The Wolves of St. Peter's (14 page)

Raphael went to bid Imperia a good night, and one of the giants provided Francesco with a torch. Halfway across the square, he realized someone was behind him and turned to see Dante. “What are you doing, Dante?

“It's dark out,” he said sadly as he shielded his eyes against the torch's light. “Bats go out at night.”

Francesco put his arm around the man's shoulders and turned him back in the direction of the brothel. What spirits haunted and tortured this poor soul? “Not tonight, Dante,” he said. “You need to rest. Go back to Imperia's for the night. Have some wine and something to eat.” Dante started to protest, but Francesco remained firm. “No, man. Not tonight. Do as I say and go back to Imperia's.” Finally Dante agreed and started back across the square.

Francesco waited until the door had closed behind Dante before resuming his own path home. The moon, still close to full, struggled to find a break in the heavy cloud cover. And while it had not rained all day, it started to spit now, a drop sizzling in the flame of his torch.

From beyond St. Peter's, past the port and The Turk's, he heard the wolves. Were there more of them now? The other night, their calls had seemed lonesome, single wolves calling out to each other. But now they called and answered each other as a chorus, dozens at a time. He thought of the refugees from the flood huddled up on the hills, listening to the wolves growing in number and wondering
just how big a fire one needed to keep the hungry animals at bay. If emboldened by hunger, would the wolves raid the camps as they had the farmers' barns, swooping in and tearing apart the closest man, woman, or child before running back through the city walls?

His horrible imaginings made him walk faster, and he reached Susanna's gate in no time. Grateful the scarf was no longer there, he went in, only to find her already asleep, her arms around the prized bolt of cloth, holding it as tenderly as a mother holds a child.

He was turning to leave when the torchlight revealed a piece of paper on the table. Susanna couldn't read, but she had taken to bringing home notices she found nailed up in the squares. Whether they were announcing a new law or simply a festival, it impressed her enormously that Francesco could decipher what to her were meaningless scrawls. He would read the notice for her in the morning, he thought as he closed her door quietly behind him.

Inside Michelangelo's house, the wolves' cries were faint and distant. Michelangelo snored serenely while the chicken watched over him like a guardian angel from its perch on the headboard. Through what used to be the front door, the soap-maker and his wife's nightly quarrel was hushed and sleepy. Francesco held the pillow to the light of the dying fire and was pleased to find it clean. He took off his boots, pulled the blankets up under his chin, and closed his eyes. He heard the soap-maker's wife giggle.

Sometimes it was good enough in life just to have a warm bed. But when his thoughts turned to those young boys huddled together on the ship, he felt guilty. He imagined them frightened and cold, not knowing they had escaped one terrible fate only to suffer another. The Turk must have bought them in a slave market in the East. Should Francesco attempt to free them? He could not overpower the guards, but could Raphael provide the means to bribe
them? But what then? He imagined them running from the ship through the icy rain, their dark skin never having known anything but the sun, up over the hills to where the wolves waited in the shadows of the trees. A wolf for every boy. And if they were so lucky as to survive the ones with four legs, there were still plenty of the two-legged variety with evil on their minds.

RICHMOND PALACE, AUTUMN 1508

My Dearest and Only Brother—

Let me begin by saying this letter comes with a thousand kisses. How long it has been since we have been parted, and how I yearn for the days when we played together! This past Tuesday marked the anniversary of Mother's death. How I do miss her. I can only believe you feel the same way.

Father has written to me of your troubles—you are to be punished for your sin of arrogance, he said. If Father is being unduly harsh with you, he is also harsh with himself, feeling he is being punished for his own sins. I will tell him you acted if not wisely, then of your own free will, the consequences of which were the predictable results of your actions and not brought about by a divine being in order to punish him. Did he not teach us to think so?

Oh, dear Brother, how difficult this time must be for you! To be denied everything you hold dear: your books, the conversation of the court, and Florence itself, with the hills we both cherish so much.

And does it still give you pain to be away from the source of your troubles, Juliet?

As there is no gentle way to tell the truth, I shall speak frankly and boldly, dear Brother, as I can with no other man. If I should cause you further pain now, it is only of your ultimate happiness I think when relating this.

I know you, Brother. For all your learning, you have a trusting heart. And what man would not have been tempted by her beauty? Perhaps that was Father's sin: not fully preparing us for the outside world. For I fear that, for all her outward sweetness, Juliet is capable of treachery.

While you were at the university in Padua and I was a maid in the court of Guido del Mare, Juliet and I often sat at the embroidery frame together. It is no secret that Guido often takes his pleasure among her maids, and it was only his respect for our father that saved me from his bed, if not from his glances. Juliet knew this and asked me who visited his bed at night, chastising me when I feigned not to know. But soon she saw my reticence as an asset, and she confessed to me her hatred for her husband. She found him distasteful, which is perhaps not surprising given he is more than thirty years her elder.

