Swept Away (17 page)

“Let
me
do it. I'll dress up as the stable boy.”

Ella shook her head. “No good. First, you don't speak German and second, there's nothing
boy
about you.”

“She has a point, I'm afraid,” Greta said.

“Okay,” Ella said. “So, it's me as a stable boy. Greta, do you know someone who might be able to recommend me over there?”

“I think so,” she said, looking unconvinced.

“Awesome. Get them on that, please. I'll need clothes, too, if you can help with that. We should move quickly. “

Greta left the room and Ella turned to Rowan who had begun to pace in agitation.

“Okay, Rowan.” She picked up the switchblade from the table and held it out to him. “I need you to cut my hair off.”

She waited for him to hold his hand out for the knife. It was the moment that said, right or wrong, good or bad, he was on board. The expression on his face nearly made her lose her conviction, he looked so unhappy. His eyes never left hers as he held his hand out and took the knife from her.

“It'll grow back,” he said hoarsely. More to convince himself than her, she knew.

T
he plan was simple
. It was the
execution
of it that could get them all killed. Ella would be inside the castle, listening and observing, in order to report anything that happened. She would plant Rowan's lighter to implicate Axel as a dabbler in the black arts. Meanwhile, Greta would get the monks to send an anonymous letter to the Protestant Magistrate suggesting that Axel was a warlock. Finally, they would manufacture the necessary evidence to support the idea that Axel was not Krüger's true heir.

Early on the day that Ella was to present herself at the castle, Greta helped her into her disguise. They had put much work into Ella's cover. She was to go into the castle as a virtual mute, able to make noises but not speak. She strapped her breasts down before she climbed into the filthy clothes Greta had found for her. Ella pulled a ragged shirt over her head. Her leggings were baggy so as not to reveal her shape and she wore thin leather slippers.

“How do I look?” she asked, holding out her arms.

Greta eyed her critically and raked her fingers through Ella's hair. “We need to cut a few more sections out of your hair,” she said.

Ella walked over to the kitchen counter and picked up a knife. She handed it to Greta. “Do it.”

As she held the knife, Greta looked into Ella's eyes. “When I see the lengths that you are willing to go in order to help me, to help us, I know that God sent you to me. I know God answered my prayers by allowing your sacrifice.” She dropped the knife and sank into a chair, her hands covering her face. Her shoulders shook with her sobs.

Ella knelt next to her. “Greta, don't,” she said. “I don't know if God sent me but I know this is exactly where I need to be. I haven't sacrificed anything yet. God willing, I won't have to.”

Greta wiped her eyes and tried to smile at Ella. “There is always a sacrifice,” she said.

“What do you mean?”

“During the war, I worked in Manheim and lived in the dormitory with the unmarried girls, but I went home to my mother in Heidelberg on the weekends. I was always very Catholic. I went to mass every day that I could. The day I came to this century, I was walking home from a late mass. It was raining, but I did not care. I had prayed and begged God to guide me, but He did not answer.” She looked at Ella and smiled. “Until He did.”

“What happened?” Ella said.

“I was so upset, I don't think I was even looking where I was going. But of course I knew the way home by heart. When the lightning crashed and the world lit up, I thought it was one of the Allies' bombs. They said they would not harm Heidelberg, but we were always afraid. When the light faded to darkness, I could tell that something was different. That everything was different. I was here. I had passed over to this time.”

“What were you crying about that got you so upset?”

“It is shameful to reveal,” Greta said in a whisper. “I had received news that day that my husband, who for so many years we believed had died in the war, was coming home.”

“You didn't want him to come home?”

Greta looked up at her. “Of course I wanted him to be alive! I thanked God that he had been spared.”

“But you didn't want to be married to him.”

“I was so young,” she said. “I married him because my stepfather insisted. We would get extra food coupons, we would get extra favors because of the honor of his service, and all of that came to pass. I got the good job in Mannheim because of my status.”

“But you didn't love him.”

“His name was Georg. No, I didn't love him.”

“So how is it you became a nun?”

