55. IL RITORNO IN PERUGIA
For the entire day they just sorted and packed and arranged things, they just hauled and hauled things from the atelier to the cart, and then that evening he sent the Florentines home, and sat the Umbrians down around the table; four mugs and one large pitcher of wine were placed in front of them, and he told them, when the last mixing pot had been safely placed in the chests strapped down onto the carriage, we’re going home, and they all sat there with their mugs in their hands, he told them very meaningfully that well, Giannicola, well, Francesco, well, Aulista — in that way to all of them, looking at them fixedly and addressing them, so that he finally winked at Giovanni too — now it’s time to go home, but not a single one of them believed what he was saying, everything was so complicated, because there was a great on the one hand, that nobody could believe the words of such a maestro who for his entire life had been wandering between Umbria and Tuscany and Rome, who continually, ever since that long-ago day, when as a small boy he had left Castel della Pieve, had constantly been on the road, like someone who is hounded by an all-consuming demon, but really, as if deep inside some dark corner at the back of even that hidden soul, a merciless demon lay in wait, in the very innermost part of that soul, for such demons do not exist here outside; all four of them, when this topic came up, nodded their heads in agreement, there is no way that a demon, here outside, could be capable of affecting someone with such strength, chasing him here and there continuously for thirty years, because this is how the situation looked, the maestro just went and went and went, the horses collapsing beneath him, and Rome came along, and Florence and Venice and Pavia and Sienna and Assisi, and who could even name them all, and of course always and again Florence and Perugia and Rome, and Perugia and Rome and Florence, and so whoever knew him just even a little would not have been able to believe it when he said, “well then, now,” for the family was going to stay here in the house of Borgo Pinti — the beautiful Signora Vannucci and the countless children — and yet still this “well then, now,” as if anyone could have entered into the spirit of the idea of them really finally going home, they knew very well there was no question of that, the only certain thing was that tomorrow, they were going back, tomorrow: back to Perugia, home to Umbria, and this was enough reason for joy in all of them, even for Giovanni, for at least now, for a while, it wouldn’t be this insane city, but a little tranquility, he let out a sigh, although his true home, though he never spoke of it, was very far from Perugia; they took a swig from the mugs and you could see that everyone was thinking about that; since 1486 — how many years, fifteen or how many, and now again, the beloved landscape of Umbria, the tastes and the smells of home — there was that much, so, well, Giannicola, Francesco, Aulista, and Giovanni. . there was that much in the maestro’s words, that much and no more, because in the depths of his words the idea of finally and forever was never enunciated, because for him, due to that consuming devil, this finally and this forever did not exist, it would never exist, so that, well, in vain was the cart already completely packed up, in vain did they tie up the last bundle with the cords with which they had fastened the canvas the previous evening for tomorrow’s journey, in vain did the guard even stand there, to watch over it until dawn, for twenty soldi, until they set out; that they were finally returning home, that this really would be a true ritorno, as they, the Umbrian apprentices, after fifteen or how many years, may have still hoped, after the maestro had brought them here to the bottega in Florence, well, not a single one of them believed it, they just sat there, they nodded to each other, they avoided the gaze of the maestro, then after the maestro left they just sipped away at the wine, in the workshop in the Via San Gilio, a cheap piquette from last year, from the hills of Chianti to the south of here, and they said to themselves, fine, just let him talk, just let him say it, but let’s forget about this ritorno, let’s forget about this finally or that after fifteen or how many years, that there will again at last be the landscape of home; the only thing certain was that the workshop here in the Via San Gilio was being closed down, they had canceled the lease for the premises with Signor Vittorio di Lorenzo Ghiberti, and with that they were going back, and for how long would depend on the maestro’s concealed, troubled soul, on this concealed soul, and on that consuming hellish whoreson within it, the creature that never left him in peace, and never would leave him in peace, but let’s forget it, Giannicola noted, and he took a swig from the mug, and for awhile none of them even spoke, because all of them knew that all the same, there was here an even greater on the other hand, for if the whole thing was so, and if despite the temporary nature of this journey home, it was still the source of a kind of joy, if not that for which they truly yearned, there was no doubt at all among the apprentices that this so-called journey home had only been incited by the bitterness of failure, as it was occurring not at all from the maestro’s free will, as — regardless of how much it was really final, and how much the four of them were really rejoicing or not at the return to Umbria — there was a great need, for some reason, for this move, to call things by their proper name; the maestro, who had become not so long ago one of the most celebrated painters in Italy, was compelled to take leave of his Florence, and the worst of it was that it wasn’t because somebody was chasing him away, or because he had had a run-in with some authority, or because the commissions were lacking to such an extent — as they were provided after a fashion by the monasteries or the more pious families — but because for the maestro, one had to say, things, for some reason. . just weren’t going well these days, they hardly dared to speak of it among themselves, so frightened were they of this mere fact, but it was so, the maestro wanted to entrust them with more and more tasks, and he hardly even came into the workshop; when they got to the point in the preparation of a picture when they could tell him that he could come into the workshop, that everything was all ready for the painting of this or another panel, even then he didn’t come, sometimes days went by until he finally stood there in the doorway in the Via San Gilio, so silently that they didn’t even notice him when he came through the door, suddenly he was just there among them, asking why this, why that, fiddling with this or that mixing pot, addressing one of them, saying this or that was no good, or that it wouldn’t be enough, or that it was too much, there was already much too much, let’s say too much turpentine in the linseed oil; he hemmed and hawed, he muttered, and no one ever dared to mention to him the “obligations long due” to them, it was so obvious that he was in a bad mood, in a word he did everything, but he avoided the brush-rack, no, it’s not that he went over to the brushes and picked out the right one and began to work on a certain canvas, no, instead he hemmed and hawed and just kept mumbling for a while, then he tossed out the remark that he would be right back, because right now he had some business to attend to; when, however, he appeared the next time, the entire thing started all over again, the panel lay there on the painting table all ready, and everything on it had already completely dried, to find a mistake in it would have been impossible, for they themselves were not just any old assistants, it was nothing for them to prepare the most perfect gesso or imprimatura, and already no one could have even found fault with the underdrawing, only he, because it had been done by his, the maestro’s, own hand; he had already run out of ideas of how to avoid it anymore and he had to start painting, even then he tried avoiding it by saying that this or that — this cloak-hem, this eye-wrinkle, this contour of the lip in the underdrawing — is not how it should be, he could well say such things to them, because they knew very well that this was not the problem, so that on the basis of the maestro’s “instructions” one of them, without saying a word, stepped up to the panel, or someone from among the Florentines, but in most cases it was Giovanni, as he had the quickest and the cleverest hand — and he visibly repaired something on the underdrawing, of course just in such a way so that he wouldn’t ruin it, as what was there already was good, everyone knew this, including the maestro himself, as he himself had sketched out the underdrawing onto the clichés earlier, and they only had to copy it onto the prepared base in the appropriate way, and they always copied these wonderful drawings accurately and without error, in this the maestro was always amazing; that is, that they experienced the extraordinary talent of his old hand in these drawings on the fine paper, and there were really no mistakes, he outlined perfectly, with the finest of sensitivities he marked on the primed panel just what kind of wondrous Madonna, child, or saint would soon be appearing here, it was just that in recent times these figures were appearing ever less frequently, as he delayed everything; to no avail was the workshop full of the more serious disciples and assistants from both Florence and Umbria, it had nothing to do with them, but with this inexplicable impotency of the maestro, there was some spasm within him, or something, they guessed, because it decisively appeared that he