"I was dreaming a love poem when you woke me," I admitted.

"Dreaming a poem?" a poem?"

"Have you never done that?"

"No. Verse comes hard to my mind." The moonlight was cool, but his gaze was searing. "Tell me your poem."

"I cannot. It was an endless stream of words." Then I remembered. "But the G.o.d of Love was holding me in his arms. I wore a trailing red gown."

"Like the sketch-chapter three!" he cried, then recited, " 'In his arms there lay a figure asleep and naked except for a crimson cloth loosely wrapping it.' " " 'In his arms there lay a figure asleep and naked except for a crimson cloth loosely wrapping it.' "

"Oh dear, I seem to plagiarize, even in my sleep."

But Romeo did not smile. "Did the G.o.d of Love also bid you eat my burning heart?"

My breath erupted in a sharp gasp. "You leap very handily from Dante and his beloved to you and me," I said.

"Should I not?"

"You should slow down."

He looked chastised and backed away. Sat on the balcony wall. "What should I say, my lady?" he asked with courtesy.

"Tell me what Don Cosimo said when you talked to him about peace."

"He spoke of history," Romeo said, remembering. "Bad blood between the Guelf and Ghibelline factions all those years ago. What a senseless conflict that was-country folk who followed the emperor, city folk who gave allegiance to the pope. Meaningless hatred. Centuries of feuding."

I nodded for Romeo to go on.

"That war was done a hundred years ago, but when Cosimo came to power, the hatred flared again. Two camps formed, jealous ghosts of the Ghibellines and Guelfs: those who rallied round the city-bound Medici-your father is one of these-and others, like my family, who lived outside the walls, hating Don Cosimo and all his friends and retainers. But he says more fault is rightly laid at my family's doorstep."

"Is that true?"

He looked downcast. "I fear it is."

"What did he tell you to do?"

"If I manage to cool tempers enough-my father, my uncles, the other anti-Medicians-Don Cosimo will bring them to his table, broker a peace."

"Did he say how this could be done? Was any sage advice given?"

"It might have been forthcoming, but I was chased from the room before I could hear it." He grinned now. "And thank you, Lady Juliet, for helping my escape."

I smiled flirtatiously. "How could I allow those ruffians to injure a peacemaker?"

His laugh was rueful. "Some peacemaker . . ."

Gently I said, "You spoke to your father?"

"And was threatened with disownment if I uttered another word." He looked down at his feet, mortified. "And yes, he did sink your father's cargo."

"Oh, Romeo!" No words could have wrenched my heart more.

"Never mind," he said. "Let us talk of pleasanter things. You are a poet poet. That amazes me."

"It should not. Women own brains, and fingers to hold a quill. Have you never heard of Christine de Pisan?"

"Of course. We studied her at university."

"Was she not a woman?"

"She was, and a great writer. A contentious writer. A poet. But Christine de Pisan was a widow," said Romeo, "who only began writing to support her children. Even she believed a woman's place was in the home-that public discourse was a male domain."

"She thought her life 'a mutation of Fortune,' " I agreed. "She claims she became 'an honorary man.' "

Romeo moved closer to me. Without invitation he threaded his fingers through my hair. "Is that what you wish for yourself?"

Something melted inside me. "I have no wish to be a man," I said, "honorary or otherwise. I only wish to write."

"Do you wish to love?" he whispered.

He was so bold. Yet I nodded.

"Close your eyes, Juliet."

Without thought or fear I did as he asked. I believed I would soon feel his lips on mine. But instead he lifted my hand and, with infinite delicacy, pushed back the sleeve of my gown. Then I felt warm breath on the tenderest inside of my forearm.

"I believe in the senses," he murmured, sending tiny waves of air across my skin. "Here is touch."

I shivered with delight. "Give me another," I demanded.

"This one is mine," he said, releasing my hand and moving away, but in the next moment he was behind me, his face buried in my hair at the back of my neck. He inhaled deeply. "Aaahh," he sighed. "The natural perfume of Juliet."

I tilted back my head to lean upon his and there we remained, still and breathing. Did he know that I wished his hands to circle my waist, slide across the naked skin of my b.r.e.a.s.t.s?

"Listen," he said softly into the sh.e.l.l of my ear.

I did, my eyes still closed. "It is the nightingale," I said. Its trilling notes in the darkness had never sounded so sweet to me. How was it that all at once I heard magic in that song?

I felt his arms on my shoulders, turning me a half-turn. Then with both hands enclosing my head, he tilted it skyward. "Open your eyes."

I did as I was told. There before me at what seemed as close as arm's length was the full moon, a dark brace of clouds skittering across its bright and shadowed surface.

"Touch. Smell. Sound. Sight," he uttered. "All so easily gratified."

"What of taste?" I said, pressing him.

"Ah, now you become greedy."

I turned to face him. "It is is one of the senses." one of the senses."

"True."

Again, I thought that he would kiss me, to this way prove the fifth sensation. Instead he turned and, searching the fruit-heavy branch, snapped from it a fat ripe fig. When he faced me again, he held in his hands its two halves.

"Were there more light," he said, "we would see the luscious . . . pink . . . flesh." His voice caressed the words.Then holding my eyes with his, he took a half in his palm and brought it to his mouth. I grew suddenly alarmed as he buried his lips in the soft fig's center and closed his eyes, ecstatic.

"My lord!" I cried, breaking the spell.

His eyes sprang open and he gazed without apology into mine. "I think I should go. I've overstayed my welcome."

