The Botticelli Killings E-Book

Stella Stollo

• Herausgeber: Graphofeel
• Kategorie: Fantasy und Science-Fiction
• Sprache: Englisch

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2016

Beschreibung

Florence, 1486: a series of murders shocks life in the city.The victims are women belonging to the rich bourgeoisie, and the ruthless assassin seems to take inspiration from the Allegory of Spring, a masterpiece by Sandro Botticelli and his assistant Filippino Lippi. An object is found on each corpse, relating to a detail of the painting: the twig slipped between the lips of a nymph, the red cloak wrapped around the Goddess, the garland of flowers adorning the neck of Spring...

Passions and intrigue involve Leonardo da Vinci, Amerigo Vespucci, Lorenzo the Magnificent and other notable figures through the refined and cultured weaving of this tale, in which the eternal battle between Love and Death is fought against the historic backdrop of a magnificent Florence.

Leseprobe

Florence, 1486: a series of murders shocks life in the city. The victims are women belonging to the rich bourgeoisie, and the ruthless assassin seems to take inspiration from the Allegory of Spring, a masterpiece by Sandro Botticelli and his assistant Filippino Lippi. An object is found on each corpse, relating to a detail of the painting: the twig slipped between the lips of a nymph, the red cloak wrapped around the Goddess, the garland of flowers adorning the neck of Spring… Passions and intrigue involve Leonardo da Vinci, Amerigo Vespucci, Lorenzo the Magnificent and other notable figures through the refined and cultured weaving of this tale, in which the eternal battle between Love and Death is fought against the historic backdrop of a magnificent Florence.

Intuizioni24

Stella Stollo

The Botticelli Killings

Murders and Mysteries in Renaissance Florence

English translation by Juliet Bates

Original edition

I delitti della Primavera. Un serial killer nella Firenze delRinascimento

Copyright © 2014 Graphofeel Edizioni

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews. For information address:

Graphofeel Edizioni

Via Livio Andronico, 67

00136 Roma

[email protected]

www.graphofeel.com

Literary property reserved.

Copyright © 2016 Graphofeel Edizioni for English edition

ISBN 978-88-97381-74-7

Cover by Carlo Vignapiano

To Dad,

who wasthe first to teach me

to love books and freedom.

To Mum,

who always helped me

follow my dreams.

Table of contents

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31

Chapter 32

Chapter 33

Chapter 34

Chapter 35

Chapter 36

Chapter 37

Chapter 38

Chapter 39

Chapter 40

Chapter 41

Chapter 42

Epilogue

Author’s Notes to the Reader

Acknowledgements

Heremy friend thy music bring,

Hail the flow’ry-crownedspring;

Let us celebrate the rose,

Whilst is blushing lustreglows.

Wasting round a breath divine,

Roses joys of menrefine.

(ANACREON, Ode LIII, 6th CENT. BC)

1

Florence, April 1486

A cold trickle of sweat ran from his forehead to his chin and Giambattista wiped it away hastily with his sleeve. Thank God he had come out without his cloak, the breeze was exceptionally warm for a spring night with damp heat rising from the cobblestones and emanating from the walls of the palazzi lining the streets. However, it might just be the fear that made him sweat so much.

He was waiting for Betta, standing in front of her building but well-concealed behind a porch column, hidden from the light cast by the burning torches hanging on the walls. Growing even more agitated, he tightened his grip around the rose stem in his hand until its thorns bit into his palm. He was suddenly afraid that his girlfriend might not come, immediately allowing his anxiety to mutate into encouraging hope. He was no longer really convinced about what he was going to do and things would be easier if she did not come.

