“Monna Lisa,” he whispered. Had he not uttered those two words, I would have taken up the dagger. “When I signal, fall.”
I could not breathe. I parted my lips and took in air through my mouth and watched as the priest’s assistant moved to the altar and began to fill the chalice with wine. Francesco’s hand hovered at his hip.
The second assistant stepped forward with a decanter of water.
“Now,” Salai whispered, and pressed something hard and blunt against my back, beneath the ribs, to make it appear as though he were delivering a fatal thrust.
Wordless, I sank to the cool marble.
Beside me, Francesco cried out and dropped to his knees just as he drew his knife; it clattered beside him on the floor. I pushed myself up to sit. Salai’s army of street urchins streamed forward, surrounding the soldier. One knifed him in the back and pulled him down so that a second could slash his throat.
The world erupted in a chorus of shrieks. I clawed to my feet, screaming Matteo’s name, cursing my tangled skirts. The orphans had swarmed him and his nursemaid; I pulled my father’s stiletto free and lurched toward them. My son was nestled in the arms of one of the monks from the Ospedale degli Innocenti.
“Lisa!” he cried. “Lisa, come with us.”
The bells in the campanile began to ring. A frantic nobleman and his wife ran past, almost knocking me down. I stayed on my feet as a wave of other panicked worshipers followed. “Leonardo, take him!” I shouted. “I will follow, I will follow-only go!”
He turned reluctantly and ran. I held my ground despite the fleeing crowd, and turned back to Francesco.
He had fallen onto his side and hip; Salai had wounded him and kicked his knife away. He was helpless.
“Lisa,” he said. His eyes were feral, terrified. “What good will it serve? What good?”
What good, indeed? I crouched down and approached him with the dagger raised overhand-the wrong way. Salai would not have approved. But I wanted to bring it down the way Francesco de’ Pazzi had brought his weapon down on Lorenzo’s brother: wildly, carelessly, with a spasm of fury, with a spray of crimson, with a thousand blows for each wrong done. I would have spared no piece of his flesh.
Entrapped my father
Murdered my loved ones
Stole my life and my child
“You aren’t my husband,” I said bitterly. “You never were. For the sake of my true husband, I will kill you.” I leaned down.
And he struck first. With a small blade, hidden in his fist. It bit into the flesh just beneath my left ear and would have sliced quickly to my right. But before it reached center I pulled away, astonished, and sat back on my haunches.
“Bitch,” he croaked. “Did you think I would let you ruin it all?” He sagged to the floor, still alive, and glared at me with hatred.
I put a hand to my throat and drew it away. It was the color of garnets-a dark necklace, Francesco’s final gift.
I can bleed to death here, I thought. I can have my revenge. I can kill Francesco now and bleed to death and they will find me later, here, dead atop his corpse.
I chose not to kill him.
I heard a roaring in my ears, the sound of the tide. Like Giuliano in Francesco’s lie, I was drowning, as surely as if I had fallen into the Arno from the Ponte Santa Trinità. Fallen, and sunk deep. And I had descended to a place, finally, where my emotions were still.
I did not worry for Matteo. I knew he was safe in his grandfather’s arms. I did not worry for myself, I did not try to flee my attackers; I knew that I was no longer their target. I did not worry about Francesco or my hatred of him. I would let God and the authorities deal with him; it was not my place. I knew my place now.
Dear God, I prayed. Let me rescue Giuliano.
Through a miracle, I rose.
My body was agonizingly leaden, moving as if through water, but I willed it to do the impossible: I moved in the direction Salvatore de’ Pazzi had gone, to go in search of my beloved. The stiletto was heavy; my hand trembled with the effort to hold it.
I heard his voice.
Lisa! Lisa, where are you?
Husband, I am coming. I opened my mouth to cry out, but my voice was no more than an anguished wheeze, lost in the roar of the flood.
