by Kari August
And whereas they had put portraits or tapestries on the walls and decorated the rooms with candle holders, religious objects, statues or weapons, here she saw mainly pretty pictures and books all about. Oh, and tons and tons of trinkets. There was just so much stuff to look at, pick up, and wonder at.
She also liked the many patterned rugs on the floor, though they too had had thick carpets brought back from the crusades during her time—not just the herbs and reeds strewn across the floors in prior times to soak up the spilled beer and grease, and of course, the droppings of the cats, dogs, and . . . rodents.
She really cherished that she hadn’t seen a single mouse or rat indoors. She had lived with so many rats one could have almost befriended them.
And the food she had eaten here was so different and varied—cuisine from all parts of the world! And though her fare had been seasoned extensively with herbs and spices from distant countries, her meals had consisted mainly of plenty of bread and meat, with some fish and vegetables. Fruit had not been eaten as much. Their fruits had been smaller, less sweet and tougher than modern varieties.
Also, except for the occasional songs of nature, this cabin was quiet. A castle was noisy, inhabited by many and a place of work for lots of people—craftsmen banging away, soldiers training, servants bustling about. Which, of course, meant that there was little room for privacy for most.
But what did she especially like about this place? It didn’t reek. Castles smelled awful, especially in the summer. In addition to the assortment of unwashed people roaming about, their garderobes—or bathrooms—were abominable. Yes, she had had a chamber pot in her bedroom that was emptied each morning, but most of the people had done their business in an alcove on a long bench with many holes in it—gossip with your neighbor! –that dribbled merely below them into a cesspool or moat. Ugh! The vile stench. Her first day in the cabin she had flushed the toilet repeatedly just to see the water swirl wondrously away.
Oh, she was adjusting fine to modern living. What could possibly go wrong?
Chapter Three
The day after Lindsey and Ned departed, Aunt Elle and Mags bounced around town shopping—Aunt Elle insisting that she treat Mags to some new clothes. Of course, with Aunt Elle for company she had to be discreet, but she couldn’t help snapping and unsnapping a “snap” on a pair of pants she saw. She had only known about the wonder of the zipper she had on her miniskirt in heaven. But then something else caught her attention. What was this? Some sticky material crackled at the cuffs of a jacket to make them tighter. She pulled and reattached the item repeatedly until Aunt Elle caught her and looked over curiously.
“I once heard how that hoop and loop fastening tape was invented. Apparently, it is supposed to mimic what the inventor noticed when he studied those sticky prickers on shrubs. Isn’t that neat? I wonder if it’s true.”
“It’s fantastic I must say.” And so, the day went.
Finally, that evening the pair decided to watch some television. This was another novelty for Mags who was still trying to comprehend how the whole thing worked. By what means did the actors get shrunk to such a small size? Just where were they doing their acting anyways? Herman had not had time to explain everything. There were certainly gaps in what she had learned from him.
Aunt Elle asked Mags what she wanted to watch. She had no idea, of course, so suggested that Aunt Elle pick. Aunt Elle smiled, did some things to the television and then said, “I love this movie.”
On came House Boat and Mags was immediately mesmerized. “Who is that man?”
“Oh, I like to refer to him as Cary Grand.”
A voluptuous woman was raising his children who were not her own. Mags could relate. But the best part of all was the romance that was developing between the stunningly handsome man and the lady.
The show reminded Mags of the other reason why she had actually wanted to return to Earth—to experience the passionate romance God had described as essential and her friends in heaven would not stop talking about. To have a man love her so he couldn’t get enough of her? Couldn’t live without her? Well, that sounded beyond exquisite.
Of course, as a respectable woman she had not revealed to God that was her other reason to return, but it certainly was. Sure, she might find such love in heaven, but she had realized that it would be easier, and she would be freer, in modern Earth.
Her brothers could tease that she had a mind of her own, but they knew that she had been raised to be a dutiful daughter, sister and wife and expected her to behave as such. She had learned what every aristocratic lady of her time ought to know—dancing, embroidery, and music. Yes, she had also loved reading, collecting books and illuminated manuscripts, which was a little odd for women of her time, but in the end, she had always done her duty. She had never been given any expectations that she would be allowed to marry for love. She knew that royal daughters and sisters were meant to make alliances. And so, she had not protested when her brother Edward IV had arranged for her to wed Duke Charles the Bold of Burgundy.
