I take it from him and slowly raise it to my face. I am strong, I tell myself, and I have the scars on my hands to prove it. What can the mirror show me that can be worse than what I see through the shop window every day?
But it is worse. Much worse. I drop the mirror and it shatters on the floor. I bury my face in my hands and weep. It is no dainty weeping, either. I honk like a goose. I recovered from the slaughter of my own family, but I will never recover from the sight of my own face.
“I didn’t know,” I manage to say. “I never realized how much I look like Nonna.”
Signor Botticelli hands me his kerchief and rests his hand on my shoulder. “You have her spirit, signorina. That is what you couldn’t disguise. That is how I recognized you even though your face was smeared with ash. And that is what makes you so beautiful.”
I look up at his canvas again. There is no mistaking the story now. Venus. Mercury. Zephyrus. Chloris. And finally, Flora, a goddess with a serene face — a woman who stood tall in her suffering.
There is a knock at the door. “Avanti!” Signor Botticelli calls, and there’s that glint in his eyes again. “I hope you don’t mind. I’ve invited others to my unveiling.”
Two men enter the studio. The first I recognize instantly. His tonsured hair is streaked with gray now, but he still wears a threadbare habit; the same wooden cross hangs from his neck.
“Grazie a Dio,” Father Alberto says as he comes toward me, his arms open wide. “I thought it was you. But I wasn’t as certain as Signor Botticelli. I am so pleased to see you alive and well.”
He embraces me then stands back. He clasps my hands and unclasps them, then embraces me again. “I thought you were lost to us.”
The man with him I don’t recognize at all. He is taller than I am — practically a giant. I’m sure if he stood on a mountain he could touch the sky. His shoulders are broad. He wears a tunic that is stretched tight across the muscles in his arms. His brown curly hair falls about his shoulders. And his face, Madonna! His features are so fine and so handsome to gaze upon, he makes Captain Umberto look like a toothless old hag.
The man stares at me just as Signor Botticelli’s apprentices did. I blot my face with Botticelli’s handkerchief and extend a hand to this stranger.
“I don’t believe we’ve met, signor,” I say.
The man smiles at me. The smile begins in his brown eyes and spreads to his two crooked front teeth.
“Flora,” he whispers, and gives my hand a familiar squeeze.
What I felt earlier that day when Signor Botticelli unveiled my painting, my Primavera, wasn’t a catastrophe — it was merely a thaw.
Now, as Emilio smiles at me, I finally bloom.
Epilogue
Nonna was wrong. She said that what made Flora — the original Flora — change into a goddess was her suffering. Now, many years later, I know that while her suffering may have shaped her, it was her ability to forgive that made her divine.
First, she had to forgive the goddess Diana for slaughtering her family. She also had to forgive her own stupid mother Niobe for raining destruction down on them.
Last and most difficult, she had to forgive herself for surviving.
“They call me Mercuzio now,” Emilio said when he let me go at last, that day in Signor Botticelli’s studio. He kept touching my face, my hair, the scars on my hands. I felt his fingers as though they were a balm. And his smile, Madonna! It wasn’t the open smile from the scrawny boy who wielded wooden swords and wheels of cheese. It was a whispering smile — the kind I used to long for as I watched Domenica and Captain Umberto embrace in my garden.
I took his hands in my own and counted all the fingers. As I caressed his face I inventoried his features: one nose, two eyes, two ears. Then I bade him kiss me again. He possessed one tongue; all his teeth; sweet breath that smelled of ginger from the Orient.
Then Emilio admired my painting. I told him it wasn’t my painting, and that, like everything else that passed through my hands, it was going to the Medici.
“A wedding present for a cousin, I believe,” Signor Botticelli said. “But I wanted you two to see it first.”
“Do they know you used a Pazzi as a model?” I asked him.
His face turned stormy. “No. Nor will they ever. I’m not like you, Flora. I value my own skin.”
Emilio grasped my hand and told Signor Botticelli he didn’t mind giving Il Magnifico the painting as long as he got to keep the real thing. And me? I was pleased as well, although I couldn’t help thinking of Mamma. She didn’t have a Pazzi-Medici wedding in real life, but a Pazzi would watch over a Medici bridal chamber, perhaps for all eternity. It was a small, secret victory, but I had grown to like secrets. Perhaps I was more of a Pazzi than I cared to admit.
