Sistine Heresy Read online

  “Oh, Father. We’ve had this discussion a hundred times. Stop worrying. The only man I need to look after me is you. And besides, my commissions have contributed to this household.”

  “Yes, they have. You have clearly made a name for yourself. But you would have been better going back to Padua when you were supposed to five years ago. You’d have children by now.” He thought for a moment. “Wasn’t that Farnese boy hanging about? It wouldn’t hurt for you to be married to a Farnese.”

  “Livio? Oh, no. It would be awful to be shackled to a simpleton like him. I can take care of myself just fine. I have plenty of commissions.”

  “That reminds me, how goes your work in Michelangelo’s studio? Does he treat you well?”

  “Well enough. He’s gruff sometimes, but he has a great vision for the chapel and I want to share it.”

  “Ah, yes. It must be fascinating for you to watch a painter like that. He doesn’t like being called a painter, but it suits him better than architecture. That’s why I recommended him to His Holiness.” He took another sip of the honey drink and settled back again, drowsy.

  Raphaela pulled his blanket higher over his chest and kissed him on his cheek. “Yes, Father. I’m sure you’re right.”

  When he began to doze, she crept from his chamber to her own.

  Her window looked out onto the Via dei Coronaria, and as the evening came on, she could hear the muffled sounds of the Carnevale celebrants in the streets below.

  Raphaela stared out at the gathering crowd, thoughts turning in her head. Her father was frequently ill. She dreaded the thought of losing him, but she had refused all opportunities to marry and start a household of her own.

  She knew her refusal set her apart from every other woman in Rome and was grateful that her father did not try to force her, as so many other fathers did, to choose between two prisons: the convent or the marriage bed.

  Raphaela loved portraiture. She was happiest playing with colors and light to render a dull face beautiful and create a little fantasy around it. When she painted a heroic setting, she did not so much tell a lie as reveal a tiny bit of truth inside the sitter’s soul, a picture of their highest aspiration.

  How dreary it would be to produce a horde of children rather than paintings. She detested the idea of being at the beck and call of a man, and sexually at his disposal.

  But the convent, she knew, was an even worse form of servitude. Mumbling prayers into the air all day long between waiting on the tyranny of some mother superior who herself had been imprisoned a generation before.

  Strange, the way the Church managed to perpetuate the servile state of women even as it pretended to elevate it. The flash of realization had recently come to her like a bolt of lightning: the Church’s veneration of the Virgin was not a glorification of women at all, but rather a gloss over its disdain for them. That the holiest woman in heaven had kept her virginity while producing a child was an insult to every female, chaste or unchaste.

  She could not understand why an untouched woman was so revered. If virginity was deemed so precious, why were so many women forcibly handed over to men to be deflowered as soon as they reached puberty? The contradiction infuriated her. Women were thwarted from all sides.

  Of course a few lucky women turned the tables of power. Women like Arabella Raimondi and Adriana Borgia, who used their sexuality rather than let themselves fall victim to it. Like Europa, Adriana rode the Borgia bull, and when Cesare was killed, she somehow got herself back to Rome unscathed.

  Raphaela was not sure if that sort of risk made Adriana a model to women or a traitor. She only knew that the thought of her was exciting.

  A man must take a few risks, or he will spend his whole life in shallow waters. A woman too. She turned the words over in her mind and made a decision.

  XVIII

  Rough hands seized the sleeping Domenico Raggi by the hair and pressed the point of a knife between his shoulder blades. In a jumble of arms and legs, he was jerked sideways from the prostitute’s bed and thrown to the floor.

  Now he could see them, four of the night watch. One held a lantern and the others wielded knives.

  “Filthy bung-boy,” one of them snarled over the cowering prostitute, then slashed through his exposed throat. The helpless man thrashed for a moment, his blood spurting through his fingers over the bed linen and the wall, then gurgled helplessly and fell limp.

  “Luca!” Domenico tried to rise from his crouch but was seized on both sides by the guard. The lantern man said, “They didn’t tell us he’d be bare-assed. Are we supposed to take him back like that? It’d teach him a lesson, though, wouldn’t it?”

