Chapter 4

4

My companions were at the tempietto , a small Doric-style octagonal temple with a cupola that rested on the edge of a vast field, encircled by a rock wall with a broken gate that hung half-off the hinges. Though a bit shabby, the tiny structure was still exquisite. A series of Tuscan columns made from peperino stone cut through the center of its square patio leading toward the entry to the dome. Paolo had his camera out and was filming Dalí entering the building. The artist had somehow come across a friendly white cat and had decided to carry it on his shoulder.

"This should have been the last building you come to as you emerge from the garden," Ignazio was explaining to Gala when I arrived. He motioned toward a set of stairs that led into the rest of the garden. "I had intended to take you down the main path so you would see the boschetto laid out in order, from earth to hell to heaven. There are the earthly creatures—those that are created by the gods, then comes the entrance to the Underworld, through the mouth of the ogre, or orco , which you'll see soon. From the orco you eventually come to the bench of Proserpina, up the stairs past the loyal Cerberus, and then, finally, you find yourself here." He gave Gala a pointed look. "But you took an alternate route, arriving here first."

Dalí raised his eyes to the little dome. "Vicino Orsini's wife, Giulia Farnese, is buried here, sì ?"

Ignazio nodded. "Some say Vicino Orsini may have been laid at her side, but there are no records of this."

Giulia. What coincidence was it that there were three of us with the same name in the garden? The Julia under the heavy rock mausoleum, the lady Farnese, and me, breathing in the air they no longer could.

Ignazio pointed to the ceiling of the entryway, which was decorated with Farnese lilies and Orsini roses, and explained how they symbolized the union between them.

Gala asked him about the empty circles surrounding the temple's base.

"Stolen over the years. They were zodiacal and biblical scenes."

"This doesn't seem like a religious place," Jack said.

"Oh, it is, very much so, just not religious in a Christian sense," Ignazio explained. "At the time Vicino created the garden, he must have worried about being accused of blasphemy. Including some biblical imagery may have been an attempt to stave off such charges. But the truth of the matter is that the tempietto is the final resting place for those going to the Greek or Roman afterlife, the representation of Elysium, not that of heaven."

Paolo bade me enter and exit the temple so he could get me on film.

I was readying myself for the walk toward the back of the tempietto when the cat that Dalí had been holding came to me and twined itself around my legs, purring. It looked up at me and meowed.

"Pick him up, Proserpina," Dalí said. "He likes a shoulder."

I did, and the little beast immediately climbed to my shoulder and rubbed his face against mine, purring even more loudly. His almost melodic meows endeared him to me. I didn't remember ever having a pet, so I wasn't sure how I was supposed to behave, and the cat's affection took me by surprise.

"Wow, he really likes you," Jack marveled. He reached out a hand to pet the little beast, but the cat stiffened against me and swatted at him. "But I guess he doesn't like me."

"I've never seen that cat before." Ignazio frowned, and I wondered why he was concerned about its appearance. Surely there must be dozens of cats wandering around the wood. Italy was full of stray cats.

The animal started to trill a little song. "I name him Orpheus," I said. It instinctively felt like the perfect name. The cat seemed to approve as he rubbed his head against my ear.

"Why Orpheus?" Jack asked.

"When Orpheus came to the Underworld seeking the return of Eurydice, Persephone—Proserpina—was moved by his tears and agreed to let her return above."

"And you are Proserpina, no? And even now, he cries in your ear. The perfect name!" Dalí was exuberant. "Now, Paolo, we shall film our Proserpina."

Orpheus jumped down but stayed close. I let Gala fuss over my clothes and hair, but my mind was on the story of Orpheus and how he lost Eurydice because of the gods' condition that he would not look back until the couple had both returned to the world of the living. When Orpheus, in his anxiety, turned around too soon, Eurydice disappeared back into the Underworld forever. It was a story that had always resonated with me—of true, deep love lost. Just thinking about it made me want to tear up.

