Leporello on the Lam

by William Stafford

  We waited out the strongest of the siesta-time sun on a blanket beneath the cart. It was still uncomfortably hot under there but better that than the blistering heat out in the open. Angelina’s amusement had at last abated and we lay on our backs looking at the underside of the cart as if we were looking at stars in the night sky. We must have slept together – by which I mean dozed off. There was no chance of impropriety with me in a frock and the dead woman lying above us like a reminder – a reminder of what? That we are all mortal? As we are all mortal, should we not make the most of what life we have? Shouldn’t I have made my move on this beauty beside me right there and then and never mind the horror on the other side of the planks, that grisly portent of what we all must come to...

  ”Bunny?”

  I woke with a start to find Angelina’s pale hand on my shoulder.

  ”Must have been quite a dream, you were tossing so much.”

  ”I can assure you I was not!” I flushed with embarrassment. A quick glance downwards showed me that my nether regions still lay dormant. I wondered wistfully if they would ever erupt again.

  ”You were in some distress, that much was clear,” Angelina continued. “Perhaps you’d like to talk about it.”

  I looked at her friendly smile, tinged with concern for me and I almost blurted out everything. Instead, I shook my head and exhaled. “I can’t remember,” I lied. “It’s gone.”

  ”Best thing too,” she nodded, patting my shoulder again before extricating herself from under the cart. “We should get moving, I suppose. That is if you are coming with me?”

  ”Well, I’m not going to roam around on my own dressed in this manner like some kind of hermit transvestite.”

  ”Oh, I don’t know...” She treated me to a brief reprise of her earlier laughter and I could have dissolved on the spot. “Let me see what we have...”

  She returned to the chest and began to pull out a few things: a bonnet, a pair of gloves...

  ”But my own clothes must be dry by now!” I protested.

  ”Leporello, you’re not thinking.” She was right. I wasn’t. I was too captivated by her curves as she bent over the chest. By her chest too, for that matter. “Word will get around that a man fitting your description is being sought for arson, attempted murder, robbery and whatever else they might care to throw at you. That description will include the clothes in which you were last seen. It seems to me you have several choices: put your clothes back on and take your chances out in the open; put your clothes on and take your chances back in the box; adopt a disguise and a new identity, however temporarily, and travel with me. It could be a great adventure, Leporello. Let us find this Martini fellow together and give him what-for.”

  ”His name’s Martello,” I pointed out.

  ”So what’s it to be?”

  I didn’t answer. I plucked my garments like they were strange fruit. Angelina’s face fell. Then it got up again as I bundled those garments into a ball and cast them into the chest. She clapped her hands in excited approval.

  ”This is going to be fun!” she beamed, coming at me with the bonnet and the gloves.

  I laughed in agreement although a foreboding deep within me that I hoped was just the cold water bubbling its way through my intestines, told me that fun would be the most improbable outcome of all.

  ***

  The reward we receive for the unbearable sun during siesta time is the lightness of the summer evenings. The sky remains light enough for travelling until almost midnight and our little cart was without a lantern of any kind - which was fortunate for me, because I would have had to walk in front of the horse, bearing the lantern and looking for obstacles in the road and making me an advertisement for moths and highway robbers. I did not fancy encountering either of those.

  By the time we were on our way, Angelina had effected quite a transformation upon me. Along with the black frock and the white bonnet, I was accoutred with a black shawl and a muffler. She insisted I wear the muffler because my facial hair, once so sculpted and elegant and now overgrown and unruly, was a bit of a giveaway. I had to cover the lower half of my face and look like a highwayman’s granny – a small price to pay for being allowed to ride up front and not in that blasted box. We’d covered the casket with the blanket, having made what reparation we could to the bashed-in lid, and now it looked like any other large parcel.

  As the evening sun began its shift, replacing its fiercer predecessor (yes, I know it’s one and the same thing, travelling around our planet – I’m not a complete idiot when it comes to astronomy) we continued on our way, happily enough. Our conversation was trivial and light. We played word games. We sang bawdy songs. It was a pleasant way to pass the time as league after league rolled away beneath our wheels.

