Chapter 15 - Mistress of Rogues by Rosamond Marshall

1954 Genre: Historical Fiction / Racy Romance

WEAPONS OF LOVE

In flight from her brutal husband, blonde Bianca fell into the hands of the puppeteer, Belcaro. She soon learned he wanted her as bait, to snare the most profligate princes of the Renaissance.

In exchange for power, Belcaro passed her from rogue to rogue. Until the night he found he could not resist the ravishing courtesan he had created.

But by that time Bianca knew him for the monster he was. And she was ready and waiting—with all the weapons of her amorous career!

"Miss Marshall's novel concerns the downfall of a lady ... whose golden hair and other charms were reminiscent of Botticelli's Venus... Bianca had a good many men in her life." —NEW YORK TIMES

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CHAPTER 15 

“But ... thou wert ... dead!” 

"Nay! Touch thy loving husband. Feel the beat of his pulse. The warmth of his cheek. Kiss his lips and know he is not dead!” So saying, Belcaro rose and came down from the dais. I stood like marble! When he came near I touched him with a trembling hand. This was no apparition from the spirit world. Belcaro was alive! 

In upheaval of mind I stammered, “Thank God! Nello did not succeed ..." 

Belcaro's flaming eyes bored into mine. "So ... Nello is thy scapegoat!" 

"My scapegoat?” 

Belcaro laughed. “Who gave Nello the poison to pour in my cup if not my darling wife?" 

"Belcaro! Say not so! I am innocent!" "Liar!" "I swear it! By Heaven!” 

"Swear by Heaven or Hell! I have my own sharp eyes and wise suspicionings to thank for my life! I removed the poison from Nello's ring ... what he poured was ... orange flower water." 

"But ... thy burial?"

"Belotti hid me. The coffin was filled with lead.”

"All this time Belotti knew?" 

“Certainly. He is and always has been my faithful servant." 

"Then why ... why didst thou stay so long in hiding?" 

"The better to witness thy betrayals!" 

Wild thoughts raced through my mind! Belcaro and his steward had plotted my ruin! They had ordered the destruction of poor Sisters Ursula and Beata. Poor Beppo! Then I thought, “The children!” 

"Belcaro! What has become of my orphan wards?” 

He smiled that sinister smile I knew so well. “Orphan wards?” 

“The three hundred and ninety-nine we saved from the plague of Siena." 

He pursed his lips, savoring my despair. "The Florentine officers of health saw to their removal. Poor waifs! The plague broke out among them. They were dying right and left." 

"Thou liest in thy teeth!” I screamed. “When I left Florence they were well and happy! Joyful at the thought of coming to Monte Speranza!" 

Belcaro hoisted his narrow shoulders in a shrug. "Could the authorities have been mistaken? I doubt it. The last I heard, they were burning sulfur throughout the palace." 

I sank to the ground and wept long and bitterly. When I ceased for lack of tears, I was alone. 

The vast, velvet-hung throne room made mock of my grief. The walls echoed to my heart-broken sighs..."O Fate, why couldst thou not reap vengeance upon Bianca alone ... and deliver the innocent children?” How gladly I would have given my life for theirs. Yet here was I—ransom to a man without pity or conscience. And the children were scattered or dead. 

In the days that followed I lived in a twilight realm twixt life and death. What good was I upon this earth? 

Belcaro sat at my bedside and wrote hours on end. Was he composing another of his famous dramas? He would interrupt that writing to spoon a cool drink be tween my parched lips, then he would go back to his pen. 

His knowledge of the arts of healing saved me. I re gained my strength—if not my will to live. 

"Bianca," said Belcaro. "Bestir thyself! Let thy youth triumph! Let thy beauty flower again!" 

I could no longer feign ill health. Belcaro led me to the apartments he'd prepared for my use. A silk-hung prison! He was a genius at such things. I had every comfort a woman could wish—except the freedom I craved. Fine foods and wines were passed through a wicket by unseen hands. Silk and satin attire was given me. I found a scented bath at eventime. And Belcaro brought me my lute of olden days. 

"Play, sing, Bianca. It will beguile thy solitude." 

Did he hope that I would slip back into the old life? My shortened hair seemed to worry him. He brushed and oiled it nightly. "With the exception of thy fair forms, 'tis thy richest treasure. It will grow long again and thou shalt be as thou wert ... non compare!” 

Hopeful at first that my plight would become known, I spent hours looking out of the window and praying. But no traveler appeared on that steep road. No wayfarer neared my prison. I then attempted to soften the heart of the hooded one who brought my food. 

“The man is a deaf-mute, Bianca," said Belcaro. "It is useless to appeal to him." 

