“Ah yes, that’s the rumor I want all over town: that I’m gallivanting off to some dim, private room with a handsome rake on my tail.” We reached the end of the corridor—thank Josephine— and she started fumbling with the keys in the lock of that door.

“All I’m saying is that wasting all this time stumbling around in the dark might mean the difference between life and death for the people we love.” I smoothed down my eyebrows and tucked hair behind ears, but nothing was helping. Nothing at all.

“If my husband heard a rumor about us stumbling around in the dark together, the only death we’d be talking about is yours.”

“You don’t care about my life.”

“You are clever. D’accordo, I’ll admit that, but . . . Porca miseria,” she cursed as her ring of keys dropped to the floor.

“Madonna, let me try.”

“‘Madonna, let me try,’” she repeated in a mocking, high-pitched tone as she elbowed me back and continued to jangle with the keys. “Can you please learn an actual curse?” And then she let out a string of curses worthy of Michelangelo.

All of our bickering must’ve stuffed both our ears because when that key finally turned that lock, neither of us seemed prepared for what we found on the other side of that door: several looters— four, maybe five, all in leather armor brandishing torches—ran-sacking that studio. They obviously didn’t know what was valuable in that room because they’d pushed Michelangelo’s sketches onto the floor and were going through shelves as though searching for gold.