Painting Mona Lisa aka I, Mona Lisa

by Jeanne Kalogridis

  I would not go to my massive feather bed with the dagger hidden in it. Instead, I crawled onto Zalumma’s little cot and wept there until I fell asleep.

  Francesco, of course, would not hear of my assisting with Zalumma’s burial or attending the service; he let the disposition of her corpse remain a cruel mystery.

  Until my father and Zalumma died, until Matteo was taken from me, I had not realized how thoroughly hatred could usurp a heart. As my father Antonio had been at the thought of losing his wife to another, I was consumed. I dreamed of murder; I knew I could never rest until I saw my father’s dagger buried in Francesco’s chest, up to the hilt.

  Your temper is hot, the astrologer had said, a furnace in which the sword of justice must be forged.

  I cared nothing for justice. I wanted revenge.

  During the long, solitary hours, I drew out the stiletto and felt it, cold and heavy, in my hand; I convinced myself that this had been the instrument of the elder Giuliano’s murder, that my father had kept it as a reminder of his guilt. It all repeats, my mother had whispered, and at last I understood. She had not meant that we would both fall in love with men named Giuliano, or bear children who were not the spawn of their ostensible fathers, or feel imprisoned by our husbands.

  You are caught in a cycle of violence, of blood and deceit. What others have begun, you must finish.

  I put my finger to the dagger’s tip, deadly fine and shining, and let it pierce me, silent and sharp. Blood rilled, a dark pearl, and I put my mouth to it before it dripped onto my skirts. It tasted like metal, like the blade; I wished it had been Francesco’s.

  What was to repeat? How was I meant to finish it?

  I recalled, as best I could, what my mother had told me of Giuliano’s death; I contemplated each separate step.

  In the Duomo, the priest had lifted the wine-filled chalice, offering it to God for blessing; this was the signal for the assassins to strike.

  In the adjacent campanile, the bell had begun to chime; this was the signal for Messer Iacopo to ride to the Piazza della Signoria, where he would proclaim the end of the Medicis’ reign, and be joined by mercenary soldiers who would help him seize the Palazzo della Signoria-in effect, the government.

  Messer Iacopo’s plan was foiled because his hired soldiers had failed to join him, and because the people had remained loyal to the Medici.

  In the Duomo, however, the plan was partially successful.

  In the instant before the signal of the raised chalice was given, my father Antonio struck, wounding Giuliano in the back. Baroncelli’s blow followed; third came Francesco de’ Pazzi’s frenzied, brutal attack. But Lorenzo-on the other side of the church-proved too swift for his aspiring assassins. He suffered only a minor wound and fought off his attackers until he was able to escape to the north sacristy.

  If Piero and Giuliano came, they would play the role of the two brothers. And I had no doubt that Francesco and Ser Salvatore would ensure that there were numerous assassins awaiting them in the cathedral. Salvatore clearly dreamed of taking Messer Iacopo’s role, and riding, this time victorious, into the Piazza della Signoria, to tell the crowd that he had just rescued Florence from the Medici.

  But what was my role to be? I would not sit passively and wait to be killed; I knew my life was forfeit regardless of the plan’s outcome. And so was my son’s, unless I took measures to prevent it.

  And then I realized: I would be the penitent, the one fueled by personal, not political rage. The one to strike the first blow.

  I thought often of Leonardo. My tears in those days sprang from many wells; guilt over my betrayal of him was one of them. Isabella had disappeared from the palazzo, and Elena would say no more about her; I hoped that she had escaped and warned Salai and his master. I could only hope that they had left Santissima Annunziata long before Salvatore’s men arrived.

  I thought of his last words to me. Giuliano de’ Medici was not your father. I am.

  Lisa, I love you, he had said. His tone had reminded me of someone else’s, someone who had spoken long ago, but it was not until I pondered for some time that I remembered whose it was.

  Lorenzo de’ Medici had lain dying, and I had asked him why he had been so kind to me.

  I love you, child.

  Had he believed himself to be my uncle? Or had Leonardo told him the truth?

