CESARE.
[With a laugh.] Well, he was touched?
VERA.
He welcomes you,
Gives you your old apartments in the Palace,
And only dwarfs your escort to a hundred
And fifty men.
CESARE.
[Touching Vera’s wrist.] Lord Vera,
He told me, in hot pleading of his cause,
Perchance I was his son. Conceive it, Vera—
Twice of St. Peter’s line! We are complaisant,
For we can take all glory at its worth.
[Madonna de’ Catanei returns with the cloak of crimson and ermine. She and the Mute wrap it round Cesare’s shoulders.
O mother, hear! [Breaking into merry laughter.
The Vatican receives us as before;
The Vatican! [Vanozza brushes tears from her eyes.
And shortly
We shall recover all our own again,
Rimini, Piombino, Imola,
The duchies and the principalities.
Even now each fortress in Romagna keeps
As a locked coffer proof against our foes.
The Vatican! The Stanze!
The Gonfalon! We hold our very course.
SCENE VI
The Papagallo in the Borgia Apartments.