“I was lucky,” Greta said. “Like you, I quickly realized what must have happened, but unlike you, I was ecstatic. Can you see that, for me, it was an escape I couldn't possibly have hoped for? Not just from Georg but from the war, too. As you know, the time portal is by the garden gate. I arrived at night. I knocked on the convent door and was taken in. I was fed and given warm clothes and a bed for the night. I was told that the Mother Superior was very ill. In fact, she was dying.”

Ella picked up the knife and handed it to Greta who then took a handful of Ella's hair in her fingers and sawed it off.

“It hurts me to do this, Ella,” she said.

“It doesn't bother me at all,” Ella said. “Please continue with your story.”

“I must have been mad,” Greta said. “After only a few hours, I asked to be presented to the Mother. I told her I was sent by God to lead the convent and that He bade me request her support in this.”

“Ballsy.”

“Pardon?”

“Nothing, please, go on,” Ella said. “She agreed to support you?”

“She believed in me,” Greta said. “I lied and told her I had been sent to her as her replacement and that I had come from very far away which is why my language sounded so strange to her. She was tired and was ready to go to our Lord. She had been fretting, as I surmised she must be—as I would have been—about the safety of her flock, once she was gone.” Greta cut another piece of hair and fluffed the remnant so it stuck out. “Ella, I wish you could have seen the peace that came over her face when she believed I was sent to take her place.”

“And it was truly what you wanted?”

“Oh, yes!” Greta reached for Ella's hand and looked into her eyes. “Since I was a little girl, I wanted to be a Sister of Mercy. There was no question, it was right for me. My job from that moment forward was to make it right for the convent.”

“So she presented you to everyone as her replacement?”

“She did. We made some excuses for my outlandish clothing and to explain why I had waited to announce my arrival. She died very soon after that and the sisters never questioned my authority. That was twenty years ago now.”

“You're an amazing woman, Greta Schaefer,” Ella said. “A resourceful and amazing woman.”

“I would say I am a lucky woman,” Greta said, putting the knife down. “A woman who has heard and seen God's will too many times to doubt it, especially as it is manifested in my own life. You are ready, Ella. You look as much like a ragged peasant boy as it is in my power to make you. If you don't speak, you will fool them.”

Ella reached out and took Greta's hand and squeezed it.

“You were an answer to prayer, yourself,” Ella said. “The convent couldn't have done any better than to have you take over.”

“I hope so.” Greta smiled. “I pray so.”

The two left the convent and walked down the lane to the pub. Ella knew Rowan could see them from the other side of the stonewall in the garden, but she dared not look at him in case someone was watching. The game was on and she needed to play her part perfectly.

She succeeded in staying mute during the interview at the pub and tried to look as confused as possible, which was not difficult, given the circumstances. When the castle contact finished speaking with Greta, he grabbed Ella roughly by the collar and led her away. Ella did not look back as she was hauled off but she found herself having serious second thoughts about this part of the plan.

R
owan worked
in the garden for most of the morning. He cursed himself for allowing Ella to talk him into this crazy idea. She was so caught up in saving the convent and maybe wanting to be a spy like her mother that she had lost all common sense. He looked around the garden and leaned on the hoe. He had long since stopped asking himself how this had happened. He knew he was the kind of guy who didn't care
how
things worked, just that they did.

The situation he had to accept right now was that he had let Ella dress up like a boy so that she could get inside a seventeenth century castle and spy on people who were able to kill and torture without concern for right or wrong. It was worse than dealing with the mob. At least the mob had some respect for the feds and needed to work around them.

He stared up at the castle. From here, he could just see the faint outline of its upper most walls. Was she in? Were they buying it? Would he ever fucking
see
her again?

Several hours later, just when he didn't think he could take another minute of not knowing what was going on, one of the novices came to the garden and waved to him to come into the convent. Hoping that meant Ella was back, Rowan dropped his hoe and came at a run.

She sat in the kitchen on a stool, talking with Greta. Her back was turned to him.

“Hey, beautiful,” he said as he entered the room.

“Well, not so much,” she said as she turned to face him. He could see she had a fat lip and a bloody nose.

“Son of a
bitch
!” Rowan said.

“I think I suitably impressed them with my credentials,” she lisped through her swollen lip.

“The head groomsman did this to you?”

