A Midsummer Tempest

XVII

Stiff under a mid-afternoon sun, Jennifer walked between Nobah Barker and Sword-of-the-Lord. The clergyman was on her left. He gripped her wrist in such a manner that the ring on her third finger lay always in his view. The youth simply gave her his arm. His face showed more torment than hers, which was frozen. Behind them, in Puritan civil garb as before, paced the rest of the escort, and a hired interpreter.

Frenchmen—mariners, dock wallopers, ferriers, hawkers, chandlers—bustling between high buildings and bare masts, stared at the party but did not interfere. There was too much else to do; here odors of salt and tar blent with those of spices, corn, lumber, dried fish and fruit, all the produce of the Midworld lands. The hot air racketed.

Abruptly Barker exclaimed, then Jennifer screamed. He dropped his hold as if burnt by an incandescence of her ring. Its colors fountained and coruscated, brighter than day. Shouts and callings upon God lifted from the other men.

The girl whirled and ran. Barker yelped an incoherent order and hastened after her. She could outdistance him, but not the four soldiers who collected their wits and pounded in pursuit. Indignation boiled from people thrust aside. In yards, the Englishmen were caught up to Jennifer.

Hands clamped. She wailed like a wildcat, writhed, tugged till cloth ripped beneath fingers. When she could not break free, she turned around to claw, kick, and bite. The Roundheads lost blood here and there before they got her down on the paving.

Their companions arrived, having made a way through the crowd. Most formed a circle, as much to hide what went on as to keep off the French. Sword-of-the-Lord flung himself on his knees beside Jennifer.

She had gone limp, half conscious. Barker knelt likewise, to blurt a quick prayer and take her left arm. The jewel had dimmed a little. He moved her hand around. The brilliance heightened afresh. As it chanced, no ship was tied up at this immediate spot; but not far out, one lay anchored. When pointed straight that way, the ring fairly flamed.

It was no more intense than the triumph on Barker’s countenance. Nevertheless he was careful to tuck the hand with the sigil under a fold of her skirt, before he got up to treat with the guards who approached.

It was considerably larger and more luxurious than the one assigned Rupert: furnished almost like a chamber ashore, save for brass chains to secure chairs, and with an inner door now shut. Long light from the west filtered past curtains to where Duchess Belinda paced.

The opening of the outer door brought her to a halt. Nina Valdes entered. “La senora—” the maid began.

Belinda interrupted. “Nay, speak English, and speak low. Make fast that latch; come hither, nigh to me.”

(Nina did. ) “I’ve summoned thee to talk in confidence, and would not risk some sailor overhears.”

“El duque—” the girl began. “Ees my lord the Duke—”

“Asleep.” Belinda’s nod toward the adjacent room held scorn.

“Ah, so.” The maid waited with a docility her eyes belied.

Belinda started pacing agin. “However steep the cliff of rank between us, Nina, Eve’s our common mother.

I’ve always found thee trusty, and I hope thou hast in turn found me appreciative.”

“My lady ees most sweet and generous.” The tone anticipated.

“Unlike too many, I have never sought to regulate my servants’ private lives. That’s for their consciences and their confessors. Yet I’m not blind. Thou art a woman grown, albeit young; there’s Moorish blood in thee; thou seekest places where I dare not go, to find adventures I may merely dream; and… well, it is no decorous example… but am I right, suspecting thou hast means, besides plain chastity, to keep thee slender?”

The girl hesitated only a blink before answering. “Some Casbah traders do sell theengs, your Grace.”

“Love philters?” broke from the duchess.

Not altogether surprised, Nina still maintained, “I would not know of such.”

“Oh, come!” Belinda stopped before her, though she must muster will to continue: “Nay, I mean no insult to thee. Thou art quite charming, and most times I grant that thou wilt have no need of artifice. And yet—I am not blind—I saw in England, there where they like their woman tall, slim, blond, and thou wert but another servant wench, and foreign and a Catholic to boot… I saw how thou mad’st conquest after conquest.

Thou’rt going home with a substantial nest-egg, garnered from thine admirers, even though the English are a cold and stingy race.” In haste: “Mistake me not! I make no accusation. I do not speak of witchcraft or the like, but simply wonder if… perchance… devices… as lawful as perfume or talc or rouge—”

Nina smiled, and began to trail the hook which had been baited by the fish. “Bueno—but oh, eet ees eemposseeble my lovely lady would’ave call for more than nature’as so bountifully geeven.”

