The Botticelli Secret

by Marina Fiorato

  Anyway, I thought I would set the whole story before Enna when I got home. The scales of our love-hate balance would have to come down on the side of friendship just for tonight, as such a story begged for a good airing. I even wheedled the last of the borlotti beans from a market vendor as she’d asked, to put the bitch in a good mood. My purse was empty, thanks to Signor Botticelli, but I paid the man with a smile and a kiss on his leathery cheek. No need to overdo it, for the beans would have gone for pig slops anyway, along with all the other market leftovers. The beans were small enough, and some were black, but they’d do well in a stew and would placate Enna and pay for her confessional services. All the stalls were packing up as the sun sank. There’s a Florentine saying that if you don’t find the Mercata Nuova interesting, then you are dead. Usually I liked to poke around the various stalls, smelling spices and listening to the strange dialects of the merchants plying their tuna or salt or wine, but not that day. That day I was preoccupied, and couldn’t wait to get home.

  Enna and I shared a cabana by the Arno. It was one of the slum houses that had been built to huddle on the left bank—timbered, rickety, clinging to each other and the shore lest they tumble into the torrent. It was freezing in winter, stank in summer, and got flooded in the rains. (Last spring the floodwater in our cabin reached our ankles and we had to borrow barrels from the coopers’ yard to make stepping stones to the bedchamber.) But we were usually bedded away from home anyway, so there seemed little point in spending our earnings on anything better. I hoped Enna had not gone out, or brought a john home, but as I neared the window I heard voices and cursed.

  Shit.

  She had a client.

  Our window had no glass (too expensive, and would just get broken by urchins), just a dun brown curtain we pulled across for privacy. I listened for a while, because if the gentleman had spilled already he might be on his way out. But if Enna was just warming him up, I’d go to the tavern.

  This is what I heard.

  The man’s voice was low and threatening. He said, “You’ve taken something that isn’t yours. I want it back.”

  Enna didn’t sound frightened and I knew they were probably doing some role play. Hell, I’ve been with fellows who want you to scream as if they’re raping you, or dress as a boy while they take you up the back way.

  “I don’t know what you’re going on about.” Enna’s voice now, rasping like a crow from the pipe she sometimes smoked. I wondered what it could all be about. As far as I knew, Enna didn’t steal either; she was too smart. How strange that we’d both become thieves on the same day.

  “I’ll ask you one more time.” The man again. “Give back what you took, and I’ll leave you in peace. If you don’t, it will be the worse for you.”

  Now Enna was getting annoyed. I know she doesn’t enjoy being threatened, even less so in her home. “Ascolta, listen, signore”—her voice dripped with sarcasm—“I can give you plenty of things, and you can pay, and we’ll both be better off. But I haven’t stolen anything, this day or any other. So unless you want a fuck, you better leave.”

  The man sighed, but the threat had gone. The sigh was that of a man at a dyer’s, told that his coat had been stained green, not blue. A silly mistake, but not a problem. “Very well. Goodbye, Luciana.”

  My skin prickled.

  Fuck.

  He wanted me.

  I waited for Enna to correct his mistake, but she sneezed instead, stopping her words. The door banged and I heard the gurgle of wine—clearly even Enna could be shaken by such things and needed a drink. I waited to be sure the fellow had gone, my heart thudding in my ears and throat. Madonna. I better get the painting back to Bembo first thing—it must be important if it had already been missed. The waters of the Arno roared in my ears with my blood. After a hundred of my rapid heartbeats. I walked in unsteadily.

  Madonna.

  Enna lay on the truckle bed, head cleft from her neck in a gaping red open cunt, only a straining white flap of skin keeping her skull clear of the floor. There was blood everywhere, higher than the spring flood had been.

  Then I knew.

  The sneeze I had heard had been a knife across her throat.

  The gurgle of wine had been her lifeblood pouring to the floor.

  I could not move, as the blood carmined the points of my shoes. My body rinsed the stain with a warm stream of piss running uncontrollably down my legs as my bladder collapsed. I slowed my breath and thought.

  They wanted me.

  I had to go.

  5

  Here are the three things I took from my house as I fled for my life.

  Cosa Uno: the Botticelli parchment, rolled tight in my bodice next to my thudding heart.

  Cosa Due: a sturdy cloak of gray miniver, a Yule gift from Bembo.

