by Matt Rees
‘What is the point? Do they want me to change it?’ The cardinal gazed at the Madonna and her naked child. ‘The Fabbrica has already decided. The painting is to be removed. Not fit for St Peter’s. I’m to find a buyer for it.’
Caravaggio dropped to the step below his canvas. He put his hands in his hair, squeezing his temples with frustration.
‘In the meantime,’ del Monte said, ‘this art of yours will be out on the street. Like the other whores.’
The rejection of another of his paintings sent Caravaggio back to the Evil Garden and the fierce, depraved life that skulked there by night – the Tavern of the Moor, the Tavern of the Wolf, the Taverns of the Tower and of the Turk, the brothels around the crumbling Mausoleum of Augustus. Onorio glowed with a gleeful spite, exhilarated to have his friend back. Caravaggio, bitter and raucous and unrestrained, complained about the Fabbrica and the cardinals and the Pope, until even Onorio put a hand over his mouth for fear of the Inquisition.
Damn Baglione, he thought. And del Monte, who was supposed to shelter me. And Cardinal-Nephew Scipione, what kind of a protector is he? And Costanza . . . No, she isn’t asking too much. But let the rest of them be damned.
Every night his jaw hurt from the tension shivering through it. He was constantly flushed and fuming with alcohol. Del Monte and Scipione seemed to flit before his eyes going from table to table at the inn, tossing money to Baglione who skipped across the canvas of The Madonna of the Serpent, dancing a villanelle with Lena.
Whenever Caravaggio stopped by the little house on the Via dei Greci, he found Lena impatient with his stumbling arrivals late at night, his rants about the Fabbrica, his drunken attempts to take her. He would awake on the bedboard at the back of the room, his hungover brain clawing to escape his skull, Domenico giggling and tickling his feet. Lena would stare at him, sour and frustrated, from the kitchen table and he would drop back on the bolster and wonder how much further he had pushed her away that night.
At the end of May, the Vatican put on a gala for the first anniversary of Pope Paul’s coronation. In the afternoon, a boat race on the Tiber ended at the bank with a brawl between the crews. An oarsman took a swing at someone and was stabbed to death. By evening the streets were filled with people who had been celebrating the whole day. They were drunk and petulant. Every laugh sounded unhinged, on the edge of a snarl.
Caravaggio and Onorio left the Tavern of the Tower and crossed the Evil Garden to the tennis courts. In the street beside the Palace of Florence, a game was underway. A cord strung across the street marked the centre of the court. A dozen yards either side of it, a chalk line on the cobbles set the back of the playing area. The walls of the street were lined with spectators, wagering on the outcome. The game concluded as Caravaggio and Onorio arrived.
‘It’s our friend Signor Ranuccio,’ Onorio said. ‘Looks like he just won.’
Ranuccio picked up the ball, a leather casing around packed wool with a lead pellet at its heart. He smacked it high in the air with his long-handled racquet and lifted his arms. The crowd mingled, making good on the bets. Some of those who had wagered against Ranuccio pelted the loser with dung from the street.
Ranuccio glanced over the heads of the gamblers. ‘Painter, what about double or quits on that ten scudi you still owe me?’ His smile was open and joyful, which made Caravaggio hate him more.
Caravaggio handed his cloak to Onorio. He had suffered all the insults he could take from powerful men before whom he must suppress his anger. He didn’t have to endure Ranuccio’s goading. He cared nothing for the ten scudi. He only wanted to finish Ranuccio, to push his face into the dirt and fill his mouth with it until he choked, as if he were stifling all the snobs of the Fabbrica and Baglione too. ‘Give me a racquet.’
Ranuccio signalled his serve as required. It was one of the game’s few rules that he should call out, ‘Eh.’
Caravaggio returned the serve. His shot glanced off the wall of the palace. Ranuccio chased it down, but Caravaggio backhanded the ball straight down the centre of the court. A few in the crowd cheered. Most bayed their derision at Ranuccio.
He doesn’t know yet, Caravaggio thought. He thinks we’re just playing tennis. He’ll understand the stakes soon enough.
After only a few points, Ranuccio was sweating hard and breathless. ‘You should’ve had a rest before you played another game,’ Onorio called to him. ‘Or you should’ve challenged Michele to a game of cards, so you could do it sitting down.’
