by Lynn Cullen
But none of this seemed to bother the Queen, for an elfin grin spread over her face. She fell to her knees, dashing the pearls sewn onto her heavy brocade skirts against the paving stones. So much did I think of Europa when the little Queen snatched Up the King’s hand and pressed it to her lips that I almost expected her to say, “Papà, forgive me.”
But this was not my little Europa. And this was not Papà in his house slippers relaxing at home after a day of printing Bibles. This was the most powerful man in the world, a serious, dangerous man, with neither the time nor the inclination for a jest.
The King pulled away his hand. “Please rise. You shall ruin your clothes.”
As in a beloved lapdog that has just been kicked, surprise then confusion flashed across her young face.
The bells of the church across the plaza began to peal. The Queen stumbled to her feet, tripping on the pearl-sewn folds of her gown. The duke shot out a gloved hand to steady her.
I cannot guess how this child Queen fares in the bridal chamber tonight.
But I was writing of this day. After the meeting of the King and Queen in the morning, we all processed to Mass said by Cardinal Mendoza, the brother of the duke, and then back into the palace for introductions, then through the Moorish arches of the arcade to the dining hall on the other side of the courtyard, where whole farmyards of creatures, roasted, minced, or candied, lay Upon the table, the smell of their cooked flesh mingling with the perfume of the grandees and their ladies. When the banquet was over, all I wished to do was to crawl off to a bench with my corset strings loosened. But there were speeches to hear and a play to attend (for which the scenery was cunningly painted—I must find out who did it), and always wine and more wine to drink, though the Spanish ladies hardly took a drop of it, as busy as they were with staring at the Queen’s French ladies, who were daintily imbibing great vats of the wine while flirting with the gentlemen. After eyeing my Unfashionable Italian dress (does no one wear striped skirts here?), neither Spanish nor French wished to interact with me. I was left alone with my frequently refilled cup and Francesca’s glare boring into my back from where she stood in the servants’ gallery.
Then, just when I was ready to float away on a sea of the grape, there was dancing, of the usual hopping Spanish sort, and very much of it, too, so when the King called for a galliard—a galliard, of all dances, with all its leaps!—no one had the wind to set forth.
“My Lady?” The King kissed the Queen’s small hand, his eyes chillingly calm. “Do you wish to dance?”
The room fell silent.
The Queen laughed and shook her head, making the light brown wisps that peeked from Under her pearl-encrusted cap stick to her cheeks with sweat. The child had been made to hop about with a stone-weight of jewels sewn Upon her gown. No wonder she was hot. Her clothes alone must have weighed more than her young self, even without the pearl the size of a pigeon’s egg hanging from the diamond-and-ruby brooch Upon her chest. Each time she stepped it thumped her like a fist.
The King’s nephew, a boy of the Queen’s same age, came over to where I stood on the dance floor, noisily catching my breath. The scarlet satin of his slashed sleeves flowed as he swept into a bow, trailing his scent of perfume and youthful sweat.
“My lady Sofonisba Anguissola.” His youth’s changeable voice was loud enough for all to hear. “Do you know the galliard?”
I started. Why would the King’s nephew know me? I was no one, a simple painting teacher, the daughter of a threadbare count who read more books than he sold.
I lowered my eyes to lessen their similarity to an owl’s great orbs. “Indeed, sir. We dance the galliard in my native town of Cremona.”
There were polite murmurs of approval from the assembly.
“I know where you are from,” he said as boldly as his youth’s raw squawk would allow. Even at his awkward age, a boy on the cusp of manhood, he was an attractive youth, with dark ringlets and a slightly turned-up nose dusted with freckles. “Will you do me the honor of joining me?”
I glanced at the King, whose face was composed and inscrutable, then at the Queen. She smiled at me in encouragement.
“The honor is mine,” I said, though my guts did turn most sharply. How would I hold Up while dancing before the most formal court in the world? Knowing how to paint the hairs on a child’s head is one matter, moving with grace is another.
