shut in a nunnery for these many years. But what I can tell you is that her mother is as fair as the first morning in May, so beauteous that she goes about often in mask in the Venetian fashion, else, it is said, the city would grind to a halt while the citizens stop in the streets to stare at her. So the daughter must be likewise if the reports are true.”
My face must have been sour as a lemon, for now Don Ferrente laughed openly. “But you should not be downcast. Be she Venus herself, she would be as a candle to the sun next to you. They say daughters are like pancakes—the more you make, the better they get. Well, in that case I say that your father must have got a dozen daughters on your mother before he sired you.”
There was Don Ferrente in a nutshell; a learned compliment referencing Venus followed by a sally about pancakes. The man was a king and a commoner, learned and ignorant all at once. But whichever way you sliced it, he had paid me two compliments, so I beamed, sunlike again.
“Indeed,” he went on, “ ‘tis a pity we may not all choose our wives with our hearts.” He patted his own queen’s hand in a way that suggested there was indeed a great affection between them. “For you could not do better than this dove, Lord Niccolò.”
Brother Guido, taking his cue to join the discourse, nodded graciously in acknowledgment of the compliment to his taste.
“For she is la Fiammetta personified.”
Now it was Brother Guido’s turn to jump and spit his wine. “I beg your pardon, Your Majesty?”
The king, thinking that the noise of the feast had drowned his words, leaned closer and shouted across me. “I said she is the image of the Lady Fiammetta—the golden hair, white skin, dark arched brows.” His hands sketched my attributes in the air as if he carved again.
Brother Guido, looking ill, nodded weakly.
“As a learned man like myself, you will appreciate this . . .” began the king, proving me right about his intellectual vanity. “Did you know that Giovanni Boccaccio did in fact first become inspired to write of the Lady Fiammetta right here, in a church in Naples? ‘Tis said he caught sight of my own ancestor, Maria d’Aquino, daughter of the House of Aragon, at mass, and became obsessed with her beauty. Ever after he wrote of her as Fiammetta, his muse.”
I looked back to Brother Guido as if I watched a game of tennis. He had recovered himself with his customary speed. “I have heard of the fabled lady, of course. And I am tolerably familiar with the writings of Boccaccio.” The latter I believed, I wasn’t sure about the former. “You must be very proud of your literary heritage, Your Majesty.”
He could not have said anything to better please the king—this bandit who would be a scholar.
“I’ll warrant you have a fine library here, Majesty,” Brother Guido went on, in a voice that told me his question had a purpose beyond mere flattery.
“I do, I do.” The king nodded, while I wondered where this direction tended.
“Might I impose upon you to let me borrow the Elegia di Madonna Fiammetta, this evening? You have put me in mind to read it again with fresh eyes, now that I know the lady was your illustrious ancestor.”
The king looked like a dog that had suddenly discovered he could lick his own balls. “Of course! Gladly. Santiago!” But the majordomo had already disappeared in search of the volume. “But if I were you, my lord.” The king beckoned and Brother Guido bent close. “I would close the book after a while and enjoy the real thing.” With a saucy nod at my tits the king rent the air with laughter as he displayed the other side of his character. The scholar retreated behind the ruffian once more.
As soon as he may, Brother Guido excused us from the feast and I grumbled all the way back to the chamber, for I had not finished my wine. Once there, however, I too was excited to resume our quest, for a small volume lay on my lord’s pillow: a leather book bound in red buckram with the cover chased in gold. “All right,” I said, as Brother Guido took up the book with trembling hands. “Take me through it again. This writer, Giovanni Boccaccio—”
“Who lived above a hundred years ago and wrote the