Page 50 of Thus with a Kiss I Die
“Thus she would know him by sight. No wonder the attack was so brutal.”
“He left in a panic, for the prince would rightly order him racked, drawn, and quartered, to make an example of him—”
Friar Laurence grasped my upraised, clenched fist. ““Vengeance is mine,” saith the Lord.’ ”
“I can exalt in the Lord’s vengeance.”
“When it occurs,” he conceded.
I looked around again. Where was Elder? Why was he never where he could do some good? If his only task in the afterlife was to haunt me and make sarcastic comments, he might as well be dead.
Yes, gentle reader, I was aware of the irony of that thought. “What was taken?” For all the mess, I saw nothing awry.
“Nothing. The waiting ladies say nothing is gone that they know, but a jewel is a little thing and hard to note, and the princess owns many jewels. Or maybe the wrongdoer came to steal and had to flee before he found something he deemed of value.”
In a second sweep of the room, I stiffened like a hunting dog on point. The bag containing Yorick’s skull was gone. I’d left it there for Nonna Ursula’s maids to put away; had they? Or had the intruder removed it for some unknown reason? In a chamber filled with treasures, only someone who feared his guilt would be discovered would remove Yorick’s skull. Right?
Before I could inquire of Old Maria or Pasqueta, a timid knock sounded on the door.
Princess Isabella stood there, wreathed in worry and twisting her hands. When she chose to don her royal presence, she was the very portrait of composure, but now I remembered how young she was and how few family members peopled her life. I gestured her in, and she hurried to her grandmother’s bedside and whimpered at the sight of the sagging wrinkles that no one noticed when Nonna Ursula’s sharp tongue spoke and her dark eyes snapped. “Will she recover?” the princess whispered like a child who fears the coming dark.
I knew Friar Laurence couldn’t tell her; all his learned knowledge couldn’t speak to the vagaries of human frailty.
Yet, like Princess Isabella, I begged for reassurance. “Yes, will she?”
He understood. “A head injury is grievous, for we know not what happens within the skull. If God favors us, the lady will live. But you must both know her age works against us, and the longer she’s without wit, the more grievous and desperate the danger.”
I nodded, and when Princess Isabella sobbed into her hand, I embraced her.
“She needs sustenance. She needs wine. She must come awake to partake of life or we have no hope.” He told me what I already knew.
I tightened my grip on Princess Isabella’s shoulders. “What can we do?”
“Sit with her,” he commanded. “Hold her hand. Brush her hair. Speak to her.”
Princess Isabella caught back her sobs and looked up. “Of what?”
“Of what you do all day. Of your weaving, your readings. Talk about the paintings in this room, your friendships, what you eat. Remind her of life.” He looked sideways at me. “You could speak to her about last night’s séance and your repentance for the sin that you committed.”
Now, how had the good brother learned of that? For I had rather hoped he wouldn’t know until told in the confessional.
He gathered up his bag. “I can now do no more here. Other injuries occurred during last night’s disturbances, and I go where I’m needed. I’ll be back later. Send for me if you see change.”
As the sun rose and light filled the chamber, I sat with Nonna Ursula, hoping for a sign of consciousness, while Princess Isabella flitted in and out, chatting as Friar Laurence instructed, telling Nonna Ursula of her palace duties, complaining the cooks didn’t listen to her, asking for advice.
One of the palace guards stood at the door. Tommaso guarded the open window. Both Old Maria and Pasqueta tried to close it; I insisted it remain open. Old Maria argued that Princess Ursula could catch a chill in her lungs.
I assured her the fire on the hearth would keep Princess Ursula from such a fate.
How I wished Nurse could have accompanied me to handle the maids, to cheer me through the long morning, to be my right hand as she often was! But someone had to stay at Casa Montague to supervise the children, the staff, and to care for my pregnant mamma, who was, I knew, fretting about Papà.
As the hours progressed, the tumult created by thedisciplinatifaded, and I hoped that would serve to reassure Nonna Ursula’s sleeping mind that her grandson had triumphed. When the normal sounds of the city and the smells of the street, good and ill, wafted in on the drafts, I reminded her of the teeming life beyond the palace and how much she loved it.
I also discussed her son, Prince Escalus the elder, suggesting irritably that he could have hung around to witness the attack on her and give his report to me. But even under my provocation, he remained unseen and unheard, and I reflected aloud and with bitterness of how useless a ghost he had turned out to be.
I also listened for the prince’s return.
I told Nonna Ursula all that, too, showed her my knives—they quieted Old Maria’s muttering about the open window—assured her that on the prince’s arrival, he would visit her and suggested if she would wake and tell us who attacked her, that would assist in the hunt for the hell-bound beast who had dared lay hands on the dowager princess of Verona.