All eyes Upon Us, we took to the floor, and encouraged by the sprightly sounds of the shawms, sackbut, and tambour, I began picking out the intricate hops and leaps of the galliard. I thank Papà for all of the lessons he Urged Upon me and my sisters Under dear signore Vari, our bad-breathed dancing master. Signore Vari’s instruction and breath came strongly to mind as I sailed through the air in my first great leap of the posture, though the memory ceased the moment I hit ground, for my partner clasped my hands and spoke.
“I am Alessandro Farnese. My mother is the King’s sister, but I was born in the Italian states. I would be there still if my father had not—” He glanced at the King, then was silent. The sound of soft leather scraping the tile floor and the swish of heavy cloth accompanied our steps.
Perhaps his interest in me was due to his affection toward his native country. “Do you speak Italian, sir?”
“Like a Roman lady of the night,” he answered in Italian. “I speak French and Spanish, too.”
Impudent. But perhaps recent events had made me too sensitive. “In which do you dream?” I said lightly.
My partner’s face was so close to mine that I could see the nutmegcolored down of early manhood Upon his Upper lip. “That is easy—Italian for my dreams of home, Spanish for my nightmares, and French for the dreams that dampen my sheets.”
We hopped apart, heat creeping into my face. I could ignore one bawdy reference, but two? Surely he would not have spoken so boldly to a woman of pure repute. Had word traveled across the sea? Had Tiberio betrayed me, laughing of his conquest of the Great Virgin? Had maestro Michelangelo spoken of the cat in heat he had harbored in his home? Surely I was letting my guilt get the best of me. The conduct of a lowly painting teacher would be of no import to the nephew of the King.
We commenced into the next pattern, I performing the steps and hops with difficulty, Don Alessandro grinning as if he owned the heavens. Between the wish to look my best for the occasion and my ongoing celebration of the resumption of my courses in July, I’d had Francesca tie my corset extra tight. Now gripped by anxiety and the iron stays digging into my ribs, I could scarcely draw wind.
“I hear you are an accomplished painter,” he said, hopping close. “Is it true you have studied with Michelangelo Buonarroti?”
I flashed him a sidelong glance. “Yes. You have heard of him?”
“Who hasn’t? He is the greatest painter of all times, is he not? My great-grandfather had him do all sorts of pictures for him.”
I smiled briefly, struggling for breath. Who was this ancestor? Although I had studied a book on the King’s family tree in preparation for my service, I had missed this branch.
“It was Great-grandfather who commissioned Michelangelo to paint The Last Judgment in the Sistine Chapel. Have you seen it?”
“Yes.”
“So are the rumors true?”
We skipped our separate ways to the music, then back together, my heart rapping against my chest. “I don’t know what you mean.”
His dark curls bounced with his footwork. “That he loves boys.”
My relief was charged with anger. “That is absurd,” I said stiffly. “Maestro Michelangelo loves to work. That is the only sort of love I observed from him.”
“That is not what I hear.”
I was startled by a couple joining Us to our left, which is not customary in the middle of a pattern. When I saw it was the Queen, I started to curtsey. I had been introduced to her that afternoon, but had certainly not been included in her exalted circle.
“Oh, please, keep dancing!” the Queen cried. “Ple
ase—we will all of Us miss our steps.”
I kept going, though flustered by whether or not I should have broken protocol by not stopping to acknowledge her. When I looked to Don Alessandro, he shrugged with a rustle of puffed sleeves.
I could hear the Queen’s Great Pearl thudding against her flat chest as she hopped to the music. Her partner turned his face to me. “Señorita, be careful not to let that gentleman with you tread Upon your toes.”
