Leonardo’s Shadow

by Christopher Grey

  “Psst! Giacomo!”

  From under a nearby portico, concealed in the shadows, a voice.

  “Renzo?”

  “Over here.”

  Together we walk away from Maggio’s workshop.

  “What are you doing? Your master is looking for you.”

  “Let him look. I’ve done enough work for today.”

  We pass by the Trivulzio family’s palazzo, with its turrets and windows. Renzo points at it.

  “Why should they live in such a house, Giacomo? Why them and not us?”

  “They worked for it, I suppose.”

  “Did they? Many a rich man made his money outside the law. They re no better than us. Yet we are the servants. Why?”

  “Well, you’ll soon be a successful carpenter.”

  “Maybe I have something better in mind.”

  “What? What can be better than learning a skill you can use to make money and live an honest life?”

  “Honest! Who in this world is truly honest, Giacomo?”

  Sometimes I do not understand my friend. He has many good qualities. He can throw a knife straighter than a rook flies, catch a fish with no more than a hook and line, and never lets being a servant stop him from talking to girls. But the thoughts are often dark behind his clear brow, and watching him fight on the Feast of Saint Michael, it did not look as though he much cared whether he lived or died.

  “Renzo, I beg of you. Don’t do anything rash.”

  “No, nothing rash. Come now, let us eat something. Have you got any money?”

  That’s my friend. If he ever paid for a meal, they’d declare a new holiday.

  We turn into the Street of Armorers, a hundred paces from the market.

  “Well, well,” Renzo says, “the gypsies are back again.”

  There is a large gypsy encampment on the heath that borders the city to the southwest, attached to the body of Milan like a strange limb. The Duke has banned them from entering the city, but they always manage to, somehow. They have to. How else will they live? They have no land of their own, no crops or other sustenance. They must survive by stealing.

  As we watch, a young gypsy girl—scarcely more than a child—walks up to a rich man, smiling and blowing him kisses. He has stopped, what else, to stare. And now a group of five lively urchins, her companions, emerge from the shadows and surround the gentleman—one pointing, another shouting, a third waving his arms like a mad thing. The man does not know which way to turn, which way to look. And before he can decide what to do, nimble hands are threading through the folds of his cloak, sifting through his pockets, rapidly removing whatever gold coins and valuables he may have had on his person.

  “Look at them go!” Renzo says, delightedly.

  Faster than lightning can touch the ground, they have disappeared into the crowd.

  The gentleman stands there, uncertain, bewildered, a bit fearful. Gradually, the spell cast on him lifts, and he soon discovers that the purse has been cut from his belt, the rings taken from his fingers, the gold chain removed from his neck. Now he understands.

  “HELP! THIEF! I’VE BEEN ROBBED!”

  You could have heard the cry in Cremona!

  I turn to Renzo, who is full of mirth. This is excellent sport to him, to see the rich duped by the poor. He says it is forever the other way round. And he is not wrong.

  When I have bought two roasted pigeons from a stall in the market, we walk to the Cathedral steps and sit down to eat. I pull the soft fragrant flesh from the bones and gobble it up, all the while worrying that my master might appear and scold me for eating meat. While we chew, there is a great coming and going in and out of the Cathedral doors by shaven-headed monks and black-robed priests. I’m reminded that the Pope is coming to Milan in less than half a year. God save us if the Master does not finish the painting in time.

  Renzo has already finished and is licking his fingers. “I’d better get back to work,” he says, standing up. “See you tomorrow for knife-throwing practice?”

  “At the Lazaretto,” I say. “Three bells, not before. My master’s students are expected.”

  “Oh, that lot,” Renzo says. “I hate the sons of the rich more than their fathers.”

  “They think no better of us,” I say.

  “Then bring me to the lesson,” Renzo says, drawing his dagger, “and let them say what they think to my face.”

  He’s serious, too. He’d take them all on before his dinner.

  “You know I can’t do that,” I say. “Unless I want to find a new master.”

