The Courier's Tale

by Peter Walker

  Pole’s star began to wane. He was accused of lassitude, passivity, pusillanimity, cowardice, indolence, selfishness, indifference to the common good. He had too great a love of quiet, of gardens, of the library. In short he was said to be another Lord Bembo, who also had too much love for his otium, his ease.

  People’s minds then turned back to the midnight hour when Pole had actually been chosen as Pope, and the electors had sent for him and begged him to come to receive the acclamation, but he had refused. He had been offered the chance to save the Church and perhaps all of Christendom (for even the Lutherans had some faith in him) but he flinched and turned away.

  As these charges were being aired, a strange tale circulated in the household. I heard it first from Beccatelli, in whom Pole himself confided, and then I heard it again from Priuli and Pace.

  It seemed that on the night in question, when the two cardinals came to Pole and offered him the pontificate, his very first thought was of the ass’s colt which two men came to fetch so that the Lord might ride it into Jerusalem the next day.

  For that reason, he listened to the ministers and agreed to go with them.

  Then, when they left him to report back to the others, it struck him how dark it was and how late the hour, and he thought that if he was elected by acclamation at midnight, that might well lead to endless accusations of electoral fraud, of ‘coming in through the window instead of the door’. So he changed his mind and sent a message after Farnese saying he should wait until daylight.

  Two more cardinals were then sent to assure him that an election at that hour and in that manner was entirely legitimate, just, canonical and in accordance with ancient precedent. So he agreed again and sent them ahead to prepare for the ceremony.

  But then, alone in the chapel for a few minutes, something strange happened to him. He thought again of the ass left at his master’s door and now it seemed to him that he actually began to take on the character of that animal. First he felt a complete indifference to earthly honours. Then he saw the pontificate in a new light, as it really was or should be, divested of all worldly wealth and honour, and well-nigh naked. And then, as in the ancient fable of Apuleius, he felt he was actually turning into an ass, with its hairy pelt and long ears and reedy voice.

  All that could actually be seen in the dim light of the chapel at that hour were those figures of the tyrants and wicked souls painted by Michelangelo on the wall. A kind of terror seized him. He called his conclavist and hastily sent him after the cardinals to say that the election must be deferred until dawn.

  Thus the vote was held the next day, but it came only after Carafa’s attack on his character and doctrine, which cost him one vote.

  So it seemed that my master lost the pontificate because, for a minute or two, some strange power turned him into an ass’s colt that was frightened of the dark.

  Whether this was the work of providence, or of the evil spirit which saps a man’s courage, I leave you to decide.

  Chapter 13

  For a long time, before I even began roaming the world as a courier in the service of Pole, I had devoted myself to the study of horse-breeding, but from a distance, in secrecy, as it were. Having no money or opportunity to put my thoughts into practice, I kept them to myself for fear of looking absurd, rather like those gentlemen who talk expertly on war but have never been seen on a battlefield or who, by the droop of an eyelid, imply that no woman is safe from them when in fact they live very modestly in that regard. But when the time came that Pole decided to leave Rome for good and go and live quietly in a monastery, I saw that my service to him was coming to an end. It was time for me to choose a new occupation.

  My thoughts turned naturally towards bloodstock. I had some capital, Judith had more, and an income from a parcel of land in Gloucestershire – I’ve always said it was an excellent county, Gloucestershire – and so we made our plans accordingly.

  I chose this city of Mantua to start our new life. I liked Mantua from the start; I liked the lie of the land, and the Regent was always amiable to any friend of Pole’s, especially one who once brought him a drawing by M. Michelangelo. And so, leaving my family in Rome, I came north to visit the place again and to survey the neighbouring countryside.

  I found a very good little farm a few miles out of town at Cerese, with serviceable stables and five paddocks for grazing. Then I went to Forli and bought a stallion, a handsome beast named Prince Aeneas, a black – the true jet black, not the rusty – which I had been watching quietly for several years, and I took him back to Cerese to cover the mares I already owned.

  Then I went to Rome to collect my family, which by then had grown in size – we had had two more sons – and brought them all back with me and we settled into a new life in Mantua.

  And here this story might have been expected to reach its end. It certainly seemed that I had come to the end of my adventures in service to the illustrious Pole. In short, I looked forward to a tranquil life, although I must now question if there is any such thing. In the end a great storm always comes. In my case, even the periods of calm have never lasted long. In fact, just then, the worst disaster of my life was approaching from a direction I had never dreamt of.

  Judith was as pleased as I was with Mantua, a rich city with its shops and silk factories, and innumerable Jews, who, in Mantua, consider themselves to be in a kind of paradise: there is no ghetto, there are as many printing presses as in Venice, they write comedies and they practice medicine and, furthermore, the Regent, Cardinal Ercole, loves them and protects their interests. When, for instance, a little later on, the order came from the Inquisition to burn all copies of the Talmud (this was after the great quarrel among the Jewish publishers) he called in certain Jews before taking any action, and spoke quietly to them so that they might know what to do. It was through the Regent that I eventually met Portaleone, a doctor, a writer of comedies, and now my literary advisor. But that was still some time in the future.

