The Marriage Portrait(97)
He is silent as he crosses the room, as he takes in the scene before him: his wife, her maids, the servant he dispatched, the box containing the dress. His appearance is immaculate: black hose, black giubbone, black boots.
“My dearest,” he murmurs, as he reaches her, his eyes flickering from her to the box to the maids, gathering information, calculating what the situation holds.
He takes her hand, standing very close to her, and bows over it for a moment, then says: “I did not expect to see you.”
How very like him this utterance is, Lucrezia thinks. A mere seven words, a seemingly bland construction, but it carries so much. He appears to say simply that he is surprised to see her, but what he is actually conveying is his displeasure that she has taken it upon herself to come down to his apartment like this. Why, she wonders, does he not want her here? For what reason does he require her to stay in her rooms?
“I thought,” she says, “I would come down myself, to ensure the dress was delivered safely, and in case I was needed for work on the portrait.”
His face doesn’t move; her hand, still in his, grows hot beneath his touch.
“I would have sent for you,” he replies, “if that were the case.”
She shrugs. “The change of air does me good.”
He nods, drops her hand, turns towards the table where the box has been laid. He places his palm upon it. “This is it?”
He seems to be asking the maids but since he is not looking at them, Emilia doesn’t realise and doesn’t answer. He waits, the picture of patience and forbearance, one hand still on the box, until Clelia leaps to her feet, curtseys, and says, “Yes, Your Grace.”
“Why…” Lucrezia addresses his back: she is going to ask him the reason for her to be kept to her rooms, she is, she is about to, but somehow she feels that to keep him talking, not confront him, might be her best course of action, the way to get as much information as possible out of him, so she swerves instead into “…is the dress to be taken away?”
“It is the usual practice,” he says. “To spare your time, to avoid trespassing on your patience. Il Bastianino will take it for a short while to his studio, where he will pose and paint it. Then,” he turns towards her, “it will be returned, when the portrait is complete.”
Lucrezia sees, for the first time, that he has an injury to the left side of his face. Under his cheekbone, just in front of his ear, are three scratches, fresh and vivid, cut deeply into the skin.
“Your face,” she exclaims, moving towards him. “Did you—?”
“It is nothing.” He touches a fingertip to the livid stripes. “I had quite forgotten.”
“But you need a salve or a—”
“It’s nothing,” he says again. “Do not concern yourself.”
“Alfonso,” she says, in a low voice, unable to hold it in any longer, “I am…I need to ask you something.”
He doesn’t reply, just keeps his eyes on her.
“There were dreadful noises in the night. And this morning I sent word to Elisabetta but heard nothing back. What is happening?”
“Leave, please,” he says, without moving, and for a shocking moment, she thinks he is addressing her, that he is ordering her from the room, in that imperative voice. But, without hesitation, Leonello, the advisers, the servant and her maids all get to their feet and file out of the door.
And then, she and Alfonso are alone, in the beautiful room where, above their heads, Aurora in her golden carriage pushes back the gloomy presence of Night.
“There are things,” he begins, in a voice barely above a murmur, “that will happen in our lives, from time to time, that may seem inexplicable to you. You do not need to involve yourself. It is my duty to deal with anything that threatens our status and our reputation. Not yours. I sent word requesting that you remain in your room, and yet here you are. What occurred last night was—”
This astounding speech, which causes Lucrezia’s limbs to tremble beneath her skirts, is interrupted by the door opening at the far end of the salon.
Jacopo the apprentice is walking towards them, his cap held in his hand. Alfonso gives him a sideways glance, then holds out a hand and points at the box. “There,” he says.
Jacopo directs his steps around them, circumnavigating the centre of the room, where Lucrezia stands with Alfonso. He takes out a leather strap from his bag and begins to fasten it around the box.
“There will be many things,” Alfonso resumes, as if Jacopo isn’t in the room, and Lucrezia recalls that Alfonso perhaps still labours under the impression that Jacopo is deaf as well as mute, “that it is better for you not to know. But I ask you to ensure at all times that the compass of your loyalties is pointing in the correct direction: you are my wife and I scarcely need to remind you that your first and foremost duty must always be to me. No one else. Not your women, not my sisters, no one. I am your husband and also, yes, your protector. So allow me, please, to protect you.”
She sees, behind him, Jacopo cast a sideways look at him, at her. He is hefting the box to his shoulder. He does this slowly, with great caution, taking as much time as possible. His steps, as he moves towards the door, are slow, and it seems for one unsettling moment that he might change course and walk towards them. But then he seems to think better of this. He adjusts his hold on the strap, on the box, and it comes to her that he is carrying her gown, that he will, very soon, be opening the lid at the studio, inhaling the air trapped there, air from her chamber; he will be touching the cloth with his hand, lifting it out, shaking it, examining it, deciding on the right combinations of pigments to replicate it on Il Bastianino’s portrait. He will be picturing her inside it, considering how it held her body, draped over her limbs; he will linger over it, examine it; it will haunt his days and flit through his dreams at night.