“I am Nesserdin,” said the newcomer.
“And I’m Petro Mancos.” Pete suddenly remembered what his wine-shop companion had told him about the mysterious Arabian guest of Cesare. “You’re the Shaykh, huh?”
“I am the Shaykh Nesserdin, yes.
I have been watching you. We have jugglers and tricksters in the east, but never have I seen one with your dexterity.”
“Thanks.” Pete was flattered, and let Nesserdin win three times in succession while the soldiers, awed, stood at attention against the walls. After that, however, the Shaykh’s luck changed.
He lost ducat after ducat. But he remained completely fascinated by the puzzle.
“Under this one, I am sure. By the beard of the Prophet! Again I am wrong! Let us try again, Petro Mancos.”
“Messer Mancos,” said a guard. “You may see the Borgia now.”
“Thanks.” Pete gathered his winnings and slid them into his purse. “So long, Pop. See you later.”
“Stay! You cannot leave now! This time I am sure I will guess aright.”
“Later,” Pete promised, and followed the guard.
The Shaykh pursued, tugging intently at his beard and muttering excitedly.
Cesare Borgia was dining with his guests in a huge banquet hall. He sat at the head of the board, a gigantic bull-like man with a ruddy, handsome face and sharp, intolerant eyes. All the nobles of Milan were apparently present.
“Ho!” cried Cesare. “So this is the Messer Mancos! Now what is this gift you have brought me?”
Pete took out the package. “Here it is.”
He stared around, realizing that he was hungry. A whole boar, roasted and juicy, lay near him, regarding him with malevolent jeweled eyes. Pete looked away hastily.
A gaunt, bearded man rose and approached Cesare, whispering in the latter’s ear. The Borgia’s eyes widened.
“So, Messer Machiavelli? Very well.”
Machiavelli grinned nastily. “Our men have just found Orsino. It would be best to have him open this gift.”
Pete’s ears pricked up. “Orsino? Say, that’s the guy who gave me the thing.”
“So?” Machiavelli purred. He clapped his hands. Within a minute Orsino was dragged into the banquet hall. The guests stopped eating to stare.
Orsino looked as if he’d been given the third degree. His clothing was in rags, and his beard smeared with blood.
“He tried to slip a stiletto into my back,” Machiavelli said. “But my guards have sharp eyes. Now, Messer Orsino, open this little gift.”
Orsino glared, shaking his head in silence.
“No? Then perhaps you wish to sleep on the rack tonight?”
“Hey, what is this?” Pete demanded, feeling his stomach freeze apprehensively. “Have I got myself mixed up with a racket?”
Nobody paid any attention. Orsino, biting his lips, took the package and unwrapped it. A jeweled box fell out.
“Open it,” Machiavelli whispered.
Cesare Borgia watched loweringly. Even to Pete’s eyes, it was evident that something was wrong. Orsino had butterfingers. He seemed to be trying to open the box without touching it.
Cursing, Cesare rose, whipping out a sword. “Open that box!” he thundered.
The lid snapped up. Orsino dropped the box and staggered back, blood dripping from his hand. Machiavelli laughed.
“A poisoned needle, as I suspected. A gift from your sister, my prince!”
“Be silent,” Cesare said. He looked down at Orsino, who lay kicking his heels against the carpet. “Drag this offal out and throw him into the garbage pit.” Anger sprang into the intolerant dark eyes. “Now, Messer Mancos—”
“Hey!” Pete yelped, trying to retreat and finding it useless. “This is a frame-up!”
But Cesare’s great sword was lifting, ready to smash down at Manx’s head. Pete’s clawing hand found the roasted boar. He swung the dripping carcass up as a shield, and the Borgia blade cleaved it in two. Cesare laughed.
“I’ll aim better next time,” he promised, and moved forward.
“Wait!” It was the Shaykh, suddenly standing before Pete, one arm lifted. “Do not slay him. At least let him explain! He may be innocent!”
“Sure, I’m innocent,” Pete babbled. “It was a frame! I’ve been double-crossed. Just give me a chance.”
CESARE lowered his sword doubtfully. “You are my guest, Shaykh Nesserdin. Your wishes shall be respected. Yet what is the life of one such varlet worth?”
