Love Beyond Time Read Online Free PDF Page A

is interested in my daughter.”
    “Who is he, Father?” Trying to avert one of
Savarec’s rare outbursts of temper, Danise said, “I promise I will
most seriously consider all of these men, and if they are here at
Duren, I will ask you to present me to them, so I can be at least
somewhat familiar with all of them before I decide.”
    “You always were a sensible girl.” Savarec
appeared to be mollified by his daughter’s words. “The third man
you have already met, and he is the one I most favor. A man of
honorable lineage, with lands near Tournai and also other estates
in Burgundy. He is Count Redmond.”
    “The pleasant man who helped us with the
stranger?” Danise tried in vain to recall Count Redmond’s face. All
she could bring to memory was a thick crop of golden hair and a
pair of pale eyes. Was he tall or short, handsome or not? She could
not remember. When she thought about the incident in the forest,
what stayed in her mind was an instant of shock brought on by the
penetrating blue gaze of a sadly injured, unknown man.
    “Well, Danise?” Savarec looked at her
expectantly. “What is your opinion of Count Redmond?”
    “As I said, he seemed pleasant, but I
scarcely had a chance to note him,” Danise responded.
    “You will have ample time to know him,”
Savarec told her. “And Clodion and Autichar, too, since all of them
are gathered here at Duren. You have my permission to speak to any
of them when and as you wish, so long as Sister Gertrude or
Clothilde is with you. I do not think any of them will make
improper advances to you, but it is always best for a young woman
to have a chaperon.”
    “In so much at least, we are agreed,” said
Sister Gertrude.

Chapter 3
     
     
    He did not know where he was. Worse, he did
not know who he was. His head ached without letup, and his
eyesight was totally undependable, ranging from a complete blur to
abnormal clarity. Every time he tried to sit up he was overcome by
nausea so severe he had to lie down again at once.
    People came and went. He knew the man in
dusty black robes was a doctor. He knew the leeches the doctor
periodically placed at the most painful spot on his head really
would help him. Their sucking would diminish the swelling and make
his headache go away. How he knew these things he could not recall,
but know them he did.
    Lying flat on his back, unable to move for
nausea, with the repellent leeches working away at him, he went
over the faces he had recently seen, seeking in those faces some
clue to his own identity.
    There was the portly middle-aged man with
gray-streaked dark hair who slept in the other bed in the tent and
snored away the long and lonely nights. The others called this man Savarec , but to his confused tentmate the name meant
nothing.
    There was Guntram of the bristling black
beard and mustache. He had a fierce expression and wild eyes, but
could be gentle enough to turn a patient or attend to his personal
needs without causing increased pain. Guntram was Savarec’s man,
and he loved and respected his master.
    A motherly, middle-aged woman, brown of hair
and eye and thick of waist, came frequently to change his linen or
wash his face and hands. A scrawny, sour-looking nun occasionally
glared down at him along her elegant nose.
    And then there was the angel, who drifted
into and out of his consciousness like a vision. But she was real.
She touched his forehead or his cheeks with tender hands and coaxed
him to swallow the food she spooned into his mouth, even when he
feared it would only come back up again. When the angel fed him,
the food stayed down, perhaps because she did not rush him as the
others did, but sat patiently waiting until he opened his mouth for
the next spoonful.
    Her face was a perfect oval, her hair was so
pale it was almost silver. She wore it in twin braids tied with
green ribbons to match her deep green wool gown. Her eyes were a
soft gray-green, shadowed by some undefined sorrow. She was small
and shapely