Duchess of Milan (63 page)

One of the men who had been guarding the door charged pell-mell across the Sala della Palla like a tennis player in full pursuit of a ball. Dispensing with all formalities, the guard shouted, “The Castello is under attack!”

Everyone looked to the big arched windows overlooking the moat. If the French were coming by way of Novara, they would first assault this northwest face of the Castello. Several of the Council members slowly walked a few steps toward the windows, crouching as if preparing to flatten themselves when crossbow bolts and cannonballs came flying out of the darkness.

The forest was dimly visible in the last hint of twilight. Nothing stirred in that dark wood.

The guard watched for a moment, his mouth open. Then he shouted once again. “Not the French! The Castello is under attack from within the city!”

The Council members and their guards rushed through the courtyard of the Rochetta and crossed the narrow drawbridge that allowed direct access from the Rochetta to the Piazza d’Armi. Beatrice and Isabella, suddenly forgotten in the panic, followed. The huge central court was dotted with flaming torches held by scurrying guards; lights also moved along the defensive galleries high atop the surrounding wings of the Castello. As they crossed the Piazza d’Armi, Beatrice saw clusters of Castello guards pushing artillery pieces mounted on two-wheeled carriages--long, pipelike culverins and short, blunt-snouted mortars and bombards.

The arched gateway directly beneath the soaring central tower glowed with torchlight; the portcullis had been lowered and the drawbridge was already up, raised quickly by huge, counter-weighted wooden beams. Beatrice could hear the roar of the city, a vast, discordant, ghostly chorus. It was as if the terrible city of Dis, the citadel of the damned, lay beyond that gate.

She followed the Councillors up the narrow, zigzagging staircase that led to the spired turret atop the central tower. The Councillors pushed open the door at the third-story landing and went out onto the open terrace. The main shaft of the tower rose into the darkness behind them. Before them was a high brick wall notched with rectangular crenellations so that crossbows and artillery could be fired from protected positions.

The noise was visceral now as Beatrice slowly walked to one of the crenellations, a cold fluid inside her, and she had to force herself to get close enough to look out. The great wheel of Milan lay before her in the night. She drew in and held a breath, for a moment captivated by the spectacle. The piazza in front of the Castello was a phosphorescent lake, teeming with thousands of blazing torches. The Via degli Armorai, the central street leading into the piazza, was a river of torchlights. So were many of the other main streets of the city. Scattered in the darkness surrounding these rivers of light were hundreds of huge, boiling orange flares marking burning houses and
palazzi.

The shouting rose beneath her, and Beatrice looked down. There must have been fifteen thousand men in the piazza below, many armored with steel breastplates and helmets; some wore entire suits of armor. Most carried a torch in one hand and a pike or sword in the other. They shouted improvised battle cries as they swarmed like belligerent fireflies toward the head of the street that ran from Sant’Ambrogio to the Castello, trying to block a phalanx of armed men attempting to push into the piazza.

Beatrice watched the skirmish with sudden, knifing horror. The attackers surged into the defenders, pikes and swords thrusting, torches hurled onto the heads of the enemy or swung as flaming clubs. The torches quickly began to dim, and the conflict compressed into a dark, ugly, writhing mass. Suddenly the attackers retreated back into the street and the men in the piazza rushed forward, jabbing with torches and pikes. At least a dozen men lay on the cobblestones in the wake of the retreat. Dark slicks of blood glimmered beside them.

Dead men, Beatrice thought. In the winking of an eye she had increased twelvefold her catalogue of corpses. Dead men like Gian. Men who once had felt a woman’s warmth in the night, who now hadn’t even a hand to clutch. Their blood still hot, everything else black and cold. This is war, Beatrice thought, sickened and feverish with horror and shame. This is what Mama meant. The war has finally come home to Milan. The war I started. In a dreadful instant she saw the entire piazza dark, covered with black corpses. When would the babies start dying?

“Moro!”

Beatrice wasn’t certain what she heard at first. But then the victory chant became unmistakable.

“Moro! Moro! Moro!”

