The man looked up at them and snatched off his hat. “No celebration, Signore. It is the questares, with the Pope’s letter. If you have sins on your head, sir.”
Michelangelo glanced back at Adriana. “Indulgences. I’d like to see this.”
The church was full and the smell of the tightly packed crowd was disagreeable. Adriana soon lost sight of Michelangelo, and Domenico, though tall, had moved toward the other side of the church and was also no longer visible. Left with her own curiosity, she edged forward until she had a view of the altar on one side of her and the aisle on the other.
A murmur spread like a wave through the mass as a procession came through the main entrance into the nave. At its front, altar boys carried candles and a flag with the insignia of the Church. Two Dominicans followed bearing a monstrance and a wooden chest fitted with brass. A third carried a red-velvet cushion bearing a scroll, sealed and beribboned in purple. The assembly murmured more loudly as it passed.
The monks proceeded to the narrow painted apse of the church and stood in a semicircle under the image of the Christ and two disciples. Two of the monks laid the sacred objects on the high altar, and the leader of the group, a Dominican with a ring of reddish hair around his tonsure, stepped to the center.
“Christians!” he called in a high sharp voice, and silence fell over the church. The murmuring of those outside in the square emphasized the quiet within. The Dominican raised his right hand, which held several rolls of paper. The sleeve of his robe fell back revealing a pelt of red hair on his forearm.
“Christians!” he repeated, “I have passports to lead the human soul to the joys of paradise.” He pointed with his free hand toward the altar where the Papal Bull was propped up on a cushion. “This is your salvation, the remission of all your sins. This is His Holiness’s tap, drawing on the vast spring of mercy granted by God to the Church of Peter. Through this spring any sin can be washed away. Anything! Sins you have committed and sins you will commit. Even sins of your departed loved ones. Some of them are writhing in purgatory right now.”
He seemed to savor the word “writhing.” He took a breath.
“But you can shorten their suffering, or end it, today! As soon as the coin rings in the chest, the soul for whom it is paid will fly out of purgatory and straight to heaven.” He raised his hands dramatically to indicate the direction of heaven. “Have you lain with your neighbor’s wife? Are you stained with adultery? Wash it away! Have you lied or violated the Sabbath or stolen? Wash it away! Even if you have stolen from a church, you can be forgiven. Even for murder. And even for buggery.”
At the word “buggery,” someone giggled.
“Schändung. Gotteslästerung,” a man next to Adriana muttered. She glanced sideways to see a monk in the black woolen habit of an Augustinian. Though he was young, he seemed haggard, his habit soiled and torn. Most likely a pilgrim, she thought. She had seen thousands of his sort in Rome.
“Christians!” the Dominican called out again, drawing her attention back to the altar. In ringing tones he continued his enumeration of every sin Adriana could imagine and several she had not considered. When the monk finished his appeal, he called upon the faithful to sing a hymn of praise while deacons set up a table next to the altar. The wooden chest full of letters was set on it and next to it the brass-bound chest for coins.
Like thread spinning out from a ball of wool, a line formed out of the mass of worshippers and moved toward the table where the monk sat with his pile of letters. One by one the penitents crept with a lit candle up to the altar and confessed while the crowd listened in prurient fascination.
Each sin had a price: adultery and fornication cost four ducats, perjury or robbing a church nine ducats. An accountant sat at table, keeping a tally of the letters sold and at which amount. The brass-bound casket was opened, and as the letters were sold, Adriana could hear the clink of coins ringing in the chest.
“Geldwechsler im Tempel!” The monk next to her muttered again, and though she could not understand German, she shared his apparent disgust.
He glanced at her and shook his head sorrowfully, as if grasping that she sympathized, then made an about-face and elbowed his way back through the crowd. Bored with peasant confessions, Adriana followed him.
Outside the church there was still no sign of Michelangelo or Domenico, but the Augustinian stood at the fountain splashing water onto his face. “Do you speak Italian?” she asked him.
