“My lord,” she said, “if we had had news of your coming we should not have received you thus.”
“Ha!” he said. “ ’Twas my plan to surprise you.”
“You find me with my hair wet. We have but recently arrived here with the grime of the journey upon us.”
“I’m not so shocked by grime as are most.” He took a strand of the hair in his hand. “I had heard it shone like gold,” he said.
“It does so when it is dry. I am grieved that it should be wet when you first meet me.”
He twisted a handful of it and pulled it gently. “I like it,” he said.
“I am glad it pleases you. As I hope to.…”
He was looking at her, and she knew him for a connoisseur of women; each detail of her body was considered, and now and again she would hear that short dry laugh of his. He was not displeased.
He looked at Adriana and the two girls.
“Leave me with Madonna Lucrezia,” he said. “I have business with her.”
“My lord,” began Adriana in alarm.
He waved his hand at her. “Have done, woman,” he said. “We have been married, if only by proxy. Begone, I say.” And as Adriana hesitated, he bellowed: “Go!”
Adriana curtsied and went, the girls following her.
Alfonso turned to her. “They will learn,” he said, “that I am a man who likes instant obedience.”
“I have already seen that.”
He came closer to her and laid his hands on her shoulders. He was not fully at ease in her company; he never was in the presence of well-bred women. He preferred the girls he met in taverns or in the villages. He looked; he beckoned; and because they would not dare disobey—nor did they want to—they came at his bidding. He was not a man who wished to spend a lot of time in wooing.
She looked fragile, but she was not inexperienced, he knew that much. He had sensed that sensuality in her which appealed to his own.
He seized her roughly and kissed her on the mouth. Then he picked her up in his arms.
“It was for this I came,” he said, and carried her through the apartments to her bedchamber.
She was barely aware of the scuffling movement, the hasty departure of the girls, who had been waiting there for her.
All through the house they would be talking of Alfonso’s visit. She did not care. Nor did he.
When Isabella heard that Alfonso had paid an unceremonious visit to the bride she was furious.
She stormed into Alfonso’s apartments and demanded to know how he could have committed such a breach of etiquette.
“How!” cried Alfonso, who saw everything literally. “By taking horse and riding there.”
“But you are expected to greet her standing by the side of our father at the ceremonial entry.”
“I shall do so.”
“But to go ahead like some lovesick apprentice!”
“All men have some curiosity about the woman they are to marry, whether they are dukes or apprentices. If you want to blame someone for this, blame yourself.”
“Myself!”
“Certainly yourself. If you had not painted her so dark, made such a monster of her, I might have been ready to wait. As it was I had to satisfy my curiosity.”
“And, knowing you, I imagine it was not only your curiosity which was satisfied.”
Alfonso burst out laughing. “Would you have her fancy she had another Sforza for a husband?”
“Sforza was not as the Pope made him out to be.”
“He should have proved otherwise.”
“What, before witnesses?” Isabella laughed. “You would not have been diffident about proving your manhood, I am sure, no matter how many witnesses were mustered.”
“It is hardly likely that mine would have been in question.”
“Indeed not, when half the children in Ferrara have a look of you!”
“The people like to know a man is a man.”
“You are almost licking your lips.”
“She was adequate.”
“As any woman would be, for you.”
“Not any woman. I would not fancy one who sought to rule me as you rule Francesco.”
Isabella angrily flounced out of the apartment and went to ask her father’s permission to go ahead of the main party to greet Lucrezia.
“It will be a courteous gesture,” she explained. “Alfonso has already been to see her. Now your daughter should go. For, as you have no wife, your daughter must act as hostess.”
Ercole agreed because he knew it was no use doing otherwise.
“I will take Giulio with me,” said Isabella, “since she should be met by one of your sons. And as Alfonso has already