The old shepherd was in despair at the King’s displeasure, for it meant ruin to them all, and perhaps a shameful death for himself. Perdita prepared with a breaking heart to give up her lover. She had often warned him what would come of this; she was no fitting mate for a Prince. Her dream of happiness was over.
“Being now awake, I’ll queen it no inch further, but milk my ewes and weep,” she murmured sorrowfully.
But Florizel had no intention of giving up the bride to whom he had plighted his troth. Not for Bohemia, nor for all the pomp that the sun saw, or the earth held, or the sea hid, would he break his oath to his beloved.
Camillo, who had remained behind when Polixenes wrathfully departed, tried to reason with the Prince. But Florizel was resolute. For some time, fearing a possible event such as had now happened, he had had a ship prepared for flight, which was riding at anchor close by. He bade Camillo return to Court and inform Polixenes that he had put to sea with Perdita; what course he meant to hold it would be better for Camillo not to know or the Prince to tell.
A plan now occurred to the good Camillo by which he hoped to benefit every one concerned. He still kept a warm feeling of affection for his late master, Leontes, and often during his sixteen years of exile he had longed to return to Sicilia. He now proposed to Florizel that he should carry Perdita to the Court of Leontes, where they would be certain to receive the warmest welcome from the repentant King, who would be anxious to make every possible amends to the son for the way in which he had treated the father. Camillo, meanwhile, would stay with Polixenes, and do everything in his power to soften his resentment and reconcile him to his son’s marriage.
The Oracle Fulfilled
After the departure of Florizel and Perdita, the shepherd’s son, seeing the despair of the old man because of the disgrace he had fallen into, counselled him to go and tell the King that Perdita was no daughter of his.
“There is no other way but to tell the King she is a changeling, and none of your flesh and blood,” he declared. “She being none of your flesh and blood, your flesh and blood has not offended the King, and so your flesh and blood is not to be punished by him. Show those things you found about her, those secret things, all but what she has with her. This being done, let the law go whistle, I warrant you.”
“I will tell the King all, every word,” said the timorous old man. “Yea, and his son’s pranks, too, who, I may say, is no honest man, neither to his father nor to me, to go about to make me the King’s brother-in-law.”
The worthy rustics at once put their intention into practice, and hearing that the King had already left the palace in pursuit of his son, they followed him to the seaside, to deliver over the things which had been found with the deserted infant.