Damp silence wrapped the grove of oak and linden trees in a shroud of nocturnal mists. It oozed through the untamed profusion of an ancient hedge of heather and wild rose vines and into the abandoned ruins of a wattle-and-thatch structure that drooped with its gaping vine-covered doorway, sagging roof, and broken windowpanes.
In a corner of the single room filled with weathered rubble, a tiny fire burned in an earthen pit surrounded by a circle of broken tiles. In its gasping light, Lysbet (Betteke) de Vriend sat coughing into the heavy woolen cape that wrapped her trembling frame. She bowed her head over a low table. The crude piece of furniture had only one leg intact and was propped up on the opposite side by a pile of unidentifiable debris and draped with a wrinkled square cloth obviously created for a much larger table.
“Holy Vader in the Heaven.” The huddled young woman—barely more than a child, she was—spoke the words as earnestly as if the Vader she addressed could be seen and felt sitting beside her in the primitive shelter she called home.
“Even though you sent no angels today,” she went on, her voice muffled, “yesterday they came bearin’ enough peat for my fire and bread and broth for more’n two evenin’ meals. Thanks be to you for daily bread.”
For a long space she kept her head bowed, her rough hands folded. The fire leapt elusively upward, weaving a web of constantly shifting ribbons of light and shadow across Betteke and her dismal surroundings. Grasping one of the chunks of heavy black bread from the table, she dipped a ragged corner into the pot of broth, lifted it to her mouth, and tore off a bite-sized piece.
“Would to God I could see the angel He sends each day,” she mumbled between bites.
An irrepressible feeling of scratchy fullness from deep in her throat overpowered her and sent her into a fit of furious coughing. She rubbed her chest, wincing as she cried out, “Ach, but it pains!”
When at last the cough subsided, and a spring of tears leaked out around her eyes, she set about once more to consume her evening meal. Slowly, deliberately, she savored each bite as if it were some delicacy from Prince Willem’s table. Then lifting the small pottery dish to her lips, she drank the remaining broth, letting the warm salty liquid trickle into her mouth and down her hot irritated throat. Was that a scrap of meat, or did her imagination prod her tongue to feel what was not there?
“It’s real.” She chewed on it as long as it held enough form to be felt between her teeth.
At length, when the surprise morsel had disintegrated, she set her dish on the table, wiped her mouth on the edge of the cloth, and bowed her head. Once more she offered thanks.
Then reaching inside her bodice, she pulled out a folded piece of paper and smoothed its wrinkles and creases on her lap. She leaned closer to the fire and began to read aloud, forming each word with affectionate precision:
“The Lord props up all who fall,
He raises up all who are bowed down.
All eyes wait upon Thee,
And Thou givest to all their food in due time.”
Betteke let the words flow down into the crannies of her soul. Though she’d never known the love of a flesh-and-blood vader, her moeder taught her ’twas their “Vader in the Heaven” who saw to it that they always had just enough food to quiet the daily pains of hunger. Never enough for a feast, but at least a daily crust of bread, either with or without the pot of broth.
She knew it was because of His care that she had found refuge in these ruins. Long ago she’d discovered this quiet spot by peering through a tiny hole in the thorny hedge that encased it well. In those days the old retired kasteel guard, Lucas van den Garde, who lived in the house next to The Crane’s Nest, came here to paint. She knew that’s what he did here because she’d heard him and his grandson, Pieter-Lucas, talk about it as they walked in the wood. She had watched with surprise as he opened the secret door through the hedge.
For a short while one of his pictures hung in the Great Church above the altar of the Chapel of the Holy Ghost. Betteke had never seen anything so beautiful. Then one day angry men broke into the church and sliced it with a big knife. She cried for the whole day.
One of his paintings nobody damaged. It hung above the altar of the Beguine sisters, who dispensed mercy and medicine to Breda’s sick. It showed Jesus touching multitudes of sick people, making the lame to walk and the blind to see, and making the sad joyful with His loving words. As long as she lived in the city, Betteke went nearly every day to look at it.
With her rough hands now slightly warmed by the fire, and her heart warmed by the memory of beautiful paintings, she folded the page from Meester van Keulen’s big Bible and put it back in its place next to her heart. She moved toward the pile of rags that formed her bed on the other side of her fire. She had barely reached the bed when she heard noises just beyond the wall.
