Juliet

IV.IV

Siena , A.D. 1340

IT WAS THE DAY OF THE PALIO, and the people of Siena were merrily afloat on a sea of song. Every street had become a river, every piazza a whirlpool of religious ecstasy, and those awash in the current kept flapping their flags and banners that they might rise out of the shallows and straddle the slippery swells of fortune, reaching up for their mother in Heaven to feel her tender touch.

The tide of devout mankind had long since broken through the floodgates of the city, spurting out into the countryside all the way to Fontebecci, a few miles north of Porta Camollia. Here, a heaving ocean of heads watched intently as the fifteen horsemen of the Palio emerged from their tents in full battle dress, prepared to honor the newly crowned Virgin by a dashing show of manhood.

It had taken Maestro Ambrogio the better part of the morning to leave town, elbowing his way through the masses, and had he been able to feel less guilt in the matter, he would have given up and turned around a thousand times before he was even halfway to Fontebecci. But he could not. How very wretched the old artist felt this morning! How dreadfully misguided had been his intervention in the affairs of these young people! Had he not been in such a hurry to join beauty with beauty for beauty’s sake, Romeo would never have known that Giulietta was alive, and she on her side would never have become infected with his passion.

How very odd, the idea that an artist’s love of beauty could so easily turn him into a delinquent. How very cruel it was of Fortuna to teach an old man a lesson at the cost of a young couple’s bliss. Or was he mistaken when he tried to explain his own crime through lofty ideas? Was it in fact his base humanity, and nothing else, that had doomed the young lovers from the very outset? Was it possible that he had transferred his own infirm desire to the admirable body of Romeo, and that all his hopes for the happy union of the youngsters had merely been a way of gaining vicarious admittance into Giulietta Tolomei’s bridal chamber?

The Maestro was not one to wallow in religious riddles unless they were part of a painting and payment was forthcoming, but it suddenly struck him that the slight nausea he was feeling at the thought of himself as a lascivious old puppeteer must be somewhat near what God was feeling every minute of every day. If indeed He felt anything. He was, after all, a divine Being, and it was entirely conceivable that divinity was incompatible with emotion. If not, then the Maestro sincerely pitied God, for the history of mankind was nothing more than a long tale of tears.

With the Virgin Mary it was different. She had been a human being, and she understood what it meant to suffer. She was the one who would always listen to your woes and make sure God sent his thunderbolts in the right direction. Like the lovely wife of a mighty man, she was the one to befriend and beseech, the one who knew how to reach his divine heart. She was the one to whom Siena had given its front-door keys, the one who had a special fondness for the Sienese, and who would protect them against their enemies, the way a mother protects the little son who seeks her embraces against the harassment of his brothers.

The Maestro’s air of imminent apocalypse was not reflected in the faces of the people he pushed aside in his quest to reach Fontebecci before the race began. Everyone was feasting, and no one was in a particular hurry to move forward; as long as one secured a spot along the open road, there was no real need to walk all the way to Fontebecci. Certainly, there would be sights to see at the starting area with all the tents, the many false starts, and the noble families whose sons were participating, but after all, what spectacle could be more worthwhile than the oncoming roar of fifteen galloping warhorses?

When he finally arrived, Maestro Ambrogio headed straight for the colors of the Marescotti eagle. Romeo had already emerged from the yellow tent, surrounded by the men of his family, and there was a remarkable scarcity of smiles among them. Even Comandante Marescotti, who was known to always have an encouraging word for everyone, be it in the most desperate of situations, looked like a soldier who knew he had fallen into an ambush. He was the one who personally held the horse steady while Romeo got into the saddle, and he was the only one who addressed his son directly.

“Fear not,” the Maestro heard him say, adjusting the plate armor covering the animal’s face, “he stands like an angel, but he will run like the devil.”

Romeo merely nodded, too excited to speak, and took the lance with the eagle flag that was handed to him. He would have to ride with it all the way, and if the Virgin Mary was kind, it would be the very one that was exchanged for the cencio at the finish line. If, on the other hand, the Virgin was in a jealous mood, he would be the last rider to plant his flag in front of the cathedral, and in return he would have to pick up a pig as a symbol of his shame.

