The Botticelli Secret

32

This was a castle of lions, a harbor guarded by ravening beasts. I had been to the Arsenale before, on one of my mother’s little educational trips, but never before had I defied the creature that ruled this city. Now that I planned to leave I saw its countenance everywhere; only now that I wanted to wrest myself from its bloody jaws did I know that the lion of Saint Mark guarded this citadel jealously, was a constant presence and nowhere more than here. The great stone beasts guarded the iron gates of this place, a fortress of bloodred stone, capped with white crenellations of sharp teeth. They were creatures of my mother—spawn of the she-lion that suckled them. If I passed through these gates, I was entering the circus. She could raise her hand like a Roman empress, to have me ripped limb from limb, for the gladiators to follow and battle on my blood-soaked sand. Signor Cristoforo was let pass through the gates and I followed. Even at the doors the beast was guardian—the first thing I saw was a great stone face of a lion, set into one wall, paying out rope through his mouth for the sailors to pull and cut to size. I stared at the gaping mouth, mesmerized. I was once again a Daniel.

I knew from my mother’s instruction that security here was as tight as a cur’s arse (my words not hers), but the doors were opened without delay to Signor Cristoforo and myself. We used the same deception which had taken us out of the ducal palace without challenge. I had simply run to my mother’s room for one of her trademark masks (I say “simply”—in truth I was more terrified while entering my mother’s chamber than the gates of the Arsenale). Our similarity meant that I had only to put this on and I was she. I blessed the times I had aped her speech and bearing while trying to improve my own. Chin high, I swept down the passages, heart thumping lest I should meet the real thing. I did see Marta, carrying coals, but nodded and swept by, and even that bitch did not know me. I glided down the Giants’ staircase to the foot where Signor Cristoforo awaited me, and we left the place without question. If the dogaressa wished to visit the Arsenale with her daughter’s tutor, it was clearly no one’s business but hers. We hurried down the Riva degli Schiavoni toward the docks, aided in our deception by a pissing drizzle which kept every passing wight huddled into his hood.

Inside the citadel of the Arsenale I was reminded, now as before, of the night when Brother Guido and I had stumbled upon the shipwrights working in the old castle at Pisa; the smells of tar and wood and linen were the same. I followed my tutor to the side of the covered harbor where smiths, caulkers, and sawyers ran about and weaved around each other, fetching and carrying in an ever-flowing stream of people. These, I knew, were the arsenalotti, a buzzing hive of drones with my mother as their queen. This was the Stato del Mar in action.

Signor Cristoforo fixed the mass with his weather eyes and shot out a hand to grab the arm of a passing man. The fellow was small and slight, with gray hair and a young face, albeit with skin tanned to leather by seagoing. His eyes turned down at the edges and gave him a sad expression, but when he recognized his captor he smiled a smile of great charm—surprising, for as far as I could see he had absolutely no teeth at all. The two men clapped hands and hugged—slapping each other on the back in a brother’s embrace. And when the stranger spoke I knew him for a Genoese, for he had the same thick vowels as my tutor. Perhaps this was his brother.

“Cristoforo, you old cunt! How come they let you out of Genoa?”

“They let you go, didn’t they?” replied my tutor in the same spirit. “I hear that they’re getting rid of all the ugly sailors.”

“Must be quiet back there then.”

It was an acknowledged joke and I smiled politely, before I realized that no one could actually see what I was doing behind my mask and under my hood.

“How is Lisabetta?”

The stranger spat neatly. “A pain in my arse and my pocket.”

“The children?”

“The same.” But it was said with love and gave me a jolt—I realized I envied this toothless sailor; he was married with children whom he loved, just like my tutor. I had a moment of misgiving—I was about to put him in danger.

“And how about you? You still teaching? Taught the dogaressa anything in the sack yet? Christ, she’s a tasty piece—makes my prick pain me.”

Now I chuckled, and the seaman looked beneath my hood and noticed my mask for the first time. Fell to his knees.

“Jesus shat! The dogaressa!” His tan face blanched. “My lady, forgive me,” he babbled. “I knew not . . . that is, I meant nothing—”

“Get up, you old pisspot,” exclaimed Signor Cristoforo, “before the whole place sees you. This is not the dogaressa, but her daughter. Signorina Luciana Mocenigo, meet Bonaccorso Nivola, the best sailor on these shores or any other.”

I gave the man my hand, as it seemed the right thing to do, and he kissed it, like a man who had just been hit round the head with a frittata pan. Signor Cristoforo drew our little trio behind a stack of pine planks twice as tall as we. The sweet sap filled my nostrils.

“She’s minded to go on a trip and wants you to take her.”

“A trip.”

“Yes. You still running the rope boats to Mestre?”

“Of course. Only way I can pay for all the bambini my Lisa-betta pops out. ‘Nother one on the way.”

“All right then. One trip. And you can feed them for a year.”

“Gold?”

“Gold.”

“How much?”

“Fifty ducats.”

The seaman gave a toothless whistle, and I swallowed. Fifty ducats was a fortune! Where the hell was I supposed to get that money? Signor Cristoforo must be mad! Then, in a horrid instant, I knew; but the thought bathed me in a sweat of terror. My mother had a coffer of gold ducats in her chamber—I had seen it only this morning as I had searched for her masks. Madonna. Then I straightened up. Only one thing could make me go back in that room, and that was Brother Guido. I’d do it if I must. The sailors continued their bargaining, as if I wasn’t there.

“When?”

“Tomorrow night. First night of Carnevale.”

Bonaccorso Nivola considered, then jerked his head in my direction. “Her mum know she’s going?”

A tiny pause from Signor Cristoforo. “No. It’s a matter of the heart.”

This was true enough—I’d laid all before my tutor and he knew that I fled for love.

Bonaccorso caught on quick. “One way then?”

“Yes.”

The sailor was silent.

“It’s risky, I won’t lie to you,” admitted my tutor. “But then you can retire.”

Bonaccorso sucked in his gums, the air whistling through his lack of teeth.

“What the hell,” he said, then addressed me directly for the first time. “Be on the San Zaccharia pier at midnight tomorrow. Bring the gold in a lace kerchief. I’ll be on the rope barge. I’ll stop for a moment, no more. You ask me if I’ve ever been to Burano to see the lacemakers. Got it?”

I nodded, mute with terror and triumph.

“Till tomorrow then.” And he was gone into the crowd as quickly as he had come. I felt faint and elated at once. It was done. I was committed. Tomorrow, I would be gone.

My tutor and I hurried back to the palace as fast as we could and parted at the staircase without a word. Both too frightened and agitated to give note to the fact this would be our last meeting. I knew I would not see him again, and I could not speak lest I give myself away, but I hoped that as I hurried away he might know that I would not forget him, and that he knew how much I owed Signor Cristoforo of Genoa.