  Cosa Tre: a shard of green glass—a broken piece of neckrim—the only fragment left of the bottle that had brought me here as a baby from Venice. It was hard as stone and curved like a claw. It would make an excellent knife and I shoved it in my garter.

  I stepped over the blood and closed Enna’s eyes, trying not to vomit in her dead face. If I could have remembered a prayer, I would have said one. All I could think of was Vero Madre, so I said the words over and over, like an Ave Maria, invoking my real mother as if she were the Virgin. Then I was out the door.

  Safe for tonight. Somewhere I would be safe for tonight. Bembo? Yes; he had gotten me into this mess. I would go to his house, lay all before him, and return the picture. I wanted no further part of it. I wished I could have scratched my image from the giant painting too—I wished I’d never heard of Botticelli. Badly frightened, I pulled my hood tight over my giveaway tresses and headed into the night.

  There was the usual press of people on the Ponte Vecchio despite the lateness of the hour. The Florentine day begins at sunset, and here you can see why; whores and night traders began their working day, playing dodge the watchmen, and numerous pairs of well-dressed married couples took the air before bed. I wished I were one of them—usually I enjoy my lifestyle but just for tonight it seemed to me that there could be nothing nicer than the safety of a circle of warm arms, a shared bed—not just for an hour or two—and a good meal. Yet who would ever marry me?

  I crept on, unrecognized, and began to climb the hill to San Miniato, that church’s bells calling me higher. The half of the city that lies across the old bridge is known as Oltrarno, “over the Arno”; and you can really tell that this is the classy bit. In this exclusive district Bembo had built his flashy new villa, well up the hill from the stews and smells of Florence. Here nothing reached the lofty senses of the hillside residents but a breath of cypress trees and a ring of bells. I knew the way well, but had never climbed the hill on foot before: girls of my talents are conveyed in a carriage (usually performing some lewd act on the way). But fear lent me speed and my heart thumped with my footsteps. Soon enough I breathed the night scent of the myrtle hedges and heard the soft plash of the fountain raining into Bembo’s carp pool: I had reached his gates. At my knock a familiar face appeared: Carlo, Bembo’s doorman, was as ugly as all seven of the sins, but at that moment I could have kissed him as if he were my Vero Madre.

  “Buona sera, Carlo.” (Uno: I knew the man’s name.)

  “How’s that new wife of yours?” (Due: I knew Carlo was recently married, to a young house maid, for whom Bembo had given a generous dowry as a reward to his loyal doorman.)

  The door opened and Carlo smiled. He carried both hands to his chest as if he were cupping a pair of melons and kissed his hands to his lips. Throughout this mime of marital bliss he said nothing and this is because (Tre) he was mute—Bembo took his tongue out, with Carlo’s agreement, after drawing up a contract which would see him live in comfort for the rest of his days. See? Bembo was a contradiction, a marriage of kindness and cruelty. I hoped he would not be angry at me tonight. I hid my trepidation with a brassy smile. “Is he in?” I pointed upstairs in the direction of the bedchamber. Carlo
nodded.

  Thank the Lord. Next question. “And la contessa?” If the countess was home, I was screwed. Or rather, not screwed; I would never get to see Bembo if his snooty bitch of a wife was in residence. A shake of the head from the doorman. He moved his hand to touch the bell for the gate house servant to show me through the grounds into the house, but I laid my hand on his. “Don’t bother, Carlo. I’ll just run up and surprise him.” My saucy wink elicited a grin. Another flash of the Chichi smile, and I was past, racing through the dark fragrant gardens. The great pond lay before me mirroring the firmament like a dropped looking glass, the golden carp shifting beneath the surface with a flash of moonlit scales. One rose and snapped at a gadfly, and I felt threat closing again. I skirted the lake and fell at last into the spacious Roman atrium. Not a soul stopped me from the shadows and I was up into the muted torchlight of the great stone stairs.

  As I reached the oaken door of Bembo’s chamber I dipped my head for sounds but could hear naught but my own heart. My knuckles kept time as they tapped for entry—once, then louder. Nothing. Bembo must be asleep.

  A plunge of the handle and I was in, to find my erstwhile lover tangled in red velvet sheets, asleep. My addled brain was two steps behind my feet, for I had already tiptoed to the bed and placed my hands on the coverlet before I remembered that Bembo always slept in pearl-white sheets of priceless Egyptian lawn. Never red.

