Niccolo’s eyes lit up. “Then it’s true what they say about the Borgias?”
“What do they say?” she shot back defensively.
“That the brother loves the sister with a criminal passion, that the father does likewise, that they killed the other brother out of jealousy, to get him out of the way. Don’t tell me you haven’t heard?”
“Niccolo, Niccolo,” she said, scolding him. “Do you believe everything you hear?”
“No, but I don’t disbelieve it either, and I don’t dismiss any rumor out of hand, no matter how preposterous, until I can learn otherwise. It’s the nature of my business.”
“Oh, and what business is that?”
“The business of lies and half-truths, denials and equivocation, innuendo.”
“Charming business.”
Afterward, with Niccolo’s head in her lap, Giuditta told him what she knew about the secrets of the strange Spanish family into whose service she had fallen. “The pope is a huge man, as big as a bear. In the household he has a reputation for moderation, especially at the table.”
“Borgia! Moderation!” interrupted Niccolo incredulously. “I’ve heard about the kinds of feasts they give at the papal court. On a fast day, they limit the fare to a mere one hundred and forty-four varieties of fish. That’s their idea of moderation!”
Giuditta rapped him on the head with her knuckles. “Do you want to hear what I have to say or not? They do stage extravagant feasts, but Papa Alexander never eats more than a little lean meat and some vegetables. And fruit—he worries about his regularity.
“But if he’s moderate at table,” she continued, “he gives himself full reign in the bedroom. He’s apparently insatiable, and he’s constantly surrounded by beautiful women. He has a new mistress now less than half his age, Giulia Farnese. Do you know what they call her in Rome? The Bride of Christ!”
Niccolo laughed. “The Bride of Christ! A sexually insatiable pope! And does the papal insatiability extend to his own daughter?”
“No, it does not,” said Giuditta firmly. “Alexander dotes on his daughter, on all his children. He’s like any other father. He wants what’s best for them. He really loves Lucrezia dearly, and he wept for days before she left him to come here. It was actually very sad, very moving.”
“Then it’s Lucrezia who’s the she-devil?” asked Niccolo.
“Nothing could be further from the truth. She doesn’t have a sinister bone in her body. Lucrezia is modest and lovable; she’s discreet, pleasant; she’s even a very religious person, a fervent Catholic. She used to read the Bible to me, out loud, in Spanish. She has a beautiful voice.”
“Did she try to convert you?” teased Niccolo.
“No, but I did learn a few things about your religion from her. Lucrezia is a beautiful woman. Did you see her at the wedding?”
“Not her face. She was masked. I only saw her hair.”
“Her hair! It’s so long and heavy, it gives her atrocious headaches. That’s part of what I did for her. I would brew her a sleeping draft, when the headaches got bad.”
“Why didn’t she just cut her hair, if it was such a problem?”
“Her father wanted it that way. He liked it long. Everything she did, she did to please him.”
“Like going through three husbands by, what, age twenty-two?”
“Exactly. Alexander arranged the marriages. She gave her consent. She did what was required of her. She was only thirteen the first time. When she wasn’t happy with her husband, Giovanni, the pope annulled the marriage, even though there were political risks involved.”
“I bet he got her dowry back, though,” smirked Niccolo.
“Of course he did. That’s why they got the annulment. They wanted it to be legal. And apparently the only real legal ground for such a thing is impotence. When Giovanni screamed that he wasn’t impotent, the pope set up a commission—two of his cardinals—to investigate. Giovanni was supposed to “perform” in front of them to prove his manhood.”
“Did he do it?”
“Of course not. He howled at the indignity of such a trial and refused to submit, so the annulment went through.”
“And was he impotent?”
“He’s remarried now for the third time and has four children. But Giovanni is the one who started the rumors of incest between Lucrezia and her father. Out of spite.”
“Then the pope’s family isn’t as hideous and unnatural as some would have us believe,” said Niccolo thoughtfully.
“You should understand that better than anyone,” said Giuditta, taunting him. “Didn’t you say it was your business—lies and half-truths, equivocation and innuendo?”
