Oil and Marble

by Stephanie Storey

  He sat down in front of the marble and stretched out his legs. His ears were loud with quiet, and his limbs thumped with emptiness. When he had finished his Pietà, a similar feeling had settled around him, but this time the feeling was much stronger. This stillness echoed through his chest like a stampede.

  Michelangelo lay back and gazed up at his colossus. David was indeed a magnificent sight. The lines of his body flowed seamlessly from hair to toes, his muscles bulged and rippled like the melody of a song, and his face was the face of a real man burdened with a mix of strength, determination, and fear. After two and a half years, and thousands of hours, the stone finally lived up to Michelangelo’s expectations. “It is finished,” he said with a smile.

  His euphoria only lasted a moment. A problem had been in the back of his mind for over two years. He had hoped that he would somehow solve it while he was carving, but no answer had yet come to mind. The problem—which seemed impossible—could no longer be ignored.

  It was the sculptor’s job to deliver the statue to its pedestal. Until David was safely installed, his job was not finished. In David’s case, that pedestal—thanks to Michelangelo’s own plea—would stand in front of the Palazzo della Signoria, over two thousand paces away.

  It had taken a dozen men multiple tries to lift that old Duccio Stone off its side and stand it on its end. He had no idea how to move the statue one step, much less two thousand, through narrow, uneven streets. The Greek statue of Naxos, proclaimed the greatest masterpiece of all time, had had its leg broken while being pulled down a short, soft, grassy hill to its pedestal. After that, the cracked statue was dumped into a quarry because it was no longer a masterpiece; it was garbage. The same fate awaited David unless Michelangelo could somehow make the impossible possible.

  Leonardo

  Leonardo squinted out over the Arno. The ditch, which would become the new riverbed once the dam was in place, was finally complete; the workers had been removing dirt for months. Now, the men were building the dam, which would force the river away from its original route and into the alternate canal. A small rivulet was already flowing into the new ditch. He loved witnessing the moment when something that had previously only existed in his imagination started to come to life. It was as though his mind had been turned inside out for the whole world to see.

  “We’re on track to be finished by spring’s end.” Colombino had a curly black mustache that accentuated his broad smile, and a flabby belly that seemed incongruous with the foreman’s firm biceps. A father of five, he often treated Leonardo like he was one of his naive young sons.

  “That’s good news.” Leonardo shaded his eyes and squinted into the sun. With his recent progress on the fresco and on Lisa’s portrait, his flood of masterpieces was well on its way. “Is the first levee holding?”

  “’Tis, though we had reinforce it with more stone than you planned.”

  “More stone? Why?”

  “Master?” interrupted a young man.

  Leonardo glanced over, taking in brown hair and the frayed clothes of a manual laborer. “Not now.” He turned back to Colombino. “Tell me about the stone.”

  “Signore,” the young man pressed.

  “Go back to work and leave the maestro be, Buonarroti,” Colombino snapped.

  “Buonarroti?” Leonardo turned. The young man was quite attractive, with deep dimples, merry brown eyes, and a perfectly straight, aquiline nose. He looked nothing like the frightful stonecutter. “Are you related to Michelangelo?”

  “Si, signore. My name is Buonarroto. Michelangelo is my older brother.”

  “Leave us for a moment, Colombino.”

  The foreman frowned, but then turned away without responding. “More stone!” he called to the men working in the riverbed.

  “You wanted to speak to me?” Leonardo asked the young man.

  “Yes, signore. I work here on your project, so every day, I witness your engineering genius.”

  Leonardo’s eyebrows rose. “Does your brother know you work for me?”

  “Of course, signore. My brother is my elder, and we are very close.” Buonarroti pushed his chest out defensively.

  “And does he approve of your work here?”

  “He understands the necessity of it.” Buonarroto looked down and hunched his shoulders awkwardly. Ah, now he saw the resemblance. “Sir, do you know about my brother’s colossus?”

