The Poetry of Secrets

by Cambria Gordon

  This was the true meaning of free will. Diego would be proud of her.

  She took the second position in line. She was the youngest of the group by ten years.

  Outside, Isabel felt the sun on her face. She squinted, the harsh light searing eyes that had only seen darkness for days. She moved to shade her brow but, of course, could not raise her hand to do it through the restraints. So she just closed her lids and tilted her chin to the sky.

  The drums beat a somber dirge. Though the whole town had gathered on both sides of the street for the processional, she did not scan the crowd for familiar faces. As well as she could, she stepped forward blindly, keeping her eyes closed, nose turned upward.

  Tinkling. A sound so lovely and sweet emerged from behind her. Or was it to the side of her? She lowered her upturned face, searching about for the source. A flash of a tambourine. Goatskin pulled taut across the front, bronzed jingles around the perimeter. It got louder and louder. Colors whirling, spinning. A scarved figure shaking the timbrel. Was that … No, it couldn’t be. Yes! It was Atika! She was creating a diversion like her father, Vano, had when he rescued his beautiful wife from enslavement. Isabel’s heart beat as loud as the instrument. Atika had received Isabel’s message! Perhaps that meant Diego was not far behind.

  And then she saw him. He was in the crowd lining the street to her left. He was masked, like at a costume ball. But she would recognize those shoulders anywhere. The cutouts of the eyes were zeroed in on Atika. Here I am, Isabel wanted to yell, to send them both a signal of some kind. She willed him to see her. But he did not. Atika was the bait. Isabel felt certain that he would strike when the timing was right.

  Atika deftly wove through the processional, ducking under the long rope of prisoners that tied everyone together. A friar, standing in between Isabel and the lead accused, glared at her, waving her away.

  “You don’t belong here, Gypsy!” he cried.

  She paid him no mind, continuing to undulate and slap the surface of the bandair in a syncopated rhythm. A tall bailiff with pants too short walked beside the line of prisoners, keeping watch over his charges. He was unsightly, with pockmarked cheeks. Atika sidled up to him, tinkling her music. She smiled seductively, flashing her white teeth. The man was awestruck, could not take his eyes off her hips. Suddenly, Diego stepped into the street near the bailiff. Isabel saw Atika’s hand reach into the bailiff’s front pocket. In one swift motion, she handed a key to Diego. No one noticed a thing.

  Watching it all, Isabel immediately wondered: What did he need a key for? To unlock her wrist cuffs? They were tied by rope, not locked irons. Isabel met Diego’s gaze. His eyes dropped to her wrists, then went wide, and instantly she knew. He had not planned for this. He assumed he could free her with a key. He looked forlornly at the hemp cord, preventing her movement in three places: wrists, neck, and ankles.

  Still the procession continued. The window was closing, the opportunity for escape shrinking.

  It was Atika who figured out what to do. Thrusting her hips at the bailiff, she removed his knife from its hilt around his waist. He did not feel anything. She spun around and slipped it to Diego. All at once, Diego was next to Isabel, cutting and slicing the rope at her wrist furiously. Isabel tried to move as far left as she possibly could, to make it easier on him, though the weight of the line of prisoners only allowed her to shift a few centimeters.

  Atika continued her dance, whipping her hair into the bailiff’s face. Isabel plodded on with the other accused as Diego worked the sharp edge behind her. She could feel that the dagger wasn’t cutting the hemp. It was too thick, and even if he did free her wrists, there were also her ankles and neck. Isabel stopped short. The four prisoners behind her stopped as well. The one in front of her was oblivious. He kept walking and she stumbled and fell.

  “Ándele!” shouted a different bailiff, poking her with a baton. “Move it!”

  She forced her face down onto the ground. Dirt flew into her nostrils. But hopefully, Diego could see that rather than cutting all three points of restraint, he only needed to cut the part where it joined the main rope. They would worry about her ankles, wrists, and neck later.

  Slowly, she rose to her feet and felt a gentle tug beside her. In seconds, the rope connecting her to the line of prisoners was severed. He had figured it out! He scooped her up in his arms and they ran.