The four of us drank wine from jeweled goblets. Signor Botticelli toasted himself. “To my genius!” he said with a raised glass. “I only hope I have done you two justice.” Emilio and I told him that yes, he’d done us more than justice, that it was one of the best works of art we’d ever seen. Signor Botticelli drank in the praise more readily than the wine; I thought he would never get his fill.
But eventually he did, and I turned my attention once again to my flesh-and-blood Mercuzio.
“I thought you were dead,” I said. “What happened to you?”
He looked away from the canvas and back to me. “I could ask the same,” he said, but he didn’t seem angry. “You weren’t at the convent like we agreed. Your sister was there. She told me she’d seen you die.”
“She said what?” That bestia. I can’t believe there was ever a moment when I thought I might like her. She disposed of my future twice — first with my flawed diamonds, the second when she sent away my love.
“Dead dead dead. You. Dead,” Emilio said. “She painted a convincing picture. She said she’d seen your head sliced clean off your body.”
That detail made me remember Captain Umberto’s last stand in my father’s library. Had Domenica seen past me, past the fire in the hearth, to the battle? Or did she just make up that detail to convince Emilio? It made no difference. The result was the same.
“I waited for you for three days,” Emilio said. “I slept outside the convent gate. I knew if you were alive you would come back. Finally I gave up and came back to Father Alberto, who gave me our purse and bid me ride to Rome to petition the pope to take action. Which he did finally with the excommunication.”
“Too late for my brothers,” I said. “Where was his army?”
Emilio shook his head sadly. “Still in Rome. Awaiting a Pazzi victory that didn’t come.”
“Coward,” I muttered.
“Easy, Flora. You’re talking about God’s representative on earth,” Father Alberto reminded me. “Him we may not question.”
Emilio was still talking. “All those days, running here and there. Rome. Milan. Naples. Begging for soldiers; begging for mercy. Messenger of the gods, indeed. There were days I thought I would dissolve into a pool of lather like my horses. And to what end?”
“Stupido,” Signor Botticelli said, cuffing him on the head. Emilio ducked as though he were a rickety boy instead of a colossus of a man. Signor Botticelli had that effect on both of us. “That you might live to see today and marry your sweetheart and be happy.”
Then he explained the rest of the Botticelli–Father Alberto plot: Emilio and I marry here, then I accompany my new husband back to Milan, where Duke Frederico Barbarossa valued my swain’s counsel so much, he deeded him a vast amount of land and so many purses of gold that Emilio practically needed a bank of his own to store it. Ah, well. I didn’t mind his riches as long as they didn’t turn him into my father. I counted us safe on that score.
“Of course it’s up to you,” Emilio said. “If you prefer I can take you to your vile sister at Our Lady of Fiesole. I will even take you to Venice and book you passage on a ship bound for the Holy Lands.”
Did I love Emilio because he was so blessed with loveliness h
is eyes shone with it? Did I love him because we’d played and then suffered together? Or did I love him simply because I was so relieved to see him alive and whole that I wept another Arno on Signor Botticelli’s floor? I’ll never know. But I choose to believe that, just as Signor Botticelli saw my spirit, I saw his, and I knew he was the one person in the world with whom I could be free.
And that was why I held back. “I can’t,” I told him. “Andrea will die if I don’t keep sending trinkets to Signor Valentini.”
Emilio had an answer for that too. “I’m rich, remember,” he said, and he smiled a goofy smile.
“Please, Emilio. This is no sporting matter. I’m talking about Andrea’s life.”
“Carissima, I love you, but I see the smoke has made you dense. I meant to say: I can send the bribes to Signor Valentini for Andrea’s upkeep.”
Upkeep. As though he were some kind of pet. “What about his release?” I asked Signor Botticelli. “Will my brother be pardoned too?”
Signor Botticelli shook his head sadly. “I fear in this matter Il Magnifico cannot be acted upon.”