Just as the helmet was brought out, Romeo caught sight of Maestro Ambrogio, and his surprise was so great that the horse became nervous beneath him. “Maestro!” he exclaimed, and there was understandable bitterness in his voice, “have you come to draw a picture of my downfall? I assure you, it will be quite the spectacle for an artist’s eye.”

“You are right,” replied Maestro Ambrogio, “to taunt me. I gave you a map leading straight to disaster; now I am eager to undo the damage.”

“Undo away, old man!” said Romeo. “You had better hurry, though, for I see the rope is ready.”

“Indeed I shall,” replied the Maestro, “if you will allow me to speak bluntly.”

“Blunt speech is all we have time for,” said Comandante Marescotti. “So let us hear it!”

Maestro Ambrogio cleared his throat. The carefully rehearsed monologue he had worked on all morning now quite escaped him, and he barely knew his first line. But necessity soon overruled eloquence, and he blurted out his information in the order it occurred to him. “You are in great danger!” he began. “And if you do not believe me-”

“We believe you!” barked Comandante Marescotti. “Tell us the details!”

“One of my students, Hassan,” the Maestro went on, “overheard a conversation in Palazzo Salimbeni last night. He was working on an angel in the ceiling, a cherub, I believe-”

“To Hell with the cherub!” roared Comandante Marescotti. “Tell us what Salimbeni is planning to do to my son!”

Maestro Ambrogio drew in air. “I believe their plan is as follows: Nothing will be attempted here at Fontebecci, as so many eyes are watching. But halfway to Porta Camollia, where the road widens, the son of Tolomei and someone else will attempt to block your way or push you into the ditch. If Salimbeni’s son is far ahead of you, they will be content with just slowing you down. But that is only the beginning. Once you enter town, be careful when you go through the contrade controlled by Salimbeni. When you pass the houses in the neighborhoods of Magione and Santo Stefano, there will be people in the towers, and they will throw things at you, if you are among the three front riders. Once you get into San Donato and Sant’Egidio, they will not be as bold, but if you are ahead of the field and look like a winner, they will risk it.”

Romeo looked at his father. “What do you make of that?”

“The same as you do,” said Comandante Marescotti. “This is no surprise, I was expecting it. But thanks to the Maestro, we now have certainty. Romeo, you must start ahead of the field and stay in front. Do not spare the horse, just go. Once you reach Porta Camollia, you must let them pass you, one by one, until you are in the fourth position.”

“But-”

“Do not interrupt me! I want you to stay in the fourth position until you are clear of Santo Stefano. Then you may climb up to the third or second position. But not the first. Not until you have passed Palazzo Salimbeni, do you understand?”

“It is too close to the finishing line! I can’t pass!”

“But you will.”

“It is too close! Nobody has ever done that before!”

“Since when,” said Comandante Marescotti, more softly, “did that ever stop my son?”

A clarion signal from the starting line ended all conversation, and the eagle helmet was placed over Romeo’s head, its visor closed. The family priest quickly executed the-very likely last-blessing of the young man, and the Maestro found himself extending the wishes to the nervous horse; after that it was up to the Virgin alone to protect her champion.

As the fifteen horses lined up at the rope, the crowd began chanting the names of favorites as well as foes. Every noble family had its supporters and its antagonists; no one household was universally loved, or despised. Even the Salimbenis had their throng of devoted clients, and it was on occasions such as these that great, ambitious men expected to see their year-round generosity rewarded with a lavish show of public support.

Among the horsemen themselves, few had thoughts for much except the road ahead. Eye contact was sought and avoided, patron saints were mobilized like locusts onto Egypt, and last-minute insults were hurled like missiles at a closing city gate. The time for prayers had passed, advice was no longer heard, and no deals could now be undone. Whatever demons, evil or good, had been conjured from the collective soul of the people of Siena, they had been given life, and only the battle itself, the race, could execute justice. There was no law but fate, no rights but the favors of chance; victory was the only truth worth knowing.