He looked up, surprised, then seemed to recognize her from the crowd. “Half Latin, half Italian, if you don’t mind.”
“You don’t approve of that, do you?” She indicated the church with her head.
“Of granting indulgences for coin? Nowhere does Scripture tell of God’s mercy being available for purchase. Buying an indulgence instead of repenting inwardly imperils the sinner’s soul.” He rubbed his back and pointed toward the stone steps below the fountain. “Please, let’s sit down. I climbed the steps of the Lateran Church yesterday on my hands and knees, praying a Pater noster at each one. I’m weary from it.”
She gathered her skirts and sat next to him. “It’s a way for them to raise money, of course. His Holiness wants to finance a new basilica to house the saints’ bones.”
The monk rubbed his knees again, and she could see now that the front of his habit was worn through and spotted with blood and dirt. He winced. “I care not how he glorifies the edifice that houses the saints’ relics. If holiness adheres to them, as it must, they could be revealed in a barn and still be holy. A contrite man should be able to come to them with a full heart and beg God’s mercy for his guilt.”
“You came to Rome looking to be free of guilt?” She added softly, “I suppose I did too, a long while ago. But I found out I wasn’t guilty after all.”
“We are none of us free of guilt. All of us lead lives full of sin. We are vermin-ridden with it, so many sins we don’t even notice or remember them. But if we don’t remember them, we can’t ask forgiveness for them and they can send us to hell.” There was desperation in his slightly bulging eyes.
Adriana shifted uncomfortably. “I don’t know if it’s that—”
“Let me tell you a story,” he interrupted. “In my youth, I was caught once in a terrible storm, and I know now it was the Hand of God, testing me.”
“A storm? Yes, storms can change people’s lives,” she ventured, but he continued without listening.
“Lightning hit a tree right in front of me and then leapt to me, knocking me unconscious. When I awoke, I felt death in the air and I called out ‘Saint Anne, help me! I will become a monk!’”
“Why Saint Anne?”
“She is the mother of Mary, pure, and the kindest of women to those who are fallen and desperate. But you interrupt me, Lady. I wanted to say that God led me to the cowl, but not to tranquility. No, not at all. The contemplative life only revealed the mortal danger I was in. I fasted and kept vigils, sometimes for days on end, but it was never enough. The devil still came to me daily, nightly, in the smallest of things. Evil thoughts about the brothers, clumsy handling of the Host at mass, misspoken words in the prayers.” He stopped, strain showing on his face.
“Forgive me, but I am not certain if I understand your point.”
“My point is that salvation is not easily won, and certainly not bought with coin. The threat of purgatory and God’s wrath hangs over us, and His devil is ever with us. Indulgences are pernicious because they cause men to avoid true contrition, true destruction of our will before His will. In short, these are empty promises and it is not God’s vicar, but His devil, who tempts men with them.”
“God’s devil? Do you mean—”
“Ah, there you are, Adriana.” Michelangelo squinted at the sky. “We probably should be going. The day is well along.” Domenico was just coming behind him with their horses in hand.
Adriana stood up. “You’re right, of course. I was just talking to…” She turned back to the monk. “You never said you
r name”
The monk stood up beside her and nodded respectfully to the two men. “Brother Martin, from Wittenberg. My family name is Luther.”
*
“It seems absurd,” Adriana said, once the town was behind them. “The indulgence peddlers come from one direction, Carafa’s guardians from another, and in a third place men like Brother Martin live in private terror of God. I don’t know what to think.”
Domenico shook his head. “God will not let us be confounded. Not on a day like today.” He swept his hand in a wide arc over his head. “Look at what He gives us.”
Adriana had to agree. The day was full of life. Jackdaws and thrushes swooped by overhead in pairs. In a copse of trees, a doe and her fawn browsed and leapt away lightly as they neared. Ahead of them a kestrel plummeted like a gray bolt and snatched something small from the ground. The predator rose again on powerful wings, its prey twitching helplessly in the last moments of life. All of nature seemed to play itself out before them in microcosm. But she could find no place in the stark dramas of the land for guilt and redemption.