The wind? Nay!
A wild boar prowling about? She lay stone still, trying not to breathe. Vader in the Heaven, she prayed silently, feeling the rawness of her throat begin to urge her to cough again. You promised to prop me when I fall, and I’m very close to fallin’ just now into great danger.
With effort she suppressed the cough that threatened to betray her presence. The noises drew closer, more distinct. She raised herself to an elbow and tucked her hair behind an ear, straining to listen. Footsteps!
Vader, Vader, let no wild beast find the doorway, she prayed in stunned silence.
But the steps came closer, leaves and twigs crackling under their weight. Now there were voices, first whispering, then speaking in an unintelligible mumble, followed by the halting, unmistakable cries of a baby.
“A newborn!”
She buried her head in her blanket and swallowed hard, choking back an explosive cough. She could hear her unseen visitors moving along the wall toward the doorway.
Could she put out the fire and hide before they found her? Nay, she must not think of her own safety. There was a newborn out in the cold of this damp foggy night, needing warmth and shelter. What sort of people had captured the infant and brought it here to invade her refuge?
She hadn’t long to ponder. Already the light of a lantern flickered at her door, and a man came through, wearing a dark cape and a beret with earflaps. He led the halting figure of a woman, her arms filled with the blanket bundle from which came the baby’s cries.
No wild boar here—or soldiers or child snatchers—but parents. Betteke smiled. Her body ceased to tremble. Even her cough fell calm. What sort of threat to their lives had roused this moeder from her childbed—and in the darkness of such a nasty night?
Betteke shrank back into the shadows of her bed and peeked out from behind her blanket just enough to watch and plan. She must help, but if she moved too suddenly, her presence would surely frighten them.
“Look!” the woman whispered. “A fire!”
With rapid instinctive responses, the young man stepped between her and the fire, as if shielding her from some unknown danger. His eyes shone in the dim light, wide and wary. If only she could assure him that this was a safe haven!
“Oh, husband,” the woman’s words were a sigh, bathed in tears.
How cold and weak she must be! Without a further thought, Betteke clambered to her feet and moved toward them.
“Here, friend,” she said. “Lie here.” She gestured toward her own bed, then reached out to help guide the woman there.
Instantly the woman gasped. Her husband shone the lantern into Betteke’s corner. “Who offers a bed?” he demanded.
“Forgive me. I had no mind to startle you,” Betteke said. “I haven’t nothin’ of great comfort to offer, but ’tis a trifle better than the rocky ground. An’ your vrouw must have rest.”
The man made no move in her direction. “Who are you?” he asked again.
“A servant girl.”
He moved the lantern closer, searching her face. “Whose servant girl?”
“I be an honest woman,” she said. “Looks as if we shiver in the same straits—all in hidin’ for our lives. An’ if your vrouw don’t rest soon, she not a-goin’ to run much farther.”
She watched his face soften. Then reaching out her arms to them, she repeated her invitation. “Lie here. I promise before the God in heaven that no harm will come to you or your newborn from these ministerin’ hands.”
Without waiting for further response, Betteke busied herself rearranging her pile of rags into as comfortable a bed as possible.
The man said nothing but watched her every move. Warily, he removed the baby from his vrouw’s arms and let Betteke guide her onto the makeshift bed. Betteke adjusted the woman’s cape, tucking it in around the edges of her body, and watched a ghost of a smile wash across the wan face.
“We be blessed that the angel brought that extra pot o’ broth yesterday,” Betteke said. “Besides, I’ve a small crust of bread left from my evenin’ meal. Had I known you were arrivin’, I should’ve eaten nothin’ and left it all for you.”
“Nay, but we brought bread along for our journey,” the man said. He bent over his vrouw and laid the bundled infant next to her.
“Journey? This woman mustn’t be on no journey. My Vader’s feathered a nest for her here. You’ll stay till her confinement be done.”
Betteke grabbed a stick, poked her fire into new life, and set the extra pot of broth on to heat. “So long as you stay here, my Vader’s angels will give you all you need,” she said as she worked. “Now let me hush lest my chatter call your pursuers through the darkness o’ this ugly night.”
