Watermark

by Vanitha Sankaran

  Martin hurried to the counter.

  “You’re late,” Tomas said in frank disapproval. A thin man with a stingy frown that seemed fixed on his face, he always looked down on Martin, and even more so on Auda.

  “There’s a customer waiting for you to pen his words. And that dirty Jew came by looking for you again. Tell him he’s not to come around here anymore. If you want to consort with the likes of him, do it on your own time.”

  Jew—he must have meant Shmuel, an old friend of her father’s.

  Martin offered a smile as he reached into the pouch on his belt and drew out two pennies. “Ah, but I brought you your fee, for this week and the next.”

  Tomas’s frown softened as he picked the coins from Martin’s palm. “Hm. Well, at least I was able to sell a few items to the man while he waited. Nothing spectacular, only some twine and old leather I’d meant to dispose of anyway.”

  He nodded toward the back of the store, which opened up into a small stall facing the market. “See to this man who wants to write a message to his two bickering sons.” He jerked his chin at Auda. “And tell the girl to sit on a stool in the back, if she must.”

  Martin shrugged an apology to Auda and disappeared behind the linen curtain that separated the shop from the stall. She shook her head and searched for a stool. Even though she’d been accompanying her father for months—ever since her sister had married—still the stationer couldn’t accept that, while Auda could not speak, she could hear just fine. He’d raised a fuss when she had first started handling his books, like the physicking book she’d brought back with her. But when he saw that she was more careful than her father with the pages, he grudgingly let her be.

  Breathing in the musty scents of pigment and charcoal, Auda took a seat toward the back of the shop, just near the curtain that separated her from her father. Here she could work in peace, copying the last of the simples into the booklet for Poncia while she listened to her father talk to his customers, and tried to catch an occasional glimpse of the market crowds.

  She had just finished another verse when the door to the shop opened. Craning her neck, she saw a short, round fellow with dark skin and tattered clothes, patched in different shades of green and gray, tottering toward the counter. A Gypsy! She had seen them before, in the Great Fair. Martin had made friends with one called Donino, and every summer he took Auda personally to see Donino and the treasures the Gypsies brought in from different corners of the world.

  Reaching Tomas, the gypsy unrolled a cloth bundle and spread its contents over the counter.

  “What is this junk?” Tomas protested. “Get this garbage out of here!”

  The gypsy bowed. His stringy gray hair fell in rancid braids about his face. “Dominus! I only bring you some worldly goods to add to your excellent range of merchandise. Please, just have a look.”

  Tomas glowered. “If you don’t leave now, I’ll call the street guard for you,” he said, waving the peddler off. “I’ve work to do, and a customer, don’t you see?” He gestured at Auda.

  “All the more reason to consider my wares, dominus,” the Gypsy said. He clacked a pair of illustrated wooden squares together. “Perhaps some fortune cards? Or a pen made from the finger bone of St. Adolphus himself?” His tone was a mixture of encouragement and servility.

  Auda drew near. The Gypsy smelled of minty spices. He was also filthy, with grease and dirt caked into his clothes and skin. She scanned the jumble of articles he’d scattered over the counter. Most looked like rubbish: wooden chits, old jars, a handful of dried seeds.

  “I’ll not tell you again. Get this garbage out of my shop,” Tomas ordered, his voice rising.

  “You have a look, domna.” A note of despair entered the Gypsy’s voice. “Maybe a bottle of liquid fire? Or a watermark from the papermakers in Italy?”

  Auda, about to turn away in disappointment, paused. The papermakers in Italy? Her father talked about them often. The Italian papermakers were at the forefront of innovation. Supported by the needs of seven universities, compared to the two in France and one in Spain, the Italians were kept busy copying textbooks for the scores of students who passed through over the years.

  If the Italians saw fit to mark their paper as their own, perhaps her father needed too as well–especially now that he was supplying a patron in the palace itself.