“So, let this be the day,” thought Maestro Ambrogio, “where you, divine Virgin, celebrate your coronation in Heaven by leniency towards us poor sinners, old as young. I beg you to take pity on Romeo Marescotti and protect him against the forces of evil that are about to eat up this city from within its own bowels. And I promise you, if you let him live, I shall devote the rest of my life to your beauty. But if he dies today, he has perished by my hand, and for sorrow and shame, that hand shall never paint again.”

AS ROMEO RODE UP to the starting area with the eagle banner, he felt the sticky web of a conspiracy closing around him. Everyone had heard of his brash challenge to Salimbeni, and knew that a family battle must ensue. Knowing the contestants, the question in most people’s minds was not so much who would win the race, but who would be alive at the end of it.

Romeo looked around at the other riders, trying to guess his odds. The Crescent Moon-Tolomei’s son, Tebaldo-was clearly in alliance with the Diamond-Salimbeni’s son, Nino-and even the Rooster and the Bull looked at him with eyes full of treason. Only the Owl nodded at him with the stern sympathy of a friend, but then, the Owl had many friends.

When the rope dropped, Romeo was not even fully inside the official starting area. He had been too busy looking at the other riders and judging their game to keep an eye on the magistrate in charge. Besides, the Palio always began with many false starts, and the starter had no qualms about bringing everyone back and starting over a dozen or so times-in fact, it was all part of the game.

But not today. For the first time in Palio history, the clarions did not sound a cancellation after the first start: Despite the confusion and the one horse left behind, the fourteen other riders were allowed to continue, and the race was on. Too shocked to feel more than a flash of fury at the foul play, Romeo tilted the lance forward until it sat tightly under his arm, dug his heels into the horse, and took up the pursuit.

The field was so far ahead that it was impossible to say who was in the lead; all he could see through the eye slit of the helmet was dust and incredulous faces turning towards him, faces of bystanders who had expected to see the young lover already far ahead of his rivals. Ignoring their cries and gestures-some encouraging, others anything but-Romeo rode right through the fray, giving the horse full rein and praying that it would return the favor.

Comandante Marescotti had run a calculated risk by giving his son a stallion; with a mare or a gelding Romeo had a fair chance, but a fair chance is not enough when your life is at stake. At least with a stallion it was all or nothing. Yes, it was possible that Cesare would get into a fight, pursue a mare, or even throw his rider to show the boy who was in charge, but on the other hand, he had the extra power needed to pull away from a dangerous situation, and, most important, he had the winning spirit.

Cesare also had another quality, something that was, under normal circumstances, entirely irrelevant to the Palio, but which now occurred to Romeo as being the only possible way in which he could ever hope to catch up with the field: The horse was an uncommonly powerful jumper.

The rules of the Palio said nothing about staying on the road. As long as a rider started at Fontebecci and ended up at the Siena Cathedral he was eligible to win the prize. It had never been necessary to stipulate the exact route, for no one had ever been foolish enough not to follow the road. The fields on either side of it were bumpy, filled with livestock or heaps of drying hay, as well as being crisscrossed by numerous fences and gates. To attempt a shortcut through the fields, in other words, meant facing an army of obstacles, obstacles that might be fun for a rider wearing a tunic, but which were murder for a horse carrying a knight with plate armor and a lance.

Romeo did not hesitate for long. The fourteen other riders were heading southwest, following a two-mile-long curve in the road that would eventually bring them to Porta Camollia. This was his chance.

Spotting an opening in the screaming crowd, he steered Cesare right off the road, into a recently harvested grain field, and beelined for the city gate.

The horse relished the challenge and tore through the field with more energy than it had displayed on the road, and when Romeo saw the first wooden fence coming up ahead, he pulled off the eagle helmet and tossed it into a passing haystack. There were no rules outlining a rider’s wear apart from the lance with the family colors; riders wore their battle dress and helmets exclusively in the interest of self-protection. In throwing away his helmet, Romeo knew he would be vulnerable to punches from the other riders as well as to objects deliberately dropped from the tower-houses of the city, but he also knew that if he did not lighten its load, the horse-strong as it was-would never make it into town.

