The Borgias' Spy: An unputdownable, gripping thriller

By Andrea Frediani

How the mighty will fall...

1497. Pope Alexander VI Borgia is perfecting his plans for the control of Italy when a heinous crime deprives him of one of the people dearest to him. All of Rome is mobilised to discover the perpetrator but a strange series of coincidences means famous court painter Pinturicchio finds himself on the front line.

To shed light on a murder that has cut the papacy to the quick, Pinturicchio is assisted by the city's most established artists, from Michelangelo Buonarroti and Filippino Lippi to Piermatteo d'Amelia and Perugino. The Borgias have so many enemies that the list of suspects grows by the day, but a masked man may be the key witness to the crime – or even its perpetrator...

Andrea Frediani brings one of the most famous cold cases in history to life in this thrilling tale of intrigue and deceit set in Renaissance Rome.

What Amazon reviewers are saying about The Borgias' Spy:

'You walk into history with ease and once inside... you don't want to get out of it!' 5* Review

'Intriguing plot, sustained narrative rhythm.' 5* Review

'Intriguing, interesting' 5* Review

• Language: English
• Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
• Release date: Sep 3, 2020
• ISBN: 9781838932985

Andrea Frediani

Andrea Frediani is an Italian author and academic. He has published several non-fiction books as well as historical novels including the Invincible series and the Dictator trilogy. His works have been translated into seven languages. His website is www.andreafrediani.it

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Prologue

Rome, summer 1497

Are you tired, your holiness?

With his customary zeal, Burcardo, the master of ceremonies, woke the pontiff from the torpor to which he had abandoned himself at the end of the hearing. The defendants had taken their leave a while ago, but the head of Christianity found even getting up from his throne and heading towards his cubicle in the adjacent tower he’d had built in the Apostolic Palace burdensome.

Alexander the sixth, known to his parents as Rodrigo Borgia, merely nodded his head. Despite having exceeded sixty years of age, he had always felt like a bull – just like the animal he contemplated now, high up in front of him, on top of the Arch of Constantine, which the able Pinturicchio had painted four years earlier as a background to the fresco on the opposite wall, the Disputation of St. Catherine in Alexandria.

The bull, the symbol of his family. He had always been faithful to it, perhaps more to that than to Christ, as his seven children could well testify after his ascent to the papal throne, which he had finally achieved five years earlier. His inexhaustible activity to strengthen the fortunes of the family and the power of the Church, the strenuous defence of its position from the many enemies that threatened it relentlessly.

But since that accursed day two weeks ago, something had changed in him. The force that had driven him to face all those difficulties with determination and unscrupulousness suddenly started to diminish, making him finally feel like the tired old man he actually was at his age. He had always looked down on the older cardinals who sat around him in the consistory, but now he sensed he was no different from them, and he felt ashamed. If only Giulia, the faithless Giulia, had not betrayed him at the time of the French invasion, at least she could have comforted him, alleviated his pains in the face of the greatest pain he had ever experienced in his life. Perhaps only her translucent skin, her mischievous smile and her intoxicating smell would have had the power to distract him, to reawaken him from the suffering that, from that ominous day, had not abandoned him for a moment.

But she was no longer there. She was gone, or maybe he had thrown her out, he didn’t even remember what had happened. And he didn’t dare go and let off some steam with Vannozza, with whom his relationship had long since run its course since he had started neglecting her for his new lover. Nor could he do it with anyone else in his family, until he knew the truth – he ran the risk of confiding in the wrong person.

He noticed that Burcardo was still waiting for his orders. He was the only one left in the hall. He waved to him. Leave me alone for a while. I want to enjoy these beautiful paintings, he lied, gesturing to the extraordinary deluge of images that surrounded him on the walls and on the ceiling. The truth was that he didn’t want to do anything, not even go to his bedroom to rest.

When the master of ceremonies had gone, however, the anguished of his soul quickly gave way to the innate curiosity of his mind, which allowed itself to be distracted and entranced by the magnificent frescoes in the hall. Alexander willingly let himself be carried away by the thoughts that the images evoked, grateful to the person who had created them for having had the power with his art to distract him, at least for a few moments, from his pain.

The painter had shown himself much less skilled in the subsequent task he had assigned to him, which was not strictly artistic. But the world depicted before his eyes showed him, in an unequivocal way, the wisdom that had guided him in choosing Pinturicchio to decorate his apartments.

