“I have come seeking information, and I believe I may have information of great interest to you as well.” Gabe hoped Baldewin would say something to make this easier. But there was only silence.
“My name is Gabehart Gerstenberg. Many years ago my brother, Valten, was betrothed to your only daughter, whom we believed to be dead. We were recently told by a servant woman named Pinnosa that your daughter was still alive and living at Hohendorf castle.”
Gabe wasn’t sure if it was his imagination, but the man’s body seemed to become more and more tense and rigid the more Gabe talked. His head had inched up and his back had straightened ever so slightly.
“My daughter,” he rasped, his voice vastly changed, “is dead. I saw her body lying in a casket when she was but two years old. She died while I was away, but I saw her—” His voice cracked.
“Forgive me for bringing to mind such a painful memory.” Gabe shifted from one foot to the other, then rubbed his stubbly chin and cheek. He couldn’t stop now. He had to find out for sure, for everyone’s sake.
Gabe waited, and Baldewin finally sat back on his heels and rubbed his face with both hands. He lowered the cowl from his head, letting it lay in folds around his neck, and looked over his shoulder at Gabe.
“Pray, go on.” His voice was steadier.
Baldewin’s hair was a mix of gray and white; he had strong features, but nothing that particularly reminded Gabe of Sophie. Perhaps Sophie wasn’t Baldewin’s daughter. Perhaps she truly was an orphan from nobody-knew-where.
But he had to find out for sure. Sophie — and Duke Baldewin — deserved to know the truth.
“Two or three weeks ago, I decided to go to Hohendorf Castle to investigate whether this story was true, whether Sophia, your daughter, was still alive. The old woman who told us this wild tale had said that the girl was in danger from Duchess Ermengard. When I arrived, I found that there was a young woman matching the old woman’s description — black hair, pale skin, blue eyes, and great beauty — serving at the castle as a scullery maid. This young woman knew nothing of her parents and had been told by the duchess that she was a poor orphan. The duchess kept her in servitude in the castle.”
The man turned and fixed his deep blue eyes on Gabe. Those eyes. They were quite similar in shape and color to Sophie’s.
“What you say rings somewhat true.” Baldewin stood slowly to his feet and faced Gabe. “I can easily imagine Duchess Ermengard doing such a thing to my daughter. But I saw Sophie’s body myself, laid out in her favorite dress, lying as still as a stone.” He turned away, staring back at the crucifix. “I had just returned from a trip to some holdings several miles to the east. I was only gone for a few days, but how I wish I had never gone … wish I’d done anything but left my little Sophie.”
The duke seemed overcome with grief and said no more. Gabe spoke softly.
“Pinnosa said that the child had been given a sleeping potion. Apparently, the duchess wanted everyone to think your daughter was dead.”
Slowly, slightly, Baldewin nodded his head. “I left as soon as I saw her lifeless body. I wanted nothing more to do with Hohendorf. I had lost my gentle wife and had married a fiend in her place. Losing my little Sophie broke something inside me. I didn’t want to live, didn’t want my responsibilities. I simply left and never went back.”
“Are you aware,” Gabe said, feeling that he was closing in on the truth, “that the duchess has told everyone that you are dead as well? My father, Duke Wilhelm, believed you died with your daughter of the same fever that supposedly killed her fifteen years ago.”
His shoulders stooped, Baldewin stood still and silent. Finally, he shook his head. “I didn’t know. I didn’t care about anything when I came here, and I haven’t communicated with anyone since coming here. Here I’m known only as Brother Baldewin. Only a few brothers, including the abbot, know who I am or that I am even here.
“But it’s also possible,” Baldewin went on, “that Ermengard let poor, old Pinnosa believe a lie and that this Sophie isn’t my daughter at all. Ermengard enjoys” — he paused as he seemed to be searching for the right word —”twisting other people’s lives with her deceptions, so I can imagine her perpetrating a trick of that kind.”
“I thought of that as well.” Gabe took a step toward the duke. “But there is one thing that might prove, or disprove, that she is your daughter.” Gabe took a deep breath, concentrating on Baldewin’s reaction as he said the next words. “Was your daughter born with a small brown mark somewhere on her body?”
Baldewin got a faraway look in his eyes. Finally, he spoke, his voice cracking again. “On her neck, below her right ear. It looked like a five-petal flower.”
Gabe swallowed. “The very same as my Sophie.”
Chapter 23