O, Juliet (24 page)

“The negotiations between your father and the Strozzi have been concluded, I assume,” she said to me, more a statement than a question.

“Yes.”

“And have you and Jacopo signed your marriage contract?” This was Contessina in a kindly tone. She spoke of a man’s and woman’s mutual pledge of marriage to each other, a paper that was crucial to the legality of the event.

“Not yet,” I answered. I hoped they could not hear the dread in my voice.

“What are you waiting for?” Elena asked quite jovially.

The earth to open up and swallow me,
I thought, but said instead, “I think it will be tomorrow.”

“Sit,” insisted Lucrezia’s mother, patting a chair next to hers. “We think we have come up with a graceful plan to mingle the two weddings, yet allow for each to bring great honor to the individual families.”

I took a seat and tried to look pleased. I did not dare meet Lucrezia’s eye.

“In most cases, as you know, the exchange of rings takes place in private,” Contessina said, “but in this special circumstance, with so many who wish to celebrate—besides our families, friends, and guests, Florentines by the thousands will want to be there—we have decided to place this ceremony in the cathedral, under the eyes of the new archbishop of Florence.”

I was thrown into silent but utter confusion. All I could see before me were visions of Friar Bartolomo in the modest chapel of San Marco at midnight. The rough weave of my gown, a doublet for my bodice, and the sweet eyes of Romeo as we married with the simplest words, the blessings of the church . . . and of Dante.

Now the archbishop of Florence!

Now a magnificent wedding ceremony under the cathedral dome.

A pearl-encrusted gown.

Thousand of onlookers.

“The archbishop is a young man, and still a little wet behind the ears,” Elena said, “but such an occasion calls for a high church presence, don’t you think, Juliet?”

“Oh. Yes. Very high.”

“Of course there will be a notary there at the church....”

“Did we not decide on two,” Elena said, “one for each couple?”

“Ah yes,” Contessina agreed. “So that our sons can deliver a receipt for your dowries to them, and hear the mutual consent of bride and groom.” Another legality.

“We were just saying that you and Lucrezia should go to him together,” Elena went on, “and take confession. A little note to him . . . he will be delighted.We understand he is quite enamored by the wealth and importance of the Medici.”

Always modest, Contessina blushed and lowered her eyes. But she, too, was consumed by these wedding plans for her son. “We thought that when the exchange of rings is finished—”

“Do you know whether Jacopo plans three rings or four?” Elena interrupted.

I shook my head. I had no idea, nor did I want to know.

Contessina, unperturbed by her in-law-to-be, continued. “—then we will proceed with the
ductio ad maritum
—”

“The initiation of cohabitation,” Elena added, as though we two idiot girls did not understand the Latin. But of course every girl who ever dreamed of marrying knew what the words meant.

“—everyone escorting the two couples back to the groom’s home. In this case we shall all go to the Palazzo Bardi.”

Contessina looked pleased. “To my Piero’s home, and here our two families’ guests will celebrate with a great feast.”

“That is the next order of business,” Elena added, looking at me. “Your mother and Allessandra Strozzi will be paying for that.”

I was squirming in my chair by now, thinking this could get no worse.

“When the festivities are over,” Contessina went on, taking my eye and holding it, “Juliet, you, your family, friends, and your father’s clients will leave for the Palazzo Strozzi....”

“And hope that not too many raucous youths will be out to taunt your cortege with their obscene noises and songs . . . ,” Elena added playfully.

Even Contessina smiled at that. “Your wedding gifts will be awaiting you there, and then you and your new husband will be put to bed.” She looked at her soon-to-be daughter-in-law. “Lucrezia and Piero have requested that the guests be ejected before their first coupling.” Then she looked at me with kind eyes. “Is that your desire, too, Juliet?”

All that emerged from my mouth was a croaking sound.

Lucrezia stood suddenly. “I think Juliet and I should go to my room and write the archbishop.”

“A splendid idea,” Elena agreed.