*

Bernardino di Betto Betti, whom everyone in Rome knew as Pinturicchio, scrutinized the figures of Pope Alexander VI Borgia and the King of France, Charles VIII, which he had just finished painting on the walls of the magnificent apartment built by the pontiff in Castel Sant’Angelo. It was the last of the six frescoes commissioned by his holiness to celebrate his role and that of his family in the events related to the French invasion of the Italian peninsula two years earlier, and the artist was happy to have almost completed them. Still a few necessary tweaks here and there, and then he could return to Perugia, where he was awaited by new commissions.

And above all, freedom.

Freedom from the climate of conspiracies in Rome, from the anguish of having to reveal to the Pope what he had discovered and the consequences that might derive from it, even for him.

Perhaps he would have done well to have stopped his work there and leave as soon as he had discovered the truth, a few days earlier, but he had decided that the sad events of which he had been unwillingly involved should in no way influence his career. He did not leave a job commissioned by a pope – and especially by that pope, halfway completed unless he wanted to throw away his brushes forever… or his head. And then, a hasty escape, apparently without any reason would have drawn too much attention to himself.

He decided that the shadows on the pontiff’s face needed accentuating to give him greater charisma and greater depth. The face, it was said, was certainly similar, but it did not communicate the Alexander’s personality as powerfully as the two versions he had painted in the apartments of the Apostolic Palace, that of the group of the Madonna with the blessed child, with Alexander depicted kneeling in the act of touching the foot of Jesus, placed in the pontiff’s cubicle, and, kneeling again, in the resurrection of Christ, painted on the lunette of one of the reception rooms.

He had been accused of focusing too much on the figure of the French king Charles, depicted paying tribute to the vicar of the Lord. Respecting the wishes of his client, he had placed him below his interlocutor, kneeling, with a humble and resigned attitude. It hadn’t really happened that way but the Pope had managed to escape the most serious threat that he had experienced during his term, and that was what counted. He had also made great efforts to accentuate as much as possible the many physical defects of that deformed and disturbing sovereign. The pontiff had wanted him barefoot and wearing a penitent’s robe, not only to highlight his alleged submission, but also to show his principal malformation, the six toes on each foot, then his face, to which already a long and hooked nose prevented him from being handsome, was marked by deep dark rings under the eyes, but above all by the pustules on his cheeks and on his forehead, a legacy of the malady which had struck the sovereign and a large part of his army during the retreat from Italy.

That point, in particular, had created a slight friction between client and artist during the project. Bernardino feared he would attract the fury of the French supporters in Rome, by painting the transalpine sovereign in those miserable conditions. Already the penitential attitude, as if Henry IV had been an act of contrition before Pope Gregory VII four hundred years earlier, was an obvious historical falsehood. The king had left the eternal city after being satisfied that a good part of his demands had been carried out and he had been carefully guarded against humiliation, although he had been obliged to pay, very unwillingly, a tribute to the pontiff. However, when he had been in Rome and met the pope, Charles had not yet caught what had been called the ‘French disease’ – otherwise known as syphilis. To depict it in that way therefore meant making him look doubly ridiculous, and Bernardino was certain that the painting would provoke a host of problems.

But his holiness had been adamant. In part it was he who felt mortified by the French pressure and by the occupation of his city by troops thirsty for looting that the king had barely managed to prevent and he had wanted to take his revenge, showing all the people coming to the castle that the Lord had inflicted a just punishment on the impertinent sovereign.

He concluded that not even the proportions were satisfactory. Alexander had wanted to dominate the king in all senses, and the artist had been forced to portray Charles as a tiny man, almost a hunchback, frail and very unrepresentative of the prestigious lineage and the important role he represented. The result was an unequal comparison between the two characters, not at all realistic, with the imposing and majestic Pope facing an insignificant individual, who seemed to have been depicted on a different scale, almost relegated to the background.

Overall, he was not at all satisfied with the final rendering of the painting. With the other five, perhaps, but not of this one, the only one in which the Pope and the king were painted one in front of the other. And the beauty was that in depicting the king so miserably, he had had to use a subject he would have preferred not to have used.

Himself.