“The duke is old,” Belinda said.

“I understand, your Grace. And… eet would be a Chreestian deed, not so, to’elp’eem to a son by’ees last wife?”

“A well-rewarded deed, I promise thee.”

“I know my lady would be kind. Alas! I’ave no mageec I can offer’er. When strength ees gone—”

“Desire upraises strength.”

The maid nodded. “There ees a musk the Casbash grannies make. Eet ees not mageec… but eet steemulates.” She lowered her lashes. “ ’Ow strong eet steemulates, I dare not say. Eet weell not by eetseelf turn men to bulls. But eef, m-m, there ees any lust to start weeth—’eld back by weariness or… een’eebeetion—”

Belinda seized her arms. “What then, what then?”

Having gotten the hook in, Nina played it. “I cannot promeese aught. ’Ees Grace eendeed ees vairy old and tired.” Deliberately: “Of course, a younger, stronger man,’eld back by an exaggerated sense of honor—a man in’oom desire’as been aroused by celibacy and by… weetnesseeng—’oo, left to nature, would reseest forever—aye, such a man, eef caught all unsuspecteeng, might find’ees senses overw’elm’ees sense.”

She drove the hook firmly home. “But such ees not’ees Grace the Duke.”

“I know,” Belinda said. “And yet my wifely duty is to try.”

Nina grinned and pulled the line in. “True, true, my lady. I weell stay deescreet w’ataiver’appens.”

“Then you have a philter?” Belinda cried.

This time it was the younger woman who cautioned quietness. “A musk, weeth subtle’erbs and flower juices. Maybe some spells were said o’er eet as well. Eet ees a strong perfume the woman wears.” She sighed. “Alas,’tees vairy, vairy costly, too. I only’ave a leetle of eet left and am not sure I aiver can find more.”

“I’d make it worth thy while,” Belinda whispered, “especially if it succeeds.”

“Pray, let me theenk on eet. I am not sure I should, my lady, though of course your weesh ees my command.”

Belinda nodded. “Aye, go. We’d best not closet us o’erlong like this.”

The maid curtsied and departed. When the door had closed again behind her, the duchess added to herself: “But soon I’ll deal for one poor dram of bliss.”

Eventide filled a glassless window, wherein a roof opposite stood black against the darkening greenish sky.

Scant light entered the chamber. It was tiny, bare planks and mildewed plaster enclosing no more than a bed, a chair, and a washstand. From the courtyard beneath came a clash of hoofs, rumble of wheels, weary day’s-end voices.

The door opened. A hand shoved Jennifer through. “Get in there with thee, witch, and bide the night!”

Nobah Barker shrilled. She stumbled, nearly falling.

“Sir, we’ve no need for roughness,” protested Sword-of-the-Lord. His companions in the hallway shifted their feet and muttered.

“Haven’t we?” Barker replied. “Thou saw’st her struggle when her ring flared bright—the ring that hell bestowed—upon the wharf.” Louder: “No supper for thee, witch! Unruliness, if not a demon, may be fasted out.”

Head high, she showed them her back.

“Oh, sir, I pray you, let me speak with her,” Sword-of-the-Lord said. “It may be I can ease her once again.”

“Thou boasted thou hadst tamed her—till today,” Barker sniffed. “Well, try it if thou wilt. The rest of us will go to supper and well-earned repose.”

“Do thou stand guard outside the door, Uriah,” ordered Righteous Gerson. “When we have eaten, Increase will relieve thee. And best we post a sentry in the courtyard. Who knows but what she might get help that way? Jashubilehem first; I’ll be the next… Be sure, my brother, that thou tak’st the ring along when thou’st despaired.”

“Why not at once?” Barker inquired.

“She’ll fight and scream, sir,’less someone persuade her,” Righteous opined. “Belike he can. These Frenchies of Marseilles are mulish anti-Protestants, I’ve seen, and might make tumult an excuse to plague us.”

Barker’s head jerked assent. Sword-of-the-Lord stepped into the room. The door clapped shut. Boots thudded in departure.

