The Caravaggio Conspiracy (6 page)

Caravaggio bowed to the bishop, then got straight to the point. ‘What’s this about you turning down my Virgin?’

Cherubini turned around slowly. He had a long, thin neck and, with his skinny legs and bulbous clothing, put the artist in mind of a brochette on a chef’s spit. A lugubrious, world-weary expression clung to his face, which could have belonged to a mask from the commedia dell’arte. Realizing the source of the
interruption
, Cherubini groaned theatrically and clasped his hand to his forehead. ‘Master Caravaggio …’

‘The very same. You haven’t forgotten my name, apparently, but you do seem to have let it slip your mind that you still owe me the small matter of 230 scudi.’

The lawyer grimaced, but stood his ground. ‘Look,’ he said, ‘this is not a convenient moment. As you can see, I am busy discussing church matters with His Grace. Do you mind calling back later?’

‘Busy?
Busy
? What do you think I’ve been these last three months? I’ve produced a painting for you that, in the opinion of many, is a masterpiece, fit to be compared to anything by Titian or Raphael. And now I hear that it’s been turned down by you and the canons because the Virgin has bare feet!

‘I assure you …’

‘And by the Discalced Carmelites, no less. Master Cherubini, may I ask you what “discalced” means?’

‘Why, it is Latin, of course.
Dis calceus
… without shoes.’

‘
Without shoes
! Exactly! They go about Rome without any shoes on, even in the dead of winter, just to show how bloody
holy
they are. But now, when I show the Virgin lying on her deathbed, they complain that I’m a blasphemer because she isn’t wearing shoes. Well, since when does anyone ever wear shoes in bed? For a quick five minutes in the local knocking shop maybe, but not, I suspect, if you’re about to meet your Maker.’

At this, the bishop couldn’t help laughing, which only added to Cherubini’s sense of insult. Drawing himself up to his full height, he narrowed his eyes and bared his teeth, which were a bright yellow. ‘Good God!’ he said. ‘This is
unconscionable
. They were right about you, Merisi. You
are
a blasphemer!’

‘In fact, Master Cherubini, I’m a Milanese. But let that pass. I did what was asked of me. I produced a finished canvas, on time, to specifications, and all I’ve got to show for it is a miserable advance of fifty scudi.’

Cherubini ran a veiny hand down the full length of his face, as if conjuring up a new expression fresh from the wreckage of the old. The truth was, he planned to sell the painting in the commercial market. Several experts, among them Vincenzo Giustiniani and the Flemish master, Rubens, had pronounced it first-rate, worth twice at least what Cherubini was paying for it. So it was just a matter of allowing a discreet interval to pass between saying no to it and realizing a handsome profit.

‘And you
shall
be paid,’ he announced, a new orotundity entering his delivery. ‘For I am a man of my word. Indeed, you shall be paid this very week. But as for the painting being installed in Santa Maria della Scala, well, I’m afraid that is quite out of the question. Quite aside from the matter of the bare feet, your model for the Virgin turns out to have been be a dirty whore from Ortaccio … a slut whose favours you have no doubt enjoyed many times. More than that – more than that, even – you have depicted Our Lady as …
dead
, when, quite explicitly, she was to have been shown on the point of her dormition into heaven.’

Caravaggio adopted a defiant pose, with his hands on his hips. The bishop, a Spaniard, who knew well the artist’s high standing at the papal court, was enjoying this unexpected diversion and stared at the artist with a grin on his face, waiting for the next outburst.

‘Have you ever actually read the Bible, Master Cherubini?’ Caravaggio asked.

‘What? How dare you!’

‘Because, if you have, perhaps you would be so kind as to point out to me where it says that Mary, the Mother of Jesus, did not die like the rest of us, but “dormissioned” into heaven, leaving no trace of her earthly body behind.’

‘It is set out quite clearly in the
Golden Legend
.’

‘The what?’

‘The
Golden Legend
… the Lives of the Saints. You know very well …’

‘– I know very well, Signor, that The Golden Legend is a story book and no substitute for the word of God.’

This was too much for Cherubini, who by now was smouldering with rage. ‘Happily for the Church,’ he boomed, ‘not all artists take so lofty a view. You should know that a new work has been commissioned, showing the dormition of Our Lady, by the esteemed artist Carlo Sarasceni, and it is this, rather than your own sacrilegious daub, that will occupy the altarpiece in Santa Maria della Scala.’

