiled brat! Those shoes were made of good leather as well I know having had the dubious pleasure of watching them march by all these last days. Of excellent leather with dainty ties at the ankles, the merest hint of open work, and modest points! With but an inch or two more in length those shoes could have been mine, for all that I am more than twice her age and half a head taller. And I know just the man in Toledo who could achieve that without insult to my toes. Now look where they are. Sinking into the filthy, stinking mud of the river, while she stares off into nothing, her head all but vibrating with the nothing that is within. And yet, even as I look, her shoulders slump and she bows her head. I am ashamed. It is all too easy to find words to criticize and mock. Far easier than it is to tell a tale whole and unadorned from start to finish with honesty, and dignity. And perhaps even a little kindliness. I am not so naturally gifted in these skills as I should like but nonetheless, I shall begin anew, perhaps with more charity if not commonsense. This then is summer in the year of our Lord, 1348. We are in the eighth month of the second year of the great dying in Christendom, but because the pestilence had not yet reached England’s shores when we left, we have all aboard this ship, or nearly all, by mutual and silent consent, determined not to speak of it. The terrible storm that came up the first day out was blessedly brief and the rest of the trip has been clear if sorely choppy. The sun brilliant but not burning, and the wind “spanking,” as the English say, which conjures up the innocence of sails like swaddling rags let loose at last. And if we have heard no bells at all though we have sailed but half a league from shore these seven days, we pretend it is of no consequence. It is only peaceful, we tell ourselves, and besides, who is to say if no bells are worse than constant bells? Of course I feign boredom when dona Luisa tells me yet again of the pomander containing the toenail of the Virgin Mary’s grandmother which she bought from a thieving peddler in Toulouse last autumn, and later stuck through with cloves and drenched with a most sovereign scent against the plague. And when in a weakened moment, Sir Andrew, scholar and doctor of law, murmured to the princess of a mixture of crushed gold and other ingredients that he as a scholar and philosopher could concoct against the evil, she sent him away. And well she should. For is this not the most excellent entourage of the wedding of Castile with England, wherein the princess Joanna, second daughter to his majesty Edward III of England, is to marry my royal master, Prince Pedro, true and only heir to King Alfonso, the eleventh of his name to reign in the kingdom of Castile? That is as soon as the final treaty arrangements are settled, which discussions are to take place in Bordeaux before the princess sets out for Castile. On these four ships we are a gathering of gentlefolk, of high nobility, a princess bride and her guard of 100 English archers, nearly the same number of gentlemen, including knights, stewards (1 included among the knights), marshals (1, the same), chamberlains (1, etc), squires, and pages (12). Of ladies in waiting there are ten, of scholars, only the one if he is not to be included among the knights. There are four lawyers, two physicians, three barber surgeons, two priests, four friars. Of tirewomen and servants and cooks and ordinary musicians, they are without number. Deep in the holds there are countless ells of cloth and robes and gold and jewels and chalices and shoes and swords and holy relics, not to mention armor, helmets, bows and arrows, pet monkeys, cats and dogs. There is even a chapel made of gold and silver and fine woods with a couch decorated with dragons rampant for the princess to pray upon, or on and in. And though I blush (if I only knew how) to say it thus so individually, here is myself, who have been sent by my prince to sing to her royal highness the songs of her new people, sent, as it were, to sing her home. What room here among all these highborn hang-abouts for death and plague and sorrow? The unnumbered know differently, but they keep their thoughts to themselves. This ship, The Edward Rex is the first of four. Close behind us is the Prouty Mare, and it holds many of the archers, many drovers, plus much gold and jewels, and exquisite mules and horses and the chapel I think. Further back is Mary of the Angels, which holds most of the Princess’s attire as well as the royal wedding dress and other such treasure. Behind all trails the last whose name I cannot pronounce, being one of those words with sibilants and fricatives, and gutturals all run together