Page 50

CHAPTER 49

E RIC FINALLY LEFT V ARALLO AND DROVE BACK OUT INTO THE T USCAN countryside. Earlier, the morning had broken gray and misty, a warm steady drizzle enveloping the world. He’d talked more to his grandmother, then worked on his laptop. Amazingly, he was able to find out where Raffaello de’ Pazzi was buried. After the family’s banishment from Florence in 1478, with the failed conspiracy to murder Lorenzo de’ Medici, the Pazzis scattered throughout Italy. But when the Medici themselves were banished in 1494, some of the family had been allowed back to Florence.

But it was never the same.

Especially after the Medici returned in 1513 and even more so in 1569 when the Grand Duchy of Tuscany was established with them in charge. Most Pazzi stayed away, living where they’d settled after 1478, outside of Florence.

Raffael de’ Pazzi no exception.

Apparently, his line of the family centered themselves on land about a hundred kilometers east of Florence. Far enough away to be out of sight, but near enough not to become out of mind. There they built villas and established lavish estates, none of which existed any longer. The land had long passed from the family and into a multitude of private hands, the Pazzi all but gone. But according to the internet there was a family burial plot in the village of Panzitta, which was about fifty kilometers north of Varallo. He’d wondered about the closeness of the name Pazzi to Panzitta, but had found nothing online to show a connection, except that all of the land surrounding the town was once owned by Pazzis. Nowadays Panzitta was a sleepy place, home to about a thousand people that catered to the nearby wineries.

He motored into Panzitta and noted the time. 7:10 P.M.

The village, nestled in a shallow pass atop a hillcrest, seemed another of the endless procession of Italian places that were built up, torn down, then built again, without much ever changing. He avoided the main plaza and parked off to one side. The few shops were all closed for the day, but he could hear people and gaiety from inside a small café. The sun was setting, the day waning, the air cool. Panzitta seemed a typical walled city with one main street, a central plaza, and a church that was too large for the smallness of the village. Romanesque in style with a plain stone exterior and a row of tall green cypresses rising in front.

He approached the church and pushed open the heavy wooden doors, both with scrolled iron grilles over leaded-glass panels. Inside was a simple but elegant design with faded frescoed walls. The central nave was supported by arches resting on columns and capitals, all stripped of plaster and ornaments. The floor was rough patterned marble, slick from centuries of use. He noticed a chapel to the left of the nave devoted to the Madonna. The tabernacle at the far end behind the altar was flanked on either side with figures of saints. His research earlier detailed that the Pazzi had a burial crypt beneath this church, there since the sixteenth century. An unimportant place that held the remains of relatively unimportant people.

Until now.

The church was empty, the still air laced with the scent of stale incense. He needed to fully investigate this place before engaging his DNA expert. The maternal line had been proven. Now he had to establish the paternal side.

He walked deeper into the nave and found the stairs down to the crypt. An iron grille barred the way, but the gate hung open. He descended the stone steps. Above, in the arch, was the carved image of the Pazzi coat of arms. Easy to spot with the two unusual sea creatures. Beneath, an inscription was carved into the stone.

ISTI SVNT VIRI SANCTI

FACTI AMICI DEI

The crypt was unlit, but he found a switch that activated a series of concealed incandescent fixtures that dissolved the darkness and revealed a multitude of tombs. The walls were a familiar gray pietra serena stone against white plaster with a barrel-vaulted ceiling.

All well maintained.

He counted. Twenty-three. The dates carved into the stone varied from the nineteenth to the sixteenth century. Everything was quiet and still. Spooky. How easy it would be to surrender to the peace and antiquity of this sanctuary of old bones.

But he had work to do.

He started to closely examine the tombs and found the one for Raffaello de’ Pazzi who, as noted, died in 1725. He did the mental math off Anna Maria’s year of birth and determined that she was fifty-eight when Raffael died. Did the accident happen before or after the birth? She then lived another eighteen years after his death. He gently caressed the limestone exterior, his fingers tracing the lettering. In French. VOILA UN HOMME. Here is a man.

“May I help you?”

He turned.

Standing at the base of the stairs was a young priest dressed in a black clerical robe complete with white collar. He’d not heard the man approach.

“What does the Latin inscription above the entrance say?”

“These are saint men who made friends with God.”

“A bit bold, would you not say?”

The priest shrugged. “The Pazzi were never known for being modest. Are you a Pazzi?”

He considered the inquiry for a moment and decided to be honest. “I am not sure. I might be.”

“We have many people who come here thinking they may be Pazzi.”

Now he was curious. “And what do you do about that?”

A smile came to the young face. “Come. I will show you.”