City of God (18 page)

As he walked, the thought of Stefano forced its way into his mind. He had not seen Stefano since the night he had ordered him to go. Of course Stefano would not come back, and Nicholas did not intend to go to him. It was not what Stefano had done but what Nicholas had done that prevented it: he would not admit to being a frightened fool. The only way to save his dignity was to act as if he regretted nothing. Still he could not help thinking of Stefano every day, nearly every hour.

Where the street narrowed down to enter the lane of the bridge, the traffic crowded together, wagons and folk on foot and on mules, and Nicholas had to shorten his steps. Without his walking stick his hands seemed awkward no matter what he tried to do with them. The ripe smell of the river reached his nose. He passed a large orange cat sitting on the stone railing of the bridge. The cat turned its head to look at him; one eye was a brilliant luminous green, but the other had been gouged out and nothing remained but the oozing socket. Nicholas's stomach heaved. He hurried on across the bridge.

With a crowd of monks and foreigners he walked up the street at the foot of the Vatican wall. Near the gate of the palace were wine sellers and orange sellers hawking their wares in several tongues. Everyone seemed to be shouting. Nicholas thought again of the cat. It was like an omen, somehow, like a messenger waiting there on the bridge for him, although what its message might have been he could not sieve from his confused imagination. The pavement under his feet, here and there marked with the Papal seal, was slippery with spilled wine and peelings of fruit. Near the palace entrance a man in foreign clothes was calmly pissing into the street in full view of every passer-by. Nicholas went up the street and into the palace. He told himself that his current height of feeling gave everything he saw a false reality; none of this meant anything, not even the cat.

The palace was crowded, although the Pope was receiving no one. Nicholas wandered from one room to the next. With Angela Borgia gone off to Ferrara he had lost his prime source of information and one of his chief means of gaining entry to the inner circles of the Borgias. Of course he was a hireling of the prince now, but he could not trade too openly on that, lest the Signory learn of it.

He did not consider that he had betrayed the Signory. They had made mistakes, and he was only making use of that; they had betrayed themselves. Nothing would come of it all anyway, in the end, nothing ever did.

In a long narrow room, among other familiars of the Borgia court, he found Valentino's secretary.

“I need some information,” Nicholas said.

The secretary was eating a peach. In his free hand was a napkin poised to catch the dripping juices. Calmly he bit into the fruit, swallowed, and said, “Of what sort?”

“The campaign against Arezzo. My emp—the Signory of Florence is hot to know what is happening there.”

The secretary laughed, holding his lips tightly closed to keep in the juice of the peach. He touched his lips with the napkin. “What can I tell you of that, who planned the whole of it? Except possibly this: Piero de' Medici is coming to Arezzo.”

“Possibly you could tell me that,” Nicholas said.

It was a decorative addition to the plan that he had not considered, to bring the exiled prince into the rebellion.

“And the rest of the campaign goes well?”

“Excellently well,” the secretary said, having nothing left in his fingers save the pit of the peach; he looked around him for some way to discard it Nicholas took it from him.

“Allow me the honor.” He bowed, and the secretary, his smile more natural, gave him an elegant courtesy in reply. Nicholas left. As he passed over the bridge below Sant' Angelo, he flung the peach pit into the Tiber.

“What can I tell them?” Bruni said. “There is no hope to give them.”

Nicholas went back to the door into the ambassador's chamber and opened it, so that he could see down the corridor and make sure that no one spied. His eyes directed there, he said, “They do not need hope, only facts. Arezzo is in the hands of Valentino, and I have heard that the citizens of Pisa are offering him their city—”

“Holy Mary, Mother of Mercy.”

“But the forces that protected Florence last year have not changed. The French are committed to keeping the Republic independent of the Pope. The presence of the Spanish army in Naples will only strengthen their resolve to help us.”

Bruni was shaking his head, his face long with gloom, and his arms folded over his breast. “You have misread the thing—the Spanish are the Borgias' protectors, and the protectors of the de' Medici, and they, not the French, possess the main force in Italy. Close the door! Do you want the entire quarter to hear us?”