  Blood.

  My hands were slick with it. Knowing already what I would see, I turned the heavy body and Bembo’s head flopped back in a posture never meant by nature. The gaping slash in the throat was the exact fellow of Enna’s mortal wound—the same hand, I’ll warrant.

  Madonna.

  My own blood drained from my head and I would have fallen forward, but a rap on the door righted me. I froze at the house maid’s voice. Carlo’s wife.

  “Master?” A pause. “Master? Carlo sent me to tell you that Signorina Vetra has passed the gate. Is she already with you, or shall I give her refreshment in the atrium?” Another knock. “Master?”

  I had, what, two more knocks before the maid entered? I knew she would not hesitate to wake her master—if he had indeed sent for me, he would have meant to be woken for his sport. In an instant I was at the window, out the casement, and swarming down the thick solid ropes of wisteria that snaked up the façade, as fast as a ship’s monkey. In truth, I had escaped here once before when la contessa had come home unexpected and unannounced. I thought fast this time. I knew that once Bembo was found I would be stopped at the gate. I could not take the risk so I did not drop to the ground, but ran over a low roof and hopped the garden wall, to land with a thud among the silent stones of the cemetery of San Miniato. I felt a presence and gathered breath for a giveaway scream, but saw only a lofty silver heron regarding me with one baleful eye from a stone table. He rose from his tomb like a phantom and flew the wall on silent wings, no doubt to stand sentinel over Bembo’s tasty carp. I breathed relief, but only for a moment.

  Shit.

  Now where?

  I had a stolen painting in my bodice, I literally had Bembo’s blood on my hands, and would soon be pursued as a murderer, if I wasn’t already.

  I needed another option. Safety. Sanctuary.

  Sanctuary? The word echoed in my memory like bellsong. Who had offered me sanctuary today? Snatches of conversation came back to me like roosting kites. Suddenly I knew where to go. God’s house was always open.

  I turned the points of my ruined shoes toward the monastery of Santa Croce, to enlist the help of the only man I had ever met who had not risen under my touch.

  6

  There were three things I knew about the monastery of Santa Croce.

  Fatto Uno: Dante wasn’t buried there. He died in Ravenna, where his body rots, but they show his tomb in the monastery church of Santa Croce, since it has lately become the mausoleum for Florence’s most famous sons. But that most revered of all Florentines is revered in . . . Ravenna. Just one more piece of evidence that the church is one huge con, if you ask me.

  Fatto Due: The place was chock-full of well-meaning Franciscans, such as the brother I had come to seek. Franciscans, it seemed to me, did much pastoral work out in the world, for the poor and leprous and other unfortunates. Unlike their chillier brethren, the austere Dominicans of Santa Maria Novella way across town. I’ll tell you how I knew that they were more approachable, and that is, though I had never set foot inside the hallowed cloisters of Santa Maria Novella, I had, in fact, been here before. Many times. And that brings me to:

  Fatto Tre: the postern brother of Santa Croce was called Brother Malachi, and would occasionally pimp me for the brethren within. Shocking, I know, but the flesh is weak when the willy is spirited, and even those with a calling could forget the Lord for quarter of an hour of prick-play. So I knew Malachi well, and hoped that this pious pander would be at the gate tonight.

  The great piazza of Santa Croce was bare and dark, empty even of the pigeons that peck and scratch in the daylight hours. The rough façade of the church loomed out of the dark, giant and forbidding; its door was a dark mouth, its single round window a cyclops’s eye. I dropped my eyes from its gaze, for I was badly frightened, and sought the little gate to the cloister, which sat low in the long high wall. Malachi was there, dozing, but waked as I reached through the gate to lift his cowl and crushed my breasts against the wrought-iron curlicues. Straightaway he leered at me, as if he had been dreaming of my face and greeted the reality seamlessly. His leer reminded me of what a dirty bastard he really was, and I called to mind one of the three Latin tags I know: “cucullus non facit monachum,” the cowl does not make the monk. (I will tell you the other two in good time—right now I am too concerned with saving my miserable skin.)

  “Greetings, Brother Malachi. Is Brother Guido within?” The odious monk stretched, farted, and leaned against the gate. “We have several of that name in Santa Croce, Chi-chi. Will you take them all at once or in succession?”