  I lifted my hand mirror and peered into it. I had lied to Leonardo when I once said that I did not often look at my reflection. When I had learned of my mother’s affair with Giuliano, I had diligently searched my face for hints of the smiling young man who had posed for Leonardo’s terra-cotta bust. And I had never seen him there.

  Now as I looked into the mirror, Leonardo gazed back at me, haggard and owlish.

  I woke late on the twenty-third of May, the day before Giuliano was to meet me in the Duomo. I had slept poorly the night before, awakened by Matteo’s muffled wails downstairs; I cried, too, until well after dawn, then fell into a heavy, sodden sleep.

  When I rose, I went out to my balcony and squinted up at the sun, startled to find that it had passed directly overhead and strayed slightly to the west; it was already afternoon. The sky was exceptionally blue and cloudless-save for a long finger of dark smoke rising up in the east.

  I stared at it, entranced, until Elena entered. I went back into the room just as she set a tray of bread and fruit on the table. She glanced up as she straightened, her expression grave. “You saw the smoke, then.”

  “Yes,” I said slowly, still dazed from sleep. “Is it-”

  “Savonarola,” she said.

  “They burned him, then.” I had heard no news at all for the past few weeks, since learning Savonarola had been arrested. But I had known at once when I saw the smoke.

  “Hung him first,” she replied unhappily. “In the piazza, in the very same spot as the Bonfire of the Vanities and the Trial by Fire. I went this morning. Ser Francesco encouraged us all to go.”

  “Did he say anything?”

  “Fra Girolamo? No, not a word. He was dressed only in his woolen undershirt. It was an ugly business. They built a round scaffold for the fire, filled it full of tinder, and raised a wooden beam in its center, so high that they had to build a long ladder to climb up to the top. The hangman carried him up and put the noose round his neck. He struggled a bit, didn’t die right away.

  “Then they lit the fire. Some fool had put firecrackers in the tinder, terrifying everyone at first. They put chains around the monks so that when the nooses burned away the bodies wouldn’t drop down into the fire, but would roast slowly. The Signoria wanted a spectacle.” She shuddered. “The monks started turning black; and then a giovano struck one of them with a stone, and the bowels spilled out in a bloody rush… Finally, the flames got so hot and rose so high, the bodies cooked through, and the arms and legs started dropping off…”

  I closed my eyes briefly. “Yes,” I said. “Yes, of course.” I looked at Elena. “You said ‘the monks’… so he wasn’t the only one executed?”

  “No. The heavy friar, the one who started the Trial by Fire… what was his name? Domenico. Fra Domenico died with him.”

  “Thank you,” I said. “I will eat my breakfast now. I’ll call for you when I’m ready to dress.”

  She left. I did not eat; instead, I went back out to the balcony to sit in the sun and watch the smoke rise to Heaven. I supposed that, with Savonarola gone, Fra Domenico had become a liability for Salvatore and Francesco.

  Zalumma would have been pleased.

  LXX

  The next morning, when Elena came to dress me, she carried a small velvet purse. When she opened it on the table, out spilled the sapphire necklace and the diamond-studded hairnet I had worn the day I married Francesco.

  They had not been stored in my trunk. I had opened it on the second day of my imprisonment and discovered that all my jewels had been taken; I had looked for them with the intention of bribing Elena to flee with Matteo.

  France
sco knew me well. But he did not know everything.

  Elena went to my wardrobe and brought out the vivid blue velvet wedding gown and my finest chemise. “Ser Francesco says you are to look especially lovely today.” So; I was to be a fine lure.

  I said nothing as she laced me into the gown; this time, I wore the brocade belt low so that I could easily reach it with a swift move of my hand.

  I was silent, too, as Elena brushed out my hair. But when she began to arrange it with great care in the sparkling hairnet, I said, “You will not help with Matteo, then.”

  I saw her face in the hand mirror; like her voice, it was stricken. “I dare not. You remember what happened to Zalumma…”

  “Yes,” I said, my voice hard. “I remember what happened to Zalumma. Do you think the same will not happen to me and my son?”

