Beatrice and Benedick (8 page)

I pricked up my ears at this. Surely Benedick would lay down his gauntlet with the rest, for I had huddled enough insults upon him about trying his sword. I excused myself and took myself off to my bed too, for I would not fail him at the tournament on the morrow.

Beatrice:
The courtyard was brave with banners of blue and gold.

The colours of the flags tricked out the colours in the mosaic, colours that the Romans had stamped in the floor centuries ago as their imperial imprimatur.

And now, eons later, Sicily's latest invaders would try their skill with the sword atop those little tiles.

Yet there was something old fashioned about the trial that Leonato had planned. He had had a loge constructed at the south side of the courtyard, a wooden structure brave with gilt and hung about with his blazon. Leonato's arms, featuring a lion, went back to his brutish British descent many centuries before. His ancestors were painting themselves blue while the Roman masons were etching dolphins into this floor.

Above his standard hung not the flag of Spain but the Trinacria, the flag of Sicily, showing my uncle's primary allegiance. The flag displayed a three-legged chimera with a gorgon's head, on a yellow and red ground. The three legs, I knew, represented the three regions of the island, but I did not know the significance of the snake-headed woman.

The scarlet of Spain was diplomatically in evidence too, fluttering and flattering about Don Pedro, who sat on a great wooden chair at the centre of the dais. He looked well today, for over his damascene sleeves he wore a white tabard emblazoned with a device in red that I did not know; at first I thought it a dagger,
but then the prince turned his body and I knew I had been mistaken. The thing was a cross fitchy, terminating in a point, with arms of a cross fleury, ending in fleur-de-lys. Above the dagger-cross floated a scallop shell; and then I knew; this was the cross of St James the Great. And at the prince's elbow was the saint himself, or at least, a little bit of him. The prize was a beautiful reliquary with a ruby as big as my thumbnail set into the top, with golden sunrays spiking about it, and a little window of diamond panes below. Through the window I could see a small dun bone, a contrast to the glory about it, which must be the fabled fingerbone of St James himself.

Leonato sat on the other side of the digit, in a chair nearly as grand as the prince's, my aunt Innogen on the other side. Hero, myself and other highborn ladies of the region sat on fat cushions at the feet of our lords, and I saw a lady in a flame-coloured dress at the far side of the loge who looked vaguely familiar.

She was
una dama in nero
; a dark lady. Her black hair was unornamented and left free to curl in a tumble of spiral ringlets about her shoulders. She had dark skin, full lips and a broad nose, and looked alien and beautiful. Her eyes, when she looked at me, were as black and soothing as the centre of the poppy. She smiled; but, caught staring, I averted my eyes. As I did so I noticed that the loge backed on to the arras that hung on the wall. The tapestried dame with her unicorn reclined with us, watching too.

The tourney was beginning. Leonato had charged his marshals that everything should be as it was in antique times, so each young squarer had to come to the loge to present himself to Don Pedro and Leonato, and to be given a sash of the prince's red or my uncle's blue to wear about their waists as they fought. I yawned through a roll-call of noble Spanish names, as young Alba de Listes, Requesenes and Guzmanes paraded before us, while the poor marshal of the lists struggled with his quill to spell their names on the roll.

Each combatant was given the right to crave a favour from the ladies on the platform. I relaxed, expecting all the young sprigs to flatter their host by approaching his daughter Hero, but, to my surprise, most of them lined up in front of me, and soon my dress was denuded of all ribbons, pins, sashes and tippets. I even had to give away my little gold brooch of the Della Scala ladder, and since all the combatants were masked I had little hope of getting it back.

I concluded that perhaps a blond head is a rarity in Spain; but I was pleased and flattered. All the time I waited, breathless, for Signor Benedick to step up, hoping he had seen my popularity. I arranged my features into an expression which I hoped conveyed modest politeness (without contrition) but to begin with I could not see Don Pedro's newest knight anywhere.

I began to feel a hollow disappointment. Perhaps if he was as terrible with a dagger and sword as he'd maintained – I remembered his sally about a parsnip and a stick of celery – then he might decide that it was politic to step aside if he could not bloom among these flowers of Spanish chivalry.