Pacis cultori… Looking at the effigy of the bull on the pedestal that surmounted the arch of the painting in front of him, Alexander shook his head and grimaced. If only he was like that now. When Pinturicchio had frescoed the hall, he had wanted to highlight the coincidence between his elevation to the papal throne and the conquest of the last remnant of Islamic territory on the Iberian peninsula, the kingdom of Granada, which Spain had recovered, which was his land, converting it to Catholicism. The advent of a Spanish pope had been hailed as a symbol of peace, but soon Alexander had been forced to realize how difficult it was to impose on the world, and to his own city, Rome, a role that was not legitimized by any dynastic claim. Of those times, above all, there had not been a pope who could be said to be protected from the threats of the Roman families, who in their own way aspired to the tiara, but also of the Christian kingdoms that did not intend to submit to his authority and which aspired to crush the State of the Church, which was among their possessions, or extort vassal promises from the pontiff.

He stared at the fresco of the Disputation of St. Caterina in Alexandria. If only things had actually gone as they did in the story it depicted! When the emperor Massimino Daia had claimed that all his subjects should sacrifice themselves to the pagan gods, Caterina had refused and, when taken to the sovereign, had ridiculed the fifty scholars who had opposed her, and even convinced them of the emptiness of polytheism. Massimino was so struck by what she had said that he had ordered the philosophers to be put to death and had wanted her to marry him, but when she refused him he condemned her to the torture of the wheel, from which the girl had miraculously escaped. If only he had been able, like Caterina, to convince rulers, nobles and powerful people to recognize his authority as God’s vicar, and if only the Lord had protected him from the dangers as he had done with the saint! But then, Caterina had been martyred by being beheaded…

He had no intention of becoming a martyr, nor did he aspire to become a saint. He knew only too well that he had too many sins on his conscience for the Lord to consider having him at his side. But he had ascended to the papal throne with the specific intent, among others, to assure full stability to the Church, after the upheavals, schisms and exiles to a foreign land of a few decades before. The Lord had to know that he was in good faith, at least on this point. He truly wanted to succeed, not only out of devotion but also so as not to be remembered simply as a pontiff devoted exclusively to worldly interests – a slave of his loins, corrupt, ambitious and a nepotist, as the people had said of him. If he could conclude his mandate by leaving a strong, united Church, protected from external threats, posterity would judge him with greater benevolence.

Perhaps.

But what had happened two weeks earlier had made him realize that there were too many enemies for him be able to hope that he could neutralize them all. He would need the Lord’s support at all times to impose respect for the Holy Mother Church, and instead, it seemed, the Lord had decided to punish him for his sins. Was he unworthy of the ministry for which he had longed all his life? And yet, he didn’t think he was any worse than his predecessors, nor to have acted in a more debatable, unprejudiced, and scandalous manner.

Yet none of his predecessors had been so severely punished by God and so fiercely attacked by their enemies. They had struck at him and injured him in the cruellest way, whoever they were. He had suffered the most terrible loss a man could suffer, and he still didn’t know who they were. He stared at the vivid colours of the fresco, the shades of pink of the clothes that the artist had painted upon himself in his own self-portrait. The intense blue of the saint’s robe, the golden sculptures of the throne on which the emperor was seated, the blinding red of the baldachin, the shaded backdrops of an imaginary Alexandria, chosen as the scenery in honour of its name, and he felt warmed by its beauty, in which he had always taken refuge throughout his life.

Then he looked up at the lunettes on the ceiling.

Pass me a diluted black tempera, Bernardino ordered his assistant, the keen Morto da Feltre, who had remained with him until that hour. I want to accentuate the shadows on his sanctity’s face.

But maestro, the young man objected. There are still portions where we must still do the rough coat and there the plaster is dry…

Something told him that he would never finish that series of frescoes so he might as well do what could be completed well. Do as I say and give me the tempera, he repeated. And while the young man was mixing the pigment with water, pouring the glue, the latex, the egg emulsion, the fig latex, the rubber and wax on the black tray, the artist took the opportunity to check the other characters of the first part of the frescoes. The Pope had wanted his whole family to be portrayed there, especially his children Cesare, Lucrezia, Giovanni and Goffredo, although they had no role in the events related to the French invasion. When he had painted them, he had known very little about them. He had met them occasionally and had received their compliments for his work, he had talked to them during receptions and parties, in the midst of a large number of people, and always only making small talk. Thus he had portrayed them on the basis of on his impressions, trying above all to please their father and thus trying to give the viewer an idea of royalty, as if they were predestined and invested with divine grace. Their figures stood out magnificently among the many characters that were dotted about the frescoes, as if a light from the sky illuminated them, and to each of them he wanted to assign a characteristic, established on the basis of his sensations. For Lucrezia beauty and grace, for Giovanni, pride and power, for Cesare determination and passion, and for the youngest, Goffredo, naivety.