without benefit of vowels. It is the most unmusical of names and goes something like: Grrshtppnlkpttl. I am told it has something to do with the weather, which does not surprise me as that sums up the English climate to perfection. Grrshtppnlkpttl. I have no idea what it is like on board those other ships, but here on the Edward Rex where most, if not all, of the people of consequence are to be found, there has been much seasickness. Starting with Sir Robert Bouchier, former chancellor to King Edward, and presently in charge of the final treaty arrangements, all those of gentle birth and stomach save the princess, have fallen prey to mal de mer. Those who have not succumbed, have been banished and thus there is no one left on deck to say her nay, save myself, who am become the soul of the affirmative, the happy, the silent, the droll, the lingering, the tender, in short, there is nothing of nay about me. Let me tell you of my first sight of the princess. Rodrigo de Malavan, our knight escort and his squire, both had the bad fortune to conceive a bloody flux in Toulouse that did not let them loose until death came to claim them just before we embarked for England. So it was that dona Luisa and I arrived in London without our knightly companion and his trusty lad, but with his seven men at arms, and all the many gifts of perfumes and cloth and jewels that my master, the prince, had seen fit to load upon us before our hasty departure from Toledo. It was thus cumbered and unencumbered, we were brought into the royal residence, to be precise into the very heart of that dark, malodorous pile they call the White Tower. While the men at arms waited below, the lady and I and the gifts were ushered up narrow stairs to the third level of the tower, and passed through a series of the most hideous tapestries stitched in colors of gray, dung brown, and mildew green, and all hung in staggered formation so as to block the wind from the windows. These windows were but poorly glazed, covered by heavy wooden shutters, and then o’erdraped by equally disgusting tapestries. Still the wind that penetrated these barriers was cold and harsh, it being that defeated end of the English autumn, and close on to the feast of the Annunciation. Poor dona Luisa fell behind at the first flight of steps, and further behind at the second. So that when we reached the third level and the maze of tapestries, she was nowhere to be seen. I lingered behind but he who ushered me along pushed me forward into the complicated maze, three steps and turn, three steps and then turn the other way again, and then again, and all the while a sort of high-pitched squealing, much shouting and laughter sounded muffled and dispersed about me. My companion in this trek was a being of such understated elegance and such overstated presence, that I determined him to be one of those servants who must better their masters. As we came to the last tapestry there rose a thundering shout, “Slay him, what say you, slay him, I say,” in that parody of a language, English. This was followed by screams of protest. My usher grinned at me in a most condescending way and drew the tapestry aside. I stepped forward, unwilling to show cowardice before this fop and came upon a scene of such chaos and rupture I could only believe that my companion was playing a malicious trick on me. Hundreds of children ran and crawled and tumbled about the floor, all shrieking and laughing. There were feet and skirts and small boots, larger boots, pink and white faces and flying yellow hair all passing in a pandemonium. One small piece of fluff shot out from the melee and landed at my feet, looked up and gave out an awful roar. Two others, a boy and a girl came at me from either side and hoiked me up and over the small beast and sent me tumbling into the room. In the count of three I ended up on my back with such a thump that the breath was knocked out of me and I could but stare at the vaulted ceiling lost in darkness above and thank the lord my lute, the only instrument not neatly tucked away, was being carried atop one of the chests that was following behind me. A face appeared above me, a round, dumpy, middle-aged face, thirty or more, and another, this one a rugged man with huge mustaches and golden hair. A wall of little children’s faces gathered around me and even the tiny roarer made its way through the forest of ankles to my side. “Oh dear,” said the dumpy face in the soft tongue of northern France, “you are not hurt sir?” I opened my mouth to speak. “No, he’s not hurt, he’s just had the wind knocked out of him,” said one of the older children. He seemed much put out that I had not provided him with better entertainment. Two small children clambered