The Falconer's Knot: A Story of Friars, Flirtation and Foul Play by Mary Hoffman

‘But until they find out who killed the man in Perugia, there will still be a shadow over him, won’t there?’ said the Abbess. ‘And however innocent he may be he can’t stay in Giardinetto for ever. People will wonder why he remains a novice.’

  The Abbot decided not to tell her that there was a second friar who did have a motive for murdering Ubaldo. He wanted to believe as she did that the killing was over.

  The nuns and friars filed into the chapel of the friary the next day, filling it to overflowing. The Abbot led the service, solemnly intoning words of comfort. There was so little room that the novices had to stand at the back and Chiara managed to catch Silvano’s eye. She wanted to talk to him about Isabella and Brother Anselmo but also hoped that he might tell her more about his life in Perugia. Chiara had already guessed from his superior horse and his hawk that Silvano was an aristocrat. And she wanted to hear him say that he no longer cared for the woman whose husband had been murdered. But it was virtually impossible for two young people of opposite sex in religious houses to speak alone, even though they lived so nearby.

  An unexpected opportunity came later in the day, when both novices found themselves back in the Basilica with Simone Martini. The artist seemed much more pleased than either of them would have been about the quantities of dull green paint that Brother Anselmo and Sister Veronica had brought him.

  ‘Do you make your own white?’ Silvano asked the painter, remembering his conversation with Brother Fazio.

  ‘My journeymen do,’ said Simone. ‘They mix the gesso for the walls in a workshop here at the Cathedral and make large quantities of lime-white.’

  ‘Saint John’s white,’ said Silvano.

  Simone raised his eyebrows, impressed. ‘Indeed, though here it will be used for Saint Martin. It’s not skilled work. They mix slaked lime and water in buckets and stir it for eight days. Then they make it into little cakes and put them to dry in the sun. We call it biacca.’

  ‘Couldn’t they make the colours for you too, Ser Simone?’ Chiara dared to ask.

  ‘I would not entrust such a task to journeymen, Sister,’ he replied. ‘Of course my assistants have the skills but you see how I need them here.’

  He gestured to the scaffolding where several men were working on the hands of figures in frescoes that were nearly finished.

  ‘My brother, Donato,’ said Simone, ‘and my friends Lippo and Tederigo. They are part of my bottega in Siena. I could not finish this commission without them.’ The artists looked down and smiled to acknowledge the visitors, then turned back to their delicate task.

  When the day’s load of colours had been brought into the chapel, Simone offered to take the visitors into the Upper Church and show them the life of Saint Francis. Sister Veronica was fascinated, dedicated follower of the Saint that she was, and even Silvano and Chiara were interested because the painter had made the scenes so real. Only Brother Anselmo seemed to have to force himself to be interested in the paintings.

  ‘As beautiful as possible,’ said Simone. ‘That is the responsibility of all us mural painters – to beautify the House of God to the best of our ability. I am trying hard in the church below us but Maestro Giotto has given me a lot to measure up to.’

  The nave was completely decorated – walls, ceilings, chapels, even the thin columns and arches that sprang up into the vaulted roof. Everywhere was a mass of bright colours and it took a while for eyes accustomed to the dimness of the Lower Church to make sense of it all. But the painter took them to the beginning of the sequence of the Saint’s life on the north side of the nave.

  It was a picture of the centre of Assisi, with a Greek temple in the middle, squeezed up between two modern buildings. The Saint walked from the left in a dark cloak, his head already haloed. On the right a man spread his cloak for Francis to walk on.

  ‘He is a simpleton,’ said Simone. ‘Not a grand person like the other men in their red and gold and white robes. But he alone recognises the holiness of Francis and pays him homage.’

  In the next picture the Saint, who had his own horse, gave a much grander, golden cloak to a poor knight.

  ‘Just like Saint Martin!’ Silvano exclaimed. ‘Will he now dream that the poor man was Our Lord?’

  ‘No,’ said Simone. ‘Francis does have a dream but it is of a palace filled with arms bearing the sign of the cross. It means that he has done a deed worthy of a knight and the arms are for him and his followers.’

