Chiara – Revenge and Triumph (22 page)

"My Lady, if you were a peasant woman, I would say, go and see her, she may offer you some hope. But an illustrious lady like you forges her own destiny regardless of what the cards say."

The countess scrutinized her for a moment. "So you don’t recommend that I summon her?"

"I did not say that. If you want to see some impressive artistry for your entertainment, by all means summon her, my Lady."

"Chiara, you too have the making of an illustrious lady. It is in your hands."

"Thank you, my Lady, for your trust."

She curtsied and kissed the outstretched hand of the countess.

* * * 

The players rushed up and surrounded her when she returned. She told them briefly parts of the conversation.

"Will you leave us now?" asked Jacomo with a worried face.

She knew that this was the question uppermost in everybody’s mind. "No, Jacomo, I Magnifici are my life. You people are my life. I will only be gone for a few days and then we will go back on the road and hopefully spend the worst of the winter in Siena. While I’m gone, you all take a deserved rest and, besides, there are a few things that need mending."

They nodded, all still a bit worried.

"Ah, I almost forgot. The Contessa has requested that we perform tomorrow. Lord d’Appiano and her entire retinue and I guess many other nobles will be there to watch us."

"Oh, I’ll die," whispered Veronica, while Jacomo exclaimed: "How exciting! I’ll have to think of some special
lazzi
."

"What you do is just fine," replied Alda. "It’s better to stick to what you know. Experiment another time, when the audience is less important."

"Yes, Jacomo. Alda is right," added Chiara.

He looked disappointed, but nodded.

* * * 

They set up their stage in front of Palazzo Del Monte. Piazza Grande was overflowing with people all the way up the steps to the cathedral. Chiara searched through the crowded windows of the palace. Several nobles were on the steps of its entrance. She spotted the countess in the middle window of the first storey, the girl Heloïse at her left, Lord d’Appiano at her right. Chiara pointed the window out to Veronica.

"When you make your collection, go first to that window and smile your finest smile. Do it for me."

The show started with the usual
arlecchino
lazzi
the crowd expected of any traveling group — always the same, but always different. They helped getting the people into the right mood. This time, he ran into the circle, stumbled, picked himself up by his pants, removed the imaginary obstacle, licking it — Jacomo had the longest tongue Chiara had ever seen — used both hands to lift his right foot stuck to the ground and rolled backward when he got it loose. When the crowd laughed, he looked around startled which earned him more laughter. Chiara cartwheeled in from the other side and let herself be chased by his amorous overtures, and she suspected that he was quite serious about some. He suddenly got distracted by a fly buzzing around him, while Chiara helped Pepe set up the wooden board. The latter practiced a few throws on the empty board, making a perfect cross. Then he took Chiara by the arm and pulled her to the board. Alda started drumming. The
arlecchino
abandoned his obstacle chase of the fly and dragged Chiara away with silent pleas not to do her act. He went down on his knees, reaching up with pleading hands, toppled forward on his face and found another distraction on the ground. Pepe again took Chiara back to her place and the whole scene repeated itself, until Chiara shook her head emphatically, sending
arlecchino
away, and he began weeping over her imaginary grave, while she dropped to her knees in pious prayer, beseeching the heavens to spare her, all done in silent pantomime.

At that point, an eerie silence took hold in the square, suddenly broken by Alda’s drumming which gradually increased to a frantic crescendo when Chiara took her place in front of the board. As abruptly as the drumming had started, it stopped, emphasizing the ensuing silence even more strongly. Pepe held up a handful of knives and turned in a circle, showing them to the spectators. His broad shoulders cut an impressive figure. He had his back to Chiara, when he rapidly turned around and almost at the same time launched his first knife. Many spectators screamed. One by one, with increasing speed, the knives embedded themselves around Chiara. After the last knife, the crowd exploded in cheers and clapping, both in recognition of Pepe’s skills and relieved that his target remained unhurt.

