The Giant, page 13
Somehow, in the altered light, I see my city with a clarity I have never experienced. Beautiful. Enchanting. Magical. Larger than me, but I am one with it. I close my eyes and let the sounds of the frenzied crowd carry me. I let the bodies press me forward. At the center of the circle, Michelangelo is our beating heart. My hand reaches for his sleeve.
Ours is an unprecedented generation. It’s as if God has predestined those of us staggering through the streets like fools to make a mark on history. It is preordained. Together, we have the power to make something miraculous, something never before seen. Our art might endure forever. We might be immortal. Can I imagine myself part of it? Maybe I just need to hang on.
Before dawn, I finally make my way home. Market vendors are still hawking their wares to crowds of revelers in the squares. Rounding the corner into the Mercato Nuovo, I see several long tables set out in rows. Vendors of fruit, fish, and poultry have set up their baskets and makeshift tables, taking advantage of the foot traffic funneling out of the squares. The aroma of food fills the air, and I feel a rush of saliva fill my cheeks.
The poultry vendor, a ponderous, sweating woman with a crown of braids and flushed cheeks, has arranged a display of large hens, their necks wrung, on a table. She has fallen asleep on a stool. Her head lolls to her shoulder, much as the hens on her table. Her son, only slightly bigger than the chickens himself, runs his small, grubby hand over the feathers of one.
“Pssst,” I whisper to the boy, one eye on the sleeping woman. “You ever seen a dragon breathe fire?” His eyes are wide and shining. He shakes his head slowly. “There’s one just around that corner.” I gesture. He turns his head but hesitates. “Really,” I say. “Don’t you hear it?” Behind us, there is the hiss of fire and the cheer of a crowd. His wide eyes glow in the candlelight. “Go have a look before it’s gone.”
The temptation is impossible to resist. The boy steps away from the chicken table and scampers around the corner. His mother sleeps.
As a blast of fireworks cracks overhead, I grasp the supple neck of one of the chickens and stuff the bird into the pouch at the front of my apron. It just fits, a few of its burgundy feathers sticking out. Quickly, I funnel my way into the rear of the crowd, leaving the poultry seller—and Michelangelo and his friends—behind me. In the chaos of the fuochi, I do not believe anyone has witnessed my trick.
I have never stolen anything before, nothing of importance. I feel my heart race at the same time that my mouth waters to think what Lucia will be able to make with the chicken.
“Collecting chickens, L’Indaco?” My heart runs cold. I turn to see Francesco Monciatto the woodcarver, who has detached himself from our group of men. Has he witnessed my prank?
“Bringing it home to my sister for the pot.” I press the feathers into my pouch. “You are working with Michelangelo now, are you?” Immediately I regret asking the question in case the answer is yes.
“Me? No. He works alone; you should know that. Ha! Actually, I’ve been working with di Cosimo.” Monciatto gestures to the fireworks. “I made some of the banners and floats for this parade, in fact.”
“Di Cosimo,” I say. “Isn’t he…” I bring my hand to my head in a gesture of questionable sanity. Di Cosimo is one of our city’s most important painters, not to mention a designer of unforgettable public pageants.
“Di Cosimo has been commissioned to orchestrate a pageant for the feast of Saint Agata. He is creating banners, floats, flags, garlands, you know, everything that is needed.” He stops and presses my arm. “He is looking for some assistants and good painters to help. You would be great. Are you interested?”
“Well, I have a few obligations,” I say, scratching my head. “But I might be able to fit something in.”
“Benissimo. Give us a few days to clear up this mess,” he nods at the back of the float ahead of us, “then come to di Cosimo’s studio. I’ll make the introduction.”
All the way home, I pray that I will slip into the house unnoticed, but when I press the door with quiet hands, I see my sister’s silhouette in the glow of a neglected fire, her arms crossed.
