Heart of Gold

by May McGoldrick

  The sound of Pico hurrying up the ladder disrupted the painter’s thoughts.

  “Phillipe, hurry! He’ll be here soon!” The handsome young sculptor looked anxiously over the top of the scaffolding at the painter and then scurried back down the ladder and across the room to look out the empty window of the newly constructed chapel. Two hours earlier, the room had been bustling with tradesmen of many crafts—carpenters, glaziers, stonemasons, and others—but the last few had left a short time earlier, cheerful with the easy camaraderie of those who work hard and who take pride in their skill.

  “Don’t worry so much, Pico. The master knows our work will be finished in time.” The painter, lying back, cast a critical eye on the scene. The face on the angel directly above was smiling, but there was a sense of strain in the smile. The artist sighed aloud. I should be happy, Elizabeth thought. Why can’t I be happy?

  She gazed up at the fresco. Certainly the painting was not the cause of her melancholy. The colors were brilliant and true. The depiction of the angels bursting in shimmering streams of light through the summer clouds had turned out well. The thin coat of plaster was nearly dry, but it didn’t matter...the painting was done. Concentrate on your work, she told herself, consciously pushing all other thoughts from her mind.

  Elizabeth Boleyn had a lot to be proud of. She considered the process for a moment. Frescoes presented some of the most challenging work done by the artists. Because you were painting on wet plaster, you had to work quickly and with a steady hand. Working on a wall was difficult enough, but lying on your back to paint ceiling frescoes was the most difficult of assignments, and only the two or three best painters in the studio were given those tasks. The old master was very particular about these works. Oh, yes, Michelangelo was very particular, indeed.

  And that made Elizabeth feel especially good about being the one the maestro chose the most often. But still, she was living a lie. The maestro had picked Phillipe, the French painter. A likable young man with an exuberant talent and very little social life outside of his work. But in reality she was nothing more than a fraud. A deception. A man’s exterior masking a woman’s soul.

  “He’s coming, Phillipe,” the man cried, clambering up the ladder. Elizabeth turned her head to see Pico’s head appear, then disappear as he missed a rung, then reappear. “I don’t like heights.”

  “Calm down, Pico,” she said, chuckling. “I’m ready for him.”

  “But it isn’t just the master. His Highness is with him!”

  Elizabeth sat up on her elbows and began to edge quickly toward the ladder. “Don Giovanni? With the master?” This was a different story. Giovanni de Medici rarely came out in public anymore, so she knew this visit must be an important one for Michelangelo. She glanced once more at the fresh painting, and prayed that the powerful ruler would find it pleasing.

  “Quick, Pico!” she called, scrambling down the ladder after his friend. “Help me pull the scaffolding into the corner.”

  Two years earlier, Elizabeth had suggested that the scaffolding they used for the ceilings be built upon wheeled platforms, and right now, as she and Pico succeeded in their struggle to push the apparatus aside, she thanked God Michelangelo had seen the value in her suggestion.

  She had used her brain, and the master greatly approved of that. Starting as an apprentice, she had learned quickly that she lacked the physical strength that many of the other young men had. And not wanting to spend her time doing the physical labor that gave her the strength required, she saw immediately that she needed to make use of her ingenuity and invention. That had been the key to being recognized early on.

  The sound of the heavy oak doors swinging open brought the two students to a halt. The aging master and the ruler of Florence entered the chapel with a train of several dozen men in attendance.

  Elizabeth looked about in amazement as the room appeared to fill instantly. There were faces everywhere, and their attention focused on the work, not the worker.

  Because the new stained-glass windows were not yet installed, streaming bars of golden sunlight washed the room with a radiant glow. Around the small central rotunda, rows of graceful columns rose straight to the ceiling, branching and bending like willows into an arch far above the resulting gallery. At the point where the pillars divided, Pico’s decorative stone carvings adorned the supports in a petrified pattern of leaf, vine, and flower.

  And at the center of it all, far above the floor, Elizabeth’s angels appeared to burst downward through the dome, revealing a vibrant blue sky and the fair-weather clouds of a benevolent heavenly sphere.

