The Daughter of Siena (24 page)
The Giraffe
A
t the top of a high tower in his
palazzo
in the Giraffa
contrada
, someone else had his head in a book. Francesco Maria Conti, cousin to the pope himself and Violante’s chief councillor, was engaged in doing something rather less than statesmanlike. He was poring over his scientific journals, journals by scientific luminaries such as Newton and Galileo. Luckily he was already interested in such things; gravitation, weight ratios, the behaviour of the spheres, magnetism and the interaction of materials were his pet hobbies. Today he was using these lofty theories to lowly ends: he was finding out how to cheat. His task was both simple and fiendishly complicated – he was attempting to rig the horse draw.
t the top of a high tower in his
palazzo
in the Giraffa
contrada
, someone else had his head in a book. Francesco Maria Conti, cousin to the pope himself and Violante’s chief councillor, was engaged in doing something rather less than statesmanlike. He was poring over his scientific journals, journals by scientific luminaries such as Newton and Galileo. Luckily he was already interested in such things; gravitation, weight ratios, the behaviour of the spheres, magnetism and the interaction of materials were his pet hobbies. Today he was using these lofty theories to lowly ends: he was finding out how to cheat. His task was both simple and fiendishly complicated – he was attempting to rig the horse draw.
The ten horses and riders for the Palios of Siena were chosen by the falling of black-and-white balls through a wooden mechanism. The weight and diameter of all the balls, with the riders chalked or written on them, were usually exactly the same. This
time they must be different. He had to match certain riders to certain horses or else all was lost. Francesco Maria Conti was not worried, though. He was a confident and accomplished man. He also had a certain advantage. He had a prototype. His cousin, Pope Innocent XIII, had sent a runner from Rome with a velvet bag; within was a collection of balls with which the conclave voted for their college of cardinals. At the last election Pope Innocent, formerly known as the more common-or-garden Michelangelo Conti, had had these election balls made and specifically weighted in order to keep out the cardinals of his hated rival faction, the Farnese, to whom the Conti had lost vital papal states in the recent Wars of Succession. It had worked; the Farnese were a spent force. For now at least.
time they must be different. He had to match certain riders to certain horses or else all was lost. Francesco Maria Conti was not worried, though. He was a confident and accomplished man. He also had a certain advantage. He had a prototype. His cousin, Pope Innocent XIII, had sent a runner from Rome with a velvet bag; within was a collection of balls with which the conclave voted for their college of cardinals. At the last election Pope Innocent, formerly known as the more common-or-garden Michelangelo Conti, had had these election balls made and specifically weighted in order to keep out the cardinals of his hated rival faction, the Farnese, to whom the Conti had lost vital papal states in the recent Wars of Succession. It had worked; the Farnese were a spent force. For now at least.
Francesco Maria Conti shook the little balls on to the table and lined up his callipers, paints, polishes and wood-shaving tools. He readied a pile of small lead musket balls for the crucible. He lit his burner but before he began to melt the lead, he used the flame to burn the note that had come with the velvet bag. He read the words as the flame darkened, then consumed them.
‘Cousin, I will send one of my trusted cardinals to your colloquy Friday next, at nine of the clock. He will be bearing my ring. M.C.’
When the note was ash Francesco Maria Conti fixed his glasses to his nose and dropped the musket balls into the crucible. While he waited for the lead to blister and bubble, he decided to look through the fine brass and wood telescope that protruded from the window of his high tower atop the Giraffa
palazzo
. The scope itself, which had once belonged to Galileo, poked out of the high casement, giving the tower, in the twilight, the silhouette of a giraffe.
palazzo
. The scope itself, which had once belonged to Galileo, poked out of the high casement, giving the tower, in the twilight, the silhouette of a giraffe.
Conti was pleased by the symmetry of ideas and remembered a tale he had once heard of the giraffe that Lorenzo de’ Medici once procured from the sultan of Egypt, in return for Medici alliance against the Ottomans. The giraffe was an immediate sensation when it arrived in Florence but shortly after its arrival its head became stuck in the beams of its stable and it broke its neck and died. Francesco Maria Conti, despite his scientific pretensions, held the deep-seated belief in omens shared by all Sienese. For this reason he had arranged for a donkey to be cast over the Camollia gate. And for this reason, he smiled when he remembered the story of the Medici giraffe. He hoped it was a harbinger of the family’s doom.
On her first evening in the castle of the Eagles in the Maremma, Pia of the Tolomei felt confident enough to go down to the stables to visit Guinevere.
That she was not, it seemed, to be a prisoner had much to do with her father-in-law, who had arrived in time for dinner. That fate that she had most feared – to be locked in a dripping cell with no light nor company but the spectre of death like the first Pia – was not to be hers.