I pause in the doorway and study her face, the deep lines creased alongside her mouth. We look at each other in silence for a few long moments. I inhale the familiar scent of smoke and onions. The last embers crackle in the hearth. Near the back door, I spy a small puddle of water where the rain has beat a steady drip through a leak in the roof.
“Did someone die?” I say finally, trying to cut through the thick atmosphere that has descended on the kitchen. I place the wine-colored hen on the table. An offering.
Lucia narrows her eyes at me. “Where have you been?”
I gesture at the chicken. “At the fuochi. And the poultry seller.”
“And then…”
I shrug. “And then what?”
“And then where else?” She crosses her arms across her chest, her eyes no more than slits.
“That’s it,” I say, fidgeting with the ties of my shift.
“The debt collector has sent you another notice,” she says, then sighs, as if it is a relief to reveal the information. From under her crossed arms, she produces a folded piece of parchment, sealed with the red wax of the Signoria. She stands and slaps it on the table. The fear is gone from her face this time; all I see now is suspicion.
Without breaking the seal, I pick up the parchment and throw it into the fire.
Lucia opens her mouth into a perfect circle. “Jacopo! In the name of God! You cannot just ignore those men. They know where we live!”
“Don’t worry about them.” I shoo her with my hand. “I am working on it.”
I move to go up to my bedchamber, but she plants her body in front of me, her hands on her hips. After a few moments of silence, she looks me in the eye. “Are you gambling again, Jacopo?”
I laugh, a brief, high-pitched hack. “Me? Why do you ask?”
“What are those cards?” She points toward the staircase. “The ones in your bedchamber?”
I raise my eyebrows. “You have been sneaking around in there?”
“No one else is going to clean that mule stable. I found them when I was tidying your worktable.”
“It’s a commission,” I say.
“A commission.” She does not budge, only crosses her arms. “For playing cards.”
“Yes! Per l’amor di Dio!” I meet her gaze. “Everything is under control. I promise.”
“I want to believe you,” she says, “but it seems I am the only one putting food on our table these days.”
I gesture frantically to the bird on the table, as if a single stolen chicken could make up for all the times she has gone to the market and paid for food from her own pocket.
In return, I get a searing gaze. “The roof is leaking. Where is the money for that?” she says. “You said you were saving up for that in the back of the ledger book. But when I went into the drawer, I found the book but the back pages were empty. What happened to it?”
When I do not respond, her eyes go big and brown. “Jacopo. Many times I have not said anything when you came home with spirits on your breath. It’s because I do not want to hear you lie to me. I do not want to hear the words I know are not true. And so I have forced myself to remain silent. More than once. Because I knew you would tell me you weren’t betting money on cards or dice. I wanted to wait for the right time to carry on a calm dialogue about all of this, but I can no longer hold my tongue.”
“You know me. When have I ever given you anything to worry about?” I say again, but I can see that the debt collector’s letter has rattled her.
“Jacopo,” she says, “you have let me down so many times. You are intelligent, you are gifted with your creations. I do not want to see you throw away everything as you sink down into this… melancholy of yours.” She sighs and begins to pace the room. “Enough times I have accepted your lies, told myself that it is only temporary, that it is not so bad, that we can bear it, that you will eventually stop and find gainful employment instead.”
“You’re the one who’s lying here!” Deep inside, I know I am only lying to myself. “You… exaggerate.”
She doesn’t waver. “Only you can decide how to squander your own time and money. I cannot stop you from throwing away every florin you make; that much is clear. But you must understand,” she says, lowering her arms and setting her brown eyes on me with a steely gaze, “that your choices do not only affect you. Our fortunes are tied together. They always have been, whether or not you want to admit it.”
I turn away from her, busying myself with tidying our felted capes hanging on an iron hook by the door. “I swear to you that things are not as bad as you think. You can trust me.”
She looks at me sideways. “Trust is earned through action, not through words, Jacopo.”
And trust is fragile. I know that now. What could I do or say to earn it back?
