‘Not yet,’ said Charles. ‘But she has rejected the nunnery and she is almost seventeen, so her guardian must have plans for her future.’
So it had not been a casual conversation when Eleanora had spoken to me about the lack of freedom a woman had. Perhaps she thought I was aware that her uncle planned a match for her. I now saw more meaning in her last words to me.
When I had told her I would come back for her, she had said, ‘I may or may not be here.’
We arrived outside Ravenna just before Easter.
Charles reported to us that the allies of the Holy League had come up and taken position where they believed they were safe, on the south side of the river Ronco. The French engineers swiftly constructed a pontoon bridge. On Easter Sunday morning Gaston de Foix led his troops across the river and arranged them in a crescent facing the Spanish earthworks. At the same time Duke Alfonso moved his cannon to where he saw a weak point on their flank.
Our infantry went forward. From the enemy ramparts murderous fire poured from their cannon and war wagons. Great swathes of our men fell, never to rise again.
But the Ferrarese artillery was not idle and when they began their barrage the cunning of Duke Alfonso showed. His guns had been set to enfilade the enemy trenches and the Spaniards were caught and could not escape being killed.
It was evident that the casualty toll would be vast. Charles, who usually thrilled at the sight of battle action, was tense and his face became grim.
It was a relief when it was time for the French light cavalry, the Bande Rosse among them, to charge the enemy position. We were no longer the inexperienced lads of Mirandola, but fighting men who yelled with blood lust and rage as they galloped into battle. But if we were not callow youths, neither were the men we faced. And they also had a gifted and expert commander, the Spaniard, Ramón de Cardona. He now signalled his own light horse to come up. And then it was hand to hand, horse against horse. In the dense thickness of the struggle there was not time to look around, to note whether one’s comrade had fallen or to rescue any other who was being overcome.
Suddenly a shout went up. The Spanish infantry were leaving the field. We had won!
But then, disaster. Better that we had lost the day than what befell now.
In pursuit of the Spanish division, whom he rightly guessed were experienced troops being withdrawn to fight another day, Gaston de Foix turned his horse and rode out onto the causeway. Urging on his men, he chased the fleeing infantry, intending to destroy them. But de Cardona and his men escaped, and in the mêlée Gaston de Foix was brought down and killed.
Ravenna was ours. The victory was to us. Pope Julius defeated, but at what cost?
The Spanish commander had eluded capture and taken his best men with him. France and King Louis had lost, utterly lost, one of the best and most brilliant soldiers. And it was only when they began to pile the bodies in bundles that the complete extent of the massacre was realized. Thousands and thousands of men on both sides had died. Court poets and scribes and historians always exaggerate the figures of the fallen, so that when they tell their tales of war at banquets and feasts the victory of the winner seems more and the defeat of the enemy greater. At Ravenna there was no need for hyperbole. The dead bodies of the men defied any counting.
More than ten thousand men. Among them Stefano and his young brother Silvio.
And Charles d’Enville.
The cannonball that struck Charles showed less mercy than the halberd that tore him apart at Agnadello. The shot blew his arm and half his face away. The day after the battle Charles died of his wounds and I could not save him.
Our troops entered Ravenna. A week later the Plague struck.
Chapter Seventy-Five
‘I CANNOT LEAVE.’
Paolo looked at me. He had come to tell me that the remnants of our army were preparing to return to Ferrara and we should go with them.
‘These people are suffering,’ I said. ‘I have the means to help them. I cannot leave.’
He nodded slowly in a beginning of understanding. ‘You are a doctor,’ he said. ‘As I am a soldier.’
The plight of the citizens was becoming more awful than that of the survivors of the two armies. The Plague was rampant in the poorer quarters. In those areas the city council had decided to shut up houses, nailing the windows and doors shut with wooden bars so that the people lying ill inside could not escape. Their calls and shouts for succour were heart-rending, as were the piteous cries of their children.