  The Gypsy nodded. “Yes, see.” He picked out a piece of twisted wire from the assorted litter on the counter that was crudely crafted into the shape of a bull. He held the device up to the weak light filtering in through the window. “The finest papermakers are using them. It’s yours, for mere pennies.”

  Auda tilted her head. How did it work?

  “No, no, no,” Tomas cried, sweeping the cloth roll with all of its articles onto the ground. “I won’t have anyone saying I consort with Gypsies and Jews, not in my shop! Get out of here.”

  “Please, dominus, just a moment. Domna.” Their eyes met. The gypsy drew back for a second, then grabbed at her skirt. “Just a look.”

  Auda moved away and hid her face. She edged back toward the curtain and the comforting sound of her father’s deep voice.

  “Get out!” Tomas pushed the man out of the store, barely allowing him to gather his belongings. He slammed the door shut.

  “Damned rain,” he swore, more to himself than to Auda, “brings all the cursed wretches out like rats from the gutter. Best be wary of them. That wire of his was probably some fraud. I’ve heard about these tricks with paper before, clever ways for those like him to send messages to one another. Some say even the Good Men used them.” He muttered something more on the damnation of heretics as he walked away.

  Auda shook her head as she watched his retreating back. Foolishness and superstition. Did the bakers use their dough marks to communicate dark deeds to one another? Did leatherworkers use their brands? Marking one’s work was hardly testament to believing in heresies.

  Yet her father was forever on the lookout for new ways to promote his paper. Perhaps he could make use of this device—if he could figure out how to use it. She would ask him later. Or maybe she would surprise him with a gift when the Gypsies came to town for the fair that summer.

  Chapter Five

  Martin didn’t linger when the bells rang for Terce, signaling noon and the end of his shift at the stall. He waved a hasty farewell to Tomas.

  “I’ll see you midweek.”

  When they were out on the street, he turned to Auda. “What a bore that customer was, talked my ear into a drowse on how his two sons have fallen in love with the same woman and were threatening to fight a duel over her hand. In the end he didn’t even send them separate letters, just one forbidding either to marry the girl!”

  Auda didn’t answer, staring instead through the heavy patter. Two black-cloaked clergymen had just turned the corner, not twenty feet from them.

  Despite herself, she tensed with fear. Jacobins, in this town? Large and hefty, they moved like a pair of fearless rats. It was said that the Dominicans, as some called them, had the skill to see into a person’s soul and root out its evil. Had they come on account of the rains?

  “Save your Soul!” one yelled at the passing carts and pedestrians.

  “Hear the Lord! He will absolve you,” the other said. His gaze turned toward them.

  Martin sucked in his breath. “This way.”

  Grasping Auda by the arm, he veered onto a side street and pulled her along a crooked path that led out of town. Through the rain, Auda couldn’t see if the men were following them. Trying not to make any noise, she clamped her mouth shut and listened, hearing nothing but the patter of water on dirt and stone. Her breath burst out in a cough. Finally, their house came into view.

  “Go inside,” Martin said in a terse voice, nodding at the door. “I’ll see to the animals.”

  Pushing through the gate, Auda came to the front door and slipped off her hood, when suddenly she paused. The door was ajar—hadn’t she closed it before she left? Tig
htening her hold on her basket, Auda edged backward. Had someone come looking for her father?

  The door flung open and a familiar face peered out. Poncia, her sister, called to her. “Auda! Where in the world have you been?”

  Auda rushed to embrace her sister. Poncia, wearing a worried frown, kept stiff for a moment, but then relaxed and returned the hug. Pulling back at last, Auda held her sister at arm’s length. Poncia looked nothing like her, flushed rosy where Auda grew pale, moved sleekly where Auda stumbled. Her sister had grown into the type of woman all girls sought to be, with round hips meant for bearing children, blond hair braided and tucked under a handkerchief, and soft skin oiled with pork fat. Even her speech sounded superior, crisp and sharp, unlike their father’s muddy mixture of Catalan, Occitan, and Spanish.

  Hard to believe this finely dressed blue-eyed beauty was related to her at all.

