Duchess of Milan (27 page)

“The Duke of Bari did not lie in pain like that to bring
my
child into the world,” Eleonora snapped, throwing out her hefty arm and menacingly pointing a thick finger toward the bedchamber.
“Do you have the tools?”

The surgeon swallowed thickly and nodded yes.

“Then we will go back in and pray that our Lord bids this baby come into the world.” Eleonora held the surgeon’s grim gaze.

Beatrice saw them come back in. Not as separate individuals but as a single menacing presence, a many-headed demon of pain. Her own pain she already knew like the affliction of a lifetime, the hot acid that burned in every tiny vein, the stinging bile in her lungs and throat, the immense aching weight against her bowels, like a torrent of molten lead blocked up inside her. She had come to know this pain well enough to negotiate with it, to offer it something here for a moment of respite there, to be assured that when it finally killed her it would take her like an expert executioner, in a clean swift stroke. But this moving, multiarmed creature of pain could not be reasoned with; it would tear her apart bit by bit. It had already tried.

She watched it surround her, all eyes, the only thing she could see clearly now. The massages and smearing of salves and prodding and poking and endless getting in and out of the birthing chair had maddened her beyond imagining, but the memory of those torments had fallen away from her consciousness like a black flake drifting into a bottomless well. Now all she could remember was the version, a lightning bolt of clarity, every instant visible and distinct. The arm sliding inside her, each movement a separate knife thrust, deeper and deeper. And then the poisonous fingers wriggling in her belly, every touch a rushing tremor of agony that began in her bowels and exploded in her head in an obscene cacophony, a shrill demon’s horn that blew daggers instead of notes. She vowed to herself that if they tried the version again, she would somehow get her head free and with her teeth tear out the monster’s throat.

But the thing did not move on her again. After a long while Beatrice ignored its leering eyes and talked with her own pain, found it yet more reasonable, felt parts of herself begin to drift into that dark well beneath her, brilliant, tinsel-like bits of her soul sparking into oblivion. For a moment she saw Mama standing there, her eyes so green, and she thought to talk to her; perhaps she did. I am going home, Mama.

She imagined that each of her own eyes saw entirely differently. One slumbered, dreaming of a huge darkness lit by dolls in white lace dresses and saints in brilliant brocade robes. The glowing dolls and shimmering saints rushed past her like an army of lanterns, this way and that, banners flying. Her other eye could look down on the beast that still leered at her; this eye saw Mama standing inside the monster, not entirely part of it. I am coming home, Mama. I have a baby with me. I want you to see my baby.

And then the many-eyed creature stirred again. Mama roused it! Why, Mama? Why do you hurt me again? But she knew why Mama had brought the monster to life, and the pain of that truth was like the hand in her womb reaching up to rip out her heart. The dolls and saints streaked past and disappeared, and she watched the surgeon reach into his leather bag and take out the shiny metal things. She remembered in an instant where she had seen those tools before and what they would do and why the monster had come for her baby.

Beatrice engaged the surgeon in a slow combat, straining with every fiber of her strength, but she was only able to move her body to the ponderous beat of a
bassa danza.
He advanced on her, the hammer and spike and hook in his hands. With infinite effort she rose to meet him. Hands grasped at her arms, but she pulled away. She stood straight up and began to fade into a black whirlwind. She put her hands on her knees and told them to bring the birthing chair. She squatted down. They all spoke to her at once, but she decided she would listen only to her own breathing. She already knew the simple terms of the agreement she had just negotiated and merely wondered with whom she had dealt. Had it been Fortune? Or Mama?

Life passed in and out of her in strong, regular surges, with a sound like distant breakers. She imagined that she was in a cathedral, as ornate as the Duomo but a thousand times longer, a great tunnel with a single candle flickering at its end. She began to walk, telling herself she must save her strength. Now and again saints stared down at her from their niches, lifelike statues that bent and admonished her in muddy, droning voices before she blinked them away. Periodically the floor tilted up like the face of a mountain, and she had to use all her force to keep going before it leveled again. Afterward, each time she was weaker.