Before long I became her chaperone on her weekly rides. On these excursions she fulfilled her charitable duties as a rich noblewoman, delivering food to poor nobles, widows mostly, who live in the countryside. Her guards would wait outside, and I would enter with her. We would be greeted by the lady of the house and offered refreshment. It was the same at all houses but one, the cottage of a blind widow. Always her son would be there. He was a musician at court. Whenever he and Juliet were at court together, not so much as a glance passed between them. But for that hour
at the cottage, I would sit with the widow and Juliet would be drawn into another room.

As you know, while the Church might look away for men, it does not for their wives. Men marry for money, connections, legitimate heirs, taking their pleasure whenever they please. But women, too, have desires. And so if that were all, I would have kept it in my confidence, as I had promised my lady that autumn.

But in winter, Guido's sister arrived at court, and that same musician fell in love with her and she with him. Juliet was jealous and confided in me that she'd told Guido of his sister's indiscretions.

I do not know if Juliet realized how heavy the price would be for her revelation, for Guido refused his sister and the musician permission to marry. When they would not obey him, he had the young musician killed. His sister was to be sent to a convent, but she instead threw herself from her tower window into the stone courtyard.

Juliet confined herself to her room and dismissed me. You arrived home in Florence just as I was leaving for England, and thus you and I were parted.

Had I known you were to fall in love with Juliet, I would have told you this before, though I do not know if it would have prevented your downfall. Reason is indeed weak in the face of love. I am sorry, my Brother.

I know you will want to learn of my life here, and I shall send news soon. But be assured I am well and my maidenhood safe from the young Henry, Duke of York, soon to be King Henry VIII. His father, the elder Henry, is not well and coughs up blood. I have received word from Adriana in Holland, who is also well and sends her love to you.

I ask you, Brother, for our safety, to burn this letter without delay. I also ask your forgiveness if its contents have brought you more pain. I will continue to petition our father on your behalf and hope he will
soon find in his heart the ability to forgive you, if only for the love of our dear mother.

He didn't know who had delivered the letter from his sister, only that it was there when he awakened. On going to bed, his fever had returned, and after a fitful night of tossing and turning, he had slept well into the morning.

Angelina had written in French, perhaps for additional safety, and he read the letter once again to commit it to memory before laying it on the fire as she requested.
Je suis desolée, mon frère …
she'd written.
For taking away the reason you live
she might just as well have added. He watched the edges curl and blacken and, after wondering if this was becoming a metaphor for his love for Juliet, gave the letter a vicious jab with the poker. A plume of ash and smoke evaded the chimney and poured into the room.

Eyes stinging, he threw the poker back onto the hearth. The chicken, observing him impassively from the table, gave one of its funny hops, coming to rest on top of Michelangelo's drawings, still surprisingly untainted.

“You shit on my pillow yet leave his drawings alone.” Francesco pushed the chicken aside and flipped through pages densely packed with muscular figures, but there was no sign of the bird's likeness. Francesco pictured Michelangelo at work on the ceiling, a giant portrait of a three-legged chicken holding the place of honor in the center of the vault.

Wrapping himself in a blanket from the bed, he poured what was left of the drinking water into what was left of the wine. After gulping it down, he sat at the table and tried to think. There was
no reason to doubt his sister. He knew the whole story except for this part about Juliet's involvement. Surely Juliet had known Guido would react with violence. Guido was loyal to his friends but ruthless with his enemies and those who betrayed him. And Guido had intended a far more lucrative match for his sister than a simple musician.

Francesco realized now he had his father's learning but not his wisdom. After completing his studies in Padua, Francesco had arrived at the del Mare court with his head full of Petrarch. Law, math, and languages too, but Petrarch especially.
Juliet will be my Laura,
he thought the moment he laid eyes on Guido's wife. Her golden hair, her downcast blue eyes. And he would be Petrarch, in love with a married woman who could never love him in return.

And so it was for over two years, until she came to him, cornering him in his offices one afternoon this past spring.
You're a lawyer,
Juliet had said.
You must help me get away from Guido. Help me obtain an annulment, for then I will be free and Guido will have to return my dowry.

I'm so sorry,
he'd replied.
It would be impossible to obtain an annulment.
Until that moment, he'd almost forgotten his Petrarchan infatuation, so thoroughly had he enjoyed the pleasure of the court's many willing young maidens—although he had often imagined Juliet's face in those darkened bed chambers.

I'll say the marriage was never consummated. They'll believe me—he is so old and ugly! Oh, I wish I were home in Milan! How could my family have been so unkind to me!

My lady, you cannot do that. None of your children may have lived past infancy, but they still prove you consummated the marriage. What would you say—they were someone else's? Then he would just kill you. I'm sorry. Guido will never let you win.

