“More proof, I should say, of your irreverent city. Not that more proof is necessary.” A group of revelers pushed past them, laughing and screeching. “This is like being in a house of lunatics.”
“Would you like to go elsewhere?”
“Yes.”
Alessandra’s gaze alighted on a row of food stalls. “Shall we dine on the lagoon?”
On the unprotected shore the air was brisk, but the solitude and tranquility of the small island was a welcome change. Antonio and Alessandra sat on a sun-warmed spit of sand not far from where the water gently lapped at the island’s edge. The gondolier Antonio had hired that morning stayed in his craft, looking out at the nearby island of Giudecca. Gondoliers must spend a great deal of time in their boats, Antonio thought, wondering how they occupied themselves when they weren’t rowing. No sooner had the thought occurred to him than the gondolier provided an answer: he plumped a few cushions and lay back for a well-deserved nap.
“This seems a charmed place,” Antonio said as Alessandra unwrapped the packages of food, revealing a roasted capon, sardines with lemon and herbs, a loaf of bread, a plum tart. A strand of hair blew across her bare face—they’d both removed their masks as soon as they were out on the lagoon—and he stifled an urge to brush it away.
“When I was a child, I used to come here with my brother and my cousins,” she said.
“Not anymore?”
“My cousins moved to Padua some years ago.”
Antonio remembered the sad fate of her father and brother. “Do you have any other family here?”
“No.” She untied the narrow leather case she wore at her waist and took out a set of cutlery. “I hope you don’t object to sharing,” she said, handing him a knife.
“Not at all. Your mother is gone also?” Antonio asked. “Or perhaps you don’t want to talk about it.”
“No, I don’t mind. It was a long time ago, or so it seems. She died when I was eight, in childbed. I witnessed it. I guess they thought because I was a girl I should know what birth was like, but it was terrifying. The child was breach, and my mother was frail—both she and the baby died. When you were here last, you asked me why I had no children. I didn’t tell you the whole truth. I take precautions because I am afraid of being with child.”
“Understandable, given your experience,” Antonio said. “Dare I ask, while you are so unguarded, if you are partial to the life you lead?”
“There are worse fates than becoming a courtesan. I never cared much about being married, like other girls. I think that in some ways I am deficient—I have never loved, in the romantic sense. So perhaps the life I have chosen is best.” She tore a piece off the loaf of bread and offered it to him. “And you? Do you have a family?”
“Three older sisters, all well married. But I have not seen them these nine years.”
“That’s a long time.”
“Yes,” Antonio agreed, though he did not explain.
“Have you a wife or mistress?”
Why was she asking? He gave Alessandra a sidelong glance, but her expression was as disinterested as ever. “Like you, I cannot love,” he admitted. “For I know it only as the prelude to disaster.”
“But how can that be?”
“It’s a long story.”
“I like long stories.”
Antonio paused. In the past nine years, he’d not told anyone this tale. He had a sudden, vivid memory of his father, his mother, of the ancient oak tree that stood on a rise just outside his childhood home. Alessandra made him think of things he had not thought about in a long time, things he didn’t necessarily want to think about, but he pushed aside his misgivings and began.
“When I was sixteen, I bested my father at swordplay,” Antonio said. “He realized then that he had no more to teach me, and so arranged for my tutelage with Don Gaspar Ortiz y Vega de la Vasquez. He lived on the other side of Utrillo, the main town in my family’s fiefdom. I had to ride two miles to the town, then another four miles past, then through a grove of walnut trees to get to his house.
“Don Gaspar was a successful sword master. He had helped train the king’s guard, and he had written a treatise on sword fighting that was very popular in Spain. He had been away for many years, then come back to Navarre with his daughter. His small estate was approached by a gravel path that came out of the walnut grove and widened into a clearing where the house stood. It was a fine house of rose-colored stone, with a large arch at the center that led to an inner courtyard, and four large windows and balconies spaced along the second floor.