upon my legs and stomach. The roarer grabbed my finger and bit it. I snatched it away and the man with the golden beard let out a shout of laughter, then disappeared. Oaf! The dumpy woman bobbed around behind the other heads appearing and disappearing, but mostly disappearing. Another face appeared, an older child, almost a woman, two new faces, each with yellow hair, and both serious, the one with wrath, the other with worry. “Father, make them let him up,” said the worried one in a high, child-like voice. The muscles of her face danced with anxiety. The wrathful one, having perused my length, found it lacking, and its burden, even more so, turned away with a shrug. The worried one took my right hand and pulled. Other hands removed the two small children, grabbed my clothing, my arms, and legs and began to push and shove me upright. “There,” she said when I was finally up and submitting myself graciously to a hundred small hands brushing the rushes off my clothing and pummeling where they could not brush. “I am sorry you have fallen, sir. Uncle, could you not have warned him?” All eyes turned to my erstwhile companion. “I have brought you gifts from your royal husband, Joannie. This,” he bowed and indicated my disheveled person, “is but one of those gifts. A…” He screwed up his eyes as though to remember some untasty meal he had eaten all too recently, “a Grisssush de Gerbob, minstrel to his highness Prince Pedro. And that,” this royal monster had the effrontery to point to a heaving bulge in the tapestries further down the hall and to raise his voice, “is one dunna Loissa dee BriggorBragoranza. I think.” I leapt forward as the tapestry heaved first to one side, then to the other. Before I could reach her, dona Luisa tumbled out from beneath the heavy cloth. “Santa Maria de Dios, sangre de la gran puta!” she cried. I grabbed her clutching hand and helped her to rise. “Oh Uncle, how could you….?” She, who I now understood to be my future mistress, came forward. “Oh please,” she said to dona Luisa, “My uncle has forgotten himself in the exercise of his duty. We most humbly beg your pardon.” Both dona Luisa and I turned and gaped at her. She smiled and said to the dumpy woman, “Ma’am, they have come from Spain, from Castile,” she corrected herself, “What is your correct name, madam?” “Dona Luisa de Maravedi, Viuda de Alcantara.” Dona Luisa sank into a deep curtsey, which was answered by an equally deep curtsey on the part of the princess. My mouth fell open at this further lapse in royal dignity. “And your name, sir?” I brought my head to the level of my knee. “Gracias de Gyville at your service, your highness.” With a grave bow of her head she said, “Your French is so beautiful,” as though there might have been some doubt! “I know nothing of Castilian.” I bowed again. “It shall be my pleasure to teach you.” There was a shocked silence as though I had offered to rape the girl and then a great burst of laughter from all about the room, even from the giant with the yellow moustache who had cast himself down upon a throne as if it were a tree stump and he a peasant picking his nails. Thus it was I met the princess. And all her brothers and sisters and their attendants, and playmates, and the King of England, and his Queen. Now is there anything in that scene to warn you that the princess “Joannie” was and is in fact a virago? No. Nor yet were there any signs that such a change was in the wind throughout the dark winter to follow. Wrath there was in plenty from her sister Isabelle, as well as screams and tantrums. Disputations there were aplenty, for there is something in the Plantagenet blood that loves an argument every bit as much as it loves its wars, loud, frequent, and bloody. But there was none such from this most decorous of princesses, this oh so gentle, so decently covered, with eyes downcast over her never absent embroidery, young damsel. And I should know, for I did sit for hours at her feet, singing the songs of my country while she set her delicate stitches one by one. The plain truth is that the only sign she was anything but a gentle broody mare with a gift for embroidery came at that first meeting when she took my hand and raised me up, and went so far as to scold her foppish uncle. Now she strides about just as my mother did when her temper was short and my father was late from the tavern. I remember hands as rough as rock and an eye that could peel the skin off a goodly man with one glance. I bear the scars today and I have never wished for a mistress half so hard. Yet I have but to look over to the railing and there she stands, once more rigid, staring out at the river banks closing in upon us, her long robe hiked up and tied with a golden cord