After what seemed like an eternity, when the men turned up nothing, they gathered on the bridge just above his head. He heard one of them grumble, “The Roman is nowhere to be seen. The bastard probably drowned.”
“He’s better off drowned than swimming in that shit,” one of the others said.
“Let’s call it a night,” came a voice filled with authority. “Nero paid us to cut his throat, not to run around chasing a wild goose till dawn.”
He listened to the footsteps of the men as they walked across the bridge above his head, one by one, until he heard nothing more.
Concerned that they had left a guard watching from a window or balcony, Cesare swam quietly along the dark bank of the small canal into the Grand Canal itself, and finally up to the dock of his own palazzo. His night watchman, assigned by the doge, was amazed to see their honored guest pull himself out of the water shivering and foul-smelling.
In his quarters, after a hot bath, Cesare put on a clean robe and drank a mug of hot sherry. He sat for quite a time, deep in thought. Then he gave the orders that he would leave at dawn. When they reached the dry land of the Veneto, he would pick up his carriage.
Cesare didn’t sleep that night. As the sun rose over the lagoon, he climbed into a large gondola, manned by three of the doge’s men armed with swords and crossbows. They were about to cast off when a burly man in a dark uniform ran out onto the dock.
“Excellency,” he said breathlessly. “I must introduce myself before you go. I am the captain of the police overseeing this district of the city. Before you depart I want to apologize for the incident last night. Venice is full of thieves and bandits who will rob any stranger unlucky enough to be caught out at night.”
“You must keep more of your men where they can be found,” Cesare said sardonically.
The captain said, “You would do us a great favor if you would delay your voyage and accompany me to the area of the attack. Your escort can wait here. Perhaps we can go into one or two of the nearby houses so that you may identify your assailants.”
Cesare was torn. He wanted to be on his way, but he also wanted to know who had planned to attack him. Yet investigating the attack could take hours and he had too much to do. Others could bring him information. Now he must return to Rome.
“Captain,” Cesare said, “under ordinary circumstances I’d be pleased to help you, but my carriage is waiting. I hope to reach Ferrara by nightfall, for the country roads are as dangerous as your alleys. So you must excuse me.”
The big policeman smiled and tipped his helmet. “Will you be returning to Venice soon, Excellency?”
“I hope to,” Cesare said, smiling.
“Ah, perhaps you will help us then. You can contact me at police headquarters near the Rialto. My name is Bernardino Nerozzi, but everyone calls me ‘Nero.’ ”
On the long trip back to Rome, Cesare considered who could have hired the police captain to murder him in Venice. But it was a hopeless task, for there were too many possibilities. If he had been killed, he chuckled inwardly, there would have been so many suspects, the crime would never be solved.
Still, he wondered. Could it have been one of Alfonso’s Aragonese relatives, seeking revenge for his death? Or Giovanni Sforza, still angry and humiliated over his divorce and the claim of impotence? Or one of the Riario, enraged at the capture of Caterina Sforza? Or Giuliano della Rovere, who hated all the Borgia, no matter how civilized he pretended to be? Surely it could have been one of the vicars of Faenza, Urbino, or some other city who wanted to stop his campaign and prevent his planned attacks. Or any one of the hundreds of men who held a grudge against his father.
As his carriage arrived at the gates of Rome, he was certain of only one thing. He must watch his back, for it was certain now that someone wanted him dead.
If being bedded by Cesare took place in paradise, Alfonso’s death was Lucrezia’s fall from grace. For now she was forced to see her life, and her family, as it truly was. She felt cast out by her father, by the Holy Father, and by the Heavenly Father as well.
Her fall from innocence was a devastating time. For she had lived and loved in magical, mythical realms, but that had now come to an end. And, oh, how she grieved. She tried to remember how it began, and yet it seemed always to be. There was no beginning.