“The first day, when I rode out of the walnut grove into the clearing, I looked up to see a figure standing at one of the center windows. It was a girl, very solemn, staring down at me. She was the most beautiful girl I’d ever seen. I sat there on my horse, forgetting everything else, not moving, just staring at her for what seemed a long time. She was so beautiful, and yet if I describe her, you might say there was nothing so special about her: she had black hair, and rosy lips, and dark eyes that were uncommonly still and deep. What made her truly beautiful were her ears. Her hair was pulled back, so I could see them clearly, small and perfectly formed, like delicate shells. She was like a rare creature one seldom sees, reminding me of a doe I’d once come across in the forest. She had that same gentle, serious expression, as if I’d surprised her, but also as if she’d been expecting me. And she was equally skittish, for she suddenly stepped back from the window and disappeared from my sight.
“And just as well, as Don Gaspar had appeared in the courtyard and was striding toward me. He was older than I’d expected, with gray hair and a small, neat gray beard, but very trim and fit. He had an elegant manner, precise in its courtesy, and he was always attendant to the correct forms of address. He greeted me and showed me into the studio, which we entered from the courtyard. I could hardly hear a word he said, could hardly speak, because of the vision I’d seen.
“But as we began the lessons, I came to my senses. How hard I fought, thinking that she might be somewhere nearby, watching. How I suffered every time I made the slightest mistake, fearful that she had witnessed my ineptitude! It was glorious and terrible. Every time I rallied against my master, I felt a triumph unlike any other I’d ever known; and when I failed, I experienced such despair, as though I would never be happy again. Of course I did not know, on that first day, that Don Gaspar was going easy on me as he developed a sense of my skill and level of training, or that my new master had an inexhaustible supply of moves and feints, more than I could ever hope to learn. Thank the heavens for my ignorance; if I’d known how easily he could best me, I might never have come back. Or perhaps I should curse my ignorance, for if I had never gone back…” Antonio paused as his eyes clouded over, then shook his head and continued.
“This went on for months. Each day as I arrived, I would see her standing at the window, and all through my lessons I would be aware of her presence somewhere in the house, but never see her; she never came back to the window as I was leaving. I learned her name, Ephegenia, and I would find myself saying it over and over, savoring it in my mouth like a taste I could not get enough of. Sunday, when I had no lessons, was torture; I spent the whole day practicing in secret, waiting only for Monday to arrive. I grew jealous of any others who took lessons with Don Gaspar, jealous that they might see her and love her as I did. I began to despair. Some days I thought I was in love with a vision, not a woman, for although I spent almost every afternoon with Don Gaspar, he never once mentioned his daughter to me.
“After I had been his student for many months, he invited me and my family to his house for a Sunday supper. To celebrate and acknowledge my superior skill, he said. I was surprised because Don Gaspar could still best me; but he insisted that I was his finest pupil, and that my family should be proud of me. You can imagine how excited I was. Surely, on an occasion such as that, I would meet Ephegenia, we would be formally introduced.
“The great day arrived, and with my family I j
oined Don Gaspar in his home. But when Ephegenia was presented to me, she offered nothing more than the brief, polite comments she’d given to my parents and my sisters. For the rest of the afternoon, she did not speak to me or even look at me. By the time we left, I was devastated. I realized that I had only imagined the feelings she had for me. I thought I’d seen something in her eyes, as she looked down at me from her window, only to discover that it had been a boy’s folly. I wasn’t certain that I would ever recover from my own foolishness.
“I almost didn’t return to my lessons. It was with a heavy heart that I approached the house the next day, not with the mixture of joy and anxiety that I had felt so many times before, a sensation that had become the most important of my life. She was not standing in the window, and I was almost glad of it, for surely she would have seen the sadness and disappointment in my face.
“I was terrible at my lessons that day, so clumsy and mindless that Don Gaspar gave me a good scratch without even trying. I think he was more upset about it than I was. I was so dispirited, I hardly cared. He yelled at me, saying that if I could do no better, I should leave.