With fingers adept at her menial tasks, Betteke handed the warmed broth to the man. She reheated the water in the little water bottle wrapped up with the baby in his swaddled cloths. At length she gathered together an assortment of debris from around the studio and built a rickety wall of sorts to shelter the young family. Then she huddled by the door, pulled her blanket tightly around her, and leaned against the wall. It would be a long wakeful night.
Through chattering teeth she whispered, “Good an’ gracious Vader, keep my cough silent. You’ve brought this little family into my care and set me to guardin’ their lives. No way can I let my hackin’ cough call their pursuers here and turn this safe haven into a trap.”
The night was long indeed. A cold wind swirled around the doorway, making a sound like the whistling of a shepherd for his dog out in the pasturelands. It blew leaves and forest debris in dizzy little circles at her feet. An occasional shower of rain brought sharp drops pelting against her cheek. Betteke shivered and buried her face in her arms. But she did not cough!
As the hours wore on, she tried every way to find a comfortable position to sit out her guard duty. But no matter which way she turned, her legs ached. When she could endure it no longer, she stood up, unfolding stiff limbs and moving numbed feet with difficulty.
Gingerly she stepped past the doorway, out from under the cover of the roof, and breathed in the cool, misty, almost-morning air. What glorious smells! Damp tree bark and washed mold mixed with the sweet pungency of a nearby clump of wild trilliums with freshly burst blooms.
The wind had gone, along with the rain. A faint hint of coming dawn lightened the scene before her, and a full moon shone powerfully through a thin canopy of morning fog. She walked out across the soggy forest floor, her steps uncertain, trampling wet leaves and snapping twigs in the web of old and new life beneath her feet.
Danger nagged at the back of her mind. Venture not too far. She seemed to hear a soft voice of warning.
But the promise of the morning stilled the voice, and she walked on, her attention arrested by a huge clump of newly sprouted mushrooms just beyond the next tree. She had barely reached the plump edible plants and was stooping to examine them when from the building behind her came the sudden piercing sounds of the infant’s cry.
“Oh!” Straightening, she turned back. “The child, my charge!”
All in the same instant, she felt the overpowering urge to cough and saw in the trees nearby a movement that did not belong to her secluded forest. Soldiers! Nay, Vader, nay! her heart cried out, while the cough took complete control of her. Let them not find the newborn child in my shelter, she prayed.
She must be still. All this noise simply called to the soldiers. What could she do? With supreme effort she tried to swallow the cough, to muffle it in her cape. It only grew worse. Her chest heaved and pained as if someone had plunged a dagger into it. In the background, she heard the baby’s continued cries.
The soldiers were headed directly toward her now. In an eyeblink she knew what she must do. Her cough would distract them and save the child. Between coughs, she called out over her shoulder, “Go away! Go! The woods are filled with mad and angry spirits! Go!”
If only the child’s parents would hear and heed the warning and the soldiers would hear and be superstitious enough to fear. Instead, the soldiers came closer.
She took off into the woods, running as fast as she could coax her legs to carry her. She ran on and coughed and coughed, the soldiers drawing closer with each step.
“They’ll arrest me,” she gasped, “and throw me into prison.”
Prison? The memory seemed to give her new energy. If they put her there, she’d never again smell the forest bark and mold and trilliums or hear the wakening sparrows or refreshing breezes rustling through the branches of the giant spreading oaks, birches, and lindens.
Last year they’d taken her Meester van Keulen to the prison, and for no good reason. Something about taking part in the ugly image breaking in the Great Church. He didn’t do it, that she knew. Much too gentle, he was, for that. Besides, he was in Gorcum that day.
At first they had let her visit him in the nasty prison. Each day she took him food and smuggled pages from his big Bible, folding and stuffing them inside the rolls of bread. Always she had smiled and tried to make him feel better, then had gone home and cried and vomited behind the garden wall.
When they no longer let her visit him, they came to take possession of his house and to cart her away to prison. But she’d seen them coming, and grabbing his big Bible and a few blankets, she had run out into the forest.
“Halt!” The soldiers were shouting at her now. Her chest ached, her legs felt as if they would buckle beneath her. Her head pounded and swam, and her cough never quit. How easy it would be to stop running. But nay, she must lead them so far away from that crying infant that they’d neither hear nor suspect his presence.