Rebuked, Niccolo remained silent a moment. “What’s the matter,” said Giuditta breaking in on his thoughts. “Are you disappointed the Borgias aren’t the monsters you thought they were?”
“Just because they’re not all tangled up in a web of incest doesn’t make them necessarily blameless,” observed Niccolo.
“True,” admitted Giuditta. “They can be fairly unscrupulous, at times. For example, there’s always talk of poisonings at court.”
“Is it true?”
“Who can say? Someone comes to dinner. He gets sick and dies a few days later. It could have been poison. It could have been bad shellfish.”
“But when that ‘someone’ is conveniently a very wealthy cardinal who collapses after dinner with the pope, who dies, and whose entire wealth and property are then immediately confiscated by the church,” said Niccolo, “and when that someone just happens to die and that wealth just happens to reach the papal coffers as Caesar’s army is running low on ammunition and supplies, and when that happens several times in the period of a few months . . .”
“No!” said Giuditta in a tone of mock incredulity. “You’re implying more than coincidence here!” She laughed before continuing, “To tell you the truth though, the pope is a little obsessed with the idea of poisons. He’s asked my opinion on these things once or twice.”
“You! What did he want to know?”
“I was with Lucrezia one day when he received a letter that really flustered him. He was arguing with the messenger who delivered it, and he wouldn’t touch the thing. Since I was close at hand, he asked me what I thought. He said the letter came from a venomous snake, and that he feared it was impregnated with poison that would seep into his fingers if he tried to read it and eventually kill him. He asked me if there was such a poison, to my knowledge.”
“And what was your learned opinion?”
“I said I didn’t think such a thing was possible.”
“So he went ahead and read the letter?”
“Only after he had the messenger lick the thing all over, inside and out!”
“What a rare and cautious man! What a pope!”
“That’s not even the best part. When he did read the letter, it drove him to distraction, and he almost had some kind of fit. He was sputtering and shouting curses. He had to drink a whole cup of brandy before he calmed down again. And do you know who the letter was from? Caterina! Apparently she was writing to tell him to get out of Italy and leave the Italians alone. She signed the letter, ‘Death to the Barbarian.’”
After four uninterrupted days in the privacy of their love nest, Niccolo and Giuditta finally decided to venture forth into the outside world again. Ferrara was still in the throes of the wedding celebration, and her streets were thronged with unlikely beings—satyrs and nymphs, ancient Roman gods and goddesses, legendary heroes. Apollo passed by under a huge gold-foil sun. He was accompanied by Neptune with his trident, hung with seaweed and gnawing on a leg of mutton. Giuditta and Niccolo, too, were masked. They thought it was better that way.
As they strolled into a slightly quieter and safer street, Giuditta said, “This celebration is nothing compared to what they do in Rome. Did you hear about the Ballet of the Chestnuts?”
“No.”
“Caesar gave a supper at the Apostolic Palace wi
th his usual prodigality. The food was perfumed and some of the dishes sprinkled with gold dust.” Niccolo winced at the thought, and Giuditta continued. “After the meal, fifty prostitutes came in—courtesans rather, respectable prostitutes, not common girls. They danced for a while first, with their gowns on, then off. Then the whole room was flooded with chestnuts.”
Niccolo looked at her blankly, “Chestnuts?”
“When the girls tried to dance, they lost their footing. Soon they were all on their hands and knees or rolling around on the floor in the chestnuts. Then the guests started to crawl in among the girls and the orgy started. There were quite a few cardinals there, bishops, and even a French ambassador.”
“But no Florentines,” said Niccolo with conviction.
Giuditta was amused at his self-righteousness. “Oh there was one of your high-minded Florentines there, the cardinal, the flabby one, Giovanni.” Niccolo tensed at the mention of his name. Exiled from Florence, he had fled to Rome, and now Cardinal Giovanni de’ Medici, the son of Lorenzo de’ Medici, was consorting with the Borgias.
