The Dark Heart of Florence by Tasha Alexander (ebook reader screen TXT) 📕

“No one will believe I killed him,” Colin said.

“Only if you’re here to defend yourself. Dying in the service of one’s country happens in our line of work. I’m afraid there’s no way I can avoid destroying your reputation. Everyone will believe you betrayed Britain. That may not seem fair, but sacrifices must be made to ensure the human race isn’t condemned to a state of perpetual war. I will tell Emily that you regretted what you’d done, that you confessed everything and were sincerely repentant. She will accept that suicide was the only honorable action in the circumstances. I thought the Duomo a suitable place for you to end it all, in full view of the public. The details of what happens will never be questioned.”

Colin remained immobile, but I could see he was braced for a fight, a fight I could not stand by and watch. I pulled the revolver out of my pocket, aimed, and fired. The bullet went wildly astray from my target, hitting Vasari’s fresco instead of Darius, but the noise—and the direction from which it came—startled him. He spun around to face me, just as Colin lunged for him, knocking him off-balance. Darius had a gun of his own, and raised it at me. Colin’s fist crashed into his jaw and sent him careening over the railing. With a sickening splat, he plunged onto the floor in front of the altar, his limbs at awkward angles, blood streaming from his head.

Screams echoed through the cathedral, not for the first time in its history. It was here, after all, that the Pazzi and their allies attacked Lorenzo and Giuliano de’ Medici, killing the latter and leaving the former bloodied but more powerful than ever. Cécile stuck close to the wall, but managed to overcome her vertigo enough to follow Tessa, who ran toward me the moment I’d fired the gun. Gingerly, Cécile peered over the railing, looking down at Darius. “You really must learn how to shoot, Kallista. Your aim is atrocious. A single shot to the head would have finished the matter more neatly.”

“I should have fired,” Tessa said.

“You have a gun?”

“I do, but I doubt I could have made the shot.”

“You ought to have given it to me,” Cécile said. “I could have with no difficulty.”

“It would have made a terrible mess of Vasari’s fresco,” Colin said, coming to stand with us. “The bullet hole is bad enough.”

“A valid point, Monsieur Hargreaves, a valid point.”

Tessa ran down the stairs ahead of us. When we caught up to her, she was standing over Darius’s body, her hands on her hips, shouting invectives. The police, whom a tourist had summoned from the piazza outside, were behind her. She spat on the corpse, told us she was going back to the palazzo to update Cook and Signora Orlandi, and stalked out of the church. Only once she had gone did the police step forward. Colin introduced himself and told them what had happened. They accepted his explanation without question.

“It’s rather embarrassing, really,” he said. “We’ve been friends for years. I had no idea he’d taken a fancy to my wife and certainly never thought he was the sort of bloke who would react violently when she rejected him. I didn’t think he’d go over the railing, but I had to get the gun away from him before he could shoot again.” He handed the Russian gun over to the police. He had Darius’s, too, tucked away in his jacket. I had no idea how he’d managed to come into possession of it. “I’d be most appreciative if we could keep this incident as quiet as possible. Gossip is so hard on the ladies.”

The police didn’t question what he said and reassured me that I need not make any sort of statement. I did not object, as my husband’s words had left me too stunned to speak. They said it was obvious what had happened and agreed that the less said about it, the better. Colin promised to pay for the repair of the damaged fresco and the cleaning of the blood-spattered floor. They thanked him and told us we were free to go.

Cécile arched her eyebrows as Colin offered each of us an arm. “Truly, Monsieur Hargreaves, you are a remarkable man. Is there no one who won’t bend to your will?”

 Florence,

149742

By the turn of the new year, I had alienated all of my friends. Even Bia now believed me to be an ardent follower of Savonarola. Only one person doubted my sincerity: Father Cambio. He came to my house frequently, but my servants, always loyal, turned him away again and again.

Friar Baldo and his friends continued to remove and preserve art, books, and other objects from Florentine palazzi, but I did not see them anymore. I kept a safe distance so that none of us would be exposed. Only once did I engage in risky behavior, going late at night to the Cappelle Medicee and climbing down the narrow stairs to the little room where we kept our trove. I’d brought with me my grandfather’s handwritten copy of Lucretius, the most precious thing I owned. I left it with everything else we’d saved and added it to the meticulous inventory Friar Baldo kept. I looked through the long list and saw that several things from Cristofano’s household were included, one a sketch by Botticelli, depicting the Three Graces. I wondered if it were the study the artist had used for the fresco in the Tornabuoni family villa, where Cristofano and I had met, so long ago. If so, how had he come to possess it, and why had he wanted an image of me?

Regret and sorrow pierced me. I could not sleep when I returned home. I paced for hours and then wrote a letter to Cristofano, apologizing for the way I’d treated him and telling him that I was now, at last, ready to tell him my secret. In the morning, I