The events he had experienced in the previous weeks, and the news that he had heard, however, had led him to change his convictions. If he had painted them now, he would have revealed other characteristics in each of them.

And in reality he had done just that, he reminded himself. It remained to be seen how long it would take the pontiff to realize it.

Pope Alexander felt reassured by those walls, of a full and intense blue, after the rapid restoration which Pinturicchio had seen to the previous month. The painter had taken advantage of this, he said, to revive some of the backgrounds and accentuate the shading of some scenes and until a few days earlier the presence of scaffolding had prevented the pontiff from making use of the hall that was the jewel in the crown of the section of the Apostolic Palace reserved for his apartments.

Alexander had assumed that the adjustments would be minimal and irrelevant. He knew very well that these touches were not the reason that the painter had had to leave his work at Castel Sant’Angelo and devote himself for a few days to the halls of the Apostolic Palace, and that it had nothing to do with art. In fact, now he began to wonder if Pinturicchio had really intervened or only pretended to.

If there had been adjustments, they had been so subtle that he could not distinguish them.

The pontiff narrowed his eyes, demanding extra effort from his fading vision, made worse by the long bouts of crying of the last two weeks and from fatigue. The subject depicted in the eight lunettes had scandalized more than one conformist with its mixture of sacred and profane. It was fashionable, of course, in those times, to recover the myths of pagan religions of the past and to accompany them with testamentary narratives, but some claimed that he and Pinturicchio had gone too far. He observed in the under-arch the images that told the myth of Io, taken from Ovid’s Metamorphoses. It followed the story of the unfortunate daughter of the Argive king Inaco, beloved of Jupiter who turned her into a heifer to hide her infidelity from Juno. But the goddess, realizing the deception, demanded that her husband give her the animal and then gave it to Argo, a giant with a thousand eyes. Mercury succeeded in freeing the heifer on behalf of Jupiter himself, but Juno sent a horse to torment her forever, until the father of the gods succeeded in freeing her from this torture, allowing her to reach Egypt, where she became a woman again, enjoying the veneration of the people as Isis.

No, it did not seem to him that Pinturicchio had done anything more than brighten up the backgrounds of the scenes and hide the cracks that appeared following the earthquake of the previous year. And the same seemed to be true of the episode where Osiris, that other famous Egyptian divinity, was the main character. It was on this sequence of scenes that Alexander had wanted the painter to dwell in more detail. Osiris had been transformed into an ox and as such was revered by the pharaohs, provoking some accusations of blasphemy, the myth easily recalling to mind the heraldic symbol of the Borgias, which was indeed the bull.

Vive diu bos, vive diu bos, Borgia lives. This was not written on the walls but he knew that this was the message which emerged from these scenes, much bloodier and more dramatic than the myth of Isis. Her husband, Osiris, god of agriculture, taught the Egyptians the use of the plough and encouraged the prosperity of his people, but his evil brother Typhon killed him and scattered his limbs. Isis managed to reassemble the body by burying it under a pyramid and the god returned in the form of an ox, called Api. In the last scene, where his eyes lingered longer, the Egyptians carried him triumphantly in a procession, worshiping him as a god.

Yes, someone had said that he also wanted to be worshiped as a god. He had heard whispering among the onlookers when he had inaugurated the hall. They had accused him of arrogance, and someone had gone so far as to say that the earthquake was a signal from the Lord to warn him and exhort him to cancel those obscene paintings. The next time, he had heard, the ceiling would fall on his head, making him the victim of his own presumption.

Let them talk. They would have done the same thing, if they had been in his position. In the decades since the schisms, the figure of the pontiff had been increasingly challenged, and it was necessary to restitute it autonomy, power, and authority, if they wanted to avoid the risk of the Church could collapsing or becoming empty of meaning. It needed to be clear: as the vicar of Christ, the pope placed himself above them all. nobles, princes and kings, and no one could threaten him without risking incurring the wrath of the Lord.

