by Roberta Rich
The judge stood and bowed to the crowd, which gave a collective bob in turn. He walked to the back of the room and disappeared through a small door.
Palladio ambled over to Hannah and patted Matteo on the head. Matteo clung to her. “Now, my son,” he said, holding out his arms, “come with me. My wife and I shall do what we can to make you happy. You shall see. It will all work out for the best.”
Matteo wrapped his legs around Hannah’s waist. “Go with this gentleman, Matteo.”
He screamed until Asher, who had been standing nearby, pulled the boy off and handed him to Palladio. Hannah hurried outside the Doge’s Palace, Matteo’s sobs echoing in her ears. Asher walked ahead of her, not with his usual brisk stride but slowly, his head sunk on his chest. Hannah could not look at him.
Hannah had done her best for Matteo, but there was no joy to be had in the result. She must find the well of strength she had deep within her, dip into the waters of courage and drink fully. Grieving would only harm her unborn baby.
CHAPTER 30
Villa di Padovani,
San Lorenzo, the Veneto
HOW IT BROKE CESCA’S heart to leave her villa. Her trunk was packed. A bailiff would arrive soon to make sure she was on the boat to Rome. She padded across the terrazzo floor of the drawing room in her bare feet, leaving behind moist, high-arched prints. In front of the fresco of the castellana, Cesca clasped her hands and bowed her head.
Once, she had imagined herself in a velvet dress, presiding at a dinner party in the loggia, diamonds in her ears, a rope of pearls around her neck, the table gleaming with silver platters, the glow from dozens of beeswax candles making her eyes sparkle.
Her plans had failed, thanks to Foscari’s bungling, but she need not trouble herself about revenge. The judge, that skinny steeple of a man in fur-trimmed robes, had saved her the task and—she must admit—the joy of watching the peach kernel tincture finish its work. Cesca genuflected to the castellana then gazed up for a farewell glance. She expected to see the wise, all-knowing eyes and the face of brilliant competence smiling down at her, but all was not as it should have been with her beloved castellana. At first, the white skin, violet eyes and heart-shaped face appeared unchanged. Pearls the size of grapes still hung from the castellana‘s plump neck, her face still radiated kindness. But something was amiss.
Cesca moved closer then dragged a stool from a corner of the room to climb up for a better look. The colours in the face and dress had grown fainter. Cesca peered from different angles to catch the light from the window. A bloom of fungus had crept across the castellana’s figure, rendering the tempera—once vibrant—dull and tinged the colour of tea. The castellana‘s eyes were like a candle that had been blown out. Her complexion, formerly pink and gold, now resembled the skin of a corpse. Cesca stood on tiptoe on the stool and, with a section of her petticoat moistened with spit, rubbed the once-green drapery of the castellana‘s skirts. A patch of the original rich viridian rewarded her efforts. If Cesca could find a ladder, she could bathe the castellana with soapy lye water and rub her dry with a soft linen cloth. There was time.
Cesca went to the kitchen and returned with a bucket of lye water, soap and a rag. Standing on a ladder she had hauled in from the stable, she scrubbed, losing track of time, fixated on cleaning the fresco. For the hundredth time she rinsed out her rag in the bucket of filthy water and wrung it out, scouring faster, so fast her hand was a blur against the plastered surface. But it was no good. All this work and she had cleaned only the hem of the castellana‘s skirts. The rest of the fresco remained overcast in an unpleasant shade of milky brown. Cesca’s arm ached; her hands stung from the lye. Even with the ladder the castellana‘s face remained beyond reach.
The fresco could not be put right. None of her efforts here had been of the slightest use. What a naive idiot she was.
A wooden-hulled barge thumped against the villa’s dock. The voices of the bailiff and the bargemen come to take her away drifted into the drawing room through the open windows.
Cesca raised the bucket of dirty lye water over her head. Her arms trembled from the weight of it, and she almost lost her balance on the ladder. With a grunt she heaved it, filthy water and all, at the fresco. The iron rim of the bucket gouged a hole in the wall. The lye ate into the exposed plaster. The castellana‘s face got the worst of the assault. The water ran in rivulets down her nose and eyes. The bucket crashed to the floor and rolled until it came to rest in the centre of the room. Cesca looked away, wiping her hands on her skirt. She climbed down from the ladder and gave the overturned bucket a kick. Not even the great Palladio could put right this wretched villa.
