O, Juliet (19 page)

The days grew chilly, the stone floor beneath my feet damp and drafty, but I walked in the sweet warmth of perpetual spring. Mama grew suspicious of my unnatural mood and when at the table Papa mentioned a generous gift of wine sent to us by his “friend” Roberto Monticecco, I was forced to stifle my urge to cry out, “Your
family
now!”

It was a great relief when Lucrezia and her mother invited me to go with them to Maestro Donatello’s bottega, where much of the work of her wedding was taking place, for I’d had no time for private conversation with my friend since the night of my own marriage.

The place was a hive of artistic industry with a dozen apprentices working, as was done at all such artists’ workshops, on everything from splendid frescoes and marble statuary to silver-work, death masks, and festive costumes.

Mona Elena Tornabuoni, a pretty-faced but spectacularly obese woman, was held in thrall by the maestro’s explanation of the craft involved in the filigreed gold salt cellars she was considering for purchase. Lucrezia and I had hung back out of her hearing so that I could admit to my marriage to Romeo and the rare events that had brought me to that moment.

By the time I’d finished, her features had slackened, the pretty mouth falling open in an O, the green eyes growing suddenly unfocused.

“You look as though I’ve told you of a murder,” I said, dashed with disappointment. “Lucrezia, I thought you would be happy for your friend. I have made a marriage for love.”

With thumb and fingers she squeezed her forehead. “You put on men’s clothes, tramped about in the street with gamblers and prostitutes and Florenzers, climbed”—she shook her head disbelievingly—“four hundred and sixty-three steps to the top of the Duomo, then put on a monk’s robes. . . .” Lucrezia seemed unable to go on with her recitation, and I was growing more and more angry.

I finished for her. “So I put on a monk’s robes, but do not forget I used Romeo’s doublet for an odd bodice, and some dried herbs as flowers in my hair, and I snuck down the hall of the monastery with a rogue friar and a half-crazed lover, and blasphemed before God by taking my vows of marriage!”

“I did not say that!”

“But you thought it. You did, Lucrezia. Do you deny it?”

“No,” she said quietly.

“Lucrezia, Juliet,” Mona Elena called without looking back at us. “I want you to see these bowls and tell me what you think.”

“We’ll be right there, Mama. We’re deciding on some gilded fruit decorations for the tables.”

Lucrezia turned back to me. She was near tears, but then so was I.

“So only
you
are allowed a happy marriage?” I accused her.

“Of course not. But why could you have not waited? Your families had become friends. Romeo was near to making it possible in an open way. A legal way.”

“I told you he said it was not possible! I told you what he learned about Jacopo and Papa’s business.”

“That is what he told you.”

“And that is what I believe! Why would he lie?”

Lucrezia forced herself to hold my angry eyes. “Your Romeo is a good man. A peace-loving man. He’s proven that. But he is impulsive, Juliet. Willful. Wild. I think he loves danger too much. Taking you out in the streets at night dressed as a man? Don’t you see? Danger sweetens the brew. Makes it more delicious.”

“No.”

She took on a stubborn expression. “I know you too well. You may be a romantic, but do you swear to me you did not question his mad adventure? Why he would put the woman he loved in harm’s way?”

“Of course such things occurred to me, Lucrezia,” I finally said. “And yes, Romeo courts danger, but it is well measured.”

The image returned of my cap being blown from my head and landing on the red arch of the Duomo’s roof.

“This is what I love about him, don’t you see? He is gentle. But not too gentle. He is thoughtful and scholarly, but at times his mind soars to far and exotic places. Places where I would like to be. He adores me, but he does not grovel or whine like a sick dog. When he holds me, when he touches me, I
know
that I have been held and touched.” I was blushing now, but it did not matter. I could see that Lucrezia’s expression was still unaccepting.

“Romeo is my husband, and I have done well marrying him. One day, you and my parents and all of Florence will understand that, and if you do not”—my voice was stronger and prouder than I thought possible—“then to hell with you all.”

A terrible and angry quiet fell like a wall between us.

“Lucrezia, I need you right now!” Mona Elena called. Hurt beyond measure, my friend turned away and joined her mother.

