Light on Lucrezia

by Виктория Холт

  She smiled gently. “You did not recall it. It is always with me. It will be with me until I die.”

  She enchanted him, this girl with one of the most evil reputations in Italy, who yet could look so innocent. He longed then to discover the true Lucrezia, and he was determined to do so before he returned to Mantua.

  The visit was to be a brief one, so there was not much time for him to do this; moreover he sensed an aloofness in Lucrezia. She was genuinely concerned, he knew, with her father’s death; and if it were true, as Isabella insisted, that Pietro Bembo was her lover, that would account for her polite indifference to his offer of friendship. She was charming of course, but he sensed she would always be that. He wanted to bring a sparkle to her eyes; to see them light up when he approached as he felt sure they would for a good friend. After all, the poor girl had not many friends whom she could trust—friends of some power, that is to say. Ercole was a hard, mean man; and Alfonso’s indifference to the sort of wife he had was obvious. Her father dead, herself childless—as far as Ferrara was concerned—the French King suggesting there might be a divorce, her brother a prisoner of the new Pope … poor girl, did she not realize the difficult position in which she stood? She should do everything in her power to win the support of a man such as the Marquis of Mantua. But she did not seem to think of her own position. She did not seem to care.

  He turned his charm on her ladies. With them he was most successful.

  Later they chattered about him to Lucrezia. Oh, but he was charming! Not handsome—they would admit that. His eyes were slanting, yet that gave them a look of humor. His nose was flattened as though his mother had sat on him when he was a baby; but did that not call attention to the tender mouth? He was fond of women; that was understandable. What a life he must have with that harridan, Isabella! They could love him out of very pity because he was married to such a woman.

  What a remarkable horseman he was! Why, when he rode out with a party he sat his horse in a manner that set him apart from all others. Did Lucrezia notice how his horse welcomed his approach and became lively and spirited as soon as he mounted?

  “He has devoted much of his time to horses,” said Lucrezia.

  “It is to be understood,” cried Angela. “Such a wife would drive anyone to something else. It is to his credit that it is only horses.”

  “Women,” added Lucrezia lightly, “have also come in for a good deal of his attention, so I have heard.”

  “It does not surprise me,” retorted Angela. “I can well believe that he would be … irresistible.”

  “I beg of you do not make Giulio jealous of the man,” cried Lucrezia in mock seriousness. “Is it not enough that you give him anxious moments on account of Ippolito?”

  “Ippolito!” Angela snapped her fingers. “Let him go back to Sanchia of Aragon.”

  Lucrezia laughed at her fiery young cousin, but she was still thinking of Francesco.

  * * *

  Francesco walked in the gardens of the palace and thought of Lucrezia. Never before had he wanted to linger in Ferrara; now he was going to be loath to leave. She excited him. She, with her gentle appearance, her evil reputation. She looked virginal, yet he knew Alfonso was her third husband, and there must have been lovers. Heaven knew there were scandals enough. What was it that excited him? That essential femininity? Or was it that gentleness? He grimaced. She was the complete antithesis of his wife. Was that the reason?

  He felt a little sad, contemplating his overbearing Isabella. If she had only been a little less clever or a little less capable, how much easier she would have been to live with! But perhaps if she had been a little more clever she would have understood that she could have ruled him completely. He might have been ruled by gentleness; he never would be by arrogance.

  There were times when he hated Isabella. Surely the gentlest of men must rebel against such a wife. Isabella was determined that everyone in Mantua should be her subject, including her husband. There had been times when he had been amused; but there had been others when even his natural placidity had been ruffled.

  She no longer appealed to him as a wife or a woman. It seemed sad that this should have happened, for when they had first married he had marveled at his good fortune in having a wife who was possessed of all the virtues.

  He was a sensual man, a man of action, yet a man of peace. He had often given way to Isabella, shrugged aside his own preferences, devoted himself to the horses he loved so that now his stables were famous throughout Italy, and the Gonzaga horses renowned for their excellence. He had also loved many women. That was his life, his escape from Isabella.

  His courtly manners were the key to his success; that gentle charm, that tender care he was always ready to display, were irresistible. He used them diplomatically although they were not feigned, and it was their very sincerity to which they owed their success.

  But toward Lucrezia he felt differently from the way in which he had felt toward any other woman, for Lucrezia was different. So depraved, said public opinion. One of the notorious Borgias. So gentle, said the evidence of his eyes, innocent no matter what has happened to her.

  He must solve the riddle of Lucrezia although he was half aware that in solving it he might come to love her differently from the way in which he had ever loved a woman before.

  This was clear, because had she been any other he would have planned a quick seduction, an ecstatic, but necessarily brief love affair, and would have returned satisfied to Mantua, fortified against the nagging of Isabella.

  But this was different. He must seek to please Lucrezia, to win her confidence, to discover what really lay beyond that serene expression, to understand her true feelings for the poet Bembo.

  This he set out to do.