She will come, she loves me too much not to. Betta had always loved him, from when they were children and their families had organized their engagement. In time, he too had grown fond of her for, while her body did not hold any attractiveness for him, her soul was gentle and kind. Discreet and respectful, she held all the right qualities for becoming a good wife and he was sincerely sorry to have to hurt her. Once again he hoped she would not come but in his heart he knew that she would gladly take the risk of being caught by her family to sneak out under the cover of darkness to meet him. He raised the rose to his nostrils and inhaled the delicate scent of the flower, with its cruel destiny to become his accomplice in the imminent crime. He jumped, startled by the clanging of a latch being dropped and, still well-hidden behind the column, watched as the front door of the building opened.

He caught a glimpse of his promised bride on the threshold, a combined wave of affection and pity rushing through him. She loves me too much to not want to see me happy. Yes, she would have been a perfect wife, loving and devoted. The pity was that there was another woman he desired as his wife! From when he had first set eyes on Esmeralda, Betta’s cousin, there had been no other room in his mind for anything except the compelling desire to have her. That young lady from Pisa, who had moved to Florence with her family the year before, had ingrained herself into his head and very blood to the point that each instant of separation made everything seem useless and unbearable. He was confident that, once Betta had disappeared with her very rich dowry, his family would accept a less advantageous marriage to the beautiful cousin. Just the thought of Esmeralda’s hands entwined in his, while his warm breath caressed the soft hollow at the base of her neck, was enough to give life to a sweet and poisonous euphoria that urged him on to act without any further hesitation.

The moment his future bride stepped out hesitatingly into the street, Giambattista hurried up to execute Messer Manisante’s instructions: he pulled a small phial from a little leather pouch and opened it, pouring its contents onto the rose, making sure that it soaked well into the petals. Then, he stepped out from his hiding place, rapidly making his way to her side. Betta’s smile lit up the air around her, shining brighter than the light from the torches. Shaking, the young man offered her the rose and she took it into her hands.

«How beautiful!» she exclaimed. The flower appeared very dark, almost black, in the night but it was not difficult for Betta to imagine its intense red colour and velvet texture. She excitedly raised both hands, lifting the rose to her nose. He did not hesitate, grabbing her wrists and pushing the corolla of the flower forcefully to her nostrils. He kept a tight grip until the girl had passed out, supporting her body with his arms as she sank gently to the ground. Stupid girl, you should have stayed at home. He studied her lifeless body, she looked dead. Manisante had guaranteed that the tincture, made of papaver somniferum and other soporific herbs, contained the correct amount of Morpheus powder. It would have made anyone inhaling it fall asleep instantly never mind a creature as slight as Betta. At least you will not feel anything...

«What are you still doing here?» He was startled by the vexed voice of a man behind him.

The man spat on the ground and continued:

«I was around the corner waiting for you to leave. You should be far away by now. Go, go! Go away. Your role here is over. Now, it is up to me».

Giambattista obeyed sheepishly, leaving Betta to the man and trampling the rose into the cobblestones in his haste to get away.

* * *

Paolo, the accomplice, lifted the girl who felt light and small. He heard sounds of laughter drawing closer and hid with his prey in a handy backstreet, standing silently until the people making their way down the street had moved on. From the racket they were making and the content of their chatter, it was clear to him that it was a band of young students looking for distractions for the night.

He walked swiftly, leaving the neighbourhood as fast as possible. When he felt it was safe, he put the girl down on the ground in a small, dark, side street, kneeling beside her and running his hands softly all over her body wrapped in smooth silk, feeling the puffed petticoat underneath. She was wearing a proper day dress, she had evidently thought it improper to go out in her nightdress. Paolo laughed and spat on the ground. She was rather ugly, he had glimpsed her on the well-lit street. And touching her even now, he could feel her pointy bones through her clothes, not at all alluring.

The last two girls he had killed were small but beautiful. And how they had resisted him, and how they had screamed! Not this one, she was asleep. Messer Manisante had prepared the same Morpheus tincture they had used for a lady many years earlier. Oh yes, she had been a real woman with her generous, overflowing shape and lips as full as a ripe plum. Oh, how he had enjoyed himself before killing her! He had never become as excited over any woman as much as he had over her. The thought of it alone was enough to arouse him now, so much so that even the unalluring body of Betta was becoming more appetizing. But the man had been very clear: he was to leave her the way she was, with all of her clothes on.

