Page 25 of The Stone Witch of Florence

TWENTY-FOUR

THE BECCHINO

Morning, July 8th of 1348, City of Florence

T hat same morning Lucia awoke late and famished. She went to the kitchen to find Ginevra, but was distracted by the eel pie her new friend had left on the kitchen table. She ate with relish, tasting each crumb and bit of eel jelly. She went to the open window with the pie in her hand, and looked out to greet the world with the true joy of one who almost had to leave it.

Joy immediately tempered at seeing the shrouded corpse of Antonella, lying stiff on the piazza. This saddened Lucia, who wished some dignity for her loyal employee. She decided she would see to it that she was properly buried before she went to give thanks for her salvation at the church of Santa Maria Novella. Lucia finished her pie, licking the crumbs from her fingers, dressed in her plainest green gown, and went outside to sit next to the body. It was here she sat when Ginevra came, returned from Sant’Elisabetta.

Lucia waved with a smile but saw something was wrong.

“Why are you sitting here next to this moldering body?” asked Ginevra by way of greeting.

“I’m waiting for the becchini , the gravediggers, to make their rounds.”

“Ah, of course. I’m sorry she’s still here. I thought the city would pick her up.”

“Perhaps they will, eventually. But I’ll need to be here and pay them, or they’ll just dump her in a ditch around the corner.”

“It is hard now to find places...”

“It’s not just that. These becchini are terrible men. They are lowborn and charge exorbitant sums, and they sing frightening songs to mock our sorrow. Awful tunes, heard even through our shut windows.” She adjusted the shroud that had fallen away from her maid’s hand with its blackening fingertips.

Ginevra nodded, and sat down next to her. “I will wait with you.”

“So, where were you this morning?”

Ginevra took out the brooch and handed it to Lucia. “Ludovico left this for me.”

“‘Not my wife/But my life?’” Lucia read. “So he was not just your friend, then?”

Ginevra answered her with silence.

“It’s not so bad if you don’t read the words—it has this lovely jewel in the center.”

“It is an amber. Do you know what an amber does?”

Lucia shook her head.

“When put on the left breast of a sleeping woman, she must admit all her secrets—it’s used to make adulteresses confess.”

“I’m sure he didn’t mean it that way—”

“I ruined my life for an idiot,” said Ginevra.

“I think you should still wear it—the words are on the back anyhow. It’s a pretty thing.”

“It is yours, then, if you like it.”

“Fine. I’ll wear it for you until you want it back. And now the message means something nice... You’re not my wife, but you saved my life.”

Ginevra managed a faint smile as Lucia pinned the brooch to her shoulder.

“Do you think it would work on a man, too? Make him tell his secrets, I mean.”

Ginevra shrugged. “Probably. Whatever man wrote down the amber’s powers probably didn’t want his wife to know she could turn it right around on him.” The women fell into silence, and Lucia busied herself adjusting Antonella’s shroud. Ginevra needed to distract herself from the worst possible morning. So she gestured across the piazza and asked, “Do you know this church well?”

“Santa Trinita? Of course. It’s where I’ll be buried; my husband bought us a chapel inside. Though it’s dark and damp now since the last flood. Why?”

“What relics does it hold?”

“The most famous is the crucifix of San Giovanni Gualberto, who spared his enemy after receiving a kiss from Christ. It’s supposed to grant wishes if you pray to it correctly... You don’t think?”

“Why not?”

“It’s been locked for months, since the plague first started.”

“Let’s go and see anyhow—”

“I’m sure it’s safe—I have a wish on it!”

“Lucia, I must see the inquisitor the day after tomorrow, and so far I’ve found nothing to tell him. Won’t you come with me since you know the inside?”

Lucia thumbed the golden jewel she had just accepted. “Alright, but only if we’re quick. I don’t want to miss the becchini .”

Santa Trinita was fronted in plain brick, pierced by three arched doors that led into the sanctuary and aisles. All of which appeared quite locked. The women walked up to the central door and Ginevra gave it a gentle push. At her slight touch, the entire door fell inward and slammed down onto the hard floor. They screamed in tandem, but there was not a soul around to hear the noise or chastise them for the damage.

Shaking her head, Ginevra stepped lightly over the fallen door and into the sanctuary, Lucia following timidly. Light poured through high windows onto mismatched murals and cracked stone floors that showed fantastical beasts rendered in black and white. It smelled of mildew, and dark stains crept up the walls—damage from the flood Lucia had mentioned. The flaking eyes of the holy martyrs and their painted benefactors did not appear to welcome them. Lucia stopped at the stone font and filled a small flask with holy water, tucking it back into her purse. “This way,” she said, leading them toward the chapel of San Giovanni Gualberto. “Look! It is still here. I told you so.” She pointed to a small sculpture: Dying Christ carved in ivory on a cross of gold, the points studded with shining red carbuncles.

“Lucia,” said Ginevra, “what is meant to be below the crucifix?”

Upon a velvet pillow was a tiny bottle, filled with a deep green liquid.

“No! That’s where the shoulder of San Giovanni Gualberto is kept.”

“He must have taken that, then!”

“But why? The crucifix is much better, hardly anyone prays to the shoulder.”

