by Megan Mulry
It was definitely Cambury’s child.
She sighed and smiled weakly, and for a second—a few breaths—she gave thanks to the Lord in Heaven that goodness had prevailed. Despite all his attempts to defile her after he’d caught her with Cambury, Floridablanca’s seed had not taken root in her body.
“It’s a girl,” the older nun stated.
She might as well have said, It’s a bit of rubbish, for the way her tone proclaimed what she thought.
“And it doesn’t appear to be breathing,” the nun added.
“Throw it away. Throw them both away.” Floridablanca got up from the chair in the corner of the firelit room where he’d been observing the gory tableau. “And clean this up. It’s disgusting.”
He paused for a moment at the foot of the bed to stare down the length of Leonor’s bloodstained body, then he hurled the remnants of his drink across her. “Puta!” he spat, and strode to the door.
He grasped the handle and was about to leave when he turned back. “I want all of you out by dawn, especially that cheating whore. Remove her from this house, dispose of the dead infant, and then be off. If I learn you helped her in any way beyond carrying her to the gutter, I’ll tell the abbess you’re a pair of thieving trollops. And Leonor?”
She groaned and turned her face toward the voice.
“If by some work of Satan you survive on the streets, you are never to contact me, do you understand? If I hear even a whisper of your existence, I’ll have you killed.”
The nuns kept their eyes downcast, knowing better than to look at him directly and risk incurring the familiar back of his hand. The door slammed shut and the three women remained in shocked silence. The older nun recovered first. She finished cleaning the baby’s body and wrapped it tidily in a small blanket. Leonor was too confused to understand why she was cleaning up a stillborn baby—perhaps preparing it for a proper burial.
The younger nun was wiping down the floors and mopping up the blood that seemed to have coated the entire room. “Sister, there is so much blood. Is there anything we can do for her?”
“You heard the count. We are not to do anything.”
“But we can’t—”
“We can and we will. She will be dead within the hour anyway. Look at her. I’m amazed she survived this long. At least we won’t have the death of the child on our souls.” Leonor watched in a daze as the nun held the tiny infant with that telling blonde hair and those dark eyes. Nora was desperate to hold her, even with her soul already ascended to Heaven, but she didn’t have the strength to reach for her. “She was quite a beautiful little thing, actually.” The nun traced the arch of one golden eyebrow. Leonor’s soul was being torn from her body.
The younger nun’s attention went from the baby back to Leonor, who must’ve appeared entirely wretched, from the expression of horror that passed across the nun’s face. “I don’t see how we can simply abandon the mother . . .”
The older nun finished wrapping the stillborn baby then looked up, her face changing from tender caregiver to heartless judge. “She is a hopeless sinner. She made her choices nine months ago. These are the consequences. Now wrap her in these sheets and carry her out to the street, as the count instructed. Carry her a few blocks away through the alley. I’m going to the kitchen to see if I can find a footman to bury the child. You get this baggage out of here.” Leonor watched blearily as the old nun lifted her chin in her general direction, then turned to the door. She heard it shut with finality and realized that was the last she would ever see of her child. The briefest glimpse.
The young nun stared at the closed door and sighed. Leonor peered through swollen lids as the other woman busied herself around the room. It was difficult to form the words through her scratchy throat and chapped lips, but she pleaded nonetheless. “The rest . . .”
The nun returned to her side. “Yes, you will rest, dear.” She took Leonor’s hand. Eternal rest, Leonor thought vaguely. She had always suspected this nun was kindhearted but had been reluctant to show it in front of the older nun or, heaven forbid, the conde. For the past nine months, anyone in the household who showed Leonor the least tenderness was summarily dismissed.
Through another wave of piercing pain, Leonor repressed a cry. “No . . .” she whispered hoarsely, “the rest . . . is coming out . . .” The nun quickly understood and moved near the head of the bed, helping to raise Leonor’s shoulders so she could bear down and emit the afterbirth. Sometime later, the bleeding had finally abated and the nun cleaned up as best she could, then tossed all the bloody rags into the fire. The smell of her own funeral pyre wafted around Leonor’s head, a sickening relief. It was almost over, this horrible life of misery, deception, and cruelty.