  Someone blew a boatswain’s pipe. The drums came to a halt. Everyone was shouting. Friars, bailiffs, spectators.

  She wrapped her arms around Diego’s neck. She felt his labored breathing through his chest. The bailiffs made chase. Diego darted left into an alley. She recognized it as the one that held the bookbinder’s shop.

  “It’s a dead end!” she yelled.

  But Diego kept running. Straight into Isaac’s bindery. Isaac stood up from a stool where he was stitching a quire.

  Diego yanked off his mask.

  “Lord Diego? What are you doing?” Then the bookbinder saw Isabel’s sanbenito, her dirty hair and crooked arm, and his expression changed to pity.

  “The tunnels!” said Diego.

  Without another question, Isaac led them down to the basement, into a storeroom carved out of the dirt. He waited on the stairs, then pulled a trapdoor closed at the top before joining them on the lower level. At the back of the space, no more than ten paces all told, hung a tarp. Isaac pulled it down. Isabel saw an opening there.

  Diego finally let her out of his arms so she could stand on her own. He used his knife to cut her ankle and wrist ties, and lastly, the rope around her neck. As he fastened a crude arm sling out of some cloth in Isaac’s workroom, she asked him how he knew about the tunnel.

  “I guessed as much when I was in the storeroom once before.” He grinned at Isaac. “The tarp was hung askew. I reasoned that the Jews must have dug escape routes all over Trujillo once the judería order was given. That’s what I would have done.”

  “Good thing the Inquisitors are not as smart as you,” said Isaac.

  Diego became serious. “This means more to us than you’ll ever know.”

  Isaac nodded once. “Now go!” He pushed them through the opening. “May God protect you.”

  Isabel ran through the dark passageway after Diego, single file. It was too narrow for them to hold hands or run together. She had to move sideways and hunch her good shoulder so her head wouldn’t hit the ceiling. Each time her foot landed on the ground, it reverberated through her shoulder. All she could do was exhale through the pain.

  They ran for what seemed like hours, but Isabel was sure it wasn’t. They emerged near the river. It appeared quiet. A few Romanis were washing clothes, but other than that, it was empty. Everyone was at the tribunal. Her tribunal.

  “This must be how Isaac smuggles the books out, the sneaky fellow,” said Diego.

  Isabel didn’t understand what he was speaking about, but this was not the time. She was gasping for air. “I need water.”

  At the riverbank, she tried to cup her hands to make a bowl, but her left arm wouldn’t comply and she couldn’t get enough water in one palm. Diego’s face showed as much pain as she was physically feeling. “Does it hurt?” he asked.

  “Not as much now.”

  “Here, let me,” he said, cupping his hands and dipping them into the river. She drank eagerly from them.

  She stood up, quenched, and gazed at him. He gently brushed her cheek with the back of his hand. “What did those bastards do to you?”

  She leaned into his hand, relishing him. “Later, I’ll explain everything.”

  He put his lips to her cheekbone. “I’m so very sorry, Isabel. Even one day in there would have been a day too long.”

  How she wanted to stay like this forever.

  He held her good hand, the right one, in both of his. “I’ve gone over what happened at the carriage hundreds of times. I feel like I failed you.”

  “There were four of them, Diego. Five, counting the spy you knocked out. It was an impossible s
ituation. And you were knifed.” She gently touched his rib cage.

  He shook his head. “I wish I had planned it better, that’s all.”

  “We’re together now, and that is the only thing that matters.”

  Diego scanned their surroundings. “The bailiffs will catch up to us soon. I need to find us a horse.”

  Isabel pointed downriver. Two rust-colored steeds were drinking.

  Diego nodded. “Some hidalgos’, most likely, coming to see the spectacle of the tribunal.”

  She shuddered, imagining what would have lain ahead if Diego had not come.

  Diego opened a leather satchel he wore crossed over his torso. He pulled out a colorful patchwork skirt and white blouse. Atika’s. “Put these on. You’ll be less conspicuous.”

  Isabel found a hidden spot behind a cedar tree and large boulder. She would be glad to be rid of the shameful sanbenito. But she could not lift it over her head with her dislocated shoulder. She called him to help.

