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N onna Ursula settled in her chair like a satisfied hen on its nest and announced in ringing tones, “We’re contacting the spirits of the next world.”

Barnadine, red-faced and perspiring, looked around as if terrified and, pulling a bottle from his jacket, took a swig.

Marcellus crossed his arms and muttered something . . . uncomplimentary.

Cal marched into the room and focused on me. “This is your doing!”

He had every reason to be upset, and I intended to pacify him. “Actually—”

Cal interrupted, “You claim to see my father’s ghost!”

Papà gaped at me. “You claim to see a ghost?”

I didn’t appreciate his choice of words. “Papà, I’m not claiming anything.”

Holofernes and Dion exchanged wide-eyed glances, nodded at each other, and sidled out of the room.

“You’re pretending to be mad to avoid yet another match?” Papà acted as if I spent my life scheming. While there could be some justification for his belief, it wasn’t true—except in the matter of marriage.

“No!” I answered.

Apparently, Mamma thought his phrasing could be improved, also, for she said, “Romeo, our Rosie is not a liar. You know this.”

“In a most unfeminine way, she does seek to change the course of her fate!” Papà pronounced. “You yourself assured me of this, Juliet!”

“Yes,” Mamma said, “but—”

Cal had a fire in his eyes. “She asked how crazed she had to be for me to cancel our betrothal.”

Together, in tones of despair, Papà and Mamma said, “Oh, Rosie.”

I pointed at Cal. “He made me angry.”

“That’s no excuse!” Mamma said.

“I’m not excusing myself. It’s the truth!”

Cal’s voice was low and intense. “I’ll tell you.” He grew more hushed and more intense with each word. “I’m going to marry you, regardless of your pretense of madness. And bed you until you forget this nonsense. A babe or two will bring you to your senses!”

“Good God, man.” Papà placed his palm flat on his own chest as if suffering palpitations. “You take your life in your hands.”

I ignored him—my own dear papà—igniting instead in rage at Cal. I pushed back my chair and advanced on my sarcastic, disbelieving betrothed. “Marriage and babes are a man’s fix for every woman’s complaint, from constipation to how many maids to hire to clean the bed drapes!”

Papà lifted his despairing hands at Mamma. “Sweet Virgin Mary, she doesn’t need a ploy when she’s got that viperous tongue! We’ll never get her married off!”

“You will.” Cal extended his arm and pointed his finger toward the chapel. “She’s marrying me if I have to carry her over my shoulder to the altar!”

“That’s enough!” Nonna Ursula’s voice had the power to shatter marble. “You’ll have eternity to battle when you’re married. For now—no, Grandson, this meeting with the spirits is my idea.”

“ You’re covering for her. ” Cal snapped at his grandmother. He actually snapped!

Papà and Elder groaned.

Imogene, Katherina, and Princess Isabella whimpered.

Barnadine squeezed himself into a dim corner as if that hid him from sight.

Marcellus decided Holofernes and Dion had the right of it, and without taking his gaze off the scene, he backed slowly and silently out the door.

Torn between horror and humor, I said, “Cal, this is not your best moment.”

Mamma released a brief laugh and settled back to enjoy the pyrotechnics.

Nonna Ursula did not disappoint. She rose to her feet without help, without a wince or a struggle, buoyed by vivid, visible choler.

“Am I so feeble and bitten by age you can’t comprehend I could have a thought on how to find my son’s killer?

Do you think me so toothless and without claws that I can’t seize the past by the throat and wring its neck until it spews forth justice? ”

Cal seemed to realize that he’d angered the whirlwind and he would be lifted into the cloud and slammed to earth, bleeding and broken. In a placating tone, he said, “Nonna, I never meant—”

She chopped her hand down.

He stopped midsentence.

Her voice gained the strength of an orator exhorting a crowd. “What can you possibly mean that won’t insult me? It’s a good thing I have you, Prince Escalus the younger, to build me a marble shithouse and help me piss in a fur-lined pee-pot!”

Whew. Nonna Ursula had a way with an insult.

Cal clasped his hand into a fist, placed it on his chest, and bowed to her. “Forgive me, Nonna. I doubt not your power and wisdom.”

“You may meditate on your foolishness while I retire and ponder what the spirits have told me this evening.” In a voice laden with mystery, she said, “If I read the portents correctly, your noble father’s butcher is closer than we realize.”

At that moment, the door from the atrium swung open and Yago, Elder’s brother, stepped onstage. “As you commanded, Mamma, I am here!”