The painful silence between us continued for the rest of the afternoon, though Mona Elena was too busy chatting about wedding preparations to notice. Night had fallen as the Tornabuoni litter approached my house.

“So I think we are settled on the dinnerware,” she droned on, “though the ornaments may be too expensive. What they charge for goldwork these days . . .”

I was relieved when we came to a halt.

“Thank you, Mona Elena, for bringing me with you to the maestro’s bottega.”

“But of course, my dear. You are so much a part of our family”—she gazed fondly at her daughter—“and this wedding.”

I gave Lucrezia a kiss, but she remained cool and rigid.

As I descended from the vehicle, the front door of my house suddenly flew open and Papa burst through it, followed by two agitated men. As they raced away on foot, my mother, pulling on a cloak, came to the door, a look of terror on her face.

“Mama, what is it? What is happening?”

“There is a fire at the factory!”

Our litter appeared now, next to the Tornabuoni’s. I saw Lucrezia and Mona Elena staring out, bewildered.

“Your father does not want us there,” Mama said as she climbed into our litter, me following her in.

So my mother does have a backbone,
I found myself thinking.

Then I began to pray.

We rode in silence, both of us shivering as much with fear as the bitter night. The grunts of our bearers were loud in the otherwise quiet streets. Soon, though, we began hearing a commotion—shouting, clanging, and a crackling roar that I had never before heard, but knew must be the voice of fire.

Mama and I from one litter and Lucrezia and Mona Elena from another emerged, wide-eyed and gasping, into a Dantean circle of hell. The office end of the factory was ablaze, the windows of all three stories belching flames. Along the outside of the weaving chambers and warehouse there was a long line of men—many of them our factory workers—heaving bucket after bucket to the front, where Papa and Jacopo tossed water onto the extravagant orange inferno. The hissing steam, the black roiling smoke, and the licking fingers of fire that darted out at will were so terrifying a sight that I felt Mama’s knees buckle almost at once.

Lucrezia and I, on either side, propped her up again and moved her back to our litter. There she sat with her feet on the ground—Mona Elena patting her hand—refusing to go inside and calm herself.

“He will burn to death!” she kept crying.

“No, Mama, he is well back from it, though I fear the office and showroom are lost.”

We watched as Jacopo, soot-covered and looking very much in command, moved down the bucket brigade and began shouting at a young man I now recognized as my cousin Marco, and several of our factory men, to direct their loads to the divide between the showroom and the weaving and dyeing chambers, the latter still miraculously untouched.

“See how brave your future husband is,” Mama whispered, recovering her wits, but grating on mine. “And clever. Should fire reach the dyeing vats, there could be a great explosion.”

Suddenly the thought of what she had just proposed caused Mama to shrink back into the litter. It was well that she did, so she could not see my abject expression. But Lucrezia saw, and turned her face away, for we had left on bitter terms the subject of my “husband.”

And then as though by the magic of thinking of that person, Romeo appeared before my eyes, racing round the corner at the head of a band of men! I could see they were his father’s workers, but they were dressed, not for their labors in the vineyard or orchard, but for some celebration. Now Roberto Monticecco brought up the rear, shaking his head disbelievingly at the terrible conflagration.

At Romeo’s shouted orders they joined the bucket brigade, relieving some of the factory men, who fell to the ground limp and exhausted and mightily grateful. Roberto and Romeo went to my father and wordlessly took up the effort by his side.

Heartsick and frantic as Papa was, he nodded thanks to the Monticecco men, and my heart soared to see it.

The fresh manpower behind the water brigade finally turned the fiery tide. Soon there was more smoke than flame, and then no more left of the blaze than a facade of blackened stone and charred window frames. The fire out, the night became dark again, with only a few street lanterns flickering on the faces of the dazed and exhausted men.

I followed Mama as she threw herself sobbing into Papa’s arms. He appeared too tired to be angry at the foolish women who had disobeyed his command and followed him to the disaster.

Marco, greatly relieved, embraced his aunt and uncle.

