Blood & Beauty: A Novel of the Borgias
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His mind moves over the possibilities like fingers across the beads on a rosary.
His beloved Lucrezia will be the first. What a jewel her husband will be given. A minor Spanish nobleman might have been good enough for an illegitimate cardinal’s daughter, but not the offspring of a pope. He gives a little growl of pleasure at the thought. Of course Count d’Aversa has got wind of it early, such is the well-oiled gossip machine of Rome. While the negotiations for an alliance with the house of Sforza continue, they still need Spain as a smokescreen. He will grant the man an audience and soothe his wounded pride. ‘No, no, my dear count. The rumours are put about deliberately to throw others off the scent. Of course she is yours. Just give me time to make it secure.’
What pleasure there is in the finessing of manipulation. Later, when the time is right, he will ditch the count, booting him out of town with a big enough purse to cover the bruise.
After that it will be Juan’s turn. Juan who, with his easy swagger and chatter, had climbed his way early into his heart. Already carrying the title of Duke of Gandia in Spain, he will be the great prize in the marriage stakes since it is his seed that will carry the dynasty. His wife will be legitimate and royal. Alexander knows which family he wants for him, but not yet how to achieve it. Well, it will happen. Every state and ruler in Christendom has need of papal approval for something at some point in their life. That is the beauty and power of the office. The only question is what, when and how can it be used as barter.
Then there is Jofré. Jofré – the thought of his youngest son makes him frown. He is a sweet enough child: a clumsy plump body on the edge of puberty, big moon face and gap teeth. But the truth is, there are times when Alexander wonders if he is indeed the father of a boy whose features and markedly simple disposition have more than a hint of Vannozza’s last husband, brought in to make her respectable while she was still entertaining a cardinal in her bed. It would never have been deliberate betrayal. Vannozza was too loyal for that. But who would not pass off a child between fathers, if the rewards for doing so were so great? Still, even if his suspicions are correct, he can make it work for them. It is a decision already taken: this gift horse will be a Borgia, whatever his parentage.
And finally there is Cesare.
Cesare.
Even the most doting father can see the strengths and faults within his own children. He knows his eldest son is powerful and clever. He has seen the speed of his mental swordwork and the charm he uses to salve the wounds he inflicts. But he has also felt the coldness in his soul, so different to his brother’s transparency. In many ways he would have made a better soldier than a priest. But the decision was taken early and it is too late to change it now. No great dynasty in Rome can survive without a secure hold inside the Church. And the higher they climb, the greater the chance of cultivating another pope. Alexander’s cousin, Juan Borgia Lanzo, is a good churchman, competent and loyal, but he will never get further than the College of Cardinals. No, Cesare alone has the steel and the drive to rise. He is certain of that. He already has a host of Church lawyers working on his illegitimacy. Bastard or no bastard, his son will become a cardinal.
‘Your Holiness. This is not an easy problem to solve.’
‘Then solve it as a difficult one!’
It will be done before the end of the year. And it will not be unrewarding for Cesare, however he may baulk at the idea. In a world where the politics of God can be as ruthless as the politics of man, his eldest son will surely grow to love the Church as much as he does.
‘And one more thing, Papà…’ He hears Lucrezia’s voice, soft in his ear. ‘Bring Cesare home soon. He pines for Rome. I can feel it underneath the words.’
Alexander turns and bows his head in the direction of the altar. Prayer and supplication. They come in many forms. As he moves out into the Vatican corridor, he calls for his bedchamber servant, who lies on a pallet dozing, waiting for his master’s return.
‘Come.’ He shakes the man. ‘We will breakfast and start work early today. Wake Burchard for me.’
CHAPTER 7
‘All I am saying, Father, is that we could do better with this union. This Sforza bridegroom is a puppet of Milan. The city of Pesaro is hardly worth the cannonballs we would use on its walls. Why waste a good marriage to get us in there?’