The architect must be counted as another addition to her long list of failures. She had misjudged the depth of his affection for her and underestimated his loyalty to his sickly wife. Yet she could not hate him. He had been generous to her yesterday, when he had dropped in to say goodbye and dribbled into her pocket a tidy stream of ducats.
Cesca must not begin her journey to Rome with her hands caked in filth and gritty with plaster dust. She picked up the rag and rubbed them with long, pitiless strokes, over and over, first the palms, then the backs, then the palms again. But though her hands turned red and raw, they would not come clean.
There were footsteps on the front stairs.
Cesca made her way to the reception room and pulled on her travel boots. How delicate were her feet; how slender her ankles. Beauty—her fresh prettiness—was a wonderful consolation. Beauty and money—Hannah’s and Palladio’s ducats snuggled in her purse—were her stepping stones to a new life in Rome.
The bailiff called to her from the front door. When she did not respond, he entered the reception room, nodding to indicate he was keen to be off. She walked over to greet him. He slammed shut the lid of her trunk, hoisted it onto his shoulder. With an appraising glance, he motioned for her to follow him to the boat.
He was a short but well-proportioned young man, with a moustache and confident swagger. Together he and Cesca walked out the front door and along the loggia. They descended the steps of the portico. As they traversed the lawn to the waiting barge, Cesca stumbled on the uneven, rock-strewn lawn. She had to pull her skirts away from the wild rose bushes that grabbed at them.
White swans lumbered on the near banks of the water. Splay-legged creatures, with grey webbed feet and odd orange bills. Yet when they heaved themselves into the Brenta, they were transformed into creatures of grace and beauty. In chevron formation they glided away from Cesca and the bailiff toward the fresh grass and juicy bugs that awaited them on the other side. There they waddled up the bank, shaking off the muddy water from their white feathers.
There was a great deal to be said for shaking off muck and striking out for fresh meadows. With her ducats, Cesca would set herself up in a townhouse in a prosperous part of Rome. She would have intrigues with rich men. As a girl, she had allowed poor priests and half-starved, itinerant masons to steal what little innocence she was born with. Now she would set her sights on wealthy churchmen—prelates, and abbots, perhaps even a scarlet-robed cardinal. Why not? Behind their pious smiles, under their stiff robes, beneath their starched cassocks and between their legs, their pricks were no different from any other man’s.
Cesca would be the most sought after courtesan in the city. Poems would be written to her. Men would pay tribute to her beauty with costly gems. One day she would wear a pearl necklace like the castellana‘s. With patience, she would accumulate a fortune and invest it in well-situated properties. She would live out her days as a signora d’affari, the income from her properties keeping her in luxury. When she was old, she would recline on a purple divan like one she had seen in Constantinople and grow portly nibbling Turkish delight.
She turned, cast one last look at the villa, gave a smile and waved. Harebells and daisies bent their heads toward her. A canal pony lifted its head, snorted and shuffled its hooves. The bailiff, whose name he confided was Luigi, placed his arm aro
und her waist to steady her as she stepped into the boat.
CHAPTER 31
Jewish Ghetto,
Venice
HANNAH TURNED OVER in bed, awakened by the gates of the ghetto groaning in protest as Vicente swung them open. It was the noise that had greeted her every sunrise since moving in with Asher and Tzipporah a few months ago. Tzipporah had insisted she join the household. “One more pickle into the barrel,” she had said, repeating Asher’s favourite expression.
Hannah had needed shelter, at least until the baby came. Yet she would rather have slept in a pig sty than in the same house as Asher, if not for her conversation with Tzipporah, who had been waiting for her in the Piazza San Marco after the trial.
Tzipporah had drawn Hannah out of earshot from Asher and said, “Asher wasn’t there, Hannah.”
“But he described exactly what happened—the butcher shop, the knife upraised, the struggle.”
