Light in the Shadows

by Linda Lafferty

  Caravaggio looked away. Outside, he saw two knights of the order walking the limestone streets, the white crosses blazing against the black of their tunics.

  “Tell me more about this commission, Your Excellency,” he said.

  “I will make it worth your while, I assure you.”

  “How?” said Caravaggio, fastening his eyes on the grand master.

  Wignacourt raised his chin. “Maestro Caravaggio, perhaps we could find a way for you to join our order. A Knight of Malta. A cavaliere.”

  Caravaggio had played at cards too many hours to allow himself a smile. Instead, he protested. “That seems impossible. I am not of noble birth . . . I’ve been convicted of murder—”

  “If you can paint the martyrdom of our patron saint with the same genius you have shown in my portrait, I intend to bring you into the order as a Knight of Obedience.”

  Caravaggio simply nodded. Any greater display would have been inappropriate to the nobility he was going to obtain.

  Wignacourt nodded in return. “Get to work at once on the painting, Maestro. But it must be the equal of my magnificent portrait—”

  Caravaggio threw back his head and laughed. The sound filled the room, reverberating off the coffered ceiling. Wignacourt was startled by the impertinence, his features hardening.

  “Grand Master Wignacourt! Forgive me,” said the artist. “You have no idea what I will create. The Beheading of St. John the Baptist shall be my masterpiece. I will give my lifeblood to the order, no less.

  “After all, I will become a knight and have to stare at it for all eternity.”

  Chapter 41

  Roma

  1608

  “Grand Admiral Fabrizio Colonna directed me to deliver this to you,” said the young man dressed in a black tunic and leggings. “I will return tomorrow evening should you wish to send a response.”

  “Grazie,” said Cecco, taking the worn letter, which was splashed with seawater and smudged by sweating hands.

  “We had a rough crossing from Malta,” said the boy. “And an even more difficult docking.” He bowed and left Cecco Boneri standing in the doorway with the Roman sun warming his face.

  Cecco withdrew into the house and opened the bruised parchment.

  . . . I share this news only with you. Your master shall soon become a knight! No longer will the noble class disdain me! The gold-chain-wearing fumblers, the so-called artists of merit, that pezzo di merda Giovanni Baglione must recognize me as an equal. The cardinals, the landowners, the conti and contesse.

  Grand Master Wignacourt has procured permission from the pope for my induction into the Knights of Obedience. Pope Paul, of course, does not know it is me. The grand master only referred to me as a man who repents his actions having killed a man in a fight.

  At the moment, I am working on a canvas that will be my greatest masterpiece: The Beheading of St. John the Baptist. Such dimensions I’ve never attempted, but I dream about how I shall fill that space . . . It shall lift the gaze of every worshipper beyond the altar, beyond the crucifix itself.

  Cecco looked out over the rooftops of Roma. He folded the letter, his fingertips caressing the thick parchment.

  Who grinds his pigments now? Surely he must mix his own paints, prepare his own gesso on the canvas. I have heard of the pages there of noble families . . . they would have no training or aptitude for the task.

  Ah, but they will be young and nimble . . . eager to please.

  Cecco looked down, realizing he was pinching the letter in his hand, his sweaty hand smearing the ink.

  This is all the news I have had in four months. Damn him! I will share it with Lena, these scraps of his life. They are a petty mouthful for the starving.

  Cecco set off to find Lena near the palazzo in Piazza Navona. She was not there, though he found two other prostitutes sharing a handful of roasted chestnuts. Their hands and teeth were blackened with char.

  The women stopped eating as he approached them. One, a red-haired woman, licked her fingers provocatively. Cecco noticed her swollen lip, turning slightly blue. The brunette picked the black bits of soot from her teeth with her fingernail, studying Cecco.

  “I look for Lena Antognetti.”

  “The girl’s sick,” said the brunette, her dark eyes glittering. “Has been for weeks now.”

  “Sick?” said Cecco. “With what?”

  The red-haired woman said, “Probably caught a chill standing in the wind, late at night—”

  “Merda!” said the brunette. “She caught something evil from a foreigner, one of those French sailors, or worse, an Englishman. They’s the ones who kill us with their diseases.”