“He interests me,” the Arab said. “There is—ah—something I wish to learn from him. Let him speak, I pray you.”
“Then speak!” Cesare thundered at the culprit.
Pete obeyed, telling as much of his story as he thought would be safe, making it quite clear that he had been an unknown tool in Orsino’s hands. Also, he declared fervently that he was too young to die.
“Ha!” said Machiavelli gloatingly. “Let me put him on the rack. Under the estrapade or the boot he will talk more loudly.”
“Don’t do it,” Pete argued, thinking fast. He remembered certain words he had heard about Cesare being renowned for his entertainments, and that he was trying very hard to impress the Milanese nobles. He lowered his voice confidentially. “I can help you immeasurably, Messer Borgia.”
“Prince!” corrected Machiavelli.
“Yeah—Prince.” Pete glared at Machiavelli. “Just let me talk to you confidentially for a few minutes.”
“So you can put a knife in my gullet?”
The thought seemed to amuse Cesare. He took Pete by the scruff of the neck, nodded at his guests, and dragged his victim into an anteroom. There he sat Manx down hard on the floor and glared at him. “Now—talk!”
It wasn’t difficult. Cesare, despite his bad temper, was intelligent. Pete mentioned Elsa Maxwell, described her activities, and told the Borgia that he needed an m.c. “Master of ceremonies, see? A sort of combination manager and publicity man to handle the parties you throw. Just food ain’t enough to put a shinding over. You need novelty.”
“We have jugglers, musicians, dancers.”
“It’s gotta be something different, Messer—I mean, Prince.” Pete went on, talking fast, trying to sell himself as a medieval Elsa Maxwell to the Borgia prince. At last he seemed to have succeeded.
“Very well,” Cesare agreed. “I’ll let you live and serve me. It is not your fault, I suppose, that Lucretia is jealous of me and uses her poisons so rashly. It is the Arab.”
“Nesserdin?”
Cesare jumped. “Listen! You canaid me, Mancos. Listen well! The Shaykh Nesserdin is the possessor of an immensely valuable treasure. When he was shipwrecked, he buried that loot on an island in the Mediterranean. But the location of it only he knows.”
Pete nodded shrewdly. “So that’s the angle! You’re trying to get the dope out of the old boy.”
The other smiled wolfishly. “Your words are strange, but I think I understand them. Yes, I wish to learn the location of the treasure. But Nesserdin guards his knowledge well. His lot is worth—” and Cesare named a sum.
Pete made a hasty computation and gasped aloud. Nearly a million bucks, American money. Whew!
“With that treasure, my fortune is made. My sister Lucretia wishes it for herself, however. She shall not have it,” went on Cesare, smiling again. “Nesserdin seems to like you. If you can get him to tell you the location of the treasure, I shall reward you richly. If you fail, it is the rack or the boot.”
HE paused significantly.
“What a choice,” Pete gulped. “The loot or the boot. But okay, Prince. It’s a deal.”
“Meantime, you will act as a—what is it?—an m.c., to disarm suspicion. We must not let Nesserdin suspect our real motives.”
“Of course not,” Manx agreed weakly.
Cesare took a locket from his neck and gave it to Pete. “A sign of my favor. But it will not guard your throat against the sword, remember,” he warned. “As for the Arab, I could
put him to torture, but men of his race are stubborn, and I think guile will work better. So learn his secret. Meantime, the night is young. Before the banquet is over I shall expect some means of enlivening it.”
Pete gulped. “It’s short notice.” A thought came to him. “Okay. I can fix it up. But I’ll need some favors to pass around to the guests.”
He explained, and Cesare grunted and summoned Machiavelli. “Open the treasure room, Messer Machiavelli. A ruby for each guest.”
“A ruby!” Mr. Manx licked his lips. “Swell!”
Fingering his sword reflectively, Cesare went back to the banquet hall. With Machiavelli, Pete found the jewels. Then went to the kitchen where, by good luck, he discovered a huge sweet pasty ready to be served. He issued hasty orders.
“You got gunpowder in these days? Magnesium?”
Nobody had heard of flashpowder. Pete substituted scrapings of copper and iron. It was better than nothing. Machiavelli watched with a skeptically lifted eyebrow.
