The Medici Mirror

by Melissa Bailey

  And he was not lying. Out of the darkness of the lagoon, shrouded in fog, the sun rose, a pale yellow disc. And it was in this sudden quickening of morning light that an amphibious city seemed to climb right out of the water. How I wish that you could have been here with me to see it. Suddenly houses and chimneys, churches and domes crowded around us, jostled for space along the banks of narrow canals. We followed their twists and turns, left, then right, moving deftly, quietly beneath bridges, below washing hanging suspended in the air above us, past the windows of palaces now glinting in sunlight. My darling, it was quite mesmeric.

  Since we set foot upon dry land, my brother Thomas and I have been compulsive sightseers. It is a bitter-sweet distraction for me from my thoughts of you. We visited the Doge’s palace, climbed the Campanile, taking in the tremendous views over the city, drank coffee in St Mark’s Square and then wandered around until we got lost.

  This afternoon, Thomas had wanted to spend time at the famous art gallery, the Accademia. I couldn’t stand the thought of being shut up inside, admiring paintings, when the day had turned out so bright. I wanted to be in the sunshine. And besides, I quite relished the idea of being alone with my thoughts. So I dropped Thomas at the gallery and arranged to meet him back there later in the day. I could then wander through the backstreets of the surrounding area. We hadn’t visited the Dorsoduro as yet and I spent a good hour simply ambling around. It is famously picturesque, the artists’ quarter, full of small galleries and studios, scattered liberally on narrow streets alongside the canals. I must confess that I wasn’t paying attention to where I was going. What I do remember is that I had just left a gallery filled with beautiful watercolours of Venice and had continued to head east in the direction of the Salute church. I passed over one bridge, caught sight of another ahead, and followed it over to the right into a narrow alleyway. I now had no idea where I was and the foot traffic had thinned to nothing. Not to be perturbed I tried to keep moving east. However, the alleyways of this area continued to narrow, the houses to grow taller, so I could no longer use the white dome of the church as a marker.

  As I was about to turn back to attempt to retrace my steps, the alleyway opened up into a tiny piazza. A ruined church stood in its corner, beside a stagnant silted-up canal. Slates were falling from the church roof, it was pockmarked with blown bricks, its foundations decaying, sliding into a watery grave. Opposite the church was a small antiques emporium. I examined the window, surprised to find such a place so far off the beaten track, and decided to venture inside – as much to get directions as to look around.

  I pushed open the door and a chime above it sounded into the darkness of the interior. I heard a woman’s voice from within greet me in Italian. But there was no sign of her. As I looked around the shop, waiting for her to appear, I saw that it was stacked full of old Venetian mirrors, what I took to be antiques. In fact, the more I looked, the only things that I could see were mirrors. Just as I was completing a circuit of the establishment, the woman appeared from a room at the side. She gabbled at me in incomprehensible Italian and I made my excuses, no doubt in the same! Then I asked if she spoke English. Smiling, she said that she spoke a little.

  This was in fact a lie as her English was very good. She told me that the shop dated back to the fifteen hundreds when it had been famous for selling the finest Murano glass. Her family had once sold to the most prestigious households in Venice and in addition had exported to Europe. Over the last two hundred years or so, with the decline in the industry, the shop had become more of a sideline. But no one in the family, given its long history and connection with glass making, could bring themselves to close it completely. So it limped on, towards the turn of yet another century. Besides, she said, people still knew the family name and sometimes sought them out, particularly if a certain artefact was wanted. We are still excellent at sourcing the finest or most idiosyncratic pieces, she told me. If you were to tell me a piece that you wanted, a piece that you had heard about, my cousins, I can guarantee, could track it down for you. It is something of a family gift, this ability to recover the lost things of the past. I often think that that is where our only skill lies these days, in finding and gathering old pieces to us.

