“Not much, but then I am not much on the streets of Florence these days. There are still Silvanos about, let’s see, a young man named Pietro, looks just like Domenico did. Same distinctive nose and chin. Domenico also had a daughter who married and had sons, but I’ve forgotten their names. They must be grown men now. But Luca, it’s been sixty years. Maybe that’s not long for you, but it is a lifetime for the rest of us. Perhaps the old enmity has faded—”
“We’re Florentines, enmity never fades!” I laughed. “You know that better than anyone, Cosimo. Hatred, like hell, lasts an eternity!”
“Then are we not all always in hell, because we feel hatred constantly and keenly? And always in heaven with our love?” He shrugged. “I am old enough now, and sick enough, and I’ve spent enough time in contemplation of late to wish I’d done some things differently in my life, Luca. Perhaps shown some mercy at times.”
“One doesn’t show mercy to an asp. One cuts off its head.”
Cosimo sighed and squeezed my hand again. “Perhaps you need your long life to learn what the rest of us do in sixty years. Tell me of some of your travels, Bastardo. That ancient manuscript you sent to me via your agent, oh, was that only three years ago? You obtained it in Macedonia, yes? Your letter said there was a story attached to it….”
“The Corpus Hermeticum,” I said. “I found it in a monastery in Macedonia.”
“I know the title,” Cosimo said slyly. “I didn’t know if you did. Would you care to divert a dying man with the story of your finding it?”
Evening was well darkened into night hours later, as I was leaving, and Cosimo’s wife Contessina de’ Bardi stopped me. She was a fat, fussy, cheerful woman whom I’d met only once before. This was because I had always met Cosimo outside of Florence, and when he traveled, he took with him a Circassian slave girl of whom he’d been inordinately fond. I’d liked her, too, finding her pretty, pleasant, and undemanding. The Circassian had borne Cosimo a son whom he’d named Carlo and brought up with Contessina’s sons. Contessina hadn’t minded. As Leonardo had pointed out, powerful men often sired bastards. Now Contessina laid her plump old hand on my shoulder.
“He has a special fondness for you,” she said, in a low voice.
“And I for him,” I said.
“Isn’t that convenient,” said a nasal, cracking voice. I turned to see a tall, strong youth of fifteen. He had thick dark hair which fell almost to his shoulders, a long, flattened nose that looked as if it had been broken and badly set, and a heavy, jutting jaw. But the combination of his ugly features was striking, even mesmerizing, and his dark, penetrating eyes flashed with will and intelligence. He gave a cool, tight smile. “Many men profess their love for Nonno now that he is dying, and yet we all know that he has been as ruthless as he has been charitable.”
“It’s not for me to criticize a great man,” I said quietly.
“You were closeted alone with Nonno for hours, and now you speak with the slick tongue of a spy,” Lorenzo barked. Fear flickered in his eyes but was quickly masked by his arrogance. “Do you report to that fool Pitti, or to the traitor Agnolo Acciaiuoli, who are dogs tearing at the sides of a grand old lion, trying to bring him down? The Medici do not stand for disloyalty! Nonno and Papa may be ill, but I will soon have authority, and I will wield it with a sure hand!”
“Lorenzo, please,” Contessina chided. She turned to me. “Please excuse my precocious grandson; the Medici have many critics, and Lorenzo’s very protective of his nonno.”
“A laudable quality,” I said politely, meeting the young Lorenzo’s eyes directly. “I am a friend of your grandfather’s, signore. I am Luca Bastardo.”
The suspicion dropped from his face and a canny brilliance came into Lorenzo’s eyes as his gaze traveled from my scalp to my toes and back again. He stepped toward me with his feet spread apart and his chest thrust out. “I’ve heard the name. I’m told you have special gifts. Nonno speaks well of you, signore. Many men would be envious of the lavish praise you receive from Cosimo de’ Medici. He isn’t easily impressed. I myself strive always to excel, just to earn a modicum of the praise he gives so freely to you.”
“I try to be worthy of his good opinion,” I answered, unable to keep the sarcastic edge from my voice. This young Lorenzo was a warrior, a lion more in the likeness of his grandfather than of his sickly, gouty father Piero. Lorenzo, however, had teeth and claws and wanted to show them, whereas Cosimo was a deeply reserved man who hid his power.
