Servant to the Borgia

by Elizabeth McGlone

  “I’ve heard nothing about it.”

  “Perhaps my cousin does not think to discuss such matters with kitchen boys. Summon her at once.” Unmistakable command resonated in her voice, that of a mother accustomed to having her wishes obeyed.

  “I’m an apprentice,” the boy protested, though his words sounded thin as a heavy blush moved over his face. He uncrossed his arms, allowing them to dangle at his side as his foot began to trace a line on the tiles. Turning his shoulder, he looked into the kitchen again.

  “May I go, sir?”

  A grumbling rasp came from a white head bent over a table in the corner. “Be quick about it. Dough won’t knead itself.”

  The apprentice disappeared in a rush. Next to her, Constanza’s back relaxed. Concealed by the fullness of their skirts, she reached out and clasped her mother’s hand. The work-roughened skin was damp and trembled before she returned the squeeze.

  Though the apprentice returned after only a moment and returned to work at his master’s side, it was some minutes before faint gasps, and a shuffling step announced the arrival of another into the kitchen. Curious, Betta peeked around her mother’s waist. A distant cousin, her mother had said, met on the streets only a few days past when she had delivered a repaired shoe to the best baker in Rome, Sancio del Porto, who had pots of basil and verbena growing outside his bodega and sometimes gave children loaves when they came begging at the end of the day. A happy chance, her mother had said, telling Betta about the splendid offer. Their cousin had been ill and needed help with her duties. She had agreed to take Betta on for a short time.

  Betta thought the housekeeper did not look ill, only fat. Very fat. Her bulk was such that it jiggled as she walked, waves of it moving and sliding as she walked to the door. After a moment of fascinated scrutiny quelled by a sharp elbow to the ribs, Betta kept her eyes on the floor.

  “Constanza,” the housekeeper greeted her mother, voice cool. Beneath a white coif, a single lock of graying brown hair escaped and was tucked back with an impatient gesture.

  “Maria,” her mother replied, bowing her head with a respectful gesture. “This is my daughter, who I told you about.” A hand on her shoulder propelled Betta forward, and she curtsied. Though she felt the weight of a heavy stare, Betta kept her eyes on the stone step leading into the kitchen. They were not invited inside. The morning air was cold, and she shivered.

  “Eight years old, you said.”

  “Yes.” It was the first time Betta could remember her mother telling a falsehood. She had just had her seventh natal day.

  A nasal noise signaled displeasure. “Scrawny. Is she strong?”

  “Yes, and quick. A good girl. Biddable.”

  “Can the girl speak for herself? What’s your name, child?”

  Betta raised her eyes; her stepfather often said that she had rebellious thoughts that he could see in her eyes. She made sure to keep them well-hidden as she answered, just in case he was right. “Betta, Donna. And I speak when spoken to.”

  The housekeeper harrumphed out a small laugh. “A lesson some of the sluts here could do with. Very well then, I’ll take her, but only ‘til Lent, when my strength has returned. Sundays for rest and a copper a week that I will save until the end.”

  Constanza was nodding.

  The housekeeper reached forward and drew Betta into the kitchen. The warmth of the room was an assault, heating her down to the marrow of her bones in a single wave. “I’ll send her out on Sunday, then,” she said, shutting the door.

  Betta wanted to protest that she had not bidden her mother goodbye, that it would be six days before she saw her again, but she felt the large woman’s eyes on her still. Instead, she lifted her chin, keeping her back straight beneath her patched woolen gown. This day would be the most important, her mother had said, and she was to work until her fingers bled and utter not a word of protest.

  Over the housekeeper’s shoulder, the cook’s apprentice was watching, the scowl of displeasure still on his face. He would not like her, she thought, because Mama had humiliated him. She met his stare without expression and followed in the wake of the housekeeper, who was already moving down the hall. The apprentice may have thought she and her mother were beggars, but she knew differently. Her father had been Giovanni, a cobbler from Florence who came to Rome and married the only daughter of another family long skilled in the craft; he had made the most beautiful shoes in the city. His work had graced the feet of cardinals and their mistresses, merchants and wealthy men. Before he had died, their shop in Trastevere had been a hive of activity, with apprentices coming from other cities to learn from him. It was the accident that had taken her father which had brought them to this, the accident, and her mother’s poor choice of a second husband.

