Francesca (25 page)

She didn’t answer him immediately. Then she said, “That was totally delicious, husband. Anytime? Any place? If that be so, then I am eager to try.” She relaxed her hold on him. “I won’t fall and drown,” Francesca assured him.

He climbed from the tub and, having wrapped a drying sheet about his loins, reached to lift her out of the cooling water and enfold her in a second, warmed cloth. Tenderly he rubbed her shoulders, her neck, and her arms. Seating her upon their bed he dried her feet, making her giggle as he slipped the towel between her toes.

“My old nursemaid used to do that when I was a child,” Francesca said.

“Mine too,” he admitted.

“Rafaello?”

“Yes, Francesca?”

“I asked you that morning at the lodge if we were happy, and you said you were. Now I would tell you that I am happy too, my lord husband,” Francesca admitted shyly.

“Would you mind if I fell in love with you?” he asked her almost boyishly.

“Have you?” she countered as her heart skipped several beats.
Love
. She hadn’t considered marriage would bring her love. She wasn’t her elder sister, Bianca, giving up everything she had and knew for a man. She had left those illusions behind her in Venice, when as a silly little girl she had believed herself in love with Prince Enzo. To be loved by one’s husband was a wonderful dream.

“I’m considering it,” he teased her. “If we lived in your Florence it would be considered very unfashionable, I know, but here in Terreno Boscoso we make our own rules, wife. Yes! I believe I shall fall in love with you, Francesca.”

She suddenly felt shy of him again, but she had to admit that the idea of having her handsome husband fall in love with her was a pleasing notion. She stood up and her drying sheet fell away. “I had best get a chemise,” she said.

“No,” he told her. “We will sleep as God fashioned us, my love.” Drawing back the coverlet of the bed, he invited her into it. Then he said, “Would you mind?”

“Mind what?” she asked him as she slid beneath the coverlet.

“If I fell in love with you,” he said softly as he joined her and wrapped an arm about her. Drawing her close, he began caressing her breasts.

“N . . . no,” Francesca answered him as softly. “I would not mind if you fell in love with me, my lord husband.”

“Do you think you could love me?” He bent and kissed a nipple.

“Oh yes!” Francesca said, blushing at her own eagerness. To love and to be loved. She was suddenly overwhelmed with a burst of happiness. She could not see the smile that touched his lips at her answer.

“I am glad,” Rafaello said. The shadow of Carlo the huntsman was banished now, and he was relieved. She would love him alone, and it was comforting. He was surprised to know how much that meant to him.

During the next few days the young duke considered a way to ferret out the bandits troubling the High Road. It was obvious that their leader was a trifle smarter than most robbers, for he could not be lured by too big a party of travelers, who would be very well guarded. He had not the men for such a venture, and they had not the skills of trained soldiers. The bait would have to be something inviting but not obviously dangerous. He discussed the matter with the old duke.

Listening, Francesca had an idea. “A wedding party,” she said. “Wedding parties are not generally considered risky to thieves.”

“We could not put some poor girl at risk,” Rafaello said.

Francesca laughed. “It doesn’t have to be a real wedding party. The bride in her closed litter can be a young man dressed like a woman. The men-at-arms guarding the wedding can appear older than they actually are, which should reassure the bandits of their superiority. Those accompanying the bride, both male and female relations, will actually be soldiers.”

Duke Titus chuckled. “Your
duchessa
has a devious mind,” he approved.

“A Florentine trait,” Francesca answered him pertly with a grin.

“What if Bruno and his robbers do not take this very tasty bait that you are suggesting?” Rafaello asked his wife.

“Oh,” Francesca answered him, “you cannot simply send your faux wedding party down the High Road without laying your groundwork first,” she explained. “First you must go to the innkeeper who brought the complaint about these villains. You have told me he is not trustworthy, for he fears you are not strong enough to root out Bruno and his ilk. He plays both ends against the middle.

“So send Captain Arnaldo to this man. He will be impressed by that. The captain will tell the innkeeper that a wealthy merchant from Milan is bringing his daughter to wed her cousin in France. The captain will tell the innkeeper that your men will do a sweep of the High Road the day before the wedding party is to come. That if he hears that Bruno is near he must let us know. He will, of course, send to the bandit in order to ingratiate himself with him. He will not realize you are on to his dangerous game.