The waters inside the cathedral were murky; I could scarcely see the wavering images of fighters against a dizzying backdrop of innocents in flight. There were orphans here-filthy lads with small glinting blades-and men with wielded swords, peasants and priests and noblemen, but I could make no sense of it. My hearing faded until the frenzied chiming of the bells sank to nothingness. In the river, all was silent.
Sunlight streamed in from the open door leading to the Via de’ Servi, and in its shaft, I saw him: Giuliano. He wore a monk’s robes. His cowl was thrown back, revealing his dark curling hair and a beard I had never seen. In his hand was a long sword, the point tilted toward the ground as he rushed forward. He was entirely a man; in my absence, he had aged. His features, pleasingly irregular, were taut and limned with faint bitterness.
He was amazing, and beautiful, and gave me back my heart.
But I was no longer here to surrender to emotion: I was here to redeem the transgressions of others. I was here to accomplish what should have been done almost two decades ago: stop the murder of innocents.
And I saw him, Salvatore, Francesco de’ Pazzi’s son, fighting his way through the onslaught of fleeing worshipers, holding his sword at his side. He was moving toward Giuliano.
But Giuliano did not see him. Giuliano saw only me. His eyes were lights from a distant shore; his face was a beacon. He mouthed my name.
I yearned to go to him, but I could not make the mistakes Anna Lucrezia, Leonardo, the elder Giuliano, made. I could not yield to my passion. I forced my gaze from Giuliano’s face and kept it fastened on Salvatore. It was impossible to walk, yet I staggered behind him. I stayed on my feet, despite the pull of the escaping crowd. God granted a miracle: I did not fall. I did not faint or die. I half ran.
As I neared both men, Giuliano’s joyous brilliance faded to concern, then alarm. He now saw the blood spilling from my throat, soaking my bodice. He did not see Salvatore approaching from the side; he saw only me, following. He did not see Salvatore an arm’s length away, raising his sword, ready to bring it down, to kill Lorenzo’s most loved son.
But I saw. And had I possessed the strength, I would have thrown my body between the two men. I would have taken the blow meant for my beloved. But I could not reach him in time; I could not step between the two men. I could only surge forward, using all the air that remained in my lungs, and close in on Salvatore from behind.
And in the instant that Salvatore raised his blade, in the instant before he brought it down upon Giuliano, I reached farther than was possible. With the dagger, I found the soft spot beneath Salvatore’s ribs and buried it there.
I remembered the painting on the wall of the Bargello of Bernardo Baroncelli. I remembered the ink drawing of him dangling from the rope, his dead face downcast, still stamped with remorse. And I whispered:
“Here, traitor.”
Relieved, I let go a sigh. Giuliano was alive, standing in dappled sunlight on the banks of the Arno, waiting with his arms open. I sank into them and down, down where the waters are deepest and black.
EPILOGUE
Lisa
JULY 1498
LXXI
I did not die, nor did Francesco. The blow I dealt Salvatore de’ Pazzi downed him, and as he lay bleeding, he was killed by another.
His mercenaries, who rode into the Piazza della Signoria at the chiming of the bells, were met by formidable opposition. Upon encountering Piero’s men-and upon learning that Salvatore would not arrive to incite the crowd against the Medici and lead the storming of the palazzo and the overthrow of the Signoria-the mercenaries disbanded and fled.
Messer Iacopo never was avenged.
It was not time, my husband explained, for the Medici to retur
n to power in Florence; there was insufficient support in the Signoria. Piero had learned the wisdom of patience. But the time will come. The time will come.
I have learned, to my amusement, that Francesco has told everyone in Florence that I am still his wife, that I have merely gone to stay in the country with my child because of nerves caused by the fright I experienced in the Duomo. He used his wits and connections to escape the noose, but he is disgraced. He will never serve in the government again.
At last I am in Rome with Giuliano and Matteo. It is hotter here, with fewer clouds and less rain. Mists and fog are less common than in Florence; the sun reveals everything in sharp, crisp relief.
