The man entering the inn has no name, at least none that will ever make it into history books. He hangs his cloak of night on its accustomed peg. He climbs the stair without a word to the innkeeper. He has no need to give orders.
Two men are seated at a table in an upper room. He sits down across from them, studying their faces by the light of one candle.
They are both men of middle age, in travel-worn garments. The one leans forward, elbows on the table, staring into the eyes of his visitor. He has a shrewd, coarse, sensual countenance, like an intelligent satyr. The other sags back against the wall, gazing sadly into space. He has the majesty of a Biblical prophet, with his noble brow and milk-white beard, but also an inexpressible air of defeat. The visitor notes that his left arm, tucked into a fold of cloak, is withered.
Preliminary courtesies are exchanged. The satyr speaks easily, with ingratiating gestures and smiles, congratulating the visitor on his precise Italian. Ale is brought; the satyr seizes up his tankard, drinks a toast to their enterprise and wipes his mouth with the back of his hand. He begins to speak. Unseen behind a panel, a clerk takes down every word.
No, he don’t talk. That’s what I’m for!
Is he my master? No, no, signore, we’re more sort of partners. Almost like brothers, you see? His mama and mine, they lived on the same farm. But Leo’s a gentleman, yes. Father was from a good old family. Much too good to marry his poor mama, but Ser Piero couldn’t get no sons by any other girl, so he kept his boy and brought him up, with a tutor and everything.
And, was the boy smart? Why, Leo was writing with his left hand (and, you know, that’s hard to do) by the time he was four! But then, one fine day, we boys were playing out in the orchard, and there was this big apple out on a high branch. Leo climbed out after it. And the branch fell! Boom, down he came and broke his left arm. Broke it so bad, the bones stuck out and the Doctor thought it might have to come off. Even when he saved the arm, it didn’t work so good anymore. It’d been shattered. Never grew right, after.
So then, Leo had to learn to do everything with his right hand. And I guess maybe it threw his humors out of balance, because he started to stutter. Stammered so bad nobody understood one word he was saying. Except me! I
listened
to him, you see, signore? And I could, uh, interpret for him. He got so he wouldn’t say nothing to nobody, except when I was around. We got such a, what’s the word, such a rapport, Leo and me, that I know what he wants to say before he says it.
And his papa said, “Say, Giovanni, you’re such a smart boy, my Leo needs you around to do his talking for him. You come live with us. I’ll pay you a nice salary.” Which was a big opportunity for me, I don’t mind telling you. When Leo was studying in books, I got to play in the street and learn a little something of the ways of the world, you understand? And I learned how to fight, which was good, because nobody dared call Leo a dummy or steal from him, while I was around.
I said, “Don’t feel bad, Leo, you’re plenty smart! One of these days we’ll get rich off your cleverness, wait and see!” And we did, signore. Plenty of times, we’ve been rolling in scudi. We just had bad luck. It could happen to anybody.
Ah! Well, let me tell you about Florence. Leo’s papa sent us to Andrea del Verrocchio, that was a big rich painter there. I said, “How are you today, signore? I’m Giovanni Barelli and this is Leonardo da Vinci, and he’s the greatest painter you’re ever going to teach, and I’m his manager”.
Signore Andrea didn’t take that too well, he must have been thinking, “Who are these kids?” But he looked over Leo’s little pictures that he done, like this rotten monster head he painted on a shield, with dead snakes and flies so real you could practically smell it, and he agreed to take Leo as an apprentice.
It probably didn’t hurt that Leo was good-looking as the Angel Gabriel himself, in those days. Those artistic types, they like the boys, eh? Saving your grace’s presence, but that’s how it is in the Art World.
So we settled into that studio, with all those other boys there, and Leo painted better than any of them. He painted so good, pretty soon he was better than Signore Andrea. Signore Andrea painted this big picture of Jesus getting baptized, but Leo helped him some. And, I’m telling you, there were these two holy angels standing side by side in the picture, and the one Signore Andrea painted looked grubby and sneaky as a pickpocket, but the angel Leo painted was just beautiful, shining so bright you’d think he had a candle stuck up his, uh, hidden under his robe or something.
