The Physician's Tale

by Ann Benson

  Through the haze of her shock, she heard Kristina asking, Janie, are you all right? Evan’s voice, also in a thick fog, was spewing out vilifications to the dead cat. Off in the distance she heard the nervous whinnies of their horses as they pranced in fear. Janie was aware of breathing, then exhaling, then trembling. Welcome hands drew her upright.

  As if in a trance, she walked through the woods with Evan and Kristina on either side supporting her by the arms. Three steps shy of Jellybean, she doubled over and vomited.

  “That’s good,” Kristina said, rubbing circles on Janie’s back. “You’ll feel better now.”

  Evan held an open canteen in front of her. “Here. Take a drink.”

  She drank and then spat out the bitter taste of terror that coated the inside of her mouth. Then she pulled her shirt aside and looked at the cat-scratch wound. “I’m all right,” she said. She touched the red rips in her skin; they didn’t hurt much yet. Later would be another matter. “At least I think I am.” She looked back into the woods in the direction of the incident. “Let’s get out of here.”

  Once she was up on Jellybean’s back, she pulled back her clothes and tried to look at her shoulder again. Blood oozed from the scratches; she opened their medical-supply case and took out the bottle of alcohol. With the hem of her shirt, she dabbed the stinging disinfectant on the rips in her flesh, wincing as the cold alcohol hit the cuts.

  To Evan’s and Kristina’s worried looks, she said, “I’ll live.” She pointed to the carcass draped over the back of Evan’s saddle. “But that guy’s my next hat.”

  “Big cat,” Kristina said. “My God, Janie, he could have really hurt you.”

  “Or worse,” Janie said. She looked closer; the cat was a female, with pendulous teats. Somewhere in the forest, cougar kittens would starve, but that was the natural order of things.

  Without that knife, Janie thought, I would be cat food right now. “Maybe we should just leave her here.”

  “That’s up to you,” Evan said. “But it’s a nice piece of fur. I’ll skin her for you.”

  She reached for the reins and winced at the pain it caused. “I think I’d probably enjoy doing that myself,” Janie said. “But, okay, you can skin her.”

  They went back out to the dirt shoulder and were quickly on their way to Orange again. Their pace was quite a bit faster.

  That afternoon, as Janie tended to her wound, Kristina set up her small pharmacy and began taking blood samples from everyone in Orange.

  When Janie found her, she was just finishing the task of organizing the vials in a leather case.

  “You’ll have some lab work to do when we get back,” Janie said.

  Assuming you go back with me, Janie thought as she watched Kristina leave the room in search of Evan. Once again, she wondered what Tom was thinking of all this. They hadn’t spoken much before she left; the effects of their heated exchange lingered. And when they did speak, he hadn’t mentioned Evan.

  “You’ll get over it,” she whispered aloud. “And everything else too.”

  “What?”

  She turned to see Lany standing in the doorway.

  “Oh, I was just muttering to myself.”

  “You do that too, huh?”

  “It’s age,” Janie said to the woman, who was younger than she, but not by all that much. “This is what you have to look forward to.”

  “As long as I keep having something to look forward to,” Lany said. They chatted amicably for a few moments about this and that, until one of the Orange children interrupted them.

  “There’s e-mail,” the little boy said.

  “Probably from Alex,” Janie said. “I told him he could write to me while I’m here.”

  But when they got to the computer, the return address was not the familiar doc@orangecommunity.net.

  From: director@doubledelta32.org

  Janie looked closer, her eyes narrowing as she read the message address.

  To: cop@orangecommunity.net

  “How did he—they—whoever—get this address?”

  Evan arrived with Kristina, just in time to hear the question. “They send out electronic feelers, basically,” he said. “They mine addresses, literally from the airwaves. We’re wireless, so anyone who can hone in on the signal can pick up what’s being said, if we don’t encrypt it.”

  “Maybe we shouldn’t read any of them,” Kristina said. “If we just ignore them…”

  “I think we should read them,” Lany said. “Know thine enemy still means something. But if I had to guess, I’d say these aren’t enemies. So…”

  She clicked on the message with the mouse; it opened. She leaned closer and read each word carefully. Everyone waited eagerly for her report on the content, to see if it was, as they all feared, an electronic version of Pandora’s box.

  “This is really strange,” she said when she finished reading. “We’re being invited to a meeting of ‘double deltas,’ whatever that means.”

  She turned and looked at the gathered listeners. “Does anyone know what double deltas are?”

  For a moment no one said anything, until Kristina said, “I do.”

  All eyes were upon her, expectantly.

  “I think I’d like to sit down for this,” she said.

  Twenty-three

  Elizabeth of Ulster bypassed her ineffectual husband, Prince Lionel, and went straight to her father-in-law with a report of what she saw. With a few graciously tendered excuses, the king slipped away and retired to his private chamber, where he flew into a raging diatribe. The brunt of this verbiage was heaped on Sir John Chandos, who now kneeled before his liege, having just delivered the news of Benoit’s embarrassment and de Coucy’s resulting outrage.

  “He made such vile threats against your daughter, sire, as one cannot imagine.”