  The housekeeper was speaking. “You’ll come back to the kitchen for hot water after I’ve shown you about. There’s a hall that needs scrubbing, and the master’s none too particular about scraping his shoes when he comes in. When that’s done, you’ll work in the scullery. Some pots and pans need attending, and there’s no trick to it, only hard work.” Her tone dripped amusement. “Should keep you busy for the day.”

  The villa was a bewildering array of corridors, and the pale light creeping through the windows only provided enough illumination to see where the walls ended and the floors began. They paused at a small room near the kitchen, which had an opening covered by a flap of heavy canvas. Brushing aside the cloth, the housekeeper retrieved a set of keys from a table in the corner and tied them to a string that dangled at her waist. “My chamber. You’ll sleep on a pallet in the corner so I can keep my eyes on you. Cousin or no, you’ll hang if I catch you stealing. Half the silver in this house would have walked out beneath the skirts of the kitchen sluts if I did not keep my wits about me.”

  “Yes, Donna.”

  “Your mother was a sweet girl, and she and I were friends before I entered into service though we’d not spoken in years. That’s the only reason I agreed to take you on. That’s one of the pitfalls of service, as the one who trained me called it. Family, friends, all of them become less important that the famiglia. Learn that lesson now, girl, and you’ll be better for it.”

  Famiglia. Betta had heard that word before. The nobles who lived in the grand houses had their families, those of the blood. Then there were the famiglia, the servants who formed another type of family, from the lowliest of pot boys to the stewards and housekeepers.

  It would not be her family, Betta thought, setting her chin. She would not stay. She would fetch and carry for the housekeeper during the six weeks until Lent, earning enough coin that her brothers and sister would go to bed with full bellies, and then she would return home. In six weeks, there would be a baby to care for, a new brother or sister, and she would leave the life of service behind.

  Though the housekeeper had said that the cleaning of the hall and the pots in the scullery would take the day, it had been a task accomplished before cena, the noon meal, and the housekeeper bestowed a nod of praise on her before telling her to eat. The food served in the kitchens for the servants was coarse, a hearty soup and bread washed down with watered wine, but there was an ample amount, and Betta ate until her stomach formed a tight little ball beneath her dress.

  She knew herself to be the subject of a dozen curious stares and kept her eyes fixed on the trencher before her, content to listen. Ears first, her mother said, and then eyes before you speak. She listened, and before the meal was out, she had learned that the master of the house, Signore Bracchis, was a widowed gentleman with grown children who spent most of his time at the home of a flaxen-haired courtesan kept like a princess in private lodgings. He visited the villa only to change his linens and monitor the flow of gold from his dealings with the Florence cloth merchants whose wares he imported.

  “Disgraceful,” one of the older housemaids murmured, shaking her head. “Our mistress not dead a year, and he’s already sent all her gowns over to his whore to be made over.”


  “More like she will sell them to the Jews,” another maid opined, a younger girl, almost pretty enough to be a courtesan herself. She twined a strand of curling hair around her finger, eyes dreamy. “Think he’ll marry her?”

  Laughter erupted from the table, and the girl blushed.

  The housekeeper gave her a hard stare. “Take that notion out of your head. For all the master is chasing after a girl young enough to be his granddaughter, he is the blood of one of the noble houses. He’d not pollute it by marrying such as her.”

  “But…”

  The housekeeper’s voice gained a stern edge, matching the set of her jaw. “We will speak of this no longer. He is our master and deserves our loyalty. Another word, and I’ll see all of you set to scrubbing this place from top to bottom with nothing save water in your buckets.” She surveyed the three housemaids with one brow lifted, as though searching for any signs of rebellion. There was none.