  We talked for a long time, exploring the cavernous reaches of the shop, the woman showing me the best items that she had. Beautiful antique mirrors, some with the glass still clear and bright, others more marked with age and deterioration. But there was a certain beauty to them all. Just as I was thinking that I should be getting back to meet Thomas, my eye chanced upon a mirror, secreted away in the corner of the room. It was, one might say, of simple design in comparison with some of the highly decorative pieces. It was a rectangular shape, with a heavy silver frame, the glass very much stained and blackened through age. Indeed, we laughed as I tried to see my own reflection in its depths. It took me some time but I eventually found myself within its darkness! When I enquired about this mirror, the woman laughed and told me an odd little tale. It was made, she said, by a famous Venetian craftsman, Theseo Mutio, at the end of the sixteenth century. She showed me his initials in the bottom left-hand corner of the mirror. It was believed, the woman said, that this piece had originally been commissioned by King Henri II of France for his mistress, Diane de Poitiers. But by accident it fell into the possession of the Queen, Catherine de Medici, who believed it was intended as a gift for her. When the King realised the mistake he ordered that the mirror be given to Diane and also branded with the couple’s cipher – the conjoining of the letters H and D – in the bottom right corner. Furious, Catherine handed over the coveted gift but its lustre began to fade and eventually it became tarnished by a darkness that spread below the surface. Nobody could explain it but, according to the story, Diane never used the mirror after Catherine gave it up. She did not wish to destroy it and thus upset the King, but neither did she want it near her.

  When the woman finished her tale, we stood in silence for a few moments, each lost in our thoughts. I looked at the overlapping letters H and D still visible beneath the mirror’s dark surface. Is it true, I asked? After all, it sounded like a tall tale. She shrugged and let out a quiet laugh. Who knows? It’s just a story that my grandfather told me once. I smiled and nodded, asking if she knew how the mirror had come to make its way back to Italy from France. But she shrugged, once again indicating that she didn’t know. That, she said at last, was as lost in history and myth as the true story of the mirror.

  What I do know, said the woman, looking at me with a confidential air, is that the mirror has come to us now through tragedy. It was most recently owned by the Tornaquincis of Rome, descendants of Catherine de Medici. Sadly, the whole family was killed one night in a fire. It was not known how it started but not one of them escaped the blaze. The mirror and a few other artefacts were the only things to survive.

  Is that why it is so stained and blackened? I ventured, letting my fingers glide over the glass. After a moment the woman answered. It’s possible, I suppose. But I do not think so. The darkness seems deeper than damage by fire and smoke. And she too let her hand linger on the mirror’s surface.

  For a few moments we stood in silence, each lost in our own thoughts. The mere existence of this object seemed incredible after what the woman had told me. Perhaps it was this touch of the miraculous that appealed. Perhaps it was the odd heritage of the piece: the idea of the King and his mistress and the doomed giving of a gift of love. Perhaps it was the romance of Venice, perhaps it was thoughts of you. Perhaps it was even a combination of all those things. But something pulled at me as I looked into the darkness of that mirror and, with an impetuosity that is rare in me, I decided to have it. More than anything I wanted it for you. When I told the woman I intended to buy it, for a moment she looked faintly taken aback. I thought that she might try to dissuade me. But then she smiled and said she would have it delivered to my hotel. I said goodbye to her and thanked her for her time and her stories. We shook hands warmly and parted.
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  As I left the little piazza, heading back the way I had come, I had a strange experience. The light was fading and Venice was taking on a different hue. The air felt colder and thicker, the canal side streets crowded in upon themselves, their height seeming to topple down upon me, pressing against their narrow edges. And I felt, suddenly and distinctly, a menace in the watery heart of this city and the sensation of something closing around me. A shiver rose inexplicably throughout my body. As if, as they say, someone had walked over my grave. I took a breath, trying to calm my nerves and closed my eyes. In that moment, in my mind’s eye, I was again upon the lagoon we had crossed that morning, but alone this time, with the fog marching in. Only it was no longer simply benign, but moulding itself into ghostly forms. Their cold damp fingers reached out to me and I felt their touch against my skin, their wet clutches closing around me.

