CHAPTER III. PIER LUIGI FARNESE
We left Milan that same day, and there followed for some months a seasonof wandering through Lombardy, going from castle to castle, from tyrannyto tyranny, just the three of us--Galeotto and myself with Falcone forour equerry and attendant.
Surely something of the fanatic's temperament there must have beenin me; for now that I had embraced a cause, I served it with all thefanaticism with which on Monte Orsaro I sought to be worthy of thecourse I had taken then.
I was become as an apostle, preaching a crusade or holy war against theDevil's lieutenant on earth, Messer Pier Luigi Farnese, sometime Dukeof Castro, now Duke of Parma and Piacenza--for the investiture dulyfollowed in the August of that year, and soon his iron hand began tobe felt throughout the State of which the Pope had constituted him aprince.
And to the zest that was begotten of pure righteousness, Galeottocunningly added yet another and more worldly spur. We were riding oneday in late September of that year from Cortemaggiore, where we hadspent a month in seeking to stir the Pallavicini to some spirit ofresistance, and we were making our way towards Romagnese, the strongholdof that great Lombard family of dal Verme.
As we were ambling by a forest path, Galeotto abruptly turned to me,Falcone at the time being some little way in advance of us, and startledme by his words.
"Cavalcanti's daughter seemed to move you strangely, Agostino," he said,and watched me turn pale under his keen glance.
In my confusion--more or less at random--"What should Cavalcanti'sdaughter be to me?" I asked.
"Why, what you will, I think," he answered, taking my questionliterally. "Cavalcanti would consider the Lord of Mondolfo and Carminaa suitable mate for his daughter, however he might hesitate to marry herto the landless Agostino d'Anguissola. He loved your father better thanany man that ever lived, and such an alliance was mutually desired."
"Do you think I need this added spur?" quoth I.
"Nay, I know that you do not. But it is well to know what rewardmay wait upon our labour. It makes that labour lighter and increasescourage."
I hung my head, without answering him, and we rode silently amain.
He had touched me where the flesh was raw and tender. Bianca de'Cavalcanti! It was a name I uttered like a prayer, like a holyinvocation. Just so had I been in a measure content to carry that nameand the memory of her sweet face. To consider her as the possibleLady of Mondolfo when I should once more have come into my own, was toconsider things that filled me almost with despair.
Again I experienced such hesitations as had kept me from ever seekingher at Pagliano, though I had been given the freedom of her garden.Giuliana had left her brand upon me. And though Bianca had by nowachieved for me what neither prayers nor fasting could accomplish, andhad exorcized the unholy visions of Giuliana from my mind, yet when Icame to consider Bianca as a possible companion--as something moreor something less than a saint enthroned in the heaven created by myworship of her--there rose between us ever that barrier of murderand adultery, a barrier which not even in imagination did I dare tooverstep.
I strove to put such thoughts from my mind that I might leave it free todo the work to which I had now vowed myself.
All through that winter we pursued our mission. With the dal Verme wehad but indifferent success, for they accounted themselves safe, being,like Cavalcanti, feudatories of the Emperor himself, and nowise includedin the territories of Parma and Piacenza. From Romagnese we made our wayto the stronghold of the Anguissola of Albarola, my cousins, who gaveme a very friendly welcome, and who, though with us in spirit andparticularly urged by their hatred of our guelphic cousin Cosimo who wasnow Pier Luigi's favourite, yet hesitated as the others had done. Andwe met with little better success with Sforza of Santafiora, towhose castle we next repaired, or yet with the Landi, the Scotti, orConfalonieri. Everywhere the same spirit of awe was abroad, and the samepusillanimity, content to hug the little that remained rather than rearits head to demand that which by right belonged.
So that when the spring came round again, and our mission done, ourcrusade preached to hearts that would not be inflamed, we turnedour steps once more towards Pagliano, we were utterly dispiritedmen--although, for myself, my despondency was tempered a little by thethought that I was to see Bianca once more.
Yet before I come to speak of her again, let me have done with thesehistorical matters in so far as they touched ourselves.