Father Alberto patted me on the back. “Do not give up hope, Flora,” he said gently. “Not while Andrea has friends and a sister such as yourself. That is very much in his favor.”
“Think of it, carissima,” Emilio said. “We could both labor on your brother’s behalf. I could continue planting words in Barbarossa’s ear about your brother’s plight; or you could yourself. That might be better. He likes pretty girls and he likes tales of suffering. The two of us working together could bring about a miracle. I’m sure of it.”
Signor Botticelli fingered one of my curls again. “Or you could stay shut up in that inferno where no one will ever see your hair or know the true color of your lips.”
He was trying to work on me by giving me an alternative that wasn’t really an alternative. I couldn’t go back; I would be caught. He’d said as much earlier. But the truth was, happy as I was in my new good fortune, part of me didn’t trust it. I distrusted all fortune I couldn’t fashion with my own hands.
“I see how it is,” Father Alberto said, nodding his head. “Flora, all those times you came to me in the confessional. You never let me finish. Let me finish now. Ego te absolvo. You have imposed a worse penance on yourself than I ever could have devised. And we mustn’t forget all your good works. You were dutiful and kind to your nonna. You saved the life of your enemy at great personal expense to yourself. You saved your lackwit of a sister. And without you, there would have been no one to remember Giuliano’s son. No, Flora. You need flagellate yourself no more.”
I accepted his absolution, he married us, and Emilio and I left to start our new life together in Milan.
Amore per sempre. Love. Forever. Those words sounded strange at first as Emilio situated me in front of him on his horse. I bid him say the words again, so he did. This time they landed easier on my ears, like the softest velvet. He wrapped his arms around me to grip the reins, and I leaned back into his embrace. It wasn’t difficult at all.
Signor Botticelli sent us on our way with a basket of flowers for me to distribute as I saw fit. “Whether they know it or not, the people of our town need to see you. It’s been a long, hard winter.” Then he kissed my hand. “Now go, you two. Make merry. You have earned it.”
He was smiling but seemed a little sad at our parting. It seemed fitting somehow. He used to complain about how my sister was not beautiful without her tinge of sadness. I wanted to tell him that his sadness made him beautiful as well. With his sad smile at last I understood what kind of man he was: the kind of man who could bring about a miracle, rejoice in a wedding, but cry at a parting. He may have been a genius, but he was one of us.
We stopped first at the goldsmith’s, where I thanked my master and mistress and promised to write. Maria cried outright. “I never hoped to see you happy,” she said. I garlanded her with daisies.
Maestro Orazio handed me a present of my old tools. “In case you get tired of being a sissy, eh?” he said with a wink. I forgave him his infrequent slaps. He had sheltered me all those years at great personal risk. Maria was right: I was no longer a debt to them.
As we left the shop and Emilio hoisted me once again up onto our horse, I looked up toward Signor Valentini’s office. There were two profiles staring down at me. I waved at them. Signor Valentini waved grandly. I waited and stared at the other man with him, waiting for a gesture that would send Emilio and me to the Bargello forever. After a moment, he brought his fingers up to his face and blew me a kiss goodbye.
I handed three roses to Signor Butternut and asked him to keep one for himself and pass two on to his masters. Signor Butternut and the other guards stared at me open-mouthed. “Who are you?” he finally asked.
Emilio had already spurred the horse halfway down the street. “Today? I am the goddess of spring. Ciao, signori!”
Then we rode north past the duomo Santa Maria del Fiore and the Gates of Paradise on the baptistery doors for what was probably the last time. People stopped and stared at us as we made our progress through the streets.
Emilio called out, “What do you think of my wife, eh? Is she not the most beautiful bride you have ever seen?”
And I played my part, smiling and scattering flowers along the way. “Here, signor. Have a daisy.” I watched closed faces of my neighbors open and they waved us on, wishing us luck. Like me, they had been through a long winter.
Our next stop was the hillside in Fiesole where there were now two graves. One had a wooden cross marked ALESSANDRA, and the second, CENESTA.
Emilio had brought Nonna’s body here to lie next to his sister’s. “It seemed right,” he said. “This way they can both watch over us.”
