It was more than I had expected, and I realized that she had now made the decision to trust me, and saw me as the route to her salvation. It was encouraging, but also a responsibility. I only hoped I could live up to whatever expectations were building in her mind. ‘I shall be there. Nine o’clock in the evening. Is there anything else I should bring? Is there anything you need?’
She looked for a minute, thinking. Then a broad smile crossed her face. ‘Flowers. I would love it if you brought me flowers. It has been such a long and dark winter, with so little colour in it. Yes, flowers.’
I looked at the smile on her face, the first I had seen there. It lit up her whole face and made her look five years younger. Her face was always elegant, but when she smiled she was truly beautiful.
‘Nine o’clock. Flour and flowers. I think I can remember that.’
The memory of her smile remained with me for the rest of the day.
CHAPTER 33
March the 12th 1556 – Convento di Sant’ Alvise
I had the trusted boatman, and he had a suitable boat. Paulo Arnaldi, one of the gang who met up outside the convent, had agreed to bring his family’s delivery boat round to the Rio di Sant’ Alvise just before nine o’clock. He was bringing the sack of flour and I was carrying a large bunch of early spring flowers.
We edged up the side canal, our eyes searching the darkness, for we dared not light a torch this close, and found the doorway. A gentle push had no effect. Perhaps she has been unable to unlock the door, I thought.
Paulo had a go and shoved hard against one of the doors while I held the other to prevent the boat from drifting across the canal. His efforts were more successful and we both peered inside to see what we were getting ourselves into. A pale hand appeared, offering us a rope’s end, and with it we pulled the boat quietly into the dock. There was just enough space inside to close the door after us, and as it closed the cover was removed from a storm lantern.
She was alone and, as before, looked frightened.
I introduced myself and Paulo, who greeted her but retreated to the end of the boat, leaving us to what he described as our ‘private conversation’.
‘There is a storeroom behind here. It has a good door and we will be private.’ Her voice was almost a whisper.
I passed the flowers to Faustina and lifting the sack of flour on to my shoulder, followed her down the corridor. As soon as the door was safely shut, Faustina looked at the flowers. Her smile returned and she shyly took my hand in thanks.
‘They are beautiful. I shall put them in my room and say my mother sent them. Thank you so much. It is very kind of you. Before I tell you about my situation, please tell me why you are being so kind? What you are doing is dangerous and you could be exiled from the Republic and even flogged by the authorities. Worse, if my family found out, they might send bravi to kill you. I am an embarrassment to them – and doubly so, now that they cannot afford to pay my allowance. If what you are doing became public knowledge, their name would be ridiculed. So why do you take such risks for someone you do not know?’
What could I say? The truth was I had no real idea why I was pursuing this dream of getting her out of the convent. It simply seemed the right thing to do . . .
‘I am new to Venice and stumbled on the convent purely by accident one day while walking and exploring the area. I saw a crowd of young men and decided to see what they were doing. When I saw you for the first time, something about your expression singled you out. I resolved to discover your story. I apologize for the impertinence, but I wanted to know about you. That is why I wrote the note.’
She smiled. ‘It was no impertinence and I am glad you did it. Otherwise I should not have had the confidence to speak to anyone outside and my fate would have been sealed. It took me a long time to pluck up the courage to reply to your note, but I am glad I did.
‘My story is not unusual. It is a tale of many women in this man’s world. The very lucky ones marry for love, the less fortunate are placed in arranged marriages with someone they may detest. For the remainder there are typically only two directions. If your family can afford it, you become a nun; if not, you go into trade. As far as the men in this city are concerned, there is only one trade women are suited for.
‘When I first came here I was not unhappy. My aunt and an elder sister were here and I became an educanda, studying under their wings. Within the last five years, my aunt and my sister have both died; my aunt from a fever and my sister from a tumour in her head.
‘With both of them gone, life was less happy, but I concentrated on my studies and became the Chapter Clerk. In that role I have responsibility for keeping the accounts of the convent, buying food and other necessities and ensuring we live within our means. It is work I enjoy and I am good at it, but the convent relies heavily on annual payments from the choir nuns’ families to supplement our other sources of income.
‘But when my family lost three ships in the same season, their fortunes were destroyed, and my father had to write to the abbess and inform her that he could no longer continue to pay. At that point my fall from grace began. We have three powerful nuns in this convent, older nuns called discrete – the so-called discreet ones – whose families have always thought themselves rivals with my family. Whilst my aunt and sister were alive they could not harm me, but now they take every opportunity to make my life a misery. They resent my gaining the position of Chapter Clerk, which each of them felt she deserved, and wait like vultures for my position to worsen.
The abbess has told me that when my income ends in July, I can no longer continue as a suor and must be degraded to the position of conversa. The discrete have great power over the converse – including the ordering of beatings for any misdemeanour. Since they determine who has or has not committed a misdemeanour, their rule is absolute.
