The Plague Tales

by Ann Benson

  “But we shall bear what we know,” she said softly, “for this is the world in which we must live, not the one we have just left. And look about you. Do you not see beauty here? Consider the beauty of this rain.” She extended her hand to catch a few drops. “I need only hold my hand out and soon I shall have enough to drink. Sweet rain to cool my thirst.”

  “It is a cold rain.”

  “It is a gift from God, Who would have us know the trees and flowers that even a cold rain brings us.”

  “It is autumn, and you have said it grows cold here. I begin to feel it for myself. Will the trees and flowers not turn brown soon?”

  “Only to be born again in green with the spring.”

  “But why must everything wither and die?”

  She shrugged. “Your questions are beyond my simple ken. Surely you would do better to consult a philosopher or a priest on such divine matters. But I will tell you what I have always believed. Things wither and die before us so we may better savor that we live.”

  But Alejandro would not be comforted. To him England was a cruel, forbidding, unwelcoming place. He no longer knew where his home was, or to whom his allegiance belonged. To King Edward he was the pope’s spy, cloaked in the guise of physician, yet to the pope he was a Spaniard to be toyed with, one who could be counted on to annoy the English royalty as much as he protected them. “Now I have the promise of a cure,” he said, “but it comes from a place that seems unreal, not of this world, and from a woman who could not be more unlike the other healers I have known. I bring it from the pale, but I must use it in the darkness. And who knows if it will even work! A fortnight’s delay in dying does not necessarily make a cure.”

  Adele said quietly, “It will work if it is God’s will for it to work.”

  With anger in his voice Alejandro said, “I curse God’s will. All around us lie His Victims.”

  She reached out and took one of his hands. Squeezing it gently, she said, “Curse it you may, but you will never change it. Things die because it is God’s will that they should.” She nodded in the direction of their destination and said, “Let us hope that it is God’s will that we get to Kate before He reaches down to claim her.” Without another word she rode off, with Alejandro close behind.

  They were admitted to the house by the same servant, whose expression was even more grave than before. “Come in quickly,” she said. “Mother Sarah is here! The very one you rode out to see. Had I known she was on her way already, I would not have sent you out to seek her. To have ridden all that way for naught, when she arrived right after ye left! Can you forgive this poor ignorant wench?”

  Alejandro looked at her with genuine bewilderment. “Foolish woman,” he said, “what are these inane mutterings?”

  “As I’ve told you, Mother Sarah is here!” she said. “She arrived not a piddle’s time after you left. I’ve been cursing myself since, and I hope you’ll not whip me.”

  With their riding cloaks dripping on the wide planks of the entry floor, Adele and Alejandro exchanged confused looks.

  “How long has she been here?” he asked the servant.

  The servant peered at him suspiciously; “Did ye not hear me, sir? Since shortly after you rode out to seek her, I said.”

  He looked at her in shock and disbelief. The servant mistook his expression for anger and continued her pathetic confession of ineptitude. “Oh, forgive me, sir! I didn’t mean to speak so harshly. And now the Mother is saying I’m a simpleton for missing some doses of medicine! The lady refused to drink that yellow swill, and who can blame her? It smells of death itself and would never cross my lips, even for the saving of my soul! Such foulness has never been kept in a vial, for the vial itself would break from the revulsion of containing it.”

  Completely confused, Alejandro looked around for Kate, remembering the old woman’s dire prophecy. “Where is the child?” he growled.

  “Why, she’s within, as is the Mother, who attends my lady.”

  Alejandro pushed roughly past her, followed closely by Adele. They rushed into the bedchamber, not knowing what to expect. There they saw a ragged figure bent over the bed, upon which lay the thin remnants of a once beautiful woman. The child stood against the far wall with a cloth in her hand, her herbal mask discarded, her eyes red and swollen. Upon seeing Alejandro and Adele she bolted away from the wall and threw herself, sobbing, into their mutual embrace.

  “Oh, Blessed Virgin be praised that you are here! I am so afraid!”

