by Dave Duncan
“Francesco Guarini, citizen by birth.”
Expectant silence.
“…Your Excellency.”
Gritti nodded. “Take him to the palace, Marco. Put him in the Wells. Come right back.”
Marco and the boatmen removed my prisoner, who went without protest; even the notorious Wells would be little worse than that slum in San Giorgio in Alga, except perhaps at high tide.
I headed over to the medical cupboard as the two boatmen carried in Vasco. He seemed to be aware of what was happening, but not truly conscious. If he died, the Ten would hunt down the witnesses in the magazzen to testify who had killed him, but would the locals lay the blame on Guarini or on me? I brought the Maestro’s bag to the couch, where Vasco was being laid in the same place Danese had occupied the day before.
“Well,” the Maestro said in his cheerful medical voice. “We shall see how Alfeo’s first-aid skills are coming along. Any injuries other than your nose and arm?”
“My pride,” Vasco mumbled. So he was conscious, which was what the Maestro needed to know.
“I can’t treat that,” the Maestro said. “But lots of people get wounded there when they try to keep up with Alfeo.” It was extremely doubtful that his patient had meant it that way. “Alfeo, bring him-”
But I was already there at his elbow with a full glass of wine, raising Vasco enough to let him drink it. “Water and a bucket, master?” I said. “Honey? More wine?”
“Much more wine. You are learning. Fante, bring the scuttle!” As the startled Amedeo obeyed, the Maestro barked, “Without the logs, you fool!” He wanted it to catch the blood while he restored the flow to Vasco’s hand to see if the color returned, but he is accustomed to having me around, able to interpret incomplete orders correctly.
By that time, I was already going out the door. I ran along the salone to the kitchen, which was a madhouse of confusion, with eight or nine Angelis all shouting at the same time and running in eccentric circles. None of them seemed to notice that I was covered in blood. Even allowing for the love of high drama that Mama has nurtured in all her children, a single breakfast guest should not justify such turmoil, but I was too worried to tarry. I snatched up the things I needed and beat a hasty withdrawal back to the atelier.
I discovered that the Maestro had requisitioned Amedeo Bolognetti to assist him as he began stitching up Vasco’s tendons and blood vessels.
“I don’t need you,” he told me when I delivered the honey and wine and replaced the bloody scuttle with the bucket. “Go and make yourself respectable for company.”
More than happy to obey, I made a brief return visit to the riot in the kitchen for some water and then headed to my own room to clean up. As I stripped off, I realized that I was going to have some wonderfully colored bruises to impress Violetta. By tomorrow I would out-spot a leopard. I was still washing when Inquisitor Gritti walked in without knocking. He closed the door, seeming to ignore me as he strolled over to peer out the window.
“So this is the lover’s leap! One forgets how wonderful is youth.”
“All the more reason to enjoy it…Your Excellency.” I was not in a mood to be courteous if he wasn’t and walking in on a man when he has no clothes on is frowned upon in elevated circles.
He turned to look at me, his ruddy, weathered face expressionless. “Tell me what happened this morning.”
To anyone else, I would have retorted that I must report to my master first, but to try that on a state inquisitor would be ridiculous, so I gave him the story from the time we arrived at the Giudecca, verbatim. Not liking the way he was looking at me, as if assessing me for the torture chamber, I threw down my towel and reached for my shirt, the only silk one I own.
“If you are lying about falling downstairs, you went to considerable lengths to obtain supporting evidence.” He was not smiling, so I didn’t.
I didn’t deign to answer at all. I pulled on my white hose-like the shirt, the only silk ones I own. The Maestro’s idea of an adequate clothing allowance for an apprentice is ludicrous. In a city where anyone who matters goes around in funereal black, young males are expected to preen and strut like peacocks, and that is not easy on a soldo here and a soldo there. I was lacing my hose to my shirt when my tormentor spoke again.
“The vizio confirms that his wounds were caused by Guarini, not you.”
I could not let that one go past without comment. “I am distressed that you would even feel required to ask him, Your Excellency.” I donned my best britches, voluminous scarlet brocade.
