Seeds of Decline

by Edward Charles

  ‘She? Who laughed in your face?’ Lucrezia could feel the pain in his voice and see it on his face.

  ‘The Strozzi girl. La Bellissima they called her.’

  ‘A beauty from the Strozzi family rejected you?’

  ‘She was the most beautiful girl in the city, and a Strozzi, so under normal circumstances well out of my reach. But I had learned from my grandfather that she was illegitimate. Our family had fallen on hard times since my grandfather’s day. My father had failed at one venture after another, and I knew our name did not stand for much. But if she was illegitimate … So I made her a proposal of marriage.’ There was blood on his lip as he spoke.

  ‘And she rejected you?’

  ‘She laughed in my face. It was only months later that I discovered she hadn’t been told she was illegitimate. But by then it was too late. The word was out. Everyone knew what had happened. Already I had become a laughing stock at court.’

  ‘You were known at court?’

  He paused, and then, as he went to speak, the corners of his mouth curled up and she saw venom in his expression. ‘Oh yes. I knew the court and, as the bible says, the court knew me.’

  Lucrezia shook her head. ‘I don’t understand.’

  STREETS OF FERRARA

  10th August 1471

  It is a difficult and dangerous time. Duke Borso has died. He was without issue and in recent weeks the succession has become a contest between Niccolò, son of Lionello, and Ercole, the legitimate son of Niccolò III. There has been a fierce contest, culminating, eventually with open fighting in the streets. But last night, Ercole won.

  Now is the time for retribution, for old scores to be settled. And now is not the time to be walking the streets of Ferrara wearing Niccolò’s colours. As all of the Savonarola family still are.

  ‘Well, if it isn’t Girolamo!’ There are five of them, grinning, but heavily armed and threatening nevertheless. ‘Still wearing the old colours I see? No time to change, perhaps?’

  Girolamo Savonarola shakes his head. Nobles. So-called honourable gentlemen of the court. Former friends of his father. He hates people like this. People whose allegiances can be bought and sold. He looks round but there’s nowhere to run to. The only chance is to brazen it out. Today that doesn’t look easy.

  ‘Remind me. In the great contest between Niccolò and Ercole, which one won?’

  Savonarola looks at the sneers and hopes that the right answer will save him. ‘Duke Ercole.’

  ‘Indeed he did. But not, as you may have noticed, without a fight. Look around you. The streets are running with blood.’ One of them lifts a dagger to his throat. ‘Including our blood. Dying of wounds inflicted by your friends, they are. Bad business.’ Nods all round. ‘We don’t take it kindly when our friends are butchered.’ Heads now shaking in unison.

  ‘Makes you want to take revenge on someone.’ A different voice, but the same tone and message.

  Now the leader comes forward, balancing the flat of his dagger blade on his finger. ‘Nice balance, this knife. Like the scales of justice. Balanced, see?’ He holds up his finger so that the knife rocks before Girolamo’s eyes. He feels his stomach turn over. ‘You’ll be pleased to hear we believe in justice.’ The knife blade remains close to his face. Nods all round. ‘A court of law. That’s what we need.’ More nods. ‘A trial.’

  They take him into a house and lock the door. ‘This is a fair trial. Or at least as fair as our friends and colleagues got at the hands of your side in this matter.’

  ‘But I haven’t done anything. Nor have I said anything on this matter to anyone.’ It is the first time Girolamo has spoken more than two words.

  ‘Passive resistance, eh? That’s even worse in my book. Those who just stand by and let it happen.’

  A new voice. ‘Allegiance. That’s enough. You don’t have to have done anything. Moral support is crime enough.’

  ‘What crime do you accuse me of?’

  ‘Treason.’ The face is very close. The grinning teeth are filthy. The breath smells of stale wine.

  ‘You are accused of treason, because your family has supported the side of Niccolò. Do you deny the charge?’

  ‘I deny treason. I am a loyal subject.’

  ‘Loyal to Niccolò. Yes. To the wrong side, to the losing side. That’s the problem. And evidence enough, in our book.’ The speaker looks round the room. Nods of agreement from the other four. ‘Well, that was easy. A unanimous verdict. This court finds you guilty of treason.’