  A mustached man, who seemed to be in charge, replied, “He’ll get plenty of ‘lesson’ in jail. And we don’t want to draw attention.” He snatched up the bundle of clothing that had been dropped over the only chair in the simple room and flung it at Domenico. “Put this on, and hurry up or we’ll drag your skinny naked ass through the streets.”

  Trembling at the sight of the dying man, Domenico forced his legs into the loose trousers that had been handed him. They were not even his own. He barely had time to throw the shirt over himself when the men shoved him through the doorway.

  At the other end of the street, a few men lurched drunkenly toward them, obviously celebrating Carnevale. They showed no interest in the guard detachment loading its prisoner into a covered horse-drawn cart.

  Nor did the celebrants swarming along the Ponte Sant’ Angelo with their candles seem to care about the cart that rumbled past them into the Castel yard.

  A guard opened the main portal to the prison at the Castel Sant’ Angelo and stepped aside to admit the night watch. “Carnevale night and that’s all you got?”

  The arriving officer ignored the remark. “Who’s in charge tonight?”

  “That’ll be me. Sergeant Bueti.” A burly red-haired man a head taller than the porter emerged from the guard room. “What’s going on here?”

  “Order of Cardinal Carafa,” the night officer said. Mustache man pushed his prisoner forward. Domenico stumbled, then caught himself with tied hands, on the stone wall. “Sodomy, we caught him in the act. I guess the Cardinal will stop by sooner or later to make it formal. We just checked the bawd houses and this is what we got.”

  “They killed him,” Domenico said. “The man I was with. That’s a crime, isn’t it?”

  The night officer sucked air through his teeth. “Yeah, there was another one but he, uh, resisted arrest.”

  Sergeant Bueti held his lantern close to Domenico’s face. “He’s a pretty one.”

  “Yep, and now he’s yours. My job’s done, and me and my men are going off duty. In case you hadn’t noticed, it’s Carnevale.” He set his lantern on the floor and stepped back toward the portal.

  Bueti blocked the door leading to the courtyard. “Far as I’m concerned, tonight’s no different from any other night. Carnevale or no, you got to enter him and the charge in the book. Else your Cardinal’s going to arrive looking for him and he won’t find him, will he? My son will take care of the prisoner.” He signaled a young man standing farther down the stone corridor. “Claudio, take this man to a cell and give him some water.”

  Claudio lifted a large ring of keys from its hook on the wall. Tall and wide-shouldered like his father, the boy was perhaps eighteen, still young enough, or sheltered enough, to be unscarred. He wore his long light brown hair tied back with a cord that hung down his back. When he got close to Domenico he stopped and looked directly at him before taking hold of the chain that hung from his wrist shackles. Awkwardly, as if he had seldom had this responsibility, he picked up a lantern and led Domenico down a wooden staircase, glancing back at him every few minutes.

  They descended to a second level, and then a third. Each time they passed one of the doors, with its crosshatched bars, the odor of dank straw, rotten and infected flesh, and human waste assaulted them.

  Finally they stopped before an empty cell and Claud
io entered first, pulling Domenico in behind him. “I have to lock you to the wall,” he mumbled, as though the task embarrassed him.

  Domenico glanced around, dread rising in him. The stone walls were streaked with black mold, and the straw on the floor was rancid. He noted that the width of the cell allowed him to lie down and recalled rumors that the lowest cells were too narrow even to allow that. Would he want to lie down anyhow, with the rats? In the corner, a wooden bucket stood empty, though the stench that came from it revealed its purpose.

  The young guard finally managed to turn his key in the rusted padlock, fastening the chain to a ring near the floor. Domenico was now anchored. At that moment he realized with a sudden nausea that he would be there, sitting or lying, in pitch blackness. His heart pounded with terror. “Please. Can you leave a candle? I have friends who will pay you.”

  “I don’t know if I can. But I’ll leave the lantern here on the floor while I get you water. You’re allowed to have that.”

  “Yes, thank you.” Domenico still stood, fearing to lower himself onto the stone floor, as if that would signal an acceptance of the terrible confinement. When the boy returned with a clay bowl of water, Domenico begged, “Please, stay a little longer.”

