Da Vinci's Tiger

by L. M. Elliott

  “How I’ve missed you,” she said. “Come, look what the Mother Superior is letting me do.” Juliet pulled me to her table, and I gasped at the border of angels she’d painted on the margins of the manuscript—figures as gorgeous as anything I’d seen the day of the joust.

  “Juliet, your illustrations are magnificent. I did not know you were so gifted an artist.”

  She beamed. “And look at this,” she whispered, glancing toward one of the older, sourer nuns bent over her work to make sure she wasn’t eavesdropping. “I am compiling a book of sayings for the abbess—quotes from Saints Augustine and Gregory but also from the likes of Seneca and Socrates!”

  By her hand, birds of paradise nested around a snippet of Socrates’s philosophy: The unexamined life is not worth living.

  “And”—Juliet leaned close to my ear—“Mother Superior said I may also write a play from what I learn from the quotes to entertain our sisters when we celebrate Easter this year.” She clapped her hands silently, like a child thrilled with a new gift. “I have learned so much reading these passages. My family never would have allowed me access to such books.”

  I couldn’t help feeling a tug at my heart as I recognized that Juliet had become Scolastica’s favored protégée—just as I had once been. I knew how much joy her encouragement brought a young, intellectually and spiritually hungry girl. I missed it.

  “Is not her work marvelous?” Scolastica approached from behind, slipping her arm through mine for support. “I know the new printing press can produce many copies of a book at a time. A miracle indeed, and yet, what a shame to lose the glory of this handmade art.”

  Juliet’s face lit up at the compliment.

  “Come, sisters,” Scolastica announced. “Time to go to the laundry and receive your clean tunics for the week.” When the women glided out silently, heads bowed, she turned to me. “Now we have time for a chat, my dear. Help me to my cell, where it can be a private one.”

  Small, whitewashed, and ornamented only with a crucifix hanging on a wall, the abbess’s cell contained a low bench-bed, a wooden chair, a washbasin, and a cabinet I knew hid her favorite books, sacred and secular. That was all. We sat down facing each other on the thin mattress. I had not forgotten how hard this bedding was despite the fact Scolastica had somehow obtained permission for wool rather than straw mattresses. Seeing how she grimaced as she shifted to get comfortable, I felt a flare of anger that she could not enjoy a real bed.

  “Mother, I wish you could sleep with me on my feather bed.”

  “You sleep alone, child?”

  I sucked in my breath. She always did cut right to the marrow.

  “Yes, Mother,” I murmured. “But I do not mind.” How could I admit that even though Luigi’s disinterest made me worry that I might be horribly unattractive, I was still relieved by my solitude? Luigi’s touch had been uninspiring to the point of making my skin crawl.

  “I hope you will be able to conceive children by him?”

  I turned crimson. “I . . . I do not know, Mother.”

  “Ginevra,” she said gently, “children are one of the greatest joys this world offers a woman. Especially in arranged marriages. Is your husband capable?”

  “I . . . I suppose?”

  “Is he able to perform properly?”

  I shrugged and began twisting handfuls of my skirt in embarrassment.

  “Child.” Scolastica put her hand over mine to stop my fidgeting. “Do you suspect your husband is a Florenzer?”

  “Indeed, Mother, he was born in Florence, you know that.”

  Scolastica laughed gently. “Perhaps we did our job in keeping you innocent of the world too thoroughly. Let me explain. Because of our city’s attachment to the ancient Greeks and Romans and their idealization of the male figure and close friendships among men, some Europeans have started calling men who love each other—in all senses of the word—by the name Florenzer. Do you suspect that—” She stopped abruptly and studied my face. “Ah, I see. It is not your husband you have come to discuss, is it?”

  This time I managed to wait until she opened her arms toward me before I cuddled up against her. I poured out the story of the joust, the Medici dinner, and the ambassador. “His Excellency seemed so taken with my verse, Mother. And he is . . .” I hesitated to admit how handsome and charming he was. “He is . . .”

