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I focused on the linen kerchief in my mother’s mouth – on her champing teeth, and the small specks of blood there – and on her jerking head, which I now held fast in my lap, so I was startled into fright when a stranger beside us began praying loudly, also in Latin.
I glanced up to see the black-frocked priest who had been tending the altar. He alternated between sprinkling my mother with liquid from a small vial and making the sign of the cross over her while he prayed.
At last the time came when my mother gave her final wrenching groan, then fell limp; her eyelids fluttered shut.
Beside me, the priest – a young red-haired man with florid, pock-marked skin – rose. ‘She is like the woman from whom Jesus cast out nine devils,’ he said with authority. ‘She is possessed.’
Sore and halting from the struggle, Zalumma nonetheless rose to her full height – a hand’s breadth taller than the priest – and glared at him. ‘It is a sickness,’ she said, ‘of which you know nothing.’
The young priest shrank, his tone now only faintly insistent. ‘It is the Devil.’
I glanced from the priest’s face to Zalumma’s stern expression. I was mature for my age and knew responsibility: my mother’s delicate health had forced me to act as mistress of the household many times, playing hostess to guests, accompanying my father in her place on social occasions, and for the last three years I had gone with Zalumma to the market in my mother’s place. But I was young in terms of my knowledge of the world, and of God. I was still undecided as to whether God was punishing her for some early sin, and whether her fits were indeed of sinister origin. But I knew only that I loved her, pitied her, and disliked the priest’s condescension.
Zalumma’s white cheeks turned shell pink. I knew her well: a scathing reply had formed in her mind, and teetered upon her rouged lips, but she checked it. She had need of the priest.
Her manner turned abruptly unctuous. ‘I am a poor slave, with no right to contradict a learned man, Father. Here, we must get my mistress to the carriage. Will you help us?’
The priest looked on her with justifiable suspicion, but he could not refuse. And so I ran to find our driver; when he had brought the carriage round to the front of the cathedral, he and the priest carried my mother to it.
Exhausted, she slept with her head cradled in Zalumma’s lap; I held her legs. We rode home directly back over the Ponte Santa Trinita, a homely stone bridge which housed no shops.
Our palazzo on the Via Maggio was neither large nor ostentatious, though my father could have afforded to adorn the house more. It had been built a century before by his great-great-grandfather from plain pietra serena, an expensive, but subtle grey stone. My father had made no additions, added no statuary, nor replaced the plain, worn floors or the scarred doors; he eschewed unnecessary adornment. We rode inside the gate, then Zalumma and the driver lifted my mother from the carriage.
To our horror, my father Antonio stood watching in the loggia.
XII (#ulink_972cc2d8-a013-51fc-970f-f9bb8b6454aa)
My father had returned early. Dressed in his usual dark farsetto, a crimson mantle and black leggings, he stood with his arms crossed at the entry to the loggia so that he would not miss us. He was a sharp-featured man, with golden brown hair that grew in darker at the crown, a narrow hooked nose, and thunderous eyebrows above pale amber eyes. His disregard for fashion showed in his face; he wore a full beard and moustache at a time when it was common for men to be clean-shaven or wear a neat goatee.
Yet, ironically, no one knew more about Florence’s current styles and cravings. My father owned a bottega in the Santa Croce district, near the ancient Wool Guild, the Arte de Lana. He specialized in supplying the very finest wools to the city’s wealthiest families. He often went to the Medici palazzo on the Via Larga, his carriage heavy with plush fabrics coloured with chermisi, the most expensive of dyes made from the dried carcasses of lice, which produced the most exquisite crimson, and alessandrino, a costly and beautiful deep blue.
Sometimes I rode with my father and waited in the carriage while he met with his most important clients at their palazzi. I enjoyed the rides, and he seemed to enjoy sharing the details of his business, speaking to me as if I were his equal; at times, I felt guilty because I was not a son who could take over the family trade. I was his sole heir, and a girl. God had frowned upon my parents, and it was taken for granted that my mother and her fits were to blame.
And now there was no hiding the fact that our secret escapade had just caused her to suffer another one.
My father was, for the most part, a self-possessed man. But certain things goaded him – my mother’s condition was one of them – and it could induce an uncontrollable rage. As I crawled from the carriage to walk behind Zalumma and the others, I saw the danger in his eye and looked guiltily away.
For the moment, love of my mother took precedence over my father’s anger. He ran to us and took Zalumma’s place, catching hold of my mother tenderly. Together, he and the driver carried her into the house; as they did, he glanced over his shoulder at Zalumma and me. He kept his tone low so it would not distress my semi-conscious mother, but I could hear the anger coiled in it, waiting to lash out.
