The Creation of Eve

by Lynn Cullen

  “If you were mine, we would have fun,” said Don Carlos. “How could we help it? We are the same age. How can you stand being with an old man?”

  We started down a wooded slope. The soft roar of rushing water marked a turning of the Eresma somewhere below. “He is hardly old,” she said, laughing. “Thirty-seven.”

  “I am nineteen.” He straightened, only bringing attention to his frail frame. “In my prime.”

  She patted his arm. “Then you should think of marrying my sister. It is my mother’s fondest wish. She is prettier than I.”

  “No one is prettier than you, My Lady,” he said vehemently.

  “Excuse me, Don Carlos,” said Don Alessandro, “but let me recount: Our Lady’s sister is young and pretty, and your father, whom you dearly love to cross, doesn’t want you to marry her because he has already made a French allegiance with Our Lady and wishes to Use you elsewhere.” He slapped an outcropping of stone embedded in the hill. “Now, tell me again why you will not wed her? I would think you’d run off in disguise and carry her away.”

  “I don’t want to.”

  “Consider yourself lucky. Your father has asked that I marry our cousin in Portugal, to hold together our realms. The rag picker’s mule has a lovelier face than my future bride.”

  “I hear something,” said Don Carlos.

  We paused to listen. There was a distinct splashing below, but the source was obscured by a tumble of boulders.

  “Maybe it’s a beaver,” whispered Don Carlos. “Or an otter. Where is my gun when I need it?”

  “I like beavers,” the Queen whispered back. “And otters. Why would you want to kill them?”

  “Shhh,” said Don Carlos. “Silly. That is just what men do.”

  We climbed onto the lichen-covered boulders, the caballeros helping the Queen and me, hampered by our skirts. A low waterfall came into view, its descent broken by a series of boulders. A few more hard-won steps revealed a pool at the base of the falls. There, swimming in waters clouded by the rain, was neither otter nor beaver but a man. His sinuous arms rhythmically sliced the gray surface. He raised his head to breathe, revealing blond hair darkened by the water.

  “Good Lord—Juan!” called Don Carlos. “What are you doing out here?”

  Don Juan stopped mid-stroke, then treaded water. His grin grew as he looked over our group, Cher-Ami barking excitedly at pond’s edge. “Swimming.”

  “I can see what you’re doing, but why?” said Don Carlos. “You must be freezing.”

  “Don’t discourage him,” Don Alessandro said. “He is having a bath, country-boy style.”

  Don Juan laughed. “Just so. My Lady—please forgive me for not addressing you properly.”

  Don Alessandro held Up a pair of breeches from a pile of clothing on a rock. “I believe I have the reason why.”

  The color heightened on My Lady’s face. “Oh, I think that is not the reason. I think he is afraid.”

  “Afraid?” Don Juan’s grin deepened, his dimples accentuated by his water-slicked hair. “Is that what I am? And why so, My Lady?”

  “My husband is very angry at you. You turned down the chance to be cardinal. Do you know how hard he had to bargain for that?”

  “Very hard, I would imagine, knowing what a poor candidate I made.”

  “Easy for you to jest, but he was quite determined for you to have a high position. You took the honor he wished to give you and threw it in his face.”

  “I am sorry, My Lady. I could not become a cardinal.”

  “Yes, because cardinals cannot take wives.”

  Don Juan splashed the water with his hand. “That was not why.”

  “Oh? Shall I tell that to the Duke of Mendoza’s niece? Is she not your lady?”

  “I regret that she misinterpreted my stay at her uncle’s house. It was necessity that drove me there—I had no place to go after I left Rome. I was not exactly welcome in Madrid.”

  I saw Don Alessandro’s watchful eyes, and Don Carlos’s rumpled brow. Did the Queen forget their presence? Had she forgotten the terror she had felt after being discovered by the King at the river in Aranjuez?

  “Shall we not walk on?” I said, affecting a playful voice. I addressed Don Alessandro and his smirk directly. “I thought My Lady was the liege lady for you all. Do you errant knights not wish to accompany her?”

  “We have stopped playing that game,” said Don Alessandro. “We are all a little older now.”

  “Speak for yourself,” said Don Carlos. “I am still your knight, My Lady.”