She walked so far. The altar was brighter now, and thousands of candles blazed around it. She no longer noticed the exhorting saints. She began to run, the huge gulps of air searing her lungs, her legs aching with fatigue. Running so fast. The infant rested on the altar, naked, swaddled only in pure light. The floor tilted up crazily, but somehow it was easy now, though she knew that when she reached the top she would fall back farther than she had come, fall all the way back. That no longer concerned her. The warmth of the candles was like the sun, and there was the baby, his eyes twinkling like gems. In a final effort that left her weightless, free of pain, she reached out for him. He was so smooth, so perfect, his skin like a warm rose petal. The words “I love you” sparked from her fingertips, and she knew he was her baby and that it did not matter that she was rushing away now, falling back into the darkness. She heard her baby cry, saw the glinting golden notes of his first cries drift down after her, and the last thing she told herself was: I can go anywhere now.

Count Girolamo da Tuttavilla removed his spectacles and rubbed his eyes. He looked up at Il Moro. Milan’s most experienced at-large envoy, the white-haired Tuttavilla was fifteen years Il Moro’s senior; indeed, he had also served under Il Moro’s father, Francesco Sforza. He was studying dispatches from Il Moro’s extensive intelligence-gathering apparatus in Venice, the kind of network of merchants, envoys, bankers, and even courtesans that Il Moro had organized in all the great capitals of Europe. “You know the saying,” Tuttavilla remarked, “ ‘We both know how many days to Saint Biagio’s feast.’ The Signory of Venice understand as well as we do that the French must not be permitted to cross the mountains. Certainly they intend to enter into the league His Holiness has proposed. The real question is to what extent they will support the league if more than words are required.”

Il Moro sat back in his chair. The light in the room, cast by large glass globes suspended from the wall by brass sconces, was curiously steady in an age of candles and oil lamps, and it sharpened the regal lines of Il Moro’s face. “That is my concern exactly. The Signory will hope that this display of Italian unity will persuade King Charles to stay home. But if the French army actually crosses the mountains . . .”Il Moro made a slight, disdainful motion of his head. “In that case I’m certain the Signory would send us their prayers.”

“Then perhaps we should agree to enter into this league only on the condition that each member state publicly pledge to assist any member state attacked by the French. That would make the Venetians accountable and would certainly give caution to the hotheads in King Charles’s retinue.”

“The Signory will never agree to that,” Il Moro offered. “Right now Venice fears Germany more than she does France. And as long as the French are in a position to counter the German threat to Venice, the Signory will never take such an aggressive position against the French. The Signory will try to pursue a more circumspect policy. Of course if the French and Germans were to settle their differences, Venetian policy might become more adventuresome.”

“Is that possible?”

“Count Belgioioso informs me that King Charles has been trying to arrange a parlay with the German Emperor’s son Maximilian. A peace between France and Germany would remove the most important obstacle to King Charles’s Crusade. And that would be a most unhappy state of affairs.” Il Moro traced his index finger over the little ruby bust of Caesar on his ring. “Well, for now I think that a vague alliance with Venice is better than no alliance at all. It is the first step. Then we can gradually increase the pressure on the Signory to put some teeth into our agreement.” Il Moro stared thoughtfully for a moment. “It occurs to me that we should make the league as visible as possible. To confirm the league, I could send you to Venice at the head of a very large suite of ambassadors and ask Duke Ercole and His Holiness to do the same. I wish that Duke Ercole and I could personally go, but we have too many enemies among the Signory.”

“Perhaps your wife? And Duke Ercole’s wife. With very large suites of ladies. That would certainly underscore the importance we attach to this accord.”

Il Moro nodded his satisfaction. He sat silently for a moment, then got up suddenly and walked over to one of the lamps. He peered at it and tapped the clear glass globe, which was filled with water; the wick burned in a glass cylinder set inside the globe. “Did you notice it while you were reading?”

Tuttavilla turned in his chair and studied the lamp. “Quite certainly. Where one might read by an oil lamp for two hours before becoming fatigued, with this the only limitation is the need for sleep.” He brandished his thick, wire-rimmed spectacles. “Perhaps we are not yet able to restore sight to the blind, but our science has assuredly extended the usefulness of old men.”

