I smiled. “Marco and I are leaving for the Medici palazzo soon,” I teased. “It is nothing to me if there is peace and quiet here or not.”
Chiara groaned. “For my sake then, Madonna, that I might have peace and quiet while you are gone.”
“Very well, then.” I rose and went to the window, peering down. The men below cheered at the sight of me. “Here I am!” I called to them. “Now, away with you!” I blew them a kiss and closed the window.
“Now they shall be happy until their dying day, and tell their grandchildren on their knee that once, la bella Simonetta blew them a kiss,” Chiara said.
Now it was my turn to roll my eyes. “Honestly. It is all quite ridiculous. You would think none of these Florentine men had seen a woman before.”
Chiara smiled. “There is no help for it now, Madonna. You’ve become a legend.”
The sad truth was that she was right. I should have heeded the words of Lucrezia dei Tornabuoni and Clarice de’ Medici more closely on that day—almost five years ago now—when they had told me that I was the reigning beauty of Florence.
Their words had been accurate in more ways than I could have foreseen. Ever since that day in the market when the two young swains had fought over my glove, my popularity had only increased. Women continued to copy my dresses—the style and cut and fabric and color, everything. And the young men of the city began passing by the Vespucci house, hoping to catch a glimpse of me. Passing by soon turned to congregating on the street outside, waiting for me to emerge. Gifts would appear on the doorstep for me: flowers; poetry; glass beads; and sometimes finer items such as gloves, small paintings, books, and silver hairpins.
Soon they began to serenade me, pledging to me their eternal love and fealty, begging to be my lover, my cavalier. It had all been amusing enough at the beginning, but soon such antics had begun to wear on the patience of everyone in the house.
We had escaped the noise this summer, as we had in years past, by spending a couple months at the Medici villa at Careggi with Clarice, Lucrezia, and Giuliano. Lorenzo would join us from the city when he could spare the time, and we had spent many a pleasant summer day and evening there in the last few years.
This year, however, we had had to come home early, as I had taken ill. I had spent most of the last month in bed with a cough, and a fever that came and went. Despite the assurances, after I’d fallen ill after my wedding, that I simply had yet to adjust to the warm, dry Florentine climate, I continued to take sick fairly regularly. The first few years, whenever I became unwell, Marco would repeat his offer to return with me to Genoa, where the air seemed more conducive to my health. Each time I refused him, and so he no longer offered.
Florence was my home now, and nothing could persuade me to leave it. Despite such occasional bouts of illness, I had felt myself blossom within Florentine society, amidst the books and conversation and artwork and beauty. My life had become exactly what I’d always hoped and dreamed it would be, and if now and then some notes of discontent would slip in, well, was not the same true of everybody?
So, now that I was recovered, we were joining Lorenzo and Clarice for dinner. It would be a small affair; just their usual circle of friends. I found myself wondering, as I did every time we went to their home, if Sandro would be there.
More often than not I was disappointed. He had become ever busier in the years since he’d painted my portrait. He received some commissions from Lorenzo himself, and many others from other prominent Florentine men and families. When he did appear at one of the Medici dinners, the two of us would always converse, but never for long, and never in private. Never again like those long afternoons in his studio, or when we would go out for walks along the Arno during a break. I missed the unexpected intimacy we had found.
I had never stopped yearning for those days, though my yearning had cooled over time, more for my own sanity than anything else. If he so missed my company, would he not seek me out more often? Invite me to sit for him again, perhaps? Would he not have come to call on me, as a friend would do? Perhaps it was not quite appropriate for him to do so; even in republican Florence, the difference in our stations was considerable. But would he not do it anyway, if he truly wished to see me?
