by Ann Benson
This time there was no mistaking the source of the sound. “How now?” he said. “What great good news is this! The sleeping beauty awakes!”
Kate managed a thin smile, though it hurt her cracked lips. She said weakly, “Am I home in Windsor? Where is Nurse?”
“No, little one, you are still in Adele’s bedroom. You have slept for many, many days, and we have been watching over you. Windsor is several hours’ ride, but I’m sure Nurse is still there, anxiously awaiting your return.”
She closed her eyes again, and lapsed back into a thin, restless sleep. Moments later she awoke again, this time with a bit more clarity. “I am so thirsty. Please, may I have a drink of water?”
Alejandro poured a cupful from the pitcher on the bedstand. He helped her ease up to a sitting position, and held the cup to her crusted lips. She drank too eagerly at first, and some of the water dripped out of the sides of her slack mouth, which was weak from the ravages of the disease, so she wiped off the stray drops on the sleeve of her nightdress.
Thank God she cannot see herself at this moment, he thought. Not a soul would take her for the same being. Her eyes were red, and her skin white as the cold morning ashes of last night’s fire. Now that she had begun to move her lips again, they cracked more deeply, oozing blood. She had not taken sustenance in such a long time that Alejandro wondered why she had not perished of starvation.
“I shall return shortly, brave lady, with some salve for your lips and some food for your belly.”
In the kitchen he found a jar of thick yellow goose fat. Ignoring Kate’s weak objections to the unpleasant taste of the makeshift salve, he smeared some of the fat on her rough lips, disliking the feel of the skin under his fingers. I hope these lips heal without scarring, he thought to himself, remembering his own mortification at a scar that was far more easily hidden than one on the face.
Soon there was a knock on the door. Alejandro called, “Enter!” and the housekeeper came in.
“Have we missed her dosing?” the woman asked timidly. “The hour is past, and I had not been called.… I feared the worst.…”
“As you can see,” he said, extending his hand toward Kate, “quite the opposite has happened! The best has come to pass!”
Warily, she crossed the room, so the physician told her that there was no danger in coming closer. “The contagion has left her, as you can see from her pretty smile!”
“Praise God!” the housekeeper said. “Shall I bring food?”
“Will you eat, child?” he asked.
She nodded.
“Bring hot broth, and some bread,” he said. “Then find your lady and tell her the good news!”
She returned quickly with a tray, and Alejandro balanced it on his knees. He tore off small chunks of the dried bread. He dipped each one in the hot broth and, after allowing it to cool a bit, carefully fed it to the little girl.
She had some difficulty at first, for her lips would not part easily, and the cracked corners of her mouth began to bleed again. But he was patient and gentle with her, and eventually she was able to consume the entire meal. The shadows on the floor of the room had moved significantly in the time it took to feed her.
When she was through, he tucked her back into the covers and went in search of Adele. He found her rummaging through the same trunk where the pink nightdress had originally been found, looking for other garments that might be of use. She hummed sweetly as she sorted the finery, and gave Alejandro a beaming smile when she saw him.
He had not seen her smile for many days. Even their lovemaking had been quiet and somber. How I delight in her beautiful smile, he thought.
She set aside her sorting and stood up. They embraced joyfully, almost desperately, and held each other for a long and tender moment. “Oh, my dear love,” she said, her voice trembling with emotion, “I feel that there is reason to hope that all will be well again, that the world may at last return to sanity and goodness. I am dreadfully weary of the constant news of cruel death.” She pulled free of his arms and went back to her sorting. “Am I wrong to hope this way?” she said. “Are we finally to be done with the menace of this plague?”
He touched her hair, and stroked it lightly a few times before giving her his answer.
“Sadly, I remind you that we have no more of the powder.”
“But surely, more can be had!”
“Rest assured that I will convince Mother Sarah that it must be had! And I will learn from her how to make it for myself. I believe it has the power to cure that has evaded us for far too long! But I will see you and Kate safely back to Windsor before I ride out again on that quest. Soon we will be able to judge her progress, and plan for the trip back to the castle.”
“How glad I will be to see Isabella again,” Adele said, touching his cheek tenderly. “You are so sweet and kind; I actually miss her acid tongue, and you have no hope of ever being able to replace her in that regard.”
He reached up to take hold of her hand. “May God be praised for smiting me with such a noble deficiency.” He was glad for the chance to interject a small amount of humor into their discourse, for what he had next to say would not be to Adele’s liking.
“Beloved, it will not be so simple to return as you think. We cannot simply go back to Windsor and announce that Kate is cured. Remember what was done to Matthews. He lacked any signs of infection, and no one hesitated to comply with my request that he be killed to protect the rest of Windsor’s occupants.”
It was the first time he had admitted to anyone but Sir John and the king that putting Matthews to death had been his idea. Adele said nothing to him, but pulled away slightly.
He gave her a look of infinite sadness, and completed his confession. “In all likelihood he would have acquired the contagion, and soon, so in my heart I believe that my decision was necessary. But I will never be convinced that it was right. I am reminded every day of how I failed him. I am bound by my oath to prolong life, not to shorten it by my own hand.”