Lucrezia took me by the hand and led me up the stairs. Several times my knees threatened to collapse under me. We went to her sleeping chamber, now crowded with marriage chests, open and overbrimming with gifts of linens and tapestries, gold plate, and Venetian glassware. The door closed behind us and I stood quaking in a cold sweat. Whispering like a criminal, I told her the truth. How Romeo had come to my balcony door on the night of the fire set by Jacopo. Romeo’s account of Marco’s murder. The true killer. Finally I spoke of our wedding bed and the joy—despite the horrors surrounding us—that we had given and received in each other’s arms.

Lucrezia listened with rapt attentiveness, nodding and making small sounds of encouragement that helped me go on. By the time I had finished, all judgment had drained away as infection recedes from an angry, suppurating wound, and she was, again, my dear and loyal friend.

“So you believe me when I say that Romeo did not murder my cousin?”

“I believe that Jacopo hated Romeo. That jealousy festers in his heart. And I do believe him capable of such an act.”

“And Romeo
not
?”

Lucrezia smiled. “And Romeo not. For all his impetuousness and willfulness and love of danger, he is not a murderer.” She took up both my hands in hers. “And he loves you so deeply. I wish . . .” She paused and her eyes filled suddenly with tears. “I wish that Piero loved me as much.”

“Oh Lucrezia, he will! Once you are husband and wife and you share a life together”—I felt myself blushing—“and a bed, he will adore you. It may be a marriage of convenience now, but it will become a marriage of love. I’m sure of it.”

“You cannot marry Jacopo,” she said in the soberest tone.

“No, I cannot.”

“It would be bigamy, and a sin against God.”

A sin against the God of Love,
I thought, then said, “But what can I do? Romeo is exiled. He would be killed on sight if he returned here.”

“Juliet.” Lucrezia squeezed my hands tightly. “You cannot wait another day. You must tell your parents the truth.”

“The truth? What truth? That Jacopo is a fire starter and a murderer? That I ran off in men’s clothing and married Romeo? That we lay together making love under their roof? My father will never believe a single awful thing about his future partner. Not from a silly, love-struck girl. But he will believe I married Romeo, and that I sacrificed my virginity to him.
That
he will believe. And it will be the end of any chance of having a life with Romeo—the avowed enemy of our family, the despised exile.”

“Would he send you to a nunnery?”

“Never. The benefit to our family would be too slight.” My voice cracked as I spoke the next. “Papa would tell Jacopo all and he would, reluctantly, submit to marrying a sullied woman. But he would wait. Insist on locking me away for long enough to be sure that I was not carrying Romeo’s child.”

Lucrezia nodded with understanding. “The Strozzi blood-line must remain pure.”

“Then together they’d seek an annulment to my marriage,” I finished.

My friend had begun to look as desperate as I felt.

“Jacopo would have good reason to disrespect me,” I said. “Loathe me. Beat me.”

“Married life would be death.”

The thought silenced us both, but I could see Lucrezia was thinking hard.

“There is something that can be done,” she said.

“Tell me!”

“Don Cosimo would never allow you to commit bigamy in the cathedral at the same altar as his son and me.”

“Oh, Lucrezia! Will you speak to him?”

She sighed with frustration. “He is gone to Rome to meet with the pope’s bankers. He won’t return for a fortnight, just before the wedding, bringing a whole phalanx of cardinals with him.”

“But I need him now,” I moaned. “He would believe me. Believe Romeo. He would see justice done!”

“You will have to wait, my friend. The moment he is home, I will go to him. Get an audience for you with him. He will see you. I know he will.”

“But in the meantime . . . ?”

“In the meantime you must be strong. Play the happy bride-to-be, delighted with your gifts.You will be kind to Jacopo, joyful with your mother, simpering to your father. The moment Don Cosimo learns the truth, he will stop your wedding to Jacopo. And in the meantime we will be thinking of how you can go and be with Romeo.” A furrowed forehead belied her hopeful words. “This will so anger your father.”

“Disgrace him,” I agreed. “I think he will disown me.”

“Could you bear that? Bear losing your family?”

“To live my life with Romeo? Gladly. More than gladly. Oh, Lucrezia!” I hugged her fiercely, hope rising in me like a strong tide. “I will be Jacopo’s perfect bride-to-be.”