  At the balls and banquets he would not with obvious intention seek her out, but it was surprising how often she found herself partnered by him. Often when she walked in the gardens with her women, he—also accompanied by his attendants—would meet her. He would bow most graciously and pause for a few words, calling her attention to the flowers and discussing those which bloomed in the gardens of his palace on the Mincio. The others would fall in behind them.

  As the time came nearer when he would be forced to leave for Mantua he began to grow desperate, and one day when they walked in the gardens, their attendants following, he told her, with that fervent sincerity which was so attractive, of his desire to be friends with her.

  She turned to him and the candor of her expression moved him deeply. “You are truly kind, my lord,” she said. “I know that you are sincere.”

  “I would I could help you. I know of your sadness. You feel alone here in this court. You long for sympathy. Duchessa … Lucrezia, allow me to give that sympathy.”

  Again she thanked him.

  “The Este!” he snapped his fingers and grimaced. “My own family by marriage. But how cold they are! How unsympathetic! And you … so young and tender, left alone to bear your grief!”

  “They do not understand,” said Lucrezia. “It seems none can understand. Until I came to Ferrara I lived close to my father. We were rarely separated. We loved each other … dearly.”

  “I know it.” He looked at her quickly, thinking of all the rumors he had heard concerning that love; and again he was deeply moved by her look of innocence.

  “I feel,” she said, “that nothing can ever be the same for me again.”

  “You feel thus because the loss is so recent. Your sorrow will moderate as time passes.”

  Her eyes filled with tears. “My brother said that once.… when I was unhappy about another death.”

  “It is true,” he answered.

  When she had mentioned her brother’s name there had been a tremor in her voice, and Francesco knew then that her fears for her brother exceeded the misery she felt on account of the death of her father. What was the truth concerning this strange family relationship which had provoked more scandal than any other in Roman history?

  Fra
ncesco longed to know; he wanted to understand every detail of her life. He wanted to take her in his arms and comfort her, make her gay, as he felt she was intended to be.

  Then he realized that through this family relationship he might win her confidence.

  He said softly: “You are anxious on account of your brother?”

  She turned to him appealingly. “The news I have heard of him frightens me.”

  “I readily understand that. He trusted the new Pope too well, I fear. He seems to forget that Julius has always been an enemy of himself and your father.”

  “Cesare has been sick … sick almost unto death. I have heard disquieting rumors that his sickness has such a hold upon him that it has deadened his judgment.”

  Francesco nodded. “He is a man deserted by his friends. I understand full well your fears, now that he is a prisoner in the Vatican.”

  “I picture him there … in the Borgia Tower.… I remember every detail of those rooms.”

  Haunted by ghosts! she thought, seeing Alfonso—dear and most loved of husbands—lying dead across his bed, Cesare’s victim. And now Cesare, weakened by sickness, humiliated by defeat, was a prisoner in those very rooms.

  Francesco laid his hand on her arm, and whispered in that tender voice which had so delighted her women attendants: “If there were aught I could do to ease your anxieties, gladly would I do it.”

  An expression of joy flitted temporarily across her face, so that he was immediately aware of that latent gaiety within her. He wanted to arouse it; he wanted to make her joyous. Was it at that moment that he began to be in love with her?

  “There might be something I could do for your brother,” he went on.

  “My lord …”

  “Say ‘Francesco.’ Need we stand on ceremony, you and I?”

  He took her hand and kissed it. “I mean to earn your gratitude. There is nothing I crave more than to bring back the laughter to your lips.”

  She smiled. “You are so kind to me, Francesco.”

  “And there has been little kindness. Listen, I beg of you. Pope Julius and I are the best of friends, and I will tell you a secret. He is asking me to take command of the Papal army. You see, these are not idle promises I make. I shall devote my energies to making you smile again. And if you saw your brother restored to health, and once again Lord of Romagna, would you be happy?”

  “I should still think of my father, but I believe that if I could know all was well with Cesare I should know such relief and pleasure that I must be happy again.”

  “Then it shall be so.”

  There were more delightful walks, more tender conversations, more promises, but eventually Francesco found it necessary to depart for Mantua, and this he did with the utmost reluctance.

  Lucrezia missed him when he went; she told herself that she longed for the sight of Pietro Bembo; but she did enjoy hearing her ladies discuss the charms of Francesco Gonzaga.

  As for Francesco, he rode into Mantua marveling at himself. What were these promises he had made? Was it possible for him to advise Julius to pardon the son of his oldest and most bitter enemy? Should not the heads of states such as Mantua be greatly relieved to have Cesare under lock and key?

  But he had told the truth when he had said that above all things he wished to please Lucrezia.

  * * *

  Cesare lay on his bed, his drawn sword by his side.

  In this room little Alfonso of Bisceglie had waited for his death. They had put him here, Cesare knew, hoping to unnerve him, to remind him of that long-ago crime. They were wrong if they thought they could do that. There had been many murders in his life and he did not look back through a mist of remorse. He did not feel remorse; he felt only frustration. He, Cesare, who felt the spirit of emperors within him, who knew that he had had a genius for military conquest, believed that ill-luck had dogged him throughout his life.