“I’m sure you’re worthy of it, as am I. Nonno never makes a mistake,” he said, stepping closer, so that the space between us tingled with a complicated interplay of rivalry and grudging acceptance, curiosity and demand. Lorenzo would soon succeed Cosimo; Lorenzo’s magnificent energy made his ascent to power inevitable. I wanted his protection from the Confraternity of the Red Feather, as I had received it from Cosimo. I didn’t know yet what Lorenzo wanted of me.
“Signore, I stood outside his bedchambers, and I heard my husband talk to you with great liveliness.” Contessina stepped between us. “I was happy to hear that. He spends much of his time alone and in silence. I asked him why he did this, and he answered, ‘When we are going away, you spend a fortnight preparing for the move. Since I soon have to go from this life to another, don’t you understand how much I have to think about?’” Contessina shook her gray head, and her sweet old face drooped. “He dwells too much in the past, in somber thoughts that do not strengthen him. I pray you will come often and distract him!”
I could hear the strains of divine merriment in her plea, which was the question at hand: would I stay in Tuscany? I didn’t know whether it was the good God or the evil one who was laughing, but I realized that I had to stop traveling and find out. I had to know, once and for all, which God it was who had His hand on me.
“For Cosimo, whom I love, of course, anything,” I answered finally, and my decision to stay was made. Whatever the consequences, I would be beside my old friend Cosimo until he died. I was choosing friendship over fear, and though I did not know it then, it would lead to the great love I’d yearned for all my life, as well as to the greatest sorrow. “I will be staying in Anchiano, tutoring a boy there. It’s not far on horseback.”
“I have a splendid idea!” Lorenzo snapped his fingers. “We will have a dinner in your honor, Luca Bastardo, a few days hence! It will be a relief from the plague. I will invite some family friends; have you met the philosopher Marsilio Ficino, my teacher and one of Nonno’s dearest friends, with whom he still plays chess? Ficino is here every day; he can see this villa from his. My brother, Giuliano, arrives tomorrow, and I will invite some of the younger friends and cousins, also. Everyone’s out in the country, anyway, because of the plague. We can have a rousing game of calcio!”
“I’m not much for games,” I said.
“If you don’t know how to play calcio, I’ll teach you; Nonno likes to watch, it’ll be good for his spirits. It’ll be good for everyone’s spirits, with the plague about,” Lorenzo said easily. “A man of your talents will pick it up in no time!” He gave me the direct, nearly contemptuous look of a man issuing a challenge. I knew there was no escaping the calcio, and that it would be a game played in deadly earnest. So did Contessina, who sighed heavily and patted my chest.
“Signore Bastardo, there is no gainsaying this stubborn grandson of mine; you must resign yourself to dinner and calcio here. You seem strong enough with all these hard muscles, I’m sure it will be no problem.” She gave me a broad smile and angled her eyes like a flirtatious young girl, then pulled her plump hand off my chest.
“I have work to do with my new charge,” I said, stalling.
“Bring the boy.” Lorenzo smiled. “He should learn calcio.”
“You’ll stay overnight.” Contessina nodded, fixing her full silk sleeves. “It’s settled.”
IT WAS A TYPICAL JUNE EVENING in the Tuscan countryside, glowworms lighting up the hills, which exhaled the fragrance of vine and leaf and bu
ds closed for the night. I relaxed into the sweet earthy smells as I waited outside under a flickering lamp for my horse to be brought out to me. He was a tall, handsome chestnut stallion I called Ginori, because the red in his coat reminded me of my old friend from my days as a becchino. The stallion had been washed, curried, and brushed while I was closeted with Cosimo. A new and finely wrought saddle had been placed on him, a gift from Cosimo, I guessed. I ran my hands over it, admiring the expensive, well-tooled leather and expertly crafted metal fittings. It was a saddle fit for a king; it was a saddle upon which to ride proudly into my destiny. It felt good to have it, if I was going to risk my life to stay in Florence. I checked the girth and made ready to mount Ginori.
“You have an eye for horseflesh,” said a high-pitched, cracking voice.