When she was just a babe, her father, sitting in the living quarters with her upon his lap, had regaled her with exciting myths peopled by Olympian gods and Titans. Was he not Zeus, the greatest Olympian god of all? For his voice was the thunder, his tears were the rain, his smile was the sun that shone on her face. And was she not Athena, the daughter-goddess who sprang full-grown from his head? Or Venus, the goddess of love, herself?
Her father read, with flying hands and eloquent words, of the story of creation. And then she was both the beautiful Eve, tempted by the snake, as well as the chaste Madonna, who gave birth to goodness itself.
In the arms of her father she felt shielded from harm; in the arms of the Holy Father she felt protected from evil; and so it was that she never feared death, for she was certain she would be safe in the arms of the Heavenly Father. For were they not all the same?
It was only now that she wore the black veil of the widow that the dark veil of illusion had been lifted from her eyes.
When she had bent to kiss the cold, stiff lips of her dead husband, she felt the emptiness of mortal man, and knew that life was suffering, and death would someday come. To her father, to Cesare, to her. Until that moment, in her heart they were immortal. And so now she wept for them all.
Some nights she was unable to sleep, and in the day she spent hours pacing her chambers, helpless to rest or find a moment’s peace. The shades of fear and shadows of doubt seduced her. Finally, she felt herself losing her last remnant of faith. She questioned all she had believed. And so she had no ground on which to stand.
“What is happening to me?” she asked Sancia, as for days she fell into terror or despair. Then she stayed in bed and grieved for Alfonso, and grew frightened for herself.
Sancia sat on the bed next to her and rubbed her forehead. She kissed her cheeks. “You are becoming aware that you are a pawn in your father’s game,” her sister-in-law explained. “Not more important than the conquering of your brother’s territories for the advancement of the Borgia family. And that is a difficult truth to bear.”
“But Papa isn’t like that,” Lucrezia tried to protest. “He has always been concerned for my happiness.”
“Always?” Sancia said, with some sarcasm. “That is a side of your father, and the Holy Father, that I am unable to see. But you must get well, you must stay strong. For your babies need you.”
“Is your father kind?” Lucrezia asked Sancia. “And does he treat you with worth?”
Sancia shook her head. “He is neither kind nor cruel to me now, for since the invasion by the French he has become ill—gone mad, some say—and yet I find him kinder than before. In Naples he is kept in a tower in the family palace, with each of us caring for him. Whenever he is frightened, he screams, ‘I hear France. The trees and the rocks call France.’ Yet for all his madness, I fear he is kinder than your father. For even when he was well I was not his world, and he was not mine. He was only my father, and so my love for him was never great enough to weaken me.”
Lucrezia wept even more, for there was truth in Sancia’s reasoning that she could no longer deny. Lucrezia swaddled herself in her blankets again. And tried to discern the ways in which her father had changed.
Her father told of a God who was merciful and joyous, but the Holy Father was an agent of a God who was punishing and often even cruel. Her heartbeat quickened when she dared to think, “How could so much evil be for good, and for God?”
It was then that she began at last to question the wisdom of her father. Was all she’d been taught good and right? Was her father truly the Vicar of Christ on earth? And was the Holy Father’s judgment also God’s? She was certain the gentle God she held in
her heart was very different from the punishing God who whispered in her father’s ears.
Less than one month after Alfonso’s death, Pope Alexander began the search for another husband for Lucrezia. Though it may have been heartless, he was determined to plan for her future, for in the event of his death he did not want her to find herself a helpless widow forced to eat from clay plates rather than silver.
Alexander called Duarte into his chambers to talk about the possibilities. “What do you think about Louis de Ligny?” Alexander asked. “He is, after all, a cousin of the king of France.”
Duarte said simply, “I don’t believe Lucrezia will find him acceptable.”
The Pope sent a message to Lucrezia in Nepi.
And received a message in return, which read, “I will not live in France.”
Next Alexander suggested Francisco Orsini, duke of Gravina.
Lucrezia’s return message read, “I do not wish to marry.”
When the Pope sent another message asking for her reasons, her reply was simple. “All my husbands are unlucky, and I do not wish another on my conscience.”
