Voices from the Past Part 67

"But I can't..."

"You should see your family. People in Vinci would like to hear about us, how we're getting along. We have money enough."

Abruptly, hands to her face, she got up, and shuffled away. "I'm too old," she said.

Cloux

As we rode along the Loire, following the river road, Francesco and I talked:

"So you received a letter from your mother yesterday?

How are things at Vaprio?"

"Quiet...everyone is well. Papa has fully recovered.

Mama says that conditions are very bad in Milan...fighting in the streets...hungry mobs...looting."

"Vaprio continues to escape...I hope nothing changes that!"

"You asked me about the pigments I bought in Paris. We have a good a.s.sortment. I've been grinding them. We'll have a beautiful green, that laurel green you're fond of."

"I'm still partial to green. I suppose you bought the Dutch pigments..."

Our horses, side by side, kept an even pace: both from the same stable, they liked walking together: the road was familiar to them: the afternoon was sunny; shafts of light rebounded from the Loire; a pair of squirrels chittered at us; hunters and their dogs pa.s.sed-someone saluted us with a playful toot of his horn.

"Mama insists that we stay away from Milan...she warns us...she said that I'm to tell you."

"I understand. We're lucky to be here; Cloux is like Vaprio; beautiful countryside; a sketch here, a sketch there."

"We should ride to Chambord."

"I prefer the river trip..."

"Shall we go on the river?"

"All right, Cecchino. You arrange the trip. Certainly, there's no finer chateau than Chambord. Let's spend a few days there. We can find new paintings, new marbles and bronzes...from Milan...Athens...Rome...the greatness of stolen art..."

As we left our horses at the stable, Francesco asked:

"Did I mention that the Princess de Lamballe has a son?

He's my age. He wants to study painting. Do you want a Prince for a pupil?"

Cloux

The King and I talked far into the night.

Youth can be so sincere: youth can evaluate and a.s.sess: last night, on the part of others, he apologized: the Gascon archers were much on his mind...

"I have thought of them many, many times...those Gascon fools...nothing else to do...made a target of your cavello...our archers..."

Bronze for cannons...he knew about that...he searched about for a solution, as if it might be possible to cast the horse. As he saw it, he felt he had rescued me. Had he? I turned over that thought. Recompense? Was Cloux recompense? He did not say so. I think we both wished to believe it was respect, admiration. His talk made us feel awkward at times.

I had not complained: I had not mentioned the monument.

Divulging his sincerity got Francis beyond his scope.

He referred to Amboise and Cloux as my home. Haven, of course. Retreat? Voluntary exile. Those thoughts could be brought in. I tried my best to avoid any embarra.s.sing approach. Presently, he was excusing the battle of man against man. Again we were faltering. His innate shrewdness came to our rescue, and we discussed architectural changes at Amboise...

"We must do everything we can to improve it...it can never be like Chambord ...help me give it a manorial feeling...walk about with me tomorrow...let's write down some of your ideas...that stairway...the entry...we have to make it less grim...harmony..."

IL CAVELLO...the words haunted us as we said good night.

I lay down under my canopy. The bed seemed to grow immense. On one side I saw a child, a bend in a river, a hill...the bed drifted...the room changed... I saw men pouring bronze into a mould... I saw a great horse in a city square...

SALAI-He is either in studio rags or elegant, foppish; he bursts with energy (has a brisk, haughty walk); he is quick with his pigments; he is as lean-featured as a fox; he is yellow-headed, tall. He has a wonderful laugh, a tooth-spread grin. His brown eyes are spoked with yellow.

A girl-chaser. My Salai will never become an accomplished artist. I still have to remind him to wash himself. Ai, Salaino! And will he ever quit that foreign habit, the habit of smoking?

Almost everywhere I travel I am troubled by poverty: I talk with the workers and some of them say they are hungry all of the time: I talk with them about their tools, and try to improve them. Shovels. Spades. Rakes.

Forks. I have suggested a more efficient roasting spit-I have made detailed drawings. I have improved a wood- planer and a file-maker. I have designed a textile machine, a better barrow, a good water-lamp.

For most field laborers, theirs is an ox-life.

Horse, mule, donkey, ox, man...they are inextricable.

Landlord and tenant, the struggle goes on and on: they are as much at loggerheads as pope and duke. Serfs, beggars, greed, knights, fools-pathos.

At Vaprio, I sometimes ate with a farmer and his wife, in their tiny stone farmhouse. They did not complain, yet they slept on mats, ate meat now and then, worked from dawn to sundown, shivered through the winters, saved flo- rins in a clay pot. Their hands at mealtime were the hands of old people and yet they were not old.

In the Vaprio region the people have to pay exorbitant milling fees, pay to use a common oven or wine press.

Fishing rights have been stolen. For a few gentlemen there may be no wood for winter; for many others there may be no wood at all. Some want a civil war to put them on their feet.

At Vaprio, I recall a child of nine or ten: I saw her often on my visits there: she reminded me of that festa, in May, in Florence, when I fell in love with my own Beatrice, when I was eleven or twelve years old. My Beatrice was beautiful, her features delicately formed, her behavior gentle and agreeable, full of candid loveliness... I thought of her as my angel.

In those days, in Firenze, I often pa.s.sed Dante's home: his wooden door had a bronze knocker, a simple braided ring. I used to imagine knocking and saying:

"Is Dante Alighieri at home?"

I expected a housekeeper to reply:

"He's been dead a hundred and fifty years, you fool!"

I would have dashed off, laughing.