  “You look well,” Poncia said, fluffing her deep blue skirts. She sat on the bench. Her six-month trip to help her new husband acquire stock for his spice trade had taken her all through the country—even to Paris itself.

  Auda hadn’t known when her sister would return, had secretly feared that Poncia wouldn’t leave merry Paris at all. Why would she? Her life now was so different from the drab routine she had had here at home, stuck taking care of a sister who lived in the dark.

  No, that wasn’t fair. Poncia had never once complained about the burden. But it was clear to all who knew her that the fair girl wanted fine clothes and a rich life. She had stayed at home longer than she should have, to take care of Auda. Any other girl her age might not have found a man to marry. But Poncia had undertaken the task with vigor, doing favors for old women in church and taking advice from matronly mothers wishing to pass on their wisdom. It was not long before one of them introduced Poncia to the handsome Jehan. Months later, they were married.

  Auda dropped her basket, wiped her face dry, and hung up her sackcloth cloak beside her sister’s new surcoat. She fingered the soft blue cloth that matched Poncia’s laced kirtle—so this is what marriage to a fine merchant brought! She pushed away a pang of envy and sat next to her sister. Lifting her hands, she rolled them around each other in imitation of wagon wheels and pointed to her mouth.

  Your trip. Tell me. She smiled and touched her sister’s arm for a response.

  Poncia shook her head. “Pull up your sleeves, Auda,” she said. “I can’t see your fingers.”

  The sisters had developed the crude sign language long ago. Her father had picked it up too, despite grumbling that he’d gone through the effort of teaching the girls their letters. Wax tablets hung in every room, but pressing words into the wax with a stylus took too much time to accommodate real conversation.

  Auda smiled at the memory of learning her letters. Reading and writing were common enough among nobles, and Narbonne boasted a small school where boys could learn the basics of grammar even if they were not destined for the clergy. Of course girls were not admitted, not that Martin could have afforded the hefty fee. Instead he had taught her and Poncia how to read and write himself.

  “It will be our secret language,” he’d said to the both of them, though his eyes met Auda’s.

  She had mastered reading and writing with ease, and was soon poring over books borrowed from the stationer on physicking and philosophy while Poncia still struggled to spell common words. Auda never gloated over her ability, but secretly was glad she was skilled at something that eluded her pretty sister.

  Auda rolled up her sleeves and mimed the motion of rolling wheels again.

  “Oh, the trip.” Poncia waved the request away. “Later. First I want to know what you were doing out by yourself. Don’t tell me it was to buy bread.” Her voice grew apprehensive. “It’s not safe out there now.”

  Auda shook her head in exasperation. Like their father, her sister worried too much.

  Poncia frowned at her. “Where’s Papa?”

  Feeding the animals. Just back from scribing. She signed the image of a goat with her left hand and fed it with her right, then mimed the motion of writing.

  “He took you to the stationer’s with him?”

  Auda crossed her arms over her chest. It’s safe.

  Poncia pursed her lips. “Well, while both of you were out, I pulled greens from the kitchen garden, and brought in the eggs from the barn—only two mind you.” She nodded at the basket on the table. “You have to learn these things, Auda. You can’t just shrug them off anymore, follow in Papa’s shadow.”

  Auda touched her sister’s cheek. After the loneliness of the past months, she was glad to have Poncia back. Even her sister’s strict words brought a smile to Auda’s face.

  Poncia relented and leaned over to kiss Auda’s brow. “It’s high time I returned,” she admitted. “I worried the entire time I was away about you.” Ignoring Auda’s frown, she passed her the vegetable basket. “And the north bred such a chill in my bones.”

  While Poncia chattered about the glorious scenery and the opulence of Paris shops, Auda sorted through the greens. She dumped a handful of peas on the table. The garden had grown lean in the recent deluge; yesterday she had found only a couple of withered carrots among the rotting vegetation. Even with the ham bone, today’s pottage would taste thin. At least there were eggs.

