The Secret Eleanor by Cecelia Holland Read Free Book Online Page A

Petronilla seized the red cloak from Eleanor, and Eleanor flung the white cloak on and tugged the veil over her face, and was on down the next flight of steps almost without pausing, and into the bright sunlight.
    De Rançun, faithful and good, was there as he had promised, with Petronilla’s small brown mare. Eleanor rode astride, but Petronilla always rode aside, so now she let de Rançun lift her up to sit sideways on the saddle, knees demurely together, and de Rançun led her off toward the little bridge, which crossed onto the Left Bank of the Seine.
    She lowered her head and kept her hands on the saddle pommel, to look meek, like Petronilla, but in her heart she laughed and danced for her freedom like a bacchant.

    Petronilla, swathed in the red cloak, kept her head down under the hood as she walked out by the guard. From there a short turn took her out through the door into the garden. She squared her shoulders, trying to carry herself with Eleanor’s pride and grandeur, her head high; it felt very unnatural, as if some iron bar ran down her back, and her toes barely touched the ground. But she strode off down between the rows of rosemary bushes toward the far wall.
    Her anger at Eleanor faded. To her surprise she was enjoying this, after the long boring summer brooding over Ralph. If Ralph knew she was doing something so bold, anyway, he would be amazed, maybe even admiring. He had always admired Eleanor for daring what she did. She wondered what Eleanor did now.
    She went a long way down the garden without turning around, but then almost to the little postern gate, she whirled around and looked back.
    Up in the top of the tower, in the chamber window, several faces popped quickly down out of sight. Before they could vanish, she saw that there were only two of them, and she gave a crow of laughter. Without waiting for further signs that she was being followed, she went on the length of the garden to the postern and let herself out the narrow wooden gate.
    She walked along more slowly, wanting to let whoever was coming after her keep on the track. This western tip of the city island narrowed down to a flat yellow spit, ending in three tiny shoals whose sandy banks barely rose above the surface of the river. The ground above the spit was sloping and covered with grass and yellow flowers; here some early king had built a wall of earth, which since had crumbled under a thousand rains to grassy lumpy mounds. She went along the curve of this relic, never looking back, toward the gardens and houses of the city.
    At her approach a flock of little birds flew up in a busy whir of wings. Turning east again, almost at the water’s edge, she went up the bank, past a man with a hoe, to his knees in onion greens, who bobbed toward her and pulled his forelock without ever stopping in his toil. In the first cluster of houses, a goat browsing on one of the thatched roofs gave her a long look, its jaws munching. Between two of the little mud-daubed houses she could see down to the river, where women were washing their laundry.
    The bustle and racket of the city rose around her. She could hear the thunder of the mill by the big bridge, and ahead of her a shrill voice was hawking meat pies. The path was wide and dusty here. A white chicken scratched industriously at the ground as if to summon worms by sheer desire.
    The air smelled of smoke and garlic and baking bread. A stream of half-naked children ran past, shrieking. She started to turn to watch them, remembering when she had been such a carefree child, but thought of her duty, and kept her eyes forward. She went along a crumbling wall of yellow stones meshed in a rose vine, pink petals fallen like warm snow on the ground.
    Behind that was a little stable connected to the monastery beyond; the monks, she knew of old, used it seldom. Bright orange lichens like round badges grew on the stone wall, and half the slates of the roof were missing. The door was balky, and she needed all her