The Borgia Mistress: A Novel Read Online Free PDF Page A

member. I had become curious about how this effect was accomplished and had gone so far as to inquire of Cesare what he knew of it. After he got over being both offended and amused by my assumption that he would have any such knowledge, he relented enough to tell me that the compound appeared to greatly increase the flow of humors through the body, most especially that of the blood. While the result could be an impressive erection, it also could overstrain the heart, cause severe pain in the stomach, and interfere with urination. Despite so mixed a reputation, it remained much in demand among men desperate to hold on to their virility.
    All that made me wonder: If a little of the cantharidin, as it was known, could accomplish so much, what might a more concentrated dosage do? Without dwelling on the details, I quickly discovered that the problem lay in the purity and strength of the substance. The gentlemen in question had had the misfortune to encounter an unusually potent supply. The source, a back alley seller unworthy of the title of apothecary, had agreed to sell me all of his remaining stock shortly before he departed Rome in considerable haste. I had set myself to study the effects—and how they might be made even more potent and deadly.
    So occupied was I that I failed to notice the storm blowing in from the west. Wind-driven rain was splattering the floor of my workroom before I realized what was happening and hurried to close the shutters over the tall windows. As I did so, I happened to glance down into the courtyard. A figure was standing there, wrapped in an enveloping cloak and sheltered from the rain by an overhang. I could not make out any features, but the angle of the head made it appear that the watcher was looking up at me.
    Having shut the windows and pulled the shutters closed, I told myself that my imagination was overwrought. With so little sleep and so much worry, likely I had conjured the watcher from shadows. Yet before I finally retired for the night, I glanced outside again. Nothing stirred in the courtyard, not even a bedraggled rat.
    Perversely, I slept well, at least for me, waking shortly after dawn to the lingering scent of rain and the sound of trumpets blaring the news of a papal proclamation.
     

 
    2
     
    The old man with a bulbous red nose and bushy gray hair growing out of his ears spat as the Pope rode past. The great wad of phlegm he hocked up landed on the sodden ground just beyond the rump of His Holiness’s fine white horse. Borgia appeared not to notice. He continued making the sign of the cross above the heads of the sullen peasants driven from nearby fields to honor his passage.
    Without breaking stride, a man-at-arms cuffed the miscreant, sending him sprawling into the mud. The grizzled paesano lay where he fell, staring up at the leaden sky. He appeared to have suffered no great injury and, for all the contentment of his expression, may have been contemplating the accolades he would receive from his neighbors as soon as the procession was out of sight.
    So it had been every plodding step along the old Via Cassia north from Rome toward the allegedly charming town of Viterbo, our way proceeded by heralds and men-at-arms proclaiming the intent of His Holiness to make his first papal progression outside of Rome. A convoy of priests carried on their shoulders the glorious gold and jeweled Tabernacle of the Eucharist brought from Saint Peter’s Basilica. Borgia had announced that he was taking the Tabernacle along as a sign of his piety and personal devotion to the Savior. Romans like a good joke, and they appreciated that one. The truth, as everyone knew, was that he wanted a ready source of convertible wealth close at hand in case worse came to worst.
    Not that anyone could tell that he was less than entirely secure. His Holiness rode immediately behind the Tabernacle, arrayed in scarlet and gold with the tripartite papal crown seemingly rock steady on his head. Despite his