The Secret Book of Grazia dei Rossi

by Jacqueline Park

  As he strode off I could have sworn I saw a dash of purple on his toenails. But the idea was so preposterous that I quickly explained it away as a trick of the light.

  When I arrived at the sala a few moments later, Judah, whose social reserve made up a good part of his dignity in my eyes, was standing with Isaachino Bonaventura and his father, greeting the guests as if they were long-lost friends. In quick order he introduced me to a Jewish dentist named Mantino with a face like a fox (he was custodian of the Medici family teeth) and a crowd of Jewish loan bankers all accompanied by their families, many of them costumed the way Christians get themselves up at carnevale, the men as women, the women as men.

  “A woman shall not wear articles proper to a man nor shall a man put on woman’s clothing . . . for it is an abomination to the Lord.” So it is stated in Deuteronomy, Chapter 22. I learned this when I was dressed as a boy for the journey from Bologna to Ferrara. That was for safety’s sake. Even so, I had to get special permission from a rabbi to transgress the prohibition against cross-dressing. What excuse had these Florentines given their rabbi? I wondered. Or had the entire crowd been granted a dispensation by the Florentine rabbi solely for the purpose of diverting themselves?

  My musing was cut short by the arrival of a second group of guests. These did not stop to dismount at the portico but instead galloped straight into the courtyard, causing those of us gathered around to dash for the safety of the arcades. Only after they had frightened us all to death did they rein their horses in. What manner of maniacs were these?

  Christian maniacs, it turned out, owners of the large estates that adjoined the Bonaventura farm — the men adorned with heavy gold necklaces that identified them as Florentine citizens of importance and the ladies laden down with golden caps and hair ornaments and rings and bracelets.

  Now our host stepped up to introduce the day’s Master of Revels, the Purim rabbi. Like the others, I crowded in to see who had volunteered to play the fool. Maestro Judah del Medigo, did he say? Surely my ears were playing me tricks. But no. The buffoon who stepped forward to receive the scepter of Purim rabbi was unquestionably Judah. And when he ascended the makeshift pulpit to begin his sermon, there was no mistaking that he was enjoying himself hugely.

  It was then that I caught sight of the prayer book dangling between the folds of his costume. Seen briefly, it appeared to be a mean, ragged printed book. You know how much Judah detests the printed book. His prayer books are all illuminated, hand-printed, and covered in velvet. What business had this ratty volume to be hidden away on the person of Judah del Medigo?

  He commenced his sermon with a reference to the ancient gods, as befitted a Florentine Platonist. “You all know that great Zeus assembled twelve gods in his pantheon,” he began. “But how many of you know which of the gods he placed in the seat of honor at his right hand?” A short, embarrassed silence.

  “Let me tell you then. Great Zeus chose as his most valued and chiefest adviser none other than Dionysus, the god of wine.”

  This announcement was greeted with a huge cheer, as if Dionysus had won his seat in the pantheon just yesterday and not thousands of years before.

  “Why pay the god of wine such respect, you may ask.” He continued when the din had died down. “I offer you this exegesis: When the world was young cannibalism and ritual murder ran rampant. Zeus himself could not stamp out the horrid practices. It was Dionysus who found the cure, for he understood that no man can live every day of his life in Apollo’s blinding light. There are dark forces in his nature that will out. In giving us the wine cult, Dionysus provided the instrument to channel man’s natural, brutish blood lust into a harmless annual feast of abandoned revelry. It is for that great service to mankind that he was rewarded with the place of honor at Zeus’s table. And it is for that same great service that we will honor him at our table tonight.”

  He raised his glass. “In the name of Dionysus I urge you to carouse and sing and dance and drink until you drop, so that you may go forward to live a restrained and prudent life for the three hundred and sixty-four days that follow. That is my sermon. Will you have me for your Purim rabbi?”

  To this question there arose a shout of affirmation unequaled, I would guess, even in the days of the wine cult.

  “Very well then. Let us begin our revels,” he concluded. And with that, he threw open his black lucco to reveal a gorgeous purple toga, sashed in bright green.

