The Poetry of Secrets

by Cambria Gordon

  His father and he had been alone in the chapel. His mother had retreated to the kitchen to check on the preparation of lunch. He laughed to himself, thinking that all the important discussions in the family were occurring in this sacred space. An open Gutenberg Bible rested in Diego’s lap. He had chosen a particularly beautiful spread, adorned with a golden scale, a human hand, and bit of red cloak on its arm holding the scale. An illuminated Bible was still rare, but the Altamirano money was plentiful and it was a sign of prestige to have a private copy in one’s home.

  “Let us take our leave,” said his father, standing. “Our meal is waiting.”

  Diego pointed to the page in the Bible. “Look at the way the artist painted those tiny lines. It almost looks like an insect.”

  “Yes, yes, quite skilled.”

  “If I may, I’d like to speak to you about an issue of great importance to me.”

  He sighed impatiently. “My stomach is empty, Son. Your mother is waiting in the dining room.”

  “I will make haste,” said Diego.

  His father sat back down.

  Diego closed the Bible. “When I was at university, my philosophy professor asked us to imagine resting in Heaven. He wanted us to see ourselves as old men who had lived a full life of earthly devotion. To understand that it was time to live out the rest of our spiritual days knowing we had done all we could, whether it be as a commander of an army, an advisor to the king, a devoted husband and father, or even a craftsman. He hoped we had pride in ourselves no matter how we earned a wage.”

  “A noble endeavor.”

  Diego took a deep breath. It was now or never. “When I imagined myself in Heaven, it was as a painter.”

  “A painter?”

  “Yes, Father. It was a vision that came to me, the way the archangel Gabriel appeared to the Virgin Mary telling her she was with child.”

  The count was mute.

  Diego had not lied, unless one considered the embellishment of certain facts lying. It was true that the professor had given them the assignment and Diego had indeed pictured himself satisfied at the end of his life, having completed many paintings, his works becoming known throughout Spain and beyond. As far as an angel or saint descending from Heaven to speak to him, that had not occurred.

  “Father? What say you?”

  “I must think on it. There is also the matter of managing our estate and holdings. It is an ongoing responsibility. There is no end to tax and rent collection.”

  “I am confident I can do both, sir.”

  “I do not like the idea of my son, a lord and count-in-waiting, being known as an artisan.”

  “It’s not as if I would be soldering silver, Father, or milling wood. I would be an artist, receiving commissions from some of the most powerful people in Spain.”

  His father harrumphed. “One cannot argue with a vision from God. You may try it for a month. Then we shall revisit the matter. And if you shall fall behind in any way, with our tenant farmers or shopkeepers, then you will say goodbye to this passing fancy.”

  As Diego lifted the iron knocker on Berruguete’s brown, wood-slatted door, he knew painting was no passing fancy. Nor was his affection for Isabel. His identity as a Jew was most certainly permanent. He must figure out a way to bring all three of these passions together.

  “Young master Diego,” said Berruguete, sweeping his arm to usher him in. “How good to see you.”

  Diego basked in the familiar smells of the studio. To some noses, it would be offensive, but to Diego, it was tantalizing. The sharp odors of copper carbonate, vinegar, and lead for manufacturing pigment. Pine tar and linseed oil for emulsions. Egg tempera and gum arabic for binding. A small tub of gold powder rested casually on a table, as if it did not cost as dear as lapis lazuli. Various props lay around the room: vases with budding hibiscus flowers, bowls of fruit. A green cloth draped over a window, the way a woman would wrap a shawl. On another table sat a spinning globe, a compass, and several palettes covered in colored blotches of paint. A door led to a second room, where Diego could see a folded-up cot leaning against the wall.

  This was Diego’s idea of Heaven on Earth.

  “I trust your father is agreeable to our arrangement?” asked Berruguete with those furry-dog eyes.

  “All is well between my father and me.”

  He slapped him on the back. “Good, good. Now let’s see what you’ve brought in that folio of yours.”

  Diego removed eleven charcoal sketches and two pen-and-ink studies, for that was all he had in Trujillo. His oil canvases were still at school in his rented room.