I recalled that the nun at Melte long ago believed it to be carried in clothing; and under her care I had survived contact with the Plague. I ordered all clothing worn by victims and their families to be burned. Then I sent our men to seize the clothes that had been taken as booty from the homes of the nobility and I distributed these to the naked. Our men were very frightened. I did not blame them. Marcantonio della Torre, who must have had more knowledge and skill than I, had succumbed to this disease. It was a more deadly and insidious enemy than we had faced on any battlefield, but it was battlefield none the less and I had to find a way to fight it with as much skill as any army general. And in this endeavour I discovered Paolo had great strength.
‘We must unlock these houses,’ I said.
‘No,’ he said. ‘We must not.’
‘We cannot leave the people who have been shut in to starve to death. They might not even have the Plague.’
‘If we ask the men to unlock the houses they will mutiny,’ reasoned Paolo. ‘They might even massacre those inside to keep them from coming out.’
‘I cannot stand by and witness people starve to death when there is food freely available.’
‘There is another way,’ said Paolo.
He explained to me that he would instruct his soldiers to knock a slat from the wooden shutter of each house and call out to the inmates to say that food and water would be pushed through each day. But the soldiers would also warn them that if they tried to leave the building they would be executed.
‘They need more than food,’ I said. ‘They need medical attention.’
‘They cannot have it, Matteo.’ Paolo regarded me seriously. ‘You yourself must appreciate this. You must help our doctors treat the French wounded, else the army quartermaster will not give us to access the food stores. Also, if you attend to those citizens where they lie sick, stricken with the Plague, then you would go from house to house, unceasing, and you would die of exhaustion,’ or someone will kill you, or indeed you will catch the disease.
‘You will retire to a safe clean place,’ Paolo went on, ‘and there you can treat people.’
‘But I—’
‘Matteo, this is how it must be,’ Paolo said firmly.
In this I let myself to be guided by him. And I found that many people did not have the Plague, but only dysentery, or boils, or scabies, or some other eczema that had flung the city officials into a panic to declare them unclean.
One day a French army officer of high rank came and spoke to me. ‘You have attended Spanish soldiers here while there are Frenchmen waiting to be seen. I order you not to do this.’
‘I am not a doctor,’ I replied, ‘I only help those who come to me in desperation. When a man is brought to me naked I do not know his race or allegiance. I will treat the sick, and if you do not allow me to do so, then I will treat no one.’
He went away.
Victory in the battle of Ravenna was claimed by the French.
When King Louis heard of the death of his nephew, Gaston de Foix, he wept. He said that he wept not only for his own loss, but also for that of France. He declared a day of mourning for his court. Then he let it be known to his ministers of war that no more French royal blood was to be spilled on Italian soil.
Paolo wrote to tell the parents of Stefano and Silvio that their sons were dead. I thought of the day at their farm only a few months ago, when Stefano’s girl had held the white silk he had brought her against her body and teased him to imagine h
ow she would look when she wore it at their wedding.
It fell to me to write to Elisabetta and tell her that Charles had perished. I knew that she would grieve for him, for although they had only spoken once, they had corresponded with each other. I made of him a hero, crediting him with a daring exploit, and inventing a quick painless end for him. I did not feel any guilt in doing this. He had been a brave and kind captain and his memory deserved no less.
I did not join in the main march back to Ferrara but remained for a while in Ravenna. This was in order to ensure that those remaining citizens still succumbing to the Plague had their last suffering eased. It was also that I had no stomach for any triumphal procession. Therefore it was only weeks later, when I returned to Ferrara, that I learned a most important prisoner had been captured at Ravenna. A powerful ally of Pope Julius who was using the Papacy to help him reinstate his family to what he considered their rightful place as rulers of Florence. This man was Cardinal Giovanni de’ Medici.
