Juliet

VII.II

Siena , A.D. 1340-1370

THE MARESCOTTIS ARE ONE of the oldest noble families in Siena. It is believed that the name was derived from Marius Scotus, a Scottish general in Charlemagne’s army. Most of the Marescottis settled in Bologna, but the family spread its wings far and wide, and the Siena branch was particularly renowned for courage and leadership in times of crisis.

But, as we know, nothing great is great forever, and the fame of the Marescottis is no exception. Hardly anyone remembers their glorious past in Siena nowadays, but then history was always more concerned with those who live to destroy than with those devoted to protection and preservation.

Romeo was born when the family was still illustrious. His father, Comandante Marescotti, was much admired for his moderation and decorum, and his deposits on that account were so plentiful that not even his son-whose greed and sloth were always outstanding-could squander his savings.

However, even the Comandante’s virtues were taxed to the bone when, early in the year 1340, Romeo encountered the woman Rosalina. She was the wife of a butcher, but everyone knew they were not happy together. In Shakespeare’s version, Rosalina is a young beauty who torments Romeo with her vow of chastity; the truth is quite the opposite. Rosalina was ten years older than he, and she became his mistress. For months, Romeo tried to persuade her to run away with him, but she was too wise to trust him.

Just after Christmas of 1340-not long after Romeo and Giulietta died here at Rocca di Tentennano-Rosalina gave birth to a son, and everyone could see the butcher was not the father. It was a great scandal, and Rosalina was afraid her husband would learn the truth and kill the baby. So, she took the newborn to Comandante Marescotti and asked if he would raise the boy in his own house.

But the Comandante said no. He did not believe her story, and turned her away. Before she left, however, Rosalina said to him, “One day you will be sorry for what you have done to me and to this child. One day, God will punish you for the justice you are denying me!”

The Comandante forgot all about this until, in 1348, the Black Death came through Siena. More than a third of the population died within months, and the mortality was worst inside the city. Bodies were piled in the streets, sons abandoned fathers, wives abandoned husbands; everyone was too afraid to remember what it means to be a human and not an animal.

In one week, Comandante Marescotti lost his mother, his wife, and all his five children; only he alone was left to survive. He washed them and dressed them, and he put them all on a cart and brought them to the cathedral to find a priest who could perform a funeral. But there were no priests. Those priests who were still alive were too busy taking care of the sick in the hospital next to the cathedral, the Santa Maria della Scala. Even there, they had too many dead bodies to be able to bury them all, and what they did was build a hollow wall inside the hospital and put all the bodies inside and seal it off.

When the Comandante arrived at the Siena Cathedral, there were Misericordia Brothers outside in the piazza digging a big hole for a mass grave, and he bribed them to admit his family into this holy ground. He told them that this was his mother, and his wife, and he told them the names and ages of all his children, and explained that they were dressed in their finest church clothes. But the men didn’t care. They took his gold and tipped the cart, and the Comandante saw all his loved ones-his future-tumble into the hole with no prayers, no blessings, and no speranza… no hope.

When he walked back through town, he did not know where he went. He did not see anything around him. To him, it was the end of the world, and he began yelling at God, asking why he had been left alive to witness this misery, and to bury his own children. He even fell to his knees, and scooped up the dirty water from the gutter running with rot and death, and poured it over himself, and drank it, hoping to finally get sick and die like everyone else.

While he was there, kneeling in the mud, he suddenly heard the voice of a boy say to him, “I’ve tried that. It doesn’t work.”

The Comandante looked up at the boy, thinking he was looking at a ghost. “Romeo!” he said. “Romeo? Is it you?”

But it was not Romeo, just a boy of eight or so, very dirty and dressed in rags. “My name is Romanino,” said the boy. “I can pull that cart for you.”

“Why do you want to pull my cart?” asked the Comandante.

“Because I am hungry,” said Romanino.

“Here-” The Comandante took out the rest of his money. “Go buy some food.”

But the boy pushed his hand away and said, “I am not a beggar.”

So, the Comandante let the boy struggle to pull the cart all the way back to Palazzo Marescotti-occasionally, he helped him and gave the cart a little push-and when they arrived at the gate, the boy looked up at the eagle ornaments on the wall and said, “This is where my father was born.”

You can imagine what a shock it was to the Comandante to hear this, and he asked the boy, “How do you know that?”

