by Eric Flint
"Somebody," Maria Anna said, "has to stay outside to watch the road. Otherwise, he won't know where we are. And I'm not inclined to tack another note onto the inn door describing our location to any group of passing strangers. This is just..."
She looked around. It was the silence that bothered her. Villages were never silent. There were always chickens clucking, children crying, women calling to one another, cattle lowing in the pastures outside. Here, there was nothing. A few wild birds in the trees, a few insects. "Eerie."
"It's not raining all that hard," Veronica said. "If I stand under that tree, I'll be dry enough. So I'll watch. The rest of you go in and get some rest."
* * * *
She watched. She was dry enough. The rain slacked off. In any case, she was an old hag of a camp follower. She had been out in worse rains, and she had found a protruding root to sit on, so her feet were resting. Surely, he would come pretty soon.
The sun was setting. It wasn't high summer any more, but the dusk would still be a long one. If he came pretty soon, they could still try to make Weichering this evening.
Mary Simpson came out of the shed. They sat next to one another. It got a little darker.
Maria Anna joined them. "The Ladies are about to start the vespers liturgy," she said. "I will watch for a while, if you wish to join them."
Veronica was feeling a little guilty for having been rude earlier in the day. Old hag of a camp follower she had been. Not proper Abbess of Quedlinburg style at all. The Englishwoman meant well. She couldn't help what she was. She nodded and slipped inside the shed, her fingers groping at her waist for the twig-and-grapevine rosary that Miss Ward had so patiently made for her.
* * * *
"Don't you want to go, too?" Maria Anna asked.
Mary Simpson shook her head, smiling, "I am not Catholic."
Maria Anna nodded. "True. I understand that many of the people in Grantville are not. Lutheran? Calvinist?"
"No. I am Unitarian."
A new word. "What is that?"
Mary explained.
Maria Anna stood transfixed, looking down at her. A Socinian. Common enough in Poland, where the sect had been tolerated for decades in the past century. She knew what the Socinians were. They.. they denied the divinity of Christ. They, since they denied His divinity, did not honor His mother. Nor Anna, the mother of the Virgin. Neither of her patron saints. Although, oddly, the woman's name was Mary. It had never occurred to her that a Socinian might carry the name of the Virgin Mother.
"Oh," she said.
"I will not hide what I am," Mary said. "If you tell them"—she gestured toward the shed—"I will understand. I won't try to predict what they might do about it. Herr Cavriani knows, perhaps. But I am not sure. It is no secret, but there is no Unitarian church in Grantville. My husband does not share my beliefs, nor my son. They are Episcopalians, Anglicans, Church of England. English Protestants, of the same faith as the current king, as Archbishop Laud." She smiled a little. "Rather high church Episcopalians, by ordinary up-time American standards, especially my son Tom. Very like Archbishop Laud, oddly enough."
She shrugged.
The archduchess looked at her. "I will..." she said. Then she stopped. She stood quietly.
* * * *
Processing her reaction to this heresy, Mary presumed.
What would the girl do? Mary could think of several things, starting with finding a representative of the inquisition and turning her over to it. The archduchess was, after all, a product of Counter Reformation Catholicism. Daughter of Ferdinand II, the Holy Roman Emperor, who was one of the most unrelenting persecutors of Protestantism in all of Europe. Clearly, from her participation in the prayers that the English Ladies recited on such a regular basis, a pious and devout young woman, completely sincere in her beliefs.
Maria Anna stood under the tree. Silently. Mary estimated that at least fifteen minutes had passed since that, "I will." She thanked her lucky stars that no man was there. No man who would leap into the middle of it, lobbying, arguing, attempting to persuade. Men tended to do that. Even the best of them.
She blinked. When John proposed, she had not said, "This is such a surprise." They had, after all, been dating seriously for almost a year. She had said, "please give me time to think. Not about whether I love you, because I do. But about whether I have what it takes, or can learn what it takes, to be the wife of a man who has chosen the Navy for a career. It's not what I ever, before I met you, thought that I might do."