I lived in terror of the day when the Doll-master's patience would wear thin—he might take by force what he could not have by persuasion. Belcaro possessed many potions and knew many arts—even those which lull the mind to sleep. He seldom failed to pass a few hours with me daily, and when I did not answer his questions or show any response to his attempts at conversation, he would smile wisely. “My patience has always been greater than that of other men." 

A month passed, then another. I would have lost count of time, except that the extreme heat told me we were entering July. This mass of brick was impervious to the rays of the sun, but the air outside my prison windows was like the breath of a furnace. 

A thousand visages leapt at me from out of my dreams. The children! The Sisters! Andrea! Fra Giacomo! Wakening I would see Belcaro's doggish grin. 

“'Twas a nightmare! Sleep! Sleep, Bianca mia." 

There were silk cords for hanging, knives with which to open my veins. I remembered the plaint of Piero de Vigne in the Divine Comedy 

... what a man

Takes from himself, it is not just he have.

Hence we shall drag him; and throughout

The dismal glade our bodies shall be hung 

On the wild thorn ...

And perhaps some last faint hope that my children were not dead made me cling to life. What if, God willing, I could return to their service? Wanting to die, I did not want to die. O contrary nature! 

August ran its course, the fragrance of ripening grapes brought back cruel memories. Andrea, Fra Giacomo, were your sacrifices in vain? I took ill again and tossed in fever. Belcaro nursed me well. 

"Hast thou no thanks for thy physician?" he said when I was restored. 

"Let me go free, Belcaro, and I will pray for thee." 

Rage darkened his face. He spoke bluntly. "Thou shalt never leave this place unless thou goest with thy lawful husband as his dutiful wife.” 

"I have pledged myself to the cloister and to the service of the poor." 

"It is the pledge of one whose mind is unsound. Thou wert ever thus, Bianca. A golden weathercock that turns with every wind! Today a weeping innocent. Tomorrow ... harlot, sinner, saint! Thou hast many faces, Bianca, and I know them all.” 

I prayed as I had never prayed before. Angel that inspired me in Siena, speak to me now! But I heard no sweet voice. No light shone. Were my sins so great that pardon should be denied forever? 

At last Belcaro's patience was exhausted. “Come, Bianca! I'll show thee something to cheer thy spirits!” He led me down a long corridor to a room arranged in. the manner of a theater. There was a stage and curtain. I could hear the scratching of a viol, played by a clumsy hand. He ordered me to take off my gown and put on a princess' robe such as his puppet princesses used to wear. He sat me down and rouged my cheeks and lips and bound jewels around my brow. "Now mount the stage, Bianca.” 

Innocent or careless of what was to befall me, I yielded to his caprice. When I reached the stage I fell into the waiting arms of two hooded men. Golden wires dangled before us. The two silent servants dragged me be neath them, attaching one to each wrist, one to each ankle. 

"My bracelets fit thee well, eh, Bianca?” I sobbed, "Let me loose!” 

“Nay!” He climbed to the stage and came to me. “Thou didst destroy the Doll-master's dolls... but I have recovered the best of them ... my puppet princess, Bianca!” He reached out a trembling hand. His fingers ran across my face, down my neck—and then he laughed a cackling laugh. "Now, we shall rehearse my new play.” Still chuckling to himself he climbed a ladder to the puppeteer's catwalk, an instant later there was a tug on one of the golden wires. My arm responded to the pull. “Hast thou forgotten thy dance steps, Bianca? Must I school thee all over again?” 

With his uncanny gift for imitating voices, he played three different roles. That of Bianca, Belcaro and Death. 

DEATH: I want this woman.

BELCARO: Nay, she is mine.

DEATH: How sayest thou she is thine? She has been my constant companion. 

BELCARO: I love her and thou, Death, hast a thou sand brides.

BIANCA: Dearest Belcaro, keep Death from me. I will dance for thy pleasure. And when I have danced thou mayest love me. 

Thus spoken, Belcaro forced me to dance by pulling the golden wires. First my arms moved. Then my feet. When, resisting, I fell, the wires cut my wrists until the blood spurted in a purple stream. 

I was forced to begin again and dance-dance-dance—until a mist swirled around me and I hung, drooping by my wires. There Belcaro left me, not bothering to release me from the terrible gyves. My wrists and ankles throbbed and burned. "Pity! Pity!" I cried as the night came down and darkness surrounded me. 

“Wilst give thyself as thou once did?” said Belcaro's voice. 

I did not answer.

