With that, Cesare walked off the dais and through a curtained door to one side. Rodrigo watched him go for a moment, then, muttering to himself, followed.
Strut as much as you like for now, Cesare, thought Ezio. But I’ll pluck you down. In the meantime, your Banker must pay the price for his involvement with you.
Putting on the air of any other party guest, he sauntered in the direction the others had gone. During the speech, the main hall had been transformed—beds and couches were placed around it under heavy canopies, and the floor had been covered with damask cushions and thick Persian rugs. Servants still passed among the guests, providing wine, but the guests had now become more interested in one another. All over the room, men and women were shedding their clothes, in pairs, threesomes, foursomes, and more. The smell of sweat rose with the heat.
Several women and not a few men, some not yet engaged in the fun and games, gave Ezio the eye, but few paid any serious attention to him as he made his way, using the columns of the room as cover, toward the Banker, who had now shed his biretta, his magnificent ferraiolo, and his cassock to reveal a spindly figure in a white cotton shirt and woolen long johns. He and the courtesan were half sitting, half lying on a canopied couch set in an alcove, more or less hidden from the view of the rest of the guests. Ezio drew near.
“And are you having a pleasant evening, my dear?” the Banker was saying, his gnarled hands fiddling clumsily with the stays of her dress.
“Yes, Eminenza. Indeed I am. There is so much to look at!”
“Oh, good. I spared no expense, you know.” His lips slobbered over her neck. He bit and sucked, moving her hand lower.
“I can tell,” she replied, her eyes meeting Ezio’s over the Banker’s shoulder and warning him to stay back—for the moment.
“Yes, sweetheart—the finer things in life make power so rewarding. If I see an apple growing on a tree, I simply pluck it. No one can stop me.”
“Well,” said the girl, “I suppose is does depend a bit on whose tree it is.”
The Banker cackled. “You don’t seem to understand, my dear—all the trees are owned—by me!”
“Not mine, dearie!”
The Banker drew back a little, and when he spoke again, frost had crept into his voice. “On the contrary, tesora; I saw you steal my attendant’s purse. I believe I’ve earned a free ride for your penance. In fact, I’m taking a free ride that’ll last all night long!”
“Free?” Ezio hoped the girl wasn’t pushing her luck. He glanced around the room. The few guards were stationed around its perimeter at intervals of perhaps fifteen feet. None was near. The Banker, on his own ground, was clearly sure of himself. Maybe too sure.
“That’s what I said,” replied the Banker, the ghost of menace in his tone. Then a new thought struck him. “Do you have a sister, by any chance?”
“No—but I have a daughter.”
The Banker considered this. “Three hundred ducats?”
“Seven.”
“You drive a hard bargain, but—done! A pleasure doing business with you.”
THIRTY-THREE
The evening wore on. Ezio listened to the voices around him—”Do it again!” “No, no—you’re hurting me!” “No, you can’t do that. I won’t allow it!”—and all the sounds of pain and pleasure—the pain real, the pleasure simulated.
The Banker was not running out of steam, unfortunately, and lost patience with his fumbling and started to tear the girl’s dress off her. She still implored Ezio with her eyes to hold his ground. “I can handle this!” she seemed to be saying to him.
He looked around the room again. Some of the servants and most of the guards had been inveigled by the guests to join in the fun. He noticed people wielding wooden and ivory dildos and little black whips.
Soon…
“Come here, my dear,” the Banker was saying, pushing the girl back down onto the couch and managing to straddle her, pushing himself into her. Then his hands closed around her neck and he started to strangle her. Choking, she struggled, then fainted.
“Oh, yes! That’s nice!” he gasped, the veins in his neck bulging. His fingers tightened around the girl’s neck. “This should increase your pleasure. It certainly increases mine!” A minute later he had finished and lay heavily on her body, slipping on their sweat, catching his breath.
He had not killed the girl. Ezio could see the rise and fall of her chest.
The Banker clawed his way to his feet, leaving her prostrate form half on and half off the couch.
He snapped out an order to a pair of servants, still on duty nearby: “Get rid of her!”
As the Banker moved toward the main orgy, Ezio and the servants watched him go. As soon as he was at a safe distance, and otherwise occupied, the servants lifted the girl gently onto the couch, placed a carafe of water near her, and covered her with a fur rug. One of them noticed Ezio. Ezio put a finger to his lips. The man smiled and nodded. At least there was some good in this fetid hellhole.
Ezio shadowed the Banker as he pulled up his long johns and moved from group to group, muttering his appreciation like a connoisseur in an art gallery.
“Oh, bellissima,” he would say from time to time, stopping to watch. Then he made for the ironbound door he’d originally appeared from and knocked on it. It was opened from within by the second attendant, who’d almost certainly been spending all that time verifying the new accounts.
Ezio didn’t give them a chance to close the door behind them. He leapt forward and his impetus pushed both men back inside. Ezio closed the door and faced them. The attendant, a little man, now in his shirtsleeves, burbled and fell to his knees, a dark stain flowering between his legs. Then he fainted. The Banker drew himself up.
“You!” he said. “Assassino! But not for much longer.” His arm snaked out to a bellpull, but Ezio was quicker. The hidden-blade sprang out and slashed through the fingers of the hand the Banker was extending. The Banker snatched his maimed hand back as three fingers scattered onto the carpet. “Stay back!” he screamed. “Kill me and it’ll do no good! Cesare will never let you live! But—”
“Yes?”
The man’s face became sly. “If you spare me…”
Ezio smiled. The Banker understood. He nursed his ruined hand.
“Well,” he said, though tears of pain and rage were starting in his eyes, “at least I have lived. The things I have seen, felt, tasted. I regret none of them. I do not regret a moment of my life.”