The Secret Book of Grazia dei Rossi

by Jacqueline Park

  There was also to be ordered for me a comfit from the apothecary called tregea. One dose a day, he explained, would encourage the flow of urine.

  “Do you like fruits?” he asked.

  I confessed that I did, mightily.

  “Well then, write this: Almonds fresh and dried, as many as you will. Fresh and dried figs before a meal. Also grapes. But not afterwards. Melons in season before a meal. But” — he held his hand up in a commanding gesture — “be so courteous to me as to cast aside the fruits which are harmful — baccelli, apples, chestnuts, and pears.”

  I gave him my solemn word never again to so much as look upon a podded bean or an apple or a chestnut or a pear, a vow which I have since broken more times than I have honored it; for I believe that no fruit of this earth is harmful in moderation, a point of contention between me and the great physician.

  But at that first meeting there was nothing in him or his prescriptions that did not command my fervid obeisance. My faith was rewarded almost at once by a dramatic improvement in my well-being. And in addition, the effects of his visit continued to brighten my life long after his departure.

  As if by magic, four new horses appeared in the stable and our daily rides resumed. The oiled cloth that covered the schoolroom windows was removed, letting in the sounds of birds and the rays of the sun and the whispers of the breeze. I was witness to that dramatic moment, for La Nonna, in a sudden reversal, decreed that henceforth the girls of the household were to be instructed in the Hebrew language and Judaic history and practice. Not Talmud, mind you. Girls had no use for the sacred law. And there was to be no Latin. Certainly no Greek. Nothing so arcane as Aramaic nor as frivolous as French. Those romances which Dante calls “the most beauteous fables of King Arthur” were condemned out of hand by my grandmother as “incredible French lies.” But I was back in the schoolroom. And, to add to the bouquet of my delights, La Nonna engaged that most excellent dancing master, Messer Ambrogio of Pesaro, who had served at the courts of Milano and Pesaro and had even been lauded in a terza rima poem by Filelfo of Firenze. The maestro came to us directly from the Estense castello, where he taught dancing to the Este children, Isabella, Beatrice, and the ducal heir, Alfonso.

  Mind you, this particular blossom had its thorny side; for the appointment of Maestro Ambrogio was, in an offhanded kind of way, an insult to Zaira. She too was an experienced dancing teacher. And she had earlier offered her services to the household and been turned down.

  My grandmother was nothing if not deliberate in her actions. She must by then have sniffed out the growing affection between my father and Zaira and I have no doubt that the wound to Zaira’s pride in the matter of the dancing lessons was the opening feint in a farther-reaching plan to sever this threatening appendage from our family group.

  But La Nonna was a shrewd old campaigner. Secure in the knowledge that nothing could come of the affair until Papa’s year of mourning was up, she bided her time, waiting for the right moment to strike.

  8

  Everyone knows that Jewish parents adore their firstborn son, often to the detriment of their other children. Yet, in the dei Rossi family it seemed that my father, the eldest, was despised by his parents almost to the point of loathing. I sensed that this unnatural malice had been provoked by an event of which I was ignorant. And to be sure, not long after we arrived at the Casa dei Rossi, my Aunt Dorotea inadvertently revealed in a dinnertime conversation that my father was not, after all, the eldest dei Rossi son. There had been another boy — the true firstborn — who died young.

  Later my cousin Ricca, loose-lipped like her mother, let slip that a weakness for gambling had clouded Papa’s early life in Ferrara, culminating in some dreadful catastrophe she could not bring herself to speak of. But all the pieces did not fall into place until a crisis in the lives of Mantova’s Jews erupted which tore aside the curtain of secrecy that had hidden my father’s early life from my view, and exposed the entire sordid mess.

  Duke Ercole d’Este was at the center of it. Just before the celebration of Chanukah, he decided, after several decades of benign tolerance, to reinstate the wearing of the yellow badge by the Jews of Ferrara. This badge, a large circle of cloth sewn to the outer garments of Jews to signify their race, was meant to warn the Christian population against the temptations of consanguinity.

