Dear Heart, How Like You This (18 page)

“I bid you gentlemen, for this day, farewell. Tomorrow I will come for you and take you to the most Holy Father. I also bid farewell to the two
Signoras
; remember that the Pope commands and expects you to make the stay of these Englishmen completely enjoyable and memorable.”

With a final bow and flourish, he opened the door of our dwelling and went back into the outside world, leaving us with our two lovely, new companions. For a moment there was an uneasy silence, and then the red-haired woman laughed a high, melodic laugh and moved quickly towards Sir John.

“Our two Englishmen have been eating, Angela! But why only bread and cheese? Surely we Italians can offer more than that!” Even though she spoke English with a deep Roman accent, her words were easy to understand. In sooth, the woman’s voice was very charming and sweet.

I could see that Sir John was utterly beguiled by this “Italian Madonna” who was so close to him that he needed but reach out his hand a short distance to touch her. Now that the elder girl had made her claim, the other, younger girl, began to glide towards me. Closer up she appeared to strike a strong note of artificiality—as if she was, somehow, uncomfortable in her role of courtesan.

“Would you like to go to the best inn in all of Roma,
Signor
, and experience such food delights as you have never before encountered in your lives?” this girl now said, speaking also in English. Even though her voice was also accented, it was not as heavily as her friend’s. The girl looked at me frankly, with large, dark eyes that seemed to be on the brink of tears. I had no problem in understanding what her eyes begged. I could see clearly that she desperately wished for me to agree to the suggestion that we direct ourselves to this inn.

I suppose she was afraid that our lusts for their fair bodies would win out over our already satisfied need for food, and soon she would find herself copulating in a strange place with an unknown man she had only just met.

We had eaten, but I could not ignore the pleading of the girl’s eyes, thus I turned to my companion and said: “What say you, Sir John? Shall we let these fine ladies guide us to the best food in all of Rome?”

Sir John stirred from his gaze of the other fair Madonna, and glanced sourly at me.

“If that is what you want, Tom, then that is what we will do. I suppose the walk will give us an excuse to look at our surroundings.”

The inn the girls spoke of was only a short distance from where we were staying; in fact, very near to the same inn where I had found our morning feast. Yea, the girl was right, it did have simply wonderful food: meat cooked in a kind of creamy sauce with some sort of string-like food that our companions laughingly assured us was made of flour and water. Even though, during my last visit, I had eaten at many banquets I had never come across this wholesome and delightful dish before.

After we had eaten to the full, we agreed to allow the women to show us all they could of the glories of ancient Rome.

On reflection, I suppose this decision may seem to many to be the height of lunacy, to indulge ourselves in a tour of a city resembling, in some quarters, army barracks. But, good reader, you must remember that we had just trekked from England, frantically dodging through a rabble army on the move. At this moment, I think Sir John and myself felt the safest we had felt in weeks. Like the Pope, I could not believe the army of the
Duc de Bourbon
really meant to render this city—a city that had once given birth to the greatest Empire known in the history of man—any real and lasting harm.

Even preparing for a siege, Rome could not be called any other word but beautiful. Furthermore, I will take the risk of offending many of my own countrymen when I state what I truly believe: even London cannot hold a stick to the renown of Rome. In a way, walking around the city at such a time, when its streets were mostly emptied of the usual pilgrims and students, had the effect of making me even more aware and reflective of its wonders. More so since most of its citizens tended at this moment to keep within the safety of their own doors, and this helped to give us the impression that we had the city of Rome to ourselves.

Whilst the four of us strolled together amongst the many ruins I mused to myself about the destruction that man and time had wrought. I thought, here once upon a time long gone, men had laboured hard to make a beautiful city of marble. All that remained of their years of drawn-out labour were only tantalising remnants of what had once been the glory of an Empire. It made me more deeply aware that nothing in life is forever.

Even though I had for a short time visited Rome late in the year of 1525, I am somewhat chagrined to admit I had only skimmed the surface of its sights. When I arrived that first time, I was made quickly a member of a party of English officials who spent many of their evenings as guests of the papal court, freely indulging themselves at the nightly papal banquet and revel. Thus, during the days that followed, I had neither the energy nor the inclination to explore the many wonders to be seen of ancient Rome. Nay, to be utterly truthful, there is another reason for my lack of inclination. At the very first papal banquet I was taken to, I met a lovely Madonna—or, should I really say, a very lovely whore. She too reminded me so much in appearance of an older Anna. In sooth, so much so that I was easily persuaded to part with a few gold coins to keep her as my bed companion during my stay. I must be more truthful when I admit that, apart from an occasional visit to a London brothel, when George would get me drunk enough to do so, I had little enough experience when it came to making love to women. ’Twas my time with Lucrezia that taught me otherwise. I suppose it was the only time in my life I succumbed purely to my body desires and learnt the true satisfaction there is to find in good lovemaking.

Remember reader, I was then a young man of barely twenty-two, away from home for the first time, and also away from a wife who welcomed me to her bed through duty only. Lucrezia, even though golden angels passed from my money belt to her, truly seemed to welcome me to her bed for other reasons. I must admit that I grew to care for her too. I recall my lovely Lucrezia telling me that it was a true joy to her to be entertaining a young man who took such simple pleasure in the normal, physical joining of a man and a woman. Rather than some corrupt, base and elderly Cardinal, whose senses could only be aroused by more and more perverted acts.

Truly, the poor girl had small scars on her private parts where the “Good Princes of the Church” had left their marks.

I often wondered when I returned to France and from there to England, what became of Lucrezia after my departure from Rome.