‘I must say it is a pleasure to have you home, Cesare.’ Alexander leans his head back against the gilded wooden frame of the papal throne where he has settled himself, and where, after only a few days, he feels most comfortable when in the presence of his eldest son. ‘I don’t know how the government of Christendom has managed to limp on without you. Since you excelled in logic as well as in rhetoric, perhaps you can answer the question yourself.’
Cesare’s new archbishop’s robes sweep the flagstone floor as he paces the room. The echoing state chambers of the Vatican are new to him and, though he would never admit it, along with the thrill of the inner sanctum there is also a certain jangling of nerves. The sarcasm in his father’s voice is not unnoticed. While Cesare has been waiting in Spoleto, he knows that Juan has been the intimate son; he needs to prove his worth quickly.
‘Because we owe the Sforzas for your election and because we need them as allies to give us muscle against the Roman families,’ he says, making it a statement rather than a question. ‘Yet we must balance Milan against Naples. And if we appoint enough of our own cardinals to the Sacred College, surely we can control the families that way.’
‘Excellent! Your professors should have awarded you your laude even earlier.’ No trace of sarcasm now. ‘Certainly the College of Cardinals will help, yes. Though not on its own. And there is the question of timing. Too many of our own men elevated too soon and our enemies will howl corruption. It’s already started. “Ten papacies would not satisfy this horde of relatives.” Ah! What exaggeration!’
‘Who dares to say that?’
‘The ambassador of Ferrara, no less! In a private letter home to the Duke d’Este.’
Alexander beams. There is nothing he enjoys more than poking around in other people’s intelligence services. No man gets to where he is today without having a better spy network than any who oppose him. ‘Still, the man has a point. You should be in my receiving-room some mornings: Spaniards coming out like frogs in the rain, each and every one claiming he is married to the daughter of a cousin of some aunt I never knew. Valencia must be half empty by now.’ He chuckles at the thought. ‘Well, we will nose out the best and let the others fall. As for Ferrara – the duke will be licking our hands in gratitude as soon as he gets a cardinal’s hat for his son’s head.’
‘We can buy half of them off the same way, Father. The rest were always going to complain. But the fact is, it is done.’ Cesare waves his hand around the room. ‘We are here and they can’t take it away from us. And when it comes to Lucrezia’s marriage—’
‘When it comes to Lucrezia’s marriage no man would be good enough for you, Cesare. And we will discuss this further when you are seated somewhere. I am suffering old man’s dizziness watching you cavort around the chamber as if it was a dance floor.’
‘I thought it was forbidden to sit in the Pope’s presence without permission,’ he shoots back mischievously.
‘So it is. But you have a way of seeming as tall as your pope, even when he is higher off the ground. So – sit,’ he says, making it sound like a command to a dog.
Cesare throws himself into a wooden chair, its intricately carved arms and slatted seat too delicate for this athletic young body. The Holy Father’s furniture, it seems, was designed with frailer clerics in mind.
‘So. Tell me what you have against the Sforzas.’
The questions are getting easier. ‘We have paid our dues to them already. Six chests of silver and a vice-chancellorship was a generous price, given that Ascanio Sforza could never have won the election anyway.’
‘True. But it is not Ascanio we are keeping sweet. It is his brother in Milan.’
‘Absolutely,’ the Pope laughs. ‘It is a compliment that has been paid to me many times. A thug, yes, but an impressive one. Any man willing to seize power from his own nephew is a dog with a rabid bite.’
‘All the more reason to keep him at arm’s length.’ Cesare pauses, affecting a certain nonchalance. ‘Is it true what they say about France?’
‘What do they say?’ Alexander says sharply.
‘That Ludovico Sforza will invite the French King to forward his claim on the throne of Naples?’
‘Ah! Rancid gossip. He would be a fool to let it happen. A foreign army would unleash Milan’s destruction alongside the rest of Italy’s. Where do you hear that?’
