Page 167 - The Grotesque Children's Book

Chapter 8.

Grim, ghastly grins

In the weeks and months prior to Santi’s first asking for medical advice

from Dr. Ludovico Valerius, that is to say

1578-1579

Santi del Meglio's rooms on Via degli Speziali Grossi in the Ghetto district near S. Maria
Nipotecosa were, on the whole, not unpleasant. Santi's mother, Sylvia, when she was alive, had
demonstrated an admirable balance between the frugality made of necessity of her husband
Jacopo del Meglio's modest business as a metalworker, and the generosity made from her good
heart and her delight in seeing her family's pleasure of fine things on their tables, walls and
backs. Nothing extravagant ever, but every piece always just one-quarter-step shy of their
means, so that over time, Sylvia had created a modest, warm and tasteful little household, which
is why her illness felt so tragic. Without her, it was almost as if literally the light went out of the
whale oil lamps or the heat went out of the fire in their hearth. Santi felt as though there was no
more heat in fire itself.

As you have seen already, Santi believed that it was he who had caused his mother to
grow ill. This belief hadn't been immediate upon the onset of her symptoms. In fact, it wasn't
even upon his mother's death that Santi began to feel he was the cause. It began when his young
wife Guilia started to exhibit the same degenerative traits as his mother, beginning with the
yellowing of the skin and a weird, disturbing pulling back of the lips, exposing the teeth in a
grim, ghastly permanent grin. It was the grin more than anything else. The grin had
accompanied his mother and his wife until they were laid to rest in their shrouds. Guilia had
been a remarkably vigorous girl when Santi had first met her one summer studying landscape
painting in Vierspitzen, Switzerland; it had been tragic seeing her wasted away.

The apothecary's usurious prices for Astragalus had bankrupted Santi del Meglio and
worse, had not cured his family. As you know, when his father began to show the same
symptoms as the rest of his family, Santi had done the unthinkable and consulted the Royal
physician directly. Initially, Santi had felt improprietous, crossing across his caste to ask Her
Majesty's personal doctor for some medical advice. One didn't do such things, of course. If you
were born a lower citizen, you consulted with lower doctors, lower barristers, lower priests. If
you crossed the lines, it wasn't just the societal scoffing which you risked, it was actual danger of
being attacked; ambushed at night at the bend of a narrow alleyway. You learned your lessons.
You heard the tales of the upstarts who dared rise against their station in life. It was only a
matter of time before the iconoclasts were imprisoned and then burned at the stake. No thank
you, had thought Santi in his younger days, I’ll leave the social changing to others. I'll just keep
my head down, avert my eyes, and accept my lot and live to paint another day. All that had

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