The Very Large Princess Read online

tara tara.’ A thousand times, perhaps, she softly said ‘Tara,’ and then fell silent.

  “I lifted my quill to write, but my mind held only ‘Tara.’ ‘Tara tara tara.’ Then like my Lady, I was still, and the horses’ footfalls sounded in my ear…tara tara.

  “Thus passed the third hour.

  “During the fourth hour, the Princess wept. Mayhap she had been weeping longer than I knew, for my mind was all in turmoil. Truly it seemed that Love had flown, leaving naught but tara--”

  “--Why did my sister weep?” interrupted Drusilla.

  “I beseeched her to tell me, but she would not speak. She drenched her kerchief and my own, and still I waited to hear what caused her woe.

  “At length, the weeping ceased. Heaving a deep sigh, she raised her eyes to mine and said, ‘Father shall be angry that I have gone. We must return to court. For all the world, I would not make dear Father angry.’ We were, by then, but a stone’s throw from Chalet de Coeur.

  “‘Sweet Lady,’ I said, ‘Tomorrow we shall return to Court, and you shall be enfolded in your father’s arms.

  “‘I would that I could see my father now,’ she said. ‘I would that I could see Drusilla.’ And her lip began to tremble and her eyes again to fill.

  “‘My Love,’ I said hastily. ‘The horses are tired. They shall rest in the Duc’s stable, for we are near arrived. And once they have rested, we shall return to your father.’

  “‘The horses shall rest,’ she said, swallowing her tears. And thus she was persuaded that we must stop here.

  “But I found her very steadfast in her purpose. Though the horses were unhitched, and taken to stable, she would not leave the carriage.

  “‘We too must rest,’ I said, but she said naught.

  “‘The Duc, I have been told, sets an excellent table,’ I said, but she stayed silent.

  “‘Even now, I believe, a fine strawberry tart rests in the larder,’ I said. Whereupon she replied, ‘I shall have strawberry tart at Court. Cook doth make it best.’

  “At length, she agreed to take some water, and soon after fell into a deep slumber. For a few coins, I was able to employ a maidservant to stay with her, that she shall not be affrighted when she awakens.”

  “But is she in the carriage still?” asked Drusilla, startled.

  “Yea, how peacefully she lies on the soft green velvet, like a nymph at water’s edge!”

  “My sister is but a light sleeper, waking at the merest sound. She must be ill that she sleeps so well!”

  “Nay,” said John, fixing Aubrey with a stern eye. “Not ill, methinks, but entranced by ought in the water she did drink.”

  “Only the direst necessity compelled me to serve her so,” said Aubrey, with a reddened face. “I used but a drop.”

  “Give me the foul potion,” John demanded, and Aubrey drew a flask from his doublet and placed it in his friend’s hand. John walked to the hearth, uncorked the flask, and tipped its contents over a log, saying as he did so, “Let us hope the lass hath ta’en no harm.”

  “We must go to her at once,” Drusilla insisted, frightened for her sister.

  But when they had reached Princess Margery, they found no cause for alarm. Her pulse was steady and her breathing easy. When John lifted her out of the carriage, she opened her eyes a little and smiled. “Drusilla,” she said, then slept again.

  She was awake at supper, which was served late, and made a hearty meal. “Drusilla hath come. We shall soon see Father,” thought Margery, and her face was so filled with contentment that later, in his bedchamber, the Duc struck out “Lady, thy sad eyes do smite my heart,” and began again with “O Lady, full of joy thou art.”

  There was little talk at table. The Duc could scarce turn his eyes from Margery’s radiant countenance, and Aubrey’s dark, expressive eyes were oft fixed on the Duc. Drusilla wondered at Aubrey’s admiration for a man who sat at his own table in such uncivil silence.

  John, whose chair was next Drusilla’s own, looked up at her and smiled, as if he knew her thoughts.

  “What shall you do when you leave the King, John?” she asked quietly. “Shall you go back to your father’s land?”

  “Mayhap, but I’ve a mind to wander first. My purse is heavy, and my needs are light. I’d like to see a bit more o’ the world before I turn my hand to farming.”

  “Yes, so should I. I have heard tales of three-horned oxen, hares as large as horses, and folk with mouths so small, they needs must sup through reeds.”

  “That is folly, lass,” said Sober John, laughing. “Yet there is much that would excite your wonder. I would that I could show you….Yet that canna be….But I ken that you would travel boldly.”

  “The journey this day was pleasant.”

  “Aye, it was indeed.”