“It’s gotten hot,” she said suddenly.
“My flask is empty too, but you see? God is looking after his children.” Domenico pointed toward a stream that ran alongside the road. In places where the brush was sparse, sunlight caused it to sparkle. He halted and dismounted. An anomaly of black amidst the color he clambered down the bank, sending up a swarm of butterflies and insects. He knelt by the stream where it flowed over some rocks and filled his flask. Then, in returning, he snatched out flowers from the roadside, leaving their long stems.
“Our own Saint Francis of Assisi,” Adriana remarked gently.
Domenico reached up his flask to Adriana and remounted his horse, one hand full of flowers. While Adriana slowly sipped the cool water, he wove a garland. When it was done, he rode alongside her and placed it on her head. “Isn’t she lovely, Michelangelo? You should paint her as a saint or sibyl. Yes, that’s it! The Borgia sibyl!”
Adriana laughed. “And I think you should paint Domenico as a saint.”
Michelangelo looked back over his shoulder. “I had not planned on saints.”
“Oh, I’d really like to be a saint, Michelo,” Domenico persisted playfully. “Can’t you put in just one little one?”
Michelangelo shook his head. “A saint must create a miracle. Do you think you can come up with one?”
“Why not? Adriana said. “Healing the sick with song? That would suit you.”
“Well, let’s see.” Domenico stroked his beardless chin, miming deep thought. “If I could really choose, if an angel asked me what miraculous thing I would want to do on earth, I would say, ‘Let me be a father.’ That’s how I’d like to please God, by founding a great lineage of people to glorify him.”
“Fatherhood?” Adriana repeated, astonished. She had never discussed his castration and did not want to now, preferring to let the subject pass. “Well, if there have been miracles before on earth, there can be this one too. We’ll leave it at that.”
Michelangelo seemed to have no patience for their banter. “Please inform me when God has made you a father and I’ll make you a saint.”
XXVII
Paris de Grassis sat on his horse at the foot of the Pont Sant’ Angelo, furious that he had to wait like a knave for his chorister. He searched for a bird with which to compare the castrato and could find none. “Peacock” implied he was vain, which he was not, no more than any other young bravo. And “capon” described his condition, but said nothing of his beauty. De Grassis sighed.
Yes, he was well and truly beautiful. Everyone found him so, even those who bitterly envied him his voice. And here he was again defying the rules of the Sistine Choir. He had been granted leave to miss a day in the chapel on the understanding that he was in pious company and would return at night. He did not return, and de Grassis had the very unpleasant sense of being tricked.
He longed for the time when the only sopranos in the choir were boys, youngsters who could be controlled, even thrashed if it was necessary, though it rarely was. But this Spanish castrato was a puzzle. He seemed genuinely submissive to papal authority, but he kept stepping over the line, slipping away for… Well, it did not bear thinking for what. De Grassis’s forbearance was wearing thin.
Ah, finally. There he was, approaching the bridge over the Tiber with two other people, Michelangelo and…? De Grassis felt his face warm with disgust when he recognized that the other one was Adriana Borgia.
He signaled the guard waiting with him and spurred his horse to meet the three of them at the center of the bridge. “Domenico Raggi, you have ignored the restrictions placed on you by the Curia. I am to escort you to your proper quarters to answer for it.”
Adriana urged her horse forward. “Maestro de Grassis, Signor Raggi was my guest at a supper party and he performed as a musician. He has done nothing wrong.”
“That will be for me to judge, Signora Borgia,” he said coolly. As for you, Signor Buonarroti, His Holiness has instructed me to advise you to attend him. I suggest you take that request as urgent.”
“Thank you, Maestro de Grassis,” Michelangelo replied, unmoved.
Domenico looked toward his companions. “I’m sorry, Adriana, Michelo. I’ll send word later.” He nodded toward the Master of Ceremonies and turned his horse away from the group toward the Sistine Chapel basement.
