The Enterprise of Death - Jesse Bullington [102]
One evening, after a day sweating in a dungeon with a pair of pliers and a pair of Jewesses, Kahlert took a constitutional among the chestnut trees above his house, and there he met the most beautiful woman he had ever seen. There were no other houses for some distance, and the servants he kept were all men, and yet here was a woman sitting on a boulder, dark enough of complexion to arouse suspicion, but comely despite it. She wore an exotic, flowing garment of multicolored silk and, even as he knew she must be brought in for questioning, Kahlert found himself looking for an excuse to delay such an engagement.
“Good evening,” Kahlert said in Spanish with a bow. “You are lost?”
The woman looked up, and he saw from the tears still shining on her cheeks that she had been crying, though her kohldarkened eyes were not the slightest bit puffy or red. She seemed to hesitate for a moment, and then replied in a husky voice. “I am indeed lost, good sir. Indeed, I doubt any in all this world are more lost than I.”
“Perhaps I may be of service, then,” said Kahlert, the encounter seeming more and more like one of his romances. “My house is not far from here, and from the patio we may overlook all of Granada. I have found a delicate pigeon sofrito after a leisurely stroll helps orient oneself marvelously.”
“That is a most generous offer,” said the woman. “If it would not be an imposition I would be pleased to join you.”
She was not jabbering at him in a foreign tongue; on the contrary, she spoke with obvious care and intelligence. Having seen a few Spanish ladies with only slightly lighter skin, Kahlert let himself hope she might actually be a lost Christian of unfortunate pallor and nothing worse. Then he realized she was clearly waiting for him to help her from her seat, and he quickly extended his hand. Through his glove her fingers felt even thinner than they looked, the delicate bones hard in his palm.
“What is your name, my lady, and from where did you hail prior to being lost?” Kahlert asked her as she released his hand and stood beside him.
She began to tremble anew, the pools of her greenish-brown eyes filling, and as if speaking the words caused her physical pain, she groaned, and he barely made out her words: “Um … a … Rose. Call me Rose. I’m from … there.” She pointed south, her face contorting with emotion.
Kahlert realized how insensitive he was. His work had not allowed for much polite contact with decent women, and he cursed himself for a low-mannered clod. “Forgive me. Of course you are exhausted and in need of rest and nourishment, not an interrogation. Please accept my apologies, Lady Rose. My name is Ashton Kahlert, and I confess that I am a terrible host.”
She nodded, too well-bred to sniffle despite the obvious appropriateness of the occasion for it. Kahlert’s mother would have sniffled. If, during his lengthy tenure as a witch-hunting Inquisitor, he had encountered even one actual witch Kahlert might have paid more attention as he led her back to his house. He might have noticed little things, like the way the hem of her dress never became dusty, or how, despite wearing little brown sandals, she left bare footprints upon the dirt track. But he had never captured anyone more sinister than a mundane midwife and so these telltale signs were lost to him.
The servants were surprised to see their master returning with anyone along the trail that wound into the hills behind the stucco-framed house, let alone a beautiful, immaculately dressed woman. Not having any women in the house meant he had not needed female servants, but the woman insisted she was perfectly capable of bathing herself once the bath was heated. Kahlert retired to change for dinner, not something he was accustomed to doing.
Omorose settled into the bathwater with a sigh, and while her illusory appearance remained unblemished, scraps of the young corpse began floating loose in the water. She frowned at that. She would