She continues. “Have you never considered that while you and our brother might choose to work, I have to rely on you? The three of us. We must rely on each other.” From the corner of my eye, I see her press her face into her hands. “And now… I cannot even get married,” she says.
For a moment I am struck mute, hating myself for ignoring this obvious consequence of my own actions. I have gambled away Lucia’s dowry. She has no hope of marrying now. In a dark corner of my mind, I feel only relief that she is stuck here caring for me, until we are both bone dust, for who else will do it? I will never admit it aloud. And I have nothing to give her in return for her labors.
The hen on the table draws flies. I think about all the money I have gambled away over the years; it is more than I could ever calculate. It would have amounted to a very handsome dowry for her; even fifty broad florins might have been enough to start. It would have given her the life that my parents might have wished or even expected. But I have already frivoled away the bride price our father set aside for her. I have made it several times but given it all away at the card table.
I sit at the table and put my forehead in my palms. Lucia has become my keeper. She could have asked me to leave long ago. She would have had our parents’ house. She would have been fine with the pittance she earns illuminating books. My choices have sent us down this path. For the first time, she has unburdened herself, has told me exactly how I have hurt her.
“You want to get married,” I say quietly. It is all I can muster.
She scoffs and her face turns pink. “What did you think, brother? If I had wanted to live a contemplative life, I could have taken my vows long ago. You know that. Why do you think I have not joined the sisters?”
I press my face into my hands. I want to shut my ears, but she continues.
“When you say that you are done gambling, I want to believe you. I do. But I cannot walk away now. You have made it our problem. My problem.” She stands and slams her palms on the table in frustration. “If you want to go spend the rest of your days in the gutter, that is your choice, but I cannot afford to be out on the street with nowhere to live.”
For a long moment, there is only the sound of a slow drip through the hole in our roof.
“I’ve written to our brother,” she says softly.
“What for?!” I yell, more from shame than from anything else, for it falls to the older brother to care for the younger ones. Just look how Michelangelo has cared for his own. Just look at how I fail.
“We don’t need Francesco to come home! Everything is fine.”
Her expression is pained. I know she has lied for me—to friends, family, neighbors. She has said that I was working and earning money when she was the one who kept us afloat. She has looked the other way when the evidence and the consequences of my debt have mounted all around us. And if Francesco bails me out, what would stop me from bleeding our little family dry once again?
“Look,” I say finally. “The debt… Yes, it was assigned to me to pay back a fine. Yes, it was for gambling. I admit it. But the fresco project at San Pier Martire. I’m paying it back through my labor there. Capito?”
“I know.” Her words come out little more than a whisper.
“How?”
She shrugs. “I deduced as much. No one had to tell me. Jacopo, you must find paying work now. If you are only working to dig yourself out of a hole, then how are we to go forward?”
A deep, heaving sigh. “The giant…” I stare at the ceiling as if God could hand down a reason why things worked out the way they had with Michelangelo. “I was deluding myself that I could work on it.”
She begins to say something about the giant, then stops herself. “You have gone to Master da Vinci. Did he give you work?”
I wave my hand and shake my head vigorously. “Those are not my people. They are all fakers who think they are better than everyone else.”
She slaps her rag on the table in exasperation. “You cannot afford to be choosy! We are talking about paying work!”
“I have sold a few little pictures,” I say, gesturing as if to make the size of my little boards.
“On the street corner?” She crosses her arms again.
“I have been looking for better work.” I shrug. “I promise.”
She sears me again with her large, brown eyes. In that moment, I hate her.
“Like what, Jacopo?”
I hook my thumb in the direction of the waning festivities in the streets. “Monciatto the woodcarver says there is work in di Cosimo’s studio. Just now he told me. Di Cosimo? That crazy man who organizes all those pageants.”
Lucia grasps my forearms with her hands and squeezes them tight. “Then for God’s sake, you must go, Jacopo. First thing tomorrow morning. No more excuses. I am coming with you.”
