Madonna of the Seven Hills (3 page)

“Come,” he said, “we will go to your mistress.”

He led the way. The little maid, following, realized suddenly that she had forgotten to tell him the sex of the child, and that he had forgotten to ask.

The baby was
brought to the Cardinal who touched its brow and blessed it.

The women fell back; they looked shame-faced as though they were to be blamed for the sex of the child.

It was a beautiful baby; there was a soft down of fair hair on the little head, and Roderigo believed that Vannozza had given him another golden beauty.

“A little girl,” said Vannozza, watching him from the bed.

He strode to her, took her hand and kissed it.

“A beautiful little girl,” he said.

“My lord is disappointed,” said Vannozza wearily. “He hoped for a boy.”

Roderigo laughed, that deep-throated musical laugh which made most people who heard it love him.

“Disappointed!” he said. “I?” Then he looked round at the women who had come closer, his eyes resting on them each in turn, caressingly, speculatively. “Disappointed because she is of the feminine sex? But you know … every one of you … that I love the soft sex with all my heart, and I can find a tenderness for it which I would deny to my own.”

The women laughed and Vannozza laughed with them; but her sharp eyes had noticed the little maid who wore an expectant expression as Roderigo’s glance lingered upon her.

She decided that, as soon as they returned to Rome, that child should be dismissed and, if Roderigo should look for her, he would look in vain.

“So my lord is pleased with our daughter?” murmured Vannozza, and signed to the women to leave her with the Cardinal.

“I verily believe,” said Roderigo, “that I shall find a softer spot in my heart for this sweet girl even than for those merry young rogues who now inhabit your nurseries. We will christen her Lucrezia; and when you are recovered, Madonna, we will return to Rome.”

And so on
that April day in the Borgia castle at Subiaco was born the child whose name was to be notorious throughout the world: Lucrezia Borgia.

THE PIAZZA PIZZO DI MERLO

H
ow delighted Vannozza was to be back in Rome!
It seemed to her during those months which followed the birth of Lucrezia that she was the happiest of women. Roderigo visited her nurseries more frequently than ever; there was an additional attraction in the golden-haired little girl.

She was a charming baby—very sweet-tempered—and would lie contentedly in her crib giving her beautiful smile to any who asked for it.

The little boys were interested in her. They would stand one on either side of the crib and try to make her laugh. They quarrelled about her. Cesare and Giovanni would always seize on any difference between them and make a quarrel about it.

Vannozza laughed with her women, listening to their bickering: “She’s
my
sister.” “No, she’s
my
sister.” It had been explained to them that she was the sister of both of them.

Cesare had answered, his eyes flashing: “But she is more mine than Giovanni’s. She loves me—Cesare—better than Giovanni.”

That, the nursemaid told him, will be for Lucrezia herself to decide.

Giovanni watched his brother with smoldering eyes; he knew why Cesare wanted Lucrezia to love him best. Cesare was aware that when Uncle Roderigo called it was always Giovanni who had the bigger share of sweetmeats; it was always Giovanni who was lifted up in those strong arms and kissed and caressed before the magnificent Uncle Roderigo turned to Cesare.

Therefore Cesare was determined that everyone else should love him best. His mother did. The nurserymaids said they did; but that might have been because, if they did not, he would have his revenge in some way, and they knew that it was more unwise to offend Cesare than Giovanni.

Lucrezia, as soon as she was able to show a preference, should show it for him. He was determined on that. That was why he hung about her crib even more than Giovanni did, putting out his hand to let those little fingers curl about his thumb.

“Lucrezia,” he would whisper. “This is Cesare, your brother. You love him best … best of all.” She would look at him with those wide blue eyes, and he would command: “Laugh, Lucrezia. Laugh like this.”

The women would crowd round the crib to watch, for strangely enough Lucrezia invariably obeyed Cesare; and when Giovanni tried to make her laugh for him, Cesare would be behind his brother pulling such demoniacal faces that Lucrezia cried instead.

“It’s that demon, Cesare,” said the women to one another, for although he was but five years old they dared not say it to Cesare.

One day, six months after Lucrezia’s birth, Vannozza was tending her vines and flowers in her garden. She had her gardeners but this was a labor of love. Her plants were beautiful and it delighted her to look after them herself for her garden and her house were almost as dear to her as her family. Who would not be proud of such a house with its façade, facing the piazza, and the light room with the big window, so different from most of the gloomy rooms in other Roman houses. She had a water cistern too, which was a rare thing.

Her maid—not the one whom Roderigo had admired; she had long since left Vannozza’s service—came to tell her that the Cardinal had called, and with him was another gentleman; but even as the girl spoke Roderigo stepped into the garden, and he was alone.

