Popes and Phantoms

by John Whitbourn

  The Rabbi, in the midst of revisiting his sorrow, found a smile. Especially when Slovo spoke again.

  ‘Proverbs 31, 6 to 7: “Give strong drink to him who is perishing and wine to those in bitter distress. Let them drink and forget their poverty and remember their misery no more.”’

  ‘Ecclesiastes 10: “Wine makes life joyful”,’ echoed the Rabbi, studying the wine flask but making no move towards it.

  ‘There is no need to restrain the joy referred to,’ added Slovo. ‘The vintage is kashrut; purchased from the ghetto by my servants this very day.’

  As they ate and drank sufficient to be sociable, Rabbi Megillah told Admiral Slovo about his recent doings, his family and the razor-edge life of the ghetto. Slovo listened carefully and chatted back.

  ‘And your wife, Admiral; how is she?’

  ‘Quite well, I understand. A mutual acquaintance brought me news of her quite recently. However, Sanhedrin 7 remains applicable: “When love was strong, we could lie on the edge of a sword; but now, when love has diminished, a bed of sixty ells is not wide enough for us.”’

  A little pause followed this conversational derailment until the Rabbi coughed to clear the air and said, ‘Well, my old friend, I am indebted to you for your hospitality. Is there anything I can do for you?’

  Stretching his smile to the appropriate length, Slovo named his price. ‘Since you mention it, might I allude to Yebamoth 122?’

  ‘“Do not bar your door to the borrower,”’ recalled Megillah. ‘Of course, it is not right or politic for me to refuse you but … well, remember Baba Metzia 75, Admiral: “One that complains but finds no sympathy is he who lends money without witnesses.” To so extend my credit to one especial Christian, well – it marks you out, you know.’

  Admiral Slovo acknowledged gravely that this was so.

  ‘And it also jangles my last thoughts of the day, Admiral. You … extend me: my position grows tenuous. Tomorrow, I and my people might be banished beyond the sea …’

  ‘Or be called home by the Messiah,’ suggested Slovo.

  ‘Indeed. That may be so, although it occurs to me that money will be of no account on that happy day.’

  ‘This is possible,’ said Slovo. ‘Meanwhile, Rabbi, I am called upon to deal with some artist type on behalf of His Holiness. Money will do the trick, in that I find it is often the case that the true hunger firing creativity is a desire for gold and the security it brings. Such is my plan with the fellow in question. I’d rather pay your usury, dear Rabbi, than listen to any more wearying talk of “art”.’

  ‘As you say, Admiral,’ concurred Megillah, slipping gladly into the old, familiar coinage.

  ‘And,’ continued Slovo, ‘it occurs to me, in the circumstances, that your reluctance might be overcome; your interest rate acceptably low …’

  Rabbi Megillah expressed surprise at this presumption. Then Admiral Slovo explained his meaning to him awhile and, at the end, the Rabbi gladly, happily, extended him unlimited credit.

  ‘Michelangelo, the sculptor, who left us without reason, and in mere caprice, is afraid, as we are informed, of returning, though we for our part are not angry with him, knowing the humours of such men of genius. In order then, that he may lay aside all anxiety, we rely on your loyalty to convince him in our name that if he returns to us he shall be uninjured and unhurt, retaining our apostolic favour in the same as he formerly enjoyed it.’

  Final of three briefs from Pope Julius II to the

  Florentine Seigniory 1506

  ‘And,’ said the Swiss Captain, Numa Droz, as they rode along, ‘when the Turks captured Otranto in the August of 1480, they tortured and killed half of the twenty-two thousand souls within and enslaved the rest. There were really interesting piles of bodies, you know: not just the usual ones you find on battlefields. Then the Archbishop and the Town Governor got publicly sawn in half so as to awe the infidel.’

  ‘And did it, Master Swiss?’ asked Admiral Slovo, feigning interest.

  ‘Did me! I apostatized then and there; made the profession of faith to their top turban and was put on the strength.’

  ‘Indeed,’ observed Slovo dryly, ‘and yet you seem passing young for a man present at such a long-ago event.’

  ‘It was my first venture out of Canton Uri, my Lord Admiral. I was a mere stripling. I ended up as a Master of Artillery and Janissary Procurer for a Macedonian frontier fort, and that was quite a nice time. The Mussulman religion is also … interesting … but nothing like the real thing,’ added the Swiss, part sincere, part in sudden recollection of his present employer. ‘So I deserted, made full restitution to Christ in Ravenna …’

  ‘And how expensive was that?’ enquired the Admiral, for his own reference purposes.

