CHAPTER 18

CHAPTER 18

Icomprehended the prince's meaning. Was the Duke Stephano's stabbing an act of ill will to the dead man? On casual inspection, and in the words of his servants and enemies, it would seem so, but if political forces were at work, Prince Escalus needed to understand those forces.

"You don't truly suspect Porcia?" He seemed truly interested in my reply.

"No." I scraped my mother's nausea medicine into a linen bag, tied it tightly, and placed it beside me. "Porcia's a sodden wit, but she's not a killer sodden wit. I almost feel sorry for her, condemned from her own mouth to return disgraced to her father's house."

"You're kind, considering how much she contributed to the belief in your guilt."

"She's wretched in herself. Surely that's punishment enough." I opened a jar, removed a handful of dried leaves, and mashed them.

"What's that?" the prince asked.

"Comfrey. It eases bruises, sprains, and aching joints." I would give it to Lysander when next I saw him, for he should indeed be bruised after last night's misadventure. To the prince, I warned, "It's also a poison, so it is to be used in a poultice only."

"You know the effects and uses of the contents of all these jars?" Prince Escalus gestured around him.

"Not all. I am an apprentice only. I have not the skill to mix such complicated medicines as does Friar Laurence." I thought of the potion he had given my mother, the one that put her into a sleep of death for two and forty hours. That was indeed a difficult potion, and one that required a delicate touch. "But when he agreed to teach me, his first and most serious task was to show me where he kept the plants that were not to be ingested. He warned that an accidental poisoning was taken as seriously as a deliberate one."

"Why does he keep poisons?"

I tamped down impatience. This was the prince. He was ignorant of the details of household and garden. And as prince, he naturally had a suspicious bent to his nature. "Ask the steward of your palace and he who tends your garden. Rodents and insects get into the storeroom and wreak havoc with the food stores. Squirrels steal the nuts. Moles dig up the garden, and rabbits eat from above. Friar Laurence says they all spread disease. We can't ever win against the pests, but we can curb them before they breed."

"Ah." He relaxed. "Poisons are in every household."

"Every household," I assured him.

"Friar Laurence—you trust him wholly?"

"I do, indeed. My family owes its existence to the good friar."

The door opened, the bell jingled, and Friar Laurence's great bulk filled the doorway. His humble brown robes declared his order, and the three knots on his corded rope cincture stood for poverty, chastity, and obedience. "The bottle is gone to your sister, my lord, and I took patience with your man to give the proper instructions for her health." The good monk looked anxious and nervous; although he was deservedly a famous alchemist, the honor of having the Prince of Verona in his shop appeared to overwhelm him.

Politely I inquired, "Your sister is not ill, I hope, my prince?" "Not ill. She's eleven." Prince Escalus seemed to think that explanation enough.

Perhaps it was. "I have younger sisters. Is there aught I can do?"

He stood and leaned across the counter. "Would you?"

His eagerness startled me. "Of course."

Friar Laurence hovered in the background. With a slight hand gesture, I indicated he should return to his labors, and he crept around the shop, or as much as a man of his girth could creep.

I seated myself on my own stool and spoke to the man who had reluctantly showed emotion . . . until now. "What help can I offer?"

"As a small child, Bella was sweet, affectionate, and loving, and I felt acutely the loss of our mother in guiding her footsteps into womanhood. When my wife died bearing our son, sorrow filled us both and we clung together." Affection and worry threaded his voice. "I thought we were close and loving, brother and sister, a family. But lately she has become—"

I chuckled. "Yes, I know. That age for young women is fraught with tempest."

"You know? You do? You understand?"

"One moment she's a child, the next she's a woman, the next a termagant, the next a penitent."

"Yes!" He looked honestly shocked at my insight. "How did you know?"

"It's perfectly natural. The place between childhood and womanhood is a wilderness of briars and monsters we all must cross." When we cross as girls, we're slashed by thorns and whipped by awkwardness, and on the other side, we're one with womanhood, but we're never as we were before. We are, in many ways, strangers to ourselves. Yet I could see no reason to tell Prince Escalus that truth; he would probably, as most men did, turn his gaze away and imagine the princess, his sister, was merely a girl grown into a woman rather than a girl grown into wisdom.