‘Suor Angelica (never was anyone so inappropriately named) administers the beatings personally, and the converse say she is a tyrant. They say she makes them undress before accepting the beating and beats them to the point of drawing blood. She insists that the punishment is not complete until she sees tears fall. This is absolutely against the rules of the order but the abbess is weak and no one dares go against Angelica. I know that as soon as I become a conversa I will be found wanting by the discrete every day, and beaten by Suor Angelica, finally to the point of death.’
She dropped to her knees in front of me, hands clasped together as if in supplication.
‘I have to escape this place, to save my very life.’
I was appalled. ‘Do your family know this? Can they not take you from here?’
Tears welled in her eyes.
‘It is a matter of pride. They would not believe my story if they heard it, and in any case the abbess would deny it. Furthermore, they cannot take me out of here, for they cannot afford a dowry for me to marry into a noble family, and the family name is too esteemed for them to allow me to marry a merchant or a person of the lower orders. So they turn away from the situation and try to deny my existence.’
It was clear to me I had no choice. I had to save her from the future she described.
‘Suor Faustina, I promise you that somehow – I do not yet know how – I will find a way to help you escape from here and find somewhere to live your life in peace. I am new to Venice and will have to take advice, but I will overcome this situation before your position here is degraded. How can we communicate safely?’
She brightened visibly at my words.
‘Hieronimo is the male servant for this convent and works for me in my position as Chapter Clerk. He can come and go as he pleases, and I trust him. Do not be put off by his appearance: his back was broken when working on a ship in the Arsenale, but he is honest and intelligent, although he cannot read. He visits the markets nearly every day. If you have a message for him to bring to me, address it to the Chapter Clerk at this convent and mark it as an invoice. Then give it to the owner of the Trattoria Sensazione on the Fondamenta della Sensa.
His name is Cesare and he has sons.’
I nodded, taking her hand for a moment, forgetting her position.
‘Marco and Angelino, and Christopho, the young one they call Pietro the Fisherman. I know them.’
‘You know them?’ she replied. ‘That is good. I know them also, as they deliver bread here every day. They can bring me the “invoice” or give it to Hieronimo. How can I get a message to you?’
I thought, and decided to take a small risk.
‘The same route. I am living at the Ca’ da Mosto.’
‘It is agreed. You must go, for we have a mass soon. Pull the door shut behind you tightly and it will lock.’
I went to leave but she tugged at my sleeve. ‘Richard. This is a very dangerous thing you are entering into, and I cannot thank you enough.’
She leaned forward and I thought she was going to kiss me, but instead she rested her forehead on my chest. It was a gesture of great intimacy, and I could not help holding her shoulders in return. ‘I will write soon.’
‘So will I.’
I felt my way back to the boat in the pitch dark. Paulo was waiting, the outer doors slightly open to let in some moonlight.
‘Riccardo, is that you?’
‘Yes, Paulo, who did you expect? One of the nuns?’
‘No such luck. How did you get on?’
‘Very successfully.’
He punched my shoulder and pulled open the door. I heard him snort in the dark. ‘You lucky devil. I thought you were a long time. How did you manage to do that? Next time, you can sit in the boat and I’ll go in. Why you lucky old devil.’
There are some secrets you can’t share.
CHAPTER 34
March thel5th 1556 – Ca’ da Mosto
The wind had risen so that the clouds were scudding across the sky, and much of the rain within them had no time to fall. However, what rain there was came horizontally, and there was no escape from it.
The mood of the city had been depressed for days, but with the buffeting wind, everyone seemed to become even more fractious and irritable. The earl in particular had been brooding and reserved, and we felt he might explode into a rage at any minute.
Although our present arrangements were uncomfortable, and clearly were not sustainable, both Thomas and I had our reasons for wanting to continue as we were for a bit longer. The last thing we needed was for Courtenay to fall out with us at this moment and withdraw his funds. In an unspoken pact to avoid outright warfare, the three of us in the Ca’ da Mosto had taken to our rooms while the inclement weather continued.
I was just reconsidering that decision when Thomas joined me. ‘Richard, if you were thinking of going out, I suggest you don’t for the moment. Letters have arrived and they look official. We may be called to a discussion at any minute.’
We waited, talking and looking out at the weather. The wind from the east was pushing the sea into the lagoon. With high tides at this stage of the moon, many of the houses were being flooded and ours was no exception. The ground floor was flooded with each tide.
The stink of mud, sewage and seaweed was overpowering. All of the great houses seemed to be in the same mess. The pescheria was completely flooded; those fishermen who had braved the waves on the lagoon seemingly able to sell their fish direct from their boats. Only the new market building seemed protected: the architect Sansovino had set its foundations higher than the city’s other buildings, and his judgement now seemed to be paying off.
Thomas’s conjecture proved right and Claudio, our new house servant (a nervous boy of about fourteen, and rather prone to making mistakes), came to find us. ‘The earl says please will you join him at your convenience’. There was a pause as he tried to remember the rest of the message, ‘But straight away.’
Thomas grinned. ‘He got that right, then. Come on, let’s not keep him waiting.’