so that her ankles are visible in their hosen. Where will it end? Am I to deliver a fifteen year old changeling to my prince? Is he to wed this…this brat? If so, if there is no change, then I am lost. For no one likes the bearer of bad tidings or questionable goods. Least of all, my young master. But once again, I lie by exaggeration. And by self-indulgence. Changed she is but she is not a brat. Angry perhaps, and frightened, and wanting some measure of herself in freedom before she comes to my bright Toledo, where she will wed, where she will bear children God willing, and where she will die most likely. This must surely be on her mind. From dona Luisa’s example alone she cannot but know of the difference between the two courts. Perhaps she does not know it all, but there she will no longer go about unveiled, or speak with men as freely as with women, or mix with anyone granted entrance to the Royal Presence. Indeed, she herself will rarely be granted such privilege, for she will be all but cloistered. Yes, it is most probable that the court and the customs of my country concerning women, will brush the dust off the wings of this poor angry butterfly so that she will fly no more. And whatever the court accomplishes by its custom, there is yet another evil that resides at its very heart. I have no doubt the princess Joan has heard and perhaps has believed the rumors about my prince, little knowing they are calumnies spread by his half-brother Henry’s slut of a mother, Eleanora de Trastemara, mistress to his majesty, King Alfonso. This is the very reason the marriage treaty is not yet signed and sealed. King Edward and Queen Phillipa, who are amazingly fond of their daughters, do not want the princess coming to Castile before they have assured themselves she will be granted all the respect and privilege of a royal progenitrix. But how, when that…that shrew, that fiend Eleanora has spread these evil rumors of cruelty and of terror about my prince, in order to stop this marriage before any heir can come to dislodge her son from the succession? Indeed, should the treaty be signed and the princess come to Castile, I doubt the hellcat will rest at the mere dusting of wings. I lift my fingers from the harsh crashing chords and draw in a deep breath. No. Just as we do not speak of the pestilence, I will not darken my mind with the droppings of that repulsive woman. I let my fingers hover and swoop to a new song, this one about the English court. Again the copla form, but this time in Catalan. I have made many such to comfort dona Luisa, as well as me, these past months. King Edward’s Court. Having heard about this wonderful king and his elegant court before I arrived, I was prepared to laugh at the very least, certainly to enjoy myself. And except for the hours spent in the Princess Joan’s solar, I did both in good measure. For so lavish is the English court, and founded on such a laxity of morals, I could not but walk about with my mouth agape and my various other parts aloft. Not only does the king prepare entertainments so grand, they will surely end by beggaring him, there is always about the court a lascivious air. Clothes, food, entertainments all have more than a hint of wantonness. Every royal robe is shot through with enough gold, silver and jewels to reduce the most mighty of nobles to a thing of ridicule. I’ve seen many an English lord with his surcoat so heavily weighted behind that his codpiece led the way before him. And as for the women, their nipples clap in the wonder of it all. Not that the princess, or even her high and mighty older sister wore such scandalous clothing, but lavish yes. I have been told the princess’s wedding dress is made of 150 ells of a rakemitz so thick and heavy with gold thread that ten bullocks could not haul it down the aisle, with or without the lady beneath. And that’s without the jewels. The clothes are bad enough in that northern court, but the food beggars belief: whole swans made naked to be cooked, then dressed again in their feathers and forced to swim in pools of honey all to arrive at the high table with a blast of trumpets. There were platters of larks tongues as small and shriveled as raisins, swimming in honey, the English do love their honey, haunches of venison and wild boar, fish of every description, in sauces, pates, frisson, stews, in bread dough even, and something called frummety, or dummity, which is made of offal, or is it offal made with honey? And beef, mountains of the stuff, they all eat great slabs of it at every meal, washed down with barrels of a beverage made from horse piss. I sampled this but once and voided it for the next three days. The headache lasted a good deal longer. To think they have