Free The Fool's Girl by Celia Rees Page A

search, ranging far out to sea, along the coast and out to the offshore islands, in case she had been swept out by tide and current. The fishermen coming into port were questioned as to whether they had seen anything and sent straight back out again. Day after day the search went on, but there was no sign of her, living or dead.
    At last my father called off the searching. He declared a period of mourning and made arrangements for an elaborate funeral. The empty coffin was draped with her purple colours and paraded through the town on a splendid bier drawn by six matching black horses. It was buried in the family vault with full funerary rights and all due ceremony, but people were struck by the strangeness and muttered that no good would come of it. Such things fed their superstitions. The spectre of the empty coffin was to haunt the city for a long time to come.
    MARIA
    My lady went into the deepest mourning, deeper by far than for her father or brother. She went triple-veiled and dressed in cypress black. She gave the running of her household over to Sebastian, which is what he had always wanted, and withdrew from the world. She took to the upper rooms of the palazzo, cutting herself off. She allowed no one to see her, not even me, not even Feste. She lived like an anchoress, taking food through a small shuttered window. The only person allowed to see her was Marijita, who arrived at the dead of night and left in the early morning, speaking to no one, as if she’d taken a vow of secrecy.
    Feste took it badly. He had been in my lady’s household from a small child. They had played together and he had taught her all sorts of tricks: how to walk on stilts and whistle like a bird. He had been her father’s Fool, then hers. He won’t thank me for telling you, but he pined like a dog, sitting outside her door for weeks, for months. He climbed up to her balcony and sang and played so sweetly that the birds stopped their voices and the bees their buzzing, just to listen. All to no purpose. She would not let him see her, or even acknowledge that he was there. He worried himself to a shadow and was like to die of grief, until I told him to look to Violetta. She was motherless, her father otherwise occupied, Lady Olivia too immersed in her own sorrow to take notice of anybody else. Who would care for her now? I thought they might comfort each other. At last he took himself off to the palace. In truth, I wanted him out of the way. Lord Sebastian had never liked him, and the hatred was returned in brimming measure. Feste has a sharp mocking tongue and does not try to guard it. He was safe while my lady was there to laugh at his wit, but without her protection he was vulnerable. One word out of turn and Lord Sebastian would snuff him as quickly as he would pinch out a moth.
    Once Sebastian realised that Lady Olivia’s withdrawal was permanent, he was not long in destroying her household. He went abroad, and in his absence the young men who made up his retinue took over bringing everything into dissolute disarray. My lady’s loyal servants and followers left one by one. They’d had enough of the insults, the violence, the drunken, vile behaviour. Months went by. My lady did nothing to intervene. Toby and I saw the year out, but when Lord Sebastian came back after the Winter Festival he seemed surprised to see us there. It was as if the disrespect and disorder had been a deliberate campaign. He had us banished. It broke my heart to leave. I would have stayed with my lady, braved any amount of humiliation and cruelty – such things mean nothing to me – but I was given no choice. I packed with a knife at my back. Armed men took Toby and me to a waiting ship and stood guard on the dock until we sailed. I cried bitterly all the way here.
    VIOLETTA
    I mourned her in my own way.
    It was as if the sun had gone from our lives, leaving everything in shades of grey. It is possible to gradually forget its brightness and grow used to living