***
He could feel himself stiffening beneath her fingers—but not enough. Not enough. A cold wire of anxiety pricked in his throat. It was not going to work. She was no Francesca. He would need her mouth.
“Here,” he said. “Come here. We’ll try another way.”
He swung his legs over so that he sat on the edge of the bed, then took Lucrezia’s hand and pulled her round to stand between his knees. His hands on her shoulders, he pushed downwards until she was kneeling in front of him.
He saw her eyes widen, and she shook her head again.
“No,” she said, and her eyes begged. “This has never worked before…”
“Maybe so. But we have all night, do we not? We are going to succeed, Lucrezia, whatever it takes.” Alfonso took her chin between finger and thumb and turned her face up towards his again. “We need an heir. It has to happen. I will not have you ridiculing me and the duchy any longer.”
“But…what do you mean? Alfonso, I haven’t—”
“If you were not regaling your little slut of a waiting-woman with the sordid details of the fiasco of your marriage bed, then perhaps you would be good enough to tell me what you were discussing,” he said, gripping one of her shoulders and loosening his laces still further with his other hand.
He saw a dull flush colour her cheeks. She said nothing, just stared at him, breathing quickly. Fury, fear and an ugly greed for her writhed in his belly like a tangle of snakes.
***
Lucrezia tried to pull away from him, but Alfonso grabbed a handful of her hair.
“I think you know what to do,” he said, pulling her head in towards him. “I’ve shown you enough times—you should have learned something by now. After all, it’s a task even the cheapest whore manages without thinking too hard about it.”
Her knees pressed painfully onto the wood of the floor, the roots of her hair burned as Alfonso’s grip tightened, and the stuff of his breeches scraped against her arms.
“Please, Alfonso—please don’t make me do this—” she began, but her words just breathed back hot against her face and he seemed not to hear her. She pushed her hands between her mouth and Alfonso’s body; he grabbed one and jerked it out of the way, pushing his own hand in to take its place. Ineffectually straining her head backwards against his grip on her hair, Lucrezia felt Alfonso’s fingers opening her mouth, and then she was fighting for breath, her protests now no more than inarticulate noises.
“We’ll do whatever it takes, Lucrezia,” she dimly heard him say through the panicked sounds she could not prevent. “We must have an heir.”
She felt his knees grip her body and knew she could not move.
***
When Alfonso snatched up his doublet and left the chamber as the first greyish light of the morning filtered into the room, Folletto was not lying across the doorway, as he would have expected. He was surprised to see the dog on its feet, blocking the way out, hackles raised and eyes white-rimmed.
“Get out of the way!” he said, but the dog did not move. Alfonso said it again. Folletto growled. Alfonso cuffed him hard across the muzzle with a hollow smack, infuriated that in every respect, every one of his dependants seemed determined to thwart him that night. Folletto snarled at him, blocking the doorway, showing teeth fully an inch in length, but Alfonso stood his ground. “Will you move, you miserable, misbegotten black hellhound? Just get out my way and let me pass!”
The dog stood square and the rumbling snarl continued.
A red mist clouded Alfonso’s vision. He pulled a pair of hunting gloves from where they were folded through his belt and swiped them, back-handed, across the dog’s head. The snarling stopped.
Alfonso strode past, deliberately ignoring the almost soundless sob that came from the room behind him. Pulling a candle from a wall-bracket, he ran down and down through the levels of the Castello, hutched his way awkwardly along the short, lowceilinged corridor and stepped down into the windowless cell.
Pushing the heavy door to, he leaned against it, his forehead and hands pressed against the blood-smelling iron. Nausea swirled through him. He screwed shut his eyes and held his breath, begging wordlessly for stillness—but the clotted silence was punctured now with bleating whimpers, and jeers and the soft voice of the Archbishop, and he could find no peace.