“I question everything. The vizio is a very courageous young man.” Gritti stumped across to a chair and sat down.
“That’s interesting.” My best doublet is striped in blue and white, ornamented with acorn-shaped glass buttons, and cost me my entire clothing allowance for a year. I admired it in the mirror as I prepared to fasten my finely starched ruff around my neck.
“He accompanied you and your gondolier across the Canale della Giudecca early on a Sunday morning.”
I turned from peering in my mirror to stare at my tormentor. “That takes courage? Giorgio is a very competent boatman.”
The old scoundrel sneered. “But Angeli is devoted to Doctor Nostradamus and, no doubt, to the invaluable assistant without whom the old man would be virtually helpless. There would be almost no other traffic and you would be far enough from land that no spectator would be able to see what was happening in the gondola.”
This was starting to feel like a nightmare. “What could happen? Are you suggesting that Giorgio and I might have presented a danger to Filiberto Vasco?” Of course he was. Anything one says or does can be distorted into evidence of evil intent.
The old man sighed. “The Grazia girl is young and inclined to hysteria, so the vizio is the key witness to your use of black magic yesterday at Ca’ Sanudo. By silencing him, you could have overthrown the case against you.”
I tucked my hair into my bonnet. “With respect, Your Excellency, I believe that your labors with evil persons have given you a very biased opinion of humanity. Far from attempting to harm Vasco this morning, Giorgio and I did everything in our power to save him. Giorgio is not a young man and I feared he would kill himself, the way he was rowing.”
Gritti smiled, all snowy-bearded grandfather again. “A noble effort! Of course mere brawn is common enough. Brains are much rarer. I watched you in action, sier Alfeo. I admit I was impressed. Definitely it is time your services were placed at La Serenissima ’s disposal.”
So that was what yesterday’s excursion had been all about! Nothing appealed to me less than being a spy for the Council of Ten. “I am enormously flattered, Your-”
“December,” Gritti continued as if I had not spoken, “is the earliest we can get you into the Great Council.” He rose and strolled back toward the window. “We shall see you get elected to some minor post with a stipend-the Salt Commission, perhaps. Just enough to explain how you can afford to eat, but the covert remuneration will be substantial and the prospects dazzling.”
“Your Excellency, I am bound to the good doctor. He is too old to train another assistant. While your offer-”
The inquisitor grunted and turned to frown at me. “I suppose we can tolerate him for a year or so. He will have to retire soon, and I could tell you within fifty ducats how much gold he has stashed away in that secret drawer in the couch. Your work for him will give you a good excuse to-”
“Your Excellency, I thank you for-”
“You would, of course,” the inquisitor said coldly, “first have to be cleared of suspicion of witchcraft and attempted murder.”
“Attempted what?”
He smiled, but no child would want a grandfather who smiled like that. “Just this morning you bled Vasco several times, I understand. Barbers and doctors hesitate to bleed patients who have already lost significant amounts of blood, but you, having no medical qualifications at all, felt free to bleed this noble man who had been wounded while attempting to re
scue you from an assailant.”
He was goading me, trying to frighten me. He was doing very well.
“I was trying to save his hand. Ask any doctor-”
“You would save his hand at the cost of his life? Of course a hand on its own cannot testify before the tribunal. If you had felt genuine concern for the vizio ’s welfare and survival, you would have found someone to treat him in Giudecca.” The inquisitor’s eyes shone with a cold, ophidian gleam.
“I offered to take him to the Convent of San Benedetto, messer. I urged him to go there, but he refused. It was he who insisted on returning to Ca’ Barbolano.”
“You would say that, of course. He cannot recall such a conversation. And yet, alas, he managed to survive your malicious abuse and lives to testify against you! A tough as well as a courageous young man!”
“But inclined to sycophantic prevarication.”
“I have two witnesses to your sorcery yesterday. My colleagues were very distressed to hear of this outrage when I reported to them last night. They were inclined to give some credit to your youth and lay most of the blame on the evil old man who has perverted you. These things would come out at the trial.”