“I guarantee there will be no sign of these robbers when your men patrol the High Road. But the next day when the wedding party goes on its way it is sure to be attacked, especially if we make it tempting enough. The bride is a virgin. She is attended by six pretty maidens. Her dower, which will travel with her is very, very rich. Bruno is a man who violated a noblewoman and took pleasure in the deed. He gave her serving woman to his men. There hasn’t been a prize like this wedding party on the High Road in months. It will be too good for him to resist. Gold and women. No bandit could eschew such a treat. Could he?” Francesca asked.

“It is a good plan,” Rafaello said, looking at his young wife with growing respect.

“An excellent plan,” old Duke Titus agreed. “I liked Francesca from the start for her common sense and her kindness. But when you chose her for your wife, my son, you gained a serious helpmate.”

“I will send Captain Arnaldo to the innkeeper in a few days’ time, after we prepare our trap for the bandits,” the young duke said.

“Let me choose the bride,” Francesca said, giggling.

“We will let our captain do that, my love,” her husband replied. “The young man chosen will be embarrassed enough.”

“And he will fight harder to prove his manhood once the enemy is engaged,” Francesca remarked wisely. “But Terza, Rosa, and I must help to dress the ladies of the wedding party, my lord.”

“That seems fair,” her father-in-law agreed. “After all, my son, this clever plan is Francesca’s. She should have some part in it.”

Rafaello nodded.

During the next few days they put together the appearance of a prosperous wedding party. Captain Arnaldo visited the innkeeper and told him of its imminent arrival. He watched with half-closed eyes, a mug of the inn’s best ale half-empty in his hand as the innkeeper surreptitiously spoke with a stableman whom the captain watched leave the vicinity. He allowed the duplicitous taverner to believe all was well. The next day he and his men swept the road from the inn to the nearby border with France and back with much noise and saber rattling.

“Your bandits appear to have gone,” he said to his host on his return. “I shall tell my master the road is safe for this wedding party. It would not do for us to have an incident. You know how sensitive Milan’s rulers are right now, even with the peace. They sent to our duke to make certain this bride and her family reached their destination safely.” Then with a nod he departed with his men back to the castle.

Reaching his destination, he sought out the young duke. “It’s done, my lord. The innkeeper, as we suspected, sent a man off to notify Bruno of the impending riches coming his way in a few days. We traveled the High Road to the border with much noise and flourishing. It was as quiet as a tomb. I saw deer and I saw wildflowers, but not one sign of the bandits. They know how to hide, although I doubt not they were spying on us as we rode the entire way,” the captain reported to his master.

“We’ll depart in two days’ time,” Rafaello said.

“Surely you aren’t going. Are you?” Francesca asked.

“I am the Duke of Terreno Boscoso,” Rafaello replied. “It is my duty to go.”

“But there will be fighting!” Francesca cried.

He and Captain Arnaldo both grinned. “Aye, my love,” he said. “There will be! And it will be glorious. The rulers of small duchies like this one rarely get to engage in any sort of battle. My father and I kept clear of the altercation between the French king and the Italian states. We showed no partiality to either side but avoided the conflict. This little adventure, rooting out these bandits, will give me an opportunity to use the skills I spent my youth learning.”

“Why is it that men never grow up?” Francesca said to no one in particular. Then she looked at Captain Arnaldo. “I charge you with his safety,” she said. “If you fail me I will be ruthless in your punishment. Do you understand me?”

“My love,” Rafaello chided her, “do not be so harsh.”

“You are this duchy’s only heir right now, my lord,” she reminded him, “and we are but newly wed.”

“She is right, my lord,” the captain said. Then he turned to Francesca. “I will personally see to his safety, my lady.”

While the
duchessa
and her two serving women had a great deal of fun dressing the soldiers who would pose as the women of the wedding party, they were also careful to see to it that the colorful robes they wore could be quickly and easily discarded to reveal the fighting men. The men involved looked uncomfortable, as Terza and Rosa couldn’t resist teasing them, especially the young man who would play the bride, a fresh-faced lad whose head they covered with a butterfly headdress—a generous length of transparent linen that was wired and draped to effect the shape of a butterfly.