Silently I sought Romeo’s eyes. His face was racked with divergent emotion: waning passion from the fight, pride in his men’s bravery, but sorrow, too, for my father’s loss, and, if I was not mistaken, joy at seeing me again—his love, his wife.

Jacopo strode up to the clutch of us then, and I thought—with a flicker of apprehension—that I saw a darkness there, one beyond his oily, soot-smeared face. In the next moment, and to my horror, I knew I had not misjudged.

He gave Romeo’s shoulder a vicious shove.

Roberto was the first to spring defensively forward. He placed his body full between his son’s and Jacopo Strozzi’s. In the next instant Papa pushed Mama from the center of the clutch and confronted the face-off.

“How do you dare disrespect my son?” Roberto demanded of Jacopo. “He and my men just helped save this factory.”

Jacopo spit on the ground at Roberto’s feet. Everyone within sight gasped at the appalling insult.

My father put a hand on Jacopo’s arm. I could see he was trying in vain for calm, and to find the right words in question.

“Jacopo, my friend. What has been the offense here? As Roberto says, Romeo and his men risked their lives to save our property.”

“Thank God we were nearby,” said Romeo, still bristling.

“We’d come into town this afternoon,” Roberto explained, forcing evenness in his voice. “We all went to the cathedral to give thanks for our successful harvest.”

Jacopo seethed. “More like successful sabotage.”

With that, Romeo surged past his father and clutched Jacopo round the neck with viselike fingers. I startled at the fury I saw in his usually gentle expression.

“You accuse us of sabotage!” he cried.

Papa pushed the men apart. His features were twisted with confusion. To Jacopo he growled, “Explain yourself.”

“I was walking home from Arentino’s and thought that I should go to the factory and check the manifest for tomorrow’s shipment. As I rounded the corner, I could see smoke pouring from a lower window. And then I saw a man running away.” His eyes passed over the faces of all the workmen who had gathered in abject silence to hear the accusation. They fell on Filippo, a man I recognized as the Monticecco’s house servant. “That man,” Jacopo declared.

“That is impossible,” Roberto cried. “Filippo has never left my side. First at the cathedral. Then at the inn where we celebrated. But more than that, he would have no reason to set your factory afire.” Roberto turned to Papa with baffled eyes. “We are friends, Capello.”

“How easy it is to claim friendship.” Jacopo’s mouth set in a stubborn line. “I know what I saw.”

“You’re lying,” Romeo said. Everyone quieted and the unnatural silence simmered dangerously. “Why are you lying?”

With lightning speed Jacopo’s fist arced through the air, landing a sharp blow to the back of Romeo’s head.

Instantly the workmen were alive with anger, as though the blow had been made to a hive of bees. Now they were ready to fly at one another.

But Roberto called out, “Everyone! Quiet yourselves! Stand down!”

Papa sought my mother’s eyes. “Take Juliet home. At once!” His eyes flashed angrily. “You should never have come.” Then without hesitation he turned from us and pushed his way back into the throng.

Mama turned to me, panic in her eyes. I could see she did not wish to leave her husband in harm’s way. Neither did I wish to leave mine. But there was no choice.

We joined Lucrezia and Mona Elena, who had stayed behind at the litters. I saw worry on Lucrezia’s face, for she knew that my circumstances—complicated and untenable before—had just become dangerous in the extreme. But I saw no recrimination in her eyes, none of the anger or outrage with which she had punished me at the bottega not two hours before. Perhaps I only wished it was so, but I felt Lucrezia’s compassion—the sisterhood that binds all women in love.

With a whispered word of caution, Lucrezia and her mother went their way. Mama and I were taken home.

W
e sat for a time at the dining table, clutching hands, silent in our misery and worry.

“They’re all right, Mama,” I said. I knew she believed I meant Papa and Jacopo. “If anything had happened to either of them, we would have heard by now.”

“At least your father and Roberto were keeping cool heads.” The words she spoke were true, but her furrowed brow belied her calm.

I brought us cups of warm wine and we sipped them, hardly meeting each other’s eyes. I could see Mama’s lids beginning to droop, but I did not dare suggest she go to bed.