Somebody came down to announce that Cesare was chafing. Pete gave a last touch to the pasty and grinned.
“All set,” he announced.
Following the servants to the banquet hall, he wondered uneasily whether he had put too much gunpowder in the pasty.
The dish was set down in the center of the board and Pete, at a nod from Cesare, took over. He clambered atop a bench and yelled for silence. At last he got it. Expectant faces were turned toward him.
“Ladies and gentlemen!” he began, feeling more at ease in his familiar role of barker. “We have a little surprise for you this evening—a prize package The Prince is distributing favors in a different way. You keep what you get!”
He had already lit a fuse that disappeared into the interior of the pasty. There was a sudden bang as the gunpowder exploded.
It was spectacular enough. The rubies, buried in the pasty, flew in every direction. Machiavelli got one just under the eye. He yelled and glared at Pete malevolently.
The contents of the pasty spattered out like a volcanic eruption, punctuated with flaring colors. It was a miniature Vesuvius. But it achieved its novel purpose. The guests discovered the rubies, and the banquet dissolved into dozens of pasty-smeared nobles diving, scuttling, leaping, and racing after the jewels.
The Shaykh Nesserdin tugged at his sleeve. “Show me your trick with the goblets and the ducat,” he urged. “I think I have guessed it now.”
Cesare was grinning.
“Okay,” Pete nodded. “Right this way, Pop. Right this way!”
And that was that. For the present Manx was safe.
AS THE days dragged slowly past, he realized that his position was a precarious one. So far, he had made no progress in discovering the nature of Lucretia Borgia’s ring poison. Meantime, Cesare Borgia watched him with an eagle eye and almost hourly demanded reports on his progress with the Shaykh.
There was little to report. Nesserdin fascinated by the ducat-goblet trick, had formed a firm friendship With Pete, but he deftly turned the subject whenever the treasure was mentioned.
Mr. Manx, practical as always, had an idea. In his previous excursions to the past he had sometimes made money—which did him no good when he returned to his own era. Why couldn’t he arrange things differently? Why, for example, couldn’t he discover the location of the Arab’s treasure, and dig it up when he went back to 1941? Why, it was a cinch!
Each night Cesare threw a party. And each night Pete had to think up something new. His ingenuity was becoming sorely taxed.
He staged a treasure hunt, which was completely successful. He had a bevy of beautiful Milanese girls, discreetly clad in Manx-designed bathing suits, go swimming in a fountain full of amber wine. He fitted out a small amusement area, with a Wheel of Fortune and other concessions—a tank of goldfish, each with a jewel tied to it, for which guests seined with tissue-paper landing-nets; a dart game in which the targets were balloons, each with a jewel inside—and a variety of other games. The prizes were always valuable. And Cesare’s reputation was thereby greatly enhanced in Milan.
“They suspect me,” he told Pete once in confidence. “Because of Lucretia, you know. They think all the Borgias are poisoners. But now public opinion is swinging to my side. Soon—” He grinned wolfishly.
“Just wait,” Pete promised. “I’m planning a swell shindig—a real cocktail party. I’ve been distilling some liquor. I can’t get the real stuff, of course, but this will do. You never tasted a French seventy-five, Prince. Or a Suissesse—or a Stinger. And wait till I’ve doped out how to make a Zombie!”
Nevertheless, Pete did not fail to make his own plans. He had to find out what poison Lucretia used. He also planned to learn from Nesserdin the location of the treasure. After that he knew very well that his life wouldn’t be safe in Milan. So he provided a means of escape.
The Arab was helpful. In Nesserdin’s private palace, near Cesare’s, Pete built the device that would ensure his getaway. Then, one night, disaster struck.
It was the cocktail party that did it. Pete, foresighted as usual, drank a pint of olive oil before attending. He had created half a dozen new and distinctly unusual alcoholic drinks. The occasion was an important one. The greatest nobles of Milan had at last overcome their suspicions sufficiently to attend a Borgia banquet.
“I have lived down my sister’s reputation!” Cesare exulted and laughed. “They no longer consider me a poisoner! Soon I will have all the backing I need, including the Arab’s treasure, Messer Mancos. Has Nesserdin told you yet?”
“Not yet. Give me time,” Pete pleaded.
