Spanish Marriage Read online

  “I have sent for Manuel,” she began. “You must meet him by the gate and show him where the stranger is. And yes, you will have to help in nursing him. He will stay in the cottage past the gates. Sister Juan has gone to make all ready. Please, Señorita Dorotea.” She stumbled over the name as all the nuns did. “Be careful what you say to him and what you say to Manuel and to anyone else about him. These are perilous times.”

  Restraining the urge to say that she knew, that she was not a child, Thea thanked the nun, curtsied, and was halfway down the hall before Sister Maria Trinidad could reply, her skirts looped up scandalously so that her ankles showed as she ran down the stairs toward the garden door.

  Manuel was waiting for her by the orchard gate. He was a short, smiling, brown man with bad teeth, who felt himself honored by God to be porter to the Sisters. He was a little baffled by the little one who was not a Sister but who wore the habit, who gave orders like an Hidalga but barely came up to his shoulder. “The Sister said there was a man, Señorita?”

  “Just past the stand of trees, Manuel. And you must swear, on the lives of your children, on the Virgin, that you will never tell anyone about him. We have to hurry.”

  Manuel had stopped, hand over his heart. “I would never do anything to hurt my Sisters,” he began, his tone heavy with wounded dignity. “You think I cannot be trusted!” He turned and made as if to return to the village. Frantic, Thea grabbed his arm and turned him around again.

  “How could I doubt you, Manuel? I apologize, but I am so frightened for this poor man. I know you are as trustworthy as an angel of the Lord, Manuel. I do! Please, we must hurry!”

  Mollified, Manuel set off again, looking at Dorthea slyly from the corner of his eye. “A man, Señorita?” he asked. “A lover? If the Sisters found that out....” He clicked his tongue disapprovingly. Thea controlled the urge to scream at him.

  “It’s a stranger, Manuel. I never saw him before. He is dreadfully sick. Sister Maria Trinidad said it would be ungodly to deny him help.” She used the Cellarer’s name for effect. Manuel had a healthy respect for Sister Maria Trinidad’s authority. “Please, he’s just a poor, sick man who needs our help. Me, what would I do with a lover here?” She gestured at the convent walls. “A fine time we’d have of it; can you imagine?” Evidently he could; after a moment Manuel gave a slow snicker and grinned at her. Thea pushed him onward. “Just a stranger,” she repeated again. Just the most beautiful man I have ever seen in my life, she added to herself, though what that’s to the purpose I don’t know. Probably a villain, too... and then: I wonder who Adele is?

  o0o

  It took all of Manuel’s strength and Thea’s considerable ingenuity to get the man back to the cottage by the gate. Sister Juan Evangelista and two novices had cleared one of the two tiny rooms out and settled a fresh straw pallet on the bed. The room smelled dusty and damp; the earthen floor had been freshly swept: there were bundled rushes by the door, ready to spread under foot.

  Heedless of Thea’s protests, the women left the cabin while Manuel stripped the man and put him to bed.

  “I’m not saying that I should be the one to help,” she fretted impatiently, “but Manuel is not strong enough to move the man safely by himself.”

  “It is not to be thought of, Señorita,” Sister Juan admonished. “A young unwedded woman...it is not possible. Trust the Lord. Manuel will do well enough.”

  “Mother is asking for you, Señorita,” Sister Maria Trinidad added quietly. The Cellarer had come up behind them silently, and her voice made Dorothea jump.

  “But the man....”

  “Will be attended to. Señorita de Silva wishes to speak with you.”

  Something in the nun’s flat tone disturbed Thea. “Silvy is all right, isn’t she? Nothing is wrong with Silvy?”

  “Wrong? No, child, but go to her. The man will be attended to: you have my word. There are some things of which we know more than you. One,” she added dryly, “is obedience, I think. When you have spoken with Mother and with Señorita de Silva, and have taken time to eat and to wash and, I think perhaps, have stopped in the chapel for a few minutes to re-collect yourself, then you may sit with him.”

  Thea knew better than to resist. “Yes, Sister. I’ll be back then.”

  Sister Juan smiled. “I don’t doubt it.”

