In the Garden of Iden (Company)

by Kage Baker

  So many mortals now, along the main street, and all staring at me. I saw a man coming out of a house. He seemed to be important; his surcoat had fur trimming on it.

  “Reverend sir.” I curtseyed deep before him as he regarded me in astonishment. “Can you tell me where the man is, that was brought here from Sevenoaks?”

  He took forever to answer. Really, had he never seen a Spanish ghost before?

  “If you mean the foul heretic, lady, he is held fast at the bishop’s house.”

  Ah. I was getting somewhere. I pulled my crucifix out of my bosom. He goggled at one or the other. “I pray you, sir, is he a great tall fellow, without a beard?”

  “Aye, fair maid, he is. Wherefore would you know?”

  “Oh, sir!” All right, he was looking at my bosom. I made it heave and brought it closer to him. “I have sought the recreant this many a mile, through wild country as you may plainly see, all that I might dispute with him concerning the true faith, to lead him out of error into salvation.” I found my rosary and waved that at him too. He blinked and replied:

  “That were a great pity, lady, for the man hath remained constant in his heresy and is to die for it.”

  I swooned. Not really; but it put the ball in his court, and my feet were killing me anyway. There was an outcry all around me, and I was lifted up and carried into the house, with much covert squeezing of my behind and even more covert tugging at my gold crucifix. Both remained attached, however. I was revived with a shot of aqua vitae and came to with suitably faint requests for data concerning my location. Many staring English faces assured me I was in the Lord Mayor’s house and need not fear, for they were all honest folk here.

  I checked my cross and rosary, then sought the face of the man I’d first spoken to. He must be El Alcalde de Rochester. I played my scene to him and played it well, too: wept for the man Harpole, explained that I had striven to save his soul but he had fled me, adamant in his heresy, though because there had been some tender feeling between us that had nothing to do with theology I thought I might still manage to reconcile him to the Church. Might I not be given this chance?

  But the Lord Mayor was shaking his head.

  “Child, he is condemned. You may save his immortal part, aye; but the knave hath argued so coldly, and so shrewdly, and hath such a wicked reputation beside, that you will never see him pardoned. Be content; there is no remedy.”

  “But I must see him!”

  “Well, that may be done,” said a lady, clearly the mayor’s wife. “But who are you, child? Are you not Spanish?” Hola.

  “I am the daughter of Doctor Ruy Anzolabejar,” I said, as proud as though it were true. “And what honorable love there hath been between myself and this poor man I will not say; but I charge you to think whether you would deny a soul one last persuasion that might be its salvation, and break a maiden’s heart into the bargain.”

  The Lord Mayor and his wife exchanged glances. She got up and encouraged her neighbors to leave. When she came back, the Lord Mayor said delicately:

  “Lady, your intent is praiseworthy, but I must tell you that though this is a godly place wherein most folk do love our queen, our prince, and his holiness the Pope, as well they ought, yet there are certain vile persons here who have acclaimed the man Harpole as a martyr. This has hardened him to his villainous intent. These ill-wishers may do you some harm if you attempt to dissuade him.”

  “Let them,” I said. “I care not, so his precious soul is saved.” So there. The Lord Mayor cleared his throat.

  “Why, then—then you may take some buttered eggs with us, and rest you from your wearisome journey, and perhaps after dark I may take you to where he is kept.”

  “I must go to him now,” I insisted. “What, shall I lose one instant of the brief time I have left to convert him?”

  “Fie for shame, husband!” cried the wife. “Put a cloak about her and take her round about by the old way. There’s none will see her in the vineyard.”

  “So shall I do.” He looked at her indignantly. “And was about to so propose, ere thou prated at me.”

  In the end we both went covered up in cloaks, through a mass of ruined walls and green garden, all around under that big cathedral. We went into the back garden of a big house, and the Lord Mayor courteously explained my purpose to several persons of importance, including Bishop Griffin himself. As in take after take of a comic film, I played my scene out some three or four times. Finally everyone agreed I should have my shot at the condemned man. So after an agony of wasted time, I found myself in front of a little low door, with a mail-clad soldier turning a key in the lock.

