Urban Venus (33 page)

‘
No! I will read it. Fetch it to me now!’ I yell again in agony as another contraction seizes me. But the midwife pushes Clara to one side.

‘
She cannot read the letter now, it is time.’

What are these wires all over me? Why are they plugging me into the mains like this? I must look like Frankenstein’s monster. What is this place? I can hear lots of hushed voices as what feels like an army of people buzzes and fusses around me. Just take me back to Vincenzo’s office, will you? We were fine there; I was having a little lie-down on the sofa, and he was painting me, so what’s all the sudden fuss? But still I don’t seem able to tell them. I can’t make them hear me, and I can’t see who they are. Still can’t open my eyes. Hold on Maria, I’m here for you…

‘
My Darling Maria,’ the letter begins.

‘
It is with a great pain in my heart that I write to you now. I know that by this time, my love, you will likely have been delivered of our child. I hope with God’s blessing all has passed well, and this communication finds you in good health.

Maria, my darling, before I say anything else, you must know this truth. You are the one and only love of my life. Never before has a woman brought such emotion, such love, such happiness into the very depths of my heart and soul. I knew from the moment I first set eyes on you that it would be so, and you have been a veritable gift from God, an inspiration to me.

Thus it pains me to tell you this: it is no longer possible for me to bring you and our child back to Venice, and I know you will consider me weak for giving into the powers which seek to keep us apart. My wife has for some time known of our love, but as loyal wives do, has been prepared to overlook my indiscretion for the sake of propriety. However of late she has been informed of the child you carry, and this has thrown her into a fit of paroxysm such as I have never seen.

You will be aware that I am in some difficulties at present in my relationship with the ducal palace and the work I have been appointed to undertake there. I have today been ordered to repay the commission received thus far, and Pordenone, that vile man who has for so long been my rival, is appointed to take my place. This is a huge misfortune and I must therefore proceed with care if I am to maintain any vestige of professional standing within the city.

I wish for nothing more than to bring you and our son back to live with me in Venice, but this cannot happen. My wife has threatened me with exposure should I bring this to bear, and I can ill afford such a denunciation at this time. Her father has great influence with the Council of Ten, and hence my future depends on her continued good will towards me.

Do not fear for the safety of the child, for I have made provision for him. He is to be taken to France by a genteel man and his wife, who are of my sound acquaintance. He too is an artist, and is commissioned to paint in Paris. They are a very fine couple who will make their way well in the world. Sadly lacking children of their own, they have vowed to bring our child up as though he were their flesh and blood, and I have provided them with the means to do this. Rest assured that he will be safe and happy with them. I have asked that they give him the family name of Urbino, to guarantee his anonymity but also in remembrance of that wonderful painting, one of many, for which you were my inspiration, and during whose creation he was within your belly. They will come for him before the week is out.

I know this will be hard for you, but I am certain that you will see it is for the best, if not now, then as you pass through life, for you are young, with many years, and opportunities, ahead of you. You have no need of the encumbrance a child born out of wedlock will bring. I do hope that, in a year or so, once the scandal has passed over and all is returned to normal, we shall be reunited and it will be possible for you to join me in Venice, albeit in secret. We can never publicly declare our love, my dear, but the thought that I might never see you again tears at my very soul, so I hold this hope for the future within my heart. Please remain in Bologna and I will send news when it is safe for you to come.

Forgive my clumsy words and the sorry news they convey, for I am no writer. Please kiss my darling child for me and give him my blessing. I hope he is endowed with your beauty and grace, and not my cowardice.

Forever yours,

Tito.’

My eyes won’t open, but they seem perfectly able to cry. Maria’s story is unfolding inside my head, and it is the saddest thing ever. I hear Vincenzo exclaim when he sees my tears.

‘
She must be waking up! Look, she’s crying! Doctor, look! Lydia, my love, can you hear me?’

She is here! Emilia is here! The child who for so long I had felt move inside me is here! And, oh, what beauty! I have never before seen such perfection in so tiny a face. But then…. I cannot bear it. I cannot put into words the pain inside me, for it is far, far worse than that searing, never-ending pain of childbirth. Nor can I find the strength to describe the events which have unfolded here, these past few hours.

Suffice to say, they came for her, and she is gone. She, too, is gone. And I have never felt so alone.

How could Tito do this to us, when I thought he loved me so? I never believed him capable of such cowardice. I know I would fight to the death for him and for our child, but it seems that strength of conviction is not reciprocated.

It has been several days, and now I am well of body again, but I have been sane of mind throughout this ordeal, and I am resolute in what I must do.

I love Tito still, but what life is there here for me now, with him gone and with no child to love and care for? I know I must leave this place and my dear Clara. She, along with my darling Bella, is all I have left. I shall seek a new life elsewhere, but where that will be, I do not yet know.

The carriage is waiting for me and I leave the house before Clara awakes. She cannot see me leave, or she would try to stop me. My poor, dear, Clara, who has been everything to me.

Tito will not see me again, but I have left a letter for Clara to send to him in Venice, informing him he that has a daughter, and that I have named her Emilia.
I know the prospects for a child born out of wedlock, and a mere girl at that, are few. But how terrible only to set eyes on my most precious daughter for a few brief moments before she was taken from me. I fear I shall die of a broken heart. I know she is safe; the family he has chosen for her was chosen wisely, and will cherish her and raise her as their own, I am certain of that. I should not fear for her safety, but how will I live without her? Again my heart aches unbearably and the agony threatens to cleave me in two. But she is not here, she is long gone, and I have nothing to keep me in this city.