  Had I been rocked by a thunderclap I could not have been more stunned. But the pagan sermon and the flamboyant costume were only the beginning for this Purim rabbi.

  Now he called out in a booming voice for Haman to be brought in — a great ugly puppet meant to be kicked and battered by the children until the Purim rabbi pronounces it dead — and insisted on exercising his prerogative to be the first to attack the creature, which he did by turning on one foot like a discus thrower, twirling the poison green ruffle of his toga far above his thighs and kicking out his balance foot like some Attic dancer. It was when he did this that I caught my second sight of his toenails, painted bright magenta to match his toga, not a trick of light after all but a carefully planned effect.

  So it went, one shock after another. The reading of the megillah, that age-old tale of Queen Esther’s heroism that normally occupies the most sacred part of the Purim feast, was relegated to a quiet mumble while Judah, the Purim rabbi, roared around the courtyard swatting people with his scepter and castigating them for not being drunk.

  “Here it is almost nones and you are still sober enough to stand upon your feet, Maestro Chaim,” he berated the dentist. Whereupon he dragged the poor man over to the fountain, shoved his face under the spigot, and would not let him up until he had consumed several mouthfuls of wine.

  At last Judah announced we could begin the feast. And sure enough, he reached into the folds of his costume and drew out the scabby prayer book I had noticed earlier, a dilapidated Haggadah held together with sisal and made of thin, printed pages, quite unlike the hand-lettered, illuminated prayer books that ornamented his studiolo. From this he proceeded to read the opening blessing of the feast.

  But wait. The words I heard were the words of the Passover blessing. And we were celebrating Purim. Yet no one challenged the error. Nor was there a voice of dissent when the Purim rabbi proceeded from the false blessing to the Four Questions, another rite of Passover suddenly transferred over to Purim.

  By custom, the asking of the questions was an honor reserved for the youngest child at the table. But Judah pointed straight to the foxy dentist, who, swaying from the effects of wine, rose unsteadily to his feet and squeaked in a high-pitched voice, “Wherefore is this Purim night different from Passover night?” Then he giggled, farted, belched loudly, and fell back into his chair. And the crowd roared approval.

  Now Judah, holding his cup in one hand and reading from the raggedy little Haggadah, answered the drunken dentist’s question as follows: “On Passover we drink only four times but on Purim we are obliged to drink ten times — nay, twenty — until we fall down in drunkenness. Fill the cups!” And all the company drained their glasses with alacrity.

  By then, there was no mistaking that the little prayer book was a parody of the Passover ritual known as the Masachet Shikurim, “The Drunkards’ Treatise,” and that what I was witnessing was the enactment of a blasphemous Purim ritual conducted by my august husband.

  When the dentist reached the fourth question his speech was so slurred that he had to repeat it six times before he got it right. And each attempt drew louder and more prolonged laughter from the guests than the one before. Finally, before Judah even had time to answer the final question, the poor man fell face forward into his soup and passed from this world for the remainder of the celebration.

  By sunset, the ground in the courtyard was littered with celebrants passed from consciousness and the hallways of the villa smelled quite odorous from the vomi
t of those who had driven their stomachs beyond endurance. Truly, in Toscana, Purim becomes the Jewish version of carnevale.

  For my part, I had had my fill of the high life of the Florentine Jews. The prospect of a long night of dancing and revelry promised only more weariness and a headache to me. But the arrival of the musicians for the night’s dancing had quite the opposite effect on Judah. He instantly proposed to partner Isaachino in the first galliard, and by the end of the long evening he had managed to partner every Jewish man and boy in the place at least once. As is their custom, the Christian men danced with their Christian ladies. But, unlike the night before, the Jews reverted to the traditional custom, men dancing with men, women with women.

  Without a curtain to hide behind, I took refuge in a dark corner of the sala hoping to escape notice. But Diamante’s sharp eyes sought me out.

