The Secret Book of Grazia dei Rossi

by Jacqueline Park

  My dear son:

  I thank you more than I can say for your letter and I beg of you to take care of yourself for I am always anxious when I remember you are in the camp, even though this is where you wish to be. We pray for your safety as you do for ours and await your arrival eagerly.

  From her who loves and longs to embrace your dear self.

  (signed) Isabella G., Colonna Palace, Roma, May 5, 1527.

  60

  May 5, 1527

  Constable Bourbon has refused two hundred thousand ducats in ransom. Already on the march when the offer reached him, he informed Lord Pirro Gonzaga coolly that his men could do better by sacking Roma. Such confidence in a general virtually without weapons, totally without siege machines, and lacking supplies of any kind leaves Lord Pirro dumbfounded.

  The Imperial soldiers are even more ragged and weary than Pirro remembers them. Slogging doggedly through the muddy countryside, they resemble nothing so much as an army of ghosts, with wild eyes like holes in their gaunt, starved faces. Even the vast sum offered them in exchange for a retreat has lost its meaning. Privation, suffering, and betrayal have leached away both reason and sentiment. There is only one emotion left in them — hatred.

  Somewhere outside of Firenze the Duke of Urbino is waiting with fresh troops for God knows what. If this is not the time for him to bring the Pope’s army to the Pope’s aid, when will that time come? The task of putting this question to the reluctant warrior has fallen to Pirro Gonzaga. Having failed to save Roma by bribery, he is ordered to press on to Toscana and instruct the Captain-General of the Pope’s Holy League to come to the aid of the city at once. Lord Pirro’s orders do not say how he is to accomplish this miracle.

  In Roma the great lords — nobles, cardinals, and merchants — have been making themselves secure in their palaces. Those who do not maintain private armies have recruited mercenaries to guard their possessions and themselves. Cardinal Cesarini has raised 200 men; Cardinal Piccolomini, 150.

  Benvenuto Cellini, who, with his customary modesty, claims to be even more talented as a soldier than as a goldsmith, has graciously accepted a commission to defend his wealthy friend Alessandro del Bene. Even now, Cellini is giving last-minute instructions to the fifty young bravi he has recruited on Alessandro’s behalf. Alessandro is confident that with Benvenuto to defend his property he has nothing to fear, come what may.

  High up on the Quirinal hill, seated on the loggia of her borrowed palace, the Marchesana Isabella d’Este gazes westward toward the Via Cassia. No sign of the Imperials yet. But when and if they come, Madonna Isabella is ready for them. So confident is she of her position in the beleaguered city that yesterday, when she knew an attack was imminent, she offered the protection of her palace to a number of noble Roman ladies and gentlemen not as well connected as herself. By evening there were some three hundred guests under her roof including Felice Orsim, the daughter of the late Pope Julius, and the ambassadors of both Ferrara and Urbino.

  “How many did we take in last night, Tommaso?” the lady inquires of her chamberlain.

  “Three hundred and twelve ladies, Excellency,” he replies. “Two cardinals. Twenty bishops.” Tommaso squints over his record book, hard-pressed to make the calculation in his head. “Forty-one clerks of the Holy See, or is it . . .”

  “Never mind.” Isabella waves him away from the book. “You must prepare to welcome twice that number before this day is out.”

  Tommaso sighs audibly.

  “Who would you have us turn away? Messer Landriani, the Milanese ambassador?” she challenges him. “Or Messer Lippomano and his family?” Lippomano represents Urbino at the Vatican. “We can hardly deny our largesse to such august persons when they choose to accept our hospitality, now can we, Messer Tommaso?”

  In truth she herself is somewhat alarmed at the response to her invitation. She had meant only to put out a discreet word to a chosen few, never anticipating the horde of “friends” that has been streaming through her doors.

  At the same time she is secretly pleased at the turnout. She knows that this prodigious display of hospitality will be the talk of Italy and bring great honor to the house of Gonzaga. She also knows that the gaining of honorable repute is inevitably followed by more substantial rewards such as dukedoms, lands, and emoluments.

  “The gunpowder, has it been delivered, Tommaso?” she asks the dour old man.

