Only Sofia-Elisabete

by Robin Kobayashi

  Ci-ci’s eyes burned bright with fury at the hobby’s impertinent slander. He recognized this villain, the one who had chased him into the desert and who had been dispatched to apprehend me.

  Fausto seeks vengeance for the humiliation he suffered when you ran away.

  Fausto? I scratched my head, still not remembering who he was.

  Buho-o-o! the hobby screeched at me from above.

  Ci-ci would have none of it. Get yourself to Biescas while I distract the hobby.

  Don’t leave me, I pleaded in tears.

  You must save yourself!

  Ci-ci spread his wings, and he took flight, transformed into a gallant swallow, ready to avenge my honor. But a swallow was no match for the hobby, who could fly doubly fast and dive at rocket speed. The hobby shrieked with laughter. It gave chase to this challenger, taunting him with, I’ll knock you half-dead to the ground, you worthless boldface, so that you can watch me pluck the goose.

  The swallow and the hobby, the hobby and the swallow—back and forth they dueled in an abandoned sky. The hobby swooped, but Ci-ci, with cunning and dare, executed a vertical dive at very high speed, with completely folded wings. Down he went like a missile, when, quick as a flash, he turned tight and pulled up out of the hobby’s reach. Undaunted, the hobby launched forth again and I feared there would be no miracle this time for the swallow.

  Twsit-twsit! Ci-ci came whizzing on, begging me to flee before it was too late. He asked, Why are you pointing the rifle-gun at the hobby? Do you know how to shoot? With one last great effort then, Ci-ci vowed to bring the hobby close to me, to give me the best shot possible. It will be your only shot, he warned. And so, my courageous swallow circled back, dipping lower and lower, the hobby in close pursuit.

  Truth be told, I hadn’t recalled what a rifle-gun was, until a familiar voice crowed in my head that I was good at shooting artificial targets. Hadn’t he, a great sportsman, instructed me himself? He went on, saying he surely was right when he adjudged me, his own child, to have the presence of mind, the firmness of nerve and the keenness of sight to be a natural gunner like him, even though I had never killed anything.

  Mind you empty yourself of emotion and nervous affection, he sternly advised me.

  I hardened my heart. Nothing except a firm resolve remained.

  When taking aim, keep your eyes opened. You don’t want to shoot with both eyes closed.

  A beginner I was not.

  The finger and eye must go hand in hand when you draw the trigger.

  Ya, ya, ya—I knew that.

  Remember, keep your gun moving, directed at this hobby that’s crossing, and fire at least two or three feet before it, given its distance and velocity.

  And take aim somewhat above it, I reminded him.

  My girl, you’re a heaven-born shooter.

  The hobby came on rapidly, gaining on the brave swallow. Its talons gleamed like two daggers, ready to plunge into the prey.

  Cock your piece and take aim.

  Cocked and poised it was.

  Steady now, steady …

  In one single breath did I mark-present-fire! and blast the hobby, piercing its corrupt heart. A veritable firework of jagged red-purple-blues exploded into the air. And then the hobby, with one last spontaneous wing-beat, sailed to earth in a mass of subdued greyish-browns.

  You got him!

  Strangely enough, I didn’t feel much at first, neither triumph nor grim satisfaction. But soon, I went from feeling practically nothing to feeling everything—the weight that comes from killing and the necessity of it, and it shattered something inside of me.

  Ci-ci, astonished at the demise of the hobby and how his own life had been saved, rushed towards me, breathless and worried. Half-human once more, he wrapped me in his wings to comfort me, and he kissed me, but his attentions only brought forth more unsteady emotions. Seeing how shaken I was, he vowed that we wouldn’t speak of it again, of how we had contrived to end the hobby. It is all done and over, he assured me.

  We trudged onwards to Biescas. No sooner had we set foot in the village, when a loud bray rang out. Raya galloped past us, followed by Rombo. Not far distant stood an ancient Roman church. The donkey sat on his haunches before the bell tower, and he whistled a spritely song, showing off a two-octave range. A thin tallish padre came to the door. He raised his hands to the heavens, overjoyed to see his beloved donkey.