  I tired of his wit at once. I had walked a dozen miles that night, up the hill to San Miniato, down again to Santa Croce, and had seen two dead souls, one I liked and one I didn’t. I needed sanctuary, not sex, and I searched my tired brain for the monk’s last name. Something about a tower. “della Torre.” That was it.

  Malachi’s brows almost shot into his cowl. “In truth? The Pisano? I thought him somewhat devout for . . . never mind.” He shook his head. “Well, at least he has the money to pay you, and then some, or at least his family does.” He turned the key in the gate and I stepped back as it opened toward me. I pushed quickly past the odious brother, but not before he grabbed my tits on the way past.

  “The brothers are at prayer,” he grunted, trapping me with his bulk. “Don’t forget my tithe on the way out. Ten percent, as always.”

  Madonna. His breath was foul—Christ knew what they fed on here—but I smiled into his drooling face and shot past into the courtyard.

  Now I have no time for God, as you know, but I did feel safer at once. The place was peaceful—a cool rectangle of emerald grass like a still lake squared around by perfect loggias of numberless arches. A chapel with a round tower and a quartet of white columns sat at one end like a temple—oddly pagan in this setting. (Mind you, it was built for the Pazzi family, and a more un-Christian bunch I could not imagine. I’ll tell you all about them later, as they come into this tale quite a bit.) I skirted round the grass and made my way to the left of the little cloister, and could hear the chanting even before I crept into the nave, soothing me with its peaceful tones. Perhaps the danger was past, and one of those who sang could give me succor.

  Even a godless slut such as I could not fail to be impressed by the interior of Santa Croce. It was a massive barn of a church. Every inch of the place was painted, as if the Scriptures were happening around you. Fabulous chapels, all hidden in Gothic arches, huddled at the altar end, their beauties illumined by devotional candles. The brothers, shrinking in their brown habits agai
nst the cold, were lined in the nave, cowls down around their shoulders for worship. From the side door where I stood I could see nothing but rows of profiles, alike as peas in the pod, so I could not at once see my monk among them. My throat tightened. There were hundreds of them, a murder of roosting crows. How would I ever find him? Once the mass was over and they were back in their cowls, I would as soon be able to tell one snail from his fellows. I lifted my eyes at the hopelessness, following the pillars to the ceiling, my gaze floating to where the notes of the austere chant rose and gathered like bedtime birds. Stone angels gazed down at me, and I remembered that my monk had a head full of bounteous, beauteous dark hair, like the archangel Michael.

  A novice.

  Hair.

  No tonsure.

  I must get up high, see the brothers from above.

  And among the angels, as if in answer to a bidding prayer, I saw a walkway, high above the keystones of the arches, spanning the length of the nave. I crept around to the stair and climbed the winding steps to the concealed way; here I could see the brothers from above and study them at my leisure. The awesome aspect of the church below, the frescoes, the tombs, the candles and song rose to meet me. I stared forward at the massive icon of the dying Christ, where he hung sorrowing above the altar like offal. He bent his Judgment Day gaze upon me and I clutched at the balustrade, fearing I must fall. I concentrated on the bowed heads of the praying friars, to stay the wash of terror that had suddenly doused me. Brother Guido must be here, he must. I looked along the rows again, this time from above, and picked out the novices easily, the ones without that incongruous bald spot. Two were blond as Venetians.

  The third was him.

  At once I felt better. He was still beautiful, and taller than all the others save the dark monk that stood right next to him. But his eyes were shadowed with violet beneath, his chin smudged with stubble. He yawned an animal yawn, all white teeth and pink tongue, and I saw that the novice had yet to become used to the earliness of the hour. For this was only the beginning of the Franciscan day—prayers and vigil at three in the morning, to continue at hourly intervals till Compline, and bed before it all begins again. Not for my taste to be sure. And not yet to his. It made him human, and I liked him at once. I kept my eyes on him, not once wavering through the interminable service, for I did not want to meet the eyes of the crucified Christ again. At length the chanting stopped and a monk began to intone Latin from the lectern in a reedy monotone. Another swung the censer back and forth on its chain, and as incense belched forth from the belly of the silver ball, the sweet cloud rose to reach me. The choking scent of the incense, the drone of the monk’s voice, the pendulum swing of the censer, the lateness of the hour, all conspired against me. My forehead rested on the cool stone of the balustrade. I had not slept since I was in Bembo’s arms, a day away, a world away.