  It had been midday when she found the stranger; now, walking the path through the convent gate and crossing into the courtyard, Thea realized that hours had passed. It was late afternoon. She entered the guesthouse attached to the cloister and went down the corridor to the rooms she and Silvy had occupied since their arrival. In her own cell she hurriedly scrubbed her feet and hands, relishing the cool water against her dusty skin. It was useless to worry about her hair, crushed under the wimple and veil, but she tried to shake out most of the dirt from the hem of her skirts. Then she went next door to speak with Silvy.

  The older woman’s cell was as plain as Thea’s—a cool, whitewashed room furnished with cot, cupboard and prie-dieu. Where Thea had cheered her small space with objects of her own, Silvy’s room remained bare, austere. Silvy was seated in the changing light of the afternoon sun, her long, mournful face oddly gray and pulled. The skin around her lips was white and ridged, her brows drawn down in a frown of pain kept carefully controlled. Thea saw it all as if for the first time and swept across the room to kneel at Silvy’s feet.

  “What happened? Silvy? You look terrible. Are you ill again? Mother....” She turned to the door as the Mother Superior entered the room. “Tell me what is wrong with her.”

  A cold hand took one of Thea’s own in its grasp.

  Silvy said, “Nothing is wrong, Dorothea, only I am tired, a little. Now. Tell me about your stranger.”

  Undistracted, Thea turned again to the doorway. “Mother, will you tell me? She won’t.” Silvy’s fingers pressed hers, and Thea squeezed back, angry and frightened, seeing the look exchanged by her duenna and the nun. “All right, then, don’t tell me. You’ve been fretting yourself over me, and I won’t have it, Silvy. I’ll find out what this is....”

  “In the meantime, hija, the stranger? Mother and I are waiting to hear about the man you found.”

  Mother Beatriz teased gently, “You must admit it is not every day that a man appears swooning in our orchard, Dorothea. Unmonastic, you would say.”

  Reluctantly Thea returned Mother Beatriz’s smile and began her story anew. She kept Silvy’s hand in her own as she spoke. “He’s a gentleman, Silvy, an Englishman. I would vouch for it on my honor. He was hurt. He has the most horrid gash across his forehead, and his feet were bleeding as if he’d walked for miles. He thought I was an angel.”

  “When he knows you better he will certainly revise his opinion,” Silvy murmured. A little of the bluish tint had left her lips, and her smile was gentle and amused. “Do you wish to play nurse again, Dorothea? You must recall that you are a lady, that you are Ibañez-de Silva—”

  “And Cannowen!” Thea added.

  “Yes, and that too, I suppose.” The duenna sighed. “Now you wish to go back to your patient. I wish we knew more of this man, but I suppose that, if he lives, he will tell us. Ask permission of Mother then, child, and eat something, for heaven’s sake.”

  “Sister Maria Trinidad left word in the kitchen that you would come down to fetch bread and milk for your supper, child. Take your time. Certainly your stranger is not going anywhere for a time. Run along. Slowly.” This was said as Thea rose precipitously in her heavy robes.

  This time she did not stop to hear what the Superior and Doña de Silva were saying of her; in a moment she was down the hall, and she turned the corner so quickly she almost overturned one of the Sisters carrying a bucket of water. She made a hasty apology and dashed down the stairs toward the kitchen.

  In Doña de Silva’s chamber the Mother Superior and Silvy were talking about Dorothea, and about the stranger. They reached no conclusions. “If he is, in truth, English, it may be an omen of
sorts,” Silvy said reluctantly. “Perhaps I should send Dorotea home to England. If her grandmother saw the child was without me....”

  “Perhaps she would not take the girl no matter what, Clara. First, I think we must learn what sort of man this stranger is and a little more of how things stand between England and Spain. You will not tell Dorotea about your heart?”

  “Would it make her happier to know that I am ill? Would it mean that I would grow well again? I think not.”

  Mother Beatriz agreed reluctantly. “Thank God she is still only a child.”

  Chapter Two

  Fortified by bread and milk and with half a dozen apricots tucked into the deep cuff of her sleeve, Thea made her way back to the cottage. Sister Juan Evangelista was waiting for her. She was drying her hands on a white towel. Beside her was a pile of debris: bloodied bandages and towels, a basin of dirty water, a pile of torn filthy rags barely recognizable as a man’s shirt.

