The Competition

by Donna Russo Morin

The door swooshed open; they heard it even within the chapel. Through the egress came the sounds of raised male voices, those who continued to huddle outside. Viviana peeked around the chapel corner. Through the door came Lapaccia, on the arm of Leonardo. Viviana’s relief sighed through her; how greatly she feared what the heckling of the men would do to the ever more fragile woman.

  “Ah, buone donne, we are all here now,” Leonardo greeted them. “Here we begin.”

  He received naught but pained stares in reply.

  Da Vinci strode into the chapel, stood with his back to the faded Madonna with Saint Anna hovering protectively above her.

  “Do you think what you are feeling has never been felt before?” He shook his head. “It is the war of art, a war we all battle. To begin such a work, any work, is to commit the soul to it. It is not any easy thing, is it? To relinquish our souls. Yet you have already done so, and on many occasions to great success. There are so many unable to take that first step, while many others are unable to finish.” Leonardo spoke with commanding authority. He moved to the front left corner, where outer wall and ceiling met the inner wall of the cappella. “Stop looking at the chapel; look at this instead. Do not think of it as a whole, but as small parts, for it is far easier to give small parts of us to small parts. There is accomplishment when each part is finished. In that satisfaction, you will find the strength to move to the next. For now, think only of this part,” he said, pointing, “for here we will begin.”

  What they had taken on was no small feat, not the work, nor what it might do to their lives and the lives of those around them. They may never be the same again.

  No, Viviana thought, that is not true. We will never be the same.

  “How do we begin, maestro?” she asked simply; it was all they needed.

  Leonardo slapped his hands together, rubbed them with relish.

  “We will begin with building the scaffolds. I have had all the necessary wood and tools delivered. They await—”

  “Mi scusi.” Fiammetta stopped him, walked toward him with a flat palm held up. “Do you mean to say that we are to build the scaffolds, with our hands?”

  The gleam on Leonardo’s face slithered away. He took two steps, stood merely inches from the indomitable form that was the Contessa Maffei.

  “Are you an artist about to create a commissioned affresco?”

  Fiammetta slanted back. “Well, yes, but—”

  “Then you will build your scaffold.”

  As if in a war of another sort, their locked gaze held. Fiammetta surprised them, surrendering as she looked away first.

  “To the garden, madonnas, where our equipment awaits,” Leonardo said, once more the serene tutor.

  Fiammetta led them out of the chapel, and further up the aisle to the transept door.

  “I have never held a hammer in my life.” Her grumbling wafted over her slumped shoulders, but she did not turn—just as well, for then she could not see the amusement on her companions’ faces.

  • • •

  Sweat covered their faces. Dust stuck to the sweat. Their smocks added another layer of heat. They had never looked so dirty; they had never felt so alive.

  It took them far longer than it would have taken men, but the first scaffold was beginning to take form. Leonardo set Mattea and Isabetta to the task of breaking holes in the walls; luckily, those used when the first fresco was done were easy to spot, as the fill plaster never looked as sturdy as the stone walls themselves. The women swung their sledgehammers with gusto, grunting even as they laughed, each trying to outwhack the other. As they walloped the walls, da Vinci showed Lapaccia how long to cut the rope, taught the other women how to notch poles together and where they should intersect, how to tie them securely enough to hold the weight of at least two of them at a time.

  “Dear contessa,” Leonardo squatted down beside where Fiammetta had flopped herself on the floor, legs splayed, a jumble of pole crosses in her lap. She had already bonked herself twice upon the head, each time sending a sneer of derision in Leonardo’s direction. “They must be at a perfect ninety-degree angle in order for the ties to securely hold with strength. You must—”

  “Maestro,” Viviana hissed at him, though her pop-eyed gaze struck elsewhere. “Leonardo!” she susurrated again from between clenched teeth.

  Leonardo looked up at her, finally, following her gaze. Seeing what she did, he quickly straightened.

