Sins of the House of Borgia (36 page)

“Allow me, Monna Violante,” he said, handing me the parchments with a look that said, I know what this is; my master knows; he will do nothing for now, but beware.

“Thank you, Ser Vittorio, my mistress is grateful for your gallantry.” He nodded and melted back into the crowd. I believed we understood one another. Somehow, with my back to Don Alfonso, I managed to slip the second parchment into my sleeve before handing Bembo’s eulogy to Donna Lucrezia for her approval. My heartbeat was just beginning to return to normal when she rose from her chair. “Messer Pietro,” she said, “come closer.” Oh God, what now? What had they been writing in the letters I carried to make her so indiscreet?

Don Alfonso frowned. “Sit down, woman, and let the game begin before these children are all crying for their mothers.”

Donna Isabella, acutely sensitive to any hint of discord between her brother and his Borgia wife, had discarded Fidelma and was watching Don Alfonso and Donna Lucrezia as though they were combatants in a close fought game of tennis. Donna Lucrezia served her ace.

“I wished to ask Ser Pietro to cast his eye over some verses I have written. I fear they are too poor for their subject.” She bestowed a meaningful smile on her husband. “I hope Ser Pietro can help me make them more worthy.”

“Ah.” Don Alfonso cleared his throat; he shifted about in his chair and his naturally high colour deepened a little. “Well, well, wife. I am certain anything you would write would honour so unworthy a subject.” He took her hand and patted it. He picked up Fonsi, who had slid from her lap as she rose and was now scrabbling at Don Alfonso’s knee, and while his attention was distracted, Donna Lucrezia handed her “verses” to Bembo and a look passed between them which I envied to the core of my being.

Only some time later, when the Battagliuola was in full swing, did I consider the significance of Vittorio. The din of screaming children and cheering adults, of squashes smashing into the convent doors and cabbages clattering against braziers was keeping my baby wakeful. As he turned somersaults and pummelled my belly, and a small pumpkin hurtled past within inches of my nose, I began to wonder if, in years to come, he would take part in Battagliuole, and if he would have brothers to fight alongside him.

How soon after the birth could I return to my lover’s bed to begin making those brothers? What was the ruling of the Church on such matters? Was it true that breast feeding prevented pregnancy? When would it be safe to lie with him again? I had never stopped wanting Cesare, though whenever I saw myself in a mirror, I wondered where the I was who had been desirable to him. I longed for him to know about his child and come to Ferrara and lay his palm against my belly and feel our baby reach out towards its warmth, but I feared his reaction should he see my extroverted navel and the skin stretched taut and shiny over my leaking breasts.

Then I thought of Vittorio, of the look he gave me as he handed me Bembo’s papers. Cesare must know, of course he must. He was far from depending only on letters from his sister for his intelligence at the court of Ferrara. Perhaps his silence meant he suspected the child was not his. He had given me my name because I had once broken a promise I had made him. Why should he believe I would be a faithful mistress? So I must tell him. If madonna would not write to him, then I must.

I could no longer give my attention to the spectacle. The letter I had to write clamoured to be let out on to the page. I could almost feel the pen in my hand, the feather tickling my palm, the yield and spring of the nib as I pressed it into clean vellum and formed the words. What words? Should I give the bare facts of the matter or dress them in declarations of love? Dwell on the practicalities or write of our child as the embodiment of our passion, a tie which bound us for life? Should I leaven my news with humour, or would that make him believe me too frivolous to make a fitting mother for his son? The more I thought about it, the more impossible the task became.

Then I remembered the letter tucked into my sleeve, the poet’s letter to his mistress. Surely there could be no better example for me to follow. But if I were to have an opportunity to read it before handing it over to Donna Lucrezia, I must leave the Battagliuola before her; I must leave now. Turning to Ser Taddeo, who was standing behind my chair, I touched his sleeve to gain his attention.

“I feel a little unwell, my dear,” I told him. “I think I would like to rest awhile, if you would be kind enough to escort me back to the castle.”

“Will the duchess permit it?” he asked, casting a doubtful glance towards madonna, who was absorbed in feeding sweets to her little dog while Don Alfonso cheered on a sortie by the Ferrarese forces from behind a barricade of green and yellow striped marrows.

