Authors: Lisa Hilton
Addio was setting a green cap jauntily over one eye.
‘Well, mooncalf,’ he said. ‘You’re surely full of surprises.’
‘The way is too narrow. You won’t back the wagons through. We have to go forward, as fast as we can, to the river, away from the Signoria, to the Prato gate.’
‘Found our tongue, have we?’ But he was smiling, I could see he loved the thrill of it. He stood up at his full little height and yelled, ‘
Popolo! Liberta!
’ at the
top of his lungs as he brought the reins cracking down. I joined my voice to his, and that is how we left Florence, swinging through the streets at a canter, crying out in pretended joy.
*
By the time the little hunchback king rode into the Piazza Signoria with his lance on his hip, we were at Careggi. Quite recovered from his odd circus adventure, and much
restored by the safety of his
Pimander
, Maestro Ficino had directed the troupe to the Medici villa in the hills, a day’s journey from the city. We would be safe there, he said
reassuringly. Whatever was happening in Florence, the
contadini
of the Tuscan countryside loved their Medici masters.
He was wrong. We smelled the wet fug of burning wood before we saw what had become of the villa. No one came to challenge us as the wagons drew up in the courtyard. The body of the building
stood, charred and blackened, but one wing had collapsed and the high loggias, whose balconies I had seen in my dream, were buckled and sagging, their fine-wrought stonework swinging like laundry
where it had not already crashed to the walled garden below. They had been here, too.
Maestro Ficino rushed straight to the library to see what had become of the precious books, while Annunziata, Immaculata and I looked out what dry kindling we could find for a fire in the gaping
kitchen hearth. They had been very kind, asked me no questions, had not sought to discover what sorrow lay on me as we crawled through the dank bare landscape, but that night, when the beasts were
attended to and we had scraped up a soup of herbs and soaked black bread, they asked me what I would do.
‘You can come with us,’ said Addio. ‘We’ll go south. Get out of this damned damp. Maybe as far as Naples.’
‘The French will be there first,’ put in Gherardus.
‘And they’ll want entertaining, won’t they, the conquering heroes? We’ll be rich.’
‘You are welcome, Mora,’ added Immaculata gently. ‘Truly welcome.’
I thanked them, but I would not go. I was
esclava
. I could not risk them being charged with stealing Medici property. Wherever Piero was, I belonged legally to him. Besides, I would not
bring ill luck upon them, as I did all who tried to care for me. My mother had loved me, and I killed her with my arrival, my papa had loved me and died that I might keep my life. Margherita was
rotting in a cell, or starved to death for all I knew and Cecco – I could not think of Cecco . . . yet of course I thought of nothing else. How his knuckles inked his forehead when he sighed
over his work, his hand in mine in a bright spring street, the taste of ricotta and apple foam, the pride in his voice as he told me what it meant to be a Florentine. I bit my lip and gnawed at my
fingers until they bled to squash down the thoughts.
After the troupe had stayed a while, helping us to restore order in the tumbled rooms, gathering fuel and what poor supplies had been left, we said goodbye. I watched them on the road until they
vanished from sight, the draggled streamers on their wagons showing bravely. I had no stomach for an adventure on the road. I would stay and mind my master, who cared for nothing but his books, so
that I could not bring him harm.
*
The nobility of the famous republic dressed themselves as Frenchmen to greet Charles and the cries of ‘liberty’ were replaced in San Giovanni with ‘
Francia!
Francia!
’ They set fireworks to dazzle his bulging eyes and stilt-walking giants to muddle his big lolling head with all the refinements of the most civilized city in Italy. For all that
the city tried to turn this charade of welcome into reality, there were fights and woundings and rapes in the streets, and it was the French, they said, who had sacked the Medici palazzo, even as
the good Florentines surrounded it with guards and sent the clerks to make an inventory. All this we had in a letter from Signor Bibbiena, who was one of the clerks.