However, he had also been ordered to do two bizarre things: the first was to leave the victim with her left breast naked. So, he reached under her neckline grabbing her breast and pulling it out from the dress. It was so small that it all fit into his palm; small but smooth and firm. He slid his lips around it and inhaled its sweet perfume of fruity oil. The girl’s breathing was growing more regular, she might wake at any moment. He needed to hurry and kill her otherwise he would not be able to obey the order to leave her untouched.

He made an angry grunt: even a cat is allowed to enjoy torturing its prey before killing it. Nevertheless, he could not afford to upset Manisante. He sighed and used one hand to cover her mouth and the other to cover her nostrils. He pressed hard and long until he was sure that the body beneath him was completely lifeless. He held the girl tightly to him, grabbing the edge of the dress on her left shoulder and pulling the fabric hard sideways and down until half of her back was uncovered, then he put the body down, belly on the cobblestones with her head turned to one side showing her profile.

He then carried out the second bizarre order: he opened his shoulder bag, taking out a fresh red rose and a small sheet of parchment, which he rolled around the stem, finally resting the flower and the message against the naked shoulder of the victim.

2

There were two reasons why Franceschetto preferred to buy his colours in Piazza del Mercato.

The first was that he hated the apothecary shop in Borgo Santa Croce where his Master, the great Filippino Lippi, preferred to buy his supplies. Well, to tell the truth, he really hated Andrea, Doctor Bartolomeo’s son: a black-haired, wiry boy of fourteen with frog-like eyes and a know-it-all attitude. He would look you up and down with contempt, as if he were Lorenzo the Magnificent’s personal doctor! Andrea’s father had inherited the shop from his father-in-law, one of the richest apothecaries in Florence with whom he had set up business in his youth. Too easy, thought Franceschetto, to be born the son of a doctor and grandson of an apothecary. No need to lift a finger to get any comfort, wealth and delicious food and all inside a luxurious palazzo. Nothing was asked of you for the right to practice your profession. And, even worse, your father did not even have to think you deserved it or that you were intelligent enough to learn his craft, it was just simply the way it always was. But Andrea was definitely a know-it-all and arrogant to his customers as well.

The second reason Franceschetto was happy that morning was that the Master had sent him to buy materials at the market, and that meant good food. Next to the soils, pigments, candles, paper, ink, dried herbs, unguents and countless remedies against maladies that were available in the Santa Croce shop, the only really tasty temptations were the little spicy cakes the family cooked themselves. While going to the square, the Doctors’ and Apothecaries’ Lodge was next to and surrounded by lots of shops and stalls selling every possible thing. For a few coins you could buy the most savoury delicacies ever made on the face of the Earth. Franceschetto wandered among the butchers’ benches where butchers and fishmongers were competing to tantalise the taste buds of the people out shopping offering the most exquisite delicacies. Such as the specially prepared pig’s liver with its potent scent of bay leaves, or the tench and carp freshly caught at dawn in the Arno River and now slowly roasting over hot coals, wafting their garlic and herb flavoured marinade. It was not easy to choose, but when he saw the scoured out pumpkins, all doubt vanished and he asked the woman behind the counter: «May I have a cone of lattarini, please?» He watched her expectantly while she plucked a handful of little silver fish from the pumpkin filled with fresh water where they were kept, and dipped them in white flour before dropping them into the deep frying pan of hot oil. His mouth watered as he savoured the smell of fresh fish frying and he felt very lucky. Unlike Andrea, he could say for certain that his father loved and appreciated him, a humble fabric dyer! The poor man valued his son’s intelligence so much that to help him escape an infernal fate of misery, mud and boiling vapour in a tiny shack on the banks of the Arno River, he had sent him to a painter’s workshop when he turned thirteen as an apprentice.

