The Enterprise of Death - Jesse Bullington [64]
“So when your wife’s not around you just get drunk all the time?” Awa asked, more than a little in the staggering way herself. They had reached their last four skins and opted to have a proper occasion with them instead of sipping the vinegary swill for the rest of their journey. “Very responsible.”
“It’s not like that!” Manuel protested. “I was celebrating the commission, wasn’t I? And the brandy was stiffer than I’d thought, and I’d been too excited to break the fast fore meeting the abbot that morn, and afterwards I’d needed a drink, and there he was, no more’n an hour or two after I’d left his abbey, sneeeeakin in like some white mouser fattened on a night’s rattin.”
“Mouser? Rattin?”
“Mouser’s a cat, isn’t she?” said Manuel. “Called such because they go ratting … eating rats. Mice? Mouse? Mouser?”
“You’re doing it again!” Awa guffawed, her honest laughter still grating and harsh from neglect. “You and your animals!”
“Can I finish?!” Manuel shouted in mock indignation. “Can I finish?!”
“Finish, finish.” Awa waved him on. “Tell me about how the abbot had a friend who was a snake, or maybe a fish, and the Pope who’s an owl, or the dog-priests or whatever.”
“Thank you, m’lady.” Manuel bowed so low he nearly singed the feather in his cap on their roaring bonfire. “So the abbot.”
“The cat abbot. Cabbot?”
“The same. So in he comes, and I’m too slanted to protest or send’em off, and I start showin’em around. So—if you had an abbot in your studio what’s brimming with pictures of saints being martyred and angels and biblical scenes and even antique scenes of mythology and all, what do you think’d be the first thing I show’em?”
“What’s the commission supposed to be?” Awa asked after giving the question far more thought than it deserved.
“Conversion of Constantine. He’s an old emperor. Was pagan, went straight.”
“Oh. Something from his book, then? You said you had biblical pictures, right?”
“Sure.” Manuel nodded. “Lots of it. But you agree then, dear friend, that maybe showin the abbot of my fucking local job my personal collection of nude women might not’ve been the keenest idea I’ve struck on?”
“Manuel,” said Awa, setting her skin down and blearily trying to meet his erratic gaze. “The two ladies I’ve seen of yours are the finest, best things I’ve ever seen. I think you should show anyone who will look, I think you should show the world, I think … yes, yes, show him the naked women. Why not?”
“He’s the abbot,” Manuel protested. “He might catch a peek around the baths, sure, but vows of chastity! He’s sworn off it, hasn’t he? And I’m not talking tasteful religious pieces with a little tit, either, I’m talking raw stuff, vivid.”
“What’s the matter with vivid?” said Awa defensively. “You say your god’s an artist, and if I were to agree with your beliefs I’d say the finest of all his pieces is women. Some of them, anyway.”
“And you’ll hear no disagreements from me on that,” said Manuel, trying to maneuver back to his story. “The one I made for Bernardo, though, is tame compared to some of my private pieces. I’m talking top-to-bottom, vivid detail. Things an abbot shouldn’t be interested in.”
“Why not? If you say—”
“Can I finish? Thank you.” Manuel sighed, too drunk to acknowledge or care that his story was more or less ruined. “So I show’em the nudes, lasses spreading their legs, pushing their chests up, bottoms out, you name it. And he’s makin these noises in his throat like—”
“Like a sheepdog! Like a sparrow! Like a—”
“Like a angry abbot, damn it! Like a really furious abbot, alright!?”
Her laughter was punctuated with a sound that