  The key was ornate. The lock clanked. These physical details claimed my attention, I found them absolutely fascinating, and of course the reason was that I had no idea why I had come to see Nicholas or what I was going to say to him. But I went in, and there he was.

  He was sitting quiet and composed on a narrow cot, the single piece of furniture in the room. His eyes widened as I came in with the Lord Mayor, but he did not react otherwise.

  The Lord Mayor lectured Nicholas sternly about his fate, and told him how he didn’t deserve this virtuous lady coming to reason with him, but since she was here, the Lord Mayor would see if youth and virtue might succeed where reverend wisdom had failed to shake Nicholas’s sinful heart. I was assured that if any violence was attempted on my person, I had but to cry out and I should be rescued instantly, and this bad fellow would be the worse for it. Having said his say, the Lord Mayor took his leave of us. The door closed after him. We were alone.

  We looked at each other in silence. Nicholas was muddy and torn too, and bruised besides; pale, thin, and unshaven. His face had changed.

  “Welcome, Spirit,” he said at last. His voice had changed, too.

  “May I sit down?” I requested. Then I realized there was only the bed to sit on. He got up and gestured for me to sit. My legs were trembling, so I sat and pulled off my shoes, which hurt my feet very much. He leaned against the wall with his arms folded, watching me.

  “How should a spirit have such muddy toes?” he wondered.

  “Didst thou think I flew here?” I looked at him. “Think again. I have walked the whole way from Iden Hall.”

  “Ah.” He looked at me steadily.

  “See?” I stretched out my feet. “No hooves.”

  A smile came and went, chilly, strange.

  “To tell truth, I am glad thou hast come,” he said. “This mortal air was getting a sweetness to it that made my heart cold to my duty. It made me wonder whether I had only dreamed—what thou knowest of. I was growing weak in my resolve. Now thou art here to test me, like a good friend, and I see it was no dream and am strong again.”

  I couldn’t think what to say at all. My eyes filled with tears.

  “Aye.” He nodded. “Weep, Spirit. I will not falter.”

  “Oh, this is stupid!”

  “I may tell thee, thou hast done me great good. Before mine eyes were opened, I believed as any weak and sensible man doth: that God exists, because we have been taught so, but there are no miracles and our only duty is earthly charity. More, I believed there were no devils nor spirits but only wickedness in men. For who has ever seen a serpent that spake with a voice, to tempt men from God?” What a strange look for me as he said that last. Almost kindly. “But, having known thee, I learned the truth of what thou art, and mine eyes are opened.”

  I had certainly shown him there were more things in heaven and earth than were dreamt of in his philosophy, hadn’t I? He eased himself down into a sitting position on the floor.

  “Regard what thou hast done. In every respect where I doubted, thou hast made me believe.” He leaned forward. “Were it not for thine ever witching me away from my duty, I could think thou wert a spirit of a different kind entirely.”

  “I am,” I said, without much hope.

  “It may be so,” he admitted. “But what thou art I cannot guess.” There was another long silence.
“Where is thine argument?” he said at last. “Where is thy subtle persuasion? Wilt thou not beg me to lie, and recant, and get mercy from the bishop?”

  “Thou wilt not,” I said. I was so tired. “They will kill thee, and I have no power to help—” My voice broke. By reflex he got up and came to me with a gesture of comfort, then froze.

  “Ah,” he said. “This is temptation too.”

  I let my head fall backward, for exasperation and weariness. He sat down again. After a moment he ventured:

  “Wert thou mortal once?”

  I nodded.

  “And art thou damned eternally?”

  “No.” I laughed. “Yes! Oh, I must be.”

  He frowned. “What wert thou, being mortal?”