  “A dance or two is exactly what you need,” she insisted. “The motion will stir up your brains and let out the noxious air. Besides, I wager there is no woman here who can dance the galliard with your speed or grace and I do so long for a sprightly partner. Come, Grazia. Be my sister.”

  A moment later she had me twirling around the room on her arm at a speed that made my head swim. Whether or not the noxious fumes in my brain were released by all the twirling, I cannot say. But my headache did subside, and gradually, its place was taken by an exhilaration of spirit that I had not felt in many a month.

  Something of the same emotion seemed to take hold of Judah. As the dancing progressed he less and less resembled the dignified scholar and more and more took on the unfamiliar coloration of a febrile youth, his wig askew, his toga crushed and wine-stained, his sharp eyes glazed over. Not that he ever lost countenance completely. But I who knew him well — or so I thought — perceived a look of wild longing in his eyes that I had never seen before.

  Did this signal that the moment for the consummation of my marriage had come? As I followed him up the staircase and into our chamber I persuaded myself that it did. But I could not have been more mistaken. While I was brushing my hair he threw himself over on the bed and began to snore. By the time I had folded my garments away and crept in beside him, I was assailed by a roar louder than the trumpeting of a pack of elephants. I raised myself on my elbow and looked down upon my husband splayed out on his back, the painted nails on his toes flashing red in the moonlight. (He had, of course, neglected to close the shutters.) Lying there beside him trying to shut out the great snorts, I remember thinking to myself that drunkards go to bed in such a state every night of their lives. And thinking further that if I were married to such a one, I would surely poison him.

  27

  After the bitter disappointment of Purim night and the prospect of returning to the emptiness of my life in Firenze, an invitation to stay on in the country with the Bonaventuras came to me as manna from heaven. Judah, although quite willing to allow me the visit, was baffled by my enthusiasm for the Bonaventura clan and for Diamante in particular.

  “She is barely literate. Even young Medina de Cases has more love of learning. What can you have to talk to her about?” he inquired with genuine puzzlement.

  Had I chosen to reply, my answer would have been: “Yes, husband, Diamante is uneducated as you point out. But she knows how to be mistress in her own bedroom, which is more than can be said for clever Grazia, and because she is generous and forthright, I know she will gladly share her womanly wisdom with me.”

  What I did not take into account was that, having lived a totally unexamined life, my friend was unable to formulate ready answers even to the simplest question about her own conduct. So that when I asked her how she went about pleasing her husband, she simply repeated, “How I please him?” as if such an idea had never entered her head. Which it hadn’t.

  “Do you feed him some potion or wear a special perfume?” I persisted.

  “Perfume on me?” She laughed delightedly. “I am lucky if I can get the manure out from under my fingernails. No, Grazia, if you are looking for such secrets you have come to the wrong person. I am no Delilah.”

  “Oh, I did not mean . . .”

  “Yes you did, my love.” She cuffed me under the chin as if we were two boys together. “And I shall make inquiries for you if you like. We live in the midst of the whores and witches in the Jewish quarter, you know. It will not be difficult.”

  “I would appreciate it,” I replied with a blush. And then because I felt the need to clarify my concern I added, “It is not only the secrets of the bedchamber that I seek, Diamante. Isaachino talks to you, does he not? He tells you about his business, his inner feeling, his life outside the family.”

  “And does not your august husband talk to you? I am told he spends each noonday alone with you in conversation.”

  How do these tales get around? “Judah never speaks of his life outside our walls to me,” I told her honestly.

  “Do you ever ask?”

  I was ashamed to admit that I held my husband too much in awe to initiate any topic of conversation.

  “What do you talk of when you dine together?” she inquired.

  “Some problem of interpretation from the Phaedo,” I replied. “Or perhaps a responsum from one of the Jewish sages. Often we are silent at the table. Judah detests trivial talk and gossip.”

  “What a pity! I find gossip the spice of life. Every noon when Isaachino comes in from the banco for dinner, I wring him dry of every drop of news.”

  “How do you do it?” I asked.

  “Do what?”

  “Wring him dry?”