  The physician comforted her as well as he could. God curse the king for ordering this travesty to take place! His conscience be damned, as it well deserves to be! He said to the little girl, “Find your strength, for you must tell me what has taken place in our absence.… Who is this hag attending your mother now?”

  She sniffled as she composed herself. “Why, this is no hag, but the midwife!” she protested. “This is the Mother Sarah!”

  This cannot be! Alejandro’s thoughts raced wildly. She cannot have left her cottage after we did, only to arrive here before us.…

  He stood up, leaving Adele in the corner with Kate in her arms. “Woman, turn around and let me see your face,” he ordered.

  Briefly glancing over her shoulder, the crone said impatiently, “Physician, do not order me about as you would some common underling. I am not your apprentice. If things were as they should be in the natural order, you would be apprenticed to me.” She shuffled forward toward the head of the bed. “Sadly, the natural order has been disrupted of late. Now, I have important work here! If you cannot be helpful, take care not to get in the way!”

  “This can’t be,” he cried again in disbelief. “We left Mother Sarah at her cottage and came directly here. No one overtook us on the way!”

  The bent grimalkin slowly turned away from her work and faced the physician. He studied her closely. It was the same lined and ancient face, the face of a thousand years’ wisdom.

  “You must always expect the unexpected,” she said, shaking her finger in his face.

  Stunned by her repetition of the remark he had heard so recently, he peered closely at her wrinkled features, searching for some reason to discount the likeness. She stared back at him, overpowering him with the strength and steadfastness of her gaze. With a knowing smile she said, “Now, if you wish to learn, watch closely here. You will see these things nowhere else.”

  Shocked though he was by her presence, for he could not believe that she had traveled so quickly, he did as he was told. He came around to the side of the bed and looked more closely at the helpless patient and saw the telltale blue and black blotches on her swollen neck. She is near to death, he thought; yet she has lived so long with the affliction.…

  “There is not much time now,” she said quietly. “The stupid wench I trusted to care for her has allowed the lady to pass over dosages of a critical tincture, and now I must use all my skills to undo the damage. Be prepared to assist me!”

  The voice, the stance, the clothing, they were as like to those of the woman at the stone cottage as was the face. He had no choice but to believe that she was the same woman. Flustered, he said, “What would you have me do? I will do anything.”

  From a nearby tray she took a long reed filled with powdered yellow stone, and gave it to him. “Hold this to the candle,” she said, “but be sure to keep it at arm’s length. Set it in the hole of that stone.” She pointed to a flat gray rock resting on a small table.

  He did as she directed, and immediately the room was lit by a blue-white sparkling flame. The light it gave was harsh, and as the blue fingers of flame sputtered out from the tip of the reed, shadows danced eerily. The odor of rotten eggs again filled the air.

  He came back to the bedside, and watched as the old woman began a droning chant in a language he had never heard before. He thought it sounded like English, or some combination of that rough language and one containing more Latin, but he could not really understand.

  Adele cradled Kate in her arms and w
atched intently, stupefied by what she was seeing. So stunned was she that she almost failed to hear Alejandro’s urgent plea. “Adele! Please, if you can understand what she is saying, try to remember for me.… I will recall her motions later. Please recall her words for me!”

  “I will!” she said, hugging the child closer.

  Mother Sarah addressed each of Kate’s mother’s symptoms in turn. “Three crumbs of a crust baked on Good Friday last, to solid up the bowels.” She broke three small clumps off a nearly petrified crust of bread and laid them on the lady’s lips.

  From a small vial she dripped seven drops of a milky fluid on the lady’s forehead. “The balm of Gilead, as rare as the gift from Sheba to Solomon.” Alejandro recognized three words from the Torah, and though he did not comprehend the remainder of her invocation, he knew this ritual, for it had been used for centuries by Jewish physicians to treat digestive and melancholy disorders. How had she come by this knowledge?

  “A coin of gold, placed in the hand, to buy back the health from the devil.” The old woman pried open the lady’s clenched fingers and closed them again around the coin.

