trees in positions which were at once revealing and comic.
CHAPTER 14
It was close on the following dawn before Carlotta and her women were found by the search party the King sent out a couple of hours after dusk.
The captain who led the party was hard put to stop his men from committing too many indiscretions with their wandering hands as they untied the unfortunate women. And many a lady-in-waiting had her breasts and behind slyly stroked in the process of being set free. But, so relieved were they after a chilly night in the woods at the mercy of any vagabond who might happen upon them, that the women didn't even notice that they were being rather unnecessarily felt as hands fought with their bonds.
Carlotta was too ashamed and exhausted to be indignant about the fate she'd suffered. She mounted a horse with difficulty and conserved all her energy to prevent the physical pain she felt from showing on her face as, surrounded by their fresh escort-bodies of the dead flung over the horses' rumps-they headed back to the court. By that time, Cesare and his men were sleeping soundly in their beds-a sleep of exhausted passion.
The following day a large band of men-at-arms, including many of Cesare's retinue, set out to scour the woods in search for the villains who had attacked the ladies of the court.
But, although they spent the whole day, they I found no trace of any possible aggressors-in [fact the forest seemed to be totally deserted! and uninhabited for many miles around the spot.
There was much discreet talk about the dastardly fate of the ladies, but nobody seemed even to think of Cesare Borgia as the possible dispenser of the treatment. The King was restrained by Carlotta from offering a large reward for information leading to the capture of the unknown rogues. The less said the better, she decided. As it was she felt unable to leave her chambers for shame.
His Majesty, after a few more days of searching and interrogating, called off the hunt. But not before half his kingdom was aware of the story-often in a grossly exaggerated form. Some even suggested in the countryside's inns that the King himself had already tired of his wife and desired the haughty Carlotta, who had enhanced her desirability in refusing to accept Cesare's suit. Certainly many were the tongues which wagged over the Duke's part in the plot. But they wagged only among the peasants, who loved to talk about things connected with nobility, and the more scandalous the better. In the court itself, Cesare, who had always conducted himself in a manner of the utmost courtesy and delicacy, was considered beyond reproach. Besides, he had never had a definite refusal to his plan for marriage from the princess.
Such a scandal, however, certainly put Carlotta out of the marriage market for the time being, and Louis, still wishing for a firm alliance between the Pope and himself, presented Cesare with two fresh possibilities for a wife. He was offered either one of the King's nieces or the daughter of the Due de Guyenne, Charlotte d'Albret.
Charlotte was only seventeen, beautiful and she was a sister of the King of Navarre. It was she that Cesare chose.
For a short time her father appeared to oppose the proposed marriage. But the King of Navarre needed the friendship of France to withstand any possible attack from Castille and pressure was brought to bear on the girl's father so that he eventually consented.
The marriage was politically sound, uniting both sides as it did at the time when Milan was noticeably belligerent over disputed territory.
Cesare was able to spend a few months only, consolidating his reputation in France and enjoying his duchess. For the trumpets of war with Milan were soon sounding forth and the Duke of Valentinois was riding south in Louis' train to chastise the Italian kingdom.
In the Vatican, Alexander breathed a sigh of relief that his son had thus consolidated the alliance with France, and began to prepare celebrations for his homecoming.
Lucrezia, to whom news of her family came once in a while, also began to make preparations — to leave her little love nest in the convent and give herself once again into Cesare's arms.