In fact Faustino seemed almost pleased with her; she had played her part admirably and he was very satisfied with the way the day had gone. He seemed not at all put out that Pia knew he had engineered for Nello to catch her with Signor Bruni, and his benign smile seemed to be protecting her from Nello’s wrath. Her husband ate nothing, the corrosive hatred in his belly clearly allowing no
appetite nor room for food. He drank, though, heavily and in silence.
appetite nor room for food. He drank, though, heavily and in silence.
She was not even afraid in her father-in-law’s company, merely sorry. She was not sorry for the kiss, for if she was never kissed like that again, it had been worth it. But she was so sorry that they had been foolish enough to dance to Faustino’s tune, and even sorrier that her lessons with Signor Bruni were now over. They could take her tutor away, but they could not erase what he had taught her – she could now ride, far and fast. But she did need a mount if she was to escape as she had planned. Nello, she noted, was not to be sharing her chamber for now, and she suspected that she had been right about him: that he would not do so until after the Palio was safely won. He would keep whatever malign essences lived within his body – his anger, his lusts – locked up inside him to pour into the Titans’ race.
Almost as heartening was the fact that Nicoletta had been left in Siena. This was fortunate, for she would never have been able to escape under her maid’s beady eye. And escape was now her only option: after the Palio, she must be gone, or be claimed by Nello.
Before this week, she would have felt no sorrow at the prospect of running away. Then, there had been nothing in the city that she would miss. Now, there was. And yet to stay would be hopeless too. That kiss could not be a beginning, so it must be an end. And so, taking a hurricane lamp, Pia trod quietly down to the stables.
As she lifted the latch she saw Guinevere’s dappled hindquarters almost at once in the warm circle of light.
She laid her hands on the little horse and was rewarded with a whinny of recognition. She hung the lamp on a curled iron hook and moved to the palfrey’s head. She stroked and kissed the horse tenderly, wrapping her arms around the pretty head, resting her cheek on the warm, silky neck. Guinevere seemed so warm and solid and reassuring, and also the nearest thing in this world to Signor Bruni.
A shuffle and a snort from the next stall alerted her to the fact that Guinevere had company. In the next four stalls were four well-matched, handsome greys, calmly munching on oats. Four horses, the same size, eating oats to fatten them for a journey, thought Pia, who had learned more about horses in a fortnight with Signor Bruni than she would have done in a lifetime of common schooling.
Carriage horses.
Carriage horses.
She turned around, holding the torch high. There, looming out of the dark corner, was the Eagles’ carriage, lacquered and well sprung, with the Eagles’ flag painted on the door in yellow and black. Pia knew that Faustino had readied his coach and four for the trip to San Galgano and the hermitage of Montesiepi the next night. Her father-in-law suffered from gout and rarely rode.
Another whinny of recognition came from behind her and she turned again to the stalls. There, shifting his weight and swishing his ragged tail, with the nervous energy of a winner, was Nello’s black stallion. She looked at the sheer size of him, a good few hands taller than Guinevere, and took a step back. But his eye was kind and he blew at her in a friendly enough fashion. She took
heart and approached quietly, putting her hand to his neck. A fragment of memory came and went in the blink of an eye as he breathed on her neck and nibbled her ear. Encouraged, she bent to look at the leg he had hurt as he jumped the wall. She chattered all the time, reassuring him, hoping he was not hurt. She ran her hand down the stallion’s injured limb as she had seen Signor Bruni do. She need not have worried: the horses in the household of Aquila were treated better than the humans; the wound was properly dressed with a poultice strapped to it neatly and firmly. Nello, she knew, would regret this injury that the horse, his great Palio hope, had sustained when he had collected his faithless wife. She was sure he would blame her for it. And punish her too? She shivered.
heart and approached quietly, putting her hand to his neck. A fragment of memory came and went in the blink of an eye as he breathed on her neck and nibbled her ear. Encouraged, she bent to look at the leg he had hurt as he jumped the wall. She chattered all the time, reassuring him, hoping he was not hurt. She ran her hand down the stallion’s injured limb as she had seen Signor Bruni do. She need not have worried: the horses in the household of Aquila were treated better than the humans; the wound was properly dressed with a poultice strapped to it neatly and firmly. Nello, she knew, would regret this injury that the horse, his great Palio hope, had sustained when he had collected his faithless wife. She was sure he would blame her for it. And punish her too? She shivered.
‘You’ll be all right, boy,’ she said. ‘But what about me?’
