The Second Duchess (18 page)

I
had myself undressed quickly to make up for the time in the Saint Catherine Tower. Nicoletta helped me don a sablelined night-gown, combed out my hair, and held long, pointed slippers of gold brocade for me to step into. I half-wished I had asked Maria Granmammelli for one of her potions, to calm my thoughts of poisoners and give me courage. Sybille offered me a posset of hot spiced wine, and I felt a moment of uncertainty; then I chided myself that this was Sybille, after all, my beloved Sybille, and I drank it down in one draught. They followed me to the duke’s apartments and left me there.

“Sit for a moment,” the duke said. He was lounging at his ease in his
studiolo
, his favorite room, filled with magnificent paintings and classical sculptures. He had also put aside his Festival costume; he was wearing a loose gown of mulberry-colored velvet furred with marten and was sipping red wine from one of his Murano glasses. The damascened dagger in its sheath lay on the table beside him.

I curtsied formally before him—as formally as I could, at least, while wearing nothing but a night-gown—and seated myself on the gilded, velvet-cushioned
sgabello
next to his chair. He leaned forward, tipped my face up with two fingers under my chin, and to my utter astonishment kissed my mouth.

“You have been drinking wine,” he said.

“A p-posset, my lord.” I was so taken aback I stumbled over the word.

He gestured toward the wine decanter on the table. There was a second, empty glass beside it. “Would you like another?”

I would have welcomed another, or for that matter two or three, but I needed to keep my wits about me. “Thank you, but no.”

He leaned back in his cushioned chair. “How does the Tassoni girl?”

So much for my thought I had slipped away to the Saint Catherine Tower unnoticed.

“Her grandfather fears for her life, so she has been given the unction,” I said. “Maria Granmammelli is with her.”

He frowned but said nothing.

“It is unfortunate,” I went on, turning my head away but watching his face from the corners of my eyes, “that such an accident marred the Festival. Your confectioners should be reproved, my lord, for their carelessness.”

“Indeed they should.”

I looked down at my hands. Too quick, that facile agreement; he did not believe for a moment it was an accident and he was humoring me like a child. Well, let him think he had succeeded. If I told him I believed it was a deliberate attempt to poison me, he would either take more care the next time—if he was behind it all—or demand to know why I believed someone wished to poison me. That was a question I did not wish to answer.

After a moment he said, “You were praying for a son today, at Corpus Domini. Tell me, Madonna, what else were you praying for?”

My heartbeat quickened. “Nothing else, my lord.”

He put the wine-glass down on the table and picked up the dagger; thoughtfully he ran his thumb over the pommel, which was oddly fashioned with two round gold medallions like wings. For the first time I was close enough to recognize the engraved designs, and to discern among them the famous capital
H
and intertwined double crescents of Henri II of France. Had the dagger once belonged to his older cousin, whose death in a joust had shocked the world? Clearly it held some unusual significance for the duke.

“Not a single Pater,” he said, “that I might be punished for my sins?”

“What—what sins are those, my lord?”

“Wrath, perhaps. Or pride. Or even lust. Three of the seven deadly sins.”

I felt color flood up into my face, and I looked away. “My own sins were quite enough to occupy me.”

“Indeed. The besetting female sin of curiosity, for one. Your brother told me you were disquisitive and difficult, and would require firm handling.”

“My
brother
told you that?”

“That and other things. What is it, Madonna? You look surprised.”

“I would have thought Maximilian had more important things to do than to write you a list of my shortcomings.”

“Maximilian? Not at all. It was Archduke Ferdinand who warned me about you. And it was not in writing—we spoke at length when he was here in Ferrara.”

“Ferdinand was here?” I realized I was shivering, and not with cold. “When?”

“You did not know? He acted as Maximilian’s emissary to arrange the preliminary details of the marriage. He came to Ferrara incognito, as an envoy of the Count of Tyrol.”

“But Ferdinand is the Count of Tyrol. I mean, it is one of his titles.”

The duke smiled. “Exactly. It was a jest between us. Naturally I would not negotiate such a serious matter with one who was not my equal in rank.”

“Naturally.”

“He was frank about rumors he had heard. I was similarly frank about my first wife and the circumstances of her death. It was later, as we were going downstairs to rejoin the court, that he described your nature to me. It appears he was right.”

I pulled my night-gown more closely around my body and moved one foot so it was placed more exactly in the center of a motif on the carpet. What had the duke told my brother? Had he confessed to the murder of his young wife? Had both Ferdinand and Maximilian known the truth all along, and arranged my marriage into Ferrara regardless?

“You are shivering. Are you cold?”

“No, my lord.”

“Very well. Stand up, if you please.”

I remained seated. What would he do if he knew I was shivering with—I was not sure, excitement, terror, determination, breathlessness—at my own disquisitive and difficult presumption in plotting to gain power over him?

“What do you intend to do?”

