Painting Mona Lisa aka I, Mona Lisa

will go with you, of course.”

She took the letter and slipped it in her bosom. I reached forth and squeezed her hand. We did not smile; our conspiracy was far too grave a matter. If my father refused, ex post facto, to give his consent to my marriage, I would have no more status than a mistress.

My dearest Lisa,

Your letter touches me so that I weep. That you should be so willing, for my sake, to risk censure for me humbles me, moves me to become a man worthy of you.

But I cannot permit you to come to me now.

Do not think for an instant that I will ever abandon you, or our love; you remain foremost in my thoughts. But you must realize that the simple act of communicating with me has opened you to danger. And that troubles my heart even more than the separation we must endure.

No doubt you have heard of the attempted overthrow of Piero by our cousins Lorenzo and Giovanni. And our situation has grown even worse. Only today, Piero received a letter from our ambassadors in Lyons. Charles has dismissed them; at this moment, they are making their way back to Tuscany. Our bankers, too, have been expelled.

Has my love waned? Never! But I cannot bear to see you put yourself in harm’s way. Be patient, beloved; let time pass, let the matter with King Charles resolve itself. Give me time, too, to think of a way to appease your father, for I cannot ask you to come to me under such unhappy circumstances-though at the same time, I am deeply moved by your willingness to do so. You are a strong woman; my father would be very proud.

When I am certain of your safety, I will send for you.

Until then, I remain

Yours forever,

Giuliano

I did not, could not, reply. What did it serve to express my hurt, my frustration, even my anger at him for not inviting me to come to him at once? What had politics to do with our love?

Late summer passed miserably. The weather grew sultry. Scores of fish died and floated on the waters of the Arno, their rotting flesh glistening silver in the sun; the stench permeated the city. It was the smell, the faithful said, of Death marching southward over the Alps. Despite the prophet’s silence, more and more citizens, even those of the nobility, yielded to his teachings and gave up their fine dress. Black, deep grays, dark blues, and browns colored the streets; gone were the brilliant peacock hues of blues, greens, and purples, the cheerful saffrons and rich scarlets.

Come into the Ark… cito, cito!

Fear had gripped the public mind. Lost without Savonarola to tell them what God was thinking, people spoke in awestruck murmurs of signs and portents: of clouds in the sky near Arezzo forming into soldiers on horseback, swords hefted above their heads; of a nun at Santa Maria Novella, overcome during Mass by a vision of a fiery red bull ramming the church with its horns; of a terrible storm in Puglia, its darkness interrupted by a dazzling thunderbolt which revealed not one, but three suns hung in the sky.

My father apparently forgot about Giuliano’s proposal and about arranging my marriage to a piagnone. He grew more troubled and distracted than usual. According to Zalumma, the Medici now refused to buy their woolen goods from him, severing a business relationship that had endured since the time of Cosimo de’ Medici and my great-grandfather. Business was bad: While wool was the fabric of choice for the nobler piagnoni, my father could no longer sell his brightly colored weaves, and it was proving difficult even to sell the dull ones, as people were reluctant to spend money on wardrobes during such uncertain times.

But there were other things perturbing him that I could not divine. He went early to Mass at Santo Spirito, then went to his shop directly afterward and did not return home until evening; I was certain he attended vespers in the Duomo, or San Marco, most likely meeting his friend Pico there. He never spoke of it, though, and he returned home late and dined with Ser Giovanni, no longer caring whether I was there to greet them at the supper table.

By August, King Charles had mobilized his troops and crossed the Alps; the conquering Cyrus had begun his inexorable march toward Tuscany. What does Piero de’ Medici plan to do to help us? people demanded. My father snorted in disapproval. “He entertains himself with sports and women; like Nero, he plays while Rome burns.”

Public hysteria increased throughout September: The eastern coastal town of Rapallo, south of Turin and Milan, was ravaged by the mercenaries who marched alongside the French. These soldiers were nothing like our Italian condottieri, who looted freely and trampled crops, but spared lives. No, these purchased swords belonged to the fierce Swiss, for whom treasures were not enough: They craved blood. And they spilled it generously, killing every single living soul they encountered. Infants suckling at their mothers’ breasts were speared through; women whose bellies were swollen from pregnancy were flayed alive. Limbs and heads were hacked off. Rapallo had become a gruesome graveyard of unburied, festering flesh piled high in the sun.

And all of us in Florence were mad with terror; even my father, formerly so eager to greet the End of Days, was afraid. The public sought reassurance, not from Piero de’ Medici, not from our Lord Priors, but from the one man who now held the city’s heart in his hands: the prior of San Marco, Savonarola. Such was the public clamor that he abandoned his self-imposed silence and agreed to preach on the Feast of Saint Matthew in the great Duomo.

Knowing the crowds would be great, we arrived at the outskirts of the Piazza del Duomo at dawn, when the sun was low and the light still gray. The sky was filled with red-tinged clouds that promised rain.

We found the church steps, the garden, the square itself overflowing with so many people that our driver could not pull the carriage into the piazza proper. Zalumma, my father, and I were required to climb down and struggle on foot toward the cathedral.

There was no Christian charity to be found. A physically strong man, my father pushed unapologetically, even brutally, through the crowds, creating just enough space for Zalumma and me to follow by pressing close behind him.

It took us the better part of an hour to make it into the church. Once my father was recognized, we were treated like dignitaries: Dominican monks escorted us the rest of the way, to the front of the sanctuary directly facing the pulpit. Despite the size of the crowd, the pews had been left inside the church, and seats had been reserved for each of us.

And there, waiting for us, was Count Giovanni Pico. His appearance shocked me. He had come almost every night to my house for the past several months, but I had not come down to catch so much as a glimpse of him. Now I saw that he had aged beyond his years, grown gray-skinned and gaunt. Leaning heavily upon a cane, he attempted to rise when he saw us, but his limbs trembled so badly that he abandoned the effort. My father sat beside him, and the two conferred urgently, quietly. As I watched them, I caught a glimpse of a familiar form behind them: Michelangelo. Wearing tailored black, he had clearly entered the ranks of the piagnoni: The severity of his dress served to accentuate the darkness of his eyes, his hair, the pronounced height of his pale brow, and the shortness of his jaw. At the sight of me, he lowered his face as if embarrassed.

I cannot say how long we waited for Mass to begin; I know only that a great deal of time passed, during which I said many prayers on Giuliano’s behalf. I was far more frightened for his life than for my own.

At last, the processional began. The smoke of incense wafted on the air. The congregation, the choir, even the priest seemed dazed. We went through the motions of ritual halfheartedly, murmuring responses without hearing them, without considering their meaning. Our minds were focused on one thing: the appearance of the prophet.

Even I-sinner, skeptic, lover of the Medici and their pagan art-found it impossible to resist the agony of anticipation. When the prophet at last ascended the steps to the podium, I-and Pico, and my father, and Zalumma- and every other person in the cathedral, including the priest, held our breaths. The silence at that moment felt impossible, given that over a thousand souls sat shoulder to shoulder within the sanctuary, and several thousand