  A new voice. ‘The punishment for treason is death by burning. However, we are short of firewood at the moment, so we offer to commute your sentence. We’ll give you a choice.’

  ‘What is the choice?’ He can hardly speak.

  A third voice now. It’s as if they have been rehearsing. ‘Death in contumacy or absolute submission. Take your choice.’

  ‘Submit to what?’ Perhaps they will respect him more if he stands up to them.

  ‘To the will of the court.’

  He knows them. He has known them all his life. Some are friends of his father. Some of their sons are his own friends. This cannot be real. Surely it’s just a game. To make the point that their man has won. He hopes so.

  ‘I submit to the will of the court.’

  Smiles all round. Perhaps he was right after all? He prays he is.

  ‘We must keep this legal. Sign here.’ As he signs the document, without even reading it, they begin to smile again. He doesn’t like those smiles. He doesn’t like those smiles at all.

  Savonarola’s eyes were full of tears. ‘I knew these men. They were nobles. They were friends of my father. They gave generously to the church. They were patrons of the arts and provided the city and its churches with paintings and sculptures. They were pillars of society. Yet they made me sign a legal document to the effect that I submitted to whatever they did in that room, and agreed to it by my own choice.’

  He smashed his hand down on a rock, once, twice, three times, until she saw the blood flowing all down his arm and ran to stop him.

  ‘And then they fucked me. They stripped me naked, bent me over a table, and one after the other, they fucked me. All five of them.’

  And as Lucrezia watched, the self-confident young monk dissolved into a distraught and tearful boy. Instinctively she put an arm round his shoulder and pulled him to her. He gripped her mantello and pulled it to his face, as if to hide his shame, and silently she hugged him as he cried openly, while the blood from his smashed and bitten hand soaked through her over-cloak and into her gamurra beneath.

  Finally, as if drained of all emotion, he raised his head to her, sniffed and wiped away the tears. ‘But what you can never understand is that with all the pain and the degradation, I think I enjoyed it.’

  It was nearly an hour before they resumed their walk and their conversation. An hour in which she tousled his hair like one of her sons, in which he apologized for the bloodstains on her clothing, and in which, with a look of abject pleading on his face, he asked her to promise never to divulge his secret to anyone.

  She squeezed his shoulder in reassurance. ‘It is my solemn promise. We are both bound by the rules of the confessional. Even out here, whilst walking. Now we are united by our secrets.’

  Together, drained of emotion, they stood, and helped each other to continue their walk, for neither of them, she sensed, felt ready to turn back and to return to the people and the chatter in the valley below them.

  ‘You have a long life ahead of you,’ Lucrezia told him, as they resumed walking, albeit now much more slowly but still arm-in-arm. ‘I would hate to think that your terrible experiences in Ferrara have soured your joy in all things creative, all beauty, just because they were enabled to come into existence by the power of the wealthy. Rich does not have to be bad and expensive does not have to mean ugly or debased.’

  He looked at her, and she could see he did not believe her.

  ‘Think of the pleasure you have had from reading. You
told me you have read Cicero, Quintilian and Ovid.’

  He nodded, as if wanting to please her, but seemingly unwilling to allow his pain to dissipate so easily. ‘Latin as it should be written. But my preference is for the saints: Jerome and Augustine and above all, St Thomas Aquinas. In his writing I find truth and the greatest solace.’ He lifted his head, an element of defiance returning. ‘But none of those wrote for money. No rich benefactor caused them to write as they did. They simply sought truth.’

  She nodded back, needing at this difficult time to agree with him. ‘I too. But I also receive succour by looking at the architecture of Michelozzo Michelozzi, at the paintings of Fra Filippo Lippi, at the fresci of Giotto and the sculptures of Donatello. You cannot, surely, reject Brunelleschi’s dome on the Duomo purely on the grounds that the rich merchants of the city participated in its funding alongside the poor?’

  ‘You are trying to trick me.’ His face was petulant now.

