The Wolves of St. Peter's (16 page)

“
And there you go alone, my poor friend, like the Grim Reaper himself.
”

Francesco laughed. “I wish I could have seen his face!”

“He did not look amused. The students thought it very funny and laughed so much I came close to apologizing.”

“Well, I'm pleased you only came close. Remember, this is the man who is having me followed and only God knows what else. I'm sure this is not what my father intended when he sent me here.”

“But are there not other matters keeping you here as well? A woman, I think? One who looks a little like our poor Calendula, if I recall correctly?”

Francesco poured himself more wine. It wasn't easy telling another man, especially one he so admired, that he'd acted like a child, but somehow he felt he owed Raphael an explanation. “Her name was Juliet, and she was the wife of Guido del Mare.”

“You fell in love with Guido's wife?”

Francesco went on, finding it a relief to tell Raphael. He hadn't been to confession for years (he doubted the very efficacy of the enterprise), but he was finding value in putting into words what weighed on his mind. “She wanted an annulment from Guido, and so I promised her I would find a solution.” Francesco suddenly felt this was someone else's story, not his at all. “But by the end of the summer, I still could not think of a way out, short of killing Guido.”

He could not tell Raphael about the time she had grown impatient and suggested just that. But he remembered it well.
Guido is my father's patron,
he had replied angrily to her suggestion.
We owe him everything. You must never again speak such vile treason.

She'd started to cry.
I'm sorry. I didn't mean it; I was just desperate.

He held her then.
I know you didn't mean it, Juliet. I will find a solution. I swear on my very life that I will.
But he knew his voice had held little hope.

“But Guido became suspicious,” Raphael offered.

“I don't know how he found out. I swear Juliet and I never so much as exchanged a glance in the presence of others. Yet someone must have had suspicions, a servant, perhaps. One day, when I was walking in the courtyard, Guido came charging toward me. He was so angry I was sure he was going to kill me right then and there. I didn't have time to think. I struck out wildly and slashed open his face with my dagger. He must have a terrible scar now.

“If I'd been a soldier and not a scholar, I would have taken advantage of his shock and killed him, but I didn't. I couldn't. He's my family's patron after all, and has been so good to us. So I ran home to my father like the scared boy I was and begged him to help me.

“One thing I know for sure. If Guido had sent his bodyguard Pollo Grosso after me, I wouldn't be alive today. That's who Guido usually gets to do his killing, but I suppose this was a question of honor. He'd been betrayed by a trusted friend, so this was a score he had to settle himself.” Francesco picked up his wine and looked at Raphael, who was listening patiently with the sort of sympathy he would have liked from his own father. “You can see why I hesitated to tell you all this.”

“You must not be so hard on yourself. Can there not yet be a happy outcome?”

“I certainly dreamed of one. But today, in a letter from my sister, I learned I was not Juliet's only lover.”

And now suddenly he wasn't thinking of Juliet, but of Susanna. Who was this man Susanna went off with? Bastiano had implied a lover. And while here he was unburdening his heart about Juliet, the woman he was supposed to be in love with, it drove him insane to think what Susanna might be doing right now with another man.

“Never mind,” he said resignedly to Raphael. “I've told you everything now. I should leave you to find better company.”

Raphael passed him the plate of bread and cheese. “Of course not. I enjoy your company, and I am honored you have taken me into your confidence at last. What you need now is a diversion. I may be short a houseboy, but I can have some food sent from Imperia's. Maybe a quiet evening would be of service to us both. A trip to the baths and some cards, perhaps, to take our minds away from women?”

“Our minds? Yours too? And who troubles yours? Imperia?” he asked half-teasingly.

“No,” Raphael answered seriously. “Not in the manner in which you speak. You know, she is with child, and I worry for her.”

“No, I didn't know. Is it impertinent to ask if she knows the father?”

“Chigi, of course. Men may pay for her company, but they do not share her bed. That is for Chigi only.”