  Giovanni gazed upward at the breathtaking scene, enraptured by the sight of celestial creatures so real it seemed they might sweep down beside him.

  “Michelangelo!” the powerful ruler murmured. “My friend! How could such a thing of beauty be wrought? What mind, what hand could conjure and execute such figures?” His voice trailed off as he stared upward in wonder.

  “Don Giovanni,” the aged master responded deferentially, trying to keep the pleased expression out of his voice. Glancing around the room, he spotted Elizabeth and Pico standing unobtrusively beside the scaffolding. “We have only provided what you have asked.”

  “True, but with such exquisite mastery of color...of space...” The Florentine raised his arm and pointed as he spoke. “The face of that one. Look at how he looks into our eyes. And look at the rippling muscles on that other one. Surely strong enough to wrestle with Jacob. Ah, Michelangelo,” he said, glancing at the artist. “This work ranks easily with your work in Rome.”

  The maestro pulled at his graying beard as he gazed critically at the painting. Elizabeth held her breath as he studied the work. With a smile, he turned back to Don Giovanni. “My friend, you honor a humble sculptor with your words. For this is the work of a young and talented artist. A man with the heart and the soul of a painter. The one I spoke of earlier...but let me introduce him. He stands here in the shadows. Phillipe, my boy, come here.”

  Elizabeth felt the knot quickly form in her stomach. She had known for some time now that her paintings spoke in a new and different language. She knew she had a gift that captured more than the exterior of her subject. She had the ability to seize the feelings within. Sadness and tears, joy and laughter, anger and greed. She had a gift; she could perceive the very essence of what she beheld—and it traveled through her fingers. It became alive in what she drew, in the colors of the paint. She knew, but never, never before had she heard her work praised so publicly by someone as important as he who stood with the maestro in the chapel.

  Entering the rotunda, Elizabeth approached the group. Stopping before the two men, she bowed and dropped to one knee as Giovanni held out his hand to her. As the young painter kissed his family ring, the ruler appraised the lad before him. He had a small build and frail, delicate hands. The lad was fortunate to have the talent he did, since if he had to make a living by any other means, he wouldn’t be long for this world. Then the lad looked up and gazed straight into his eyes, and the Medici padrone nodded approvingly. The young man had the brightest and most intelligent eyes he’d seen in a long time. A quite handsome face—almost beautiful—but for the pasty complexion and the puckered red scar along the high cheekbone. Giovanni raised him up and smiled, waving his plump, jeweled fingers at the ceiling fresco.

  “Is it possible that a man so young as you could have produced such a masterwork?”

  Elizabeth blushed at the compliment, turning her face skyward.

  “He is a master,” Michelangelo said proudly. “In my studio, Phillipe is the youngest of the ten masters. He will be the finest.” The maestro paused and put his arm around Elizabeth’s shoulder. “Someday, he’ll be another Raphael, Don Giovanni. This young man has the potential to surpass even the great Leonardo...God rest his old bones. You wait and see. It won’t be long.”

  Giovanni de Medici smiled encouragingly on the young painter and turned away. “What other marvels do you have in stor
e for me today, Michelangelo.”

  And as quickly as they had entered, they were gone, leaving an excited Pico gazing admiringly across the chapel rotunda at Elizabeth.

  “How can you stand there so calmly?” The young man ran over and snatched Elizabeth’s hat off her head and teasingly threw it into the air. “Look up there, Phillipe. Your angels are smiling at you.”

  Elizabeth looked up, but all she could see was a smirk.

  “This calls for a celebration!” Pico caught the hat and placed it firmly on his friend’s short-cropped hair. “I’ll run and get the others at the studio, and we’ll meet you at the baths off the Piazza del Duomo.”

  “Pico, you know that I don’t—”

  “Come on, Phillipe! This is a special occasion. It isn’t every day that Giovanni de Medici, the Duke of Nemours, gushes over your work. Come on!”