  “Yes, madama. It arrived last night. In a covered wagon, as you ordered.”

  “And the pikes?”

  “Lined up in the antechamber.”

  “And the men? Where are they garrisoned?”

  “Up at the top of the giardino, madama. At the Torre de Mesa.” The Torre de Mesa. Isabella shudders. She knows her history. That tower is the spot from which Nero watched the burning of Roma. Now her own men are positioned there. Is this a sign that they are destined to witness a similar conflagration? She shivers again. A footman with no knowledge of history to burden his soul steps forward with a shawl and wraps it around her, murmuring something about a nip in the air. She graces him with a dazzling smile. He has told her what she wanted to hear. That her shivers were brought on by a chill in the air. Nothing more. Isabella orders a draft of warmed spiced wine and proceeds to get on with her tasks.

  A glance at her account books tells her how much she has already spent on the defense of this palazzo.

  Fifty gold ducats for fifty armed men.

  Ten gold ducats for gunpowder.

  Five ducats for pikes.

  Her treasure chest is running low. But the unpleasantness will be over within a few days and she will be on her way back to Mantova, having finally gained the prize for which she came to Roma two years ago. It is as she always told her children. The key to a successful life is perseverance. Next to piety, of course. She crosses herself, recites a quick Paternoster, and turns back to the matter at hand.

  Forty barrels of wine.

  One hundred pounds of sifted wheat.

  Twelve casks of oil.

  “What say you, Tommaso? Are we well provisioned for the siege?” she asks.

  The graybeard shakes his head dolefully. “They do eat, madama,” he reports sadly. “In between their tears, they are eating our larder bare.”

  “Perhaps weeping stimulates the appetite,” she suggests facetiously.

  “Oh no, madama,” he replies quite seriously. “Essence of ginger is a far better remedy for loss of appetite than tears.”

  Isabella smothers a smile and asks him to get on with his report from the cucina.

  “We used forty pounds of fish at yesterday’s dinner,” he tells her sadly. “Not a herring bone is left. My boys are at the market at this very moment with orders to buy anything that wriggles, just as you instructed.” His thin lips register disapproval of this profligate spending.

  “We are sharing our bounty as Christ commands us to do,” Isabella admonishes him. “Now be sure your scullions get plenty of smoked fish. It keeps and we may use it on the journey home. And extra flour. And candles. And send Costanza to fetch the boy Danilo. She will find him with his mother in the Room of the Fishes.”

  The more she sees of Grazia’s boy, the better she likes what she sees. The brightness of his mind, the modesty of his spirit, the eagerness with which he embraces life, are all qualities that attract her. By some miracle he has managed to avoid the contagion of that deep pessimism endemic to his mother’s race. This boy is his father’s son. Already he has done credit to his blood — and, one must add, to his upbringing — by his exemplary behavior on the tour he took with his father of the camps of Lombardia. She reminds herself that when the present disruption is over, she owes it to her house to take a closer interest in his education.

  But why wait to enjoy a preceptor’s pleasure in the company of such a charming boy? History is in the making this very hour. Why not take him up t
o the top of Nero’s tower and impart to him a lesson in living history? Together they will enjoy what may turn out to be the most spectacular event she is likely to witness in a life replete with spectacular events.

  On the other side of the Colonna Palace, the little maid Costanza picks her way through the mass of bodies sprawled along the walls of the covered loggia of the piano nobile. Dio, what a mess there will be to clean up when this lot decamps. She swerves to avoid a puddle of urine that has overflowed the slop bucket Madama thoughtfully provided for her guests. Are they too lazy or too proud to carry their pisspot out to the courtyard? she asks herself, then shrugs off the question. Let them wallow in their own slop if they like. She has too much work today to bother over Colonna’s marble floors. Serves him right if the stains never come out, the old goat.

  Costanza has no sympathy for the highborn refugees who have crowded into these halls, not even for the women that follow after her begging milk for their babies. If they’d nursed their own brats rather than sending them off to wet nurses, they’d have plenty of milk handy now when they need it.