Flying over the first fence, Cesare came down heavily on the other side, and Romeo wasted no time in stripping the breastplate from his shoulders and tossing it into the middle of the pigsty he was riding through. The next two fences were lower than the first, and the horse jumped them with ease as Romeo held the lance high above his head to avoid getting it caught on the rails. Losing the lance with the Marescotti colors meant losing the race, even if he came in as number one.

Everyone who saw him that day would have sworn that Romeo was attempting the impossible. The distance saved by the shortcut was easily nullified by the many jumps, and once back on the road, he would-at best-be as far behind the other riders as he had been before. To say nothing of the harm done to the horse from galloping across heaps and holes and jumping like a mad dog under the August sun.

Luckily, Romeo did not know his odds. He also did not know that he emerged on the road ahead of the field due to very unusual circumstances. Somewhere along the way, an anonymous bystander had let loose a hamper of geese right in front of the Palio riders, and in the confusion, rotten eggs had been very accurately launched at a particular horseman-belonging to a particular tower-house-in retaliation for a similar incident the year before. Such pranks were part of the Palio, but only rarely did they have any profound influence on the race.

There were those who saw the Virgin Mary’s hand in it all: the geese, the delay, and Romeo’s magical flight over seven fences. But to the fourteen riders, who had dutifully followed the road, Romeo’s sudden appearance ahead of them could be nothing but the work of the devil. And so they pursued him with hateful vehemence as the road gradually narrowed to funnel them all through the arch of Porta Camollia.

Only the boys who had climbed up onto the brickwork of the city gate had been able to see the latter part of Romeo’s daring ride with their own eyes, and whatever their previous allegiances, whatever the loves and hates of their kin crowding below, those boys could not help but cheer on the reckless challenger as he shot through the gate beneath them, eminently vulnerable without his body armor and helmet, and immediately followed by a band of frenzied foes.

MANY A PALIO HAD been decided at Porta Camollia; the rider who had the good fortune to be first through the city gate stood a decent chance of maintaining the lead through the narrow city streets and ending up the winner in Piazza del Duomo. The greatest challenge from now on was the tower-houses lining the road on both sides; despite the law stipulating that if objects had been deliberately thrown from a tower, then that tower must be torn down, flowerpots and bricks kept falling-miraculously or devilishly, depending on your allegiance-onto rivals passing in the street below. Despite the law, such acts were rarely punished, for to gather a sober and unanimous account of events leading to accidents along the Palio racetrack was something very few city officials had ever bothered to attempt.

As he rode under the fateful gate and entered Siena in the lead position, Romeo was only too aware of disobeying his father. Comandante Marescotti had instructed him to avoid being in the lead, precisely because of the danger of projectiles thrown from the towers. Even with a helmet on his head, a man could easily be knocked from his horse by a well-aimed terra-cotta pot; with no helmet on, he was sure to be dead before he even hit the ground.

But Romeo could not let the others pass him. He had struggled so hard to catch up and pass the field that the idea of falling back to the fourth position-even in the interest of strategy and self-preservation-was as repulsive as giving in completely and letting the others finish the race without him.

And so he spurred on the horse and thundered into town, trusting in the Virgin to carve his way with her heavenly staff and deliver him from any evil falling from aloft.

He saw no faces, no limbs, no bodies; Romeo’s path was lined with walls studded with screaming mouths and wide-open eyes, mouths that made no sound, and eyes that saw nothing but black and white, rival and ally, and which would never be able to recount the facts of the race, for in a maddened crowd there are none. All is emotion, all is hope, and the wishes of the crowd will always trump the truth of one.

The first projectile hit him just as he entered the neighborhood of Magione. He never saw what it was, just felt a sudden, burning pain in his shoulder as the object merely grazed him and fell to the ground somewhere in his wake.

The next one-a terra-cotta pot-hit his thigh with a numbing thud, and for a brief instant he thought the impact might have crushed the bone. But when he touched a hand to his leg, he felt nothing, not even pain. Not that it mattered whether the bone was broken or not, as long as he was still in the saddle and his foot still firmly in the stirrup.

