“I’m as amazed as you are.”
Instead of taking away the tray, she sat down in Descartes’s usual chair beside the fountain. “I am glad he is not here,” she said.
“I don’t blame you. He’s been eating berries and croissants by the truckload.” I didn’t mention the takeaway treats he always tucked in his pockets.
Her brow furrowed for a moment, then she beamed. “Ah, non. I do not mean for that reason. I am glad because I wish to talk to you. I have something news to tell you. I think you will be happy to hear it.”
“Have you been playing detective again, Elisabeth?” The last time she’d looked this excited was when she’d shared her theory about our “zhondo”: that the unknown skeleton from the palace might be that of Meister Eckhart.
She clapped her hands with delight. “Oui! Remember what you told me?” She leaned closer and spoke in a low, conspiratorial voice. “That the man had a unique shape? Legs that came almost up to the neck?”
I laughed. “Maybe not quite that long. But yes, very long legs for a man his size. As long as mine, and I’m much taller than he was.”
“Yes. So. Last week I got in touch with my cousin — I told you he is a Dominican, yes?” I nodded. “I do not tell him why I ask, so don’t worry, I keep the secret. But I ask him, ‘What do the Dominicans know about the appearance of Eckhart — his size, his shape?’ Mon Dieu, my cousin thinks I am crazy, but he says, ‘Okay, I will do some research.’ And this morning, I have an e-mail from him. No one painted a picture of Eckhart until hundreds of years after he died, so we don’t know what his face looked like. But. Sometimes, behind the back, the other friars called him Ciconia Dei.” She leaned back, looking pleased with herself.
“Why did they call him that?”
Her eyes danced and her smug smile broadened. “It is Latin. It means ‘the stork of God.’”
CHAPTER 34
Martini avoids Laura as assiduously as Petrarch seeks her out. Whenever Petrarch is in Avignon, he dogs the poor woman’s steps, carefully trailing twenty or thirty paces behind her, scrupulously praying a stone’s throw away: close enough to see her, close enough to be seen — his melancholy face, his artfully downcast gaze — yet far enough that the distance is conspicuously chaste. For Simone, on the other hand, no distance would be chaste or ethereal if he were in her presence, so he steers clear altogether.
And yet there’s no escaping her, or at least the reminders of her; in a way, she trails Simone as relentlessly as Petrarch trails her. Scarcely a day goes by without some count or marquis or emissary or lady seeking him out, taking him aside, and murmuring in his ear, as if it were a secret, “I know you painted the lady Laura’s portrait for poor Petrarch. I have seen it — and such a likeness!” Apparently everyone in Avignon has seen the secret portrait…and yet he knows that is not so, for occasionally, to test the admirers, he poses trick questions, which nearly always trip them up: “And what did you think of the emerald necklace she wore?” he might ask, or perhaps, “Was the blue of her eyes perhaps too deep?”
Astonishing, how the small, secret portrait of Laura — seen by few but praised by many — has put Martini’s name on the lips of all. Petrarch has now written not one, but two sonnets praising the picture. These have been copied and put into wide circulation, perhaps by other poets, but perhaps by Petrarch himself, not one for self-effacement. Martini had been appalled by the poems, but he’d be a fool to turn down the well-heeled clients that the poems have brought him. One of them, Cardinal Corsini — even more prone to self-admiration than Petrarch, if such a thing is possible — has commissioned a portrait of his own dearly beloved: himself.
Between the portraits and the frescoes in the pope’s bedchamber, Simone is now laden with work, and gradually the death portrait of Christ seems less urgent. The pope’s frescoes are nearly finished. The twenty-four panels that crown the bedroom’s walls depict scenes from the four Gospels, although — high on the walls as they are — who will be able to see and appreciate their details? The frescoes in the window recesses depict architectural features — arches, columns, and coffers — that heighten the illusion of depth, making the walls appear not merely six feet thick, but ten or twelve, so His Holiness can sleep secure in the knowledge of the strength of his fortress.
Simone now employs two assistants to do the drudge work for him: painting backgrounds and draperies and inscriptions, freeing Simone to focus on what he does best, and prefers above alclass="underline" the faces and bodies that everyone tells him are more lifelike than any other painter’s — and it’s true! He’s buried in commissions, working harder than he has ever worked in his life.
His latest project is a set of four frescoes commissioned for the portico of the cathedral. One of them, Andrea Corsini Healing a Blind Man, is paying the bills for the other three scenes, in a manner of speaking. The painting depicts a miracle that — according to the Corsini family, at least — occurred only a few years earlier, right here on the cathedral’s front porch, one morning before Mass. A wondrous event, if true, restoring sight to a blind man, yet Simone can’t help suspecting that the painting isn’t motivated purely by piety. The Corsinis have launched a vigorous campaign to have Andrea declared a saint, and the fresco is central to their strategy: “See,” it seems to say, “the proof is right before your eyes. You’d have to be blind yourself not to see it.”
The second fresco, the Madonna of Humility, is obligatory — the cathedral is, after all, dedicated to Mary. This one, too, Simone finds it hard to put his whole heart into. Perhaps he’s grown skeptical about the miracle of the Virgin Birth, but more likely he’s simply tired of painting mothers and babies year after year, especially as Giovanna grows sadder and sadder about her barren womb.
The third scene, by contrast—The Blessing Christ—is a source of satisfaction and deep pride to Simone. Jesus seems to float in the sky; his right hand is raised in benediction, and his left cradles an orb. Within the orb, Simone has represented the world in miniature: a landscape, rippling waters, and a starry sky, all artfully contained inside the sphere. The Savior’s gaze is strong and direct, as if our Lord were locking eyes with each viewer, one by one. Such an intimate, powerful gaze is bold and without precedent — unlike any portrait of Jesus that Simone has ever done, or ever seen. Surely this homage to Christ will bless the man who painted it; surely this will wash away Simone’s secret guilt.
The fourth of the portal frescoes shows Saint George slaying a dragon and rescuing a princess. Not surprisingly, this fresco is livelier than the other three. Simone is not the first painter to portray the heroic deed, but he is the first — of this he feels sure — to bring such vivid drama to it. The knight, on horseback, charges forward, his lance gripped in both hands, galloping over the bones of earlier knights who died fighting the beast. The dragon rears up to fight, its scaly back arched, its talons clawing for the horse. The eyes are glittering with reptilian hate, and the sharp-toothed mouth is open to unleash a blast of fire. But the creature is a split second too slow: Although the dragon’s body has not yet had time to register it, the mortal blow has, at the very instant portrayed, been delivered. With unerring aim, Saint George has thrust his lance straight into the beast’s open mouth, with such force that it has pierced the throat completely and emerged at the back of the neck, its sharp tip drenched with blood.