The Tapestry: A Novel
Page 32
The next morning, Geoffrey told me he’d gone to a bathhouse, a German custom, and then spent hours in a tavern, finding enough people who spoke French for interesting conversation. He was intrigued by the men’s views of England and enjoyed the friendly argument that ensued over our king’s faith, even laughed off their ridicule over Henry VIII’s five wives.
But a day later, back on the road, we suffered an attack. After staring at the brilliant stars through the branches of a desiccated oak, I fell asleep. I’d entered my first dream—I was hurrying to Vespers in the priory—when the peal of the bells summoning us to prayers became the screams of men.
“Wake up, Joanna, wake up,” Geoffrey shook me hard. “Get under the wagon.”
I crawled under our wagon and watched, in horror, as Jochen and the soldiers beat the men they’d found crawling into our camp to try to rob us. They were easily vanquished, but Jochen didn’t send them fleeing. The invaders were punched and kicked by our “protectors” as they cursed and even laughed.
After it was all over, Geoffrey stalked over to Jochen. I heard fresh shouting, and Geoffrey returned tense with anger.
He rustled around inside the wagon and then emerged, holding something: a knife.
“Joanna, keep it with you in the wagon and everywhere you go.”
I shook my head. “If there is another attack, surely Jochen and his men can defend us. It would take an army to defeat them.”
Geoffrey continued to press the weapon on me. “Keep it with you at all times.”
After staring at him for a moment, I said, “You think it’s Jochen I should be most afraid of.”
“He blames you for what happened.”
“How can that be?”
“It is ludicrous, yes. Bad luck? Almost no one in the city even saw you, you went straight to bed. If anyone should be blamed, it’s me, talking to a room full of men in a tavern. They all knew strangers were in their city.”
The wagon kept going, east and then south, and the mighty Rhine, forlorn from drought, sometimes flashed into view. We entered no more walled cities, both for fear of enticing thieves and because disease galloped through some of those cities. One day I saw dead animals on a field, with people standing in a circle around them, helpless. Holbein’s drunken wailing about the end of the world seemed more possible than I wanted to admit to myself.
I lost track of the number of days, but I knew we’d traveled several weeks by the thickness of Geoffrey’s beard, for he had not shaved since going to the city bathhouse. The air finally began to cool, and we endured a few days of rain. The thirsty ground soaked in every drop. It was too late for the growing season; all the rain did was soften the roads, slowing our pace of travel. Geoffrey told me one evening that his chief worry was that by the time we reached Salzburg, it would be winter and we would be trapped there until the spring thaw. Our quest to find Edmund stretched out as endless, devouring our time, our money, our very future.
Although the nights grew colder, I still preferred to rest on the ground. It was difficult to sleep soundly, for I did nothing but sit in the wagon all day, conversing with no one. My fellow passengers understood French, but Geoffrey and I agreed that due to the threat that still hung over me, that even here, a hundred miles deep, I should tell no one anything, for someday, when we reached the large cities in the southern German lands, news of my whereabouts could travel. And so my mind was left to turn in on itself, worrying about Edmund and wondering who sent that man to kill me, and fearing for Catherine Howard and Thomas Culpepper and my other friends in faraway England, at the mercy of the king. What would King Henry do if I disappeared for more than a few months, the expected span of time to look at a few tapestry workshops? Time and again, my thoughts circled back to Arthur, too. I felt so far away from my little cousin; I longed to hug him. But when would I ever see him again?
Which is why one night, in a clearing of the forest of the prince elector Palatine, I was awake when the men came.
I jumped to my feet at the first scream, before Geoffrey, before any of the others. The fires had died. I could not see anything in the darkness except for human forms darting here and there—Jochen’s men, I assumed. But as I squinted in the moonlight, it seemed there were other men among them, with swords and knives. I was surrounded by shouts and curses, and the sound of steel hitting steel.
Geoffrey pushed me against a tree next to the wagon, and stood in front of me, a sword in his hand, as the fighting reached a pitch.
“What’s happening, Geoffrey?” I shouted.
“I don’t know,” he shouted back.
At that moment a man rushed toward Geoffrey, his own sword flashing. As they fought, I cried, “No, no, no, no, no.” I couldn’t bear this—it was impossible to live if Geoffrey should be killed.
I raised my knife in my right hand and sprang forward, to stand next to him, to do something.
Boom. There was a deafening explosion, like thunder, followed by a second and a third. An acrid smell filled the air. I gasped from it, choking, as I realized that the men attacking us had backed away. Then they were running, calling to one another, melting into the forest. I couldn’t see Geoffrey in the smoky darkness.
“Geoffrey, where are you?” I screamed.
In seconds, he was beside me.
“Are you hurt, Joanna?”
“No,” I said, weeping as I clung to him. He was damp with sweat but he was standing, and he seemed uninjured. “I thought they would kill you,” I cried.
“Well, I’m not dead, I’m not even hurt,” he said, breathless, and wrapped both of his arms around me. Gratitude and a fierce joy charged through me, and I kissed him on the cheeks.