“He wasn’t there,” Tzipporah repeated. “I was.”
“But…”
“I was coming home late that night from helping at my sister’s confinement on Calle Farnese. I saw everything. I was too frightened of getting stabbed—either accidentally by you, or by the nobleman—to intervene. So I rushed home to fetch Asher. By the time we returned, it was too late. The nobleman was dead.”
“But why did Asher say he had witnessed the murder?”
“To protect me.” Tzipporah took Hannah’s hand and held it to her cheek.
“I did a stupid thing, which I hope you can forgive. You and Isaac are prosperous now. Perhaps you cannot comprehend how difficult it is to keep five sons and a husband fed and clothed. We are always short of food, no matter how I skimp. I water the soup. I seldom buy meat and when I do, only the cheapest cuts. I buy week-old bread and soak it in water. I make my creams and unguents to sell. But there is never enough money to go around.”
“Isaac and I have struggled, too.”
“That dreadful night, I seized a chance to make a few scudi. For once I wanted enough lamb on the table for everyone to eat their fill. Before Asher loaded the body of di Padovani onto the boat, I stripped off his fine cloak, leather boots, linen shirt and breeches. I sold them to a second-hand clothing dealer.”
“So that is what started the rumours?”
“Murdered men do not undress themselves. If I had thrown everything in the fire, as Asher told me to, everyone would have assumed Niccolò had died of the plague and his body heaved in the lagoon like so many others during that terrible time.” Tzipporah glanced at the ground. “Neither of us breathed a word. But you know how people gossip. There were questions about his death, but in the absence of a body and witnesses, nothing could be proven.”
“I am glad you told me,” said Hannah. Yet none of this excused Asher from threatening to expose her part in the murder.
“Asher is not perfect. What man is? But he is not the villain you think him.”
Hannah took Tzipporah’s arm and together they walked across San Marco.
It had begun to rain. The skies opened up, tipping out heavy buckets of water. The rain tasted salty on Hannah’s lips. When they arrived back in the ghetto, Hannah embraced Tzipporah. She did not know of Asher’s threats to denounce his sister. And Hannah would never tell her.
Now it was morning, weeks later, and Hannah struggled to awaken. The apartment in the old wood-frame building was so stuffy and hot that every day she awoke with swollen eyes and a leaden feeling in her limbs. The bed sheets clung to her. The early-morning humidity presaged rain. Hannah dressed and, with a squirming bundle in her arms, walked down three flights of shaky stairs to the campo. Isaac followed, carrying a wooden stool.
The rain-swollen clouds cast a pallor on the cobbles, even as morning sun peered through. The campo was nearly empty. Most of the men were in shul, the women inside preparing breakfast. Isaac should have been in shul, prayer shawl on his shoulders, kippah on his head, as he davened in time to the Rabbi’s prayers, but ten men to make up the minyan had been present this morning and so Isaac, to her delight, had decided to sit chatting with her while she nursed the baby. Since his arrival Isaac had left her side only to fetch provisions from the market or to go to shul.
Two months ago when Hannah felt her first birth pang—she had doubled over from the shocking intensity of it—there had been a knock on Asher’s door. When she flung it open, Isaac stood there, leaning against the door jamb, still ship sick from his journey. Jessica was in his arms. The little girl gave a glad cry when she saw Hannah. They entered the room. There was no more meat on Isaac than on a Shabbat pullet on Sunday morning. His shirt, the one Hannah had made for him out of fine cotton lawn, hung in folds. But when he opened his mouth to grin at her, she saw he still had all his teeth. There were a few strands of white in his beard that had not been there last year.
“Are you still angry with me?” she said. “If you are, I do not want you here. I cannot bring forth our child in an atmosphere of strife and disapproval.”
Isaac closed the door behind them and put his arms around her. “I am so sorry, Hannah. When you left with Assunta in the middle of the night, I thought you loved Matteo more than you loved me. I thought you had renounced our marriage, that you wanted to be free of me, free even of Jessica, so you could live once again in Venice. I thought, forgive me, that you no longer wanted me as your husband.”