“So I left, feeling as if I wanted to die: my mind was in turmoil, my heart in despair. I was untying my horse at the front of the house when a walnut fell out of the sky and landed at my feet. It was odd—the trees were too far away for the nuts to be blown hither, even with a strong wind. Then I realized it had not come from the grove, but from behind me. I turned and looked up, and there she was, in the window. She gave a barely perceptible nod, and I understood that she had thrown the walnut, and that I was to pick it up. When I did so, I saw that the shell was hollow. I pulled the two halves apart and inside found a bit of white cloth, folded very carefully into a tiny square. I unfolded it. In the center of the cloth was a beautifully embroidered heart of red silk.
“It took a moment for me to comprehend the significance of this. I looked back at Ephegenia. She stood as still and silent as ever, then she lightly touched her right hand to her heart. The expression on her face changed ever so slightly, not a smile, but somehow a brightening. This was all I needed to understand her meaning.
“She loved me. I wanted to leap into the air, to shout, to sing—but instead I tried to preserve my youthful dignity. I bowed low, then held the cloth to my chest, to show her I would always keep her heart next to my own. And for the first time, I saw her smile. In such a way did she transport me from death to life once again.
“I jumped on my horse and raced home. I couldn’t wait to tell my father the news. I found him in his study and announced that I wanted to marry Ephegenia Ortiz. What he told me in return would lead to the destruction of all our lives.
“I could not marry her, my father said, because she was betrothed to another. And who was this man? None other than the duke of Girrón. I will not exaggerate and say he was our most hated enemy, but there was no love lost between us. The duke was our neighbor to the south; our lands and his shared a border. He had been unfairly claiming rights to some of our lands for years. At first, he had tried to convince my father to sell this land to him, but when my father would not agree, Girrón tried to take it from him. That he had not been able to do so made him angry and bitter, and our encounters with him in the town were generally less than pleasant. Girrón was much older than Ephegenia or I; he was a widower with two children, one of whom was nearly Ephegenia’s age, fifteen.
“When my father told me that the duke was going to marry Ephegenia, I was overcome with jealousy and rage. When he pointed out that the duke was much richer than we were, with many men-at-arms, horses, fine houses, and so on, and could provide Ephegenia with things I could not, it just made me angrier. He also reminded me that the dowries for my three sisters had emptied his pockets, and that it would be necessary for me to marry a rich girl. ‘Although Ephegenia is a fine girl, of a respectable family, she is not rich,’ he said. ‘Even if she were not already betrothed, I would have to advise against it.’
“I had gone from death to life to death again in one day. That my beloved father did not understand the depth of my love for Ephegenia only added to my despair. He thought I could be dissuaded by another suitor, or by the need for money, but I refused to be put off so easily. I would devise a way to speak to Ephegenia, to meet with her in secret. After all, she had given me her heart. Surely she despised this proposed marriage as much as I did.
“The next day, she was waiting at the window as always. I was prepared. I had written a note and put it in the walnut shell. When I held it up for her to see, she opened the window, and I quickly threw it inside. In the note, I’d written that I’d wait for her in the walnut grove after my lesson. I knew that Don Gaspar tutored another student after me, and would be occupied. Still, she would have to sneak out past her duenna and the servants. I told her I would wait there every day, until she came.
“Three days later, she finally arrived. Our meeting was so strange—at first it felt like a dream to hear her speak again, to be so close to her. I kissed her hand, and knelt before her, and told her I would lay down my life for her. She burst into tears when she spoke of her upcoming marriage to the duke. For a few weeks, we went on so: I would wait every day, and she would meet me when she could. Finally we could not bear it anymore, and we decided that we must elope.