***
The early morning light was flooding through into the North Hall and the day’s giornata was ready to accept its paint. Jacomo ran a hand over the smooth, warm surface of the plaster and thought of Lucrezia’s skin. He closed his eyes and saw her—creamy pale and huge-eyed, nose and cheeks freckled like a thrushes’ egg. Clothed, she had seemed delicately small and rather vulnerable, but naked he had found her possessed of a quick, taut energy that had entirely delighted him. All those layers of lawn and silk had hidden the truth most effectively.
Even as he thought this, Jacomo’s eyes snapped open. He held his breath as his mind made an almost muscular movement: an idea for a change in the fresco’s design pushed its way into his consciousness. His breathing quickened and he jumped down from the trestle upon which he had been standing.
“Brother,” he said, his voice a little husky, “I’ve just had an idea.”
The friar looked up from his paintpot. “What is it, child? Come on, Jacomo, tell me. I’ve seen that smile on your face too many times before. This looks like a good one.”
And Jacomo explained. He scrambled back up onto the trestle and roughed out the new design with his hands, his fingers tracing onto the plaster all that he could see in his mind’s eye as clearly as though it were already complete. “And it’s the height of aristocratic artistic taste at the moment, is it not, Brother?” he said, turning back to the friar. “Hopefully we can fool him completely, and then he can enjoy confusing—no, more than that—bewildering—anyone who sees the painting!”
There was one element to the subterfuge, however, that Jacomo avoided sharing with the reverend brother.
Fra Pandolf frowned, lower lip jutting as he considered what he had heard. Then the frown cleared and a boyish smile took its place. “Oh, yes, Jacomo. It certainly is a good one—I wish I had thought of it myself! Of course…I am not sure that I’ll be able to…” He tailed off, hesitating.
“I’ll do it all.”
“Yes, yes,” said Pandolf, more enthusiastic by the moment. “Judging by the sinopia, I would say that we have three more giornate to complete before the new section. Would you agree?”
Jacomo nodded.
“How many days will the new section take, Jacomo?”
“Another four or five, perhaps.”
“A little more than a week, then, for the work to be completed.”
A little more than a week, Jacomo thought. He would count it in hours.
Tomaso appeared then, yawning, rubbing his eyes and hitching up his breeches. Jacomo’s heart lurched. Yesterday, he thought, those breeches had clothed a very different body.
They set to work and rapidly progressed with the day’s giornata, Jacomo tackling the more complex sections—the great bronze Talos, creaking to terrifying life, the fear in the faces of the Argonauts and Jason’s wild flight from the scene. Fra Pandolf was busy with sky, sea and sand.
They had been intensely busy for some two hours when the sound of footsteps coming up the spiral staircase interrupted their almost silent progress.
Jacomo’s heart skipped a beat and his face felt suddenly cold as the duke appeared, gazing intently at the painting.
He had Lucrezia by the hand.
She was ashen-faced, and bruise-coloured shadows stood out under her eyes. Looking up at Jacomo, her gaze was eloquent. The duke, without releasing his hold upon Lucrezia, turned from her, as, in conversation with the reverend brother, he stretched with his other arm to point out some feature of the fresco that had caught his attention.
Lucrezia, her eyes still fixed upon Jacomo’s, turned her head as far from her husband’s eye as she dared and mouthed silent
ly, “I love you.”
Facing directly towards the duke, he did not dare answer, but he risked the smallest twitch of a smile. Lucrezia’s mouth opened a fraction and its corners lifted infinitesimally.
“What think you, Fra Pandolf?” the duke asked.
Jacomo started.
“A charming idea, Signore, and one I shall be delighted to undertake forthwith. Jacomo?”
The plump friar’s words were cheerful and confident, but his expression, Jacomo thought, was tainted with suppressed panic. He had no idea what they were discussing, but Pandolf prattled on, covering his incriminating ignorance.
“A portrait of the fair Signora! A lovely idea! As a fresco, Signore?” He threw Jacomo another frightened glance.
“I think so,” said the duke. “The Signora will then become a permanence within the Castello Estense, for many generations to admire.”