The third object to hit him was smaller, and that was fortunate, for it hit him right on the forehead and nearly knocked him out. It took Romeo a few gasps to shake the darkness and regain control of the horse, and meanwhile, all around him, the wall of screaming mouths was laughing at his confusion. Only now did he fully understand what his father had known all along: If he stayed in the lead through the neighborhoods controlled by the Salimbenis, he would never finish the race.

Once the decision was made, it was not hard to fall back from the lead position; the challenge was to avoid being passed by more than three other riders. They all glared at him as they passed him-the son of Tolomei, the son of Salimbeni, and someone else who did not matter-and Romeo glared right back at them, hating them for thinking he was giving up, and hating himself for resorting to tricks.

Taking up the pursuit, he stayed as close to the three as he could, keeping his head down and trusting that no tower-dwelling Salimbeni supporter would risk hurting the son of their patron. His calculation proved right. The sight of the Salimbeni banner with the three diamonds made everyone hesitate one moment too long in throwing their bricks and pots, and as the four riders galloped through the neighborhood of San Donato, Romeo was not struck by a single object.

Riding by Palazzo Salimbeni at last, he knew the time had come for him to do the impossible: pass his three rivals, one by one, before the track turned sharply up Via del Capitano and into Piazza del Duomo. This was truly the moment when divine intervention would show itself; were he to succeed and win the race from his current position, it could only be a result of heavenly favor.

Spurring on the horse, Romeo managed to catch up with the son of Tolomei and the son of Salimbeni-side by side as if they had been allies forever-but just as he was about to pass them, Nino Salimbeni drew back his arm like a scorpion its tail, and sunk a shiny dagger into the flesh of Tebaldo Tolomei, right above the harness where the tender neck was visible between the body armor and the helmet.

It happened so quickly that no one else could possibly have seen exactly who attacked and how. There was a flash of gold, a brief struggle. Then seventeen-year-old Tebaldo Tolomei tumbled from the horse, limply, in the middle of Piazza Tolomei, to be pulled aside by his father’s screaming clients, while the assassin continued at full speed without even looking back.

The only one to react to the atrocity was the third rider, who-fearing for his own life now that he seemed the only serious contender left-began swinging his banner at the murderer, trying to knock him out of the saddle.

Giving Cesare full rein, Romeo tried to pass the two wrestling riders, but was thwarted when Nino Salimbeni broadsided him in an attempt at avoiding the third rider’s banner. Hanging by little more than a stirrup, Romeo saw Palazzo Marescotti fly by and knew that the most lethal corner of the Palio was coming up ahead. If he was not back in the saddle when the road turned, his Palio-and maybe his life-would come to a very ignoble end.

IN PIAZZA DEL DUOMO, Friar Lorenzo regretted-for the twentieth time that morning-not staying in his lonely cell with his prayer book. Rather, he had allowed himself to be swept outside and away by the madness of the Palio. Here he was, trapped in the crowd and barely able to see the finish line, never mind that demonic cloth flying from a tall pole, that silken noose around the neck of innocence: the cencio.

Next to him was the podium holding the heads of the noble families, not to be confused with the podium of the government, which held fewer luxuries, and fewer ancestors, but-for all the self-effacing rhetoric-an equal amount of ambition. Both Tolomei and Salimbeni were visible on the former, opting to watch their sons triumph from the comfort of cushioned seats rather than suffering the dust of the starting line at Fontebecci only to toss their paternal advice at an ungrateful youngster who would never heed it anyway.

As they sat there, waving at their cheering supporters with measured condescension, they were not deaf to the fact that, this year, the tone of the masses had changed. The Palio had always been a cacophony of voices with everyone singing the songs of their own contrada and their own heroes-including the houses of Tolomei and Salimbeni, if they had a rider in the race-but this year it seemed many more people were joining in the songs of Aquila, the Marescotti eagle.

Sitting there, listening to it all, Tolomei looked worried. Only now, Friar Lorenzo ventured to guess, did the great man wonder whether it had been such a good idea to bring along with him the true prize of the Palio: his niece Giulietta.