Ranuccio flicked his fingers off his chin.
‘You waste all your energy tupping your whores.’ Onorio played to the crowd. ‘You’ve less facility at sports that’re played standing up.’
Ranuccio’s elder brother, Giovan Francesco, jostled Onorio. They exchanged threats under their breath.
Ranuccio served. He went for Caravaggio’s return. His shot was intended to bounce off the palace wall, but it caught a window ledge. It came back towards him and the point went to Caravaggio.
The painter felt a stillness within. Excitement came before a contest, and fear in the fraction of a second when defeat was inevitable. The time between was filled with the instinctive, absolute focus of the hunt. His eyes on Ranuccio were dead.
With the next point, Caravaggio sent his ball wide and deep, almost to the chalk line. At full speed, Ranuccio stretched for it, missed, and went head first into the wall, to the amusement of the crowd. His brother dragged him from the ground. Ranuccio stared at Caravaggio, his feet apart, his racquet held with the force of a weapon.
Now he knows what we’re playing for, Caravaggio thought. ‘My serve.’
Ranuccio lashed the ball back to him.
The game was tight, the rallies short, each man striking with such force that his opponent could barely keep the ball alive once the initiative was lost. They were quickly to the deciding point. Ranuccio had Caravaggio on the defensive. He advanced towards the cord and volleyed deep. Caravaggio flicked the ball wide. It ricocheted off the head of an onlooker. The deflection wrong-footed Ranuccio and the ball rolled to a halt behind him.
Ranuccio picked up the ball and made to serve. Caravaggio came to the cord. ‘It’s my game, Tomassoni.’
Ranuccio grumbled under his breath and set himself for the serve.
‘Hey, coglione, you lost,’ Caravaggio said.
‘It came off that fool’s head.’ Ranuccio wiped at the sweat on his bruised brow. ‘It doesn’t count.’
‘What’re you talking about? Spectators are in play.’
‘No, they’re not.’
‘Where do you think you’re playing? In the court of the French king? It’s a street game. You know the rules.’
‘The game’s not over.’ Ranuccio came towards Caravaggio. ‘It didn’t bounce off that man. He stuck out his head and nodded the ball past me. He did it deliberately. That’s not in the rules.’
Tremors of unstoppable fury shuddered through Caravaggio, the aftershocks of the agitation he had been forced to repress in the presence of his wealthy patrons. ‘You lie through your throat.’
At the side of the street, the onlookers argued over the call. The man whose head had been struck by the ball claimed innocence, but those who had bet on Ranuccio converged on him.
‘We’re not finished yet,’ Ranuccio shouted.
‘Shut up. It’s over. You can say farewell to that ten scudi now.’ Caravaggio poked Ranuccio on the shoulder with the end of his racquet.
Ranuccio swatted it away. ‘You dirty faggot.’
‘Once you’ve done kissing your money goodbye, you can kiss me here.’ Caravaggio turned and slapped his backside.
A swordsman’s turn of the wrist and Ranuccio had struck him on the shoulderblade with the frame of his racquet. Caravaggio spun and swiped at Ranuccio’s chest. They clubbed each other with their racquets, until Onorio and Ranuccio’s brother came between them.
Caravaggio jabbed his finger at Ranuccio. ‘I’m going home for my sword, you prick.’ He threw his
racquet like a spear.
‘You know where to find me. I’ll cut you up.’
Caravaggio rushed away to collect his weapon. His breath came in shuddering snorts. It’s now, he thought. It has to be now. Let him die, and I’ll be free.
At the corner, the man who had blocked Caravaggio’s shot slumped against the palace wall. He was bleeding from his nose and staring with puzzlement at the blood on his palm, as though it were a text in a secret language.
Once they had their swords, they rushed past a game of pallone on the way to the Tomassoni house. A player drove his wooden armguard into the nose of a youth on the opposing team who had made the mistake of watching the ball loop through the air. ‘Did you see that?’ Onorio laughed. He spotted Caravaggio’s naked, stern concentration. ‘No, of course you didn’t.’
Mario Minniti caught up with them on the way. ‘A duel, I heard. Let’s hope his seconds join in. Then Onorio and I can make it a general brawl. Michele, try a few feints, a disengage and a cut- over. Then take a long step in with your left leg and shaft him in the groin with your dagger.’