This news stung Caravaggio. Sarasceni, a Venetian who had lived in Rome for the last five years, was a friend and one of his most devoted admirers. It was hard to believe that he would accept a commission in such circumstances. But then, he reflected, times were hard, business was business and everyone was out to make as much as they could before they were thought old hat or the plague got them.

‘Daub it might be to you, Signor Cherubini,’ he retorted. ‘We shall see how history judges your action. I wonder which of us will be remembered a hundred years from now, the artist or the …
lawyer
.’

For a moment, Cherubini was speechless. Caravaggio could have chosen no more personal line of attack. Then he recovered his voice. ‘Get out!’ he said. ‘Leave my house. You shall be paid your thirty pieces of silver. Do not, however, on pain of arrest for trespass, dare to darken my door again.’

But before he had finished speaking, Caravaggio had already gone.

That afternoon, in the Turk’s Head, Prospero Orsi and Onorio Longhi, Caravaggio’s two closest companions in Rome, listened indulgently as the monstrous tale unfolded of how Cherubini – a buffoon as well as a rogue, and quite possibly a child molester – had rejected
Death of the Virgin
and given a fresh commission in its stead to Carlo Sarasceni.

‘I’m not surprised, to tell you the truth,’ Longhi said, as soon as he could get a word in edgeways. ‘The wonder is that Carlo didn’t get in before you at the French church. I mean, he speaks French half the time and gets all his clothes sent from Marseille. I don’t know why he doesn’t just go and live there.’

‘But you’re not saying he’d have stolen the commission, are you?’ Caravaggio asked. This was a question of honour and he was not ready to concede the point.

Longhi flicked a lock of his blonde hair away from his face. ‘No – probably not. But he wanted it. He thought he was the obvious choice, even if he does call himself a Caravaggista.’

‘Remind me to give him a kick up the arse next time I see him.’

‘By all means.’

‘And I’ll hold him down while you do it,’ Orsi added. He was a small man, known generally as Prosperini, but was always there at the first hint of trouble, ready to lay in with with either fists or rapier. ‘Mind you,’ he continued, ‘it’s not Carlo’s fault that Cherubini’s a prick.’

‘No,’ Caravaggio agreed. ‘And I can’t blame him for picking up on the job after I’d already had my go. But he’d better bloody well wait until I’ve been paid before starting. Otherwise, he and I will have a serious falling out.’

‘Funny he should come up like this,’ Orsi said. ‘I ran into him the other day. He’d just come back from Venice. His father’s ill, apparently. He says the Doge and his advisers are scared the Ottomans are going to attack the city. Turns out the Sultan has re-built his fleet, and his generals and admirals are looking for any excuse they can find to go to war.’

‘So Anna was right, then.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘She told me a while back that one of her clients – a Dominican from Venice – was worried the Turks were getting ready for war. He said all the Pope would do was celebrate High Mass and pray for God’s intervention.’

Longhi was picking at his teeth with a sliver of wood he’d peeled from the edge of the table. ‘If you ask me,’ he said, ‘a proper war would do us all a world of good. I haven’t had my sword out of its scabbard in months.’

‘Bollocks!’ said Orsi. ‘You were arrested just last month. You hit a baker over the head with the hilt of your sword after he overcharged you 10 baiocci for a loaf of bread. I was there, remember.’

‘Yes, well that doesn’t count, does it? He wasn’t a gentleman and I didn’t cut him, did I? Get your facts straight.’

‘Do you really think the Turks will have another go?’ Caravaggio asked. ‘You’d think after Lepanto …’

The Battle of Lepanto, the greatest naval confrontation for a hundred years, had been fought in 1571, off the west coast of Greece, between the Holy League, led by the Pope, and the Ottomans, resulting in a famous Christian victory. But Cyprus had still been wrested from the Venetians and there were endless rumours of fresh incursions into Hungary and Austria, even of an upcoming assault on Vienna itself.

‘Lepanto was thirty years ago,’ Longhi said. ‘The Turks have learned a lot since then. They’ve got new guns and new tactics. There’s even talk they’ve built a squadron of galleasses, high as houses. If you ask me, another war is only a matter of time.’