  “The blood of the lamb, to ward off the pest, marked upon the lintel as in ancient Egypt.” Mother Sarah dipped her thumb in a small bowl of bright red fluid, then smeared the headboard of the bed with a long streak of the substance.

  Now the old woman held the shell of a walnut in her hand, and passed her other hand over it in slow circular motions as she whispered indecipherable chants. She placed the shell on the lady’s abdomen and lifted the upper half, revealing a large black spider with a white diamond on its back. The confused creature scampered immediately toward the lady’s chest and quickly disappeared under the bedclothes. Watching from the corner, Adele crossed herself again and grimaced, and Kate cried out, each one imagining how it would feel to have the furry-legged black thing crawling on her own chest.

  Then the old woman bent stiffly and retrieved a small package that had been resting by her feet. The small brown sack was tied with a cord dirtied by many openings. Onto a nearby board she poured out a small pile of a grainy grayish powder. Pinching a quantity between her fingers, she said, “A knuckle’s worth.” She sifted it from her fingers into a small bowl. Then she picked up a vial and said, “Half of a cupped hand.” She poured some of the yellowish water into her cupped hand and allowed it to drip into the bowl containing the powder. Mixing the two together carefully, she made a disagreeable gray-green slurry, which gave off a musty odor and would not be welcomed by even the most desperate patient.

  First she dipped her finger in the potion, and smeared a small quantity on the lady’s forehead, then she ladled the rest into the objecting patient’s mouth. Even in her state of great weakness the lady attempted to spit the foul mixture back out again, but the old woman covered her mouth with surprising strength, forcing the lady to ingest the medicine. The weak patient swallowed, then resumed her irregular panting.

  Mother Sarah gently wiped the sweat, off the patient’s cheeks and the dribble from her chin. “Soon we shall be through, and you can rest again,” she cooed reassuringly. She slipped a silver ring on the finger of the gasping patient, intoning, “A ring made from pennies begged by lepers!”

  Then with a sigh of resignation Mother Sarah pulled the last of her implements out of her satchel. A small woven strip of red cloth, much like a ribbon, was folded once to form a small loop with a crossed tail, and pinned to the nightdress over the patient’s heart. “To ward off the spirit of the plague maiden,” she said, “who fears the color of blood and will not disturb a heart protected by its wearing.”

  Finally the old woman collapsed into a nearby chair, depleted and exhausted from her efforts to cure her failing patient. She did not move or make a sound for many minutes; even her breathing was so shallow as to be barely noticeable.

  Alejandro shook the old woman’s arm gently. So motionless was her trance that he feared she might have diverted death onto herself from the lady. But her eyes fluttered open, and she righted herself in the chair.

  “I can do no more,” she said. “Now we must pray.”

  And so they prayed, each in the way of his or her custom, for the lady’s recovery. But as the sun lowered in the sky, it became plain to all that the spirit of the Plague Maiden had not been dispelled. The lady began her journey to the other side of life. Her eyelids began to flutter and her gaze shifted around the room.

  The physician knew there was no focus to her gaze, much as the loved ones would like to imagine, and that the patient had little control over herself. He was not surprised when she pulled her legs up near her body as would an infant and lay on her side in a huddled pose, as if protecting her plague-distended belly. He heard her gasp in one last breath, and then saw that she was still, her unseeing eyes staring out from between her slightly parted lids.

  In keeping with the local custom Mother Sarah closed the woman’s eyes and placed a penny on each one.

  Kate, sobbing uncontrollably, her small body completely enfolded in Adele’s arms, cried out, “Mama!” with pitiful grief and anguish. Alejandro was about to wrap the bedclothes about the dead woman’s body, but Kate begged him to stop.

  “Please, Physician, let me kiss her one more time.”

  Kneeling down and holding her by the arms, he said gently, “I cannot, child, for the contagion may pass from her lips to yours.”

  But her pitiful and plaintive expression was more than he could bear. He watched as she wiped away her tears one more time with the cloth he had given her.

