I, Mona Lisa (14 page)

“I hear Lorenzo is still determined to win a cardinal’s hat for his second boy,” my father said, with the faintest hint of disapproval. He kept stroking his bearded chin with the pad of his thumb and his knuckle, a habit he usually indulged only when nervous.

“Giovanni, yes.” Pico flashed a brief, wan smile. “My namesake.”

I had seen both boys. Giuliano was fair of face and form, but Giovanni looked like an overstuffed sausage with spindly legs. The eldest brother, Piero, took after his mother, and was being groomed as his father’s successor—though rumor said he was a dullard, entirely unfit.

Pico hesitated before continuing; his mien was that of a man being pulled in two directions. “Yes, Lorenzo is quite attached to the idea . . . though, of course, Giovanni is far too young to be considered. It would require a . . . bending of canon law.”

“Lorenzo is quite talented at bending things,” my father said offhandedly. Even I had overheard enough of this particular topic to know the outrage it had incited in most Florentines; Lorenzo had lobbied to raise taxes in order to pay for Giovanni’s cardinalship. My father’s mood grew abruptly jocular. “Tell Madonna Lucrezia what he said about his boys.”

“Ah.” Pico lowered his face slightly as his lips curved gently upward. “You must understand that he does not say it to them directly, of course. He dotes on them too much to show them any unkindness.” At last, he gazed straight into my mother’s eyes. “Just as you so obviously do on your daughter, Madonna.”

I did not understand why my mother flushed. She had been uncharacteristically quiet up to this point, though she was clearly taken, as we all were, with the charming Count.

Pico appeared to take no note of her discomfort. “Lorenzo always says: ‘My eldest is foolish, the next clever, and the youngest, good.’”

My mother’s smile was taut; she gave a nod, then said, “I am glad young Giuliano is a comfort to his father. I am sorry to hear of Ser Lorenzo’s illness.”

Pico sighed again, this time in mild frustration. “It is hard to witness,
Madonna. Especially since—I am sure your husband has spoken of this—I am a follower of the teachings of Fra Girolamo.”

“Savonarola,” my mother said softly, her posture stiffening at the mention of the name. Suddenly, I understood her reticence.

Messer Giovanni continued speaking as if he had not heard. “I have begged Lorenzo several times to send for Fra Girolamo—but
il Magnifico
still rankles at having been rebuffed by San Marco’s new prior. I truly believe, Madonna Lucrezia, that were Fra Girolamo permitted to lay hands upon Lorenzo and pray for him, he would be healed at once.”

My mother averted her face; Pico’s tone grew more impassioned.

“Oh, sweet Madonna, do not turn from the truth. I have seen Fra Girolamo work miracles. In my life, I have met no man more devoted to God or more sincere. Forgive me for being so blunt in your presence, but we have all seen priests who consort with women, who overindulge in food and wine and all manner of worldly corruption. But Fra Girolamo’s prayers are powerful because his ways are pure. He lives in poverty; he fasts; he expiates his sin with the whip. When he is not preaching or ministering to the poor, he is on his knees in prayer. And God speaks to him, Madonna. God gives him visions.”

As he spoke, Ser Giovanni’s countenance grew incandescent; his eyes seemed brighter than the fire. He leaned forward and took my mother’s hand in his with great tenderness and a concern that held no trace of impropriety. My father moved toward her as well, until he was balanced precariously on the edge of his chair. Clearly, he had brought Pico here expressly for this purpose.

“Forgive my boldness, but your husband has told me of your suffering, Madonna Lucrezia. I cannot bear to think of one so young and fair being denied a normal life—especially when I know, with infinite certainty, that Fra Girolamo’s prayers can cure you.”

My mother was mortified, furious; she could not meet Pico’s gaze. Yet despite the intensity of her emotions, her tone was controlled as she replied, “Other holy men have prayed to God on my behalf. I and my husband have prayed, and we are good Christians, yet God has not seen fit to heal me.” At last, she brought herself to face Pico. “Yet,
if you are so convinced of the efficacy of Fra Girolamo’s prayers, why do you not ask him to pray for me from afar?”

In his urgency, Messer Giovanni vacated his chair to bend on one knee before my mother in a posture of outright supplication; he lowered his voice so that I had to lean forward myself in order to hear it over the crackling of the fire.

