Coming to an isolated wooden building separated from the rest of the camp by a rushing and swollen stream, the monarchs reined in their steeds and halted the company before crossing the harrow timber bridge which crossed the flood. Even at that distance the stench which surrounded the edifice before them was nauseating. Many of the company quickly applied kerchiefs to their noses. The King rose in his stirrups and addressed the riders behind them.
"My lords and ladies, the structure you see before you was built upon the suggestion of your most excellent Queen, whose idea it is that all the disabled might be better cared for were they to be gathered in one place and not tended each to his own tent. We have many men suffering still the wounds of this summer's battles, and every day brings us fresh casualties from the outposts. Our physicians and chirurgeons are most able, and we have been able to recruit from the numerous civilians who camp with us attendants to help. It is reported to me that our novel manner of seeing to the battle-injured has caused more lives to be saved than otherwise—a tribute to my most honored Queen and lady."
Isabella wasted no time blushing. "I wish to inspect this infirmary," she announced to those who could hear her. "It will not be pretty. Only you who are hardy and with strong stomachs attend me. The rest may wait until we ride on. Who will go?"
Behind the building the members of the Court could glimpse large, grisly mounds of char and ash, all that remained of amputated arms and legs, of blood-ruined garments and noxious refuse, and there also, flapping away, was a long clothesline of stained bandages hung out to air. The somber structure itself seemed lifeless and silent at this distance, but it took little imagination to know it was surely filled with the groans and moans of human pain, of men dying with fever and infection and ghastly wounds which would not heal.
A number of the men and a very few ladies rode forward, and Dolores was among them. What was a few stinks and groans to a daughter of the alleys, she had shrugged mentally, and her reward, as she had hoped, was Isabella's surprised but visible approval. The Count of Cabra helped Dolores to dismount and offered his arm as escort into the hospital. She took it and did not look back, but she could almost feel the intensity of Francho's eyes following her determined, proud walk across the timber bridge. Good. She hoped he was impressed, the bribón.
***
Muffled in heavy cloaks against the damp cold that crept into the bones, the Count of Tendilla and his son took the night air to flee a raucous game of cards played by di Lido, Pulgar, and several knights of the Count's complement at a rude trestle table set up in Tendilla's quarters. The wind brought the pungent smell of damp hay and horses to Francho's nose, blowing from the huge, canvas-covered corrals in which the animals were sheltered, and it also scattered the glowing remnants of the fires on which the common soldiery had cooked their suppers before their huts. He heard, from within the tight dwellings, the chink of coins and the slap of cards, the plink of a guitar, an offkey voice, even a woman's laugh, a sound until recently just the camp follower's high-pitched giggle in this place of men, beasts, and killing weapons.
At various intervals along the paths fires burned in sheltered iron braziers where the watch on their rounds could stop and warm their hands. The two strolling men returned the sentries' salutes with casual nods.
"What ails you, Francisco? You were pacing like a caged beast this evening."
Francho hunched his broad shoulders. "The fact is, I feel like a caged beast, my lord. 'Tis the inactivity that grates my nerves. I have not even the comfort of fingering my lute, although after all these months I doubt I can yet play it."
Tendilla's voice was calm. "A true musician needs only a few days' practice to recall his art. And you are a true musician."
"I might as well be a true tailor for what good the knowledge of minstrelsy does me."
"Francisco, can you not control your impatience? We have discussed this all before. The longer we place you in Moorish territory, the more likely becomes the chance of your being uncovered before you can garner anything of value. Only when the approach to Granada is finally open to our armies can we plan our own strategy so that we emerge invaluable to the victory. Yours is the vital part; it must be played with delicate timing or not at all, and with consideration of any future turn of events." His tone took on an acid quality. "Our enemy, unfortunately, does not cooperate by surrendering on time; they care naught for our ambitions."
"My apologies for my impatience or for seeming ungrateful, Don Iñigo, but I am restive. Either I am a man of substance or I am not; and I am anxious for the trial to begin and have done. Sir, I was knighted under the name Francisco de Mendoza, a name it is my greatest pride to bear, but yet I am a fraud, an actor, an imposter. Can you understand?"