  Why did the Duke choose that moment to reintroduce the hated thing? More than likely, sheer whimsicality. I can attest to the vagrant impulses that run riot in the blood of the Estes. Our patroness has inherited a sufficient measure of the family capriciousness to give me ample proof of it. Or perhaps there was an actual cause. The rains had hit our territory with unaccustomed force that autumn, flooding the forests and ruining the hunting season. That whim of nature could easily have moved a prince who loved the hunt to vent his spleen on whatever target came to hand, such as the Jews. Whatever the cause, a grido reinstating the wearing of the badge was promulgated and the parnassim of the Jewish community of Ferrara were soon at our portal begging my father to intercede for them.

  To my surprise, my grandfather refused even to consider the proposal. “If the Duke will not be moved, he will not. And that is the end of it,” he announced to the five men and the rabbi who had come to beg help.

  “All very well for you, Ser Baruch, since you and your family are exempt from wearing the hated thing,” one of the five snapped back. “But for us it is an unbearable mortification.”

  “To be marked with the same brand as the whores,” added another. Indeed, it is the deepest of all humiliations for Jews to be forced to wear the same mark of identification as prostitutes.

  “I will leave this town forever and migrate to the Holy Land rather than ask my wife to sew that accursed badge on my garments,” one of the younger parnassim burst out.

  “The Duke has retired to Belriguardo to wait out the rain,” the rabbi explained in a more conciliatory tone. “We need someone to travel there who can command an audience . . . someone who has a way with him —”

  “Not my son,” Grandfather interrupted heatedly. “Not Daniele. I forbid it.”

  “He is our only hope,” the rabbi responded gravely.

  “Our children will be spat upon and cursed in the streets,” cried the old man, on the edge of tears.

  Once again the rabbi spoke: “The wearing of the badge always leads to trouble. It gives succor to those who believe that anything is allowable.”

  “There is no trouble in Ferrara.” La Nonna’s voice rose firmly over all. “And there will not be if you stick to your prayers and behave yourselves.”

  But the rabbi was not to be bullied. “You know, madonna, that Fra Bernardino is back in the district,” he reminded her. “He surely will take this action of the Duke as a sign that Ferrara is a fertile ground on which to spread his slanders. And we all know what happened in Mantova this very year, when the Gonzagas gave the frate his way.”

  That arrow hit home, leaving La Nonna silent and my grandfather gazing heavenward, looking for guidance from above.

  After allowing them a few moments to contemplate the possibility of another of Fra Bernardino’s spectacles, the rabbi broke the silence. “We have collected a sum of ducats.” He stepped aside to reveal two strongboxes at his feet.

  “How many ducats do you have there?” Grandfather asked.

  “Five hundred gold ducats,” the rabbi whispered. “Enough to buy the Duke five altarpieces by the finest masters.”

  “I will match that sum with five hundred more,” Grandfather offered, as easily as if he were offering them a barrel of oil or a packet of spices. “But I cannot allow my son to go to Belriguardo. That is asking too much.”

  “I will pray with him before he goes,” the rov offered. “I will pray all night.”

  “And I.”

  “And I too.”

  “He will be purified by prayer,” the rabbi went
on. “He will go into the den of vipers and walk through it without being tempted.”

  “Amen,” echoed throughout the room.

  Now the rabbi strode forward and, placing his hands on Papa’s shoulders, pronounced over him the ancient words of the benediction, “May God bless you and guard you . . .” “Yiv aresh icha adonai . . .”

  When he finished, Papa turned to my grandfather and said, “I must go, Father. I must.”

  But Grandfather held back, refusing his permission.

  Then, just when it appeared to me that we would all turn into stone waiting for some resolution, the rabbi beckoned to me, of all unlikely people. Wordlessly, he led me up to the bimah at the front of the synagogue, where women never dare to tread, and stood me before the Holy Ark. Was he planning to make a human sacrifice of me right there in my grandparents’ private synagogue on an autumn day in the month of Ab?