He returned to linger over the two bloodiest scenes in the cycle of Osiris, separated by one of the gilded coffered arms of the cross. In the first, Typhon, assisted by three other characters, beat his brother to death, while the second a desperate Isis collected the remains of her dismembered husband. His eye fell on the character immediately behind the assassin. He was on one knee and was wearing armour and was holding a spear, just as he remembered from the preparatory drafts. But there was something about that figure which seemed out of place. He squinted and tried to focus on it.

And then he realized. Pinturicchio had radically changed its facial features and hair. He looked hard at it. Not only was it no longer the same character as before, but it was not even what it should have been.

It was something that he would have preferred not to see standing behind a murderer, as though it were the instigator and Typhon the assassin.

Why had Pinturicchio done such a thing? And without saying anything? Was there some meaning in that specific change? Was it something to do with the investigation that he had assigned to him?

Suddenly he became terribly suspicious and felt his stomach churning so violently that it took his breath away for a few moments. His vision clouded over and he thanked the Lord that he was seated, otherwise he would have fallen to the ground.

He tried to cry out, to call the servants, but the words would not come out of his mouth. He tried again, and only a weak, strangled sound emerged.

Then he stamped his feet on the ground. The noise resounded through the great hall and finally one of the attendants entered the room. From his worried expression, Alexander realized that he was not a pleasant sight.

Get… get Pinturicchio… immediately! he whispered with the last drop of energy he had left, before letting himself be lifted and carried into his room.

Maestro, you are desired at the Apostolic Palace. His holiness wants to speak to you urgently.

The peremptory announcement of the papal messenger made a shiver run down Bernardino’s spine, as he remained with his brush suspended in midair for a few moments, near the candle that his assistant kept close to the paintings to allow him to see all the details.

It was extremely unusual for the pope to solicit his presence like this, suddenly, and at that time of day. It could only mean that the moment he had been awaiting for a few days had arrived. And he already knew what to do.

Tell his holiness that I will come as soon as possible, he replied.

The messenger gave him a puzzled look. I’ll wait for you, Maestro, he replied.

That won’t be necessary. Go and announce my arrival. I must conclude my work here. I cannot let this dry without finishing it and then I have to go to my studio to fetch some drawings that I wanted to show to his holiness. Don’t worry, I’ll come as soon as possible if the Supreme Pontiff wants me to come tonight and cannot wait for tomorrow.

In fact he cannot wait. He is extremely anxious to see you.

Bernardino nodded. Then he ostentatiously turned his back on him and went back to working on the wall, suggesting that, for him, the interview was over and the interlocutor dismissed. The other man hesitated again, then gave up and his steps resounded further and further away in the corridors of the castle. When he heard no more noise, the artist handed his brush to Morto.

You dry everything here. I’m going.

The young man stared at him in surprise. What drawings do you have to show to his holiness? You never mentioned anything to me…

Just an idea of mine, he replied vaguely. Don’t worry about it.

He rinsed his hands and, without even bothering to change, left the bag with his good clothes in it and set off towards the exit, walking briskly along the narrow and gloomy rooms of the fortress of Rome. He had thought so many times in the last few days about this precise moment in time. He had prepared every detail and he was sure he knew how to handle with it calmly and reasonably, but his awareness of being precisely in the place where the popes incarcerated people made his stomach turn over. He remembered the stories he had heard about the gloomy, damp, dark dungeons of the castle, which were probably just below him, and of the cries and wails that some had heard during the night. A single word from Alexander would be sufficient for him too to become one of those desperate voices. He had done nothing, but he had been involved in terrible events for the Pope’s family, and it was never possible to predict what consequent whims of the powerful this would mean. Especially when they were passionate and bloody men like the Borgias.

He was now aware of secrets that the pontiff would have had an interest in keeping secret.

He reached the exit and the guards hastened to open the front door, greeting him with deference. He was one of the most esteemed and well-known men of Rome, yet never, as in those moments now, had his life hung by a thread. It had happened, several times in those two weeks, but in each circumstance he had been able to count on the Pope’s support at the end of the day. Now, however, Alexander could become his fiercest enemy.