He sauntered into the Apothecaries’ Lodge, happily munching on the last of his little fried fish, and made his way to Messer Antonio Marini’s area.

«Good morning Franceschetto, nice to see you. How is Master Filippino?»

While he might not have been considered as famous a doctor as Andrea’s father, Antonio the apothecary was for sure much kinder and joyful. Furthermore, his shop was smaller but just as good as the Apothecary. All of the materials, powders and herbs were rigorously catalogued and preserved in an orderly fashion in either glass jars or terracotta bowls.

Franceschetto asked the apothecary for some packets of «Bianco Sangiovanni».

«So, your master has finished his stock for his ‘skin painting’. Here you are, fine and purified. With this he will be able to paint the most glowing of complexions, fit for a Madonna».

Franceschetto smiled at him thankfully. It was common for any apothecary to know that calcium carbonate, also called «Bianco Sangiovanni», when mixed with a touch of sinopia red, would produce the perfect shade for painting faces and naked skin on wooden panels and walls. Andrea was such an unpleasant person he would never think of showing any interest in colours. On the contrary, he sold earths and pigments, with the highest indifference for their final use, often with a veil of superiority stamped on his face in contempt of the painters he considered beneath him. «Master Filippino, as an artist with his own workshop, is registered with the same association as your father», Franceschetto had pointed out to him but the insolent reply had been: «Well, my father is a doctor and therefore a scientist and an intellectual while your Master is nothing more than a manual labourer. And you, so proud to work for him, you are only the skivvy of an unskilled worker».

While the boy took the money out of his wallet to pay, his nostrils were being tantalised by whiffs of all sorts of smells: grain, smoke, herbs, cheese and frying lard.

«Messer Antonio, can you please keep my things for a moment? I am going to buy some food quickly and will come straight back».

In the bakers’ area, Franceschetto gave in to the heavenly scent of freshly baked bread and, with a happy smile on his face, no matter what Andrea thought, he felt very lucky indeed! Filippino Lippi, short of some white calcium carbonate following the large supply carried out two days earlier at Santa Croce, and knowing how much his boy liked to hang around the stalls, had sent him to the market. Not only, he had also given him a few coins to buy himself something nice. His Master was no manual labourer but a very skilled and respected artist, also a handsome man with fine intelligence and a gentle soul. In the two years he had been apprenticed to his workshop, he had never been mistreated! Andrea might be the son of a doctor but his father was a very hard and severe teacher and would allow for no mistakes from his son. He had no misgivings about mistreating his son, not even in front of clients and Franceschetto was once witness to some rough behaviour. What despicable people doctor Bartolomeo and his son were! He could not understand why Master Filippino continued to buy his supplies from their shop. His friend Sandro Botticelli has not set foot in their apothecary shop for the last ten years. There was talk that the great painter held Santa Croce’s doctor responsible for the death of a woman who had been very dear to him, a lady called Ginevra. Franceschetto did not find that hard to believe.

A sudden skirmish, followed by shouting from the square pulled him abruptly back from his daydreaming.

* * *

«Another one! He has killed another one!»

«It was the monster! Florence is no longer a safe place».

«This is the third innocent person slaughtered by the monster in the last three months!»

The throng were going mad, crowding around a cart that had been dragged into the square. A poor man had found the corpse in a little alley close by and, judging by her finery and elegant clothes, he knew she was neither a prostitute nor a homeless person, whose death would not have interested anyone. So, he had put the body onto his cart and brought it to the square to see if someone could recognize her.

«It is Betta, Gonfalonier Guidi’s oldest daughter», someone gasped.

«Are you sure?»

«No doubt about it. I know her and her family. Poor things, they must think she is still in her bed at this hour».

«Another girl from a good family, honest and respectable. How can we protect our daughters? This monster must be caught! What is the Signoria doing?»

