The Dark Heart of Florence Tasha Alexander (novels for beginners .TXT) 📖

“Do you think we should have Monsieur Hargreaves and Monsieur Benton-Smith accompany us?” Cécile asked.

“We’ll do better on our own,” I said. “Showing up unannounced with gentlemen in tow looks more suspicious than a pair of ladies calling to offer thanks. Our strategy worked perfectly on the consul and we should employ it now as well.”

“A violent criminal is unlikely to know Masha or even recognize her name.”

“We know for a fact she was friends with at least one murderer.” Almost four years ago, while Cécile and I were visiting St. Petersburg, a charming Russian prince, Vasilii Ruslanovich Guryanov, hired me to investigate the death of his mistress, the greatest ballerina of her generation, Irina Semenova Nemetseva. The identity of the murderer shocked us all.

“That man would have fooled anyone,” Cécile said.

“My point is that a well-heeled Russian traveler, murderer or not, may well move in the same social circles as Masha.”

Cécile shrugged but did not look convinced.

We started with the house in Oltrarno, and by three o’clock had made the acquaintance of every gentleman on the consul’s list. Half of them we dismissed the moment we set eyes on them, as their white hair and advanced age did not meet the description Signore Bastieri and Tessa had given of the man with the carriage. The others each seemed promising in their own way, but none admitted to having assisted Lena, nor could offer any suggestions as to any fellow countrymen who might have. They all were acquainted with Masha.

“We’ve been naïve,” I said. “A Russian assassin wouldn’t register with the consulate.”

“Nor would the consul divulge the identity of someone skulking about undercover,” Cécile said.

“The consul probably wouldn’t even be aware of the presence of such a person.” I frowned. “No wonder Colin was so willing to let us pursue this angle.”

“What now?” Cécile asked.

“We play tourist, just for an hour or two. I need to let my thoughts percolate and do that best when my brain thinks I’m otherwise occupied.”

We went to the Palazzo Vecchio, where we wandered through the enormous Salone dei Cinquecento—the Hall of the Five Hundred—built on the order of Savonarola in the late fifteenth century. The friar, having helped create the environment that led to the ousting of the Medici, had longed to return Florence to Republican glory. With the Medici gone, he finally had his chance. He established a Great Council of five hundred men and needed a space in the palazzo that could hold them all. After Savonarola’s downfall, the room was enlarged again, with Michelangelo and Leonardo da Vinci hired to decorate the walls, but neither artist completed their work.

My brain would not quiet. I couldn’t master my thoughts, which remained disjointed and confused. I half snapped into focus when Cécile and I entered the La Sala delle Carte Geografiche, a wood-paneled room whose walls hid cupboard doors, behind which jewelry, scientific instruments, and a variety of other precious items had been stored over the centuries. Fifty-four maps decorated them, each depicting the known world at the time of Cosimo I’s rule. Beneath the wooden-coffered ceiling stood a huge globe in the dead center of the room. Hovering next to it was a young man working as a docent, who introduced himself as Frosino.

“Ladies, please, may I show you something very special?” he asked, bowing as he spoke. “There is a chamber accessed from a hidden door, just over here, behind one of the maps. Would you like to see?”

“Most definitely,” I said. We followed him through the door into a small room.

“Bianca Cappello, a courtesan, was the mistress of Francesco de’ Medici. Someone conveniently murdered her husband. Two years later, Francesco’s father, Cosimo I, died, and Francesco became grand duke. This gave him the power to do what he’d long wanted: move his mistress into the palazzo. Four years later, his wife died, and he secretly married Bianca, but the Florentines never accepted her as their duchess. They used to sing The Tuscan Grand Duke has married a whore / Who was a Venetian noble before. This little room was her private space. She could look through that window to watch, unobserved, everything happening in the Sala dei Cinquecento.”

“Was their marriage happy?” Cécile said.

“I believe they did care deeply for each other,” the docent said, “although it did not end well. They died one day apart, after both falling hideously and simultaneously ill. Many suspect they were poisoned by enemies.”

“How ghastly,” I said. “Was it common for secret passages to be built in palazzi?” I asked.

“Common enough,” Frosino said. “There was much fighting in Florence before the days of the Medici. Violent factions loyal to powerful rival families frequently caused chaos. Those families wanted to be able to come and go from their houses without being seen. Some even had tunnels dug so that they did not have to walk in the street.”

“Do those tunnels still exist?”

“I very much doubt it, signora,” he said. “Such things were not necessary once the violence stopped. They were probably filled in long ago.”

“What caused the violence to stop?” Cécile asked.

“The merchants eventually convinced the city that it was bad for business. The oldest palazzi originally had tall towers for defense, but they were ordered to be taken down so that the government, not individual families controlled Florence.”

“But the Medici controlled the city after that,” I said. “They were an individual family.”

Frosino made a dismissive gesture. “We Florentines have never much minded having to reconcile contradictory facts. There were remnants of the old republican democracy, even under the Medici.”

I was still mulling over the existence of those long-forgot tunnels after we’d thanked Frosino for his tour and walked back to Kat’s palazzo. Upon reaching front door, I did not immediately go inside but instead stepped into the narrow alley that ran along the side of the house.

“If you’re hoping to find a secret door, don’t bother,” Cécile said. “In addition to inspecting every inch of the inside of the house, I’ve done