  Somehow I forced myself to open my eyes and spurred my body into motion, running, almost tumbling, along the tiny alleyways. Before I knew it I turned a corner and was back in the midst of a crowd. I recovered myself a little and continued walking. I turned another corner and the Accademia came into view, Thomas standing beside it, looking at his watch, then chastising me for my lateness. It was all so suddenly mundane. In the chatter that followed, that feeling of intense fear vanished as quickly as it had come. But, even now, much later, when I revisit it, I cannot understand it, cannot begin to comprehend where it came from. Perhaps it was mere overtiredness on my part. Perhaps my longing for you is making my mind excitable, making me feel things which do not truly exist. Whatever it is I know that I cannot wait to see you again, to be comforted by your presence, to feel you within my arms.

  By the time this letter reaches you, I will no doubt almost be home, destined before your eyes have long taken in the words off the page to see them for myself. I have missed you beyond measure.

  Yours always

  James x

  30

  ‘WHAT ARE YOU doing here?’

  The words bounced off the walls, loud against the hush of the factory. I jumped to my feet, my heart beating wildly, to see Tara advancing up the staircase towards me. Her expression was strained, her skin not quite as radiant as usual and her perfectly bobbed hair, ordinarily so sleek and stylish, was tied back in a rough ponytail. She still looked beautiful, but also tired and tense. However, as she halted in front of me, I noticed there was a twinkle in her eye.

  ‘Hi, Tara.’

  ‘Hi yourself. How the hell did you get in here?’

  I shrugged. It was probably better if she didn’t know.

  She narrowed her eyes but obviously decided to let it pass.

  ‘So, how are you?’ I asked.

  ‘Hmm. Not bad,’ she said, an edge of petulance to her voice, ‘considering I’m here at the weekend. Making up for lost time, Richard calls it.’ And she gave me a pointed look. ‘But I’d say it’s more to do with the fact that Hajime hasn’t yet been quite as fantastic on this job as he imagined he could be. Richard hasn’t told me that, of course. It would involve losing face, after all. Admitting he made a bad decision with you.’ Pause. ‘Plus he and I aren’t really talking at the moment.’

  ‘Oh. I’m sorry to hear that,’ I said, trying to disguise the tremor of jubilation in my voice.

  ‘No, you’re not,’ said Tara, smiling at me. ‘Anyway, enough of that. How are you?’

  ‘Oh . . .’ I paused, wondering in fact how I was doing. ‘I’m okay, I suppose.’

  Tara studied me for a moment. ‘No, you’re not.’

  ‘No, I’m not.’

  ‘Serves you right for not returning my calls.’ She frowned at me, but there was still a hint of a smile on her face. ‘So just what are you doing here, Johnny?’

  I took a breath and wondered what I should say. But there was no question of not telling her everything. ‘I read your file about James and Amelia.’

  ‘Oh, that. You’re still interested in it after everything that’s happened?’

  ‘It’s got under my skin, if you know what I mean?’

  Tara looked at me and then nodded. ‘Weird stuff, huh?’

  ‘Weird and annoyingly incomplete.’

  ‘Yeah. I did my best, but I couldn’t find anything else.’

  ‘That’s what I thought. But something told me there was more to the story here at the factory. So I came back. And I found these.’ I lifted up the pieces of paper I was still holding.

  ‘What are they?’

  ‘They’re letters. Two of them. I’ve only got through the first one but it made for pretty interesting reading. Want to see?’

  Tara shook her head and instead of taking them looked down at her watch. ‘Why don’t you tell me instead? Hajime’s on his way in and I wouldn’t want him to find you here.’

  We made our way up the stairs and into the clicking room as I summarised the contents of the letter. When I had finished, Tara remained silent for a moment, leaning against one of the clicking benches and absent-mindedly picking at a piece of leather. ‘So the mirror did belong to Diane after all, if you believe the story that the woman told James. And it came here via Rome and Venice. On the heels of tragedy.’ She paused for a moment. ‘Where did you find the letters?’

  ‘Behind this photograph.’ I moved towards her and showed her the picture of Amelia in the assembling room.

  ‘Wow. Look at the two of them.’

  ‘Hmm. What do you think? Lovers?’

  Tara continued to look at the photograph. ‘Well, from what I found it would seem so. He gave her the green shoes and we found them in the underground room. So they were probably down there together sometime. And now this photograph and the letters. It has to be, right?’