  “I told thee what I was.” I looked down at him. “A child of Spain. And by chance, and by lies, I came into the dungeons of the Inquisition there.” He looked uncomfortable then. “Oh, yes, señor. Didst thou think I was only a mask of Satan, with no real heart to be broken? What thou lovedst was real enough. Suffering and all. Muddy feet and all.”

  He jumped up and went to the window, and stood there staring out.

  “Hast thou never heard,” I tried to put it a way he might understand, “of spirits who partake neither of Heaven nor of Hell?”

  “The heathen and the dead children,” he whispered, “who are neither damned nor saved.”

  “Just so.”

  He turned around and looked at me with such dread in his eyes, I grew angry. Was he superstitious? This man? I clenched my fists. “Now hearing you’d been arrested for yelling in the street, I came weeping all the way here and never slept, and was followed by a murderer, and had neither rest nor food, and God knows why I troubled myself, for I knew you’d only say I was Satan come to tempt you. I wanted to save your life! But I’m too late! You have your martyr’s crown, your horrible death! Oh, I could have gone away with you—I would have run away from my duty and lived with you in any street in Europe, I’d have read your awful Scripture and listened to your awful sermons and worshiped your awful God—”

  “Stop!” He seized me by the shoulders. “Stop! Stop!”

  “Don’t you tell me to stop!” I screamed at him. “You talked and talked—”

  “But if I could have saved thee—”

  The door flew open. We both turned, expecting the guard. It wasn’t the guard, though. It was Joseph.

  “Excuse me.” He marched right up to us, looking determined, and threw a punch at Nicholas. He had to jump a little to connect with Nicholas’s jaw, but he connected, and Nicholas crashed backward into the wall.

  “Mendoza, out. Now.” Joseph turned to me.

  This was too much. This was grossly unfair. I collapsed sobbing on the bed. Joseph exhaled angrily and went to the door, where the Lord Mayor was peering in with a rather frightened face.

  “I must have some private speech with my child, it seems. Pray pardon me.” And he swung the door shut, bang. Turning back, he said:

  “Okay, Mendoza, get up. I’ve just ridden thirty miles on an extremely unpleasant horse and I don’t feel like having an argument. You are in a lot of trouble.”

  “No!” I cried. “You can’t make me leave now!”

  “Now? Not leave now? What do you want to do, stay here until they torch the guy?”

  Nicholas was struggling to his feet, staring from one to the other of us in bewilderment. Cinema Standard was enough like Tudor English for him to be able to understand about one word in three of what we were saying.

  “I don’t know! God, God, help me, I can’t save him!”

  “What language are you speaking?” inquired Nicholas in Latin.

  “Shut up, creep. Oh, and by the way,” Joseph continued in Latin, turning to him, “would you tell me why you were trying to get into my room with a sword? It takes something more to kill me, as you no doubt have guessed.”

  “I never went to your room to kill you,” said Nicholas. “I was trying to get out of the house without being killed. I went to your room only for medicine, to calm your daughter. You know what I saw when I opened your door.”

  “I know. You ought to have knocked. But do you understand you are a dead man?”

  “Truly I know it,” said Nicholas, with a little of his former sneer. “But I die in a just cause. And I will testify to the truth until I have no voice.”

  “You mean to denounce us to the world, then?” Soberly, Joseph put his hand on his pouch, where he kept his little glass vials. I opened my mouth, but no scream came out.

  “By no means. Who would believe me? The ranting of a madman is not regarded. I mean to put my last breath to better use.”

  “Very wise of you, I’m sure.” But Joseph’s fingers were still working at the fastening. Nicholas saw the fear in my eyes.

  “Thou art not her father!” he blurted out in English. “Though I’ll lay odds thou art the same demon who stole the child and made her what she is.”

  Dead silence. Joseph surveyed him.

  “Boy, you’re good at figuring things out. Isn’t he? Except that if anybody’s the devil in this room it’s you, buster.” An extraordinary bitterness came into his face. “I’ve seen you before. I know you, all right, preacher man. Age after age, you come back. You always lead the crusades. You’re so damned golden-tongued, other people just flock to die for your causes. You die with them, it’s true, because you’re stupid enough to believe your own great lies; but you always come back again somehow. Oh, I know you.”