Except she had invited Francesco into her bed the day she told him Calendula was her cousin. He was certain he hadn't misunderstood her.

“And she shares her bed only with Chigi because …”

“Because she longs for the same thing all women long for,” Raphael said firmly. “Love. A home. Security for her children.”

“But why not you, Raphael? It's Rome's worst-kept secret that Imperia fell in love with you the moment you arrived here and now only settles for Chigi. Is it because of who she is?”

Raphael shook his head. “Her profession does not matter to me. It is not easy to explain. As much as I care for her, I feel I am seeking something else … something I cannot put into words. I love many beautiful women, and their beauty touches me, but … never mind. I cannot explain it. For now, I have my work. It is easier this way.” He put down his cup and smiled. “Let me send for a great joint of venison, and we will eat, drink, and forget our cares for an evening.”

IT
was Francesco who suggested they visit the Sistine Chapel. After many cups of wine, he was still angry with Michelangelo. But he was sure Bastiano would not be spying on him again, and if ever there were a good opportunity to show Raphael the ceiling, it was now.

The cold night air half-sobered them, though not enough to call off their mission. With jugs of wine and freshly lit torches, they set out, making the short journey to the Vatican longer by taking a wrong turn and ending up at a dead end.

When they finally arrived, the lone guard at the chapel door was slumped against the doorframe. “He's either asleep or as drunk as we are,” Francesco whispered. “Our bribe may be wasted on him. You think we can sneak by him?”

“Not wise, I should think. If he does awaken, he is likely to go at us with that spear.”

Raphael was right, for at the sound of their voices the guard awoke. “Halt! Halt! Who goes there?” He raised the spear, but his fumbled attempt to aim it in their direction sent it clattering to the floor. He dove to retrieve it, but Francesco planted his foot on it.

“Quiet, man. It is I, Francesco, houseboy to Michelangelo,” he said with a drunken swagger. “We're not here to make mischief. Will you allow us in and keep your peace?”

“Who's he?” he said with a surly nod at Raphael.

“Only a wisp in your dreams. Take this wine, and let us agree you neither granted us entrance nor fell asleep at your post.”

“That's a fair trade,” he said, sampling the wine. He handed a large brass key to Francesco, who turned it in the lock.

“Good,” said Francesco, handing him back the key. “We will need you to let us out again, so don't fall back asleep.”

Their torches made only a small dent in the black cavern of the chapel. If at all possible, the air in here was even colder and damper than outside.

“It is not the first time I have been here,” Raphael said as he removed his beret, his voice echoing in the vast room. He held his torch high and moved along the wall, the luminous colors of the frescoes flashing by. Francesco was about to ask if he was seeking a particular painting when Raphael paused. “Here. The work of Perugino, my old master, Christ giving the keys to Heaven to St. Peter, just as we were given the key to the chapel. See, this is him. He painted himself into the fresco, standing next to St. Peter. He joked it was so St. Peter would remember him when he appeared before the real Gates of Heaven. He loves to paint drapery, and no one can work more folds into a robe than he. It is the grace of his figures that makes him so popular, but what I truly admire are the settings. This landscape is more than just a backdrop. It has a story all its own.
Perugino laughed when I asked him what was beyond those hills and trees, saying,
Whatever you want, my boy.
”

Raphael studied the fresco wistfully a moment longer, then lowered his torch. “It is good to look on his face again. It has been a long time, and only God knows if I will see him again. I came to see this fresco when I first arrived in Rome, but Michelangelo was furious and told me to get out and stay out.” Raphael laughed. “His Holiness said it is better to comply with Michelangelo's wishes for the sake of peace. I think His Holiness is a little afraid of him.”

“And for good reason,” Francesco said. “Once, His Holiness dared to say work was not progressing as he hoped. As he was leaving, a plank fell from the scaffold. It fell nowhere near him, but I don't doubt he took it as a warning. If he'd not gone to such lengths to convince Michelangelo to accept the commission, I'm sure the man would be sitting in a dungeon in Castel Sant'Angelo as we speak. It makes me almost laugh to think the Pope, who makes whole kingdoms quake in fear, is afraid of a painter.”

