WSIM24B Chapter 20
We rode hard for Forli. It was pointless, of course; Charlotte was dead. There was absolutely nothing I could do to bring her back. She was thirty-three years old. And she was gone.
She'd fallen ill, developed a fever, and died three days later. There hadn't been time to fetch the doctor from Ravenna. By the time I reached the city, she'd been dead for over a week. I wouldn't be able to see her, or touch her. Of course it was no longer her. I knew that. I was still in shock, though. There was nothing I could do but offer comfort to my children, who were predictably devastated.
Charlotte hadn't been a typical aristocratic mother. She didn't leave her offspring to the nannies and the tutors. She'd spent time with her children, and supervised their meals and their education. Ten year old Luisa cried in my arms. Nicola would soon be seven; he tried to be a good little stoic. Isabelle was only three, and little Antonia turned one year old a week after her mother's death. Neither one was particularly comfortable in my embrace; they didn't know me very well.
Gina and Maria Elise were also in tears. Charlotte had never seen Gina as a servant, or a rival; they'd been colleagues, sharing me as a mutual responsibility (or burden). And Charlotte had always treated Maria as a member of the family. Only four months older than Luisa, Maria Elise knew that she was fortunate - and she'd known who to thank for it.
Father Peruzzi finally got his wish; his church would be famous. I commissioned a magnificent memorial for her. She would be buried in the western apse. There would be a large sarcophagus, with a sculpture of her resting on top of it. The walls of the apse would be repainted with frescoes, celebrating the deeds of female saints.
We held a funeral mass, with Maria Elise sitting on one side of me, and Luisa and Nicola on the other. I broke with tradition (and cut Father Peruzzi's homily short) to address the mourners. All I had to say was how wonderful Charlotte had been in life - which many of those present already knew - and that I'd loved her, dearly.
***
I
had
loved her. Perhaps not exclusively, but in my own defence, let me remind you that I'd met Gina many years earlier. Also, Charlotte and I had been separated for four years. Yes, I'd strayed. Often. But it was Charlotte herself who urged me to maintain a relationship with Fiametta.
I was forty-two years old, and had spent almost half of my life in the Sim. It was more than half of what I remembered, certainly, because who remembers the first four or five years of their life? Those moments are important - I'm sure they are - but our earliest memories are often fragmentary at best, or based almost entirely on photographs or the recollections of people who were there.
Most of my life, then, had been spent in Renaissance Italy and France, in a nebulous sort of existence, wondering if these experiences and the people who shared them were even real. Descartes would have said that
I
was real, because I was thinking about what I'd seen and lived through.
Charlotte was real. Gina was real. And the children we'd created between us deserved to be treated as if they were real, too. I just didn't know what would happen to them in the future.
My own fate was predetermined. The Sim would end on August 11
th
, or perhaps a day later. Then I would be tortured and killed by Captain Teck and his crew.
But what would happen to the Sim? Would it continue to run? Or did it simply end? What was going to happen to the billion or so simulated people who inhabited it?
Maria Elise wasn't created by the makers of the Sim. Sure, they'd written some code to allow for procreation, but it was Gina and I who had brought our little girl into the world.
I was an idiot. I hadn't thought about these things. My children were either going to be orphans, or else their existence was going to end a matter of days (or hours) before mine.
Maybe a philosopher could have made better sense of it. I only saw the two possibilities. Either the children would survive me - in which case they'd be alone - or they were doomed just as I was.
So I made provisions for the future. It was time for me to take a more active role in their upbringing, and to make myself more familiar with their nannies and tutors. I also called in my friends: Miguel, Diego and Pedro Ramires, Vicente, and my secretary Agapito.
- "I have five children." I said. "Maria Elise is one of them - no different than my children by Charlotte. And there are five of you, my good friends who've saved my life, or saved me from disaster more often than I can count. Now I have a boon to ask. I want you to stand as godfathers to my children. Not one each, but all five of you for all five of them. In case anything should happen to me."
- "Nothing's going to happen to you." said Diego.
- "In case, I said. I'm not going back to the war, so that may help. But there's still illness, accident and assassins. So... should anything happen to me, I want you all to look after my children. Protect them. Help them."
- "You know that we would have done that anyway." said Diego.
I caught Miguel's eye; I knew that big Michelotto would have. I was glad to hear Diego say it, though. Pedro was emphatically nodding, too. But I'd wanted to include Vicente and Agapito, since I wasn't sure that they would have included themselves.
I re-wrote my will, and had it witnessed. I included then names of my five friends as my chosen guardians for the children.
Then I had to deal with Charlotte's ladies-in-waiting. Anne and Celine had come with her from France, and had remained by her side ever since. Both women were 35 now. I gave them choices.
Anne elected to go home. I provided her with a sum of money which she could use as a small dowry, or keep for herself. Celine chose to stay with us - if I could find a role for her. I was pretty sure that she'd had an affair with Diego, years before, but she seemed to be sweet on Agapito now.
- "Would you teach my daughters?" I asked her.
- "What would you have me teach them?"
- "Everything you know about France, and the places you've been. How to be a lady. And most important, tell them of their mother. It's especially important for Isabelle and Antonia. I want them to have memories of her."
Celine teared up a little at that, but she agreed. She teared up even more when I told her that she'd receive the same sum as Anne had, to do with as she wished.
In case of the second possibility - that the end of the Sim meant the end of this world, and that my children had no longer to live than I did, I decided that they should enjoy their remaining time as much as humanly possible.
That meant books for Maria Elise and Luisa, who shared a love of stories. I got small, docile jennets for them to learn to ride, and a pony for Nicola. I myself took them on short excursions. Vicente was always with us, but sometimes one or more of the other godfathers came along. I also invented backyard croquet around that time (at least I think I invented it).
We all learned about plants together, with Maria Elise tutoring us. I also took the two older girls with me into town, looking for things I could do to improve Forli for its people. I read or told stories to the younger ones before their bedtime.
And at the end of the day, I cried. Some of my tears were for Charlotte. Some were for me. And some were for the years I'd spent away from my children, wasting time, killing people for the Pope. My employer sent me a short, formal condolence note, which he'd had some secretary write. The Pope's only contribution was his signature - unless the secretary forged that, too.
I did a lot of thinking about that.
In fact, I did a lot of thinking, period. In all honesty, I tried to avoid it, by staying as busy as I possibly could. But alone at night, lying on my bed, there wasn't a whole lot else to do.
That was the state of affairs I'd created for myself, and I lived with it until All Hallow's Eve - or Halloween, if you prefer. That was when Gina cornered me in the garden.
- "How are you, Torun?" she asked. I remember being surprised to hear that name from her lips. Gina had always called me Pilgrim; it was Charlotte who had called me Torun - for 'Thorn'.
Gina had done that deliberately. But why?
- "I'm fine." I said. "How are you?"
- "You're not fine." she said. "
You're lost.
"
I had rarely - if ever - seen Gina angry. Afraid, yes. Concerned for me, apprehensive, worried about what Charlotte might think, or say... but never angry. And unless I was seriously mistaken, Gina was seriously ticked off at me.
- "What... what's wrong?"