Leonardo has come to visit us now that I have regained some of my strength. I am sitting for him again-despite the bandage on my neck-and I am beginning to think he will never be satisfied with the painting. He alters it constantly, saying that my reunion with Giuliano will be reflected in my expression. He promises that he will not remain in Milan forever; when he fulfills his obligations to the Duke, he will come to Rome, with Giuliano as his patron.
Shortly after Leonardo’s arrival, when I first sat for him in Giuliano’s Roman palazzo, I asked him about my mother. The instant he had told me I was his child, I knew it was true. Because I had always looked for another man’s face in my reflection, I had never seen his. Yet I looked on his features, in feminine form, every time I smiled down at my image on the gessoed panel.
He had indeed been smitten with Giuliano-until, through Lorenzo, he met Anna Lucrezia. He never expressed his feelings to her because he had sworn never to take a wife, lest it interfere with his art or his studies. But the emotion became quite uncontrollable, and when he first realized my mother and Giuliano were lovers-that evening on the shadowy Via de’ Gori, when he had first yearned to paint her-he was overtaken by jealousy. He could, he confessed, have killed Giuliano himself at that moment.
And the following morning in the Duomo, that jealousy distracted him from sensing the tragedy about to occur.
That was why he had never told anyone about his discovery-shortly after coming to Santissima Annunziata as the Medici’s agent-that my father was the penitent in the Duomo. How could he arrest a man for yielding to jealousy, when he himself had been so tormented by it? It had made no sense; nor did it make sense to pain me unnecessarily with such news.
When the murder occurred, Leonardo had been devastated. And on the day of Giuliano’s funeral at San Lorenzo, he had left the sanctuary, overwhelmed, and gone out to the churchyard to silently vent his sorrow. There he found my weeping mother and confessed his guilt and his love to her. Shared grief bound them together, and beneath its sway they lost themselves.
“And see what misery my passion caused for your mother, and for you,” he said. “I could not let you make the same error. I would not risk telling you Giuliano was alive, for fear you would try to contact him and endanger him and yourself.”
I looked out the window at the relentless sunshine. “Why didn’t you tell me this from the beginning?” I pressed gently. “Why did you let me think I was Giuliano’s child?”
“Because I wanted you to have full rights as a Medici; they could care far better for you than a poor artist. It harmed no one and gave Lorenzo joy on his deathbed.” His expression grew sadly tender. “Most of all, I did not want to tarnish the memory of your mother. She was a woman of great virtue. She confessed to me that, in all the time she was with Giuliano, she would not bed him-though all the world believed she had. Such was her loyalty to her husband; and so her shame, when she lay with me, was all the greater.
“Why should I confess that she and I-a sodomite, no less-were lovers, and risk damaging the respect due her?”
“I respect her no less,” I said. “I love you both.”
He smiled brilliantly.
I will send the portrait back with Leonardo when he returns to Milan. And when he finishes it-if he ever does-neither I nor Giuliano will accept it. I want him to keep it.
For he has only Salai. But if he takes the painting, my mother and I will always be with him.
I, on the other hand, have Giuliano and Matteo. And each time I gaze into the looking glass, I will see my mother and father.
And I will smile.
A Conversation with Jeanne Kalogridis
Could you tell us a little bit about your background and when you decided that you wanted to lead a literary life?
I was a shy, scrawny, unpopular kid with frizzy hair and thick glasses; since I had no social life, I read. I adored dark fantasy and science fiction, and I was writing my own stories as soon as I could hold a pencil. My mom and sisters were always dragging me to the mall on weekends, so while they shopped, I hung in the local bookstore. I think the defining moment for me came when I picked up a copy of Ray Bradbury’s The Illustrated Man in a Waldenbooks. His writing was so beautiful, so lyrical… I decided then I wanted to write like that.
“Of course, I had heard of The Da Vinci Code-who hasn”t?’
Who are some of your favorite authors?
Margaret Atwood, Angela Carter, Philippa Gregory, Tracy Chevalier, and Chuck Palahniuk.