Francesco then showed Raphael where generations of choirboys had carved their names into the wall. “Look.
Josquin.
He was a choirboy here once, and now they sing his Masses. Tell Alfeo to carve his name beside his when he comes here. For luck. If you believe in such things.”

Francesco led the way up the scaffolding, somehow managing to hold on to the side of the ladder with one hand while juggling the lit torch and their remaining jug of wine with the other. They emerged at the top, their laughter echoing through the vast chamber.

They picked their way across the spans to where Michelangelo had been working. Francesco took both torches and planted them in a pail beneath the painting of
The Flood.

“This is it,” Raphael said in wonderment. They lay on their
backs in order to see it better. The fresco was enormous, although they agreed it would appear very small from the chapel floor.

Francesco had to remind himself it was only three days ago he'd been up here and seen the colored chunks of plaster in the pail. Everything they now admired had been painted since then, and Michelangelo had worked largely, if not entirely, on his own. Bastiano had been spying on Francesco, and for all he knew Michelangelo had given his other assistants similar missions.

“It is extraordinary,” Raphael said. “Not just the imagination that brings the story to life, with all its horror and fear. It is the figures themselves. Michelangelo is the true heir of ancient Rome. The rest of us had to struggle out of the darkness that was left when Rome fell. It has been a slow evolution from the infantile decorations of the early Church. Perugino made great strides, and I believe now we have found the light again. But with Michelangelo's work, you would think the intervening thousand years had never happened. It is as if the greatest Roman artists laid down their tools in the evening, only to have Michelangelo pick them up the very next morning and resume where they had left off.”

“
My destiny is to live among diverse and bewildering storms,
” Francesco said, quoting from Petrarch. “
But for you perhaps there will follow a better era. This slumber of forgetfulness will not endure forever. When the darkness has lifted, our children's children can live again in the light.
I have often thought Petrarch was speaking to me when he wrote that. Deluded, perhaps, but I do think we are witnessing Rome's rebirth.”

“
What else can history be but the praise of Rome?
” Raphael returned. “We certainly share a love of Petrarch. Have you ever wondered how different the world would be if Rome had not fallen? Imagine if we had spent the past thousand years building upon that
greatness. Instead, we have had to pull ourselves out from under the weight of superstition that filled the void. Think of the poetry, the art, the music, the wisdom, the knowledge … Perhaps we would have chariots that could take us to the stars. But I do know there will never be anything greater than what we are looking at tonight. Imagine this whole ceiling when it is completed …”

“He still has a long way to go,” Francesco returned bluntly. “And for all we know, he'll tear it down again and never be finished. He threatens as much.” He broke off, realizing his own prejudice toward his master was clouding his reason, before continuing. “And while you commend him perhaps a little more than I feel is deserved, it humbles me nonetheless to see you give so much praise to this man's work. You call his work superior to your own and show no jealousy. I can assure you he says nothing in kind about your work. He calls it the work of a woman: all pretty faces and effeminate gestures.”

Raphael's laughter rang heartily through the chapel. “He is angry that what he judges as inferior gets any recognition. The glory should all be his. It is a shame he cannot enjoy it.”

Seldom do great virtue and great beauty dwell in one person,
Petrarch had written, but then, he didn't know Raphael. If anyone was incapable of treachery, it was Raphael. “Even if my father doesn't allow me to go home this Christmas,” Francesco said, “you should go, Raphael, and see it in winter. It's so peaceful. Steam rises from the hot spring and freezes on the branches of the trees. I enjoyed many a cold day with a cup of mulled wine, reading before a roaring fire. You really must go. I only hope I have the chance again.”

“You will,” Raphael said. “And I thank you for the invitation, but I shall decline until you can go as well.” He paused for a moment. “I am not sure how to broach this, but when you told me your story,
I could not help but wonder if it were Juliet herself who told Guido of your indiscretions.”