Meg hardly noticed the man who stumbled to a table in the corner and leaned on it. His head was bandaged, his clothes torn and dirty. Someone shoved a stool beneath him and he sat down heavily, his head in his hands.
She heard Violetta shriek. “O look at poor Will!”
Meg felt liquid all over her hand. The tap was overflowing. She turned it off and hurried over with a dripping cup of sack.
Violetta glared at her. “I suppose you will blame Mack for this?”
“My brother would not hurt Will,” said Meg, giving Violetta a stern look of warning. “Will, tell me who did this and I’ll thrash the guts out of him.”
Violetta tried to wipe the dried blood and dirt from Will’s face. He turned his head aside with a grimace and took the towel from her.
“I would feign a good tale but my wit took a battering. In truth, it was no honorable fight; I dealt not a single blow in exchange for my hurts.” Will gulped down the sack. “I gave up the sword to one who proved his ownership, and he thanked me thus!” He touched his bandaged head.
Violetta whimpered.
“Who was my assailant, you ask? ‘Aargh, Aargh!’ ” Will groaned.
Meg nodded. “Was he wearing a ruff?” she asked.
“His hands were rough but his neck was notable for the absence of one,” said Will.
“Certainly he was that notorious pimp and brawler, Roger Ruffneck,” said Meg. He must have been following them.
Violetta gasped. “He is the same one who pinched my arm!”
“You’re lucky he did not kill you, Will. It is rumored that he has murdered more than one of his rivals,” said Meg. “It was I who took that sword from him, and I shall do it again and skewer him through the—” Meg stopped, for she saw Will looking at her in alarm. “Where was my brother when Ruffneck attacked you?”
“We had just parted,” said Will. “Blame him not. He was excellent good company and we are already fast friends.”
“I love him myself,” said Meg, smiling to hear Will speak warmly of Mack.
“It was a false friend who left you in danger,” said Violetta, frowning at Meg. “I would not have done so.” She turned her attention back to Will. “Who tended to your wounds?” Her eyes brimmed with tears of tender concern.
“It was a young doctor in the company of an old, bald coot who would have left me in the street. The doctor himself was a good fellow named Thomas Valentine.”
Violetta cried out again, putting her hand to her throat. She leaped up as if to run out the door, then turned and fell to her knees, grasping Will’s fingers and watering them with her tears.
Will gave Meg a surprised look. “Am I really such a pitiable sight?”
“Indeed you are,” she said. Of course she knew the real reason for Violetta’s distress. Her father and her faithful lover were nearby looking for her.
“You are drawing unwanted attention,” said Meg, not unkindly. “Go and wipe your eyes.”
“What prodigious tears!” said Will as Violetta scurried away. “Think you Cleopatra cried so over the wounds of Mark Antony?”
Meg shook her head. “Hers were crocodile tears. Violetta weeps with unfeigned sadness at your plight.”
“It would seem she loves me then,” Will mused. He looked a little dismayed.
Now was Meg’s chance to speak on her friend’s behalf. “As hard as Roger smote you, love has smitten her. The difference is your wounds will heal.”
“What about you, Meg?” Will’s tone was plaintive but his eyes sparkled. “Do mortal goddesses never weep? Do they fall in love? In Ovid’s poetry they do.”
There he goes again, calling me a goddess! Meg felt confident, even bold. Perhaps Meg could banter with Will as Mack had done. She tipped her head to the side and winked. “I soak my pillow every night with tears of unrequited love for Will Shake-his-beard.” A hot blush rose up her neck. She wondered if she was being too saucy.
“So she loves me!” Will threw his head back and laughed. The sudden movement made him wince with pain. “What can I do about it?”
“Woo her,” said Meg. “She will tire of you, fall out of love, and you will be free again.”
“I woo the indomitable Meg?” asked Will. “How shall I undertake that Herculean task?”
Meg did not know what “indomitable” or “Herculean” meant, but she suspected Will was referring to her great size. Once again she was Long Meg, the object of men’s taunts.
“You misunderstand me and mock me to boot. I’ll pluck your shaking beard for that!” she said, her teasing mood giving way to vexation.
“Peace, you Amazon warrior!” said Will. “I am wooing as you suggested.”
“Not me, fool! We were talking about Violetta. She is the one smitten by love. Woo her.” Meg didn’t really mean it. Why should she encourage Violetta’s silliness?
“Then you do not love your poor, wounded Will?”
“I do not, for you irk me on purpose like every other jack,” she said, but to her surprise she was not angry.
“I shall not rile you further, Long Meg, for if you throw me out of here how shall I court the fair Violetta?” he said, letting out his breath in a sigh.
Meg rolled her eyes. “How indeed? You may stay, for though I do not love you, I would not add to your injuries. Now good night.”
Wearied yet strangely excited by this contest of wits, Meg went up to her room. There she found Violetta tossing uneasily on her pallet.
“Did anything else happen?” she asked, sitting up and lifting her red, swollen face to Meg.
Meg nodded. “Your tears served you well, for in their aftermath I persuaded Will of your love and encouraged him to woo you,” she said, pulling off her clothes. “I know that was to be Mack’s office, but it was Meg who found the opportunity.” She flopped on her bed. “I kept my promise. You keep my secret.”
Violetta’s eyes filled again. “My father and Thomas—how close they came to finding me!”
“Your father sounds like a harsh man. I understand why you ran away from him.” Meg meant to be sympathetic but Violetta sobbed even louder. “Now, now. Thomas Valentine is a man of virtue. But who loves what is virtuous?” she said, adopting a lighter tone. “We love sweets and rare fruits that make us ill. ‘Love knows no reason,’ Will says.” She yawned and climbed under the coverlet. “Perhaps I shall meet this doctor and against all reason he will fall in love with me. I will marry him and you can marry Will.” Meg hardly knew what she was saying, and as soon as these words left her mouth she fell asleep, while Violetta whimpered like a kitten.
Will’s injuries were not serious enough to deter him from adventure. The next day he asked Meg to arrange for him to spend a whole day with Mack. “This time you must come along and be my defender,” he urged.
“You may borrow a poniard and defend yourself. Or better yet, I have a pistol,” she said, just to see his eyes grow round. I had better watch my tongue, she thought.
Before going to meet Will, Meg asked Violetta for help with her disguise.
“You are strangely fixated on this clothing,” said Violetta, looking askance at her.
“I do this for your sake. If he looks too closely at Mack and recognizes me, the game will be up.”
Violetta obliged, paying particular attention to the fit of Meg’s doublet. “If anything betrays you it will be your bosom. You had better wrap this cloth around your chest first.”
Meg took off the doublet and regarded her breasts. Sometime in the last year they had grown ripe and round, probably while she was sleeping. “I should be glad, but ’tis an inconvenience now,” she murmured to herself.
When Meg was swaddled and dressed, Violetta tucked the last locks of her hair under her cap and helped her smudge her upper lip and chin with ashes.
“You look nothing like yourself, save your height and the color of your eyes,” Violetta said approvingly. “I would not know you myself.”