  “He has only spoken what is in my own heart!” the king roared. “Find them!” He pounded his fist on the table; the windows rattled.

  Sir John rose up. “A thorough job of searching the grounds has already been done, my lord. We did not find your daughter here.”

  The king shot him a hard glance in response to the unwelcome reminder that he was now legally Kate’s parent. “As you suspected?”

  “I believe, sire,” Chandos continued, “that she has gone into the countryside with the Jew. She knows the grounds well, and she is far too clever to remain here.”

  The king said nothing, but with terrifying quickness he picked up a carved ornamental figure and threw it through the window. As glass tinkled to the ground outside, he boomed, “De Coucy must not have a reason to sever ties with us! An ally with such lands must be retained at all costs.”

  With astonishing calm, Sir John said, “It would be a foolish move on his part to do such a thing. To forgo a kingdom over a relative’s embarrassment—a vile and revolting relative at that—it is simply not sensible. He may use this incident, however, to extract a better dowry from you. One ought to consider that perhaps he has even set these events in place himself in order to—”

  “He’s been given dowry enough for twelve brides! And he is not clever enough to think of such a convoluted plot. No, it is all her doing—she must be found and brought back. Then I shall deliver her to de Coucy instead of Benoit—to be a scullery maid for her sister’s kitchen. Now go, and bring her back.”

  “We will not find her tonight, sire. Tomorrow we can take out a proper party and—”

  “Gather the best trackers in the kingdom and set them on her trail. The dogs can search in the night!”

  “But we without keen noses cannot follow. We will find her tomorrow, of that I am sure.”

  “Those who keep the May might have seen them—you can enlist their help. Go out into the villages and roust out everyone who spent this night in Maying. Threaten them all with troubles if they do not cooperate.”

  “Begging your pardon, sire, but I must disabuse you of the notion that those who keep the May will make themselves your allies.”

&n
bsp; The king glared at him. “All Englishmen are my allies, if they wish to prosper.”

  Sir John nodded. “That said, sire, I am sure you realize that among your guests tonight are a number of lords—all of whom profess sincere loyalty to you, one cannot help but say—who would much prefer to be out in the countryside, ensuring the survival of humankind by coupling with each and every Maid of the May he could find, were he not obliged to be here tonight to celebrate your daughter’s eventual coupling.” He made a sly smile. “Their wives, however, are forever your allies for commanding their husbands into unwilling faithfulness, which may prove to be more beneficial.”

  The king uttered an obscene curse under his breath. “Very well, go at first light. Take de Coucy and Benoit with you. I would not have either of them here to annoy me until this matter is resolved. Though I cannot fathom why de Coucy has such venom against her, perhaps it will satisfy his lust for retribution to join in the hunt.”

  He waved his knight off.

  Sir John bowed, wondering in echo of his king why de Coucy should hate the young woman so. He told himself that it did not matter in the end, as he hurried out of the audience chamber to wake the master of the hounds.

  North, she told him. They will expect us to go south. Reunited father and daughter hastened through the darkness, as fast as the horse would run. The lights of May bonfires could be seen here and there along the route; they rode past the pagan revelries and never stopped until finally they came to a small stream in a wooded place where the horse could rest and be watered. Alejandro dismounted first, then brought Kate down off their mount. With the immediate threat of capture behind them, they were free at last to embrace each other in the joy of their reunion.

  When at last Alejandro was able to let her go, he said, “Did he harm you, daughter?”

  She could not tell him the full extent of her encounter with Benoit; there would be time enough later. “My spirit was wounded,” she said, “but you have restored it.” Tears welled up in her eyes. “I am still not convinced that you are real,” she said. “Can all this time have passed in separation, and now we are together again?”

  Alejandro laughed with genuine joy. “I am real enough, and time has indeed passed. Very much time. I shall prove it to you tomorrow by showing you the gray in my hair.”

  “It will become you, I am sure.”

  “As womanhood becomes you.” He lifted her off the ground, then spun her around, grinning with joy, until they were both dizzy and laughing.

  When he set her down again, the youngest daughter of Edward Plantagenet looked into the eyes of the man who had lovingly raised her as his own child. “Seven years,” she said.

  “Nearly eight!”

  “And now that we are together again I feel as if I saw you only yesterday and that we have never been apart! How can that be possible?”

  Alejandro embraced her again, this time a ferocity that bordered on desperation. “I regret every day that we have missed. I should have come sooner….”

  She clung tightly to him. “I know you would have come sooner if you circumstances permitted.” She pulled away slightly and said, “I fear almost to ask—what of my son? Is he sound and hale?”

  “Oh, yes!” Alejandro cried. “Far more than that—I cannot properly describe his excellence. He has brought me nothing but joy and pride. He is quick-witted and polite, handsome, fair in his coloring, just like you and—”

  He stopped abruptly. After a moment of silence, Kate finished the utterance for him.

  “Like Guillaume Karle?” she said.

  “Yes,” Alejandro said, under his breath. “Like his father, whose name he bears. I thought it the proper name for him.”