We speed through the Piazza Maggiore and I permit myself one last glance up at the church of San Petronio, its huge campanile cutting the shadows of the square firmly in two. A sudden spear of moonlight illuminates a stained glass window, and the image of Our Lord is revealed to me. Am I worthy of looking upon his face? I feel I should deflect my gaze, lower my head in shame, but I am drawn to see his visage one last time. As I glance upwards, his enigmatic smile is sufficient to bestow upon me his blessing and forgiveness.

And then at this very moment I know what I must do. As though struck by a bolt of lightening, I realise He is calling to me, and I must go to Him. I had believed that leaving Bologna would be sufficient to rid myself of these dark, dark days, but what is there left for me on God’s earth? I am alone in the world; no mortal has need of me now. My Lord is calling to me….

As the carriage makes a sharp turn into the Via d’Azeglio I pull my cloak tightly around me and throw myself onto the street below.

‘
Lydia,
cara
, can you hear me?’ Vincenzo asks.

‘
Yes,’ I reply in a whisper.

Twenty-Eight

‘
She’s dead,’ I sob. ‘Maria is dead.’

‘
Lydia, you’re awake. Thank God for that!’ Vincenzo sighs, and I open my eyes to find him standing by my side, tears streaming down his face.

‘
Maria, died,’ I say again, but he doesn’t seem to be listening, clearly too caught up in the emotion of the moment. But I’ve only been asleep.

‘
She killed herself because the man she loved wasn’t brave enough to do what he should have done.’ Then I look around and register where I am, no longer in the sixteenth century, but back in the twenty-first, in a high-tech hospital suite, with wires and beepers all around me.

‘
Why am I in here? What’s happened with your painting? What’s all this for?’ I ask, pulling at the wires which pin me to the bed as I try to haul myself into a sitting position.

Vincenzo moves to open the door and calls out ‘She’s awake!’ and then it seems it’s party-time, as Sophia and Leonora, Dante, Lanzo and Stefano, plus Antonio Di Girolamo all pile in, a real frenzy of friends. I am overwhelmed as they all come across to my bed and plaster me with kisses and hugs, with ‘We were so worried,’ and ‘What happened to you, Lydia?’ and ‘We thought we were losing you,’ flying around everywhere, until a young, female doctor, a nurse trailing in her wake, comes into the room and calls order, sending them back outside so that she can check me over.

‘
You had us worried there for a moment, Signorina Irvine,’ she says, standing back from the bed once she has finished prodding and poking at me. ‘But you seem to have come round very quickly. We thought you were in danger of going into a coma, as your vital signs were very weak when Signore Tizzaro brought you in, but amazingly you now seem to be showing no symptoms at all. Your body is returning to normal very quickly. It’s quite unheard of.’

‘
I was asleep,’ I reply, simply. ‘I don’t know what all the fuss was about.’

‘
I think it was a little more than that, Signorina,’ she chuckles condescendingly, considering herself, as she rightly would, the better qualified to pass judgement on my health.

‘
I feel fine, just like I’ve had a long, long sleep,’ I say, but don’t add out loud that I also feel deeply sad, remembering the dreams and Maria’s fate.

‘
How long was I out for?’ I ask.

‘
A little under an hour,’ the doctor replies, and I am surprised at that.

‘
But it felt like a lifetime,’ Vincenzo says, slumping back into his chair, looking thoroughly exhausted. ‘You really scared me, you know.’

‘
I’m sorry,’ I say. The doctor excuses herself, once more expressing her amazement at my rapid recovery, and promising to return in fifteen minutes to carry out further observations.

‘
Where did you go to?’ Vincenzo asks, panic subsiding and curiosity taking hold.

‘
I was dreaming about Maria,’ I reply. ‘I’ve never done that before outside the gallery, so to start with I just felt a bit sleepy and didn’t give too much thought to it. I think those roses sent me off, you know, those ones on your desk. Maria always had roses like that around her. Such a strong smell. She’s dead,’ I say again, as the pain of memory hits once more.

‘
Of course she’s dead,’ he laughs, ‘she lived nearly five hundred years ago.’

‘
No, you know what I mean,’ I say impatiently. ‘She died in the dream. Can you bring Antonio in? I want him to hear all this.’

Antonio comes into the room clutching a small bunch of flowers. Not roses, I’m glad to say. Bless him, he must have nipped to the hospital shop at break-neck speed after I woke up.

‘
How are you, my dear?’ he asks in his gentle, fatherly way.

‘
I’m fine, thank you,’ I reply, smiling in confirmation.

‘
Well, I must say you look remarkably well for one whom we considered in such grave health mere moments ago.’

‘
I dreamt about Maria,’ I tell him. ‘She gave birth to Emilia. And Titian sent the baby away. To live in France. With a couple who were going there. They went to Paris. Then she killed herself. Maria, I mean.’ I blurt out the bare facts in short, sharp sentences, wanting to tell him everything all at once, and knowing he will want to hear it, as it is the resolution of his own story, too.

‘
Slow down, slow down, my dear,’ he says, taking hold of my hand and patting it with his other. ‘It sounds like you have a lot to tell us, but there is no rush.’

‘
How could he do that to her?’ I ask, once I’ve recounted pretty much everything I can remember to Vincenzo and Antonio. ‘They were so in love, they meant everything to each other, and he threw it away so easily. He always thought he was having a son, but Maria wrote him a letter to tell him about Emilia, after she’d been taken away. She had nothing to live for, poor girl.’

‘
That would be why
my
story ended so abruptly,’ says Antonio, and I have to say he almost looks relieved, not at the outcome obviously, which is a tragic one, but that he now knows there is a valid reason for his own dreams coming to an end as they did. They ceased at the moment in time when Tiziano Vecellio pushed Maria Rossi and their daughter, Emilia, from his life. There was nothing more for Antonio to dream about, as the love of Titian’s life was no longer with him. Titian wouldn’t have known what had then become of Maria, I should imagine.