  Berruguete studied them intently. He lifted a fragile piece of parchment, ripped in the center where Diego had pressed the quill too hard. It was a study with close-ups of eyes, feet, and hands in groupings on the page.

  Under the scrutiny, Diego tapped his fingers to the syncopation he had fashioned on the walk over. No working artist, and certainly not one of Berruguete’s stature, had ever viewed his work before. The professors at school were multifaceted: doctors, philosophers, theologians. And while some painted as a leisure pursuit, none did for their vocation.

  “You can do hands, gracias a Dios. That’s the most difficult, always.”

  Diego relaxed a little. “I have not yet painted an entire figure with live models.”

  “We can remedy that,” said Berruguete, carefully returning the sketches to the folio. “I am having a sitting this week with the alguacil. He commissioned his own portrait. I believe he wants to present it to his betrothed as a matrimonial gift.”

  Diego swallowed. “Don Sancho?”

  Berruguete nodded, standing.

  His rival would be here, in this very room. Diego would have to study his brow, his ears, his fingers. Fingers that might touch Isabel one day. Would he be able to paint him without revealing his jealousy? Would he charge at him with a palette knife?

  “Diego?” said Berruguete.

  “My apologies. I didn’t hear you.”

  “I was telling you about my latest piece.” He led Diego into the second room, chuckling. “It’s such a large canvas, it needs its own quarters. This is normally where I bed, but I’ve propped up the pallet so I can view the work unencumbered by anything in my vision.”

  There was no easel. The canvas had already been pulled tight over wood backing. It reached floor to ceiling and nearly wall to wall.

  “Is that … ?” Diego’s words fell away. He was staring at a familiar scene. The scaffolding where a prisoner had been hung. A platform with a fiery priest. Somber Dominican friars behind him. A royal sibling, dressed in red velvet. Two stakes with nearly naked dead bodies. Jewish bodies. Bodies that in another place and time could have been Diego himself. “You … painted the auto de fe?” He thought his voice might fail him again, but it came out strong.

  He shrugged. “Normally, I do not do pictorial narration. Too many things can happen that are out of my control. Weather, stubborn beasts, an angry mob. In addition, it’s hard to settle on one image when the event keeps unfolding and changing. I prefer the studio and a sitting subject.”

  Diego moved closer to examine the painting. “I didn’t realize the tribunal was so boring that someone fell asleep.”

  “You like that dozing figure on the bench, eh?” Berruguete laughed, misunderstanding Diego entirely. “I thought it added some realism.”

  “Oh, I don’t think you have anything to worry about there. The whole scene is quite believable.”

  “As you saw when you came in”—Berruguete gestured to the other part of the studio with the vases, flowers, compass, and globe—“I’m experimenting with figurative objects. Still life is quite radical, you know. The only other painter I’ve heard about who is doing this type of subject matter is de’Barbari out of Venice.” He paused. “Now where was I?”

  “The auto de fe,” said Diego tightly.

  “Yes. It’s the first time I’ve created a work of this scale. The Madonna I did for the church in Par
edes de Nava was one quarter this size. But the corregidor in Trujillo is an acquaintance of my parents. And someone in the royal court asked if he knew any painters who might capture the tribunal. The request came about on such short notice, I almost declined.” He stared at his own painting. “But the Holy Office pays well.”

  Diego was enraged.

  “I confess I was quite moved by the entire experience.” Berruguete’s eyes shone brightly.

  “Moved?”

  “It is amazing, is it not? The way the monarchy can dispatch evil from our midst so handily? It’s a brilliant deterrent. Conversos being forced to watch their brethren and sisters burn. I had not seen that before.”

  Diego felt the urge to scream. He regarded Berruguete. For a painter who studied in Italy, at the vanguard of the rebirth of art, philosophy, and architecture, he was the very opposite of enlightenment. He was pure darkness.

  “You were in Italy, studying art at the Italian court, were you not?” asked Diego.

  “Indeed. I worked at the Ducal Palace. Truly an architectural masterpiece. They even have a room just for contemplation.”

