When Prince Caonabo arrested me, I had not allowed myself to be detained all mild and acquiescent, although who knows what I might have done had the man been cunning enough to shower me with ardent kisses and embraces, for clearly I was susceptible to such blandishments.

Instead I had leaped into action.

I conceived a violently imprudent plan.

I begged the steward to take me for a tour of the schoolrooms, since the heir and I hoped to bring into the world many well-behaved children. In one schoolroom I made myself useful with the older children by engaging them in a geography lesson in which they described to me in great detail the particulars of a map of Lutetia. When I returned to my rooms I kept the door to my suite open while I paged through books of fashion on a couch by the door. Every time I heard footsteps I took a turn around the sitting room that led past the door.

At mid-afternoon my labors were rewarded when the young steward ambled past, obviously on the lookout for me. Men did strut about life with a strong sense of their self-importance!

“Shh!” I whispered, “for they keep me trapped here. They don’t want me to talk to people lest I say unkind things about the heir’s wife.”

“Have you unkind things to say of her?” he asked with keen interest as he ogled my chest. “I hear all kinds of smoke but have seen no fire.”

“I could show you some fire,” I said with a look meant to inflame his interest. “I’ve nothing to do but sit for hours in the garden. Not that the heir’s wife needs watching by people like us.”

“Is it true a djelimuso guards the suite at all hours, day and night?”

“It is. I can’t hope to slip out as long as her eye is open! The frustrating part is that I could be gone for hours and she would never know, if I could just get out this door.”

He was eager to show me what he could accomplish! We arranged for him to create a distraction in the morning at second bell, after which I would meet him at a place he named that I pretended to know the location of. He hadn’t even asked my name, although by the evidence of his gaze he had become well acquainted with the shape of my breasts.