  “Word at the king’s court is that rose is the scent to be smelled this season,” Poncia said, shelling the peas. “I suppose I’ll be drying petals for months.” She pushed aside a pile of pods to feed to the animals later.

  Music? Auda signed, strumming an imaginary fiddle.

  “Song and dance on every road,” her sister said and sang a witty verse about a courtier fooling his lord over an affair with the lord’s wife.

  Auda smiled in appreciation. She’d always fancied clever tales and the rhythm of words set to song, often humming her favorites when she was alone. It was the only time her voice sounded normal, sounded real. She rarely spoke, even at home. Her stump tongue could produce some sounds. Growing up, Poncia had encouraged her to try different syllables. Na. Ma. Pa. But the noises always sounded harsh to Auda, underscored her inability to speak normally. Nothing like her voice on paper.

  “Papa would do well to put aside this business of making paper and scribe instead, in a real city, somewhere with more coin,” her sister said.

  Auda sighed and turned so as not to answer. She fanned the hearth flames and poured a jug of water into the pot of grease and oats from last night’s meal. An old apple core floated to the top.

  “Surely even here he can turn to a better trade than peddling paper to the masses—perhaps scribing for the abbey up in Fontfroide. It’s a foolhardy risk to be associated with an invention discovered by Moors and infidels.”

  Poncia warmed to her subject. “What need do simple folk have of knowing letters anyway? What would they know to write? The names of their lord’s sheep and the number of needles in a stack of hay? For pity’s sake.”

  Auda grit her teeth and chopped the savory, her knife knocking against the table. Poncia made this argument often, usually to their father. Scribing could be a lucrative profession, if managed well. And papermaking, well it was a risk. What was the use in making cheap paper when the only ones who knew their letters—noblemen and priests—could afford the more costly parchment rolls?

  Still, the price of parchment went up every year; animal hide was increasingly scarce. Tomas explained it was on account of death in the cattle herds, lack of feed, and better uses for the skins.

  “Now that I’m married, I’ll ask Jehan to find a better living for Papa,” Poncia continued. “Maybe as a scribe for a fine house. And you should have a thought for yourself. It’s well past time to start searching for a man to wed you.” She looked at Auda sidelong. “All the women in town are surely talking, and you can ill afford that.”

  Auda squared her jaw and huffed at her sister’s lecture.

  Women, sour and old. Gossip more than whores. She didn’t let on how much the com
ments hurt—not that she was plain or even a fright, but that she was a burden on their father.

  “Auda!”

  Always talk when I’m there. She templed her hands into the sign of a house, and made a cross with her fingers. Send her to the convent!

  “Who said that?” Poncia asked in a sharp tone.

  Auda tossed the peas and herbs into the pot and fanned the flames. She shrugged. I can tell tales too. She took the oversized tablet from the shelf and scratched into the green wax with a stylus. The words played a rhythm in her head. If she’d had time, she would have written the words like verse to a song, with cadence and flair. But Poncia was an impatient reader and scanned the words over Auda’s shoulder as she wrote.

  Lady Margaret, the cloth-maker’s wife.

  Whose servant wench is always saying when the Master

  will be gone.

  So the lady can rush to see the widower chandler.

  Who is always looking to couple.

  And when the deed is done, the lady will go home,

  To find someone else polishing her husband's pole.

  Who?

  None other than the servant wench,

  Who earns two pennies for every tumble.

  Poncia’s flattened lips gave way to a muffled giggle. “You shouldn’t tease about such things.”

  Smirking, Auda took the eggs from the basket.

  “Best not to write such things either,” Poncia said, serious again. She carried the tablet to the hearth fire and tilted it back and forth near the flames until the wax melted and ran level. “Nothing that would make a stranger look twice at you.”

  Auda frowned and gave the pottage a quick stir. Her sister never knew how to have fun. She dropped the eggs into it whole. The scent of garlic and ham rose from the almost bubbling soup.

  “I know you think I fret overly,” Poncia sighed. “But there are madmen out there who would easily trade your soul to safeguard their own. In a single blink of the eye, they would descend upon you.”