was endure. Then I made the Sign of the Cross and I left the church. I was in utter 
despair.
  For a while I walked around. Once again, it was only the most pleasant town I had ever 
seen, with everyone happily at work, with best-swept cobbled streets, and pretty flower 
boxes under all the windows, and prettily dressed people going about their affairs.
  It was the cleanest place I'd ever seen in my life, and the most contented. And the 
people, they were all eager to sell me their wares, but they didn't press it terribly 
much. But it was an awfully dull town in a way. There were no people my age, none at all 
that I saw. In fact, there weren't all that many children.
  What should I do? Where should I go? What was I looking for?
  I didn't quite know how to answer my own questions, but I was certainly on my guard for 
the slightest evidence that this town somehow harbored the demons, that Ursula had not 
found me here, but that I had found her.
  The mere thought of her overcame me with a cool, inviting shock of desire. I saw her 
breasts, felt the taste of her, saw in a blurred flash the flowered meadow. No!
  Think. Make some plan. As for this town, no matter what the priest knew, these people 
were too wholesome for harboring demons.
  
  
  5
  THE PRICE OF PEACE AND THE PRICE OF VENGEANCE
  
  AS the heat of the day started to really rise, I went into the arbor of the Inn for the 
heavy noon meal and sat down by myself under the wisteria, which was blooming 
magnificently over the latticework. This place was on the same side of the town as the 
Dominican church, and it too had a lovely view of the town to the left and a view out 
over the mountains.
  I closed my eyes, and putting my elbows on the table, I clasped my hands and I prayed. 
"God, tell me what to do. Show me what is to be done." And then I was quiet in my heart, 
waiting, thinking. What were my choices?
  Take this tale to Florence? Who would believe it? Go to Cosimo himself and tell him 
this story? Much as I admired and trusted the Medici, I had to realize something. Nobody 
of my family was living but me. I alone could lay claim to our fortunes in the Medici 
bank. I didn't think Cosimo would deny my signature or my face. He'd give over to me what 
was mine, whether I had kinsmen or not, but a story of demons? I'd wind up locked up 
somewhere in Florence!
  And talk of the stake, of being burnt for a sorcerer, that was entirely possible. Not 
likely. But possible. It could happen very suddenly and spontaneously in a town like 
this, a mob gathering, denunciations by a local priest, people shouting and running to 
see what was up. This did now and then happen to people.
  About this time, my meal was set out for me, a good meal with plenty of fresh fruit and 
well-cooked mutton and gravy, and as I started to dip my bread and eat, up came two men 
who asked to sit down with me and buy a cup of wine for me.
  I realized one of them was a Franciscan, a very kindly-looking priest, poorer it seemed 
than the Dominicans, which was logical I suppose, and the other an elderly man with 
little twinkling eyes and long stiff white eyebrows, sticking up as if with glue, as if 
he were costumed as a cheerful elf to delight children.
  "We saw you go in to the Dominicans," said the Franciscan quietly and politely and 
smiling at me. "You didn't look so happy when you came out." He winked. "Why don't you 
try us?" Then he laughed. It was no more than a good-natured joke and I knew it, about 
the rivalry of the two orders. "You're a fine-looking young man; you come from Florence?" 
he asked.
  "Yes, Father, traveling," I said, "though where exactly, I don't know. I'm stopped here 
for a while, I think." I was talking with my mouth full, but I was too hungry to stop. 
"Sit down, please." I started to rise, but they sat down.
  I bought another pitcher of red wine for the table.
  "Well, you couldn't have found a finer place," said the little old man, who seemed to 
have his wits about him, "that is why I am so happy that God sent my own son, back here, 
to serve in our church, so that he could live out his days by his family."
  "Ah, so you are father and son," I said.
  "Yes, and I never thought I'd live so long," said the father, "to see such prosperity 
come to this town as has come. It's miraculous."
  "It is, it is the blessing of God," said the priest innocently and sincerely. "It's a 
true wonder."
  "Oh, really, instruct me in this, how so?" I asked. I pushed the plate of fruit to 
them. But they said they had eaten.
  "Well, in my time," said the father, "you know we had more than our share of woes, or 
that's how it seemed to me. But now? It's utter bliss, this place. Nothing bad ever 
happens."
  "It's true," said the priest. "You know, I remember the lepers we had in the old days, 
who lived outside the walls. They are all gone now. And then there were always a few 
really bad youths, young men causing trouble, you know, the really bad sort. You had them 
in every town. But now? You couldn't find one bad man in all of Santa Maddalana or in any 
of the villages around. It's as if people have returned to God with their whole hearts."
  "Yes," said the old elfin man, shaking his head, "and God has been merciful in so many 
other ways."
  I felt chills on my back again, as I had with Ursula, but it was not from pleasure. "In 
what way is that, in particular?" I asked.
  "Well, look around," said the old man. "Have you seen any cripples in our streets? Do 
you see any half-wits? When I was a child, why, when you, my son, were a child" - he said 
to the priest - "there were always a few unfortunate souls, born ill formed, or without 
good brains, you know, and one had to look out for them. I can remember a time when there 
were always beggars at the gates. We have no beggars, haven't had any for years."
  "Amazing," I said.
  "Yes, true," said the priest thoughtfully. "Everyone here is in good health. That's why 
the nuns left so long ago. Did you see the old hospital shut up? And the convent out of 
town, long abandoned. I think there are sheep in there now. The farmers use its old 
rooms."
  "No one ever takes sick?" I asked.
  "Well, they do," said the priest, taking a slow drink of his wine, as though he were a 
moderate man in this respect, "but they don't suffer, you know. It's not like the old 
days. It seems if a person is like to go, then he goes quickly."
  "Yes, true, thanks be to God," said the elder. "And the women," said the priest, "they 
are lucky here in birth. They are not burdened with so many children. Oh, we have many 
whom God calls home to himself in the first few weeks - you know, it's the curse of a 
mother - but in general, our families are blessedly small." He looked to his father. "My 
poor mother," he said, "she had twenty babies all told. Well, that never happens now, 
does it?"
  The little old man stuck out his chest and smiled proudly. "Aye, twenty children I 
reared myself; well, many have gone their way, and I don't even know what became of...