The Doll-master repeated his show daily until, for very agony, I danced. To cease was finest torture. Night and day I hung to those wires. Night and day I feared some new invention of my tormentor. He took devilish delight in writing his "comedies" in my presence. He would ask my opinion on this or that line. When I did not speak he aped my voice: "Yes, dearest Belcaro. I prefer the first reading. My love, I fly to thy bosom. Thou art my king of all delights.” 

Now at the very sound of his footsteps I would get to my feet and stand obedient. The slightest pull of the wires made me groan with pain. 

Doll-master Belcare trained his “doll” well. Those smaller puppets he had used of old were not more subservient to his will than I. 

Could I die by shunning food, and not incur the horrid penalty for self-destruction? I attempted it, but my agony was so great that I soon crawled to the food that was put before me. 

Belcaro let me go unwashed and unkempt. My golden hair was beginning to grow long. My princess costume was in rags. How much could the body endure? How long before the mind would break? I heard the scratching of the viol in my fevered dreams and my limbs twitched at the sound. 

"Today we shall perform another drama called 'Bianca Defies Death for Belcaro,'” said my tormentor. 

“Kill me. Kill me," I screamed. “But do not pull those wires." 

The foolish face grinned down. “Dance, Bianca, dance." 

I languished in a relapse of illness that took my mind and wrapped it in cocoon-like silence. Belcaro released me from the wires and nursed me like a babe. But as soon as I recovered he made me into a live puppet again. 

Mad! The man was mad! And if I had doubted it, he gave me the proof himself. 

“I have written a grand tragedy, Bianca. Seven characters. Five acts. Five scenes per act. Thou art Circe, daughter of Helios, an enchantress living in the isle of Aenea. Circe keeps Ulysses with her a year and changes his companions into swine.” He brought out new puppets 

two handsome knights in silver armor. Then he dressed me in Circe's attire. “Look!" He led me to a mirror. My eyes were dark and hollow. My face was so emaciated that the bones stared through the skin. While I stood, wondering what suffering would waste me to death, Belcaro gabbled, “See. Thou art Circe in the flesh. Thou art seduction in the shape of woman." 

My tormentor was insane! 

The shadowy forms of things dead and dead again drew in around me. I scarcely felt the pincer of the golden gyves. Belcaro ground his teeth on his own windy verse. Nothing was left me for tears, no strength to wail or beat the breast. 

“Dance, Circe!” screamed Belcaro. He manipulated his characters with a madman's skill. His voice changed basso to alto. Alto to a soprano. 

I danced in a murky cloud. And sometimes when the cloud parted I saw the Holy Mother, angel-bright. "Suffer thy child to repentance," I murmured between feverish lips. She seemed to smile and the heavens opened. 

"Dance, thou daughter of Satan," snarled Belcaro. 

"I cannot," I whispered, and fell like a puppet whose strings are broken. 

"I have not even concluded the first act," raved Bel caro. He came down from his perch and slashed at me with his ivory wand. "Stand up! We must perform the rest. Ulysses waits to speak his part.” 

Pain brought me to my senses. "... Thy will be done,” I prayed. “Thy kingdom come.” 

Suddenly, through half-closed eyes, I saw—Nello! He was scaling Belcaro's ladder to get to the puppeteer's catwalk above. I saw him maneuver a looped cord like a hangman's noose. A moment later the loop fell over Belcaro's head and tightened around his thin neck. I saw Nello leap off the beam on the other side. It was a see-saw of death—the dwarf making counter-weight for Belcaro's body! 

Belcaro's eyes bulged. He clawed at the strangling snare around his throat. His legs jiggled in a frantic dance of death. He gagged, turned blue and suddenly went as limp as one of his own puppets when the Doll-master's hand is still. 

I closed my eyes in horror, but on hearing a "thump" and a dull thud, I could not keep them closed. When Nello let go of the rope and dropped nimbly to the floor, Belcaro's limp remains plummeted to the stage not far from me. Even in death his gnarled fingers seemed to reach—reach. I screamed in terror! 

"Fear not, Bianca," said Nello gathering me into his short arms, "thy sufferings are over.” 

He loves who remains steadfast. The little man cared for me like a brother. When I suffered another attack of the fevers, he cooked for me, washed me, fed me, kept me alive. When I began to mend he told me what had happened. 

"When thou wentest away with Sisters Ursula and Beata, Belotti locked me in the cellar and gave me only bread and water. But thou knowest thy Nello ... that he comes and goes when he pleases. I loosened one of the bars and wriggled through the grating and like a good hound I was on the scent to Monte Speranza! I'd heard the name." 

“The children?” He shrugged. “I wanted only to find thee!” 