  “A man,” Scolastica said with a small laugh. “And a diplomat looking to seal a strong bond between Venice and Florence. Think with that brilliant mind of yours. What better way, my dear, to become fast friends with Lorenzo de’ Medici than by joining in the Magnifico’s poetry and philosophy circles and choosing a Platonic lover to idolize as Lorenzo does Lucrezia Donati, or Giuliano does Simonetta Vespucci?”

  I pulled away from her in embarrassed disappointment. “You mean I am nothing but a . . . a pawn on a chessboard? That he really does not think highly of . . . of my poetry . . . or me?”

  “Child.” Her voice was full of affection. “How could he not be taken with your poetry? It is so fine. Or not enamored of that face?” She pinched my cheek. “Of course, these reactions of his are surely true. But Ginevra, you must also recognize forces that lie behind actions and roll them forward. And you must safeguard your virtue or lose heaven.”

  She grew serious. “Such—shall we call them—‘unsanctioned’ love affairs are commonplace in Florence, since marriages are essentially business deals for affluent families like ours. Peasants are more able to let affection or friendship guide who they marry, God bless them. We are not. But while a man grows in reputation for his conquests, a woman simply becomes of ill repute. You must recognize that and be wary.”

  “Am I to never know love then?” I said. Was I never to know the bliss described in the sonnets I’d memorized? Never experience the promise and surrender of a real kiss?

  Scolastica’s eyes twinkled bright within the constellation of wrinkles surrounding them. “I did not say that, daughter.” She still had a young girl’s dimples when she smiled. “After all, I had a husband and beautiful children myself before retiring here to devote myself to God. I knew love of all kinds—wife, mother, friend, and . . .” She lifted my chin so I looked directly into her eyes. “I knew a heart-stopping Platonic love myself, the height of chivalry. Never consummated physically and the most elevating of devotion. My soul is far richer for it. Some things are even better than”—she lowered her voice to a whisper—“or at least as good as a kiss and what follows.”

  I looked at her with shock.

  She gently patted my face before continuing. “But Platonic love is a complex notion, my dear, fraught with pitfalls and dangers as well as glory for the woman. It is a terrifying thing to be—in essence—seen as responsible for a man’s soul. After all, that is the individual man’s responsibility, is it not, to lead a life that takes him to God? Too often a man can proclaim this Platonic ideal and use the show of piety and self-control it creates to hide and continue all sorts of behaviors that the Lord would not smile upon.”

  She paused a moment to make sure I had taken in her words. I nodded.

  “Too often we women think that we can save the men we love from themselves, or that it is our responsibility to do so. All we can do is try to influence by our own behaviors and choices and keep ourselves intact spiritually and mentally. Now, that being said, my dear, there is love to be found within these truths with the right man. With the right man both of you grow, inspiring each other. With the right man, such love and friendship is genuine, born not of calculation or some sort of advancement politically or socially, but of understanding and giving. Like our Lord’s love for us. Just be sure that it is this kind of Platonic love, Ginevra, before you give your heart.”

  I burned to know what man in her past she referred to, but her look told me not to dare ask. “But how will I know when it is real?”

  “You will know it when you feel it, Ginevra. It is like nothing else. But heed the boundaries I described as best you can. Wear virt
ue like armor in a joust for eternity and for your own sense of self.” She squeezed me tight and then pulled away to stand. “There is something I have wanted to give you.”

  From her cabinet, Scolastica pulled out a carefully folded black scarf. “Take this scapular. Wear it to mark yourself as a beloved conversa, a noncloistered laysister of our convent, free to come and go. As a Benci, Le Murate’s greatest benefactor, you are always welcome to the room your grandfather made for your aunt Caterina. You may come here anytime for reflection and prayer. So many people see our walls as confinement, but you know the supportive community among our sisters, the study of thought possible for women in a convent’s seclusion, released from men’s politics.”

  She placed the dark scarf upon my shoulders. “Outside, my dear, you may be placed within a gilded cage of men’s perceptions of you. They will stand and admire you—which is a blessing and a curse. It can be a lonely thing to be turned into an ideal, especially when one is young and has a heart that beats and yearns. But don’t forget that from that perch, you can see and experience the wonders of this mortal world, wonders that men control—its art, its literature, its music.