  After he removed the sling and ugly sackcloth gown, he began to unbutton the stays on her filthy dress underneath, the one she had worn the night she left her house. How long ago that seemed.

  He laughed. “This is not how I imagined undressing you.”

  “Nor I,” she said, yet goose skin pimpled on her back from his touch. She sighed, enjoying the brief pleasure all over her body after so much abuse.

  He left on her undermost layer, a chemise, and kissed the back of her neck. “How do you still smell like roses after so many days?”

  “Don’t be a daft liar!” she giggled.

  “Bury these garments,” he instructed her. “I’ll steal one of the horses.”

  While Diego quietly approached the two animals, she used a sharp rock with her good hand to loosen the dirt. Then she wedged the clothes in a hollow beneath one of the tree roots. She covered it all up with the soil.

  She saw Diego pat the rear of one of the horses, whispering in its ear. Within a few minutes, he was leading him back to the boulder. “It’s a regular saddle, I’m afraid,” he told her. “You’ll be more comfortable if you straddle it.” He looked toward the river. “Don’t tarry. I’m not sure where the footman is who watches him.”

  Atika’s skirt had no hoops or layers underneath to limit movement. Isabel was easily able to sit atop the saddle, one leg on either side of the horse’s girth. Diego came up behind her and they took off at a gallop immediately. He held the reins with only one hand, wrapping his other arm around Isabel to steady her. Though her shoulder throbbed from the horse’s gait, she didn’t complain. They were finally together.

  The route was familiar, for it was the same pathway they had ridden before. When they got to the bridge, Diego slowed the horse to a walk.

  “You warned me about this bridge,” she said.

  “Yes, but it’s still daylight,” he told her, though the sun was quite low in the sky. It must be nearing five hours after high noon.

  They galloped past the area where they had seen the genet. Where he told her he was Jewish. Where they had first kissed. A short while later, they approached the castle ruins.

  “This is where we stop,” Diego said, slowing down the horse.

  Isabel was confused. She realized she had not asked where they were going. She was just enjoying her freedom and being with Diego. She hadn’t thought about a destination at all.

  “Are we going to wander forever like the ghost of Princess Noeima?” she asked as they dismounted.

  He pointed to the west. “You see that far mountain range? That’s Portugal. That will be your new home.”

  Now, with a slow dawning, she faced the truth. She could not return to Spain. Ever.

  She gazed out over the tangerine-and-aqua horizon. “So you and I will be together in Portugal?”

  “That’s my plan,” said Diego as he tied up the horse. “But not right away. I have a friend from school riding from Lisbon. Paolo will be here before sundown to take you back with him.”

  “But what about you?”

  “I must return to Trujillo immediately to arrange transport for your family to Portugal. They aren’t safe now that you’ve escaped the Holy Office. It’s only a matter of a day or two before they’ll be taken in and questioned for any information on your whereabouts. My servant, Martín, will go to them.”

  “But he knows to tell my parents nothing of your plan, correct?”

  “Yes, but the torturers don’t know they are in the dark.”

  Isabel felt horrible for putting her family in danger like this. “Why did that blasted spy have to find us that night?”

  “We couldn’t have anticipated the ambush, Isabel. If our plan had worked and we’d gotten away, your family would have had a little more time. But not much.”

  She nodded. This was the reality of their situation and they must not dwell in the past.

  He smiled. “I have friends in Lisbon. In addition to Paolo, there’s my Hebrew professor, Aron ben Cardoza. I’ve arranged for you to live with him and his wife and children until I can get back there.”

  “An openly Jewish family,” she said excitedly.

  “I can’t wait to tell him in person about my heritage, too.” Diego smiled. “Though he probably won’t be surprised, given how I drank up what little bit of Hebrew he had time to impart before I left.” He tenderly touched the sling. “And by the time I get there, this will be healed.”

  “Ojalá,” she said. She hoped so. Isabel gathered her hair at her nape, longing for a comb or even scissors to chop off the knots and tangles. “How will I contact you?”