  This Padre Miguel welcomed us weary travelers. He was particularly affected by me, the sad half-goose, half-maiden, who ruffled her feathered wings, and scratched herself with her webbed toes whenever she mumbled out responses to his questions.

  Tomorrow, we must take you to la Gloriosa.

  Is that a church? I asked him, bob-bob-bobbing my head.

  The padre told us the legend of how Empress Elena, a Christian in the fourth century, sought refuge in an open cave to avoid persecution by the Romans. The entrance of it was instantly hidden by a large spider’s web and, thus, she was saved. Thereafter, an intermittent spring miraculously appeared. Some say the water comes from the river Jordan.

  This spring, la Gloriosa, is said to have curative properties, and he exchanged a look with Ci-ci.

  For some reason, I couldn’t stop thinking about the sacred spring. I had to find it to see if it would sing for me.

  That night, I wandered alone, up a stony trail into the mountains, to the chorus of a thousand chirping grasshoppers. In a valley lit up by two horned moons forming a lustrous circle, I came upon a mysterious structure—a cromlech, it being a large flattish stone supported by two upright stones. Guarding it stood an ibex with lyre-shaped horns. This tawny majestic beast trotted up to me, a half-goose, half-maiden, curious to see whether I was a mythical creature. In the end, he lost interest and turned about, unimpressed.

  My mind went dark. Then came the morning light to guide the way. It shone on a white hermitage in the distance and, nearby, a path that descended to a cliffside. I knelt there near the cliff, waiting and waiting, when a gentle spray of mist fell upon me. Ribbons of water began to trickle down the precipice overhead, to form a liquid curtain, silver-hued and tranquil. La Gloriosa, the intermittent stream!

  Dressed only in my patchy shift, I splashed forth into a shallow pool, stepping lightly with my webbed toes onto the moss-covered stones. I cupped my hands to drink the sacred water tumbling before me and, while doing so, espied a cave behind the waterfall. It was a small cave, the saint’s hiding place. I sat at the entrance of it, alone in contemplation, partially hidden by the dripping clear strands of water outside.

  Shortly afterwards, a glowing young man, his chest bare, waded behind the waterfall. He must have been heaven-sent. His frame was slender, yet strong, his aspect sensitive, yet resolute. Around his neck he wore charms—two lucky gold rings. Hand on hip, he sighed, whereupon he began to hum a familiar Scottish song. He crouched low, which is when he finally noticed me, the quiet cave-dweller. A sweet sad smile graced his countenance.

  There you are, querida mía, and he ducked inside to sit with me. He bore a flowery gift. Are you hiding from me? I thought I had lost you again.

  I’m not lost.

  He crowned me with a wreath of rosemary and wild mountain flowers—the lavender globularias, the pink bird’s-eye primroses, the marsh-marigolds. Something about it, this tender gesture, attested to his steadfastness and made me feel safe. Curious about the charms he wore, I touched the bright gold rings, with their design of two clasped hands—an emblem of union and devotion. My actions, for whatever reason, made him happy. He said, I purchased these for us in Zaragoza, at a goldsmith’s, after which, he boldly leaned forward to kiss me, a lingering kiss with a question mark hanging at the end.

  Flustered by the hotness of our commingling breaths, I shrank back, suddenly aware of my near nakedness and my hair that had been let down—both mortal sins! My thoughts spilled out clumsily into endless questions. Who are you? Where are my clothes? Confused, I reached behind me. Wings! What did you do wit
h my wings? These important things I demanded to know. It had been such a lovely excursion to la Gloriosa, but now it was ruined, as was I, apparently, by this handsome intruder bearing wedding rings.

  My mind in a whirl, I clutched my head, trying to escape my reason and those painful memories called truth that reached out to subdue me, to claim me back again. Because once you go mad, you prefer that illusory world where you can hide and stay lost, where things needn’t make any sense, where you aren’t held accountable for your actions. Clawing at the air, I desperately cried out, Help! Ci-ci, where are you? Tangled visions unraveled in my brain, falling away one by one, until there were none.