The young woman was hardly recognizable as she sat there between father and husband-to-be, her regal attire at odds with her wan cheeks. She had turned her head once, to look right at Friar Lorenzo, as if she had known all along that he was standing there, observing her. The look on her face sent a stab of compassion through his heart, immediately followed by a stab of fury that he was unable to save her.

Was this why God had delivered her from the slaughter that befell her family-only to thrust her into the arms of the very villain who had shed their blood? It was a cruel, cruel fate, and Friar Lorenzo found himself suddenly wishing that neither she, nor he, had survived that evil day.

IF GIULIETTA HAD KNOWN her friend’s thoughts as she sat there on the podium, displayed for everyone to pity, she would have agreed that marriage to Salimbeni was a fate worse than death. But it was too early to give in to despair; the Palio was not yet over, Romeo was-as far as she knew-still alive, and Heaven might still be on their side.

If the Virgin Mary had truly been offended by Romeo’s behavior in the cathedral the night before, she would surely have struck him dead on the spot; the fact that he had been allowed to live, and return home unharmed, must mean that Heaven wanted him to ride in the Palio. But then… the design of Heaven was one thing, and quite another was the will of the man sitting next to her, Salimbeni.

A distant rumble of oncoming horses made the crowd around the podium contract in expectation and erupt in frenzied cheers, calling out the names of their favorites and rivals as if shouting could somehow direct fate. Everywhere around her, people stretched to see which of the fifteen Palio riders would be first into the piazza, but Giulietta could not look. Closing her eyes to the turmoil, she pressed her folded hands to her lips and dared to speak the one word that would make everything right, “Aquila!”

One breathless moment later, that word was repeated everywhere around her by thousands of voices: Aquila! Aquila! Aquila! It was cried, it was chuckled, it was sneered… and Giulietta opened her eyes excitedly to see Romeo sweeping through the piazza-his horse skidding on the uneven track and foaming with exhaustion-heading straight for the angel wagon with the cencio. His face was torn with rage, and she was shocked to see him smeared in blood, but he still had the eagle banner in his hand, and he was first. First.

Not pausing to cheer, Romeo rode right up to the angel wagon, pushed aside the chubby choirboys dressed with wings and suspended with ropes, grabbed the pole with the cencio, and planted his own banner instead. Holding his prize high in unrestrained triumph, he turned to face his closest rival, Nino Salimbeni, and to relish the other’s rage.

Nobody cared about the riders coming in third, fourth, and fifth; almost as one, the crowd’s heads were turning to see what Salimbeni was going to do about Romeo and this unexpected turn of events. By now, there was not a man or woman in Siena who was ignorant of Romeo’s defying Salimbeni, and his pledge to the Virgin Mary-that if he won the Palio, he would not turn the cencio into clothes, but drape it over his wedding bed-and there were few hearts that did not harbor some sympathy for the young lover.

Seeing that Romeo had secured the cencio, Tolomei got up abruptly, swaying in the crosswinds of fortune. All around him, the people of Siena were wailing and pleading, begging him to change his heart. Yet next to him sat a man who would surely squash that heart if he did.

“Messer Tolomei!” bellowed Romeo, holding the cencio high as the horse reared up beneath him, “Heaven has spoken in my favor! Do you dare ignore the wishes of the Virgin Mary? Will you sacrifice this city to her wrath? Does the pleasure of that man”-he pointed boldly at Salimbeni-“mean more to you than the safety of us all?”

A roar of outrage went through the crowd at the idea, and the guards surrounding the podium positioned themselves to draw and defend. There were those among the townspeople who defied the guards and boldly reached for Giulietta, urging her to jump from the podium and let them deliver her to Romeo. But Salimbeni put a stop to their attempts by standing up and placing a firm hand on her shoulder.

“Very well, boy!” he yelled to Romeo, counting on his many friends and supporters to cheer him on and turn the tide. “You won the race! Now go home and turn that cencio into a nice dress for yourself, and maybe I’ll let you be my bridesmaid when-”

But the crowd had heard enough and would not let him finish. “Shame on the Salimbenis,” cried someone, “for violating the will of Heaven!” And the rest responded immediately, screaming out their indignation against the noble gentlemen and preparing to turn rage into riot. Old Palio rivalries were now quite forgotten, and the few imbeciles still singing were quickly shut up by their peers.