“My lord,” cried Vannozza, “that you should find me thus.…”

Roderigo’s smile was disarming. “But you look charming among your plants,” he told her.

“Will you not come into the house? I hear you have brought a guest. The women should have attended to you better.”

“But it was my wish to speak to you alone … out here while you worked among your flowers.”

She was startled. She knew that he had something important to say, and she wondered whether he preferred to say it out of doors because even in well-ordered houses such as hers servants had a habit of listening to what they should not.

A cold fear numbed her mind as she wondered if he had come to tell her that this was the end of their liaison. She was acutely conscious of her thirty-eight years. She guarded her beauty well, but even so, a woman of thirty-eight who had borne several children could not compete with young girls; and there could scarcely be a young girl who, if she could resist the charm of the Cardinal, would be able to turn away from all that such an influential man could bring a mistress.

“My lord,” she said faintly, “you have news.”

The Cardinal lifted his serene face to the sky and smiled his most beautiful smile.

“My dear Vannozza,” he said, “as you know, I hold you in the deepest regard.” Vannozza caught her breath in horror. It sounded like the beginning of dismissal. “You live here in this house with our three children. It is a happy little home, but there is something missing; these children have no father.”

Vannozza wanted to cast herself at his feet, to implore him not to remove his benevolent presence from their lives. They might as well be dead if he did. As well try to live without the sun. But she knew how he disliked unpleasant scenes; and she said calmly: “My children have the best father in the world. I would rather they had never been born than that they should have had another.”

“You say delightful things … delightfully,” said Roderigo. “These are my children and dearly I love them. Never shall I forget the great service you have done me in giving them to me, my dearest love.”

“My lord.…” The tears had come to her eyes and she dashed them
away, but Roderigo was looking at the sky, so determined was he not to see them.

“But it is not good that you should live in this house—a beautiful and still young woman, with your children about you, and only the uncle of those children to visit you.”

“My lord, if I have offended you in some way I pray you tell me quickly where I have been at fault.”

“You have committed no fault, my dear Vannozza. It is but to make life easier for you that I have made these plans. I want none to point at you and whisper: ‘Ah, there goes Vannozza Catanei, the woman who has children and no husband.’ That is why I have found a husband for you.”

“A husband! But, my lord …”

Roderigo silenced her with an authoritative smile. “You have a young baby in this house, Vannozza; she is six months old. Therefore you must have a husband.”

This was the end. She knew it. He would not have provided her with a husband if he had not tired of her.

He read her thoughts. But it was not entirely true that he was weary of her; he would always have some affection for her and would continue to visit her house, but that would be mainly to see his children; there were younger women with whom he wished to spend his leisure. There was some truth in what he was telling her; he did think it wise that she should be known as a married woman, for he could not have it said that his little ones were the children of a courtesan.

He said quickly: “Your husband’s duties will be to live in this house, to appear with you in public. They will end there, Vannozza.”

“Your lordship means?”

“Do you think that I could mean anything else? I am a jealous lover, Vannozza. Have you not yet learned that?”

“I know you to be jealous when you are a lover, my lord.”

He laid his hand on her shoulder. “Have no fear, Vannozza. You and I have been together too long to part now. It is solely for the sake of our children that I take this step. And I have chosen a quiet man to be your husband. He is a good man, a man of great respectability, and he is prepared to be the only sort of husband I could content myself with giving you.”

She took his hand and kissed it.

“And your Eminence will come and visit us now and then?”

“As ever, my dear. As ever. Now come and meet Giorgio di Croce. You will see that he is a mild-tempered man; you will have no difficulty with such a one, I do assure you.”

She followed him into the house, wondering what inducement had been offered to this man that he had agreed to marry her. It was not difficult to guess. There would be scarcely a man in Rome who would refuse to marry a woman whom the influential Cardinal had selected for him.

Vannozza was uneasy. She did not care to be bartered thus, as though she were a slave. She would certainly keep Giorgio di Croce in his place.

In her room which overlooked the piazza he was waiting. He rose as they entered and the Cardinal made the introductions.

The mild-tempered man took her hands and kissed them; she studied him and saw that his pale eyes gleamed as he took in her voluptuous charm.

Did the Cardinal notice? If so, he gave no sign.

From the loggia
of her mother’s house Lucrezia looked out on the piazza and watched with quiet pleasure the people who passed. The city of the seven hills outside her mother’s house fascinated her, and it was her favorite pleasure to slip out to the loggia and watch people passing over the St. Angelo Bridge. There were Cardinals on white mules whose silver bridles gleamed in the sunshine; there were masked ladies and gentlemen; there were litters, curtained so that it was impossible to see the occupants.