Nicholas toed the door shut; no one seemed interested in spying. As usual the drapery was closed over Bruni's windows and the chamber was gloomy as a crypt. Nicholas took out his tinderbox to light the two candles on the wall behind Bruni's desk. At the blooming of the light Bruni jerked his head away.

“Excellency, we must have light to compose the letter.”

“I cannot write the letter,” Bruni said.

“Surely Valentino is trying to frighten the Signory into negotiating. We must help them—”

He stopped. Bruni was opening a drawer of his desk; he was removing from it a leather-bound novel, the same one he had been reading when Nicholas left that morning for the Leonine City.

“I cannot write the letter,” Bruni said. “You write it, Nicholas. You always change everything I say anyway.”

“Excellency.”

Bruni spread the novel open on his desk. “This is a fine story, Nicholas. The knight's true-love puts him to every test, and yet he remains pure of heart and ever-faithful.”

Nicholas's mouth hung open; he stood like a day-scholar, gaping, while Bruni spoke. Not Ugo, then, but Bruni himself must have made Nicholas's work known to Valentino. Bruni had known all the while what Nicholas was doing in the letters. Bruni, who now lowered himself into his novel and read himself away. Nicholas went out of the office.

Nicholas worked over the letter until long after the rest of the legation had gone; by the time he shut up the offices and went away to his home and his supper, night had fallen.

The sky was moonless, sprinkled with stars sparkling in their subtle colors, and the air was humid and warm. Tomorrow would be a hot day, the first day of the summer. Nicholas enjoyed the walk, only wishing that he had his walking stick. He had seldom needed its support but the feel of the knob and the sound tapping in the road had added something to the walk. Also he thought that it made him look more interesting. He was crossing the piazza below the Campidoglio when he noticed several men following him.

He stopped at once. From here the way was narrow and dark, and he knew better than to lead a pack into such a place. Immediately the men surrounded him.

“Don't be foolish,” Nicholas said. “The watch will come by at any moment.”

There were four of them, all standing very close to him. He opened his hands and closed them again.

“I have no money.”

Something hard struck his arm from behind, numbing it to the elbow. “Get your hands up!”

He put up his hands. They could see he had no weapon, nothing but his tongue, which ran out of control.

“I have no money. You're wasting your time. The watch will come by any moment now.”

A blow on the side of the head knocked him to the street. He knew they would kill him. He had come so happily, so innocently to this.

“Wait,” a rough voice said, “that's Il Bello's honey man.”

“He's rich! Get his purse.”

“Il Bello is a bad man to run against.”

“He says he has no money anyway.”

They were going. They were leaving him alone there. Disbelieving, he lifted his head, and the last to go cast him an angry look and swung his foot at him, which Nicholas dodged by rolling over. Now that man too was hurrying away across the empty piazza.

In the tower of the Aracoeli, up on the hill, a bell began to toll.

Nicholas stood up, his coat filthy with grit and his left arm still a lump without feeling. Il Bello: Stefano. He tugged at his clothes. His hose was torn on one knee and he had lost a shoe. All the bells in Rome were beginning to toll around him and he could hear the monks assembling on the stairs of the Aracoeli, behind him, but he did not turn.

Stefano: Il Bello. He began to walk painfully toward his home. It didn't matter, really. Stefano did not matter, and it was a weakness to long for him, especially now, when at last Nicholas's own influence and work were of weight in Rome. That was important, not Stefano. He lifted his head up, he was walking along under the trees that lined the street toward the Colosseo, and the dusty air pent under their broad canopies brushed over his face. His arm was tingling to life again, throbbing. His life he owed to Stefano, whom he had cast out. He dragged himself painfully back to his house, where Juan would care for him.

Fixed as usual on the recovery of Pisa, the Florentine Signory paid little heed to the rebellion in Arezzo, although Nicholas wrote two letters describing the situation there as needing quick action. Then in the height of the summer, Piero de' Medici, head of the exiled house, entered Arezzo with Vitellozzo Vitelli, a captain of Valentino's who owed the Signory a blood debt for the killing of his brother; the Aretines packed the streets to cheer them all the way to the palace. The Signory panicked. A courier rushed orders to the Florentine ambassador with the French king to plead for help, and duly enough King Louis sent orders to his troops in Milan to support the city against Valentino.