And now it is Cesare’s turn to smile. ‘You were the one who taught me how to lay a table, remember, Father?’
It is true enough. Like the best aspiring politicians, Cesare Borgia had learned many of his skills at his father’s knee. They had always been the best of visits: those evenings when, after dinner, Rodrigo would dismiss the women and servants and call him and Juan to sit up around the table where he would then rearrange the chaos of the leftovers to set up a map of his beloved Italy across the great wooden surface. ‘See – this land is four times as long as it is wide. And each part has different textures.’ Fish skeletons for Venice at the top right, chicken and steak bones for Milan and Naples at either end, with a smattering of leftover soft fruits for Florence, Siena and the smaller states. And across the centre a sprawling set of interlocking spoons to show the land that belonged to the papacy, with Rome itself marked by a knife. Juan always went for the knife and took out the soft fruit. But its edge was not so sharp that it could cut through the bones. Cesare, in contrast, spent as much time looking and thinking as acting. To this day, for him chess is a poor substitute for the power play of the dinner table and in his mind the great boot-shaped land that makes up Italy has tougher leather at the top and the bottom than the middle.
‘I still think Ludovico Sforza might do it,’ he says carefully. ‘He is turned inside-out with ambition.’
‘What are you saying, Cesare? That we should cultivate Naples and King Ferrante instead? A man who likes to hang his captives in cages around his court so he can watch them die slowly?’
‘Oh, you don’t care about such things, Father. You are just displeased with him because Naples supported the sale of Pope Innocent’s castles.’
‘Yes, you could say I am “displeased”,’ Alexander growls, though his pleasure at his son’s acuity is obvious. For months he has had advisers coming out of every fold of his papal garments, but few of them cut to the marrow like Cesare. Well, he had sent him to Pisa to get his mind sharpened. He cannot complain if now he uses it to draw blood.
‘Those castles were fiefdoms that belonged to the Church, not for selling on for profit by his poxy son. And certainly not into the hands of the Orsini. The devil take them. It is a crime against the papacy. Look at the routes in and out of Rome that the Orsini family control now.’
‘The map is in my head, Father. You forget, I came in riding those very roads.’
He had slipped out of Spoleto ten days before, incognito, with only Michelotto for company, the route back into the city chosen deliberately so that he could study the placing of these Orsini castles.
Once inside the main gates, he had gone first to Vannozza’s house. Mother and son had not seen each other for almost two years and her delight at this fiercely handsome son of hers was infectious. She had plied him with her latest wines (after the children had been taken from her she had turned to nurturing vines) and fussed over him in a way he would allow no other woman ever to do. Even Michelotto had relaxed that night.
Next day, as they made their way to the Vatican, anonymity allowed him to see Rome through sharper eyes. The gaudy coronation arches – revealed now as painted wood – had long since flaked and cracked and the streets were as filthy as ever. On the way to the river they passed the remains of the Colosseum and the Forum, under grey winter skies, their appearance more ragged than he remembers. No doubt a few more ancient treasures had been dug out of the ground since he left; the fashion for new learning has sparked a rising market for old Rome, though Cesare himself has little time for such artistic snobbery.
At the western edge of the Forum gangs of men were hauling fallen masonry on to carts. What isn’t worth saving is ripe for reuse. Except that, thanks to his father’s new decree, every stone dug up and used for building will now yield a separate tithe to the Church: a pope who has been a vice-chancellor half his life still has a few new revenue tricks up his sleeve. No – there is not a lot going on in Rome that Cesare has missed in his months of exile. Except perhaps the chance to show his father how much he knows.
‘But it wasn’t only Naples who defied you over those castles, Father. You said in your letters that della Rovere negotiated the deal.’
‘Negotiated it and witnessed the signatures on the contracts in his own house, the Judas prick.’ Alexander snarls. ‘Still, since our enemy’s aim is to make us angry…’ he takes a long theatrical breath, ‘we will be sanguine instead. To hold the balance, we will bind Milan fast with the thread of Lucrezia’s marriage and Naples a little looser with another alliance. I thank the Blessed Virgin that I have been gifted with not one but three fine children ready for wedlock.’