Maestro Ficino wrote to Cecco’s parents, to tell those poor people what had befallen their son. How he had been brave and loyal to the last, as though that could comfort them. He offered
me the letter, and a fresh pen to add my own words of condolence. I took it to my chamber, but I could not bring myself to write a word. Was I not the curse that had brought such terrible sorrow on
that simple cheerful home? I could not bear to imagine Signora Corsellini’s plain sweet face all crumpled with grief, or the dignified quiet with which his father would bear it; those
tumbling, happy children with their brother gone. I had seen how proud Cecco’s father had been of his son, the scholar, the hope of his family, who had died in a dream of faith to a man who
barely knew his name. It was my fault, my fault. I had boasted to Maestro Ficino that I had the sight, and I had not even been able to prevent Cecco’s death; we had been saved by fairground
tumbling, and the loud voice of a girl who had conned money from the credulous by feigning dumbness. Cecco had been my friend, my true friend, he had even kissed me, and I had not saved him. He had
died and I, who did not deserve it, lived.
I was glad that those first weeks were so hard, glad to have the ache of hunger always inside me, glad that after a day of hauling and fetching and cleaning I fell into a dreamless sleep in the
nest of rags I had huddled together for a bed. That we had nothing did not seem to trouble Maestro Ficino. He did not mind the biting chill, nor the sorry messes of flour cakes and rotten cheese I
scrambled together to feed us. By dint of an energy which surprised me in the old man, he made a snug place for himself in a little chamber off the library, where once I had rubbed the smoke stains
away we saw that the walls were all set with coloured stones, a bright spring landscape which contrasted sharply with the endless grey without. He scavenged amongst the emptied closets and toppled
cabinets and produced a collection of treasures. Such books as remained; a wonderful cup set in ivory, made of a single polished shell; a many-sided sundial in painted wood; an astrological chart
in gilded leather with an ebony rim which he told me was ancient work, Arabic work such as might have come from Toledo.
I cared nothing for it. I wished to learn nothing more from him. I wished only to make myself as numb as I had once been in the kitchens of the palazzo, and I wondered what had become of the
folk there, now they were fled, and often wished myself among them. Better that I had never been found, never been brought to the
scrittoio
, for then Cecco might have lived.
Maestro Ficino set himself to writing letters, searching out news of the family. He found a lad from the village along the hill to carry them and a nag to carry him. By and by, the people round
about sought to make amends for what had been done to the villa, or perhaps they were merely afraid of a time when Piero might come to his own again, for I began to find little offerings laid out
on the kitchen threshold, a few eggs, a loaf of new bread.
I thought it unlikely that Piero would ever return to Tuscany, even less so that he would remember his precious scholar lost in the countryside. He was at Bologna, he was at Venice, Donna
Alfonsina had torn the rings from her fingers to pay him an army, but the Medici jewels were locked up in the Signoria and the French had taken what the Florentines had overlooked. And when the
hunchback king marched on to Rome, God called on Savonarola, the monk of San Marco, to govern Florence, that it might be a righteous city, cleansed of the taint of the Medici tyrants. All this we
learned from the letters that trickled in from the Maestro’s correspondents all over Italy, but I paid scant attention.
To work and then to sleep and to bring no trouble was all I thought on.
CHAPTER NINE
T
HE DAYS WENT BY AND I BARELY SPOKE TO MY
master. I tied my head in a cloth and went to the woods each day. There were
mushrooms and garlic root for eating, and I found other things, some of which I had seen on my walks with my father. I gathered comfrey and alder to soothe the skin, dock and fern, radish root and
fennel bulb, rosemary and sage, hyssop and mint. I went down to the vegetable gardens and saw that they could still flourish, when the spring came, that there would be figs, perhaps white peaches
and rose petals for cordial. There was a fountain in the
cortile
, a naked boy holding a fish, where I gathered water lilies to stew the roots into a tea which staved away dreams. It gave me
a bitter smile to think that once I had sought refuge in sleep. I scoured out the larder and set my herbs to dry there, so that gradually their sweetness covered the lingering stench of smoke.
Careggi was more silent than a convent, but the peace did not soothe me. If I moved every moment I was awake, and swigged at my swamy tea like a
barbone
in a tavern, then I could check the
remorse; but in the few moments between lying down and the opiate’s curtain falling, my head was wild with ragged, unbearable screams.