Jennifer stood at the window. He came behind her and said in misery, “Oh, did they hurt thee very much, my lady? Why didst thou try to break away from them? It only earned thee cruel blows and wrenchings. I strove to make them kinder… but the fear when suddenly the jewel was a beacon, there on the waterfront, did madden them.”

“What happened afterward?” she replied in a small, parched voice, not looking at him. In shadowiness, against a torn and stained dark gown, only her hair, which had fallen loose, and the ring had any real light to them; and the asp stone showed now no special brilliance.

“Thou didst not see? Ah, nay. I saw thee on the cobblestones, alone beneath a hundred Frenchmen’s eyes, except for me and… and thy pain and grief.”

She nodded. “I didn’t really hear what happened next.”

“How art thou?”

“I’m recovered in the flesh. If thou wouldst give a little balm, speak on.”

“Well—” He plunged into it. “Nobah Barker mightily exulted. This was the very thing for which he’d hoped, the ring to point a trail to our great prey. That’s why we walked the dockside, for a clue of the same kind that Rupert might well seek. If help for him lies southward in the sea—

“Our leader reasoned that the ship nearby in some wise must be fateful for the search.’Twas a… chebeck… not docked, but out at anchor, its tender solely moored against the pier, to save a wharfage fee, as we discovered. When we had satisfied the French police that thou hadst had an epileptic fit, and all the people’round us had dispersed—through our interpreter, we found the captain. Meanwhile thou lay all mute where we had borne thee—”

The sound of his hurt on her account forced Jennifer to admit, “I mostly was malingering, to spare myself from being further used. Tell on.”

“I did not voice my hope that was the case,” he said, a shade less unhappily. “The captain is the owner too, a scoundrel quite willing to hire out at no large sum despite not being told what we intend. That seems an omen to inspirit us. For Barker’s learned, from English factors here who have connection to Sir Malachi, that naught has yet been seen or heard of Rupert. Therefore he scarcely can have raised a troop, and we’re enough to take him, scandal-free,” he ended in a rush.

“Speak for thyself,” she said bitterly. “ ’Tis no good sign for me.”

“Oh, Jennifer,” he pleaded, “have I not told thee how we are no monsters, simply common men who love their land too much to let it rot?”

“Thou’st spoken better sense, in brighter words, than thy companions: even made me smile,” she agreed. “I was right thankful for a beam of light that fell when sunniness passed overhead—but couldn’t climb out of my pit thereon. And now the very stars are being snuffed.” She leaned palms on windowsill, face into the air. The yard below was becoming a pool of murk. “There may well be some rightness in thy cause. It was mine own, I thought until of late, and many of its folk are dear to me. It hurts to hurt them by my stubbornness. I’m ignorant, the merest fisher lass, quite lost among the ins and outs of this. What may the will of God be? I can’t say.”

She turned, regarded his twilit countenance, and finished contritely: “I’m sorry that my heart has run away.”

Her hands reached to give his a brief embrace. And the ring exploded into light.

He lurched back with a cry. A lifted arm sought to shield his eyes. And yet the many-colored radiance which poured forth was not fiery. It filled the room like a benediction spoken in rainbows.

“The kindled sign—O Rupert, art thou nigh?” Even as she whispered, Jennifer muffled it in a fold of her dress. Fearfully she scanned out the opening. If anyone stood beneath, the flash had been too short to notice. She hastened into a far corner. “Keep silent, friend, dear friend, call not for help.”

He had drawn blade. “The sigil’s come awake,” he said wildly. “What may it mean?”

“No harm. Thou suffered’st none today. Not so?” A quaking went through her. She fought it down, lifted her head and beckoned. “Come hither to me, Sword-of-the-Lord,” she said in a strange tone. “Fear not.”

He let his steel sink and walked stiff-legged. She spread her skirt to screen off the glow. Her ankles shocked him out of his first dread of witchcraft. Slowly, her left arm rose. When she pointed straight at him, the jewel rioted.

“Thou art my luck,” she said. “The fire-gem shines for thee. I’ll lay it on my breast beside thy name.”

Cautiously she slipped the ring off her finger and down the front of her dress. The least light seeped out through cloth, up past bosom, to make throat, eyes, tumbled tawny hair stand forth against a dusk which seemed to have become nearly full night though sunset tarried still above roofs.