  “How about you, Juan?” called Don Alessandro. “Do you still play the game?”

  Treading water, Don Juan regarded Don Alessandro. He swung his gaze to me. “Doña Sofonisba, when I was in Rome, I met someone who knew you. He said you were both students of Michelangelo Buonarroti.”

  My heart stopped. I had known only one student of Michelangelo’s in Rome.

  “He wondered if you had ever spoken of him, or of Michelangelo.”

  Don Alessandro snatched Up the rest of Don Juan’s clothes. “Let it be said that Juan is a knight without his armor.”

  Don Juan paddled closer to shore, then stood, naked to the waist. Water streamed down his lean body. “Hey!”

  At that moment, I should have whisked the Queen from the scene, but I was too stunned by Don Juan’s announcement to move. Of her own volition the Queen turned away. “If a cardinal’s hat is not good enough for you to wear,” she called over her shoulder, her voice reedy with spirit, “perhaps nothing is.”

  Don Alessandro shoved the clothes into her arms. “Go!”

  She held the clothes away from herself as if they were tainted.

  “Run!” Don Alessandro exclaimed. “Back to the palace!”

  With a giddy yelp, she hugged them to herself and scrambled onto the rocks.

  “Behind you,” cried Don Carlos with a horsey laugh. “You dropped his shift!”

  “Keep going, Elisabeth!” shouted Don Alessandro.

  Seeing his chance, Don Juan sprang through the water and halfway onto the shore. His hand was on the shift at the same time Don Alessandro stomped his boot Upon it.

  An angry voice rang from above. “What is this?”

  My heart shot against my chest. Flesh prickling, I looked Up. The King stood at the top of the boulders, hands on hips.

  Don Juan lowered himself back into the water.

  The Queen dropped the clothes as if they had burst on fire.

  I held my breath, waiting for His Majesty’s rebuke. But instead of shouting, his face relaxed into a mask of sosiego, as cool as the dark water lapping around Don Juan’s neck. He stretched his hand down toward the Queen.

  She worked her way over the boulders. I knew—everyone knew, even Cher-Ami—not to follow.

  When they were gone, Don Alessandro tossed Don Juan his shift. I began my own climb over the rocks, my stomach churning.

  “I hate him!” cried Don Carlos. “He has got no right to bully her around. He treats his horses better.”

  “He’s her husband,” said Don Juan. He caught Up to Us, buckling his breeches, then scooped Up Cher-Ami. “You are blameless, doña Sofonisba. Do not worry, I will make that clear.”

  “Do you jest?” exclaimed Don Alessandro. “Do you think anything you say to the King will have value?”

  When we returned to the palace, the King and Queen were not to be found. I paced Up and down the arcade, my brain a puddle of contrite terror. Once again I had failed to rein in the Queen’s impetuous behavior. Once again I had brought shame to her, to myself, and to my father, too, if I were lucky enough to be sent home.

  What seemed like hours later, the King and Queen swept in from out-of-doors. I fell nearly prostrate into a curtsey.

  “Attend to the Queen,” said the King, the high color in his face not matching the calm in his voice. “She will need you now.”

  She smiled briefly as he kissed her hand then left her. Stiffly, she began to walk. Only whe
n I fell in line behind her did I notice the pine needles caught in the back of her braids, and the dirt Upon the shoulder of her gown.

  ITEM: Although many pigments benefit from liberal grinding, take great care when preparing pigments like smalt, bice, and the blue, ultramarine. You may think to make them fine by much grinding, but doing so only makes them starved and dead.

  25 APRIL 1565

  The Palace, Aranjuez

  Immediately after the King found the Queen stealing Don Juan’s clothes while he swam, His Majesty launched a serious program of family leisure, a behavior he continues to this day. He wishes to hunt or picnic or boat with his family every day, even though you would think his capacity to frolic would be diminished by the troubles mounting in his lands. Perhaps it is in response to these troubles that he seeks diversion. Perhaps it is better to shoot deer than to worry about the people rising Up against the King’s rule and the Holy Catholic Church in the Low Countries, threatening to destroy the churches in their towns. Perhaps it is more restful to eat grapes Under a spreading oak than to address the problem of the Turks now gathering a fleet in the Mediterranean to sail against Spain. Perhaps it is more peaceful to float down the muddy waters of the Tajo than think of the English pirates, Drake and Hawkins, prowling the waters of the Atlantic Under orders of their Queen Elizabeth, eager to steal the gold shipped from the New World—the gold desperately needed to pay the King’s restless armies.

