The Creation Of Eve (18 page)

Yesterday afternoon Don Carlos had stormed into the Queen's chambers, where she and her dozen or so ladies were working on their embroidery. He threw himself on some pillows near her feet.

"He says I cannot go to the Netherlands!" he exclaimed.

Don Alessandro strayed in, his lightly freckled face crooked in its characteristic playful smirk. "Don Carlos offered his services to rule there," he explained as he kissed the Queen's hand. "The King turned him down."

"And he wonders why the people there are in revolt!" Don Carlos cried from his pillows. "They want a true ruler governing them, not some woman who is not even Queen--sorry, Don Alessandro. I know your mother does the best that she can as the regent there."

Don Alessandro leaned against a wall. "No offense taken. I am deeply honored by every bone your father throws my family's way."

Don Carlos cocked his head as if deciding whether there was mockery in his cousin's voice, then went on. "The Dutch need a Prince who will love them and respect them, and will let them have their religion. I do not care if they are Protestant--not if they would love me back."

From her pillow at her embroidery frame, the condesa began, "One 's subjects are not always the best judge of what is good for--"

"Of course they would love you, Toad," said the Queen, breaking in. "You would rule with your heart." My Lady, who had been crying over the death the previous day of the spaniel she had brought with her from France, wiped her eyes and pulled her needle through the linen stretched on a frame before her. It was to be a covering for a kneeler in the convent of the Descalzas Reales, where the King's sister Dona Juana lives when in Madrid. I could not help wondering if the Queen took some pleasure in stabbing her needle into the cloth on which dona Eufrasia might someday kneel.

Don Carlos rolled onto his back and rearranged the pillows to gaze Up at her. "I would let the Dutch keep the profits they made from working their land."

"That would be just like you," she said. "So kind and so good."

Madame de Clermont murmured in agreement.

He warmed to their encouragement. "And I would provide alms to the needy among them."

"I know you would, Toad."

"And I would--"

"--guarantee a hen in every Dutch peasant 's stewing pot?" Don Alessandro grinned from his position against the wall. "I will tell my mother to try that."

One of the French ladies laughed.

Don Carlos's rapturous smile twisted into a frown. "This is nothing to laugh about."

The French lady lowered her head. The Queen started to soothe him, but her words were cut off by the twelve-o'clock bells clanging from their tower above the Cathedral. As we waited for their incessant tolling to finish, I thought of the King's motto: "Time and I can take on any two others." Only the most powerful man in the world would dare claim Time as his personal ally. Most humans are mercifully unconscious of Time slipping through their fingers at every moment--certainly not conscious of it often enough to think of yoking it to their own purpose. For others of us, Time is a torture, spinning itself out in maddening fits and starts while we wait for our true lives to begin.

"Dona Sofonisba," Don Alessandro said when the bells had stilled, "I like the picture you did of yourself." He nodded to the canvas brought from my chamber and hung on the Queen's wall at her request.

All heads turned to where I sat at my customary place by the window, sketching the Queen, then to the portrait. I could feel my cheeks color. Although in response to maestro Mor's painting I had carefully considered when to Use hard edges, employing them only on my eyes to give them what I hoped would be a look of intelligence, the portrait had not been a success, at least not to me. It lacked the vitality I had envisioned as I worked, resulting in little more life to it than maestro Mor's soulless portrait of the Queen. For all my good intentions, I had not been able to find the spirit behind my own face.

"When are you going to paint me?" asked Don Alessandro.

"Thank you for your interest, Your Highness, but maestro Mor is the court painter."

"Not any longer." He laughed. "Mor is no more."

I said I did not Understand.

"You had not heard?" he said. "Senor Mor left very suddenly the night before last, without a single good-bye. The details are not yet clear, but it seems Mor made the mistake of bragging to Dona Juana about all the heads of state he has painted when she was sitting for a portrait. When Dona Juana asked him to list these personages, among them were several German princes known to be sympathetic to Luther. Dona Juana then inquired--quite nicely, she told me--about the books maestro Mor has read. She had heard there might be Protestant books circulating behind closed doors at court, not that he would know of them, of course. He was gone the next day, the Unfinished painting of Dona Juana still on his easel. Word has it that he is on a ship to England."

