Page 9 of The Stone Witch of Florence

EIGHT

FIRENZE DI NUOVO

July of 1348, Gates of Florence

G inevra and Piero arrived at the Porta San Gallo early in the morning of July 7, 1348, several long weeks after the fiasco at the Feast of San Zenobio—and only a few short hours after the pear tree intimated that Ludovico was cold and dead. Normally, there was a long line of Florentine gentlemen standing in front of the gate at daybreak, each waiting to pass back into the city after an evening of revels in suburban brothels. But today, Ginevra and Piero were the sole applicants for entry. The gigantic nail-studded doors were shut, and it was only with much shouting that they were able to attract the attention of the keeper who sat in his room atop the gate’s tower.

“Move along! The city’s closed to foreigners!” he yelled down once he saw them.

“We have business here with His Holiness the Bishop!” called up Ginevra.

“Where is Old Antonio?” called Piero. “He let me out of this gate two weeks ago and said he would watch for my return!”

“Old Antonio is now Dead Antonio, may his soul be at peace. I’m the new gatekeeper, Young Antonio, and I’m not supposed to let anyone in.”

“But we have a letter from the Acciaiuoli family, inviting us to Florence!” said Ginevra.

Young Antonio paused, uncertain of the correct action.

“Please,” continued Ginevra. “Can you have your man open the door?”

“Man?! I have no man. It is only me at this post! You’re lucky you came to this gate and not another, where there might not even be anyone there at all!”

“Well, we are sorry to trouble you, Young Antonio. But please have a look at our letter! We come at the urgent request of the bishop’s nephew. Piero here is the son of a Florentine and is a resident of this city.”

Young Antonio squinted down from his perch. Even from the height, he could see a big official-looking seal on the letter. He did not want to interrupt the business of the bishop.

Nobody was around anyway to see that he let them in, a crooked-nosed woman and her child. They seemed harmless enough.

“Alright, alright, hold on.”

The keeper climbed down the long spiral stairs from his tower, opened a little door that was cut out of the big door, and for the first time in eight years, Ginevra saw her adopted home.

She stepped through the doorway, eager to experience the same elation she had when she first entered Florence as a young girl so many years ago, but O—desolate place! Never had Ginevra felt old before, but nothing shows time like a place once gay and full, now going to dust and shadows. Instead of the giddy excitement of her youth, she was overtaken by deep dread. She was now absolutely certain that her dream had been a portent. It was not just Ludovico who was gone. The city was so quiet she could hear the ringing in her ears, hear the plaster upon the walls. As if all its inhabitants had disappeared into the air.

Gone were the fumbling customs agents, the stoic soldiers, the peddlers of trinkets looking to part you from your coin as soon as you arrived. Gone was the pastry man who sold you hot fried bread that he plucked from a cauldron of bubbling lard with his bare fingertips.

Gone were the merchants’ wives, flouting sumptuary laws in their striped purple gowns and ridiculous red turbans, and the country mendicant who shouted at them. Where were the vegetable sellers, with their lettuces and garlics spread on clean blankets on the cobbled streets? And the new kittens who sat on the garlics and mewed for their mother cats? Gone, gone, gone.

“Piero,” she whispered, for it seemed strange to speak loudly in this empty space, “was it like this when you left?”

“Not quite,” he said with a shiver. “There were still some people walking about when I was last here. Half the city must have died while I was away. Come, I will take you to Bishop Acciaiuoli now. Let’s hope he’s still alive.”