Leonor was barely conscious when the nun wrapped her in one of the few remaining sheets and lifted her into her arms.
“Aren’t you a feather?” the nun asked lightly, as if Leonor was a small, sleepy child being carried to the nursery by her nanny.
“Please . . .” Leonor whispered near the woman’s ear.
“What is it dear?” She carried her down the stairs where a few sputtering torches cast menacing shadows along the stone walls. Leonor would never miss this dungeon-like mansion. She would miss very little from this world. She would miss Dennis Cambury. And their beautiful child. But the baby was already waiting for her in Heaven; she had seen the nun bless her. Yes, Leonor had prayed for her child to be spared a life of despair. Was this God’s cruel answer?
Leonor’s head bobbed against the nun’s sturdy shoulder. All the pain was starting to slip away. She could no longer remember what she’d been pleading for. They were passing through the alleys behind the splendid houses in the wealthiest quarter of Madrid.
“I am so sorry I must leave you,” the nun confided. “I have already gone far beyond what . . . ” Leonor drifted in and out of the words. The count demanded . . . every day of my life . . . God means for anyone . . . to suffer . . . creature . . . and then Leonor thought she heard a door knocker, perhaps announcing her arrival at the gates of Hell . . . then nothing but blissful peace, utter blackness, death.
Hell had a lovely smell: rosewater and fresh linen. Leonor rolled her cheek against the cool fabric and inhaled. Then gasped. Ow. That was more like it. Hell. Pain shot through the left side of her skull, as though she’d been smashed with a fire iron. Come to think of it, the conde had been using the fire iron recently.
At least her eyes were no longer crusted shut with dried blood. Hell was very clean.
Maybe it was purgatory, because the whole bit about angels singing was apparently true. And the language of angels happened to be English. The lilting tune mingled with the rosewater scent, fresh and sultry all at once. Leonor had always adored roses for that reason, the lovely balance of budding innocence followed by tawdry, blatant sensuality. As if the flower tried very hard to be contained and appropriate, but ultimately fell out into a burst of joyful display because it must.
Leonor sighed aloud. The velvety English rose stopped singing abruptly and a scurry of light footsteps came close. Too tired to be afraid, she turned toward the sound and slowly opened her eyes. Heaven indeed. An angel from on high looked down at her.
“You’re alive!” The blonde woman was so perfect, so smooth and unsullied. Leonor suddenly saw herself as this woman must: used and ugly; her face swollen and bruised, cut and horrifying. What a time to feel self-conscious about her appearance, when all she should feel was glad to be alive.
Wait.
“Am I alive?” She tried to sit up, but the angel pressed a gentle but firm hand against her shoulder.
“Yes! Isn’t it wonderful? A miracle. You need lots and lots of rest. Do you remember who you are?”
Did she? She wasn’t sure, but she knew Leonor was dead and gone. She thought of the name Dennis had always called her. His Nora. She croaked out of her dry throat, “Nora?”
“Yes! You are Nora! Oh! Water. You need water. I am such a selfish thing, wanting
to make you talk and tell me all about yourself.” The busy angel moved around the bed to pour a glass of crystalline water from the equally crystalline decanter. “You have caused so much excitement here in the house.” She came back around and helped Nora sit up so she could drink.
“Excitement?” Nora asked with a worried look, after the first delicious sip.
The other woman continued, “Oh, don’t you worry. We haven’t said a word to anyone untrustworthy. Of course my uncle only has the most devoted servants.” Then she whispered in a conspiratorial aside, “Because he’s a spy, don’t you know. So it certainly wouldn’t do to have servants of a hireling nature. That would be very bad for spying! But you must be exhausted. You’re still bleeding from the birth. You’ve been asleep for days. How do you feel anyway?”
