by Max Brand
A murmur from the verge of the town swelled suddenly into a strong shouting as voices nearer at hand took up the cry: “Duca! Duca!”
Vitellozzo looked as though he had been stabbed to the heart. His face withered with pain and with fear.
“Giovanpaolo!” he called out. “Is Cesare Borgia in Sinigaglia here with us?”
“Hush! Hush!” cried Oliverotto, who had run to the door and thrown it wide. “You can hear something else!”
They were able to make it out, cheering and laughter combined, and always the cry; “Duca! Duca! Tizzo! Tizzo!”
Giovanpaolo began to clap his hands and laughed with happiness.
“But wait!” called Vitellozzo. “You’re safe enough with Tizzo; yet how about the rest of us? We’ve heard that Tizzo is a blind servant to Cesare Borgia. What if he’s come here to cut our throats and send our heads back to his master in a basket? What about that? We are not bound to Tizzo by long services as you are!”
“Do you know him?” asked Giovanpaolo.
“No. I’ve never seen his face.”
“If you talk to him for five minutes you’ll forget to be afraid. He’s the most honest man in Italy, Vitellozzo. When the Borgia plans his murders, he doesn’t pick Tizzo to execute them. Depend on it. We’re safer than before if we have Tizzo with us.”
“But what if he’s the vanguard of the Borgia army?”
“Our outposts would have sent in word that the army is coming,” protested the Baglione. “Wait till you see Tizzo.”
The clamor poured echoing down the street and approached the tavern.
“What’s to be our position here?” exclaimed Oliverotto. “Here we are each with a little army of our own and all, nominally, in the service of Cesare Borgia. And here comes part of the rest of Borgia’s army to enter the city which we’re holding for him. Now I ask you, what shall we do? Shall we declare open war with Borgia, seize Tizzo and his men as prisoners, and defy the duke and all his hired men? Or shall we attempt to honor the duke in the person of Tizzo? Answer up brightly, my friends!”
“There’s no need to,” said Giovanpaolo. “The uproar’s going past us and Tizzo isn’t coming in here, after all.”
For the shouting of “Duca! Duca!” was in fact streaming on down the street.
“But if he came this way, it’s because he wants to see us,” said Vitellozzo. “Why should he go by us?”
“He has red hair and an unsettled brain,” said Oliverotto. “One can expect anything from him.”
The youngest of the Orsini remarked: “He is a mongrel — half English and half Italian. What can you expect from him?”
“Wine, gentlemen? Did I hear you call for wine?” asked a servile voice at the door.
And in came a figure with a white cap set on the head and a white cloth over the arm, carrying a tray loaded with red wine.
Giovanpaolo Baglione, at the casement, was listening with bowed, attentive head, to the passing of the clamor down the street.
“Here — serve the wine!” exclaimed the young Orsini. “I need a drink and I need it badly. Don’t stumble over my foot, you fool.”
“Keep your feet out of the way, then, you blockhead,” said the other.
THE words jumped Orsini fiercely to his feet, with a hand on his sword, but he saw that the man who had just put down the tray had now thrown off the white cloth, the white cap, and revealed a head of flaming red hair, a light breastplate of steel chased with gold, and a light sword belted high on his hip.
“Tizzo!” shouted Giovanpaolo from the casement, turning suddenly around. “Be careful, Orsini. Take your hand from your sword. If you try to handle this flame, it will burn you to the bone. Give him your hand. Tizzo, I make you known to my friends. Oliverotto, Vitellozzo, the Orsini. Men you should have known long before this. Why did you come slipping in among us like this?”
“I beg your pardons,” said Tizzo to them all, “but I came into Sinigaglia with no more than a hundred tough Romagnol peasants behind me and if your highnesses decided to be angry, you could have swallowed me in a single mouthful. So I decided that I would have a look at your faces.”
“And how do the faces seem to you?” asked the young Orsini, darkly.
“They seem to me like men who are as honest as they have to be,” answered Tizzo, calmly and quickly.
“I smell an insult in that!” exclaimed Orsini.
“Your nose is long enough to sniff into corners,” said Tizzo.