  Elizabeth looked up at the handsome Genoan apprentice and smiled. She’d been working with him for two years, and he’d never even guessed that she was a woman. Pico was a young, squarely built man with large callused hands that showed the signs of his trade. From the first moment when they’d met, the young sculptor had taken the task of looking after the frail, boyish-looking painter. Elizabeth knew it would have been much easier for Pico just to call her weak and to ignore her as some of the other artists in the master’s studio had done early on.

  But he hadn’t. In fact, Pico had often been the shield behind whom Elizabeth had been able to hide during these very public years. He had the strength; she had the talent. He protected the young man he knew as Phillipe. And she shared with him a sensitivity for art that elevated him in the skills of his trade beyond his imagination. She spoke of the softness, the elegance, the way each curve of a sculpture must relay feeling, emotion, a story, even. These concepts of art had been foreign to Pico until he’d met up with Phillipe. And the two artists understood one another in a way that was nearly spiritual.

  “My sister is expecting me, Pico. Why don’t you go on without me.”

  “I won’t,” Pico said adamantly, turning on the surprised painter and planting his fists on his hips. “Phillipe, how long must this go on?”

  “What are you talking about?” Elizabeth asked, raising an eyebrow at the vehemence of the young man’s tone.

  “You have the right to live your life as much as she does.” The sculptor paused. He hadn’t intended to speak so brusquely to his friend. “Phillipe, everyone is talking about you two.”

  “Talking?” Elizabeth face flushed angrily. “Who is talking that has any right? No one, Pico. No one has any right to speak about Mary or about me. I have never given anyone reason to.”

  Pico grabbed Elizabeth by the shoulders. “Listen to me, my friend. I’m about to tell you things that you should have heard long ago.”

  “I don’t want to hear.” Elizabeth tried to turn and shrug off the man’s grip on her shoulder, but Pico’s large hands held her securely in place.

  “It’s too late, Phillipe. You must listen to what I have to say.”

  Elizabeth pushed away the man’s hands and walked to the scaffolding, turning and sagging heavily against the ladder.

  Following her and leaning against one of the columns, Pico looked down into the sad, black eyes of the young painter. So talented, but so naive. For the entire time he’d known Phillipe, he’d never once heard him speak of any kin other than his sister and her child. It was true that the three lived in the modest villa of Joseph Bardi, the wool merchant. But Joseph and his wife Ernesta were not kin to Phillipe. From what Pico had gathered, the lonely older couple had taken in the three as tenants at first, and from what Phillipe had said, they’d become close over years. But what Pico needed to say to Phillipe was not something that those two people would have any knowledge of. No, there was no one else who would do this. Pico knew it was up to him.

  “What I have to tell you regards your sister.”

  “You’re about to badmouth her. Because she rejected your advances.”

  “I don’t know what she tells you every night, but your sister didn’t refuse my attentions. It happened quite a while ago, and it was wrong, I know. But I slept with her, Phillipe, as more than half of Florence has.” Pico held up his hand as Elizabeth shot to her feet and began to interrupt. “Wait, my friend. Hear me out.”

  The sculptor watched as Elizabeth stopped, averting her eyes. “What she did reject were my half-empty pockets. But this was after...” Pico paused for effect, “after she came to my bed.”

  Elizabeth sat down on the pedestal at the base of the column and took her head in her hands.

  “My friend, you have to put a stop to this. It is no secret that you are the highest-paid apprentice Michelangelo has. With the wages you make, you should be living in comfort, with a servant to attend to you. Instead, where are you? Still living under someone else’s roof. You could marry and have a woman and children of your own. But instead, all you do is work. And for what? For wages your sister spends.”

  Elizabeth felt a knot in her throat, but she knew she wouldn’t cry. Even if she were alone, she knew she wouldn’t. She’d forgotten how to cry.

  “Everyone in the studio knows that you are doing outside work. Everyone knows you need the money.”

  Elizabeth looked up in surprise. She had worked hard to keep her outside commissions a secret.

  “Yes, the portraits. Everyone knows. Including Michelangelo. And don’t be so surprised. Your style, your brushwork—it is so obvious, Phillipe. You can call yourself what you want, but everyone knows who you are.” Pico looked earnestly into Elizabeth’s face. “And tell me, Phillipe. What do you do with that money?”