The Pope called again for Duarte. “She is simply impossible,” he said. “She is willful and irritating. I will not live forever, and if I die, only Cesare will be left to care for her.”
Duarte said, “She seems to get on well with Jofre, and Sancia too. She may need more time to recover from her grief. Call her back to Rome, and then you will have the opportunity to ask her to consider what you suggest. A new husband comes too close to the old, and Nepi is too far from Rome.”
The weeks passed slowly as Lucrezia tried to recover from her grief and find a reason to go on living. Finally one night, as she lay in bed reading by the light of her candles, her brother Jofre came to sit beside her bed.
Jofre’s thatched blond hair was hidden beneath a cap of green velvet, and his light eyes were bloodshot from lack of sleep. Lucrezia knew he had begged to retire early, and therefore found it peculiar that he was dressed in fresh clothes as though he was going out. But before she had any chance to question him he began to speak, as though his words were being forced from his lips.
“I have done things I am ashamed of,” he told her. “And for those I judge myself. No God would judge me so. And I have done things for which our father would judge me, yet I have never judged him so.”
Lucrezia sat up straighter in bed, her own eyes swollen from weeping. “What could you have done, little brother, that our father could judge? For, of the four of us, you were the least attended to, and the sweetest of all.”
Jofre looked at her, and she was witness to his struggle. He had waited so long to confess, and of anyone he most trusted her. “I cannot bear to carry this sin on my soul any longer,” he said. “For I’ve held it far too long.”
Lucrezia reached for his hand, for in his eyes she saw such confusion and guilt it made her own misery seem less. “What is it that so troubles you?” she asked.
“You will despise me for this truth,” he said. “If I speak of this to anyone but you, my life will be lost. Yet if I do not unburden myself, I fear I will go mad, or my soul will be lost. And for me that holds an even greater terror.”
Lucrezia was puzzled. “What is this sin that is so terrible it causes you to tremble?” she asked. “You can place your trust in me. I vow no danger will befall you, for your truth will never pass my lips.”
Jofre looked at his sister, and fell into a stutter. “It was not Cesare who killed our brother Juan.”
Lucrezia quickly placed her fingers to his lips. “Do not speak another word, my brother. Do not speak the words I can hear within my heart, for I have known you since you were the babe I held. But I am desperate to ask, what could be so dear that it would call for such an act?”
Jofre put his head on his sister’s chest and allowed her to hold him gently as he whispered. “Sancia,” he said. “For my soul is bound to hers in ways I do not understand. Without her, my own breath seems to stop.”
Lucrezia thought of Alfonso and she understood. Then she thought of Cesare. How tormented he must be. Now she felt a great compassion for all those victimized by love, and in that moment love seemed far more treacherous than war.
Cesare could not continue his campaign for the Romagna without first visiting his sister. He must see her to explain, to ask for forgiveness, to regain her love.
When he arrived in Nepi, Sancia tried to keep him away, but he pushed past her to his sister’s chambers and forced himself inside.
There Lucrezia sat, playing a plaintive tune on her lute. When she saw Cesare her fingers froze on the strings, her song stopped in the air.
He ran to her and kneeled before her, placing his head on her knees. “I curse the day I was born to cause you such grief. I curse the day I found I loved you more than life itself, and I wished for just one moment to see you again, before I fought another battle, for without your love no battle is even worth the fight.”
Lucrezia placed her hand on her brother’s auburn hair, and smoothed it in comfort until he could lift his head to look at her. Yet she said nothing.
“Can you ever forgive me?” he asked.
“How can I not?” she answered.
His eyes filled, though hers did not. “Do you love me still, above all else on earth?” he asked.
She breathed deeply, and found herself hesitating for just a moment. “I love you, my brother. For you too are less a player in this game than a pawn, and for that I pity us both.”
Cesare stood before her puzzled, but still he thanked her. “It will be easier to fight to gain more territories for Rome now that I have seen you again.”