“Mother used to tell me stories,” replied the boy. “She said my father was very brave. He was a great knight with arms this big. But he had to go and fight with the Emperor in the Holy Land, and he never returned. She used to say that maybe, one day, he would come back and look for me. And if he did, I had to tell him something, and then he would know who I was.”

“What did you have to tell him?”

The boy grinned, and just then, in that smile, the Comandante knew the truth before he even heard the words: “That I am a little eagle, an aquilino.”

That same night, Comandante Marescotti found himself sitting at the empty servants’ table in the kitchen, eating food for the first time in days. Across from him, Romanino was gnawing at a chicken bone, too busy to ask questions.

“Tell me,” said the Comandante, “when did your mother Rosalina die?”

“Long ago,” replied the boy. “Before all this. He beat her, you know. And one day, she didn’t get up. He yelled at her, and pulled at her hair, but she didn’t move. She didn’t move at all. Then he started crying. And I went up to her and talked to her, but she didn’t open her eyes. She was cold. I put my hand on her face-that was when I knew he had beat her too hard, and I told him so, and he kicked me, and then he tried to catch me, but I ran… out the door. And I just kept running. Even though he yelled after me, I just kept running, and running, until I was at my aunt’s, and she took me in, and I stayed there. I worked, you know. I did my bit. And I took care of the baby when it came, and helped her to put food on the table. And they liked me, I think they really liked having me around to take care of the baby, until… until everyone started dying. The baker died, and the butcher, and the farmer who sold us fruit, and we did not have enough food. But she kept giving me the same as the others, even though they were still hungry, so… I ran away.”

The boy looked at him with wise green eyes, and the Comandante thought to himself how strange it was that this boy, a skinny little eight-year-old, could have more integrity than he had ever seen in a man. “How did you survive,” he had to ask, “through all this?”

“I don’t know”-Romanino shrugged-“but Mother always told me I was different. Stronger. That I wouldn’t get sick and stupid like the others. She said that I had a different kind of head on my shoulders. And that’s why they didn’t like me. Because they knew I was better than them. That was how I survived. By thinking of what she said. About me. And them. She said I would survive. And that’s what I did.”

“Do you know who I am?” asked the Comandante at last.

The boy looked at him. “You’re a great man, I think.”

“I don’t know about that.”

“But you are,” insisted Romanino. “You’re a great man. You have a big kitchen. And a chicken. And you let me pull your cart all the way. And now you’re sharing your chicken with me.”

“That doesn’t make me a great man.”

“You were drinking sewer water when I found you,” observed the boy. “Now you are drinking wine. To me, that makes you the greatest man I’ve ever met.”

THE NEXT MORNING, Comandante Marescotti took Romanino back to the boy’s aunt and uncle. As they walked together down the steep streets towards Fontebranda, weaving their way through garbage and gore, the sun came out for the first time in days. Or perhaps it had been shining every day, but the Comandante had spent all his time in the darkness of his home, pouring water to lips that were beyond drinking.

“What is your uncle’s name?” asked the Comandante, realizing that he had forgotten to ask that most obvious question.

“Benincasa,” replied the boy. “He makes colors. I like the blue, but it is expensive.” He glanced up at the Comandante. “My father always wore nice colors, you know. Yellow mostly, with a black cape that looked like wings when he was riding fast. When you are rich you can do that.”

“I suppose,” said the Comandante.

Romanino stopped at a gate of tall iron bars and looked glumly into the courtyard. “This is it. That is Monna Lappa, my aunt. Or… she is not really my aunt, but she wanted me to call her that anyway.”

Comandante Marescotti was surprised at the size of the place; he had imagined something far more humble. Inside the courtyard, three children were helping their mother spread out laundry, while a tiny girl crawled around on her hands and knees, picking up grains laid out for the geese.

“Romanino!” The woman jumped to her feet when she saw the boy through the gate, and as soon as the bar had been lifted off the hook and the door opened, she pulled him inside and embraced him with tears and kisses. “We thought you were dead, you silly boy!”

In the commotion, nobody took any notice of the baby girl, and the Comandante-who had been just about to back away from the happy family reunion-was the only person with the presence of mind to see her crawling towards the open gate and to bend over and pick her up with awkward hands.

It was an uncommonly pretty little girl, thought Comandante Marescotti, and much more charming than one would expect from someone that size. In fact, despite his lack of experience with such tiny personnel, he found himself almost unwilling to hand the baby back to Monna Lappa, and he simply stood there, looking at the little face, feeling something stirring inside his chest, like a small spring flower forcing its way up through the frozen soil.