*
Minutes later, Michelangelo confronted the guard who barred his way to the Sistine Chapel. “What’s going on here?”
The halberdier was tall, as were all the men in the new Swiss Guard, and rendered the more imposing by his Spanish helmet, topped with a high curved blade and a cockscomb of red feathers. He stood with his feet apart in a stance between attention and ease, an elaborate halberd held diagonally across his chest, the haft resting on the protruding vertical crease of his cuirass. His pose was formal and his uniform gaudy, with broad ribbons of orange and red hanging from his waist to his knee. He stared past them into the distance.
“Why is the chapel blocked?” Adriana asked.
Michelangelo poked the soldier’s shiny cuirass with two fingers. “You know who I am. Get out of my way.”
The guard replied emotionlessly, his Swiss accent hardening the Italian consonants. “I am sorry, Signore. The Holy Father has ordered the chapel closed to all but himself.”
“His Papal Majesty seems to be put out about something,” Michelangelo said to Adriana. “This is exactly the sort of crap I’ve been subject to for half a year. It’s maddening.” He rubbed the space between his eyebrows. “I’m sorry, Adriana. You’ve come all this way for nothing.”
“Don’t worry, Michelo. I have to look after my housemaster’s marketing in any case. We can do this another time.”
“All right. The least I can do then is accompany you to the Navona market. It’s not a place for you to go wandering around alone.”
“Shouldn’t you obey His Holiness first?”
He took her by the arm and urged her toward the staircase again. “It can wait. I’ve had enough of obedience lately.”
*
Adriana had not been to the market at the Piazza Navona in years. But the confusion of sounds, of goats bleating, hawkers crying their wares, farmers loading and unloading wagons, was exactly as she remembered it. They tied their horses up at the periphery and wandered along the narrow pathways between the stalls.
There was no sign of Jacopo near the grain merchants, and Adriana resigned herself to the fact that she would have to look for him at the butchers’ corner, the most disagreeable part of the market.
They made their way to the far end of the oval market, where the odors were strongest from the freshly slaughtered animals, the horse dung swept perfunctorily aside, and the ever-present urine.
There were several butcher’s stalls, but clearly one family was favored, with multiple customers all trying to buy meat at the same time. An elderly couple stood at the rear tending a
small stove while four young men struggled with livestock in a corral in front. Jacopo was just directing one of them who straddled a newly slaughtered ram and was handing up portions of viscera to another man to wrap. Blood still trickled from the open throat of the ram and ran in a narrow channel to the side of the piazza. The young man glanced up at Adriana and Michelangelo as he wiped a bloodstained hand on his own bare chest.
At her side, she felt Michelangelo suddenly react. He took hold of her arm and said quietly, “I’ve got to go. Your housemaster is here and you’re safe. Good-bye, then.” Without waiting for a reply, he hurried away.
“Michelo, where are you going?” she called after him, but he disappeared into the crowd without looking back.
“Ah, Madonna, it’s you.” Jacopo, the housemaster, turned at the sound of her voice. “Lady, you should not trouble yourself to come here. You’ll only dirty your shoes. The wagon is tied up in the Corsia Agonale. Let me finish this purchase and I’ll meet you there.”
Adriana peered out over the market where Michelangelo had disappeared, then back at the young butcher. He scratched the side of his beardless face and Adriana saw that that half his index finger was missing. Only a stub up to the first knuckle remained.
*
“Holiness, why am I barred from my workplace?” Michelangelo kissed the Pontiff’s ring with cursory deference and rose immediately.
Julius’s face darkened. “Do not pretend innocence. You left your assistants idle for two days,” he growled, putting emphasis on the word “two.”
“What? That’s what provoked Your Holiness’s wrath?” Michelangelo could not keep his voice from rising in pitch. “We’ve been working without stop for months and we’re all exhausted. I simply granted us all two days’ respite.”
“Maestro de Grassis tells me you also took my chapel singer.”
Sistine Heresy Page 18