“Madonna . . . you have certainly heard of the prophecy of the
papa angelico
?”

Everyone in France and Italy knew of the ages-old prophecy of the angelic Pope—one elected not by cardinals but by God, who would come to cleanse the Church of its corruption and unite it shortly before Christ’s return.

My mother gave the most cursory of nods.

“He is Fra Girolamo; in my heart, I am convinced. He is no ordinary man. Madonna, what harm can it do for you to come hear him once? I will arrange for him to meet you privately after Mass, this very Sunday if you are willing. Think of it: Through Fra Girolamo’s hands, God will heal you. You need be a prisoner in this house no longer. Only come, Madonna . . .”

She glanced over at my father. There was reproach in her gaze at first, for he had put her in the most awkward possible situation; yet that reproach melted away as she caught sight of his face.

There was nothing conniving in my father’s expression, nothing that smacked of satisfaction or victory. Like Pico’s, his face was aglow—not with reflected firelight or godly inspiration, but with the purest, most desperate love I had ever seen.

It was that, more than Pico’s persuasive charm, which made her yield; and when at last she answered the Count, she was gazing upon my father, with all the pain and love that had been hidden in her heart now visible in her expression. Her eyes shone with tears, which spilled onto her cheeks when she spoke.

“Only once,” she said—to my father, not to the kneeling Pico. “Only once.”

T
hat Sunday the sky was blue, lit by a sun too feeble to soften the gripping cold. My thickest cloak, of scarlet wool lined with rabbit fur, was not enough to warm me; the air stung my eyes and made them water. In the carriage, my mother sat rigid and expressionless between me and Zalumma, her black hair and eyes in striking contrast to the white ermine cape wrapped about her emerald velvet gown. Across from us, my father glanced solicitously at his wife, eager to obtain a sign of encouragement or affection, but she gazed past him as if he were not present. Zalumma glanced directly at my father and did not bother to hide the outrage she felt on behalf of her mistress.

Count Pico rode with us and did his best to distract my father and me with pleasant comments, but there was no ignoring my mother’s humiliation, icy and bitter as the weather. Arrangements had been made for us to meet privately with Fra Girolamo directly after the service, so that he could lay hands upon my mother and pray for her.

I gasped as we rolled up to the entrance of the church at San Marco. My awe was not generated by the building—a plain structure of unadorned stone, of the same style as our parish at Santo Spirito—but
rather by the number of people who, being unable to find room inside the sanctuary, pressed tightly against one another in the doorway, on the steps, all the way out into the piazza.

Had Count Pico not been with us, we would never have gained entry. He called out as he stepped from the carriage, and at once, three generously sized Dominican monks came forward and escorted us inside. Their effect on the the crowd was magical; it melted away like wax before a flame. In a moment, I found myself standing between my mother and father not far from the pulpit and the main altar, beneath which Cosimo de’ Medici lay entombed.

Compared to the grand Duomo, San Marco’s interior was sedate and unremarkable, with its pale stone colonnades and its simple altar. Yet the mood inside the sanctuary was feverish; despite the numbing chill, women fanned themselves and whispered, agitated. Men stamped their feet—not against the cold, but out of impatience—and monks groaned as they prayed aloud. I felt as though I were at Carnival, awaiting a much-anticipated joust.

The choir began to sing, and the processional began.

With rapt expressions, worshipers turned eagerly toward the parade. First came the young acolytes, one holding the great cross, another swinging a thurible which perfumed the air with frankincense. Next came the deacon, and then the priest himself.

Last of all came Fra Girolamo, in the place of highest honor. At the sight of him, people cried out: “Fra Girolamo! Pray for me!” “God bless you, Brother!” Loudest of all was the cry “Babbo! Babbo!” that sweet term only the youngest children use to address their fathers.

I stood on tiptoe and craned my neck trying to get a glimpse of him. I caught only the impression of a frayed brown friar’s robe poorly filled by a thin figure; the hood was up, and his head was bowed. Pride was not among his sins, I decided.

He sat, huddled and intimidated, with the acolytes; only then did the people grow calmer. Yet as the Mass progressed, their restlessness again increased. When the choir sang the
Gloria in excelsis,
the crowd began to fidget. The Epistle was chanted, the Gradual sung; when the
priest read the Gospel, people were murmuring continuously—to themselves, to each other, to God.