“Why take one relic but not the other?”

“Of course, this is why I became sick, why we are the only ones here: Santa Trinita is a dead parish , Ginevra.”

A grumbly voice singing and the rasping wood wheels of a cart on flagstones came through the broken doorway and interrupted them. As the voice got closer, they could make out the words to its song:

My passengers are stacked within

And though their lips are taut and grim

With puff of gas and jerk of limb

Your friends and lovers call to me

“As you are now, once was I thee

As I am now, so you shall be”

A becchino had come at last. Ginevra tucked away the bottle, and the women ran out and called to him. The frightful character stopped. Ginevra and Lucia looked at him as they walked across the piazza, shielding their eyes from the afternoon sun with their hands.

It was impossible to tell his age. His posture was crooked from years of manual labor, so that at first he seemed to be very old. But then he had moved his heavy cart so deftly it seemed he must be very young. He was dressed in nothing but his breechcloth and a large rag piled up on his head.

“Good afternoon, rosy maidens,” he said cheerily. “I see you’ve a fresh one for me?” He lifted the corner of Antonella’s shroud. “Oof, maybe not so fresh. She smells like Satan’s farts.”

Lucia’s jaw dropped. Ginevra grabbed her shoulder.

“Excuse me, my dear Signore, for interrupting your song,” she said. “We were hoping we might acquire your services to take our departed friend to the yard at...” She looked at Lucia.

“I... I don’t know her parish, she was poor.”

“Well, you’ll want San Paolino, then,” said the becchino . “That’s where the poor are buried. And I can take her there for two florins.”

“Two FLORINS?” the women shouted in unison.

“San Paolino is not even a mile from here,” objected Lucia.

“Ladies, if you can find a man cheaper than I—or, rather, if you can find any other man at all than I—then I shall be on my way and leave you with your fragrant friend.”

“Give us just a moment,” Ginevra said.

He bowed accommodatingly, and the two women stepped away to consult each other.

“Has your husband left you wanting?” Ginevra asked Lucia quietly.

“For Christian tenderness, yes.”

“You know what I mean.”

“In his haste to escape me, he neglected to collect a certain strongbox.”

“Let us appease the becchino ’s greed, then, for we have no other alternative.”

Lucia nodded reluctantly.

“Good,” said Ginevra. “And besides, I have an idea.”

She turned back to the becchino . “We’ll pay, but I’m coming with you to make sure that she is buried properly where you say.”

The becchino shrugged. “As you wish, Dama.”

“Well, aren’t you going to put her into the cart?”

“Aren’t you going to pay me two florins?”

“Ugh. Rude man. We’ll be right back.”

He grinned a horrid grin. “I’ll wait.”

“Are you sure you want to go with him?” whispered Lucia once they were inside.

“I’m sure—he is one of the few who still goes about the city. He may know something about the thefts.”

“Ah! You are clever. Very well. I’m going to go to Santa Maria Novella to pray. I’ll see you back here this evening for supper?”

Ginevra was touched by the hopefulness in her voice. “Yes, I promise. And—since they are on your way anyhow—would you consider stopping in at Santa Reparata and the Baptistry?”

Lucia stiffened. “And what would you have me do there?”

“Just look, that’s all. It’s where the first two thefts took place, so you might see if there are any signs or clues, any more of these strange bottles...”

Lucia tried to think of an excuse, but really she couldn’t see the harm in simply walking into two churches in the middle of the afternoon. “Alright, since you are being so good as to accompany Antonella to San Paolino. I have no desire to see any more corpses.”

“Don’t look at the scaffolds at Santa Reparata, then.”

The women went back outside, embraced, and parted ways. Ginevra pressed two heavy gold coins into the becchino ’s palm, then habitually felt for her coral pendant to make sure it was securely in place. A plague pit was no place to take chances.

The becchino hoisted dead Antonella into his cart with surprising speed, and then rolled along toward San Paolino. He said nothing as they walked, preferring to whistle the tune of his earlier song, including all sorts of trills and flourishy notes that made the melody inappropriately cheerful for the ghastly lyrics it accompanied.

“What is your name?” asked Ginevra, to make him stop whistling.

“You may call me to my face what you call me to my ass: I am the same as all who toil like me. For you, my name may be just Becchino.”

“Very well, Becchino. You know, it’s hard for some, to accept they are despised. But you do not seem to mind it?”

“Well, it is better not to be, when one has a choice, but I haven’t a choice. Because I was born a poor man, my existence was despised before I ever earned it. Now, at least, I do my best to earn it.”

“By singing perverted songs and cheating those in desperate situations?”

“Aren’t you a lofty one! I do a great service with my songs. Death comes for everyone. Mocking it is the only way to remove its sting.”

Ginevra thought about this. Laughter to drive away darkness, as Vermilia had taught her so long ago about the malocchio . “Alright, Becchino,” she answered. “But how does that explain your exorbitant billing practices?”

“Ah, yes. Well I am a bit greedy about it.”

Suddenly, Ginevra became aware of a low humming sound. “What’s that?”

“That’s the sound of the yard at San Paolino.”

“The sound?”

“You’ll see.” They rounded the corner. “Which spot is good enough for your friend?”