Gala slapped me. "Pay attention!"

I gasped and instinctively raised my hand to my cheek, shocked. It wasn't a slap hard enough to leave a mark, but it was a startling violation. Orpheus hissed at her, and Gala made to kick the cat, but he easily evaded her boot.

Gala didn't let me protest. "We don't pay you to daydream, Julia. Now start walking. And smile." She pointed at the tempietto .

Orpheus seemed to be waiting for me. I picked him up, glad that he had hissed at Gala in my defense. He went right to my shoulder. Furious about the slap, I plastered a smile on my face and walked the twenty feet through the catwalk of columns toward the inner sanctum, admiring the arched ceiling and its rosettes above. Light filtered in from circular windows around the dome's edges and from little openings in the tip of the cupola.

As I entered the little room, I thought I heard my name again.

But Orpheus only purred louder in my ear, which convinced me that I imagined the whispers, that perhaps I really was just tired or coming down with something.

Brushing the thoughts away, I scanned the room. How odd there was no plaque for Giulia, who may be resting beneath my feet—nothing to mention a date of death, no words of love or memory.

I turned toward the door, ready to strut out for Paolo's camera.

Julia...

This time I heard my name loud and clear. There was no way I could have imagined it. Before I could react, two birds flew through the cupola windows and dive-bombed Orpheus, then fled just as quickly as they'd swooped in. Orpheus howled and bolted, his claws piercing my dress and skin as he pushed himself off my shoulder. I shrieked and attempted to run but only managed to pitch forward, landing in the dust and leaves covering the tempietto floor. As I fell, I thought I saw the faintest ghostly figure against the far wall, the figure of a woman. There was something familiar about her, but I didn't have a chance to understand why before the shape disappeared and Jack appeared by my side.

"Are you all right?" he asked, lifting me up. "That cat just streaked by us like it had seen a ghost."

"I think it did," I said, dusting myself off.

Jack pulled a leaf from my hair. His skin smelled earthy, fresh like a spring morning. "You're joking, right?"

I could only give him a nervous laugh before the rest of the Dalí entourage crowded around the temple entrance.

"I'm fine," I said, willing my body to stop shaking. "I just need some air." I pushed my way through them and out of the tempietto , wondering if the ghost had been communing with the dead Giulia buried there or if her words were intended for me.

"What did you see?" Ignazio asked, concerned.

What did I see? Not "are you all right" or "what happened," but what had I seen? For a moment, I considered telling him about the ghost, but something held me back.

"Two birds flew down from the windows and went after the cat. He launched himself off my shoulder." I looked at my hands; they were still trembling.

"What kind of birds?"

"Turtledoves," I said, not understanding what difference it made.

He sighed and nodded. "They must have a nest somewhere up high."

It would be unusual for birds to be protecting a nest in November, but I didn't bother to contradict him. "Heh," I said instead, "I thought doves were peaceful birds." I touched the spot on my shoulder where Orpheus had clawed me and felt blood. A nasty set of claw marks were bright against my skin. Ignazio reached a hand toward my wound, but I recoiled, afraid of the heat of his touch.

He frowned but didn't comment on my action. Instead, he pulled a handkerchief out of his pocket and dangled it toward me. Conflicted, I took it and winced as I pressed it against the wound. Despite all my internal warnings about this man, I wanted Ignazio to take care of me, to help, and a part of me wished I hadn't pulled away from him.

"We'll need to clean that up so it doesn't get infected. There is a first aid kit in the truck," he said. "I'll take you to the spot where I think Maestro Dalí will want to paint you, and then I'll go back and get it. It's not far."

"Grazie." Much as I wanted him to help, I didn't want him to touch me again. The jolt that rushed through my body and mind when he merely brushed against me was overwhelming enough, and I didn't think I could handle more.