I watched Signore Andrea and I could tell he wasn’t so happy about this. The little boys were crazy jealous, and I knew sooner or later somebody would slip poison into Leo’s dinner. So I went to Signore Andrea, I said, “Thanks a lot for the training, signore, but it’s time my Leo opened his own studio someplace else, don’t you agree?”
But he didn’t agree. He said Leo had to work for him a certain number of years and a day, or he wouldn’t get into San Luca’s Guild, blah blah blah. I saw Signore Andrea didn’t want no competition. So I knew it was time to get us some leverage.
Any rich man has secrets, eh, signore? You know what I mean, I can tell. And I could climb drainpipes real good, and open windows too, and get locked cabinets open with one of Leo’s palette knives. Pretty soon, I knew some things about Signore Andrea I’m sure he wouldn’t want the Pope to hear about. You’d be amazed how fast he changed his mind about Leo getting his own studio, after I put a little word in his ear! Even threw in a nice parting gift of money.
And, signore, the commissions poured in! Big murals for churches. Painted shields and armor. Portraits of little, rich girls. Half those little girls fell in love with Leo, good-looking as he was. Of course, to talk to him they had to go through
me
, and I wasn’t so bad-looking either, in those days. Life was sweet, signore.
The only problem we had, and I’m only telling you this because it turned out to be a blessing in disguise, was, if I left Leo alone in his studio while I was out with Ginevra or Isabella or Catarina, I’d come back and find he’d been, uh, distracted by his little drawings. Just filling up page after page with pictures of his hands, or water, or clouds or dead mice or anything. “Leo,” I said, “think of that nice bishop, waiting for his painting of the three wizards adoring Baby Jesus! You got to concentrate, Leo!” I told him.
I thought if I took his pens and paper away and locked him in, he’d have to paint. And it worked. But then one night I came in late, and I was a little, maybe, upset, because I was having troubles with Isabella, and I went to let Leo out so he could eat. There was this big canvas he was supposed to have been working on, still white as Isabella’s—well—he hadn’t painted one brushstroke on it, signore. What he done was
drawn all over the walls
. I was so mad I socked him, boom, and he went flying. The candle fell and set fire to his straw mattress. What I saw, with the room all lit up, was that these were all drawings of
machines
.
Which was something new for him, see? Instead of useless things, here were pictures of gears and blades and ratchets, with soldiers and horses getting cut to little pieces by them. “Giovanni,” I said to myself, “you’re looking at a fortune here!”
So I beat out the fire, and I gave Leo all the pens and paper he wanted. I went off to the kitchen and made him a nice dish of fried cheese. And while I cooked I figured, figured, all the time figured the angles.
Well. You heard of Galeazzo Sforza, eh? Duke of Milan, Lord of Genoa, the one they call
il orrendo
? Yes, him.
He was crazy mean. The kind of little boy who liked to pull wings off flies, and worse when he grew up. No beauty, either; eyes too close together and a weak chin. But he respected artists, signore.
The duke had only been on the throne a couple of years then, but people already knew the way his tastes ran, which is why I thought of him when I saw Leo’s pictures. So Leo wrote this beautiful letter to him, about what he could design for his dungeons and armies. I told him what to write. Such a letter we sent, signore! Such a lot of promises we made. I knew it was our necks in the halter if we couldn’t deliver, but I had faith in Leo.
Pretty soon the duke sent a letter back, too, mostly saying, “Why don’t you boys come to my palace in Milan so we can have a nice little talk?” It came at a good time, because Isabella’s papa was about to send over a couple of
his
boys for a little talk with me, you follow, signore? So I bundled up Leo and his books and papers and pens on one fast horse, and me on another, and away we went.
Now, one book Leo had with him was by this old Greek named Hero, full of clockwork and infernal machines. Leo studied the whole time we traveled. First, he copied the pictures. Then he made new drawings, taking all the old machines apart on paper and mixing up the pieces. Every inn we stopped at, he’d sit there at a table, drawing, while I got the drinks and talked to girls. We had to buy another horse to carry all the ideas Leo had.