We covered our noses and descended the stone steps to the floor below, the stink getting worse as we did so. I could hear the storekeepers splashing about and knew the tide had, once again, penetrated the whole area. The previous day, we had asked them to sweep out the mud and seaweed when the tide fell, but as born Venetians they just shrugged and said it would be done ‘in the spring, when the tides abate’. In the meantime, we had to learn to live with it.
The earl was sitting at a table in front of the large windows that filled most of the canal-facing wall, and had papers strewn everywhere before him. He waved us forward, still reading, and indicated the available chairs. We sat and waited, feeling, as he always made us feel, like schoolboys awaiting a headmaster.
‘Close the door tightly, gentlemen; the smell from below is overpowering. I have news, gentlemen, news.’ He waved one of the letters in front of us.
‘Sir John Mason writes from Brussels. Cardinal Pole, it seems, is making his position as Papal Legate felt in England. Perhaps he is still chagrined at not becoming Pope, but it seems his reforms for the priesthood are so severe that many wish he had remained in Rome. Perhaps he sees the power of our Queen’s Spanish husband rising, and wishes to demonstrate that he can be as strong against would-be backsliders and heretics as any Inquisition. In any event, there is unrest in London, with talk of murder and robbery on London Bridge. We have left behind an unhappy country, and the plague gets worse in London every day. Apparently a comet blazed over London two months ago, and rumours spread that Judgement Day was at hand.
‘Some good news emerges, however. William Herbert, my good Earl of Pembroke, continues to be my friend at Court and sends funds for fresh horses. Perhaps he is trying to encourage us to travel further. Who knows?’
I looked at Thomas with concern, for the Earl of Pembroke was nothing if not the Queen’s man, and if he was encouraging Courtenay to travel, it was not clear why, or in which direction. Certainly not back home, I thought. Thomas seemed to share my thoughts, but gave me one of his little shakes of the head which reminded me to remain silent.
‘Mason himself promises a fine gelding from Brussels and includes a message from Ruy Gòmez, King Philip’s closest friend, to the effect that the King does not believe any of the scurrilous stories still circulating about me and the Princess Elizabeth, and that I should not consider myself under suspicion in any respect.
‘I have also received a short but courteous note from William Ryce, at Greenwich Palace, kindly passed on in the diplomatic bag by Ambassador Mason, to confirm that my mother, the ioness of Exeter, is in good health and in favour with Her Majesty.’
The earl put down the letter and picked up another.
‘This may be a strange coincidence, but at the very time I receive messages, from the highest of places, that my name is held in favour by King Philip and by the Queen, I get a visit this morning from a Cornishman, a Henry Killigrew, saying he is acting as an intermediary, presenting me with an invitation to visit France. There I am offered thirty thousand crowns and numerous other unspecified benefits. What do you think of that? Killigrew is returning tomorrow for my reply. Perhaps the horses are to make a journey to France more comfortable? What do you think?’
I looked at Thomas and could see by his expression that he thought as I did; that only a fool would not realize that such huge sums of money must be the price of some great and terrible act – perhaps an act of treason. How could Courtenay not understand that? Thomas mumbled about affairs of state being above him, but I was less willing to remain silent.
‘Like Thomas, Your Grace, I am only a humble observer of these great affairs, but I do smell the possibility of an intrigue here. Since leaving England, you have conducted yourself with the utmost decorum, and moved only in the highest and most acceptable circles. Yet you have on numerous occasions emphasized to Thomas and to me the continuing threats against Queen Mary in England and the ever-present possibility that various groups are plotting against her. Might it not be that your innocence of implication in such intrigues is being tested? In the past, for example, Ruy Gòmez has not, I believe, been a good friend to
your family?’
Thomas squirmed awkwardly in his chair, but the earl took my words seriously and put down Killigrew’s paper as if it were on fire. ‘And the invitation to France?’
‘If genuine, it is surely motivated by that which benefits France, rather than yourself?’
‘And if not genuine?’
‘Then it is quite possibly an attempt by those who would put you down to create evidence of wrongdoing when none exists.’
Courtenay rose from the table and paced along the great window and back again. Twice he stopped and looked carefully at me, then appeared to change his mind and continued walking. Finally, he leaned against the window and pointed his finger at me, in what I took to be accusation. On this occasion I was mistaken.
‘Richard, I believe you are right. I believe we have two messages here, intermingled but separable, and susceptible to interpretation. First, as you say, there are those in France and – who knows? – perhaps in England still, who would oppose our queen and, more particularly, any risk of domination of our country by Spain, in the form of King Philip.
‘Secondly and quite separately, I am sure I have friends at Court – genuine friends, such as Mason and Pembroke, who would see me live a fruitful and happy life. Their gifts are, I am sure, genuine acts of personal friendship and I shall take them as such.
‘The solution is clear: I shall send Killigrew away with a flea in his ear, and inform Peter Vannes that I have done so, asking him to send confirmation of my absolute loyalty to Her Majesty. If that puts Killigrew at risk, then so be it. I shall certainly not travel to France.
Daughters of the Doge (Richard Stocker) Page 16