We had left the nobles unresponsive, as you have seen. But soon theprognostications of the crafty Gonzaga were realized. Soon Farnese,through his excessive tyranny, stung them out of their apathy. The firstto feel his iron hand were the Pallavicini, whom he stripped of theirlands of Cortemaggiore, taking as hostages Girolamo Pallavicini's wifeand mother. Next he hurled his troops against the dal Verme, forcingRomagnese to capitulate, and then seeking similarly to reduce theirother fief of Bobbio. Thence upon his all-conquering way, he marchedupon Castel San Giovanni, whence he sought to oust the Sforza, andat the same time he committed the mistake of attempting to drive theGonzaga out of Soragna.
This last rashness brought down upon his head the direct personalresentment of Ferrante Gonzaga. With the Imperial troops at his heelsthe Governor of Milan not only intervened to save Soragna for hisfamily, but forced Pier Luigi to disgorge Bobbio and Romagnese,restoring them to the dal Verme, and compelled him to raise the siege ofSan Giovanni upon which he was at the time engaged--claiming that boththese noble houses were feudatories of the Empire.
Intimidated by that rude lesson, Pier Luigi was forced to draw in hissteely claws. To console himself, he turned his attention to the Val diTaro, and issued an edict commanding all nobles there to disarm, disbandtheir troops, quit their fortresses, and go to reside in the principalcities of their districts. Those who resisted or demurred, he crushedat once with exile and confiscation; and even those who meekly did hiswill, he stripped of all privileges as feudal lords.
Even my mother, we heard, was forced to dismiss her trivial garrison,having been ordered to close the Citadel of Mondolfo, and take up herresidence in our palace in the city itself. But she went further thanshe was bidden--she took the veil in the Convent of Santa Chiara, and soretired from the world.
The State began to ferment in secret at so much and such harsh tyranny.Farnese was acting in Piacenza as Tarquin of old had acted in hisgarden, slicing the tallest poppies from their stems. And soon to swellhis treasury, which not even his plunder, brigandage, and extortionateconfiscations could fill sufficiently to satisfy his greed, he sethimself to look into the past lives of the nobles, and to promulgatelaws that were retroactive, so that he was enabled to levy fresh finesand perpetrate fresh sequestrations in punishment of deeds that had beendone long years ago.
Amongst these, we heard that he had Giovanni d'Anguissola decapitated ineffigy for his rebellion against the authority of the Holy See, and thatmy tyrannies of Mondolfo and Carmina were confiscated from me because ofmy offence in being Giovanni d'Anguissola's son. And presently we heardthat Mondolfo had been conferred by Farnese upon his good and loyalservant and captain, the Lord Cosimo d'Anguissola, subject to a tax of athousand ducats yearly!
Galeotto ground his teeth and swore horribly when the news was broughtus from Piacenza, whilst I felt my heart sink and the last hopeof Bianca--the hope secretly entertained almost against hopeitself--withering in my soul.
But soon came consolation. Pier Luigi had gone too far. Even rats whencornered will turn at bay and bare their teeth for combat. So now thenobles of the Valnure and the Val di Taro.
The Scotti, the Pallavicini, the Landi, and the Anguissola of Albarola,came one after the other in secret to Pagliano to interview the gloomyGaleotto. And at one gathering that was secretly held in a chamber ofthe castle, he lashed them with his furious scorn.
"You are come now," he jeered at them, "now that you are maimed; nowthat you have been bled of half your strength; now that most of yourteeth are drawn. Had you but had the spirit and good sense to rise s
ixmonths ago when I summoned you so to do, the struggle had been briefand the victory certain. Now the fight will be all fraught with risk,dangerous to engage, and uncertain of issue."
But it was they--these men who themselves had been so pusillanimous atfirst--who now urged him to take the lead, swearing to follow him to thedeath, to save for their children what little was still left them.
"In that spirit I will not lead you a step," he answered them. "If weraise our standard, we fight for all our ancient rights, for all ourprivileges, and for the restoration of all that has been confiscated;in short, for the expulsion of the Farnese from these lands. If that isyour spirit, then I will consider what is to be done--for, believe me,open warfare will no longer avail us here. What we have to do mustbe done by guile. You have waited too long to resolve yourselves. Andwhilst you have grown weak, Farnese has been growing strong. He hasfawned upon and flattered the populace; he has set the people againstthe nobles; he has pretended that in crushing the nobles he was servingthe people, and they--poor fools!--have so far believed him that theywill run to his banner in any struggle that may ensue."