The fascination was equal on both sides; soon, the baby began slapping and pulling at the Comandante’s features with all signs of delight.

“Caterina!” cried her mother, quickly liberating the distinguished visitor by snatching away the girl. “I beg your pardon, Messere!”

“No need, no need,” said the Comandante. “God has kept his hand over you and yours, Monna Lappa. Your house is blessed, I think.”

The woman looked at him for a long time. Then she bent her head. “Thank you, Messere.”

The Comandante turned to go, but hesitated. Turning again, he looked at Romanino. The boy was standing straight, like a young tree braced against the wind, and yet his eyes had lost their courage.

“Monna Lappa,” said Comandante Marescotti, “I want-I would like-I wonder if you might consider giving up this boy. To me.”

The woman’s expression was mostly one of disbelief.

“You see,” the Comandante quickly added, “I believe he is my grandson.”

The words came as a surprise to everyone, including the Comandante. While Monna Lappa looked almost frightened at the confession, Romanino was positively cock-a-hoop, and the boy’s glee nearly made the Comandante burst out laughing despite himself.

“You are Comandante Marescotti?” exclaimed the woman, her cheeks flushed with excitement. “Then it was true! Oh, the poor girl! I never-” Too shocked to know how to behave, Monna Lappa grabbed Romanino by the shoulder and pushed him towards the Comandante. “Go! Go, you silly boy! And… don’t forget to thank the Lord!”

She did not have to say it twice, and before the Comandante even had a visual confirmation of the advance, Romanino’s arms were already wrapped around his midsection, a snotty nose burrowing into the embroidered velvet.

“Come now,” he said, patting the dirty head, “we need to find you a pair of shoes. And other things. So, stop crying.”

“I know,” sniffled the boy, wiping away his tears, “knights don’t cry.”

“They certainly do,” said the Comandante, taking the boy’s hand, “but only when they are clean and dressed, and wearing shoes. Do you think you can wait that long?”

“I’ll do my best.”

When they walked away down the street together, hand in hand, Comandante Marescotti found himself struggling against an onslaught of shame. How was it possible that he, a man sick with grief, who had lost everything save his own heartbeat, could find so much comfort in the presence of a small, sticky fist tucked firmly inside his own?

IT WAS MANY YEARS later when, one day, a traveling monk came to Palazzo Marescotti and asked to speak with the head of the family. The monk explained that he had come from a monastery in Viterbo, and that he had been instructed by his abbot to return a great treasure to its proper owner.

Romanino, who was now a grown man of thirty years, invited the monk inside and sent his daughters upstairs to see if their great-grandfather, the old Comandante, had the strength to meet with the guest. While they waited for the Comandante to come down, Romanino made sure the monk had food and drink, and his curiosity was so great that he asked the stranger about the nature of the treasure.

“I know little about its origins,” replied the monk between mouthfuls, “but I do know that I cannot take it back with me.”

“Why not?” inquired Romanino.

“Because it has a great, destructive power,” said the monk, helping himself to more bread. “Everyone who opens the box falls ill.”

Romanino sat back on his chair. “I thought you said it was a treasure? Now you tell me it is evil!”

“Pardon me, Messere,” the monk corrected him, “but I never said it was evil. I just said that it has great powers. For protection, but also for destruction. And therefore, it must be returned to the hands that can control those powers. It must be returned to its proper owner. That is all I know.”

“And that owner is Comandante Marescotti?”

The monk nodded again, but this time with less conviction. “We believe so.”

“Because if it is not,” Romanino pointed out, “you have brought a demon into my house, you realize.”

The monk looked sheepish. “Messere,” he said, urgingly, “please believe that I had no intention of harming you or your family. I am only doing what I have been instructed to do. This box”-he reached into his satchel and took out a small and very simple wooden box which he put gently down on the table-“was given to us by the priests of San Lorenzo, our cathedral, and I believe that maybe-but I am not sure-it contains a relic of a saint that was recently sent to Viterbo by its noble patron in Siena.”

“I have heard of no such saint!” exclaimed Romanino, eyeing the box with apprehension. “Who was the noble patron?”

The monk folded his hands in respect. “The pious and modest Monna Mina of the Salimbeni, Messere.”

“Huh.” Romanino fell silent for a while. He had heard of the lady, certainly-who had not heard of the young bride’s madness and the alleged curse on the basement wall?-but what kind of saint would befriend the Salimbenis? “Then may I ask why you are not returning this so-called treasure to her?”

