Light in the Shadows

by Linda Lafferty

  Caravaggio smiled. “Arrivederci, Cardinale.”

  Chapter 13

  Roma

  1604

  Caravaggio’s heart thumped steadily, reverberating against her cheekbone. Anna Bianchini lifted her head from the artist’s chest.

  Having worked as a prostitute since she arrived in Roma from Siena at age thirteen, she knew better than to make herself too comfortable on a man’s body.

  But she wanted this man. He had made her desirable. Rich men—even cardinals—sought her now, sending their lackeys to fetch her in the sordid streets of Roma. The Senese with the red hair, they said. The one Maestro Caravaggio painted: The Penitent Magdalene.

  Anna felt warmth rush up her neck. Then her smile flickered as she thought of Fillide.

  Anna’s low upbringing and ordinary looks meant she never qualified as a courtesan the way her friend Fillide Melandroni had. Fillide had more ambition.

  Fillide has no more culture than I have. Both our mothers worked as washerwomen, gathering piss from the stables to clean stains from dirty clothes. But Fillide has always had that self-confidence—she’s a natural-born actress, that one!

  Anna picked at her cuticles.

  “Annunccia,” said the painter, staring at her. He ran his index finger over the furrow between her eyebrows. “What are you thinking?”

  “I should gather my clothes and go, Maestro Caravaggio.”

  “Call me Michele.” He chuckled. “You’ve shared my bed and my canvases. We should dispense with the formalities, don’t you think?”

  “Were your patrons pleased with the paintings?”

  “Certo! I’ve got patrons sniffing around for more work.”

  Anna’s face brightened. “You will paint me again?”

  Caravaggio drew in a breath, contemplating. He nodded, his beard scratching against the bedsheet. “Yes. Yes, I think I will use you,” he said, looking across the room into the distance. “But I need another, another woman. One who has more of a biting edge.”

  Anna moved her mouth to Caravaggio’s chest and bit his nipple.

  “Ow!” he said, shoving her away roughly. “What the devil made you do that?”

  “I know who you want, you bastard. You want Fillide.”

  “He wants to paint me?” said Fillide Melandroni.

  Anna Bianchini jutted out her chin. “He wants to paint us both, Fillide. He needs two models.”

  Fillide’s mouth curved into more of a smirk than a smile. “Who shall I be?”

  Anna narrowed her eyes. “He’s my patron, Fillide. Don’t you get ideas.”

  Fillide laughed, twirling a strand of hair around her finger. “He did ask for me, Anna. Business is business.”

  “He only questioned me about you. He hasn’t actually asked you to sit yet.”

  “He will. I know it.”

  Annunccia narrowed her eyes. “Ranuccio better not find you hanging about Maestro Caravaggio. He’ll beat you.”

  “Pff! As if he would! I’d be damaged goods. I bring him more money than all the rest of you girls put together. Besides, I have a great patron now with Vincenzo Giustiniani. Ranuccio wouldn’t dare lay a hand on me.”

  Anna sucked in her breath through her teeth. “I’m only delivering the message because I told Maestro Caravaggio I would. But Ranuccio won’t stand for—”

  “Anna!” Fillide laughed, stroking her friend’s wrist. “You worry too much. I have my own way of handling Ranuccio, you shall see.”

  Fillide toyed with a strand of hair grazing her neck. She wrapped it around and around her finger. “I think I will visit Vincenzo.”

  Vincenzo Giustiniani, one of the richest men in Roma, welcomed Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio into the Palazzo Giustiniani, a stone’s throw from the Pantheon.

  “Siediti!” said the nobleman, gesturing to a chair upholstered in earth-toned taffeta. “I want to talk business again with you.”

  Giustiniani poured his guest a glass of ruby wine from a carafe.

  “I want you to meet someone,” he said, handing the artist the glass. “I think you will be pleased to make her acquaintance. But then, any man would!”

  “Who is that?”

  “My mistress, the great courtesan Fillide Melandroni, the beauty of Roma. I want you to paint her for me.”

  Caravaggio smiled as he moved the rim of the glass to his lips.

  Too much of a coincidence. This girl Fillide is shrewd. Sì! It will show on canvas.

  “Antonio! Send in Signorina Melandroni, per favore.”

  “Sì, signore.”

