The Passion of Artemisia by Susan Vreeland

dark nave and into a small side chapel lit by four candles.
    I felt separated from myself during the mass, as if I were a passerby witnessing something tawdry. I was seized by a longing for my mother, for her soft touch on the back of my head, her sad singing. It would have settled her to know I was married. Porzia smiled at me in an encouraging way, and I tried to make my face properly cheerful, demure andgrateful, but the stone church was so cold that without my cloak on I shivered uncontrollably.
    The Latin words of the priest passed over me in a blur of low tones which made me feel there was something furtive about what we were doing. I repeated the vows and tried to think about them, but when the priest came to “as long as you both shall live,” I realized that these were the same words Graziela must have said. I could hardly get them out. I looked in Pietro Antonio’s face as she told me to. His expression was serious, but without the tenderness of Michelangelo in his red lucco looking through me to touch my soul.

    After it was over, Porzia put my cloak over my shoulders. “I’ll miss you,” she said softly.
    â€œI feel like a part of my life is over,” I said only loud enough for her to hear.
    â€œA new life is about to begin for you. Don’t worry. Pierantonio’s a good man,” she whispered.
    â€œI hope to God you’re right.”
    Rain dripped down my neck, but still I hesitated before stepping up into the coach where the cassone had been transferred. Father flung his hands up, vexed by my faltering moment. I was only waiting for some affectionate gesture from him.
    â€œGet in, get in,” he said, and slipped me a small blue drawstring bag, weighty in my hand. I hid it in the folds of my skirt as I stepped into the coach. I noticed tight lines around his eyes and realized this was a hard moment for him. “I’ll write to Michelangelo Buonarrotti the Younger about you. Make sure you go see him.” He closed the door, the coach lurched ahead, and this Pietro, or this Antonio, and I were off to Florence, where, I thought with relief, I would be free of dishonor.
    Husband and wife. I kept telling that to myself as the coach headed north through the Porta del Popolo on Via Flaminia and into the countryside of ox carts and puddles. I had a rightful husband. Madonna benedetta , let him be kind. We rode facing each other in silence. Should I speak or wait for him to say something first? His unquiet eyes kept looking out the window, so I looked too. What was it that held his interest so? Vineyards with leaves every shade from gold to russet? Orchards of almond trees? Blocky farmhouses behind the thin curtain of rain? Sodden sheep? It was as though landscape was more important than what was right before him. Me.
    â€œWhat are you looking at?”
    â€œEverything. Nothing. The poplar trees have lost their leaves. We’ll have an early winter. It might even snow.”
    What an odd way to start a marriage. With the weather.
    â€œDo they call you Pietro or Antonio?”
    He turned to me at last. “Pierantonio.”
    â€œHmm. Kind of long.”
    Slowly, he smiled in a wry, intriguing way, on only one side of his face. “So’s Artemisia.”
    â€œDo you mind if I call you Pietro? I like that best.”
    â€œCall me what you’d like.”
    The need to say more necessary things hung like an iron weight in my chest. “What do you know about me?” I asked.
    â€œI know what happened.”
    â€œThe story talked about in the streets, or the truth?” I was filled with a burning urge to spill out to him the truth. “I am innocent. Though not a virgin, I am innocent.”
    He nodded, and I was grateful for that. “This man, Agostino—”
    â€œDoesn’t deserve the blood in his veins. He’s a churl and a scoundrel.”
    â€œYou were going to marry him?”
    â€œBecause I thought I had to. I