Light on Lucrezia - By Plaidy, Jean Page 0,52

sphere of influence.

When she had married him ten years before, Francesco had adored her. She had seemed to him quite wonderful, combining handsome looks with a clever brain. As for herself, she tolerated him. She considered him far from prepossessing, for although he was tall and had a good figure he bore unmistakably the mark of his German ancestors; and the Hohenzollern features did not appeal to Isabella’s sense of beauty. His nose had the appearance of being flattened out; his eyes looked sleepy; his forehead immense. His charm did not touch Isabella, and she was surprised that other women should be deeply conscious of it.

It was necessary to Francesco to indulge in love affairs outside his marriage as he was a deeply sensual man and, in any case in his time, men who did not so indulge were often accused of impotence.

What did it matter what mistresses he took, Isabella asked herself, as long as she produced sons for the glorification of her family and his?

Rumor had it that when, immediately after the birth of one of her children, she discovered it to be a girl, she rose from her bed and removed it from the elaborate cradle which had been prepared, as she pointed out, for a male child.

She was a strong woman, accustomed to rule, sharp-tongued, witty, elegant, admired and respected, but loved by few.

She had heard much about the women who were beloved by the Pope, and she was envious of them; therefore she was ready to grant asylum to Giovanni Sforza, when he came riding to Mantua to beg it, and received him with as much warmth as he could expect from a woman of her character.

“My dear Marchesa,” he said, bowing over her hand, “I come to you as a beggar, knowing that the brother of my dear dead Maddalena would not turn me away.”

“Certainly he shall not turn you away,” said Isabella. “Certainly you shall have refuge here. There must be some place where those who have suffered at the hands of these outrageous Borgias should find rest.”

“How happy I am that I came!”

Isabella looked at him with some scorn, since he was a weak man and she despised weakness. On the other hand she was looking forward to talking with him at her little court, and drawing from him further scandalous stories concerning the infamous Borgias.

So Giovanni was made welcome, and he found the cultured court of Mantua to his taste. Here wars were not considered of the greatest importance. Literature was discussed; matters of the mind. The Duke, with his military glory, might be an outsider, but let him go to his stables where he was breeding those horses which were fast becoming known as not only the best in Italy but in the world.

There was nothing which delighted Isabella more than to gather about her the wittiest people of Mantua and many of those from all parts of Italy who visited her court. She wished to be known, not as the virtual governor of Mantua only, but as patroness of the arts.

Conversation in her apartments must be witty; and she must reign indisputably queen—she, Isabella d’Este Gonzaga. Her father, the Duke of Ferrara, and her brothers all respected her political genius; they always had; and thus she had habitually visualized herself as the most brilliant member of the most important family in Italy. It was small wonder that she felt piqued to see the rise of another family and the power which the women of that family seemed to possess over its head.

Now with Giovanni Sforza in her salon she led the conversation to the affairs of the Borgias and declared that Giovanni Sforza, who had intimate experience of that strange family, would be able to tell them whether those tales they heard of the scandalous Borgias were really true.

So Giovanni told the stories which Isabella wished him to tell.

He had been forced to divorce Lucrezia! Why? Because His Holiness was so enamored of his daughter that he could not endure her having a husband. The marriage had not been consummated! Lies … all lies. It had been consummated a thousand times. And the golden-haired, innocent Lucrezia, who had stood before the assembly so demurely and declared herself still a virgin was then truly pregnant. But the child was not his.

The apartments of Mantua rang with laughter. Old scandals were revived; and Giovanni felt his vanity soothed in some measure. He could not fight the Borgias with arms, but he