Thea’s words were greeted with uncomprehending silence. Everyone stared at her blankly, actors and spectators alike. Her exasperation palpable, she tried again.
“The two of them told all of society that she lay with them both, separately, to trap one of them into marriage,” she said. “But she didn’t, you see. It was all a lie.”
More blank faces.
Thea looked around desperately. “If she lay with only one of them, he would be honor-bound to marry her,” she explained, almost frantic. “But if she lay with both of them, then neither would have to marry her, and she would be ruined and called names besides. Don’t you understand?”
Finally, they understood. Jaws dropped and spines straightened, and the audience members launched into a round of enthusiastic booing.
Crowd: Those dastardly knaves! Cads! Villains! Boooo!
Francis: We played a game of pully-hawly. She might be carrying my baby.
Percy: We played a game of rankum-spankum. She might be carrying my baby.
Francis: I’ll knock your teeth from your skull.
Percy: I’ll tear your guts from your body.
The two knaves hurled themselves at each other in an exuberant mock fight. The spectators cheered, the other actors laughed, and Thea…
Thea watched, one hand over her mouth, looking lost. She made no move to intervene.
“So does either of us marry her?” asked the man playing Percy.
Thea said nothing.
“Miss?” prompted the other knave. “Who does she marry?
Again, Thea said nothing.
Faced with Thea’s silence, the actors continued alone, the script an old one, already well known. Thea watched the scene unfold, her light gone, as if her life was yet again falling apart before her eyes.
It was the man playing Lord Ventnor who spoke first.
Lord: She will not marry either of you, since she lay with you both. And who knows how many others there were? Once these women start, they never stop.
Rosamund: But I didn’t!
Lord: Women like you always say that.
Rosamund: They’re lying!
Lord: My son and his friend would never lie. You tried to trap them. Everyone knows your father wants you to marry a nobleman. You harlot!
Percy: Ha ha! She is ruined!
Francis: We have had our revenge! Ha ha!
Crowd: Booooo. Hissssss.
Merchant: But what about me? She’s my daughter.
Narrator: [says nothing]
Merchant: Oi! Miss! My daughter. Don’t I say something to help her?
Narrator: No. You don’t say anything. You hide in the crowd.
Crowd: What?
Actors: What?
Merchant: [looking around, bewildered] But she’s just standing there, with these toffs telling filthy lies. Where’s her family? These people are saying shameful things, and she’s all alone.
Narrator: Yes, she is, isn’t she?
The spectators muttered, confusion on their faces, and the actors exchanged looks, full of questions. The whole room waited for Thea to elaborate. She said nothing.
The man playing the merchant scratched his head, face screwed up. “But I’m meant to be her father. I should stand at her side. I should knock their teeth out. I should… I should…”
“But you don’t,” Thea said softly. “You hide in the crowd and pretend you don’t know her. You just leave her there, standing alone.”
The crowd fell silent as understanding crept through the room like an icy November mist.
Rafe realized he was leaning forward, tense from his jaw to his shoulders to his thighs. He wanted to smash heads against the wall, starting with her father, because Thea’s joie de vivre was a gift that she gave to the world, and they had robbed her of it.
Something inside him ached, something he could only call his heart. Ached for that bright young woman, whose life had been ruined in such a malicious, meaningless way. Who continued to bear the burden, because of people like him, who nodded and asked no questions because they thought they already knew. That was the genius of the plot against her: People would believe that a scheming woman had used wiles to trick a man, because that was one of the stories people always believed.
And Rafe, damn his own eyes, had chosen to believe that too. Hell, he had believed it so deeply he had based his entire scheme upon it. But watching her now, he could not doubt she told the truth.
Yet still she teased and laughed and played, even with this scar upon her heart.
She was a survivor. When people talked of survivors, they meant battle-scarred soldiers and shipwrecked sailors, people like Rafe, who wore his trauma on his face. But how many other survivors walked through the crowd? Unmarked, unnoticed, keeping their scars hidden as they went about their daily lives. Pasting on a brave face, putting others at their ease, hiding their pain beneath a smile. Of course: Life treated most people roughly, once in a while. Who didn’t, at some point, feel like they had been mauled by an indifferent beast?