After I reassured everyone I was fine, Ignazio led us down another set of stairs to the top of a wide hippodrome lined with huge statues of acorns and pine cones resting on pedestals and set between long benches. Partway down the stairs was a level spot with a small statue about four feet high that was half covered in moss and surrounded in weeds. Emerging from this wild nature were three heads, oddly added to the top of the stone body—Cerberus.

"He's guarding the dead in the Underworld," Gala said, jerking a thumb back toward the tempietto .

Thinking of the ghostly woman I had just seen, I shivered as Orpheus emerged from the brush and began to rub his face on one of Cerberus's legs, marking his territory. "Perhaps he's not so savage after all." I chuckled. Despite his three heads, the dog looked rather docile. I ran a hand over one of its snouts as if to test my theory.

But Gala didn't hear me. She was already down in the hippodrome, directing Jack on where to set up the easel. Instead, it was Dalí who appeared at my side. He, too, extended a hand and rubbed one of the beast's snouts. "You're right. He's not so savage, not like this. But I always picture him as he was in Dante's Inferno ."

"How so?" I asked.

"Canto six, on gluttony," Ignazio, who had just appeared seemingly out of nowhere, chimed in before Dalí could respond. Then he proceeded to recite the poem, his voice mesmerizing, the accent smooth, though not quite Italian, not quite like any I could identify:

"‘Cerberus, cruel monster, fierce and strange,

Through his wide threefold throat barks as a dog

Over the multitude immersed beneath.

His eyes glare crimson, black his unctuous beard,

His belly large, and clawed the hands, with which

He tears the spirits, flays them, and their limbs

Piecemeal disports.'"

"But this Cerberus could barely tear apart a rabbit," I said, pointing at the statue.

Ignazio raised an eyebrow at me. "You assume this is always his form."

"The Cerberus in my mind is wild, rearing back, towering over Dante, black and dangerous," Dalí said.

"You are right. He is dangerous," Ignazio said, then went down the stairs.

I stared after him, wondering what he meant.

"You have nothing to worry about, little Proserpina," Dalí said, his hand stroking each of the dog's heads in turn. "He's your protector, remember?" He winked at me and followed Ignazio.

I began to trail after them down the stairs, but the scrape of stone against stone pulled my attention back. Cerberus's heads seemed to have moved, to have turned upon its stone body pedestal so that one was squarely facing me when I could have sworn it wasn't before. Unnerved, but sure I had dreamed it, I hastened down the stairway.

When I caught up to the group, Paolo was setting up his camera in the new location, and Dalí was instructing Jack on his requirements for painting that day. We were before another giant statue, this one of a woman, her legs spread apart to form a bench, her body a backrest for any who would sit down. Her hands were missing, and her fine carved features had eroded, leaving a face lacking any detail, though from her dress, it was plain that she was once regal. Upon her head was a crown that looked like a basket, one I imagined once held carved fruit. I was inexplicably drawn to the bench, craving to be nestled in the figure's wide arms—the figure I instinctively knew represented Proserpina—to sit upon the ancient stones and look down the length of the hippodrome.

"The goddess Proserpina," Ignazio verified, waving his arm expansively toward the bench.

"Sì," Dalí exclaimed. "A purple paradox. Proserpina in the arms of Proserpina."

Gala had taken a rag from Dalí's box of equipment and started to dust off the bench. I helped her remove some of the leaves and other debris that had accumulated over the years. There was still a lot of moss on the seat, but I thought that would be good extra padding if I were to sit on the hard bench for the next few hours.

"I'll go get the first aid kit," Ignazio said, leaving us to our preparations.

"First aid kit?" Jack asked, concerned.

I moved the handkerchief and indicated the gash where Orpheus had pierced my skin. Pinpricks of blood dotted the cloth. As I pulled it away, the smoky scent of Ignazio lingered, and I resisted the urge to put it to my nose and breathe in deep.

"That cat gave you a mean scratch," Gala said. She seemed less concerned about me and more concerned that my skin had been marred. I didn't know why it mattered—I could hide the gash in photos, and Dalí didn't have to paint it.