  “Ah yes, the classical Greek influence. Surely among the great thinkers who passed through the palace, you heard talk of earthly judgments rather than those handed down from God?”

  “You mean prison? Queen Isabella’s holy brotherhood has created local policing systems and jails that are quite successful. Or perhaps you speak of an angry mob who takes justice into their own hands? That works as well.”

  Diego bit down on his lip to control his rage. Plenty of innocent Jews were murdered in killing sprees. It happened all over the country. That hardly sounded like justice. “I am referring to something less punitive, such as, in the case of a transgression between two men, forgiving the one who has committed a crime if they have accepted the error of their ways and repented sincerely.”

  Berruguete looked aghast. “Even in Giotto’s masterpiece, Kiss of Judas, with all its figurative realism, Jesúcristo has the final word on forgiveness. Not the man who was wronged.”

  “The ancient Romans gave power to the people when they overthrew the empire,” countered Diego. “This is the essence of a republic. How can the Catholic Church expect the people to accept them when they do not accept the people? The people are autonomous beings who can adjudicate their own sins.”

  “The people must accept the word of God.”

  Diego dipped his head slightly. “I mean no disrespect to the Church. Or to you, Señor Berruguete. But surely you agree that when it comes to Judaizing, the punishment does not fit the crime?”

  “On the contrary, it is quite apt.”

  “Torturing and burning people whose only fault is that they descend from Israelites? We should be embracing them. They were chosen by God for a covenant. His favor and love afforded them special sanctification. The laws of Cristo are merely a continuity of the laws of Moses. Christianity is actually a completion and fulfillment of Judaism.”

  “You blaspheme.” Berruguete walked away, and into the main room of the studio.

  This conversation was over. Diego had tried logic and debate, but it was futile.

  Berruguete turned back, looking at Diego askance. “The canvas is not a place to reveal your opinions, my dear boy. If you are not up to the task, tell me now.”

  No, he did not feel up to the task of apprenticing under a man who would paint such vile imagery of Diego’s own people, who followed orders like a sheep to a dog, who sold his soul to the highest patron. But he desperately wanted to paint, to learn to use oil, and short of moving to Madrid, which held other artists but no Isabel, Berruguete was the only choice in town.

  “I am your humble servant.”

  Isabel watched the parchment curl in the flame of the kitchen hearth until the thin paper was merely bits of black. It was Diego’s sixth note in two weeks, since the day they had ridden up to Monfragüe. All had gone unanswered. She wanted to see him desperately, but after Papá’s and Mamá’s mistreatment at the hands of the Inquisitors, she was afraid of bringing more harm to her family if she and Diego were caught.

  As each missive burned, a small piece of her died along with it. If she could cut open her chest, spread her ribs, and peer into her own anatomy, she would not be surprised to find her heart had shriveled to the size of a prune.

  Last Thursday, she had ventured out to visit Atika, and even that excursion proved dangerous. She had gone to seek advice about the man she loved and the man she was betrothed to. She needed a friend she could trust, not like her own sister, who couldn’t wait for her to fail.

  Atika had been in the amphitheater, setting up cushions for another poetry reading.

  “Your father told me I’d find you here,” said Isabel, panting from climbing so many steps.

  Atika turned to her. “Are you coming tonight?”

  “My heart isn’t in it, if I’m being honest.”

  She raised one eyebrow. “You have to. I’ve got a real salty one to recite. There are also going to be dancers doing the zambra, I heard.” Atika started swaying her hips to music only she could hear.

  Isabel just sighed.

  Atika took a seat and patted the space next to her. “What’s wrong?”

  Isabel lifted up her skirt and joined her. “Diego and I …”

  “No!” Her mouth spread in a sly grin. “You took my advice and lay together?”

  Isabel allowed herself to laugh. “What? No! We shared nothing more than kisses, but …” For a girl who loved words, she was having a very hard time expressing herself.

  “You will, though, soon?” asked Atika.