“Oh!” The monk was horrified at the idea. “No! The treasure doesn’t like the Salimbenis! One of my poor brethren, a Salimbeni by birth, died in his sleep after touching the box-”

“God damn you, monk!” barked Romanino, and stood up. “Take your cursed box and leave my house at once!”

“But then, he was a hundred and two years old!” the monk hastened to add. “And other people who touched it have had miraculous recoveries from long-term ailments!”

Just then, Comandante Marescotti entered the dining hall with great dignity, his proud bearing suported by a cane. Instead of shooing the monk out the door with a broom-as he was just about to do-Romanino calmed himself and made sure his grandfather was seated comfortably at the table end, before he explained the circumstances of the unexpected visit.

“Viterbo?” The Comandante frowned. “How would they know my name?”

The monk stood awkwardly, not knowing whether he should stay up or sit down, and whether he or Romanino was expected to answer the question. “Here…” he said instead, placing the box in front of the old man, “this, I was told, must be returned to its proper owner.”

“Grandfather, be careful!” exclaimed Romanino as the Comandante reached out to open the box. “We do not know what demons it contains!”

“No, my son,” replied the Comandante, “but we intend to find out.”

There was a moment’s dreadful silence while the Comandante slowly lifted the lid and peeked into the box. Seeing that his grandfather did not immediately fall to the floor in convulsions, Romanino stepped closer and looked, too.

In the box lay a ring.

“I wouldn’t…” began the monk, but Comandante Marescotti had already taken out the ring and was staring at it in disbelief.

“Who,” he said, his hand shaking, “did you say gave you this?”

“My abbot,” replied the monk, backing up in fear. “He told me that the men who found it had spoken the name Marescotti before they died of a ghastly fever, three days after receiving the saint’s coffin.”

Romanino looked at his grandfather, anxious that he should put down the ring. But the Comandante was in another world, touching the ring’s eagle signet without any fear and mumbling to himself an old family motto, “Faithful through the centuries,” engraved on the inside of the band in tiny letters. “Come, my son,” he finally said, reaching out for Romanino. “This was your father’s ring. Now it is yours.”

Romanino didn’t know what to do. On the one hand, he wanted to obey his grandfather; on the other, he was afraid of the ring, and he was not so sure that he was its rightful owner, even if it had belonged to his father. When Comandante Marescotti saw him hesitating, the old man was filled with anger, explosive anger, and he began to yell that Romanino was a coward, and to demand that he take the ring. But just as Romanino stepped forward, the Comandante fell back in his chair in a seizure, dropping the ring on the floor.

When he saw that the old man had fallen prey to the ring’s evil, the monk screamed in horror and fled from the room, leaving Romanino to throw himself at his grandfather and beseech his soul to remain in the body for the last sacrament. “Monk!” he bellowed, cradling the Comandante’s head, “come back here and do your job, you rat, or I swear I’ll bring the devil to Viterbo and we’ll eat you all alive!”

Hearing the threat, the monk came back into the kitchen, and he found in his satchel the small vial of consecrated oil that his abbot had given him for the journey. So, the Comandante received the extreme unction, and he lay very peacefully for a moment, looking at Romanino. His last words before he died were, “Shine on high, my son.”

Understandably, Romanino did not know what to think about that damned ring. It was obviously evil and had killed his grandfather, but at the same time, it had belonged to his father, Romeo. In the end Romanino decided to keep it, but to put the box in a place where no one but he could find it. And so he went down into the basement and into the Bottini, to put the box away in a dark corner where nobody ever came. He never told his children about it for fear that their curiosity would make them unleash its demons once again, but he wrote down the whole story, sealed the paper, and kept it with the rest of the family records.

It is doubtful whether Romanino ever discovered the truth about the ring in his lifetime and, for many generations, the box remained hidden in the Bottini underneath the house, untouched and unclaimed. But even so, there was a feeling among the Marescottis that an old evil was somehow imbedded in the house, and the family eventually decided to sell the building in 1506. Needless to say, the box with the ring stayed where it was.

NOW, MANY HUNDRED years later, another grandfather, old man Marescotti, was walking through his vineyard one summer day when he suddenly looked down and saw a little girl standing at his feet. He asked her, in Italian, who she was, and she replied, also in Italian, that her name was Giulietta, and that she was almost three years old. He was very surprised, because usually little children were afraid of him, but this one kept talking to him as if they were old friends, and when they started walking, she put her hand in his.