  In the meantime we settled in. I took this house not far from the palace and the water, a high, narrow house in which I installed my little brood all as content as doves in a cote. By then, as I said, we had more children, and another adult had also joined the family. When Judith had found she was pregnant again, she wept and said she would not go through childbirth without a woman of her own country at her side. Then she spoke fiercely. She seemed to blame me for something – that her mother was dead, that I had led her far from her English sisters. So of course I took the blame, and went hunting about for a companion for her. This was how I found Agnes Hide. She was the daughter of a Southampton merchant who had set up in Venice, trading in English stuff, woollen clothes and hides.

  Agnes was the exact opposite of Judith. She was tall, fair, blond, sleepy, peaceable. She spoke good Italian; Judith’s was lamentable. Being quite different, they were nevertheless very pleased with each other.

  From this house we ventured forth to see where we were. After inspecting the ducal palace, the great church of S. Pietro, the palace of the Te, and the shores of the lake, which was as flat as millpond whenever you looked at it, but which still rose up and drowned people without warning from time to time, we ranged over the Mantuan countryside. For some reason this is never threatening or gloomy as the campagna around Rome can be in a certain light. We saw the little brick house where Virgil once lived and kept his beasts as a shepherd, and the big river – ‘slow-treading Mincio’ as Flamminio called it – moving among its robes of reeds.

  Five miles beyond the town we came to the beautiful pleasure-house called Marmerol, where the Duke keeps his orange trees in great tubs, which he moves from one place to another according to his ducal whim.

  We were happy with everything that we found.

  There was no inkling of what was to come: beautiful Mantua was to be Judith’s last home on earth. A tragedy was in preparation. Yet everything appeared prosperous. All the mares had conceived. Judith found she was pregnant again. And about the same time, my nep
hew George came to live with us. More than ever I liked his brave and gentle nature. He had come to Italy to learn the language and gain experience of the world. On the way he had stayed in the German cities, in Switzerland and Venice, and he brought with him the latest books on science, astronomy and the techniques of husbandry. Late into the evening he would sit up and, translating as he went, would read aloud to me:

  To make a trial of your stallion and see whether he is fit for procreation, you should press the genital members with two fingers and with locks of wool draw out his seed. If it cleaves together, he is a good stallion, but if it hangs together like bird lime or milk and whey, you should not let him cover your mares.

  Your mares should be well compacted, fair and beautiful, with large belly and loins, and aged between three and ten.

  The appetite of the female for the male, which is called the horsing, lasts sixty days and is easily recognised by these signs: first they leave their usual company and prefer running towards north and south rather than east and west. They will let no one near them until they are tired or have met a male. If they meet a female in the same state as themselves they rejoice in her society, lifting their tail, changing their voice and sending forth from their secrets a certain thin humour like the seed of the male.

  Among all females in the world there is none, apart from women, more greedy for procreation, which carries them over mountains and rivers. In Spain, on Mount Tegro by the ocean, the mares rage so far in their lust that they conceive by the south-west wind, just as hens lay eggs without being trodden by the cock. The foals of these unions, however, do not live long.

  The best time for joining the horse and mare is from the vernal equinox to the summer solstice, so that the foals have warm weather and green grass from their birth.

  Good foals will rise quickly when stirred from their rest, and run away fast: they should be cheerful, wanton, contend with their equals and race against them, not be terrified by any strange sight, and should leap over a ditch, and appear meek when provoked.

  They should be long-bodied, full of muscle and sharp, with a little head, black eyes, open and wide nostrils, sharp pitched ears, a soft and broad neck, a thick mane falling to the right side, a broad and full breast, large shoulders and shoulder bones, round ribs, a little belly and double backbone, loins pressed downwards broad and well set, a long tail with curled hair and high, straight and equal legs, round knees, round buttocks, brawny and fleshy thighs, high, hard and hollow hoofs, and the veins should be conspicuous and apparent all over the body.

  By this time I had four yearlings which, more or less, I thought, matched this description, and now the mares were in foal again. I don’t know which is the source of greater contentment – hearing words that conform to reality, or seeing reality confirm the authority of the written word.

  Soon our numbers increased again. We were joined by Elizeus Heywood, a wild, wayward young man whose father had sent him abroad to keep out of trouble. He made a beeline for Pole. Pole, immersed in his books, sent him on to us. Finally there arrived another nephew, John Throckmorton, Long John, as we called him, for he was so tall he towered over all of us and indeed over every head in the Mantuan street. The young men brought a lively spirit to the household. Judith already knew my nephews well; she found herself queen of a little court which had sprung up around her. We spent most of the summer in the country, at Cerese, where the air was sweeter than in town.

  I told the boys they must not stop with us old folk out in the sticks but hurry off and see the world.

  ‘Oh no, dear Uncle,’ said Long John. ‘We’re staying. We know which side our bread is buttered on.’

  Being a married lady, and pregnant again as well, Judith ruled them all easily. It was to Agnes Hide they made love. She, in turn, at the age of twenty-six, laughed at them. George was the oldest and he was only twenty-one or twenty-two.