  He went on explaining the frescoes and gradually, as the Colour Master and Mistress became more involved in the story, the novices were able to linger behind.

  ‘They are wonderful, aren’t they?’ said Silvano.

  ‘Truly,’ said Chiara. ‘I have never imagined anything like it. But I don’t understand why the church dedicated to the Saint is so full of light and colour while we, who are also supposed to dedicate ourselves to the Order he inspired, must live without either.’

  ‘Do you hate it so much?’ asked Silvano.

  ‘It is different for you,’ said Chiara. ‘One day you will leave but I must stay for ever.’

  ‘I don’t know when that day will be,’ said Silvano. ‘And maybe something will happen so that you can leave too. I know that Monna Isabella would like to do something for you. Perhaps you could write to her?’

  Chiara looked up at him gratefully. ‘Thank you. Perhaps I will. How was she when you left her in Gubbio?’

  ‘Quite calm and composed,’ said Silvano. ‘She is a fine lady. I think she will recover from her husband’s death.’

  He heard what he thought was a very unreligious snort of suppressed laughter from the novice nun.

  ‘Of course she will! She hated him.’

  Silvano was amazed. ‘Hated him? But she seemed so upset at the friary. I’m sure she nearly fainted when they put his body into the carriage.’

  ‘Only because she had seen your Brother Anselmo,’ said Chiara.

  ‘But why?’

  ‘His secular name was Domenico and they were in love when they were young,’ said Chiara. ‘It is a terribly sad story. Ubaldo took her from him. There was no way in which her family would let her marry a poor scholar when a rich merchant came courting.’

  ‘And so Domenico became a friar,’ said Silvano. ‘That makes sense.’

  ‘Yes but Isabella didn’t know that, not till yesterday. And now she would be free to marry him, but of course he has taken a vow of celibacy.’

  ‘Come, Sister Orsola,’ called Veronica. ‘You can see our blessed Saint Clare here.’

  They hurried after the others so that Simone could show them the painting of Saint Clare and her fellow nuns encountering the funeral procession of Saint Francis. The Saint lay on a bier covered in a gold-patterned cloth while Clare leant over, sorrowing and almost taking him in her arms. The other sisters whispered sadly to each other in the background. One of the ones on the right looked a bit like Chiara.

  But Silvano could not keep his mind on the story. Monna Isabella and Brother Anselmo had once been in love! And Ubaldo had separated them. Anselmo must have hated him. Yet Silvano could not reconcile the kindly and devout man he knew with one who would kill out of jealousy. He tried to think how he would feel if another man took Angelica from him then chided himself. It was not the same. He had hardly ever exchanged a word with her; she was not his. She had been another man’s before he knew her. And he had not killed that man.

  They had reached the last pictures on the south side and were almost back at the stairs to the Lower Church. Simone was explaining that they showed miracles that happened after Francis’s death. Sister Veronica was making sure that Chiara looked at every detail and did not dawdle behind again with the handsome novice.

  As they descended back into the Lower Church and the painter showed the sisters where other new paintings were going to be, Silvano decided to speak to th
e Colour Master about what he had heard. He simply couldn’t keep his curiosity to himself.

  ‘Brother Anselmo, is it true that you . . . that you knew Monna Isabella when you were young?’

  It was perhaps the only thing that could have shaken Anselmo out of his reverie. He started and began to say, ‘But how . . .?’ Then he changed his mind and sighed.

  ‘It is true,’ he said simply. ‘I had not seen her for nearly twenty years, until she came to the friary yesterday. I have prayed and struggled with my feelings but the sight of her has undone many years of devotion to the service of Our Lord. I am deep in sin.’

  ‘But not the sin of murder?’ whispered Silvano.

  Brother Anselmo looked at him reproachfully.

  ‘I mean, I’m sure you didn’t kill Ubaldo,’ said Silvano hastily. ‘But do any of the other brothers know your history with Monna Isabella?’

  ‘Abbot Bonsignore does,’ said Anselmo. ‘I told him the reason I had first become a friar when I joined the house at Giardinetto. But he didn’t know the name of the woman I loved or the man who married her. I told him only when he questioned me yesterday. He asked me about meeting you on the night of the murder and I told him I had been out for some fresh air. He asked me straight out if I had been to Ubaldo’s cell.’