  He stroked my hair. “Sofia … Sofia …”

  I gazed up him. Why was my head cradled in his lap?

  “Do you know my name?” He asked me this several times.

  Know his name! I struggled to sit up, which was when I realized a frightening truth—I wore nothing but a short thin shift. Struck with maidenly panic, I hunched over and drew up my knees. I racked my wits to piece the fragments of my memory together.

  “You’re … you’re …” I stammered faintly, my cheeks pink hot with shame. Had I been caught at one of my passionate dreams about him?

  “Yes, querida mía?”

  My darling? Such easy familiarity! I stared open-mouthed at his bare chest and the shocking indecency of it. He was not in the least abashed.

  I glanced down at his conspicuous nether person. “Señorito Kitt … you’re … wearing only drawers.”

  A great sob broke from him.

  “You’ve come back to me,” he uttered with the most tender pathos. And then he wept into the crook of his arm.

  Immediately I felt sorry for it, for having thought him undignified, when he was overcome with emotion. But why his tears? Bewildered by them, I fretted at my state of undress and my loss of virtue. What had we done? Surely Mr. Munro hadn’t acted in an ungentlemanlike manner towards me. Surely those shiny eyes of his bespoke innocence and candor. He brushed away a tear from his nose.

  “We must marry quickly,” said he, taking my hands in his.

  10. Luna de Miel

  Mr. Munro went straight to the point. He had known from the moment he set out to find me, upon receiving Emmerence’s urgent message that I had gone missing, that we must elope without delay. He would not see me ruined because of his actions and our traveling alone and sleeping side by side.

  We had slept together? Still confused, I willed my brain to work.

  “What—what day is it?”

  “Wednesday, the thirty-first of August.”

  “How did you find me?”

  “I recalled the route you would take.”

  “But the desert—when did you—”

  He placed a finger to my lips. “Hush … we promised each other not to speak of it again.”

  Curious about what “it” was, I asked him for details. But he changed the subject.

  “I have done things for you and seen things that only a married man should have the privilege of doing or looking upon,” he confessed.

  As a consequence, he felt bound by honor and his love for me, not to mention his desperate wish to save me from Don Fausto. He had become outraged at the sight of the faded purplish stripes on my back. Had I been caned? He needed not guess at which depraved individual had done this.

  “Yet, how could I ask for your hand, and thereby protect you by becoming your husband, when you couldn’t remember my name—or anything else? You were, most certainly, not quite right in the head,” he told me, cupping my cheek in a tender way.

  I blushed crimson, because it was obvious that Mr. Munro had devotedly cared for me. We had become more than just intimates.

  “What a goose I must have been.”

  He grinned, as if I had told a good joke. “Oh, aye, my goose, you were uncommonly skilled at catching insects for me.”

  “How strange you are.”

  “The goose. The swallow. Remember?”

  “Señorito Kitt, what on earth—”

  Kissing my palm, he became quite amorous. “Won’t you call me Kitt?”

  “Kitt,” I bleated out, sheepishly. “I thought you had forgotten me after our quarrel in the museum.”

  “Never,” was his warm reply.

  “I accused you of not making bold choices; yet, here you are. You must know how sorry I am for doubting you.”

  With downcast eyes, he admitted, “Sometimes I take too long to reflect … and weigh my decisions … and thereafter I hesitate to speak, out of fear of upsetting my family or friends.”

  “Oh, Kitt.” I understood now. Silence on his part indicated circumspection and didn’t signify his disinterest or lack of love. If only I hadn’t misjudged him so quickly during our argument that terrible day in Madrid.

  He said, “I beg you to forbear with me in the future.”

  Contrite, I nodded my agreement. This certainly made him happy, and he awarded me with a great many kisses, some chaste and some not so chaste. A reddish glow suffused his countenance. He kissed me passionately again, ending it with a questioning air, but this time I knew what he wanted to know.