Amongst all the antique posturing I'd half expected to see broadswords and helms, but all the competitors wore their fencing plastrons of creamy white, with a toughened breastplate, a blade-catcher at the throat and a visor of iron net obscuring the face. This was sport after all, not warfare – these noble babies were as safe here as in their cradles. I might not have spotted Signor Benedick among the uniform throng, but my gaze found him at last by reason of his greater height among the tiny Spanish. I watched him await his turn, and even if he had been of Spanish stature I would still have known him, for he spent his time until his bout balancing his foil on one finger, adjusting his hand all the time to keep the sword in the air as if he were a Carnevale juggler.

I felt a little ashamed for him amongst all these soldiers. He was a clown, and I did not have high hopes for him in the
match. I was, I felt, about to witness his humiliation; but now the longed-for moment had come, I felt strangely sorry for him.

Then he was suddenly there, before the loge, his visor under his arm. In his plain white plastron he could have stood up with any man alive, and looked vastly different to the primped peacock of the previous evening. He bowed low, and Don Pedro, anxious not to betray his preference, spoke to him as he had to every knight of either colour.

‘Your name, señor?'

‘Signor Mountanto.'

The Spanish yakked away like jackals and I curled my lip. It was a poor jest, and one that he had reckoned on only the menfolk understanding –
mountanto,
an upward thrust in fencing, was also slang for a gentleman's manhood. My scorn was magnified by the fact that he chose to fight for Don Pedro, his new sworn brother. True, the states of Padua and Sicily had little to say to one another, but Signor Benedick had clearly thrown in his lot with the Spanish, and I felt it a small betrayal.

‘Would you like to crave a favour from one of the ladies who so ornament our loge?' asked the prince.

‘I thank you, Your Highness,' replied Benedick in ringing tones, ‘but one of these ladies already did me the honour of bestowing me with her favour; after dinner the night before last.'

The loge rocked with laughter at this bawdy jest, but there was no offence taken, as he was already, it seemed, an acknowledged wit. Not once did he look at me, and no one else could know of the episode of the
settebello,
but I shrank inside, and when he put on his visor and turned without giving me away, I felt nothing but relief.

Once the competitors stood in the circle of the mosaic, around the inlaid head of Medusa, there were no more names, just the scarlet and the blue. It was blood versus sea, Spain versus Sicily, and I thought now that I had been wrong to call it
sport; it was much more serious than that. The courtyard was packed not just with Leonato's guests, but with the townspeople of Messina, none of whom had much reason to love their Spanish overlords. Many of them waved the Trinacria flag; all of them cheered for blue, and were silent for scarlet. Every dagger and blade wore a foil; this was a serious business dressed as an entertainment. The whole affair felt like a practice, a rehearsal, for a graver matter. But for what?

As the morning wore on the sun skewed round in the sky and lit the ruby in St James's reliquary, illumined like a flare, shining out like the grail to the worthiest knight, a prize to covet indeed. And, incredibly, as bout followed bout, it seemed inevitable that the saint's finger would be claimed by Signor Mountanto.

I could see Don Pedro sit forward on his wooden throne, delighted with his new protégé. For as the rounds progressed even I had to admit that Signor Benedick outclassed all those who stood up with him. Not that I had much admiration for the Spanish style of swordplay; it was too pretty, with too many flourishes. It was attractive to watch, but had not the strength and clean lines of good Italian combat, and the beautifying flourishes left the core open to blow after blow. So Signor Benedick was giving them a master class. His
stoccata
was impenetrable, his
imbroccata
impressive and his
punta reversa
impassable. Not only that, but he gave good show – he would throw his sword from gauntlet to gauntlet, even fight a round with his left hand. One fellow he fought with just his dagger and still his opponent's foil never touched him. Another he fought with his body entirely turned away from his adversary, literally fighting him behind his back. The tournament was becoming a joke.