sent hundreds of barrels of it as a gift to my young prince. I must warn him before he samples it. Again the shadow comes over me and again I start to scramble up. “Nay, be seated. I want to know the words to the song,” says the princess and before I can open my mouth, she squats, yes squats! And looks me straight in the eyes, her eyebrows raised, her nose squished up, her mouth pursed. Oh no! She is going to ask me to teach it to her. An arduous task at best, a hideous one with the princess, so full it is of backing and forthing and toing and froing, for while my English is quite excellent, as is my French, d’oel and d’oc, my German, my Latin, my Catalan, and my Portuguese, it is not so with the princess and so we must pause and go back and explain, add details, hear the chords again, PLAY them again, not just once, but twice, and thrice and repeat the words as many times in Castilian, Holy Mary, what a mangling! And all the while her face contorts and recontorts with concentration. Behold, the English face when it is concentrating, it is something to wring the heart. Only contemplate what muscular frenzy will greet my prince from his bridal couch when he requires of her a kiss. Eh, and what? And that dreadful English glottal, huh! For, lamentable as it is, save for her native French, a smattering of Latin, and that unspeakable language the English moo and low, the Princess Joan is a monoglot. And, I blush to admit, the prince is little better. “What does it mean?” says the princess. I lower my gaze, then hastily drag it back up from the tear in her hose a hand’s breadth above the left ankle. I cannot even remember the tune I used when last she asked. “It is only a romance, your Highness, the one about the fisherman’s daughter….” “Who falls in love with the prince. That’s the one.” Down at this level, I see that the sun has done a certain blending of those defects I earlier mentioned and she now looks almost….pleasing, though for all her manners, very like my youngest sister playing Tarry Do on the floor at home. “A prince comes to the village where a fisherman and his daughter live and wishes the fisherman to carry him to an island where a holy community lives.” Her face is so alive with curiosity, that I swing my gaze beyond her to the rail and proceed to kill the fisherman in a storm, then to save the valiant prince by swimming him to the island where he begins to study for monkhood. “Ah,” and “aha!” she says, and “Swim! How curious. I cannot do that.” In short order I bring on the fisherman’s daughter and all is revealed, she is the prince’s long lost sister who as an infant was saved from an evil tyrant by a loyal servitor, disguised as a fisherman. “Long lost sister? But I thought you said….how could she fall in love with him if he is her brother?” “She fell in love before she knew she was his sister.” “Surely she would know even without being told.” “You mean in her heart?” I tap the organ in question. “Have a care, Minstrel. I am not stupid.” “No your highness. I would never…” “You just did.” “Forgive me if my careless tone...” She brushes this aside. “You do not think we can know such things in our hearts?” Arise Plantagenet! What will that pig-slut Eleanora make of her? “My princess…may I call you that?” She rolls her eyes. “Yes, well, my own experience has taught me differently, your highness. All too often I was sure I knew something, even in the face of contrary truth. And always I knew it here, in my heart, and could allow no other truth to enter. As an example, I thought I knew what others thought, or what they knew, or even who they were in their own hearts.” I catch my breath and hear myself saying, “Until I was most painfully disabused of such belief.” A sudden trembling takes me. “I do not see how that applies,” she says. Please, oh please, let us return to how the weather is in Castile, or how the ladies dress in King Alfonso’s court! There must be some way to turn it. “Let me put it another way, your highness. I have learned not to trust my heart in the absence of facts.” I rub my fingers together as though such facts were grains of sand. “That seems a paltry reason to lose one’s faith.” “Faith! Oh no, I do not speak of faith, your highness, but only of aligning that which I truly want to that which is truly there.” “If that were the only criterion, then how could you believe in the resurrection of our lord?” I stare at her, at the narrow chin, the high cheekbones, the anxious, squeezing flesh around the eyes. All those days you were sitting so demurely over your embroidery, still and empty while your brothers and sister rode the storm, all that while, you were taking in every word, every tactic. And now you are here, asking of all