Letter to Francesca from Vinca - III

To Francesca de Savona

My dearest cousin Francesca, so much has happened since last I wrote to you I hardly know where to begin! I am sure you have heard that Fina’s engagement was dissolved. My poor sister was devastated and I have spent many long hours comforting her. Some days she does seem more her normal, bright self while others she still sinks into despondency and I am lost as how to ease her. On such days even our dance lessons do not bring her out of her sorrow and you know how she loves to dance!

Recently we attended a party with Papá and Agneta and seeing her dance there with the gentlemen and seeing the way her face lit up I thought perhaps the last of her wounds had at last healed but since I am still unsure.

I wish you could have been here for that party! It was as fine and glorious as any I had ever seen! I wondered that those who enforce the sumptuary laws did not intrude upon it! Perhaps though it was not so glorious as that and just seemed that way to my simple self for I have never seen or been so close to such riches. Agneta certainly seemed within her element. I am unsure what happened to Fina. She did manage to slip the leash of her chaperone early and I saw her only briefly in the dance later in the evening but did not see her again until Anna collected us both to return home. She always did have greater skill at escaping her chaperones than I did! Agneta made sure we left before the wine flowed too freely, leading normally wise men to engage in dishonorable actions.

During the evening when the music played so fine and the room was warm and smelled of fruit and fresh flowers and expensive scented oils I finally met Papá’s patron. My dear cousin, I must admit to someone my fear. Never have I met anyone so formidable and fearsome and even just the thought of him makes my hands tremble and my heart race. I had heard stories of Domenico de Marciano Vettori but nothing could prepare me for meeting him face to face. I had understood he was young as the head of his family for his father had passed into the grace of God suddenly and quite unexpectedly. Sir Domenico Vettori has proven to be as ruthless as his father with as much skill in business, if not more. Though he terrified me I find I cannot sleep at night without visions of his eyes dancing through my dreams. I find the image frightening and yet more. Fortunately I have not seen him again, even in passing, since that night and I expect my own fears continue to conjure him in my mind. I expect soon I will forget I have ever met him and my dreams will be my own again.

So much has happened so fast since coming to the city. Within days of that glorious party Papá came to us with news that we were to move into a new home! A glorious palazzo south in the city with a glorious view of Duomo di Siena! Papá has told us stories of the beauty of it with its courtyard and garden. He is the only one who has seen it yet but within days men will come with carts to move our possessions from this humble casa to the new home. Papá says there are rooms like we have never seen and Agneta insists that Fina and I will each have our own. I am not sure I will be able to sleep without Fina there to talk with in the darkness. Save for while I was married to my Simon we have ever shared a room.

What I find myself wondering though is the manner in which Papá has come to this fine palazzo. He does not discuss it and I am privy to his books and ledgers and while the gifts and pay he has received for his paintings, both new and those he had sequestered away from before we moved to Siena, have been most generous and more than our family has ever seen before, by my calculations it is not enough to afford such a great home in so short a time. While doing his ledgers I did query him but he grew garrulous and merely stated that God had been most gracious to us.

I did not question him further for it is his business and nothing a mere woman should be involved in, but at night I sometimes wonder and worry about what price may come from such grandness later.

Oh but I will not let such thoughts darken this letter any longer for I have wonderful news! At last brother Pietro has arrived home! Such a great feast was held here that by the end we had all been stuffed so full of game and exotic fruits that few were able to dance afterward! I have never seen Papá spend so much on wine. Though Agneta was distressed that the sala was too small to invite all the guests she wanted. I suspect she was more interested in the daughters those guests would bring to introduce to handsome Pietro now that he is considered a much more respectable husband than he would have been even a year ago. Papá has promised her another celebration nearly as grand when we have settled into the palazzo. I find it strange that I even look forward to it.

We have received letters from Blasio as well that he will move his office to Siena now and bring his wife and son to live at the palazzo. I never got on as well with Blasio but it will be good to have him to help Papá with his ledgers for I am such a simple woman I should not have my nose in the business of men.

The hour grows late now and I find myself wearying. Fina already rests; her breathing content and even. I wonder if I will be able to rest as well when I join her.

Your loving cousin, Vinca