THE banquet was an unqualified success, up to a certain point. Pete knew that the olive oil in his stomach could absorb large quantities of alcohol. But he had drunk bathtub gin in an era when a scarified palate was a mark of sophistication. So he did not, for some time, realize the horrible effects of his Petro Mancos Special.
It was bad, no question about that. It had a wallop like a sledgehammer. Yet is wasn’t the worst. Cesare, whose palate was like iron, poured the Specials down happily. The guests followed his example, but there were many furtive glances exchanged.
Then Pete rose as servants brought and distributed goblets full of brownish fluid. “A new drink, ladies and gentlemen, created especially for this occasion. The Borgia Cocktail! I give you our host, the prince!”
The guests stood, goblets raised. They tossed off the cocktail. There was a ruby at the bottom of each cup—but no one noticed that! The Manx-distorted liquor of a civilized era was much too much for the throats of the Milanese!
A fat prelate clawed at his chest and gargled, “Poison!”
That started it. Machiavelli imitated a geyser and clawed for an ewer of water. All around the table guests were suffering from Pete’s unfortunate experiment with the prince’s brandy.
Cesare stood up, staring. He tasted his drink, and shot a furious glance at Pete. Cursing, he whipped out his sword and leaped on the table.
“Yipe!” Mr. Manx gasped. “They can’t take it! They think it’s a Mickey Finn!”
“Spoil my plans, will you?” Cesare roared. “You dog! I’ll cleave you in two parts!”
Pete did not wait to explain. A window shattered as he dived through it. He raced through the moonlit gardens, realizing all too well what had given Cesare Borgia his reputation as a poisoner in the centuries to come.
“Jeepers!” he groaned. “Why do these things always happen to me?”
He clambered over a wall, dodged through an alley, and found himself in the huge garden of Nesserdin. It was time for a getaway. Cesare Borgia’s vengeance would be swift and sudden.
A dim figure caught up with him. Pete instinctively dodged before he recognized the Shaykh. “Oh—Pop! You’d better get back to Cesare’s banquet. You can’t help me now.”
“I don’t understand,” Nesserdin said plaintively. “I liked that drink. What are you doing?”
Pete struck light to his flint and bent to kindle an already pr
epared bonfire. “Scramming. Clearing out,” he amplified. “I figured something like this might happen.” He nervously scraped some tar from the wood and rolled it into a ball between his fingers. “I’m leaving Milan, Pop.”
Nesserdin blinked. “I do not understand.”
Pete pointed. “See that metal cape over the bonfire? And those pipes? They lead to the valve of my balloon.”
“Balloon?”
“Sure. A free balloon, lifted by hot air. Like—like politicians,” Pete explained at random. “That’s the thing I’ve been working on.”
“Oh. I did not understand what it was.”
NO one had guessed, luckily. With strong silk, Pete had made a balloon, suspended a basket under it, and prepared a bonfire to inflate the device when necessary. In his circus days, he had made balloon ascensions. It was the old stuff to him.
“It’ll take a while to inflate,” he added.
“Then let us drink wine,” Nesserdin said. “Come! We will be safer in my palace where Cesare’s men can not glimpse you.”
That was true enough. In a downstairs room, Pete nervously rolled the ball of tar in his hand while he drank wine. Through the window he could see the glow of the fire. How long would it take to inflate the balloon?
Nesserdin went to a desk, found a quill and a scrap of paper. Over his shoulder he said, “Petro Mancos, you have been a good friend to me. I am in danger here. The Borgias wish the treasure I buried, but they shall not have it.”
Pete gulped wine. “Yeah. I know, Pop.”
The Shaykh scribbled something. “In case I meet death, I leave the treasure to you. Here is the location. You have been a good friend to me, and I have no other heirs.”
Pete took the scrap of paper dumbly. “I—gee, thanks, Pop,” he muttered. “But you don’t have to do this. You’re not going to be killed. Why not take off with me in the balloon?” This would mean losing the treasure, of course, but somehow Pete didn’t think of that just then.
Nesserdin smiled. “I do not want it. If I leave Milan, I shall return to my home in the East. I have treasures enough there. The loot on the island shall remain hidden until you take it. Besides—” He paused as something banged against the door.
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