  Numa Droz looked shocked.

  ‘The price, Admiral,’ he said firmly, ‘was long hours on my knees – and the hard acquisition of true repentance. Money is weightless; mere base metal in questions affecting the soul. Contrary to what you might think, I’m a true son of the Church; albeit prone to lapses.’

  Slovo managed to keep his surprise to himself – there was a need for care. All Swiss met outside their natural boundaries were controlled mass-murderers, specially exported for that reason. The two of them were alone together on the Florentine road and Numa Droz could at any time surrender to his national passion for blood. Slovo discreetly loosened the stiletto concealed in his saddle.

  ‘And then I took employ with Ferdinand I of Naples,’ Droz continued, the little difficulty apparently forgotten. ‘Now, there was an interesting man. He kept a sort of gallery of his dead enemies, stuffed and mounted, and all dressed in their finery, for him to promenade around from time to time, musing on the shortness and vagaries of life. One day, when I was in special favour, I was given a private viewing …’

  ‘So was I,’ said Admiral Slovo. ‘The Duc’ de Praz-Ridolfi of Romagna looked better than he did in life, I thought. I complimented Ferdinand on it and he actually smiled!’

  ‘Ridolfi?’ said Droz. ‘The slim one, hooked nose, yellow doublet?’

  ‘With jewelled dagger poised in left hand, yes, the same,’ confirmed Slovo.

  ‘Oh … well, we have that much in common then, Admiral.’

  ‘And also service with his Apostolic Holiness,’ added Slovo, quietly mortified to find even two points of similarity with this barbarian.

  ‘Oh yes, I should say so! What happy days, Admiral. I can tell you; as soon as I heard the stories that he was unchristian, warlike and intemperate, I said farewell to Naples and sped to Rome. There’s not been a peaceful day since, I’m glad to say.’

  ‘My recollection is much the same,’ said Slovo crisply.

  ‘He’s been a good father to mercenaries everywhere – for and against him. I was put on the strength right away, you know; full pay from day one whether you kill or not – and you don’t get that sort of consideration just anywhere. Oh look, there’s a strangled man in that ditch.’

  ‘So there is.’

  ‘And Julius even got that Michel-angel fellow to design us Swiss lads uniforms. Do you like it?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Me neither. Still, I expect it’ll grow on people. Mind you, before then, I’ll have earned and stolen a packet and be back in Uri with the wife.’

  Admiral Slovo studied the sky without much hope of consolation and, finding none, pressed on.

  ‘You are far from home, Master Swiss. Suppose your wife has not waited?’

  Numa Droz shrugged and flicked at his horse’s ear.

  ‘Then I’ll kill her and marry afresh. Her sister’s quite juicy, now I think of it. Either way, there’s a wife at the cabin door.’

  Far along the road, Admiral Slovo’s constantly roving eye had detected a lone horseman. Numa Droz spotted him at the same time and suddenly all thoughts of home were forgotten.

  ‘A demi-lance, riding hard, alone,’ Droz said in clipped tones. ‘We stand.’

  The two men, forged in different
but equal fires, did not visibly prepare to meet the rider but adjustments were made all the same. Most encounters on the road were innocence itself but mistakes could not be undone.

  ‘Admiral Slovo?’ said the man when he drew near (but still politely far enough away).

  Slovo smiled whilst remaining inscrutable. ‘Possibly,’ he replied.

  The rider did not take offence. He was familiar with the etiquette of the time.

  ‘I am Peter Anselm,’ he said, with as much of a bow as his armour would permit. ‘Or Petro Anselmi to you, condottiere in the service of Florence, sent to greet and hasten you.’

  Admiral Slovo raised one inquisitive eyebrow, confirming nothing, but signifying the very slightest interest in pursuing the ‘Slovo’ identification.

  ‘This Michelangelo business – it draws to a head,’ explained Anselmi, ‘the Seigniory see cause for speed.’

  Admiral Slovo did not approve of qualities like speed; cousins as they were to the unforgivable: carelessness. ‘And what is the news, Condottiere?’ he asked pleasantly.

  ‘All good!’ the man replied. ‘There could be a war!’