  Renzo shrugs, blows on his knife blade, wipes it on his sleeve, and sheathes it.

  We shake hands and embrace. Before we part, I tell him: “Don’t lose your chance with Maggio because of pride, Renzo.”

  He nods, but says nothing more.

  I watch my friend walk away. Yes, we servants must better ourselves. But if the others won’t, I will. I am resolved to. I have a great desire to run back home and take out my paper and charcoal and start drawing. There is a certain way the afternoon light falls on the mulberry tree in the garden that I have not yet captured successfully. And I must.

  But my heart falls into my stomach when I think of what I still have to do. My master and Maggio are building a flying machine. And I have but a few days to find it and make my report to the Duke.

  XVIII

  From the street come loud echoes of laughing and cursing. The students. With a groan, I knock on the study door.

  “They’re here, Master.”

  “I’m finishing something. Look after them until I am ready, will you?”

  “Yes, Master.”

  I hate being alone with the students.

  “The Master will be with you soon,” I say, opening the front door.

  “Meanwhile,” Tommaso says, entering, “we have to put up with you, Giacomo.”

  “No more than I you,” I say.

  “Watch your tongue, boy,” Tommaso says, “or I’ll have it pulled out by the root.”

  They stand around our front room whispering insults at me while I pull out the drawing materials from the chest. They each take a board, paper, and charcoal.

  “The Master wishes you to draw this bowl of fruit,” I say, placing it on a table under the window, where the light and shadow will make the scene most appealing. There is a bunch of grapes, two lemons, an apple, and a red pear.

  “I’d rather eat it than draw it,” says the pinch-faced Filippo, who curls his hair and wears it to his shoulders like a girl.

  “It will certainly look better in your stomach than it ever could in your drawing,” Tommaso says.

  They all chortle at that, even Filippo, after some hesitation.

  The students take their seats around the table and pretend to draw. But before long they turn their attention back to me.

  “Don’t just stand there with that ugly look on your face!” says Simone, a particularly unpleasant fellow with bulging eyes (from a noble family of eye-bulgers).

  “He always has an ugly look on his face,” Filippo says. “He was born with it!”

  “He must get it from his parents. Whoever they are,” says Marcantonio.

  “Yes, who are they, Giacomo? You never tell us. Peasants? Gypsies? Or wild dogs?”

  My head feels like an eggshell which their words are cracking open.

  “In my opinion,” Tommaso says, “Giacomo has no parents. I think he was found under a bush!”

  “I do have parents!” I cry out. “I do—”

  Now the Master appears from behind his door.

  We all turn to statues.

  “What is going on in here?”

  No answer.

  “Is this an art class or a cattle auction?”

  Someone laughs.

  “Draw in silence, or do not draw at all. Gentlemen, if you cannot show some restraint, I will have to cancel the lesson and send you off to the friar for moral instruction.”

  “If you do that, Master,” says Tommaso, “you
will corrupt us utterly.”

  The whole group bursts into laughter. Even the Master smiles now, may his eyes fail for it. “Settle down, gentlemen. Please!” he says. “Why is nobody drawing?”

  “Because your servant has not brought the wine,” Tommaso replies. “Gods blood, Master Leonardo, if I had a servant as lacking in attentiveness as your Giacomo, I’d whip him morning, noon, and night.”

  “Master, please—”

  “Giacomo,” he says, “go to the kitchen and bring the wine.”

  “And don’t spill any this time, emptyhead!”

  I depart the room to hissing and whistling.

  In the kitchen, Caterina is chopping, chopping, chopping—great Heaven, she has cut her finger! “Look what you’ve done!” I cry.

  “The Devil is passing through our house,” she says.

  I take a rag and wrap it around her finger to stop the bleeding. She sits down, forlorn. “Here, drink this,” I say, and offer her a cup of the wine I am pouring for the students. She shakes her head.

  “My mind was wandering,” she says, “and then my knife did. I’m getting old, lad; my limbs no longer obey me.” And, in truth, there is no spirit in her face today.