‘You’re obsessed with the groin, aren’t you, Sicilian.’ Onorio clapped his hand to Mario’s shoulder. They laughed like boys on their way to see a game, excited and carefree.
Caravaggio ceased to hear anything. The evening darkness deepened. He glided down the streets, the shadows cradling him. Ranuccio wouldn’t be able to spot his outline. He would rush into the light and kill his man.
At the doorway of the Tomassoni house, his breath surged in his body, all his force ready for this. He would kill his man. Kill him.
‘Come out, if you’ve got the balls,’ Onorio yelled. He picked up a stone and threw it at a first-floor window. The moment it connected with the shutters, heavy feet sounded from inside.
Caravaggio drew his sword, a gilded hilt from Ferrara, a Toledo blade, the bevel glistening down its length like an icy vein. He sighted along it as Ranuccio came out of the courtyard flanked by his brother and another soldier. With his left hand, he drew out a dagger as long as his forearm.
The seconds threw some insults, but Caravaggio heard only his breath and the blood in his head. His mouth was dry. He flexed his grip around the sword handle. Thumb and index finger met above the crosspiece to control the blade, protected by the sweeping guard of the quillon block. He shifted the dagger in his other hand so that his thumb lay along the spine of the blade, bracing it, the flat of the knife facing him, not the edge.
Ranuccio advanced. The two men extended their sword arms, right feet forward, the tips of their rapiers high and en garde. Ranuccio’s pupils were long slits across his cobalt irises, like a goat’s eyes. Caravaggio wondered if he were fighting some kind of evil beast, then he realized his opponent was mad with such fear and exhilaration that it distorted him.
He had practised the sword so often with Onorio and watched so many duels at the French tennis courts, his movements were instinctive, but he made himself check his position. He had to be sure not to forget his technique in the rush to kill. He set his feet apart the width of his torso, twisting his hips to keep both shoulders facing Ranuccio, his right arm leading, his left arm ready with the dagger. He engaged the muscles of his belly, to stay light on his feet.
As they circled, Caravaggio watched his opponent’s body. He might parry the rapier easily enough if he saw the signs from Ranuccio’s arm and torso before the attack advanced. It was the hardest thing to learn when he had first held a sword, not to be mesmerized by the killing tip as it dangled half an arm’s length from his face. Watch the arm, he whispered to himself. Watch this big bastard’s bulky torso. It’ll be as if he were shouting, ‘Now I’m about to try and hit you this way.’
Ranuccio lifted his chest a fraction. Caravaggio parried before the man extended his arm fully into his thrust. Again Ranuccio tried, perplexed and furious at Caravaggio’s sharp defence. The heavy sword glanced aside with a delicate, almost feathery contact, as Caravaggio turned his wrist upwards and nudged the oncoming blade beyond his shoulder.
Caravaggio thrust, the tip of his blade making for the eyes. Ranuccio slapped it away with a hasty jerk to the left. He jumped backwards and crouched low. The fool ought to have parried with a roll of the wrist, Caravaggio thought. It would’ve kept his point on me. He might even have counter-attacked. Either he’s nervous or he’s not much good.
He tried to recall their first fight at the Farnese Palace. He couldn’t remember the way Ranuccio had moved, but he knew he had beaten him. He cleared that fight from his mind. He was here and this time it was to the death. God help me. He whispered an Ave.
With a shuffle and a short spring, Ranuccio made another high thrust. Caravaggio let it come onto his blade. He took his left foot across behind his right, pulling his body out of the path of the thrust. With an upturn of his wrist, the point of his rapier rose above Ranuccio’s sword. In the same movement, he went forward a quarter step with his right foot and felt his tip catch in Ranuccio’s upper arm.
He backed away. Ranuccio went onto one knee and fingered the wound. Pain replaced the rage in his face.
Giovan Francesco was only a few yards from his brother, but still he yelled to him: ‘Ranuccio, remember all I taught you.’
The older Tomassonis were soldiers, Caravaggio thought. They fought for the faith and for the Farnese in Flanders and Hungary. Ranuccio’s problem is that he’s never had a chance to prove his manhood. All his bravado is bullshit.
