He felt the last movement in his loins. It was joy and beauty and savagery all combined in his screwing into this firm and beautiful unknown body. He squeezed the buttocks in his hands as he thrust, and his thrusts slowed to grinding heaves. He was losing control. It was heaven. It was hell. He couldn't keep it back. It was coming, coming, into the body of this strange, prostrate girl whose buttocks were in his hands, whose tight, clinging vagina was around his prick, whose face was there pressed into the sand in the darkness. It was coming, whirling, here, oh God, here… “Aaaaaaaah!”… the final cry groaned from his throat, forcing his lips apart and he flopped and bit her strained neck as he shot his sperm into her helpless, wide-open passage.
The girl lay as though dead and after a while he pulled his hands out from under her behind and rolled off her. Now that it was over he felt a flatness. It certainly didn't seem worth the extreme and violent measures he'd gone to to get it.
His thoughts, as he tucked his limp penis into the slit in his hose, turned on the difficulty of getting home, of getting away from the girl- it seemed too unnatural just to get up and walk off-of keeping clear of her in future, of avoiding recognition. It was chilly, too, now.
He glanced back at the bridge, wondering if anyone had heard the cry of his climax. As far as he could see nobody was there. But, by now, it was impossible really to see anything at that distance.
A slithering movement beside him brought his glance quickly back to the girl. He recoiled. Having had time, at last, to recover from her winding, she'd reached out and grabbed the dagger which he, so carelessly, had left lying beside them on the sand.
Now she had drawn herself up onto her knees and was glaring at him with eyes whose gleaming fury he could feel even through the gloom.
He drew back, without a word, slithering back onto his knees, getting warily to his feet as she did.
“Now I shall kill you,” she said with a quiet intensity. “Now I have the dagger and I shall kill you.”
He didn't answer. He kept his eyes on her and the dagger, whose gold handle gave off a slight luster in the darkness.
Crouching, she came toward him. He faced her, arms bent out toward her like a wrestler, watching intently. There was danger in running. He might fall; she might overtake him on the rough ground and stab him from behind. He waited for her to come at him.
When she did, leaping forward suddenly with the knife upraised, his foot lashed out and caught her in the groin. She fell on one knee and he leapt on her. In spite of her pain, she clung desperately to the dagger. But he was too strong for her. Slowly he forced her arm down until the knife was between them. He brought up his knee under her elbow from his standing position and the knife fell from her momentarily paralyzed fingers.
He pushed her back with his foot and groped quickly for the knife. He was half aware of her body flying at him once more as he rose with the knife. There was a slight moan from her lips and she fell heavily against him.
He twisted and leapt away. But the knife didn't come away in his hand. Behind him the girl slumped heavily to the ground and lay face down without a tremor.
Cesare stayed stock-still where he was. A flush of horror washed over him. He waited for her to move, to groan, but she lay like a corpse.
Cautiously he moved back to where she lay. He looked around for the knife, but he couldn't find it. He looked back at her still figure, chilled. He stood over her. He could see both her hands and the knife wasn't in either of them. Overcoming a sudden urge just to leave, to rush off into the night, he bent and turned her over. The cold sight of what he had known from her stillness petrified him. The dagger was buried in her breast almost to the gold hilt. Around it her brown, peasant dress was stained a darker brown. Her eyes were open, but unseeing.
Cesare's mind became a confusion of irrelevant, frightened thoughts. It was some minutes before he was able to think with any clarity. Then he forced himself to be calm and work out what to do. The main thing, he told himself tensely, was to be quick. The next, leave nothing to identify himself. He looked down at the hilt of the dagger and shuddered. He stopped his gaze from rising to the girl's face just in time and, closing his eyes, caught the handle of the knife and pulled. It came away with a smooth springy pressure and when he opened his eyes it was wet and dripping in his hand.
Have to wash it. He glanced around at the river a dozen paces away. He started toward it and then stopped and looked back at the body. He went back to it and put his hand on the girl's breast. No, of course she was dead. Steeling himself, he took her under each armpit and dragged her as quietly as he could manage to the edge of the bank. He swilled the knife in the almost still water of the river and wiped it on her dress. Then, very gently and carefully, he rolled her over into the water.
He stood up, breathing quickly. Now the city guard wouldn't see the body immediately if they came down onto the bank. He glanced back at the bridge which was like some great conscious presence, a witness to the drama. Suppose her people were out looking for her there, wondering why she hadn't got home. But surely they'd have come straight down onto the bank. Maybe there were a dozen reasons why she might be late on any particular day. He'd only watched her for three days in all-far from conclusive evidence that she followed an unchanging pattern.
Cesare stuffed the dagger back into his belt. He glanced at his hose and then pulled his doublet down as far as possible, hiding the slit as best he could. He didn't look back at the river.
At the parapet he heard voices. They filled him with a consuming dread. He knew they were looking for her. The voices came from people who must be standing on the bridge. There were several voices. He listened. A voice came out distinctly from the others…
“She came across the bridge just like everyday…”
And then another.
“Never should have left her. It was so near…”
Cesare didn't stay to hear any more. With his heart in his mouth, he crept down toward the river and slipped into the darkness of one of the great spans of the bridge. There he waited, quietly, hardly daring to breathe, hoping that the obvious wouldn't occur to them- to come down and scour the river bank.
For half an hour he waited, but nobody came down onto the bank and after a few minutes he crept slowly back to the Parapet higher up. The voices had gone; there was nobody about.
Not much later he let himself into the grounds of Cardinal Roderigo's house. His clothes were still in the garden shed. He changed, rolled the others into an unrecognizable ball and went into the house to his room. He was there, reading, when his father came to see him much later and tell him the news of the morrow-it was to be the crowning day for Christ's Vicar.
CHAPTER 8
Cardinal Roderigo was crowned Pope Alexander VI next day on the steps of the Basilica of St. Peter. The streets of Rome were crowded with citizens, shouting, laughing, applauding.
Their common eyes were dazzled by the colorful beauty of the procession to the Lateran, the Pope's cathedral church.
Alexander, smiling and serene, completely confident and happy in the fulfillment of his aim, rode on a huge white stallion surrounded by banners including the arms of the Borgias — the Bull. The new Pope held his hand high, blessing the populace with the Fisherman's Ring which glittered from his forefinger in the sunshine.
The magnificent cortege included seven hundred priests and prelates, two thousand knights on horseback, three thousand archers and Turkish horsemen and the Palatine Guard with their flashing halberds and shields.
Watching the procession in all its blaze of color, listening to the music, smelling the incense and the flowers which heralded a night of festivity, Cesare could hardly believe in his adventure of the previous night. A desire not to recall the details of its ending denied him the liberty to enjoy remembering the beginning. It was an episode he preferred to forget.