Riccardo Bruni was edgy and impatient and could find no peace. Each morning, before the sun got hot and high, he took Leocorno out into the Maremma and, with the grasses whispering underhoof and the salt breeze in his nostrils, rode over the salt marshes. Sometimes he got as close to Pia’s prison as he dared. Sometimes he imagined he saw her dark head at the casement. But he was always too far away to be sure. Once, he saw Nello in the distance, like a child’s lead soldier on the horizon, racing like shot fired from a pistol. Riccardo swallowed. Nello looked as if he could not be beaten.
In the city, sweltering under the shimmering haze of high summer, the heat lay like a blanket on the old
stones. Children skipped from shadow to shadow to save their unshod feet. Riccardo helped his father when he could but, as the Palio neared and Domenico’s spirits soared, Riccardo found the older man’s increased chatter unbearable. He sought out the duchess, the one person he could talk to about Pia.
stones. Children skipped from shadow to shadow to save their unshod feet. Riccardo helped his father when he could but, as the Palio neared and Domenico’s spirits soared, Riccardo found the older man’s increased chatter unbearable. He sought out the duchess, the one person he could talk to about Pia.
He climbed the Torre del Mangia, closer to the sun but into the breeze and out of the oven of hot stone, and from thence she would take him to the cool of the library, where there was the smell of books, the muffled silence of the volumes piled high on each wall, and a cool respite from the searing heat of the day. She would read to him, always from the
Morte d’Arthur
, translating as she went. Sometimes Riccardo would think, in awe, of the quiet intelligence that must be required to read one language and speak another. Mostly, he would just listen, with his head resting on his arms on the map-table as round as the one in Camelot, sometimes listening to the tales she told, sometimes hearing no words but just the calm rhythm of her speech. Violante’s words soothed him, and he let them run over his head like a cooling brook. Sometimes he closed his eyes. Sometimes he even slept.
Morte d’Arthur
, translating as she went. Sometimes Riccardo would think, in awe, of the quiet intelligence that must be required to read one language and speak another. Mostly, he would just listen, with his head resting on his arms on the map-table as round as the one in Camelot, sometimes listening to the tales she told, sometimes hearing no words but just the calm rhythm of her speech. Violante’s words soothed him, and he let them run over his head like a cooling brook. Sometimes he closed his eyes. Sometimes he even slept.
Violante de’ Medici did not care why Riccardo came to her; she found balm in his company. Under her eye in the library, he seemed younger to her. She could not believe now that he had ridden like a boyar, leaped from his horse in vain to save Vicenzo and put himself in Faustino’s sights. Today he represented a welcome distraction from
the inexorable approach of that fateful meeting at San Galgano, and then the Palio, and then – what? He had taken to coming every day, and she had taken to expecting him, and knew how much she would miss him if he stopped.
the inexorable approach of that fateful meeting at San Galgano, and then the Palio, and then – what? He had taken to coming every day, and she had taken to expecting him, and knew how much she would miss him if he stopped.
But these quiet sessions had another purpose too. Violante could see that Riccardo was dangerously drawn to Pia and was suffering the agonies of her absence. So the readings had an ulterior motive. She was reading him a cautionary tale, a private sermon of a boy who would become a mighty and jealous king, who would smite a favoured knight for stealing his queen.
Riccardo’s dark head, resting on his arms, was still; Violante could not be sure if he slept or no. She smiled. It did not matter. She suspected he did not sleep much, rising early to train his new mount and twisting on his pallet at night, eating out his heart for his lady.
‘So when he came to the churchyard, Sir Arthur alighted and tied his horse to the stile, and so he went to the tent, and found no knights there, for they were at the jousting. And so he handled the sword by the handles, and lightly and fiercely pulled it out of the stone, and took his horse and rode his way until he came to his brother Sir Kay, and delivered him the sword …’
The doors flew open and a breathless Gretchen entered. Riccardo’s head rose – then he
had
heard – and he made to get up. Gretchen held up a hand.
had
heard – and he made to get up. Gretchen held up a hand.
‘Stay. Your Grace, we have had an odd delivery. Will you come?’
Violante followed Gretchen down the stairs, Riccardo behind them at a distance. In the cool courtyard by the
trade entrance to the palace, the gates were open and a carter was unpacking his load: brooms, perhaps a hundred or more, collecting like a spiky bonfire in the centre of the court. Gretchen began to berate the carter at once.
trade entrance to the palace, the gates were open and a carter was unpacking his load: brooms, perhaps a hundred or more, collecting like a spiky bonfire in the centre of the court. Gretchen began to berate the carter at once.
‘Have you cloth for ears? Did I not say that we have no need of these brooms? And if we did, we would buy them single soldiers, not in battalions!’
The carter, who had the measure of Gretchen, nonetheless took off his cap when he saw Violante and sketched a bow.
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