Her heart softened. “My dear,” she said soothingly, “I have often seen you darken since that day, and I suspected that this was the cause.”
Ashamed, he hung his head. “Matthews is not the only patient I have failed. There was a patient in Aragon for whom I would have traded my own life, so angry was I at the impotence of my best treatments.” He stopped short of explaining further, for it could only lead to trouble, and he did not wish to invite the specter of Carlos Alderón back into his dreams.
“I don’t believe that God expects anyone but His only son to perform miracles.”
“It has never been God’s expectation for me,” he replied, “—only my own.”
Adele touched his cheek again. “Then you must release yourself from this impossible obligation, for its weight will destroy you in short time.”
Sighing wearily, he acknowledged that she was right. “But now,” he said, “we must continue to discuss the matter at hand, I am afraid. There are plans to be made.”
Patiently, he explained to her what he thought would happen on their return, that he and Kate would be greeted as had Matthews and Reed, and then quarantined. “But as soon as anyone finds out that Kate had been afflicted with the pestilence, I have no doubt that she will either be banished or killed, and even the king himself will not object.”
“King Edward would never allow that to happen to his own child!”
Alejandro looked into her eyes and said, “I have heard it said that he did not stop the taking of his own father’s life.”
Adele’s silence confirmed the rumor.
“We must keep this our secret, Adele, and Kate will never be able to tell anyone either. It would be in keeping with my own previous edict about Matthews to see her put out or destroyed, and the castle’s residents will look to me to initiate the act. How can I justify sparing her when Matthews has already paid with his life? I cannot help but suspect that King Edward would be glad to be rid of the daily reminder of his past indiscretions. Surely i
t would improve the queen’s view of him if the child was not such a visible irritant. No one with the means to do so will come forward to save her.”
She set aside her previously happy work, and walked slowly to the tall window. Looking out on the cold day, she said softly, “Tell me how you would have me help. I will do what I can to make this easier for all of us.”
“We must hope that Isabella has managed to hide your absence from her father. You will have to find your way back to her without my help, I fear.”
“Fortunately, that will not be difficult. She will provide a separate room for me during a quarantine that I shall impose upon myself. When I reach the secret passageway, I will send a message to her through the cook, all the while keeping my distance, and she will see me safely but separately housed.”
“You have no doubt of this?”
“Alejandro, I assure you, the princess loves me like a sister, and it shall be done.”
Though Alejandro doubted that Isabella was capable of loving anyone with such selflessness, he did not contradict her. “You can safely rejoin the daily life at Windsor in a fortnight. Kate and I will, of course, be quarantined as were Matthews and Reed. I will explain our prolonged absence by saying that I took it upon myself to remain outside the walls for longer than originally thought because of the closeness of our contact with Kate’s mother, which is in part true. No one will be displeased at my extra caution. I imagine that few will say they have missed my daily harangues about taking precautions against infection.”
She made no comment, knowing that her confirmation of his statement would not improve his spirits. She simply asked, “How long will it be before Kate is well enough to resume the journey?”
“I cannot truthfully say; I have never known anyone to recover from this scourge before, and I have no experience on which to base even a reasonable guess. In a few days I will be better able to tell. At present she is quite weak, and it is out of the question for her convalescence to end now. She is young, and will heal quickly for that, but right now she is unspeakably tiny and frail, and I have seen this work against a rapid recovery.”
“Then I suppose we shall just have to watch and wait, and pray for her health to return speedily.”
“Aye, I suppose we shall” was his resigned reply.
Kate surprised them all with the rapidity of her healing. In six or seven days, she had regained a good measure of her formerly exuberant demeanor. Her lips were no longer miserably cracked and her bones did not protrude so pathetically. She was beginning to show some color in her cheeks, and her delightful smile had come back in full measure. She chattered incessantly to anyone who would listen.
Alejandro knew that it was time to leave. Though he was eager to be done with the king’s unsavory business, he knew that their return to Windsor would mean the end of the blissful private time that he and Adele had shared. He was sure that Kate could be convinced to keep their secret, but others at Windsor might not look so kindly or enthusiastically on their liaison.
“We shall leave for Windsor two days hence,” he finally said to Adele.
“Blessed Madonna! How I have longed to hear those words!” She called enthusiastically to the housekeeper to begin organizing their belongings.
He watched her with great sadness, knowing that she could not be blamed for feeling as she did, regardless of the effect it had on him. He turned away and went to tell the groom to make their horses ready for their journey, his heart burning with grief for a love that surely had no future.
On their route back to Windsor there was a small monastery with a chapel. As they neared it Adele said, “Let us stop here. I wish to make my confession. It has been far too long since I have been absolved of my sins, and I would have God smile upon me again.” Without waiting for Alejandro’s reaction she dismounted from her horse.
“Shall I wait here, then, with Kate?” he asked, still astride his mount.
The look she gave him in response to his question was curious and questioning. “Why can you both not come inside as well?”
