The Testament of Yves Gundron (36 page)

In the mid-autumn Adelaïda grew queasy and quiet, and soon announced that she sensed a new life taking root within her belly. This discovery gave me such a shock of joy that I could almost forget all the difficulty that had beset us in the last few months, all her unpleasantness, all my doubts. If my brother had broken his vows, so be it; if I had turned back upon my duties by spending so much time inventing, then this was a reward in spite of my misdeed. My wife beamed when she told me, and I could not contain my shouting, my happiness, for a moment. “This is the best thing that could possibly happen,” I said.

“I, too, am pleased,” she said. Her eyes shone with the mystery of what went on inside her.

Ruth was out at my brother's as she always seemed to be anymore, and the child napped in her hammock, so for the first time in months my wife and I disrobed in complete joy—though it was midday and there was work, as ever, to do—to enjoy the sweetness of our conjugal bed. What pleasure to touch her strong, fair body and know that it nourished a human soul; and what delight to feel once more her delight at my touch.

Mandrik, arriving with Ruth for the dinner they'd come to expect at sundown, was overwhelmed with happiness—much more than when we told him of Elizaveta's imminent arrival—and bent down to kiss what was still the workaday softness of Adelaïda's belly. My wife giggled, and he reached around to hug her middle. “An heir,” he told her, his cheek pressed into her. “A whole, miraculous new life.”

“Something bad might come of it yet,” she said. “I wouldn't hope.”

“No. It's a good sign. There hasn't been a child born in the parish since Tansy Gansevöort's at Advent.”

“The Devil's work, sure.”

“Which makes this new life even more a miracle.”

So said all the neighbors. Even Father Stanislaus threw his arms around me in church the next morning. “A most excellent sign, my brother!” he cried.

“That's what Mandrik said.” I was flabbergasted at the priest's familiarity.

“At last,” he said, “the spell is broken.”

“But it's only a baby. We don't know that it'll live.”

He shook his narrow head. “Far more than that, after all we've been through. It is the mark of God's love, Yves, for the people of this land.”

Walking home through the crisp morning to my farm—for once again had I discovered the pleasures of ambling to church—I began to wonder if he and my brother were right. The dearth of new bairns could not mean that my fellows did not fulfill their conjugal duties. Our crops were less than abundant, a subtle decrease in productivity of which no one knew the cause, but of which everyone, I am sure, suspected our stranger; and it was my family that would lift us out. I turned briefly off the road with a white rock for the cairn, and I bid good day to Hammadi and thanked my grandmother for whatever had been her influence.

There was praise to be given, and I would give it. I might yet be able to expand our house with the money from the past few years' abundance; build a second room onto the side—not, as had been the last addition, for keeping our stores, but to allow us more freedom to move. Adelaïda and I might have our bed in our own nook; and our children would have more room to play in the winter. I resolved to begin cutting lumber that afternoon, that by spring it would be cured and ready for building. While I was cutting, I would set some aside for a second bed, that Ruth and Elizaveta might have a more comfortable place to sleep for now, and the two children, daughter and son, after the stranger left. And in the darkest weeks of winter, when the snow piled up so that I could barely keep a path open to the barn, I would keep myself warm
building me a table and stool, that I might have, as my brother did, a spot to sit and copy down all that teemed in my mind.

A few weeks after I announced our good news to the priest, however, a strange event befell us. For the first time in memory, Ydlbert had found himself with a house full of sons and no work on whose accomplishment their survival depended. He had struck a bargain, then, with the four eldest: if they would be patient, and not fight one another for their turns, each could take Thea and the cart out on his own, and drive about like a householder for an entire day. The boys were, by report, delighted at this unforeseen change in their routine, and agreed to draw straws for the order of their privilege. Dirk drew the longest, and set out with the cart, a skin of water, and a heel of bread the next morning.

By nightfall he had not returned; but Ydlbert knew of his son's dalliance with Prugne Martin, and wished him Godspeed in that endeavor. When, however, Dirk did not return after dawn, Ydlbert began to fear for his welfare. He came by as I was up on the roof, weighting the new thatch with stones. He climbed up the ladder to sit beside me.