He dismissed them at last with the promise that they should hear fromhim, and on the morrow, attended by Falcone only, he rode forth againfrom Pagliano, to seek out the dal Verme and the Sforza of Santafioraand endeavour to engage their interest against the man who had outragedthem.
And that was early in August of the year '46.
I remained at Pagliano by Galeotto's request. He would have no needof me upon his mission. But he might desire me to seek out some of theothers of the Val di Taro with such messages as he should send me.
And in all this time I had seen but little of Monna Bianca. We met underher father's eye in that gold-and-purple dining-room; and there I woulddevoutly, though surreptitiously, feast my eyes upon the exquisitebeauty of her. But I seldom spoke to her, and then it was upon the mosttrivial matters; whilst although the summer was now full fragrantlyunfolded, yet I never dared to intrude into that garden of hers to whichI had been bidden, ever restrained by the overwhelming memory of thepast.
So poignant was this memory that at times I caught myself wonderingwhether, after all, I had not been mistaken in lending an ear so readilyto the arguments of Fra Gervasio, whether Fra Gervasio himself had notbeen mistaken in assuming that my place was in the world, and whether Ihad not done best to have carried out my original intention of seekingrefuge in some monastery in the lowly position of a lay brother.
Meanwhile the Lord of Pagliano used me in the most affectionate andfatherly manner. But not even this sufficed to encourage me wherehis daughter was concerned, and I seemed to observe also that Biancaherself, if she did not actually avoid my society, was certainly at nopains to seek it.
What the end would have been but for the terrible intervention there wasin our affairs, I have often surmised without result.
It happened that one day, about a week after Galeotto had left us thererode up to the gates of Pagliano a very magnificent company, and therewas great braying of horns, stamping of horses and rattle of arms.
My Lord Pier Luigi Farnese had been on a visit to his city of Parma, andon his return journey had thought well to turn aside into the lands ofultra-Po, and pay a visit to the Lord of Pagliano, whom he did not love,yet whom, perhaps, it may have been his intention to conciliate, sincehurt him he could not.
Sufficiently severe had been the lesson he had received for meddlingwith Imperial fiefs; and he must have been mad had he thought ofprovoking further the resentment of the Emperor. To Farnese, Charles Vwas a sleeping dog it was as well to leave sleeping.
He rode, then, upon his friendly visit into the Castle of Pagliano,attended by a vast retinue of courtiers and ladies, pages, lackeys, anda score of men-at-arms. A messenger had ridden on in advance towarn Cavalcanti of the honour that the Duke proposed to do him,and Cavalcanti, relishing the honour no whit, yet submitting out ofdiscreetness, stood to receive his excellency at the foot of the marblestaircase with Bianca on one side and myself upon the other.
Under the archway they rode, Farnese at the head of the cavalcade. Hebestrode a splendid white palfrey, whose mane and tail were henna-dyed,whose crimson velvet trappings trailed almost to the ground. He wasdressed in white velvet, even to his thigh-boots, which were laced withgold and armed with heavy gold spurs. A scarlet plume was clasped by agreat diamond in his velvet cap, and on his right wrist was perched ahooded falcon.
He was a tall and gracefully shaped man of something over forty years ofage, black-haired and olive-skinned, wearing a small pointed beard thatadded length to his face. His nose was aquiline, and he had fine eyes,but under them there were heavy brown shadows, and as he came nearer itwas seen that his countenance was marred by an unpleasant eruption ofsores.
After him came his gentlemen, a round dozen of them, with half thatnumber of splendid ladies, all a very dazzling company. Behind these,in blazing liveries, there was a cloud of pages upon mules, and lackeysleading sumpter-beasts; and then to afford them an effective background,a grey, steel phalanx of men-at-arms.
I describe his entrance as it appeared at a glance, for I did not studyit or absorb any of its details. My horrified gaze was held by a figurethat rode on his right hand, a queenly woman with a beautiful palecountenance and a lazy, insolent smile.