More than you think, my young lion, ran Tendilla's thoughts. I am not blind to your interest in Doña Leonora, but we will not discuss that now. Instead he replied, "You are your own worst enemy, Francisco, for you do not understand that the essence of a person is not written on a baptismal certificate, nor is the worth of his deeds. You were honored for your personal valor, not for your name."
"Your name, my lord."
The Count sighed. "Yes, withal; I understand you. I sympathize with your feeling of impermanence, but this is a bargain we have made and to which we have been and must continue to be faithful. I cannot, I will not jeopardize either of our aims by catering to your restlessness and sending you forth prematurely. For any reason."
Francho opened his mouth to mention his uneasy situation with Leonora and then shut it, changing his mind. One did not argue with Don Iñigo. Besides, Don Iñigo's original offer was to help him recover his birthright, not to woo the Count's kinswoman. He doubted that the cool, reserved Count would understand that love does not wait for convenience in order to happen.
He ventured a glance at his companion's aristocratic profile outlined against the flare of torches bracketed on the building walls. Still—he could be wrong. Doña María had once let slip that she thought her restrained cousin had been in love with Francho's mother, Elena de Venegas. In fact, she implied that Tendilla still kept Elena's memory so bright that no other woman seemed to engage him, even after twenty years. Perhaps he would understand Francho's fear of losing Leonora to a more viable suitor and why he was suddenly so irked not to have his inheritance; for after all, the Count had supplied him, as a loan, ample funds to support himself pleasantly at Court. But the words to express this stuck in his throat.
Halting at a dark corner where no torchlight masked the awesome spangle of the black heavens, Don Iñigo called Francho's attention to certain formations of heavenly bodies and brought up new advances which had been made in astronomy and navigation. But although he spoke on one level his mind operated on another, considering again the complexities of his relationship with this young man. The blood always tells, he reflected. He doubted the possibility of taking any ragtag orphan off the street and creating a successful gentleman—not with that inborn grace and command that only the blood could carry.
And yet, his pseudo-son was not supremely noble; he did not look upon himself as a crusader fighting to clear a dead father's name, or to hold to waning ideas of old-time chivalry. He followed his early training in the alleys, where ephemeral honor meant nothing and self everything. Not that Francisco was not honorable, Mendoza corrected himself—the fact was he was admirably honest to admit that his efforts were to revive a name for himself, and only incidentally for his forebears. A representative member of the younger generation, this one, Mendoza judged, proud but realistic, romantic but not mystic, strong but not brutish.
Reluctantly he had to admit to himself that Francisco had become important to him—not as a mere instrument of his strategy more personal than the many other agents, high and base, who comprised the eyes and ears of his spy ring—but truly as himself. The son poor, mad Carlotta had never given him.
His eyes traveled over the younger man's shadowed form, tall and broad-shouldered, head tilted up as he
studied the unwinking stars. Elena's son. She would have gazed at Francho with glowing eyes and overlooked his faults and foibles to smile with pride at his courage, his bold style and his talent. Elena would have placed her hand upon her son's strong arm and swept into the Court like a bright angel, gay and triumphant, inquiring up at him with cozening, startlingly blue eyes to bring her a sweet, thanking him with the lovely, two-noted laugh which damped out all the unimportant noises of the dissonant world. Elena would have...
Mendoza shook loose the thought and crushed it into nothing and let it blow away. Elena was dust. Elena was gone.
Francho brought his eyes down from staring at the planet Jupiter. "My Lord? Did you say something?"
"No. Shall we go on?"
They continued to walk. They spoke of the ambassadors who had just arrived from the Sultan of Egypt carrying barely veiled threats against the Christians dwelling in the Holy Land should Their Catholic Majesties continue to persecute the Moors with wars.
"What answer are we sending back?" Francho asked.
"A dissembling one, of course; whatever will placate them for the moment. It is felt that the rents and tributes the Sultan extorts from the Holy Land's gentiles are so huge that this alone will protect them from his revenge."