But perhaps he no longer needed me, I thought now, staring glumly at my reflection in the mirror. There was a rumor going about that Maestro Botticelli had painted a small portrait of Lucrezia Donati Ardenghelli at the behest of Lorenzo de’ Medici. It was said to be a most scandalous painting, one of the supposedly respectable matron as Eve—or, another tale said, as Salome, dancing naked before Herod—and one that il Magnifico kept in his private chambers and permitted no one else to set eyes upon. Where the rumors had come from if no one else had seen the painting I was not sure, and so most of the time I was able to dismiss it as yet another fabrication of Florentine society. Yet, whether it was true or not, I found it gave me another reason to quite dislike Donna Ardenghelli.
Perhaps our friendship had always meant more to me than to him. I was a fool for putting so much stock by it.
So while I always hoped to see Maestro Botticelli, I had long since stopped hoping for anything more.
* * *
Of course, he was there that evening.
Even as Lorenzo drew me into a conversation with some of his friends about another work of Plato’s—one recently translated by Lorenzo’s friend, Angelo Poliziano, and which I had read eagerly as soon as I could get my hands on it—I was constantly aware of where Sandro was in the room, of who he was speaking to. At times I fancied I could feel his eyes on me, but I always—though barely—resisted the temptation to turn and see if my suspicions were correct.
Almost as though he could sense my thoughts, Lorenzo soon waved Sandro over. “Sandro,” he called, and the painter made his excuses to Donna Ardenghelli, with whom he had been speaking—the very sight caused jealousy to prickle my skin like a nasty rash—and came to join our circle. “You must tell our friends here about the newest commission you have accepted. I do not believe they have heard.”
Sandro nodded briefly at those gathered around—did I imagine it, or did his eyes settle for just a moment too long on my hand where it was tucked into Marco’s arm?—before answering. “Indeed, it is a very great honor, and a commission I was most pleased and grateful to accept,” he said. “I am to paint a work for one of the chapels in Santa Maria Novella.”
There was a chorus of congratulations. “And what is to be the subject of the painting?” Marco asked. He seemed relieved by the change of topic, as he had not read the book we had all been discussing previously.
“It is to depict the adoration of the Magi,” Sandro replied. He inclined his head toward Lorenzo. “My most noble friend suggested it.”
“That I did,” Lorenzo said. “It is a favorite theme of mine, having grown up with the marvelous frescoes in our chapel here on the same theme.”
“Indeed,” Sandro said, a slight smile playing about his lips.
It occurred to me that the Three Kings were the only rich men in the Bible who entered into heaven, or were indeed spoken well of in the Good Book. No doubt that had more to do with the Medici family’s preference of the theme than anything else. I bent my head slightly to hide the sudden smile that spread across my face, yet when I looked up again Sandro caught my eye and flashed me a quick smile in return, as though he knew my thoughts.
“You have become quite successful, Maestro Botticelli,” said Tomaso Soderini, who had also bestowed a commission upon the painter not too long ago. “As we all knew you would. Why, no doubt you have a suitable income now to take a wife, and to settle down.”
The smile I had been fighting back drained from my face.
“I suppose that I do, signore,” Sandro said, his smile now looking a bit forced. “But I have no plans to take a wife anytime soon. My work is a jealous mistress, indeed.”
“But do not the Good Lord and his apostles tell us that marriage is a most desirable state?”
Signor Soderini pressed. “Would it not be helpful for your work to have a woman to keep house for you?”
“Since you press me, signore,” Botticelli said, his smile widening as he spoke, “let me tell you what befell me one night. I dreamt that I did indeed have a wife, and my anguish and despair awoke me. I so feared dreaming such again that I spent the rest of the night roaming Florence like one possessed to stop myself from falling back into sleep!”
The group of men roared with laughter at this, even Signor Soderini. I laughed as well, more with relief than anything else. Just then Sandro’s eyes caught and held mine, for a moment longer than was seemly, and there was naught but sincerity in them. I shivered.
“Ah, there is my boy!” Lorenzo proclaimed proudly, interrupting the laughter. He bent down to scoop up a small boy who had toddled over and was grasping at the hem of his father’s tunic—Piero, who was two years old. Perhaps jealous of the attention being paid her younger brother, four-year-old Lucrezia followed, crying, “Papa!”
