The Book of Shadows

by James Reese

  Soon all the Royals, or nearly all, had sat for me. The King’s brothers, the Comtes d’Artois and de Provence, and their wives; plus other Princes of the Blood—the Ducs de Bourbon, Condé, Penthièvre, Conti, and Orléans. And Madame Royale. And Madame Elisabeth. And a host of lesser nobles. Those who had everything had nothing till they posed for me! Of course, I charged what I pleased, and it was quickly paid. In one six-month span, I declined five times the number of commissions I accepted. Of greater concern to me then was the hiring of bankers: I painted only between appointments with same.

  The wealth suited me, but the renown did not. It was when a portrait bust of myself, sculpted in terra-cotta by Pajou appeared in that year’s Salon that I knew it was time to travel. I’d evolved from an artist into a work of art! Unwittingly, I’d traded away my anonymity. Yes, it was time to leave Paris. Again.

  Preparing for my departure, I discovered a slight problem: my fame had outstripped my credentials. And one needed certain affiliations, certain credentials. Licenses. Memberships, et cetera. A bother, really, but still a necessity. And so, I determined to gain admittance to the Royal Academy of Painting and Sculpture.

  I set to work. I retired to my studio. I saw no one. I spurned suitors, rejected the few friends I’d made. I completed my outstanding commissions and took no more.

  What followed was a difficult period, artistically. It was a time in which I learned the value of discipline. Let me explain: history was the most respected genre, not portraiture. I had never done a history painting. What’s more, I never would have done a history painting if the Academy had not…. Suffice to say that inside of three months I had produced five histories—“Innocence and Justice,” “Peace Bringing Back Abundance,” “Venus Binding the Wings of Cupid,” “Love Testing an Arrow in the Presence of Venus,” and “Juno Borrowing the Girdle of Venus.” (This output would have taken another painter two, perhaps three years; indeed, I had to “play” with the dates of composition.) These paintings were all mediocre, by my standards, but they were more than good enough to gain me admission to the Academy. In truth, I might have painted anything, for the Queen was rather vocal in support of my application. Indeed, one day, in the course of a final sitting, I confided to her that these works shamed me, that having to do the histories angered me, and she paid me thirty-five thousand francs for all five paintings and promised to store them and never show them.

  That same day the Queen gave me a letter of introduction to her sister, Queen Maria Carolina of Naples. And so it was I decided on a southerly route from France, from unwanted fame, and from a name not my own.

  22

  From the Book of Sebastiana d’Azur—

  “Séjour en Italie:

  Away from Rome—Sublime Naples!—

  La Serenissima—I Meet My Soror Mystica”

  I WENT STRAIGHT to Rome, but as I found that ancient place overactive—owing to some high ceremony involving Pius VI—I stayed but three days before hastening to Naples. I went via the inland valleys, the mountains rising all around and showing their high-lying cities and castles and churches and convents as some women show their jewels, high on an ample bosom.

  Naples…Sublime! It was summertime, and the blazing golden light—the color of the palest topaz—was spectacular. That Neapolitan light—and the true artist will always ask of a place she has not seen, What is the light like?—the Neapolitan light enchants as it filters down through vine-covered trellises, flows over marble and stone. Yes, nowhere is shadow so charming, nowhere is color so charged. Nowhere has accident such grace. Coming as I had from the clutter and clamor of Rome, I savored the higher pitch of light and color, as well as the lower pitch of everything else.

  I settled at the Hôtel du Maroc at Chiaja, south of the city. The view from my room was splendid: the sea and the Isle of Capri in front of me; to the left stood Vesuvius, belching up smoke and steam; and to the right spread the hills of Posilipo, dotted with white villas, diamantine under that strong sun.

  I was so taken with the city itself, I did not hurry to Court.

  In the evenings, as the purple wine flowed and the golden light faded, I dined among the natives. I forged good relations, as every traveler should. Once or twice too often, perhaps, I danced the tarantella with men whose names I did not care to learn.

