1492–98
Brother Vincenzo sweeps in from Bologna. He is, as always, furious with Girolamo. “You’re not faking, are you? Or are you? No, you can’t be, you look positively humble for a change. Did you deliberately get infested with a demon to waste my time? Are you expecting me to save your life just so the Franciscans don’t undermine my authority? It’s more than you’re worth.”
He doesn’t seem to want answers to his rhetorical questions, so Girolamo says nothing. Vincenzo has the guards take Girolamo across the city to the rival Dominican monastery of Santa Maria Novella and has him locked up in a monk’s cell there. The cell has a bed, a chased gold crucifix on one wall, and a peeling fresco of St Peter Martyr writing “Credo” in his own blood. There is a grey, white, and black rag rug on the stone floor. Even though it is comparatively luxurious, which he would usually disapprove in a monk’s cell, he finds it a balm after the prison. A novice from Santa Maria Novella brings him a bowl of warm water to wash in, and though he has to come right into the cell to put down the steaming bowl, he won’t talk to Girolamo and seems to be terrified of him. After the time in the prison, Girolamo is very glad of the chance to get clean. The water is black when he is done. He puts on a clean white habit the novice brought. By this time his own is barely good enough for rags. The borrowed habit is too short for his arms and the hood hangs forward over his face. Vincenzo comes and peers at him, strokes his beard, then goes away in evident disgust without saying anything.
Later old Brother Tomasso brings Girolamo a clean and mended summer habit of his own from San Marco.
“What’s going to happen to me?” he asks. “Are they going to burn me?”
“Pah. Except for Jews in Spain, only a couple of dozen people have ever been burned for heresy. It’s a hundred and fifty years since we burned a heretic in Florence,” Tomasso says. “Brother Mariano was just trying to frighten you. As long as the threat’s there, they hardly ever have to actually do it.”
“They burned me—” He stops. “How about Jan Hus? And Joan of Arc?”
“That wasn’t in Italy. And they were meddling in politics, both of them,” Tomasso says. “I remember the English burning Joan in France, when I was a young monk. Don’t worry. They’re just going to exorcise you.”
“They’ve already exorcised me until I’m half dead of it, to no effect,” Girolamo says.
“First Brother Vincenzo says they were amateurs, and he’s going to do it right. He seems to know what he’s talking about.” Tomasso smiles and bobs his jutting head. “It’ll be good to have you back. We’ve missed you at San Marco.”
The next morning, they lead him into the great high-arched basilica, with its grey stone pillars, black-and-white arches, and walls that are white where they are not decorated. The monks of Santa Maria Novella lead the way in full black-and-white Dominican robes, chanting. Next comes a priest with an incense-filled censer, swinging it to and fro, scenting the air with the heavy musk. Girolamo follows in his plain white summer habit. Behind him come the monks of San Marco, followed by the Dominican monks of Fiesole, and last the nuns of Santa Lucia, led by the First Sister, who looks chastened. The church of Santa Maria Novella is three times the size of their church at San Marco, almost as big as the cathedral. It is packed for this ceremony with monks of all denominations, and townsmen, some in the red cloaks of guildmasters, but more of them humble men in work clothes. He does not see Pico or Marsilio, but Angelo is visible, in his scholar’s robe, looking lost among the crowd. There are no women present except the nuns of Santa Lucia.
First Brother Vincenzo is standing before the huge hanging crucifix of Giotto. The monks of Santa Maria Novella move smoothly to the left and take up their ranks before the great frescoed crucifixion of Massacio, so skillfully painted that it looks almost like another chapel. The monks of San Marco and Fiesole move to the right, under the crucifix of Brunelleschi. The two groups, in their matching black-and-white habits, would have seemed indistinguishable to anyone who did not know them, just blocks of monks. To Girolamo they are all individuals. He tries not to meet any eyes when he is is left standing alone in a circle of grey-and-white tiled floor. Giotto’s painted Christ looks down at him sorrowfully, and looking up at it he misses God so much that he starts to cry spontaneously.
Girolamo has realised that this is his last chance, and also that he has to make it convincing. The awe-inspiring surroundings help. As Vincenzo comes forward and begins the exorcism, Girolamo begins to babble in Hebrew. He has decided that the most convincing babbling, in the unlikely event that anyone understands it, would be fragments of psalms. They sound empty in his mouth, which makes him cry harder. It helps that he knows the ceremony so well, from having it performed over him so many times in the last weeks—he is never so formal when he banishes demons himself. When Vincenzo tips the holy water over him, he is ready, he falls to the floor as he did in Santa Lucia, curls up, and begins to repeat a psalm loudly in Latin “Have mercy upon me, Lord!”