‘Not much of a teacher, are you, Giovan Francesco?’ Onorio laughed. ‘This dickhead couldn’t spear a whore with her skirts over her head. Good thrust, Michele. Keep the big idiot moving. He won’t touch you.’
Ranuccio snarled, came up from the ground and forward in one motion.
‘Dirt,’ Onorio shouted.
From Ranuccio’s dagger hand came a spray of dung and mud he had grabbed off the street. Caravaggio blinked hard and rubbed his face with his sleeve.
Ranuccio laid into him with a heavy slash. It took Caravaggio’s rapier almost out of his grip, hammering it to his left. Thank God it wasn’t a thrust, or I’d be skewered now.
His eyes still clouded, he went by instinct to his right. Get behind your sword. He put up his guard and felt Ranuccio slash once more. Through the grit, he could just about see. Not the blade, but the arm and the set of the body. Here he comes again. Another step to his right and this time Caravaggio followed his parry with a thrust that connected.
Ranuccio cursed. A cut to the head, above his ear.
‘Lucky for you he couldn’t see where you were, Ranuccio, or that would’ve been the end for you,’ Mario bellowed. ‘You cheating bastard.’
Caravaggio retreated a few steps and squinted hard through the remaining dirt around his eyes. A dozen bystanders had gathered, hanging back from the duellers and their seconds. They were quiet. Even in Rome, where blood was sport, they knew they were about to see a man die, and it silenced them.
His sword arm high, Caravaggio closed on Ranuccio. He pretended to hesitate, made his eyes freeze with fear. He wanted Ranuccio to sense an opportunity. Ranuccio fell for it. He bared his teeth and slashed. Caravaggio relaxed his wrist and let Ranuccio knock his blade low. The force of his own blow left Ranuccio off balance, leaning to Caravaggio’s right.
Then Caravaggio made his move. A step forward with his left foot. He swung his rapier in a high arc onto Ranuccio’s head. It glanced off the crown as the man dropped to the ground.
‘A fine move, Michele,’ Onorio said.
Ranuccio lay on his back, pushed himself up on his elbows, and spat at Caravaggio’s boots.
‘This is your shaming for the insult you gave me.’ Caravaggio spoke loudly, so that the onlookers in the shadows of the Via della Scrofa would know that he had fought for his honour.
He took one step back. Ranuccio’s features relaxed. Caravaggio saw that the ugly defiance of a moment before had been the expectation of death and that Ranuccio now believed he would be allowed to
live.
As he put his hand to his wounded head Ranuccio barely moved his lips to speak, but Caravaggio heard him. ‘I’ll make your whore Lena screw every john in the Evil Garden.’
Caravaggio’s ribs tightened. A single lunge, and his blade sank into Ranuccio, even as the man scuttled away from his thrust. He pierced him in the groin.
Ranuccio doubled up and rolled. Caravaggio felt the muscle and skin slicing on his sword, as though his hand dug inside the living flesh.
With a sudden outcry, Ranuccio’s brother jumped forward. He unsheathed his sword and came at Caravaggio. Now it was no duel. It was a battle, and Giovan Francesco had been a hero in the field. Caravaggio thrust at his attacker, but Giovan Francesco gave him the simplest, most effective response. A parry and riposte in one motion, high, from inside the line of Caravaggio’s sword. Caravaggio heard the scraping of the two blades, a million tiny contacts, the pitch rising as Giovan Francesco’s sword slid along his own. Then the tip had him below the ear. He twitched his head away and his scalp turned cold.
Onorio shouldered Giovan Francesco off-balance and retreated with Caravaggio at his back. Mario was beside him, his sword en garde.
Ranuccio sat on the ground, doubled over. He opened his eyes, the lids coming apart slowly, weeping and red. He held his groin. Blood darkened his hands and soaked his turquoise pantaloons. His face was full of shame, like a man embarrassed by incontinence.
Onorio kicked a rotten cabbage from the gutter. The muck of the street sprayed across the wounded fighter’s face. ‘May you rest in peace.’
‘I’m not dead,’ Ranuccio said.
‘You will be soon, cazzo.’ Onorio parried another thrust from Giovan Francesco.
Ranuccio spoke through white lips. His face was earnest, as if he were a parent explaining something simple yet vital to a small child. ‘I don’t want to die.’