  He thumped his pillow in sudden rage against fate, which had made him first fight to free himself from the Church and then had taken that great prop, his father’s power, from beside him before he was strong enough to stand alone. Worst of all was that ill-fate which had struck him with a sickness at the time when he most needed his strength.

  But he would come back to greatness. He swore it.

  He felt the power within him. That was why he lay in the darkness of this room, which for weaker men would have been haunted by the ghost of a murdered young man, and laughed at the darkness, laughed at Alfonso’s ghost, for he was truly unafraid.

  He must get well again. He must eat heartily and sleep for long periods, that he might cast off the lassitude of the last weeks.

  He began to carry out his plans. Special meals were prepared at his command, and he spent much time—he had plenty to spare—discussing the menus; he retired to his bed early and rose late. He engaged in card games with his guards; and he exulted because he felt his strength returning to him.

  His guards grew friendly; they looked forward to the games; this Cesare Borgia, whom they had expected to dread, seemed but a mild man after all. They told him they marveled at his calm.

  He shrugged his shoulders. “I put many people in positions similar to that in which I find myself,” he said. “I remember this now, and mayhap that is why I am so calm. Some of them were freed. I do not believe that this will be my home forever.”

  The jailers exchanged glances; they watched him regaining his strength.

  “My lord Duke,” they would ask, “is there aught we can do for you?”

  He would give them small commissions and he noticed their increasing respect. It filled him with exultation. It meant that men still feared Cesare Borgia. It meant that they too believed a prison in the Borgia Tower would not always be his home.

  * * *

  With Francesco gone and Bembo far away, Lucrezia brooded continually on the plight of Cesare.

  Something must be done, she was convinced. Cesare could not remain indefinitely a prisoner in the Borgia Tower. The subtle cruelty of choosing such a place for him was not lost on Lucrezia; for although she knew him well enough to realize that he would suffer little remorse for the murder of her husband which had taken place in those rooms, it was in those very apartments that he had sat with their father and discussed great plans. She believed that Cesare must be near to madness, and that he must be released at all cost.

  Therefore she went to see Duke Ercole and, throwing herself on her knees before the old man, she cried: “My dear father, I have come to ask you to grant me one request. I have asked for little since I have been here and I trust you will bear this in mind.”

  The old Duke looked at her sourly. He was feeling ill and was displeased with life. Often he wondered what would happen to Ferrara when it was ruled by his son Alfonso; he remembered too that he hated the marriage which had allied his house with that of the Borgias—a family which was now of no consequence in Italy; moreover there was no son yet. If this marriage was going to prove unfruitful he would do all in his power to undo it—ducats or no ducats.

  “Well,” he said, “what is this you would ask?”

  “I would ask you to allow me to invite my brother to Ferrara.”

  “Are you mad?”

  “Is it mad to wish to see a member of my family?”

  “It would be madness to invite your brother here.”

  “My brother is sick. Remember how he brought me back to life. He needs nursing. Who should do that but his sister?”

  Ercole smiled unpleasantly. “We want no scandals brought into Ferrara,” he said.

  “I promise you there would be none.”

  “There always will be scandal where two Borgias are together,” retorted the Duke cruelly.

  “You are a man with a family,” persisted Lucrezia, “you must know something of the ties which bind families together.”

  “I understand nothing of the ties which bind the Borgias. Nor do I wish to.”

  “But you must hear me. Allow me to invite my brother and the
children of the Vatican to Ferrara. Let it be a short visit. I promise you it shall be so. But I beg of you, give me your permission to ask my brother here. He would not wish to stay. Maybe he would go into France. He has estates there.”

  “The King of France has written to me that on no account will he be allowed into France in spite of your supplications. He advises me to have nothing to do with the priest’s bastard.”

  Lucrezia was unpleasantly startled. She had had high hopes of Cesare’s being able to go to France. The French King had always been his friend, she had believed; and he had a family there.

  She looked pleadingly into the tight-lipped gray old face, but the Duke was adamant.

  He closed his eyes. “I am very tired,” he said. “Go now and be thankful that you made a good match before it was too late to do so.”

  “A good match?” she said with an air of defiance. “Do you think I am so happy here?”

  “You’re a fool if you prefer a prison in Rome to your apartments in the palace here.”

  “I see,” said Lucrezia, “that I was foolish to hope … for kindness … for sympathy.”

  “You were foolish if you thought I would have more than one Borgia at my court.”

  He watched her sardonically as she left him.

  * * *

  Cesare took a last look round the apartments. No more would he lie on that bed, his drawn sword at his side, no more order those elaborate meals, nor play cards with his jailers. He had done that which, such a short while ago, he had sworn he would never do. He had surrendered Romagna as the price of freedom. Now he could walk out of his prison; but he must leave Rome.

  He was filled with hope. His sojourn in the Borgia Tower had given him back his strength. In some safe place he would make his plans, and within a few months he would win back all he had lost.

  He wished that he could go to Ferrara. He needed Lucrezia at such a time. By the saints, he thought, I’ll remember old Ercole for this insult. He shall wish that he had never been born before I have done with him.