  The redhead flicked her hand, dismissing her friend’s words. Cecco smelled a musky odor rising from her body as she sidled close to him. “Now, you are a good-looking ragazzo. You want to spend some time with Lilliana?”

  “Leave him alone, Lilli,” said her dark-haired friend, a shawl barely concealing her olive-skinned cleavage. “He’s looking for Lena. He is Caravaggio’s boy.”

  “Doesn’t hurt to have some fun, Giulia—”

  “You’ll find her in the Ortaccio di Ripetta, on Via dei Greci,” said the brunette. “Ask there, and you’ll find her. She’s too sick to leave her bed.”

  “She’s that ill? How does she feed her little boy now?”

  Giulia shrugged. Cecco turned to leave.

  “Wait,” she said.

  She dug a coin out of her bodice.

  “Buy her some hot chestnuts from the vendor there,” she said, pressing the warm quattrino into Cecco’s hand. “Tell her Giulia and Lilli wish her well.”

  Lena’s mother led Cecco up the narrow stairs. There was a sickly-sweet smell to the bedroom, even though the windows were flung open. Two pigeons stood on the edge of the windowsill.

  “Cecco,” whispered a soft voice. “You’ve come.”

  “Lena,” he said, taking a moment to recognize the emaciated body. “I heard you were ill—”

  Lena struggled up to her elbows, making the bed creak. She looked frantically past her visitor. “Has he come?”

  It took Cecco a second to realize. “My master?” He shook his head. “No, Lena. He is far away. Now lie back.”

  “Far away?” she said, her voice trailing off. Her arms quivered under the exertion of sitting up. She fell back against the feather pillow.

  “In Malta. He is painting the Knights of Malta.”

  “Malta! Is that Africa?”

  “Almost.”

  “So far away,” she said in a breathless voice.

  “It is an incredible honor, Lena,” Cecco said. “And he is safe from the reach of Roma.”

  Lena lay back, her hands crumpling together like a dying bird.

  Cecco sat on the edge of her pallet.

  She is so young. And dying.

  “How is Antonio, your little one?”

  “Antonio . . .” said Lena, a ghost of a smile racing across her face. “He is quite big and strong now. He helps his grandmother launder clothes in the Tiber.” She began coughing, the spasm rocking her thin body. Cecco looked at her sunken chest where her voluptuous breasts used to strain at her bodice. “I can’t look after him now.”

  “Of course not. I’m sure your mother adores his company.”

  “I’m afraid I am a burden on her.”

  Cecco looked away from her sunken eyes. He focused on the two pigeons at the open window.

  Lena followed his focus. “Mamma says they are dirty birds, the pigeons. But they are my amusement here. I love to watch them touch beaks, coo, and strut. Sometimes they fly away together.” She sought Cecco’s hand, her fingers inching across the coverlet. “That’s what I wish I could have done with Michele. Fly away.”

  Cecco squeezed her hand, feeling the sharp bones.

  “I know, Lena. I know.”

  Chapter 42

  Valletta, Malta

  1608

  “This beast of heat!” said Caravaggio, wiping th
e rivulets of sweat from his forehead and temples.

  “I could open the shutters, Maestro,” offered the young page Alessandro Costa. “The sea breeze would cool—”

  “Leave them shut, damn you!” said Caravaggio. “It must be dark for the lanterns to cast the light—”

  The heavy wooden door creaked open.

  “What is this shouting?” said Grand Master Wignacourt. He glared first at Alessandro and then Caravaggio. “This is not behavior befitting a knight . . . or a knight in training.”

  Caravaggio glanced at his blank canvas. His lips quivered to answer, hot words bubbling on his spit.

  But he remained silent.

  “I have come, Maestro Caravaggio,” said the grand master, “to offer you a chance to see Mdina. If you will accompany me, I think it would be good for your . . . nerves.”

  “What is there for me in Mdina? More rock? I’m trying to capture the spirit and breadth of this painting.”

  Wignacourt raised an eyebrow. “Mdina is the old capital of the Order of Malta before the construction of Valletta. It is an exquisite town of courtyards, fountains, and flowers.”