He'd answered, "As long as it takes." Which had almost caused her to accept then and there. Instead, she had walked around like a zombie for a week, thinking about it. Death, injury, captivity, all part of your husband's job. By the time she said "yes," she had accepted what she was doing.
This way, at least, whatever conclusion the archduchess might reach, she would "own" it. Whether she called off the whole project of the escape and went running to the nearest Catholic church for sanctuary rather than travel in the company of a Socinian, or worse. Worse from Mary's perspective, at least. Or if she decided to continue traveling with them. Whatever she did, if she decided for herself, she would not feel that she was pushed into it, would not be resentful later.
It was a long quarter-hour.
"I will...." Maria Anna said again, "I will get up a half hour earlier than is my custom every day for the remainder of my life, to say a rosary for your salvation. I will also dedicate two novenas per year for that purpose, as well as performing the Stations of the Cross for this purpose during Lent."
Whatever Mary had expected, it was not that. Her shoulders sagged a little; she put one hand against the tree trunk for support.
A little tremulously, she answered, "That is a big commitment of time for a prominent political figure to make. I do know who you are, you know. Not Miss Ward's niece who was told by her mama to come along with us. Knowing that you are doing that, going to so much trouble over me, will give me a very bad conscience, every time I think about it.
Maria Anna smiled triumphantly, "That's what it's supposed to do."
* * * *
Maria Anna was far from sure that her decision was the correct one. She knew that Papa would not think so, certainly. Nor Father Lamormaini. Conscientia triumphata. Not conscience triumphant, but conscience being paraded, like booty in an ancient Roman triumphal procession, by her conquering affections. It was all too likely that she had allowed her growing liking for this up-time woman to take her conscience captive, against the requirements of strict duty and clear obligation. If that was the case, nonetheless, she had made the decision. She could discuss the matter with her confessor later, if she ever again got to a place where she could confess. Which seemed by no means certain at the moment. She let her right hand drop, feeling the flannel-wrapped golden rose that she wore beneath her skirt.
She looked down the darkening street. "There is Herr Cavriani," she said.
He was running toward them smoothly, followed by another man who was not running with anything like the same ease.
"We have to go," he said. "There is no more time. A messenger came to Reichertshofen just as I was about to leave; that delayed us, a little. The Bavarians will be marching out at first light, before full dawn. If we aren't in Neuburg by then, they will overtake us. We sent him on, cross-country, to notify the Swedes. The USE. General Banér's forces, in any case. With a request that as a quid pro quo, he is to beg that Neuburg opens its gates to us if we manage to arrive ahead of the Bavarians. Which means, essentially, if we arrive before sunrise. If, of course, they let him in to deliver the message. Or if he can find a patrol outside the walls that will believe him.
Mary Ward, reluctantly, cut the vespers liturgy short. After Cavriani had said several things that were just what she would expect of a man who did not appear to be at all devout. He carried a rosary case, but she had never seen him open it.
Neither Mary Simpson nor Veronica had seen fit to enlighten the mother superior about Cavriani's background. Some
things just were not necessary.
The pudgy little man with Cavriani was still panting when they started down the road towards Weichering. Mengersdorf, he said his name was.
* * * *
They had been on the road for four hours when Mengersdorf fell. They had not even reached Weichering.
He was just lying on the ground. Floppy.
Maria Anna let loose the handles of the wheelbarrow, noticing that some of her skin stuck to them. Mary Simpson climbed out. Looked at him. Felt of him.
No fever—if anything, he was chilly. He didn't speak any English, nor did he appear to understand her German. Painstakingly, through Cavriani, she asked questions. No chest pain. No headache. But his limbs were like jelly, his whole body floppy.
She stood looking at him, frowning. Thinking. Trying to remember. Tom, when he was about seven or eight. Always such an energetic boy. A day when he had been running and climbing, nonstop. They had been in the country, a creek with a swimming hole. Jump from the bank, splash, wade to the shore, run up the bank again, jump, repeat.
Just before supper, he had fallen like this. What had the pediatrician said? "He has just used up all of his blood sugar. Give him something to eat; a couple of teaspoons of sugar, if you have it. Put him in a warm tub, keep the arms and legs moving so he doesn't stiffen up. He should be all right in a couple of hours."
