‘Dio la benedica, nostra principessa!’
‘Non si dimentichi di noi!’fn3
For Donna Clemenza personified a sort of legend to the Neapolitans. They remembered her father, the handsome Carlo Martelo, the friend of poets and in particular of the divine Dante, a learned prince, as good a musician as he was valiant in arms, who travelled the peninsula, followed by two hundred French, Provençal, and Italian gentlemen, all dressed, as he was himself, half in scarlet and half in green, their horses caparisoned in silver and gold. It was said of him that he was a true son of Venus, for he possessed ‘the five gifts that incite to love and which are health, beauty, wealth, leisure, and youth’. They had looked forward to his becoming king; but he had died of the plague at twenty-four and his wife, a princess of Hapsburg, had expired upon hearing the news, an event which had struck the popular imagination.
Naples had transferred its affection to Clémence who, as she grew up, had developed a likeness to her father. The royal orphan was adored in the poor quarters of the town to which she went to distribute charity; she was invariably affected by distress. Her face inspired the painters of the school of Giotto in their representations of the Virgin and the saints in their frescoes; and to this day travellers who visit the churches of Campania and Apulia may admire upon the walls of the sanctuaries the golden hair, the clear gentle eyes, the grace of the slightly curving neck, the long slender hands, without knowing that it is the portrait of the beautiful Clémence of Hungary.
Upon the crenellated deck which covered the after-castle, some thirty feet above the waves, the fiancée of the King of France gazed for the last time upon the land of her childhood, upon the old Castell’Ovo in which she had been born, upon Castelnuovo where she had grown up, upon the swarming crowd who threw her kisses, upon the whole lively, wonderful, dusty scene.
‘Thank you, Madam my Grandmother,’ she thought, her eyes raised to the window from which the figure of Marie of Hungary had just disappeared. ‘I shall doubtless never see you again. Thank you for all you have done for me. Having reached the age of twenty-two, I was in despair at not having yet found a husband; I thought that I should never find one and that I should have to enter a convent. It was you who were right to counsel patience. And now I am to be queen of that great kingdom which is watered by four rivers, and lapped by three seas. My cousin the King of England, my aunt of Majorca, my kinsman of Bohemia, my sister the Crown Princess of Vienna, and even my uncle Robert, who reigns here and whose subject I was till today, will become my vassals for the lands they have in France, or the links they have with that crown. But will it not be too heavy for me?’
She was experiencing at one and the same time joy and exaltation, fear of the unknown and that peculiar disquiet which comes upon the spirit at an irrevocable change of destiny, even when it surpasses every dream.
‘Your people are showing how much they love you, Madam,’ said a fat man standing beside her. ‘But I wager that the people of France will soon love you as much, and merely upon seeing you will welcome you as demonstratively as these are bidding you farewell.’
‘Oh, you will always be my friend, Messire de Bouville,’ Clémence replied warmly.
She felt the need of spreading her happiness around her and of thanking everyone.
The Comte de Bouville, once chamberlain to Philip the Fair and King Louis X’s envoy, had come to Naples on a first visit during the winter to ask for her hand; he had returned two weeks ago to fetch the Princess and conduct her to Paris now that the marriage could be celebrated.
‘And you too, Signor Baglioni, you are also my friend,’ she added, turning towards the young Tuscan who acted as secretary to Bouville and controlled the expedition’s finances, which had been lent by the Italian banks in Paris. The young man acknowledged the compliment with a bow.
Indeed, everyone was happy that morning. Fat Bouville, sweating a little in the June heat and throwing his black-and-white locks back behind his ears, felt confident and proud at having succeeded so well in his mission and at conducting so splendid a wife to his king.
Guccio Baglioni was dreaming of the fair Marie de Cressay, his secret fiancée, for whom he was taking home a whole chest of silks and embroideries. He was uncertain whether he had been right to ask for the Neauphle-le-Vieux branch of the bank from his uncle. Should he content himself with so small an establishment?
‘But it’s only a start; I shall easily be able to change it for another post, and besides I shall spend most of my time in Paris.’ Assured of the protection of his new sovereign, he set no limits to his ambition; he already saw Marie as lady-in-waiting to the Queen, and himself becoming Grand Pantler or Grand Treasurer within a few months. Enguerrand de Marigny had started with no greater advantages. Of course he had come to a pretty bad end. But then he was no Lombard.
His hand on his dagger, his chin held high, Guccio looked at Naples deployed before him, as if he were about to buy it.
Ten galleys escorted the ship to the open sea; then the Neapolitans watched this white sea-fortress fade into the distance.
A FEW DAYS LATER THE San Giovanni was no more than a half-dismasted, tortured hulk, running before the squalls, tossed in huge seas, while the captain endeavoured to keep her afloat and make what he conceived to be the coast of France, though doubtful whether he would ever succeed in bringing his passengers safely into port.
The ship had been caught on the latitude of Corsica by one of those brief but devastating storms which, on occasion, ravage the Mediterranean. Six anchors had been lost in an endeavour to hold the ship to the wind off the coast of Elba, and she had barely escaped being wrecked upon the island’s rocky shore. They had managed to sail upon their course, but in a tremendous sea. A day, a night, and another day had been spent amid the hell of waters. Several sailors had been injured in taking in what remained of the sails. The crow’s nest had gone overboard with all the weight of stones destined for Barbary pirates. The saloon hatch had had to be forced open with axes in order to free the Neapolitan gentlemen imprisoned by the fall of the mainmast. The Princess’s chests of dresses, jewels, and plate, all her wedding presents, had been washed away. The surgeon-barber’s sick bay in the forecastle was crowded. The chaplain was even unable to celebrate the aride2 Mass because ciborium, chalice, books, and ornaments had been swept overboard by a wave. Clutching the rigging, crucifix in hand, he listened to the confessions of those who thought they were soon to die.
The magnetized needle was now utterly useless, since it bobbed wildly upon the residue of water left in the container in which it floated. The captain, an excitable Latin, had torn his robe open to the waist as a sign of despair and was heard to cry, between a couple of orders: ‘Lord, come to my help!’ Nevertheless, he seemed to know his business well enough and to be doing his best to extricate them from their difficulties; he had had the oars shipped. They were so long and heavy that seven men were needed to work each one of them. And he had summoned a dozen sailors to control the helm, six on each side.
Nevertheless, Bouville had been furious with him at the beginning of the storm.
‘Well, Master Mariner, is this the kind of shaking you give a Princess engaged to the King my master?’ the ex-Grand Chamberlain had cried. ‘Your ship must be badly loaded to roll like this. You know nothing of navigation