“When things began heating up between the prostitutes and the churchmen, the pope suddenly called everyone to attention. Attendants brought in a silk mantle encrusted with gold and jewels, a pair of shoes of the finest Corinthian leather and some caps. Alexander promised these as prizes to the man who could “perform” the greatest number of times with the prostitutes.”
“And who won?” asked Niccolo.
“Caesar, of course.”
Niccolo was too curious not to ask, “How many times?”
“Six.”
They walked on in silence for a while, unconsciously retracing their footsteps back to the small, red-walled park where they had spent their first night together. A brooding expression had replaced the look of dumb beatitude that had been on Niccolo’s face for the past several days. “What’s wrong?” said Giuditta, brushing his face with both her hands as though she were trying to remove the worry that was starting to settle in there.
“Caesar,” said Niccolo.
“The inscrutable Caesar,” echoed Giuditta. “You know what they say in Rome? The pope never does what he says, and Caesar never says what he does.”
“That’s just the problem,” said Niccolo. “I’ve spent the last two months with the man and I’m as ignorant of his intentions as I was on the first day I met him.”
“Caesar is dangerous,” said Giuditta.
“You don’t have to tell me that.”
“No,” she said, real concern showing in her voice. “I mean it. I’ve been watching him for years now, and something’s happening to him. Even Lucrezia is concerned.”
“Does she speak to you about him? Has she told you anything? Do you know anything that might help me?” said Niccolo, hopefully.
“I told you, they’re very close. In fact, she may be the only person in the world he really talks to. And lately, she worries. She says there is something gnawing at him. She says there’s madness in him.”
“He’s far from mad,” said Niccolo. “He always knows exactly what he’s doing. The control he exerts over himself, the way he moves.”
“Just the same, be careful with him, Niccolo. Something is happening to him. His behavior is getting more unpredictable.”
More unpredictable, indeed. A shiver ran through Niccolo. This was the man upon whose whim the survival of Florence depended. This was man to whom, very shortly, the Florentine envoy would have to report for another round of cat and mouse.
The idyll was almost over. They both felt it. Giuditta knew that soon she would have to leave for Rome, and Niccolo would shortly be caught up once again in the web of intrigue being spun by the diabolical Caesar. Already they had stayed too long.
“Niccolo,” she said softly. “Do you ever think of the day we met, the first time?”
“I think about it all the time.”
“And if I told you I thought about it all the time, and that I also thought about something else—about revenge—what would you think of me?”
“You can call it revenge. Or you can call it justice.”
“And if I call it justice, would you help me, if I needed it?”
“Giuditta,” he said taking her in his arms. “I know who killed your father and brother. I found out years ago.
“You knew!” she spit at him. “And you didn’t tell me?”
He tried to put an arm around her but she brushed it off. “Listen,” he said. “I’m sorry. I should have said something, but I didn’t want to open old wounds. Besides, there’s nothing you can do about it now. You’ve long since had your revenge.”
“What do you mean?”
Niccolo explained: “You remember the dagger I found, the one I gave to you? It had a small symbol cut in the handle. That symbol was the mark of the Medici family. Lorenzo de’ Medici is dead, and the rest of his clan was driven from Florence. Florence has purged herself of the vermin that did that to your father and in the same process, given you the revenge you wanted.”
“Has she?” said Giuditta in a voice that left Niccolo wondering. “Has she really?”
The next morning, Niccolo complained of small things to keep his mind off larger concerns. He complained about his chronic lack of money and the impossibility of ever getting enough from his government to even cover his expenses. Giuditta smiled and teased him, “You should go to work for the Borgia. They’re profligate, and they pay on time.”
“I’ve already had an offer,” he said.
“And you turned it down?”
“What else could I do?”
“You remain loyal to your stingy republic, no matter what. Is that how it is?”
“Loyalty is a virtue. I’ve never betrayed anyone,” asserted Niccolo.
“Did you ever stop to consider that the republic that claims such a large share of your loyalty once tried to kill me?”
