O, Juliet by Robin Maxwell Read Free Book Online

left and I, with a girlish giggle, moved left, guileless and confused.
    By now Romeo had certainly made the street. I curtsied prettily and let the frustrated ruffians pass, satisfied with my impromptu performance.
    I sidestepped to a window overlooking the street to claim one more vision of this daring soul, but was greeted by nothing more than sight of his pursuers bursting from the front door and running out into the empty, torchlit street, with futile looks this way and that.
    Then all at once a white horse exploded from an alleyway into their midst, scattering the men like a handful of dice thrown on the ground. They loudly cursed the rider.
    It was Romeo!
    I thrilled as the mount reared up proudly on two legs and crashed down again. Then amid a terrible clattering of hooves on cobble, horse and master sped off into the dark.
    I wondered how I could calmly return to Jacopo Strozzi—his grazing ewes and monetary distractions. All my thoughts were of this Monticecco man, so recently a stranger, now a star at the center of my universe. And I wondered at the time and place for the future assignation he had announced—the cathedral at noon on Wednesday . Why the Duomo? And why in broad daylight?
    And then I knew. I sighed happily. Romeo. My poet. My friend . Vita Nuova.
    A New Life!

Chapter Four
    H ow many times that Wednesday morn I rushed between my bedroom’s window on the street to its garden balcony, I do not know. The window was to see the arrival of Lucrezia in her litter come to fetch me, and the balcony to cool my brow, receive a chestful of calming air.
    She could not be late. Not today!
    I had many times pleaded with my father for leave to go to the cathedral, and just as many been refused. It was not to Mass I wished to go—for that purpose they surely would have given me leave—but to Friar Bartolomo’s weekly “Symposium” on the subject of Dante Alighieri’s works. It was a popular lecture, one attended by hundreds, sometimes a thousand, it was said, so beloved were his poems with his Florentine brethren.
    It was this gathering to which Romeo Monticecco had invited me as he’d fled the Medici ballroom. I’d thought of nothing else since then, and worried myself sick with the thought of my father’s certain prohibition.
    Then a miracle on Tuesday.
    The sinking of his ship full of goods forced a sudden trip to the port town of Pisa. I was left blessedly alone with Mama, who, while strict in many ways, was in others very malleable. I proceeded to bandy about the name of my friend Lucrezia, whom I had begged and convinced to come along to the symposium.
    “Lucrezia has asked me to accompany her to the Duomo at Wednesday noon,” I lied. “To the symposium,” I reminded my absentminded mother. “Dante.”
    She had perked up instantly, for she approved very heartily of my friendship with a soon-to-be Medici, and the more time I spent in her company, the better. Then Mama’s face fell.
    “You know how often your father has said no to this.”
    “But we’ll have a chaperone—hers. And we’ll go in the Tornabuoni litter.” I spoke conspiratorially. “The whole town is still talking about the Medici ball. Lucrezia is so admired as a great lady.”
    “Yes, she is.” Mama pursed her lips into a tight bud as she did when she was thinking hard. “Well, I suppose it will be all right. But you must dress properly. Something demure.”
    I had won my permission.
    Now I was peering out my front window in nervous anticipation. I wore a sky blue silk guarnacca , its bodice so high that not an inch of bosom could be seen, and a thick rolled headdress that covered my hair. I bit my lips to pink them, and slapped my cheeks to do the same. The use of cosmetics was frowned upon in my father’s house, and in any event none would be proper for a visit to the Duomo at noon.
    Then I saw them—four liveried bearers carrying the wide, gilded Tornabuoni litter. I raced down the steps, calling good-bye to Mama, and