“Hail,” said I, “what news, brother?”

“Dirk's not back yet.”

One of the rocks slipped free of its tether, and I anxiously eyed the ground to make certain my wife and daughter were not nearby. Below, however, there was nothing but the dirt yard, and in the distance the animals going about their sleepy lives in the pasture. “Remember, he's a lad yet. He may have wandered off on an adventure.”

“Aye, a lad he is, and my son. I'm worried for him.”

“If he's not back by sundown, we'll set off in search of him at dawn.”

Ydlbert noddeled grimly, and helped me tie the last few rocks.

I fully expected Dirk's return, and felt no misgivings thus advising my friend. But the evening came and went without word of the missing boy, and long before the sun was up my neighbor was knocking on my door, his face a mere mask of its usual, jovial self. Adelaïda made up our provisions as we hitched Enyadatta to the cart, and she gave us a blessing as we left.

We drove first to the city, where I imagined we might find Dirk
stone drunk in a tavern, but no one in Nnms had caught sight of him. We followed the Via Urbis out the East Gate, where neither of us had ever gone before; but the road came to a halt before we reached the Eastern Mountains, and there was not a soul about whom we could question. We doubled back through town, then, this time receiving the sympathetic cheers of the townspeople, who no doubt thought our quarry perished by the roadside. None of our good neighbors had seen the lad since he'd headed west two days since, and at last, toward the wane of the day, and miles west of Mandragora, we reached the place where the High Road met the Low, with nary a word of the boy. We dismounted the cart and waded through the meadow, all the while shouting Dirk's name, but our voices rebounded against the Great Mountains to the west, and when the sun set we returned to the cart, our heads hanging heavy with defeat.

“It's your brother's fault,” Ydlbert said, his elbows resting on his knees and his head tucked down as we rode.

“Mandrik's?”

“Aye. All those tales of the Beyond Dirk imbibed with his mother's milk. Now he's gone off to seek it, and kidnapped my horse as well.”

I was affronted on my brother's behalf, but understood my friend's terror. “It's only been two days, Ydlbert. He's sure to come back.”

“Between your brother and the strangers, it's a wonder all the children of the village haven't wandered off, looking for the great world.”

“I promise he'll come back,” I said, though I knew how futile were such promises.

The next day dawned and set without news of Dirk, and in my heart I began to fear him dead. The day after that, I rose with a heavy feeling in my chest, as if I were full of my friend's grief; early that afternoon I set out for a barefoot walk along the road, to mortify my senses and to give me the opportunity for quiet reflection. It did not seem fair that I should expect a new child while he lost one he had reared from infancy to manhood. So engrossed was I in these musings that I did not see Jude Dithyramb approaching in his cart until his dappled Wicket was nearly upon me. The horse neighed and slowed. His master pulled on the singing brakes, and called out good-naturedly, “Walking in your sleep, Gundron?”

“Dreaming, aye. Thinking about Ydlbert's lost son.”

“You needn't look so downcast about it.”

“When my closest friend has lost his child? I cannot but grieve.”

“Aye, but only a moment since I saw Dirk von Iggislau—that same one you seek and have feared dead—driving, neither fast, nor whooping, nor with Prugne Martin alongside him.” Wicket swung his gray, speckled head back and forth before me, and I patted his broad nose. “He simply sat on the seat with the reins slack, and let Thea walk at her will. I waved hello as I passed him, but he didn't even notice.”

“That's not like him,” I said. “He's usually high enough of spirits. But then, who knows where he's been this half week?”

“Aye, well, he looked a sight. I'll say that. He looked like he'd been through something or other.”

Jude was beginning to gray about the temples, and surely would never marry now. In that moment I prayed silently that he be spared the fate that afflicted his mother. “Did you see him go home?”

“Nay, not home. The horse was set on turning into your yard, and your wife and stranger ran out to greet him. I'm sure he's still there. Perhaps you can knock some sense into him—or at least find out what's wrong.”

“Will you drive me home? And then go to Ydlbert's, to tell him the news?”

“Of course, lad. Come aboard.”