Chapter Seventy-Six
IN KEEPING WITH his status as a son of Lorenzo the Magnificent, the most influential one-time ruler of Florence, Cardinal Giovanni de’ Medici was lodged in the royal apartments and allowed freedom of movement.
Immediately I arrived in Ferrara I was summoned to the castello. The cardinal had been hawking in the Barco and had injured himself when dismounting from his horse after the hunt. He was very fat and I was more inclined to think that he would have injured the horse.
The duke’s chamberlain, who had greeted me, said, ‘I have heard that you are more than a mere condottieri lieutenant, Messer Matteo. You are required to assist in the treatment of the Cardinal Giovanni de’ Medici. The skin of his leg was torn open and it has now become infected. It is known that you have some medical ability so you will look at his injury and see what might be done to heal it.’
I could have said I was unable to help. But it would have been foolish to incur the annoyance of the duke and duchess. Being near a Medici gave me cause for disquiet and I was nervous as the chamberlain led me to the cardinal’s rooms, where he lay upon his bed being visited by the duchess and one of her cousins.
I need not have worried. The cardinal had no interest in me as an individual. He was short sighted, and in any case did not want to watch as I examined his leg. He turned his head away while one of Donna Lucrezia’s ladies held his hand.
If I had been a servant I would have been completely ignored as I went about my work, but my reputation for healing meant I had some status. The duchess watched me as I bent to look more closely at the wound, then she made a comment. She was well educated, slipping easily from one language to another, but for this remark, in order to be private and as she was speaking to one of her own kinfolk, she spoke Catalan.
Which I could understand.
‘The young doctor, Dorotea’ – Donna Lucrezia’s voice was languid and sensual – ‘he shows a shapely leg beneath his tunic, don’t you think?’
I tried to keep my face still, but I could not hide my discomfort.
The duchess looked at me curiously. She had surmised that I understood her.
Her cousin Dorotea saved the situation. ‘He blushes!’ she cried out gaily. ‘By your gesture, madonna, he guesses at your meaning.’
They laughed together at my embarrassment.
This lady sidled over to me. ‘They say you have healing hands, Messer Matteo. Would you like to place them upon me? I have such an ache.’
‘Hush, Dorotea,’ Donna Lucrezia scolded her. ‘You are too forward in your manner.’
As I wrote out a recipe and made to take my leave Donna Lucrezia rose from her seat and handed me a gold coin. ‘For your trouble.’
‘It is no trouble for a great lady such as yourself,’ I said.
‘Ah, I recognize you now!’ she exclaimed.
I could not speak. It was not possible. It had been so many years ago, only a glimpse in the crowd. But she was an intelligent woman.
‘You are the gallant that seized Eleanora’s ribbon in the joust!’
I breathed again. ‘I – I am,’ I managed to say.
‘And’ – she laughed – ‘claimed your reward so eloquently.’
I bent my head to acknowledge her compliment.
‘Making your horse bow down like that. It is a trick that gypsies teach their horses, is it not?’
I was grateful that my head was bent and I raised it slowly.
‘I remember when I was a girl in Rome,’ she went on, ‘there was a horse fair held every year and we watched from the windows of the Vatican as they performed for us. They were the best of horsemen, running up and down with the horses to show them off to us.’ Lucrezia Borgia looked at me not unkindly. ‘I am very sympathetic to the affairs of the heart, but you should know that Eleanora d’Alciato de Travalle will be soon contracted in marriage. She is warded by her uncle, both her parents being dead. She has little dowry, so, there it is, the convent or marriage.’ She paused. ‘Of course, a man can happily accept a woman with no fortune, although he himself would need to have some money of his own. If such a one appeared, who could make an offer . . .’ She paused again. ‘It might be possible . . .’
Chapter Seventy-Seven
THE WISDOM OF the Spanish commander Ramón de Cardona soon became evident. At the siege of Ravenna, having seen that the city was lost, he had retired, husbanding his best troops to enable them to fight another day. His infantry were a formidable and well-armed force. They now met up with the rest of the papal army and began to gobble up the disputed places of the Romagna.