  Suddenly, the young man was not so amusing. “Yes,” Leonardo said impatiently.

  “Well, he must move it from Il Duomo all the way to the Palazzo della Signoria …” Buonarroto took a deep breath and then continued. “And he doesn’t know how.”

  Ah, yes. Of course. The largest statue in Florentine history. The challenge was unprecedented. “Go on.”

  “It must be at city hall in time for the unveiling, and if he doesn’t make it, Signor Machiavelli says they won’t pay him any more, and if he drops it while trying to move it …” Buonarroto shook his head.

  If he dropped it, Michelangelo’s precious David would be destroyed, just like Leonardo’s clay horse under the blows of the French.

  “But you, you can change the course of rivers,” Buonarroto said, his voice thick with awe. “Surely you could move a stone.”

  Leonardo could devise a plan to move a statue, no matter how heavy or cumbersome. He had all kinds of ideas for pulley systems and cranes to aid in such projects. “I’m sorry,” he said, patting the young man’s shoulder. “I am too busy with my own work. But by all means, please tell your brother we spoke and if he wants to come to me with his questions, I’m happy to take a minute out of my day to give him some advice. Make sure and tell him that.”

  “Grazie, maestro,” he muttered and, shoulders dropping with disappointment, he trudged back to work.

  So Michelangelo’s great triumph might not be so certain after all. The David might not make his summer unveiling. If Leonardo could finish one of his masterpieces before then … “Colombino!” he called, waving the foreman back over. “You said you had to add more stone?”

  “Yes, signore. It will take more time, but in the long run, it will be worth it, I assure you.”

  Leonardo shook his head. “We must keep to the schedule. In fact, we should speed it up, get it done as quickly as possible. Hire more men if you need to. The sooner we get the original dam built, the sooner we can correct any problems, and the sooner we can turn Pisa into a desert.”

  “I would prefer to build a dam without problems in the first place, instead of having to fix them later. Signore.”

  That was the way unthinking men spoke. “Colombino, who is the engineer, you or I?”

  “You are, maestro,” Colombino said, his mustache twitching.

  “And I know how much weight the system will bear. Return to my specifications. They will hold.”

  Michelangelo

  “Who said that?” Michelangelo stared up into Buonarroto’s innocent expression.

  “Leonardo.”

  Michelangelo’s mouth opened and closed, but no words came out.

  “From Vinci,” Buonarroto clarified.

  “I know who Leonardo is. What did you tell him?”

  “That you’re having trouble moving the statue.”

  “Cazzo,” he cursed and stood. He had been lying under the front of David’s transport, tightening a rope. The first thing he had done to prepare for the move was to wrap David in a black linen tarp padded with straw. He wanted to protect the marble from any nicks or scratches, and he didn’t want anyone else to see the statue until the city was ready to officially unveil it. After securing the tarp, Michelangelo had dismantled his privacy shed and, with the help of forty men and a pulley, loaded David onto a wooden transport.

  “He said he was too busy to come here to help,” Buonarroto told him, “but he offered to give you advice if you came to him with your plans.”

  “I bet he did.” Michelangelo yanked off his work gloves and rubbed his blistered hands. He couldn’t believ
e his brother had exposed his failures to that condescending bastard.

  “It was last week,” Buonarroto said, moving out of the way as Michelangelo went to inspect other side of the transport. “I didn’t tell you in case you figured it out on your own, but you seem so nervous, and I’m sure he’d still be willing to help.”

  “You should get some input from the Master from Vinci,” Piero Soderini suggested. The gonfaloniere often stopped by to watch. “I’m sure he could tell us how to make this work.”