  No hair-tearing, no jumping up and down. Only his voice dropping to an unexpected bass with Nicholas staring at him, unable to comprehend.

  “You think I’m not her father?” Joseph thundered. “I took her out of the grave and gave her eternal life, which is more than your lousy God would have done! You’re the one who seduced her into believing that your miserable little cult matters a damn, when she knows nothing matters less. You’re the one who’s made her hate what she is. How’s she supposed to live, now, after what you’ve done to her heart?”

  Not understanding him, Nicholas had stopped listening and was watching me where I cowered on the bed.

  “So thou canst disobey him,” he said softly. “So thou hast a free will and may choose.”

  “Mendoza, get up. I’m taking you out of here.”

  Nicholas held my gaze, and I could not look away. “Stay with me until I have suffered tomorrow. Be with me at the end. I cannot rest otherwise, nor wilt thou rest. This thou knowest, love.”

  Joseph seized me and pulled me to my feet. “Mendoza, we’re getting on two fine horses I paid ready cash for and we’re riding south. We are not going to watch an auto-da-fé. Come on.”

  My heart felt like a balloon.

  “You can’t make me leave if I don’t want to. Can you?” I said to Joseph. “I’m already in trouble. I’m staying until it’s over tomorrow. When it’s over, I’ll go back with you, and the Company can do whatever it wants to.”

  Joseph let go of me. “It might teach you a lesson, at that,” he said. “All right.” He looked at Nicholas. “Young man. Do you know how many burnings at the stake I’ve had to sit through? Seven hundred and nine. Yours may be the first one I’ve ever enjoyed. In anticipation of that, I thank you.”

  He swung the door open and pulled me out with him.

  I went obediently enough. I let Joseph lead me back to the Lord Mayor’s house with the Lord Mayor practically bowing and scraping beside us the whole way and telling us about his cousin who had married one of Katherine of Aragon’s grooms. Apparently he offered to put us up for the night, too, but I missed what he and Joseph said to each other in that regard, because I was in a fog.

  Something had happened in that cell that made it all right between us again. My own Nicholas had been looking at me at the last, and not that cold godly stranger.

  At the Lord Mayor’s house we were shown to an upstairs room, quite nicely furnished. Food and hot wine were brought for us; soap and water in a basi
n for me. I watched as Joseph talked to people. He explained, he apologized, he made arrangements, and at last he closed the door on the last mayoral wish for our pleasant stay in Rochester.

  Turning around, he leaned against the door and stared at me.

  “You shouldn’t have said all those awful things about Nicholas,” I said thickly. “Not true at all. Petty of you. Coming back age after age?”

  He put his palms to his temples and pressed, as though he were trying to keep his brains from exploding.

  “I mean, what, you believe in reincarnation or something?” I went on.

  “You’re how old now, Mendoza?” he inquired, with tremendous self-control.

  “Nineteen. Maybe.”

  “Nineteen, huh?” He took his hands down and began to pace. “Jesus. This must be what it’s like to have a real daughter. What are they teaching you kids back there? As for reincarnation, it’s realer than you think, smart-ass. There are only so many personality types among mortals. They just use the same ones over and over. Zealots like your Nicholas keep turning up, and every time they do, they make trouble for everybody. He’s screwed you up, the son of a bitch. When this guy burns tomorrow—”

  “Oh, he won’t burn,” I said dreamily. “He’s going to recant. That’s why he wants me to be there. He’ll save himself, and then what will you do? He knows all about us. And he understands—isn’t that incredible? A mortal capable of understanding the truth about us? See, you won’t have any choice. You’ll have to recruit him for us now. Give him tribrantine. And you know he’ll be the best mortal worker we’ve ever had, once we explain the whole truth to him. Imagine all that intellect and all that zeal working for us!”