Then the son of the footman, who was studying for the priesthood, stood up before the assembled company, and from a large book of common prayer he began in his unstable adolescent treble to read the marriage ceremony.
By now the assembled company was enthralled and captivated by the spectacle of the two children who gazed so lovingly at one another, and the Grafin was well pleased with the success of her entertainment. The ceremony had reached the point of the giving and receiving of rings, and Tomas blinked in surprise as an older boy beside him pressed an ornate gold ring into his hand and whispered that he was to put it on the finger of ‘that little tinker’s brat’. Too confused to register the insult Tomas took the bauble and was about to comply when something unforeseen occurred.
Out from the edge of the pavilion, where she had crept to keep watch on her daughter (whatever old Morisa might say) dashed the mother of Kisaiya, her hair loose and flying and her face distorted with a fury that caused everyone in her path to step hurriedly aside. Like a mother tigress she seized her daughter by the arm and dragged her screaming and protesting away, the white shawl that was to have been her wedding veil slipping from the child’s shoulders and dropping to the ground.
That evening the Graf returned to the manor, to find his household in an uproar and his pretty young wife in tears and his son locked in his room guarded by two manservants in case the ‘horrible gypsy woman’ should return and kidnap him as well. Patiently he got the story of the day’s events from his wife, and sighed deeply, and weary as he was from his long journey he set out alone on foot to the campground by the river’s bend.
Around the fires there were no songs or tales told that night, and the Graf was met by a group of the grim faced menfolk who respectfully accompanied him to the largest of the tents. There he seated himself in the place prepared for him, and pipes were lit, and a flask of brandy passed around and offered to him. Wise in the ways of the People, he knew from these signs that a great offence had been taken, but that none there held him in the least responsible. As it were any normal gathering the Graf spoke of his journey to the capital, and of the new foal of his bay mare, and as it were an item of lesser interest, that his son Tomas was being sent away to school in the Autumn to be educated as befitted the heir to his lands and estates.
‘No doubt,’ said one of the men casually, ‘His mother will miss him greatly.’
‘No doubt,’ agreed the Graf in an even voice, ‘But she spoils him; you know what women are.’
Then the mood around the fire relaxed, and the brandy went round again, and someone called for a song, and the song was ‘Dark Eyes’ from the steppes of Russia. It told of a gypsy man longing for his sweetheart, and the violin wept and cried in the night while the Graf listened and felt relief mixed with the sadness that his son now must leave the family home for a time, earlier than he had planned, for he knew well the customs and laws of his nomadic friends, and how serious had been the affront.
To the music of the same violin wept little Kisaiya, silently so that none should hear, the back of her white blouse now as red as her dress, for a mother tigress is not gentle. Silently she wept, and clutched tight to her breast she held her treasure, the bright golden ring she had snatched from Tomas’ fingers at the last minute before she was dragged away.
Now the seasons turned, and the years passed, and the People moved from place to place, from campground to campground, and there were births, and deaths, and marriages promised and made, but none of the last for Kisaiya, who threw scorn in the face of any match proposed to her, and it was whispered that she thought herself already married to the son of the Rei who was gone away to school and whom she had never so much as glimpsed since the day of the mock wedding. It was noticed that around her neck she wore a bright golden ring of antique design which she was wont to fondle, and once her mother came upon her as she spoke to it in secret as to a living person, and beat her again, but it was all one to Kisaiya the proud and wilful one, who obeyed no law but her own.
The seasons turned and the years passed, and when a seventh summer had come since the day of the mock wedding, the wagons of the People returned once more to their old campground in the bend of the river, and when the tents were erected and the horses turned out to the sweet grass of the riverbank came a message sent down from the great manor on the hill, and the man who brought it was dressed all in the black of mourning.