  ‘The Seigniory sent for me and said, “We do not want to go to war with Pope Julius because of you. You must return; and if you do so, we will write you letters of such authority that, should he do you harm, he will be doing it to the Seigniory.” Accordingly, I took the letters and went back to the Pope.’

  Michelangelo Buonarroti. Private letter. 1507

  ‘The Republic of Florence,’ said Admiral Slovo, breaking the news as gently as he could to someone he suspected of naivety, ‘will not risk the losses incumbent in war, solely for you. The strong order the weak, who in turn direct the powerless. I invite you to speculate on your own position within that hierarchy. In short, the Seigniory will at our request, charmed by a little money, spew you forth to whatever fate has in store.’

  ‘That is the way of the World,’ added Petro Anselmi with a grin. ‘My little son knows that and he’s only three! Where have you been all your life, Artist?’

  Sheltered from the gales of reality by two small but talented hands, thought Admiral Slovo – but forbore to say as much as he watched Michelangelo look from Slovo to Droz to Anselmi. Bags of nerve, judged the Admiral, or maybe just bad temper allowed free rein.

  ‘I disagree with the Admiral,’ said Michelangelo, his agitated voice going up and down the scales like a monkey on a stick. ‘I doubt Florence can ever afford to defer to such an aggressive Pontiff for fear of the demands, yet unformulated, that would follow in train. It is my belief that the Seigniory have chosen a field on which to stand and fight.’

  Admiral Slovo smiled and leant forward to replenish his goblet with wine. Numa Droz remained impassive, his gaze shifting lithely back and forth between Anselmi and the Sculptor – thus passing the little test Slovo had set him.

  ‘I detect the echo of another’s voice behind your own, Master Sculptor,’ said Admiral Slovo patiently. ‘May I be so bold as to enquire whose?’

  Michelangelo’s ugly young face coloured. ‘I have taken counsel with a certain officer of the Republic,’ he said briskly.

  ‘A certain Second Chancellor?’ enquired Slovo. ‘Perhaps a certain Master Niccolo Machiavelli?’

  Michelangelo confirmed the suggestion by shrugging noncommittally and suddenly finding the ceiling very absorbing. ‘And what of it?’ he asked angrily. ‘People seek me out for their statue requirements; I seek his advice on the subtleties of statecraft. This is an age of specialists, Admiral.’

  Slovo concurred. ‘Ordinarily, yes – but in this case, no. In my friend Niccolo, we have a man sadly attended by Madame Misfortune in his every endeavour. His thoughts are trained, drilled and marched boldly out to battle – to be routed at reality’s first charge. His long-planned Florentine citizens’ militia will come to nothing.’

  ‘Good,’ said Anselmi, his professional feelings outraged. ‘Amateurs spoil trade.’ Numa Droz wholeheartedly agreed.

  ‘His foreign missions,’ Slovo continued, ‘have spread vigorous ill will and throughout his life he will unerringly change sides from Medici oligarchs to the Republic and back; at precisely the wrong times.9 If I were you, Master Michelangelo, I would not hazard my already short existence on Machiavelli’s advice.’

  Michelangelo glared at him, fright and frustration boiling up into bravery. ‘Well,’ he said, ‘I’m obliged to you for your fatherly words. But, given the choice, I’ll cleave to his opinion, not yours.’

  With one black-bejewelled finger, Slovo waved Numa Droz forward.

  ‘I don’t know much about art,’ said the Swiss, ‘but all I’ve heard indicates that an artist needs his HANDS!’

  Before his last words had ceased, Droz’s sword carved a silver arc, its proposed termination the joint of Michelangelo’s right wrist.

  Its speed was such that there was no time for the Artist to disgrace himself with a scream, or, in fact, to react at all. He therefore maintained the most commendable Stoic calm and watched as Anselmi somehow parried the blow with his short-sword.

  ‘Very sorry, Master Swiss,’ said Anselmi with courteous regret, ‘but I can’t permit that: orders, I’m afraid.’

  ‘You’re very good,’ said Numa Droz, one craftsman to another as they disengaged blades. ‘Nice and fast.’

  Anselmi permitted himself a modest smile. ‘Thank you – but you made it possible; there wasn’t full force in your blow. You didn’t intend the complete job, did you?’

  Droz further indicated his spirit of professional fellowship. ‘You’re right; I confess – but not many could have told.’

  ‘Just a life-long scar, not a hack-off, am I right?’