The darkness began to change the colours of the city, making them duller and more opaque. Bernardino took a fleeting glance to his right, towards the basilica of Saint Peter and the Apostolic Palace, wrapped in a network of scaffolding for the extension works that had been ongoing since he had moved to Rome. All in all, he told himself, it was good that the decisive moment had come in the evening. It would be easier.

He ignored the buildings of the Borgo where his workshop was located, and headed towards the tower that guarded the Sant ‘Angelo bridge, walking towards the opposite bank with growing anxiety. He hoped that the papal messenger had returned to the Apostolic Palace and would not be nearby, thus noticing him on his journey, quite different from what it should have been. He passed the two chapels that guarded the opposite end of the bridge and proceeded quickly, his head lowered, ignoring for once the numerous and contradictory impressions that this bewitching city had always made upon him. The ruins of ancient monuments, the elegant palaces of the nobility, the pastures and undergrowth, the improvised fortification and the strange and varied humanity that still at that time of day roamed the streets to eat, to pray, to commit crimes and to intrigue.

He knew that all too well about that, what with everything he had been through in the last few days.

Before going home, he found a coachman and hired him and his wagon, giving him the address where he was to come and pick him up in an hour, and then he arrived in front of the door of the house he had been renting in recent years, close to the Tiber in the Ponte district. Now came the hard part, he told himself. He had to make sure that Grania didn’t make a fuss. He climbed the stairs and knocked. He didn’t have to wait long for Clelia, the eldest daughter, to come and open up. The girl did not even deign to look at him and immediately turned her back on him after a fleeting grunt that Bernardino could only interpret as a greeting. He frowned – usually, at least Clelia was not so surly. She had probably been arguing with her mother.

Just for a change.

We’re leaving, right now. Get the girls ready, he told her, referring to Adriana, Faustina Girolama and Egidia, his other three daughters, two of whom he saw playing on the bed while the third, barely a year old, was in her mother’s arms, weeping.

It didn’t take the artist long to figure out what had happened. Grania had scolded her eldest daughter for something, Clelia had responded in kind and her mother had reacted vehemently, screaming and shouting as was her custom without taking into account the presence of her youngest daughter in her arms.

You should get me a wet-nurse once and for all. Do you think Clelia helps me with the girls? She does nothing, nothing at all! With all the money the Pope gives you, you can’t even afford to help the mother of your daughters! You’re the same old miser… began Grania’s usual litany. He wasn’t even listening, though.

Clelia was listening, however, and stared at him in astonishment. Are we leaving? And for where? she said.

Perugia. Let’s get a move on, he declared. And don’t waste your time bringing half the house with you. I have already arranged everything necessary elsewhere, for all of us. I have procured more or less the same clothes that you have here. I’m going downstairs to prepare the wagon. I want you down in half an hour.

At least four female voices rose in unison against him. But why? And why so suddenly? Clelia protested.

Is it something to do with that business? Grania asked him.

His partner knew the story, but only part of it. When he had discovered the truth he had avoided involving her in all of it, merely telling her that he had not had any results.

Partly, but it’s not just that, he lied. "Put simply, I should have started a commission in Perugia but I stayed longer than expected here in order to complete the work at Castel Sant’Angelo. So, the sooner I arrive in Perugia the sooner I will get an advance on my next job.

Then you go. We will follow you without all this rush, was his companions’ obvious and predictable response.

That is not possible, he replied testily. The work for the pontiff is not fully concluded. I left it in the hands of my assistants, who will finish it, but his holiness may not like it, so it would be better for you if I take you with me, to avoid unpleasant reprisals on his part. And in part it was true. Then he would send a letter to his assistants giving them instructions on how to finish the job.

And, of course, a letter of apology to his holiness… explaining everything… when he was far away from any possible revenge he might decide to partake…

I knew it. You have mishandled the task that was entrusted and have ended up in trouble and we… and these poor innocent creatures, complained Grania, pointing to her youngest daughters, they must pay the consequences.

He cut her off. Stop all this fuss. Hurry up. I will wait for you downstairs. I am going to prepare the wagon, he declared. Then he opened a cupboard and took out a trunk he had prepared some time before. It was full of books and objects from which he did not intend to be parted. He hoisted it up with difficulty and put it on his shoulder, stumbling for a few moments and going towards the door, trying not to pay attention to the screams that filled the apartment, then he looked at Faustina Girolama and nodded to her.