She ran on until she stumbled on a large tree root and fell into a heap on the edge of a thicket of brambles. She heard a voice shouting in heavy Spanish accent, “And who are you?” The words rang with disgusting glee.
From the background, another answered for her. “Lysbet de Vriend, que no?”
Laughter and shouts of triumph rang out through the forest.
“Betteke!”
“At last we found her!”
The whole pack swarmed over her. She felt hot breath on her forehead, rough hands ripping off her clothes, and pain, pain, pain! Then all went black, and she slipped from pain and fear and coughing into merciful oblivion.
****
Tante Lysbet passed her first night in the tower prison wrapped tightly in her long black cape and sitting huddled on a large low block of wood in a corner. The filthy straw-strewn floor beneath her feet sent cold shivers through her body. She hugged her knees, resting her head on her forearms and longing for warmth, the suspension of thought, and sweet soul-numbing sleep.
As if the heaven were deaf to her cry, her mind raced all night long, chasing after terrifying images—Spanish soldiers wrenching her from Vrouw de Smid’s newborn infant, Gretta and Dirck Engelshofen laden with armloads of verboden boecken….
“Moeder was wrong,” she mumbled into her lap. “God does not vindicate every woman with a clear conscience. Either He is no longer watching—or He is no longer almighty!”
A strange tight feeling held her shoulders rigid, cramping her legs, and setting her teeth to chattering. The scenes in her mind turned bloody—an infant slain, Dirck and Gretta Engelshofen tied to a common stake, her own body paraded through the streets in disgrace toward a scaffold!
“God!” she shrieked out at last, “how can you stand by and let all this happen?”
From the opposite corner of the cell in a pile of straw came the voice of Lompen Mieke, Lysbet’s single cell mate. “Hold yer mouth so’s a body kin sleep!”
How could it be that she, the pious midwife, was forced to make her bed in a dungeon with this notorious thief? Could she not at least have been given some sort of likewise innocent companion so that they might console each other in their persecuted straits?
She fought to stay awake and watchful through the hours of the night and yearned for morning light. Off and on she heard Roland calling out the hour of the night. But the voice sounded muffled, as if strangling. Its mournful tone made the night drag more slowly and filled her with a soul-crushing heaviness.
The single torch burning from its holder on the wall sent ghostly shadows dancing through the rafters, around the walls, and into her face. When the torch had burned itself out and the first blush of new-sprung light shone through one of the two high windows in the cell, Lysbet heard a loud clanging of armor, a jingling of chains, and the sound of heavy voices approaching. Metal clanked on metal, and the door creaked open. She watched a pair of soldiers drag a woman into the cell and dump her like a bag of newly digged onions to the floor in the middle of the room. Without a backward glance, they marched out and bolted the door with a shuddering thud.
The crumpled woman lay so still that Lysbet rose from her place and knelt beside the silent form. “Great God,” she prayed, “whoever she may be, don’t let her be dead.”
She lay her hand on a shoulder and felt warmth. Instantly, the woman began to cough. Deep, rattly, persistent, it set her whole body to trembling. Lysbet lifted her to her arms, brushed the matted hair back from a flushed young face, and gasped aloud.
“Betteke! Lysbet de Vriend!”
Under her breath, she mumbled, “I should have known she’d come to this state, alone out there in that shambled studio with no shelter, only damp and cold and nothing to sustain her but wild mushrooms and the pitiful rations I managed to send out to her every day. It was enough to give the dear poor child a deadly illness.”
She sighed and shook her head as if to dislodge some persistent fogginess. “I thought she would at least be safe from her pursuers there. The place was so well hidden.”
But God had deserted even this trusting, helpless soul. Angry at the enormity of the divine betrayal, Lysbet barked a command to Lompen Mieke in the midst of her straw pile. “Gather together all the clean straw you can find and make a bed for this poor sick woman.”
“Why should I?” Mieke snapped.
“Because she’s going to die if you don’t. That’s all the reason you need.”
“But it’s mine—all I got.”
The pout in the shrill voice only increased Lysbet’s anger. “Petulant thief,” she stormed, “I don’t care what you have and what you don’t. If you can’t find enough kindness in your heart to help save the life of an innocent woman who’s being consumed by raw cold humors in her lungs, then you need a flogging, not a bed.”
