by Karen Essex
Beatrice stepped into her chariot, taking the reins from the attendant who would ride behind the royal sisters on his horse. She waited for the man to help Isabella onto the seat beside her. She clicked the reins, slowly guiding the horse into the street.
“Isabella, there is something you do not understand about me. For you, immortality is at the end of a paintbrush. For me, it is at the end of my husband’s cock.”
Isabella was stunned to hear such words coming from her sister.
“I will achieve immortality through the births of my sons.” She flicked her whip at her horse, signaling to Isabella that the conversation was over.
FROM THE NOTEBOOK OF LEONARDO:
Drawn by great curiosity and eager desire, wishing to see the various and strange shapes made by nature, I wandered some distance among gloomy, overhanging rocks, coming to the entrance of a large cave. I stood in front if it for some time, kneeling and shading my eyes, stupefied and amazed, for I did not have prior knowledge of its existence. Suddenly, two things arose in me—fear and desire. Fear of the menacing darkness of the cave, and desire to see if there was any marvelous thing inside it.
JUNE 1493; IN THE TERRITORY OF MANTUA
ISABELLA wakes from her nap on the boat, soft summer light warming her cheek. She must have been asleep for some time. The sun has moved enough so that the canvas tent over her head is no longer keeping her shaded. The afternoon sun is high in the air, the breeze is still, and she has been waiting for Beatrice, she estimates, for several hours. The nap has taken the edge off of her moodiness and her stomach has settled. When Beatrice arrives, Isabella will not be tempted to be belligerent about having to take a boat into the river in the middle of a summer day just to see her illustrious sister.
The sketch of her nephew, which she promised to return to Beatrice, sits on her lap. She picks it up and holds it in the sunshine to take in for one last time its extraordinary details. The hand of the Magistro is unmistakable. Though Beatrice’s letters had assured her that the baby boy, named Ercole after their father, had been sketched quickly, the details were remarkable. A thousand strokes of shading highlight the child’s features. Wisps of dark hair crown his high brow like a Roman Caesar. His round, open mouth and bright eyes give the impression that he is surprised to have been born; to have found himself on this earth, framed in a golden cradle adorned with the Sforza and Visconti and Este crests, and wearing an embroidered robe and a tiny pearl-studded cap. Isabella has seen several renderings of the Christ child by the Magistro, who emphasized his mortality, whereas the son of Ludovico and Beatrice he rendered as positively heavenly.
A beautiful boy, though he probably no longer looks like the sketch, which was done five months ago. Isabella thinks she could reach through the painting and cover him with kisses. Her whole body yearns when she looks at the picture of the child. She feels doubly envious—both the boy and the drawing done by the Magistro belong to her sister. She knows that she has to return the sketch to Beatrice. It will be hard to give it up, but she does not want to bring a curse upon her own pregnancy by coveting either the son or the sketch of the son of her sister.
Beatrice is on her way back from a diplomatic mission to Venice, the city Isabella has herself just visited. Isabella had been thrilled when the elderly doge, Agostino Barbarigo, had personally invited her to visit the city during the festival of the Marriage with the Sea—a great honor to both herself and Francesco. Every year, in a solemn ceremony, the doge would mount a grand ship and throw a ring into the sea, to give thanks for the primary source of Venice’s prosperity. Some version of this rite had been going on since ancient times. The ritual was always followed by an enormous banquet. To be feted by the doge at this event was an honor of the highest sort.
Isabella’s joy was instantly thwarted when she received word that Beatrice was planning to be in Venice at the same time. Isabella almost canceled her trip; she was mortified at the prospect of appearing in Venice with her sister. Since her marriage, Beatrice had had more than three hundred gowns made—an amount that had disgusted Duchess Leonora, who complained to Isabella that Beatrice could stock the town’s shops with her personal wardrobe. Her jewels, selected from Milan’s Treasure Tower at will, were beyond compare. Isabel of Aragon had been grousing to anyone who would listen that she was sick of Il Moro going into Milan’s treasury and decorating his wife “like a shrine.” When Beatrice traveled now, it was with a retinue of hundreds. She went nowhere without her choir of singers, her Milanese courtiers, her poets and musicians, her dressmakers, her dozens of ladies-in-waiting all costumed and bejeweled like royalty, and her finest horses, the saddlery alone of which was studded with more gems than the crowns of the kings and queens of most small nations. No—Isabella was not about to appear in Venice at what should be her finest hour, looking shabby in comparison to her sister. Isabella’s dress and retinue rivaled all but the great queens of the world. It’s just that now, her sister was fitting into that category.