  No more was said, but later, as she and Margery traversed the winding stairs to their bedchamber, Drusilla’s thoughts were all of ships and caravans. “Oh, Aubrey,” she sighed to herself. “The world is vast, and there is much we might have seen together. Now must I a lonely pilgrim be.”

  “Drusilla, come,” said Margery, as she readied herself for bed.

  “Bye and bye,” said her sister, opening the doors to the balcony, and stepping out.

  Only a sliver of moon disturbed the darkness. Drusilla leaned against the balustrade, and tried to calm her restless heart.

  But voices soon sounded in the scented air, and shadowy figures moved in the garden below. “John, I have been a fool,” Drusilla heard, and knew the voice was Aubrey’s.

  “Aye and worse,” said John.

  She stepped back and turned to go inside, then stopped. “‘Tis wrong to stay,” she thought, “and yet I cannot leave.”

  “I shall abide here all the same,” Aubrey was saying. “De Coeur hath agreed to school me in all styles of poesy. “

  “For a rare fee, I make no doubt.”

  “John, I beseech you to go to my father and speak for me.”

  “Lad, you served the King ill, and played false with his daughters.”

  “I truly repent what I have done, and shall atone. But Margery is so very beautiful and Drusilla so very large….That I chose to pluck the lily, and not the yew, should give no cause for wonder.”

  “I did wonder at it. Aye, she is large. Large of heart and large of mind. Aye and bonny too. For my own part, I fancy a wife that stands up tall beside me. Her hand shall not be so wee that I canna feel it in mine.”

  “Perhaps you are in the right. It would please Father, were I to make the match, and Drusilla hath ever been a friend….What did you say, John? I did not hear you.”

  “I must see to Fernanda now,” John’s voice came gruffly. “For she was ne’er meant to pull a cart. Princes oft take what they please, but we shall come to blows an’ you touch my horse again.”

  “Forgive me,” called Aubrey, but John did not reply.

  Drusilla waited until it seemed the Prince had gone, then quietly went inside. “I have ever been his friend,” she thought, as she prepared for sleep, “and friendship oft can turn to love. Perhaps in time….But no, ‘tis folly to think of him so. He courted me, then left me, on a whim. And now he gives up Margery. He is but a lad, pulled hither and yon by fanciful desires….Oh, ‘tis hard, ‘tis very hard.”

  Margery stirred as Drusilla crept into bed. “Drusilla,” she murmured. “Aubrey told me a tale. He said we would go to Father, and we did not.”

  “Tomorrow we shall go,” Drusilla said.

  “Tomorrow,” murmured Margery, and let her eyes fall shut.

  Drusilla fell asleep less readily, and was awake at dawn. Margery watched from bed as her sister dressed.

  “Take care,” she said suddenly. “You shall tread on the pretty ribbon.”

  “‘Tis not a ribbon,” said Drusilla, looking at the floor near her feet. “‘Tis but a wilted posy.”

  “How its fragrance lingers,” she mused, as she picked up the rose that John had given her. “Although the bush grew w
ild and rough, its bloom hath more lasting beauty than many a palace cultivar.”

  She put it softly by, and quietly left the bedchamber, thinking to have a quick word with the coachman who would drive them home. She knew that William arose at first cockcrow.

  The household was so still that Drusilla had reached the foot of the staircase without encountering even a chambermaid or a drowsy page. “This Duc,” she thought, “lies late abed, and so do his servants also.”

  When she entered the Great Hall, however, she was surprised to find Prince Aubrey standing at a window, looking out. She thought to pass unnoticed, but suddenly he turned and spoke: “I never saw John look so angry. And you, Drusilla,” he continued. “Have I quite lost your good will?”

  “Nay,” said Drusilla, looking down. “That can never be.”

  “Ah, you stand fast,” he said gently, coming forward with his hands extended, as if to take hers. His face was pale, and his hair and clothes disheveled. “I knew it would be so. While I am beset by contradictions. All night I stayed awake and thought of love, and yet this morn, still am I left with a riddle.”

  “What riddle?” asked Drusilla, drawing back slightly.

  “The riddle of myself. In your great wisdom, can you take pity on a blind fool?”

  “Speak plainly, Aubrey. What do you wish of me?”

  “That you, like Juno, shall forgive and wait, until such time as I’ve the heart of Jove. For I have much to learn, and would not come to you unready.”

  For a moment, Drusilla’s heart leapt. Aubrey’s eyes looked deeply into hers, and seemed to hold the promise of all that she most wanted. “And yet he hath