The people of Siena knew that if they all united against the few, they might be able to storm the podium and steal away the lady who so obviously belonged to another. It would not be the first time they had rebelled against Salimbeni, and they knew that if only they kept pushing, they would soon have the mighty men hiding within their tall towers, all stairs and ladders pulled up and out of reach.

To Giulietta, who sat on the podium like an inexperienced sailor on a stormy sea, it was frightening and intoxicating to feel the power of the elements raging about her. There they were, thousands of strangers, whose names she did not know, but who were ready to brave the halberds of the guards to bring her justice. If only they kept pushing, the podium would soon keel over, and all the noble gentlemen would be busy saving themselves and their fine robes from the rabble.

In such a pandemonium, Giulietta figured, she and Romeo might be able to disappear, and the Virgin Mary would surely keep the riot going long enough for them to escape the city together.

But it was not to be. Before the mob had gathered momentum, a new group of people came bursting into the piazza, to scream terrible news at Messer Tolomei. “Tebaldo!” they cried, pulling at their hair in despair, “it is Tebaldo! Oh, the poor boy!” And when they finally reached the podium and found Tolomei on his knees, begging them to tell him what had happened to his son, they replied in tears, waving a bloody dagger in the air, “He is dead! Murdered! Stabbed to death during the Palio!”

As soon as he understood the message, Tolomei fell over in convulsions, and the whole podium erupted in fear. Shocked by the sight of her uncle like this, looking as if he was possessed by a demon, Giulietta at first recoiled, then forced herself to kneel down and attend to him as best she could, shielding him from the scuffle of feet and legs until Monna Antonia and the servants were able to get through. “Uncle Tolomei,” she urged him, not knowing what else to say, “calm yourself!”

The only man to stand straight through it all was Salimbeni, who demanded to see the murder weapon and instantly held it up for everyone to behold. “Look!” he roared. “There you have your hero! This is the dagger that killed Tebaldo Tolomei during our holy race! See?” He pointed at its shaft. “It has the Marescotti eagle engraved! What do you make of that?”

Giulietta looked out in horror to see the crowd staring at Salimbeni and the dagger in disbelief. Here was the man they had wanted to punish just a moment ago, but the shocking news of the misdeed and the sight of Messer Tolomei’s grieving figure had distracted them. Now they did not know what to think, and they just stood there, gaping, waiting for a cue.

Seeing the changing expression on their faces, Giulietta understood right away that Salimbeni had planned this moment in advance, in order to turn the mob against Romeo in case he won the Palio. Now they were quite forgetting their reasons for attacking the podium in the first place, yet their emotions were still running wild, ravenous for some other object to tear apart.

They did not have to wait long. Salimbeni had enough loyal clients in the crowd that, as soon as he waved the dagger in the air, someone yelled out, “Romeo is the murderer!”

Within a moment, the people of Siena were once again united, this time in disgusted hatred against the young man they had just hailed as their hero.

Afloat on such a full sea of commotion, Salimbeni now dared to order Romeo’s immediate arrest, and to call everyone who disagreed a traitor. But to Giulietta’s immense relief, when the guards returned to the podium a quarter of an hour later, they brought only a foaming horse, the eagle banner, and the cencio. Of Romeo Marescotti there had been no trace. No matter how many people they had asked, they had received the same reply: Not a single person had seen Romeo leaving the piazza.

Only when they started making house calls later that night did one man-in the interest of saving his wife and daughters from the uniformed villains-confess that he had heard a rumor saying Romeo Marescotti had escaped through the underground Bottini aqueduct in the company of a young Franciscan friar.

When Giulietta heard this rumor whispered by the servants later that evening, she sent up a grateful prayer to the Virgin Mary. There was no doubt in her mind that the Franciscan friar had been Friar Lorenzo, and she knew him well enough to be sure that he would do everything in his power to save the man he knew she loved.