  Of course I knew that Jews have never countenanced human sacrifices, at least not since the binding of Isaac. But the pagans had reached deep into my imagination and although my mind knew that what I feared was impossible, my body trembled.

  Seeing this, Papa rushed to my aid. “What are you doing to my daughter?” he demanded, pushing the rabbi aside. “Have you no better stratagem than to toy with the fears of a child?”

  “I am not toying with your daughter, Daniele,” the rabbi replied calmly. “It is the fate of this community that I seek to influence. And the Lord in His wisdom has shown me the way. I see now that this child is the key.”

  “You intend to send my granddaughter to plead with the Duke?” Grandfather demanded.

  “No, sir,” the rabbi retorted. “I mean to send this child and her brother along with their father to petition the Duke. For if anything will secure Daniele’s honor, it is the witness of his little ones.”

  This bizarre idea, completely incomprehensible to me, was greeted by others in the gathering with loud approval. This time Grandfather did not instantly declare his opposition but instead pulled on his beard thoughtfully, as if the idea was worth considering.

  But as always, it was my grandmother who finally decided. After waiting a few moments for her husband’s response and seeing that none came forth, she strode up to the bimah and, placing her hand on my shoulders, announced, “So be it. The children will go with Daniele. We have wasted enough time. It is already two hours since the rising of the sun and the banco is not yet open. Let us all go to our tasks and be done with this.”

  The road to Belriguardo lies along the tops of the dikes that line the Po. From that vantage point the verdant fields of grain rose to meet us and wave us on our journey. In the year 1487 the devastation of the Venetian war was only a year past, yet already the natural fertility of the Po Valley had reasserted itself. Where else in Italy could one ride through league after league of fields burgeoning with grain a scant year after they had been burned to the ground in a devastating war?

  Sited on a commanding rise in the midst of this paradise stood Belriguardo, built in the last century by an Este ancestor as an outpost in Ferrara’s defense system. Rising out of the mist, it was a structure from the Reale di Francia come to life. Everything about it spelled romance: the four tall towers from which a maiden might gaze wistfully down at her paladin; the long approach lined with an unbroken row of tall poplars, stiff as sentinels; the great surrounding wall that Papa told us measured 383 steps around and was still unbreachable. And, most wonderful to our eyes, an enormous rectangular fishpond, whose length matched the row of poplars on the opposite side of the approach, illuminated, as it were, by the flashing silvery tails of its fishy inhabitants as they scurried and jumped in the clear water.

  Now, I thought to myself, I know why they call these places delizie, for this fanciful approach was truly a delight.

  The huge entrance gate displayed a different facet of the Este style — majesty. Intricately wrought of iron, it was sheltered by a terra-cotta roof mounted on four columns, two of white marble, two of red. These embellishments, Papa explained to us, had been added recently by Duke Ercole, whose taste ran heavily to columns. Ferrara was stuffed with them during his rule. I found them most imposing.

  We made our entrance, still mounted, through the west tower and thence into a courtyard as big as a meadow, with a paved brick road running through it. On this path, we dismounted. And there we stood — inside the castle.

  Papa took it all in stride. Showing his familiarity with the place, he pointed out to us the features of the ground floor: on our left the wine cellars and the cancellaria; on our right the kitchens, dispensary, and barbershop. Above us the piano nobile was bordered all around by an open loggia which, Papa told us, gave access to the family’s rooms and seven guest suites with servants’ quarters attached. That servants should have their own quarters was a new notion to me. In the houses in which I had lived servants slept where they could — on landings or in corners or if lucky on trundle beds in our rooms. As I had suspected, life in castles was of a very different order from life in houses, even grand houses like the Casa dei Rossi.