Jacomo saw him turn to Lucrezia, who met his gaze briefly, then looked at the floor.
“I suggest we place the portrait at the southern end of the landing that leads to the stairs from the Entrance Hall. The light from the double window falls there for much of each day. Perhaps you will come with me now, Fra Pandolf, and reassure me that this is a suitable location in terms of light, of visibility—of viability.”
“Yes, yes, Signore, straight away.”
“Lucrezia!”
It was, Jacomo thought, more of an order than a request, but she did not move.
“I should like to stay a while longer and look further at the progress of the Argonauts, Alfonso.” Her voice was cool and firm.
The duke stared at her for a moment, then turned on his heel and descended the spiral steps, closely followed by the flapping brown robes of the reverend brother.
Tomaso’s gaze moved from Lucrezia to Jacomo. The tension that hung between them was almost palpable, and Tomaso’s whole body radiated curiosity. Jacomo widened his eyes at him and jerked his head towards the stairs. “Just give us a few minutes, Tomaso, please…” he said.
Tomaso grinned, shrugged and shambled off towards the staircase.
Jacomo dared not hold her; his hands were covered with paint. Lucrezia was trembling visibly, but she smiled and reached forward. She touched one of his hands. Then, as she had before, looked at the coloured smear on her fingers and folded them into a fist; she touched the fist to her lips and then turned back to the painting.
Jacomo watched her.
Her voice was low and fast as she said, “He says he has to meet someone at noon, I don’t know who, and then he wishes to go hawking. That will give us about four hours. Meet me—”
Jacomo interrupted. “I know just where to meet,” he said. “I found it the other day before I went to get the boat. Go to the bottom of the steps to the Torre San Paolo just after noon—as soon as he’s left—and we’ll climb to the roof.”
“I’ll be there,” Lucrezia breathed, still apparently scrutinizing the fresco.
“Has he hurt you?”
“He did not strike me,” she said, without expression.
Jacomo saw her pallor and the deep violet smudges beneath her eyes, and a heavy feeling of foreboding swelled in his chest. He ached to put his arms around her, but before he could take even a step towards her, Tomaso’s untidy head appeared at the end of the gallery.
“They’re in the Long Corridor, on their way back, Jacomo.”
Lucrezia’s eyes widened as she turned first to Tomaso and then to Jacomo. Her unspoken question was easy to answer.
“I trust him,” Jacomo said softly, as the ringing footsteps of the duke preceded their owner into the hall; Fra Pandolf’s aged sandals softly scuffed the stone floor behind him. Both men climbed to the gallery.
“I should like you to begin work immediately upon finishing this piece, Pandolf. Can you estimate how long the portrait will take?”
Jacomo saw the friar’s eyes snap to him.
“Well…” Pandolf said, “…young Tomaso can prepare the wall while we finish work on this painting, Signore, which will save a great deal of time. Then perhaps a day, maybe two, to complete initial sketches and studies. I…er…I should like Jacomo here to sketch too, as it will be…er…excellent practice for him—and then, given the size of the area to be covered, I think perhaps a week after that, Signore.”
The duke nodded and reached once more for Lucrezia’s hand. She did not raise her arm, Jacomo saw, but allowed him to lift her hand from where it hung loosely at her side. She did not look up at him once. They left together.
Jacomo’s teeth clenched; he pushed fisted hands down into his pockets. Scuffing the toe of his boot against one of the big earthenware paint jars, he imagined himself hurling it over the balustrade, heard it shattering on the floor below.
The reverend brother sank down onto the wooden trestle and put his hands over his face. His shoulders were shaking.
“What is it, Brother?”
The friar dropped his hands and burst out, “Oh, Jacomo, this portrait. What shall I do? You said this would be your last commission with me, absolutely the last—what am I going to do? How can I do a portrait alone? I can hardly see further than the end of my sleeve. And all in front of him! He’ll be watching the sketching, seeing what I do. He’ll know, Jacomo: there’ll be no hiding it.” He buried his face in his hands again.