“I—thy fortune?” His weapon clattered to the floor. “How? I’ve tried and failed. I’d spend this penny life of mine to buy the gold of one hour’s joy for Jennifer, but thou’rt too steadfast in thine angry grief.”

“I think the ring’s reflecting from thy soul,” she said. This time she took his hands. They lay big and helpless in hers. “And here at last a chance has come for thee.”

“To do what thing, my lady?” His voice cracked across.

“Set me free.”

“Nay!” He seemed to make an effort to break loose. She held him. “That’s impossible. Mine oath, my duty—”

Then she did let him go. “Indeed.” Her words grew regretful, almost caressing. “I ought to understand a pledge. Believe me that I do, and care for thee, and merely wish that we might both have stood on one side of the wall they’ve built between us. Goodnight, dear Sword-of-the-Lord. Remember me.”

“What dost thou mean?” he asked, terrified.

“Thou, being loyal, must know loyalty,” she explained as if to a well-loved child. “Wouldst thou be gladly made into a thing that hunts its master down the selfsame link of plighted faith which binds them? Nor will I.”

“What canst thou do?”

“This world has many doors, and resolution is their single key.” (He uttered a noise. ) “A sudden leap o’erboard, with emptied lungs; a poniard snatched for briefest borrowing; self-strangulation on a bit of food”—Jennifer smiled—“though that’s not pretty—better, some dark night, to bite my tongue in two and then wait quiet… Should one way fail, there’s hundreds more to try.”

He stood appalled. She stroked his cheek. “Do not think ill of me for this, my sweet,” she said.

“Someday, when thou hast had thy fill of earth, it may be we shall meet in Paradise and shake our heads and share a moment’s laughter, half jesting and half sad, at this night’s youth.”

“No heaven for self-murderers, but hell,” wrenched from him.

“I think not in this case—”

“Thou’rt wrong, forever!”

“Where’er the door may lead, I’ll open it.” Jennifer sighed. “ ’Tis true, the key is cold and hard to lift.

Therefore goodnight. Go. Leave me here to pray.”

“To pray for strength in sin? I could not stir.”

She said like a slap: “If thou must cumber me, at least keep still.” In a few steps she crossed to the narrow cot and knelt beside it. Straw ticking rustled at her touch.

He stood for a moment, stumbled about for a moment, until he cried: “Nay, cease it, stop this horror, Jennifer! I’ll aid thee—oh, I will, I will, I will!” He fell likewise to his knees, buried face in hands, and wept with unpracticed roughness.

She came to him, drew his head onto her breast, smoothed his hair, and murmured. He clung to her. “I knew thou wouldst,” she said after a while, “less from the ring than thee.”

“It is… the lesser sin… to save thy soul,” he hiccoughed.

“Speak soft,” she warned.

He withdrew to hunker before her and ask forlornly, “How can I bring thee past the watch?”

Her speech flew sharp. “I’ve thought on this, as prisoners are wont. Go out and tell the sentry that it seems I’m near repentance—’twill explain thy tears—and thou wouldst fetch thy Bible for its power. Bring back as well, though hidden, from thy chest a suit of thine own clothes; I’m near thy size. I’ll don it. Then—oh, quickly, ere the moonrise!—let me down from this window to the court. Its guard, I’ve seen, stands not below the house but at the portal. Given ample gloom, I can be lowered nigh invisibly. But hasten!”

His mind set, he sprang up. “In thy service, lady mine.” The words were bombast; the readiness wherewith he took back his sword and left the room were not.

From the floor, Jennifer gazed after him. The ring-light glinted off tears of her own. “Oh, hard it is to use him heartlessly,” she mourned, “and from its grave call forth knight-errantry.”

Bells began pealing. She started. The Angelus, she thought. Here in thy land of France wilt thou hear my confession, Mother Mary?