Orisi looked thoughtful. ‘I spoke to this Monsignor from the Apostolic Palace the other day, after Mass. He’d seen me at Cardinal Orlandi’s. I’m still working on that fresco about Lepanto and he came over to see how I was doing. Anyway, we got to talking about the Ottomans. Turns out he’d been to Isfahan recently as part of a delegation from the Holy See. He told me that Shah Abbas of the Persians had called on the Pope to agree an alliance against the Turks, who he said were our common enemy. The Pope was interested. Very interested, apparently. I mean, he’s got enough to do with the Protestants on the one hand and stuck-up Venetians on the other. But Cardinal Battista – our esteemed Camerlengo – was dead against it. A plague on both their houses, he said. The pair of them, Persians as well as Turks, were Muslim and therefore our sworn enemies, and we’d be better off striking a pact with the devil himself. Some Hospitaller or other, over on business from Malta, backed him up. It did the trick. Now it looks as if the Pope’s gone cold on the idea and we’re all back where we started.’

Orazio Battista, a member of the Sacred College since the time of Pope Sixtus V, was easily the most powerful Cardinal in Rome, to whom even the
cardinal-nephews
deferred. As Camerlengo of the Apostolic Camera, the Vatican treasury, he controlled the finances of the Holy See and the Papal States. He knew the wealth of every member of the Curia and how that wealth had been acquired.

‘A hard man to fathom,’ Caravaggio said. ‘He knows where the bodies are buried.’

‘Yes,’ said Longhi. ‘But that’s mainly because he dug the graves.’

‘Exactly. And popes depend on bastards like that. They may talk about the power of prayer, but it’s the Inquisition and the army they rely on in a crisis.’

Orsi dispensed another round of drinks. ‘You know what they say about Battista. Get on his wrong side and the next thing you know you’re strung up by the arms in the Tor di Nona, begging for mercy … either that or crawling around the scaffold looking for your head.’

At that thought, Caravaggio shivered.

‘Well,’ said Longhi, ‘hold on a moment. Maybe we’re looking at this the wrong way round. See it from Battista’s perspective, perched up there in the Vatican. Christian Europe must seem pretty well invincible to him right now. As far as he’s concerned, it’s not the Turks that are the problem, but the English and the Dutch – and they’re a long way from Rome. Look at our monuments, our churches, our city walls, the cardinals and princes in their finery. The Swiss Guard, too, of course, and the Knights Hospitaller out there in Malta. And, please, let’s not forget the
sbirri
. The moment the Turks appear on the top of the Quirinal Hill, they’ll be arrested for carrying scimitars without a permit.’

The other two grinned at this. But Longhi wasn’t finished.

‘The point is – and this is what they all forget – the Muslims don’t give up that easily. They’re hard bastards, fighting for a cause they believe in. They think
history’s
on their side, no matter how long it takes. And from what I hear, if they die in battle they go straight to heaven, with seventy virgins each to attend to their needs.’

‘Is that a fact?’ Orsi asked. ‘Well, they wouldn’t stay virgins for long if it was me.’

This prompted Caravaggio to yawn expansively. ‘Listen to him, Onorio. You’d never guess he had the smallest prick in Ortaccio.’

‘All the same,’ said Longhi, ‘you watch. Before we’re too old we’ll be out there on the Hungarian plains, fighting for Christian survival.’

‘We can only hope,’ said Caravaggio.

Maya Studer had been looking for a way of escape when she first met Liam Dempsey. The reception at the Irish College on the Via dei Santo Quattro had been dull even by the standards of ecclesiastical hospitality in Rome. An elderly Italian bishop was shamelessly flirting with her by the drinks table, seeking to impress her with the extent of his connections. Several times he patted her hand; once he even stroked her arm. She had smiled politely, then, when Dempsey drifted past on his way to the college garden, she had hooked her arm under his and announced in
impeccable
Italian: ‘I’m sorry, Your Grace, but my fiancé and I really have to go. We’re trying for a baby, and the way my cycle works this afternoon may be our best hope.’

Frustratingly for Dempsey, that had been the high point so far. He hadn’t even kissed Maya yet, let alone slept with her. She wasn’t that kind of girl – or so it seemed. But she was happy enough to spend time in his company. This was their second lunch date and the next step, apparently, was to go to a movie.