  She lowered her face, ashamed, and would not look at me or speak to me after that. When she was finished and I was ready, she moved to open the door.

  “Stop,” I said, and she hesitated. “There is one very small thing you could do for me. I need a moment. Just a moment alone, to compose myself.”

  Reluctantly, she faced me. “I am not to leave you alone, Madonna. Ser Francesco said specifically-”

  “Then don’t leave me alone,” I said swiftly. “I left my shawl out on the balcony. Would you fetch it for me, please?”

  She knew. She gave a little sigh and nodded, yielding, and walked slowly to the balcony, carefully keeping her back to me the entire while.

  I moved faster, more quietly, than I had ever thought I could. I pulled my father’s dagger from the feathery insides of the mattress and slipped it into my belt.

  Elena returned slowly from the balcony. “Your shawl is not there,” she said.

  “Thank you for looking,” I said.

  The soldier who had killed Zalumma-a hostile young man with scar-pitted cheeks-led me to the carriage, where Francesco and Salvatore de’ Pazzi sat waiting. Francesco was dressed in his best prior’s gown; for the first time since I had known him, he wore a long knife on his belt. Salvatore wore a lucco of muted dark green-the very sort of elegant but austere tunic that Lorenzo de’ Medici might have chosen. He, too, was armed with a fine sword at his hip.

  “Beautiful, beautiful,” Salvatore murmured at the sight of me. He leaned forward, stooping in the carriage, and offered his hand to help me up; I refused, shaking off the hold of the soldier behind me. I grabbed the edge of the door and pulled myself and my heavy gown, with its long train, inside.

  “She makes a pretty picture, doesn’t she?” Francesco remarked with pride, as if he had created me himself.

  “Indeed.” Salvatore graced us with a haughty smile.

  I sat beside the soldier. Claudio drove us; a second carriage followed, and I leaned out the window to try to see who was inside. I could only make out shadows.

  “Sit back, Lisa,” Francesco said sharply, so that I turned back to look at him as we rumbled through the gate and onto the street. “You ought not be so curious. You’ll learn more than you ever wanted to know soon enough.” His eyes were bright from exhilaration and nerves. I stared at him, hard, and felt the weight of my father’s knife against my body.

  It was a warm day-too warm for a heavy velvet gown-yet I felt cold and numb, and the air still carried a hint of smoke from the previous day’s fire. The light was too harsh, the colors too bright. The blue of my sleeve pained me so much that I squinted.

  In the Piazza del Duomo, the crowds were few; I suspected they were even more spare at San Marco that morning. Flanked by Francesco and Salvatore and followed by my soldier, I walked past the octagonal Baptistery of San Giovanni, where I had been married and my son baptized. Francesco took my arm and steered me straight ahead so that I could not see those who emerged from the carriage behind us.

  The Duomo’s interior was dim and cool. As I passed over its threshold, the edges of the present blurred and melted into the past. I could not judge where one ended and the other began.

  We moved together down a side aisle: Salvatore on my far left, Francesco to my immediate left. On my right was the murderous young soldier. Our pace was brisk; I tried to see past my false husband, past Salvatore. I searched desperately for a beloved face-praying that I would see it, that I would not.

  But I saw little as we swept relentlessly toward the altar. I gleaned only impressions: A sanctuary less than a third full. Beggars, black-wimpled nuns, merchants; a pair of monks hushing a group of restless urchins of varying ages. As we walked past other nobles to take our place-second row from the altar, on the side by the wooden choir-Francesco smiled and nodded to acquaintances. I followed his gaze and saw Lord Priors, six of them in various places surrounding us.

  I wondered which were accomplices, and which victims.

  At last we came to rest beneath the massive cupola. I stood between my husband and the unhappy soldier, and turned my head to my right at the sight of bodies moving toward us.

  Matteo. Matteo walking on strong little legs, clinging to the hand of his stooped nursemaid. Stubborn boy; he would not let her carry him. As he neared, I let go a soft cry. Francesco gripped my arm, but with the other, I reached out to my son. Matteo saw me, and with a shattering smile, he called to me, and I to him.

