“We shall have to have lights,” replied the Pope. “And see, the rain is coming in through the windows.”

Gasparre was on his way across the apartment to call for lights and the Bishop had gone to the window when the roof immediately above the Papal chair collapsed.

Gasparre cried out in alarm and he and the Bishop, choking with the dust which filled the air, ran to that spot where the Pope had been sitting.

They could not lift the heavy beams, so they ran from the apartment shouting for help.

“The Pope is dead,” cried Gasparre. “The roof has collapsed and he in the chair is buried beneath the masonry.”

Guards and officials were running into the apartments; and it was not long before the news was spreading through Rome: “The Pope is dead. This is the work of God. He has been struck down because of his evil deeds. God has taken his life, as he and his son have taken the lives of so many.”

The people were preparing to riot, as they invariably did on the death of the Pope. The wise ones barricaded themselves in their houses; and guards were placed at the gates of the Vatican.


* * *

In the Pope’s apartment men worked hard to lift the fallen masonry.

“He cannot be alive,” they said.

They crossed themselves; they believed that what they saw was the work of God. They were astonished though that God had not taken Cesare with his father. Cesare’s rooms above the Pope’s had been hit; his floor had collapsed and it was under this that the Pope now lay buried; but Cesare had left his apartments only a few moments before the lightning had struck a chimney and a thunderbolt had crashed through the roof.

Cesare heard the news and came hurrying to his father’s apartment.

He was horrified. In those moments he realized that he needed his father as much now as he had needed him all his life. If the Pope died there would be a new Pope, and what of Cesare’s grandiose plans then? How could he carry them out without the help of the Holy Father? Who would respect him without the might of his father behind him?

“Oh my father,” he cried. “You must not die. You shall not die.”

Calling for shovels and axes, he tore at the masonry, his hands bleeding, the sweat pouring down his face.

“My lord,” gasped Gasparre, “His Holiness cannot be alive.”

Cesare turned and struck the chamberlain across the face.

“Work harder!” he shrieked. “He is under there and he is not dead. He is not dead, I tell you.”

Under his orders the men obeyed; sweating and panting they lifted the great beams and at length Cesare discovered a corner of the Pope’s cloak. He seized it with a shout of triumph and in a few breathless minutes Alexander, unconscious and bleeding from cuts, was exposed to their view. Cesare shouted orders. “Help me carry him to his bed. Send for physicians. Let no one delay. If my father dies, so shall you all.”

Alexander was very weak, but he was not dead and, when Cesare knelt down and called aloud his thanks to God and the saints for his father’s escape, he opened his eyes and smiled at his son.

“Oh my father,” cried Cesare, “you are still with us. You must not leave us. You must not.”

His voice had risen to a hysterical cry which the Pope seemed to interpret as a call for help; slowly he smiled, a beautiful smile of reassurance; and those watching said: “These Borgias are not human. They have powers of which we know nothing.”

The doctors said that the Pope had sustained a great shock, that he was suffering from an acute fever, and that there must be more bleeding.

“Then bleed him,” cried Cesare. His eyes glinted threateningly. “His life is in your hands. Forget it not, for I never will.”

He sent for Lucrezia and they sat together in the sickroom, their arms about each other, fearful for the life of the beloved man in the bed.

“You will nurse him, Lucrezia; you only,” insisted Cesare, his eyes wide with fear; for he believed that there might be some to seize this opportunity and attempt to do that to the Pope which he and his son had done to so many. Cesare put his face against his sister’s. “You, I … and our father … we are as one,” he went on. “We must be together … always. Therein lies our strength and our happiness.”

“Yes, Cesare,” she answered.

“Do not forget it, sister. We may be Pope … we may be General … we may be wife and mother … but first—always first—we are Borgias.”

She nodded, and she was afraid. She had seen lights in Cesare’s eyes which terrified her.

But at this time there must be no thought in her head but that of her father’s well-being. It would be her duty and her pleasure to nurse him back to health.