"This month she has pain. I think . . . um . . . I think . . . you know." He was so embarrassed.

Which was charming in a small family sort of way. In my household, poor Papà tried to ignore the female monthly travails, but with so many of us mostly cycling at the same time, the fighting and weeping made that almost impossible. Even Cesario knew to walk softly when the moon was full. "I understand."

"She's crying and won't let me near her."

"Poor child." Suffering in that big, dark, formal palace. "Does she have not a nurse?"

"When Bella was but five, I found her nurse overcome with wine. I dismissed her, and my little sister confessed it happened all too often. I blame myself. I was unobservant."

I scrutinized him, checking the boxes in my mind.

1.Prince Escalus appeared to be without emotion, yet he deeply loved his sister.

2.He shouldered responsibility and took blame without whining

3.He was deeply alone and, I thought, lonely.

I had to find this man a good wife.

As the prince and I spoke, Friar Laurence gathered herbs for another potion. No, wait, he was examining the contents of my basket with a smile. I'd brought enough for several hearty meals, and Friar Laurence was dedicated to fine dining. As he emptied the basket, I suggested, "Why don't I invite Princess Isabella to visit us? My parents are beloved among my friends, my sisters would show her how to be a woman, my brother loves all women and—"

"Your brother?" The prince's eyes grew cold.

"Cesario. He's six." I waited for him to realize that I had no designs to bring his sister into my family by nefarious means.

Being a man, he admitted to no fault. "That's right. I believe I sent a christening gift."

"A silver cup. Our family thanks you. I promise to try to keep Cesario from teaching her to climb trees."

"Bella would not . . . But perhaps if she climbed a tree . . ." The prince rubbed his forehead. "She hides in the library. She broods so much!"

Friar Laurence lifted the concoction I had made for my mother's morning sickness and sniffed it. "Again?" Heaven knows why he sounded surprised. If you'll recall, he witnessed their impetuous passion and performed the secret marriage between Romeo and Juliet to save them from sin, as well as to unite the two warring clans of Montague and Capulet.

That plan almost foundered like an overweight galleon, and he doesn't mess with those potions anymore. At least . . . not to my knowledge.

"Again," I said to Friar Laurence. I turned back to Prince Escalus, whose face was schooled in polite disinterest in the meaning of my potion. "I could speak with Isabella if she needs more guidance, and my mother is most loving, although I deem Katherina would be a better confidant. She and Bella are almost the same age and might become friends."

"Surely they would!" The prince sounded almost cheerful.

"Because they're both female and of an age?"

"I've misspoken again?"

At his wry expression, I laughed. "The Montagues are famed for their hospitality. Let's try this and pray your lady sister finds friendship and comfort somewhere among us."

"I will so pray."

Speaking of my family reminded me . . . "Prince Escalus, I have the florin I owe you." I half thought he'd refuse it, say he'd cheated, laugh at me for offering it, then on the way home I would indeed get myself a sorbetto.

Instead he looked at the coin and smiled that odd half smile. "Thank you." He placed it in a hidden pocket on his doublet and walked out of the shop, and his limp, I noted, was more severe than of the previous day.

"Wait a minute!" He hadn't told me why it was his fault Duke Stephano asked for my hand in marriage. "Come back!"

As if he had heard me, he limped back in on Nurse's heels.

Nurse, the unflappable, the stoic, the daunting, rushed in, cheeks flushed, mouth agape, eyes wide with alarm.

I feared for her health. "Nurse, what is it?"

She leaned against the counter to catch her breath. "She . . . She . . ."

Prince Escalus pushed a stool under her rump. "Sit, good woman, and speak. She . . . who?"

Friar Laurence put a goblet of wine into her hand.

She drank, sputtered, wiped her hand on her gray linen sleeve. "I heard it on the street. I confirmed. I talked to her servants. It's true!"

I'd never seen her so overwrought. "Nurse, calm please." I dampened my handkerchief in a basin of water and calming flowers, wrung it out, and blotted her ruddy cheeks. "Tell us the news."

"Porcia." She wiggled her fingers above her head to indicate the absurd headdress. "Porcia was found this morning—poisoned. Dead!"