  The nursemaid seized him, pulled him off his feet, and carried him until she stood beside the soldier, our barrier. Matteo writhed, trying to worm his way to me, but she held him fast, and the soldier took a slight step forward so that I could not touch my child. I turned away, anguished.

  “We thought it best,” Francesco said softly to me, “that a mother be able to see her son. To know where he is at every moment so that she is always reminded to act in his best interest.”

  I looked at the soldier. I had thought he came to serve as my guard and my assassin alone. Now I looked at him waiting with his great knife beside my son; hatred so pressed on me I could scarcely stand.

  I had come to the Duomo with one aim: to kill Francesco before the signal was given. Now I faltered. How could I save my child and still see my tormentor dead? I had only one blow. If I struck at the soldier, Francesco would surely strike at me-and Salvatore de’ Pazzi was within sword’s reach of Giuliano’s heir.

  Your child is already dead, I told myself, just as you are. We had no salvation; I had only one chance-not at rescue, but revenge.

  I put my hand-the one that had reached for Matteo-lightly on my waist, where the dagger lay hidden. And I marveled that I was willing to abandon my son in the interest of hate; how like my father Antonio I had become. But he had faced only one loss, I reasoned stubbornly. I had suffered many.

  I fingered my belt and did not know what I should do.

  Mass began. The priest and acolytes processed to the dark altar limned with gold and crowned with a carving of the dying Christ upon the cross. The swinging thurible bled frankincense-laden smoke into the shadowy dimness, further blurring shapes and the edges of time. The choir sang the Introit and Kyrie. Behind us, a scattering of giggling orphans pushed their way toward the front of the church, mixing in with the offended nobility. One of the monks followed, hissing reprimands. The smell of sour, filthy children wafted our way; Francesco disapprovingly lifted a kerchief to his nose.

  Dominus vobiscum, God be with you all, the priest said.

  Et cum spiritu tuo, Francesco replied.

  As the priest’s assistant chanted the Epistle, I detected motion in the periphery of my vision. Something, someone dark and cowled, had sidled his way through the assembly to stand behind me. I imagined I heard his breath, felt it warm on my shoulder. I knew that he had come for me.

  He will not strike yet, I told myself, though the urge to reach for my weapon was strong. He will not kill me until the signal.

  Francesco glanced sidewise over his shoulder at the hooded assassin; approval flickered in his gaze. This was part of his plan. As he turned back, he caught me watching him and was pleased by my fright. He graced me with a cold, falsely
benign smile.

  The choir sang the Gradual: Arise, Lord, in Thine holy anger. Lift up Thineself against the rage of my adversaries.

  Far to my left, a ripple passed through the row of priors and nobles and flowed to Salvatore de’ Pazzi. He turned to my husband and whispered. I strained to hear him.

  “… have spotted Piero. But not…”

  Francesco recoiled and unintentionally strained his neck, peering to his left at the crowd. “Where is Giuliano?”

  I tensed, agonizingly aware of the assassin at my back, at the soldier standing beside my child. If Giuliano had failed to come, they might well kill us immediately. A pair of urchins behind us hooted at a joke; the monk hushed them.

  I did not hear the Gospel. I heard the priest droning during the sermon but could not interpret his words. The fingers of my right hand hovered at the edge of my belt. Had the soldier or my assassin moved, I would have lashed out blindly.

  Another tide of whispers washed Salvatore’s way. He murmured to Francesco and gestured with his chin at a distant point to his left. “He is here…”

  He is here.

  Here, somewhere near me, beyond my sight or voice, beyond my touch in the moment before I was to die. I did not cry at the knowledge, but I swayed beneath its weight. I looked down at the marble beneath my feet and prayed. Be safe and live. Be safe…

  The priest chanted the Oremus, took the Host, and lifted it toward the crucified Christ in offering.

  Offerimus tibi, Domine…

  Salvatore rested his hand upon the hilt of his sword and leaned toward Francesco. His lips formed a word: Soon.

  As he did so, my assassin leaned in instantly, smoothly, stepping upon my train so that I could not bolt, and pressed his lips to my ear.