"We were both startled," I explained, feeling like I had to excuse the episode somehow.

Orpheus seemed to realize we were talking about him and jumped up on the bench.

"No, no, no," Dalí said, coming toward us. "Proserpina first." He picked up the cat and dropped him on the ground. Then he took me by the arm and bade me to sit upon the bench.

Together, Gala and Dalí began to arrange me, and soon I was lounging along the bench, one leg dangling off the side, the other outstretched, my arms above my head, my face turned away from Dalí. I felt oddly comfortable in the arms of the goddess, despite the bizarre pose.

"Bellissima," Gala said, the Italian word sounding strange in her Russian tongue. "She is perfect."

Might this be one of the only times Gala would compliment me?

Paolo took several snapshots of me before Ignazio returned with the first aid kit. He set the kit on the edge of the bench next to me and dug out a piece of gauze, upon which he poured some iodine. Leaning forward, he pressed the gauze against my skin. It seemed he was being careful not to brush against me with his fingers as he wiped off the blood, and for that I was grateful. But his very nearness set my body tingling. It was a confusing combination of lust tinged with terror, and it set me on edge. How could I be attracted to someone I was also inexplicably afraid of? He had been nothing but kind to me, yet underneath his beautiful exterior I could only sense darkness— wrongness .

"Welcome home, little goddess," he said to me, his voice low enough that the rest of the entourage would not hear.

The hairs on the back of my neck stood up. Home? What was he suggesting? While I was desperate to figure out where my home really was, I didn't believe this bizarre garden was it. I thought of the other Julias buried in the ground not far from where I sat. No, he couldn't have meant that, could he? A lump rose to my throat. I was about to break my pose and pull away, but Ignazio waved a hand, indicating the stone where I reclined.

"The bench," he said.

"Ah." I was glad to look away from Ignazio and up at Proserpina's eroded face. I willed myself to be calm, to take slow breaths.

Ignazio fetched an Elastoplast from the kit, pulled off its paper and applied it to the wound with great care. In the few seconds before he backed away, I was overcome with a great urge to reach up for him, to bring him to me, to seal his lips against mine. I cleared my throat and turned my head away. His lips curled upward in a satisfied smile. Then he left, ascending the steps toward the tempietto . I shuddered, tamping down any remaining vestige of desire. I was not one to play with fire.

After his departure, Gala fussed over me, arranging my limbs again and fixing my clothing. "You stupid girl. I would have had him kiss it better," she said.

I couldn't respond, sure my cheeks were the same shade as my dress.

Just then, Dalí, who had wandered off while I was being tended to, gave a shout from the other end of the hippodrome. He stood near a statue of a siren, waving something in the air. "Pomegranates," he exclaimed as he rushed back to us, raving about finding the fruit-loaded trees. He had two ruby-round orbs in his hands, which he placed, one in front of me and the other to my left, upon one of Proserpina's stone legs.

"Tomorrow we will remove the dress," he said as he stepped back to look at me.

"Of course." I shrugged, just as Orpheus jumped up and curled himself into a ball in my lap, tucking his face into my belly. I expected Dalí to shoo the beast away, but he only said "bueno" and then returned to his easel.

A subtle shift in the air drew my attention. Ignazio was there, standing slightly apart from the rest, that damned smile at the edges of his lips. I had been wrong to assume he had departed. Crimson heat rose to my cheeks with the thought of his eyes upon my naked body. I looked away, wishing I hadn't agreed with Dalí so easily. Perhaps I could have bought at least another day of clothing.

"I'll return soon with the midday meal," Ignazio told the group. This time I watched him make his way back to the truck. I was glad for his departure and relaxed the moment he vanished down the trail. Gala, Jack, and Paolo also left us, eager to explore more of the garden, while Dalí began to paint me—a preliminary sketch in oils. He planned to create many images of me, and I knew it wasn't feasible to develop entire paintings in the garden. It was the perfect time to ask him about his techniques.