  Now I must sit down, too. I am shaking with rage.

  “The students say I do not have any parents. But I do, Caterina, I know I do!”

  I feel a terrible pain welling up inside, along with the old questions. Where are my parents? Who are they? Why have they never come looking for me?

  “Who am I, Caterina? Who?”

  I sit down beside her and bury my face in my hands. “Now, now,” she says. “Don’t fret so. Of course you have parents, boy. And perhaps they—” Then we hear him calling for me. “Well, you’d better wipe your face and go,” Caterina says.

  “I have to know. I have to find out who they are.”

  She shakes her head. “Don’t ask me, Giacomo, I’m just an old woman.”

  “But the Master received a letter from Cecilia Gallerani in which she called me ‘our Giacomo.’ What does that mean, Caterina? ‘Our Giacomo’? You told me the Master would have married her, had it been allowed. But you don’t need to marry to have a child. What if they—”

  “That’s enough, boy. Don’t fill your head with such thoughts; they are pure foolishness and will only bring you more misery. Now hurry back to the Master.”

  When I return with the wine, the students are seated at the large table with their drawing boards aloft, and the Master is walking up and down, inspecting their work.

  “I have always said that it is better to draw in company than alone, because the presence of others will inspire you to greater efforts. But, gentlemen, to judge from your work, the lack of accomplishment in one has spread to you all.”

  Silence.

  “Have none of you received any benefit from my classes?”

  “Oh, indeed yes, Master,” Tommaso says. “For an hour each week we have not had to listen to our fathers telling us that we drink too much, eat too much, and gamble too much. All of which is true,” he adds, “but the more the old folk scold, the less we obey them.”

  The Master looks lost. Then he says: “If you can learn nothing from me, I must inform your parents that I will no longer teach you.”

  “We’ll go and study with Michelangelo, then.”

  The air in the room freezes on the instant.

  My master coughs. “What?”

  Silence.

  The Master closes his eyes. He takes a deep breath and says, in a voice as mild as May: “Will whoever spoke last please repeat what he said. I promise not to be angry. I merely wish to know what the gentleman means by it.”

  Somebody sneezes.

  “I only want to hear about Mich-Michelangelo,” the Master says. “Come, surely you can share with me what you know.”

  The students continue to look at their feet.

  Then Tommaso looks up and says: “Michelangelo is coming to Milan.”

  My master takes a deep breath.

  “Ah. Indeed.”

  “Yes, Master,” Marcantonio says, eagerly joining in. “Have you not heard? It is all the talk at the moment.”

  “I do not listen to gossip, gentlemen, and neither should you. Michelangelo will never leave his home in Florence.”

  “He is in Rome, Master, just at the moment,” Marcantonio says. Insolent dog. “But he is looking to move, and my father has heard Duke Ludovico say that he will be made very welcome in Milan, should he choose to come.”

  The Master lets out a long breath. “I see,” he says. “Well then, let us, while we wait for the great Michelangelo to arrive, proceed with our lesson.”

  My master has recovered. Well done, Master! But it has taken all his strength; he looks like he has run a league.

  Someone yawns.

  “Giacomo,” my master says, “would you be so good as to serve the wine.”

  “Yes, Master.”

  “And hurry,” someone says under his breath, “or by the time you finish, we’ll all be asleep.”

  I do hurry. I do not want to miss the lesson. The Master begins his lecture: “Painting is based on perspective, which is nothing less than a thorough knowledge of the function of the eye. And what is the eye, gentlemen?”

  The window of the soul.

  “The window of the soul. Wasn’t anyone listening last week?”

  As I serve Tommaso, he leans towards me and whispers: “I have to show you something, Giacomo. Meet me after class.”

  “No.”

  “Giacomo! Stop talking and do your duties, or out you go.”

  “Yes, Master.”

  “See the trouble you get into by refusing me, Giacomo?” Tommaso says. He smiles, revealing even, white teeth. His hair is black as a ravens wing. He ruffles mine.