“Sometimes now I wonder what I was thinking. It seems to me I wasn’t thinking—for certainly our plan was only half a plan at best. I left my home in the middle of the night and rode to Ephegenia’s house to find her waiting for me, as we’d agreed, in the walnut grove. She was shivering with cold and fear. But when she got on my horse, and put her arms around me, and we rode away, I believe we were happier than we’d ever been in our lives. And so we were, for the next few hours that it took to ride to Utrillo and then Pamplona.
“I had stayed at an inn in Pamplona with my father, and there we were headed—beyond that, I’m not quite certain what we proposed to do, except find a priest who would agree to marry us. I suppose we believed that if the deed was done, our families would be forced to accept it. But we had no sooner arrived at the inn than we were caught up with, first by my father and Don Gaspar.
“My father had noticed my absence soon after I’d gone, and quickly understood the reason for my late-night departure. My feelings were apparently not as concealed as I’d thought. He rode to Ephegenia’s house and woke her father, who was ready to leave within minutes. Riding hard, they nearly overtook us on the road to Pamplona. They were angry and upset, of course, and we were heartbroken by such a terrible end to our escape. Ephegenia was crying hysterically as Don Gaspar took her away.
“But our bad luck did not end there. A few of Girrón’s men had seen us when we had earlier passed through Utrillo. Not long after my father arrived, so did the duke, full of fury and demanding satisfaction.
“Although my father explained to the duke that he had discovered us before we had eloped, the duke insisted upon a duel of honor. I had despoiled his intended bride, he said. Although I hadn’t done what he suggested, I was eager to fight him, but my father wouldn’t allow it.
“‘He is a boy of seventeen,’ my father told Girrón, ‘and you are a man of much experience. It will be easy for you to take him, and it will add no luster to your reputation. Surely there is another way for us to satisfy you.’
“My father offered the duke the lands he had so long been coveting. But the duke wouldn’t have it—he wanted a fight. I argued with my father to let me fight Girrón, but he refused. And so my father and the duke drew swords.
“In his day, my father was an excellent sword fighter, but he had not been in a duel for many years. Girrón was a brute, always in one dispute or another, and rumors said that he had made many a man a corpse. It was clear, very quickly, that Girrón had the upper hand. I tried to step in to help my father, but his men held me back. And that is how I watched my father die: first with a jab to the stomach, then one in each arm—I think the duke was tormenting him, tormenting me
—then the killing thrust through the throat. As my father lay dying, he could not even speak to me any last words.
“After my father took his final breath, I stood and drew my sword. Girrón’s men moved toward me, but the duke waved them away.
“‘Behold the new viscount,’ he said. He wiped my father’s blood from his sword and faced me. ‘The last viscount of Utrillo-Navarre, I’d wager—and the one with the shortest rule.’
“I knew he was going to kill me, but I didn’t care. My father was dead, on my account, and Ephegenia was gone—I knew I would never see her again. My life, as I’d known it, was over. But perhaps that—that and all I’d learned from Don Gaspar in the past year—saved me, for I fought as I had never fought before, without fear of pain or death. And the duke was complacent; he did not expect such a fierce combatant. It seemed that every feint he made, I countered with a thrust, wounding him three times, even leaving a long cut along his cheek. Then, growing bolder, I stabbed him in each arm, as he’d done to my father. By this time, the duke was worried, and his men were getting restless. I realized then that I was all alone; even if I killed the duke, there would be four of them left for me to fight, should they choose to avenge their leader. And then Girrón made a foolhardy move. Perhaps he was tired, or perhaps I had wounded him more seriously than I’d thought. In any event, he left his chest unguarded, and I ran him through. He fell, clutching his heart, and expired in seconds.
“Just as Girrón’s men were about to close in, other men who had been watching our duel came forward to my defense. One was the duke of Ossuna, who then and there took me under his protection. He had seen the entire encounter and would proclaim my innocence to any court; I had the right to avenge my father, he said. I could not but be grateful to him for this; and since there was little left for me in Navarre, I went with him to Sicily, where he was viceroy for a few years, and then to Naples.
The Rossetti Letter (v5) Page 20