  ‘Precisely!’ said Numa Droz, wreathed in sunny smiles. ‘Just an indication of what could be.’

  ‘I’m off!’ shouted Michelangelo, regaining his powers of speech and coordination, but halted one second into his progress in order to avoid impaling his throat on Anselmi’s sword.

  ‘You stay where you are,’ said the condottiere, expertly using the tip of his blade on the Sculptor’s Adam’s apple to guide him back to his seat, ‘and listen to what these kind gentlemen have to say.’

  ‘I am indebted, sir,’ said Slovo graciously, slightly cheered by this economical display of skill in a world of so much wasted energy and emotion.

  ‘Florence is all for freedom,’ said Anselmi, his barbarous Italian only slightly spoiling the effect, ‘but my understanding is that the sentiment is conditional upon Florence’s perceived present interest. Now, if it were down to me, Sculptor, I’d let you stay in the City and then we’d have war with His Holiness – excellent! It would do my free company’s trading figures a power of good. However, sad to say, my employer is of a more reflective mind. Accordingly, you’ll sit this meeting out, attend and digest. At the end, if you remain obdurate, I’ll escort you safely home – comprehend?’

  Michelangelo nodded obediently. The sword slowly withdrew.

  ‘Cutting to the root of the matter,’ said Slovo, choosing the phrase advisedly and watching Michelangelo pale afresh, ‘I am willing, of my own funds, to offer you three hundred ducats to return to Rome and complete your commission. My personal lines of credit with the Florentine goldsmiths guild, via a Jew of Rome, are easily verifiable.’

  ‘Already done,’ commented Anselmi efficiently. ‘Sculptor: this man has what he says he has.’

  There was just the merest whisper of a slight in thinking such a confirmation necessary, but Slovo passed over it with magnanimity. Numa Droz, awaiting a signal to act, took his cue and appeared to relax.

  ‘What use is gold to a dead man?’ asked Michelangelo reasonably enough. ‘I would not survive my first night back in Rome. Please explain to me the seductiveness of being the richest garrotted corpse in the Tiber.’

  So there it was: Slovo had made persuasive appeals to the three great motivations: firstly reason, then fear, then avarice. Thrice rejected, unable to tempt the rabbit from its Fl
orentine burrow, he now had to exert himself and exercise ingenuity.

  ‘I think,’ he said sadly, ‘this issue might be resolved if the Sculptor and I were to speak alone.’

  ‘Conceivable,’ said Anselmi, as politely as his cultural background would permit. ‘Possible even: if you were to surrender the stiletto concealed in your right boot and perhaps the curiously large, probably spring-loaded, ring – yes, that one with the jet-stone.’

  ‘Don’t leave me!’ shouted Michelangelo, turning to the condottiere as his protector.

  ‘There are deeper tides at play in this episode, Sculptor,’ said Slovo, in an even tone, like a good father to his child, ‘as you well know. That being so, if I were to say that I mean you no harm; if further, I was to swear to that effect by all the gods, would you not then change your mind?’

  Michelangelo swivelled to look at him, his face emulating the paleness of his marble creations, and was obliged to swallow a sudden excess of saliva. ‘Yes, I would,’ he said, abruptly calm again. ‘Please leave us, Anselmi; I wish to speak with the Admiral.’

  ‘For all your present differences,’ said Slovo, ‘may I first say that I do admire your Pietà … and the David.’

  ‘So you do have artistic sensitivities?’ asked Michelangelo with keen interest.

  ‘No. Not as commonly defined.’

  The Sculptor looked at Slovo as if starting his assessment afresh and a lengthy silence fell on them. Slovo was happy to let it live its natural span.

  ‘Admiral,’ said Michelangelo eventually, ‘I find it hard to trust a man such as you. Without a lively appreciation of art, a human is the prisoner of his fallen nature.’

  ‘Offhand,’ replied Slovo, ‘I might counter that it is only His Holiness’s most lively appreciation of your art that brings us to this meeting.’

  ‘He is an exception. Cold and rigid in his grave, he would still be untrustworthy. What alternative token of faith can you offer me?’

  Admiral Slovo twirled the tip of one gloved finger in his wine, watching the resultant whirlpool pass from birth, through vigour, into nothingness. ‘Well, he said, ‘I might say that I find the Stoical teachings (tempered with certain Old Testament insights) most persuasive …’