The men defending the piazza began to move wagons to all the entrances, tipping them over to barricade the streets. All the streets except the Via degli Armorai. Now Beatrice understood. These men were armorers, wearing their inventory to defend their city. They obviously hoped that Il Moro would appear to lead them against the French; apparently they had discounted the rumors of his illness or demise. Their attackers, the men surging up the streets, were the hirelings of the Council of Nobles, whose intention, of course, was to take the piazza and eliminate any threat to an orderly surrender when the French appeared.

The Councillors high above the piazza were gravely alarmed by the demonstration in favor of Il Moro. They crowded at one of the crenellations, pointing to the piazza, gesturing and shouting to one another. Beatrice felt completely vacant. She knew that there was something she should do to stop this carnage. But whatever she did in this life Fortune twisted and made a mockery of. So she would do nothing. Almost in a trance, she watched the Councillors discuss their strategy. She drew closer, with some morbid, detached curiosity, wanting to hear. Let them choose, she dreamily instructed herself. Let them game with Fortune.

It all seemed fascinating and meaningless, like a strange puppet show. Count Borromeo, chopping with his hand, his hatchet nose snapping forward, his puckered mouth spitting vehemently: “Get the artillery up here, and we will blow them to offal in five minutes! Get the bombards and mortars up here!” Count Landriano, horrified, but nodding agreement. The guards, running to execute the order. Eesh, watching.

As if an angel’s hand had passed in front of her face, Beatrice realized what she had to do. She walked over to Isabella. Eesh’s face was as serene as the moon, her eyes impossible to read.

“Eesh, if you will agree to resist the French, I will support you.”

Now Isabella blinked. “I don’t think so, Toto,” she said with unreal calm. “I don’t need your support, and I don’t believe that it is possible to resist the French.”

“Yes, you do, Eesh. You do need my support. You need me to tell these armorers that my husband is too ill to govern them and that he has sanctioned Francesco as the new Duke, as he had originally intended after Gian died. Because if I don’t tell them that, these armorers will fight the Council’s men, and Milan will be burned to cinders before the French even get here. You and Francesco will rule over a city of embers and corpses. Thousands of these men out here will be dead. Thousands of women and children trampled in the streets and burned in their homes. Thousands of dead babies.”

Isabella looked out toward the city. Her profile was marvelous, as firm and elegant as an antique Roman bust. She turned back to Beatrice but said nothing.

“Eesh, no one has fought the French yet. Florence, Rome, Naples--they just gave up and opened the gates. And all the big guns are with the King’s army. Orleans probably doesn’t have siege guns in Novara. They expect we will surrender without a fight. If we go to the walls we can hold them off for weeks at least. Eesh, if we don’t fight the French we will fight each other. The armorers are not going to be persuaded to put down their arms and submit to the French. They would not do it even if my husband appeared and told them to.”

Isabella nodded very slowly. “Come with me.” She put her hand under Beatrice’s elbow and led her to the side of Count Landriano, who appeared clammy and distracted; he nervously watched Count Borromeo bark orders at the guards. Isabella waited imperiously until she had Landriano’s full attention.

“Her Highness has no wish to see bloodshed in the streets of Milan,” Isabella said. “She has decided to tell the armorers that her husband can no longer continue in his duties and that he endorses my son, Francesco, as Duke. I believe that will put an end to this disagreeable business.”

Count Landriano was visibly relieved. He smiled gratefully at Beatrice. “I think Your Highness is making a very noble gesture.

Very noble indeed. I would, however, suggest that you make your announcement quickly, before Count Borromeo has his artillery in place.”

Beatrice looked at Isabella; her eyes were dark, faintly silvered, the Bay of Naples in moonlight. Her chin was tucked down slightly. Beatrice realized that she had loved Eesh and hated Eesh and had never known her at all. But it was far too late now to ask if she could trust her.

She took a torch from one of the guards. The Councillors were all looking at her now. Even Count Borromeo had suspended his campaign.

The guard helped her climb up into the notchlike crenellation. She straightened up slowly. She was standing on a brick ledge somewhat more than an arm-span wide and almost as long. Advancing closer to the edge, she could see the moat directly beneath her, black water shimmering with reflected torchlight. She placed her left hand on the thick stone wall beside her, steadying herself. With her right hand she waved the torch over her head. The burning pitch spit sparks at her.