"Pietro di Lido mentioned that Charles of Naples warns that our wars will cost the Eastern Christians dearly."
Mendoza's smile, if Francho could have seen it clearly, was thin. "Our King discounts this pious interference from Charles as worry that once having conquered the Moors, Ferdinand might then have the freedom to assert his claim to the crown of Naples. But I believe he is right."
They went on discussing the vulnerability of the Christians in Moslem lands, and soon they turned back toward their quarters. Each would have rather had a more personal conversation, actually on the same subject, Leonora de Zuniga. But neither could speak. Tendilla could not break his habitual aloof containment. Francho feared rebuff from this man he so respected. The barrier of restraint still pervaded their relationship.
***
Later that night, the night of the mass, the meeting Francho had arranged had to be short for there was only half an hour before the guard was changed. Francho arrived first at the low-ceilinged shelter just inside the gate in the west stockade, pushing back his hood to identify himself to the posted sentries he had earlier bribed to go blind, deaf, and dumb. Entering, he saw there was some warmth at least in the hut, from a crude hearth where faggots burned in an iron brazier. An oil lamp with two floating wicks sat on a plank table. And there was a bench.
Flinging back his cloak he paced back and forth on the packed earth floor, hearing the deep and lugubrious multi-voiced lament floating on the wind from the church where his uncle the Cardinal Mendoza celebrated a mass for the Christian dead. His mind was in a ferment, wondering and hoping that Leonora would really be coming, but annoyed with the coarseness of the only meeting place he could quickly arrange where they would be safe from interruption.
Abruptly the door was pushed open and Leonora slipped in, shoving it shut behind her and leaning back against the rough wood as if she had been running. As Francho came toward her she threw back the hood of her enveloping cloak and regarded him mutely, her brown eyes wide and waiting, her expression so apprehensive that he stopped short a few feet from her. They lost several of their precious seconds, suspended, just looking at each other as the muffled, solemn requiem music penetrated the hut. Then Francho whispered, "I love you, Leonora!"
The spell was broken. With a little cry she ran into his arms for a hug, and then put up her mouth to be kissed. And kiss her he did, but gently, almost reverently, fearing to frighten her. And then he took her lips again, still lightly and tenderly, but feeling a happiness coming over him at this close communion of their souls. She was like a small, trembling bird, warm, untried, but willing. Slowly, slowly, he warned himself as he sternly reined in his passion, his will to crush her to him, she is yet a girl, an innocent....
Her breath was coming shallow. She slipped away from him, needing to conquer her reactions to his gentle, loving touch, and he allowed her to go for they had to talk. To give them both a space to recover their wits—he felt still the pressure of her warm mouth upon his—he began by asking her if she would ride out with him the next morning.
A shadow passed over her face. "But I have already promised Felipe de Guzman."
"Then unpromise him."
"But I can't do that. It would appear peculiar."
"You were with him all this afternoon, and part of this evening too. Perhaps you would rather ride with him."
"Don't be cruel. Do you think it is for Don Felipe's sake that I have probably poisoned my poor dueña? The Count of Perens is a good friend, we have known each other since childhood and I like him, nothing more. But it is improper for an unbetrothed woman to give all her attention to one man."
"It tears me apart when you smile so fondly at him. Or at any of the other gallants that trail you," Francho said jealously.
The amber brown eyes grew troubled and dark. "And what would you of me? Shall I wait alone and cheerless then until you decide to declare yourself, señor?"
"I have declared myself. You know I adore the very ground you walk on, that I would die for you gladly, that I dream of you waking and sleeping. I wear your kerchief next to my heart where it hears how that besotted organ beats only for you...."