  “Yes, Donna,” they responded, and beneath the table, Betta heard a faint movement, an ankle sharply kicked.

  After the meal ended, there was more work. The scullery was a small, airless chamber lacking the windows of the kitchen. Lead pipes in the wall emptied the water into a metal basin so large that Betta could have comfortably bathed inside. Pots and skillets, spits and trivets lay covering the large table, the implements cluttered with the fragmentary remains of the dish each had cooked. The apprentice who had greeted her so unenthusiastically that morning explained her duties, a look of cheerful vindictiveness stealing over his features as he described the daunting task.

  Master Bartolomeo, the cook, watched their interaction over his shoulder as he sat at a grinding wheel, shooting sparks from a knife as he honed the edge. Betta could not stop from looking back at him frequently, afraid that the man’s fluffy white hair would catch fire. The chef was, by far, the oldest man that she had ever seen still practicing a craft. The folds of his face were speckled with age spots, and his hands, when they were not pressing down upon the knife, trembled with palsy. Wispy white hair formed an uneven halo around his face, the ragged thatch looking like he hacked at the strands with a knife when they grew too long.

  “Now, now, leave the girl be, Angelo.” The chef’s rheumy eyes crinkled into a smile that Betta could not help but return. “She is skinny, like a dried bean. Do we not have some of the wild boar stewed with wine and raisins held back? That will put a smile on her pretty face.” Reaching out, he pinched her cheek gently.

  Angelo looked down. “That was served three weeks past, Master.”

  The chef’s eyebrows, feathery as the wings of a bird, arched in surprise. “So long ago? Ah, no matter. Find something else. We shall have this little one as fat as a fine young partridge before the season is out.” Never ceasing his kindly smile, he handed her an apron. Betta was enveloped by the scent of him, unlike that of any person she had ever encountered, sweet and spicy. There was no dirt on his person; of all the men she had met, he was the cleanest, lacking even a discoloration beneath his fingernails. The food smells breathing from his skin were intoxicating, and she had to resist the urge to follow him back to the kitchen, just so that she could attempt to identify them, the rose water and cloves, the pungent reek of garlic and the buttery heaviness of oil.

  She scrubbed at the pots, hands growing white and wrinkling from their soaking in cold water and listened to Master Bartolomeo talking. He flew through the kitchen as though wings were attached to his shoulders, preparing pranzo for the master.

  A crate of birds arrived and was taken out to the terrace attached to the kitchens. Master Bartolomeo slaughtered each of the birds, the pristine white of their feathers dripping into rivers of red as they were suspended from hooks embedded in the wall. When the font ceased, the carcasses were cut open, and the blood wiped out with a cloth. The organs were removed and replaced in the cavity accompanied by salt, pepper, and fennel flowers. The smell of the birds, hung once again in the shade so that they did not touch, swam through her mind, delicious with the tang of iron and salt and herbs.

  Though the housekeeper claimed to be ill, Betta could see no sign of it as the day wore on; the woman moved like a barrel that had been shoved down a steep hill, never ceasing its revolutions. After Master Bartolomeo had finished his meal preparations, she returned to Donna Maria’s side. Under her direction, the linens were examined, and the majolica plates adorned with images of lions were shined. Dust from the street crept into each room, and Betta made use of a straw broom.

  By the end of the day, there were blisters on her hands and feet, and her mind was numb with exhaustion. She was too tired to join the rest of the servants for pranzo. The thin straw pallet in the corner was welcoming, and she sank into it with a blissful sigh. Her eyes were shutting when the canvas flap covering the door moved, and the housekeeper appeared, a piece of bread covered in cheese and olive oil resting on the wooden plate in her hand.

  Too exhausted to sit up, Betta watched with leaden eyes as the cook set the plate by her head and then reached down to take the shoes from her feet. The housekeeper hissed sympathetically at the blood staining her patched hose.