"No, no."

But he had leapt to the balcony wall and swung his body up into the tree. Hanging loose from the branch by one arm, he leaned down and held out his hand to me. The fig's other half was cupped in his palm. "For you, my lady-the final sense."

I took it, words failing me once again.

"When you taste it," he said, "think of me."

Then he was gone, all rustling leaves and shadows.

I stood stupidly, staring at the half fruit, and, smiling, brought it to my lips.

Chapter Seven.

It was the custom that all women friends of a bride should keep her company during the first meal at the house of the bridegroom. In the case of Chaterina Valenti, this was the house of her bridegroom's father, where the couple had taken up residence.

It was a run-down house, dark and badly furnished, the faint smell of mold and rot pervading all. As we silently ate our meal at the long wooden table, Chaterina's father-in-law, grunting as he chewed, threw bits of meat and whole bones to two mange-ridden dogs lounging in the straw at his feet. Her husband, Antonio, who had clearly learned manners from his loutish father, smiled at the poor girl with bits of food stuck between his teeth.

His mother, Mona Ginetta, to which neither man paid the slightest attention, was a grim harridan who regarded all her guests with equal disdain. Her house was poor and her men coa.r.s.e, and I guessed she wished that they were not so embarra.s.singly on display to the gentlewomen of Florence.

Making the occasion bleaker still was the dour priest who had been invited to share the meal-another custom recently popular-as though a man of religion at a family's table made them pious. This cleric, after he had spoken the blessing, never said another word. He did not bother to hide his boredom, nor had he bothered to wash. He was rank with perspiration and smelled as though he had stepped in excrement in the street.

Chaterina was much relieved when Antonio and his father, trailed by the dogs and the priest, left the table with barely a "Buona sera," but I watched her face crumple with disappointment when her mother-in-law stayed firm in her chair. The sour-faced woman had, for the first time, been given leave to a.s.sert her dominion in the household. Chaterina was, from this moment on, the dominated.

"Has everyone had enough to eat?" our friend asked us, the first words she had spoken the whole meal through, and reached for a slice of bread. In a flash her hand was slapped away by Mona Ginetta, who fixed the girl with a withering glare, silencing all of us before we could answer.

"You've had two pieces already," she accused. "And a double portion of macaroni. My son will not look kindly on a wife going to fat." Then she looked around the table, wondering, I supposed, if she dared insult any of the rest of us.

"Sorry, Mona Ginetta, sorry," the daughter-in-law said. "I'll be more attentive to what I eat."

"It's funny," I said lightly but pointedly, "Chaterina is always the one we worry is too thin."

"That is true," Lucrezia piped in with an encouraging smile at our beleaguered friend. "She's got the tiniest waist. We're all jealous of her."

As everyone else chimed in with their agreement, Mona Ginetta began to seethe.

"I have a gift for you," Elena Rinaldi said, drawing the conversation onto pleasanter ground and pushing a small wrapped box toward her hostess. When the rest of us began speaking excitedly, Mona Ginetta pushed back her chair with a decisive sc.r.a.pe and stood. To Chaterina she said, "I will leave you to your guests." In a moment she was thankfully gone, but her leave had not purged the room of darkness. We were horribly aware that this shrew stood at the center of Chaterina's future.

And all I could think of was Allessandra Strozzi.

"Dare we ask about the wedding night?" Maria piped in, keeping her voice low. Antonio might come from a boorish family, but he was half the age of Maria's betrothed.

I did not think Chaterina's face could fall any further, but I was wrong. She pushed her lips tight together to keep from crying, but tears still sprang to her eyes. "Awful," she managed.

Lucrezia reached out and placed a hand on Chaterina's.

"I was afraid," she went on, "and I told him so . . . expecting that he would . . . be gentle." She hid her face in her cupped hands. "He was not. He pounded hard. Went on and on. It seemed like forever."

It pained me to hear her continue, for I knew I had no bright banter to buoy her, no advice to share.

"It hurt. Terribly," she said, her voice cracking. "Then he . . ." She hesitated. ". . . pulled away. Out. He was angry. Disgusted. Told me I was 'dry.' Told me I had hurt him him."

Chaterina went silent then, and we were all still, battered by her account.

"I have just the thing," Constanza Marello suddenly said.

What in heaven's name could the Spinster of Florence have to offer the miserable newlywed?

"I have four sisters," she went on. "All married. They talk among themselves. Endlessly. About what goes on . . . under the sheets." She leered so lasciviously we broke into laughter, and the unhappy spell was shattered. Constanza beckoned to us and we leaned in to the center of the table. "There is an oil they use . . . for lubrication. My eldest sister's husband is endowed like a stallion, she tells us. This oil 'eases the pa.s.sage.' "

A hopeful smile played on Chaterina's lips. "Could you get me some?" she said, then added with a conspiratorial grin, "Though I shall never have to worry about a horse-sized cazzo cazzo. More like a billy goat."

Everyone roared at that, and the evening went on in much better cheer.

Later, Lucrezia and I stood outside waiting for our litters to be brought around. It was a mild evening that reminded me of another such night.

"Why are you smiling like that?" she asked me.

I hesitated before answering. "He came to my balcony."

"Oh no . . . Juliet!"

"It was lovely, Lucrezia. He was a perfect gentleman."

"Alone on your garden balcony in the middle of the night?"

I said nothing.

"And you would therefore have been in your shift?"

"With a robe."