Francesco had counseled Isabella to proceed with her plans; he had correspondence from Ludovico indicating that Beatrice would postpone her trip for a few weeks while Ludovico finessed some finer points of negotiations he was making with France. Luckily, his information turned out to be accurate, and Isabella had a splendid trip to Venice, during which every honor was bestowed upon her. The doge himself received her into the city at Santa Croce, along with the entire signory, and ambassadors from Naples, Milan, and Ferrara. After kissing the hand of His Most Serene Highness, Isabella was invited onto his barge, where one hundred of Venice’s dignitaries—eyes, smiles, and jewels glittering—awaited her. The prince insisted that she sit next to him as they wandered up the Canal Grande. Bells chimed from every major church and cathedral, and an arsenal of guns and trumpets announced her arrival. It seemed that the whole city had come out to see the marchesa, wife of the army’s captain general. Isabella felt as if the very stones of Venice were rejoicing over her presence. She spent a week being liberally entertained at the expense of the signory, and endured countless ceremonies with a cheery smile, even when the heat was extreme and the food lousy, thinking all the while of the honor she was bringing to Francesco and to the state of Mantua.
Everyone who was anyone seemed to have a palazzo on one of the canals, and Isabella visited queens, dukes, and other royalty from around the world. She learned astonishing things: that the Genoan explorer Columbus had found new trade routes in the west, returning with gold, spices, sandalwood, exotic birds, and a dozen copper-colored natives who were said to be strange but very beautiful. The Venetians were terribly worried over this new discovery because they controlled all the trade routes to the east. This Columbus had sailed west to reach India. The Venetians wondered if the astronomer Paolo Toscanelli had been right after all. Was the earth really round? At any rate, in true covert Venetian style, they had sent secret agents to Columbus to purchase a copy of his report to his benefactors, the King and Queen of Spain. Isabella adored hearing this kind of information that she could repeat all over the courts of Italy. She ended her stay with a tour of the city’s great art, and made the acquaintance of the Bellini brothers, Gentile and Giovanni, who were painting frescoes in the Council Hall. She spent an afternoon with them—their sister was the wife of Mantua’s court painter, Andrea Mantegna—and left with a promise from Gentile of a portrait of the doge by the year’s end for her studiolo.
After leaving Venice, Isabella went to Padua, where she prayed with all her heart at the Basilica of Il Santo that she was carrying a boy, and then on to Vicenza and Verona, where the signory had arranged for her to be entertained by the local nobility. Finally, at the end of May, since Francesco was traveling, she went to visit her dearest friend, her sister-in-law Elisabetta Gonzaga, Duchess of Urbino. The two of them spent glorious weeks together, reading poems and singing, and enjoying the fresh air. As a surprise, Ludovico sent her the viol player Jacopo di San Second, who serenaded her with a special song about a swan whose mate has g
one. He misses her so much that he wants to die. Isabella could see the suspicious look on Elisabetta’s face as the viol player sang this mournful love song sent from her brother-in-law. It shocked Isabella too. Could it be that she still had Ludovico’s heart? Was that what he meant when he said that they had to be patient? She reveled in the idea—not that Ludovico’s affection carried the weight it had in the past. Now, outside of the flattery, it hardly mattered. She was carrying her husband’s child. She had brought glory to Francesco by the impression she had made in Venice. His letters to her reflected the heaps of praise he heard about her from every important personage she encountered on her trip, and he made no secret of how grateful he was to have a wife who could enhance not only his position with the Most Serene Republic, but the position of the city-state he governed as well. Ludovico’s affection at this point was like the diamond clasp on a pearl necklace—nice, but not so essential.