  “Mio bene uomini,” he cried, arms opened to greet the two men with a kiss for each of their cheeks. For his appearance there, Leonardo gave the sort of greeting that had never before passed between him and one of their guests.

  Each man returned the greeting in kind, but said nothing; it appeared as though they were incapable. The young and tall one, the older and rounder one, both wore the same mask, one of blatant astonishment.

  “Madonnas, come, come meet my good men.” Leonardo waved a hand at all the Disciples, no matter their chore. Viviana knew who these men were, had recognized them immediately, and yet da Vinci spoke as if they were lounging at café watching life pass by along a via.

  Da Vinci introduced each woman to each man individually, Fiammetta last, not for her rank, but for the ignominy she had suffered whilst attempting to pick up her stout form from the floor. At least the venerable artists paid her the courtesy of bowing deeper than they had to the other women, save perhaps Lapaccia.

  As Sandro Botticelli and Andrea Verrocchio greeted the other women, Viviana took herself to Leonardo’s side. As if to take it, she pinched his arm, shushing his small yelp.

  “Why are they here? You knew they were coming but said nothing?” She pinched him again.

  “I did not tell you because I knew it would only bring you more agitation,” Leonardo said, unwinding her arm from his so she could pinch him no more. “And they are here, madonna, to help.”

  “What?!” The tsk of her emphatic t echoed through the small chapel.

  Leonardo simply patted her on the shoulder.

  Sandro Botticelli and Andrea Verrocchio said little during the introductions. When the flummoxed daze broke, Botticelli broke it. “I see you are building your own scaffolds. Is it true, madonnas?”

  How pleased Viviana was that they were, if only for the confounded look upon the genius’s face; it was worth all the splinters and scrapes—every one—on her hands and arms.

  “Sì, they are, and making good progress of it, too,” Leonardo said, standing a bit taller, ignoring Fiammetta’s groan.

  “And they will be strong enough to hold you?” This from Botticelli.

  “Oh, indeed they will,” Fiammetta answered with all the frustrated determination she now carried.

  “True, quite true,” Leonardo agreed, ignoring the raised brows and pursed lips of the men’s expressions.

  “Well, making a scaffold is one thing,” Verrocchio huffed as if insulted. “Painting a fresco is quite another.”

  “Also true,” Leonardo agreed. “Would you have a care to see examples of their work?”

  “Most assuredly,” Botticelli replied.

  “This way then.” Leonardo stepped out of the chapel, holding up an arm to show the way to the side door.

  As one, the Disciples made to follow, but were stopped by their maestro’s own halting gesture.

  “It will fare better if you are not there,” he explained, leaning toward them, whispering to them. “They will be more inclined to express their pleasant surprise without having to do so in front of you.”

  “In front of us women, you mean,” Isabetta said snidely.

  “The maestro is correct,” Viviana conceded.

  Isabetta huffed, with a shake of her head, “Men.”

  There was nothing more that needed to be said.

  Leonardo took himself away, the women’s malignant proclamations about his gender tagging along behind.

  • • •

  Da Vinci spoke not a word as his two companions made their way about the studio, as they pored over th
e array of canvasses, those set to dry against the wall and those still upon the easels, still in progress.

  Verrocchio, the nickname given him meaning “true eye,” stopped in the middle of the room, turning slowly; his face a portrait of an incredulous daze.

  “These…all these…are by their hands and none other’s?”

  “To the one. Their talent and none other’s,” Leonardo assured him, chest puffed out, chin high.

  Botticelli paused before Lapaccia’s work, bent down, and retrieved a canvas from the crux of the wall, holding it at eye level before him.

  “That is the work of Mona Cavalcanti,” Leonardo told him. “You are her favorite. She strives to master your techniques.”

  Sandro looked at him, cupid-bow lips agape.

  “She honors me,” he whispered, turning back, still with the painting in his grip, still with wonder upon his face.

  • • •

  “Quick.” Mattea slithered from the edge of the chapel where she had been spying, “they return.”