He looked at her with such an expression of joy she had to glance away from the heat of it. “I could not be at peace until I knew what had happened to Matteo. I wanted you to sail with me. But you—” she gave a sharp cry as another pang ripped through her and she handed Jessica to Isaac, then gripped the back of a chair “—would not leave your precious silkworms.” Hannah knew these words were unfair and she would regret them, but the pain in her belly was too great to filter her thoughts.
“We will argue later. You have something more important to do now.”
The tenderness in his voice gave her hope things would be well between them once more.
“We are both stubborn as peasants, aren’t we?” said Hannah.
Yet another pang seized Hannah.
“Who shall I fetch for you?” asked Isaac.
“Tzipporah. She’s visiting her sister on Farnese.”
Tzipporah came running, along with her mother, who made sure all drawers and valises, windows and doors were open to encourage the safe passage of the child. Tzipporah sprinkled a circle of salt around the bed to keep at bay Lilith, the Angel of Death.
Childbirth was like being astride a wild bull. No amount of shouting, imploring or groaning made the slightest difference. Pain after pain bucked through her, squeezing her middle like a too-tight girth, making her twist and moan, causing her to cry out to God for mercy then howl like a beast in the fields. At last she understood what other women endured and it made her wonder at the forbearance of those like Bianca, who had had so many pregnancies.
After several hours of labour, Hannah vowed to Tzipporah, who was holding her hand, that if she survived, and she must for the sake of the infant and Jessica, she would never lie with Isaac again. He could be as handsome as he liked, with his muscular back, curly black beard and lean torso, but she would not be persuaded. If he had had the decency to be present and see her suffering, she would have screamed this at him for all the world to hear.
Tzipporah nodded, amused, and wiped Hannah’s forehead with a damp cloth. “I always say that when I am in labour. And then, Asher always manages to change my mind. Give one last push, Hannah—you are almost there.”
Finally, it was over.
Daniel emerged pink and kicking as Hannah groaned and thrashed in Tzipporah and Asher’s bed. Isaac, with Jessica and the wet nurse, fretted in the campo below with Asher, who, many times a father, had tried to distract Isaac with a game of chess. But it was no use. Isaac, Asher reported later, had insisted on wearing a new path in the cobblestones with his pacing.
Forgiveness—what a long and bumpy road. After Dani
el’s birth, a chilly formality descended between Hannah and Isaac, and beneath its surface, anger. But anger requires energy. Hannah had none. She was exhausted from the confinement, her lack of nourishment while in jail, and then from nightly feedings and daytime nursing, worrying and washing. Then, before Daniel was circumcised on the eighth day, Hannah forgave Isaac for the harsh words of his letter; he forgave her for leaving.
Daniel was as perfect an infant as Hannah and Isaac had ever seen. A round face, pink bow of a mouth, hair as downy as the first fine feathers of a duckling. Even the old mohel who circumcised him remarked on his comeliness.
Hannah planted herself on a bench near the wellhead. She tucked the baby under her shawl and began to suckle him. Although less than an hour ago Hannah had spooned gruel into his bird-hungry mouth, Daniel now latched on to her nipple as though he had not eaten since the day he was born. If Hannah had not been so tired, she would have told Daniel how impossibly beautiful he was. Isaac hunkered down next to her, munching on a piece of bread dipped in honey and sipping a cup of tea. Jessica played nearby. She was walking well now, hardly tottering on her sturdy legs. With her green eyes and black hair, she showed every sign of growing up to be as lovely as her mother, Leah. A few women smiled and nodded at them as they lowered wooden buckets into the well, heaved them up and then trudged back to their quarters.
When he had drunk his fill, Daniel gurgled and batted at her breast, his brown eyes following Jessica as she shrieked and ran with other children. Hannah cupped Daniel’s cap of black hair and smoothed it off his forehead. Isaac cooed to him and murmured nonsense in his ear. Two dark concentric circles, a large one bent over the smaller. How much Daniel resembled Isaac—the same generous mouth, well-shaped head and long legs, but Daniel’s eyes were brown like hers. This lucky baby had inherited the best of each of them.