In my panic, I had not yet taken full measure of the Queen’s partner. When at last I did, I fear my double look was as broad as a mummer’s in a morality play. The young man, a youth near the same age as my partner, had eyes the clear, deep blue of my rich cousin’s favorite sapphire ring, their brightness set off by the fresh country pink of his cheeks. His wheaten hair, certain strands of which glinted golden in the candlelight, caught on the lace of his high collar. Though he moved with a sinuous strength and grace, he kept his chin tilted down and his eyes were friendly and alert. His was not the guarded look of an experienced courtier.
“Perdón, señorita Sofonisba,” said Don Alessandro, panting. “My new Uncle is very rude. He should be the one watching his feet. How long have you known a galliard, Uncle?”
“I am just this minute learning it,” said the young man. To the Queen he said, “How would you say I do, Your Majesty?”
The Queen, her cheeks rosy with exertion and her dark eyes snapping with excitement, lifted her pointed little chin. “Like you have been dancing it all your life.”
Don Alessandro made a scoffing sound. “How else is she to answer your question, Don Juan? Her Majesty is much too kind to say that you have the feet of an ox and the gait of a pig.”
Don Juan smiled apologetically, then raised the Queen’s hand to the music. As he whirled her away, I saw her lips curl into a laugh.
The King saw, too, from his throne at the edge of the dance floor.
The music played faster, hurrying my feet and making me laugh as I abandoned all thoughts of impropriety and Rome and Michelangelo. My heartbeat pounding in my ears, I leapt toward Don Alessandro in the final posture, but before I could land, he grabbed me by the waist and lifted me in the air.
Shocked, I did as my brain commanded: I raised my arms as if flying. The crowd broke out in a roar as Don Alessandro turned me above his head, and for six long beats, six long beats, I soared like a bird. And there on high, the crowd’s applause and my own ragged breath ringing in my ears, I looked down Upon Don Juan. I saw his look into the Queen’s eyes and her returned questioning gaze.
And then I was back to the earth again.
Too soon, the dance was over. When the music stopped, everyone turned and bowed to the Queen and Don Juan, then to young Don Alessandro and me in approbation.
“Well done,” said Don Alessandro. He kissed my hand. “If you paint as well as you dance, you must be Michelangelo’s match.”
“You flatter me,” I murmured.
Soon afterward all we ladies and lords of the court escorted the King and Queen to the bridal chamber, and after both were bedded in their shifts of finest linen, the Queen laughing, the King alternating between scowls at his men and sidelong frowns at his bride, we withdrew to find our l odgings.
Still glowing from the congratulations of many on my galliard, I retired with Francesca to our lodgings in the palace, to a room I was made to share with an older lady from Sevilla, doña Elvira de Herrera y da Silva. After receiving this lady’s kind words of praise, I asked her a question that had been on my mind.
“Señora, who was the Queen’s partner in the galliard? Don Alessandro called him his ‘new uncle.’ ”
“Don Juan de Austria?” said doña Elvira. “ ‘Newly discovered ’ is more the term.” She shrugged off her gold-stitched black bodice with the help of her maid, a young woman with the dark complexion of a Portuguese.
Francesca Unlaced the back of my own bodice, the upturned knob of her chin raised in a frown. “I do not Understand,” I said.
“Don Juan did not know he was the King’s brother Until only recently,” said doña Elvira. “He was brought Up as a common country boy.”
“How could that be? Ah, thank you, Francesca, that feels better.”
Francesca folded my discarded garment. “If the signorina did not throw herself around so much . . .” she muttered.
“His father was the Emperor, like Our King,” doña Elvira said, “but his mother—Maria, please, can you not Undo these laces any more quickly?” She raised her arms as her maid finished her Unlacing and lifted off her corset. “He is a comely boy. I would not look for him to be at court too long. The King is Used to being the only cock in the roost. He cannot take too kindly to this golden youth showing Up in his middle age, in spite of their common blood—indeed, perhaps because of it.”
“But who is Don Juan’s mother?” I asked.
Massaging her ribs, which if like my own bore the aching impressions of her recently removed corset Upon them, doña Elvira dropped onto the narrow bed in her shift and, without answering my question, almost immediately began to snore. Such is the effect on the body of much feasting and dancing.