“Stand up.”

I stood up slowly.

He began to unfasten the gold-corded knots on the front of my night-gown. I flinched away at first, but he caught hold of the brocade and pulled me back. Rather than humiliate myself by struggling, I stood quietly as he finished opening the gown and pushing it back from my shoulders. It fell with a rustle of silk and fur. I was naked beneath it but for my hair.

“You have such lovely hair,” he said. “Golden-rose, like apricots. I should like you to obtain an apricot-scented perfume to enhance the impression. Turn around.”

I turned. I felt him rest one hand on the curve of my hip. The touch was firm and surprisingly calming. I closed my eyes. I thought of him jerking my skirts over my head and thrashing me with the stick from the fireplace, and I hated him.

“A faint mark or two left,” he said. “By tomorrow, they will be gone. Obey me in future, Madonna, and there will be no more.”

I began to shiver again, all through my body. It was cold in the
camerino
. It was December in Ferrara, after all, and I was naked. I wanted to walk away, but I did not. Where would I go? Duchess I might be, but he was the duke and my master. I thought of the day when I would have proof he had killed his first wife, and could walk away if I chose.

“Let us go to bed,” he said. “The sheets have been warmed.” I gathered up my night-gown and wrapped it around me; I could not quite bring myself to walk through into the bedchamber naked. He followed me. The bedsheets were indeed warm and scented with his favorite sandalwood. I put the night-gown aside again and climbed into the bed’s silken softness, my hair crackling and clinging to my skin like gossamer.

“So you were praying for a son and nothing more,” he said. “Let us do our part, then, Madonna, to bring that particular prayer to fruition.”

He put off his robe. I turned my face into the pillow—yes, he had taught me all sorts of things about men and women and what they could do together, but gazing openly at his naked body was something I could not yet quite manage. He said nothing, but lay on the bed beside me and put his arms around me. I stiffened. I still felt cold. Holy Virgin, I could not forget the pressure of his hand between my shoulder blades, holding me down while he thrashed me with a poplar switch. How could any man expect any woman to forget that?

“You are not yourself,” he said. He ran his hand over my shoulder.

“Did you expect I would not be changed by what you did?” He ran his hand over my shoulder again, then slowly down my arm. His palm was warm and firm and more insistent. After a moment he said, “The only change I expect from you is a greater desire to please me.”

I no longer felt chilled. Was it the luxurious coverlets and the heat of the duke’s body next to mine, or was it the fire of resentment simmering in my heart and slowly pulsing out through my flesh to the very tips of my fingers and toes? Bide your time, I exhorted myself. You will have your chance for revenge, after you have found the truth and can use it to protect yourself. Bide your time.

“Very well, my lord.” I tried to make my voice soft and humble. “I will do my best.”

The movement of his hand along my arm stopped. To my surprise he laughed again, very softly. “I am not such a fool as to be taken in by a pretty voice and lowered eyes,” he said. He took hold of my wrist and pinned it against the pillow. “Be angry if you must. A sweet is always improved by the addition of a little spice.”

 

 

I remember when Alfonso showed my portrait to the archduke from Austria, the one who thought he was so clever by posing as his own servant. Just look at that spot of joy on her cheek, Alfonso said. ’Twasn’t only for me she blushed, but for everyone who said a kind word to her. Smirk smirk. Wink wink.
Che mucchio di merda!
He might as well have said straight out I’d played the whore with half the men of the court. Too soon made glad, he said. Well, maybe I was. But did he ever think it was because he never made any effort to make me glad himself?

Yes, he was one of them, Alfonso’s French friend, Sandro Bellinceno—oh, he was passionately in love with me, and sent me notes, even poems sometimes. I had a book called
I Modi
, full of pictures of men and women in bed with each other. Such a wonderful book it was, condemned by the pope himself. I stole it from Alfonso—I’m sure he had it just because it was rare and had poetry as well as the pictures. He was furious when he found it was missing, but he never suspected me because he knew I couldn’t read. He couldn’t search for it openly because it was a forbidden book and he shouldn’t have had it in the first place.

T
he next morning my ladies goggled avidly at my flesh as they helped me to dress. There were no fresh marks to titillate them, thank God, but when Katharina held a mirror for me, I could see the marks of the duke’s pleasure in the faint violet shadows under my eyes, and in the way my lips were swollen and reddened enough I had no need for lip-paint. Would everyone else see as well, and whisper behind their hands? Better that, at least, than the titters and whispers after the duke had beaten me—or the cardinal’s insinuations that our marriage was an unhappy one.

I gestured the mirror aside. I had left my own marks on the duke’s chest and arms—bruises, or so I hoped, scratches, and a bitemark or two.
A sweet is always improved by the addition of a little spice
. Spice he had been given, in generous measure, and I had found it eased a bit of my own resentment to strike back physically for the way he had treated me. Perhaps that had been his intention all along. Perhaps—