  “Sofía mía, marry me today, if you would still have me.”

  “Would I!” and I flung my arms round his neck, ecstatic that he, a highly-principled young man, truly wanted me despite my faults and scandalous behavior, not to mention my troublesome family history. But something concerned me. “Kitt, how can we marry, when we are both not of age in Spain?”

  He told me, “Padre Miguel explained that, as long as we declare before him that we take each other for husband and wife, there is nothing really that can prevent the marriage being legal. Most parents, he said, choose to accept the marriage instead of casting off their children.”

  Being cast off didn’t bother me, given what my mother had done and that she hadn’t a thing now, not even her orange-diamond ring.

  “What will happen when we return to England?”

  Worried lines creased his forehead. “There, and in Scotland, several obstacles remain to our immediate happiness.” His tongue then faltered. “I don’t … expect you to understand them fully yet.”

  “Oh, I do understand,” I assured him brightly, to cheer us.

  But I didn’t really then. How could I possibly ascertain the shades of meaning he tried to convey? How could any young bride see clearly when she’s loca de contenta—mad with joy? England and its obstacles seemed such a long way off, more than a million heartbeats into the future, and so, I told myself that I needn’t worry about marital matters and whatever else at the moment. If anything, my heart would burst from too much love before then.

  Thereafter, we got dressed. For some inexplicable reason, we became bashful. Kitt’s natural reserve increased, and I sensed that he, being gentlemanlike, strove to suppress his excitement. Our arms entwined round each other’s waists, we sallied forth, up the stony path, not saying a word. Still, I waited, hoping for a sign from him, that one amorous gesture of his that I wished more than anything to hear on my wedding day. And then, finally, it came—his deep love-sigh.

  A peal of bells greeted us at the lofty white sanctuary, this hermitage of Santa Elena built near the source of the spring. At the top of the steps leading to the atrium and bell tower, Padre Miguel stood astounded, gazing up at the bells that had rung of their own accord.

  “La Gloriosa has cured you.”

  “It has, padre,” I told him.

  He crossed himself. “The saint has spoken and blessed your union. Only through marriage may you live together in that state of purity which becometh Christians.”

  Opening the arched wooden door, he then led us into a nave covered by a vault of lunettes. Two witnesses, they being sheep herders, had been assembled for the marriage ceremony. But first, the padre must hear our confessions, because surely, we young lovers, who were smitten with each other, had entertained impure thoughts. Kitt went before me, and since he hadn’t given in to temptation, h
is confession didn’t take long. Next, I made my confession. I resolved to tell the padre about one of my crimes—stealing bottles of wine.

  “Theft is a mortal sin.” The padre frowned. “What else have you done?”

  “Well …” I hemmed and hawed. “One day, while roaming on the desert steppe, I came to a hamlet without a name, and I … declared myself a prophetess.”

  “A lie, though not a mortal sin, is still a sin. What did you predict?”

  “I predicted that … freedom, education and equality are the future for womankind.”

  He shook his head, clearly exasperated. “Heresy is a mortal sin.”

  A tirade followed about free-thinkers who put their souls in danger of eternal hell. Then, quieting down, he exhorted me to repent my foolish beliefs. The alternative would be limpieza—a cleansing.

  He addressed Kitt afterwards. “I recommend frequent confessions for her. And you, the husband, must manage your wife—make her submit, yield and obey.”

  “Depend on it, padre, my will shall be made known,” was Kitt’s even reply. “Compliant she often is; compliant she’ll be forever as my wife.”

  I nearly choked at the thought, until I realized he was being ironic.

  Kitt whispered in my ear, “My love, I will make you go to confession once a week.”

  “Oh, botheration,” I muttered in a nervous way.

  He looked upon me with curious eyes, to which I gave an evasive shrug. My thieving behavior as Candelas’s girl—this must never be known by him, otherwise I could not possibly marry into a respectable, loving, reasonable family such as Kitt’s. I knew that much to be true, and I flattered myself on possessing youthful wisdom.