The sky was bright and clear as the horse-drawn carriage took them along the convoluted Viale Machiavelli, through the riotous Boboli gardens, past the Belvedere fortress with its looming clock-tower, toward the Arno River. The air was clear and fresh, the scent of flowers and blooming trees sweet but not cloying. Unlike Venice, a city that had virtually rotted from within around its toxic lagoon and in the deep chemical-soup slurries at the bottom of its canals, Florence had remained more or less beautiful over the centuries. The carriage headed toward the old Roman gateway to the inner city, and then along the broad, straight Via de Serragli toward the Carraia Bridge.