  But she shook her head. ‘Not at all. But you will need to be able to respond to such debate if you are to preach in the city of Florence. You may be right in everything you say, but the people of Florence are merchants, street people, market people, arguers, debaters, writers and negotiators of contracts, manipulators of the spoken and the written word. You will be in their city. Words are their pleasure and their sport and if you want to convince them, you will have to play the game their way.’

  His eyes were like those of a chastised dog and she smiled as she used to do to her children. ‘All I ask is that you do not sweep us all into the gutter just because we sponsor great works of art.’

  He nodded, wiping away a late tear.

  ‘These men, these names, they are not abstract reputations. They are real people, our personal friends. They have lived with us, often in our houses, sometimes for years. Donatello spent months at a time in a shed in our garden while the Palazzo Medici was being built. Sandro Botticelli lived with us in the house, sharing our food, for two years. He and Lorenzo have been close friends since they were boys. And Leonardo da Vinci, and Poliziano …’

  ‘Stop! Please stop.’ His hand was raised over his head in defence, as if he expected a beating.

  She stiffened, surprised and confused at the sudden outburst.

  He shook his fists, as if surrounded by invisible demons, batting them away with his hands. ‘They are all the same. Don’t you realize? All of them …’

  ‘What?’ She could see his fear and distaste but did not understand the reason for it.

  ‘As my German friends in the University of Bologna used to say, Florenzers. Sodomites, every one.’

  She shook her head. ‘You must not believe everything you hear. If you are rich and famous there are always people who want to drag you down. And what is the easiest accusation to make?’ She shrugged.

  ‘Are you trying to tell me it isn’t true? Is this, then, another of those layers of the onion that have to be peeled away?’ He looked as if he wanted to believe her, but there was no doubt about the concern on his face.

  Lucrezia found herself short of breath. It was a question she and Piero had discussed many times, especially when Lorenzo was young and so in thrall to Sandro Botticelli and Angelo Poliziano. And under their roof too. This was by no means the first time she had wondered exactly what membership of the Platonic Academy had come to involve by the time Lorenzo became an active participant.

  But this was no time to dig up old bones. She forced herself to smile. ‘There is, no doubt, some element of truth in every statement. But also gross exaggeration.’ She tried to make her voice sound light, as she had done in the past when her children were young and frightened. ‘We are talking about boys experimenting, playing silly games, learning by trying and by doing what is right and wrong. But I do not believe any young man in Florence is … at risk.’ She shook her head again. ‘It simply isn’t true.’

  But even as she gave the assurance, she remembered conversations with Piero, and even more with Giovanni, who was always so much easier to talk to, especially in matters concerning life. Perhaps to convince herself, she decided to tell Savonarola a story.

  PALAZZO MEDICI

  November 1467

  ‘We cannot allow matters to continue like this. I cannot believe the accusations have a single element of truth in them. Nevertheless, everyone is gossiping and if we leave it, matters will only get worse.’

  Lucrezia nods absent-mindedly. The problem is that even at seventeen she is pretty sure Lorenzo will run rings around his father. Especially on a matter that embarrasses Piero much more than it embarrasses her son. But despite her reservations about how to handle Lorenzo, Lucrezia has to agree. Something has to be done and, in theory at least, Piero, as head of the household, is the one to do it.

  Piero calls Lorenzo to him the following day. ‘There are unkind rumours coming from the Mercato Vecchio.’

  Lorenzo nods, disinterested. ‘Yeah. Always. You wouldn’t believe what goes on up there at night. Frightens my horses it does.’ He smirks and waits for the next move.

  ‘They say you go to the marketplace at night.’

  ‘Course I do. We all do. That’s where the fun is. I’m seventeen, Father. You can’t expect me to sit at home and play the lute. There’s a life out there and I’m going to live it while I can.’

  ‘What do you mean while you can?’

  ‘Well, once I’m married I’ll have to be a bit more circumspect, won’t I? But at the moment, the fun’s all to be had at the Mercato Vecchio.’

  ‘What do you do there all night?’

  ‘You know. Dress up. Show off our new clothes. Strut about with our best falcons. Race the greyhounds. Lay trails for the scent-hounds. Race our horses.’

