rose that stood or fell between her and Venus. I did not dare to stand and draw attention to myself as the subject of the painting. Already Don Ferrente and his queen were turning to smile and nod in their appreciation of the likeness.
I smiled back and craned and twisted, wriggling my bottom on the pew as if I had cunny crabs, but it was no good; the vital bloom was just lost to sight in a sea of bobbing heads.
My escort turned to admonish me. “Be still!” hissed Brother Guido. “A lady sits like a statue, in a seemly fashion. Do you have an itch?”
I looked poniards at him “No, I am trying to see Flora’s rose—can you see from where you are?”
He looked, shook his head. “We will have to peruse the thing closely when we file out at the end. Until then, keep your head down.”
“Did you see il Magnifico?”
This time he nodded. “Yes. He is well placed for our purposes, for all the guests will file past him at the end of the ceremony to be presented. See? His gentlemen-in-waiting hold baskets of laurel branches for Lorenzo to distribute to the guests at the end, as a sign of peace.”
I saw the two liveried attendants with their meaningless leaves—I pictured again Lorenzo’s own pet giraffe munching happily on the laurel leaves outside; the family pet happily devouring the family emblem. I snorted through my nose. Peace indeed. The Medici will eat itself, for the family plotted against its own head.
“Look, Luciana,” continued Brother Guido, instantly forgetting his own decorum. I followed his pointing finger, pleased that his voice held the first note of worship I had detected since his audience with the pope. But I saw no one but a quiet, astonishingly ugly man, with a robe of dun gray, writing on a tablet. The only spot of brightness in his costume was a crown of roses he wore on his brow, making him look faintly ridiculous. Even his companions found him dull, it seemed; for the two young peacocks that flanked him had both turned around to converse with their friends in the pew behind. Yet to look at Brother Guido’s moonstruck expression was to recall when he had first laid eyes on the pope.
“Who is it?” I whispered.
“That is Angelo Poliziano. The Medici court poet. Remember, he wrote the Stanze, upon which the Primavera is based, and the verses on the rose which we heard this very night?”
“Oh, yes. They were quite pretty.” I looked at the man with new respect, and was pleased that Brother Guido had not lost all his idols—for him, seeing the man whose verses he had copied so oft and so painstakingly in the scriptorium of Santa Croce was clearly a cause for joy.
My own pleasure in his ceased in an instant when one of the poet’s companions turned back around. I had seen him before that day, of course, but then he had been in two dimensions, harmless, rendered on the poplar panel of the Primavera, clad as Mercury. Here he was in the flesh.
Sandro Botticelli.
And by some ill chance he met my horrified eyes and, in that instant, recognized me.
Three things happened at once.
Cosa Uno: he stood, but so did the whole congregation.
Cosa Due: he cried out, but his voice was drowned by a fanfare of crumhorns.
Cosa Tre: The bride and bridegroom entered.
They came through the open doors as black shapes against the bright day, then resolved into creatures of fable, living and walking before us. They walked down the nave arm in arm, in the Tuscan tradition.
The bride was, as Brother Guido had guessed in Rome, Venus to the life. She even wore the clothes from the painting to the last detail, the oyster silk dress with embroidered flames at the neck flaring to burn her lily throat, the vivid ocher and azure cloak with the beaded hem, and the gold filigree pattens on her dainty feet, the veil on her red hair as light as mist on a spring morning. Bright at her breast was fastened the amber and gold roundel of the medal of Sol Invictus. I studied her face—delicate and white as a magnolia petal with the merest hint of pink high on each cheek, her eyes glassy and calm. I felt drawn to this quiet maiden and sorry for her at once—she was an innocent pawn in this. I studied the swell of her belly with a practiced eye but could not