There can be no acceptable explanation, he said to himself. I have no choice but to go. He made a simple shrug with his shoulders, then dismounted, and took Kate down from the horse she and Adele shared.
The bell they rang was answered quickly by a small and frail-looking monk in a brown robe.
“Father, I wish to make confession,” Adele said.
He looked first at Adele and then at the tall man with the little girl by his side. Alejandro felt the priest’s gaze settle on him, scrutinizing, appraising.
“And you?” the priest asked.
He hesitated a moment before speaking. “I shall pray while we wait for the lady,” he said.
“As you wish,” the priest said, and led them inside.
It seemed to Alejandro that he waited for a very long time while Adele bared her soul to the priest. What can her sins have been, that it requires so much to recount them? he wondered. He looked all around the chapel with its vaulted ceiling, his neck craning to see the details of the ornate ceiling.
Even their small temples are luxurious, he thought to himself. And the windows, so tall, so colorful! Though seven other priests were praying at the front of the sanctuary, the chapel was nearly perfectly silent. They pray noiselessly, he thought, remembering the droning chants that his father would recite at the Sabbath table.
Then the seven priests stood up in unison, and began to walk slowly down the center aisle of the chapel. The first began to sing, his voice clear and sweet, and the six others sang the same phrase in unison after him. The sounds of their voices rose up to the ceiling and were amplified within the peaks. It was haunting and almost painfully beautiful, and Alejandro found himself feeling unaccountably blessed by the soothing tones of their joined voices. As they filed out of the sanctuary in a long row, the priests continued their singing; the sound faded as they disappeared into the monastery, until it was no more than a whispered afterthought.
He felt a hand on his arm; he had not realized that his eyes were closed. He opened them quickly and saw Adele standing before him, with a look of radiant peace on her face. “I am absolved,” she said.
He stood and faced her. “What sins have you committed that you should be so long in obtaining forgiveness?” he asked gently.
She smiled sweetly, a woman once again reconciled to herself. “I have been with a man who is not my husband.”
He almost winced before her. “Then that sin is on me as well,” he said.
“I have been untrue to my king.”
“He well deserved your untruth.”
“Nevertheless, he is my king. My family swore loyalty to him. And I have betrayed my lady Isabella by staying away so long.”
“Was it not your wish to do so?” he said.
“Therein lies the sin,” she said. “It was my wish. And because of the gravity of these transgressions, I required additional instruction beyond my penance. This gentle priest was kind enough to teach me.”
She turned and watched as the priest rose up from the place where he was kneeling at the altar. Then she turned back to Alejandro and said, “And now I am prepared to return to Windsor.”
To the relief of those they had left behind in Windsor, Alejandro and Kate both emerged healthy from their confinement a fortnight later, and by that time the child had regained all of her high spirits and the rosy glow of her cheeks. Adele resumed her place in Isabella’s household, the king never even having noticed her absence. Kate resumed her incessant pestering and tall tales and made endless demands for chess matches. Even patient old Nurse, who had seemed at one time to have limitless tolerance for the child, wished aloud for a few moments of blessed silence.
The rich autumn, whose windblown brush had not yet begun to touch the landscape with gold and copper before their departure, was now nearly spent. Cold gusts blew gray twigs and dry brown leaves all around the stark countryside. Nearly three months had passed, and Windsor Castle’s gloomy oc
cupants settled into their winter routine, already quite bored with the entertainments that would ordinarily have seen them through the long darkness of the cold season.
One gray day Alejandro was summoned to the king’s private apartment. When he arrived, the monarch was waiting for him. A pile of scrolls lay on the table.
“You must read these,” the king said. “Time and again they report the plague’s dissipation outside Windsor. Perhaps it is time to investigate these reports. What say you to the notion of a mission of discovery? Shall we send out a party to ride through the countryside and bring back firsthand reports?”
Alejandro looked quickly through the messages. “Sire, these are but a few reports, and from scattered locations.”
“My retainers have sent messages enough, and all say the same thing: new cases of the disease are virtually unknown since the first falling of snow.”
Alejandro knew that he needed to explain his fears to the king in terms that the brave but anxious monarch, a man who had been denied access to the kingdom he ruled for far too long, could more easily understand. “Imagine,” he began, “that you are fighting a great battle, and your spies have ridden out ten leagues in each direction, and found no waiting army within that perimeter. Think then, of what you would do if only one of those spies ventured but one league farther than the others, and there found a well-equipped army, poised and ready for a bold attack on your forces.”
The king grew impatient with Alejandro’s long-winded allegory. He grunted his displeasure and said, “You are quick to cast down my conclusion as unmerited, learned Physician, but you offer no other alternatives. Knowing my responsibility to my subjects, what would you do if it were you in my place, with a castleful of irate prisoners, and a kingdom in need of attention?”
“I would send the outside retainers back along their previous routes for a ride of two hours’ time, to be sure there are no other armies nearby. Remember, Your Majesty, that the pope has borne a far longer isolation than you. He remains well, last we heard.”
The king sighed in frustration. “I have no doubt that I am one hundred times as unhappy as Clement; I am in the middle of a war, and I must see to the winning of it!”