He smiled again. Likely the job offer had come from his two fellow inquisitors. He had delivered it and I had refused it. Now I was fair game.
I had my shoes on, I was ready. “But you admit that one witness is a hysterical juvenile. Shall we go and see if Doctor Nostradamus has managed to silence the other one yet?”
32
O ut in the salone, I detected mouth-watering odors from the kitchen. Noemi was hovering there anxiously. Noemi is so delicate she could almost hover literally, and I can never meet her eye without smiling.
“Ready?”
She nodded vigorously.
“I shall tell the Maestro,” I said. “It seems our feast is ready, Your Excellency.”
Gritti walked on without comment, ignoring the statuary and paintings. Back at the atelier we found Vasco sitting on a chair-not one of the best-and sipping a glass of wine. Loss of blood always imparts a strong thirst and the redness of wine makes it the best fluid to help the body replace the loss. He was huddled under a blanket, which at least hid his bandaged arm and blood-ruined garments. His pallor was less marked than before, but with a grotesquely swollen nose trailing wisps of packing and two rapidly developing black eyes, he looked as if he had fallen headfirst off a bell tower. I don’t say he had earned all that. I don’t say he hadn’t, either.
Beside him stood Missier Grande, who was a surprise but not much of one, for he would have heard from the fante about his deputy’s injury. The look he gave me conveyed little appreciation of the work I had done to bring the man back alive.
The Maestro was wiping his hands on a damp cloth. He scowled approvingly at me. “If you must waste so much money on clothes, they deserve to be worn in good company. I was just telling Missier Grande that his vizio owes his life to you yet again, Alfeo.”
“Again?” murmured the inquisitor. “You mean again after yesterday?”
“No.” The Maestro’s smirk told me that he had been dragging bait, although Gritti might not realize that. “I was thinking of the time when the gondola overturned and Alfeo had to tow the vizio to shore.”
“Our prima colazione is ready, master,” I said hopefully.
“Your Excellency,” Missier Grande said, “I should see the vizio home.”
“Not just yet.” Gritti walked over to one the green chairs and turned it so he could include Vasco in his field of view. “First I want answers to a couple of questions.”
“As you please,” the Maestro said with unusual amiability.
He hobbled to his red chair, leaning on furniture because he had left his staff there. I went to my side of the desk and sat. Missier Grande remained standing. The two fanti were out in the androne, watching through the open door and within easy hail.
“Doctor Nostradamus,” Gritti said, staring intently at him, “yesterday you did not know who Algol was. Do not interrupt me! If you had known you would have said so, and you didn’t. You merely said you would tell me today, and this morning you sent your boy all the way to the Giudecca to accost a man who had not previously been mentioned in this case. To the best of my recollection, the name of Francesco Guarini has never been brought before the Ten. I grant you that his reaction to Zeno’s summons was suspicious and his violence against the vizio will send him to the galleys, but where is your evidence that he has anything to do with either the Algol matter or the death of Danese Dolfin? Explain.”
The Maestro leaned back, rested his elbows on the arms of his chair, and put his fingertips together, five and five. That almost always means that he is about to start lecturing, but for once it did not.
“The revered and mighty Council of Ten does not reveal all its methods, Your Excellency. I have my own professional secrets and need them to earn my living. I assure you that you have your man and a couple of witnesses are available. With a little encouragement, Guarini will confess to everything.”
Inquisitors do not take kindly to defiance. Indeed, they take very cruelly to it, and Gritti’s smile clotted my blood like butter. “But it is you I am presently encouraging. You will tell me how you learned his name. I will know who told you, and when. I am prepared to go to great lengths to get the truth.”
There was the ultimatum. We were back to the question of how much torture a frail octogenarian could stand, and who else might be questioned in his stead. Gritti meant what he was saying. He was clearly prepared to accept as a working hypothesis that Guarini was Algol and would solve both the espionage case and the murder for him. Now he was investigating the problem of black magic. He had the scent of witchcraft in his nostrils and a true fanatic sees witchcraft as much worse than espionage.