“Go with care,” Lucrezia said. “For in truth, I could not bear another great loss.”
Before he left she allowed him to embrace her, and in spite of all that had happened she found herself comforted by him. “I am off to unify the Papal States,” he told her. “And when we meet again, I hope to have accomplished all I’ve promised.”
Lucrezia smiled. “With grace, someday soon we will both be back in Rome to stay.”
During her last months in Nepi, Lucrezia began to read constantly. She read the lives of saints, explored the lives of heroes and heroines, and studied the great philosophers. She filled her mind with knowledge. And she finally understood that there was only one decision she must make.
Would she live her life or would she take her life?
If she lived, she wondered, how would she find peace? She had already determined that no matter how many times her father traded her in marriage, she would never again love as she had loved Alfonso.
Yet to find peace she knew she must be able to forgive those who had wronged her, for if she could not, the anger she held in her heart and her mind would tether her to hate and rob her of her freedom.
Three months after she had arrived, she began by opening the doors to her palace in Nepi, to see the people, to listen to their complaints, and to construct a system of government that would serve the poor as well as those who carried gold. She determined to devote herself, and her life, to those who were helpless, who had suffered as she had. Those whose fate rested in the hands of rulers more powerful than themselves.
If she took the power her father had allowed her, and used the Borgia name for good as Cesare used his for war, she might find a life worth living. Like the saints who devoted their lives to God, she would from that day forward devote hers to helping others, and do it with such generosity and grace that when she met her death the face of God would smile upon her.
It was then that her father insisted that Lucrezia return to Rome.
23
IN ROME AGAIN, Cesare readied his army, and this time most of his soldiers were Italian and Spanish. His Italian infantrymen were well disciplined, and wore metal helmets with scarlet and gold doublets on which Cesare’s coat of arms had been embroidered. His army was led by talented Spanish captains, as well as veteran condottieri including Gian Baglioni and Paolo
Orsini. For chief of staff, Cesare chose his captain carefully: Vito Vitelli, who brought with him twenty-one superb cannons. Together there were 2,200 soldiers on horses and 4,300 infantrymen. Dion Naldi, Caterina’s old captain, brought his own troops to assist Cesare on his new quest.
The army’s first target was Pesaro, still ruled by Lucrezia’s ex-husband, Giovanni Sforza. Alexander had excommunicated him when it was discovered that he was in negotiations with the Turks to ward off the papal army.
Here too, as in Imola and Forli, the citizens themselves were not anxious to sacrifice their lives or property for their brutish ruler. Some of the leading citizens arrested Giovanni’s brother Galli when they heard Cesare was on his way, but rather than face his terrible ex-brother-in-law, Giovanni quickly fled to Venice to offer them his territory.
Cesare entered Pesaro in the rain, accompanied by his army of 150 men dressed in red and yellow uniforms, and were greeted by happy crowds and great fanfare. The citizens quickly surrendered and handed Cesare the keys to the city. Now he was lord of Pesaro.
With no battle to fight, Cesare went immediately to set up quarters in Sforza Castle, in the very apartments where his sister Lucrezia had lived. There he slept in her bed for two nights, dreaming of her.
The next morning he and Vitelli managed to confiscate seventy cannons from Pesaro’s arsenal before they continued on their campaign. By the time they reached Rimini, Cesare had added ninety cannons to his artillery. The most difficult obstacle to overcome was the heavy rains the army encountered on the long ride up the coastal road. But before Cesare even reached the gates, the citizens—on hearing of his coming—drove out their hated oppressors, the brothers Pan and Carlo Malatesta. And another city surrendered.
Cesare was buoyant about his victories, but his next conquest would prove to be a difficult and overwhelming task. His objective was Faenza, ruled by the beloved Astorre Manfredi. Not only was the city a powerful fortress surrounded by high crenellated walls for defense, but it was peopled by brave and loyal citizens. It was also protected by the best infantry in all of Italy. Faenza would not surrender without a fierce fight.