It was Giuliana.
How she came there I did not at the moment trouble to reflect. She wasthere. That was the hideous fact that made me doubt the sight of my owneyes, made me conceive almost that I was at my disordered visions again,the fruit of too much brooding. I felt as if all the blood were beingexhausted from my heart, as if my limbs would refuse their office, andI leaned for support against the terminal of the balustrade by which Istood.
She saw me. And after the first slight start of astonishment, her lazysmile grew broader and more insolent. I was but indifferently consciousof the hustle about me, of the fact that Cavalcanti himself was holdingthe Duke's stirrup, whilst the latter got slowly to the ground andrelinquished his falcon to a groom who wore a perch suspended from hisneck, bearing three other hooded birds. Similarly I was no more thanconscious of being forced to face the Duke by words that Cavalcanti wasuttering. He was presenting me.
"This, my lord, is Agostino d'Anguissola."
I saw, as through a haze, the swarthy, pustuled visage frown down uponme. I heard a voice which was at once harsh and effeminate and quitedetestable, saying in unfriendly tones:
"The son of Giovanni d'Anguissola of Mondolfo, eh?"
"The same, my lord," said Cavalcanti, adding generously--"Giovannid'Anguissola was my friend."
"It is a friendship that does you little credit, sir," was the harshanswer. "It is not well to befriend the enemies of God."
Was it possible that I had heard aright? Had this human foulness daredto speak of God?
"That is a matter upon which I will not dispute with a guest," saidCavalcanti with an urbanity of tone belied by the anger that flashedfrom his brown eyes.
At the time I thought him greatly daring, little dreaming that,forewarned of the Duke's coming, his measures were taken, and thatone blast from the silver whistle that hung upon his breast would haveproduced a tide of men-at-arms that would have engulfed and overwhelmedMesser Pier Luigi and his suite.
Farnese dismissed the matter with a casual laugh. And then a lazy,drawling voice--a voice that once had been sweetest music to my ears,but now was loathsome as the croaking of Stygian frogs--addressed me.
"Why, here is a great change, sir saint! We had heard you had turnedanchorite; and behold you in cloth of gold, shining as you wouldout-dazzle Phoebus."
I stood palely before her, striving to keep the loathing from my face,and I was conscious that Bianca had suddenly turned and was regarding uswith eyes of grave concern.
"I like you better for the change," pursued Giuliana. "And I vowthat you have grown at least another inch. Have you no word for me,Agostino?"
I was forced to answer her. "I trust that all
is well with you,Madonna," I said.
Her lazy smile grew broader, displaying the dazzling whiteness ofher strong teeth. "Why, all is very well with me," said she, and hersidelong glance at the Duke, half mocking, half kindly with an odiouskindliness, seemed to give added explanations.
That he should have dared bring here this woman whom no doubt he hadwrested from his creature Gambara--here into the shrine of my pure andsaintly Bianca--was something for which I could have killed him then,for which I hated him far more bitterly than for any of those darkturpitudes that I had heard associated with his odious name.
And meanwhile there he stood, that Pope's bastard, leaning over myBianca, speaking to her, and in his eyes the glow of a dark and unholyfire what time they fed upon her beauty as the slug feeds upon the lily.He seemed to have no thought for any other, nor for the circumstancethat he kept us all standing there.
"You must come to our Court at Piacenza, Madonna," I heard himmurmuring. "We knew not that so fair a flower was blossoming unseenin this garden of Pagliano. It is not well that such a jewel shouldbe hidden in this grey casket. You were made to queen it in a court,Madonna; and at Piacenza you shall be hailed and honoured as its queen."And so he rambled on with his rough and trivial flattery, his foullypimpled face within a foot of hers, and she shrinking before him, verywhite and mute and frightened. Her father looked on with darkling brows,and Giuliana began to gnaw her lip and look less lazy, whilst in thecourtly background there was a respectful murmuring babble, supplying asycophantic chorus to the Duke's detestable adulation.
It was Cavalcanti, at last, who came to his daughter's rescue by aperemptory offer to escort the Duke and his retinue within.