  “Most importantly, you make the choice of songs you sing within the cage. With your mind and gifts, it can be an exquisite litany. Sing of us. Sing of yourself. Sing of what treasure lies inside women’s hearts and minds if men but look beyond their preconceived notions. We think, we feel, we bleed when hurt. We have courage when tested. Someday men may laud rather than fear that. That is my hope.

  “So sing, Ginevra. Make them listen.”

  9

  “WHAT IS IT LIKE IN THE CONVENT?” SANCHA WHISPERED TO me as we began the walk home. She had refused to let me cross the city alone, tucking a kitchen knife in her belt to escort me—a comical precaution, but I had been in too much of a hurry to argue the point with her. Of course accompanying me also allowed her one of her favorite pastimes—watching people. Rather than entering Le Murate with me, she had waited outside on via Ghibellina, amusing herself by assessing visitors coming into the city’s northern gate, weary from crossing the Apennines on the road from Bologna.

  Her curiosity now turned from that parade of strangers to the inner workings of Le Murate. “Is it all hair shirts and floggings? And spirits and goblins pursuing the nuns?”

  “Goodness, no, Sancha. What makes you think such things?”

  She shrugged. “I’ve heard of strange goings-on inside.” She yanked me away from stepping in ox dung. Florence’s backstreets were narrow and crowded. Men jostled one another, relieved themselves in corners, and argued loudly—even throwing punches—over neighborhood politics. A pair of debaters in front of us shoved each other until one of them fell to the ground. Sancha kept me close to the sand-colored walls and stayed on my outside arm, dismissing men ogling her with a scowl.

  She was a rare good soul, this fierce little protector of mine. I couldn’t help but smile. “And what have you heard, Sancha?”

  “Well . . .” She pulled me close, as if someone could hear her in that din. “My cousin works in the Medici kitchens. Once the great Lorenzo and some of his band climbed the garden walls of the convent at night and peeped in windows. And . . .”

  I stopped. “He did what?”

  “My lady, men do that on a lark and a dare all the time to see the nuns.”

  I was horrified. “I had no idea.”

  Sancha nodded, as if confirming something as obvious as the sun rising in the morning. “The Magnifico and his friends returned at dawn, hungry, and laid siege to the kitchen, where my cousin was beginning the morning meal. She heard Lorenzo brag that he had seen the nuns at prayer. He said that over each hovered an angel.” Sancha lowered her voice as if sharing a secret. “But one had a bloodred devil crouching beside her, whispering in her ear, as if they were friends conspiring together. It was later told that the sister confessed a sin to the abbess that required her doing terrible penance.”

  Sancha’s expression was so earnest, I knew I could do little to shake her superstitions. But I tried. “It is not like that, Sancha. The sisters do pray, for their own souls and ours, and many do seem rather angelic. But in all the years I was there, I never saw a demon or a ghost.” Of course, I did remember the novice who fled her new husband on her wedding night when he passed out from wine, daring to run away into the night disguised as a servant. She claimed she had been guided safely through the dark streets to Le Murate by a kind gentleman, who at the convent door revealed himself to be St. Peter. I always supposed she’d made up the story to prevent her family dragging her back to her marriage. Who could argue with an apostle?

  But I was still incredulous at the thought of carousing men climbing the walls to spy on penitent women just for fun. “Are you describing the night the Magnifico spotted smoke coming from the convent’s kitchens and rushed in to put out a fire?”

  Sancha patted my arm. “No, my lady.”

  “But,” I began, “he has been such a benefactor to Le Murate since the fire, rebuilding the kitchen and the laundry.”

  Sancha just shook her head. “Why do you think he was so nearby that he happened to see smoke and fire in the middle of the night?”

  That silenced me. We continued our path home along via dell’Agnolo. I was about to protest her gossip again, when I heard her catch her breath and mutter, “My God, who is that?” Sancha quickened her pace and pulled me along with her.