It had seemed such an unfeeling thing to say to a mother whose only child had collapsed. But she did it, and in a couple of hours, Tom had been ready to run again.
"Ask him," she said to Cavriani, "when was the last time that he ate."
"Ate?" Mengersdorf looked bewildered. "Ah. I sent the food that was in the house with my family. When I sent them to Neuburg. I expected to follow them much sooner. Ate? Two days ago, I guess. Three days, counting this one."
"Are you accustomed to taking this much exercise?"
"Exercise?" Cavriani was puzzled.
"Does he usually run, walk, like this, for hours on end?"
"What? Oh," Mengersdorf said, "no, no."
No sugar. No hot bath. Some food, though. She gave him a little jerky, some water, and said, "No help for it. He goes into the wheelbarrow and I walk." They hefted him up from the ground.
"He's quite a bit heavier than you are," Cavriani said. "Let me push it for a while." He grasped the handles; felt the stickiness, let loose again.
"Your hands," he said sharply to Maria Anna. "Are they blistered? Are the blisters breaking."
She held them out; then realized that it was too dark to see. "They are raw; much of the skin is gone."
Cavriani swore. "How long have you been pushing this by yourself?"
"Veronica helped."
"How long have you been pushing it?"
"Since Pörnbach, most of the time. But we rested in Pobenhausen, waiting for you. You know that. You found us. They weren't quite so bad, then."
Cavriani shook his head. Then, to Mary Simpson, "If you have enough water, a little to spare, perhaps you could wipe off these handles. And pour a little on her hands, to rinse them. Who has the salve and the bandages? We don't dare make a light; do the best you can by feel."
* * * *
Past Weichering. Darker than ever, a steady drizzle. Without a moon, no way to guess how much time had passed. From Weichering to Neuburg, only seven miles. The Bavarians would be sending out patrols before the bulk of the army marched; mounted patrols, moving much faster than people on foot. The English Ladies made no complaints; neither did anyone else. They trudged on steadily.
Hoofbeats, behind them, following the road. It was still dark, just the slightest hint of a false dawn. No way to get the wheelbarrow out of the rut and out of sight. Mengersdorf looked, Cavriani thought, dead enough to pass for a corpse. The patrol wouldn't risk a shot; if one of them paused to spear him to make sure—well, they would have traded one life for a dozen. The rest of them hid.
The lead horse slowed a little; the patrol walked single—file around the wheelbarrow, in the other rut. They didn't bother moving it from the road; neither did they bother examining the apparent corpse.
I hope, Mary Simpson thought, that they go back another way. She could feel the new, tender, skin on her feet breaking through again, the gauze of the bandages grinding into the soles.
Cavriani went back to pushing the wheelbarrow.
Dawn. A little village, to the left. "Zell," Mengersdorf whispered. Two and a half miles to the Neuburg gates, perhaps.
Hoofbeats again. Not the same patrol. Muffled, this time, slower. Closer than the first patrol had been when they heard it. No time to disappear; they moved to the side of the road. Stood. Just refugees.
We are not worth your time, we are not worth your time, Mary Simpson thought. We are not worth your time.
Cavriani pushed her forward. It was a man with a horse and cart, whom Cavriani seemed to know.
They abandoned the wheelbarrow. She, Mengersdorf, Veronica, Sister Winifred with her bad ankle, got onto the cart. The man turned the horse. The rest of them ran, trying to keep pace with it.
"Tell me, Veit," Cavriani gasped, "how did you do it?"
Egli looked at him in some surprise. "Your runner arrived last evening, just before dark, so I knew you were coming. I bribed the gatekeeper—this is his cart. Let's hope that he stays bribed."
He had. Scarcely a testimony to the Neuburg city militia's tight security procedures, but nonetheless welcome.
Egli did notify the Swedes about it. After the people for whom he felt immediate responsibility were safely at his house.
* * * *
Neuburg
"I am not," Maria Anna said, "going to Grantville."
Mary Ward looked at her. "You are my responsibility."
