In the sumptuous Villa Belmont did Portia Brabantio abide, a fair-haired, newly orphaned lady with the ripening of twenty-two summers upon her bosom, a wit as sharp as a dagger, and a beauty that had been praised on all the islands of Venice, particularly by those signors hoping to gain access to her knickers. Waiting upon the lady was her maid Nerissa, a raven-haired beauty half again as clever as her mistress, and as good a friend as money could buy. The two had been together since they were little girls, and so loved and hated each other like sisters.

“By my troth, Nerissa, my little body is weary of this great world.” Over her hair Portia wore a net of gold punctuated with pearls, which she picked at as if they were opulent lice.

“Well, buying shoes can be taxing, especially when you have only one maid to carry your parcels.”

“Not from buying shoes,” said Portia, lifting her gown to check that she was wearing new shoes and that all the travel and her father dying while she was gone had not been in vain. “I haven’t been sleeping well since we returned from Florence. I wake thinking I hear screaming deep in the bowels of the villa—the sound of someone suffering, but when I sit up in bed, I hear nothing.”

“Perhaps if you did something during the day, milady—lifted a finger, maybe two, in care of yourself—exhaustion would pleasantly overtake you and your slumber would be filled with sweetest dreams.”

“Dancing?” ventured Portia. “I do so prefer dancing to suffering, don’t you, Nerissa?”

“You speak as if one must choose one over another, but as any gentleman who has turned you around a ballroom can attest, dancing and suffering can be partners in step.”

“Oh, sweet Nerissa, I shall miss your loving snark when I am married and you are safely installed in a nunnery giving good service to priests and pirates, or in a brothel bearing the gentle jumps of rascals.”

“Would it were so, but I fear I shall ever be here at Belmont, blowing dust and clearing the cobwebs from milady’s nethers, your father’s puzzle having verily assured your spinsterhood.”

They tittered through gritted teeth, then Portia flung her needlepoint off the veranda as if it were a pie made from leprosy, then plopped down on a marble stool by the table, her legs askew, elbow to thigh, hand cradling a troubled chin.

“Oh balls.”

“Milady?”

“You’re right, of course,” said Portia. She scowled at three jewel chests that were laid out on the table. “I know you’re right. No man is going to pay the bride price and pass Father’s sodding test. Three thousand ducats? It’s absurd.”

“Your father set the price and the test to see you married better than Desdemona.”