  “Whatever happens to the young man, he would not have lived long lying out in the sun. The Blessed Virgin brought you to him, child.”

  Thea nodded anxiously. Sister Juan made her feel tiny, weak, and clumsy. Next to the Infirmarian’s tall, sturdy form, her serene, brisk competence, Thea saw herself as the child the nuns, even Silvy called her. “How is he, Sister?”

  Sister Juan smiled faintly. “I think he will live. Prayers work miracles; my herbs and rest should do the rest. Now, you will sit with him. It will mean long hours, child. It is not a game.”

  “I know that. You saw, I sat with Silvy....”

  “I saw you sit with a woman you love, one who has been a mother to you. It is harder to give such patience to a stranger. Even one who looks like that.”

  Thea looked steadily at the Infirmarian. “I can do it.” “You will have to,” Sister Juan agreed. “Well, for the present, he is asleep. When you hear the bell for Compline you must rouse him a little and see that he takes this.” She pointed to a jug on the one table in the little anteroom. “A cupful. It is not pleasant to taste; he will not want it, but it helps to bring the fever down: white willow bark and feverfew. If he is thirsty, you may give him water, all he will take. If he wakes and will not sleep again, make him some chamomile tea; I have left the flowers for you. You know how to make it? Good.” She handed Thea a small wooden box which smelled faintly of the dull, musty flowers.

  Thea felt a response was needed. “I understand,” she said seriously. Half her mind was already with the man in the other room.

  “I have put a bandage on his head to draw out the poison from his wound. What he needs now is sleep. Later, perhaps, food.... Now you, you must not run off unless someone is with him. Is that clear?”

  “Of course it is.” Thea shrugged angrily. “Sister, I am not a baby.”

  She might as well not have spoken. “If it were not for the sickness in the village and the Feast next week, I would not expect you to do this, child. It cannot be helped. If you need me, send for me.”

  “Yes, Sister, I will.”

  Sister Juan Evangelista smiled again, a little grimly. “Take the bottle then and the herbs. I will send water; there is wood by the brazier, if you make tea.” A little more kindly, she laid a hand on Thea’s shoulder. “We will save him, niña. Trust in God.”

  By the time Dorothea had made her curtsy and risen up again the Infirmarian was gone. Balancing the jug and wooden box, the apricots rolling in her folded sleeve, Thea entered the second room where the stranger slept.

  Manuel had stripped his filthy clothes from him and dressed him in a white nightshirt which only accentuated the pallor under his tan. Most of his forehead and his left eye were obscured by the immense bandage Sister Juan Evangelista had bound there. He was no less handsome than Thea had remembered, but now she saw, too, the droop of exhaustion and pain on his lips, the cluster of small lines by his eyes, a heavy furrow between his dark brows. Not just a hero, she thought; a tired man. Gingerly Thea set down the jug and box and took her place silently on the chair by the bed.

  Then began the waiting. There was little to do until the bell for Compline rang but watch him in the flickering candlelight. When Sister Scholastica, the youngest of the novices, arrived with a bucket of water, Dorothea was startled to find how little time had passed: barely an hour.

  “Mother thought you might like to have this,” Scholastica whispered to Thea when they were both in the anteroom. Thea held out her hands to receive her embroidery threads and frame. What she felt was not gratitude, but she conveyed her thanks to the Superior and her love to Silvy, and settled back in the sickroom with her frame and her threads in hand to work at the pattern.

  He was stuporous when she roused him to force half a cup of the antipyretic brew down his throat. In the middle of the night, when Thea had been deep in sleep for several hours, he woke her with his mutterings.

  “Sir? Señor?” Groggily, remembering what her task was, Thea fanned the flame in the brazier and set the kettle to boil. The man’s eyes were open, his face a mask of terror; his hands clutched convulsively at the sheets. “Sir....” If only she had a name for him, Thea thought distractedly.

  “Fire. For God’s sake, something’s afire. Water.” Thea reached hurriedly for a dipper of water and managed to get most of it into his mouth despite the way he thrashed. When he had drunk the man looked at Thea; he seemed to focus on her for a moment. “Who are you?” he asked querulously, but when she began to explain he shook his head. “Words—don’t anyone in this devilish country speak a human language?” he slurred and tried again to sit up.