Jacomo crouched next to him and laid an arm over the plump shoulders. “Stop, Brother! Stop this! I’ll—listen, I’ll do this portrait.”
“But you said—”
“I know what I said. But I’ll do it.”
There was a long silence, during which the friar appeared to be struggling with himself. After several moments, he said, “I’ll tell the duke that you are going to do the portrait. I’ll make sure that you finally have the recognition you’ve deserved for years. I have been proud, Jacomo—no, more than that, worse than that. I have been conceited—but now I am deeply ashamed of myself. Santo cielo, I am a member of the order of Saint Francis, one of the most humble men in Christendom, and I am not worthy of this habit. I shall not paint again after this.”
There were tears in his eyes. Jacomo pulled a paint rag from his pocket and handed it to him.
As Pandolf blew his nose and wiped his face, streaking it with paint, Jacomo imagined the duke’s reaction to being told that it would be his commissioned artist’s apprentice who would paint his wife rather than the master; imagined the suspicion, the scrutiny, the watchful eye upon them during every day the picture took to complete.
“I don’t want you to tell him,” he said.
Pandolf put down the damp rag. “What?”
“We’ll do it as we usually do. You can leave here with your reputation intact and then announce your retirement.”
“Jacomo, I—”
“It’s best this way.”
Pandolf nodded. Then, as though a thought had just struck him, he said, “But what about the sketches, Jacomo? The duke will see my work, and—”
“He won’t have to. Sit up close to her, work slowly and tell him you are focusing on detail. He will soon tire of watching.”
“Will you do the face and the hands and—”
“I will do it all, Brother. I could do it from memory.” That slipped out before Jacomo could stop it. He saw the reverend brother’s eyes widen and held his breath. But it seemed that Pandolf’s smothering anxiety and guilt were all-consuming and he showed no more than a moment’s flicker of interest in his apprentice’s inappropriate familiarity with the duchess.
They returned to work. Jacomo’s desire for Lucrezia was now tangled painfully with a sharp fear for her safety. But the knowledge that their release from this purgatory could only come with the completion of the fresco—and now, it seemed, a portrait—focused his energy on what he had to do, and he found himself painting with a speed and dexterity he would not have thought possible.
Some time later, he glanced out of the window and saw that the sun was almost at its height. It was nearly noon.
23
Dust danced across the thick stripe of yellow sunlight that cut the little room in two. Catelina put down her basket and looked around her: it was clean enough, and quite homely, but sparsely furnished and without, she saw, even a speck of decoration. A small, scrubbed wooden table stood in the middle of the room, along with three mismatched chairs. Over the backs of two of the chairs were an assortment of bridles, leather straps and a roughly folded brown blanket, matted with hair. A row of hooks on the far wall held several heavy coats, a grubby doublet, a long stick like a shepherd’s crook and a woollen hat. A pile of boots lay on the floor beneath them. All four walls were bare, but on a rough shelf along one side stood—in no decorative order—three plates, two bowls and four pewter goblets. The fireplace was empty, though ash and the unburned ends of branches spoke of a recent blaze.
“There’s another two rooms upstairs,” Giorgio said. “Would you like to see?”
Catelina nodded.
She went up the narrow staircase before him, and peered into each of the two rooms which lay up under the eaves. In each was a bed: around each bed were heavy woollen curtains that had been roughly nailed to the ceiling beams. A low stool stood under the window in the larger of the two rooms, and a huge wooden chest took up much of the floor space in the smaller. The walls, again, were bare.
Catelina crossed to the window of the larger room. Behind the other dwellings that clustered near to this one, she could see outbuildings in varying states of dilapidation, stacks of wood, rows of barrels, a patchwork of vegetables and flowers. A hairy black pig rootled in the earth in the cramped little square of land next door.
His Last Duchess Page 22