Do you want to come down and help your father? he asked her, and the little girl, who had recently turned eight years old, ran to join him. They went down the stairs together and reached the hall of the building, where the painter hurried to place the trunk on the ground and drag it to the edge of the road, and then, with his daughter, waited for the wagon he had rented.

Did you make the Pope angry, Father? the child asked him.

Bernardino looked at her tenderly and forced himself to smile, despite everything. With her he could afford to be more sincere. People are strange, my child. Even the popes. They might take it out on you even though you are completely blameless, he replied.

As he had predicted, the coachman arrived before his family. He had to send Faustina back upstairs to prompt his mother and older sister, who, united temporarily by mutual solidarity, presented themselves a while later with expressions of contempt painted on their faces. They dragged three trunks with great difficulty, and the painter motioned for the coachman to go and help them. Then, after arranging their luggage, they all climbed into the cart in gloomy silence. The tension was more tangible than the dense fog produced by the humidity of the night. They were all angry and wore sulky expressions. But it wasn’t over yet.

Bernardino told the driver to return to where he had been before. They headed north, stopping near Porta del Popolo, in a side street of Via del Corso, in front of the entrance of a modest building.

Why are we stopping here? Grania said, breaking the silence.

All we need to take with us is stored here.

Then he told the coachman and Clelia to help him. The two of them got down with the painter, who opened the door with the keys, then entered a warehouse and oriented himself with the faint light of the sky that filtered through the openings, progressively accustoming his eyes to the shadows. He pointed to the other two trunks stacked in a corner of the room. Together they lifted them up, taking them out one at a time and, after several trips, the cart was packed with luggage. Finally, Bernardino went back inside, took the canvas and, back on the vehicle, handed it to Faustina.

Please don’t let it get spoiled, he said to the girl.

What is this monster? Faustina answered, looking at the charcoal drawing with a puzzled expression on her face.

We have left so many useful things at home, and now you bring this horror with you? Grania inevitably protested. She tried to grab hold of it, with the obvious intention of throwing it away.

Bernardino grabbed her forearm, squeezing it with all the strength he had. Don’t you dare, he hissed, looking into her eyes, grimly.

For once, she did not insist, and Bernardino was surprised at his determination. He had never been able to silence her before. But that sketch was all he had left of her, and he wouldn’t let anyone take it from him. He motioned for the coachman to start and began to stare at the Porta del Popolo with his heart in his mouth, as the dark shape of the gateway grew closer and closer.

And it was only when they were beyond the walls that he finally relaxed, even allowing himself a smile.

He was free now

I

St. Peter’s Basilica, October 26, 1496

And so here we are in the hands of these Spaniards…

At this point, perhaps the French would have been preferable…

Are you joking? They would rape our women and infect us with syphilis… Have you forgotten what happened only two years ago?

You’re right. But I cannot stand the arrogance of these Spaniards. While we had a Roman Pope, at least we had fellow citizens in the most important positions, even if they were all his relatives. But now, this Pope Borgia is putting Spaniards everywhere.

And all members of his family too, for that matter…

Yes. We have become a Spanish domain, like the kingdom of Naples in the South. Just think, in the consistory there are now five Spanish cardinals, including the son of the pope, Cesare, and his cousin Juan. What will remain of the Romans?

Bernardino di Betto was unable to concentrate on the ceremony he had been called to attend by the Pope as soon as he had arrived in Rome for his new commission – the investiture of the pontiff’s second son, Giovanni Borgia, to the post of gonfalonier of the Church and captain general of the papal troops. Much more interesting were the whispered comments of the Romans seated next to him in the midst of the extraordinary throng of people that had crowded into St. Peter’s Basilica for the occasion, not so much out of

Reviews for The Borgias' Spy

[vesper1931 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

1497 Giovanni Borgia the favourite son of Pope Alexander VI, Rodrigo Borgia, is found dead, stabbed. Pinturicchio, painter to the pope, enlists the help of his fellow painters to discover information that would lead to the killer. Giovanni's bodyguard, Ramiro, is determined to avenge his death.
Unfortunately the story really didn't engage my interest and with such unlikeable main characters I didn't really care who the 'guilty' party was
ARC was provided by the publisher via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.