questions, that one. That particular question. “Who am I to consider such a heresy, your Grace? I, a mere man…” And never so brave as dare be truthful. I tap my heart again. “I have learned that the only unassailable truth in my heart is our heavenly maker, his son, and the holy spirit.” “How were you so cruelly disabused of your…certainty did you call it?” Time stands still. I look into those hungry, furious child’s eyes, they could be my own all those many years ago, and something shifts within. A bubble from beneath the heavy muck of lies wins through and slowly rises. I close my eyes and watch it break the surface and disappear. Is this how it will happen? “Someone died,” I whisper, then clear my throat. “Someone who believed in me.” “He died because he believed what you said?” “Yes.” “Who?” “A friend.” “Did you believe what you said?” “Yes.” And still do, God help me. I open my eyes and she is gone. Where? Over there by the rail, she is staring down at the oxen pulling the ship along. To the next stage of her journey. God help her. The trees open a little and a soft breeze cools my face. There are tears on my cheeks. Tears as warm as unshed blood. In a little while the princess returns and kneels in front of me. Her voice is gentle. “So, how did the story end?” “Oh. Yes. The Prince was delighted with his newfound sister and instead of becoming a monk, he takes her away to the capital to meet their father, the king where they live happily ..” “How is it that the fisherman didn’t recognize the prince when he first came?” “What?” “The fisherman who was the faithful servitor, the one who drowned.” “Perhaps, your highness, because he looked like his maternal great grandmother whom the fisherman, or rather the faithful servitor never knew.” She smiles, “You said that because you knew my great grandmother was a princess of Castile and you sought to distract me.” “Forgive me, your highness, you are too wise for me.” “So I suppose the princess falls in love with and marries the handsome king in the next kingdom over?” “How would you have it end?” “I shall have to think about that. Teach me how to sing it.” I set to with a pleasure I had not expected. No longer arduous, the task becomes its own pleasure. And, to my surprise, I am not so bad a teacher as I had thought. “What,” she says for the tenth time, “Can you say that again?” Her roughened finger touches the neck of the lute. “Never mind. I know the ending now.” “You do?” She smiles broadly. “I think she bids her father a loving farewell, and her brother too, then becomes a minstrel and takes to the roads.” There is a shout from high above us. The city is in sight! The captain appears on his deck and stares off to the south and east. “There it is. Only a little further down the estuary, your highness.” The rest of us rush to the rail including Sir Andrew and several more of the archers who have erupted from their quarters below deck. And finally, yes, the Lady Adelaide in a hideously stained lavender robe, heaving herself across the deck, free to once again wreak her special brand of havoc on us all. When she arrives at her station behind the princess, that sweet creature swings about and says, “I am not yet ready to return to custody, Madam,” in tones so frigid the lady’s nose would freeze off if it could be found. Those nearest have heard and politely turn to stare at the still invisible city. “Where is it?” they murmur, “where is the city?” “Over there behind those trees. See, there is definitely a smudge on the horizon.” “How gray and marshy it is.” “And hot, the heat is enough to….” “See, see all that smoke.” From the shore on our right, a bell begins to ring, a single note, again, and then again. The sound is frail, thin almost. We look at each other and then away, afraid of what this portends. Another bell rings farther along on the other side, and then another, harsh and clanging, as though it were clearing its throat. Away in the distance, there is a low-pitched double bell then even farther yet, hardly audible at all, a high pitched eight note peal. The bells have begun to ring again. “They have spotted us, your highness,” calls the captain. “Those bells ring in your honor.” There is a general sigh of relief and then, bourn to us by a southerly breeze comes the smell. As one we lift our hands to our noses. “Is that it, sir Minstrel?” her highness whispers. “Yes, your Highness,” I say, pretending not to understand. “It is your city of Bordeaux.” She is silent for a while. And then, even softer still, “It is the plague, is it not?” “Yes, my princess, most assuredly so,” I say slowly and close my eyes in prayer. When I open them, she is no longer beside me.
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