  Those first days were passed near the Porta Capuana and the Piazza del Mercato, its trundle carts and stalls fragrant from their wares. I ate from those traveling restaurants, which come along on wheels, announcing themselves by the rattle of their hanging pots and pans, wherein bits of cuttle-fish are always on the boil in a spicy sauce, to be served with spaghetti and with fruit to follow, the whole of it washed down with cooled lemon water. Exquisite! Finally, after faring out to Pompeii one Sunday afternoon—and there I enjoyed the late-day hours of lengthening shadows—I resolved to go to Court the next day. It was time. I was due, if not expected.

  I’d heard that the Royals were about to venture abroad. The King, Ferdinand IV, and his consort, the Queen Maria Carolina, sister to the French Queen, were going to Vienna, the first stop on a tour intended to secure dynastic marriages for their children. Through a quick correspondence, it was determined that I would paint the Prince and Princesses in their parents’ absence.

  Eventually, the King and Queen sent word of their successes. Their daughters, the three Marias—Theresa, Luisa, and Cristina—would settle upon lesser thrones in Austria, Tuscany, and Sardinia. Happily, I had painted the last of the Marias by the time the first of these announcements arrived in Naples, and so I was able to avoid the ensuing pomp. I focused instead on the full-length portrait of their brother, Prince Francesco di Borbone, who was seventeen and nicely handsome, not marked—as were his sisters, mother, and aunt—by his Austrian forebears.

  The Prince…I decided to paint him in a rather traditional pose—just a hint of a palatial setting, with swags of heavy emerald drapery behind him, two columns framing an easy scene of the distant Bay of Naples. I would add several stock accessories, such as the corner of an ornate desk upon which I would place a globe and several laid-open books, all intended to portray the Prince with a worldly, educated air that he did not, in fact, possess.

  I painted the Prince in profile. Despite this pose, he would not stop turning toward me to stare, smitten, wide-eyed and smiling. I would announce playfully, “I am doing the eyes now,” and urge him to resume his pose. Invariably, he would turn slowly back toward me, as a flower finds the sun. So tempting. Indeed, I received many commissions to paint the forms of those who admired my own. But in the Prince’s case, I was disinterested, merely flattered; and this was no impediment to the work: I could have completed the portrait of the Prince in his absence: sittings are more often than not a rite, a ritual conducted for the subject’s benefit.

  As Court Portraitist, I sat beside the Prince at the Te Deum—for four voices and orchestra—written and sung in honor of the newly affianced Princesses. This gave rise to rumors; two ministers suggested, strongly, that I absent myself from Court before the Queen’s return.

  As I’d come to Naples by the mountains, I returned to Rome in sight of the sea. I preferred to travel at night, saving the days for the happy hazard of things. I was on the road a long while, stopping whenever I wanted, enjoying the hospitality of the natives. Every Italian, just met, seemed a friend.

  Sadly, Rome—save for its many Raphaels—remained unimpressive. I cannot say why. I played the tourist, took some quick commissions—nothing more involved than some pen-and-ink busts. Within a week of my arrival, I’d made plans to decamp to Venice.

  Upon my arrival there I sought out one Dominic Vivant D——: I had a letter of introduction from a Neapolitan nobleman…. Or was it a Parisian nobleman? I forget Signore D——’s profession; it is probable he had none, and was merely, idly rich. All I remember of the man is that he possessed neither talent nor charm, and I would not have passed a second evening in his company had it not been for his mistress, Isabel
la Téotocchi.

  Téotocchi was a popular hostess, reputedly quite “liberal” in her ways. Well known by one name, regardless of her marital state—which varied suddenly and often—Téotocchi had taken on D——as a lover for reasons all her own. Indeed, while I was still in Venice she would drop D——and marry the State Inquisitor, Count A——, whom she did not love. This alliance was purposeful, and it was as the Countess A——that Téotocchi oversaw a salon frequented by the likes of Casanova, Chateaubriand, and Madame de Staël; too, her influence over Venetian legal affairs ought not to be diminished.

  Téotocchi! She had a talent for life, and her death, some years back, shook me badly. The Blood came to her in public; she had not felt its advent. One moment she sat along the Riva degli Schiavoni, taking tea among the tourists, a white silk parasol aslant on her shoulder against the sun, and the next moment she lay fallen from her chair, choking, the Blood bubbling from every orifice, seeping from every pore…Ah, but perhaps I should temper this? Perhaps this is more than you care to know about the Blood? I will say only this, then: you must, sister, avoid such a fate! Listen to the Blood. They say it warns of its coming.

