The Skin Map by Stephen R. Lawhead Page A

vehicle: a large, high-sided affair with a cloth top drawn over curved hoops to form a round tentlike covering. The wagon was pulled by not one but two rangy, long-eared mules, and sitting on the driver’s bench was a very plump man in a baggy cloth hat. She stopped and allowed the vehicle to meet her, whereupon it slowed and rolled to a halt.
    “Hiya!” she called, putting on a chirpy voice in the fledgling hope that her damp and bedraggled appearance might be overlooked.
    “ Guten Tag ,” came the reply, which sent Wilhelmina instantly back to her childhood and her German grandmother’s kitchen.
    The unexpected oddity of encountering a Deutschsprachigen on the road only served to deepen her already fathomless confusion. Bereft of speech, she could only stare at the man.
    Thinking, perhaps, that she had not understood, the stranger smiled and repeated his greeting.
    “ Guten Tag ,” Mina replied. Grasping for her long-disused German, she said, “ Ich freue mich, Sie kennen zu lernen .” The words felt lumpy and wooden in her mouth, and her tongue resisted making them. “Sprechen Sie Englisch ?”
    “ Es tut mir Leid, Fräulein. Nein ,” answered the man. He eyed her curiously, taking in her odd clothes and short hair, then squirmed in his seat and searched both ways down the road. “ Sind Sie alleine hier ?”
    It took her a moment, but the words came winging back to her as if from a very great distance. He’s asking if I am alone out here, she thought. “ Ja ,” she answered. “ Alleine .”
    The fat man nodded, then spouted a longish sentence that again sent Wilhelmina right back to the German she had learned as a child—the long-outdated language of her grandmother, who had learned it from her immigrant grandmother, and much different from the Hochdeutsch Mina had studied in school. Nevertheless, she worked it out that he was offering her a ride to the next town. She accepted on the spot. The traveller put down the reins and stood, leaned over, and indicated the iron step ring projecting from the base of the wagon bed behind the front wheel, then reached down his hand. She placed a muddy boot on the step and accepted the offered hand, and was pulled effortlessly up and onto the wooden seat. As soon as she had settled on the bench, the man picked up the reins and gave them a snap. “ Hü! ” he called; the wagon gave a jolt, the wheels creaked, and the mules resumed their languid clip-clop pace.
    They proceeded in silence, rocking over the uneven road. Now and then, she stole a glance at the driver of the wagon. Her companion was a well-upholstered man of indeterminate age, with a mild, pleasant demeanour. His clothes were clean and tidy, but so very basic as to be nondescript—consisting of a plain wool jacket of dark green over a rough but clean linen shirt and spacious breeches of heavy dark hopsacking. His shoes were sturdy ankle-high boots, well crafted, but scuffed and worn and badly in need of a shine. The plump fellow presented an altogether unremarkable appearance—save for his face: smooth, pink as a baby’s, round, even-featured, with pale blue eyes beneath pale eyebrows, and ample cheeks that glowed in the brisk autumn breeze beneath the fine haze of a thin, stubbly blond beard.
    It was that sweet-natured face that made him, she decided, for the countenance with which he faced the world wore an expression of benign cheerfulness—as if all that met his gaze amused and delighted, as if the world and everything in it existed only for his pleasure. He seemed to exude goodwill.
    Finally, Wilhelmina cleared her throat and said, “ Ich spreche ein biss-chen Deutsch, ja ?”
    The man looked at her and smiled. “ Sehr gut, Fräulein .”
    “Thank you for stopping for me,” she said. “ Ich bin Wilhelmina.” My name is Wilhelmina.
    “A good name,” replied the man, his own accent broad but light. “I, too, have a name,” he announced proudly. “I am Englebert Stifflebeam.” Lifting a