“I’ll stand no more!” shouted Orsini, snatching out his sword. Giovanpaolo, running in, struck down the blade.
“You shall not fight,” said the Baglione. “Tizzo, what sort of fire-brained foolishness is all this? Orsini, put up your sword! Tizzo, you are to blame!’’
“Am I to blame?” said Tizzo, carelessly. “My lord Orsini, I ask your pardon, if I am to blame. And Giovanpaolo, who is the perfect knight, says that I am at fault. Will you give me your hand?”
The Orsini stretched out his, grudgingly. But in a moment the atmosphere of the room had lightened a great deal, and Tizzo was saying: “We’ve heard a great deal about hard feelings among you hired soldiers. We’ve heard that you were ready to turn on the duke of Romagna and try your best weapons against him. Is that the truth? I hope not. I’ve come ahead of his army to find out what’s in your mind.”
Oliverotto had been dropping the heavy links of a gold chain through his fingers. He stopped this, now, to look up and say: “You’ve rented your hand and your heart and your soul to Cesare Borgia, Tizzo, and every man in Italy knows it. And a lie told about a man’s master is not a sin. However, you see that we can’t take your word.”
“Suppose that I’m free of the duke?” said Tizzo.
“If you were free of the duke, still you’d be bound to him,” said Vitellozzo, “because the woman you love is held in his hands.”
“Shall I prove to you that I’m in fact a free man?” asked Tizzo.
“Prove it if you can, my friend,” said Oliverotto.
“Nothing more easy,” said Tizzo.
It was a big room, low of ceiling, the heavy wooden beams discolored by sooty incrustations, because the fireplace smoked badly. At the farther end two curtained doorways communicated with the rooms beyond; and it was towards these curtains that Tizzo now turned and waved his hand.
“It’s safe enough, I think,” said he.
AND out of the shadowy curtains two figures came forward into the light. The one had the red face and the huge shoulders of the baron of Melrose; the other was Lady Beatrice Baglione, covered by the sweeping length of a dark cloak. Giovanpaolo ran to his sister with an outcry of wonder and of happiness.
“Is the Borgia drunk?” asked Oliverotto. “Or has Tizzo managed to get his father and the lady away by some sleight or trick?”
“What do you know of Cesare Borgia?” asked Tizzo.
“I know murder of him!” stated the older Orsini,
“So do I,” said Tizzo. “But I also know that he keeps his friends.”
“We are not friends of his, and we’ve proved it by rebelling against him,” said Oliverotto.
“Stop the rebellion and he’ll welcome you back in his service. That’s what I’ve come to tell you.”
“Ah, he sent you on before him?” suggested Giovanpaolo. “And you’re to persuade us, and flatter us, and bribe us here and there? Is that it, Tizzo? And Beatrice is even sent along to make us feel that the tiger for once has his fill of meat and is ready to sleep and be petted? Is that the game of it?” Beatrice went up to Tizzo and waited for his answer. But he merely laughed at the concern of Giovanpaolo.
“Not one of you knows what a man he is!” said Tizzo. “What he’s done is partly for himself and partly for the sake of Italy. But the rest of you think of nothing by plundering a town here, or making a rich marriage there. I tell you, there’s no fear in him, either.
“He doesn’t fear the strength of all of you combined. He’s marching on Sinigaglia now, and you’l
l hear his trumpets in the morning. Make up your minds by that time what you intend to do. If you want peace, you shall have it. If you want war, he promises to wash the streets of Sinigaglia with blood.”
The others stood silent for a moment. Giovanpaolo said: “The truth is this. If we join the duke now, there’s hardly a power in Italy that can stand against us. But if we make him too great, he’ll simply be fattening us before he cuts our throats and roasts us on a fire. Now, my dear lads, think it over wisely and well. Let Beatrice tell us what she thinks of the duke.”
Beatrice sat in a tall-backed chair and smiled on the generals.
She said: “I’ll tell you the truth as I see it about him. He likes well enough a man he can use. He’s used Tizzo to capture Forli and Urbino. So of course, he is kind to him. More than kind. He even sends him away and sets him free from danger. I was held as a guarantee of the sword of Giovanpaolo. But he gave me up at once when Tizzo said that he couldn’t leave without me.”