Then a thought struck me like a hammer blow.

“I cannot in the meantime sign the contract with him. We’ll be as good as married.”

Lucrezia was thinking hard.

I was trying to think, too, but my mind was a welter of confusion.

Then my friend looked at me and smiled.

“I have an idea,” she said.

I
was strangely calm as we entered the great church. The massive dome dwarfed all those who stood in small clutches, or knelt at the various altars and prayed, and a muted cacophony of echoes swirled around us.

Lucrezia and I were arm in arm, but it was she pulling me forward, bracing me with her firm intent.

“There he is,” she said. “He must indeed be enamored of the Medici. He could only have gotten my note moments ago, yet here he comes, looking like a horny husband to his bride.... Ah, Father, you do honor us with your prompt attention,” she said, waiting for the archbishop of Florence to extend his hand to be kissed.

He was youthful, with an unlined face, and had a scent of perfume about him. His red silken dress trimmed with gold rivaled the gowns of the greatest ladies here. Yet he looked flustered in a way I had never seen a high clergyman be.

“Signorina Tornabuoni,” he crooned in the most honeyed tones. “It is I who is honored.”
Your father-in-law and husband will be making huge donations to the church,
I believed him to be thinking,
paying for great frescoes and rich altarpieces.

“Meet my friend Juliet Capelletti, who will be married to Jacopo Strozzi alongside Piero and myself.”

“Ah, signorina,” he said, forcing himself to attend me. “The Strozzi . . . such a fine family . . .”
A fabulously wealthy family, though not as powerful as the Medici,
I could hear him silently saying.

“We would very much like to take confession with you today,” Lucrezia said. She was, as we had planned, about to offer me first into the confessional, but before she could, the archbishop dropped my hand and took up hers.

“I will hear you at once,” he said very loudly.

A group of a dozen worshippers walking by us took great interest in his words. Here was a juicy piece of gossip to be shared later over dinner or at the baths.

“Look, there is an open confessional,” the priest went on so they could hear. “I shall listen to the Medici bride-to-be first”—he smiled broadly at Lucrezia, then turned to me—“and then the Strozzi!”

He led Lucrezia away to the row of carved wooden cubicles, leaving me standing there, the onlookers staring with blatant, even prurient interest at the scene the archbishop had created. It was then, to my abject horror, that I saw standing among them another man of God, this one gaping at me with shocked indignation.

Friar Bartolomo.

“Father,” I said weakly. “May I speak with you?”

He shook his head no, then swiveled under his brown robe and strode away toward the main altar.

I did not wish to make a commotion, but I could not let him go with such thoughts as he must be thinking. I followed after him and by lengthening my stride managed to walk beside him.

“Please,” I whispered. “You do not understand.”

“Are you marrying again?” he demanded, his voice taut with anger.

“No!” I was nearly shouting. I lowered my voice, but dared to take his arm and slow his pace. “This wedding will not take place.”

He stared at me unconvinced. “Your true husband is exiled in Verona, and accused of a terrible killing. Yet you are here”—he raised his hands helplessly to heaven—“
pretending
to be marrying another man? Whatever his crime”—he leaned in and whispered fiercely in my ear—“your place is with Romeo.”

“I know. I
know
.”

“I cannot believe him a murderer,” Friar Bartolomo said, his voice impassioned. “And of your cousin . . .” He looked me in the eye, then shook his head. “Impossible.”

Joy and relief flooded me. “Oh, Father, he is innocent of murder.”

The friar considered this and said with a perverse smile, “Though not of thievery. He stole our mule.” He grew serious again. “What is your plan, Juliet? How will you avoid this marriage?”

I looked around us desperately. The cathedral was no place to talk. And now I could see Lucrezia exiting the confessional, looking around the cavernous church for sight of me. She waved when she saw me, and beckoned.

“I have to go,” I said.

“Honor your marriage at any cost,” the monk said with terrible gravity.

“Have no doubt that I will.”

Then he left me and with a single fortifying breath, I went to meet Lucrezia.