  The plan was to travel as far as we could before the horse was too tired. Then we would find a coaching inn where Dobbin (the name, unoriginal as it was, had stuck) could be refreshed or replaced. In some ways I didn’t want this part of our journey to come to an end. I willed poor Dobbin to keep going and never to tire. The entertainment provided by the company of this remarkable young woman was a source of pure delight for me. I had never felt this way before about anyone. I don’t think my master ever did – perhaps one day he might have met someone who would capture his heart and focus his loins on her and her alone. We will never know now.

  All good things and all the bad ones too, have to come to an end. As the sky dissolved from pink and yellow to a deepening blue we came to a cluster of buildings. It was an inn of exactly the type we were seeking. Amazing luck! But then, with Angelina beside me, I felt that the world was smiling on me at last. Finally I was in Dame Fortune’s good books. And about bloody time too!

  Dobbin too recognised our good luck and he summoned the energy to get us to the inn just that little bit quicker.

  ”I’d better do the talking,” Angelina nudged me before jumping down and tending to the horse. When I’d finished marvelling at the sensation of her touch, I asked why this should be so.

  ”Unless you’re planning on adopting the squeaky croak of an old crone and have the ability to sustain such a characterisation for the duration of our stay, brief though it may be...”

  ”Ah.” Like the jab from her elbow, I got this point as well. She was right, of course. It would be better if I played a mute. This relieved me of the bugbear of having to remember details of our cover story, should anyone ask our business, and put the onus entirely upon her. This suited the old me, the lazier Leporello, but the newer, more chivalrous fellow who was taking shape within me, found this somewhat abrasive.

  As it turned out, my delightful travelling companion proved to be quite the actress.

  ***

  ”We are heading to Barcelona, my good fellow,” she told the tapster as we booked in. “My mother and I. And Neddy, our horse.” Brilliant! Even Dobbin was incognito.

  The burly fellow behind the bar shrugged. He couldn’t care less. He demanded payment up front for our room, our meal and straw for Neddy. Angelina gave him a gold piece which he examined carefully. Our business didn’t interest him, only the validity of our coins. Satisfied he pocketed the gold, muttered something about there being jugged hare available if we were quick about ordering, told us where our room was and poured us watered wine. His eyes moved from side-to-side and he leant over the counter to us, conspiratorially. He advised us to leave neither cart nor horse unattended and tapped the side of his nose with a finger like a length of chorizo.

  Angelina took this warning in her stride and, raising her voice a little, announced there was nothing of value on the cart, just a load of old clothes we were taking to the poor, that our steed was on his last legs and headed to a tannery and the cart itself was riddled with woodworm. I wanted to nudge her, kick her or tackle her to the ground to stop her. Any fellow of felonious intent within earshot would take
this proclamation as evidence to the contrary. The lady was protesting too much, he would think and would be out to the stable quick as a flash. I glanced around the inn, trying to contain the rising panic within me. No one seemed in the least bit interested but then a hardened criminal would hardly be leaning towards us with his hand cupped behind his ear, would he?

  Everyone looked an unsavoury character to me. The men playing cards in the corner. The old man sucking on his pipe by the hearth. The woman nursing a baby by the window. The baby. ..

  I patted Angelina’s forearm and signalled with my eyes that I was going to sit with Dobbin.

  ”Yes, mother,” she smiled. “And try not to get your boots wet this time.”

  I frowned, puzzled. Had she misread my ocular communication? Or was she deliberately providing a cryptic answer to throw any eavesdroppers off our trail? Perhaps she really did think I was going to the privy? Either way, I left her at the bar to spend the rest of my evening with the bloody horse.