“As you know, the welfare of this child concerns her closely. She will excuse me if you explain the reason, and come straight back yourself.”

“Should I ask Donna Angela to accompany you?”

“I would prefer it to be you.” I squeezed his wrist and gave him a smile I hoped conveyed both warmth and vulnerability.

He picked his way cautiously across ground made treacherous by squashed fruit and vegetables, dodging missiles as he went, wincing at the high-pitched screams of over-excited children. I watched him bow to madonna and Don Alfonso, madonna cocking one ear towards him to hear what he had to say above the din of battle. She cast me a troubled glance, I frowned and clenched my hands over my belly, she nodded and waved Ser Taddeo away impatiently as he attempted a second bow.

***

I overdid the delicacy of my condition a little on the way back to the castle, so that it took me some time to persuade Taddeo it was safe to leave me and no, I had no need of a physician. As soon as I had shut the door of my chamber on his bowing figure and anxious expression, I slid Bembo’s letter out of my sleeve. Seated on the edge of my bed, I unfolded it, careful to avoid leaving any trace of my subterfuge in the way of tears or creases or ink smudges. I wondered that so sensitive a piece of correspondence should be unsealed, then immediately realised that dollops of wax and ribbons would only make it more conspicuous. Far from being made reckless by their passion, these two were well versed in the skills of illicit courtship. They knew the rules of the game.

As I opened the letter, hot with shame at my disloyalty and anticipation of what I might find, yet another, smaller parchment fell out of it. It would have landed in my lap had I still got one. As it was, it slid over the mound of my belly on to the floor. I squatted to retrieve it then levered myself back up on to the bed. Bright spots danced before my eyes from the effort and I could not immediately catch my breath. I feared I was to be punished for lying to Taddeo by my lie coming true. Forcing myself to breathe steadily, willing my heartbeat to slow, I read the larger of the two parchments. It contained only a few words.

How could I better this? I return your lines to you, sweet lady, as the only possible expression of my sentiments, the perfect mirror to your perfect loveliness.

I unfolded the smaller page, where a verse was inscribed in Donna Lucrezia’s hand. I committed it to memory. I remember it still, though my reasons are more complicated than you might expect. It read thus:

I think were I to die

And with my wealth of pain

Cease longing,

Such great love to deny

Could make the world remain

Unloving.

When I consider this,

Death’s long delay is all

I must desire,

Since reason tells me bliss

Is felt by one in thrall

To such a fire.

Were these truly madonna’s words? She was a competent versifier, but no better than the rest of us when we composed sonnets or
maccheroni
to pass the time on wet days. We invented patterns of words and meanings with less thought than we embroidered shirts or altar cloths. I found it difficult to believe her capable of writing so plain and full of feeling. But if the poem was hers, dare I make use of it? Surely Cesare would recognise it. Then again, why should he? Why should he be interested in the lines madonna composed for her lovers? He was happier poring over Vitruvius or Caesar’s Gallic Wars than reading poetry of any kind. Besides, Vittorio could not have had sight of this letter; he had handed it straight to me after Bembo had dropped it. Unless he had eyes in Bembo’s inkwell, or a spy lodged in the poet’s heart, Cesare could not know what it contained.

I read it through again. I thought of how I would wake up sometimes, terrified, in the middle of the night. Convinced my baby was dead, I would press my palms against my belly and will him to kick. Then, feeling as though my body filled the whole dark space of the bedroom, squeezing out lamps and linen chests, even Angela’s usually empty bed, I was certain I would die giving birth to some monster, my womb torn and bleeding, my heart burst from the effort. Fear jangled the nerves in my arms and legs until I was forced to get out of bed and walk about, though the joints in my knees tended to grow stiff and painful during the night. How could I bear to die while Cesare still lived? What good could heaven do me while he remained on earth?
Such great love to deny, could make the world remain unloving.

My decision was made. I would send him the poem, and it would assure him far better than my own poor words that I was a faithful mistress and the child I was carrying was his. His son, God willing, his firstborn son.

