Elizabeth glanced at him. “She seemed excited at the prospect of the marriage,” she replied.
“Aye, but was she in love with him?” Shakespeare asked again.
“Do you doubt that she was?”
Shakespeare shrugged. “I do not know. That is why I asked. She scarcely knew him.”
“He knew her no better,” Elizabeth replied. “Have you never heard of two people falling in love upon first sight?”
Smythe glanced at her sharply, but she did not look at him. Almost as if she were carefully avoiding it, he thought.
“I am a poet,” Shakespeare replied. “Of course I know that people can fall in love upon first sight. The question is, was she one of those people?”
Elizabeth did not seem to have an answer.
Shakespeare tried another tack. “Did she know that Corwin had gone to her house to see her father and break off the engagement?” he asked, softly.
Elizabeth gasped and her eyes grew wide. “Is this true?” she asked with astonishment.
“He told me so himself,” Shakespeare replied.
“But… why?”
“It seems he believed she had deceived him about her virtue,” he replied.
“What!” Elizabeth said, with disbelief.
“I do not know precisely what Corwin had heard, or from whom,” Shakespeare said, “for he was in a fever of outrage and indignation when he came to the Theatre, but it seems that someone had convinced him that Hera was not… chaste.”
Elizabeth brought her hands up to her face. “Who would do such a vile thing?”
“We do not know,” said Shakespeare. “But we intend to do our utmost to find out.”
“She sits there as if she does not even hear us,” Smythe said, staring at Hera where she sat by the window on the other side of the room. “I know that we are speaking softly, so perhaps she cannot tell what we are saying from over there, but just the same, you would think that she would respond to our presence in some way, at least.”
Elizabeth ’s eyes were glistening with tears. “I have tried speaking to her,” she said, “but she simply does not answer.”
“Let me try,” said Smythe.
“Be gentle with her,” said Elizabeth.
He crossed the room and knelt on the floor by her side. She did not respond to his approach. “Hera…” he said, softy.
She did not respond.
“Hera?”
She kept on staring out the window, as if she hadn’t heard him.
“Hem” he said, more firmly and emphatically, though without raising his voice. He reached out and gently placed two fingers on her cheek, carefully turning her face toward his.
He was not certain if she really saw him, although she seemed to. Her gaze met his and, for a moment, it was as if she were looking through him. Then her eyes focused on his. He wanted to say something to her, but suddenly, he could not seem to find the words. The look in her eyes was one of unbearable pain and sadness, a grief that ran so deep it went down to her very soul. She blinked, and a single tear trickled down her cheek.
***
“What did you see when you gazed into her eyes?” asked Shakespeare, as they left the Darcie house.
“Unutterable sadness,” Smythe replied. “A grief so deep and all-encompassing that there was no room within her for aught else. It filled her to the very brim.”