  Claudio hesitated and held the lantern up before his prisoner’s face. “Your voice. I know you. I heard you sing once. At Whitsuntide, in St. Peter’s. My God. How did this happen to you?”

  “A sin, a foolishness. Please don’t make me recount it. A man has already paid for it with his life.”

  “Do your friends know you are here? Can anyone help you? The choirmaster?”

  Domenico shook his head. “Definitely not him. He follows orders of the Master of Ceremonies, the one who locks us up at night. Some of us find ways to get out, but it’s dangerous—obviously.” Domenico stared at the lantern for a moment. “But maybe…Michelangelo Buonarroti.”

  “The sculptor? You know him?”

  “Yes. He’s painting in the Sistine Chapel for the Pope. He’s not really a friend. But he might have pity. I don’t know.”

  “Do you want me to carry a message to him? I get off duty at ten. If you know where he lives.”

  “His workshop is in the Piazza Rusticucci, near Santa Caterina. Here.” Domenico lifted his shackled hands to the cross at his throat. “Take this to him. He should remember it. Tell him where I am and that I beg him to help.”

  “And if he’s not home?” The boy tugged at the short column of hair behind his neck, as if trying to pull an answer from it.

  Domenico closed his eyes for a moment, then asked weakly, “What is the punishment for sodomy?”

  “Ah, that differs according to the mercy of the judge. I’ve heard of men executed for it, and others flogged. But a flogging in a place like this…” He stopped. “Look, I have to lock the cell, but I’ll leave the lantern here. It should last the night.”

  He unclasped the cross from Domenico’s neck and slid it inside his leather jerkin. When he withdrew his hand, he offered something. “Keep this in exchange for the cross. At least for tonight, for comfort.”

  It was a small rosary, with simple wooden beads. Domenico took it silently.

  “My name is Claudio,” the young guard said.

  “Yes. I’m Domenico.” The guard’s kindness, the exchange of names, it was a straw of hope. “God bless you for this,” he said with quiet fervor.

  “May God bless us both,” Claudio said, stooping through the doorway.

  Then Domenico was alone and the lock fell into place with a heavy, heartbreaking clank. He stared into the unwavering flame of the lantern and began the rosary, his own thoughts intruding. “Pater noster, qui es in caelis… Teach me obedience. Sanctificetur nomen tuum. Adveniat regnum tuum. Why do you wait so long to come? Panem nostrum quotidianum da nobis hodie. Not just bread. Teach me also what sin is, Lord. Is it the act or the thought or the pleasure from it? Do I offend Thee in the surrender of my flesh, which is in Thine image, or already in the desires of my heart, which I cannot hide from Thee? And if I obey Thee and Thy servants, will that free me from sin? But what if the obedience is the sin?”

  No answers came, no understanding, and so he drew the next bead forward and began the Ave Maria, mumbling the words he had said so many times he could pray while his mind wandered elsewhere. Where was the soul of Luca now? Had a prostitute any hope of salvation? And what about the thousands of Romans celebrating Carnevale in the same way? Was every act of the flesh a sin, if it was not under God’s sacrament? Was there no form of love or need, however intense, that was exempt from the rule? Did not Christ also surround himself with men who adored him, who left their wives for him?

  Domenico sobbed into his clenched fists. Surely there was a place for him in God’s kingdom. If he came out of this purgatory alive he would ask the one man who seemed to wrestle with the same hard questions: Michelangelo.

  If.

  XIX

  Bacchanalia

  The horse race had just finished and Michelangelo’s wineskin made its way around the group once again. Darkness had fallen and Silvio fumbled for a moment in the leather purse at his belt, then withdrew candles with little collars and handed them around. The three stood together, waiting. Finally someone in the street shouted “Moccoletti! Moccoletti!” and it came, spreading up the street from the Piazza Venezia like a grass fire. One by one the candles were ignited until each person held a flickering light. Moccoli flickered in windows, atop walls and on balconies, until the entire Via del Corso seemed a lava flow of flames.