"You are not," Maria Anna retorted, "my Mother Superior. Or, for that matter, my aunt. Nor am I your responsibility. I have traveled with you. I am grateful that you allowed me to. It has made my trip thus far a lot easier."
Easier? Mary Simpson looked at the archduchess' hands. As bad as her own feet. She wondered exactly what Maria Anna had been expecting when she left Munich.
"It is perfectly clear what you should do," Mary Ward insisted.
"You have instructions from the pope. Obey them." Maria Anna paused. "They do not include me."
"I am sure," Mary Ward said, "that if the holy father had the slightest idea that you would be leaving Munich with us...."
"The fact remains," Maria Anna answered, "that he did not. Nor am I sufficiently arrogant to believe that I can gauge his intent and desires when he is in Rome and I am in Neuburg. Once again. Your instructions do not include me. Is that clear?"
Narrowing her lips, Mary Ward said, "I will check on Sister Winifred. And on the unfortunate man who came with us." She left the room.
Veit Egli rested his chin on his hand. His house was not large. Four rooms, which included the kitchen. Two up, two down. And, at the moment, very full, not that all of Neuburg was not very full. Right at the moment, he wished that he were somewhere else. There were all too many strong-minded women in one small space. "I believe," he announced, "that I will take a walk. See if there is anything to see at the perimeters."
"Please check at every entry point," Cavriani said pleasantly. "You know what I mean."
"Enjoy yourself," Mary Simpson said pleasantly.
Veronica's contribution was, "Don't get shot. There are a lot of stray bullets going up. You'll be just as dead if one falls on your head by accident as if somebody deliberately aims one directly at your chest."
"Just a little ray of sunshine, this morning, aren't we?" Egli retorted. He was seriously thinking about eating lunch out. Perhaps supper as well, if Herr Cavriani did not need him, of course. Cavriani had gone to the bridge, to see if anything could be done to expedite the safe conducts for the English Ladies. The runner whom he had sent ahead had arrived and delivered the message, but had not been seen since. Egli hoped that he had crossed the bridge and had reached Banér's radio. H
e had no real way of knowing. No one would admit having seen the man after he left Egli's.
* * * *
At the moment, they had Egli's office to themselves.
"Why not?" Mary Simpson asked.
"Why not what?" Maria Anna returned the serve.
"Why not go with them?"
"I do not trust the Swedes. The Swede. The usurping so-called emperor."
Mary nodded slowly. Sometimes, she almost forgot that this energetic, shrewd, practical young woman, knowledgeable in the ways of gardens and dairy barns, was also the daughter of Ferdinand II, Holy Roman Emperor. It occurred to her that Maria Anna probably never forgot that.
Maria Anna was talking, rather slowly. "At the moment, I hope, General Banér does not know that I am with the English Ladies. In all of the newspapers that we have bought, there has not been any speculation at all that I left Munich with them. Some seem to believe that I have already returned to Austria but am being, as you say, kept under wraps. If I am not in Hungary praying for the defense of the border. Or somewhere else. If Herr Cavriani has not told the General...somehow, I do not believe that he has told the general. Then, in any case, there is no reason for the Swedish commanders here to take a special interest in one more refugee from the countryside."
"Honestly," Mary said, "I don't think that Mike—that Prime Minister Stearns—would agree to an effort to hold you against your will. I don't think that the people in Grantville would let anyone imprison you, if you came to them voluntarily."
"Why not?" Maria Anna asked simply. "In a way, they are holding Princess Kristina hostage, aren't they? No matter how politely and gently? Even if she spends time in Magdeburg and joined her father for the Congress of Copenhagen. Bars are bars, even if they are woven of spider silk rather than cast of steel. And I am not a young child, who is accustomed to having adults such as your future Imperial Countess of Narnia molding and forming her actions, limiting where she can go and telling her when, happy enough if her cage is fairly large. I am an adult, with a place I need to go and a task to complete. A place and a task that, I think, the Swede would try very hard to find out. He would, I think, feel obliged to put me under much tighter constraints than you have done to Princess Kristina, knowing that I ran from Munich. In the last analysis, the prime minister serves the emperor. Not the other way around."
