Poison: A Novel of the Renaissance (42 page)

At my look of surprise, he added, “We have all made mistakes, each and every one of us. The trick is to not keep making them over and over.”

“I don’t,” I said, not modestly but truthfully. “I keep finding new mistakes to make. I suspect that I have a genius for it.”

Borgia chuckled. “You are young yet. Time will season you.”

That he assumed I would have such time can be taken as a sign of confidence in his own ability to carry all before him. I could only hope that he was right. A short while later, he let me go, for which I was grateful. Anxiety as to what, if any, future lay ahead of me could not outweigh exhaustion. I had dragged a pallet from the attendants’ room into the small chamber. Having left Borgia to his own rest, I fell onto it and was asleep almost instantly.

I knew nothing more until sometime in the depths of night when I awoke suddenly, uncertain of where I was. Several moments passed before I remembered and then a rush of fear went through me. I touched a hand to the broad felt hat that, awkward though it was to sleep in, concealed my hair. Reassured that it was in place, I drifted off again but slept lightly, mindful of the great struggle to come.

With the new day, the real work began. The merchants of this world will be cheered to know that God is, apparently, one of them. Everything I witnessed within the bazaar that was the papal conclave confirms this. If God truly moved through the princes of his Church, then God is a bargainer, a negotiator, a clever seller of goods, and an equally skilled purchaser of same. From all this, I have concluded that it is the merchants, rather than the meek, who will inherit the Earth. What they will do with it is anyone’s guess.

It was a day of whispered conversations, of notes passed hand to hand, of surreptitious visits and huddles over goblets of wine. A day of smiles, cold and otherwise, of pressed handshakes and murmured confidences. A day in which immense amounts of money and vast properties were thrown down upon the table as so many chips and swept up as readily.

A day that seemed to leave Borgia well satisfied, for all that he ate only a little and retired to bed early.

On the next day, the first scrutiny, as it is called, was held.

Borgia lost.

He received seven votes but fourteen in all went to della Rovere and his surrogates. A two-thirds majority having been achieved by no man, the conclave continued.

What shall I tell you of the following day? Shall I speak of my mounting anxiety as the meetings, and the dealing, went on or of the many times I dared to peer outside Borgia’s suite to try to assess what was happening elsewhere? Perhaps you would like to hear of who I saw coming and going between the various apartments—attendants, usually, carrying messages, but on occasion a cardinal himself, skittering quickly in the hope of not being seen or swaggering without shame. I had wondered at Borgia’s determination to amass vast wealth on top of what he already possessed, but in those hours I came to understand why he had done it. I could inventory the exact payments made to so many princes of the Church, but as their venality is known to all, there seems no point.

Suffice it to say that very wealthy men became even wealthier over the course of a few crucial hours. But still it was not enough.

The second scrutiny was held in the evening of the third day. The tally was little changed from the first except that Borgia had gained a single vote. Negotiations continued through the night. There
were rumors of a stalemate. I could only imagine the mood of the crowd gathered all this time in the piazza, waiting on the news that would tell them whether there would be order or chaos.

With all the coming and going within Il Cardinale’s suite, I did not sleep. Early the next morning, I went to collect fresh bread provided by the Vatican kitchen, having confirmed the day before that the loaves were good enough not to offend Borgia’s palate. By selecting several at random, I thought to minimize the chance that anyone could think of using them as a means of poisoning him—or me.

At the same time, I collected the letter slipped through the slot by an anonymous hand. Of course, Il Cardinale had established a means of communicating with the outside world even though sealed away in conclave. I would have expected nothing less.

I was about to go when I stopped short suddenly, my heart racing. A hint of camphor and citrus hung in the air. Turning, I only just managed to stifle a gasp. Morozzi stood directly behind me.

The golden angel looked entirely well and whole, untouched by his failure in the basilica. There was no doubt that he knew me for who I was. For a moment, I feared he was about to denounce me but he merely inclined his head and smiled pleasantly.