  “Oh . . .” She pondered the question thoughtfully. When at last she answered, it was with regret. “I declare I do not know how I do it. Or even that I do it.”

  In the end Diamante’s secret turned out to be no secret at all. It took but a single dinner table conversation to give me the answer to my question. If you want a talkative man, marry a blabbermouth. Isaachino Bonaventura was a born talker. All anyone had to do to tap the contents of his mind was to sit in his presence with a silent tongue and out would pour a stream of anecdotes, events past, present, and future, speculation, and opinions, most of them shrewd, some manifestly sagacious. And all this without the slightest encouragement from anybody.

  I learned more of the goings-on in Firenze at my first dinner with the Bonaventuras than I had in over a year in the company of my reticent husband.

  “Things are coming to a head in town, I fear,” Isaachino informed the assemblage. “The monk from Ferrara has come into collision with the Pope, and our Medici is about to be squeezed between the two of them.”

  “But does not the Christian pope command the loyalty of all Catholics?” I inquired. “How can a mere monk defy him?”

  “For one thing, this monk is no ordinary street beggar with dirty feet,” Isaachino replied, delighted to have his conversational pump primed. “Girolamo Savonarola is a dangerous man.”

  “As dangerous as Fra Bernardino da Feltre?”

  “Worse.”

  “Oh no. Forgive me, Ser Isaachino, but he could not be worse than that villain. No one could be worse,” I assured him earnestly. “Have you not heard of the Blood Libel of Trento?”

  “Believe it or not, Madonna Grazia, I have heard of the Blood Libel,” he replied. “And I also have heard of your family’s expulsion from Mantova at Fra Bernardino’s instigation, and still I say that this Savonarola is the more dangerous. The Jews here think of him as just another anti-Semitic priest, and he is that, of course. But he is far more clever, far more powerful than any of the others. Do you know that when Lorenzo the Magnificent lay dying he sent for this bastard of a priest to grant him absolution for his sins? Think of it. Lorenzo dei Medici felt the need of Savonarola’s blessing before he could pass securely into the next world. Count Pico of Mirandola was sent to the convent of San Marco to bring the priest to the magnifico’s bedside. You do know
that Mirandola is a follower of Savonarola’s, do you not?”

  “But Count Pico is a Platonist,” I protested. “A philosopher, a humanist.” That much I did know.

  “He is also obsessed by cabala. He spends his days searching for the universal truth in numbers, signs, and tongues. That is why he employed your honored husband to teach him Hebrew. So that he could ferret out the secrets of cabala.”

  “Judah does not believe in mysticism,” I assured him. “He thinks it is all nonsense.”

  “Heaven forbid I should slander such a jewel in the Jewish firmament as Judah del Medigo,” he answered graciously. “But when I refer to Count Pico of Mirandola I know whereof I speak. He comes often to the marketplace, especially in the melon season, for he is very fond of melons and prefers to select them himself. And he talks to everyone. Especially Jews. Because of his obsession with cabala.”

  “But Judah despises the cabalists,” I repeated weakly.

  “I tell you only what I heard from the lips of Count Pico himself. Oh, he was eloquent, lady, when he spoke of cabala, that ancient and mysterious text which contains the most secret revelations of all and which will resolve every problem of mankind.” Here Isaachino made his eyes wide with wonder in imitation of Mirandola’s manner. “With his own mouth he assured me that the sage who learns the alphabet of God in the correlation of letters and numbers will discover the hidden harmonies between different levels of being, between heaven and earth, between man and the world. And that sage will have the method of reducing all faiths, all doctrines, all languages of the Lord to one unity — one Christian unity. These Christians are all proselytizers in their hearts,” he added. “He would turn us all into Christians.”

  “Count Pico told you he would turn us all into Christians?”

  “No, he only said ‘one unity.’ But whose unity do you think he has in mind? Do you imagine he wishes to unite the world under the laws of Moses?”

  I kept my own counsel on that question and Isaachino moved to another subject. But I did resolve to question Judah on the subject of his patron at the first opportunity, and indeed I brought the subject up the next day when I was seated opposite him at our own table.