‘You women will see her to bed, then I will have words with you.’
This was the worst possible outcome. Had my mother not succumbed to a fit, we could have argued that she had been too long housebound, and deserved the outing. But I was overwhelmed by a sense of responsibility for all that had happened, and was ready to submit to a well-deserved tirade. My mother had taken me into the city because she delighted in me, and wished to please me by showing me the city’s treasures. My father could never be bothered; he scorned the Duomo, calling it ‘ill-conceived’, and said that our church at Santo Spirito was good enough for us.
So my father carried Mother up to her bed. I closed the shutters to block out the sun, then helped Zalumma undress her down to her camicia, made of embroidered white silk, so fine and thin it could scarce be called cloth. Once that was done, and Zalumma was certain my mother was sleeping comfortably, we stepped quietly out into her antechamber and closed the door behind us.
My father was waiting for us. His arms were again folded against his chest, his lightly freckled cheeks flushed; his gaze could have withered the freshest rose.
Zalumma did not cower. She faced him directly, her manner courteous but not servile, and waited for him to speak first.
His tone was low but faintly atremble. ‘You knew of the danger to her. You knew, and yet you let her leave the house. What kind of loyalty is this? What shall we do if she dies?’
Zalumma’s tone was perfectly calm, her manner respectful. ‘She will not die, Ser Antonio; the fit has passed and she is sleeping. But you are right; I am at fault. Without my help, she could not have gone.’
‘I shall sell you!’ My father’s tone slowly rose. ‘Sell you, and buy a more responsible slave!’
Zalumma lowered her eyelids; I saw the muscles in her jaw clench with the effort of holding words back. I could imagine what they were. I am the lady’s slave, from her father’s household; I was hers before we ever set eyes on you, and hers alone to sell. But she said nothing. We all knew that my father loved my mother, and my mother loved Zalumma. He would never sell her.
‘Go,’ my father said. ‘Get downstairs.’
Zalumma hesitated an instant; she did not want to leave my mother alone, but the master had spoken. She passed by us, her skirts sweeping against the stone floor. My father and I were alone.
I lifted my chin, instinctively defiant. I had been born so; my father and I were evenly matched in terms of temper.
‘You were behind this,’ he said; his cheeks grew even more crimson. ‘You, with your notions. Your mother did this to please you.’
‘Yes, I was behind it.’ My own voice trembled, which annoyed me; I fought to steady it. ‘Mother did this just to please me. Do you think I am happy that she had a spell? She has gone out before without incident. Do you think I meant for this to happen?’
He shook his head. ‘A girl so young, so full of such brazen disrespect. Listen to me: You will stay at home, by your mother’s side, all week. You are not to go to Mass or market. Do you not know how serious this offence is? Do you not know how terrified I was, to come home and find her gone? Do you not feel at all ashamed that your selfishness has hurt your mother so? Or do you care nothing for her life?’
His tone steadily rose throughout his discourse, so that by its end, he was shouting at me.
‘Of course—’ I began, but broke off as my mother’s door opened, and she appeared in the doorway.
Both my father and I were startled and turned to look at her. She looked like a wraith, clutching the doorjamb to keep her balance, her eyes heavy-lidded with exhaustion. Zalumma had taken down her hair, and it spilled darkly over her shoulders, her bosom and down to her waist; she wore nothing but the billowing camicia, with its long, puffed sleeves.
She spoke in nothing more than a whisper, but the emotion in it could be clearly heard. ‘Leave her be. This was my idea, all of it. If you must shout, shout at me.’
‘You mustn’t be up,’ I said, but my words were drowned out by my father’s angry voice.
‘How could you do such a thing when you know it is dangerous? Why must you frighten me so, Lucrezia? You might have died!’
My mother gazed on him with haggard eyes. ‘I am tired. Tired of this house, of this life. I don’t care if I die. I want to go out, as normal folk do. I want to live as any normal woman does.’
She would have said more, but my father interrupted. ‘God forgive you for speaking so lightly of death. It is His will that you live so, His judgment. You should accept it meekly.’
I had never heard venom in my gentle mother’s tone, had never seen her sneer. But that day, I heard and saw both.
Her lip tugged at one corner. ‘Do not mock God, Antonio, when we both know the truth of it.’
He moved swiftly, blindingly, to strike her; she shrank backwards.
I moved just as quickly to intervene. I pummelled my father’s shoulders, forcing him away from her. ‘How dare you!’ I cried. ‘How dare you! She is kind and good – everything you are not!’
His pale golden eyes were wide, bright with rage. He struck out with the back of his hand; I fell back, startled to find myself sitting on the floor.
He swept from the room. As he did, I looked frantically about for something to hurl after him; but all I had was the cape still about my shoulders, a gift from him of heavy alessandrino blue wool.