  “I can’t take any more chances with him,” she said, sidestepping the question. “Things with my family, our situation, has worsened. Also, Don Sancho and my father reached an agreement for next spring. He’s been sending gifts.” Though they were beautiful—a hand-painted fan, a pair of pink gloves as pale as the dawn—Isabel loathed them. “This came yesterday.” She pulled a silver-filigreed and sapphire ring out of her pouch. “Look inside.”

  Atika examined it more closely. “Isabel y Sancho, siempre.” Isabel and Sancho, forever. “There’s no backing out now, is there?”

  Isabel began to cry. Atika put her arms around her and let her mourn her future. “I’m so sorry, Isabel.”

  On the way home from the visit, when Isabel turned onto Calle de la Victoria, she had seen a stranger loitering near their house. His back was to her, so he could not see her approach. He did not look like a pícaro in dirty rags and worn shoes, but he was no tradesman either. He wore a clean, well-pressed black doublet over gray hose, yet did not carry himself with the air of a grandee. She had certainly never seen him before in the neighborhood. Isabel thought he might be a spy.

  Isabel quickly came up with a ruse. She went back the way she’d come, ducking into a nearby lace shop. Using a spare coin her mother had given her, she bought a cheap veil. She covered her face with it, something she never did, and left one eye peeking out in the way the streetwalkers did when they wanted to proposition a man. Even though it was not yet dark, the hour when the unsavories came out, he was still a man. If he did not respond to her provocations, she would know he was a spy.

  “Buenas,” she called to him, swaying her hips and pausing directly in front of him.

  He did not answer. He was chewing búcaro, the reddish clay used in pottery, which people had recently discovered was enjoyable to put in their mouths. Isabel hated the stuff. It tasted like what came out of a horse’s back end.

  She lowered her lashes coquettishly. “Feeling lonely? We could have a grand time together, you and I.”

  He chuckled and his eyes traveled down her body. “I’d like to, señorita. But I’m meeting someone. Move along, now.”

  “As you wish.”

  He was a spy; she was sure of it. Was her family the target? She continued along the street for a few meters, when he called out to her.

  She turned back, heart pumping. This was
good news! He was not a spy after all. But, God’s bunions, what debauchery had she gotten herself into? She might actually have to do something untoward with him!

  “Do you know who lives in that house?” He pointed to her wooden door.

  “No, señor,” she said, trying to keep her voice steady.

  “I just thought if this street was where you, uh, worked, you might know.”

  “I’m sorry I can’t be of more help, señor.” She meandered away from him, swaying her hips. When she turned the corner, she scurried back in the direction of her house on a parallel street. Gathering the folds of her skirt up around her waist, she managed to climb over the back fence, landing with a thump in their yard. The del Castillo dog barked from the front patio, hearing the disturbance, but she paid him no mind.

  So they were being watched. Now that the Inquisition knew they were friends with the Cohens, the Perez family must be on an official list for suspected Judaizers.

  From then on, she would not be leaving the house except for church, wine deliveries, and the market. She told her whole family to do the same.

  Staring at the hearth in her kitchen, she took out Don Sancho’s ring. She wished she could throw the befouled metal into the fire, too. But she would wear it on her finger. With spies in their midst, Don Sancho was the only assurance for their safety. She could not forsake him. If she and Diego were discovered, the alguacil would be publicly humiliated. He would not hesitate to find evidence against his adulterous heretic whore, and turn her—or worse, those she loved—in to the Inquisition.

  Grief overtook her and she sank to the floor in the kitchen. She was also completely exhausted. Her days had been spent accompanying Papá on deliveries in case a customer had a question or a problem and a note needed to be written. In addition to her regular responsibilities of adding up the ledgers, she also helped clean grape skins from filters, checked for sugar content in the wooden vats, ordered empty bottles from Abraham the glassblower, and transferred red grapes from baskets to press. Because the baskets were so heavy, she enlisted Beatriz to help her. It had to be completed bowl by bowl in small batches, so it took much longer than when Papá and his servant, Pedro, lifted it. Pedro was mostly unavailable now, having to spend all his time at the vineyards, tasting grapes and haggling with the farmer for lower prices, tasks that Papá had always done.