“I am not prepared to tell you at this time,” the Maestro said calmly, making as if to rise. “After we have eaten I may say more on the topic, but I believe it is irrelevant.”
“It is relevant if I say it is!” The inquisitor’s rubicund face darkened a few shades.
“But I know the details and you do not.” If the Maestro was deliberately trying to get both himself and me arrested, he was certainly proceeding in the correct manner.
“Filippo Nostradamus, I am aware of your international reputation as a doctor. I am also aware of your reputation as a philosopher who dabbles in the dark arts, and I fear that this time you have dabbled much deeper than any Christian should, or can without selling his soul to the Enemy. I am aware that you have served La Serenissima well in the past, but I will not and cannot tolerate Satanism. How did you learn that Algol was Francesco Guarini?”
“Black magic,” said Filiberto Vasco.
Heads turned. Now who was the life of the party?
“You have our attention, Vizio,” the inquisitor said.
Judging by his gleeful expression, Vasco was rising above his pain. “When Zeno knocked on Guarini’s door, Guarini called out to ask who he was.” His voice was muffled and slurred by all the wine that he had consumed, but he was not too drunk to know what he was saying, and he was looking at me, not Gritti, gloating over worse tales he had yet to tell. “Zeno wouldn’t tell him. First he asked for Guarini by name. Then he asked for ‘Mirphak.’ And finally he said that the dead man sent him!”
“Mirphak?” Gritti looked to me.
I hope my smile was debonair and not grotesque. “A shot in the dark, Your Excellency. Algol is the second brightest star in the constellation of Perseus. Mirphak is the brightest. If one was a code name, then the other might be. I was hoping it might provoke a guilty reaction.”
Undeceived, the inquisitor shook his head contemptuously and looked back to Vasco, who probably tried to smile, because he winced with sudden pain.
“But when Zeno said, ‘Danese Dolfin sent me,’ Guarini threw the door open and attacked him.”
“That one worked,” I explained brightly.
And that one worked f
or Gritti, too. It would have been a believable ruse for me to try, and it had produced a convincing indication of guilt. He shrugged.
“It was true,” Vasco protested. “Dolfin did send him! That was how they learned the name. Last night, Nostradamus and Zeno raised the ghost of Danese Dolfin and made it tell them who murdered him.”
“Head injuries,” the Maestro muttered sadly. “Difficult prognosis. Prolonged rest is indicated.”
“No, he’s just drunk,” I said. “He never can hold his liquor. After all that lost blood, he’s sprung his timbers.”
“Over there?” Vasco pointed. “There’s a spyhole beside the mirror. I watched from the dining room. I saw it all! I heard the ghost speak in Dolfin’s voice!”
Missier Grande strode over to inspect. “That is correct,” he announced. “There is a spyhole and the cover is currently open.”
I felt as if I had been clubbed between the eyes. How had he done that? Someone might have opened it that morning, but I was certain I had seen it closed last night before we began our seance. Had Vasco himself used occult means to open the shutter so he could spy on us?
“Necromancy?” Gritti declaimed. “In all my years I have never heard a more terrible accusation. “ Missier Grande, take Nostradamus and Zeno to the palace and lock them in separate cells. They are to be charged with practicing Satanism.”
“I’m ravenous,” I said. “Providing first aid to critically wounded comrades is very hunger-making work and I need my breakfast. Mama Angeli has prepared a marvelous prima colazione in your honor, Excellency. Can’t we eat first?”
The inquisitor stood up. “No,” he said. “I will not sup at the table of a man I believe to be an agent of the Fiend.”
“This is ridiculous!” roared the Maestro. “That boy is confused by concussion and also quite obviously drunk, and yet you accept his wild allegations as reliable testimony? Am I an idiot that I would perform forbidden rites where he could overlook me, when I knew he was in the house? Do you think we don’t know the spyhole is there? If you think I am so senile that I would forget about it, do you believe Alfeo would? Your Excellency, you are running a travesty of an investigation!”