Nora was . . . almost happy . . . if such a thing were possible when one’s entire body felt as though it’d been tied to the back of a carriage and dragged through the streets of Madrid for a fortnight. And then the angel’s words brought her back to the present.
“The baby . . .” she whispered distractedly, after refusing any more of the delectable water. It was so rich, she was nauseous after a few sips.
The angel’s head whipped around as she placed the glass down on the bedside table. “The nun who brought you to us told the kitchen maid the baby had died.”
“Yes, she was stillborn.”
The other woman’s eyes lowered in sympathy. “It is a terrible loss.” She reached for Nora’s hand and squeezed it gently. “We have all suffered so many losses this past year, but somehow we are meant to go on. I can’t help but feel you were delivered here by some divine stroke, that in some way—”
The rambling angel was interrupted by two small children of about six or seven barreling into the sunny chamber. “Mamamamamama!” they chorused.
The woman’s face bloomed in happiness. Well, perhaps the woman’s face never really bloomed, because she seemed to be in a perpetual state of full-blown happiness at all times. She whipped the boy and girl up into a fierce, twirling hug and blew raspberries into the crooks of their necks. They giggled, and she squeezed them tighter. Then both small heads swung toward the bed, and they wriggled out of their mother’s hold. “Is the angel awake?” The boy placed his hand around Nora’s wrist, as if he were the resident physician, checking her pulse. He appeared very serious about her condition.
“Is she improving, Mama?” the little girl asked, holding Nora’s other hand, equally concerned. “She looks very kind.”
The children’s faces were oddly familiar: amber eyes filled with tender curiosity, waves of unruly blond hair.
Their mother leaned against the side of the bed and stared down at Nora with something akin to awe. “Yes. Isn’t she beautiful? Like the painting Uncle Fitz showed us at señor Goya’s studio last week. Do you remember?”
The boy narrowed his eyes, keeping his attention on Nora as he tried to recall the information his mother requested. “Yes, Mama. Of the Madonna. And the Holy Family.”
“But she also looks like the tiny miniature painting,” the little girl hastened to add, wanting to show her knowledge too. “The one Uncle Fitz brought from London.”
“Yes, darling.” The woman smoothed the boy’s unruly blond hair against his head and turned lovingly toward the young girl. “Very much like that one too.”
Nora was being pulled under another tide of exhausting confusion. “You are both so kind,” she whispered to the children. “What are your names?”
“I am Georgiana Elizabeth . . . but everyone calls me Georgie. I am older by seventeen minutes.”
“Archibald William Cambury, at your service.” He glared at his sister for a second or two, then turned back to Nora. “And she may be older, but I’m still the Marquess of Camburton.” The little boy bowed formally at the waist.
At the mention of the Marquess of Camburton, Nora fainted dead away.
The next time she woke, it was dark except for a small fire burning in the grate across the room and a single candle that lit the blonde Englishwoman’s beautiful face as she sat reading in a chair very close to the bed.
Tilting her head slowly to take a better look around, Nora was immediately disoriented. Her head seemed to have cleared, but her senses were still confused: the street sounds and smells reminded her of Madrid, but the room’s decoration and the woman herself made Nora believe she was in England.
“Where are we?”
The blonde woman looked up quickly, snapping the book shut and putting it down on the bedside table as she rose to stand at Nora’s side. “Oh, I’m relieved you’re awake again. The physicians have been ever so worried your head was permanently addled or you had swelling or some such nonsense between your brain and your skull, and I told them I absolutely refused to let that happen. But it was probably too much to have Archie and Georgie come running in here and terrifying you this afternoon with all their raucous affection, and now I’m doing the same thing all over again, talking incessantly when you are probably overwhelmed and wondering where you are and how you came to be here and—”
She stopped abruptly when Nora reached out her hand and rested it over the other woman’s wildly gesturing one.
“What is your name?” Nora asked softly.