I want to say that on that day I felt Nonna’s presence, but the truth was I didn’t. I didn’t need it. She had already moved on but she left a piece of herself behind in me. I still tend it as I would a rare and elegant plant — an orange tree, for example.
Our final stop before riding for Milan was the convent, where we met Domenica herself, still beautiful but faded and sad like the Venus in Signor Botticelli’s painting. We invited her to come with us. We told her that Emilio had power in the duke’s court, and that we could find her a husband. Maybe not one as handsome as Captain Umberto, but one who would at least treat her with respect. “Your choice,” I said.
She looked first to Emilio and then to me with a look I recognized only too well: she was jealous enough to dump my hairbrushes down the chamberpots and spit in my soup. At least she knew what she was feeling (I never did) and said she needed more time to contemplate our kind offer. “I like it here,” she said. “The nuns leave me alone.” I send for her yearly; yearly she refuses. I will keep inviting her until she arrives.
And that is the end of my story. I’ve kept it locked up tight in a secret compartment of my heart. But then yesterday something happened that caused me to dump those memories out and sift through them like flawed gems.
We were here at our country house, everyone but your father, who was forced to stay at court to advise the duke on an important matter of state (probably the construction of another statue — I swear Barbarossa can be helpless as a child).
You, my children — Andrea, Cenesta, Giuliano, and little Alessandra — were out playing in the yard. I was pruning the roses when I heard a thump! I ran to the base of a tree where Alessandra lay crumpled and screaming, her arm broken so badly her bone poked through skin. I sent for the village doctor, who took one look at her and announced the arm had to come off. He even produced a saw still caked with blood from his last patient, then seemed surprised when my boot connected with his arse and sent him flying down the stairs and out of the house.
That was when I learned that memory can be stored in our hands as well as our minds. Signor Botticelli told me I possessed my Nonna’s spirit, but until yesterday I didn’t think I possessed any of her talents. You all have seen how well I cook. Madonna! I can’t stan
d preparing pheasants or eels. Even after I cook them they still slither down the gullet.
But standing over Alessandra as she screamed so loud I was sure the Mother of God herself heard, I found that I inherited more of Nonna than just her spirit. My hands didn’t falter as I ground your sister a sedative of poppy seeds and water, set the bone straight and true, then sewed the skin shut over it.
Later, after I had hushed her down with lullabies, I came to the kitchen to see the rest of you, worry making you jump like fleas. No matter how often I assured you that her arm will heal, that next spring she will be chasing the rest of you through the garden again, you were not comforted. At first I didn’t understand. After all: it was just a broken arm. Not as though she’d been pulled apart by horses.
But later, after you were all asleep, I finally understood. To you this is paradise — like the garden in my father’s palazzo — but better since it is surrounded by rolling hills of grape vines, sunflowers, and olive trees, instead of being walled in by vanity and greed. But we cannot stay in paradise, bambini: sooner or later everyone gets kicked out. Nonna understood this. She wanted me to be strong, as I do you.
So I went to your father’s library and found rolls of vellum, to which I have committed these memories that you might peruse at your leisure. I could no longer justify hiding the past from you. I was wrong to keep you in ignorance. You should know about what came before, both the brutality and beauty.
Now I will tell you what Nonna told my papa all those years ago: we have enough. Don’t listen to those in Milan who whisper that you need better dresses, more gems, and your father would be a better ruler than the duke. We do not need to sue or do battle with the Medici for the things Il Magnifico took from us. I know for a fact we would lose, and I cannot watch anyone else I love get torn apart.
It has been a long night. Dawn is breaking now as I finish writing this. Outside a man approaches, limping from a gash in his leg that is wrapped in filthy linen. He is a simple man and he carries a live chicken. He sits on a bench, removes his cap, and waits. I don’t know how he knew to come to me for help but it makes no difference. Something in his face reminds me of Andrea. He is not Andrea (this man has two hands) but I shall treat him as if he were, and my next patient and the next, until Andrea himself comes walking up the hillside to our house. And he will come. I have felt it on the wind, which no longer pursues me like an enemy. Instead, it tickles my ear as a lover would. It whispers: freedom. It whispers: hope.
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