We went to see the duke, in Milan. You know what he was doing, when we were shown in? He was gambling with a pretty girl. He’d bet her she couldn’t keep an egg in her open mouth from the stroke of noon until midnight. Her father’s life was the stake. She was standing there the whole time with tears in her sweet eyes, her mouth stretched wide around this goose egg, and I knew her jaws must have been aching bad. He was just ignoring her. If I didn’t know what kind of man he was before, I knew then.
But I acted big, I told him about the great machines Leo invented, that would make him powerful as Caesar, Alexander, Charlemagne! And, maybe I’m a little crude when I express myself, and I was only a country boy then and didn’t know much about impressing people. I could see the duke smiling, like he was going to enjoy sending us to the dungeon for wasting his time.
Lucky for us both, Leo had his papers with the drawings all ready, and his beautiful clear handwriting that anybody could read. Leo bowed before him and offered the sketchbook. The duke looked at the pages, and he couldn’t take his eyes away after he’d seen the picture on top. He started reading, saying nothing, turning pages. After a while he called for some wine. He didn’t give us any. We stood there, and the girl stood there too with the egg still in her mouth, staring at us. The sun slanted across the tiles on the floor and the fountain outside splashed the whole time.
Finally the duke closed the sketchbook. He asked Leo if he could really build all these devices, and I told him of course we could! Only, we’d need some of his best armorers and blacksmiths, not to mention money. “Well,” said the duke, “Smart boys like you, you’ll have everything you want!”
I thought to myself, “Giovanni, your fortune’s made!”
So you can imagine, signore, how I nearly wet myself when Leo walked over to the girl and took the egg out of her mouth. Who were we, to criticize a rich man’s fun? But the duke, he took it all right. He just laughed and said we could have the girl too.
Her name was Fiammetta. She was crazy in love with Leo from that moment. Waited on him hand and foot, in the nice rooms the duke gave us. Cooked and cleaned and brushed his clothes, which was nice for me, because I was too busy for that now.
But, signore, you should know that Leo is chaste. Eh? No, no, not like that at all. It’s all
up here
with him, see? So you can be sure there wasn’t nothing sinful going on. Which I’m telling you in case your king has any question about his morals.
So, I got busy. We had a whole kind of blacksmith-studio to build, and workers to hire. I got a clerk to copy Leo’s drawings and pass them out to the workers, so everybody understood what we were making. There was iron and coal to buy. Getting it all up and running was like making a big machine, too, but I’m good at that. I can run around, yell at people to get going. I push things, you see? And I pushed Leo on the job, so his mind didn’t wander. He kept wanting to change the design once he’d finished, kept having new ideas. “Leo,” I told him, “get
organized
! One thing at a time!”
But, once all the workmen understood Leo’s designs, he could afford to draw his little pictures. The big machine started rolling. The master smith, smart man named Marulli, such a pity he’s dead now, he really caught fire with the idea of Leo’s steam engine. He even pointed out one or two ways it could work better. Pretty soon the forges were going day and night. The workers were coming in all hours and forgetting to eat, they were so excited.
The duke himself came in to watch. I showed him all the models, and the work going on. He had the brains to appreciate good ideas. He was happy with our work, I tell you. There was a look in his nasty little eyes that was almost pure. You know what I mean? Bad men don’t love God or other men, but sometimes they love
things
, and that’s the closest they ever get to being human.
So what happened? The duke got himself armed for war and, sure enough, one started. The Ligurians sent in condottieri to take Pavia.
Yes, Pavia, you know the name? Famous siege. Changed the way wars were going to be fought forever after, and I should know, because I was there. You want to hear what really happened?
Pavia was defended pretty good.
Il orrendo
had built new walls only a little while before. The condottieri got there and saw they had one tough nut to crack. Then up came this Pavian traitor named Lazzaro Doria, and he said to them: “Say, there’s this big place called the Mirabello over there, it’s the duke’s own hunting estate with walls and a castle, and he ain’t home. If you camp there, you can starve out the Pavians from a nice defensible position.”
“Good,” said the condottieri. Pretty soon they were living high, eating venison from the duke’s own park while the Pavians were rationing food, marching out in the morning to make big threats and fire off a gun or two. At night they slept in the duke’s feather beds. One soft campaign!
Until the duke heard about it. I was there when he got the news and I saw him smile.
Uh-oh,
I said to myself,
I sure wouldn’t want to be those condottieri.