  Moving a delicate statue that was nearly the height of four men standing on top of each other’s shoulders was not easy. David would need to remain upright the entire time. Lowering him to his side and raising him to his feet again was too risky. The center of the Duccio Stone had been abnormally shallow. If they lay David on his side, the weight might bow inward and crack his slender waist. But moving him upright created a different set of problems. David was so tall that the men had already taken down the archway over the entrance of the cathedral workshop; he never would have fit under it. Along the road to city hall, Michelangelo feared low-hanging balconies and awnings obstructing his path. David’s height wasn’t the only issue. The statue’s knees were thin, his ankles even thinner. His bent left elbow protruded out to the side. One bump in the road could reverberate through David’s bones like a cymbal, cracking him to pieces. David was like the heart of a farmer’s daughter in love with a young duke: easy to break and impossible to repair.

  Regardless of the risks, Michelangelo would never ask for Leonardo’s help. Never. “I have plenty of help already, molto grazie.”

  Giuliano da Sangallo, the city’s most prolific architect, had assisted in designing the transport. The covered statue had been lifted onto a flat wooden bed nailed to the top of five of the sturdiest wagons in town. David was tied firmly to a thick pole rising out of the center of the platform. The marble was tied so tightly that Michelangelo could not move it the width of a blade of grass. On each side of the transport were a series of wooden bars. Two dozen workers, who would each be paid a full florin upon David’s safe delivery to the palazzo, would grip those bars and push the contraption forward. They had already tested the device several times, filling it with boulders and a dozen men. Nothing compared to David’s height and weight, of course, but the contraption had held.

  “This design will work,” Michelangelo declared, although he could hear the lack of confidence in his own tone. “Tomorrow. You will see tomorrow.”

  Soderini pulled him aside. “I didn’t want to tell you this, because I didn’t want to put undue pressure on you, but …” His voice trailed off.

  “But what?”

  “Pro-Medici rebels have infiltrated Florence. They claim your statue carries an anti-Medici message. If you can’t move it, they will say it is a sign that the Medici should return to power. And you know how partial Florentines are to signs,” Soderini finished with a sigh.

  Michelangelo’s throat tightened. “My David is pro-Florence. The only thing it stands against is tyranny.”

  “I know that. But the people … Please, you must get your statue safely to city hall, even if it means consulting Leonardo, just to be sure.”

  “I am sure. Gonfaloniere, I promise this will work.”

  “I hope you’re right.” Soderini’s brow remained furrowed with worry.

  Me, too, Michelangelo thought, but he didn’t utter that out loud. Instead, he tied another set of ropes around David, hoping to finally make himself feel secure.

  That night, Michelangelo didn’t sleep. He catalogued every sharp corner and missing cobblestone on the road ahead; calculated every runaway horse David might meet along the way. He was haunted by the sounds of cracking wood, splitting ropes, and popping bolts. During the darkest patch of night, he even imagined an army of Medici men spinning David round and round until the cart broke in two and the statue spiraled into oblivion.

  As the sun rose in a brilliant burst of red, Michelangelo reassured himself that the transport was sturdy. The statue was tied down tighter than a chest of a king’s gold. And God would surely protect David.

  Michelangelo and Buonarroto ate breakfast in silence. His brother would not be there to help with the move. Buonarroto would be at the Arno, helping Leonardo instead. No one else in the family came downstairs to say good morning or good luck. Michelangelo walked to the cathedral alone. As workers began to arrive, he checked and rechecked all of the ropes, but no matter how tightly he tied, he couldn’t shake the nagging feeling that the move was doomed.

  “What time are we starting?” Piero Soderini asked, pulling his collar up to protect his chin from a howling wind.

  “Soon,” Michelangelo said. He went over every rope, every piece of wood, every nail and bolt again. He climbed up on the truck bed, grabbed David, and shook as hard as he could. The statue did not budge.

  But neither did his feeling of dread.

  “You see anything wrong?” he called down to Giuliano da Sangallo.

  “Wrong? Nothing’s wrong, my boy,” the architect said, a smile brightening his wrinkled features. “This is your day of triumph. Time to get on with it.”

  Granacci circled the transport one last time. “Bueno,” he confirmed, giving Michelangelo an encouraging nod.

  He was just being paranoid. There was nothing wrong with the transport. David would be fine. “To your stations,” he yelled.

