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Dante covered his mouth so he wouldn’t cry out. He felt like it was happening tohim. He heard the cell door slam closed.
“Mamma, Papa!” the other boy wailed, the way Dante used to.
Dante bit his lip, still shaking. He felt terrible for the boy. He wanted to tell the boy that crying wouldn’t do any good. That his parentswouldn’t come. That putting jelly on the rope would only make everything worse.
Dante didn’t want to hear the boy crying. He covered his ears, but he could still hear it through his fingers.
“Opera Singer, wake up!” Dante shouted. “Wake up!”
Opera Singer woke up and started screaming. “Aaahhhhhh!”
Dante covered his ears again, but he could still hear crying.
Then he realized that the crying was his own.
CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT
It was dawn by the time Franco reached Piazza Bellini, one of the holiest places in Palermo. He slowed Arabo to a respectful trot and passed the Chiesa di San Cataldo with its red-domed roof, La Martorana with its tall bell tower, and the Chiesa di Santa Caterina d’Alessandria with its adjoining convent of amber limestone. Its cloistered walls imprisoned Violetta, and Franco was going to free her.
He dismounted, tied Arabo to a hitch, and hurried up the massive steps to the arched doorway, then bounded up a marble stairway to an entrance hall with white plaster walls. The convent was silent, and the air smelled of disinfectant.
Franco had never been here before, but the layout was plain. He pushed open a door into a hallway with white and gray floor tiles and a vaulted ceiling. Large glass windows overlooked a beautiful courtyard with a garden around a circular fountain. There was another door at the end of the hall.
Franco hurried that way, burst through the door, and found himself in a small visiting room with white plaster walls. It contained a row of stools in front of decorative iron grates made to look like grapevines, shuttered from the inside. There was a door on the right, and Franco hurried there.
“Please, open up, I’m here to see Baronessina Zito!” Franco knocked until the door was opened by a frowning old nun in the black veil and white habit of the Dominicans.
“Sir, what’s this racket?”
“I need to see Baronessina Zito. She was brought here last night.”
“Only immediate family may visit—”
“I’m her brother,” Franco interrupted.
“Nevertheless, this is a cloistered convent. We have visiting hours.”
“Please, I just got back in town. I traveled all night to see my sister.”
The nun eyed him up and down, pursing thin lips. “Go wait at the first window. Keep your voice down.”
“Thank you.” Franco sat down and smoothed back his damp hair as the shutters opened.
“Franco?”
Franco could barely see through the decorative grate, but he could tell she was upset, her eyes puffy from crying. Her red hair was in its chignon, and she had on the lilac dress from yesterday.
“Darling, are you okay?” Franco put his hand on the iron grate, wishing he could touch her. “We have to get you out of here, and I have a plan. I’m—”
“Franco, did you set fire to the palazzo? And thegiardino?”
“Yes.”
Violetta gasped, her hand flying to her mouth. “How could you do such a thing?”
Franco blinked. “Because of what your father did to us, Violetta. And your mother, too.”
“But they’re so upset, it’s so awful, and the palazzo isruined! My father was shocked!”
