Виктория Холт - Madonna of the Seven Hills

“Of what, Madonna?”

“I know not, I only know I am afraid. But when you put your arms about me, dear Pedro, I am less afraid. So … do not talk of leaving me. Talk only of staying with me, of helping me to forget these evil things which happen all about me. Pedro, sweet Pedro, talk no more of unworthiness. Stay with me, Pedro. Love me … for I love you too.”

He kissed her lips this time, wonderingly, marvelling, and she returned his kisses.

There was a wildness about her.

“Pedro, I keep seeing it. The pictures come to me. The party … the masked figure … and my brother … and then Giovanni. Oh Pedro, I must shut them out. I cannot bear them. I am frightened, Pedro. Help me … help me, my loved one, to forget.”

Alexander had givenorders that a search was to be made to find the murderers of his son, that they might be brought to justice, and there were rumors implicating various people, for Giovanni had had a host of enemies.

It was said that Giovanni Sforza had planned the murder; that he resented the affection between his wife and her family; and Giovanni Borgia had shared that affection with her brother Cesare and her father.

Giovanni Sforza and other suspects quickly established their innocence; there was one name, however, which none dared utter.

The Pope was too unhappy to voice his fears; nor would he face them. He was shut in his rooms alone because he feared someone might give voice to the terrible suspicion which at this time he was unable to face, even in his own thoughts.

This was the greatest tragedy of Alexander’s life and when, a few days after Giovanni’s body had been discovered, he stood before the Consistory, he mourned openly for the death of his beloved son.

“A worse blow could not have fallen upon us,” he declared, “since we loved the Duke of Gandia above all others. We would give most willingly seven tiaras if we could bring him back. We have been punished by God for our sins, for the Duke did not merit this terrible death.”

To the astonishment of all present, Alexander went on to declare that the way of life at the Vatican should be reformed and there should be no more pandering to worldly interests. He would renounce nepotism and begin the reforms in his own household.

The Cardinals were aghast. Never had they thought to hear Alexander make such utterances. He was a changed man.

Cesare sought audience with his father afterward, and looking at that stricken face he was filled with sharp jealousy as he asked himself: Would he have felt such grief for me?

“Father,” said Cesare, “what meant you by those words you spoke before the Cardinals?”

“We meant exactly what we said,” replied the Pope.

Cesare felt as though icy hands were gripping his body, realizing that his father would not meet his eyes.

“Then,” pursued Cesare, who could not leave this subject, once he had started it, “do you mean that you will do nothing to help me, to help Goffredo, Lucrezia and the rest of our family?”

The Pope was silent.

“Father, I beg of you, tell me what is in your mind.”

The Pope lifted his eyes to his son’s face, and Cesare saw there what he had dreaded to find. They held an accusation.

He suspects! thought Cesare. He knows.

Then he remembered those words which the Pope had spoken when he heard of Giovanni’s death. “To those who have dealt death to him so shall they be dealt with. Nothing shall be too bitter for them to endure.”

“Father,” said Cesare, “we must stand together after a tragedy such as this. We must not forget that, whatever happens to any of us, the family must go on.”

“We would be alone,” said the Pope. “Go from us now.”

Cesare went uneasily.

He sought out Sanchia. “I would Lucrezia were here,” he said. “She might comfort our father. But he did not ask even for her. He does not seem to want any of us now. He thinks of nothing but Giovanni.”

But Cesare could find no peace with Sanchia. He must go to his father once more. He must know whether he had read aright the accusation in those eyes.

He went to the Pope’s apartments, taking Sanchia and Goffredo with him, and after a long delay they were admitted.

Sanchia knelt at Alexander’s feet and lifted her beautiful blue eyes to his face. “Father, be comforted,” she said; “it is double grief to your children to see you so.”

The Pope looked at her with cold eyes. He said: “They quarrelled over you—he and his brother. Go from me. I am arranging that you shall leave Rome. You will be departing shortly, with your husband, for Squillace.”

“But Father,” began Sanchia, “we would comfort you in your bitter loss.”

“You comfort me most by removing yourself from my presence.”

It was the first time Cesare had seen his father unmoved by beauty.

“Please go now, you and Goffredo,” he said to Sanchia. Then, turning to Cesare, he went on: “I would have you stay.”

When they were alone they looked at each other, and there was no mistaking the meaning in Alexander’s eyes.

His voice broke as he said: “They shall search no more. I would not have them discover my son’s murderer now. I could bear no further misery.”

Cesare knelt and would have taken his father’s hand, but Alexander removed it. It was as though he could not bear to be touched by the hand which had slain Giovanni.

“I wish you to go to Naples,” he said. “You are appointed Cardinal Legate for the coronation of the new King.”

“Father, another could go,” protested Cesare.

“It is our wish that you should go,” said the Pope firmly. “Now, I pray you leave me. I would be alone with my grief.”

Pedro presented himselfdaily at the convent. When Sister Girolama suggested his visits were too frequent he had his explanations: His Holiness was prostrate with grief; his one comfort was derived from his daughter’s messages. He did not wish her to return to the Vatican which was deep in mourning, but to stay where she was that he might write to her and she to him. He wished to hear details of her daily life. That was why Pedro called so frequently at the convent.

This was not true, but it was a good enough excuse. It might have been that the sisters had realized that the beautiful girl would never be one of them. Perhaps they sensed her innate worldliness and made no effort to combat it.

Lucrezia lived in her cells which she had converted into comfortable rooms, and if Pedro visited her there instead of in the cold bare room at first assigned to them, that was a matter between the Pope’s daughter and her visitor. Her maid would act as chaperone and, although the maid was a very frivolous creature, she was one who had been selected for the post by the Holy Father, and it was not for the Prioress to complain.

Lucrezia had changed, but the nuns were not conscious of physical appearances, and it was left to Pantisilea to tell her that her eyes were brighter and that she was a hundred times lovelier than she had been when she, Pantisilea, had first come to attend her.

“It is love,” said Pantisilea.

“It is such a hopeless love,” murmured Lucrezia. “Sometimes I wonder where it can lead us.”

But when Pedro was with her she ceased to ask herself such practical questions. All that mattered to Lucrezia was the fulfillment of her love, for she was fully alive now to her own sensuality.

That love had begun in sorrow. She remembered well the day when the terrible shock of Giovanni’s death had made her turn to Pedro. It was then, when he had put his arms about her, that she had realized how deeply in love with him she was.

Love! It was a precious thing. It was worth facing danger for the sake of love; and she had discovered this about herself: She would never again be one to deny love.