  “You will soon see why I want her painted. She is a beauty, though her lips are brutish, like a man’s. Ah, but the kisses she bestows!”

  “My lips—a man’s?” said a low, melodious voice.

  Caravaggio looked up to see a tall, strong woman, her forehead bunched up in consternation. He smiled. Despite the puckered brow, Fillide was ravishing.

  “My petal! No one’s mouth is like yours. Ah, see, Maestro Caravaggio, how her lips express themselves, mirroring the look in her eyes. Strength and character in every feature.”

  Fillide arched her right eyebrow, looking at the two men before her as if she were a bird of prey. “Ah, so this is the artist you will use.” She looked Caravaggio up and down twice. “They say you paint well, signore.”

  “Have you seen my work, signorina?”

  “I know your Amor Vincit Omnia, the little boy cupid, of course. The Lute Player—again a young boy.”

  Caravaggio nodded.

  “Too boyish for me,” the courtesan said, flicking her wrist dismissively. “Perhaps more to the tastes of the cardinals. I’ve seen the big one you did for the ceiling of Cardinal del Monte’s—”

  “Ah. Jupiter, Neptune and Pluto.”

  “Disgusting. With all the palle and penises dangling from the men’s legs. I felt like Pluto was sitting on my face,” she said, lifting her chin. “But I suppose the cardinals are particularly fond of it.”

  Giustiniani raised his hand in a vague attempt to stop his mistress’s tongue from lashing the pope’s chosen. He loved her dirty talk in bed, but never had he heard her speak like this in public.

  Caravaggio parted his lips in a smile. She has more spirit in her face than any courtesan in Roma. Ah, what I can do with this model!

  “I shall look forward to having my portrait painted by you, Maestro Caravaggio,” she said. “I trust you will not make my lips look like a man’s.”

  Fillide gave a smoldering, lascivious look to Giustiniani.

  “I promise you no man could work the spell my lips cast.” She curtsied to her patron, an insolent arch to her eyebrow. As she grasped her brocade skirt, Caravaggio recognized the fabric. He had painted Anna Bianchini in the same garment.

  “May I be excused?” she asked her patron. “I have some business I must attend to.”

  “Certainly, signorina. I shall call for you later.”

  As she shut the door behind her, Vincenzo Giustiniani sighed in delight.

  “Paint her well, my friend.”

  Caravaggio met his eye.

  “Oh, I shall,” he said. “You will see.”

  Chapter 14

  Roma

  1604

  Ranuccio Tomassoni did not follow his brothers in the family tradition of soldiering. For generations, the Tomassonis had served in the armies of the Farnese family, fighting in Flanders, Hungary, and the fractured city-states of the Italian peninsula.

  But the Farnese fortunes had faded and their personal armies disbanded. Now the Tomassoni family was destitute. Without war to occupy them, Ranuccio’s brothers wreaked havoc in the streets along with other vagabond soldiers who had moved to Roma. They became the bravi of the Roman streets—thugs looking for a brawl or a prosperous shakedown.

  The young Ranuccio—who had never served in the Farnese militia—gathered income from the streets off Piazza Navona, trading in whores to satisfy the appetites of rich clergy and aristocracy. The two girls fr
om Siena, Anna Bianchini and Fillide Melandroni, provided a steady stream of scudi from the purses of randy men. Because Ranuccio’s stable of girls was coveted, he was, like Caravaggio, often included in the debauchery of the Roman cardinals. Michelangelo Merisi provided the art, Ranuccio Tomassoni the women.

  But when Tomassoni learned that Fillide was being painted by Caravaggio, his face twisted in anger. “He’s up to no good, that bastard! If he touches my Fillide—”

  “You mean if he touches her without paying, little brother,” corrected his elder brother, Giovan. “If he paints the whore, she will be wanted by every nobleman and cardinale in Roma. Look at Anna’s business now. No one can get enough of her figa.”

  “I don’t trust him,” spat Ranuccio. “I’ve seen how he looks at Fillide. And his arrogance! He swaggers about the streets with his sword as if he were a nobleman, spoiling for a fight.”

  “You do the same,” snapped Giovan. “Both of you beg to be arrested.”

  Caravaggio finished the portrait of Fillide Melandroni in less than a month.