  I glanced up the street in the direction she was looking and spotted the back of a tall man with a mane of curls, wearing a rose-colored tunic. He had just emerged from a small corner row house. In the mustard browns of the surrounding buildings and the crowd of dirt-covered laborers who lived on the north side of Piazza di Santa Croce, the man’s richly colored clothing made him stand out like a colorful rooster among chickens. But it wasn’t until he turned to speak to someone ambling beside him that I recognized the beautiful, smooth-chiseled face. It was Leonardo da Vinci.

  “He’s a painter and sculptor,” I said.

  “Hmmmm. I thought from the looks of him that he was born of higher stuff.” Sancha seemed pleased to hear he was not.

  We trailed behind Leonardo, since we were heading in the same direction. He bowed and spoke to people as he passed. I have to admit I was curious myself. Although artists were regarded as mere craftsmen for hire, I still marveled at such talent milling about town like any ordinary person. But as we approached our house, I slowed, ready to leave the street.

  The bells of the Duomo began to chime the hour, a deep resounding tolling that rippled out along the streets from the cathedral, washing up against the walls in swells of sound, then crashing off them in echoes. Other church bells answered, one after another, so all of Florence pealed and throbbed.

  “My lady.” Sancha tugged on my arm without taking her eyes off Leonardo’s retreating figure. “I feel the need to attend midday mass. May we go to the cathedral?” The Duomo lay a few minutes away in the direction Leonardo was walking.

  I laughed at Sancha’s thinly disguised motivation. She grinned at me. Why not? I thought. And so Sancha and I followed.

  Another turn on a corner and the rich red bricks of the Duomo’s legendary dome loomed over Florence’s tiled roofs. I never ceased to marvel at it whenever it popped into my view. I stopped and shaded my eyes to look up at it.

  The largest dome in all Christendom, it had risen under the direction of Brunelleschi, an artist-engineer renowned for his temper and strange habits. He based his design for the Duomo on his study of Rome’s Pantheon—a pagan temple—which alone was enough to make most Florentines distrust its construction. Despite citizens amusing themselves by sitting at the cathedral’s base to watch the laborers—and making bets as to when the whole thing would crash to the ground—Brunelleschi successfully finished the egg-shaped dome in fifteen years. The final touch was placing a golden orb and cross atop its lantern. Watching that gleaming ball being hoisted to its spot touching the sky was one of the last thin
gs I witnessed as a young girl free to be out on the streets of Florence, before I entered convent school. I remembered the scene vividly—Verrocchio had constructed the orb and overseen lifting it by cranes and pulleys.

  I brought my gaze back down to street level, estimating that a young Leonardo had been part of Verrocchio’s band of workers that day—probably the age I was now. Sancha tugged on my arm, and I resumed my gait, allowing her to pull me along so she kept Leonardo in sight.

  Just as we stepped into the massive shadows the cathedral threw along its square, Leonardo stopped abruptly. He balled his hands into fists, putting them on his hips, and shouted angrily.

  “What’s he doing?” Sancha muttered. We both looked in the direction he’d yelled. A young man in two-toned hose and a tight doublet turned, searching the crowd for the shout. When he spotted Leonardo, he squared his feet and bit his thumb at him—the highest of insults!

  Sancha laughed. “Now there’ll be a fight.”

  But when Leonardo threw up his hands, spread wide in disbelief and challenge, the man waved him off dismissively and stalked away. Leonardo stayed rooted for a few moments, staring at where the man had been. Then he lowered his arms and stormed into a nearby house.

  “What was that all about, do you suppose, Sancha?”

  Watching that exchange, her expression had changed from delighted curiosity to gossipy interest and finally to disgust. “That man just dropped a letter into a tamburi.”

  “Really?” I asked. Tamburi were locked wooden boxes placed near major churches by the Ufficiali di Notte, the Officers of the Night. In those boxes, Florentines could denounce their neighbors for vice by leaving secret accusations of crimes against decency that brought arrest and trial in front of a tribunal of old men. The tamburi were notorious and much used—but I had never before seen anyone actually drop a denunciation into one. “What do you suppose he is reporting?”