Lorenzo leaned down to ruffle her pale curls. “And my principessina,” he said affectionately.
Clarice appeared at her husband’s elbow. “They wished to say good night before they go to bed,” she said. “Come, children. Time to say your prayers and go to sleep.”
Lucrezia had left her father’s side and come to mine, wrapping her arms around my waist in a childish hug. “Someday, Signora Simonetta,” she said, looking up at me, her dark eyes serious, “I shall be a grown-up lady and wear beautiful dresses like you, and stay at parties all night!”
I laughed and leaned down to hug her, releasing Marco’s arm. “You certainly shall,” I said. “And you shall be the most beautiful lady at any party.”
Clarice had often brought Lucrezia to visit me in the four years since her birth, and as the girl had grown older, I had become something of a favorite with her. With a child yet to come for Marco and myself, I loved spending time with Lorenzo and Clarice’s children, even though—especially lately—it only served to underscore all that I had not achieved.
“Come, Lucrezia,” Clarice said again. “Until you are a grown lady, you must keep to your bedtime.”
“Can Signora Simonetta tuck me in?” Lucrezia asked.
I laughed again. “I certainly can if you wish it.”
I waited as Lucrezia bid her father good night, then I let her lead me to the nursery. Clarice tossed me a grateful look over her shoulder.
Clarice settled young Piero into his little bed as the children’s nursemaid helped Lucrezia change into a clean shift. The youngest Medici child, one-year-old Maria Maddalena, was already in bed and clapped with pleasure at seeing her siblings.
“Now, come, Madonna Lucrezia,” I said as the little girl climbed into her bed. She giggled at being addressed like a grown-up lady, even as she allowed me to draw the covers over her. “To sleep, and you shall have dreams about attending parties wearing beautiful gowns.”
“I will?” she asked.
“I am certain of it.”
Within seconds, it seemed, she had nodded off to sleep, and I rose and tiptoed from the nursery. Clarice had been watching from the door.
“Thank you,” she said. “You are so wonderful with her.”
“She is a joy, truly,” I said. “If only I…” I trailed off, unable to meet my friend’s eyes.
“Surely there is still hope,” Clarice said. “Why, you are only, what, twenty-one?”
I lowered my voice, though there was no one around to overhear. “In truth, I am beginning to lose hope,” I said. “Five years I have been married, and no sign of conception.”
“Perhaps the fault lies with him,” she suggested. “Some sin on his soul, perhaps.”
I shook my head. “I do not know if God works that way, despite what the priests say,” I said. “And you know as well as I do that the fault always lies with the woman. Even if it does not.”
Clarice pursed her lips; she had never abandoned her conservative Roman upbringing in favor of her husband’s liberal view of the world, though Lorenzo, too, was pious enough. “Well, whatever the case,” she said at last, deciding not to argue the point, “never lose hope, Simonetta. God may bless you in time.”
“I hope you are right,” I said, casting one last look back at the nursery door as we returned to the party. Then there was the thing I could never bring myself to confess to Clarice, with her nursery full of children and her husband keeping a mistress: I had begun to feel that Marco was upset with me for not providing him with children, with a son and heir. He had never said such to me, of course; but despite my words to my friend, he had come to my bed less frequently of late, and what other reason could there be but his dissatisfaction with me? Of course, I had been ill recently, but that excuse rang hollow within my heart. The night before had been the first time we had made love since my illness, and even as he moved within me he felt somehow removed, distant, as though he performed the act more for duty than for pleasure.
Yet Clarice, too, had known sorrow in childbearing. There had been a set of twins born the year after Lucrezia who had died mere hours after their birth, and just a few weeks past she had given birth to a daughter who had survived only days. This party was her first public appearance since her lying-in, and though I could still see traces of the sadness in her eyes, both her faith and her practical manner allowed her to go on.