Much hilarity ensued once the head covering had been donned. The red-faced bride was escorted to her open litter.

“I’m almost tempted by such a lovely wench myself,” Captain Arnaldo chuckled, seeing the results of the women’s labor.

The false wedding party departed the castle. The soldiers that would be shadowing them blended into the landscape, but for a token force escorting the merchant and his family. Traveling slowly along the High Road they passed the inn, the innkeeper watching them.

“I wonder who he is more afraid of,” Captain Arnaldo murmured to the duke. “You or Bruno.”

“I suspect we are equally dangerous,” Rafaello replied, “but I am this duchy’s ruler. Having complained to me of these bandits our innkeeper friend would have done better to trust in my authority instead of playing both ends against the middle. I will have to punish him when this is over. No one must be allowed to believe that I am not aware of everything happening on my own lands.”

“I agree,” the captain responded.

The false wedding party moved along. The bride was clearly visible in her open litter.

Half a dozen richly garbed ladies upon their horses surrounded her, escorted by several prosperous-looking gentlemen. There were three carts full of what appeared to be a rich dower, and eight men-at-arms. To anyone seeing the train it appeared to be a wealthy wedding party. Nothing more.

They were at least two miles past the inn when the bandits struck, rising from the side of the High Road, weapons in hand. The travelers stopped, the false ladies shrieking as it was expected that women surprised by robbers would do. The man chosen to play the bride’s father shouted in an outraged voice.

“How dare you stop us? Move aside!”

The bandit chief called Bruno stepped forward. “That is a fine horse you are riding, sir. I will have it! And I will have your pretty daughter for myself, while your ladies entertain my men. As for you and your gentlemen, you are all dead men!”

It was then that the duke and his men appeared, surrounding the bandits from behind.

“I think not,” Rafaello said in a hard voice. “It is you who has earned a quick trip to hell! You are sentenced to death for the kidnapping and rape of Aceline du Barry last year, and for your boldness in impersonating me while you used the poor woman.”

Bruno’s mouth fell open with his surprise, but, recovering quickly, he lunged at the duke, who was still ahorse. Rafaello Cesare was an excellent horseman. His stallion responded to the rein and reared up, knocking the bandit to the ground. The duke then jumped from the animal’s back, dagger in hand, flung himself atop the robber, and slit his throat. Standing up he told his men, “Hang the rest of them, and leave them hanging as a lesson to any who would steal from travelers along this road.” Then, turning to Captain Arnaldo, he said, “We have an innkeeper to punish.”

The two men rode back to the inn, where they found the innkeeper in his taproom. The man looked up, surprised, as the duke and his captain entered. “My lord!” he exclaimed, and hurried to bring them wine.

The duke waved his hospitality aside. “You came to me for justice, and then you betrayed me,” he said without any preamble. “Know that Bruno is dead and his men as well. The High Road will be kept safe where it runs through Terreno Boscoso as long as I am this duchy’s ruler. The wedding party that passed by your inn several hours ago was a trap conceived to draw Bruno and his men out into the open. When we realized your duplicity we knew if we told you of such a rich prize you would be certain to get word to the bandits. You did not disappoint me. Bruno and his men have paid for their crimes with their lives. Now I must decide how to punish you.”

“My lord, have mercy!” the innkeeper begged him.

“Are you aware that your bandit friend kidnapped and assaulted a young noblewoman who had been a guest of my father’s last summer as she traveled home to France? She bore his child, and the horrendous experience rendered her mad. She now resides in a convent with her bastard, being cared for by the nuns.”

“My lord, I did not know!” the innkeeper babbled.

“No, you did not. But you did know this bandit and his men would ruin your trade if word got out that the High Road was not safe. So you came to me, and I promised you that I would take care of the matter. Yet before I might, you betrayed me by going to the bandits. Why?”

“My lord, my stableman is kin to Bruno. He told the robber of my complaint to you. Bruno came and threatened to burn my inn to the ground and slay me if I did not cooperate with him. I had no other choice!”