  ‘Play football?’ Piero is trying to show he understands.

  ‘Football? At my age? Have a heart. I haven’t played football for three years. Too much risk of getting clattered.’

  ‘Clattered? What does that mean?’

  ‘You know. Kicked, barged into the crowd, tripped so you fall into a horse trough. They all picked on me in my last few games. I was targeted. Everyone wanted to be the one that clattered Lorenzo. So I quit.’

  ‘I wish you wouldn’t use that modern language. It’s coarse.’

  ‘It’s Tuscan. The language of our people.’ Predictably, Lorenzo has become combative.

  ‘I know, and Dante and Petrarch and Boccaccio …’

  ‘You know, so why ask me?’

  Lucrezia, sitting quietly in the corner, shoots a glance at Piero, who realizes he’s been led off the trail. She jerks her head to tell him to get back to the point.

  Piero does his best. ‘They say all sorts of immoral things are going on up there.’

  Lorenzo grins. ‘I’ll say. Short measures on silk. Over-pricing of olive oil. Clipped coins. And, of course, usury. They all say the bankers are the worst when it comes to breaking the law.’

  Piero looks at Lucrezia and shrugs his impotence.

  She takes a deep breath and launches into it. ‘They say you are having sex with men.’ Her voice is clipped. The voice Lorenzo knows not to joke with.

  But Lorenzo is prepared, and doesn’t bat an eyelid. ‘Who in particular?’

  She swallows hard, embarrassed, but committed now. ‘They say you are having sex with Sandro.’

  Lorenzo laughs aloud. ‘I would hardly need to drag myself all the way to the marketplace to have sex with Sandro, would I? He lives here, under the same roof.’

  ‘Answer the question.’ Piero is losing his temper now. Not a common occurrence, but nasty when it happens.

  ‘Oh really? I’m supposed to be having sex with Sandro, am I? And who is supposed to be fucking who?’ Lorenzo has a tendency to coarsen the conversation when he is defending himself. He knows his parents don’t like it and it puts them off their stride.

  Of course, Piero has not considered that sort of unpleasant detail, but as Sandro is four years older than Lorenzo, he assumes he is the perpetrator, and so
he answers accordingly.

  Lorenzo just laughs and says, ‘Out of the question.’ As he walks out of the door, he stops, turns and shakes his head. ‘I don’t do submissive.’

  Lucrezia gave Girolamo her most motherly smile. ‘And of course that was the end of that.’

  But even as she uttered the words, she found herself hearing them in a new way. Originally, when Lorenzo had made his response, she had accepted it as he presented it; as a simple denial of a scurrilous allegation. But now, in talking to this monk and in deciding what to say and what to omit, she began looking at her family with a different eye, from outside. And this time, it had to be said, with the awareness of Lorenzo’s slippery facility with words.

  Now she was uncertain. Had her son’s denial been nothing of the sort but rather a lawyer’s sidestep, redefining the question in such a way as to enable denial?

  Now, uncomfortably, she found herself unsure. Of course Lorenzo didn’t play the submissive. It would have been out of character. Lorenzo always dominated any relationship with another person, man or woman. All relationships were, to him, comparisons, measures of greatness, contests. And as contests, he had to win every one of them. No, Lorenzo would never put himself in any position that even hinted at passivity, never mind submission. She was sure of that.

  Besides, he would have had no need to. The richest, most glamorous, charming, brilliant and powerful man in Florence had never needed to. Lorenzo, she knew with certainty, was never the seeker, but always the sought. They all pursued him. Of course they did. They pursued him for his money and for his patronage and for his influence. Simply to be able to say ‘I am a friend of Lorenzo’ was to open doors, to wealth, power and opportunity. She had always accepted that. But never, until this moment, had she questioned the extent or nature that their pursuit might take. It would certainly never have reflected pursuit in the sense of dominance.

  But the reverse? The reverse might well be true. Women pursued men ruthlessly on occasions, but always by carefully controlled retreat. The thrill of the chase, by offered, or perhaps better by subtly suggested, submission.