“I paid a fortune for him, and he’s worth every dinari,” I said, swinging myself up onto the horse’s back. “He’s smart, well trained, and has never deserted me in battle.”
“A laudable quality,” Lorenzo returned. He stepped out of the darkness into the lamplight, so that the flickering yellow flames distorted, dissolved, and re-created his bold, ugly features, making him one moment demonic and the next celestially handsome. “Nonno has an eye like that for friends. I’ve tried to develop it; I have to live up to him. Because of my position, I keep friends like your horse about me, friends who’ve been put to the test and shown their mettle. Friends who will stick.”
“Your friends will be kept busy with all the battles you’ll have,” I said. He lifted one side of his mouth in a lopsided smile. I touched my heel to Ginori’s side and the horse flicked his ears forward and moved immediately into a brisk, forward walk.
“Enjoy the saddle. I had it made for myself, but your horse deserved it more than mine!” he called. For a moment I was too surprised to do anything. Then I swung around to thank him, but Lorenzo had melted back into the darkness. Another complicated Medici, I thought, only this one was an unknown quantity. His gift was no gift but a test, and I resolved to bring Lorenzo something to reciprocate when I returned. I also resolved to find out how much power the Confraternity of the Red Feather still possessed. I had to know this, both for my own safety and because Lorenzo would know. He was a man not afraid to exercise power, and my own freedom was too precious to me for me to surrender it willingly to anyone, even a Medici.
Chapter 16
I WOKE THE NEXT MORNING with golden and lavender Tuscan sun touching my face like an old friend for the first time in over half a century. I had stayed overnight at the only inn in Anchiano, a ramshackle, ivy-covered place with a serviceable tavern attached. I was relieved to wake, because a long dream had gripped me: Nicolo Silvano was preaching from a pulpit, pointing his finger at me, laughing maniacally. Then I was stuck in a web, a vast outstretched web of pink and green, with people crawling on it. I flailed and tore through the web, and suddenly I was standing in a room, at a masque. Music played for gorgeously costumed people. A slim feminine form approached, and my heart ached: it was the woman from the vision of the philosopher’s stone. She stood in blinding radiance, her face obscured. That gut-level awareness of her that I had felt many times over the last century blossomed into her presence, soft, sweet, smooth. But when I reached for her, she kept receding. My heart beat wildly with longing. Then there were warm fingers on my cheeks, and when I opened my eyes, it was a long beam of light, and not the hand of my beloved.
I felt stripped bare and undefended, but there was no gainsaying the dream. I had known yesterday, when telling the young Leonardo about my vision, that I was invoking it, putting on the noose of its enchantment. I dressed quickly and went downstairs to the tavern for breakfast. Crusty bread, a thick, steaming porridge, chunks of cottardite ham, and a sliced white pear were served to me by a lovely blond woman. I was eager to break the spell of vulnerability that the dream had cast upon me and focused on her to distract myself. She had golden curls worn long down her back in a fashion to make a man’s fingers itch to run through them. Her hazel eyes flicked up at mine and she smiled, showing her full pink lips and even white teeth. I took in the large, widely spaced eyes set in her sculpted oval face, and I knew who she was.
“Caterina,” I said.
“You have the advantage, signore. I don’t know your name,” she replied huskily.
“That’s Luca Bastardo,” sang a musical voice. “He’s my teacher now.” It was Leonardo wearing an emerald-green lucco whose uneven hem looked as if he’d shortened it himself. He skipped in and sat on the bench beside me.
“Is that so, little man?” Caterina asked, ruffling his hair. “I’ll get you some bread and honey, bambino.” She went off with her shapely rounded hips swaying beneath her sleeveless giornea.
“I don’t think you should look at my mother that way,” Leonardo said. He placed my dagger on the table beside me and then slid my bowl of porridge over in front of himself. I watched him dig into the food, remembering how I’d always eaten alone at Silvano’s. The food there had always been delicious and plentiful, but the company was scant and tainted: myself. Leonardo had no sense of that kind of poverty of the spirit, or how far one would go to alleviate it. Something else generated his life, something shining and unbounded at his core.