  “You mustn’t. My father can’t see any letters arriving for me in a woman’s hand. It will be too suspicious. Paolo will check on you at the ben Cardozas and write to me. My parents know his seal. He’s the son of a duque.” His eyebrows moved together in concern. “Isabel, please understand that it will be a while until we meet again. I need to get back to my normal life for a time. Paint with Berruguete. Collect taxes. Gather maravedis little by little so my parents don’t notice. I don’t want either of them to question what I do. I think it should take about three months. Then I will join you in Lisbon.”

  “And my parents?”

  “Martín will smuggle them out the way we just traveled. With a couple more horses and a mule, of course.”

  “They won’t take much with them, you can be assured of that.” One thing her mother was not was sentimental with her possessions. Beatriz, on the other hand, with her dresses and veils, was unpredictable. Isabel was grateful she wouldn’t be there to watch her sister try to choose what to pack. Leaving Juan Carlos would be difficult enough for Beatriz. But Isabel was certain the safety of her own family would rule in the end and Beatriz would do what she was told. Portugal was closer than Florence. Perhaps Abuela could make it after all.

  “With any luck, they should be joining you in one week,” promised Diego.

  “So this is goodbye?” ventured Isabel, her heart already aching with loss.

  His eyes told her everything.

  She fell against him, crying. “You saved me.”

  “I would do it over and over.”

  His arms enclosed her. She cleaved herself to him, listening to the sound of their breathing blend with the din of the forest—birds cawing, cicadas whirring, water rushing. After a time, he gently created some space so he could look at her.

  “Don’t move. I want to paint you,” he whispered.

  “But you have no brushes.”

  “I’ll draw you in my mind.”

  They remained in that position, the artist and his muse, until the sun teetered before its final descent.

  For nearly three days, Isabel and Paolo made their way across the mountain range to Portugal. Thankfully, Paolo had brought an extra pair of boots, which were much sturdier and warmer than her worn leather slippers. The nights were so cold that even wrapping herself in Diego’s green-and-red-striped cloak did little good. Still, she cherished it. He had draped it over her shoulders
before he left. It was the only thing she had of his. The illustrated note, the one with the peacock feathers on the border, was tucked away in a drawer at home. She cheered herself with the certainty that there would be many more drawings to come in their future. Perhaps one of her as an old lady, she thought amusedly.

  During the daylight rides, Paolo distracted her with talk of his classes at university. She told him about her life in Trujillo, so different from his privileged life in Asturius. But at night when they made camp, her mind spun with horrific images. The beaten-up men of the Cohen family. The hooded masks of her torturers, with only their cruel eyes peeking out. The rack she was raised and lowered from.

  She had to sleep sitting up, the way she had done in the prison cell, because if she lay down, her shoulder hurt too much. Any pressure on it was excruciating. So Paolo set up a lean-to with a tarp and a long stick, stacking their supplies behind her back for support.

  On the third day, the wind carried the briny smell up the hill before she even caught her first glimpse of the sea. It delighted her.

  Paolo explained that Lisbon was actually at the mouth of the Tagus River, which led to the ocean. The Tagus River was the very same river she and Diego had ridden beside. It made her feel like she had something familiar from home in this new country.

  Lisbon looked nothing like Trujillo. White town houses lined the streets, which were nearly all paved or cobblestoned. Where Trujillo was flat, Lisbon seemed to be built on one giant hill, with all roads leading to the port below. The city teemed with people and animals, assaulting her sense of smell. Heaps of dung. Carts with the sour odor of the deceased, their bare feet sticking out beyond burlap covers. The acrid fish market.

  The ben Cardozas lived on the first floor of a stucco town house in the Alfama barrio. Aron wasn’t at home when Isabel and Paolo arrived, but his wife was. She answered the door holding the hand of one child, about four years old, and balancing another on her hip. Her features were lovely, with almond-shaped blue eyes that reminded Isabel of Atika. Inside, a dark wooden ceiling sagged low. The floor was tiled, but the colors were dull. Upon closer look, Isabel noticed the tiles had some sort of sandy covering. Though the house was not fancy, it felt like a home.