I bunched it in my hands and threw it, but it went scarcely farther than an arm’s length before dropping silently to the floor – a vain gesture.
And then I came to myself and ran into my mother’s room to find her on her knees beside the bed. I helped her up into it, covered her with a blanket, and held her hand while she – once again half asleep – wept softly.
‘Hush,’ I told her. ‘We didn’t mean it. And we will make amends.’
She reached up blindly, looking for my hand; I clasped hers. ‘It all repeats,’ she moaned, and her eyes at last closed. ‘It all repeats …’
‘Hush now,’ I said, ‘and sleep.’
XIII (#ulink_c9fe2b65-843a-53c3-b806-9bb996d09e1c)
I sat at my mother’s bedside the rest of the day. When the sun began to set, I lit a taper and remained. A servant came bearing my father’s request that I come down and sup with him; I refused. I did not want to be reconciled yet.
But as I sat in the darkness watching my mother’s profile in the candleglow, I felt a stirring of regret. I was no better than my father; out of love and a desire to protect her, I had permitted my rage to overtake me. When my father had lifted his hand, threatening her – though I did not believe he would actually strike her – I had struck him, and not once, but several times. This, even though I knew our fighting broke my mother’s heart. I was a bad daughter. One of the worst, for I was vengeful and plotted against those who harmed the people I loved. When I was ten, we had a new servant, Evangelia, a stocky woman with black hairs on her chin and a broad red face. When she first witnessed one of my mother’s fits, she proclaimed – like the priest in the Duomo – that my mother was possessed of the Devil and needed prayer.
That claim alone would not have provoked my hatred, only my dislike: as I said, I was still undecided as to whether it was true, but I knew such statements embarrassed and hurt my mother. But Evangelia would not let the matter rest. Whenever she was in the same room as my mother, she crossed herself and made the sign to avert the evil eye – two fingers pointing outward in a vee at the level of her own eyes. She began to wear a charm in a pouch hung round her neck, then at last did the unforgivable: she left a second charm hanging from my mother’s door. It was supposedly to keep my mother confined to her room; when other servants confessed the truth of it, my mother wept. But she was too kind and ashamed to say anything to Evangelia.
I took matters into my own hands; I would not tolerate anyone who made my mother cry. I stole into my mother’s room and took her finest ring, a large ruby set in delicately crafted gold, a wedding-gift from my father.
I hid it within Evangelia’s belongings, then waited. The predictable occurred: the ring was found, to everyone’s horror – especially Evangelia’s. My father dismissed her at once.
At first I felt a sense of satisfaction: justice had been served, and my mother would no longer weep with shame. But after a few days, my conscience began to pain me. Most of Florence knew of Evangelia’s supposed crime, and she was widowed with a small daughter. No family would hire her. How would she survive?
I confessed my sin to the priest and to God: neither brought relief. At last I went to my mother and tearfully told her the truth. She was stern and told me outright what I already knew – that I had ruined a woman’s life. To my relief, she did not tell the full truth to my father, only that a terrible mistake had been made. She begged him to find Evangelia and bring her back, so that her name might be cleared.
But my father’s efforts were futile. Evangelia had already left Florence, unable to find employment.
I lived from then on with the guilt. And as I sat watching my sleeping mother that night, I remembered all the angry outbursts of my youth, every vengeful act I had ever committed. There were many; and I prayed to God, the God who loved my mother and did not want her stricken with fits, to relieve me of my dreadful temper. My eyes filled; I knew my father and I added to my mother’s suffering every time we fought.
As the first tear spilled onto my cheek, my mother stirred in her sleep and murmured something unintelligible. I put a gentle hand on her arm. ‘It’s all right. I am here.’
The instant I uttered the words, the door opened softly. I glanced up to see Zalumma, a goblet in her hand. She had removed her cap and scarf, and plaited her wild hair, but a halo of untamed curls still framed her white face.
‘I brought a draught,’ she said quietly. ‘When your mother wakes, this will let her sleep through the night.’
I nodded and tried to wipe my damp cheek casually, hoping Zalumma would not notice as she set the goblet beside my mother’s bed.
Of course she noticed everything, even though she had her back to me. As she turned, with her voice still low, she said, ‘You mustn’t cry.’
‘But it’s my fault.’
Zalumma flared. ‘It’s not your fault. It’s never been your fault.’ She sighed bitterly as she looked down on her sleeping mistress. ‘What the priest in the Duomo said—’
I leaned forward, eager to hear her opinion. ‘Yes?’
‘It is vileness. It is ignorance, you understand? Your mother is the truest Christian I know.’ She paused. ‘When I was a very young girl …’
‘When you lived in the mountains?’