And to Fra Girolamo. It was like listening to the thrum of insects and nocturnal creatures on a summer’s night—a sound loud and unintelligible.

The instant he ascended the pulpit, the sanctuary fell profoundly silent, so silent that I could hear a carriage’s wooden wheels rattling on the cobblestones of the Via Larga.

Above us, above Cosimo’s bones, stood a small gaunt man with sunken cheeks and great, protruding dark eyes; his hood was pushed back, revealing a head crowned by coarse black curls.

He was even homelier than his nemesis, Lorenzo de’ Medici. His brow was low and sloping. His nose looked as if someone had taken a great axe-shaped square of flesh and pressed it to his face; the bridge jutted straight out from his brow in a perpendicular line, then dropped down at an abrupt right angle. His lower teeth were crooked and protruded so that his full lower lip pushed outward.

No messiah was ever more unseemly. Yet the timid man I had seen in the procession and the one who ascended the pulpit could not have differed more. This new Savonarola, this touted
papa angelico,
had increased magically in stature; his eyes blazed with certainty, and his bony hands gripped the sides of the pulpit with divine authority. This was a man transformed by a power greater than himself, a power that radiated from his frail body and permeated the chill air surrounding us. For the first time since entering the church, I forgot the cold. Even my mother, who had remained subdued, beaten, and silent throughout the ritual, let go a soft sound of amazement.

On the other side of my father, the Count clasped his hands in a gesture of supplication. “Fra Girolamo,” he cried, “give us your blessing and we will be healed!” I glanced at his upturned face, radiant with devotion, at the sudden tears filling his eyes. At once I understood why Zalumma had once derided Savonarola and his followers as
piagnoni
—“wailers.”

But the emotion swirling about us was infinite, wild, genuine. Men and women stretched forth their arms, palms open, pleading.

And Fra Girolamo responded. His gaze swept over us; he seemed to see us, each one, and to acknowledge the love directed at him. He made the sign of the cross over the crowd with hands that trembled faintly from contained emotion—and when he did, contented sighs rose heavenward, and at last the sanctuary again was still.

Savonarola closed his eyes, summoning an internal force, and then he spoke.

“Our sermon comes today from the twentieth chapter of Jeremiah.” His voice, loud and ringing against the vaulted ceiling, was surprisingly high-pitched and nasal.

He shook his head sorrowfully and lowered his face as if shamed. “I am in derision daily, everyone mocketh me . . . because the word of the Lord was made a reproach unto me. . . .” He raised his face skyward, as if looking straight at God. “But His word was in mine heart as a burning fire shut up in my bones, and I was weary with forbearing. . . .”

Now he looked on us. “People of Florence! Though others mock me, I can no longer hold back the word of the Lord. He has spoken unto me, and it burns in me so bright I must speak or be consumed by its flame.

“Hear the word of God: Think you well, O you wealthy, for affliction shall strike you! This city shall no longer be called Florence, but Den of Thieves, Immorality, Bloodshed. Then you will all be poor, all wretched. . . . Unheard-of times are at hand.”

As he spoke, his voice deepened and grew stronger. The air vibrated with his booming assertions; it trembled with a presence that might well have been God.

“O you fornicators, you sodomites, you lovers of filth! Your children shall be brutalized, dragged into the streets and mangled. Their blood will fill the Arno, yet God will not heed their piteous cries!”

I started as a woman close behind us let out an anguished howl; the church walls echoed with racking sobs. Overwhelmed by remorse, my own father buried his face in his hands and wept along with Count Pico.

But my mother stiffened; she seized my arm protectively and,
blinking rapidly from anger, tilted her chin defiantly at Fra Girolamo. “How dare he!” she said, her gaze fixed on the monk, who had paused to give his words time to take effect. Her voice was raised, loud enough to be heard over the wailing crowd. “God hears the cries of innocent children! How can he say such horrid things?”

Just as my mother had clutched my arm protectively, so Zalumma quickly took my mother’s. “Hush, Madonna. You must calm yourself. . . .” She leaned closer to whisper directly into my mother’s ear. My mother gave an indignant shake of her head and wound her arm about my shoulders. She pressed me tightly to her side as though I were a small child. Zalumma ignored the preacher and his
piagnoni
and kept her keen gaze focused on her mistress. I, too, grew worried; I could feel the rapid rise and fall of my mother’s bosom, feel the tension in her grip.