A cart arrived, laden with boxes and bales of linen. Maestro Ficino came to me in the garden, his eyes dancing with excitement. I was prodding at the claggy yellow earth with a hoe, trying to
dig a runnel to plant cabbage seeds.
‘Ser Giovanni, he’s coming! Look, he has written, he says he is coming here, to Careggi.’
I remembered the young man at the ball, Piero’s cousin, who had betrayed him. I supposed he would be master here now.
‘Well, I hope he brings some supplies. There’s next to nothing for us, let alone a fine gentleman’s servants,’ I said sourly.
‘Yes, yes of course, Mora. I’m sure Ser Giovanni will set everything to rights. But do you not see? He is coming, he will bring books, instruments. It will be like the old days. I
shall go on with my work!’
I had heard plenty of the old days at Careggi, in the time of Piero’s father, when a whole academy of scholars filled the villa, where the talk was all of Plato and magic and the old
learning. I was sick of it.
‘I’m glad for you, sir, I’m sure,’ I answered, like a proper servant.
‘No, Mora, you do not see. There was not time in Florence, I found you too late. I told you I had brought you for a reason.’
He was moving towards me, with an odd look in his eyes.
‘What? What reason?’
His gaze moved along my body. I had put away my old draggled red dress, it was hardly decent and I feared to spoil it further. I wore a pair of breeches I had found in the stables and a torn
linen cloth tied about me like a shirt. The copper skin of my ankles showed above my boots.
‘I will explain everything to you, Mora. But first, if you would,’ his old voice grew wheedling, ‘we should go indoors. I would have you undress.’
I thought he had run mad. And then I thought I knew all about that, and there would be no yellow silk cushions stifling me this time. I picked up my hoe and held it in front of me.
‘For shame, sir! Do not come closer to me, or I shall strike you, I shall do it! And I’m sorry I saved you, I should have left you to burn.’
My eyes were brimming with hot tears, I could not believe that my quiet master should use me so. I was angry, so angry that I wanted to tear at him with my teeth. Maestro Ficino looked puzzled,
then he stepped back with his eyes full of pity.
‘You do not know? Mora, I am sorry. I had thought . . .’
‘Thought what?’ I yelled. ‘Thought what? You take me and you keep me like a fairground creature and I work for you and I understand nothing and Cecco, Cecco.’
I was weeping now, sobbing with fury, and he reached out a tentative hand and touched my shoulder.
‘I am truly sorry. Come, I mean you no harm, Mora. No harm. Come and I will explain to you.’
Warily, I followed him upstairs to his little library, still brandishing the hoe in front of me. Iron. Good for binding demons.
My father had known what I was. He had seen it in me, even when I was a tiny girl, Maestro Ficino said. I knew nothing as he had sought to protect me, but he had written of it, and his letters
had been copied to Ficino himself. He would have had me read them, had there been time, but they were lost now, trampled under some Gascon mercenary’s foot. My master said he had been
searching for me ever since the drawing of the Toledo angel had been seen in Italy.
‘The
Almandal
,’ I said, ‘I heard him speak of it. The man who came to buy me.’
‘Your father had very little time,’ Maestro Ficino replied, ‘but he knew what he was doing. The
Almandal
is ascribed to—’
‘—Solomon,’ I said wearily. I was tired of it, so tired of his mysteriousness, his belief in things which changed nothing. What stupid conjuring trick could bring Cecco
back?
‘Well done. For the invocation of angels, their names written with a silver stylus on a wax tablet. They manifest as children, in red garments, their hands blood red, crowned with
roses.’
‘So you know it was not real. Cecco thought—’
‘Poor Cecco. He was too young, he was not so learned as he liked to think, poor, poor lad. He told you I wanted to summon angels?’
‘Something like that.’
‘I sent for you, you and the books. But I was away at Pisa when you came and since you would not speak they could not make out who you were, they thought you were bought as a house
slave.’
‘And slaves are invisible.’
‘It is true, I should have taken more care to seek you out. But then I was so busy with my studies. It was not until Cecco saw you and recognised you as the wise woman’s
assistant—’
‘He told you that?’
‘But of course. Still, I needed to be sure. I had you speak with me, and it seemed to be so. Your father taught you much better than you think, Mora. I was ready, but
then—’