"You are sketching me in oil—will you paint it in oil, too, or will you use a different medium?"

Dalí paused and regarded me. "Why do you wish to know this?"

"I am a painter as well. I didn't just model for the accademia. I graduated in the spring."

He snorted. "Women are not suited for art. You are a muse, you are a goddess, but you are not an artist. You will never be an artist."

"That's a terribly backward view," I ventured boldly. "There are many female artists."

Dalí laughed, loud and long. The sound was eerie against the silence of the hippodrome. "C'est un spectacle," he said in French. "Nothing more. A brief shine before history obliterates all memory of them."

"I am not a spectacle," I told him.

"Neither are you a real painter. Now hush, Proserpina. I'm paying you to model, not comment on art."

I pressed my lips together, willing myself to be quiet, to not say the words I wished to say. And I closed my eyes, so I would not cry. I thought of Artemisia Gentileschi, Mary Cassatt, Dorothea Tanning, Helen Lundeberg, Frida Kahlo—women I admired for their talent and verve, women whom Dalí had just declared to be nothing more than inconsequential. I pictured Meret Oppenheim's Object in my mind. Her fur-lined tea set had captured the world's imagination a decade back, in a way that even Dalí's melting clocks could not.

I fumed as he painted. My whole reason for coming to this damned place was dashed with just a line out of Dalí's mouth. I wanted to retort, to spit back all the things that the art world and tabloids said about him—that he was a sellout who cared more about commercial success than art, that he was a Nazi sympathizer and lover of dictators like Hitler and Franco. That he was a shallow self-promoter, a consummate narcissist, a political opportunist who had compromised his art for fame.

I wanted to scream all these things at him, but I remembered the number on the piece of paper that I had shown Lillian, a monetary sum I could not conceivably make in any other way, and I kept my mouth shut. But I decided then that the opinions of this man would not sway me. Besides, I reasoned, he was right about one thing. I hadn't paid him to teach me. He was the one who had hired me for an outrageous fee and I had gratefully accepted it.

I counted down from one hundred to calm myself. Maybe Lillian had been right in her worries about my visiting Bomarzo.

After a time, I did fall into a dream state, thinking of what the Sacro Bosco might have been like when Vicino Orsini first created it. In my mind, the tangled mess of weeds before me was instead filled with grassy paths between beds of flowers and herbs. I pictured the women in their beautiful dresses, the men in their jackets and ruffled shirts, and musicians playing in the rotunda that overlooked the hippodrome. I could hear their happy murmurings, the women's laughter, the grand stories of the men. It was almost like a memory, a good one, one that had made me content.

At some point, Jack roused me from my fugue. "Ready for lunch?"

I sat up and looked around. Dalí had already set aside his paints and was making his way up a crumbling moss-covered stairway behind Proserpina's bench. I made to stand but my leg had gone to sleep. Shaking it, I winced with the sensation, and Jack extended his arm to help me up.

"Those steps would be much faster, but clearly, we have to take the long way," he said, pointing to the staircase on Proserpina's right, which led deeper into the boschetto but was blocked by a massive tree that had fallen long ago.

"That would have been a great shortcut," I agreed as we headed up the stairs. "This leads around the edge of the garden, rather than through it." At the top stretched a vast field, half of which was sowed with wheat, the other half with corn. On the far edge of the field, I could make out the silhouettes of a man and a donkey. "I always associate cornfields with America," I said with wonder. The truth was that I wasn't sure I had ever seen a cornfield in person, but I couldn't tell Jack that. My "memories" of the United States were built upon images I had seen in newspapers and films.

Jack laughed. "It's wacky to see something so familiar here, isn't it? But don't worry, we don't have to find our way through the cornfield."

We walked along the edge of the field until we saw a monstrous vase rising out of the weeds of the garden, towering over us by four or five feet. "How strange," I said, marveling at the size. I pressed my hand against it.

The whisper came to me again, faint this time. Julia, don't... Julia, Julia, don't... I snatched my hand away.