The crowd fell silent. Leonato's face grew sourer and sourer, and Don Pedro's countenance brightened. Benedick might be an Italian, but he was fighting in the colours of Spain, and Don Pedro, at this rate, would win the day.

My own visage soured as much as my uncle's, for as I watched I realised that Signor Benedick had gulled me at dinner. For he had clearly downplayed his talents in swordplay, preferring, for whatever reason, to appear a feckless dilettante, rather than a young man who had clearly studied every aspect of the art of combat for all of his childhood. I do not know why I was surprised; boys of his class would have been routinely schooled by a fencing master – my own brother trained every day … I stopped, caught by an idea.

My brother's situation was singular, in that while his male cousins were sent to war to cool their heels, or even taken up for murderers after a bloody street brawl, my brother was left with no opponents to practise his swordplay on. So Tebaldo Della Scala, lord of Villafranca, sharpened his sword on his sister.

From a very young age I was taught how to block a blow with a dagger, how to circle my braids with a rapier, how to protect my chest spoon, how to jump with both feet above a blow. I too was taught the
stoccata,
the
imbroccata
and the
punta reversa,
and yes, the
mountanto
too. And I was well used to fighting a young man of twenty.

I looked across at Hero, but she was deep in conversation with Claudio. A week earlier I would have told her what I planned to do, but today I did not. She had become, almost overnight, much more like the young woman her father wanted her to be. But I did not think it was Leonato's influence. I think it was Claudio's. For that dinner on the first night with the Spanish had been as pivotal to Hero as it had been to me. The young man was devout, and he had dismissed her Italian lovers' tales but listened rapt to the story of Mary of the Letter. I sensed, now, that she would not beg me to hear tales of love, but rather of scripture; that she would pick up a gradual over a book of hours. For it was she who had, despite the disparity of our years, this very morning bullied me to church. Like an opal,
Hero had changed to Claudio's colour. Even now her head was turned to him, as she enjoyed the tourney not through her own observations but through his eyes. She would never notice my departure.

Slowly, slowly, I edged to the back of the loge and crept down the temporary wooden stairs. The lady with the unicorn watched me and I held my finger to my lips. I made my way through the lists and into the gatehouse which served as an armoury for the day. The marshals were in the courtyard and there were no more than a couple of kitchen boys guarding the foils. I picked a rapier, a dagger and a suit from the racks and swept out before the dolts could stop me, saying as I went: ‘My uncle's orders; another knight has arrived.' Expecting to be stopped at all times I slipped through the archway, across the small cloister and into the unlocked chapel.

I carried my booty to the nave, which I knew would be empty at this hour, for the friar was not a man to wear out his knees with prayer between the bells – and, in fact, I had already seen him in the throng outside. Still, I went behind the rood screen to change, and a parade of saints in the fresco watched me with disapproval. One of those who looked down in judgement was St James the Great – admonishing me with perhaps the very finger that waited to be won in the courtyard. With shaking hands, I took off my gown as quickly as I could – and pulled on the suit and visor. If I was caught in the chapel as Beatrice I could say I was praying for the knights; if I was caught as a knight I could likewise say I was praying for my own success – but to be discovered in my shift and stockings would take a little more explanation.

The white plastron fitted like a skin. Fortunately I was tall too, and had a decent pair of shoulders, and small breasts, so once the suit was on and the breastplate was in place, there was nothing to betray my female form. I put on the helmet and passed a hand before my face – I was satisfied, from my
observation of the other knights, that no one could see my face through the dense grille of the mask.

When I returned to the courtyard the servers were handing round goblets, and there seemed to be some lull in the fighting. I picked a fellow in the crowd I didn't know. He had a Trinacria tied around his throat like a kerchief. ‘What is happening?'

He turned to me. ‘Signor Mountanto has won,' he said sourly, ‘unless another comes to challenge him.'

I walked straight up to the loge before my courage failed, and bowed to the prince.

Don Pedro put down his goblet next to the reliquary. ‘A latecomer!' he cried, always diverted by novelty. He beckoned the marshal of the lists with his beringed hand. ‘Will you show us your face?'