  When first I met her, Téotocchi—my Soror Mystica, the one who taught me so much—was, though in her middle years, possessor of a full beauty. Standing quite tall, she’d go about black-clad through the hottest Italian summers; she preferred, as I do, draped fabrics as opposed to those of the tailored type. She favored the cape-like, concealing domino and wore it whenever she pleased, not just at Carnevale. Black hair, fair skin tinted by the Italian sun…and those eyes! Their green-blue sparkle shamed the Venetian lagoons. They were the first eyes to show me l’oeil de crapaud.

  And so it was in Venice, in the years before Revolution came to Paris, shaking society off its axis, that I began to learn. To trust and learn. Of course, the first thing I learned was my true nature: that I was a witch. Then, there came the Knowledge, which, I assume, someone or something has shown you, or is showing you now. I wonder, is it me? Am I, Sebastiana d’Azur, your Soror Mystica? Have you come to read, to transcribe from this, my Book of Shadows? Am I with you? Am I alive or have I suffered the Blood?

  …I spent several months secreted away with Téotocchi. I faked my taking leave of Venice—I was rumored to have accepted a lucrative offer to paint the daughter of a Portuguese merchant; which rumor I started—so that, should I be spied, the spy might doubt his or her own eyes.

  Our days were spent in the upstairs rooms of Téotocchi’s well-appointed palazzo; a catalog of its contents would include the finest furniture, Chinese prints, Egyptian papyri, and countless books and manuscripts. Each morning, boats would arrive laden with fruits, flowers, and vegetables, and we had only to drop our baskets down by their strings to secure such things as oranges from Palermo and fish drawn from the sea not an hour earlier. We ventured out onto the canals and into the piazzas only at night; even then we went disguised. In Venice, a city accustomed to costumery, this was easily done.

  Yes, we “studied” by day, and at nightfall we descended, disguised, to dine. We favored the restaurant of Santa Margherita, which had paper lanterns of every hue hung about its arbor. Each night we ordered the same dish—filet of sole cooked with raisins, pine kernels, and candied lemon peel—and never tired of it. Over Braganza wine and clove macaroons, we’d talk away the small hours of the morning, me struggling with the Italian I’d not yet mastered. Other nights, nights when it was too hot to sleep, so hot it seemed even the nightingales and gondoliers had lost their voices, we’d descend to sit in silence beside the canal, where innumerable shellfish glittered at the foot of the seawall, where seaweed shone black on the moon-silvered water.

  I remained in Venice through a season of festivals, and I might have stayed forever if not for…Well, Téotocchi had always said, without explanation, that I’d have to leave Venice. I had turned a deaf ear, but finally the dreaded day came, and Téotocchi would brook no debate. We were to witness the marriage of the Doge and the sea; then, said she, I was to leave the city.

  On the appointed day, we boarded one of the thousand crafts that clogged the canals and we sailed out into the harbor. At the head of our tiny barque stood Téotocchi’s beloved servant boy, Nicolo, so richly, so darkly beautiful. (Indeed, Téotocchi had a household rule: when she was at home, which was often, Nicolo was to be unclothed, regardless of his pursuit, chore, or leisure. It was an arrangement that seemed to suit them both, and though I soon grew accustomed to his nakedness, never did my admiration wane. Far from it: indeed, much later, when Nico was made to perform at my esbat in Paris, I…Ah, all in time.

  (For now, I’ll say this: in Venice, Nicolo was directed to love me, or rather to make love to me. And this he did with all the ardor of an aficionado. Téotocchi had a jeweled hourglass with two handles of jade; and so it was that the slow, slow passage of sand governed Nico’s use of his lips, his tongue, his fingers, and his quite dexterous and durable member. Lessons, they were. And Téotocchi witnessed each one, including my…deflowering. On that occasion, she gathered up the bloodied silks on which we’d all lain, boiled the blood from them, and gave the extraction to Nicolo—a love philter that heightened his attraction, strengthened his attentions, tiringly so. Finally, withdrawing from Téotocchi’s laboratoire d’amour, I left her to suffer Nico’s boyish aggression alone, and I resumed a less strenuous course of study…. Of course, you know, witch, it is common among the sisterhood, the keeping of boys.)

