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“Nothing. I snuck out straightaway to warn Ginevra before she left.”

“She has not been here since this morning, Piero. I’m afraid she must have gone already.”

“But when she comes back, they will take her and put her in the stinche!”

“Oh, what do we do?? You must go back and find out more. Find out why the bishop believes that she stole the bread relic, when it was he who asked her to come and apprehend the thief.”

“He will never tell me; I only am his servant. I only learned of this by accident. What if you asked him? Your house looks important.”

“No. He mustn’t know I’m still alive. Or that anyone is trying to help Ginevra. Tell me, Piero, do you sleep in his chamber?”

“Of course,” said Piero proudly. “I have my very own truckle bed that rolls out.”

“And is he a sound sleeper?”

“No...he tosses and turns until it is very late and then sleeps for just an hour or two.”

“That will do.” Lucia unpinned a golden brooch from her shoulder and handed it to Piero.

“What is this? It looks very expensive. Is this a spell written on it?”

“Sort of—it says not my wife, but my life—Ginevra says this jewel is magic. I need you to take this, and stay awake all night on your truckle bed, and when the bishop sleeps, put this above his heart. Then you ask him to tell his secrets, and why he lies that Ginevra has stolen relics.”

Piero went back to his master’s home, but the bishop was not there. Nor were the mercenaries who usually hung about, tormenting him. He was too late. They already were camped together at the Porta San Niccolo, waiting with their pointy knives for Ginevra’s return.

THIRTY-NINE

THE INQUISITOR &

THE STONE WITCH

Evening, July 11th of 1348,

the Road to San Romolo

And then it was just Ginevra and the inquisitor, plus the donkey from the courtyard, who would carry back their holy cargo. Ginevra did not have time to tell Lucia where she was going. She did not want the inquisitor to know about their relationship if things went badly, anyhow. They would be back tomorrow, God willing.

After they passed through the open Porta San Niccolo, empty homes thinned to the refuse-strewn wastelands, and then to fields of whatever unruly wheat had sown itself, threaded through with vines of cucumber and blue morning glories. They heard the loud hum of frogs and crickets in irrigation ditches, the chattering of summer birdsong. The earth did not mind that those who tended it were dead. It carried on merrily. The two individuals walked in silence, uncomfortable in their travelers’ intimacy.

The inquisitor went slowly, still bundled in his perfumed, protective linens and huffing through his pomander. “Well, Monna Ginevra. You must be pleased.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, here is what you wanted. The two of us, off to capture the thief ourselves with no support from the city.” He was still smarting at the bishop’s insults.

Ginevra snorted. “This is not what I wanted. To be walking toward a jettatore, with an inquisitor, the office that ruined my life, and now asks the most absurd task of me in order to get it back.” She didn’t like that he had called her worries womanish. That he was with her only because nobody else would help him.

“It was not I who passed your sentence. It was my predecessor—”

“It may as well have been you.”

“Monna, it is made so clear how to avoid heresy. You cannot be angry about your punishment; you must have known you were transgressing.”

“Against the rules of men, perhaps. But sinning before God, no. People were dying and I helped them. The methods I used—the secret gemstones? Doesn’t the power of all things on the earth come from God?”

“Perhaps. But these powers must be translated through the church, or there would be chaos. You know that.”

“I thought only to show Christian charity. I thought learned men could understand what I was doing. But their minds were small.”