Isabella returned in triumph to Mantua, until she heard that almost as soon as she left Venice, Beatrice had arrived in unprecedented splendor with a retinue of twelve hundred. She gave not one but two diplomatic speeches to the signory and was received as a princess and ambassador. To honor her, the doge commanded a boat race down the Canal Grande with female rowers for the first time in Venice’s history—all for the pleasure of Beatrice. Everyone was taken with her eloquence, her elegance, and her charm. From Beatrice’s letters and all the other letters she received on the matter, Isabella discerned that everything about Beatrice’s trip was slightly more wonderful than her own. Some sycophant even wrote that Beatrice’s jewels “reflected the very wonder of the Universe, but none was so precious as the duchess herself.”
The sun has already begun its descent to the west when that lauded duchess’s bucentaur finally appears from the east, followed by a flotilla, undoubtedly loaded with Beatrice’s attendants, gowns, jewels, loot from Venice, and whatever and whomever she travels with these days. Isabella decides that she will not leave her boat, but wait for Beatrice to come to her. It’s the least she can do for refusing Isabella’s hospitality, drawing her pregnant sister out of her comfortable chambers on a summer day.
It takes some time for Beatrice to understand that she must go to Isabella. After some confusion, she appears, flush, excited, and hurried. The sisters’ hot cheeks meet in double kisses.
“What pressing business keeps you from allowing us your company for a few days, Your Excellency?” Isabella asks, smiling. “Francesco is beside himself with grief. He has a new Barbary steed—huge, with a neck like a tree trunk. He wanted to see you tame the beast.”
“Oh, please tell him that I will make good on his challenge at another time. At the moment, there is no time to waste, and many things which I must discuss with you.”
“I have received so many reports of your triumphs in Venice that I require no further details,” Isabella says.
Beatrice spends not another moment on the niceties. “As you know, Ludovico has never had good relations with Venice.”
Yes, Isabella thinks. They neither like nor trust your husband because he tries to play all sides against one another, or that is the common wisdom in Venice.
“I was given two audiences with the signory. Ludovico sent me there to inform them of his growing alliances with both France and Germany. He is bringing these two factions together, Isabella. Imagine!”
“How is he maneuvering this?” Isabella asks. “They have long been enemies.” But the question she is asking herself is, who will be sacrificed in the negotiations?
“You will hear this soon enough, but at present, please keep the matter secret. Ludovico has betrothed his niece Bianca Maria to Emperor Maximilian, King of Germany and Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire.”
“Not the little beauty who is engaged to our Galeazz?”
“No, Ludovico would never do that to his own daughter. She adores Galeazz. You do not know this girl. She is Duke Gian Galeazzo’s sister—sweet, but rather feeble in the head, just like her brother.”
And she will come with an astounding dowry that will pad the Frankish coffers, Isabella speculates to herself. Why is Ludovico bribing the emperor? “Sounds like a very wise move,” she says. “And who is he marrying off to France?”
Beatrice takes no notice of the sarcasm, but pulls Isabella closer to her, lowering her voice. “He has given his blessing for France to invade Naples.”
“Interesting,” Isabella says slowly while she works out the political puzzle in her mind. With France, Milan, and Germany against Naples, who is left to stand for them? The Pope, of course, who won’t like the French so close to his borders. And possibly Venice, which would not align with Naples, but might be tempted to interfere with Ludovico’s grand plans. “And you are going to stand with Ludovico against our maternal grandfather Ferrante?”
“Grandfather is near death, and he more than anyone is an example of the necessity of making pitiless decisions. If he hadn’t done that himself, he would have died long ago, and not of old age. We are left with no choice, Isabella.” Beatrice sounds more like one of the seasoned, cold diplomats in their father’s service than the excitable girl she has always been. In fact, she sounds more and more like the Diamond himself.