  “Don’t touch me.”

  I pull away with a sudden movement, sending the jug of wine leaping from my tray. It lands on the floor with a crack and a swiftly spreading pool of red.

  “Now look what you’ve done, boy!” Tommaso says.

  “What is going on here?” The Master has drawn near without my noticing. “What foolishness is this, Giacomo?”

  “Master, it was my fault,” Tommaso says, hanging his head. “I apologize. I asked Giacomo if there was something in my eye, but it seems to have gone now.”

  He looks up and winks at me. I do not want to be his fellow conspirator, but I must stay silent or suffer for it.

  “Giacomo, go to the kitchen. Now, boy! The rest of you—back to your drawings.”

  Then, just as the class begins to settle down, there is a knocking at the front door. Four men and horses outside: three in armor, one in black robes. I have never seen them at the house before. A fifth horse, perfectly white except for a black ring around the left eye, stands nearby, without a rider.

  “What is it?” I say.

  The one in robes replies: “We have come for Master Leonardo.”

  “Your business with him?”

  “Is none of yours. Summon him.”

  The look on his face cautions me. I turn back inside.

  “Master? Visitors.”

  “Yes, tell them I am coming, and to wait.”

  Which I do. But they are not happy about it. What a fine creature the white horse is. I reach out to stroke its mane.

  “Leave her alone, boy,” one of the men says.

  “Gentlemen,” the Master is saying to the students, “I am wanted. Finish your drawings and leave them with Giacomo. I will look at them later.”

  “Master, where are you going?” I say, as he prepares to leave. “I don’t want to be …”

  … left alone with the students.

  “I will return by nightfall, Giacomo. You are in charge here until then.”

  “We’ll be sure to finish up our drawings, Master,” Filippo says.

  “Oh yes,” Tommaso adds, “we’ll finish things, all right.”

  As soon as the door has closed, they rise from their seats
and come towards me. I should run now, I surely should. But I cannot do that, I have been left in charge. “You heard the Master,” I say, trembling now. I can’t help it. “Finish your drawings and leave.”

  “Giacomo, come over here. I said I had something to show you,” Tommaso says. I hear Simone’s high-pitched squeal of laughter. “You’ve never seen anything like it, I promise you.”

  “Keep away from me.”

  Marcantonio comes at me and I lash out with my fist, catching him a glancing blow on the chin. “You little turd!” he cries.

  Then Filippo draws his sword.

  “No, none of that,” Tommaso says, “use your fists.”

  Filippo gives him an angry look, but sheathes it once more. Now they have formed a semicircle around me, forcing me into a corner.

  Before I can land more than a punch, I am thrown to the floor. Drawing boards are sent flying and papers are scattered everywhere. The Master’s easel falls over with a crash. They are all on me now, pressing me down. I manage to kick at Simone, hitting him in the chest—but now my legs are held fast. Tommaso is standing over me.

  “Hold him, lads, I want to see how much pain the gypsy boy can take before he cries.”

  Then someone enters the room—what, Caterina? Before anyone can stop her, she brings down a heavy iron pan on Tommaso’s head! A dreadful thud. He falls to the floor.

  “Get off my lad,” she says. “All of you.”

  They let go of me, though whether that is because of her order or the shock of seeing Tommaso laid out, I cannot say. I get up. My enemies stand back. Tommaso lies there, unaided. Caterina is still holding the pan in front of her, like an ax. Her hands are shaking.

  “Do you know whom you have struck, old woman? That is Tommaso Bentivoglio, son of Milan’s Chief Magistrate!”

  “Then let his father be the judge of his actions here today. The lesson is over.”

  I look down and am relieved to see Tommaso move. He groans. Simone and Marcantonio hold him under the arms and lift him up. They cannot support him. He falls to the floor again. Simone lets out a giggle. Marcantonio slaps his head. “Shut it, Simone.”

  Again they raise Tommaso, and this time he stays up. They back away towards the front door, Tommaso sagging between them.