No one noticed what he was feeling. In fact, it seemed to him that everything was working against him. Finally one day, when he realised that for the third time in a row Galeazzo was not waiting for him to wrap him up in his furs but had entrusted the task to a black footman, all his bitterness welled up inside him and he came to a sudden decision. As soon as he could he slipped out of the room, packed his most essential belongings, secured the dagger in his belt and, stealing along the walls, made his escape from Galeazzo’s castle and out into the world.
He did not strike out towards the city. The thought of its unfamiliar atmosphere terrified him. Instead he headed north, across open land, keeping a good distance from the peasants working in the fields. If he came face to face with anyone, even a child, he would draw his dagger, and he took instant fright at the squawking of birds as they fluttered into the air behind his back. Everything was strange and new to him. He felt like a bat driven out of its cave in broad daylight, and he pressed on in inexpressible uncertainty, without aim or direction, already regretting that he had set out at all. Towards twilight he stopped in the centre of an immense field. His legs were shaking. Count Franghipani was afraid — afraid of the falling darkness, afraid of the totally alien landscape.
Suddenly he heard the thudding of hoofs behind him. He was still debating what to do when the horsemen were upon him. They were two Hungarian guards from the Duke’s personal entourage.
“We’ve been looking for you, young man. You’re such a fine young fellow the whole troop has been riding around after you. Get yourself home immediately, or there’ll be trouble.”
Lytto begged them to leave him alone, to let him make his own way in the world. No one needed him at the castle any more.
“Don’t talk rubbish. You’re the apple of his lordship’s eye,” said one of the guards.
Lytto stared at him in surprise, then, without a word, allowed them to haul him up onto the saddle and take him home.
Sitting at dinner that evening, the Duke had noticed that Lytto was not at his usual place behind his chair. To his question, where was the young Count Franghipani, no one could offer an answer. He instructed the servants to go and find him. By the time the third course was being served the boy had still not appeared. Galeazzo was overcome by a strange restlessness. He leapt up from the table, seized a torch and set out to look for him in person, with the whole Court following in his wake, calling out “Lytto, Lytto!” in room after room. After a long and fruitless search he finally found someone who had seen the boy leaving the castle through a small gate on the northern side. The Duke immediately ordered his guards to scour the countryside and bring Franghipani back, dead or alive.
He was still pacing up and down the great hall when a tearful and thoroughly demoralised Lytto was brought before him. His face brightened momentarily, then instantly became even more severe than usual. He did not enquire into the reasons for this truancy; he was quite sure they were no more than an adolescent longing for adventure and the urge to wander — nothing of more particular significance. Not for a moment did he doubt his ability to read the boy’s state of mind, and he rebuked him thoroughly, in his most coldly domineering manner.
But Lytto was happy. He felt that he had defeated Galeazzo. The Duke’s insistence on getting him back had been a silent admission that he loved him.
And so it was. That night Galeazzo did not sleep a wink. He allowed no one anywhere near him, and spent the whole time pacing up and down three large rooms. He had revealed his true feelings to himself. What he had always denied was now incontrovertible — that Lytto mattered to him. He would miss him in his absence, would worry about him. He needed him. In short, he loved him.
He was filled with a rage he would never have believed himself capable of. The tower of solitude, his whole life’s work, was tottering. Once you loved someone, what was to stop others laying siege to your heart, and then others again? First the boy, then some friend, then a woman, a mistress, and finally, in the twilight of his life, he too would become the slave of passions, of other people, and an unknown fate — just like all the others he so despised. Once the canker took root inside him he would never be able to tear it out. He would have to nip it in the bud, cauterise the wound, however painfully, before it was too late. He wrestled with himself until dawn, and was ready with his answer. He would send Lytto away. A separation in space and time would do the rest.
So the next day he summoned Lytto back to the Council Chamber, and addressed him as follows:
“Count Franghipani, we commend the study of the French language to your attention. It is true that Latin will suffice for general purposes; but nonetheless, if you are to make yourself fully understood wherever you are, it is essential to speak in the local idiom. It is a courtesy that makes us at home in the country we are visiting. Now, it is our resolve to send you, with a view to developing your talents, to Paris, to a renowned university there to study the disciplines of law and philosophy. As one of our future statesmen, and as a thoughtful person with a tendency to melancholy, you will need both. We confess we have often felt our own lack of a university education, and we desire that you should want for nothing in your adult life and be able, through your studies, to render even greater service to your country. We shall see to it that you have provisions and an escort appropriate to your rank. We have assigned St Lawrence’s day, which falls three weeks from today, as the date of your departure.”
Struck dumb with terror, Lytto uttered not a single word of thanks.
Galeazzo stood up and put his arm around the boy’s shoulder.
“I want you to be happy in Paris. Enjoy yourself. Take part in the varied life of a student. Don’t hold back on the liquor… And the ladies there, they say, are very good looking. The years will pass, and when you return you will have many tales to tell of your fine and amusing adventures.”
In a flash, Lytto saw through Galeazzo’s intentions. This too was part of the duel between them. It was Galeazzo’s way of freeing himself from the love he felt towards him. He felt sure, from the way Galeazzo’s arm had flinched when it touched his shoulder, that a real struggle was going on in the Duke’s soul, and he promptly resolved never to submit. Three weeks was a long time. Perhaps he might still manage to get the better of him.
He doubled and redoubled his attentions. His skill was almost magical. And now that he looked at it more closely, it became clear in just how many aspects of palace life he was indispensable. There were so many things, the minutiae of Galeazzo’s personal habits and requirements, and where his bits and pieces were kept, that only he understood. It was he who held the keys to Galeazzo’s cupboards. The black servants, in contrast, though they danced attendance on the Duke, were clumsy and heavy-handed, which deeply irritated their fastidious master. Only Lytto knew how to tuck him up in bed the way he liked, to pull his boots on without hurting him and pour his drinks with a pleasing, graceful movement of the hand. These and a thousand similar tiny but significant and interconnected details had become associated with his person. The Duke’s querulousness seemed to grow from day to day, and his absolute insistence on what he was accustomed to made the ever-attentive Lytto an even more necessary presence, more important than the Chancellor himself. Lytto forgot nothing, was party to everything, and every evening alike the Duke could have had nothing but praise for him.