“How is it that the invasion of Naples is the business of Milan?” Isabella asks.
Beatrice sits back a little, and Isabella is grateful to have the space from her sister, whose emotions are so heated at this moment that they are suffocating her, like some kind of turbulent, pressing wind.
“Ludovico has decided to take the title of Duke of Milan. France and Germany are supporting it in exchange for his alliance. Emperor Max has the power to invest Ludovico with the title. There is some ancient agreement that at the end of the Visconti line, the Holy Roman emperor may reinvest the duchy to whomever he pleases. The last male Visconti is long dead. It is that simple.”
“And what of Gian Galeazzo and Isabel of Aragon? How will they be deposed?”
Isabella watches carefully for Beatrice’s reaction to the name of their cousin, because she has neglected to mention her own rise in fortune, status, and title, should Ludovico’s scheme come to pass.
“Gian Galeazzo is puerile and has sickening sexual habits. He has no interest in fulfilling even the simplest of his duties, and frankly, God help us if he did. He is the worst dissolute in the kingdom. He beats his wife!” Beatrice’s indignation rises. “I feel sorry for Isabel of Aragon. I tried to be her friend, but she would have none of it if I didn’t join her in asking her father to take Ludovico down. Now she has roused Uncle Alfonso to the point where he is ready to attack us. What should we do, Isabella? The moment grandfather dies, Alfonso will be upon us. Should we wait for that day?”
Isabella knows that much of what Beatrice says is true. She received a languid letter last month from the Duchess of Montferrat, who wrote, There is nothing fresh to report from Milan but that Duke Gian Galeazzo has taken to beating his wife. She knows that Aragon’s humiliation is unbearable, and that she complains to everyone how Ludovico and Beatrice have all the money, power, and glory, and she and her husband are treated like beggars. Yet Ludovico did already have all the power. Did he have to go to these lengths—intrigue, betrothals, invasions on Italian soil—to grab the title? As far as Isabella could see, Gian Galeazzo was pathetic, but in the scheme of politics, harmless. And she doubted that Alfonso would make such a drastic move just to appease his unhappy daughter.
“Beatrice, is it wise to invite the French into Italy?” This is precisely what Francesco has been asking since rumors of Ludovico’s intrigue with France has been spreading about.
“We have the protection of Emperor Max, who is very dear to us, and will keep the French contained to Naples, and the word of King Charles that he will go no farther north once Naples is his.”
Isabella sees that Beatrice and Ludovico have worked this scenario out in their minds and are committed to its fruition. Beatrice is not here to ask for advice. Her eyes shine and flick
er with life as she speaks about the plan. Her cheeks are flushed with color and her hands wave about like some beautiful Fury. Isabella cannot tell whether the nausea in her own stomach is acting as some kind of warning about the folly of all this, or if the little creature growing inside her is raging again. She sits back in the wooden chair, leaning her head against its high back. “I don’t feel well,” she finally says.
Beatrice calls for something cool for Isabella to drink. She takes a cold cloth from the hands of Isabella’s servant and wipes her sister’s brow. Isabella thinks that Beatrice’s hand might be shaking, or is that an illusion caused by the motion in her stomach or the rocking of the boat?
“You must go home and rest,” Beatrice says. “But I must trouble you with one thing before I leave you. It is a message from Ludovico, a request.”
Here is precisely what Isabella has not wanted to hear: what is to be her part in this plan that Ludovico and Beatrice and half the world, it seems, have been devising. Here is what she had hoped to escape because of her condition. But unless she feigns passing out, there is no escape.
“Ludovico has heard all about your conquest of the doge and everyone else in Venice. Oh, it’s the talk of Italy, don’t you worry. Everyone is aware of the powers of your charm and your intellect, Isabella. My husband merely hopes that, if given the chance, you will use those powers in his favor.”
“I would do anything for my sister and my brother-in-law.” She prays that Beatrice will leave the matter thus.
“Will you use your influence with Francesco to convince him to fight with the French in Naples? He is a great soldier and commander, and we would feel secure if he were leading the invasion.”