The Marriage Portrait(37)

Alfonso passes the goods to a man who stands just behind him, and he turns to Lucrezia, takes the hem of her veil and lifts it, up, up, over her head, and suddenly she can see, she can breathe. There is nothing between her and the world, nothing screening her vision, nothing to stop her eyes moving freely about the church, drinking it in, nothing between her skin and the incense-heavy air, and nothing between her and the man in front of her.

The priest has indicated that the Mass will begin and Alfonso adjusts his body so that he is facing the altar. It takes Lucrezia a moment to follow suit.

There are many words in Latin, flowing over their heads or perhaps floating up to the ceiling. Lucrezia is finding that she cannot concentrate, cannot interpret what the priest is saying. Every now and again she catches a word and she can make it mean something—the Father, the soul, a union—but she cannot stitch it into a sentence or even a clause. She knows she should be absorbing the solemnity and significance of the ceremony but all she can do is examine as much of Alfonso as she can see: his shoes, their polished brown sides, the places where it is possible to see the outline of his feet through the leather, the curve of his long calves through his hose, the way the cuffs of his shirt are fastened with a fine twist of silver. His hair is dark, longer than that of other men she has met; it falls across his brow. And he is tall, just as she remembered, with the broad body of a soldier. Her head barely reaches his shoulder, her feet take up less than half the space of his.

She is aware of his in-breath and out-breath, the rasp of cloth as he moves to take the cup and then pass it to her.

The priest removes the lilies from her, joins their hands together and motions them to face each other. He is saying more words now and Lucrezia can grasp “husband” and “wife” and “life” and she knows then that it is done, she is married, that it can never be undone. She is no longer the person she has always been but someone else she doesn’t yet know, with a different name, a different home. She now belongs to this man standing before her, and when she raises her eyes she is expecting him to look solemn and grave.

Instead, on the face of Duke Alfonso, Lucrezia is taken aback to see, there is something else. Alfonso has been as little affected by the seriousness of the religious ceremony as she has. When her eyes meet his, it is clear that he has been waiting for her gaze; his mouth turns up a little at the corners. He slides his eyes towards the priest—still reciting words pertaining to God and duty—then flicks them back to hers, with a slight raise of one eyebrow.

It is an expression of amusement, one that casts a cloak of collusion around her and him, together. It says, This priest is really quite dull, isn’t he? And: When will this be over?

Lucrezia couldn’t have been more surprised than if Alfonso had performed a dance up there on the altar. She feels her own mouth beginning to curve into a smile.

A pressure is applied to her hand, joined to his, and she realises he is squeezing her fingers. She glances at him again and sees that he is twitching his nose, just a tiny amount. It is the same face he pulled all those years ago, on the battlements of the tower, the mouse face. She wants to say to him: You remember that? You remember seeing me there, with my pet mouse? And also: Do you regret that it is not Maria here today, in this dress, with her hands in yours? Do you really not mind that it is me and not her?

But there would be no sense in saying any of these things to him. They are now turning to face the back of the church and they are moving down the aisle, through the yellow arches of light, over the red diamond tiles and the marble tombs; they are passing out through the enormous doors and Alfonso is linking her arm through his, and she can feel the crackle of embroidery, and also something else—the shift and spring of muscle and sinew beneath his clothes.

When they come out on to the steps of the church, he waves at the gathered crowds and Lucrezia does the same. Her veil is thrown back, the sun on her face, and the crowds are shouting and cheering, holding up small flags and handkerchiefs, under the stern gaze of her father’s guards. Alfonso is nodding at the people of Florence, his black hair gleaming in the light, and he turns and speaks his first words as her husband: “Do you still have the painting of the stone marten?”

“La faina?” she says. “Of course! She is one of my most treasured possessions. I keep her beside my table and she is the first thing I see every day.”

He looks at her, his head on one side, a quizzical smile playing around his lips.

“Her?” he says.

Lucrezia nods. “She looks like a her to me.”

“And do you think she will be happy to leave Florence and go to Ferrara?”

Lucrezia looks up at this man, her husband, who broke with tradition and selected this painting for her as a bridal gift, just over two years ago, who had noticed and remembered her love for animals—that pink-nosed mouse held in her palm—who had sent it to her, the first painting she ever owned.

“Yes,” Lucrezia says. “I think she will.”

And there, on the steps of Santa Maria Novella, Alfonso presses his hand to hers, as the sun beats down on them both, on the crowds, on the intersecting stones of the piazza, the battlements of the palazzo, the streets and gutters and archways, on the red roofs all over the city, and the hills and trees and fields of the surrounding land.





Scorched Earth


Fortezza, near Bondeno, 1561