Jack didn't seem to notice. "Gala saw Ignazio before he left for lunch and asked him about the vase. He said it represents Bacchus's entry into hell, with his goblet in hand."

"I think someone is buried here," I said, certain it was true. There were ashes within or under the vase. I could sense it. And this time, I somehow knew that the voice had been talking to me. It was a warning, but a warning I didn't understand.

"Now you are letting your imagination run wild," Jack said, giving me a light sock in the arm.

I laughed, but I was unnerved. How could I feel such conviction about something I had no knowledge of? And why had this ghost chosen to communicate with me? Why not Jack or any of the others? I changed the subject to quell my rising anxiety. "So, why do you think Vicino Orsini created so many monsters to represent death and the Underworld?"

Jack laughed. "We humans are all obsessed with money, sex, and death, aren't we? But wait, you ain't seen nothin' yet."

There weren't many trees in that part of the boschetto , and two statues were visible a few paces ahead of us—a monstrous elephant with a castle on its back, and a bizarre, doglike dragon fighting off lions. As we neared, I could see Dalí had mounted the elephant and stood in its castle, holding an arm out, pointing the beast forward. Paolo was at its base, filming.

"We're up here," I heard Gala say. It sounded like she was right next to me, but when I whirled about, I didn't see her anywhere.

Jack nudged my arm and pointed up a path toward a gigantic face, its mouth wide open in a scream. I gasped. This must be the screaming ogre that Dalí mentioned yesterday. Gala stood inside the mouth of the monster, below its two stone teeth, waving at us.

"But I could hear her perfectly," I said in awe.

"An acoustic trick that Ignazio showed us. Killer-diller, huh? Come on—there is a mountain of food up there."

We made our way up the dirt trail to the orco . Pomegranate bushes laden with fruit flanked the stone of the monster's cheeks, the surrounding ground littered with fallen fruit. As we approached, I saw it had a tongue—a table carved from peperino . Above the mouth was an inscription: OGNI PENSIERO VOLA. All thoughts fly. Or at least anything said in the mouth of this ogre.

Jack went right in, but I stopped to admire the incredible structure before me. The "tongue" table was laden with food, and around the interior of the monster was a long bench carved into the rock. What a feat of engineering this must have been to create.

Dalí waved me in, and I stepped forward, crossing below the enormous teeth, but as I did, the stone walls seemed to press closer to me. My world spun terribly out of control, and everything became a blur...the faces of my companions, the food on the table. As the orco became awash in shades of gray that grew darker by the second, a roaring sound filled my ears, and the smell of smoke overwhelmed my nostrils.

I came to my senses in the fiery hot arms of Ignazio, who must have caught me before I smashed my head on the table. "Ogni pensiero vola," he whispered in my ear.

The world stopped spinning abruptly and all the puzzling sensations I was experiencing ceased just as quickly. There was no smoke, no roaring noise. I took a deep breath. Ignazio righted me and let go.

"Be careful, Julia," Jack admonished. "Those shoes really are terrible."

"Grazie," I said to Ignazio, but I wasn't sure I was thankful. What did he just do? Why had everything righted with his whisper? All thoughts fly. I moved away from him to the opposite side of the tiny room.

"Grab a plate, Julia. Eat up," Gala instructed. "You clearly need some sustenance to fulfill your duties this afternoon. It would not do to have you faint on the job."

I pursed my lips and said nothing, surveying the spread before us instead.

Lunch was set up buffet-style, and I looked on in awe as Ignazio described the dozens of little dishes sprawled out on the table: garlic rolls; canapé of chicken liver, truffles, and woodcock; little salads with bresaola and pomegranate seeds; maccheroni with bread crumbs; apple and pomegranate fritters; pastry puffs with cheese and mortadella; coratella , a much revered Roman dish made of lamb's liver and offal; roasted mushrooms; potato salad; Romanesco broccoli with pomegranate and pine nuts; roast chicken stuffed with prosciutto; and a ricotta tart for dessert. I wondered how much Dalí was paying for such catering.

