the niceties of refined living? Alfonso never wasted his time wooing; he saw a girl, seduced her and, if the experience pleased him, repeated the performance. Otherwise the affair was forgotten. Alfonso was a hearty, virile man.
Anna Sforza had not really been disturbed. She had her own tastes and, although as wife to the heir of Ferrara, she had been ready to bear him children, she was clearly glad when Alfonso spent his nights with a humble mistress and left her to dally with that pretty Negress whom she adored.
But Anna oddly enough, in an attempt to do her duty, had met her death. She had died in childbed. Not the first nor the last woman to do so; yet in Anna’s case it seemed doubly tragic.
“Well, Alfonso, what have you to say?”
“There has to be a marriage,” murmured Alfonso absently.
“But with the Borgias!”
Alfonso shrugged.
“And she a bastard!” went on Ercole.
“You’ll doubtless get a good dowry with her, Father,” said Alfonso with a grin. “That should please you.”
“Not for the biggest dowry in the world would I wish to see the house of Ferrara joined with that of the Borgias. Yet, if we refuse, we’ll have the Papacy against us. You realize what that will mean in these days of unrest.”
Alfonso’s eyes were shining. “We’ll use the cannon on any who come this way.”
“Cannon!” cried Ercole. “Of what use are your cannon against the Pope’s armies? And yet … and yet …”
“You’d be surprised if you saw them in action, Father.”
“The Pope’s armies …”
“No, no! My cannon. In days to come the cannon I shall make will have first place on the battlefield.”
“It is of this marriage that I wish to talk. Oh Alfonso, have you no sense of the fitness of things?”
It was the old cry. Some years ago this son of his had been wagered that he would not walk through the streets of Ferrara naked, with a sword in his hand. He had accepted the wager and done this thing. He had not understood that the people who had watched his progress would never forget what the heir of Ferrara had done.
Oh, why was not Ippolito the eldest son? But Ippolito might have made trouble. Or Ferrante? Ferrante was reckless. Sigismondo? One did not want a priest to rule a dukedom. Giulio was a bastard and Giulio had been spoilt because of his beauty. But what was the use of railing against these sons of his? Alfonso was the eldest and for all his crudeness he was at least a man.
“Well, you do not seem in the least perturbed,” said the Duke.
“There’ll be compensations, I doubt not,” murmured Alfonso. His thoughts were back in the foundry; at this time of day—unless some luscious girl crossed his path—cannons were so much more interesting than women.
“Oh, there might be compensations,” agreed the Duke, rising, “but none would be great enough for me to welcome union with that notorious family.”
He rose and walked away and, as he did so, he heard Alfonso, whistling—in the coarsest possible manner—to his men.
It was carnival time in Urbino, and Guidobaldo di Montefeltre, the Duke found himself forced to entertain Cesare Borgia while he was waiting for the surrender of the town of Faenza.
The Duke was not pleased, but he dared do nothing else. Cesare, who had now assumed the title of Duke of Romagna, was an enemy to be feared, as none was entirely sure in which direction his armies would turn next.
So to the castle came the newly made Duke of Romagna, and it was necessary for the Duke and his proud wife, Elizabetta Gonzaga (who was sister to Francesco Gonzaga, husband of Isabella d’Este) to receive Cesare with all honor.
Elizabetta hated the Borgias; she had a score to settle with them. Her husband had been prematurely struck down with gout and found walking difficult and he who had once been a great soldier was now a victim of periodic immobility. But the Duke was of a kindly nature and ready to forget the past. Elizabetta, proud, haughty, looking on herself as an aristocrat, resented the Borgias and the treatment her husband had received at their hands, for it was Guidobaldo who had been with Giovanni Borgia when war had been waged against the Orsinis at Bracciano; and forced to obey the unwarlike commands of Giovanni Borgia, Guidobaldo had been wounded and taken prisoner. It was during the months in a French prison that he had contracted his gout and his health had