But I cannot live any longer with his cruelty. Oh, I wish I were dead! I'll kill myself if I have to!

He'd bidden her not to think of such a solution and promised he would find a way to help her.

What if Guido died?
she'd then asked.

Then, yes, you would have not only your dowry but his property as well. And in time that will happen, for Guido is not young.

He will never die—he is so strong and hale! I'm trapped. I'll kill myself, I swear to you!
She looked up at him, her eyes filled with tears.

He made her promise she would not kill herself, and she agreed on the condition that he continue to think of ways to help her. His better judgment was no match for her blue eyes, and so he met her again. And again. And again. Soon Francesco had all but stopped visiting the bedrooms of his favorite maidens, only going when the stretches between his meetings with Juliet became intolerable. Why Guido sought out other girls baffled him. If Juliet had been his, he would have been content to forsake all others. But she wasn't then, and she wasn't now, and here he was in Rome, spending his nights with a gypsy girl with a blackened tooth.

Francesco put his head on the table, remembering the day that stood out in his memory as the beginning of the end. Guido had formed a hunting party, and Francesco had gone out to wish him good luck. The sun was rising, but already the dew was being burned off the grass. Guido sat high on his favorite stallion. Pollo Grosso came closer as Francesco approached on foot, glaring down at him from his horse as if he already knew what Francesco was thinking. He brought his horse dangerously close, and Francesco, feeling the horse's breath on his face, jumped away from the stamping hooves. Francesco had already learned that Pollo Grosso guarded Guido zealously, instinctively distrusting everyone Guido knew. Furthermore,
he watched Juliet like a dog in heat. When Francesco pointed out the latter, Guido had laughed.
I'm not worried. I throw him one of the local girls every once in a while to keep him happy. And I know he'd kill any man who dared think of touching my wife.
Francesco remembered that as Pollo Grosso continued to glare down at him, looking ready to tear him apart with his teeth.

Guido never hunted alone. Ten nobles accompanied him, and for every one of them ten servants. Everywhere carts were loaded with tents and food, and baying among them were greyhounds and mastiffs, tails quivering in anticipation of fresh blood. It was a party large enough to scare off every stag in the country, but Francesco knew Guido's huntsmen already had the prey cornered between the hills and the river.

I wish you would come, Francesco,
Guido had said. His falcon sat steadily on his arm, and Francesco thought how, in profile, Guido and his bird looked much the same.
I was hoping to continue our discussion from last night about Castiglione. You maintain he thinks knowledge of the humanities is the most important quality for a courtier, while I believe the warrior spirit is the most important. Who is right—me or Castiglione?

Yes, but the rents …
Francesco said feebly, as though this wasn't a duty he could pawn off on one of the lesser secretaries.

You are a good man, Francesco. I am fortunate to have you watching out for me. You my purse and matters of the mind, and Pollo Grosso my back.
He smiled, giving Francesco an affectionate flick on the arm with his whip. Francesco avoided Pollo Grosso's hateful eye.

Guido nodded toward three pretty girls giggling as they piled into a cart, their arms laden with flowers. They looked to be sisters, the youngest maybe twelve, the eldest sixteen.
I shall miss your conversation, but I will have them to console me tonight. I am sure you can understand why I married so late, with so many beautiful girls.
Unfortunately, though, I may have waited too long, as I cannot seem to produce an heir.

I'm sure Juliet will give you a son soon,
Francesco said, thinking he very well could be on his way to fathering Guido's heir for him.

One of the girls glanced at Francesco before covering her face coquettishly with her flowers.
You want that one?
Guido asked.
Since you are missing the hunt, I should not be so greedy. Although I know many young maids are vying for your affections.

Francesco agreed weakly, suddenly justifying to himself the meeting he was about to have with his patron's wife. Why should Juliet have to live without pleasure when Guido had so much? Still, he couldn't help but feel disloyal. He knew too how angry this would make his father if he ever found out. And Pollo Grosso scared him to death. But he could not stop himself.

To Francesco's relief, the hunting horn sounded.
Enjoy the hunt,
he said.
We'll see you a few days hence.

Yes, we will continue our conversation then,
Guido replied,
although I must warn you, I shall win our next chess match or I will set Pollo Grosso on you.

Laughing companionably, Guido bade him farewell, and Francesco waited until the last of the hunting party had crested the hill. Then, instead of returning to his offices in Guido's castle, he turned and ran beyond the gardens to the grove of monkey puzzle trees, where she waited for him.
Juliet.

She ran to him, and he remembered the sun on her golden hair, her eyes so blue, her rose perfume. And when he picked her up, her yellow dress had swirled around her … No! Not yellow. Blue! It had been blue, like her eyes.

It was no good. He just couldn't recapture the excitement and passion for which he'd risked death and disgrace. Now that he had
the yellow dress in his head, it wasn't even Juliet he was remembering. It was Calendula.