"Please, partake," Ignazio said when he'd finished. He laid a hand on the artist's shoulder and held it there for a moment, which I thought odd—it seemed a gesture of power, and Dalí was not someone who let anyone other than Gala dominate him. I expected the artist to move away or say something, but Dalí didn't even seem to register it.

Nor did he seem to notice that Gala had her hand high on Jack's thigh, a sight I couldn't help but see when I took my seat on the bench.

"Mon Dieu," she said in French after biting into a golden croquette of some sort. She closed her eyes, savoring the flavor. "Potato."

"Try the broccoli," Dalí instructed me, pointing to the whorls of green on my plate. I lifted the Romanesco to my mouth but purposefully lost a pomegranate seed to the floor. A bird would find it later, I supposed. I took a bite. The broccoli, to my surprise, wasn't cold. We were a long way from the castello , and I did not smell or see any fire to warm the food.

Dalí looked unsatisfied. "Did you have the salad? The pomegranate seeds are the ultimate complement to the chicory and bresaola. "

I gave him a sheepish smile. "I'm not partial to salad."

He pointed at a fritter on my plate. "Then you must have the fritters."

I couldn't understand his weird insistence that I eat certain foods, although I noticed they all had pomegranate seeds. Dalí being his freakish, surreal self, I assumed, wanting me to really fill Proserpina's shoes. Fine. Much as I hated pomegranate seeds, perhaps if I ate a fritter he would leave me alone. I lifted the pastry off the plate and thought I heard the faintest of whispers.

Julia...don't...

I was tired of my mind playing tricks on me. I took a bite. The crunch and sweetness of a pomegranate aril hit my tongue, and for a moment, I was transported. My senses were overwhelmed by a rush of indescribable love, so profound that it seemed to permeate my very being. I felt as though I was floating, ensconced in the warm embrace of someone deeply familiar yet distant. Passionate kisses, whispered promises—I experienced them all, vivid as if happening in the present.

I heard a whisper. "Ogni pensiero vola."

And then, as suddenly as it had come, the sensation was ripped from me, leaving an aching emptiness where that feeling of pure love had been. My world was spinning, my eyes refocusing on the stone room around me. I was struck by the heady aroma of smoke and leather, as if remnants of that ephemeral moment had followed me back.

Ignazio bent down to pick up my fork, which had clattered to the floor in my daze. "All thoughts fly," he said, smiling at me. "Don't worry, I'll get you a clean one."

"I'm not hungry anymore," I replied, standing up. I had to get out of the mouth of that monster. Leaving with as much decorum as I could muster, I rushed down the path, away from the orco .

I had never been faint of heart, having dizzy spells. And the whispers... What did they mean? What was wrong with me? One second dizzy, but then suddenly not. And I was left haunted by the intense love and passion that had been so cruelly snatched away.

I hurried past the elephant with the castle on its back and the dragon fighting off the lions and found myself at the foot of a giant statue of a seated woman, her mossy legs before her, a wide bowl upon her head, from which a wild abundance of autumn flowers grew—cyclamen, autumn iris, chrysanthemums, winter honeysuckle. It was an outlandish, impossible bouquet. Who had planted such a chaotic arrangement in that basin? Surely it didn't grow that way on its own. The statue looked in the direction of the orco 's mouth, where I could see my companions talking as though nothing had happened.

As I neared the statue, I began to feel nauseous, my stomach roiling with each step. I stopped, clutching at my belly, wondering if I might lose what little lunch I had managed to eat. I looked up at the statue. Her face was serene, beautiful, her hair tumbling down her back. A little cherub seemed to be whispering something in her ear.

Ceres.