«Her body was found in a small alley. It must have happened last night».

«What was an honest girl doing out at night alone?»

Everybody wanted their say, shouting to cover the loud voices of other people, some women sobbing desperately and cursing the «monster» and his foul actions. That is how the people had defined this killer, given the horrifying condition of the first two corpses. The first tortured body had been found on the Ponte Vecchio and some had even thought she had been attacked by a wild animal, such was the condition of the body.

* * *

Franceschetto’s good mood disappeared like colour in white spirit. Who would tell Master Filippino? He did not want to see Master distraught and devastated by grief as with the other two.

He stood on tiptoes, trying to see between the people and glimpse who was inside the cart but it was impossible, there were too many people pushing and shoving.

«Did they find this girl undressed like the others?» asked someone beside him.

«No, this time she was dressed, the monster only managed to uncover her left breast and half of her back. He might not have had time to rape her like he did the others. Perhaps he was scared by something and so killed her quickly».

«Are you sure?»

«Certainly, I saw her when they brought the cart, before the crowd surrounded it».

«So, she was dressed and wearing all of her jewellery?» He remembered that the detail of the necklaces with golden pendants around the necks of the other two females had left his Master quite troubled. The families had not recognized the jewels and it had been deduced that the killer had been the one to place the jewellery around the neck of the young girls.

«No, I did not see any jewellery. But there was a red rose, the man who found her dead said that she had a red rose on her bare shoulder. Oh yes, there was also a little piece of parchment with a message».

«What message? What did it say?»

«Now you are asking me too much, lad! How would I know?»

Franceschetto mused that the absence of the jewel was good news. But he did not have the time to feel reassured:

«Bad business, hey!» The voice in his ear and hot breath on his neck of someone that grabbed him from behind made him jump. He turned in fright.

«Oh, it is you Messer Antonio! You startled me».

«Sorry my boy. In this chaos, someone pushed me while I was approaching and I almost fell on you», the apothecary explained, having come out to see what all the fuss was about.

«Who did you think I was? The killer?» The man’s mocking laughter shamed the boy. «Do not tell me that you are worried. You are no delicate young girl, hey?»

«I am not worried about myself but for Master Filippino. Because of that painting he loves so much, you know it, do you not?» He immediately regretted not having held his tongue: it was a delicate matter, his Master had said.

«I know my boy. Filippino confided in me. You mean that wonderful painting he did with Botticelli that represents spring».

«Yes, that one!» He was relieved that he had not given anything away to the apothecary.

«Yes, a terrible story. Such a wonderful painting and those two poor artists tormenting themselves because they fear that those terrifying murders allude to the characters portrayed in it. We now have eight dead».

«But is this not the third murder?»

«Yes, yes, in these recent months. But there have been others in the past!» Franceschetto curious to know more, looked anxiously at the old apothecary, but the man was biting his lip as if he regretted saying too much.

«Let it go. If your Master has not told you anything, you should not pay any attention to an old man’s talk».

The two made their way back to the Apothecary together, where Franceschetto collected his packets of Bianco.

In saying goodbye the apothecary smiled gently and winked at the boy, lifting his index finger to his lips.

3

After three days of light cold rain and gray air, the spring morning sunshine had unexpected strength, filtering through the windows and inundating the workshop with its warm crystal rays. Everyone in the shop was busily at work but Filippino had woken up feeling tired. He was not yet in his thirties but was already feeling the burden of fame and the pressure of having to keep his dream alive, which he had managed to make into a reality but that also meant maintaining a steady stream of artwork, each expected to be more perfect than the last. From the time he had become an independent artist with his own workshop in Via Palazzuolo, he had achieved one success after another. He watched his pupils reproducing some drawings onto a tapestry, while Niccolò, his top student, was painting an altarpiece. They had a lot of work, perhaps too much. Commissions were increasing with his fame.