Niccolo was instantly on the defensive. “It wasn’t the republic then. Those were different times. There was a tyrant in Florence, and I tried to tell you, the tyrant has been consigned to oblivion. It’s over. You’ve had your revenge.”
“And something like that could never happen now, under your government.”
“Never,” affirmed Niccolo.
“But if it did, where would your loyalties lie, Niccolo?”
“You know you don’t even have to ask.”
“Don’t I?” Giuditta laughed at him. “You’re an odd duck, Niccolo Machiavelli. This queer allegiance you have to your republic. And to justice. I really think that if you had to choose between me and the idea of justice, you’d pick the idea.”
He thought it would be useless to pursue the subject and lapsed into a moody silence. Still, it bothered him that she had reproached him for his loyalty to his republic and the idea of justice. What was wrong with loyalty to an idea, especially a high and noble one?
“Come on,” said Giuditta making an effort to dissipate the gloom that had settled around them. “I’m going to do you a big favor.” As they made their way through the streets of Ferrara, the ebb and flow of masked partygoers had begun to recede, and normally clad individuals going about everyday errands were beginning to take their places. Giuditta led Niccolo into a street of small shops and entered one of the more modest establishments there.
“Daniele,” she called. An old Jew materialized from a back room. He was clad in black, with the yellow symbol emblazoned prominently on his gown by order of the indefatigable forces of law and order under the leadership Giorgio Zampante, the police chief. Giuditta talked quietly with the man for a few minutes. They conversed in their incomprehensible language that came from low in the throat. When Giuditta spoke, her voice was husky and mysterious. To Niccolo, it was thrilling.
Daniele disappeared and Giuditta turned to Niccolo. “Sit down,” she said, indicating a small table. “He’ll be right back.” When Daniele returned, he was carrying paper, pens, and ink, as well as a small, full purse. Giuditta took the writ
ing materials. The purse was deposited heavily in front of Niccolo. “Go on,” she said. “Take it. Its fifty ducats. I hope it’s enough. I’ve arranged a loan for you.”
Niccolo did not even bother to protest. He needed the money. “And the terms?”
Giuditta replied in a businesslike fashion: “I’ve given security, so you don’t have to worry about that. Daniele will give you the name and address of an associate of his in Florence where you can repay the loan, if and when your republic sees fit to reimburse you. The interest is thirty-two percent.
“Thirty-two percent!” objected Niccolo. “That’s usu . . .”
“You were going to say, ‘banking’? Anyway, it could have been forty percent. I got you the preferred rate. Besides, the coffers of the republic are full, aren’t they? It won’t hurt them.” She gave him a broad smile. In the meantime, Daniele had brought food and a sweet liquor to refresh them. Having confided the address in Florence where Niccolo could go to discharge his obligation, the old man tacitly withdrew.
“What’s this?” said Niccolo, poking his finger in a mound of black paste or jelly that was heaped on a plate set in front of him.
“Eat it. It’s good,” said Giuditta.
“How?”
“Spread a little on the bread, like this.” Giuditta took a thin square of dried bread and covered it with the mysterious substance. Niccolo did likewise. “Well?” she said, waiting for his reaction.
“Salty,” said Niccolo dubiously. “Now, what is it?”
“Caviale, I think they call it in Italian.”
“Never heard of it.”
“It’s sturgeon, sort of,” said Giuditta. “It’s actually the eggs.”
“Fish eggs? Fish eggs,” said Niccolo philosophically. “How do you know about this stuff?”
“The Jews of Ferrara know about it, but the Italians are still ignorant. The Jewish fishermen take the sturgeon in the river here. When the time is right, and the females are full of eggs, you get caviale. It’s good, don’t you think?”
Niccolo was not convinced. He took another tentative bite of the fishy substance to be polite and then sat back and sipped at his drink. He watched while Giuditta began to write. Her delicate hand raced rapidly across the surface of the paper from right to left, again and again until the whole page was covered with indecipherable symbols. She was writing to an associate in Rome.
Machiavelli: The Novel Page 40