“But she never did nothin’ fer me.” Her tone had turned saucy.
Lysbet didn’t say another word but breathed deeply, as if filling her entire body with all the strength that vengeance could provide. She got to her feet and walked to Mieke’s side. Grabbing her by the arm, she lifted her off the straw and tried to remove her to the other side of the cell. But she could only go a pace or two, for the woman’s leg was fastened with a wide iron band and secured to the wall by a heavy chain. She shoved her to one side and grabbed up all the straw she could by handfuls. She came back and pushed a now thrashing, shrieking Mieke out of her way again and again until she’d assembled a scanty bed for her suffering friend.
The guard flung open the door and shouted at Mieke, “Hold your abominable mouth, wretch!”
“She stole my bed,” Mieke retorted, pointing an accusing finger at Lysbet.
A smirk spread over his face, and he spat in her direction. “So somebody stole something from you for a change. Hooray!” He pulled his sword from its sheath and brandished it under her nose. “Now, you either hold your mouth, or we’ll have to help you do so, do you hear?”
Mieke retreated to her corner, sputtering and sniffling. An occasional obscene phrase punctuated her low grousing mumble after that, but she uttered no more screams.
Lysbet removed her own cape and spread it across the straw, then helped Betteke onto the makeshift bed and wrapped her the best she could. “Pay the insolent little thief no attention,” she mumbled to her patient.
Then she called out to the retiring guard, “Heer gaoler, can you send a Beguine sister here to administer healing herbs to this sick prisoner?”
“Woman, I don’t run no healin’ place here. In case you forgot, this is a prison. Folks that need healin’ should think about that before they do the unlawful deeds that send ’em here in the first place.” Without pausing to hear her reply, he barged out of the cell.
“We’ve done nothing amiss,” Lysbet protested. “At least a cup of water, given in the name of Jesus…”
She heard a titter from Mieke’s corner and felt warmth rise in her cheeks and dignity well up in her throat. In the name of justice, they couldn’t treat her like this.
She looked down into the distressed face of the orphan servant girl. She was red with an advanced heatte and racked with an incessant cough. Her eyes never opened but oozed tears. Lysbet cast a net into her mind for words of comfort and drew in nothing but anger. She held her tongue and simply smoothed the forehead and massaged the shoulders and hands. “I’m with you, child,” she whispered, calmed herself by the gentle actions. “I’ll do all I can.”
In the meantime, her mind was doing what it did best—searching for a cure. A healing concoction of anise dried by fire and mingled with honey. Perfect for cleansing the heaviest breast of all phlegmatic superfluities. If she could only get word to the Beguines, they would bring her the brew, poultices, blankets….
Lysbet hovered over her patient, wishing, waiting, listening to the cough, wondering…. At regular intervals, now, she heard bells sounding from the Convent of the St. Catharina Sisters just outside the city wall beyond the tower. Was that where God had hidden himself?
When Lysbet had grown so hungry she felt certain she would soon collapse, a guard entered the cell bearing a hunk of black bread and a mug full of nondescript, lukewarm liquid for each prisoner. She put the liquid to Betteke’s lips.
“Drink it, friend,” she said. “‘Twill give you strength.”
“Thank you,” Betteke whispered, then drank it to the bottom of the mug. For a bit, her cough subsided just enough to allow her to drift into a fitful sleep.
No sooner had she fallen asleep, however, than two uniformed men with dark hair and thick mustachios burst into the cell. They carried long curved sabers at their belts. Heads held high, boots clicking, they stood over the sleeping woman and called out, “Lysbet de Vriend, in the name of His Majesty King Philip and his regent, the Duke of Alva, stand forth!”
Tante Lysbet gasped. “The woman is dreadfully ill,” she said, “and sleeping soundly for the first time since they flung her to this floor at daybreak.”
The soldiers laughed. “Too ill to answer questions that could save her life?” taunted one.
“Too ill for anything but sleep,” she told him. “She has a dreadful case of oppressed lungs. If only you would send to the Beguines to bring some healing brews and poultices.”
“We shall see how ill she is,” the second man challenged, jabbing Betteke with the toe of his heavy boot.
Lysbet cringed and covered her mouth with both hands as she uttered a little distress cry. The soldier looked at her with stern steely eyes, then kicked the sleeping woman again.