  “Flowers!” muttered Caravaggio under his breath.

  “And I want to take you to see the grotto where the shipwrecked Saint Paul stayed under the succor extended by Publius.”

  “Grotto, you say?” said Caravaggio, glaring into the black gesso of his enormous canvas. “Saint Paul was housed in a grotto?”

  “Along with Saint Luke, his accompanying friend and physician. You do know the Bible, do you not, Maestro Caravaggio?” said the grand master, sucking in his breath. “The Acts of the Apostles and the Gospel of Saint Luke?”

  Caravaggio remained silent.

  “For your education, which is sorely lacking for an apprentice knight,” said Wignacourt sternly, “Apostle Paul was a prisoner being taken to Roma for trial. The ship carrying him and nearly three hundred others was shipwrecked along Malta’s coast. All survived by swimming to land.”

  “But what of the grotto?”

  Wignacourt held up his hand for silence. “‘And later we learned that the island was called Malta. And the people who lived there showed us great kindness, and they made a fire and called us all to warm ourselves.’ This is the Gospel of Saint Luke.” The grand master bowed his head.

  “Saint Paul took shelter in the grotto outside Mdina, hiding from the Romans,” he continued. “The Maltese protected him. They said he had a great power—he was bitten by a viper but showed no effect.”

  Caravaggio tilted his head, staring at the pool of light cast by the lanterns.

  “I think, Maestro,” said Wignacourt, looking up at Caravaggio’s vast blank canvas, “that the excursion out of this hot, dark room will do you good.”

  It was nearly dusk the following day when Grand Master Alof de Wignacourt and Caravaggio approached the ancient capital of Malta.

  After two hours of travel in the rocking coach, the grand master pulled the curtains back from the window. He pointed to a limestone city perched atop a rocky mount, encircled by a great wall. Mdina was bathed in a soft yellow light of torches.

  “There she is.”

  Caravaggio moved closer to the window as the coach jolted over the stone road. “It looks like paintings of Spain . . . or even Jerusalem.”

  “Mdina is many thousands of years old,” said the grand master, swaying to the rocking carriage. “It was one of the first Roman territories to embrace Christianity.”

  Caravaggio looked out at the stone moat and the gate crowned with the banner of the Maltese Knights.

  Two guards approached the carriage. Their flaming torches illuminated golden motes of spinning dust.

  “Your Grace,” said one, bowing low. “Welcome back to Mdina.”

  “Mdina’s Palazzo Falson was built in the early thirteenth century,” said Wignacourt. “There had once been a synagogue at the site.”

  “Jews here in Malta?” said Caravaggio.

  “Malta has mixed the races for centuries,” said the grand master. “Listen to the natives’ language. Though it is mostly Arabic, there is a scattering of words from every European country.”

  Palazzo Falson’s central courtyard with its graceful arches evoked Spanish influence. Tinkling fountains, bougainvillea spilling down the walls, white calla lilies and roses. The patio floor was an intricate mosaic.

  “We will drink some tea,” said the grand master. “Once you are refreshed, I will take you to the grottos.”

  As they waited for their tea, Wignacourt leaned toward the painter.

  “Let me ask you, Maestro Caravaggio. Besides being beyond the reach of the pope and certain execution, why do you wish to become a knight of the Order of Malta?”

  “Your Grace . . .”

  “You owe me that much, Caravaggio. I risk the wrath of Pope Paul when he discovers that the man for whom I begged clemency is you. Is it only the safety you seek?”

  “I want . . . I desire to be a knight. I want the right to carry a sword.”

  “Social class, then?”

  “The honor, Grand Master. I once challenged a man—an artist!—to a duel. He refused, saying that I was beneath him. He was of noble birth and he would not lift a sword against me, as if my flesh were not good enough to meet his blade. That memory chews at my soul.”

  The crickets chirped in a pulsating chorus. A servant dressed in white linen brought in a tray of tea and small cakes. He poured the tea from the pot through a ceramic sieve, straining the mint leaves.

  “Grazie,” said Wignacourt. “Per favore, serve my guest first.”

  Caravaggio accepted the cup, the steamy fragrance of mint scenting the garden air.