It was a sad tale he had to tell, of men in a far off land who had decided among themselves that there should be no rulers, no lords, but only free men living together as brothers. A good saying, this, it seemed, but then it was told that to bring this about it was thought necessary that all the rulers of men should be murdered. Now, it was no great news to the People that the gaje would make war on one another, ruler against ruler, for so it had always been and good luck to them so long as the People were not called upon to fight for this great Lord or that; but that the rulers themselves were all to be slaughtered? Who should keep order in the towns and cities, or quell the madness that came upon folk that were shut up year upon year in the same place?
All this was bad enough, but there was worse to come, and it was the women who saw it first and began to wail and tear their clothes while the men were still debating this new insanity of the gaje. For the saying was that the Rei himself and his young wife were riding in their carriage in the city when a man hurled a bomb in through the carriage window and killed them both, as well as many people round about.
Then the lamenting broke out in earnest, and the messenger from the great manor on the hill backed away in fear of these savage folk who tore their garments and poured ashes from the fire on their heads and wailed as though they had gone mad ’til his ears were well nigh deafened with the clamour. Shaking his head he retreated back up the hill to the silence of the manor where there was grief, it was true, but all to measure with the doors draped in sober black and the mirrors covered.
In the camp of the People there was mourning according to their custom for the Rei who had been much loved and a great friend, but there was another reason also: for who should now take his place as Lord over the forests and streams of the estate that had been their refuge and sanctuary?
True, there was the son of the Rei who had been sent away to school in the Capitol, but while a lad of seventeen summers might be reckoned a man grown among the People, none knew the customs of the gaje in this matter.
Only Kisaiya knew in her heart as it were a thing foreordained that Tomas should now return to her; for were they not man and wife already according to the law of the gaje? Therefore that evening as soon as she was able, she slipped away from the camp, and stopping by the river’s edge she washed the ashes from her face and hair and made her way to the edge of the park and by the pavilion, now deserted and empty, she prayed to hona, the moon, to send her love to her.
One hour and then two she waited patiently, while the moon climbed high in the heavens and lit the pavilion as it were day. Then with no real surprise she spied a shadowy figure making his uncertain way down the paved walk from the manor, and much as he had grown she knew him, and just as when they were both children she rushed to meet him.
To Tomas who had told himself that he was only seeking relief from the oppressive gloom of the manor it seemed at first as if some spectral figure had emerged from the old pavilion and hurled itself into his arms. In truth he had all but forgotten the little gypsy girl who had been the companion of his childhood, and with his nerves wrought up by the sudden death of both his parents and the oppressive ceremonies of mourning he first drew back in fear as of something supernatural.
The warm body pressed against his and the strong arms flung about his neck soon convinced him otherwise, however, and since it is the nature of the young ever to seek life in the presence of death, it was not long before Tomas had convinced himself that this was the woman he had loved best all his life and yearned for always. Thus when Kisaiya shyly held out the bright gold ring on its chain to him
and told him from whence it had come, it was the most natural thing in the world that Tomas should take the ring and place it solemnly on her finger, not remembering that he stood in the place of the altar bedecked all with flowers.
Now it was no small thing that a great Lord should die who had governance over vast lands and properties, his son and heir having but seventeen summers and unschooled in the art of managing such an estate. Those whose business it was to see to such things summoned a relative of the family, a man of middle years whose task it would be to guide the young man’s footsteps as he assumed the mantle of his father.
This man’s name was Guntrum, a distant uncle, a kindly soul who grieved to see the young man pale and distraught, his world all of a sudden turned upside down. With him came his secretary, a ferret of a man, and Guntrum charged him to keep watch on Tomas and report back on all that the young man did, for Guntrum himself would be much occupied with the affairs of the estate.
Thus it was that when Tomas went down to the pavilion in the park the secretary followed him, and seeing what transpired there reported back to Guntrum, who smiled indulgently and said that nothing could be better than that Tomas should have found easement of his grief. All knew of the Graf’s odd humour in the matter of the gypsies, and nothing was thought of it, for in those days what a man did on his own lands was his affair.
