Diane Stuckart - A Bolt from the Blue

I could guess what must have happened next. Even so, I asked, “What then?”

“It was easy,” she replied with a shrug, the gesture sending her gown sliding off her once-plump shoulder. “Her wagon was waiting at the laundry shed. I met her there under pretense of bringing her linens to wash. She put me in the empty basket and covered me with those linens, and then drove off. We made it past the guards, but she refused to let me climb from my hiding place lest someone traveling on the road take notice of me.”

The tears began to fall more swiftly, and these she brushed away with an impatient hand. I could only listen in dread as she went on. “I don’t know what went wrong. Someone must have seen me climb into the basket; that, or they discovered me missing and knew that no other carts save hers had left that morning.

“The duke’s men found us before we had been gone an hour. I tried to protect her. I said she didn’t know I was hiding in the basket, but they did not believe me. They returned us to the castle, and my husband had me locked away here.”

She paused and gave a harsh little laugh. “He told me that, despite what I’d done, he would still honor our agreement. And so, he visits me every few days. I vow I would rather suffer the stoning if it meant he would never touch me again.”

By this time, uncertainty was nibbling at a corner of my brain. Though Marianna’s story rang with stark truth, the manner of her escape made me uneasy. Carefully, I asked, “What of the washerwoman? What became of her?”

“My husband took great pleasure in telling me she had been beaten and hanged for her offense. And so, my torment here is worse for knowing that an innocent soul died on my behalf.” She sighed and shook her head. “Ah, my poor Rebecca, so plain of face but so good of heart. I pray each night to Saint Barbara that her suffering was brief and that she found her reward in heaven.”

Rebecca?

I frowned uncertainly. It was a strange coincidence that the washerwoman who’d helped the young duchess had the same name as the washerwoman I knew. Odder still, from the girl’s vague description, that both were plain-faced women from Milan. But they had to be two different women, for Marianna’s Rebecca had been hanged by a vindictive duke less than a fortnight earlier. My Rebecca was quite alive and doing laundry while I was skulking about Nicodemo’s castle.

Unless the two Rebeccas were both the same woman.

Unless Marianna’s washerwoman had never been hanged, but had instead pretended friendship as she betrayed the young girl to her husband the duke.

The unbidden thought came from nowhere. I shook my head to banish the disloyal notion, but it refused to be dismissed. And, looking back on all that had happened thus far, it occurred to me now that the greater part of our adventure had fallen into place with suspicious ease. From stumbling across Rebecca wearing my father’s cloak, to getting past the Duke of Pontalba’s guards with nary a look, our path had been gently paved. I recalled, as well, that Tito had questioned why a washerwoman would risk helping us on so dangerous a mission.

Why, indeed?

And had it not been Rebecca who had hinted that spies might be conducting their furtive business in the shadows of Castle Sforza? Could it be that she was so certain about such clandestine activities because she herself was a spy for the Duke of Pontalba?

I shook my head again and took a deep breath. I would have to consider this later. For the moment, my task was to locate my father. . assuming that Tito had not been right all along, and our quest was but a chase for wild birds. I had lingered here far too long with the young duchess. At any moment, the duke’s men-perhaps Nicodemo himself! — might find me here whispering with their prisoner. I must learn quickly if she knew anything of my father so I could continue my search.

Though she still stood just inside the door, she had sagged back into her earlier listless state. Softly, I called, “I shall help you, Marianna, but you must first help me. Do you know if the duke’s men brought another prisoner here today? He would be a tall man, pleasant of face, wearing a brown tunic, and with dark hair and beard.”

I feared for a moment that she no longer heard me, until she managed a slow nod.

“I heard something. . Perhaps it was today; perhaps it was yesterday. I did not bother to look. Several of them came through the passage. They spoke in rough voices and laughed cruelly, so I guessed that they had another unfortunate like me. Then they were gone, and I heard no more.”

I swallowed back my disappointment at so vague a reply and gave her an encouraging smile. “Perhaps it was he. I shall search further.”

“Wait!”

The cry was sharp, anguished. She had pressed her face to the gap in the door, so that I could see nothing but a pair of haunted brown eyes, the delicate flesh below them so dark it appeared bruised. “You must swear you will come back for me, Delfina. Swear it!”

“I swear upon my father’s life that I shall see you rescued,” I replied, crossing myself for emphasis. “Now, I must go find my father, so we can end this ugly business and send your cousin Ludovico to free you.”

My words seemed to reassure her, for the tormented eyes vanished from the slot. Sighing, I turned toward the final door, which lay at the end of the hallway. This must be the way to the roof, I told myself as I started in that direction. By this time, however, I feared that my father and the flying machine were both lost to me. . perhaps had never been in Pontalba, at all. Even so, I would first search the battlements for any clue before giving up and returning to rejoin Tito and Rebecca.

Barely had I put a hand to the latch on that door, however, when a thin voice drifted to me from Marianna’s tiny cell.

“Leonardo. That’s what I heard the soldiers call him. . Leonardo.”

“I found it. As we hoped, the flying machine is hidden up behind the battlements.”

My eager words as I returned to the laundry shed drew cries of relief from both Rebecca and Tito. The latter dropped the paddle he was using to stir one pot of laundry and leaped lightly from the wooden step on which he’d been balanced to stand before me.

“Is it damaged?” he eagerly demanded. “Have they assembled it yet, or is it still in sections?”

“It is in sections, just as we last saw it,” I told him as I stripped off my borrowed page’s tunic and retied my belt over my own brown garment. Swapping out the pilfered cap for my own, I recounted how I had made my way from the great hall to a narrow spiral stairway at the top of the castle, which led up to the battlements.

I kept to myself, however, the way my heart had pounded as I’d climbed those final iron steps-each little better than a rung-all the way up to a small hatch that opened onto the sky. The dizzy sensation had intensified there, making me feel as if I might tumble from the parapets at any instant, no matter that I made no move. Steadying myself against a short chimney, I had swallowed back my nausea and taken stock of the situation.

As I’d hoped, the walks from one tower to another were all connected; moreover, several portions of the main roof were relatively flat and quite sturdy enough for a man to walk across. I had hoped to find the flying machine lying directly behind the battlements above the barracks, but the walks there were too narrow to accommodate its breadth. I would have to search out the craft, which meant avoiding discovery by Nicodemo’s guard.