“Do you make that into a villainy?” demanded Tizzo.
“I make nothing. But since you’re too honest for the Borgian statecraft, he would try to stretch your honesty far enough to use it for a mask. The rest of you may do as you please, but I’ll plead with Giovanpaolo on my knees not to join this foolish alliance. Cesare Borgia will feast you in the morning and murder you by noon, and I know it by instinct.”
Vitellozzo said suddenly: “Actions mean more than words. Consider this. No one has done more than Tizzo for the duke. Forli and Urbino are two prizes worth having in hand. And here is Tizzo contracted for a certain period to the service of the duke but set free the instant he requests it. Not only that, but Beatrice Baglione is freed also, and the father of Tizzo. The rest of you may think what you please, but I say with Plato that virtue can be learned and that the Borgia seems to have learned it. I’m ready to join him again.”
“Vitellozzo Vitelli, I can see you with your hands tied behind your back and the sword at your throat!” said Lady Beatrice.
HE looked at her with a scowl. He was young. Too much success, too much power in his youth had given him an excess of age in his face. He was dressed with an almost feminine luxury. He kept gripping and relaxing his grasp from the handle of a dagger at the butt of which there was a big emerald, like a great cat’s-eye.
“We take our advice from men, not from girls,” said he. “You hear what I decide on, all of you. Now you can do as you please.”
They stared at one another. In all Italy a more priceless crew of cutthroats could not have been gathered, except that Giovanpaolo Baglione was a man of honor as great as his courage. He stood up and threw a cloak over his shoulders.
“The rest of you can do as you please,” he said. “I leave Sinigaglia to you and the Borgia. Beatrice, come with me.”
“Giovanpaolo, I can’t go and leave Tizzo behind us in this trap,” said the girl.
“Whether you want to or not,” said he, “you must go.”
Tizzo went to her and led her by the arm from the room. After he had passed through the door, with Baglione behind him, Vitellozzo said: “You see that Tizzo trusts the Borgia absolutely. Isn’t that proof enough for us?”
And slowly the heads of the others were nodded.
IV. THE SHREWD MACHIAVIELLI.
THERE WAS TROUBLE with Vitellozzo in the morning. During his sleep of the night he had a vision of Giovanpaolo in which the Baglione warned him with a gloomy brow and a raised finger that he was only one day from the start of a long residence in hell. Paolo Orsini, on the other hand, worked to persuade the captain, and finally he consented to start forward with the others to welcome the duke. He refused to ride a horse but said that he wanted a mule under him for the sake of the sure footing.
What he said on this morning was long remembered by men.
“When a man quits his instinct and follows his reason, it is time for him to have a surer seat than a horse can give him.”
All of the words and the actions of Vitellozzo during this day were overclouded by a strange sense of doom. Everything he did or said was recalled afterward by the witnesses.
When he rode out with the rest of the generals, he kept to the rear on his mule. His head was down and he shook it from side to side now and again. Tizzo, riding the white stallion at his side, said: “Vitellozzo, if you feel the devil elbowing you in the ribs, why don’t you turn back?”
The hired soldier merely raised his head and stared at Tizzo, with a blank, uncomprehending eye. Afterwards the father of Tizzo said to him: “That Vitellozzo is seeing shadows at midday. There will be trouble ahead of us all!”
There was a check when the long column of the army of the Borgia came in view. The generals who had been in revolt had spread their forces in varying directions towards Ancona. The troops of Vitellozzo, for instance, were quartered in Morro and Fiumessino, a dozen miles south and east of Sinigaglia. The duke came on with five hundred chosen men-at-arms in the lead of his column.
These men were under the command of Ludovico di Mirandola and Raffaello de’ Pazzi. Next came a picked thousand of Gascon and Swiss infantry, men able to stand off the charge of cavalry with their pikes and blast the mounted men with the fire from their arquebuses. The main body followed behind, raising a great dust cloud, and with the brilliant uniforms of the Romagnol infantry gleaming through the dust.