  “You have the sin of Pride, Maestro Caravaggio. A brother of the holy order must renounce this sin.”

  Caravaggio set down his cup. “Has Cavaliere Roero renounced his sin, Grand Master?”

  Wignacourt frowned. “What does Fra Roero have to do with this?”

  “He taunts me endlessly about my humble birth. He calls me a Turk. He declares I will foul the order with my induction. That it is only the charity of the Colonnas and you, yourself, Grand Master, that allows me to be granted knighthood.”

  “I see,” said Wignacourt. He sat quietly for a moment. He shook his head and began again. “Tell me, do you truly believe in God?”

  “Sì,” said Caravaggio. “A cruel God who punishes.”

  “You are a man of the Old Testament, then?”

  “Perhaps.”

  “I can see that trait in your paintings. All dark—but the flash of light. Perhaps the light is God?”

  Caravaggio shrugged. “Forgive me, Grand Master. I do not know. It is what I see. The suffering . . .”

  “The humanity too,” said Wignacourt, stirring his tea with a silver spoon. “I saw what you captured in Martelli’s portrait. Tell me, Caravaggio. I heard you scolding the pages in that suffocatingly hot room. I saw the great expanse of black—an empty canvas.”

  Caravaggio looked down at the calla lilies in the garden.

  Wignacourt laid a hand on Caravaggio’s sleeve. “Finish your tea, Maestro. I shall take you to the grottos of Saint Paul.”

  Two Maltese guards with oil lamps led the grand master and Caravaggio down the millennia-old limestone steps. A single guard followed, his torch casting only a small pool of light behind the group.

  Caravaggio felt the cool air meet his face, drying the sweat from his skin. He breathed deeply, his eyes scanning the cavern below him.

  “This is where the Roman governor Publius sheltered Saint Paul, sixty years after the birth of Christ,” said the grand master. “Paul cured the governor’s father of a fatal disease. The Maltese were forever grateful.”

  Caravaggio reached out his hand to touch the cool rock wall.

  Wignacourt nodded. “I will leave you now. Rodrigo! Stay here with the torch until the maestro is ready to retire. Then show him to his room.”

  The grand master climbed the
steps accompanied by the men with oil lanterns. Caravaggio watched their shadows play and retreat against the stone.

  He turned to the Maltese guard. The man kept his eyes focused on the grotto floor. Caravaggio retreated into the darkness.

  “Look up at me, guard,” said Caravaggio.

  Rodrigo’s jawline was taut. His eyes lifted and he looked Caravaggio in the eye.

  “Have you ever killed a man?” asked Caravaggio from the shadows.

  The guard moved his tongue over his front teeth, making his lips bulge. “I’m a guard working under the Order of Malta,” he said, his voice hoarse. “We have Turkish prisoners. What do you think, Maestro?”

  “I think you have the look of a killer. Bene. Look down as if you are going to behead a man.”

  “With what? A sword? A hatchet?”

  “A sword.”

  “Sì,” said the guard. “I know how to do it.”

  Caravaggio’s face grew animated. “Davvero? You have cut a man’s head off?”

  “More than one,” the guard grunted. “But it’s hard to sever the bones of the neck unless you have a proper sword. Not any sword will do—”

  “How do you manage, then? If you’ve already swung and killed the man.”

  The guard narrowed his eyes. With a swift sweep of his free hand around his hip, he produced a sharp blade, its metal glinting in the torchlight.

  “A pugnale. I always keep a sharp dagger in my sheath.”

  Caravaggio sat down on a rock, absorbing the words.

  A dagger!

  Back in Valletta, Caravaggio sealed himself in the limestone oratory of the cathedral. Rather than being soothed and rested by his excursion to Mdina, the artist was short-tempered and edgy. He paced in the dark room, shifting his eyes from the leaping torchlight to the black gesso of the untouched canvas.

  The two pages, Alessandro Costa and Nicholas de Paris Boissy, shifted nervously on their feet, their eyes fastened on the stone floor.

  “Look here, Costa!” said Caravaggio, picking up a brush from the table. “Do you see the red paint still clinging to the bristles of this brush? The hairs are stiff and useless now!”