“Well, I shall ask Madonna Lucrezia about her tonight.” Orsino and I were invited to see His Holiness again this evening; another of his small gatherings in the papal apartments. Surely Lucrezia would be there. Now that her marriage to Lord Sforza had been annulled and a few months passed for the talk to die down, she had left the Convent of San Sisto for the Vatican. I knew Lucrezia was cross with me; I’d had a few letters arrive in Carbognano, accusing me of breaking her father’s heart—but she never held a grudge for long. Leonello would have said it was because she had the attention capacity of a flea.

“My sister is ill,” Cesare informed me as I inquired after Lucrezia that night, making my entrance with Orsino. “She broke her arm at the convent, and she is resting quietly while the bone heals. I know she will wish to see you in a week or two, when the pain passes.”

“We had planned to return to Carbognano in another week,” I began. Holy Virgin save me, how long was this visit going to drag on? We had originally intended to stay in the city only a fortnight or so, but Rodrigo had said we must wait until he decided upon a match for Laura. And then he ruled that that would have to wait until Lucrezia’s next marriage was settled first, and then he decreed that both betrothals must be postponed until after the Christmas festivities. And now Christmas was come and gone; the year had turned and we were nearing Lent, and nothing at all was settled. I missed my square castello in Carbognano with a fierceness that surprised me.

And these past few weeks, it wasn’t just the Pope who delayed our return home. Orsino was making excuses too, and that surprised me even more.

“Don’t you want to see how the garden is faring?” I’d cajoled him just last week. “I want to see the beautiful roses you had planted for me. And we could attend Easter Mass in our own church. The new stained-glass window is bound to be in place by now.” All of us together at the altar, my daughter kneeling between us—and pray God, no betrothal for her yet. Not for years, if I got my way.

“You’re the one who wanted to come to Rome,” Orsino had pointed out.

“And you’re the one who wanted it to be a short visit,” I said in return. Why in the name of the Holy Virgin had my usually pliable husband changed his mind?

“My lady wife will be delighted to pay a call upon your sister,” Orsino was telling Cesare in the rather grand tones he had been using lately. “Perhaps our Laura will someday be a countess like Madonna Lucrezia. His Holiness will have told you he is now considering a French comte for a betrothal?”