"If Sofonisba's painting pictures now," Don Carlos said from the pillows at the Queen's feet, "she had better paint me first!"

I was too stunned by how quickly Mor had been ousted to respond. No matter. The condesa was only too pleased to speak for me. "Dona Sofonisba is here to give instruction to the Queen. Not to paint sundry portraits."

Don Carlos sat up, puffing out his sunken chest. "Mind whom you speak to, woman. I am the heir to the Spanish Empire."

The condesa took Up her pomander in consternation.

"Don't worry, Toad," the Queen said mildly, "I would make an exception for you."

"You would?"

"Please excuse me, My Lady," said the condesa, "but you said if dona Sofonisba were to paint portraits, they should be of you alone."

"I made that rule," said the Queen, "I can break it. Sofi, would you mind?"

"Of course not." I straightened my pile of paper, panicking at the thought of making this willowy wisp of a youth appear as a stout limb of the Spanish family tree. Is this how the great Leonardo had felt, when pressured by Isabella d'Este, Duchess of Mantua, to do her portrait? For years, it is said, the duchess badgered maestro Leonardo to paint her. The most he could ever produce was a sketch of her profile, painful in its portrayal of her thin lips and large nose. On the other hand, there are subjects so beautiful the artist finds himself portraying them over and over, as maestro Michelangelo had painted his secretary, Tommaso Cavalieri, when signore Tommaso had been young. I had seen study after study of signore Tommaso in the Maestro's house. I even recognized him in the fresco of the Last Judgment in the Sistine Chapel--arrows in hand, he is the handsomely pensive Saint Sebastian.

Don Carlos pressed an exuberant kiss on the Queen's hand. "Thank you, My Lady!" He clambered over and knelt before me on one knee. "Could you paint me soon, dona Sofonisba?"

"I can start whenever Her Majesty wishes me to."

"I should like you to start now."

The Queen nodded at me, her chin tucked back in amused affection.

"Now? Truly?" Don Carlos raked his fingers through his thistledown hair. "How should I stand?"

Don Alessandro stopped the page bringing in fruit on a blue and yellow ceramic tray. "You ought to hold the Rod of Office," he said, taking some grapes.

"Like thus?" Don Carlos struck a pose with his hands clenching an imaginary staff.

I saw the Queen hide her smile.

"I do believe you appear to be shimmying up a pole," said Don Alessandro.

"Or milking a cow." Don Juan entered the chamber with a playful grin on that fresh country face so like the King's yet so different. "A very noble cow, of course."

"Your words do not hurt me," Don Carlos said, though he dropped his hands to his side.

The Queen sat up, her cheeks suddenly bright.

"Perhaps it would be best if you just continued talking with the Queen, Your Majesty," I suggested to the Prince. "I can sketch informally, to get a measure of your face. It will take me some time to plan a painting. Usually I do several studies first."

The Queen shook her head at madame de Clermont, who offered to get her fruit. "Meanwhile, we shall have a sketching party."

"Sounds entertaining." Don Alessandro dangled some grapes over his mouth. "Though poor 'Sofi' will be doing all the work."

"You forget," said the Queen. "I can draw, too."

"You are talented
and
beautiful," said Don Alessandro, munching. "I think I shall die of love."

"Shut your mouth," Don Carlos growled.

Don Juan petted the little spaniel that had jumped down from madame de Clermont's lap to run to him. The little dog turned its head in pleasure as Don Juan scratched its back. "My Lady, I am sorry to hear that you lost your dear pet," he said to the Queen.

She nodded, tears welling in her eyes.

"How do your drawing lessons go?" he asked gently. "Is she a good student?" he asked me.

"The best," I said.

Don Alessandro cut me a look. "As excellent a student as you were with maestro Michelangelo?"

I fumbled with my box of chalks. "The Queen excels me."

"Of course," he said.

Don Juan gave madame's little spaniel one last pat. "Your Majesty," he asked the Queen, "would you like to practice your sketching on me?"

Don Alessandro looked between the two of them, wiping his mouth. "Yes. Do start with Uncle."

The Queen's sadness disappeared as quickly as it had come. "I
am
going to start with Don Juan," she said, "because he asked me nicely."

