The Saracen: Land of the Infidel Part 88

For a moment she did not speak.

Then she said abruptly, "I bid you good night, Your Signory."

He drew back, shocked. "Madonna!"

"The same way you came will see you out."

"I but meant to praise your skill at diplomacy. I hope I have not given offense."

"A gentleman always _knows_ when he is giving offense."

"I--I merely wish to clear--to set my mind at rest," Simon stammered. He cursed himself for his heavy-handed attempt to test her. It was true, the French were no good at intrigue.

"Rest your mind somewhere else." She went to the door and stood there, back to him. Was she going to call for help? How embarra.s.sing it would be if he were caught here.

The beautiful curve of her back distracted and confused him still more.

"If you do not leave, I will," said Sophia, grasping the black iron door handle. "You may stay in this room forever if you wish."

_What a brouillement I have made of this rendezvous._ Casting about frantically in his mind, Simon wondered what his troubadour father, Roland, would have done.

_Or Sire Tristan or Sire Gawain, what would they do now?_

There was no more time to think. He must act. He threw himself to his knees, arms outstretched, and waited. A long, silent moment pa.s.sed.

Finally Sophia turned her head. Her lips--those tender, rose-colored lips--parted and her eyes widened. She turned all the way around.

She started to laugh.

"Laugh at me if you will, but do not cast me out." The sound of her laughter was like the chiming of a bell. After a moment she stopped laughing and smiled. A lovely smile, he thought, a kindly smile. He could happily kneel here for as long as she went on smiling.

"I have never had a man kneel to me before." A faint vexation flickered across her face. "First you accuse me of kissing you only to further my uncle's plots against the Tartars. Then you kneel to me. What am I to make of you?"

Relief swept over him as he realized she was no longer angry.

"Make me your slave."

"My slave? You are toying with me, Your Signory."

"Toying with you? Never. Call me Simon if it please you."

"You would be my friend?"

"I would be more than your friend, Madonna."

She came to him and held out her hands. Her smile was dazzling.

"Well then, Simon, you may call me Sophia. And you may rise."

Simon grasped her hands, feeling joy in his very fingertips. He vaulted to his feet and thought of taking her in his arms, but she freed her hands with a quick, unexpected motion and took a step backward.

_With just a movement of her hands she can lift me up or cast me down._

"For a man to kneel to a woman is not the custom in Sicily, Simon," she said softly.

It was as he suspected. She was not familiar with the ways of courtly love.

"If I do anything that seems strange to you, Sophia"--he used her name for the first time, and it thrilled him--"know that my actions are ruled by what we call l'amour courtois, which means that we know how to value women, whose value is beyond price."

"I have heard of courtly love. It sounds blasphemous to me, almost as if the man wors.h.i.+ps the woman. I do not think your patron saint would approve."

"My patron saint?"

"Him." She pointed to the small painting in a gilt wooden case that stood open on a large black chest. Candles in heavy enamel sticks stood on either side of the painting.

Sophia took his hand. At the touch of her cool fingers the muscles of his arms tensed. She led him across the room. Still holding his hand, she spread the wings of the case wider apart so he could see the image.

That it was a saint was apparent at once from the aureole of gold paint encircling the black hair. Simon saw a narrow face with huge, staring blue eyes painted with such bright paint they looked like sapphires.

Compared with the saint's eyes the sky behind his head seemed pale.

There were purplish shadows under the eyes, and the cheeks curved inward like those of a starving man. The beard and mustache hung straight but were ragged at the ends, and what little could be seen of the saint's robe was gray. To the left of the halo, in the background, stood a fluted ivory pillar with a square base and a flaring top. The pillar connected the azure sky and ochre ground. Simon felt admiration for the face; in that desolate scene the saint must have endured great privation and come through with holy wisdom.

"A wonderful face," he said, turning to Sophia with a smile. "And you say this is my patron saint?"

"Simon of the Desert," she said. "Simon Stylites."

"Stylites? What does that mean? I do not know Greek."

"Neither do I," she said, "but a priest told me that his name means 'he of the pillar.' Saint Simon was a hermit who lived ages ago, when the Church was young. He dwelt and prayed for thirty years on top of a pillar that was all that was left of an ancient pagan temple. That is the pillar behind him."

Live on top of a pillar for thirty years? Questions crowded into Simon's mind. How did he keep from falling off when he slept? Would not the burning desert sun have killed him? How did he get food and water? After thirty years the pillar ought to be surrounded by quite a pile of--

No, he put that thought firmly out of his mind. After all, the whole point about saints was that they were not subject to natural laws.

He asked only one question. "How high was the pillar?"

She shook her head. "I do not know. So high that he had to climb a ladder to get to the top. Then his disciples took the ladder away." She pointed at the pillar in the painting. "I tried to paint it so that it could be any height you might imagine."

"_You_ painted this?"

"You find that hard to believe," she said with amused resignation. "That is why I hardly ever tell anyone. Many people would be sure I was lying.

Others would think that a woman who paints is some kind of freak. Or that it is somehow dishonorable for a lady to paint, as if you, for instance, were to engage in trade. What do you think?"

"I think G.o.d has given you a very great gift," said Simon solemnly.

She squeezed his hand, giving him exquisite pleasure, and then, to his sorrow, let it go. "I hoped you would understand." She put the candlestick down, and Saint Simon Stylites receded into the shadows.

"I knew that you were going to be someone very important in my life when I found out your name is Simon," she said. "I think my saint wished us to meet."

How sweetly innocent she was, Simon mused. He was ashamed of the thoughts he had been entertaining about her ever since they had kissed in the Contessa di Monaldeschi's garden. Over the days and nights he had gradually grown more and more familiar with her--in his fancy.