The generals from Sinigaglia drew rein when they saw the imposing force. Oliverotto shouted suddenly: “There! Do you see it? There’s the trap, and Vitellozzo was right from the first!”
One of the Orsini turned sharply to Tizzo with murder in his face.
“You knew what would happen, Tizzo!” he exclaimed.
“What will happen?” muttered Tizzo, frowning. “A friendly meeting is what will happen. Look!” he pointed.
Ahead of them, at the slow pace of a walking mule, Vitellozzo was riding forward alone his head still slightly depressed, as though he saw nothing worthy of concern in the imposing host that was moving towards them.
Oliverotto groaned and then laughed.
“Well, if the devil is taking charge of us, we’ll have to go where he beckons,” said the general, and they all went forward towards the Borgia.
Cesare Borgia, on an ambling pad that looked hardly as large as its rider, swept out from the head of the column with half a dozen of his leaders around him. He was completely armed in the finest plate that gleamed with a reddish cast, there was so much gold chased over the surface of the armor. His head alone was bare, the long hair blowing, and his face dimmed by the usual mask. It seemed to Tizzo that the eyes of the duke were flashing with an extra brilliance as he rode up.
In the background was the white face of Bonfadini the poisoner, and near Bonfadini rode that man of in creasing fame, Niccolò Machiavelli, with his faint smile that made his face look like that of a cat.
Reining his pad back to a walk as he drew near, the Borgia called out heartily: “Where is my brother, Vitellozzo?”
THEN he seemed to make sure of the repentant rebel for the first time and rode straight to him. He leaned from his saddle and caught the arm of Vitellozzo to prevent him from dismounting, then kissed him affectionately.
The duke said, so that all could hear: “The best of friends make the shrewdest of enemies, Vitellozzo. But now we are home again in one house.”
Vitellozzo answered: “Perhaps so, my lord. I see we are to have the same devil with us.”
“What devil?” asked the duke.
“The white one,” said Vitellozzo, and pointed at Bonfadini.
Everyone in Italy knew the singular talent of Bonfadini, but Cesare Borgia laughed openly and loudly when he heard the remark.
“My dear Vitellozzo,” he said, “a sin loses most of its taint when it’s exposed to the open day. You must admit that.”
The white face of Bonfadini, for the first time in the knowledge of men, slowly turned scarlet. Tizzo looked at the cold devil with amazement. And Vitellozzo said: “If I die in my
sleep, tonight, my ghost will know whom to blame for the quick trip to heaven.”
The duke was greeting the others, one by one. When he came to Tizzo, he laid his big hand on the shoulder of his captain and said: “Honesty is a new policy for me, Tizzo. But I think it’s going to prove the best one.”
At this, his own staff and the men from Sinigaglia all laughed. They rode on together. The men-at-arms who followed, seeing this amicable reunion, all began to shout and cheer and cry: “Duca! Duca! Vitellozzo! Orsini! Tizzo! Oliverotto! Duca! Duca!” for they could see that some hard and dangerous fighting was being avoided by this reconciliation. The news spread back through the column. All the way into Sinigaglia there was a continual cheering from the rearward ranks.
Tizzo listened carefully to every word the duke spoke. Paolo Orsini was very bold. He said to the Borgia, frankly: “You always have hated me and my house, my lord.”
“That’s true,” said the Borgia. “But why should I refuse to use one of the sharpest swords in Italy, even if my enemy has put the edge to it?”
Paolo Orsini laughed. He said: “Every man with a clear head and a strong hand ought to be in your service, my lord. If that could happen, Italy would soon be one country, and never a Frenchman or a Swiss in it.”
“Or a Spaniard, either,” said Vitellozzo.
There was a slight, embarrassed pause. The reference to the Spanish blood of the Borgias was too direct and insulting, but the duke turned to Vitellozzo and said calmly: “You stab at me, Vitellozzo, but a dagger of words has no point — not when a friend uses it.”
“My lord, you mistook me,” said Vitellozzo.
But there was a sour twist of satisfaction on his face. All of these men, Tizzo could see, feared the duke to the cores of their hearts, but they were unwilling to rejoin him and submit to his leadership without making some gestures of an independent mind and spirit.