“Wake up, young heretic!” he shouted.
Both men grabbed Betteke by the arms and pulled her to a sitting position. Lysbet watched the puffy eyes flutter.
“Tell us,” the taller of the two soldiers demanded, “are you not Lysbet de Vriend, housekeeper of heretic, Pieter van Keulen?”
Her breath came heavy and shallow. She nodded and said in a voice so weak it was nearly inaudible, “Housekeeper to Pieter van Keulen.”
The other soldier jabbed her in the ribs and ordered, “Speak up! We hear you not.”
“Ja, ja. What did you say?” the other prodded with mock sweetness.
“I am,” she began a bit louder, “housekeeper…” A spasm of coughing ripped through her.
“To the heretic, Pieter van Keulen?” the first soldier demanded.
“You stall, scullion,” taunted the other.
“To Pieter van Keulen,” she answered between coughs.
Jabbing her in the shoulder, the second soldier prodded her on. “And agree you that he is a heretic?”
“I know not what a heretic is,” she protested, “but my meester is a man like God.”
Both men laughed.
“Like God, was he, when he entered God’s holy Great Church and took his axe to the statues and windows and destroyed all those priceless icons the men and women of Breda need to help them worship God?”
Tante Lysbet cringed as she watched Betteke labor to breathe. She reached out to her and laid a hand on the girl’s forearm. “Easy, child.”
A soldier shoved Tante Lysbet into the straw. “Hold your mouth, you witch,” he growled.
Witch? The word resounded in her brain like an impossible nightmare. She righted herself and watched and listened, incredulous, as Lysbet de Vriend seemed at last to bring her cough under control.
“My meester never did the things you say,” she said evenly.
“Was it not true that he refused to pray to the saints in the church?”
“He had no need of any of those things in order to worship God,” she said with growing strength and coherence. “Jesus said, ‘God is spirit and all who worship Him must worship in spirit and in truth.’ He never mentioned icons.”
“Where did you learn the words of Jesus?” the first soldier said with a jeer.
“Read them for myself.”
“You read them?” He laughed, then turned to his companion. “You heard her? She read the words? A peasant orphan turned servant and she claims she can read.”
The other soldier stooped down to her level, then balancing himself on bended knees and looking directly into her eyes, he challenged her. “Pray tell us, how did you learn to read? Your meester taught you, didn’t he?”
“My Vader in the Heaven taught me,” she answered simply.
Tante Lysbet listened with especial attention. She’d heard rumors of this story but had not quite believed what she heard.
“Come, tell us the truth,” the kneeling soldier begged.
“’Twas my moeder what first tried to teach me.”
“Your moeder? She knew how to read?” the kneeling soldier asked.
Betteke smiled. “She was once a right fine moneyed woman, b’fore my vader died. Many times she tried to teach me. Said it was the most important thing in life for me to learn. But I was still so young an’ couldn’t seem to learn. Then one night she lay a-dyin’….”
The standing soldier waved his hands before her and interrupted, “Nay. We want to hear how your meester taught you to read from the big Bible he kept hidden in a chest.”
“But he didn’t do that,” Betteke insisted, her voice even, her eyes looking straight at him.
“Then we want to hear no more,” he said.
Trying to gather evidence to silence van Keulen, Lysbet decided. Surely she was hearing sounds of evil spirits flitting about, cackling in her ear every time they passed her way.
The kneeling soldier raised a hand to silence the other. “Nay,” he said, “but I very much want to hear the rest of this story.” Then, turning toward Betteke, he said, “Go on, child.”
Betteke smiled. “I was a sittin’ by my moeder’s bedside a-holdin’ her hand and fearin’ with all my innards. She’d been silent an’ ever so still for a long, long while. Then, just before she closed them beautiful moeder eyes fer the last time, she looked hard at me an’ said, ‘Your Vader in the Heaven has written a treasured book. I saw one once in the hands of a travelin’ preacher. I heard him read from its pages, and the words were more wonderful than anything I ever heard from another man’s lips.’
“Then she grabbed me by the wrist an’ said in her most beggin’ tone, ’Ever’ day you live, ask our Vader to give the Book to you.’
“I asked her how I’d know it when I saw it. ‘He’ll tell you, child,’ she said.