“Have you tried the bread?” he inquired. “It’s surprisingly good.”

Anyone listening to him would have mistaken his amicable manner toward a mere page as a sign of Christian kindness. I, however, understood him well enough.

“You can be assured that I will,” I told him stiffly. “I taste everything meant for Il Cardinale.”

“How very responsible of you. I hope he appreciates the risk you take.” With a smile, he leaned forward and said close to my ear. “I hear his poisoner is a Jewess possessed by demons. If I were Borgia, I would fear her above all.”

As he spoke, he drew my locket from beneath his cassock and held it so that I alone of those gathered nearby could see it.

An instant later, it had vanished back from whence it had come, close to what passed for his heart.

Bile rose in the back of my throat. I stumbled away, hoping against all hope that I had managed to conceal my fear from Morozzi but knowing too well that I had not.

My hands were still trembling a short time later when I brought Borgia his breakfast and the letter.

He glanced at me as he broke the seal and prepared to read. “Is something wrong?”

“I had an encounter with Morozzi.”

He nodded but said nothing and gave his attention to the letter. After a moment, he remarked, “Cesare expresses his confidence that you are safeguarding me properly.”

“Is he well?” I asked, as mildly as I could manage.

“Apparently so. Della Rovere’s men are finding Siena an unfriendly place. No one wants to talk with them.”

That was hardly surprising since, as Cesare himself had said, he was very good at frightening people. However, there was a darker side to the news.

“If della Rovere is unable to convince the cardinals not to elect you pope because of your dealings with the Jews, he will be left with only one other option.”

Borgia finished reading and nodded. “He will have to let Morozzi kill me.”

For a man standing on the brink of death, he seemed remarkably calm.

My own nerves were considerably more frayed. “The mad priest is here, he has my locket and its contents, and he has made it more
than clear that he intends to act.” Indeed, he had taunted me with his plan.

“I have no doubt that he does. The only question is how.”

“Everything you eat, everything you drink, I test it all. But he knows that. Perhaps he intends to use a contact poison after all.” The possibility haunted me.

“You did not think he had the skill for that. If he does use such a poison, there will be no direct link to you. Suspicion will fall on the man everyone knows has made himself my enemy, della Rovere.”

“Except that I am here.” I did not speak from concern for myself, at least not mainly, but rather to the point that my presence might embolden the mad priest to throw all caution to the wind and attack Borgia in any way he could, thinking to unmask me afterward and in the ensuing chaos, proclaim me a murderess.

“If the worst happens,” Borgia said, “conceal yourself as best you can and wait for Vittoro. He will get you out.”

I stared at him. “You have already thought of this.”

“I may not be much of a priest but I am a very good administrator. I try to plan for all contingencies.”

He got up to go without having breakfasted, from which I concluded he was not as impervious to the situation as he liked to appear.

“Wear the gloves,” I called after him. I had insisted that he bring half a dozen pairs and keep one of them on at all times when he was outside the apartment. Further, I had instructed him—there is no other word for it—not to accept anything directly from the hand of another but to pass everything through his secretaries for my inspection. As a result, they, too, wore gloves.

Beyond that, he wore the formal vestments of his rank when outside his quarters, as did all the cardinals. The garments left no part of him uncovered save for his head.

Over his shoulder, he said, “Believe me, Francesca, I am in no rush to leave this world.”

It was now the tenth of August, Anno Domini 1492. The cardinals had been in conclave four full days. All were growing restless, understanding as they did the need to protect the stability of the Church so lately healed from the Great Schism. Too long a delay in naming the new pope and far more than merely the populace of Rome would rise up in fear of a return to chaos. Frightened, angry people are unpredictable, and therefore all the more dangerous.

Accordingly, when the third scrutiny was held later that day, I was not especially surprised to learn that a clear favorite had emerged.

Borgia had fourteen votes, one short of the fifteen needed to become pope.

Morozzi had to strike soon.