  Each woman picked up a tool, a pole, anything. As the three men returned to the portal of the chapel, the women looked at them with batting eyes and insipid smiles. Leonardo sniffed at their poor attempt at nonchalance.

  If they had expected—hoped for—words of praise, they heard none. The words that did come were far better.

  “So,” Andrea Verrocchio strode toward them, arms akimbo as his experienced eye surveyed the site. “It is only the middle tiers that will hold the true scenes, so it is the top with its simple sky that we should start with. Clouds are an easy form to master, even within affresco.”

  We. The word exploded in Viviana’s mind. He said we.

  More soldiers now stood among their ranks in this war.

  • • •

  The glooming of gray dusk awaited them as the women left Santo Spirito together, perhaps never more so united, never more unconquerable. Their words fell over each other’s like the streams of a many-branched river cascading over a fall, their laughter the babbling.

  Leonardo, Verrocchio, and Botticelli had left first, Leonardo assuring them with a wave from the door that no remnants of the aggravated horde remained. With their dispersal came the women’s safe passage away.

  “It is sad to think our maestro will be gone for a few days,” Viviana mused.

  “Yes, but look who we shall have to fill the void till he returns,” Isabetta crowed.

  “In all my wildest fantasies, I never imagined I would work under such masterful tutelage as Botticelli and Verrocchio,” Natasia made a prayer of gratitude.

  Isabetta walked beside her, twined their arms. “Our true maestro is the greatest of them all, no matter what others may say. But what he has done bringing—aiee!”

  The rock, hurled from somewhere out of the darkness, thwacked against the cobbles as it bounced off her, smashing into pieces.

  Isabetta grabbed her left shoulder with her right hand as she tumbled to the ground.

  Natasia, the closest to her, dropped beside her.

  “Are you injured? How badly are you hurt?” she asked urgently, trying to pry Isabetta’s hand from her shoulder.

  “Isabetta!” Viviana cried, running toward her wounded friend, then spinning, running toward the darkness.

  “Viviana! No!” Fiammetta screamed at her, running after Viviana, and pulling her back.

  A trembling group, the women gathered around Isabetta, elbows pressed to their sides, shoulders to their ears. They formed a shield about her, their heaving breath and Isabetta’s moans creating a chorus of fear and pain.

  “Puah!” Isabetta spat her disgust as she pulled away the partlet over her simple gown, as the torn and bruised flesh upon her shoulder revealed itself. She sat up, still within the circle of protection her sisterhood had created. Fisted hands trembled.

  “Cowards!” Isabetta threw her head back like a wolf and cried out. “You harm women from the safety of the dark? Are you so afraid of us? You are not men, you are vipers!”

  No one could be seen; nothing could be heard but the chirping of crickets and the slam of a shutter or two somewhere down along the street. Fiammetta rose slowly, standing in the circle of them still. “Things grow more serious.”

  With another moan, Isabetta picked herself up, a helping woman at each arm. “Yes,” she growled, “and so do I. We have begun; we have Botticelli and Verrocchio on our side as well as our maestro. I will not allow cowards”—this word she yelled once more though her voice quivered with tears, though whether of pain or righteousness it was difficult to distinguish—“to stop us. Not now, not ever.”

  “Not now, not ever,” Viviana repeated, a far-off echo of Isabetta’s rectitude, yet as unshakable as the stone it reverberated off.

  During all of their previous travails, their daring deeds, their criminal doings, never before had one of them been physically injured. What had they undertaken? What had she forced them to do?

  “Leonardo is right,” she spat. “We are at war.”

  Chapter Twenty-One

  “Sacrifices are made in the name of love, no matter what it is we love.”

  A sculpted thigh slid snugly into the hollow of a hip, a small face lay cradled in the dip of a broad shoulder, a full, fleshy chest lay welcomed upon a firm, accommodating one. Nearly a foot different in height and yet their bodies entwined with the strangest coupling of precise melding. Viviana languished there, Sansone’s body encompassing hers, in perfect harmony.

  I am lost, she thought. I cannot tell where I end and he begins.

