of heart is grieved through the loins, you watch the way in which they join. For as surely as the farmer does reap what he sow, there’s more than one way to raise Cupid’s bow. Pain. I will pain her heart and plague her mind and of the Ebreo speak unkind. I’ll abuse and insult, torment and demean, commingling youthful love with youthful spleen. She is a local cow who doth love to chew the homegrown cud, so imagine her fear as I speak of sending her off to marry blue blood. Oh, I’ll have it so nothing seems more splendid to her eyes than loving the very thing that I despise. And just as Eve was drawn to fruit of the forbidden tree, she’ll flock to the Ebreo for hate of me.”

Benito felt his mind fracture and through the crack, like molten lava scorching everything in its path, came the mocking little voice. You coward, it burned inside his brain, you pathetic coward. First you kill the father and now you destroy the daughter. Take this spoon and kill him now. Bash his very brains out.

Giuseppe heard the sound of a wagon and glanced over his shoulder. Bobo the Fool approached, conducting a two-horse-drawn cart that carried a good two dozen cases of wine. It was time for him to go; he had business in Lucca to attend to.

Giuseppe leaned in to Benito to quickly finish his instructions. “Now listen closely, for here’s what you’re to know, to make a hero of our young Ebreo. When the bravest men line up to start the Drunken Saint’s Race, among them Benito will have a space.”

The news squelched the little voice inside Benito’s head and he turned to face Giuseppe.

“Yes,” Giuseppe said, returning Benito’s boyish smile with a smirk. “You will race the race.”

And in an instant, as was so often the case, Benito loved Giuseppe. He had always dreamt of racing in the feast.

“But second shall be your place,” said Giuseppe matter-of-factly.

And in an instant, as was so often the case, Benito felt all the love in his heart transform to hate.

“You will lose,” Giuseppe continued, “lose so we may win. For in order to hate the sinner and avenge the sin, the Ebreo must first be a hero and the hero must win.” Giuseppe put his hands on Benito’s shoulders and looked into his eyes. “Now I’m off to Lucca. More details upon my return. But in the meantime, tell no one. Be shrewd. Deal with a sly hand, as now we start in earnest our play for Ebreo land.”

“Vaffanculo,” Benito whispered to himself as he watched Giuseppe and Bobo roll away from the mill in the wagon. Benito returned to the simultaneous actions of stirring the olive vessel and staring inside the barn at Mari as she prepped the salt and bay leaves for the next vessel. Tist, tist tist, La Piccola Voce clucked his demon tongue. You know much of whores, but nothing of girls.

“Oh, shut up,” Benito murmured. “You’ll see.”

You, scoffed La Piccola Voce, Giuseppe’s willing whore? I would sooner entrust your vendetta to a boy in a dress. You’ll do nothing of honor but much of shame. You will be as you’ve always been.

“Oh, you’ll see, and so too will Giuseppe.” Benito took to stirring the olives with a bit more vigor. Again, he pressed himself into the vessel. “Crude Benito, here for all to mock. Lewd Benito, who’s deflowered the flock. Benito, bawdy, lowly and rank, the butt of all childish pranks. So mock me, bring it all in heaps, say I copulated with sheep. Run me over with your large words, hear from me what you only want heard. For I remember, you coward bully, ‘twas I who undid that pulley. And the act that gave you wife and land put nary a penny in my hand. But this time Benito shall not toil in vain to have Giuseppe make the gain. No, while he plays the Ebreo and plays Mari, I’ll play along and play all three. So mock me, ’tis better I be mistook, for Benito’s not as dumb as he might look. And whilst you laugh, I operate in stealth, for soon I’ll be the man with wife and wealth.”

In Which We Learn

of Little-Known Saint Rachel

“Surely, Priest,” said the Meducci guard, “there must be a patron saint of lost causes and impossible odds?” Davido felt his mouth go dry and his chest run with sweat under his heavy robe. Could