‘Yes, when I lived in the mountains. I had a brother. Closer to me than a brother; he was my twin.’ She smiled with affection at the memory. ‘Headstrong and full of mischief he was, always making our mother wring her hands. And I was always helping him.’ The faint, wry smile faded at once. ‘One day he climbed a very tall tree. He wanted to reach the sky, he said. I followed him up as far as I could, but he climbed so high that I grew frightened, and stopped. He crawled out onto a limb …’ There was the slightest catch in her voice; she paused, then resumed calmly. ‘Too far. And he fell.’
I straightened in my chair, aghast. ‘Did he die?’
‘We thought he would; he had cracked his head and it bled terribly, all over my apron. When he was better and could walk, we went outside to play. But before we went too far, he fell, and began to shake, just as your mother does. Afterwards, he could not speak for a while, and slept. Then he was better again until the next time.’
‘Just like Mother.’ I paused. ‘Did the fits … did they ever … did he …?’
‘Did the fits kill him? No. I don’t know what became of him after we were separated.’ Zalumma eyed me, trying to judge whether I had grasped the point of her tale. ‘My brother never had fits before he hurt his head. His fits came after his injury. His fits came because of his injury.’
‘So … Mother has struck her head?’
Zalumma averted her gaze a bit – perhaps she was only telling a story, calculated to soothe me – but she nodded. ‘I believe so. Now … Do you think God pushed a little boy from a tree to punish him for his sins? Or do you think he was so craven that the Devil possessed him, and caused him to leap?’
‘No, of course not.’
‘There are people who would disagree with you. But I knew my brother’s heart, and I know your mother’s; and I know that God would never be so cruel, nor allow the Devil to rest in such sweet souls.’
The instant Zalumma said it, my doubts about the matter vanished. Despite what Evangelia or the priest said, my mother was not a host to demons. She attended Mass daily at our private chapel; she prayed constantly and had a shrine to the Virgin of the Flower – the lily, symbol of resurrection and of Florence – in her room. She was generous to the poor and never spoke ill of anyone. To my mind, she was as holy as any saint. The revelation gave me great relief.
But one thing still troubled me.
There is murder here, and thoughts of murder. Plots within plots once more.
I could not forget what the astrologer had told me two years earlier: that I was surrounded by deceit, doomed to finish a bloody deed others had begun.
It all repeats.
‘The strange things Mother cries out,’ I said. ‘Did your brother do that, too?’
Zalumma’s fine porcelain features reflected hesitation; at last she yielded to the truth. ‘No. She spoke of those things before the fits came, since she was a girl. She … she sees and knows things that are hidden from the rest of us. Many of the things she has said have come to pass. I think God has touched her, given her a gift.’
Murder, and thoughts of murder. This time, I did not want to believe what Zalumma said, and so I decided that, in this case, she was being superstitious. ‘Thank you,’ I told her. ‘I will remember what you have said.’
She smiled and leaned down to put an arm around my shoulder. ‘No more vigil; it’s my turn now. Go and get something to eat.’
I looked past her at my mother, uncertain. I still felt responsible for what had happened that morning.
‘Go,’ Zalumma said, in a tone that allowed no argument. ‘I’ll sit with her now.’
So I rose and left them – but I did not go in search of the cook. Instead, I went downstairs with the intent of going to pray. I wandered outside into the rear courtyard and garden. Just beyond them, in a small separate structure, lay our chapel. The night was bitter cold, the sky clouded and moonless, but I carried a lamp so that I would not stumble over my skirts or a stepping-stone.
I opened the chapel’s heavy wooden door and slipped inside. The interior was dark and gloomy, lit only by the votives flickering in front of the small paintings of our family’s patron saints: the woolly John the Baptist in honour of Florence; the Virgin of the Lily, my mother’s favourite; Santa Maria del Fiore, for whom the Duomo was named; and my father’s namesake, St. Anthony, who bore the Christ-child in his arms.
Most private Florentine families’ chapels were decorated with large murals, often portraying members as saints or Madonnas. Ours lacked such embellishment, save for the paintings of the three saints. Our grandest adornment was suspended over the altar: a large wooden statue of the crucified Christ, his expression as haunted and mournful as that of the aged, repentant Magdalen in the Duomo’s Baptistery.
As I entered, I heard a soft, low moaning. And as I lifted the lamp towards the noise, I saw a dark figure kneeling at the altar railing. My father was praying earnestly, his forehead pressed hard against the knuckles of his tightly folded hands.
I knelt beside him. He turned towards me; the lamplight glittered off the unshed tears in his amber eyes, eyes full of misery and remorse.
‘Daughter, forgive me,’ he said.
