It was near midday by the time Signore Fusili arrived home. He went straight to his studiolo and closed the door firmly but he did not sit idly, for the sounds of his family and household activity told him his task was best done before anyone interrupted. He opened the strong box kept within his desk and withdrew the sum of money he would need to fulfil the demands of Piero de’ Medici. It filled three purses and emptied his coffers. As hard as it would be on the household’s needs, he knew he must set aside the money now, to secure the amount. Then he dropped the pouch of Medici coin into the box. Though it was a meagre offering compared to what he’d just removed, it would have to do for the month. He had no doubt his wife could manage and he’d take a little extra from the business account to tide them over. Loyalty to the Medicis was counted in coin and he could not break trust with his ally however much it hurt his purse.

He must send word to Signore Spinelli in Pistoia to expect his arrival in the first days of July, and pray to God that he’d received Luna’s portrait and thought her marriage worthy for his son. He did not enjoy knowing he’d have to carry bribery money with him and get it to those whom Piero courted, though the sooner it was done the better. The Fusili name was at stake, as was the financial security of Vincenzio’s business.

‘Bring me wine,’ he shouted, pondering how best to convince the families on Piero’s list to entrust their sons to a Medici-led force and what tactics to use to negotiate a lucrative marriage contract with the Spinelli family. Why did everyone test him so? He’d saved Luna from being cast out at birth, that was the important thing. He’d stopped her being sent to the convent to live as an orphan. Would any other man have shown such compassion for a motherless crippled baby girl? No one really understood the depths of his grief. He’d not realised Giulia was so close to death and afterwards, he’d had to get as far away as he could from the blood and stench of that room, from the clouded white of his wife’s dead eyes, the creep of cold in her flesh. The rest of what he’d done that day was his burden to bear and he would take it to his grave.

Vincenzio stood abruptly and threw his head around the door, shouting to have his wine else the whole damned house be sacked.

‘It is here,’ Lucrezia said as she hurried in and placed a tray down on his desk. ‘Do not shout so, husband. It upsets the children to hear their father angry.’