  ‘She would love me if I had more money,’ said Long John at supper one evening. Every night we had supper at the long table under the apricot trees.

  ‘You know nothing about these matters,’ said Elizeus. ‘Lovers live on love as larks live on leeks.’

  ‘Ah – but there’s more to marriage than four bare legs in a bed,’ said John.

  ‘That’s enough,’ said Judith, who would not permit any hint of indelicacy at her court.

  Agnes, tall and fair, sat there smiling but with her eyes lowered as if she had a secret.

  Late one night a white bow was seen across the fields. It was a night rainbow – a thing never dreamt of in a lifetime but when you see one you know at once what it is.

  Sometimes I had to blink at what had happened to me. There I was, with a wife and children, possessions, horses, and English visitors coming and going without any danger. It was hard to believe my old life spent half on horseback, with nothing to my name but a few books and clothes, and the forces of a dangerous enemy, my own king, always threatening on the horizon.

  In the autumn the time came for Judith’s lying-in. John and Elizeus had gone off to Florence. I remember that week very clearly. George was always with me in the parlour; he read aloud to entertain me and keep my mind from wandering upstairs. Above our heads there was a great campaign under way: I could hear the drumming footsteps and orders, as to the commissariat, for linen, hot water, lidded basins, a winestoop, a warming pan, pictures of St Margaret . . . Men are kept at a distance from this campaign, and in fact know no more about its progress than people on dry land who hear the sounds of a battle out at sea. George by then was reading aloud the history of all the four-footed beasts – I remember that night we met the sphinx, which belongs to the ape family and stores its food in its cheeks, and the hedgehog whose ribs, dried and powdered, are a cure for colic, and two types of the vulgar little mouse, the rustic and the urban: ‘They can discern their enemies: not fearing the ox, they run from a cat. Thus it is clear they have sound judgement and make good choices.’

  Seeing that I could hardly concentrate, George turned his attention back to the horse, the most noble of the animals:

  The eyes of a horse are great or glassy; it is reported of Emperor Augustus that his eyes were much brighter than other men’s, and resembled those of horses; their eyes also see perfectly in the dark . . . Homer affirms that there are in horses divine qualities, for, being tied to their manger, they mourned the death of Patroclus, and foreshadowed what would happen to Achilles . . . They lament their lost masters with tears and they foreknow battles . . . They love wet places, and baths, and also music – the whole host of the army of the Sybarites taught their horses to dance to the sound of a pipe.

  I could not listen any longer. I begged George to put his book aside. Above us the footsteps were thudding back and forth very furiously. There came the sound a husband dreads – most pitiful cries. After a time there was a silence, and then came another sound which I could not fail to recognise. It was the newcomer, who, lifting her voice, made herself known through the whole house. This was my sixth child.

  The neighbours came in and gave me boxes of pickled pumpkin, which is the reward for new fathers in Italy. In Italy, as well, the newborn is washed in warm white wine. In half an hour my little daughter was brought down to me smelling sweet and, frankly, rather bibulous. The maid-servants allowed me to hold her. I kept her in my arms, and went straight upstairs, but at the door of the bedchamber I met Agnes.

  She looked pale and she tried to keep me out.

  ‘Not yet,’ she said.

  But I went past her and went in and saw Judith, who was the colour of snow. I saw at once that although body and soul were still together, life itself was marching away. I instantly ran down and called for a doctor. This was Portaleone, whom I knew by then but only slightly. Sometimes Jews could or would treat gentiles, sometimes not – I never made out the rules too clearly. In this instance, Portaleone came at once and then there commenced a great battle to order back the force that was retreating before our eyes.

  How long the
engagement went on I scarcely knew. Portaleone was the commanding general, I was a messenger and foot-soldier. Judith herself seemed oblivious to the danger. She took the baby for a moment, and smiled at me.

  ‘She has a little cap of black hair like me,’ she said, ‘but she has a resemblance to you, which makes me love her.’

  Then she slid back on the pillow. I became truly fearful. There was a great deal of blood being lost. Basin after basin was taken away. Later, Portaleone said that I began to act like a madman: at one point I left the room and came back with a songbird in a cage. That was true, but it was not wholly a deranged act. The bird was Judith’s pet, which she greatly loved. I had the idea that if she heard it sing that might alert her to how far she was journeying from us.

  The bird in fact did sing a little, and hopped back and forward in the candlelight. What did it know about our human tales? But I thought that Judith’s eyes moved under their lids. I was not mad, but as watchful as I have ever been in my life. In time, I saw that Portaleone had given up the engagement, though he said nothing and kept applying compresses and poultices and elixir of sage.

  Finally he turned to me and opened his hands. I sent for the priests. I realised then it was morning. The boys were brought in to see their mother, but she did not open her eyes. Francis was then five years old. The priests began to chant the prayer for the dying. The bird chirped too, now and then, but no one dared put it out because of my glance. But I was not mad. It was only much later, when I realised what I had lost, that despair and self-pity seized me. When I went down the stairs early that afternoon I was a widower with four living children, but I still hadn’t taken in that description of myself.