  “I keep what I earn.”

  “No, you don’t. We see your sister spending it.”

  “Why are you doing this to me, Pico?” Elizabeth’s face reflected the pain in her heart. “Why now?”

  “Because I am your friend. Your only friend. Phillipe, what just happened here today is nothing you can simply ignore, nothing you can just forget.” Pico had to get his friend’s attention. “The word will be out in no time. Everyone will want you. You’ll have opportunities, commissions far more grand than any you’ve yet had. But she could ruin it all. You need to put her in her place. She has to curb her...excesses. You need to talk to her. It’s your right because you’re her brother, and because you support her and the little one. You can order her to stop. Or at least to be more discreet.”

  Elizabeth had known for a long time about Mary’s wildness. But there was not much she’d been able to do about it. Mary was twenty-one years old. A grown woman. Elizabeth could not lock her away, and she could not put her out on the street. Neither option was acceptable.

  So all she did was divert what free time she had to Mary’s daughter. Jaime. The three-year-old Jaime was the only bright spot that Elizabeth had outside of her work. Truly, the young child was the reason Elizabeth put up with all she did. Elizabeth had loved her sister once, but now she wondered if her love had not turned into an emotion closer to pity.

  “She made a scene the night before last.”

  Elizabeth looked up.

  “At the Palazzo Vecchio. Your sister was there...mingling with all the friends of the Duke of Urbino. From what Gino told me, her dress alone must have been worth half a year’s wages.”

  Elizabeth knew Pico’s friend Gino. The son of one of the wealthiest families in Florence. She doubted he ever paid for anything in his life. What could he know of the value of money?

  “There were also a large number of foreigners there. Guests of the duke. From what I hear, your sister took quite a fancy to an Englishman. They danced and spent most of the evening together. Gino didn’t know what happened or what was said between them, but suddenly Mary was screaming at the man to leave her alone. It was quite an embarrassing scene. The duke was mortified, and she left before anything more could be said. Gino said she was as pale as death, Phillipe. I don’t think she’ll be welcomed back there.” Pico fell s
ilent.

  After a moment Elizabeth stood and walked toward the door. “I’m sorry, Phillipe.” Elizabeth turned and looked at the sculptor. “I’ll talk to her,” she said quietly, before disappearing through the door.

  Pico stood alone in the rotunda. Above him the faces of angels looked on gloomily as the evening’s encroaching darkness began to settle on the room.

  Chapter 12

  Don Giovanni waited for the strolling musicians to move on before continuing his conversation with Ambrose Macpherson, Baron of Roxburgh, Lord Protector of the Borders, Ambassador and Special Emissary of His Majesty, James V of Scotland.

  “I tell you, my friend, the French king has an eye on Florence. My sources bring news of him moving his troops east.”

  “What makes you think it is your land that he is after?” Ambrose pushed back his chair and looked at his host, Giovanni de Medici, the Duke of Nemours, perhaps the wealthiest man in Europe, and the uncontested ruler of the flourishing Florentine city-state. “You know it is more likely that he would be after the Emperor Charles. Francis’s feud with him far exceeds any ill will he feels toward you or your family.”

  Giovanni paused, looking down into his jeweled goblet. Ambrose had arrived just two nights ago, after spending a week with Francis. If anyone could offer insights into France’s intentions, that man was Ambrose Macpherson.

  “It’s true. Francis would be a fool to move into Italy, turning his back to Charles. This could work to my advantage. After all, the Holy Roman Emperor is the greater threat of the two. Just think, if Francis is busy fighting Charles, he might leave Florence alone.”

  “Except that Charles has a large number of troops guarding the Pope in Rome.” Ambrose looked at the duke straight on. “Just remember, whatever happens this summer, don’t let your guard down.”

  The duke’s face creased with a slight smile. “What is this I hear? First you talk me out of my worries; now you fan the flames of my concern. So much for the politician I have learned to admire. You speak as though Scotland, Francis’s oldest ally, is at last taking sides with me. Does this mean that you’ll help the poor Florentines, my friend?”