At first, it had seemed like a spectacular pairing. Burgundy was considered one of the most elegant and richest regions in western Europe. The Valois King John of France had given the title of Duke of Burgundy to one of his sons about a hundred years before. Then through a successful marriage to the rich heiress of Flanders and by military conquest, that Duke Philip the Bold had expanded Burgundy to not only include the area of northeast France, but also the rich industrial and trading region of the Low Countries—what modern people called Belgium. His son, the next Duke, John the Fearless, who married a Bavarian heiress, had even had his cousin killed to maintain Burgundy’s possessions before being slain himself. Then the next son, Duke Philip the Good, acquired Luxembourg and made Burgundy an extremely prosperous entity of its own. He also formed the chivalrous and knightly organization of the Golden Sheep which had helped maintain a cohesiveness with his nobles. But he had really created a name for himself when he had turned over Joan of Arc to the English who had then burned her at the stake. But when that Duke had passed, his son, her future husband Charles, had become Duke. By then Burgundy was considered one of the most affluent, cultured, and sophisticated regions in Europe—it had more riches than the kingdom of France. Fish, furs, and wool in the north had been traded for olives, spices and wine in the south, and Burgundy had benefitted from it all in their fortuitous location between France and the Hapsburg Holy Roman Empire, the trading network snaking through Burgundian possessions with Bruges the outstanding commercial and financial city of the North, Ghent the governmental city, and Malines—modern Mechelen—the judicial city. What Burgundy had, became a source of envy for other nations and essentially over the prior hundred years had been fought over between Burgundy, England and France with shifting alliances constantly occurring.
Any aristocratic or royal lady should have been thrilled to be marrying into the Burgundian family. And Mags had been, acquiring the titles of Duchess of Burgundy, of Brabant, of Guelders, of Limbourg, and of Luxembourg. She also became the Countess of Artois, Flanders, Franche Comte, Hainault, Holland, Namur, Zeeland, and Zutphen. And furthermore, Lady of Friesland and Malines . . . just to name a few.
Of course, King Louis XI of France had not been happy about this Burgundian-English alliance and had attempted to prevent her wedding. First, he had tried to foil the papal dispensation required for the marriage since Charles and Mags were fourth cousins, both having descended from Edward III of England. Then he had worked at thwarting Mag’s brother, Edward IV, from obtaining the loans he required to pay the costly dowry for the marriage. But the worst was when he had tried to slander Mag’s reputation, saying she was not a virgin—how could she be when she was marrying at the ancient age of twenty-two? —and had even spread the rumor she had had a love child.
But the marriage had taken place, nonetheless, among much fanfare. The days of celebration—the procession, and then the feasting, jousting, and tournament—had been the talk of legend al
l over Europe.
And Mags had seen upon first viewing Charles that he possessed a handsome, sturdy visage. He knew his court manners, was recognized as a great orator and spoke competently in Dutch, English, French, German, Italian, and Portuguese. And he loved music.
But see . . . well . . . uh . . . if only . . . fine. She’ll just admit it—Charles was nevertheless, a bit of a disappointment. Let’s start off with the fact that he was so much shorter than she—he was smaller than average for a man and even littler than his father had been. Oh, that hadn’t stopped him from kissing her in public at their first meeting whereupon she had had to bend her head to make that happen. He hadn’t appeared embarrassed, but she had almost heard the tittering.
Then it was his personality. He had been known as a spoiled child, who had refused to take no for an answer, who had grown into an adult who had trouble compromising. He could have terrible bouts of bad temper and even have a cruel streak—just to give an example, in one town he had conquered, the prominent townsfolk had been tied in pairs and thrown off the ramparts. He never quite lived that down.
He had been mostly raised by his religious mother and it showed. Yes, Mags was also pious and liked to observe all the religious days with him, however . . . Charles was, well, not like his pleasure-loving father had been known to be. In fact, Charles had been estranged from his father until making up in the very end.
And sure, his father had carried his affability to an extreme, producing at least seventeen illegitimate children with some twenty-three mistresses, and constructing “fun” palaces where guests fell from faulty stairs into bags of feathers, or statues spouted paint, or ink spurted from books, or surprise fountains squirted water up lady’s skirts.
But Charles did not even like to mix much with women. Charles preferred the company of his counselors, clerics or soldiers than putting up with what he considered the “frivolities” of women. If they were in the same town together, he preferred the living arrangements between her female court and his male court to remain separate.
But, nevertheless, thirty-three-year-old Charles was experienced in the marital bed when they first wedded—and ready to finally sire a male heir. And they both had had high expectations—after all, her own mother had had a dozen babies, including lots of sons, though only seven children had survived into adult years.
And despite the fact that his first wife, Catherine of France, had passed at age eighteen with no children, his second marriage with Isabelle of Bourbon—who he had purportedly really liked—had produced a child—her stepdaughter, Marie. Mags had been so hopeful their pairing, as his third wife, would finally yield his desired male heir.
But as pious as they both were, their relations in bed were supposed to be, and could be labeled as . . . a duty—strictly for the purpose of procreation. Oh, they earnestly tried, at least initially, the times they were actually together and Charles wasn’t off fighting some battle to expand or protect his territory—he was quite ambitious and actually wanted to become the KING of Burgundy . . . but nothing happened even though Mags went on several pilgrimages to shrines. So, after three years, they saw each other less frequently, dwindling down to not at all the final couple years of their marriage—in the whole nine years they were married until Charles was slain while fighting, they were only together some total days of perhaps one year.