“I asked her how I’d know to read it without her to teach me. I can’t ever forget her answer. ‘If’n He loves you enough to give it to you an’ tell you what it is, think you He won’t also teach you to read it?’”
“So,” taunted the standing soldier, “when you going to tell us how Pieter van Keulen taught you to read his big Bible?”
Lysbet bristled. How dare he persist in trying to trap Betteke? She opened her mouth to come to her friend’s defense. But Betteke was already speaking. “I can’t never tell you that because it’ll never be the truth.”
“The truth!” He spit out the words. “What do you know about the truth? Anybody in their right mind knows God is not going to come down from heaven and teach anybody how to read. So whatever story you have to tell us is surely something your simple imagination has given you so you can defend your wicked meester.”
Betteke hesitated for only an instant, then said, “The truth is, when one day I did find a copy of God’s Book, I did what my moeder had told me to do. I begged my Vader, if the words in the big book were so important that He wanted me to know them, would He please show me what they said.”
She paused and Tante Lysbet watched the man on bended knee before Betteke. A strange look—half disbelief, half wonder—spread across the dark face.
“And?” he prodded her. His companion still stood, shifting his weight back and forth from one leg to the other, tapping his fingers nervously on the sheath of his sword.
“The marks on the page stood straight an’ tall like uniformed men,” she went on. “In the beginnin’, I remembered some of them what Moeder had showed me. Then all of the sudden, in my wonderin’ mind, I fancied I heard them sayin’ a string of words more marvelous than anythin’ I’d ever heard.”
The standing soldier threw back his head and laughed a loud hollow laugh. A smile of derision curled his lips. “And what might those marvelous words be?”
Betteke lifted her head and met the smirky challenge in his eyes with a peaceful calm such as Lysbet had scarcely seen in anyone’s face. “‘The Lord is my Shepherd. I want for nothin’,’” she recited. She raised a forefinger, pointed it in his direction, and added, “An’ I can tell you it’s true. I never want fer nothin’. Never!”
The man opened his mouth as if to taunt the girl. But no words came out and the smirk dissolved from his face. The prison cell fell utterly silent except for the faint sound of sniffles from Lompen Mieke’s corner. The soldiers reminded Tante Lysbet of giant pig bladders once filled with air, now pricked by the point of their own sword and deflated. The kneeling man pushed himself to his feet with an air of almost reverence. Together, they slipped out the door, the one speechless, the other mumbling, “All we need for now…we’ll be back….”
Tante Lysbet gathered her young charge in her arms and whispered, “Betteke, Betteke.” Then not knowing what more to say, she wept, pouring out heavy tears into the girl’s long matted hair.
****
Nighttime returned to the cell. Mieke crept as far into her corner as her leg-irons and chains would allow. Without a word about straw, she curled up on her cape and was soon snoring rhythmically.
“Pathetic creature!” Tante Lysbet whispered. Surely there must be something she could do for her. Then she remembered back to her early days in the Beguinage, how she and the other Beguines had tried teaching the girl to care for herself and others. But she only robbed their stores and misused the sisters until they despaired of helping her. Nay, Lysbet had done all she could.
She turned to help Betteke settle in for the night.
“Sorry it couldn’t have been softer and warmer,” Tante Lysbet muttered.
“Most comfortable I’ve had since I left Meester van Keulen’s,” Betteke whispered. “You’ve treated me most kindly this day, and I shall give thanks to my Vader in the Heaven.”
Even after the servant girl’s breathing grew more steady and sleeplike, she coughed sporadically.
If only I had the herbs to make her well! Lysbet mused. Maybe God will have mercy yet. Nay, she told herself, God does not visit this tower.
In her mind, she heard a soft reprimand. Ah, but He has visited you here this day.
“How?” Lysbet challenged the voice aloud.
The answer came back, In His strange and beautiful little Betteke!
Lysbet knew it was true. Still, she trusted no one and determined to keep awake to be sure all stayed in order. She stationed herself on the block of wood where she’d spent her previous night and prepared to sit this one out as well.