  Silvano held his breath.

  ‘I told him I had thought of it,’ said Anselmo. ‘The temptation was strong to find out how he had treated her over the years – just to hear him say her name would have been a sweet torment. But I struggled with it and took myself for a walk around the grounds instead.’

  ‘She hated him,’ said Silvano. ‘She has never stopped loving you. She told Chiara, I mean Sister Orsola.’

  Anselmo sat down suddenly on a step and put his head in his hands.

  ‘It is like a nightmare,’ he said. ‘I told the Abbot about my past connection with Ubaldo and he believed in my innocence. But if this story gets out in the friary, I cannot trust that the other brothers will have such confidence in me, I am so recently come among them.’

  ‘I shall tell no one,’ promised Silvano. ‘But wouldn’t the best thing be if we could find out who the real murderer was?’

  Anselmo smiled for the first time for days. Silvano’s trust in him was balm to his bruised feelings.

  ‘Yes, indeed. But how shall we do that? You are in the same situation yourself, are you not, with the man in Perugia?’

  ‘Yes but I am not there and can do nothing about my case,’ said Silvano. ‘At least we are both here. We cannot let suspicion fall on you or any of the other brothers for that matter.’

  ‘Unless one of them is guilty,’ said Anselmo.

  Simone had stopped to talk to a tall, red-haired man working on a wall in the south transept. He had introduced the sisters and now beckoned to the Franciscan brothers to join them. Silvano thought the man’s long face looked vaguely familiar but he couldn’t imagine where he might have seen him before.

  ‘This is my old friend and rival Pietro Lorenzetti,’ said Simone. ‘I have known him and his little brother Ambrogio ever since we were all boys growing up together in Siena. For years now we have competed for commissions and I’m delighted to find him here in Assisi too.’

  Pietro bowed courteously to both of them.

  ‘Simone tells me that you and the holy sisters are supplying him with colours,’ he said. ‘Could you do the same for me? Now that I see the scale of the area I’ve been commissioned to decorate, I doubt that what I have brought with me will last for long.’

  ‘I should be honoured to serve you,’ said Brother Anselmo, his composure recovered.

  ‘I suppose we can manage to supply both of you,’ said Sister Veronica. ‘We must work even harder in the colour room, Sister Orsola. Mother Elena will be happy since it is all to the glory of Saint Francis.’

  ‘How did you like the paintings of Maestro Giotto?’ asked Pietro. ‘Simone tells me you have just seen them for the first time.’

  ‘They are beyond words,’ said Anselmo. ‘He is a genius of your art.’

  ‘Did you ever meet him?’ asked Silvano but the two Sienese shook their heads.

  ‘Our master was Duccio di Buoninsegna,’ explained Simone. ‘We admire the work of the great Giotto but we were taught by Duccio.’

  ‘It was he who painted the Mary in Majesty for the Cathedral in Siena,’ Anselmo told Silvano.

  ‘You have seen it?’ said Pietro eagerly.

  Anselmo nodded. ‘I was there when they carried it into the Cathedral.’

  ‘Ah,’ said Simone. ‘That was a great day! Five years ago and I remember it perfectly. There was a great procession from the Maestro’s workshop through the streets of Siena up to our Cathedral of the Virgin on the hill. All the rulers of the city were there and all the other nobles and important people.’

  ‘And all the common people came out to see it too,’ added Pietro. ‘Everyone carried a candle. It was like the greatest religious festival and we had a tremendous party afterwards in the workshop. Do you remember that, Simone?’

  ‘Of course,’ laughed the painter. ‘And I remember the headache I had the next day as well, saving your presence, Sisters!’

  ‘We were no longer Duccio’s apprentices by then, of course, though Ambrogio still worked with him occasionally,’ said Pietro. ‘Simone and I had our own bottegas. But we remain friends with him.’

  ‘Is he still alive?’ asked Chiara.

  ‘Yes, but very old now,’ said Simone, gravely. ‘He paints little these days. But he and Giotto di Bondone are still the greatest artists in Italy. We just aspire to do anything as well.’