  I suppose I should enjoy these outings. How much more pleasant they are than contemplating the great and terrible emptiness that I feel these days. If only I could lose myself in planning a painting—an epic subject from mythology, something complicated, something worthy of a maestra— but the Queen needs me now, more than ever. For though she has the full attention of the King, even being made to work daily alongside him in his office as she had once lightly requested, she has become as a wild thing—quiet while others are gay, easily startled, given to inexplicable laughter when others are silent. And though she cares little for her appearance now, letting her brows and hairline grow back to their natural state, leaving her hair Undressed and her skin Unpowdered, she is all the more beautiful for it. Yet she does not enjoy her beauty—I think she is completely Unaware of it. How can I think of painting Greek gods when she is so Unwell? I must play along at the King’s games, hoping to cajole her into health, though we have all been kept so busy at group idleness that even Don Carlos has complained.

  “Can I not just go hawking by myself?” the Prince exclaimed just this morning, after Mass.

  We were taking a family walk in the flower garden. Dew still clung to the spring-bright greenery along the walkway, dampening the edges of the ladies’ skirts. It was the usual cozy gathering of Royal blood—the King and Queen, the King’s sister Doña Juana, Don Carlos, Don Juan, and myself. The only one missing was Don Alessandro, who had recently left, grumbling, to wed Princess Maria of Portugal. I was allowed to accompany the family with the idea that I should sketch pictures of them as they ambled. Strolling guitarists and attending servants, Francesca included, completed our little group.

  “I have got a headache,” said Don Carlos. “I just want to hawk.”

  In the woods across the river, the cooing of wood doves, the ever-present spirits of Aranjuez, could be heard over the soft strumming of the guitars. The King studied his son. “Have you tried the powders I sent you?”

  “I liked the new herbs doctor Debruyne gave me. At least they didn’t dry out my throat. Why did you send him to Sevilla with doctor Hernández? I liked him. You’re not a doctor!”

  I made myself peer into the woods. Doctor Debruyne had been sent to Sevilla? Although I had not seen him these past months, I had thought he was at El Escorial or Valsaín or one of the King’s other experimental gardens, and that we had only just missed each other as the court had traveled from palace to palace in the King’s new search for pleasure.

  Don Carlos kicked a rare Turkish tulip, heavy with moisture, sprawling from its bed. “It would do me more good to let Striker catch wood doves than to drag around these gardens.”

  “Thank you for coming along and humoring me in my wish for Us to be close as a family,” the King said in an ironic tone, “even with your dry mouth.”

  Doña Juana snapped her fingers and pointed at a red tulip standing Upright in its bed. Francesca, the closest of the servants, bustled forth and with a grunt plucked the flower, sending off a shower of dewdrops. She gave it to Doña Juana.

  Doña Juana took a whiff. “Stinks.” She dropped the bloom.

  Don Juan, carrying my easel next to me, drew in a quiet breath.

  The King slid his hand around the Queen’s neck. “I mean not to torture you, Carlos. My most treasured memories as a youth were when traveling with my family—I only wish that for you. Remember visiting Aunt Mary’s palace in Brussels, Juana?”

  “Yes,” Doña Juana said flatly. “Her chambers stunk of overripe jasmine and fried garlic.”

  “I don’t remember that,” said the King, frowning. “But I do recall her showing Us her works of art. It is where I first saw the work of El Bosco.”

  “Oh,” said Doña Juana, “is that whom we have to blame for your heretical tastes—Aunt Mary?”

  “I cannot help that you refuse to see the spiritual message in El Bosco’s work, Juana,” said the King. “How he must have suffered, imagining Hell so vividly on earth.”

  “Hell on earth,” said Don Juan. “Imagine.” He threw a stick for the reddish-furred mongrel he had recently found in the woods. The dog raced Cher-Ami to the prize.

