But then I saw my goal: the Cardinal’s palazzo rising rich and arrogant midway between the Campo dei Fiori and the Ponte Sant’Angelo. “Can’t miss it,” the sour old walnut in the apron had told me. “Not with that huge shield over the door. Got a bull on it—what kind of crest is that for a man of God?” And even if I’d missed the bull, there was no mistaking the crush of people flowing through the great doors. Ladies in figured velvets and air-light veils; clerics in red and purple robes; young dandies with jewels on their fingers and those huge slashed sleeves—yes, a wedding party awaiting the arrival of the bride.

Those grand double doors weren’t for me, not in my too-small shoes and the patched ill-fitting dress I’d gotten used off a vendor who tried to tell me the stains at the hem were embroidery and not old mud. But there’s always a separate entrance for servants and deliveries, and soon I was knocking on another door. This time I didn’t even have time to pat the little bundle under my skirt and mutter a prayer before the door was wrenched open.

“Thank the Madonna, Maestro, you’re—” The young man in the apron broke off, staring at me. “Who are you?”

“Carmelina Mangano.” I felt a lock of short black hair spring loose on my forehead, the heat frizzing it out from under the headdress I’d improvised from another length of stained cloth. “My cousin, Maestro Marco Santini—”

“Yes?” the apprentice said eagerly. “You know where he is?”

“I was hoping you could tell me.”

“Oh, God in heaven,” the boy moaned. “He flitted out to play zara this morning—just a round, he said, no more than an hour, just to relax him before the feast. Saints help us, it’s been hours now and we’re sunk—”

Sounded like Marco was up to his old tricks. “A nose for sauces and a hand for pastry,” my father had often complained about my cousin, “and nothing between the ears but cards and dice!” But the apprentice had turned away from the door, yammering and moaning to a cluster of flour-aproned serving girls, and my nose started swooning.

Saffron. Sweet Santa Marta, how long had it been since I smelled saffron? Or the sweet sizzle of duck being turned on a spit and sauced with honey and the juice from an orange? A sharper smell, that would be fine vinegar, the good stuff from Modena so tart and yet so mellow on the tongue it could bring tears to the eyes . . .