In spite of the fact that he is one of our guild’s busiest painters and a genius at staging public spectacles, Piero di Cosimo lives more as a beast than a man. His house and workshop occupy an entire city block. Vines have overtaken the walls and doorways so that I hardly know where to enter.
When I finally find the unassuming entryway to di Cosimo’s studio, I stop for a moment and ready myself. The only thing that matters now is making a good impression. A lot is riding on my employment here, not only for myself but also for Lucia. What a relief that I was able to convince her to stay behind at home. I push my shoulders back and brush my stained shift as if it might improve my appearance. And what an ass of myself I would have made if I had brought my sister along with me to vouch for my skill. The men would surely have laughed me all the way back out into the street.
I step inside di Cosimo’s walled orchard, then hesitate. The fruit trees look as though they have never been trimmed. Steam rises into the branches from great copper vats, and the smell of animal glue and boiling eggs hangs in the air like a smothering cloud. I make my way through the tangled branches, an improbable forest in the city, to an open door where there are voices. Men working. The acrid smell of vinegar and pigments.
“Monciatto the woodcarver sent me,” I say to a boy whose apron falls to the top of his soiled clogs. The boy disappears into the clutter and I wait, trying again to appear relaxed and confident. I feel the grin on my face quiver.
Inside di Cosimo’s studio, I see that things are not much improved from the outside. The floors look as if they have never been swept. Every tabletop is cluttered with paper, models, brushes, and banners. The carcasses of great parade decorations lie dormant, burdened under the weight of teetering contraptions long abandoned. There are hollow wooden angels. Papier-mâché figures as tall as a man. The head of a fearsome dragon with wild eyes and a lolling tongue.
While I wait, I stare into the face of the dragon, widening my eyes to match. What do I have to be afraid of? I stick out my tongue and try to twist it sideways, matching the expression of the unlikely beast.
“Jacopo!” Monciatto says. I quickly collect myself and reassume my swaggering, confident posture. “You’ve decided to join us. Come!” When Monciatto turns away, I make one last wide-eyed face at the dragon before following Monciatto’s back into the depths of the studio.
The space is cavernous and filled with warm light from leaded windows high up on the south side. For each of the dozen or so assistants, there are at least two cats. I make my way through the clutter, feeling the warm swirl of feline forms around my ankles. Other cats lounge on the tabletops, on fragments and pieces of disused carnival floats, on the cool dirt floor, or high in the dark reaches of paraphernalia discarded from years of pageants and spectacles.
“We are getting ready for the next parade already,” Monciatto tells me. “Master di Cosimo has asked all of us to recommend our friends. There should be work here for a while. Master!” he calls to a sagging wooden screen in the corner of the studio. I stand behind Monciatto and peer inside.
Seated on a low, wooden stool, Master di Cosimo is little more than a potato of a man who looks as though he has never washed. He regards us with round, bulging eyes like those of a toad.
“Master, this is Jacopo Torni... L’Indaco, they call him. He is a guildsman skilled with fresco and illumination.”
Master di Cosimo stands, teeters. He waddles over to us, then looks me up and down with a skeptical, twitching eye.
“Who is your father?”
“Master Torni. The illuminator. May God protect his soul.” I cross myself and hope that Master di Cosimo can’t see my hand tremble.
Di Cosimo’s toad eyes go wide, then he nods. He lays a meaty hand on my shoulder and his mouth turns into a wide grin. He grasps my hand.
It only takes an instant. I am hired, if only thanks to the credibility of my dead father.
I am surprised at how quickly I fall into a comfortable rhythm of work. Somehow, amid the squalor and chaos, di Cosimo’s workshop is productive. I find myself among a happy cadre of apprentices, painting the colorful arms of our city’s major and minor guilds on long fabric banners. I recognize the golden eagle of the merchants, the lamb of the wool guild, the gray stripes of the shoemakers, the iron calipers of the blacksmiths. In other corners, assistants are grinding pigments, cutting fabric, painting trees in the backgrounds of small panels, stirring glue in pots for papier-mâché.