They had met in front of the Fontana del Moro, at the southern end of the Piazza Navona. Now, as they made their way past jugglers, human statues and several prostrate beggars to the Tre Scalini restaurant, she again hooked her arm under his so that he thought they must look like two young lovers. It felt good. Maya, like nearly all upper-class Swiss, was an accomplished linguist, born and raised in the German-speaking canton of Schaffhausen, near the border with Baden-Württemberg. Twenty-six years old, she had the most startling green eyes and thick black hair. Her designer clothes were from the Milan fashion houses and her shoes from Bologna. Today, she wore a high-waisted, pale-lemon skirt that ended some three inches above her knees and a white, ruffled blouse, the top three buttons of which were undone, exposing a deep and well-defined cleavage. She made Dempsey, in his jeans, blue shirt and sneakers, feel like a peasant. But it wasn’t just her clothes. A lawyer by training, she had recently returned to Europe from the United States, where she had earned an MBA at the Harvard Business School. In the meantime, she had been recruited to a job in the legal department of UBS Bank in Zurich and was due to start work in September. So even if they ended up having a summer romance, Dempsey doubted that he’d ever see her again much past the autumn. Still, that still left a good eight weeks and he was determined to make the most of it.

He didn’t like to admit it, but he was nervous. It was almost two years since he’d been with a woman. He felt like a born-again virgin.

When they reached the Tre Scalini, with its unrivalled view of Bernini’s Fontana dei Quattro Fiumi he realized, too late, that he should have booked. The day was hot and sticky and the tables beneath the big umbrellas were hopelessly crowded.

But then Maya smiled at the major-domo in his crisp linen jacket, and seconds later a table appeared, as if by magic, followed by a waiter bearing a
complimentary
bottle of Pellegrino. The grateful diners ran their eyes quickly down the lunch menu and ordered pasta and a bottle of Frascati.

Though Dempsey imagined Maya to be somewhat ‘proper’ in her attitude to men – a product, perhaps, of her Swiss upbringing – the reality was very different. There had been a string of lovers during her student days, in all of whom she lost interest as soon as the thrill of conquest faded. At Harvard, a little older and wiser, she had slept with three of her fellow graduate students and conducted a protracted, on-off affair with her director of studies. The fact of the matter was, she was waiting for the young Irishman to make the first move. She knew that he had been through hard times since his trauma in Iraq and probably hadn’t been with a woman for at least a year. She wouldn’t blame him if he lacked confidence. Who wouldn’t, she told herself, after spending twelve months in reconstructive surgery? But so far as she was concerned, he was quite exceptionally attractive. In one sense, he was conventionally handsome, with strong, regular features and a thick mane of hair. But it was his eyes that had really drawn her attention. They looked haunted, as if they had seen too much of the world’s horror. She could imagine him playing a brilliant, but vulnerable young doctor in an afternoon TV drama, or maybe a soldier – which, of course, was what he had been. She didn’t doubt that sooner or later – preferably sooner – they would go to bed together. What happened after that was anybody’s guess.

The Frascati had arrived and Dempsey poured each of them a glass.

‘
Sláinte
!’ he said.

‘
Sláinte chugat
– good health to you.’

‘Jesus Christ! Do you speak Irish as well?’

This made her laugh. ‘No,’ she said. ‘It was something the rector of the Irish College said to me the other night.’

‘The rector? So he was hitting on you as well.’

‘Why, are you jealous?’

‘I just remember the bishop with his hand on your arm.’

‘Even men of God have eyes,’ she said, staring at him across the top of her glass. ‘And desires.’

‘Don’t we all?’ he said.

They sipped at their wine.

‘What would you be doing if you were back in Galway?’ she asked.

He thought for a second. ‘Probably looking out at the rain through a pub window.’

The thought pleased her. ‘Maybe you’ll take me there some day,’ she said.

‘You never know,’ he replied. He wondered if he should make the first move.

The waiter brought their order.

Dempsey raised a forkful of lightly grilled zucchini. ‘Let’s talk about you for a change. You must have had a strong Catholic upbringing to have a father who ended up as commandant of the Swiss Guard. You don’t get much more faithful than that.’

‘Hold on,’ she replied, laughing. ‘Didn’t you tell me your childhood home was full of religious statues?’

‘That’s true. My father said the rosary a dozen times a day. Sometimes when he was on the phone he’d pass the old-fashioned flex through his fingers like it was a set of beads.’

Maya tried to picture Mr Dempsey, his mouth moving in silent prayer as he listened to his bank manager recommending a new vehicle for his savings.

‘Do you miss him?’

The blue in his eyes turned to ice as he considered his reply. ‘He wasn’t an easy man,’ was all he said.

‘Perhaps he would have said the same about you.’

‘Perhaps.’

She reached for the bottle of Frascati and refilled their glasses. ‘But tell me more about your uncle. If you think my father is a leading Catholic, what about him? He must be the first ever Irish Superior General. Is that right?’