  ***

  An hour or so later, Angelina joined me in the stable, bearing a covered plate. She had brought me the last of the jugged hare, which by the taste of it had died of spice poisoning, with a meagre smattering of overcooked root vegetables on the side. Whatever the shortcomings of the fare (and I have sampled the best before now – when I could filch a mouthful of pheasant when my master wasn’t looking) I wolfed it down in a manner out of keeping with my assumed identity as an enfeebled old woman.

  While I ate in this indecorous fashion, Angelina’s eyes shone brightly as she brought me up-to-date with news from the bar. She had asked for directions to Barcelona, even though this information was entirely unnecessary and part of our cover, but this had gained the trust of the innkeeper. He revealed a few very interesting things. A coach had come through earlier that day and the driver told him that another driver at a previous inn somewhere else had told him there was a manhunt on for a thief and arsonist, a dangerous man who was not to be approached. It was believed he had kidnapped a young noblewoman and stolen the corpse of an old woman.

  ”I wonder who that could be,” I mused. “We should watch out for him.”

  ”It’s you, you plum” Angelina rolled her eyes. “The story may have grown in the telling but it is clear you are still being sought. We must leave here at first light.”

  Pop went my dream of a lie-in in a proper bed, a hearty breakfast and some warm water. What I’d seen of the inn had pleased me – when I wasn’t being paranoid and believing everyone would cut your throat as soon as look at you - and I had hoped to enjoy our stay properly – as properly as my role-playing and cross-dressing would allow.

  ”And there’s more!” Angelina giggled like a child with a secret. I held up my plate, glad of any food however poorly cooked. Oh, what I could do in that kitchen! I had picked up quite a wealth of culinary knowledge and expertise in my master’s service. Many’s the time I would be despatched to the kitchen in the middle of the night to rustle him up a snack of epicurean proportion. He needed to keep his strength up at all times, you see...

  ”Not the food, poltroon! “ she laughed. “The old man by the fireplace, the one smoking the pipe? He came to get a refill of ale and overheard me mention the name Martello. I was telling the barman Martello was my intended, my fiancé, and had arranged to meet him at this very inn. I asked if they recognised the name or the description I gave of my sweetheart. The barman shook his head but the old man took me aside and said he had seen such a man. He warned me against any kind of attachment – clearly his opinion of Martello is extremely low- he wouldn’t say why and seemed concerned he had said too much already, and shuffled off somewhere. He did reveal that Martello had been through here yesterday, and was quite a regular customer. He advised me to continue our journey to Barcelona and to conceal myself in a convent. I’d be better off without a man like that.”

  ”Hmm,” I mulled this over, picking an errant shred of hare from my teeth with my fingernail.

  ”Honestly, mother,” Angelina laughed, “your table manners leave a lot to be desired.”

  ”Huh,” I grunted with equal indelicacy. Angelina laughed again. “All very well you laughing at me in this get-up, lying in your comfortable bed while I watch over Dobbin – sorry, Neddy here – to make sure no one nicks him overnight.”

  Angelina gasped and clapped her hands. “Oh, Leporello? Really? Were you not my aged mother, I would plant such a kiss on your lips right now. I was just about to say I would take over so you could go up to our room. Thank you, thank you!” She skipped away before I could change my mind.

  She was right: I was a plum and a poltroon and a fool to myself, but this small sacrifice had made her happy and that was what mattered. That was all that mattered.

  I stretched out under the cart and tried to doze. Dobbin, clearly more at ease with playing his new alter-ego, was already asleep.

  When this day had begun I had not imagined it turning out like this by bedtime. I would have guessed, if questioned when I set out from Donna Flavia’s that morning, that I would be spending the night actually in a bed, not in a frock under a cart at an inn leagues away from where I woke up. The course of events, and their by-and-large- favourable outcome, were all what you might call unforeseen, but as I lay there, trying not to let the presence of straw activate my sneeze reflex, the most unexpected aspect of this crazy day was Angelina – or to be precise, the effect this lovely creature was having on me.

  ”And what might that effect be, eh, Leporello?”

  I almost jumped out of my skin. My master’s voice!