“I didn’t say I was going to teach you,” I temporized. I gazed away from him. Something about Leonardo’s beauty reminded me of the horror to which my own looks had consigned me as a child. After decades of barely recalling the brothel, I now remembered it all too well. Leonardo, so sure of his prerogative, had no notion of that kind of suffering. I would have considered him insolent if he weren’t so serenely warm and gracious, if calm didn’t stream off him the way halos radiated from angels in paintings.
“You’re here, you’re going to teach me,” he said, between spoonfuls of porridge. “Let’s start today. I’m ready to learn, professore.”
“Today I am going into Florence to see the Duomo,” I said, a little crossly, because I never liked the feeling of being maneuvered, and lately that was happening a lot. There was dried blood on my dagger, and I wiped it on my lucco before sliding it into its holster on my thigh.
“Florence, that’s a splendid idea!” he cried. His mother came back with a plate of bread slathered with butter and dripping with honey. “Mama, Luca’s taking me into Florence today!”
“Hold your horses—” I started.
“Oh, yes, is that your beautiful horse in the stable? The chestnut stallion?” Leonardo asked eagerly. “I should like to draw him! I’ll get started before we leave!”
“Don’t you think we should talk to your papa about a new tutor?” Caterina asked. She set the plate down in front of Leonardo and seated herself opposite us. Her full bosom strained against the yellow apron over her plain blue giornea, her collar opened to show her white throat. She smelled of cooked meats and yeasty breads and spilled wine beneath her flowery perfume, and a little slick of honey glistened along her lower lip. I wanted to lick the honey off. She leaned over the table, asking “How much do you propose to charge, signore? Ser Piero is ever mindful of cost.”
“I don’t know what tutors earn,” I said. I took a long draught from my cup of water to conceal the way her charm made my breath accelerate.
“We’ll pay him well, I’ll talk to Papa,” Leonardo said earnestly. “But not so well that Papa gets angry.” He took the ham from my plate, beaming first at his mother and then at me. He was irresistible, and he knew it. I had no idea what to teach him, but he did. I would have to follow his lead. This would have dismayed me with any other person, living or dead. Since liberating myself from the brothel, my own freedom had been of primary importance. There had never before been anyone for whom I was willing to compromise it even slightly. Even the great love of my vision had been relegated to a nebulous future. Now—because Leonardo had asked, and because Cosimo was dying, and because my peripatetic heart cared for them both, and because I wouldn’t flee from the hand of God anymore, whether that hand was cruel
or kind—I willingly settled in a city where I could be imprisoned and killed. The whole situation made me cross.
“I have to make arrangements,” I said, rising from the table.
“You’ll be back soon?” he called. I nodded to him over my shoulder, found Caterina holding her son’s hand to her lips as she stared after me. I sucked in my gut, held my shoulders a little wider and my spine a little straighter. Anchiano was going to be an interesting place.
I RODE TO THE LITTLE VINEYARD I OWNED and introduced myself to my tenants as a descendant of the original Luca Bastardo who owned it. So I became the son of myself, for Leonardo and Cosimo. An older couple with two grown sons tended the place, and they were skeptical at first, but I recited for them the figures from the past ten years, yields of grape harvested and casks sold and which merchants bought the wine for how much and so forth. I was completely accurate because I kept meticulous account of my half-share of the yield. They were soon convinced of my authenticity and fell all over themselves to please me. I explained that I would be staying in Anchiano for an undetermined length of time, and there was some discussion as to where I would live. With the wealth I’d accumulated over many decades, I could have lived anywhere. I did not tell them that because the vineyard suited my requirements. I wanted neither to flaunt my money nor to call attention to myself by setting up a household. The couple and one son lived in the main villa, and the older son, who had a wife and baby, lived in a small cottage on the property. It was agreed that the young family would move back in with his parents and I would take up residence in the cottage. I told them that I expected my horse to be well tended. The younger son, a big, rawboned country lad about Lorenzo’s ago, lit up and promised to treat Ginori “better than husbands do their wives.”
Having arranged things to my satisfaction, I rode back to the tavern. Leonardo was outside on the lawn in front of the inn, playing a skipping game with rocks arranged in a square. He held a fluttering piece of paper in his hand as he leapt around.
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