She hadn’t really blamed her husband. What was the use of them being together? She was barren, that much was obvious. It was always the wife’s fault, wasn’t it? Especially since Charles had fathered a couple bastards in addition to her stepdaughter. Certainly, she recognized it was more important for him to go on fighting important battles than spending time with her. And let’s be honest, she wasn’t exactly pining away for him, either. She occupied herself acting as his representative while he was away, entertaining nobles and royalty and touring his territory, making sure everyone followed the laws set down by the Duke.
Yes, they had a fondness for chess, falconry, hunting and reading in common, but he could do those things just as well with his male companions.
At least that was what she had convinced herself of until she had met her new modern friends in heaven. Then she started hearing about the companionship of a partner, marrying for love, and also topics she had no idea what they were talking about—to put it delicately, the pleasures of bed sport. Weren’t you just supposed to lie there and wait for the thing to be over with? What was passion really? She wanted to know but, of course, had been too embarrassed to ask her new friends. And then when God had told her how important it was to experience romance, she had determined that she wanted another chance at love.
She could have picked someone in heaven and had actually contemplated approaching that delectable artist, Leonardo—such a manly figure with a charming smile—but then she realized that he, uh, liked men—he didn’t flaunt it, but he didn’t hide it either. And even though Charles and she didn’t spend time together in heaven, she still had her standing as a respectable true lady to maintain. So, it became more and more obvious that if she was going to do this . . . this . . . loving, she required getting away. So that’s when she had approached God and come up with the less embarrassing excuse for returning to Earth because she wanted to fix her nonexistent reputation.
She stared at Cary now on the television. He was lounging in a small boat, kissing that lucky woman. Oh, she wanted to be her. A melody was playing. She glanced at Elle. “What is that lovely song?”
“Let’s see, just what are the lyrics?” Elle started singing along, “La la la laaa, da da da daaa, do dooo . . . a book from just a look, a touch can say it all . . . de de de deee toooniiight.” Elle smiled wistfully. “What woman would not like to be in his arms?”
Mags had found her man, her partner. She was sure of it. “Elle?”
“Yeah?”
“Cary is so . . .”
“Oh, yes . . .”
“Where can I find him?”
“Let’s see. Where is he now—England? No, I’m pretty sure near where my husband and I own a house—by the movie studios.”
But then Mags had a disappointing thought. “Do you think he truly loves this woman?”
Elle glanced over. “He supposedly did fall in love with her for real, but she did not him.”
Mags was elated. There was hope. They watched some more of the show. When it ended, she decided to be honest with Elle. “I would like to see him. Do you think I could?”
“Whom? Cary?”
Mags nodded.
Elle giggled. “Sure. Why not? I think all you have to do is get on one of those tour buses.” She sprung up. “No, wait. I have a better idea. I love seeing him this way. Oh, I’ll surprise you. We should fly home—you know I have a private jet—and then we could stay at my house for a while.”
Mags wasn’t sure what all Elle was talking about but didn’t think she should admit it. Just as when Elle had told her yesterday that her husband was an entertainment producer who was really busy most of the time, and she hadn’t wanted to let on then either that she didn’t have a clue what that meant. She had merely responded instead that her husband had been a European Duke who was so concerned with warfare that he had never been home either.
Elle had then responded, “Barons, Counts, Dukes—there are a million of them over there, aren’t there? So, you don’t see him much?”
Mags had shaken her head. “No, uh . . . I didn’t. I’m a widow now.”
“Ah, I’m sorry.”
And that had ended that bit of conversation for the time being.
But Elle was elaborating further now about their travel plans to see Cary. “Why don’t we leave tomorrow morning?”
“That sounds wonderful.” Mags smiled.
“I suppose we should inform Lindsey and Ned.”
Mags nodded. “Probably so.”
“But then they would undoubtedly worry unnecessarily again.”
“I think likely.”
Elle chuckled. “I
’ll just leave Lindsey and Ned a note on the dining table that they can read next weekend—after the fact. How does that sound?”
“Perfectly acceptable to me.” Mags grinned.
The next day, Mags found she did not like Elle’s town as much as the place she had just been. Besides the fact that the beautiful mountainous scenery could not compare, the crowds, the noise, the eccentric people, and the traffic were all a bit overwhelming.
They ate and then drove to some big building, and Mags caught a glimpse of a sign proclaiming WAX . . . something, before Elle told her not to look further. There were wax carvers during her time, and she briefly wondered if Cary was one also—if he had a lovely artistic side to him.
They climbed out of the car, and then Elle insisted that Mags not peer at anything but the ground until she said it was okay.
Elle guided her step-by-step, around corner after corner, through the building. Of course, Mags could not resist taking a peek off to her side occasionally. But what she saw puzzled her. People were posing stiffly or doing things such as reading books in various different rooms with not a peep being said—one of the persons even looked just like Marie Antoinette!
Finally, Elle exclaimed, “There he is!”
Mags looked up then.
She stared at Cary, handsome as ever, as he stood before a fireplace, looking at a painting of a woman above the mantel.
Mags tried getting his attention. “Cary? I’m so glad to make your acquaintance. I’m Mags York.”
Elle laughed, but Cary did not move. It was as if he was oddly frozen in place.
She looked at Elle. “What’s wrong with him?”