Our exhausted troops were sent in batches to help garrison some towns around Ferrara. It would be a defensive action only. Decimated by our losses at Ravenna, we could not regroup in sufficient force to engage in any battle, far less mount a campaign. The Venetians and the Swiss, despite their mistrust of each other, were coming together. Under the direction of the Pope, they would control the northern part of Italy. The time had come. The French would have to leave Ferrara and get to Milan while the roads were still open to them.
This information came to Paolo and me by gossip and hearsay. Since the death of Charles and many of the French officers we’d had little contact with what was happening within the French army and the councils of war.
But I received a note from Eleanora asking to meet me privately by the fountain in the garden of the castello after dark.
I went there alone and waited. It was close to midnight before she appeared.
‘I could not slip away earlier,’ she whispered.
I made to take her in my arms but she withdrew. ‘I came to inform you that Duke Alfonso is on his way to Rome.’
‘To Rome!’
‘Hush!’ She glanced about her. ‘It will become common knowledge eventually, but I thought it would be to your advantage to know this now. He has gone to make peace with the Pope.’
‘I am grateful to you for telling me this,’ I said. I touched her arm and she shivered.
‘I came also to tell you that I am leaving Ferrara.’
I stepped back. ‘When? Why?’
‘My uncle’ – she looked away – ‘wishes me to marry. There is yet another older man whose wife has died and he has made an offer. I am to travel to my uncle’s house at Travalle near Florence and meet him there.’
‘Eleanora!’
She would not meet my gaze.
‘Eleanora.’ I grasped her hand and made her look at me. There were tears unshed in her eyes.
‘Has a marriage contract been signed?’
‘No.’ She frowned and shook her head. ‘I am first to be inspected by his family to see if I am worthy. That is the way of it.’
‘It does not need to be the way of it,’ I said. ‘If I had money or patronage then I might approach your uncle—’
‘Shush.’ She put her finger to my lips. ‘There is no point in useless speculation, Matteo. We are not able to live our lives as we would wish.’
I thought of what both she an
d Elisabetta had said to me regarding the difference between the wishes of a man and a woman.
‘What would you be, Eleanora, if you could do anything you wanted?’
‘If I were a man?’
‘I am a man, yet I cannot do what I want.’
‘Then you tell me. What profession or trade would you follow if free to do so?’
‘I think now I would become a doctor,’ I said. ‘And you? What would you do if free to occupy yourself as you wished?’
‘I would like to study the texts of humanity. As women we are taught to read, yet unless you enter the convent there is little opportunity to further your knowledge. And’ – she managed a smile – ‘I do not want to be a nun.’
‘Several women attended the dissections at Bologna,’ I told her.
‘I do not know if I could endure that, but I would like to attend a class given by one of the philosophers.’
‘And’ – I moved nearer to her – ‘if you were free to choose whom you wished to marry?’
‘How could I, a mere woman, make that decision?’
I brought my face close to hers. With the end of my tongue I traced the outline of her mouth: I drew it along the outside edge of her top lip, and then along her lower lip. I stood back and looked into her eyes. She returned my gaze. Her eyes were wide and green as emeralds. I leaned forward, not touching her, and inserted the tip of my tongue between her parted lips.
She made a tiny moan.
There was the noise of someone approaching, the footsteps of the guard marching along the walkway.
She shrank back. ‘I must go,’ she whispered.
‘No, wait,’ I called, ‘please—’
‘Who is there?’ The soldier had his pike at the ready as he approached.
I stepped to where he could see me and identified myself. By the time I had assured him I was not a papal spy Eleanora had gone.
Paolo was as alarmed as I when I told him that Duke Alfonso was on his way to Rome to try to agree terms with Pope Julius.
‘There is no future for us here, Matteo,’ he said.
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