  They stood in quiet remembrance of the good man who had touched their lives so deeply. When the time seemed proper, Kate glanced up at the sky and said, “Dawn is coming. We must ride now. There will be time to speak of my son later, when we are safe.”

  Alejandro nodded. They remounted and started off again. This time Alejandro turned the horse in an easterly direction. Kate stopped him.

  “Père, I say again, it is not wise to head to the south or the east just now.”

  He brought the horse up short. “But we must go to Dover to cross.”

  “That is what they will expect us to do. Of course we should go that way eventually, but right now it would serve us well to be a bit more unpredictable. They will never think to look for us to the north.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because we have no reason to go that way. There is plague in the north, and Chandos knows that I know it.”

  “Chandos…”

  She hesitated slightly, then said, “The king trusts no other man more than Chandos. It will be he who comes out after us.”

  She saw the disappointment in Alejandro’s expression and understood. Softly, she said, “His heart will not be in it, Père. But he is a loyal knight and will do what is asked of him.”

  “And your brother? Will he take part in the chase?”

  “Perhaps,” she said. “Not because he cares whether I am found or not—he has no great fondness for the affairs of state. But he is a warrior, albeit a bloated one of late. If he comes along, it will be for the thrill of the hunt itself, not because he has any great wish for me to return.”

  She said nothing for a moment. “But de Coucy is another matter. He will want vengeance for Benoit’s humiliation, and if the feel of the tip of my knife remains in his memory, he will want to punish me, simply to satisfy his own pride.”

  With great defiance in his voice, Alejandro said, “Let him come. I will take his head, as he took Guillaume Karle’s.”

  For a moment, each one wrestled with the memory of Karle’s helmet tumbling to the ground with the head still inside it, while the body remained astride the horse.

  Then Alejandro said, “The time for settling scores will come. Now is the time to be away from here.”

  They rode north through the woods at the swiftest pace they could manage. After a good stint of hard riding through the forest, they ventured out onto a road, which, by its width and wear, seemed relatively well traveled. Yet, as they continued, they saw that weeds and brush were beginning to encroach. After a time, they came upon a signpost. The board was cracked and dry; all the lettering seemed to have been worn away.

  At the bottom of the sign hung a tattered, faded flag. When they reached it, Alejandro took hold of the cloth and pulled it toward him, spreading it wide open. Within the folds, where it was not bleached by the sun, the cloth was dark gray.

  Both knew what a black flag meant.

  Alejandro said quietly, “Shall we proceed?”

  “Yes,” Kate replied.

  Farther along, they came to a small abandoned village.

  “They cannot all be gone to the celebrations,” Kate said bitterly.

  “No, daughter, I think not.”

  Alejandro dismounted in the village square and took the horse’s reins in his hand. He walked about, leading the horse with Kate still astride. He stopped in front of a small cottage; its door was wide open, but no one was within.

  He examined it quickly, then came back outside. “There should be peace in solitude of this sort, but my heart shivers with wondering what happened to the people who once lived here.”

  “I feel as though we are trespassing, though against whom, I cannot say,” Kate said. “Let us be off again, Père; I care not for this place.”

  They continued on the same road out of the village; its condition worsened. Perhaps a half hour’s ride farther, a small manor house came into view.

  Alejandro dismounted again and wrapped the horse’s reins around a low tree branch. “If it is unoccupied, it will be easier to hide here than in a cottage. Certainly it will be more comfortable than sleeping in the forest. Stay here,” he said. “I’ll look within.”

  Halfway to the manse, he turned and looked back at her, as if for reassurance. She read his expression and said, “Go. But hurry bac
k.”

  Outside the planked wood door was a bell; he rang it loudly, then waited with nervous anticipation. After a short while he rang again, but as before, no one appeared to greet him. He tried the door, and to his surprise it opened without difficulty.

  Inside, the furnishings were sparse and of lesser quality than he would expect to find in such a manor. He walked quickly through a few of the rooms but saw little evidence of occupation. There was a small room with its own hearth, which opened into a room with a door to the rear gardens. A narrow window afforded a decent view; the horse could be tethered within sight. At the back of the gardens there was a brook, perhaps fifty paces back, so they would have water.

  “This will do,” Alejandro said when he returned to Kate’s side. He glanced back wistfully. “I am put to mind of the place given to me after I first left Windsor,” he said. “Too grand for a simple man like me.”

  His daughter touched him tenderly on the shoulder, knowing that his memories of that place would be bittersweet. “In the light of morning, this place will seem positively small, and you will be thinking of our escape to France.”

  “No doubt,” he agreed. “But before we sleep, we should do what we can to confuse our pursuers.”

  They rode back to the village square on the same trail he had followed into the woods. He guided the horse in an ever-widening series of circles in the dirt, and though the animal seemed somewhat confused, he responded to Alejandro’s tugging on the reins precisely as Alejandro had hoped he would. After leaving a concentrated scent in one place, they rode to the east, knowing that in the morning they would ride north again. Then he spurred the animal back into the woods and cut a switch, which Kate dragged behind them until they entered the stream. Alejandro guided the horse through the stream’s twisting path until the rear gardens of the abandoned estate came into view.