that I remain while the physicians dress his wounds.”
Sanchia nodded.
“Why are the doctors so long in coming?” cried Lucrezia. “Do they not understand that delay is dangerous?”
Sanchia put her arm about Lucrezia. “My dear sister,” she said, “you are overwrought. They will be here soon … and if he lives through this night … we will save him. You and I together.”
When the physicians came Sanchia drew Lucrezia to a corner of the room while Alfonso’s wounds were dressed and the ambassador looked on.
Sanchia’s voice was cold and angry as she whispered: “Lucrezia, you understand what this means … all that this means?”
“I heard his words,” Lucrezia replied.
“We have to fight him! We have to fight your brother and my lover for Alfonso’s life.”
“I know it.”
“They would have taken him to the Tiber, as they did your brother Giovanni. It is the same method … so successful before. Thank God it failed this time.”
“Thank God,” whispered Lucrezia.
“There will be other attempts.”
“They shall not succeed,” declared Lucrezia fiercely.
“The Pope understands. That is why he insists on the Neapolitan ambassador’s watching the dressing of the wounds. He does not want it said that poison was inserted into his blood by the Papal doctors. You love him, do you not? He is your husband and should be more to you than any other. Can I trust you with my little brother?”
“Can I trust you with my husband?”
Then they began to cry and comforted each other, until Sanchia said: “It is not the time for tears. If he recovers we will have a stove brought into this room, and all that he eats shall be prepared by us. We will stand guard over him, Lucrezia … my little brother, your beloved husband.”
“It is wonderful, Sanchia,” said Lucrezia, “at such a time to have someone whom one can trust.”
“I feel that too,” answered Sanchia.
In the streets the people stood in little groups, discussing the attempt on the life of Alfonso of Bisceglie. In the Vatican there was much whispering and hurrying to and fro.
In the sick-room Alfonso hovered between life and death, and two women with a fierce fanaticism in their eyes stood guard over him. In a corner of that room two beds had been placed, although they were not occupied at the same time. When Sanchia slept Lucrezia was on guard and Lucrezia slumbered while Sanchia watched Alfonso. They had had a field-stove brought into the apartment in readiness, to prepare his food.
Sanchia had demanded that the guards placed outside the apartment should be those whom she was sure she could trust—members of her own household and her brother’s. She sent messages to her uncle, King Federico, telling him what happened, and as a result Messer Galeano da Anna, a noted Neapolitan surgeon, arrived in the company of Messer Clemente Gactula, Federico’s own physician.
By this time it seemed almost certain that Alfonso would live, and now that he was well enough to realize that either Lucrezia or Sanchia was constantly with him and that his doctors were those sent by his uncle, he felt a new confidence and with this came a new strength.
The Pope was a little irritated by his daughter’s desertion of his own sick-room for that of her husband. He hinted that it was a little melodramatic of the two women to watch over Alfonso as though his life were still in danger.
But Alexander was worried. He was fully aware who was responsible for the attack, and this meant that he could only pretend that he wanted his son-in-law’s would-be murderers brought to justice.
It was said in the Vatican and in the streets that if Alfonso recovered from this attack it would not be long before he met with another, for it was clear that Cesare Borgia, the dreaded Il Valentino, was behind this attempt on his life.
They were very anxious days for Lucrezia. How could she help recalling that period of great anguish when she had learned that her lover’s body had been found in the Tiber? She knew who had arranged poor Pedro’s death. It was the same one who had tried to strike down Alfonso.
Sometimes Alfonso would call out in his sleep and she would rush to his bedside to soothe him. She knew that his nightmares were always of threatening danger, and there was one name which he never failed to whisper—Cesare!
Lucrezia decided that she must see her brother; she must make him understand how devotedly she loved Alfonso. Cesare loved her. Had they not always