Is there a book that most influenced your life or inspired you to become a writer?
The Illustrated Man by Ray Bradbury. And his The Martian Chronicles. When I worked on my first novel, I bought new copies of those books and consciously tried to imitate his style.
You have already authored a historical novel about Renaissance Italy , The Borgia Bride. What was the inspiration for I, Mona Lisa?
Italy at the turn of the sixteenth century is pure gold for an author. The times were turbulent, the advances in the art world amazing, the characters mesmerizing. I fell in love with the period while writing The Borgia Bride. When I started reading about Renaissance Florence, I realized I had to write a novel set there. Of course, I had heard of The Da Vinci Code-who hasn’t? In every bookstore, Mona Lisa’s eyes were staring at me. I began to wonder about the woman who had posed for Leonardo’s painting. The more I read about her, the more intrigued I became.
Do you scrupulously adhere to historical fact in your novels, or do you take liberties if the story can benefit from the change?
I scrupulously adhere to historical fact. If a fact is recorded, I don’t contradict it. I do take liberties in writing possible scenes behind the scenes, and in giving the characters motivation to explain their actions. We can never really know what the characters were thinking or what they really intended; that’s where fiction enters the story.
And to what extent did you stick to the facts in writing I, Mona Lisa? How did you conduct your research?
Let me answer the second question first. While I rely on the Internet, I don’t trust everything I read online-I use the Web to direct me to published experts on the topic. Then it’s off to a bookstore or a university library, where I usually check out thirty or forty titles on my subject.
Now, for the first question: I was forced to speculate more while writing I, Mona Lisa for the simple reason that little is known about Lisa Gherardini. While I adhered to my historical time line-to the very day, where the Medici and other historical figures were involved-I took advantage of the freedom offered by Lisa’s relative anonymity. This allowed me to involve her in a conspiracy.
“We’ve seen the Mona Lisa’s image so often that we dont’t really see it anymore.”
What is it about Mona Lisa that you hoped to reveal to your readers?
We’ve seen the Mona Lisa’s image so often that we don’t really see it anymore. It’s been copied so inelegantly so many times that she now seems homely, even mannish. If you look at a fine print of the original and try to forget all the cartoonish rendering of it, you’ll begin to see the breathtaking beauty of the woman who posed for it.
I wanted people to lose their jaded reaction to that person. I would like them to realize that they’re looking at a five-hundred-year-old image of a real woman who left her session with Leonardo
and lived a real life.
Why do you think readers are so drawn to historical fiction?
Because history is fascinating-and fact is often stranger than fiction. Also, readers of historical fiction love to learn, and this permits us to do so in a very enjoyable way.
What do you see when you look at the Mona Lisa? Please share a few thoughts about your reaction to da Vinci’s famous portrait.
As I mentioned above, when you stare at a fine print of the original-I have one, and I stared at it every day that I worked on the novel-you begin to see the woman’s true beauty. And you see how fine and elegant and tender Leonardo’s rendering was. She literally melts into the shadows. But bear in mind that we are looking at a painting that, sadly, is distorted by an ugly yellow film and was retouched by insensitive “artists” over the centuries. I read Vasari’s comments about the painting, written fifty years after Mona Lisa was painted. He describes the fresh bloom of pink on Lisa’s lips, the blush on her cheeks, the vein in her neck that seems almost to be beating. He speaks of the very pores from which her eyebrows emerge. All of those details have been lost, but when I look at the portrait now, I try to imagine them.
Who are some of your favorite historical figures?
My namesake, Joan (in French, Jeanne) of Arc-yes, she was deluded, but she kicked butt and made a man a king. I read a lot of biographies of strong women when I was growing up; I admired Marie Curie, Elizabeth Blackwell (first female M.D. in the U.S.), Elizabeth I, Boudicca (who gave the Imperial Roman army a run for its money), Jane Addams, and Susan B. Anthony.
Painting Mona Lisa aka I, Mona Lisa Page 48