  Two dozen workers went to either side of the transport and positioned themselves behind their wooden bars. “On my count,” Michelangelo called, his throat pinching. “Uno.”

  Please, God, help us.

  “Due.”

  Do whatever you must to protect him, he prayed.

  “Tre!”

  The men grunted and pushed on their bars, edging the wagon forward. The wood groaned and creaked. The bulky contraption seemed large as a mountain.

  Something cold struck Michelangelo’s head.

  He looked up. The red sunrise had given way to clouds, now breaking apart into a storm. Raindrops fell like confetti at a parade. “Wait!” he cried.

  The men stopped pushing. The transport moaned and settled. They were still in the cathedral workshop; David hadn’t even moved forward a single braccia.

  “Why did we stop?” Soderini asked. He had been walking in front of the transport as though leading an Easter procession.

  Rain fell in large drops.

  Sangallo shook his head. “We can’t move in the mud. Under this weight, these wheels would dig in faster than a family of rabbits.”

  “The moment the rain stops, we’ll try again,” Michelangelo said. They could leave the statue where it was, still on cathedral land, safe under its protective tarp, resting on its transport, until they were ready to try again.

  As everyone else hustled for cover, Michelangelo turned his face to the sky and drank in the rain. He should have been frustrated at the delay, but instead, he felt enormous relief. As long as it was raining, he had time to figure out what was bothering him and design a safer transport. As long as it was raining, David didn’t have to move. As long as it was raining, David was safe.

  Please God, he prayed, don’t ever let the rain stop.

  Leonardo

  Rain clattered on the rooftop and echoed through the Sala del Maggiore Consiglio. It had been raining nonstop for nearly two days.

  Leonardo paced. His Battle of Anghiari fresco would eventually span the massive eastern wall, but he wasn’t ready to begin painting yet. He still had more work to do, and the rain was an annoying reminder that he would have to be more careful with this new fresco. Rain left moisture in the air. Moisture grew into mold. And mold led to rot.

  Rumors had finally started trickling down from Milan that Leonardo’s Last Supper was crumbling off the wall. The Milanese were panicking, trying to find a way to repair the damage. Leonardo knew his reputation would never survive a second crumbling masterpiece. No. This fresco would need to adhere perfectly to the wall for centuries.

>   He would have to use a more durable fresco technique, which probably meant he would need to work fast. No altering facial expressions or adding a brush stroke here or there, whenever inspiration struck. This time, his design would have to be perfect before he began.

  Therefore, Leonardo took his time developing his composition. He spent many hours pacing his studio or taking long walks or standing in the empty Sala del Maggiore Consiglio, staring at the wall. An outsider would probably see this as wasted, absentminded daydreaming, but to him it was the most important part of the process, his mind firing with ideas, lines, shadows, colors, and shapes. In between the days and nights of thinking, he also had bursts of furious drawing, when he got lost in the rhythmical movement of his chalk across paper and his memories of war.

  Piero Soderini, Niccolo Machiavelli, and the rest of the Signoria wanted Leonardo’s representation of the Florentine victory at the Battle of Anghiari to be a marvelous celebration of war. They’d suggested images of formidable generals wearing grand armor, soldiers riding courageously into battle, and St. Peter alighting from heaven to bless the entire army.

  But Leonardo had been to war. What he remembered was pure chaos and brutality: flashing metallic swords, hot crimson blood, smoky gray gunpowder, the chestnut gleam of a horse’s kicking hide, the indigo of dusk setting over blue-faced, dying men. His fresco would be a swirling, twirling mass of horses and swords and shields and soldiers, a circular design leading the eye round and round, snaring the viewer in a whirl of madness, like soldiers trapped in the never-ending cycle of war.

  “Master!” Salaì burst through the door of the salon.

  “I’m glad you’re here. Come and stand here, like this,” Leonardo said, posing in front of the wall as though being trampled by a horse. “I want to see it from across the room.”