"I doubt it. But I will talk to him. And one thing more, Signore Piero, if I may try your patience. Remember the painting that I had sent to you from Pisa? Would it be possible to have some of your people look at it before they depart on trading missions." I said this partly, I suppose, to impress Piero with my unflagging determination.
He nodded vigorously, as if pleased to be bothered with still one more request. Probably he had little intention of honoring it anyway. "The painting is very beautiful, and I thank you for its loan. I have kept it where my eyes can fall on it every day." And with a little beckoning gesture he led me into another room and showed me the Magdalen above a fireplace. We both regarded it for a few moments in silence.
Then Piero went on: "I will have it moved to your room, if you like . . . of course you are going to stay with us, while you are in Florence."
"Thank you, Signore Piero. Your hospitality and generosity are more than a poor soldier like myself deserves." I was about to add that I had no wish to find the painting gazing at me each morning when I awoke, when a new idea struck me, what I considered to be a really clever thought. "And yes, I would like it in my room. Though I trust that my stay will not be long."
To implement my new brainstorm, I paid a visit that very day to Verrocchio's studio. This time I went alone—Lorenzo, I should perhaps explain, was out of town on business at the time.
The studio had been transformed in the year since I had seen it last. There were at least half a dozen apprentices in sight, all of them busy shoveling sand, mixing and grinding pigments, hammering boards together into a platform, sweating and sending up a haze of dust from all the drudgery that lies behind serene fine art in metal and stone and paint. None of these youths recognized me, nor I them. But one went promptly to inform the master of my arrival, and returned in a moment to lead me to another room.
The very structure of the building had been changed considerably during the last twelve-month. A neighbor's stable had been taken over, and built into the growing complex. Raw timber walled some rooms completely new. But though the place was much enlarged, it was still crowded by its new production; business was booming tremendously.
I was conducted to where Verrocchio was at work, in one of the newly added rooms. The master, who had not changed noticeably, was not really glad to see me, though he made me welcome with effusive words. Here comes trouble, the expression on his fleshy face proclaimed. He was at work sculpting a clay figure, about half life-size, whose model, a sturdy lad wearing only a leather apron and some token bits of ancient-looking armor, stood on a small stage under the usual skylight. At a second glance I recognized this youth, altered by a year's fast growth, as the very one that I had come to see.
"Messer Verrocchio," I began, "I suppose you have seen or heard nothing of the Hungarian woman since the last time I was here?"
"Nothing. Well, that is, only that she . . ." Verrocchio broke off, looking embarrassed.
"You mean you have heard of my marital difficulties with her, and that she has run away again."
He nodded.
"Be sure and let me know if you hear more. You know where I can be reached. But it is really a painting that I have come to see you about today—a painting, and this young fellow who did it."
Verrocchio proved willing enough for me to hire away his apprentice and model for what I said would probably be a few days' work. He probably thought that his powerful patrons were still more interested in helping me than they really were, and I did not trouble to enlighten him. And so that very afternoon I was standing with Leonardo before the Magdalen in my small guest room at the palazzo Medici.
"It is only the face that I really want, you see. As many copies as you can make, drawing well, in the time that you can work for me. Here is the painting. And you must still have the woman's face in your mind's eye, as she spent a long time posing for you."
The boy was handsome, but there was something inhuman, almost, about his eyes. If I had met him armed in the field, I should have expected him to be extremely dangerous, for reasons having nothing to do with size or training.
He said only: "Tracings could be made, if we had thin paper."
"I can get you paper, or give you money to buy some. What I must have are good likenesses of this woman. I want a man who has never seen her to be able to recognize her when he does, once he has studied one of your sketches."
Leonardo was pinning up a small sheet of paper on the small easel he had brought with him. "Yes, I think I can do that, provided the man who looks has good eyes to see."
He began to draw. I, having learned how sometimes good artisans were bothered by close observation, moved away to look out of the window into the courtyard.
"Have you ever seen the woman again in the flesh?" I asked, as casually as possible. I had not forgotten that only this young artisan's tip had enabled me to locate Helen the first time around.
"No, signore," the boy answered. But there was something in his voice that made me turn back to look at him. I found him regarding me in that calculating, almost robotic way of his. Then he added: "But I have seen Perugino since then."
"Perugino." It took me a few moments to recall where I had heard that name before. Yes, Verrocchio had spoken it, at some point during at least one of my visits to his place of business a year ago. "Perugino was the bearded apprentice, in your master's studio last summer?"
"He had shaved, the last time I saw him."
"And where was that? And when?"
"I saw him here in Florence. About six months ago. But since then I have heard that he has gone to Rome, to paint some murals in a church there. Which church I do not know." Leonardo looked at me for a moment longer, then turned back to his work.
I turned back to the window again. I found one hand, knuckles white, wrist shaking, clutching my dagger's hilt. Dolt that I was! not to have known. But still I could not believe that a king's sister could have left me for a mere artist . . .
Before my eyes in imagination, I brought the face of the bearded one, clear as my memory could focus it. Now I could remember how that countenance had looked when I first brought the rescued Helen into the studio—the very place where he had first brought her to be a model. Confused, stunned, displaying a strange mixture of emotions. Somehow I had got the impression that Perugino had first met her in some Florentine tavern. But what had Morsino said? . . . an attractive girl, of diminutive stature, recently arrived . . . in the company of a troop of traveling players, or an itinerant artist, or something of that kind . . .
And Matthias, earlier. Something about an artisan. How his sister had actually run off with one. If she could do such a thing when a Sforza wedding was in prospect, then why not as the bride of a Drakulya?
. . . and again, just after the wedding ceremony, Perugino handing her an armful of flowers. How had he looked, then? Could I trust my memory to tell me? And she...
It was still almost impossible to believe. I turned away from the window again. "Leonardo," I called softly. In my greatest angers I maintain full control of myself and my behavior. "Be plain. You are telling me that she ran off with this Perugino."
"It is nothing to me, signore. I do not wish to become involved. But yes, I think that is what happened."
"I see. And has this matter been discussed at the studio?"
He hesitated. "Not really. Not much. I think we all guessed, last year, what had happened. Perugino quit the studio a little while after you left for Pisa. But you were gone. There was no way to tell you anything. Signore Lorenzo did not come round again to the studio for a long time."