Somewhere in the middle of deep thoughts about the amazing power in Betteke’s simple, uneducated trust in the Vader in the Heaven, Lysbet slipped into a dream world. Peopled with Spanish soldiers, Beguine sisters, and laughing children, it didn’t make a lot of sense, but old Lucas van den Garde hobbled around through all the scenes, smiling and using his paintbrush to put a dot of color on everyone’s nose. He had just touched the end of her nose with the bristles of his brush when she heard a rustling in the straw beside her and shook herself quickly awake.
Straining her eyes in the faint torchlight, she made out a figure in long full cape crouching beside Betteke. She heard voices whispering and cocked her ears to catch it all.
“A gift from the Beguines,” she heard the incredible words. “Your friend will know how to use it?”
“Praise be to my Vader,” Betteke replied.
Lysbet strained to see the visitor’s face. Which Beguine might it be, and how did she know to bring the herbs? A shiver tripped down her back.
“Can you tell me again those words from God’s book? I never heard anything so beautiful. Must learn them for myself.”
Tante Lysbet felt the hairs stand erect on the back of her neck. Deep down inside, her mind screamed out, Betteke, Betteke, hush. It’s an inquisitor come to trap you!
Almost as if she’d heard, the girl didn’t respond to the question. Instead she made some shuffling noises Lysbet could not identify. Then she heard the visitor whisper, “Nay, you cannot give me your precious pages.”
Nay, indeed! What was Betteke doing?
“Take them if you’ll read and learn them. I’ve already carved them into my heart.”
“How kind of you! Rest well.”
The mock gentleness sent terror to Lysbet’s soul. In a sort of benumbed silence, she watched the figure slip out the door. Betteke lay back down and began once more to cough.
Tante Lysbet rose and went to her patient. “Your gift from the Beguines—let me see and apply it. Your body needs it badly.”
“You heard?” Betteke asked between coughs.
“I did,” Tante Lysbet said. She trembled as she examined the row of bottles lying in the straw beside her. She uncorked each one and sniffed at its contents to satisfy herself that they were genuine. Anise seed, honey, and the poultice of horseradish. Everything she would have ordered. Whatever his devious plan might be, the visitor had indeed been to the Beguinage. She lifted the large jug filled with brew and smelled its contents. “Black mullein boiled in wine,” she said. “Perfect for loosening raw humors and bringing an end to the heatte and the cough and spittings of corrupt rotten matter that so torment you.”
She set to work mixing and administering all the familiar herbs, excitement rippling through her body, visions of a healed Betteke bursting in her mind.
“How did it happen that he brought these things to you?” she asked.
“My Vader sent him,” Betteke said simply.
“And what did you give him in return?”
“The page from the Holy Book where it says, ‘The Lord is my Shepherd.’”
Tante Lysbet shivered. “I hope he does not use it as evidence against you.”
“Why should he?”
Tante Lysbet marveled at the trusting, loving soul that flowered with such beauty and fragrance in this plain orphan girl. How could she tell her that this man’s job was to catch in traps all who did not hold faithfully to the doctrines and traditions of the Papist church, especially those who read and cherished pages from God’s Book?
“Beware, my child,” she said simply. “Such soldiers are trained in the deceptive arts.”
Betteke grabbed her by both hands, looked full into her eyes, her own face the picture of a contentment such as Tante Lysbet had never experienced in all her struggling life. “You’ve kindly warned me, friend, an’ I thank you. But methinks you mustn’t know how powerful are the words I gave that man tonight. God himself says His words are like a sword that pierces men’s hearts and makes them want to repent and be rescued from their sinful ways.”
“I only hope you’re right.” Tante Lysbet sighed. “They must let you go free. You have so much love to give to this warring world.”
“God an’ I know I’ve done nothin’ deservin’ of the stake, but if these wicked men choose not to listen to His voice, He’ll give me the strength to die like a brave soldier for His cross.”
“Here,” Lysbet said, removing her hands from the girl’s grip. “We must finish with the herbs. Lie down now and let me spread the poultice on your rattly chest.”
As Tante Lysbet worked, Betteke spoke again. “One thing more. Don’t you forget it. Whatever that man may do with the paper I gave him, I shall go to my death prayin’ my Vader in the Heaven will not leave him alone till he cries out to Him to be his Shepherd too.”
All through the night, Betteke slept without a cough. From Mieke’s corner Lysbet detected a never ceasing succession of gentle weeping sounds.