scertained. But
straight to Gonzalo de Cordoba's Spanish camp he went, equipped with
a safe-conduct from the Great Captain, obtained for Cesare by Cardinal
Remolino.

There he found a court of friends already awaiting him, among whom were
his brother Giuffredo and the Cardinal Lodovico Borgia, and he received
from Gonzalo a very cordial welcome.

Spain was considering the invasion of Tuscany with the ultimate
object of assailing Milan and driving the French out of the peninsula
altogether. Piero de'Medici--killed at Garigliano--had no doubt been
serving Spain with some such end in view as the conquest of Florence,
and, though Piero was dead, there was no reason why the plan should be
abandoned; rather, all the more reason to carry it forward, since now
Spain would more directly profit by it. Bartolomeo d'Alviano was to have
commanded the army destined for that campaign; but Cesare, by virtue
of his friends and influence in Pisa, Siena, and Piombino, was so
preferable a captain for such an expedition that Gonzalo gave him charge
of it within a few days of his arrival at the Spanish camp.

To Cesare this would have been the thin end of a mighty edge. Here was
a chance to begin all over again, and, beginning thus, backed by Spanish
arms, there was no saying how far he might have gone. Meanwhile, what a
beginning! To avenge himself thus upon that Florentine Republic which,
under the protection of France, had dared at every turn to flout him and
had been the instrument of his ultimate ruin! Sweet to him would have
been the poetic justice he would have administered--as sweet to him
as it would have been terrible to Florence, upon which he would have
descended like another scourge of God.

Briskly and with high-running hopes he set about his preparations during
that spring of 1504 what time the Pope's Holiness in Rome was seeking to
justify his treachery by heaping odium upon the Borgias. Thus he thought
to show that if he had broken faith, he had broken faith with knaves
deserving none. It was in pursuit of this that Michele da Corella was
now pressed with questions, which, however, yielded nothing, and that
Asquino de Colloredo (the sometime servant of Cardinal Michaeli)
was tortured into confessing that he had poisoned his master at the
instigation of Alexander and Cesare--as has been seen--which confession
Pope Julius was very quick to publish.

But in Naples, it may well be that Cesare cared nought for these
matters