Chiara took a step forward, turned around, and began counting the knives stretching one finger at a time, making mistakes and having to restart several times. She ran across the stage to Pepe, while Jacomo stumbled forward, jubilant, presenting her a cheek, and then slunk back to the imaginary grave, sulking when instead she kissed Pepe on both cheeks to the renewed laughter and applause of the crowd.

Next she skipped like a young girl to the board and removed six knives. She threw three one by one to Pepe who was about ten paces away. Alda again started drumming. Facing each other, each juggled the three knives for a while and then one by one the knives started flying between them with two forming a high arc above the other four. After about a minute or two, they stopped and bowed deeply toward the windows of Palazzo Del Monte. The applause went on and on.

Veronica with her most charming smile went under the window of the countess who handed a heavy purse to Heloïse. The girl beamed, hopping in excitement, and dropped it to Veronica below. The latter bowed deeply to the renewed applause of the people.

As always, the two skits they performed were an anticlimax, although appreciated by the crowd. At the end, the whole troupe again bowed deeply to the nobles in Palazzo Del Monte.

Their total purse for the day added up to close to twenty florins, three quarters of which in gold coins. Jacomo and Veronica’s eyes almost popped from their face when they saw it.

* * * 

At dawn next day, Chiara rode up to Palazzo Benincasa, on her trusted mare and a second good riding horse, she and Pepe had bought the day before. It was a crisp morning. She wore a cloak over her boy’s outfit. A leather bag with women’s clothing, a solid cloth bag with food for the trip, another containing a mixture of grains for the horses, and a quiver of six arrows were attached to her saddle, while she carried the longbow on her back. In her belt stuck several throwing knives. Her hair fell loosely to her shoulders.

A middle-aged guardsman in light steel armor was waiting near the entrance. She greeted him.

"Good morning, boy," he replied, "have you been sent by Lady Chiara?"

"
Messer
Mercurio, this is Lady Chiara," a voice full of mirth rang from a window above.

He looked disconcerted at Chiara, then bowed deeply and said: "Lady, please accept my humble apologies."

"Good morning, Lady Maria," cried Chiara. "I hope I am not the cause for you rising so early."

"Oh yes, you are. I wanted to wish you a good journey. You were superb yesterday. We talked about nothing else for the rest of the day."

"Thank you, my Lady." She turned to the guardsman. "
Messer
Mercurio, no apology is needed, but where is your second horse?"

"Second horse? I don’t need a second horse. This is a sturdy beast."

"You will need a second horse to change regularly, or else I will leave you behind before the sun has reached its apex. I want to be in Grosseto by tomorrow night."

"My Lady, it will take us at least three days and that is cutting it fine."

"I assure you,
Messere
, that by tomorrow night I will ride through the gates of Grosseto. I also suggest that you leave your armor and lance here so that you do not tax your horses unnecessarily."

"Leave my armor and my lance? I would feel naked without them. How can I protect you if I’m vulnerable myself?"

"You will be little protection to me if I have to leave you behind."

She heard Lady Maria’s laughter.

"I warned you,
Messer
Mercurio. You are not dealing with one of my court ladies. I think you better do as Lady Chiara suggests."

"
Messer
Mercurio, let’s get you a spare horse. The stable boy can bring your armor and lance back to your quarters. Good-bye, Lady Maria."

"God be with you, my child."

Chiara did not wait for the guard’s answer and started riding out of the piazza to the stables below.

They took to the road at a swift pace, cantering whenever the terrain permitted it without danger to the horses or tiring them unduly. At the first steep uphill grade, Chiara dismounted and led her two horses on foot.

"Lady Chiara, it is safe to ride uphill, even this steep."

"I know,
Messere
, but I do not want to tire the horse unnecessarily and a bit of fast walking is good for body and mind."

He dismounted, grumbling to himself. At the top of the incline, they changed mounts and cantered downhill. Whenever he began slowing down, she forged ahead, forcing him to catch up. Past noon they crossed the Asso River at the foot of Mont Elcino. Chiara suggested that they take a short meal break and let the horses graze.

"
Messer
Mercurio, how are we doing?" she questioned as she spread out a selection of sausages, cheeses, and dark bread.

"Do you intend to keep up this pace?"

