Keturah and Lord Death

“I’ve brought another. Keturah, you are dusted all over with flour. You look so ... pretty.”

Oh, handsome Ben, I thought. Good, solid Ben—but would I always have to be covered in flour and sugar to be beautiful to him? It made me more tired to think of it. Still, he was very handsome.

“I thought what a generous thing it was of Ben to bring squashes to the poor,” Padmoh said, “so I offered to carry lettuces. And besides, Mother Marshall bade me come.”

Ben looked at her as if she were a stray cat that had followed him home. Grandmother served them portions of the pie I had made, and Ben set right to eating.

“I am practicing for the cooking contest tomorrow,” I said, dearly wishing there would be a tomorrow.

Padmoh sat down, too, and gingerly took a taste.

“It’s delicious,” Ben said after a mouthful.

“There is a certain aftertaste,” Padmoh said delicately, “but it is quite good.”

Grandmother turned the talk to the beautification of the village, and Ben and even Padmoh and my friends talked about the wonders of it.

“Mistress Smith and some other women went to Hermit Gregor’s house,” Ben said. “They scrubbed and tossed and folded and washed and swept and gardened until he wept and promised to be a better man.”

Everyone laughed.

Padmoh said genteelly, “Widow Harker, who beds her cow in her house for want of a shed, came home today to find a sweet, clean shed for her cow.”

Ben noticed I was quiet and said, “With pie like this,

Keturah, you could win Best Cook at fair time.”

“I am glad you like it,” I said.

Padmoh scowled at him and then at me. “It is hard to tell such a thing from pies,” she said. “Besides, didn’t he say that very thing to me the other day. Fickle Ben.”

“But I do believe this pie makes Keturah a fraction better,” Ben said.

Gretta and Beatrice smiled, and Padmoh stabbed violently at the pie with her fork. I felt sorry that she was unhappy, but I was relieved that Ben had loosened his tongue in favor of my chances.

Just then there was a weak knock at the door, and I opened it to see Tobias standing with lemons in his hands.

I threw my arms around him, then took the lemons. “Why, they are beautiful, Tobias! So plump, so fresh. Did they cost very much?”

Slowly he held out the second set of coins John Temsland had given him. “Not a pe

Only then did I notice that he was most pale, whiter than the gray dust around his mouth and eyes.

“How did you get them, then?”

“It is a strange tale I have to tell, Keturah.”

“Sit, and tell it,” I said. He sat down slowly, feeling for the chair as if he were blind. Gretta put her hand on her brother’s shoulder.

“I looked and looked, Keturah,” he began. “No one had lemons. At last I thought to go to the road that heads to Great Town, only to the crossroads, in hopes of seeing a merchant who might tell me where to find them. And sure enough, Keturah, I met there a man who had many wondrous wares in his cart. I told him my errand, that the best cook of Tide-by-Rood needed lemons. Lemons, says he, why I have lemons here, all the way from Spain. I would have them, sir, I said. But when I held out the coins Lord Temsland gave me, he shook his head. Not enough, said he. Take it, sir, I said, and tell what I can do to make up the difference. Whatever it is, I said, I will do it. He snatched the coins, and said that if I would serve him for one round year, I should have paid the price in full.

“But I need the lemons now, for Keturah Reeve must cook a dish for the king, I said. Very well, said he, then I must get a year’s work out of you in a single month. No, sir, I said, the lemons must be delivered now. Then you have no bargain, said he. Give me back my coins, I said. No, I shall not—good day, he said.

“Mistress Keturah, you know I am not good at wrestling, but I knew you and the young lord and the queen must have lemons. So I tackled him. He was a tall man, and much fatter than me, but it was for the lemons, you see. He beat me soundly, and then picked up his donkey prod with which to finish the fight. I thought I was going to lose my life, as well as the coins, for which I was most sorry on account of your needing lemons.

“The merchant raised the prod, and as he was about to bring it down upon my head, he stopped cold and stared into nothingness. Pale he went, gray as the underbelly of a fish. He shook his head once, and nodded once, as if he were having a conversation with a ghost. I shivered in fear to see his countenance, so full of terror it was. The prod dropped, forgotten.

“At last he turned his eyes to me. Blank with horror, they were, but utterly resigned. Death has come for me, he said. I have cheated him many times, and now he comes to collect his debt. He gives me one last chance, before I go with him, to atone for the suffering I have brought to others through my cheating ways. Lad, the merchant says to me, there are coins sewn into my coat. They are all yours if you will forgive me.

“May I have the lemons, sir? asks I. He nodded once. Then I forgive you, I said. And he crumpled and dropped dead.

“His eyes were still open in death, and they seemed to look at me with gratitude. I waited beside him a long time, until it rained into his open eyes and the mule bawled for hunger. And I came home.”

Tobias stared at the table, his lips parted as if he had not the strength to clamp his jaws together.

I raised the lemons to my nose. Did they not smell of the sun? My pie would bring sunshine and cloud to the palate. My pie would win Best Cook at the fair. My pie would win me Ben Marshall—

Tobias began to weep. “Keturah—he died of the plague.”

XI

J bestow my first kiss.

My lemons had brought plague. I had brought plague to my beloved Tide-by-Rood. Had Lord Death not warned us about Great Town? Plague. The word stopped up my ears and filled my mouth and throat so sufficatingly I could not speak for a moment.

Tobias put his face in his hands. “I am sick, Keturah,” he said.

Gretta threw her arms around him, and I stroked his hair. “Do not be afraid,” I said.

Tobias raised his face to me. His tears had mixed with the dust from the journey, making gray, chalky lines down his cheeks.

“You must tell no one what you know, and I will go to Lord Death,” I said, and now I was crying too.

“It is too late to keep it secret,” Gretta said. “Padmoh has already flown to spread the news.”

“What are you going to do, Keturah?” Ben said to me, and there was fear and accusation in his voice. “Is it true that you have brought death into our midst?”

Down in the village I could hear shouts and screams.

“They will think you have brought the plague, Keturah,” Beatrice said, her hands clasped as if in prayer.

“But I have, my friend,” I said. “They will be right.”

Gretta went to the window. “They are coming!” she said.

Grandmother came to me in her nightdress. “You must go into the wood and hide, Keturah,” she said, and her voice was chillingly calm. “I will pretend you are here and not let them in. I will forestall them as long as I can.”

“I will go into the forest, though not to hide,” I said.

Just then I heard a clattering of hooves on the cobbles outside, and a great pounding at the door.

“Ben, you must protect Grandmother,” I said.

“I? How can I protect her from a mob?” said Ben helplessly.

Again there was pounding, and the door flew open. In the doorway stood John Temsland and Henry and a number of young men.