  “Kate, kiss your handkerchief,” he said.

  Between her hitches and sobs she said, “But why?”

  “I will show you.”

  She wiped her eyes one more time and then kissed the cloth.

  “Now give it to me.”

  He reached out with her small hand and placed it in his larger one. He smiled reassuringly and stroked her hair. Then he rose up from his crouch and went to the bedside. He touched the handkerchief to the dead woman’s lips, then tucked it into her hand.

  “Now she will take your kiss with her into all of eternity.”

  Alejandro stood by, fidgeting impatiently, and watched as Mother Sarah splashed cool water against the wrinkled skin of her face and neck again and again, trying to remove the foulness that had settled into her pores during the failed ritual of healing.

  Still bent over the basin, she turned her head toward him and said, “Would you not allow an old woman a moment’s respite?”

  “I would question you about—”

  “Aye, I know, there is much you wish to ask me.” Water dripped from her face and hands and she wiped them dry on her apron, sighing deeply. “Very well,” she said. “You have my attention now.”

  “What I wish to know first is how—”

  “Is how it is that you could ride on horses from my home while I stood and watched you leave, and then, horseless myself, arrived here before you?”

  “Yes!”

  “In truth, young man, it did not happen that way.”

  “But I saw it with my own eyes, as did my companion.… Adele!” he called.

  She came from the next room with Kate in her arms.

  “Please tell this woman what we saw.”

  “Alejandro, the child …” she said, concern on her face. “I would not have her hear this. It is blasphemy!”

  He took Kate from Adele and handed her to the servant, who took the child away. With Kate safely out of earshot Adele related the events of their earlier ride to the old woman.

  “You did not see me pass as you first rode out?”

  Alejandro and Adele looked at each other. Adele shrugged, and Alejandro said, “I do not recall seeing a woman such as yourself.”

  “But there were travelers on the road, were there not?” the old woman said.

  “There were,” he said almost angrily, “but none such as yourself!”

  “In my years of treating those with disorders of both the
body and soul, I have known many people who see what they wish to see, in total disregard of what is actually before them. It must have been powerfully important to you to see me in that glade today, or surely you would have seen that the house and clearing were quite empty.”

  “Woman, I assure you,” he responded, his anger now unbridled, “that my soul, body, and mind are all equally sound and I have no doubt that you were there at that cottage, as my companion has verified.”

  He waited for her to respond, but she simply remained silent, her hands folded across her ample bosom.

  “Well? What have you to say now?”

  “I have to say, impertinent stripling, that though I do not doubt you believe your tale to be true, it is in actuality your recollection of a most pleasing dream. How can one be sure that your weary minds did not conjure up the entire occurrence, simply for the joy of having something wondrous to contemplate in these trying days?”

  “I have brought out the things you gave me, the medicines—”

  “—which you cannot say for sure that you acquired from me …”

  Exasperated by her repeated denials, Alejandro threw up his hands. He paced restlessly around the small room, muttering to himself. Finally he said to her, his voice bitter with disappointment, “Then at least let me understand why your efforts failed to save the life of the lady. By the telling of the servant, she had lived with the affliction for over a fortnight! This is remarkable. I have never seen such success. What went wrong in the final hours? I must know!”

  The old woman sat down, and breathed a deep sigh before answering. “Physician, do you ever use your skills on a patient who cannot possibly survive?”

  He said nothing, but his thoughts went instantly to Carlos Alderón’s slow wasting.

  “Aye, I thought you might have,” she said, recognizing his shamed look. “Your eyes betray you, though you cannot speak of it.”

  He hung his head and said, “You are right. I have made such wasted treatments.”

  Her voice grew gentler and more soothing. “Never consider those treatments wasted, for their effect on the living is of far greater consequence. If I simply walked away from this lady today, my disregard for those who cherished her would have been as deadly to them as the plague itself. I will not take away the hope of a child. But I would be lying if I claimed to have a cure. I have long delayed the dying, but a cure eludes me.”