"Yes, at least today. We may have to take it a bit easier tomorrow if we don’t want to kill the horses."

"Then we should be in Grosseto by tomorrow," he admitted with visible reluctance. "We usually stay the night in Mont Elcino." He pointed to the hilltop town.

"Do we have to go up there? It seems a waste of time. Can’t we bypass it?"

"Unfortunately, we have to go almost to the top."

She noticed that he had dropped the previous formality and she was glad. When she slipped the longbow again over her torso before remounting, he looked at her skeptically and asked: "Do you always carry a bow and arrows?"

"Yes."

"They are not much use nowadays. They cannot penetrate modern armor or even the new type of chain mail."

"They may not be of much use in battle between soldiers, but they are ideal against bandits. You can let loose several in quick succession, not like with the crossbow where you only get one shot."

"But most bandits now also carry chain mail."

"Then you aim at unprotected parts, such as the face, the neck, the lower buttocks or thighs, or the flanks of their horses."

"But that needs top accuracy. I know few men who could do that."

"Maybe women have a steadier hand,
Messer
Mercurio," she laughed.

* * * 

Late afternoon they reached San Angelo in Colle.

"How far is the next town,
Messer
Mercurio?"

"Cinigiano? … At this pace close to four hours."

"So we may have to camp in the open tonight."

"There is a somewhat shady inn just across the ford of the Orcia. That’s halfway to Cinigiano."

"Then we should make it there before it gets dark. Would you like to take another break and eat something before we continue?"

He nodded and dismounted stiffly.
He’s not used to hard riding anymore,
she mused. Her acrobatics had toned her muscles, and she felt no more than a slight fatigue.

Just beyond San Angelo the road followed a tortuous path hugging the forested hillside. They dismounted for another steep incline, when they were suddenly confronted by four men.

One of them shouted: "Your money and valuables and we’ll spare your lives, resist and you’re dead."

He had hardly finished the sentence when a knife struck his face and he dropped his sword with a yell. A second later the fellow next to him collapsed to the ground with a groan. The other two now turned and ran, disappearing in the trees. Mercurio had just managed to pull his sword. Chiara could not quite suppress a smile when she saw the dumbfounded expression on his face.

The first man started running away too, the knife still stuck in his face.

"My knife! Stop, or you’ll have an arrow in your back," cried Chiara, while swinging the bow over her head and inserting an arrow. The man cast a look over his shoulder and came to an sudden halt. She walked up to him. He winced as she pulled the knife out and wiped the blade on his tunic. He was bleeding profusely, but she guessed that he would survive. He pressed both hands to his wounds and looked at her fearfully.

Mercurio was bending over the other one.

"Is he dead?" asked Chiara, hoping that it would not be so.

"No, I think you only knocked him out. The hilt must have hit him… When he wakes we will take both back to San Angelo."

Chiara looked around for the second knife and found it a few steps away. She stuck both again under her belt, saying at the same time: "I’m not going to waste precious time on those two. We’ll leave them to fend for themselves. Just relieve them of their weapons."

Mercurio only shook his head and said: "As you wish."

She picked up the sword of the first man. Its cheap blade was nicked at several places. She stuck it into the ground and bent it until it snapped. Then she threw the hilt with its stump into the undergrowth. Mercurio did the same to the other blade, still shaking his head while he did.

She took the bridles of her two horses and continued up the path, leaving the two bandits behind. The summit was only a short way off and soon they were riding downhill, cantering again when the road flattened. Darkness fell as they crossed the Orcia and saw a stone enclosure. The heavy wooden gate was already shut, but when they knocked, an old man opened it after a short wait. As Mercurio had warned, the inn, a single large room with a dirt-packed floor and a lean-to kitchen, smelled and looked dirty. After unsaddling the horses in the adjoining stable, Chiara asked the innkeeper to feed them hay and the grains she had taken along, but decided to supervise the old stable hand so he would not cheat. There were only a couple of other guests, two scruffy men in their twenties or thirties, who had already bedded down on a bit of old straw in the corner nearer to the door. She noticed that both watched their every move and occasionally murmured to each other.