  Vincenzo Giustiniani was pleased with the portrait. The artist’s work sparked passion, and he sent more and more often for his mistress. His desire filled Fillide’s purse, as well as Ranuccio’s.

  One morning, Fillide sat in front of a warped-looking glass as her maid, Matilde, brushed her long hair. The comb snagged in an unruly lock.

  “Ow!” Fillide smacked Matilde’s hand. “You are hurting me!”

  “I beg your pardon, signorina.”

  “I do wish Signor Giustiniani wouldn’t snarl my hair,” said Fillide. “He is such an ardent lover. I have Caravaggio’s portrait to thank for that. Perhaps he should take the canvas to his bed and not me?”

  Matilde covered her mouth with her free hand. She locked eyes in the mirror with her mistress, and they both burst out laughing.

  A rap on the door.

  “May I enter, Signorina Fillide?” said a young voice.

  “Sì, avanti.”

  “A letter for you,” said a servant boy, bowing. He offered a letter sealed with crimson wax. His hair brushed his eyes as he looked up to watch the lovely Fillide Melandroni open the parchment. She studied the scrawled signature of Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio at the bottom.

  “Alvise!” she called to the boy as he walked toward the door. “Stay, per favore! Will you read this to me?”

  Alvise Caretto nodded, taking the letter in his hand. He squinted hard, his lips moving slowly as the syllables stumbled out, one by one. “‘Please—do me—the hon-or—’”

  “Really, Alvise!” Fillide said, her eyes squinting with impatience. “You did go to school, didn’t you?”

  The boy blushed. “‘—of—sit-ting for me—as a mod-el.’”

  Alvise’s face had colored deep scarlet. He looked down from the letter to the floor.

  “Grazie, Alvise! You’ve made me a happy woman. Read on.”

  “‘Please meet me tom-or-row evening at—Osteria della Lupa. Or any night this week. I will be there.’”

  “Perfect,” said Fillide, gazing back into her looking glass as her maid combed her hair. “Perhaps he will forget those little boys clad in bedsheets. This Caravaggio will make me known throughout Roma, and beyond!”

  Fillide fingered the pearl drop earrings, her nail sliding across the black velvet nap of the pendants.

  Were these the same earrings Annunccia wore in that first painting? She told me how strange he was, how he made her cry.

  But I didn’t expect this!

  Fillide stared down at the freshly killed pig lying on Caravaggio’s bed. Two fat flies crept about the animal’s snout.

  He is mad, this artist—

  “Hold the sword here,” said Caravaggio, taking her right hand away from her ear. His hands were firm against hers, making her grasp the brass hilt.

  He positioned his model’s arms and hands.

  “And Abra, Judith’s maid. That’s you, Signora Rossi,” he said to the old washerwoman standing next to Fillide. “You’re looking on, eager to receive the severed head.” He moved Signora Rossi a step to the left, his two hands adjusting her wrinkled face in profile.

  He walked back to his blank canvas, consulting the marks he had made outlining his composition.

  “Che schifo!” said Fillide, staring down at the bloody pig’s head. Disgusting.

  “Brava! Sì, schifoso! Focus on that disgust—and how will you sever the pig’s head from its body?”

  Fillide looked up, aghast. “I’m no butcher, Maestro Merisi!”

  “That’s the point, signorina. You are Judith hacking off Holofernes’s head. You’ve never done this before—neither had she. You are saving the Jews from the Assyrian tyrant. I want you to figure out how it’s done.”

  “Can I not have the male model here instead of a stinking pig?”

  “No, Signorina Melandroni. There is no horror in a living model with no blood. Now sever the pig’s head! Cut sinew from bone until it splits in two.”

  “Bastardo!” Fillide cursed.

  “Do it!” said Caravaggio, his face darkening. “Now! Or leave my studio.”

  She looked down at the pig. She grabbed the pig’s ear with her left hand, pulling the neck from the body, twisting its head to get a better purchase.

  I wanted to be a Madonna! Not a butcher.

  With the sword in her right hand, Fillide began to saw. Her face puckered in consternation, a vertical furrow erupting between her eyebrows.

  “You are Judith, damn you!” shouted the artist. “Will you finish the deed or not? Or haven’t you the courage, you who make a living on your back?”