In the weeks that followed Tomas and Kisaiya met often, in secret as they thought, yet eyes were upon them; and if Tomas was allowed his pastimes as befitted a future Lord of the gaje, it was a different matter in the tents and wagons. Some advised that the girl should be whipped until the wilfulness left her, but the mother of Kisaiya said she had already beaten her daughter until her arm grew tired, to no avail. Others were for banishment, but old Moriza bade them remember that young Tomas would one day soon be a Lord in his father’s stead, and it would be a good thing if the People continued to have a friend and protector among the gaje. If Kisaiya had had brothers or a husband to be dishonoured, things might have fallen out otherwise, Moriza said, but as the other children of her mother had died in infancy, and the girl herself had refused all offers of marriage . . . the old woman shrugged, and spat into the fire, and would say no more.
So things went on, and the time came when the People were to go on the road once more, for there were fairs to attend for the buying and selling of horses, and meetings with other tribes, and although it seems to the gaje that the People roam as aimlessly as clouds at the mercy of every change of the wind, it is not so. Like the vadni ratsa, the wild goose, the People come and they go, but always to a set place at a set time.
As for Tomas and Kisaiya, bitter was that parting, but Tomas told her that before the year was out he should be of age, as the gaje reckoned it, and Kisaiya said eagerly, ‘And then we shall be married?’ For Tomas had told her that what they had done as children was no proper marriage at all by the laws of the gaje, but only a sort of play, and it must be done properly, with proper rites and ceremonies. It was all one to Kisaiya, so long as her Tomas and she would be together, and in truth neither of them had any more idea of what that would mean than the children they had been.
When the air had cleared of the dust from the wheels of the last wagon, and the heavy hoofbeats of the great piebald gry could no longer be heard, Tomas sighed with a heavy heart and went to see Uncle Guntrum to discuss plans for his coming marriage when the wagons should return, and he should be of an age to take a wife. Fortunately for all concerned, the sly secretary had kept his uncle informed of all that had passed between the two young people, so that it was less of a shock than it might have been when Tomas presented his guardian with his choice of wife.
Gently but firmly, Guntrum told the lad that he must put such wild fancies out of his head. With Tomas’ coming of age, he said, would come duties and responsibilities such as he could not imagine, and the business of the estate alone would require all his time and attention for the first few years. Then, his uncle said, a suitable wife would be found from among the neighbouring families, someone of equal rank and lineage who could stand beside him and share his life and present him with children to carry on his father’s proud old name.
Then, because he was at heart a kindly man, he came round from behind the desk where he worked, and with heavy bonhomie told Tomas that of course, in the meantime, he should have his little gypsy for company; only there should be no more wild talk of marrying the wench. Eh? Then he slapped Tomas on the shoulder, man to man, and Tomas went from the room with a face like thunder and despair in his heart.
Now the little secretary had been well pleased to accompany Guntrum to this new post, and it suited him not at all that Tomas should come of age and take over the manifold riches of the estate, and he and his master be no more needed. He had, as was said, a sly and a devious nature, well adapted to listening at keyholes and hiding behind bushes, and as Tomas left his uncle he met the youth outside the door, and with fawning expressions of sympathy and understanding proposed a solution to the dilemma.
Tomas must understand that the gypsies by reason of their wandering ways, and not meaning the least disrespect, were not acceptable in the eyes of his peers and marrying one would do his standing untold harm, might even cause him to lose favour with the Emperor and his lands and titles be forfeit. However, continued the wily secretary as Tomas’ face fell still further, what if the gypsy were no gypsy?
Feeling the warm light of a sudden hope, Tomas seized the secretary by the arm and demanded to know what riddle was this? How could his love be anything other than what she was?
Why surely, the secretary replied cunningly, was it not simply a matter of dress and deportment? Could not dressmakers and such be hired? Could not tutors be found in the small but essential matter of speech and manners? In a short time, he continued blandly, making light of the difficulty, Tomas’ love could pass as a foreign beauty; of Spanish descent, perhaps, in light of her complexion, but then the difficulty of her origins would be as it had never existed.