***

With Carnival at an end, madonna distracted herself from the dreary privations of Lent by throwing herself into the preparations for my lying-in, which would begin after Easter. Perhaps taking vicarious pleasure in the fact that my condition excused me from the Lenten fast, she supervised my diet closely. If the child were to be a boy, I must eat only warm foods. She had all my dishes prepared in her own kitchens, usually under her personal supervision, or that of Angela, who made no secret of her resentment of this enforced time away from Giulio. You should not be thinking of love at this time, admonished madonna. Nor of beef with peppers or red fruit puddings, retorted Angela, putting in front of me a compote of figs in ginger syrup in a bowl decorated with a picture of a robust baby boy pissing an arc of golden urine into a stream. Eat, said madonna. I felt like a goose being fattened for
pate di fegato
.

The dish was one of a set Don Alfonso had made for Donna Lucrezia’s use during her ill-fated pregnancy of the summer before. It made me remember the shrivelled bundle of flesh and bones Cesare had cast into the moat, the grim cast of his mouth, and the way he dropped his eyelids so nothing could be read in his face of grief, or frustration, or anything else. I feared these thoughts would harm my child, but I could say nothing. It was a sign of madonna’s special favour that she was allowing me to use the dishes, and of Don Alfonso’s indulgence of her generosity towards me in my predicament. So I ate, but madonna must have read some reluctance in my face, spotted some hesitation so minute even I was unaware of it, as I put the spoon to my lips. Drawing her chair close to mine, so we would not be overheard, she murmured, “You see, if I had not been so ill, he would not have come when he did. Your baby was made from the loss of mine. Perhaps her soul may enter your child and live.”

***

Once Easter had passed, I moved out of the room I shared with Angela, into an inner chamber on the floor below madonna’s apartments where there was no risk of draughts from windows. There I would have to stay until my churching, six weeks after the birth of my child. Even sitting among the braziers in the orange garden was no longer advised by Donna Lucrezia’s doctors and the midwife she had engaged to attend me, if we were to be sure of the baby’s sex. I wondered, briefly, how madonna proposed to pursue her correspondence with Bembo, but I had not the energy to care much as my body swelled and my heart grew indolent.

To make absolutely certain I would not be exposed to cold, for it was a chilly spring, with damp, salt winds blowing off the Adriatic, madonna had the walls of my room hung with several layers of rugs and tapestries and the bottom of the door padded with a sort of fabric salami, a linen tube stuffed with wool and fastened at either end with a drawstring. Red brocade curtains surrounded my bed, which was piled with soft blankets made only from the wool of young rams. The fire was lit day and night, fed and stoked by the Dalmatian slave, whom madonna had lent me with misgiving because her sallow complexion indicated an excess of cold yellow bile in her nature. A male slave would have been better, but males could not enter a lying-in chamber.

I was glad of her silence, and Cesare’s arms stamped on her collar. It made me feel a part of him was there with me, muffled in my woollen gowns and choking in the fragrant smoke of the fire, in which handfuls of coriander seeds popped and spat to ensure a quick and easy delivery.

I was never alone. Madonna herself spent as much time in the lying-in chamber as her duties permitted, almost as though pregnancy were a contagion she hoped to catch from me. We women played at
biribissi
and cards, read to one another, or sang to pass the time. Fidelma read passages from the
De regimine praegnantium
of Michele Savonarola, the grandfather of Fra Girolamo, whose example had inspired her beloved Fra Raffaello. To my surprise, madonna tolerated the readings, and even praised the soundness of Ser Michele’s advice; the Savonaroli were a respected family in Ferrara, doctors and teachers at the university. Madonna’s Ferrarese women, many of whom were already married, told tales of their own confinements, tales which became darker and more lurid whenever madonna was absent. I knew they resented being obliged to attend the upstart Valentino’s concubine, and that they wanted to frighten me, perhaps even precipitate an early birth. But I was beyond their reach, inviolably content to sit and do nothing, to watch my companions sewing baby clothes or gambling their jewellery on a hand at
cacho
, to listen to Angela singing Giulio’s songs, her voice cracked as a broken heart in the smoky atmosphere.