  Fillide threw the artist a dark look, enraged. She grasped the sword tighter, half inspired to take a swing at him. Instead, she took a step back from the pig’s body to avoid the spilling blood. She stretched the sinews of the animal’s neck, pulling the pig’s ear, and began to cut.

  Her forehead buckled in concentration.

  “Sì!” hissed Caravaggio. “Hold it there. Don’t move a muscle.”

  The old washerwoman stared over Fillide’s shoulder. Fillide caught a whiff of her rotten teeth.

  Why should this ugly old crone stand so close to me with her stinking breath?

  “Signora Rossi,” said the artist. “Stretch the cloth in your hands, as if you are preparing to wrap the pig’s head in it. Keep your eyes on the sword.”

  Caravaggio stepped away from his canvas toward the tableau. He pried the pig’s mouth open, exposing its teeth in pathetic horror. Then he smiled in satisfaction, nicking the canvas to mark where Holofernes’s head would lie when he painted him the next day.

  Chapter 15

  PROVINCE OF SIENA

  The Tuscan hills were a sea of sunflowers, the villa an island on the highest hilltop, looking out over once-vast estates. Those fields of sunflowers now belonged to a Dutch conglomerate that had bought them in the bankruptcy of a French corporation . . . and Lucia hadn’t bothered to go any further into the past. After her day digging through the contessa’s family archives, the official state property-tax records were almost too easy. She found that the villa itself, shorn of its fields—the villa where the D’Estrato family had retreated after one of their patriarchs was executed for treason against Siena in the late eighteenth century—was now owned by a man named Haziz Hafez al-Rachmaan. And about him, she cheerfully admitted to the professor, she knew only that he didn’t sound likely to be the descendant of Italian nobility.

  The professor had inclined his head in gracious acceptance of the limits of her research. He was less gracious when Lucia told him that Moto was coming with them to Siena.

  “Why? He’ll be worthless.”

  “He’s my friend.”

  The professor had raised an eyebrow at that.

  “You bring all your friends wherever you go?”

  She gave that the response it deserved, a toss of her mop of black hair and a simple answer: “He’s coming.”

  Richma
n tried a different tack.

  “There won’t be room for him in your wretched little car.”

  “First you insult my friend. Now you insult my car. If I’m next on your list, I suggest you stop right now.”

  The professor didn’t say anything.

  “Am I missing something here, Professor?”

  He shrugged. “I thought we were doing this together. A research project. For the seminar. I wasn’t expecting company.”

  She gave him a smile. “If I didn’t know better, Ralphie, I’d say you were jealous.” And before he could deny it, she added, “Maybe I’m being foolish, but things did get a little sketchy when we went to see Te-Te.”

  “Sketchy? We damn near got killed.”

  “That’s why I thought it might be good to have someone else along. Just in case.”

  The professor shrugged, hardly mollified. “He doesn’t particularly seem to be the bodyguard type.”

  Lucia laughed. “No. Moto’s no tipo tosto. But he’s good company, and as far as I’m concerned, he’s family. He’s coming.”

  She didn’t mention that Moto’s feelings would be hurt if they left him behind. Moto hated to be left out. He hated it when anyone suggested he wasn’t up to a challenge, that he wasn’t tough enough—even though “tough enough” was very definitely not his style.

  “Fine,” said the professor. “It’s your car. But he’s sitting in the back. I’m not going to cram myself in there.”

  “Of course not,” said Lucia, and she couldn’t resist giving him a kiss on the forehead. “It wouldn’t be dignified.”

  The drive wasn’t a long one, and Moto, if not much of a bodyguard, was certainly good company. Uncomplainingly ensconced in the back seat, he provided a steady stream of amusing chatter, keeping his Italian slow enough for the professor to understand what he was saying and mixing in his own broken English whenever possible.

  By the time they crossed the sea of sunflowers and drove up the hill, the professor had joined in and all three of them were laughing as they parked in front of the villa.

  And now, having introduced themselves—scholars on a research project, looking for D’Estrato family archives—and having apologized for arriving without an appointment, Lucia, Professor Richman, and Moto stood with Hafez al-Rachmaan in the rather grand entry hall. Al-Rachmaan’s smile was welcoming, his tone was cordial—and he clearly considered them an annoyance. Even so, before he dismissed them, he was going to make certain they understood exactly how well he had done to wind up here.