Leonardo's Swans (4 page)

Oh, he was perfect! At the Christmas pageants, for which people came from all over Italy, he sat next to the duke at each performance, complimenting him on his devotion to reviving the theater. To please the clergy, Ercole always staged a religious tableau or two so they wouldn’t complain about his more pagan theatrical endeavors. This year, Ercole chose the Annunciation for the opening pageant, in which a bold player wearing angel wings flew onstage on ropes to announce the Virgin’s fate. The following evening they witnessed a reenactment of the birth of Christ in a manger. The court artists had filled the stage with real barnyard animals, and at times the bleating goats drowned out the players’ words. Still everyone agreed that this did not distract from the drama of the tableau, but added realism, since such animals were undoubtedly present at Our Lord’s birth.

After Christmas, and to celebrate the New Year of 1490 as well as the beginning of a new decade, the duke let loose his passion for the sort of theatrical presentations he loved. In the old Palazzo della Ragione, remodeled into a theater, he presented ancient Latin comedies which he himself translated into Italian, hiring actors, dancers, and musicians from all over Italy. He collaborated with Niccolò da Correggio on a new version of Ovid’s
Metamorphoses
, a lavish production with music, dance, and recitation. Francesco sat with the duke during the performance, gasping in awe at how convincing the actors were in both behavior and costume as the gods of old, thus proving himself a worthy son-in-law.

Isabella did see her betrothed making flirtatious conversation with some of the ladies of the court, which she did not like at all. She had thought that this enticing demeanor of his had been her private reserve. But her fiancé had charm to spare, and virility too, and someday, she reminded herself, she would be the happy recipient of all of that. In the meanwhile, her mother, Leonora, counseled her that a woman must always forgive her husband any indulgences before the marriage. For it was natural for an unmarried man to give in to these urges. And besides, it did not do for two innocents to tumble into bed together after a wedding and have to figure out the entire map of lovemaking. If he carried these proclivities into the marriage, well, a woman could choose to rebel and demand fidelity, or to adjust and remain silent. Either way, the outcome would probably be the same. The man would do whatever he wished, quietly or openly, for that was the nature of men. Some Italian women were getting just as bad, but thanks to Our Lord and her own good discipline, Leonora was certain her daughters would not join the ranks of the promiscuous. The women of the House of Este must be above these things.

“S
O
if Ludovico Sforza had been less interested in making mischief in Milan and more interested in arranging a good marriage for himself, I would be taking home the portrait of Beatrice? Is that what you are telling me?” Francesco smiles naughtily as his valet shakes out the thick muslin he will use to wrap the painting of Isabella.

“That is correct,” she says as she watches her image disappear behind the heavy white cloth. “The court records show that there were a mere thirty days between the arrival of the ambassador from Mantua and the arrival of the ambassador of Milan.”

“Then your family concluded the business of our marriage rather quickly. Perhaps they were afraid you would receive no more offers,” he teased.

“Sir!” she exclaims. Might he really believe that? “Have you so little regard for me?”

Francesco quickly takes her aside, away from the ears of his servants. “It was God Himself pushing your father to hurry because He ordained this union from Heaven. You are not meant for Ludovico of Milan or anyone else, but me. That is what our marriage is going to be, Isabella. Heaven.”

How does he always know exactly what to say to please her? He is right; marriage with any other man is unthinkable. How grateful she is that she will spend her life with the man she loves while her sister must go live in the strange city of Milan in a huge fortress where her husband pleasures himself with the company of other women.

“What about you, my dear Isabella? Do you not wish the ambassador from Mantua had slipped from his horse, or had run into terrible weather or a band of thieves or something else to detain him so that you would be going to Ludovico? He intends to rule a great portion of the European continent, you know.”

“Oh, how can you suggest that? Ludovico is old and terrible! He has no interest in marriage. Beatrice’s portrait will probably be eaten by worms before he sends someone to collect it!” She leans as close to her fiancé as she dares to share her secret. “It is very bad, sir, what has happened. Please do not betray my confidence. My father had no higher wish than to marry his daughters in a double wedding, but Ludovico refused, making some excuse for why he could not marry next year. Messer Trotti, our ambassador to Milan, has pushed him as hard as he dares to set a firm date into the future, but Ludovico will not! They say he is in love with a woman named Cecilia, who is very beautiful, and that he holds her up as a wife in his court. But her family is of no use to him politically, and therefore he cannot marry her. My poor sister! Do you think I would trade places with her?”

Francesco does not seem at all surprised by this news, gossip in Italy being impossible to suppress. Perhaps the entire country knows of Ludovico’s slight to Beatrice and to the Este family. Francesco does, however, take advantage of being this close to his beloved with no eyes upon them. He moves his lips to her neck. He doesn’t kiss her exactly, but takes in a deep breath, as if he wishes to carry her scent with him back to Mantua. He runs his nose the length of her neck from the bottom of her ear to the nape, breathing her in. Then, he pulls away, whispering, “That will have to linger in our memories until our wedding day.”

While she is still recovering, she realizes that he and his valet and her portrait are gone, and she will not see him again for three months.