The words are still empty, to Girolamo’s ears, still spoken to a closed ear. God has withdrawn himself from Girolamo and all his kind. If he is to play this masquerade through, he will have to get used to it. People in the crowd are convinced, they start to call out hosannas. First Brother Vincenzo lifts him up from the ground. “It would be better if you’ve forgotten everything since you touched the stone at Santa Lucia,” he whispers in benediction in Girolamo’s ear as he gives him the kiss of peace.
“Brother Vincenzo!” he says. Santa Maria Novella is so memorable and distinguished that he thinks asking where he is would be unconvincing, so he settles for “How did I get here?”
“You tried to banish a demon that was too strong for you, and were possessed,” Vincenzo says. “It was too strong for your brothers here, so I had to come from Bologna especially to save you.”
“Thank you, First Brother Vincenzo,” he says, and coughs. “I am not worthy.”
“You’re right about that,” Brother Vincenzo murmurs, while making the sign of the cross.
Later, after a long ceremony of thanksgiving in Santa Maria Novella followed by a long scolding by Vincenzo, on the theme of his unworthiness, he goes back to San Marco with his brothers. He claims he knows nothing since he touched the stone. He goes to the hours of the divine office and takes his part in the service. It is painful, but not as painful as the the memory of drawing the cross in Hell. Here it is as if God has turned away, in Hell it is as if God no longer exists.
He has decided to go through with this life as best he can, as he remembers it, saving Florence from the French, making God’s pure Ark and saving as many souls as he can. In addition, he will keep researching ways to take the stone to Hell, if he can, more effective ones than cutting a slit in his belly. It is going to be long and grim, and he is determined to make some small changes—like having Valori ban torture at the same time he brings in the right of appeal.
He can’t think how to see Marsilio and what he should say to him. He runs into him in the street outside San Lorenzo before he has decided. “Better if we don’t meet for now, my dear,” Marsilio says, quietly. “I’ll come and see you when it’s time.” He moves on, leaving Girolamo staring after him. He knows, and he must know the exorcism did nothing. Girolamo waits for him to come.
His cough gets better. He stops wearing the hair belt, and carries the stone bound against his belly inside a plain linen band. He thanks Pico for detecting his possession, and Pico says it was nothing. But there is a constraint between them. Pico is neither respectfully friendly nor intimately contemptuous, but seems a little afraid. He sees Pico’s servant Cristoforo running errands at the Medici Palace, and on making discreet inquiries learns that Pico has passed him on to Piero, on the insistence of Isabella. Her instincts for these things have always been good. He does not see her again. Pico continues to live with her. He trusts Marsilio to prevent the poisoning, and as far as Girolamo knows, Piero does not attempt to poison either Pico or Angelo. They both come to his sermons from time to time. Marsilio does not, but then he never did. Girolamo does not seek him out, although he misses him so much. He misses them all. So much of his life now is going through empty motions, saying what he remembers saying before.
Charles invades, as he always does. Capponi comes and asks him to go with Piero. He says Marsilio suggested it, and that Marsilio is a wise old bird. His conversation with Charles goes as well as it usually does. To his surprise, Piero flees anyway when he doesn’t get any credit for the negotiations and the Greys start asking for more share of power.
No one asks about the disappearance of the stone. The volume of Pliny is still in Santa Croce, and he wonders how many people know it is empty. He does not ask Lucrezia Salviati about it. When she comes to see him, as she always does, after her brother flees, to ask whether she is safe, she does not ask in the name of their friends, but in the name of a favour she once did him, which she does not name. He tells her that he knows everything in detail, including her plots with Piero, but that she is safe to continue them, that she can do whatever she wants and he will never move against her or her children, though he will not countenance any return of her brothers. He asks if there are any books at San Marco she wants to borrow. They become friends, of a kind, though they seldom meet. They send each other books, and letters about books, regularly. “I am working on a biography of Alexander the Great,” she writes. “Do you have the writings of Quintus Curtius?” he responds, and she writes back “I do. But you are the first person to offer them to me instead of telling me Alexander is no fit subject for a woman.” He has San Marco’s copy of Plutarch’s Life of Alexander copied for her.