  “I’ve something for those. Eat, else you won’t have the strength for the morrow.” She rummaged through a basket of simples in the corner, emerging with a small blue jar. Betta flopped a hand over and lifted the bread, tearing it into two sections without looking over at the delicate ministrations. The flavor was an explosion of pleasure on her tongue. The oil was from the first pressing rather than the bitter dregs her mother was forced to buy. Her stomach, pleasantly full since the noon meal, gurgled in appreciation. Rising on one elbow, she finished chewing the first and then took a bite of the second half. Her mouth was dry, and she choked on the bread.

  “There’s water in the jug,” the housekeeper said, already moving back to the hallway. As the flap pulled back, Donna Maria spoke over her shoulder.

  “You did well today.”

  Chapter 3

  Cesare Borgia’s keen ears detected a faint noise as he ascended the last steps that led to the second story loggia, a small, pitiful cry, the sound as muffled and distant as the bells ringing over the city which thrilled in an unending peal, calling the devoted to prayer.

  The sun was hot where it streamed onto the tile floor. Cesare could feel it beneath the leather soles of his shoes. The heat did not trouble him. His family were Valencians, after all, born to a hotter sun which had seen the fortunes of their family rise and fall from the time that his ancestor had led the charge to recapture the town of Xativa from the Moors. Lucrezia was of the same mettle. Most girls of seven would have fled to their chamber or the gardens to ease their grief. Not Lucrezia. She was also a creature of the sun, finding comfort in the warmth.

  He had been searching for her for an hour, scouring each of the rooms in the Palazzo Pizzo di Merlo. Had Juan’s smirk not alerted him to the trouble, he might have passed the day away with his tutors without knowing that Lucrezia was in pain. But Juan could never resist gloating, and his smiles always meant that someone was crying.

  The kitten had been a whim, a gray puff of smoke with eyes nearly the same green and gold that he and Lucrezia shared. He had returned from his lessons in the city one morning to find it shivering outside the gate, swaying in the breeze as it clung to live with needle claws. I know what to do with you, little one, he thought, scratching it behind the ears before shoving it into the folds between his shirt and doublet. The rumble had surprised him. Lucrezia’s delight in his gift had not, and the animal had steadily fattened on constant offerings of fish and cream and sausage.

  He had found the body of the kitten on the stairs, it's head a crumpled mass of gray and blood and bones. Juan’s doing, left where Lucrezia would be the first to see it. And Lucrezia…

  His eyes found her, hidden in the corner, body concealed beneath the table where Mama took her wine in the evenings when Papa did not visit her. Cesare quickened his pace, crossing the loggia in a dozen strides before
crouching on the tile in front of the table.

  “Lucrezia,” he coaxed. “Come out.” He could not see her face; she had curled herself into a tight little ball, revealing only pale curls spilling out from beneath a hood and fragile shoulders which shook from the force of her sobs. She was a child whose angular bones pressed hard against the skin, sharp of elbow and cheekbone and neck. The only softness was her wealth of hair and her heart.

  Sighing, he wedged his torso beneath the table and scooted forward until he could wrap arms around her waist. He pulled, dragging them back from the confined space.

  For a moment she resisted, striking out with hands and feet, then her body eased as the tears began again. She smelled of salt, and the front of her bodice was wet. Rage surged at the knowledge of how long her tears must have continued with only himself to inquire about her absence. No matter, he was there now. Cesare remained sitting, moving to brace his back against the wall. Lucrezia remained on his lap. He said nothing, knowing that the words would emerge eventually when her tears allowed her to speak.

  Minutes passed. Cesare began rubbing up and down her back, lightly scratching, and her muscles relaxed in response. He hummed a song his Valencian nurse had taught him, whispering of golden fields and mountain retreats where springs bubbled up from the earth. The tears stopped, though her shoulders still trembled. He had always been able to soothe her, even when no one else could. Mama had been sick after Lucrezia had been born, the baby left with nurses content to allow her to scream the night away. It had been his touch that could lull her back to sleep, a child of four years stealing through the house to rock his sister’s cradle.

  “He killed it,” Lucrezia finally whispered, her fingers clenched on his doublet. Her eyes looked up at him, sparkles of gold veined with red.