Talk of this dominated every gathering in Italy through the summer. No one marked it especially when Duke Valentino, with the cannon borrowed from his new ally Guidobaldo da Urbino, marched away across Guidobaldo's territory to attack Camerino.

In the heat of the summer night Nicholas slept in snatches, tormented by dreams. He woke once before midnight and went out to the kitchen for a cool glass of wine to settle his sleep. Juan slept on his cot in the narrow space between the wall and the wooden table. Nicholas slipped past him; the old man turned and broke into a hollow snore. Nicholas drank his wine and returned to his bed.

Yet he did not sleep. He lay on his back, thinking of Stefano.

Somewhere nearby a dog began to bark. Nicholas rolled over; the sound penetrated his ears like thorns. He rolled over again, trying to stop his ears with the pillow. The light sheet slid off his body and he clutched at it and pulled it up over his shoulders.

Under the racket of the dog another sound reached him, much nearer. He sat up in his bed, his ears stretching. Someone was walking about in the garden outside his house. He remembered the time that Stefano had broken into the house, but then he had not been alone. Perhaps it was Stefano. He pulled on his dressing gown and stuffed his feet into house shoes. If it were Stefano—if it were not Stefano—he opened the door enough to put his head out and scan the main room.

It was as he had left it; one candle burned in the iron bracket by the front door. Nicholas went across the room to make certain that the door was locked.

Just as he reached it the door swung open. He stopped. Miguelito stood there on the step.

Nicholas said, “What do you want with me?”

Miguelito came by him into the room. He wore a long black traveling coat; his muddy boots left a trail on the floor. He flung his hat off across the room.

“I have come from Urbino,” Miguelito said.

“Ah,” Nicholas said, and was out of breath.

“It worked,” Miguelito said. “Guidobaldo fled, Urbino belongs to Cesare Borgia. Who sends you this, with his respects.”

He gave Nicholas a ring.

“It worked,” Nicholas said.

He closed his fingers over the heavy jewel. A hot delirium welled up in his mind, a triumph almost like sex. He smiled, and Miguelito smiled too, a sudden bright unexpected flash of teeth.

“Have a glass of wine with me,” Nicholas said. “We shall drink to the victory.”

Juan was in the kitchen doorway, blinking at them. Nicholas waved him away again. Miguelito was smothering down a yawn; he glanced around the darkened room and smiled sleepily at Nicholas again.

“Aren't you going to look at the bauble?” He unfastened the front of his coat and shrugged it off; it fell to the floor.

Nicholas opened his hand and looked down at the ring. In the light of the candle he could not make out the color of the stone, which looked black. The massive setting was carved of gold.

“Very fine,” he said.

Miguelito went to the nearest chair. “He is right. There is something mad about you—who can trust a man who cares nothing of a ruby? My horse is outside. Someone must tend him.” He sank into the chair, swung one filthy boot at a time up onto the plush cushion of the chair opposite, put his head back, and shut his eyes. Within the space of two heartbeats he was asleep.

Juan had come back into this room from the kitchen, a ragged gray shawl over his shoulders. Nicholas stood irresolutely. He was frightened of horses. He opened his hand again to look down at the ring. Now he saw that the stone was red, indeed a ruby.

“Go to bed,” he said to Juan. He went out to the garden, caught Miguelito's exhausted horse, and led it by the bridle down the street to the nearest inn with a stable.

By morning the news of the fall of Urbino was general talk in Rome. Nicholas reached the Florentine legation half an hour later than usual; the rest of the staff was already in their places, buzzing, not a one of them at work. When Nicholas came in, every scribe and page rushed at him jabbering.

He went through the midst of them to the coat rack and hung up his coat. All in one voice, they were shouting at him, repeating over and over again the names of Urbino and Duke Valentino.

“Be quiet!” Nicholas shouted.