The armorers had been watching the Castello for any sign of an announcement, and they quickly saw her signal. But it was some time before the noise level fell in the piazza. And even then a haunting chorus of anger and chaos came from the outlying streets, a distant dirge. A voice inside her said to someone else: I’m not afraid, I’m not giving up. I’m doing what is right. My husband’s title and my son’s inheritance are not worth a thousand dead babies. They are not worth one dead baby.

“I am the Duchess of Milan!” The force of her shout gave her a moment of vertigo. It was so quiet in the aftermath that she could hear something else now, the dull whoosh of the fires burning throughout the city. “My husband cannot appear before you because he is seriously ill!” A low, angry rumble began, and she waved the torch frantically to signal that she had more to say.

The crowd became silent again. Beatrice closed her eyes and blinked at her welling tears. She had not had time to think how hard this would be. She had never imagined that there would be a time when she could not force herself to speak. But now it was almost as though a hand were clutching her throat.

Eesh was beside her, seemingly materialized like a dark spirit.

She lightly touched Beatrice’s arm. A strange contact, almost soothing, encouraging. But of course she would. I have to say it, Beatrice told herself, in that moment identifying a hundred things about herself she had never known, among them how desperately she loved being Duchess of Milan.

Somehow she forced the first word out, telling herself that each moment of hesitation might bring about the deaths of innocent people. “Accordingly--”

Suddenly Eesh clutched her arm, a tight, startling grip, strong enough to seize her bodily, to hurl her into the darkness. Why now? Beatrice asked with the leisurely clarity that precedes catastrophe; why not wait until I have endorsed her son before she pushes me off? Then she realized she could shove her torch right in Eesh’s face. . . .

But Eesh was pulling her back. Away from the edge. Eesh moved in front of her, and all she could see was her cousin’s broad shoulders and long, dark hair, the subtle red tint fiery in the torchlight.

Isabella stood there for what seemed a long while, entirely still, almost as if she were debating whether to leap. Then her shoulders heaved and she shouted, “I have just come from the Duke of Milan’s sickbed!” Her voice was astonishingly powerful, the words seeming to ring off the black dome of the sky. “His condition is much improved! He will recover fully within days and lead us to victory over the French! Accordingly, I ask that every citizen of Milan who has taken up arms tonight in hope of making my son their duke now abandon that cause! To those who would use my son to effect a disgraceful surrender to the invader, let me say I will put a knife into my breast and my son’s breast before I will permit that to happen! We must be of one body and one soul to resist the French! And we must resist the French!”

Mysteriously, Beatrice listened to these words without surprise, with a serene feeling that she had heard them before. This was Eesh, here in these few shouted sentences, all of her complexities and contradictions. The lies and the truths, the histrionics and the heartfelt sentiment, the stealth and the sincerity. And ultimately, the goodness. Standing on that ledge, Eesh had discovered the truth of her own soul.

Eesh turned to her, and now Beatrice experienced the shock she should have felt at Eesh’s words. She had expected the beatific smile of a saint, a supernatural glow, a glimpse of God’s face. Instead there was a terror in Eesh’s eyes, a fear of some unspeakable torment, as if she had thrown herself off the tower and some malignant deity had suspended her an instant before her dreams ended against the pavement. And then Beatrice realized that as hard as it had been for her to think of surrendering her dreams moments earlier, it must have been a thousand times harder for Eesh actually to do it.

Beatrice took Isabella in her arms. Eesh was limp, dead again, the rest of her life thrown into those few words of self-definition.

The armorers in the piazza responded with a rising clamor of confusion. An armorer in a brightly polished steel breastplate, standing just beneath the tower on the grassy slope beside the moat, shouted to be heard. The crowd noise subsided, and soon only the eerily whooshing fires were audible. Beatrice watched with relief as the phalanxes of armed men in the streets pulled back and dwindled. Milanese would not fight Milanese tonight.

“That is all very well, Your Highnesses!” the man in the breastplate shouted up to the duchesses. “But who will lead us against the French tonight?”