* * *

Alexander was a Titan. A few days after the accident, which would have proved fatal to most men of his age, he was sitting up in bed, as merry as he had ever been, with the members of his family about him, his intellectual powers undiminished, receiving ambassadors, conducting matters of Church and State with a vigor which would have been astonishing in a man twenty years his junior. His eyes dwelt more fondly on one member of the family than on any other: his beloved daughter Lucrezia. Cesare was conscious of this.

Alexander had been aware of Cesare’s alarm and grief but he knew the reason for his hysterical emotion was in a large measure due to fear of the loss of that great protective canopy of Papal influence under which Cesare was sheltering. Cesare knew, as did every head of state in Italy, that once that canopy was removed, Cesare and all his brilliant triumphs would not last four days. Cesare had every good reason to keep his father alive.

But the fear in Lucrezia’s eyes was not for her own future. Dear improvident child! she did not think of that. She had laid her hands against his chest and wept in her emotion of love. She had said: “Most beloved, Most Holy Father, how could I endure my life without you!”

It was gratifying to know that his son realized the worth of his father’s protection; but the knowledge of his daughter’s disinterested love was more precious than anything in Alexander’s life at this time.

He loved her more deeply than ever before. His eyes followed her about the room, and he was uneasy when she was not there.

He declared: “I will have none but my daughter to nurse me.”

And when she threw herself beside his bed and declared with tears in her eyes that she would be near him night and day, they mingled their tears, and then because the Pope had never encouraged tears in himself or his family, he held her to him and cried: “For what do we weep? We should laugh, daughter, sing songs of joy, for what father in this world was ever blessed with such a daughter, and what daughter ever had such love from a father as I give to you?”

She must leave Santa Maria in Portico and stay in the Vatican. An apartment must be made ready for her next his own. Then he would rest easily knowing that at any hour of the day or night he had only to call to bring her to his bedside.

There were two who watched with dissatisfaction. Cesare because he could see that his sister’s influence with their father could at any moment outstrip his own; Alfonso because Lucrezia had moved to the Vatican where he was not allowed to join her, and this meant that he must, temporarily, give up his wife to her father.

Alfonso fretted and spent a great deal of time with his friends, those men and women with whom he had associated in Lucrezia’s apartments before the French invasion. They were mostly Neapolitans, who were on the alert, measuring the extent of the alliance between the Borgias and the French.

Cesare, knowing this, told himself that Alfonso was more than an irritation. He was a danger. Lucrezia was devoted to him; what might he not ask of her, and knowing her influence with the Pope, what might come of it?

It seemed to Cesare that Alfonso—insipid youth though he was—was one of his most dangerous enemies.


* * *

During that July of the Jubilee year 1500 there were many pilgrims in Rome. Christians were arriving from every part of Europe and many of them, either because of poverty or piety, spent their nights sleeping against the walls of St. Peter’s.

It was a night of moonshine and starlight, and Alfonso was taking supper with Lucrezia in her apartments of the Vatican. They were alone together and Alfonso, saying his last farewell complained bitterly of the need to leave her.

“Very soon, dearest, my father will be recovered,” said Lucrezia. “Then I shall be with you in Santa Maria.”

“He is well enough now for you to leave him,” retorted Alfonso sulkily.

“He needs me here … for a little longer. Be patient, my dear husband.”

Alfonso kissed her. “I miss you so much, Lucrezia.”

She touched his face tenderly. “As I do you.”

“Dearest Lucrezia, the nights seem long without you. I dream still …!”

“Your nightmares, dearest? Oh that I were there to comfort you and tell you there is nothing to fear. But soon, Alfonso … perhaps next week.”

“Next week, you think?”

She nodded. “I will speak to my father.”

“I long for next week.”

They embraced and, as it was approaching midnight, he left her.

With his gentlemen-in-waiting, Tomaso Albanese and his squire, he left the Vatican and came into the Square. It was very quiet, as the place was deserted except for a group of pilgrims who huddled on the steps of St. Peter’s.