3 - Cruel Music by Beverle Graves Myers

farther on, towering stacks of folded fabrics in every hue and texture. I twisted around to tell Benito to go back, but my nimble manservant was already ducking under my elbow. Without missing a step, he pinched the nearest padded bottom and darted through the resulting cleft. I sucked in my stomach and wriggled after him.
    “What is it, Benito?” I cried as I crashed into his back. “Move along.” The ladies were squealing, and one lifted her basket as if she might use it as a weapon. Yet my manservant stood stock still. He clutched my cloak. “Master, do you see?”
    I saw. She was examining fabrics halfway down the aisle, pointing out a bolt of silk the color of the lagoon on a summer day. As the merchant unfurled the blue green cloth, the sun that filtered through holes in his canvas awning turned the silk to rippling water. She laughed in delight. Despite the raucous cries swirling around me, every note of that silvery laugh hit my ears like a blow from a sledgehammer.
    “Liya Del’Vecchio,” I whispered. “How on earth?”
    Benito’s anxious gaze searched my face. “Are you going to speak to her?”
    I took a deep breath. Liya gathered the silk to her chest and trailed a length over one arm. The olive skin of her smooth cheeks and forehead seemed to glow in the dappled sunlight. I remembered her heavy dark hair done in coiled plaits secured with gold pins. Her tresses still shone like a raven’s wing, but now they were shorter, loose on her shoulders, confined only by a cap tied under her chin. A white cap, not the yellow kerchief I’d seen other Jews wearing as we’d come through the city. She laughed again, but shook her head. The tradesman spread his arms, entreating. She smiled sadly, as if the price of the cloth was much too dear, then handed it back in a bright bundle. She turned to go up the aisle, away from where we stood. Still I hesitated.
    “Master?” Benito’s voice was tight. He bounced from foot to foot. “Shall I follow her?”
    “No. It has to be me. Only…” I glanced back over my shoulder. The three ladies had turned back to their shopping and were bending to cram their prizes in deep baskets already laden with meat and produce. Other women pushed and shoved to get by. I could just see the round brim of our follower’s hat, dipping up and down several stalls back.
    I sighed in frustration. Liya Del’Vecchio was part of my past. She was my business and mine alone. I didn’t know whether my shadow took orders from Rossobelli, Montorio, or someone else, but he was clearly up to no good. I had no intention of putting Liya under his notice.
    A barrel at my right hand held a display of mops and brooms. Moving quickly, I tossed its owner a coin and grabbed a long-handled mop. Benito gazed open-mouthed, wondering if I’d lost my wits. He soon understood. That morning, for our sightseeing tour, he’d brought out a tricorne edged with gold point d’Espagne and a fringe of ostrich feathers. As it wasn’t my favorite hat, I’d demurred and we’d had a good-natured skirmish. Now I was glad I’d deferred to my manservant’s fashion dictum. Shielded by the mob, I transferred my tricorne to the mop’s wooly head and secured my cloak beneath it.
    While Benito went snaking down the crowded aisle with my eye-catching headgear bobbing beside him, I made sure that my shadow was still well behind. Then I ducked between two stalls and out into the square.
    I trotted back toward the Pantheon and mounted its steps. Streets exited the square alongside the huge building, branching to the east and west. A solid wall of buildings bounded the square beyond the temporary market. If I kept an eagle eye from my position, it would be impossible for Liya to leave without my notice. I didn’t have long to wait. I spotted her straight back and determined gait just as a new disturbance was moving down a side street.
    I shot down the stairs to collide with a group in rough clothing just bounding onto the