This time I had no desire for love games. Furthermore, “the French disease” currently raged throughout the Continent and I had no wish to join its numbers. And, to be even more candid, I had for long realised I am not a man who can freely engage in bed sports without having my heart somehow engaged. I suppose that is why I spend so much of my free time composing love songs for my lute, rather than indulging myself in the pursuit of fleshly desires. I had concluded, even at this early stage of my life, that if I could not be with someone for whom I feel deeply for I would rather not be with anyone. My affection for Lucrezia taught me this: lust is akin to dust, barren and without true purpose. Moreover, I had not much liking for the taste it left in my mouth.

Thus, the girl who looked at me with such frightened eyes had nothing to fear from me—I was emotionally spent. Sir John and the woman with the red-gold hair were a different story. We returned to our lodgings by late afternoon. When I entered our dwelling, I went first to the fireplace to rebuild and re-light the fire that was long-hours dead. As the rooms were now fairly dark, John went around the building and lit the tapers set in holders upon the walls. Once I had finished my task, I turned my attention back to our female companions. Beatrice was taking a goblet of wine and smiling flirtingly at John. And my knight was being responsive, yea, very responsive indeed, to the charms of this Italian Madonna. A woman obviously more experienced in alluring and arousing a man than the woman set-aside for me.

So, what of her—what of Angela, the woman companion chosen for me by the papacy itself?

Angela stood near the table, with her back turned to me, and her head bent as if she simply wanted to disappear.

I decided to take pity on the girl. She was obviously finding the situation of being alone with two strange men too hard to bear. I went amongst my gear and brought out the lute I took when I travelled. Even though it was old and worn, it still had the ability to thrum the hearts and souls of those who listened when I played.

Sir John reclined upon a chair when I returned, with Beatrice, her arm looped around his neck, seated on his lap. He lifted up his head when he saw me return to the room with my lute in my hands, and laughed his bark of a laugh, saying: “Good thinking, Tom. Music to help speed us into the night, and maybe into other things as well.”

My knight laughed again, as if he had made the best joke in all Christendom, but, though his companion laughed her appreciation, I noticed my companion’s back had become even more rigid.

I found myself a stool and began experimenting with a few tunes, wondering which one was the best to put the poor girl at her ease. At length, with a sense of relief, I thought the music had already subtly changed the atmosphere in the room. Indeed, Angela gazed towards to me with a more reflective, less frightened look in her eyes. I smiled at her, and beckoned her to come closer to the fire, and where I was seated. For a moment the girl’s eyes became somewhat glazed. Then, with a swift, fleeting look at her now embrace-locked friend, she moved slowly over to seat herself at my feet. We were both suddenly startled by the sound of Sir John laughing as he arose from the chair. I looked immediately at him, and saw that he had his arm over the shoulders of Beatrice and was leading her in the direction of his chamber. He saw my look and winked at me.

“I bid you good people farewell for this night. I think this night will bring us many pleasures unexpected from our meeting with the Pope. Goodnight, Tom! No need to keep to your playing, Tom lad. Perhaps ’tis time to give your fingers other work.”

Sir John barked a final laugh, and then took Beatrice into his chamber, tugging the curtain closed behind him.

I then happened to look at the girl beside me. Tears rolled unchecked down her cheeks. For a few moments, I sat there, unsure what best to do. Finally, I put my lute carefully on the earthen floor, and went to kneel beside her.

“My dear girl, you really have nothing to fear from me!”

She laughed a bitter laugh, and wiped away her tears hurriedly with her hands, making her pale face dirty in the process.

“You are a man,
Signor
, and only a man would speak such foolishness! You tell me that I have nothing to fear from you! Do you call that nothing—what is happening in there?”

With those words she gestured her head in the direction of Sir John’s chamber from where the clear sounds of lovemaking could now be clearly heard.

“But, surely, Angela, this is not the first time that you have acted the courtesan? Surely you must know the way the dice is thrown?”

I felt very confused and bewildered. She was obviously very upset by being here with me, but I could not bring myself to believe that an innocent would have been selected to make this day pleasurable for the “shunted to one side” English diplomats.

Angela’s tears began to flow again; she then took in a deep breath and began to speak in a hoarse, tense voice. “
Si
, I know now how the dice is thrown, as
Signor
said, but yesterday, yesterday I did not. Oh for yesterday, when my heart was full, and I believed…”

She covered her face with her hands. Angela appeared an image of absolute misery.

“You speak in riddles, Angela. But believe me, dear
Signora
, when I say that you have nothing to fear from me. I have no desire to indulge myself with a woman I barely know, and awake with ashes in my mouth. Especially with a woman who obviously desires me not. Trust me; I tell you no falsehoods when I say that I take no pleasure from bed sports where there is no love or true affection…”

Angela looked at me for a long moment, her eyes shining with unspent tears. She reached out to touch me fleetingly on my arm.

“You are a good man. A very good man! Oh,
Signor
, I feel as if my heart breaks.”

“That, mistress, in itself is not an uncommon affliction. Many of us hide broken hearts. If you like, I will listen to your tale… It may help to distract us from what goes on in the other room.”

I wryly smiled at her, reflecting as I did so that Sir John was noisy in other ways other than just sleep.

Angela looked hard at me, and then deeply sighed.

“What has happened is the punishment of the good God. Indeed,
Signor
, I am just a stupid woman who has found out to her cost where her stupidity has led her.”

I threw some more tinder upon the diminishing fire, then turned back to her to ask: “And how are you stupid, my dear?”