  It was the most sensual moment of her life. It was an embrace one could live upon for a very long time—if needs be such.

  Did he feel her smile fade? He lifted his head. “You need not fear me, nor anyone, ever.” His lips lowered, paid bountiful homage to hers.

  Their lovemaking had been different this time; without the aching insistence of lust, it had slowed; it had become a leisurely, lingering journey of explorations and sensations. Viviana knew not which version she preferred; in truth, she preferred both. Yet his words brought back the frightening events of the early evening, before she had returned home to find him waiting for her. The simple act had done much to alleviate the fear and anger that had accompanied her the rest of the way home.

  Viviana raised her head from his chest. “If I have fear, it is not of you.”

  A scowl furrowed a crease at the top of his long nose. Sansone rolled them over on the bed. His fine hair fell forward. A soft ashen brown, the sun had swung its brush against random strands and glorified it with gold. The effect was a dewy color that brushed near the meadows that were his eyes. How she longed to delve forever into their depths, among the secrets, the scars, the sweetness.

  “What is it then that you do fear?” he asked.

  For an instant Viviana feared to tell him, feared his reaction, but the other fright was by far stronger. She told him of the rock.

  He studied her, every aspect of her face.

  “As there is nothing I can do or say that will make you stop this endeavor…” Viviana shook her head back and forth once and then again, her hair, tangled by their lovemaking, swishing against the linen.

  “Then I will become, once more, your shadow, tesoro mio,” he whispered in her ear, sweetly kissing it, tender touches that tingled her skin.

  When Sansone rose up again, Viviana saw upon his face the same bitter sweetness, the same memories, as in her mind. How awful it had been through all those years to have him ever near, to be never close.

  Viviana drew a line down the sharp curves of his face with a single fingertip; what a miracle it was to at last be so close, so dear.

  “Then I will feel safer than ever before.” She lifted her head to kiss him.

  Their lips separated, he lay beside her, and propped her head upon his arm, their legs and linens entwined. Viviana breathed deep, aroused by the scents of their lovemaking still slick upon their skin, listening to his heart beat in time with hers. From the ope
n window, a waft of air found them, adding its caress to theirs; laughing voices from somewhere below joined the chirping of crickets and the hooting of owls. Viviana closed her eyes, relishing the eternity of the moment.

  “I would like to meet your sons.” The words came from his mouth and the rumble in his chest. Viviana’s eyes flew open. “And the other Disciples. I think it is time.”

  Viviana held so still she could have been sleeping, dreaming. She wasn’t.

  Sansone propped himself up on one elbow. “Do you not agree?”

  She didn’t answer, for she had no answer. She needed time to think on it.

  Sansone smiled down at her. “If we are to marry—”

  “Marry?” Viviana’s pretense faded, disappeared as a shooting star does as it falls away from earth.

  He leaned away from her. Though she tried to pull him back, he would have none of it.

  “Did you think that this”—his eyes roved about the room, the bed, and its canopy above—“would be all we would share? Did you think it would be enough?”

  “I…I…” Viviana bit her lip to stop her stuttering. “I have not thought of it, to be true. It seems such a miracle that I am in your arms, my mind has gone no further.”

  “Perhaps it should,” he said. “Perhaps you should think hard upon it.”

  Viviana said not a word, for thoughts stormed in on her like a rampaging bull. To share his love, to the end of her days? Yes, that she could envision. But marriage? To once more become the property of a man, and a younger man at that? To give herself and of herself completely to another as she had once before, never having such wholeness returned. Could she do it? Would she do it? She said nothing.

  With a heavy sigh, Sansone leaned toward her, kissed her once, then again and deeply, then unraveled himself from their nest and began to dress.

  Viviana shot up, pulling the linen up to cover her bare breasts. “Where are you going? Are you leaving?” Are you leaving me?

  He nodded. “You have much to think about, and much to do in the morning, sì?”

  “Yes, but…”

  “I shall take my leave and allow you sleep.”