She bowed head over close-locked hands. “I marked him for mine own. I know not how. Some fisher lads who paid some timid calls, a London’prentice winking in the street: what more knew I of men, or they of me? I thought I saw a glint in Rupert’s glance, then dared not think it of the prince, the prince. But this poor chick—My skill affrighted me. I widened eyes at his vast earnestness, then shyly fluttered them, and sighed a bit; let fingers linger when he helped dismount; drew breath and held it for to flush my cheek and swell my bosom… whilst I crouched alert. Tonight the ring has said there is a chance, and so I hauled him in, struck home the gaff, and mean to leave him gasping on the strand… Is it a deadly sin if done for Rupert? I fear it is. My sin, my sin, not his.”

She crossed herself, and remained for a time huddled silent.

The door opened. She glimpsed her guard outside, then Sword-of-the-Lord closed it again. His lungs labored but he moved fast. A moment he took to kiss the Book he bore and lay it on the bed. Jennifer had jumped erect. “I wear two suits of clothes, one’neath the next,” he told her. “Be not alarmed when I take off the first.”

She had to giggle.

After he had removed shoes—drawing from his wallet a pair for her—and the outer tunic, shirt, breeches, stockings: he swung about and threw an arm across his eyes as if this were a game of hide-and-seek.

“Upon mine honor, lady, I’ll not look,” he said, hoarse with embarrassment.

She laughed low and touched lips to his, which almost felled him. “Why, in this darkness I’m a simple blob.” she said. He held his stance.

As she undressed and reclad herself behind his back, she continued: “I’ve bethought me of thy safety—”

“Will I not join thee?” he asked, dismayed.

“ ’Tis better not. Truly. We’d have to set a rendezvous, and who knows how I must dodge about? Besides, thy disappearance—ye men share a room, don’t ye?—’twould rouse quick suspicion and chase. Nay, come forth churned—thou’rt no actor—to say I refused thy ministrations after all, as if my possessor had twinned. Take to thy bed as if in sorrow o’er it. They’ll question thee in the morning, of course. Say what thou wilt—the truth may be best—but declare I bewitched thee till none could ha’ known what went on. They like thee well, I’ve marked, no matter how they bait thee. Fain’ll they believe, and take the blame themselves for leaving an innocent boy thus alone with a sorceress.”

“I more than half believe the thing myself,” he mumbled.

Me too, she thought. I ne’er have felt this giddiness, this swerve and swoop upon a tingling wind, save when with Rupert, and mayhap not then. Is’t but I have no time to be afraid?

“I can’t let thee flee alone!” he said. “Where’lt thou go? Who’ll protect thee?”

“I’ve thought of the English consulate. Belike’tis Royalist, especially here in Marseilles. If not, there’ll be Royalists elsewhere about. Remember, I know a bit o’ French, to ask my way and—Curse whoever made men’s clothes! Every single button in the wrong place. Wilt thou help?… Nay, don’t tremble. I’m learning how… Ah. Behold thy boy companion, Sword-of-the-Lord.”

Jennifer moved to the window, where some light remained. The first stars were twinkling forth. He could see that his clothes hung baggy on her, which served to hide the curves beneath. A shining caught his eye.

“Thy hair,” he said frantically. “I couldn’t well bring a hat along, indoors, and forgot—”

“I didn’t. Thou hast thy steel. I’ve never doubted thou keepest the edge keen.”

“What? Oh, nay, I beg thee!”

“Haggle these locks off short. They’ll grow back on a live scalp.’Tis false what’s said about corpses: anyhow, if they fried at the stake.”

He winced, took up the blade he had removed with his outer garb, and obeyed her. Then he stood dumb by starlight, holding the tresses to him.

She grinned from beneath the ragged cut. “So at last thou’st made a Roundhead of me,” she said. “I ought to stroll right by their man in the gateway, if he doesn’t converse.” With a glance at the roof-top opposite, and its chimney starting to show silver:’That’s if I’m begone in the next few minutes. Full moon this night.”

“And what abroad beneath it?” He shuddered. “Merely me. And… aye, thy love. Let it not live too long.

Thou hast a life before thee, dear.” She gave him a real kiss on the mouth. “Farewell.”

In a single movement he dropped her shorn hair, caught her wrists, upheld her as she wriggled onto the sill, and lowered her down the wall. She had less than a yard to go when he released her. Already the blackness had taken her from his sight. Hanging out the window, he heard soles hit stones. Was a word blown upward to him? He couldn’t tell. She was gone. He dragged himself back to stand alone in the room.