"Is that why?" said Don Alessandro.

The Queen rose from her embroidery frame. "Sofi, do you have a chalk and paper I can Use?"

At the Queen's bidding, and with sarcastic laughter from Don Alessandro, Don Carlos and Don Juan struck poses on the pillows before Us, Don Juan rather tentatively, Don Carlos proud as a dog with a new bone. The Queen settled next to me at the window. We began by holding out our chalks, to take measurement of our subject's heads, to transfer the proportion to our paper.

The Queen made a few marks, then stopped to watch me. "I am sorry, Don Juan, my sketch will not be as good as Sofi's."

"That wouldn't be your fault," said Don Juan. "You are hampered by poor subject matter."

"Now that's the truth," Don Alessandro said over his mouthful of grapes. "Can't they do any better than you, Uncle, out there in the country?"

"What ails you today, Don Alessandro?" said the Queen. "You are as bitter as spoiled wine."

He smiled and crossed his arms. "You wouldn't say such a thing to Don Juan."

"I would not need to." The Queen squinted at her Upheld chalk to gauge another measurement. She lowered her arm. "Has anyone told you how much you look like the King, Don Juan? You have the same forehead and brows. You can tell that you are brothers."

"Except that whereas the King's mother was a queen," said Don Alessandro, "Don Juan's mother was a whore."

I winced. The ladies glanced at one another before resuming their sewing.

Don Alessandro laughed. "What is wrong with everybody? I merely speak the facts. You don't take offense, do you, Uncle?"

Don Juan did not answer.

"Dear Alessandro," the Queen scolded, "the rules of courtesy apply even to the Royal Family. You should apologize."

Madame's little spaniel jumped in Don Juan's lap. He smoothed the dog's fur over the bony knob at the top of its head. "It does not matter."

"No." The Queen put down her chalk. "He should."

"This is ridiculous," said Don Alessandro.

"I don't care if your father is the Duke of Parma and your mother the regent of the Netherlands," said the Queen. "Do you know what happened to an heir to the throne of France when he thought he was above common sense?"

Don Alessandro made a face of weary annoyance. "No."

"This is a true story. It is about my father's brother."

"Oh, good--a story!" Don Carlos crawled forward, then sprawled at her feet. "Tell me, My Lady."

"Are you sure you are comfortable, Toad? The floor looks very hard." He knocked a green-and-orange-glazed tile. "Not so bad. Please, tell me!"

"Very well, then. For you, Toady, I will." The Queen spread her skirts over her knees. I sat back, too, unable to work with Don Carlos out of position.

"Not so very long ago, before my father was King, his younger brother went riding to war with his friends somewhere in northern France. There were three or four of them, all of them young and full of high spirits and mischief, for they were going to join a real battle, not just jousting and riding at the lists."

Don Carlos nodded vigorously.

"They rode along," said the Queen, "running their horses into each other and throwing chestnuts, and calling each other names. And then, in the midst of their merriment, they came to a village. There they went from house to house, thinking to demand food, but all the cottages were empty. For you see, the plague had freshly struck."

"Oh, no," Don Alessandro groaned. "Not a plague story."

"Shh!" said Don Carlos. "
I'm
listening, My Lady."

"Thank you, Toad. Well, the young men staggered from cottage to vacant cottage, drinking, singing, and carousing, becoming more and more rambunctious as they went. By the time they stumbled into the last cottage, they were overturning tables and smashing the crockery. Suddenly, one of them had a brilliant idea: 'Why don't we slash the mattresses with our swords?' "

Don Carlos's eyes brightened.

"Oh," said the Queen, "that was great, good fun, indeed, destroying all those mattresses. And then, when there were no more mattresses to slash, they had a merry pillow fight. The down was still fluttering onto the shoulders of my father's brother when he cried out, 'No son of the King of France has ever died of the plague! I could wrap myself in these sheets and never fall prey to it.' One of his friends said, 'Would you like to bet?' And my father's brother said,
'Oui!'
So they placed their drunken wagers and he rolled in the empty sheets."

"Fool!" Don Carlos shouted.

"This is my uncle," the Queen reminded him.

Don Carlos frowned in contrition.
"Lo siento."