Tomas hurried away, hope reborn in his heart, to seek out and secure the services of all those who might contribute to the transformation of Kisaiya into a lady of quality and gentle birth, so that when the year might be passed, and the tribe returned to their old camp by the bend of the river, all should be in readiness.
The secretary, meantime, hugged himself with delight, for it seemed to him that the task Tomas was undertaking would absorb all his energies for some time to come, and furthermore was certain to fail, for how could a barefoot ragged vagabond possibly pass as a lady in society? Thus Tomas would be mocked and reviled for his presumption, and his gypsy whore would be cast out, and meanwhile his master would continue managing the rich estate and he, the faithful assistant would share in the fruits, like a jackal under a rich man’s table.
He reckoned without the nature of Kisaiya of the wagons, Kisaiya who recognised no law but her own will, but that law was as adamantine. When Kisaiya set her mind on a thing nothing could divert her, and when she first saw herself in the glass, dressed as a lady of the gaje with her hair piled high and a gown upon her that floated like a cloud below the rigid slenderness of her waist, she felt a breathless enchantment that owed little to the cruel stays that confined her breathing. From that moment she desired nothing so much as to become such a lady, and those Tomas had hired who had thought the son of the Graf quite mad and besotted, found to their surprise that the enthusiasm and dedication of their pupil made the task far easier than they would have believed possible.
When word was sent down to the mother of Kisaiya that her daughter would henceforth dwell in the great manor above the park and no longer go on the road with her tribe there was nothing for it but that the mother of Kisaiya should rend her garments and whiten her face with ashes, and wail aloud that she had no daughter, that her daughter Kisaiya was dead. Such was the custom, and the women of the tribe joined with her but without real conviction, for they felt in their hearts that the People were well rid of
such a one.
It was the custom of the People that all the possessions of the dead should be burned, lest the mule, the spirit of the dead one, should return to trouble the living; but instead the few possessions of Kisaiya were done up in a bundle with the goosedown bedding that was hers and sent up to the manor. Perhaps it was done out of mercy, that she should not wholly forget her people, for among such odds and ends as had been hers was the violin made by the grandfather of Kisaiya, who had been a famous musician and maker of instruments and had given the instrument to Kisaiya’s mother to be passed to her children. Kisaiya, when she received the bundle, curled her lip scornfully and ordered that all be burnt: only the violin she kept, for what reason she knew not.
Thus it came to pass that by the time Tomas should be of an age to inherit the title and lands of the Graf, Kisaiya was no longer called Kisaiya, but rather Isobel, a lady out of Spanish lands in the west, and even those of the household who remembered who she had been felt it had always been so, such was the will of Kisaiya to succeed when she desired a thing to be. She spoke only the language of the gaje and dressed and carried herself in all ways as one of them, and close upon Tomas’ coming of age came the announcement that he was to be married to the dark eyed beauty who was the Lady Isobel of Castille. All the household rejoiced at the news, and even his Uncle Guntrum reluctantly gave his blessing; only the wily secretary was cast down in misery at the cruel ruin of all his hopes.
The days passed, the seasons came and went, and Tomas and the Lady Isobel went up to the city to live in the mansion owned by his family, for there was business to be done there by the son of the old Graf, and Tomas began to meet his father’s friends and associates, and to be schooled by them in what was thought proper to his station and rank. Tomas strove hard to conform and to be a credit to his Father’s memory, and if in so doing he lost some of his youthful exuberance and warmth, well that was only to be expected. Isobel herself was not sorry to leave the estate, with its memories of the days when she had run barefoot beside the wagons, the warm smell of the gry strong in her nostrils. Now her world was of parties, and balls, and walking through the parks of the city with other high born ladies when the day was fine.
The Girl with the Peacock Harp Page 3