  ”You sly cur! I’m hardly cold and you’re already trying to wet your wick.”

  ”Master?” I raised myself up onto my elbows and glanced around the gloomy barn.

  ”Oh, don’t be a fool, man. I’m not real!”

  ”No? No! Of course not. You’re....gone.”

  ”Treat me as your conscience. I am here to guide you.”

  ”Then I’m in more trouble than I thought.”

  ”Now, now, don’t be like that. What about that girl, eh? Quite the dish, isn’t she? Why aren’t you up there, making your move?”

  ”Shut up! It’s not like that!”

  ”You presume to tell me to shut up?”

  ”By your own admission, you’re not real.”

  ”Even so. A little respect, if you please. And that bulge beneath your frock tells me it is exactly like that. What’s with the dress, anyway? Never had you pegged for the kinky stuff.”

  ”Go away!”

  ”Very well.”

  And he was gone. I blinked in the darkness and lay back. Marvellous, I thought. The old dog had taken to visiting me in my dreams. Now I was wide awake and, my master had been correct, a part of me was especially awake. Before I could do anything about it, I was suddenly aware I was not alone. Someone had come into the barn and was approaching the cart.

  I had enough presence of mind to refrain from crying out “Master?” or any other name for that matter, and I held my breath as the figure approached.

  What I could see of this interloper suggested to me that this was a person of the female persuasion – well, they dressed like one from the knees down at least. It wasn’t my lovely Angelina (and when did ‘my’ replace ‘the’ in my thinking?) and therefore the visitor was unwelcome. The cart rocked as this unknown she climbed aboard. I scuttled out but kept in the shadows, like an overgrown beetle – in a frock. From this vantage point I could see what she was up to.

  The cheeky mare was ransacking Angelina’s chest – by which I mean the trunk she transported her belongings in (Focus, Leporello!) – taking out items of clothing one by one and holding them up for inspection. She was the woman from the bar, the one who had been nursing the baby. And now she was helping herself to Angelina’s things! Well, not if I had anything to say on the matter!


  I was shuffling to my feet when a voice stopped me. It was an internal voice but it had the effect of pulling me back – in fact it knocked me off balance.

  My master’s voice, as clearly and distinctly as if he’d been kneeling beside me, said, “Wait, Leporello! She has one more box to open!”

  I was too stunned to argue or even wonder if I was still dreaming. I waited and I watched as she pushed the chest aside and stood over the casket. She pulled the blanket away and bent over to peer at it. The hole in the lid intrigued her. She leaned forwards and put her hand in...

  ...and she snapped herself upright like a whip-crack, backing away from the body in the box in revulsion. Her whole face was working as she gasped in horror. That was before she dropped out of view, having backed off the edge of the cart. She landed on her backside on the floor.

  ”Get on the cart!” my master’s voice came again, but I was already climbing up. There were times when he and I were so alike in thought it saved our skins in many a scrape. I drew myself up to my full height and extended my arms outwards, like a parody of a sleepwalker. Emitting a low moan, I approached the edge of the cart. The effect on the terrified woman was like a bolt of lightning. With a terrible scream, she half-scrambled and half-ran from the barn, gibbering and calling on Our Lord and all the saints she could think of.

  I watched her go, highly amused but inside my head it was my master’s laughter that filled my thoughts.

  ”Excellent, Leporello!” He managed to gasp out the words between belts of roaring laughter. “I think you have cured her of thievery for good!”

  I sat on the edge of the cart, a little shaken myself – to put it mildly.

  ”Is that really you, master? Are you really here?”

  Before he could answer or before I could come to my senses – whichever way you want to look at it – old coil broke out at the inn. The screaming woman had raised the alarum and people were pouring from the main building to see what the fuss was all about. Within seconds I was facing a sea of angry faces. At that moment, their anger was directed at the thief for disturbing their sleep (and whatever else they may have been engaged in at the time – it all goes on in these inns, you know).