His beard scratched my cheeks, and suddenly his lips were against mine, and my mouth opened as I kissed him. Geoffrey’s hands ran up my back and in another instant his fingers tore through my hair, hanging loose over my shoulders. He pulled my hair so hard it hurt, but I welcomed the pain and pressed up against him even harder.
There was a flash of bright light and we sprang apart. Someone had lit torches.
Two men slowly approached us, a boy ahead of them holding a torch. The men held long sticks in their arms that whispers of smoke curled from. I had never seen them with my own eyes, but it seemed to me that these must be guns, and I had heard their firing. Which is how they frightened off the men who attacked us, even though there were so many of them. By the torchlight I saw men lying everywhere, dead or injured. One of them, I realized with a jolt, was Jochen. I saw bright blood on his chest. Jochen could be dying. Our wagon had no leader. And we had no one who could speak for us. We’d have to represent ourselves.
The taller man said something to Geoffrey and me in German, and then repeated it when we didn’t answer.
“We are English,” Geoffrey said.
He turned to the other man, short and bearded, who said to us in French, “You are English? Do you speak French?”
When Geoffrey nodded, he said, “My name is Arnulf and this man”—he gestured to the tallest man—“is Freiherr von Seckenburg, our lord. Many of your party have been killed and others are wounded. The bandits are desperate men, and if we had not been tracking them on behalf of the prince elector Palatine, you would be dead, too.”
I said, “We are most grateful to you, sir.”
He frowned, disapproving that I had spoken. Turning back to Geoffrey, Arnulf said, “What are you doing in the Palatine—why do English people travel deep into the German lands so late in the year, when there has been hardship? You tempt hungry people with your wealth.”
Geoffrey said, “We are not wealthy, and our destination is Salzburg.”
That made an impact. The pair spoke to one another in German and then Arnulf said, “Why do you want to go there?”
“To see the physician called Paracelsus.”
Now the men laughed at us. “You ride
in a wagon for weeks and weeks, to see that old fool? It is a ridiculous statement.” He turned to his companions. “We should search their wagon.”
Geoffrey protested that we had done nothing wrong, that there was nothing improper about our traveling, but they ignored us as they searched our belongings. To my amazement, von Seckenburg rummaged harder than anyone else. Geoffrey and I could not say a word to each other because Arnulf stayed close, his face hard with suspicion.
My heart stopped as von Seckenburg emerged, excited, carrying my document of safe conduct from Queen Mary of Hungary and the bags that contained Geoffrey’s coins, all the money he’d been given by John Cheke. They squatted on the ground and counted it in front of us, as overjoyed as children playing with toys.
“Joanna, this is not good,” Geoffrey said in a low voice.
Arnulf turned on us, his eyes now gleaming. “So you are not wealthy? You expect us to believe you are nothing but an English couple seeking the advice of a physician? We are not stupid. You are spies.”
“That is absurd,” I said. “We are on a journey to find a friend whose last known location was in Salzburg. This man, Geoffrey Scovill, is a constable in the town of Dartford and I am the tapestry mistress of His Majesty King Henry the Eighth. I had an audience with the queen in Brussels and she gave me this safe conduct.”
Arnulf translated my words to all the others gathered and the men laughed harder than ever.
“A woman in charge of a king’s tapestries?” Arnulf scoffed.
“I tell you, it is the truth,” I said, furious. “How could we be spies? Who on earth would we be spying for?”
Geoffrey laid a cautioning hand on my arm. “We have committed no crime in your land. None. Take our money if you must, but allow us to continue on our way.”
Arnulf smiled for the first time, exposing a line of brown teeth.
“You will soon learn we don’t care for spies in the Palatine. The others can go, all those who survived the bandits. But not you two. You’re coming with us.”
33
I’m surprised they haven’t killed us,” said Geoffrey.
The two of us, now prisoners, rode in the back of a wagon, sitting in damp straw. Our conveyance was a poor farmer’s cart, without a cover. It had rained, briefly, just after we set out, and the chilly gray sky held the threat of more like a giant apron sagging over our heads.
The route we followed was more mountainous than the previous one, and the two horses pulling the cart strained as they trod up the narrow road. The driver kept whipping them to go faster.
“We haven’t done anything wrong,” I said, for the tenth time, eying Arnulf trotting ahead, out of earshot.
“They had to come up with an excuse to steal our money,” Geoffrey said. “In the daylight, you can see their clothes are of wretched quality, even those of their lord. All they possess are those guns. The most intelligent thing would be to shoot us—or stab us, if they don’t want to waste the powder—and bury our bodies in the woods so no one will ever question where the money came from.”
I shuddered. “Please, Geoffrey.”
“Don’t turn into a delicate flower on me now, Joanna. I think that when you spoke up before, when you insisted that you are a tapestry mistress to the king of England, he laughed, but it put a worry into Arnulf’s mind. He doesn’t want to be punished for killing someone who turns out to be of importance. Hold on to that. You must be stronger, and more determined, than you’ve ever been before, if we are to survive this.”
I knew Geoffrey was right.
“What can we do—how will we find someone to listen to us?” I asked.