“Vanessa.” She smiled. “Yes, that is the best place to start. You’re quite right. My name is Vanessa Montagu Cambury, Marchioness of Camburton. You make me very nervous, you see, and I always speak too much and too rapidly when I’m nervous. So I apologize in advance, but you are really such a marvel and we are all quite smitten with you.”
“May I have another sip of water?” Nora was confused by the barrage of words. Even though the woman spoke in an elegant, aristocratic Spanish, her accent was distinctly British. It reminded Nora keenly of Dennis and the time they’d spent together.
“Oh dear. I am quite the worst.” Vanessa poured the water as she spoke. Nora suspected the woman never did one thing at a time when life was always providing the opportunity to do two or even three things simultaneously. “I promised my uncle I would be the best nurse—and, not to be overly self-congratulatory, which is a shortcoming of mine I suppose you’d best familiarize yourself with right away in any case—well, not a shortcoming, necessarily, because I don’t think I’m arrogant about it; in fact, I’m very factual about myself and my accomplishments—and I really have been quite attentive and helpful—”
Vanessa tipped the glass to Nora’s lips so she could drink and then continued speaking at that breakneck pace. “You were, well, quite nearly dead when you arrived, and I don’t think it’s too much of an exaggeration to say I was the one who brought you back to life.” She continued to hold the glass of water while Nora drank, then helped her sit up. “There’s been enough death around here, I informed Uncle Fitz, and I wasn’t about to let the Grim Reaper cross the threshold again this year. Don’t you agree?” When Nora widened her eyes to indicate she’d had enough water, Vanessa pulled the glass away and patted Nora’s lips with a clean napkin.
Nora’s eyes slid shut. “I’m awake, but the candlelight seems to add to my headache. Do you mind if we speak while my eyes are closed?”
“Oh, that’s a splendid idea.” She could hear the rustle of fabric as Vanessa settled in the nearby armchair. After a brief pause—that must have seemed an eternity to someone so eager—Vanessa said, “So, I’m sure you have a vast number of questions, and I am at your service to answer them. If my suspicions are correct, you are Leonor Medinacelli de Redondo, Condesa de Floridablanca, and you were in love with my husband’s younger brother, Dennis Cambury. Is that right?”
“Yes,” Nora whispered. “How is it possible? Where is he? Is Dennis here?” She turned her face away from Vanessa’s, too embarrassed to show the tears of hope that slid down her cheeks.
For the first time, Vanessa sounded less than glimmering. “I don’t wish to add to your misery, but I’m not one for mincing words. The Cambury brothers—my husband
and your, well, lover I suppose—are dead. They were aboard the Susannah, and she sank last October off the coast of Scotland, in Ayr Bay. There were no survivors.”
Nora turned back to face her and opened her eyes slowly to get a better look at this strange woman who could be so matter-of-fact about her husband’s death. She must not have loved him.
Then she caught a glimpse of Vanessa’s eyes and saw the depth of the other woman’s loss. Vanessa was trying to smile, for Nora’s sake, she supposed, but her lashes were wet with unshed tears. “They were peas in a pod, those two.” She wiped at her eyes as if the tears were an annoyance. “After Dennis returned from Madrid in September, he told us all about you, what a beauty you were, how he’d fallen madly in love with a Spanish lady. How he was planning to rescue you from your horrid husband, petition the Pope if he had to. He would have done it, you know. If anyone could have done it, Dennis was your man.”
Nora smiled to hear the words. Her heart was pounding at the terrible news that Dennis was gone, but there was a strange peace to it as well. She would see him soon. And he had meant everything he had said to her the previous year.
Over the past nine months, Leonor’s husband had nearly convinced her that Dennis Cambury was a thieving, cheating, dastardly Englishman who’d used her body and cast her aside. Dennis had promised to return to Madrid by Christmas, to petition the church for an annulment, to help her escape from Floridablanca, to do whatever could be done. But he’d never come. She’d tried to write to him, but the conde always managed to intercept her letters. As the dreadful months of her pregnancy crept by, the conde’s accusations had started to sound plausible to her weakening mind.