Free The Silver Cup by Constance Leeds Page B

smelly eel blood from her hands as best she could, but now she headed for the stream to cleanse them in the icy running water. On the way, she passed the church. Seeing her, Lukas joined his cousin for the walk.
    â€œGood morning, Anna. Where are you going? ”
    Anna explained her morning to Lukas.
    â€œSo it’s eel for dinner? Perhaps I should join you.”
    â€œPlease! At least I’d have some reward for all the stink,” said Anna, holding her hands far from her body.
    â€œI’ll see if I can,” said Lukas. “I’m sure this will interest you. Yesterday, a priest visited Father Rupert from Aachen. He’d heard a strange little monk named Peter whom they call the Hermit. The priest said Peter was old and dirty, with a yellow face and long matted hair, and he speaks with great skill about about the Pope’s war. A vast crowd follows him. The crowd in Aachen was as numerous as the stars. Enough to fill our town twenty times over.”
    Anna tried to picture it. “Are these the armed pilgrims Martin speaks of?”
    â€œThe Hermit is leading his followers to Jerusalem. I hear my brother Martin thinks this war will make him a wealthy knight.”
    Anna nodded. “There is something more bothering him. I think he’s worried about his soul.”
    â€œNot Martin.”
    â€œListen harder, Lukas.”
    Â 
 
Later that morning, after Mass, Lukas arrived for Anna’s eel stew, and talked of Peter. The early spring afternoon was bright, but the light was colorless and cold. Inside, the shuttered house was dark and chilly except at the hearth, where a generous fire burned warm and bright. Anna, Gunther, Martin, and Lukas pulled their stools close, sharing orange heat and the stew.
    â€œThey say wherever he goes, Peter is given silver and things of great value. He even has chests filled with Jewish silver, collected for his promise to leave them alone. He gives everything to the poor who follow him,” said Lukas.
    â€œThe Hermit should buy weapons instead,” said Martin, his mouth filled with chunks of eel, juice dribbling down his chin. “I hope we see him in Cologne.”
    â€œWell, I won’t see him,” sighed Anna. “I’ll stay here with Smudge, but at least he’s better company than Margarete and Elisabeth. Sometimes I feel even more alone with them.”
    Martin nodded and wiped his face with his sleeve, “Sometimes when I’m sitting with them, Elisabeth smiles, and Margarete nods her head. Elisabeth has little use for words, and Margarete has little use for people. Could they be more dull? ”
    â€œYou shouldn’t speak ill of our sisters,” said Lukas.
    â€œThey’re both so beautiful. I must look like a spotted mushroom next to them,” said Anna.
    Often Anna wished she could step outside herself and see her face. She knew her hands, which were strong and straight, and she knew her feet which were not small but not as large as her cousin’s insults would suggest. She knew her hair, which was dark bronze and heavy, not golden and curled like her cousins. But she did not know her own face. In a still, dark pool, sometimes, she almost caught herself, a shadowy image that was hard to see. Am I fair at all? she wondered.
    â€œWhat color are my eyes, Father?” she asked suddenly.
    â€œYour eyes?”
    â€œYes, Father. What color are they?”
    â€œNot blue,” said Gunther without looking up from his stew.
    â€œNot blue? Is that a color? Please, Lukas?”
    â€œWhy should you care about the color of your eyes?” asked Lukas.
    â€œThey’re not blue at all. Not brown either. Nor gray,” said Martin raising one eyebrow and squinting at Anna’s face.
    â€œPlease. You’re so mean. What color are they?”
    â€œSpeckled. A bit of green and gold and bit of dark blue. Speckled.”
    â€œSpeckled? ”
    â€œLike a hen’s feathers, poor