  She shoves a clinging child aside impatiently and turns toward the Room of the Fishes. Each time she approaches this portal, she pauses to eavesdrop, hoping to overhear some bit of information that will clarify a mystery that has plagued her ever since Madama took in the occupants: What does a great lady like Madonna Isabella find to love in this no-account Jewess and her brat?

  “Remember, Madonna Madre, that a thirty-foot wall stands between them and us and that scaling such a wall is a very risky venture,” she hears.

  “Risky but not impossible,” the woman Grazia answers.

  “Mama, you worry too much. Have I not told you that with my own eyes I saw the abandoned Imperial artillery lying along the road all the way down from Lombardia? And did you not hear Lord Pirro explain that even if Bourbon does manage somehow to break into the Borgo, the city bridges can be cut and the city saved?”

  “Yes, I heard. But —”

  Costanza marches into the Room of the Fishes. “Madonna is calling for Master Danilo,” she announces without ceremony.

  Grazia looks up. “She wishes to see my son?”

  “At once.”

  “Then I must go,” the boy announces. “At once.”

  “One minute, my son. How fares Madonna Isabella on this terrible morning?” Grazia asks the maid.

  “Seemed like her regular self to me, lady,” is the surly answer. “You know Madama. It would take an eruption of Vesuvius to shake her up.”

  “She is as good as her motto,” Grazia remarks. “Nec spero, nec metu.”

  Costanza recognizes the phrase as the one she has seen embroidered on Madama’s linens and engraved on some of Madama’s medals. She has often wondered what it meant but is damned if she will give the Jewess the satisfaction of asking.

  “Nec spero, nec metu means ‘without hope or fear,’” the boy answers her unasked question. “A very valiant motto for a lady, do you not agree, Costanza?”

  As always, the maid is mollified by his winning ways. “I suppose so,” she answers grudgingly.

  He smiles, bows to his mother, and with a knightly sweep of his arm, beckons to the maid. “Lead on, Costanza. Madama is not only without hope or fear, she is also without patience and does not like to be kept waiting.”

  But Grazia, reluctant to relinquish her son, recalls the pair before they have passed through the curtain. “Tell me, Costanza, what news do we have from the town?”

  “They say a vast army is approaching from Viterbo.”

  “And that doesn’t trouble you at all?”

  “It’s all one to me, lady, who sits on Saint Peter’s throne. If the Imperials do take Roma, they say the Emperor will leave Spain and come and live here with us and the city will prosper more than it has under these greedy-gut priests.” And off she goes.

  If this girl’s cynicism is any indication, Grazia thinks, how can the Romans be depended on to rise to the demands of this day? What is to stop them from running from the fight and making common cause with the looters? It is all very well for Danilo to speak of impregnable walls and irresistible firepower, but in the end battles are fought by men and half of Renzo da Ceri’s men are cooks and priests and scullions and other come-lately soldiers. The thought that her life and the life of her son may end up in such hands brings on a wave of despair.

  61

  May 7, 1527

  At dawn two suns are rising in the Roman sky. This is not an astronomical phenomenon. The second sun glistering on the crest of Mount Auria is the reflection of twenty-two thousand steel helmets and twenty-two thousand brass breastplates. Last night the Imperial army took up a position just outside the walls of Roma high on the Janiculum hill. Yet no alarms are sounded. No bells ring out warnings. The citizens of Roma — those who are awake this early — look up at the Janiculum and point and comment, but there is no panic in the streets.

  Why are the citizens of Roma not more alarmed? History has lulled them into sanguinity. This is hardly the first hostile army to assemble under the massive brown walls. Again and again over the centuries, armies have shown their mettle to the Romans. Only last fall, the rambunctious Colonna clan led a force of some thirty-five hundred Imperials through the city gates virtually unopposed and straight into the heart of Christendom. But they were done away in a day by a series of quick negotiations. That autumnal sortie is still fresh in the minds of Romans, those experts at eleventh-hour reprieves.

  True, this year’s Imperial army is formidably large. But it is known to be in a terrible state of dilapidation. The soldiers have long since lost everything but their armor. They have been forced by the winter’s privations to save their lives at the expense of their heavy weaponry, which lies abandoned all along the route from Bologna to Roma. Against such an enemy, a well-provisioned city can hold out almost indefinitely.