“Arnulf has the safe-conduct document and I doubt very much he will return it,” said Geoffrey. “We must wait, and listen, and learn all we can, and when the opportunity presents, speak up. Hans Holbein was right. We don’t understand enough of the German history or the German character. I don’t even know if the Palatine is Catholic or Lutheran. All I can say in my defense is, Jochen was not exactly what one would call a teacher.”
I thought, with a twist, of our leader, bleeding to death on the ground.
“It turned out I was bad luck for Jochen,” I murmured.
Geoffrey said nothing, and I could not stop myself from saying, “As I am bad luck for you.”
“Don’t say that—never say that.” Geoffrey slapped the side of the cart, which made the driver turn around, scowling. He raised his whip at us, muttering something foul.
Neither of us made a sound for a good while, until Geoffrey spoke, in a low voice, haltingly. “Joanna, I need to say something to you about what happened last night, what happened between us.”
Even in this miserable, cold cart, my cheeks flamed hot.
“It’s not necessary,” I said.
“Yes, it is. Please hear me out. We know that we’re drawn to each other, but still, we don’t get on well, Joanna. Too stubborn, the two of us, perhaps. And I know that those feelings you have for me, they are not the same sort you have for Edmund. It isn’t love in your heart. I have known that for a while, and accepted it. I am sorry about what happened in the woods. I think it was the relief of being alive, it can make people do things they wouldn’t ordinarily do. But I failed to show you respect. Forgive me.”
I turned away from him, looking at the gray-and-brown cheerless countryside but not seeing it. At the front of our convoy, one of the men said something that ended in a questioning tone and another shouted back, “Ja, natürlich.” I snatched up a handful of straw and tried to snap it in two, but it wasn’t dry enough.
“How can you tell me what is in my heart?” I said.
Geoffrey stammered, “I didn’t. I meant that—” He broke off. “Wait. Wait. What do you mean? What are you trying to tell me?”
“You always think you know everything, and perhaps this time you don’t,” I said. “That’s all.”
He sat up straighter against the side of the cart.
“When we extricate ourselves from this situation, are you saying that there are things we can plan for ourselves?” he said, still wary.
I could not believe while it happened that I was doing this, but I reached through the straw for Geoffrey’s hand. When I touched his warm skin, I intertwined my fingers with his. In response, he pulled me up, to press against him and kissed me, not as he did in the woods, but tenderly, again and again.
“When did you know?” he murmured.
“Always,” I said. “Or perhaps three days ago? I can’t say.”
Geoffrey laughed.
For hours, we said not a word but gripped each other’s hands, tight. And the next day, and the one after that, as we spoke of many things, I rarely let go of Geoffrey’s hand. Often I rested my head on his broad shoulder, and he would run his finger along the lines of my cap, twirling strands of hair.
Geoffrey said, “When I was fighting in the forest—all those men coming at me with knives and swords—a thought went through my mind, ‘I’m going to die trying to take the woman I love to another man.’”
I took that in. “So you’ve believed all this time that I wish to be with Edmund again? Geoffrey, I have told you, and I meant it, that I fear for Edmund and I care about him, deeply. But we will never be married.”
Geoffrey nodded. “I still must find him, Joanna. That hasn’t changed. I accepted a commission from John Cheke. When we are able to win our freedom from these men, my search continues.”
“Our search,” I corrected him. And then I put into words a thought that I’d had for some time. “What shall we do if we find Edmund but he doesn’t want to return to England, if he is lost on this strange path of his?”
“That possibility exists,” he said. “I will do whatever is most just and fair—to everyone, I hope. But first, we need to break free of our captors.”
“Yes, you are right.” I said.
“Without trial? Without any opportunity to speak for ourselves?”
“I don’t know,” he said.
The next day, we emerged from the road through the forest and I looked down upon a town nestled in a valley, on the side of a dark blue river. A castle loomed on a ridge high above the town, surrounded on three sides by a dense forest of leafless trees, low mountains rising behind.
Heidelberg Castle seemed handsome, its long redbrick wings stretching into the woods. But when we drew close, Geoffrey nudged me, pointing to a blackened section of the castle, with one of its walls collapsed.
Arnulf said, “The castle was struck by lightning a few years ago.”
Was it God’s punishment?
At the side of the castle, we were pulled out of the back of the cart. They parted me from Geoffrey, of course. Men and women prisoners could have no contact. I didn’t want to give our captors the satisfaction of seeing me weep, but the truth was that I choked with fear for both of us.
“Be strong, Joanna, and remember what I said about looking for opportunity,” said Geoffrey.
We embraced, quickly, frantically, while the men talked of something. Too soon, they pulled us apart. Arnulf led me away first, without permitting us to say a final good-bye, without my being able to look into Geoffrey’s face. I saw only the back of his head, his light brown hair tousled from my desperate grip.
The room Arnulf took me to was not a dungeon. I had spent months in cells within the Tower of London and Het Gravensteen in Ghent. This was of a better sort. I had a few pieces of furniture, a bed with a clean blanket, and a window yielding a view of the city and the valley. But there was a lock on the door from the outside. I was in a cell, no matter what one wanted to call it.