I climbed up, and he clicked to his horse, and we made haste home. He left me off at the edge of my property; and there, sure enough, was black Thea, still hitched to her cart, and dragging it in an idle circle about the yard. I stopped to bring her some of Enyadatta's hay, at which my horse piteously complained.

My family did not hear me approach, and I was well within the door before they noticed me. Dirk was bent over double on the bench, his eyes resting in his palms, and Adelaïda daubed at his neck and temples with a damp rag.

“Has he taken ill?” I asked.

“No,” Ruth said.

“Madder'n Christmas in March,” Adelaïda said. “The poor darling.”

Ruth busily shook her head no. But if I were to believe one of them, my wife, with our heir inside her, it would be.

“It was Thea brought him here,” my wife said. “He sat senseless as a doorpost behind her, and she came up the yard to whinny hello. We
had a sight of it, trying to coax him down. But finally he came in, and drank some broth, and hasn't opened his lips else but to rave.”

I knelt at his feet. His sharp, youthful knees poked out through filthy brown trousers, and his leather shoes were caked with mud. There were cuts along his arms, and a dark bruise blossomed along one sharp cheekbone. He rocked himself slightly to and fro, or perhaps it was the pressure of Adelaïda's hand upon his nape.

“Dirk?” I asked. His leg, beneath my hand, burned like midsummer. “It's Gundron. Will you tell me what happened?”

He shook his head slowly, side to side.

“I cannot tell,” Adelaïda said, “if we should send for the priest or your brother. I think he wants blessing.”

Ruth said, “I don't think Stanislaus should be involved. I'll go get Mandrik.”

“Thea's hitched in the yard,” I told her, “if you can drive her. I sent Dithyramb already to tell Ydlbert the boy was home.”

Ruth's lips were tucked up over her teeth and pinched white. “I'll be back.”

Elizaveta ran out after her, and I don't think my wife even noticed Ruth swiping her up to take along for the ride.

The house seemed dark and hot. “Dirk,” I began again. “Please. You must tell me what's happened. I won't be angry. I'll help you if I can.” For at the very worst, I reasoned, Prugne was with child; and Ydlbert and I together could certainly carve out a living for him. I was ashamed never to have thought of such a solution before—after all our years of friendship, it was little to offer.

“I have seen a terrible place.”

“A vision,” Adelaïda cooed.

He shook his bowed head violently. “As real as you. I saw the great, wide sea.”

I continued to pat his leg as one pats the back of a colicky babe. “Tell me, if you are able.”

He crossed his long arms over his curly head. “There is nothing to do at my father's farm, Yves. Bartholomew is as big as I, and Manfred and Jowl can both do nearly a man's labor. It's boring as Purgatory there, don't tell my father I said so. So we all agreed that I might go out for a wander in the cart, and that the next day someone else might go. I went westward out the High Road, for the rumor was they'd paved
way out to where it joins the Low, and I hadn't wandered that far since I was a lad.”

“You're a lad still.”

“Is it true,” Adelaïda asked, “about the road?”

“Aye, and a beautiful sight. As I traveled that way, my Uncle Yorik and your Uncle Frith both called out to see if anything was the matter, so little did they expect to see anyone there. Jungfrau shouted a curse upon Thea for making too much noise.”

I said, “Typical.”

“May I have some more broth?”

Adelaïda brought him a saucerful. His strong hands shaking, he lifted his bruised head to sip it. His face flushed crimson, and his eyes, ordinarily a pleasant walnut hue, of a sudden glimmered black. He gave Adelaïda back the bowl, and wiped his brow on his sleeve.

“Out I went, then, along the High Road, to its end. Thea is a good runner, and for days she had done nought but stand at pasture, so she was glad of the exercise. I passed even the derelict farm of Titus Marnt, and the ruins of the von Broleau place. Finally there it was, the juncture of the roads, both as smooth and lovely as anyone could imagine. Past them the grass grew tall, and rippled, full of the last autumn flowers, in the breeze. The mountains rose up all around to enclose me, and but for Thea's impatient stamp and the breath in her nostrils, all was silent.