Free I, Mona Lisa by Jeanne Kalogridis Page B

never owned one or had any idea of how to wield one.
    Pale and lifeless in an unadorned tunic of black, Lorenzo, his neck still bandaged, received Leonardo in his study, surrounded by artwork of astonishing beauty. He gazed up at Leonardo with eyes clouded by guilt and grief—yet even these could not hide his interest in hearing what the artist had to say.
    On the morning of the twenty-sixth of April, Leonardo had stood several rows from the altar in the Cathedral of Santa Maria del Fiore. He’d had questions for Lorenzo about a joint commission he and his former teacher Andrea Verrocchio had received to sculpt a bust of Giuliano, and hoped to catch
il Magnifico
after the service. Leonardo attended Mass only when he had business to conduct; he found the natural world far more awe-inspiring than a man-made cathedral. Hewas on very good terms with the Medici. Over the past few years, he had stayed for months at a time in Lorenzo’s house as one of the many artists in the family’s employ.
    To Leonardo’s surprise that morning in the Duomo, Giuliano had arrived, late, disheveled, and escorted by Francesco de’ Pazzi and his employee.
    Leonardo found men and women equally beautiful, equally worthy of his love, but he lived an unrequited life by choice. An artist could not allow the storms of love to interrupt his work. He avoided women most of all, for the demands of a wife and children would make his studies—of art, of the world and its inhabitants—impossible. He did not want to become as his master Verrocchio was—wasting his talent, taking on any work, whether it be the construction of masks for Carnival or the gilding of a lady’s slippers, to feed his hungry family. There was never any time to experiment, to observe, to improve his skills.
    Ser Antonio, Leonardo’s grandfather, had first explained this concept to him. Antonio had loved his grandson deeply, ignoring the fact that he was the illegitimate get of a servant girl. As Leonardo grew, only his grandfather noted the boy’s talent, and had given him a book of paper and charcoal. When Leonardo was seven years old, he had been sitting in the cool grass with a silverpoint stylus and a rough panel of wood, studying how the wind rippled through the leaves of an olive orchard. Ser Antonio—ever busy, straight-shouldered and sharp-eyed despite his eighty-eight years—had paused to stand beside him, and look with him at the glittering trees.
    Quite suddenly and unprompted, he said,
Pay no attention to custom, my boy. I had half your talent—yes, I was good at drawing and eager, like you, to understand how the natural world works—but I listened to my father. Before I came to the farm, I was apprenticed to him as a notary.
    That is what we are—a family of notaries. One sired me, and so I sired one myself—your father. What have we given the world? Contracts and bills of exchange, and signatures on documents which will turn to dust.
    I did not give up my dreams altogether; even as I learned about the profession, I drew in secret. I stared at birds and rivers, and wondered how they worked. But then I met your grandmother Lucia and fell in love. It was the worst thing ever to happen, for I abandoned art and science and married her. Then there were children, and no time to look at trees. Lucia found my scribblings and cast them into the fire.
    But God has given us you—you with your amazing mind and eyes and hands. You have a duty not to abandon them.
    Promise me you will not make my mistake; promise me you will never let your heart carry you away.
    Young Leonardo had promised.
    But when he became a protégé of the Medici and a member of their inner circle, he had been drawn, physically and emotionally, to Lorenzo’s younger brother. Giuliano was infinitely lovable. It was not simply the man’s striking appearance—Leonardo was himself far more attractive, often called “beautiful” by his friends—but rather the pure goodness of his spirit.
    This fact