  In due course the illustrious Duca himself came forth to greet us. To me he was a fabulous presence so beyond my world that I failed to notice his ordinary human flaws, such as his limp or the sardonic curl of his mouth. He was all in black, the better, I daresay, to display the magnificence of his jewelry: a long heavy gold chain (which must have been worth a thousand ducats); a pendant carved from a giant pearl and set with what seemed to be a thousand sparkling diamonds; innumerable rings; and most impressive of all, a little clock he wore on his wrist. As the child of banchieri, I was not unaccustomed to the sight of jewels but I had never seen anything like that little wrist clock.

  Noticing my fascination, the Duke beckoned me closer so that I might have a good look at it. He even took it off his wrist and invited me to hold it in my hand, the better to watch the time go by. However capricious the man was, he was also capable of true kindness. In that, his favorite daughter, our Madonna Isabella, takes after him.

  Now came the time for Papa to explain the purpose of his visit. He began by lauding the Duke for his bounty, his goodness, his generosity and most especially his generosity to his Jewish subjects, a piece of flattery which to me rang false, although it did get Papa to his point: the hated yellow badge.

  “I suspected that might be the matter which drew you to me, Daniele.” Although the Duke’s lips widened in a smile, his eyes remained cold. “But much as I might wish to please you, I cannot rescind my order. I have given my sacred word to Fra Bernardino. It was he who prayed for our cause night and day and turned the tide for us against the Venetians. In return I promised to grant him any wish his heart desired. And what he desired of me was the restoring of the yellow badge.”

  On the face of it, this unequivocal rejection put an end to the dialogue. But no. It turned out to be only the beginning of the negotiations. After a few more rounds of the polite palaver that passes for conversation in courts, Papa stopped himself in midsentence, slapped his thigh, and cursed lightly. “Dio mio, the gift. I have forgotten the gift.”

  At the word “gift,” the Duke brightened considerably.

  “The community of Jews wishes to make a tribute to Your Magnificence,” Papa announced, as he summoned the grooms who stood behind him with the saddlebags. “A reminder of our service to you in the past and of our wish to serve you in the future.”

  “There are those who might say this was a bribe to persuade me to rescind the grido of the badge,” the Duke commented.

  “We live in corrupt times. Men are cynical today.” Papa paused to sigh for the loss of innocence in our time. “It would pain me to take these casks full of golden ducats back to my people and tell them that their gift has been spurned.”

  “Nor would I for the world offend my Jews, who, as you rightly say, have often come to my aid in times of trouble.” He paused. “Do you have a solu
tion to offer, Daniele?”

  “No, sir,” Papa replied. “Unless . . .”

  “You are thinking what I am thinking, are you not, my little son of Israel? A wager? Your gift against my grido? That way, fate will decide and no human agency can be called to account. What say you, Daniele? Do you have the nerve for it? Is luck on the side of the Jews today?”

  “Whether luck is on our side remains to be seen, sir. But in answer to your first question, yes, I do have the nerve.”

  “I heard you had taken a pledge never to gamble again.” The Duke smiled that sly smile of his.

  “Like your vow to Fra Bernardino, that pledge must give way to a higher purpose, sir,” my father answered smartly, causing the Duke to laugh out loud.

  “By God and by Jesus you are quick, Daniele. I have missed your wit since you took that oath, indeed I have.”

  “And I have missed the honor of basking in your sun, sir,” Papa answered gallantly.

  “Well.” The Duke sat up in his velvet chair, sprightly now and full of cheer. “Shall we begin?”

  “At your command, sir,” Papa answered.

  “And what’s your game? Still Zara?” the Duke asked, with what I felt to be a new malevolence in his tone.

  “Zara, yes,” Papa answered quietly. “Let it be Zara.” It was the first time in my life I ever heard the word “Zara,” but I knew from the moment it reached my ears that it was cursed.

  A trestle table was assembled and covered with a green baize cloth like the one in the gambling booth at the market. At Duke Ercole’s nod a silver cup and set of dice appeared.

  The Duke shook out his hand a few times as if to limber his wrist. Papa remained still as a well. Then the Duke broke the silence with a curse.

  “Damn the devil. We cannot play Zara, my friend. For we have no barratiero.”