  The melee began. Strangers threw themselves at each other, each trying to extinguish the other’s moccolo while keeping his own alight. Masked figures in fantastical costumes chased each other and fell into an embrace. Rome scintillated and gave itself over to licentiousness. In the wild back-and-forth a bearded man staggered against Adriana. He was gold-clad, crowned and bejeweled like a Babylonian king, and exceedingly drunk.

  “Scusi,” he mumbled with foul breath and lurched sideways into an alley. He slouched against a wall for a moment and then slid gracefully down to lie in drunken stupor. His polished metal crown tilted precariously over his brow, reflecting the light of passing candles.

  “I think someone wants our attention.” Silvio nodded toward a pair of boys coming toward them. As the two neared, they opened their doublets, exposing the swell of breasts. Women, Adriana realized with a shock. Prostitutes dressed for the lawless appetites of Carnevale. One of them pressed herself against Michelangelo, who flinched in apparent distaste. Silvio, however, allowed the fraudulent boy to caress him from chest to groin.

  Adriana suddenly felt the other prostitute’s hand slide across her and squeeze her breast. A woman’s voice whispered in her ear, “For you, I cost nothing, Lady.” Shocked, she twisted away from the prurient hand and staggered against Silvio, who caught her.

  “By the saints, Adriana. You’ve had too much wine. We’ve got to take you back to the Piazza Venezia to get some food in your stomach.”

  “Yes. Food would be good,” she breathed, and they retraced their steps, passing the alley where the kingly reveler had fallen unconscious. The old man half lay, half slouched against the wall, but his finery had been stripped from him. He snored loudly, oblivious to everything. Three young men stood over him; two of them argued over his cloak and crown.

  “Son of a whore!” the taller one shouted. “I saw him first.”

  “Take your hands off it, you pig’s ass, or I’ll send you to hell,” the other one snarled. The first man began to pummel the other, who shielded his face with his forearms. The third man stood swaying on uncertain legs and pointed at the unconscious victim, mumbling something incoherent.

  Silvio held his candle out in front of him, illuminating the scene. “I know those boys. From the Farnese.”

  At the word “Farnese,” the attacker paused and glanced over toward the light. At that instant his victim sprang forward and pounded his fist onto the distracted opponent’s chest.
When he raised it again, he held a bloody knife. The wounded man staggered back while his attacker lurched into the crowded street. The third man careened after him.

  Michelangelo caught the wounded man from behind as he collapsed, and both went to their knees. Blood poured over the man’s bulky chest and trickled over his knuckles as he covered the wound with his own hand. He looked down at himself in astonishment and then lost consciousness. Silvio knelt in front of the two and pressed a wad of the crumpled shirt against the wound. The naked king, on whose account the whole quarrel had arisen, still slept.

  Onlookers gathered, forming a ring of candlelight, while someone ran for guards in the Piazza del Popolo. At the periphery of the crowd, Adriana stood dumbfounded. Everyone she could see—the belligerents, the spectators, and herself—wore masks, as if in a Carnevale tableau. She seemed suspended in a world of myth where Cardinals and satyrs, pagan gods and serpents celebrated bloody pandemonium.

  At that moment a gloved hand encircled her wrist and yanked her into the crowd.

  His sheer momentum pulled her with him, in among the revelers. She thought at first the assailant had returned, but then she recognized the doublet of a masked boy she had seen at the end of the parade. Excited, she let herself be dragged through the river of candle flames, wondering how far he would take her.

  Half a street away, he abruptly swung her into a church. Without stopping, he pulled her along the outside aisle of the sanctuary into an open confessional. He seized her hands and, pinning them against the wall on both sides of her head, he covered her mouth with his. For a brief moment she tasted wine on his lips, and then she wrenched her head to the side. She tried to push him away but could not, for the angle at which he held her gave him an advantage. And yet, he did not molest her further. Instead he rested his head almost sorrowfully against her neck, both of their chests heaving from the sprint. His breath warmed her throat.

  Curiously, he did not smell from the exertion, as had every other man she passed close to on the street. He was beardless, and even the way he leaned against her was gentle. The only discomfort she felt was the hardness of her own medallion pressed between her breasts.