Back at the house, he found that a beautiful young woman was having coffee with his wife. And there was another little girl there, too, stuffing herself with biscotti. His wife explained to him that the young woman was Diane Tolomei, the widow of old Professor Tolomei, and that she had come to ask some questions about the Marescotti family.

Grandfather Marescotti treated Diane Tolomei very well and answered all her questions. She asked him if it was true that his line was descended directly from Romeo Marescotti, through the boy Romanino, and he said yes. She also asked him if he was aware that Romeo Marescotti was the Romeo from Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet, and he said yes, he was aware of that, too. Then she asked if he knew that her line came straight from Juliet, and he said yes, he suspected as much, seeing that she was a Tolomei, and that she had called one of her daughters Giulietta. But when she asked him if he could guess the reason for her visit, he said no, not at all.

Now Diane Tolomei asked him if his family still had in their possession Romeo’s ring. Grandfather Marescotti said that he had no idea what she meant by that. She also asked him if he had ever seen a small wooden box that supposedly contained an evil treasure, or if he had ever heard his parents or grandparents mention such a box. He said no, he had never heard anything about it from anyone. She seemed a little disappointed, and when he asked her what this was all about, she said that maybe it was better this way, maybe she should not bring these old things back to life.

You can imagine what Grandfather Marescotti said to that. He told Diane that she had already asked too many questions, and he had answered every one of them, so now it was time she answered some of his. What kind of ring was she talking about, and why did she think he would know anything about it?

What Diane Tolomei told him first was the story of Romanino and the monk from Viterbo. She explained that her husband had been researching these issues all his life, and that he was the one who had found the Marescotti family records in the city archive and discovered Romanino’s notes about the box. It was a good thing, she said, that Romanino had been too wise to wear the ring, for he was not its rightful owner, and it was possible that it would have done him much harm.

Before she could continue with her explanations, the old man’s grandson, Alessandro-or, as they called him, Romeo-came to the table to steal a biscotto. When Diane realized that he was Romeo, she got very excited, and said, “It is a great honor to meet you, young man. Now, here is someone very special that I want you to meet.” And she pulled one of the little girls into her lap, and said, as if she was presenting a wonder of the world, “This is Giulietta.”

Romeo stuck the biscotto in his pocket. “I don’t think so,” he said. “She’s wearing a diaper.”

“No!” protested Diane Tolomei, pulling down the girl’s dress. “Those are fancy pants. She is a big girl. Aren’t you, Jules?”

Now, Romeo started backing up, hoping he could sneak away, but his grandfather stopped him and told him to take the two little girls and play with them while the adults had coffee. So, he did.

Meanwhile, Diane Tolomei told Grandfather Marescotti and his wife about Romeo’s ring; she explained that it had been his signet ring, and that he had given it to Giulietta Tolomei in a secret marriage ritual performed by their friend, Friar Lorenzo. Therefore, she claimed, the ring’s rightful heir was Giulietta, her daughter, and she went on to explain that it must be recovered for the curse on the Tolomeis to finally end.

Grandfather Marescotti was fascinated by Diane Tolomei’s story, mostly because she was obviously not an Italian, and yet she was so very passionate about the events of the past. It amazed him that this modern woman from America seemed to believe there was a curse on her family-an ancient curse from the Middle Ages, no less-and that she even thought her husband had died as a result of this. It made sense, he supposed, that she should be eager to somehow try and stop it, so that her little girls could grow up without it hanging over their heads. For some reason, she seemed to think that her daughters were particularly exposed to the curse, maybe because both their parents had been Tolomeis.

Obviously, Grandfather Marescotti was sorry that he could not help this poor young widow, but Diane interrupted him as soon as he started to apologize. “From what you have told me, Signore,” she said, “I believe the box with the ring is still there, hidden in the Bottini underneath Palazzo Marescotti, untouched since Romanino put it there more than six hundred years ago.”

Grandfather Marescotti could not help laughing and slapping his knees. “That is too fantastic!” he said. “I cannot imagine it would still be there. And if it is, the reason must be that it is hidden so well that no one can find it. Including me.”

To persuade him to go looking for the ring, Diane told him that if he were able to find it and give it to her, she would give him something in return that the Marescotti family must be equally keen to recover, and which had been in Tolomei possession for far too long. She asked him if he had any idea what sort of treasure she was talking about, but he did not.

Now, Diane Tolomei took a photo out of her purse and put it on the table in front of him. And Grandfather Marescotti crossed himself when he saw that not only was it an old cencio spread out on a table, but it was a cencio he had heard described many times by his own grandfather; a cencio which he had never imagined he would ever see, or touch, because it could no longer possibly exist.