  An image flitted across my mind. It was James, in the armchair and playing with the green shoe in his hand. Another followed, this time of the woman’s body on the bed in the cellar. I was becoming increasingly sure that it had been Amelia.

  ‘Do you think he killed her, Johnny?’

  As Tara uttered the words I saw the body, supine on the bed, and wondered, for the first time, if it was dead. I blinked to clear my vision, then shrugged. ‘It seems fairly likely, wouldn’t you say?’

  She nodded. ‘But if his death was natural, something odd still seems to have happened.’

  I thought about it again: the bruising around James’s neck, the grazing on his hands. The heart attack he had ultimately suffered. These were the facts. But how did they fit together?

  Tara dropped the piece of leather she had been stroking and picked up a clicking knife from the workbench. She stared at its sharp blade. ‘And if Amelia was already dead and he was down in the basement, what was he doing down there alone?’

  ‘That I don’t know.’ But as I said it I thought of the Italian woman’s tale of the mirror. Of the darkening of the glass after Catherine had had to relinquish possession of it. James was right. It sounded like a tall tale. But these days I wasn’t quite my old sceptical self. A fleeting image of my darkened self, the self I thought I had seen in the mirror, appeared momentarily in my mind and then glided beyond view. I looked at Tara again. She was still holding the clicking knife, but was now flicking it between her finger and thumb.

  ‘You should be careful with that,’ I said. I looked at the blade and remembered how easily, how cleanly it had sliced through the leather when I had used it earlier. ‘It’s amazingly sharp.’

  She made a face and pointed it at me. Then she laughed and placed it back on the workbench.

  We were both quiet for a few seconds.

  ‘How’s Ophelia, by the way?’

  Surprised by the question, I looked up. ‘She’s fine.’

  Tara paused. ‘Look, I think I owe both you and her an apology. I made assumptions about who was coming into the factory and I was way off base. I’m sorry.’

  I smiled. ‘Apology accepted.’ But, as I thought of Ophelia having the factory keys cut, I wondered if in fact Tara had been far off the mark.

  �
��So, do you think she and I will ever meet? I’d like to get to know her.’

  ‘Really?’ I said, frowning.

  ‘Yes, I mean it. I think I’ve been a little harsh where she’s concerned.’

  ‘Well, perhaps,’ I said, and smiled.

  Tara watched me for a second before moving on. ‘And you should probably call Richard. I know he regrets how things turned out. You should clear the air. Try and get back on this job.’

  ‘Richard can call me if he wants to patch things up.’

  ‘Okay, fair enough. But I thought you’d be glad to get rid of Hajime. Stop him sniffing around your territory.’ Tara’s tone was teasing but it made me think of the underground room. Sooner or later, if he hadn’t already, Hajime would stumble upon it. I felt the rise of an angry feeling in my chest again and I pictured Richard, hand outstretched, demanding my keys. I breathed hard and tried to calm myself.

  ‘Johnny.’ Tara’s voice seemed to come from a long way away. My eyes slowly focused on her. ‘Look, you’d better get out of here. Hajime will be here any minute.’ And she looked at her watch again. ‘In fact, he’s already late.’

  ‘Okay,’ I said, pocketing the letters and photograph. When I reached the top of the stairs I turned. ‘Thanks, Tara. I’ll keep you posted if I find out anything else. Take care of yourself.’

  ‘You too.’

  And, as she raised her hand in goodbye, I turned and left.

  31

  Paris, France

  1898

  My darling,

  I have struggled in my time here to erase you from my mind for even a moment. Know that I miss you terribly, with an intensity that I find hard to bear. I catch glimpses of you everywhere: in a dark-haired woman walking ahead of me along the bank of the Seine, another turning down an alleyway in Saint Germain, a third darting behind Notre-Dame and away from me. Always the woman’s face is just beyond my gaze, her turn an instant too early for me to see her clearly. And yet each time I am convinced that it is you. Even though I know that it cannot be. I am haunted by you. I seem to catch the scent of your skin on the air as I walk beside the river, feel the echo of your touch in the graze of the wind, hear your dulcet tones in the rustling of the trees. I long to hold you again, to be with you in the flickering flame of candlelight.