Dempsey responded gratefully to the change of subject. ‘He’s the first all right. A pioneer. Not quite the same thing, though, is it? While my uncle gets to dress in black from head to foot, your father is a one-man sartorial riot, with scarlet tunic and knee-britches, buckled shoes, a ruff and a silver helmet with an ostrich feather in it.’

‘He looks good, don’t you think?’

‘I’d certainly pick him out in a police line-up.’

‘Except,’ said Maya, ‘that he’s the head of the police.’

Now Dempsey was grinning. ‘Seriously,’ he said, ‘what made him go for the job? He and your mother get a pretty cool apartment, I’ll grant you that. But it’s still a bit of an odd thing to do. Like being colonel-in-charge of the Beefeaters.’

‘For a start,’ said Maya, twisting a mouthful of pasta onto her fork, ‘he didn’t go for the job. He was asked. You have to be invited. And for another thing, he’d been a top business executive for twenty years and an army officer for seven years before that, with five more years in the Reserve. So it was time for a change. As for being a good Catholic, I’d say he’s above average, nothing more. But he believes in it and his loyalty to the Pope is absolute.’

Dempsey put his fork down and raised his glass to his lips. ‘So if he heard there were shenanigans afoot in the conclave, he’d be concerned?’

‘Shenanigans? I don’t understand.’

‘Goings-on. Things that shouldn’t be happening.’

‘What are you suggesting?’

‘Just thinking aloud. If he heard there were people in high places putting undue pressure on certain cardinals to give their vote to a certain hardline
candidate
, would that be something your father would take notice of?’

She looked at him hard. It was obvious to him that she didn’t like the
direction
in which their conversation was going. ‘Of course he’d take notice,’ she said. ‘But there’d be nothing he could do … not unless there was murder involved, or blackmail – something of that order. You have to realize that in the interregnum between two papacies my father’s primary, indeed sole loyalty, is to the College of Cardinals.’

‘But there are hundreds of cardinals, from all over the world, most of whom he’s never met. How can he be loyal to all of them?’

‘It’s an institutional loyalty, stupid. It works through the Camerlengo.’

‘Cardinal Bosani?’

‘Yes, but …’

‘And what if the Camerlengo is pursuing his own agenda?’

Maya bristled. ‘Don’t be ridiculous!’

Dempsey’s eyes darted round the tables next to them, where various
combinations
of Italians and lesser races were enjoying their lunch. ‘Keep your voice down,’ he said. ‘Don’t you know, the Curia’s agents are everywhere?’

This stopped her in her tracks. Then she caught the look in his eyes and the tension dissolved in a flash. ‘Oh!’ she said. ‘I get it. You are making fun of me.’

‘Maybe I am and maybe I’m not,’ he said. ‘It’s just that my uncle has got the crazy idea that Cardinal Bosani wants a pro-European, anti-Muslim Pope. He thinks there’s a faction in the Curia out to provoke a confrontation with Islam.’

‘What on earth for?’ She looked dubious.

‘A Catholic revival, I suppose. Just what we need in these troubled times.’

Maya leaned in, sensing the antipathy. ‘Bosani is not my favourite cardinal. He’s a smooth-talking bully with an over-inflated sense of his own importance. But he’s not a madman. No one who wanted war in Europe could ever earn the confidence of two popes. The idea that he could rig the vote in favour of his own candidate is preposterous. For a start, it ignores the fact that most of the cardinals due here next week have all sorts of ideas about who would do the best job. Take it from me, all Cardinal Bosani wants is a pope who stands up for the faith in
troubled
times. Is that so too much to ask?’

‘I suppose not,’ said Dempsey, appearing to accept the logic of her argument. ‘I think maybe my uncle’s just a bit on edge because there aren’t any Jesuits in the race. Even so, if you hear anything, you might let me know … just to put his mind at rest.’

‘He sounds a bit paranoid, if you don’t mind my saying so.’

‘Aren’t they all?’ he said. ‘More to the point, are you still on for a film tonight? Only, Rome’s full of tourists and I’d need to book in advance.’

She looked at him and her face softened. He was a hard man to say no to. ‘I’m not sure if the Irish and the Swiss were ever made to get along,’ she said. ‘But I’ll give it a go … for now. Call it an experiment.’

‘Excellent,’ he said. ‘I’ll pick you up at seven-thirty. Dress informal.’