  The same confidence possesses Pope Clement. Despite the great army arrayed against him across the river, he refuses to withdraw to the security of the Castel Sant’Angelo. No member of his retinue dares to interrupt his morning devotions; but the moment he emerges from the small chapel adjoining his private apartments, he is besieged by his advisers.

  “Excellency . . .” Paolo Giovio, Clement’s chief secretary, begins the importunings. Giovio may be a mediocre historian but he is a first-rate courtier. In a single flowing gesture, he manages to glance the papal ring on the way down, touch his lips to the hem of Clement’s cape, and cross himself on the way up. “I beseech your Holiness, on behalf of good Christians everywhere, to leave this palace and secure your person in the Castel Sant’Angelo.”

  Clement dismisses Giovio by simply turning his head away in the direction of his military commander for the defense of Roma, Renzo da Ceri. “Is all in readiness, captain?” he asks.

  “Every man at his post, sir.” The old soldier stiffens to attention.

  “Well armed?”

  “As you ordered, Holiness.”

  “And the bridges?”

  “Well guarded, Holiness.”

  This answer does not please the Pope. For days he has been agitating for destruction of the bridges that connect the Vatican city with old Roma. But Renzo is held back by the inhabitants of Trastevere whose houses along the riverbank would collapse with the bridges. “The Romans love their bridges, sir,” he explains. “If we destroy them, we destroy the morale of our troops.”

  “And if the Imperials manage to gain the Vatican, what then will stop them from crossing the river into Roma?” the Pope inquires with some asperity.

  “I will stop them, sir. I and my men.” This is no pose. The man means every word he says. “The day the Imperials enter Roma, you have my permission to take my head from my shoulders.”

  Renzo’s sincerity is irresistible. Besides, the Pope wants to believe him.

  “My city is in yo
ur hands, my son.” Clement holds out his ring to be kissed. Renzo falls at the Pontiff’s feet to be blessed. Everyone present is convinced that, with two such valiant characters at the helm, their cause will prevail.

  Constable Bourbon falls asleep at midnight, lulled into restfulness by the quiet of the great city. He awakens after a brief but profound sleep, dons his silver surcoat, makes his confession, and orders his drummers to sound the stand-to.

  An experienced tactician, he is fully aware that the ideal point of attack on the Borgo is from the west where the Vatican itself would offer his men protection from the guns of Sant’Angelo. But the western wall presents a sheer thirty-foot cliff and, as the aspiring strategist Danilo dei Rossi pointed out to his mother, the Imperial army has long since been forced to abandon its siege equipment. Now, the only advantages that remain to Bourbon are the numerical superiority of his troops and his own nerve.

  In a classic maneuver, he dispatches his second in command, the Prince of Orange, to create a diversion by feinting an attack on the Ponte Milvio. Then he mounts his huge charger and, serenaded by the beat of drums and the blare of trumpets, sallies forth to bash his way through the impregnable walls of Roma at San Spirito.

  After an hour of hard fighting at San Spirito, Renzo da Ceri’s men have knocked down the makeshift scaling ladders mounted against the wall and killed a hundred landsknechts.

  “Victory!” shout da Ceri’s men, “Victory to the Holy Father.”

  Da Ceri himself cannot quite believe how easily this bunch of summer soldiers turned back the Imperial assault. But, not being overly thoughtful by nature, he simply thanks God for His help and dispatches a small squad to the Vatican bearing the five standard flags captured from the vanquished enemy. Caught up in the panoply of the banners that swirl above them flaunting the Habsburg double eagle — now humbled — the crowd that has assembled to watch the battle cheers wildly.

  None of this commotion disturbs the concentration of Benvenuto Cellini, out for a spot of reconnoitering with his patron, del Bene, and now busily at work bringing the battle scene to life in his sketchbook. The goldsmith works quickly, using only a crayon; he has caught the terrible stillness of the dead who lie draped over the wall in grotesque attitudes and the contrast of their presence with the tensed muscles of the papal arquebusiers, who continue to pursue the fight against their defeated enemy.