  ‘And yet you have painted your own Mary in Majesty in Siena, I believe,’ said Sister Veronica.

  Simone inclined his head gracefully. ‘I am honoured that you have heard of it,’ he said. ‘But I must get back to my Saint Martin or I shall not complete the chapel in time.’

  And the visitors from Giardinetto took their leave.

  ‘We should travel together next time, Sister Veronica,’ said Brother Anselmo. ‘It would save using two carts and taking up your man’s time unnecessarily.’

  Silvano and Chiara exchanged looks. That would give them more time together and surely they would snatch a few words. It was beginning to be important to them both.

  .

  CHAPTER TEN

  Mundualdus

  So, Brother Fazio told you something of the art of illumination?’ Anselmo asked Silvano on their way back to the friary.

  ‘He’s very clever,’ said Silvano. ‘I saw the Gospel he is working on.’

  ‘His Saint John?’ said Anselmo. ‘It is a masterpiece, isn’t it?’

  ‘Wonderful,’ said Silvano. ‘I liked it a lot better than when he showed me where he makes the white.’

  ‘Ah,’ smiled Anselmo. ‘The malodorous shed. The brothers believe that Fazio has no sense of smell. It must help with that aspect of his work.’

  ‘He’s quite a character,’ said Silvano.

  ‘He was a bit suspicious of me when I came, I think,’ said Anselmo. ‘After all, he is an expert when it comes to colours. But the sort we supply to artists like Simone Martini aren’t all suitable for illumination, and vice versa. So Fazio and I have settled down, each to his own speciality and I don’t think he sees me as a threat any longer.’

  ‘You don’t have much ill-feeling in the friary, do you?’ said Silvano. ‘I’ve noticed the brothers seem to get along pretty well.’

  ‘In the main, yes,’ said Anselmo. ‘Each has his own task to get on with and that helps. But sometimes a brother might feel that another is treading on his toes. I believe that Brother Valentino and Brother Rufino don’t always see eye to eye for instance.’

  ‘Brother Rufino is the Infirmarian, I know,’ said Silvano. ‘B
ut Valentino?’

  ‘He is the Herbalist. You see that his role overlaps a bit with Brother Rufino’s.’

  ‘You said in Assisi that one of the brothers could be the murderer . . .’

  ‘I should not like to believe such a thing,’ said Anselmo quickly.

  ‘Can’t we try to find out?’ asked Silvano. ‘I hate the thought that anyone might suspect you.’

  ‘They won’t,’ said Anselmo. ‘As you know, I have told only you and Abbot Bonsignore about Monna Isabella.’

  ‘But all the same,’ insisted Silvano, ‘wouldn’t it be good to think we have found the real culprit?’

  ‘You are a good boy,’ said Anselmo. ‘And I think it would ease your troubled heart to clear an innocent man. But how would we set about it? The Abbot has questioned all the brothers and apparently found nothing to suggest that the murderer came from within the friary.’

  ‘Then there is nothing we can do?’

  ‘Not now, I fear. The murderer has long fled.’

  ‘We could ask Monna Isabella,’ Silvano suggested hesitantly. ‘At least Sister Orsola could. I’m sure she will see her again. She could ask about Ubaldo’s enemies.’

  Anselmo’s brow creased with an old sadness.

  ‘I should not wish to distress her,’ he said softly.

  Silvano was silent for a while, wondering when he would see the pretty Chiara again.

  ‘When shall we next go to Ser Simone?’ he asked. ‘Ser Pietro too now I suppose.’

  ‘That has not been decided,’ said Anselmo. ‘We expect them to visit us next at the friary. Simone wishes to discuss the ultramarine with us. They will be with us the day after tomorrow.’

  It was the day of Ubaldo’s funeral. The principal mourners were Isabella and her four children and the merchant’s younger brother, Umberto. He was a tall and grim-faced man with a forbidding air and Isabella had always sensed that he disapproved of her. She felt grateful for the first time that her husband had died away from home. She would not have put it past her brother-in-law to suspect her of a hand in Ubaldo’s death otherwise.