  The city was deep in celebration, the canals chock-a-block with boats.

  Finally, too sad to speak, I saw come the great, gilded vessel, the Bucintoro. The Doge sat high upon it, senators at his slippered feet. In its wake came boatfuls of musicians, all brightly clad. The smooth dark wood of their instruments shone under the sun. The sea sparkled, the city itself seemed cast in gold.

  As the Bucintoro neared—Téotocchi had known just where to anchor, and Nicolo had guided us expertly into place—I could see clearly the old Doge and the older senators, skeletal in their black gowns, clownish in their three-bowed wigs.

  Then, the ceremony itself: the Doge stood—cheers from the flotilla, washing back like a great wave over the city—and quite showily slipped a ring from his finger. He held it high, as high as he could, as though seeking to set it on the sun. It seemed he stood like this for an eternity, until the cheering stopped and silence spread from the sea to the shore. Perfect silence. No sound but the sea’s music, the hollow batting of boats one against another. And then, finally, the Doge sent that glistening gold ring arcing through the air to fall slowly, slowly—and, I swear it, audibly!—into the sea.

  A thousand canons announced to the citizenry the consummation of this marriage, said to ensure the safety and prosperity of the city long known as La Serenissima. Bells rang above the canons, summoning all Venetians to masses of celebration.

  We three remained at sea. Finally, Téotocchi took from a pocket deep in her own black robe a simple gold band and, with far less ceremony but with equal solemnity, she slipped it onto my finger, ensuring my safety, my prosperity.

  That evening—it was a starlit summer evening some seven months after I’d arrived—I left Venice.

  23

  From the Book of Sebastiana d’Azur—

  “I Return to a Troubled Paris”

  I TRAVELED, alone, and all in the service of my art…. In those days, I would travel any distance to see a certain painting. I had boundless energy for such trips. In some places I passed months; in others, weeks or days, hours even. Finding a place anything less than exquisite, I would simply summon my coach. All the while, of course, I missed Téotocchi.

  It was always the same, my modus operandi. I would arrive in a city noisily, splashily, attending one or two soirées—and then I would disappear. I made sure my name was known, that word of my presence was whispered in all the finer salons. In each city, I would contract a young man to do my bidding—shopping, for foodstuffs as well as pigments, canvases
and other painterly supplies. Usually it was a university student. Eventually, these boys—they were not quite men, at least not when I met them—these boys would deliver the lesser portraits, collect the smaller fees. Payment far in excess of services rendered guaranteed their silence, their loyalty. (I admit to other means of inducing loyalty, means which were mutually satisfying.) So, I would not be seen in society, sometimes for weeks on end. I would tell everyone that I was simply too busy to accept invitations. I was the author of countless regrets.

  Occasionally, the privileged would come to my door. Oh, the deep delight of looking a prince in the eye and telling him, squarely, no. “No!” And then, as his fleshy cheeks flush with anger, as tears of frustration well in his rheumy eyes, at the very instant when it seems you might fall out of favor, you recant. “Oh yes, yes, yes,” I would say, flustered, “I will do it. For you, sir, I must do it!” And then I would shoo him away, always, always having upped my original price, and I would turn out the portrait in a half-day. (Indeed, the portraits were often completed before negotiations were!) “No, no, no,” I would say, “one sitting will do. The Prince is far too busy to sit twice!” In truth, I could not bear sitting idly through more modeling than was needed, for in the presence of my subjects I had to slow the speed at which I painted.

  Then, with the agreed-upon date of delivery at least three days past, I would touch-up the portrait—so that it was wet when delivered—and bring it myself to the subject’s city mansion or his summer estate, careful to appear a bit disheveled, dressed in a paint-smeared smock, a touch of kohl under my eyes. Breathlessly, I would apologize for the delay; and then, payment in hand, I would humbly take my leave, denying all manner of invitation to sup, to dance, to pass the weekend, “Mais non,” I’d mutter, “So-and-so sits, this very minute, in my studio!”