  “These are dangerous times to speak lightly of Hell, little brother,” said Doña Juana, her harsh voice discordant with the music of the guitars. “The Pope has asked Inquisitor-General Valdés to step Up his vigilance in Spain now that the Protestant Huguenots are making such deep inroads into France. In this new atmosphere, men might go to the stake for saying”—she shrugged—“just about anything.”

  The King stroked the Queen’s neck as they walked. “Juan is amongst friends—he need not watch his words here.”

  It would seem this was true. Instead of censoring his brother since the incident at the pond last fall, the King has treated Don Juan like a dear friend, including him on all his journeys and at every family gathering.

  Indeed, he has scarcely let Don Juan out of his sight.

  “Heresy is not a problem in Spain now,” said the King. “There has not been one auto-de-fé this year.”

  “A mistake,” said Doña Juana. “Father left it to me to keep Spain pure and—”

  “I think you may rest now,” the King said. “The Inquisitor-General, too. I wonder if he might grow too fond of the power that has been given him.”

  Doña Juana lowered her brow, white-lashed eyes flashing. “Some of Us take the sacred charge that has been given Us by Father with all due seriousness. If you think for one minute we take it on for our own personal gratification, when some of Us could be sitting back instead, wearing new gowns daily and playing with little dogs—”

  The Queen broke in, Unaware, it seemed, of the ill feelings rising around her. “My Lord, may I take a painting to my mother?”

  The King gazed Upon her, a slight frown penetrating his mask of sosiego. After a separation of more than five years, My Lady is to meet the French Queen Mother in June, at the border between France and Spain. Queen Catherine is on progress with her son the young King Charles, her wish being to show him the full extent of his kingdom. In all his nearly fifteen years, the boy has not been much beyond Paris. But even Francesca mutters that the French Queen Mother’s true reason for coming to the border is to meet with our King to remind him of his allegiance with France, and as for seeing her daughter—here Francesca spits before continuing—well, that is just an afterthought.

  “Which painting do you think she would like?” the King asked.

  “How about one of those El Boscos?” Doña Juana suggested sweetly. “I think she would like The Garden of
Earthly Delights.”

  The King glanced at her, unamused. For him to offer the French Queen Mother any of his precious paintings at all was generous. Truth be told, his relationship with Queen Catherine is on poor footing that grows ever poorer. Whereas the King had long ago nipped in the bud the problem of civil Unrest by allowing Inquisitor-General Valdés to crank Up his rack, Queen Catherine shores Up the power of the French Crown by entering into secret agreements with every monarch in Europe. Against the Protestants threatening her from within her own country, she gathers Up foreign allies like so many chess pieces, going so far of late as to make an accord with the Turkish Sultan Suleiman, who plans to sail against Spain at any moment. The King had reluctantly been planning to meet with her, but after learning of her alliance with someone with whom he is at war has broken off all plans. Only My Lady’s most heartrending pleas caused him to allow her to join her mother still, and even that was on one condition suggested by Doña Juana: that no French Protestant nobles accompany Queen Catherine at the reunion.

  Now, for the first time in my memory, the Queen agreed with Doña Juana. “I would like Mother to have an El Bosco. She has nothing quite like them. But The Garden of Earthly Delights is too frightening. Even I cannot look at that one, with its strange beasts and monstrous fruits and skewered men. Could you possibly spare the tabletop with the Seven Deadly Sins painted Upon it, instead?”

  The King drew in a breath. It was well known that of all the Boscos save for The Garden, the King favored the tabletop painting especially. He keeps it in the Queen’s bedchamber and allows not even the smallest cup or book of devotions to be placed Upon it. “If you truly think, my darling . . .”

  “I think she would be edified by its many lessons, My Lord. The little dogs fighting over a bone in ‘Envy’ will delight her—she is as fond of dogs as I am.”

  “As I recall,” said the King, “she has a Leonardo—the one of the woman with the haunting smile, you had said.”

  “La Gioconda, Sofi said it is called.”

  “Yes. Precisely. Perhaps your mother would like one of his contemporary’s works, a Botticelli, perhaps. Or if she likes something a little older, I have several beautiful van Eycks from the collection of my great-grandmother Isabel.”