“I am counting on you to keep him at bay long enough for me to win,” Borgia said when he returned to his quarters briefly.

With that he was gone again, off to meet with one or another of the very few cardinals not yet pledged for or against him.

His secretaries went as well, leaving me alone in the silent apartment to ponder what I should do.

Or more particularly, what Morozzi would do.

How reluctant I was to put myself in the mad priest’s mind yet how vital it was that I manage no less. I paced and fiddled, sighed and groaned, sat and stood, and at one point snatched off the hat I had come to loathe and yanked hard enough on my hair to bring tears to my eyes.

Finally, frustrated beyond bearing and deeply worried about Borgia, I left the apartment to see if I could learn anything about what was happening.

I was about halfway down the passage linking the cardinals’
quarters to the chapel itself when a party of several prelates and their attendants surged toward me from the opposite end. Quickly, I pressed back against the wall and averted my face as they passed, but not before I saw that della Rovere was in the lead. If you have seen the portrait Raphael did of him, you will think him a frail, white-bearded man of somber mien, and I suppose that he was by the time he sat for the painter. But that day he was not yet fifty years old and still endowed with vigor many a man of similar age would have envied. Without the concealment of a beard, his features could be seen to be somewhat soft, the eyes deep-set beneath jutting brows, and the mouth seemingly set in permanent disapproval.

He went by and the rest of his party with him, giving no sign of having noticed me. I breathed a sigh of relief and continued on, hoping to encounter one of Borgia’s secretaries or, failing that, simply to loiter about and pick up what gossip I could. Much of the day had gone as I stewed over what to do. It was already past vespers. From what I could glean by listening here and there, no further vote was planned before the following morning.

That being the case, I assumed that Borgia would return soon to his apartment, expecting to find something to eat. I hurried back to be there when he arrived.

He looked tired but in no way downhearted as he pulled off his gloves, accepted the wine I poured for him, and took a seat.

Without preamble, he said, “I think Gherardo is senile.”

It took me a moment to realize that he was referring to the aged patriarch of Venice for whose sake the conclave had been delayed.

“Half the time we’re talking, he seems to think he’s a boy back in Venice.”

“Do you have his vote?” You would think that someone in my line of work would be a master—or mistress—of circumspection.
My father was such but it is a skill in which I remain lamentably lacking.

Fortunately, my directness did not faze Borgia. Indeed, he was to tell me later that he valued that quality in me almost more than any other.

“When he is in the here and now, I believe that I do.”

I stepped back and stared at him. My heart was beating very fast. “Then it is done?”

He shrugged and accepted his wine. “If God wills it.”

His manner did not fool me. I knew him too well not to realize that he was both deeply pleased and still apprehensive. How could he not be? He was so very close and yet—

“Della Rovere knows,” I said, “or at least he suspects.”

“What makes you say that?”

“I saw him in the passage a short time ago. He looked . . . upset.”

“You know he is prone to constipation? Perhaps it was that.”

I smiled despite myself. “No, I think it was of rather more import.”

“We will vote again at break of day,” Borgia said. “Shortly before then, I will go to see Gherardo again in hope of finding him still of the same mind, whatever that may be. In the meantime, I trust you, and the sturdy lock on the door, to keep me from harm.”

I nodded and went about my tasks, seeing to his meal, but my thoughts were elsewhere. Whatever the state of his bowels, I was convinced that what I had seen on della Rovere’s face meant that he knew the final blow was about to fall. Yet Morozzi seemed so supremely confident, mocking me with his assurance of success. As for the rest of us, we were all sealed away in a world where the only chance to commit murder and get away with it had to lie in making a stranger appear responsible.

“Della Rovere must know by now that his only way of stopping you from becoming pope is to let Morozzi kill you,” I said.

“So it appears . . .” Borgia muttered. He seemed disinclined to go over yet again how close he was to the precipice.

“But,” I went on, speaking as much to myself as to him, “for all that they have allied themselves, della Rovere and Morozzi don’t really seek the same end.”