  “Please, oh God, sir, please lie back,” Thea entreated. One hand came up and tried to slap her away. “I’m trying to help you!” She wondered if she should call Sister Juan for help, and filled the dipper again, this time with the feverfew decoction; she hoped it would help. Plainly, he was delirious.

  “Tryn’ pois’n me,” he spat furiously.

  This time her temper was up, invaluably. “Oh no you don’t.” With one hand Thea pushed him down, her fist dead in the middle of his chest. “You stay there for a minute.” With the other hand she reached behind her for the carved wooden box that held the chamomile flowers. The water on the brazier was nearing a boil when she put a handful of leaves into the pot. She let it stand then for a few minutes and, at last, poured the thin, pale green liquid into a mug and turned to her patient again.

  “You drink this,” she ordered.

  He looked at her over the rim of the cup. “Adele?”

  “No, I’m not Adele, whoever she is, and you’d better drink this, or I shall....”

  Unable to think of a consequence dire enough to impress a grown man half-mad with fever, she never finished the threat. Coercion was unnecessary: he drank down most of the tea in one draught and finished the rest with a thirsty gulp. Surprised, Thea poured another cup for him, which he drank greedily.

  My angel,” he said finally, faintly, “from the field. Thank you, little angel.”

  Thea smiled at him uncertainly, and wondered what to say. By the time she murmured, “Sleep,” he was already unconscious.

  Sister Juan Evangelista woke her before Prime and opened a shutter so that a little of the pale morning light filtered into the room. Briefly Thea explained what had happened the night before and what she had done.

  “It is good,” the Infirmarian said at last. “He sleeps deep now; I think the fever will break. I will ask Sister Scholastica to take your place for a while after Prime, child.”

  “I don’t want....”

  “It is not what you want, but what is best for your patient, yes? Some time to wash, something to eat....” She ignored the evidence of Thea’s small midnight supper of apricots. “Señorita de Silva will want to see you,” she finished.

  That was unanswerable. “When may I come back?”

  “In an hour or so. Sister Scholastica will take good care of our patient, hija. I will go now and send her to you after Prime.”

  In fact Thea was gone for se
veral hours, first to breakfast in the refectory, then to visit with Silvy. The older woman looked tired, unrefreshed by her night’s sleep, and her hands were as cold as ice. Silvy refused to answer questions about her own health; she was all eager to hear about the stranger.

  “Well, it sounds as if you are doing a good job, niña, but I still do not like the idea, a man we do not know, a girl your age alone for hours with a stranger....”

  “Who is burning up with fever and never sure from one minute to the next whether I’m an angel or someone called Adele! Why is it,” she continued, teasing, “that most of the time I am ‘that child’, and now, suddenly, I am ‘a girl of your age?’”

  Silvy did not return the smile. “It is the way the world thinks, niña; you know as well as I. This stranger....”

  “When he’s well and we can ask him questions he won’t be a stranger any more. I mean to ask him everything.” Thea retorted.

  “Poor Señor Mysterioso,” Silvy smiled. “He little knows what he will be wakening to. You want to go back now? All right, but Dorotea, meniña, be careful with this man. He is....”

  “A stranger,” Thea finished. She kissed one of Silvy’s papery, cool cheeks and smiled. “I’ll be so good,” she promised, and left.

  In the gate house Sister Scholastica was drowsily telling her beads at the stranger’s bedside. He was quiet, but his skin was frighteningly hot to the touch.

  “Quiet as a lamb,” the novice reported to Thea. “I only hope it is not a bad sign, Señorita. Sister Juan will be back later, when she has done in the village.” Sister Scholastica left with a last glance for the man on the bed and a smile for Thea.

  “Who are you?” Thea asked the sleeping form. She puttered about the room and made certain there was a supply of the feverfew decoction and that fresh water had been brought. Finally, with nothing more to occupy her than her embroidery, Thea settled herself on the chair by the bed. “Who are you?” she asked again. Of course there was no reply. After a moment she sighed and took up her needle again.