He reached out to take her hand but she jerked away from him, having suddenly grown angry. "Oh, you great dolt! If you truly loved me you would demand to wed me; you would have already put your suit before my mother and my uncle. You only amuse yourself with beguiling me. And I—so stupid to have believed your casual protestations, to have risked my reputation by meeting you here. How could you mislead me so? Oh, I want never to lay eyes on your false-hearted face again—"
She whirled toward the door and, as she knew he would, with one bound Francho had hold of her. Although she struggled he carried her back to the bench, plumped her down, and held her there. He brought his face close to hers and stared directly into her tear-bright eyes. "Leonora, my sweetest love, I ask for your hand. Will you be my wife?"
A tear slipped down her cheek. "No! How much could you honor me if you have forced me to speak with such humiliating boldness. I hate you."
"No, you don't hate me. Just listen to me," he cried, tightening his grasp on her shoulders. "There are serious reasons why I have not been able to speak of betrothal. There is nothing in this world I want but to have you as my wife before God and man, and I would cherish and worship you for all of my life. But I have no right to ask for you—yet."
"I don't understand that. What do you mean you have no right? Your name is Mendoza, your sire the Count of Tendilla who cares much for you. And so does my mother..."
"And my fortune is nonexistent."
Now it is out in the open, Francho thought, and better this way, for what good is a future without her? God grant she loves me enough to wait. "Leonora, I have little of my own to offer you. I have no lands, no coffers of gold, no castle. I am only a poor knight. Where is my right to speak to you of marriage now?"
She wiped her eyes on her sleeve, her ivory brow wrinkling in confusion. "But—you are Don Iñigo's only son. Surely he will soon settle property upon you. And when he dies you will inherit all of his estates. You will be vastly wealthy."
He came, then, within a hair's breadth of telling her everything, who he really was and the true patrimony which he had to claim, and that, if everything were returned to him, he would be wealthy. If, if. For once he heeded the shout of caution at the back of his head and bit back the words that had jumped to his lips. "My—my father has said nothing to me of inheritance. Nor can I count on it that he will. He is not too old. If his wife Carlotta dies he may marry again and have legitimate children and wish to settle his properties on them. A young wife looking out for her issue can twist even a man like the Count around her finger. It has happened before."
Her frown deepened, but her eyes remained on his. "I don't understand. Has he not given you any indication at all of his intentions?"
"Are you not familiar with the inscrutable Don Iñigo? He keeps his own counsel, nor will he be pushed by casual questioning. I could not allow you to share a niggardly life with me, and therefore, until I am sure of my fortunes, I must make my own provisions, which will take time. If you will trust me, my heart, if you can love me enough to wait, I will come to you some day with the whole world as a pillow upon which to rest your lovely head."
"But why do you have so little confidence in Don Iñigo? I cannot fathom it. He is your sire and he is not a heartless man. And—if your grants would not come from him, then from whom else?"
"I cannot speak of it. Trust me, Leonora, for I cannot divulge my plans. It will take a while but the rewards will be worth the effort. Believe me, mi corazón, I do have a way to make my own fortune, independent of whatever the Count may decide. And then I will claim you, and I will allow no one to tell me nay."
"And you cannot give me any inkling of what you must do?"
"No. I have given my parole."
Her small, full mouth trembled. "May I ask at least the length of time you speak of?" She saw a look of pleading come into his blue eyes, so somber under the knit black brows.
"Perhaps—a year or two."
"Oh, Francisco!" Leonora slumped as limp as a rag.
He went to his knees before her. He pressed the palm of her hand first against his lips and then leaned his burning cheek against it, but he would not allow her to disengage her eyes from his own azure intensity. "I will tell you the truth. There is a chance that naught will come of my endeavors. And there is another chance that I will inherit little from Don Iñigo; perhaps at most I will attain a petty title and a moldering keep in the mountains. But Don Felipe can ask your hand tomorrow and eventually make you a duchess, rich and powerful and honored. So if I speak like a fool it's only because I adore you so desperately, and that is why I dare risk your laughter and ridicule by asking you to wait, to prevail upon your guardians to wait, to give me the time I need to be worthy to win you." His short laugh was hollow. "And because I am a grasper at dreams, I dared hope that you would love me that well...." Tautness had crept into his voice, the fear of rebuff, for who would blame her?
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