Courtesan's Lover (2 page)

***

“We could deliver you to Vasquez in a carpet, like Cleopatra,” Cristo had suggested.

He
seemed
excited
by
the
idea, but I demurred. “That's a horrible idea, Cristo,” I said. “It would probably ruin the dress, which cost a fortune. Any carpet you might be able to find will probably be filthy,and I'll end up covered in dust and cobwebs and smelling of old wool. Not very attractive. It may have been all very well in ancient Rome, or Egypt or wherever it was, but I don't fancy it in the slightest, here in Napoli.”

Cristo
saw
my
point
in
the
end, and so we discussed for some time how we might adapt Cleopatra's plan to suit the occasion. He was wedded to his idea of concealment and would not be moved from it. “People like unwrapping gifts,” he said.

***

“Quick!” the servant says. “Get up here!” He and the other two men help me to seat myself as near to the middle of the bed as we can manage, without creasing my clothes, rumpling the golden fabric, or disturbing the straightness of the ribbon. They almost lift me, in fact. I lie down, both ribbon and gauze stretching out flat on either side of me.

“Ready, Señora?” my new friend asks. His tone is deferential, but his eyes are dancing. He licks his lips, twitching down a smile.

I nod again. “Quite ready, thank you. Just don't wrap it too tightly. It must be left loose: this dress will be ruined if it's crushed.” I fold my arms across my chest.

“
Maestre
Vasquez will be here in moments, Señora,” he assures me, leaning across me and taking the far ends of the sheer length of doubled-over fabric. He lifts it back toward himself, letting it fall so it completely covers me from head to foot. He gently tucks it in under me. Then he takes the other side and folds this back over the first layer, tucking that in on my other side, until all the ends are (so I imagine—I can now see almost nothing) out of sight, and I am neatly wrapped like a big parcel inside four layers of cypress gauze. The last thing I feel is the servant's hands tying the ribbon around the level of my belly. Not one part of me remains visible: not a wisp of hair, not even the tip of one shoe.

I feel somewhat confined and discover I cannot really move my arms properly, but I suppose it
is
still more comfortable and sweet-smelling than a carpet would have been.

“Are you quite comfortable, Señora?” my friend asks.

“Quite, thank you,” I reply politely. My words sound oddly muffled.

“We go downstairs, now, and tell
Maestre
something important is deliver to the upstairs chamber—as soon as he home. He not be long. You wait.”

I hear footsteps, the click of the door closing, and finally a soft and sunlit silence.

As I have been instructed, I wait.

And wait.

And wait.

All I can hear is my own breath, inside my silk cocoon, and the rustling of my skirts as I shift position a fraction.

What will he be like, this Vasquez? Cristoforo has assured me of his wealth, his eminent standing as a senior official in the occupying army, and of his desire for my company. But what sort of man is he? I wonder if I shall enjoy what is about to happen. Will he be gifted in the arts of the bedchamber? Might he even be someone who will turn out to be more to me than a paying patron? Perhaps, in time to come, I shall look back fondly on this evening as the moment something extraordinary began. But then, of course, the converse is just as possible: tonight's tryst could as easily turn out to be that fateful encounter that every courtesan secretly dreads. Because such fateful encounters do happen. It happened to me all those years ago, after all, did it not? I was lucky to survive that night.

I might not be so fortunate another time.

My scar tweaks as I remember.

But…Cristo made it all sound so enticing the other day.

***

“You tell me you need a new patron—well, what would you say to a Spaniard?” he said.

“A Spaniard? An Inquisitor?”

Cristo
laughed. “No, no, no—nothing like that—can't imagine any of them spending a single
scudo
on
such
sinful
and
wicked
activities
as
a
liaison
with
a
courtesan
—
even one as beautiful as you, Francesca. No, this man's a tremendously wealthy
Maestre de Campo
in
the
Spanish
Army. I've been working with him for months. Now, I could be wrong, but from what I've heard him say, I am given to understand that he's becoming increasingly desperate for the attentions of a beautiful woman. He rarely goes an hour without mentioning the fact, as it happens.”

I
smiled, and Cristo grinned at me.
“
He's as rich as Croesus,” he said. I glanced over to where Modesto was standing by the door to my chamber, but my manservant's face was unreadable.

“He's young,” Cristo went on, “younger than me, a good soldier—not the brightest, perhaps, but clever enough to have been promoted several times. He's a bit particular, I suppose you could say. Others might say pedantic, but—”

“I really meant, shall I find him attractive?”

Cristo
laughed. “That's not for me to say, really, is it,
cara
? Come with me the day after tomorrow, though, and I'll present you to him—with a suitably ostentatious flourish, I think—and then you can decide for yourself what you think of our young Miguel Vasquez.”

I
wanted
to
know
what
Modesto
thought
of
this
idea before I agreed to anything.

“I think you should do it,” he said after a moment's pause. “What with the death of the Conte di Vecchio, and now the news that the Signore here is leaving the city”—he nodded toward Cristo, then turned back to me—“you have to think of your financial position. With the likes of Emilia Rosa and that simpering little bitch Alessandra Malacoda rising to such dizzying heights in the city, you're going to have to make sure you keep pace. Old and decrepit he might well have been, but the Conte di Vecchio had status in Napoli, and his patronage was a godsend last year.”