To: Ludovico Sforza, Duke of Bari, Regent of Milan

From: Leonardo the Florentine, Master of Engineering, Weaponry, and Painting

Most Illustrious Lord,

Having now seen the creations of all those who call themselves masters and inventors of the instruments of war, and finding that these inventions are no greater in any respect than those in common use, I am emboldened to write to you to acquaint you with my secrets, and offer to demonstrate at any convenient time all those assertions which are recorded below:

1. I have designs for bridges that are light, strong, and easily carried to pursue and defeat the enemy. I also have plans for destroying the enemy’s bridges and siege equipment.

2. I know how to cut off water from trenches, and how to construct an infinite number of movable shelters, scaling ladders, and other instruments crucial to the enterprise of a siege.

3. I have plans for destroying every fortress or other stronghold unless it has been founded upon rock.

4. I have designs for making cannon, very convenient and easy to transport, with which to hurl small stones like a rain of hail, causing great terror, loss, and confusion to the enemy.

5. I can make armored vehicles, safe and unassailable, which will infiltrate the ranks of the enemy.

6. I can make cannon, mortars, and light ordnance of very beautiful and useful shapes, quite different from those already in use.

7. I can supply catapults and other engines of wonderful efficacy for slinging great stones and other instruments of destruction.

8. Also, in times of peace, I will prove myself as adept as anyone else in architecture and in the construction of buildings, and in conducting water from one place to another.

9. I can execute sculpture in marble, bronze, or clay, and also painting, in which my work will stand comparison with anyone else, whoever he may be.

10. Finally, I would undertake the work of making the bronze horse, which shall honor the memory of your father and the illustrious House of Sforza.

If any of the aforesaid claims seem impossible, I offer myself as ready to demonstrate them in whatever place shall please Your Excellency, to whom I humbly commend myself.

—Leonardo the Florentine, 1483

THE NEW YEAR, 1490; IN THE CITY OF FERRARA

B
EATRICE
’
S
portrait sits alone for weeks in Leonora’s studiolo, and the family practically goes mad trying not to mention it. Isabella takes pity on Beatrice and asks Niccolò da Correggio to set some of his sonnets to song so that she might sing them for her sister and cheer her up. That the poet Niccolò is hopelessly in love with Isabella and carries out her every wish as if she were doing him the favor by asking is common knowledge. He has now set fifteen sonnets to the lute. Every evening after dinner, Isabella plays one or two for her sister, followed by a game of cards, at which Beatrice excels. Isabella either lets Beatrice win, or Beatrice wins fairly, and then Isabella rushes to her room, where she can enjoy in privacy the memory of Francesco’s breath on her neck.

When she becomes bored with entertaining Beatrice, she sends her pet dwarf, Mathilda, to make Beatrice laugh by lifting up her skirts and chasing Beatrice’s greyhound puppy around the room, shooting little squirts of pee in his direction. Mathilda reports that Beatrice has laughed at no jokes, but cannot stifle her delight at this routine. “I ran after that little dog ’til I was bone dry and out of breath. The princess finally passed out on her bed, and the servants had to come in and clean so she wouldn’t have to wake up to the stink of piss, God bless her little soul.”

Isabella has also become very devout in recent weeks, attending Mass daily, much to her mother’s happy surprise. She does not reveal the reason, but it is this: she gives thanks to God for the celestial secretary who arranged the schedules of all parties so that Francesco Gonzaga’s ambassador from Mantua arrived in the nick of time to save her from a betrothal to Ludovico, who would have humiliated her as he is doing to her sister.

Isabella knows that Beatrice inquires daily whether their father has received correspondence from Ambassador Trotti in Milan. Finally, on one of the frigid, last days of January, Trotti returns from Milan, and asks for an immediate audience with the duke and his family.

The family, minus the three little brothers, Alfonso, Ferrante, and Ippolito, who are already sent to bed, gather in the small drawing room that is easiest to warm to a crisp by its large fireplace. The ceiling is not so very high, and the room has an intimate feel, conducive for spilling gossip, for that was the main product that the Ferrarese ambassadors brought back from their missions.

Trotti is as puffed up as a pig’s bladder with his news. Impatient to get through the small talk and the niceties, he turns to Duke Ercole. “Your Excellency, how I wish you had been there to see it! It was the most magnificent spectacle in the world. All of Italy is talking of it.”

The family looks at him mutely.

“So, you have
not
heard?”

No one says a word. Ercole and Leonora, practiced at receiving the most devastating news without reaction, remain as inscrutable as ever while Isabella guesses that Trotti will announce some magnificent ceremony at which Ludovico has married his mistress after all. Beatrice anticipates his words like a poor starved dog waiting outside a tavern for scraps.

“The Masque of the Planets? The Feast of Paradise?” Trotti looks at them as if their very knowledge of the Italian language is in question. “Don’t be surprised if you soon receive dozens of letters describing the wonders. It was the most magical, spectacular thing I have ever witnessed, and all designed by the painter and engineer Leonardo the Florentine. Picture this: a gigantic dome built under the ceiling of a great hall. All night long, there was music and dancing and processions of gigantic murals of Italy’s most glorious battles, from the days of the Romans all the way to the days of Ludovico’s father’s great victories for Milan. The scenes were so detailed and so gloriously violent, I felt as if I was thrown into the midst of battle.