He told me boastfully that he had done for Belcaro's deaf-mutes as well as for the Doll-master himself. 

“I buried the dogs with their master ...” he said and scraped a finger across his throat, “... buried 'em so deep not even the trump of doom could get 'em up." He pleaded with me to eat. "Get well, Bianca. When thou art well, we can go back to Florence." 

Though still weak I was as eager as he to return to Florence and search for my wards; but how could I travel in the garb of a puppet princess? 

There was another thought that haunted me. I remembered having seen only three mules led away by the assassins. Where was the fourth? The one I'd ridden? Where was my blanket roll. The pillow that concealed the Book? 

While I searched, Nello was looking for money. 

"Belcaro always carried a full purse,” said he. " 'Twould not be like him to come to Monte Speranza without gold.” 

We explored every room of the great convent, the cellars, barns and outhouses. We emptied the Doll-master's coffers of fripperies, gimcrack jewels and gold laces. At last after three days, Nello crawled behind the altar in the chapel. After a short silence punctuated with grunts, I heard him call, “Bianca! I've found the gold!" He dragged out a small coffer with a heavy lock. "Go! Bianchissima! Find a tool. Something to pry it open." 

When I returned with a poker, Nello was squatting beside a small iron-bound chest, a look of sly curiosity on his ugly little face. "It doesn't rattle like gold. It's not so heavy as gold. But it's Belcaro's money chest. See ... his mark?" 

Watching Nello break the intricate lock I was reminded of a like scene that had taken place in the library of the Villa Gaia. Nello discovering a manuscript that was to change my world. What happenings since that day! What a long, long way Bianca had traveled. 

Bang! 

“There!” cried Nello. He raised the lid and tossed away my white gown, vest and sandals; underneath was—the Book! 

I could not utter a sound—only stare. "No gold!" whined Nello. “Just that old book!". 

What words could tell my joy and thankfulness. I could have hugged him and did! 

"Oh! well,” said Nello. "We'll take the old thing with us anyway. Maybe we can sell it for a meal or two." 

I pressed his little hands in mine. "Nello ... should I die and thou ... be left with this Book ... care for it as thou wouldst for me whom thou didst name Bianchis sima. Guard it for my sake, so long as thou hast breath in thy body.” 

"Amen!" grunted Nello crossly. “So much fuss about a book.” He sighed. “I'll stow it at the bottom of the food sack.” 

At last, clad in the garb I preferred, I could shake the dust of Monte Speranza. 

These were the last bright days of autumn. The vine yards were shorn of their purple fruit. The fields were harvested. A great quiet brooded o'er the countryside. I would have hurried but weakness slowed me. Poor Nello was distressed to see the red scars on my ankles and wrists. 

“Thou canst cover 'em with jeweled bracelets, Bian chissima." 

I knew my days for wearing jeweled bracelets were over. 

We made slow progress, Nello staggering beneath the weight of a sack that he had filled with food from the larder. I, carrying a wool cloak which served us for a blanket. We slept in haymows or behind the hedges. Watchdogs were our dread. 

One day we came to a village where a fair was in progress. A troupe of three tumblers was amusing the crowds. Seeing their performance, Nello set down his knapsack and went tumbling and somersaulting into the ring of onlookers. His comic antics earned more applause than the precise skill of the acrobats, so much applause that their master put on a scowl. 

"Get away, dwarf." 

But the crowd howled and clapped for the "little man," and Nello had his cap filled with pennies. Alas, there were not many fairs, and the luck-a-day crowd was not open-handed. Soon our purse was empty, our food sack also. But we were nearing our goal. 

It was the fourteenth day of our labored journey. The afternoon had turned frosty. I ached in every bone. How much longer could I go on? 

"Look! The Duomo!” Nello's shout of triumph roused me out of my weariness. And at last, here were the familiar streets—my palace. Nello swinging on the knocker. 

A new porter peered through the wicket. "Let me in. I am thy mistress."

"My master is Messer Belotti," he said gruffly. "I answer to none other.” The wicket banged shut. 

"I'll go in by a way I know," said Nello. “Wait for me 'neath that arch." 

Shivering I obeyed. Was not Nello my Knight Errant? 

He was gone some time, and came back crestfallen. "It is true, Bianchissima. Belotti is the master. I looked through the keyhole. He's fatter than ever from good eating. Let me stick him like the pig he is?” 

I made an impatient gesture. "Nello, was there no sign of the children?” 

"Not a single child."

“The Sisters?” 

"Nobody there except Belotti. Ask me ... I think he has no right there, either!" 

I remembered the document I had signed. “A power of attorney.” In signing, I had given my all into the hands of a rascal. 

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