Camilla Rucellai comes to him alone on a cold day in Advent in 1495. In his memories, she came with her husband, Ridolfo, earlier in the year, both of them asking to dissolve their marriage and take vows. Now she comes alone, and he sees her in the parlour. The wind has stripped the leaves from the trees and is blowing down the narrow streets of Florence howling like a wolf. The sunlight through the window casts a pale square on the floor, which seems to shine cold. Girolamo is shivering in his black wool winter habit. His feet are icy. Camilla is wearing a modest matronly grey-and-white dress, with a dark blue wool cloak. She has her hair entirely covered. She wears no jewels, and her thick spectacles are plain. But even dressed as simply as this she seems far more worldly than he is used to, because he is used to seeing her as a nun. She puts her hands into her sleeves for warmth after they sit down. “I want to enter a life of religion,” she says. “I always did. My father named me after Virgil’s Amazon, Camilla, and educated me in Latin and Greek, but then expected me to marry tamely and make alliances for him, to unite the Bartolini and the Rucellai. My whole desire has always been to dedicate my life to God.”
“But you are a married woman. Your vows would have to be dissolved.”
“You can do that,” she says.
It’s true that he can, but it’s very rare to be asked. “Does your husband also want to enter a house of religion?”
She blushes fiercely. “I’ve tried and tried but I can’t persuade him. He wants children. He wants worldly success. I know I am meant to be a nun, a First Sister, leading a community of sisters into the light, in your pure Florence.” She looks directly at him, her pale eyes magnified by the lenses. “God shows me things,” she declares boldly.
He nods, taking that for granted. “But you must be careful with such revelation.”
“He shows you things too, doesn’t he?”
“For me it is complicated now,” he says.
“And have you seen me as a nun, as a Dominican nun, in a house of learning and art and prophecy?” she asks, eagerly.
“I have, many times,” he says. “I will speak to Ridolfo and have him release you, with your dowry.”
“I don’t know that he will listen to you,” she says. Outside the wind howls, rattling the pane in the window. “He says you were possessed by a demon, and who knows whether you might still be.”
Girolamo raises his eyebrows. He is about to reply when God speaks to Camilla. She closes her weak eyes and leans forward, as if listening to something he cannot hear.
“Oh!” she says, staring at him. “It’s true! You were not possessed, were you?”
He looks at her warily. “No,” he admits. “I was not possessed.”
“So what you said was true. You are a demon. And that is how you know the future. Yes … and you mean well, and you are making Florence His city.”
“That’s true,” he says.
“But if you’re a demon, you’re damned!” she blurts out.
“Eternally shut out from the love of God,” he agrees. “But though I am bound for Hell, I do what I can to help others avoid that fate.”
She starts to cry, tears slipping down her cheeks under her glasses. She takes them off and wipes her eyes. “Sorry,” she says, sniffing, and wiping her nose with a square of linen from her pocket. “Sorry, but it’s the saddest thing I ever heard. And you know you’ll be martyred?”
“Yes,” he says, not surprised she has seen it, as she saw it so many times before. “I will speak to your husband. I will put the fear of God into him. You will have your Santa Caterina.”
“And I will do what I can to help you bear your burden,” she says.
From that time he has an ally and a friend who tries to understand, which is a blessing. He tries not to lean too hard on her support as she is gathering her little community. Everything else goes on as it did before.
He shouts down Tomasso’s suggestion of a Bonfire of Vanities, and they have all-day rival hymn singing, with prizes, instead. Benevieni’s clean words to dirty songs are very popular, and if some of the boys sometimes sing the old words quietly, it’s not surprising.
He sees the Pardo family in the streets one day, with a group of other Jews, and is glad they are safe in Florence. He preaches a sermon on St Paul’s words about a converted Jew being the truest kind of Christian, to try to encourage sincere conversion. He has heard that in Spain, where conversions have been forced, the converts are called “New Christians” and treated badly. He denounces this from the pulpit. No one appreciates this sermon, least of all Pope Alexander. Opposition to him grows, as usual.
His shoulders ache from the old torture, and sometimes his throat rasps from all the prison coughing. He is lonely. But there is breath and beauty and food and flowers and birdsong and art. He tries through reading, and Sister Camilla tries through prayer, to discover how anyone could take an object into Hell, but they find nothing. Life goes on.
Until the day Domenico accepts Mariano’s challenge to walk through fire, and it all spins out of control, and Girolamo is arrested again, and taken to the cell in the tower they call the little inn. He is not tortured, this time, because torture has been abolished as barbaric and also useless, but he admits to meddling in politics.
And then at last Marsilio comes.