It came to me in that moment, her name. How, I couldn't tell you. I only knew the woman was familiar, as though I had always known her. The comfort of her arms, the way her hips so generously curved, the swell of her breasts, her hands caressing me, the feel of her lips against mine. Before me was an image in mossy peperino , but there was more to this statue, just as I instinctively knew there was more to the myth of Ceres, of Pluto, of Proserpina. It wasn't the same as the tale written in the pages of the books on my shelves, the story passed through centuries of mortal telling. No, the truth was different, twisted up, and it had little to do with motherhood and everything to do with passion, betrayal, and deceit.

I didn't have time to ponder this stunning new understanding, for at that moment the ground began to vibrate beneath my feet. At first, it was a soft, barely perceptible feeling, but it grew until the earth was shaking violently. The stone of the statue in front of me seemed to be moving—no, rippling—as the earth shifted. I looked around at the few trees that stuck up between the statues, hoping that none would fall on me.

"An earthquake," Jack said, appearing behind me. "I was in one once in California."

Terror drove me to him. Between my nausea in the mouth of the orco , the whispers, the memory of stolen love, this sudden earthquake, and the strange recognition of the goddess before me, I could no longer pretend I was fine. I threw myself into Jack's arms. He held me and stroked my hair until the ground stopped shaking.

"You are safe, Julia. You are safe," he said.

But even with Jack holding me, I didn't feel safe.

"Can we go back to the bench where I was modeling?" I asked him after I had calmed a bit.

Thankfully, he did not ask me to explain why—if I spoke too much I might start crying like a child. He might understand my need to escape the area of the earthquake, but he wouldn't understand why I thought sitting on the bench might give me comfort that he could not. He offered his arm and led me back to the bench. As soon as I sat upon it, a sense of calm flooded through me.

Jack sat down next to me and put his arm over my shoulders. "Are you okay?" he asked, concerned.

I nodded. I liked his arm around me. "Much better, thank you. I don't know what came over me."

"Have you been in an earthquake before?"

"No, we didn't get them where I grew up," I said, unsure if that was true.

Jack stood abruptly, distancing himself from me as the sound of Dalí and Gala's voices and footsteps came down the stairway behind the bench. When Gala reached us, she went to Jack and put her arm around his waist.

"There she is, my Proserpina." Dalí patted my shoulder, then went to his easel. "Are you ready?"

"At least the earthquake didn't topple your painting," I said, marveling that the easel was still standing upon its thin wooden legs.

"Earthquake?" Gala asked.

"You didn't feel it?" That made no sense. The orco was a mere hundred and twenty feet or so from the statue of Ceres, separated only by a few trees and some bushes. A shout from one to the other would easily be heard.

She looked at Dalí and Paolo, who shrugged and shook their heads. "We didn't feel anything."

"I felt it," Jack exclaimed, coming to the rescue of my sanity. "Maybe the stone in the monster's mouth was so thick it prevented you from feeling it, but it was a really big one."

"No earthquake will bother Dalí!" the artist shouted in the direction of the statues near the orco , as if offering a challenge. I shuddered at the thought that one might respond. He turned back to me. "Now, little Proserpina, you are ready to begin again?"

I wasn't, but I didn't know how to articulate how confused I was about everything that had happened so far that day. Save for the scratch on my shoulder, my body was fine. I looked at Dalí and reminded myself yet again about the massive sum of money waiting for me when I finished. Regardless of what he thought about women painting, I would observe him at work and ask questions all the same. I would learn, even if he didn't realize he was teaching me.

Besides, I was coming to realize he had little to do with why I was really here. In his art, I'd be the physical representation of Proserpina, the mythical Persephone. People around the world would recognize me as her when his painting fell into public purveyance. That and the pull of the garden, the ghost whispering in my ear, the heated connection with Ignazio, and now the inexplicable familiarity of Ceres, solidified my determination. They were somehow all connected. There was something here, in this wild place of Sacro Bosco, something that might help me understand myself. I was determined to figure it out, no matter how much it scared me.

"I'm ready." I settled back against the bench, hoping that the meditative state that sitting sometimes put me in would be a balm to my troubled spirit.