“How long,” he said, his voice shaking, “has your family kept this hidden from us?”

“For as long,” replied Diane Tolomei, “as your family has kept the ring hidden from us, Signore. And now, I think, you will agree that it is time we return these treasures to their proper owners, and put an end to the evil that has left us both in this sad state.”

Naturally, Grandfather Marescotti was insulted by the suggestion that he was in a sad state, and he said as much, loudly listing all the blessings surrounding him on all sides.

“Are you telling me,” said Diane Tolomei, leaning over the table and touching his hands, “that there are not days when you feel a mighty power watching you with impatient eyes, an ancient ally who is waiting for you to do the one thing you have to do?”

Her words made a great impression on her two hosts, and they all sat in silence for a moment, until suddenly they heard a terrible noise from the barn, and they saw Romeo come running, trying to carry one of his screaming and kicking guests. It was the girl Giulietta, who had cut herself on a hayfork, and Romeo’s grandmother had to stitch her up on the kitchen table.

Romeo’s grandparents were not actually angry with him for what had happened. It was much worse. They were simply terrified to see that their grandson was causing pain and destruction wherever he went. And now, after listening to Diane Tolomei’s stories, they began to worry that he truly did have evil hands… that some old demon lived on inside his body, and that, just like his ancestor Romeo, he would live a life-a short life-of violence and sorrow.

Grandfather Marescotti felt so bad about what had happened to the little girl that he promised Diane he would do everything in his power to find the ring. And she thanked him and said that, regardless of his success, she would return soon with the cencio, so that at least Romeo could get what belonged to him. For some reason, it was very important to her that Romeo still be there when she came back, because she wanted to try something with him. She did not say what it was, and no one dared to ask.

They agreed that Diane Tolomei would return in two weeks, which would give Grandfather Marescotti time to investigate the matter of the ring, and they all parted as friends. Before she drove away, however, Diane said one last thing to him. She told him that if he was successful in his search for the ring, he must be very careful and open the box as little as possible. And under no circumstances must he touch the ring itself. It had, she reminded him, a history of hurting people.

Grandfather Marescotti drove into town the very next day, determined to find the ring. For days and days he went all over the Bottini underneath Palazzo Marescotti to find Romanino’s secret hiding place. When he finally found it-he had to borrow a metal detector-he could see why no one else had stumbled across it before; the box had been pushed deep inside a narrow crack in the wall, and was covered with crumbled sandstone.

As he pulled it out, he remembered what Diane Tolomei had said about not opening the lid more than necessary, but after six centuries in dust and gravel, the wood had become so dry and fragile that even his careful touch was too much for the box. And so the wood fell apart like a lump of sawdust, and within a moment, he found himself standing with the ring right in his hand.

He decided not to give in to irrational fears, and instead of putting the ring in another box, he put it in his trouser pocket and drove back to his villa outside of town. After that drive, with the ring in his pocket, no other male was ever born in his family to carry the name Romeo Marescotti-much to his frustration, everyone kept having girls, girls, girls. There would only ever be Romeo, his grandson, and he very much doubted this restless boy would ever marry and have sons of his own.

Of course, Grandfather Marescotti did not realize all this at the time; he was just happy that he had found the ring for Diane Tolomei, and he was anxious to finally get his hands on the old cencio from 1340 and show it around the contrada. He was already planning to donate it to the Eagle Museum, and imagined that it would bring much good luck in the next Palio.

But it was not going to be that way. On the day when Diane Tolomei was supposed to come back and visit them, he had gathered the whole family for a big party, and his wife had been cooking for several days. He had put the ring in a new box, and she had tied a red ribbon around it. They had even taken Romeo into town-despite the fact that it was just before the Palio-to get him a real haircut, not just the gnocchi pot and the scissors. Now, all they had to do was wait.

And so they waited. And waited. But Diane Tolomei did not come. Normally, Grandfather Marescotti would have been furious, but this time, he was afraid. He could not explain it. He felt as if he had a fever, and he could not eat. That same evening he heard the terrible news. His cousin called to tell him that there had been a car accident, and that Professor Tolomei’s widow and two little daughters had died. Imagine how he felt. He and his wife were crying for Diane Tolomei and the little girls, and the very next day, he sat down and wrote a letter to his daughter in Rome, asking her to forgive him, and to come home. But she never wrote back, and she never came.