So now, with Francesca stirring in the bed and my robe Upon my shoulders and the frail light of the moon seeping in through the thick round panes of the window, I try to record my thoughts, though my head swims in the dimness. It is no Use. I can write no more. It is not the dark nor the grape nor this wretched quill that stills me, but the cold. I cannot feel my toes! Where are all the fireplaces in this country?
To the Very Magnificent Signorina Sofonisba,
In the Court of the Spanish King
Congratulations on your appointment to serve Her Sacred Majesty Elisabeth, Queen of Spain, as Painter to the Queen. How pleased I was for you when maestro Michelangelo, upon receiving your father’s letter, told me you were afforded this honor. You must be very proud, painting the portraits of such important personages. My work on the Maestro’s broken statue must seem like child’s play in comparison. Still, I am satisfied. I have reattached the two arms. After I polished the seams, you cannot tell where they had been struck off. It is odd—I have not found the vein of emery which had so enraged the Maestro. The flaw he struck must have been very small, but he is such a perfectionist even the smallest imperfection will cause him to abandon a work. I certainly cannot ask him about it. He falls into a hostile silence if I merely mention the piece. But I will keep working on it. In my small way, I am honored to be a part of what I think will be his most important work when it is finished.
Again, my congratulations. I am humbled to say that I know you.
From Rome,
21st January, 1560
Your servant,
Tiberio Calcagni
ITEM: The King’s grandmother is said to have gone mad from loving her husband, Philippe the Handsome, too much. Queen Juana attacked her husband’s mistress with scissors, chopping off the woman’s long hair. The Queen shrieked from the battlements of the castle at La Mota when not allowed to follow her husband to Flanders. She dismissed all her ladies, to prevent her husband from dallying with them. When he died, she wandered with the wagon carrying his coffin over mountains and plains, peeking in each night to see if he was still there.
ITEM: To size a canvas, one must scrape on a thin solution of rabbit-skin glue and powdered white chalk. The glue must not taste sour or salty when moistened; putrefied glue has little adhesive power.
ITEM: “A woman needs be graceful, mannerly, clever, prudent, and beautiful to excel at court.”
—COUNT BALDASSARE CASTIGLIONE, The Book of the Courtier
13 FEBRUARY 1560
El Alcázar, Toledo
There was a play at the bishop’s palace last night at which I cried overmuch when the shepherdess died, though I could tell the shepherdess was truly a shepherd and her swain was so drunk that he thrice forgot his lines. When I left the performance with the Queen and her other ladies, I wept again when I saw a caballero steal away
from the window grate at which he’d been wooing a lady. This morning, on the way to the Cathedral with Her Majesty, the mere sight of a husband bowing before his wife as she stepped from her carriage made my eyes fill to overflowing. It seems I will weep at anything.
I can see the worry on Francesca’s face. Perhaps she thinks I will go mad like the King’s grandmother Juana the Mad. Perhaps I shall. For since receiving Tiberio’s letter yesterday, I am Unbalanced.
Did Papà tell maestro Michelangelo my position here was greater than it is? If so, his boasting has Undone me, for Tiberio seems to believe that I think I am above him. If he ever had thoughts of wedding me, he does not have them now.
What cruel irony! I am less of a person here now at court than I was in Cremona. At least in Cremona I could still nurse my wild hope of becoming a maestra—as long as the truth of my transgression in Rome remained secret. Now, here in Toledo, I watch the last wisps of my dream melt away like honey in water. At best, I am a Useless, not particularly attractive, ornament of the court; at worst, a novelty akin to a white crow or singing cow. Courtiers peer at me in curiosity as I sketch scenes of court life while I stand in wait for the girl Queen to let me teach her colors. In the fortnight since my arrival, she did not acknowledge my purpose Until just last night, when we were in Her Majesty’s heavily perfumed chambers, dancing for her as she waited for the King to arrive for his nuptial duties.