“Leonardo made it for me,” Il Moro said, tapping the globe again. “He sends me a list often ideas, one of which might be useful. A most peculiar man. Always railing against the humanists, no doubt because he cannot read Latin. Yet there is something to be said for the quality of his vision, unencumbered by the past, focused fully on the future. Of course as soon as one of my scholars has translated a text from the Greek into the vernacular, Leonardo must have it.” Il Moro smiled wistfully. “My father would have been amused by him. He would have pitted Leonardo against Filarete--Filarete drawing his perfect cities shaped like stars, Leonardo imagining roads stacked one atop the other and carriages drawn only by some concoction of gears and springs. My father had a gift for seeing genius where other men could see only nuisance.” Il Moro took his seat again, a subtle reminder of his smile remaining on his lips. He did not look at Tuttavilla.

Glancing up from under his black eyebrows, Tuttavilla studied Il Moro for a moment before he broke the silence. “You were always your father’s favorite, though of course he could not openly declare it of a fourth son, so far from the succession. But we all knew it. Do you remember when you were fifteen or sixteen and you were out near Binasco on May Day? You got into that wrestling tournament with the country toughs, and you beat them all. When I told your father, he pounded his fist in that way of his and boomed,
‘Stupendissimo,
Lodovico Maria!’ Then he said to me, ‘Do you know how he beat them, Messer Girlaomo? Not with his back, though it is strong enough. With his mind. With tricks and cunning, always a half-dozen moves ahead of his opponent. That is why he will be a stronger man than I, No one can defeat Lodovico Maria’s mind.’ “ Tuttavilla smiled warmly and openly, without any suggestion of a flatterer’s guile. “I’m sure that your father’s soul is comforted in knowing that Milan enjoys your governance.”

Il Moro looked up. His opaque black eyes suggested, though not unkindly, that Tuttavilla retreat from whatever border he was attempting to cross. Then he peered abstractedly into Leonardo’s unwavering light. “The light of reason,” he said with a slightly ironic edge. “We are asked to believe that this light will someday illuminate the entire world. And yet any learned painter can tell you that without darkness in contrast to light, the appearance of form and shape cannot be created.
Chiaroscuro.
Light and shade. The more brilliant the light, the more profound its absence must be. Look at the work of the Florentine painters. The boundary between light and dark is as sharp as a blade.”

As if validating his hypothesis, Il Moro stared into the sharp, distinct shadows behind his secretaries’ lecterns. At the knock on the door, his shoulders jerked lightly with surprise.

The messenger was Bernardino da Corte. Il Moro’s chief of security was an angular man with aquiline Milanese features and a swarthy, southern Mediterranean complexion. He dipped to his knee and clutched his cap to his breast. “Messer Ambrogio has bid me inform you that your wife has borne you a son, unflawed, with no unusual markings and in robust health.”

Il Moro’s face and voice conveyed nothing. “I have dictated to Messer Calco a complete agenda for the celebrations. You may tell him to proceed.”

Unexpectedly, Bernardino did not rise, and his fingers tightened on his cap. “Your Highness. Messer Ambrogio begs to consult with you on a situation that has developed regarding the Duchess of Bari.”

A strange reflection seemed to dart across Il Moro’s eyes, as if Leonardo’s lamp had suddenly flared and then died. “Where is Messer Ambrogio?” he asked evenly.

CHAPTER 22

It was a place of translucent light, a deep, clear sea. Once in a long while a curious floating statue, perhaps a tomb effigy, might glide past, brocade robes billowing as they propelled it along like a huge cuttlefish, its gemstone crust twinkling until it disappeared into the distance.

The pain brought her closer to the surface. Occasionally she could see the people on the shore; they appeared briefly like figures painted on tarot cards, then blew away when the clouds covered the sun. Once she saw Mama and told herself: Mama isn’t dead. Why is Mama here?

The throbbing in her womb stripped away the gauzy layers of her dream. The light in the room steadied and brightened, turning everything hard and real. Her hands and feet were cold. She knew she was alive, and the panic that immediately gripped her was the worst pain of all: Did I dream my baby? She had to get up.