“It appears to be part of the hiring process,” Ella said. She winced as Rowan touched her battered face.

“It is a rough world in 1620,” Greta said.

“No shit,” Rowan said. “Imagine if they'd decided you weren't right for the job.”

H
ans Krüger sat
at his desk and stared at the fat oaf who stood before him. Mayer had ushered him in only minutes before. Usually Mayer left the room in order that his lord could deal with any miscreants as he saw fit without concern that Mayer could testify that a crime had been committed. But today, Krüger suspected Mayer had left to escape the man's foul stench. Besides, if Krüger wanted to murder this disgusting excuse of skin-stretched blubber, he could do it in the town square with his bare hands for no reason at all and there would be no consequences. He began to wonder about Mayer's ability to handle his position.

The fat slob had been instructed not to speak until his lord addressed him. Krüger used this as an opportunity to determine if the lout was a veteran liar—something which he, Krüger was able to determine by mere observation—and, ultimately, if he could be useful in future or would lose his worthless life before lunch. The man stood, his double chin vibrating as if he were hopping in place. It was Krüger's experience that overt displays of nervousness usually meant there was truth to be found in a man's words. Liars were smooth. Liars did not sweat. The process of misleading was a practiced art that only the devious and nimble of mind accomplished with ease. This man, his fear redolent and rolling off him in waves, may not be an honest man in his other dealings, but Krüger believed he would tell the truth about why he had been brought to the castle today.

“Speak,” Krüger said. “You saw something strange by the convent today I am told?”

“Yes, milord,” the toad squeaked.

“What was it that you saw, my good man?”

“The new gardener at the convent, milord,” the man said, licking his lips as he spoke. “He speaks a language no one has ever heard before.”

“So he is a foreigner. What is strange about that?”

The man clasped his hands to his fat chin as if afraid he was not giving the right answers to some predetermined examination. Krüger had half a mind to execute Mayer for bringing him this useless parasite.

“They say he is a simpleton,” the man said, huge rivulets of sweat creasing down his fat face. “But he sleeps and takes his meals inside the convent.”

Krüger abruptly checked his sneering response to the man.

“He sleeps
inside
the convent, you say?”

“Yes.”

“You have seen this or just heard?”

“Both, milord,” the man said.

Krüger looked out the window in the direction of the convent.

“That is indeed odd,” he said.

R
owan stood
next to their bed where he had spread out the items they would need for their plan to work. He stood looking down at the straw-stuffed woolen comforter upon which he had laid Ella's cell phone, his lighter, the block of C-4 and the tangle of blasting caps.

“If you're caught with any of this stuff, they'll arrest you as a witch,” he said. “But
especially
your phone.”

“I know.”

“I hate you doing this.”

Ella sat on the edge of the bed. She held his hand to her cheek and looked into his eyes. “I know,” she said.

“You don't have to plant the lighter in Axel's bedroom. It's too dangerous.”

“Yes, I do.”

“Jesus.”

“If you can start exploding things at exactly noon, Rowan, I'll be ready to go. I'll be moving in the opposite direction of everyone else. In the panic, no one will see me.” She stood up and pulled off her stable boy clothes which she kicked into a pile in the corner of the room.

“Do you really know how to make a bomb?” he asked as he watched her.

Ella shook her head and pulled a nightgown over her head.

“Then how did you—”

“Look, Rowan, I went out with a guy from work, okay? And he thought it'd impress me that he was qualified to handle C4. So he brought some over.”

“Sounds like a moron. He was in your apartment?”

“Rowan, nothing happened. I was just feeling lonely one night.”

“None of my business.”

“We don't have time to get into this. Just tell me where and when so I can use every minute of the window you give me.”

“It wasn't that idiot, Hugo, was it?”

Ella looked at him in horror. “How do you know Hugo?”

“I told you, I talked to some people at your office when I was trying to find you.”

“And you talked to Hugo?”

“In a manner of speaking.” He stared at the block of C4.

“Just jam the blasting cap into it,” Ella said. “And then mold it or stuff it into something.” She held up a handful of the blasting caps with their fuses dangling. “And make sure you've got the book matches handy.”