‘Take me out of the Church and you can have a fourth.’ The words spill out so fast that it seems Cesare might not have given them permission.
‘This is an old conversation, my son,’ Alexander counters carefully. ‘You know it cannot be done. We need a Borgia in the Church.’
Juan. The name hangs, unspoken, in the air. God damn it, the worse his brother behaves, it seems, the more his father’s favourite he becomes. Well, there is no point in revisiting it now. ‘So let it be Jofré instead.’
‘Ah! Your brother still sleeps with his thumb in his mouth.’
‘Yet you say you are ready to marry him off.’
The doubt slides in again, but Alexander pushes it away. ‘The betrothal will last for years. And the organ he needs for that job will mature faster than his mind. Enough now. You are like a dog that will not let go of the bone on this. It is already decided. Lucrezia will marry Giovanni Sforza who, while he may be a puppet, will become our puppet, and bring with him the city of Pesaro and, if we handle him right, an insight into whatever Milan does before she does it. And then, after we have clawed back some recompense for the castles, Jofré will take a wife from Naples.’
‘And Juan?’
‘Ah! There are also talks in hand with Juan. I will discuss them with you both when he comes. First, I want you to see the new apartments.’
‘What talks? Is it Spain, Father? Will he marry into Spain?’
‘I said enough, Cesare!’ And now his tone says it too. Cesare bows his obedience. He has pushed too hard too quickly and he knows it. He offers a hand to help his father down the steps from the great chair, but it is brushed away impatiently.
‘I am not so old I need your help yet. Come. I have things to show you. I know painting is of little interest to you, but a modern pope must impress with art as well as politics or we will be damned as philistines as well as foreigners. You will use some charm in place of muscle now, please.’
It is true that Cesare, like his father, is not much moved by art. For him the greatest excitement in Rome now is the work being done on Castel Sant’ Angelo, the great fortress on the river with an imperial mausoleum deep in its bowels where the architect and engineer Giuliano da Sangallo is carving out new rooms, reinforcing the outer fortifications and repairing the upper-storey walkway between the castle and the Vatican palace.
Cesare has a lot of time for men like da Sangallo. He identifies with the way they look at the world: seeing what could be, rather than what is. The way they build first in their minds, higher, stronger, greater, the power in the challenge as much
as the achievement. Like the best generals, the vision is theirs alone. Yet they too need an army of muscle to make it happen. One of the things that he holds against Ludovico Sforza is how he squanders the talents of such warrior artists. Even now he has a man at court in Milan who claims to be able to build bridges indestructible to any army, yet what does Sforza have him doing, this da Vinci, but making clay models for a giant bronze horse commissioned to bolster the family’s monstrous pride? The wasted energy of vanity. When he, Cesare Borgia, rides out of Rome at the head of an army (and he knows, as only a young man can, that it will happen), he will have such an engineer at his side, so that for every castle or fortress that confronts him, there will be a mind cleverer than his own working on its destruction.
Father and son make their way through the downstairs salon and along the corridors of the old Vatican palace. Alexander’s considerable bulk does not prevent them from walking faster than most around them. Those they encounter stop and bow low as he passes, though their heads snap up fast enough to catch a glimpse of Cesare. His arrival has been long anticipated and he does not disappoint: this handsome young man in full ecclesiastical robes, hair still as thick and long as that of Our Lord – a reminder that though he has a clutch of benefices to his name he has yet to take final holy orders. When he gets to his new home in Trastevere, he will find a dozen invitations to dine at the houses of lovely if disreputable women. Why not? With his elevation to archbishop he is worth over sixteen thousand ducats a year, and as long as the Holy Mother Church demands celibacy, but does not impose chastity, the entrepreneurial spirit will always rise to fill the gap.