Perhaps she was right. I could not give up hope just yet.
I pushed aside such melancholy thoughts as best I could. I was at a party given by my dearest friends, and whatever problems existed in my marriage—real or imagined—could be dealt with another time.
22
I had just found myself a fresh glass of wine and was going to join Clarice and some other women friends of hers when I heard an unmistakable voice behind me. “Madonna Simonetta.”
I turned to see Sandro sweeping me a bow. “Maestro Botticelli,” I said, forcing his Christian name back from the tip of my tongue, as I always did. As I still did, even after all this time. “I did not get a chance to properly greet you earlier. You are looking well.”
“And you are looking as beautiful as ever,” he said, “though you do not need me to tell you that. Yet I do think you are more beautiful now than when I painted your portrait.”
In spite of myself, I enjoyed the compliment, which would always mean more coming from him than from anyone else. “I am like a fine wine, perhaps,” I said. “I improve with age.”
“I would say so.”
When the conversation seemed to end there, I felt my annoyance grow. Why seek me out at all, if you merely wish to exchange trivial pleasantries and nothing more? I wanted to ask him, but of course I did not. “Well, if you will excuse me.”
“No,” he said quickly. “That is, I had hoped to have a word. Alone.”
His last word made my pulse spike even as he continued. “As alone as we can be in this crowded room, at least.”
“Perhaps we stand a better chance of not being overheard in a crowded room,” I said. “Although I wonder what you can possibly have to say that warrants so much secrecy.”
He drew me into a corner. “It is a delicate matter.”
“Indeed?” I asked. My heart was hammering foolishly at his nearness. “Then perhaps it is an inappropriate subject to discuss with a lady.”
He gave me a frustrated look. “Please, Simonetta, I pray you. Do not play the high society lady with me now.”
I should have reprimanded him for speaking to me so familiarly in public, but I did not—whether because he finally used only my given name, or because I had longed to hear him speak familiarly to me for so long, I could not say. “Very well,” I said at last. “What is this delicate matter, then?”
“I wish you to pose for me.”
“Ah,” I said. “Since I have done so once before, I cannot quite comprehend why it should be such a private matter now. And I see that you only seek me out when you want something from me.”
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��You have not let me explain,” he said. “And that is not true, Simonetta. We converse every time we see each other. If we could do so more, no one would be happier than I.”
“Then, why—” But I stopped abruptly, knowing I could not go on. He was right; we conversed and interacted exactly as much as was proper for two people of our different stations. If it was some further intimacy I wanted—like when he had painted my portrait—well then, I had no right to long for any such thing. And therefore I could hardly take its lack out on him.
When I remained silent, he went on. “It is a very different sort of painting that I have in mind this time,” he said. “That is why it is delicate.”
“What is it?” I asked, almost breathless with anticipation.
He lowered his voice. “A depiction of Venus, being born from the sea,” he said. “I can envision it all, the whole thing in its entirety. And the only woman I can picture as Venus is you.”
For a moment I was quite speechless at these words. Unbidden, I remembered what he had said to me one night as he worked on my portrait: You are the muse, Simonetta. There is no other.
Had his words meant more than I had dared to dream?
“I see,” I said, struggling to regain my composure. “And is it delicate because the Church would, no doubt, not approve of such a work if they were to learn of it?”
He waved this aside. “Perhaps they would not, but that is not the point. No, I … you see, in my vision, Venus is being born anew from the waves, greeting the world for the first time. She must be…” He paused, glancing at me. “Nude.”
Again I fought to speak, but for very different reasons. “And so,” I managed finally, “you ask me to pose for you without a shred of clothing on, in your studio, before your assistants and apprentices—”
“No, no,” he interrupted. “I would not ask you to … no. There would be no one there but me.”
“That may be even worse,” I said. “In my husband’s eyes, anyway. Surely you cannot think Marco would approve?”
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