I
looked
at
my
feet
and
pushed
the
toe
of
my
shoe
down
into
a
knot
hole
in
the
floor. He was right, I knew, but, wanting to justify myself, I said, “But I have other patrons. There's Filippo…”

Modesto
rolled
his
eyes.

Irritated, I added, “And I took on Signor di Cicciano a few weeks ago.”

Cristo's eyebrows lifted. “That young reprobate? I've heard of him. You should be careful, Francesca—I'm surprised you're still in one piece, from what people have said. I'm serious, you must take care.”

The
same
thought
had
occurred
to
me, on a couple of occasions in the company of this new patron. Michele di Cicciano can be very wild. Perhaps Modesto had a point, I thought. I need someone steady. Rich and steady. At least while Cristo is away.

***

A door bangs somewhere below me. Somebody shouts, and then several male voices rumble incomprehensibly. Heavy footsteps thud on a staircase. My pulse quickens. Perhaps this is him. Oh, dear. Cristo said he had a “prodigious appetite”… What if he is enormous? Shall I end this evening completely flattened? I fiddle my lips between my teeth to redden them, then lick them. I try to lift my arm to pinch color into my cheeks, but the servant has tied the ribbon too tightly, and I can't reach my face without spoiling the lie of the cloth.

No one comes into the room, however, and within seconds, the sounds from below fade away. My thoughts begin to wander again.

***

The
poor
Conte
di
Vecchio. I feel horribly responsible for his death. I told Cristo about it—I said I'd killed him. Oh, I know I didn't actually do it, but I still feel so guilty about it that it seems to me sometimes that I did. I should never have agreed to see Vicino da Argenta that day, vile man that he is. It was stupid of me. Modesto has always told me I should keep away from him. And if Argenta hadn't been with me that afternoon, the Conte di Vecchio would still be alive, Modesto would be happy with the money I'm earning, and I wouldn't be lying here like an oversized birthday present, unable to move, almost entirely ignorant about the man I am to bed.

Cristo
was
shocked
when
I
told
him
about
the
Conte
di
Vecchio. He had known the old man was dead but not how it had happened.

“I hadn't seen him for two or three weeks,” I said. “He'd been on a trip, I think.” I pictured the old man—Giovanni Battista, the elderly Conte di Vecchio: stooped, stiff and slow in his movements, the wreck of a once debonair adventurer. Lovemaking had cost him dearly every time, I think, but he had enjoyed it—on the days when he was able to manage it—and on those occasions when his bones had ached too fiercely to permit him to rut, he had just liked sitting in my bed with me and listening to me recite poetry or reading to him from my diaries. He was a dear old thing; he was the means of my establishment here in Napoli, and I am genuinely sorry he's gone. And not just because of the money, either.

“Go on,” Cristoforo said.

“Well, as I say, he'd been away for ages. So had you.”

“It's an annoying habit of the army, to request one to work from time to time.”

I
ignored
his
sarcasm. “So, seeing as all my favorites had declined to come and see me, I had to resort to scraping the bottom of the barrel.” I paused. “Vicino da Argenta.”

Cristoforo
did
not
need
to
comment. The expression of disgust on his face was eloquent.

I
gave
him
a
wry
smile. “I know—the man's repulsive.”

“Then why?”

Shame
glowed
warm
in
my
cheeks
as
I
admitted
it. “Because I needed the money.”

Cristoforo
shook
his
head
and
made
a
soft
“tut” of disbelief with his tongue. The heat in my face flared now with irritation. “Don't look at me like that!” I said. “I have a living to make just as you do. I have two houses to manage and my children to care for. If the men I prefer choose not to come and see me, I have to make do with the ones I would rather avoid.”

He
inclined
his
head
in
reluctant
acceptance
of
this.

“Anyway,” I said. “Vicino had come here early on the evening that Giovanni Battista died. He was drunk—which was hardly a surprise—and he was being particularly boring. I had no wish to engage him in conversation, and he seemed incapable of actually doing anything very exciting, so I decided that the best way to deal with the situation was probably just to make sure he couldn't expect me to talk to him.”

Cristoforo
raised
a
quizzical
eyebrow.

“My mother always told me it was ill-mannered to speak with your mouth full.”

Cristo
tipped
back
his
head
and
barked
out
a
laugh. I continued my tale. “And then, the door to my chamber—this chamber—bangs open. Thinking it's Modesto, I take no notice, and just carry on with what I'm doing—Vicino's too drunk to care about the interruption—but it isn't Modesto. It's Giovanni Battista.”

I
had
glanced
over
my
shoulder
from
where
I
was
crouched
on
the
floor
in
front
of
Argenta. The expression on his poor face—it's still haunting me. He looked utterly devastated. He said nothing, just stared at me for several seconds, and then blundered blindly out of the door. I made to follow him, but as soon as I started to stand, bloody Vicino caught my wrist and tried to hold me back, and by the time I had pulled myself from his grasp, the front door had slammed and the Conte di Vecchio had gone.