The Family - Mario Puzo [60]
Duarte’s good-natured laughter rang out through the great hall. “Your Worthiness, forgive me. And it is with both awe and admiration that I present my point. How can one be certain that your young warrior, Cesare, is but your second son? Your attractiveness to women is legendary, and your vigor of heroic proportions. It is difficult for me to believe that there are not some others, hidden by their mothers, and hidden from you . . . ”
At that, Alexander began to laugh. “You are a brilliant advisor, and a diplomat as well,” he said. “And if the young cardinal’s destiny is to be a holy warrior, the time will come that your argument will serve us. But for now it is Juan who is the captain general, and he must lead our troops. And so, for the present time, we must bend our knees and pray for victory.”
Twenty-one-year-old Cesare, standing outside the Hall of Popes, clothed in the garments of a cardinal, overheard this conversation, and for the first time in memory he felt a certain hope. Was it possible that above all the treachery in the world, there truly was a heaven and a Father who had heard? He walked back to his apartments, his head filled with imaginings, for the first time daring to anticipate the day when he might be called upon to lead the troops of Rome.
Captain General Juan Borgia, and the condottiere Guido Feltra, led the papal army north from Rome toward the first of the Orsini castles. Though the Orsini were fierce soldiers, at this first bastion they were stunned by the sheer number of papal troops, and so the first two castles fell without a battle.
When the news was brought to Duarte, he met with Alexander. “I suspect this is a plan of the Orsini, to trick our new commanders into believing that this will be an easy victory. Only then will the Orsini show their true abilities.”
Alexander nodded. “Then you have little confidence in Feltra?”
“I have seen the Orsini in battle . . . ” Duarte said.
Cesare had been called by Alexander, for his father knew his skill in strategy. And now the Pope asked him, “You may speak the truth. To what do you ascribe the greatest danger in this situation?”
Careful to keep his emotions in check, Cesare responded with caution. “I fear that Feltra is not more skilled at military matters than the captain general. And I anticipate that this easy victory will place both off guard—leading to disaster at Bracciano, for there the Orsini will assemble their finest warriors. And there della Rovere will inspire them to think it a holy war, which will make them even stronger.”
The Pope marveled at this son’s assessment of the situation, but he did not yet know how accurate Cesare was. For it was not more than a few days before the Orsini resistance stiffened, and della Rovere, the most dangerous enemy of the Pope, called upon the distinguished artillery commander Vito Vitelli to raise an army to rescue the Orsini.
Vitelli’s army moved quickly and descended upon the papal army at Soriano. There both Juan and Guido Feltra proved hopelessly incapable, and the papal forces suffered a stunning defeat. Guido Feltra was captured, taken prisoner, and thrown in a dungeon in one of the Orsini castles. Juan fled, escaping serious injury with only a cut to his face.
Hearing of this, and reassuring himself that his son was not badly hurt, Alexander again called Cesare and Duarte into the Hall of Popes.
“The war is not lost,” Duarte reassured him, “for we have other resources available to us.”
Cesare added, “And if the Holy Father determines we are in serious danger, he can always call in Gonsalvo de Córdoba’s experienced Spanish troops from Naples . . . ”
But after meeting with the ambassadors of Spain, France, and Venice—all of them urging peace—Pope Alexander, always a diplomat, agreed reluctantly to return the surrendered castles to the Orsini. Of course, they must be made to pay a price for this arrangement. After much negotiation, the Pope accepted fifty thousand ducats. For, after all, such compensation was necessary to fill the coffers of the Holy Catholic Church.
The outcome