The Alchemist's Apprentice aa-1

by Dave Duncan

  “Top floor,” she said.

  “You watch out for her, sonny,” said one on another balcony. “She lies in wait for the young ones.”

  The first countered: “No, you stop in at her place, handsome. She’s the one who gets lonely.”

  “You can share me,” I suggested, earning whoops of approval from spectators at other windows.

  Giorgio said, “Good luck. Their husbands carry knives, you know.”

  “Husbands or not,” I told him. “I won’t be long.” There were other gondoliers waiting nearby, so I knew he would not lack for conversation.

  The stairs were dark and narrow, smelling of urine and unfamiliar cooking, as tenement stairs usually do. I met no husbands and no one lay in wait for me. Top floor was four up, and I slowed to a walk for the last flight, so I would not be short of breath when I arrived. I had a choice of three doors. The first did not answer my knock. Nor did the second, but a woman shouted from inside it, and then told me to try the one opposite, which was the one I had already tried.

  Either Alexius Karagounis was out trying to sell his books elsewhere or he had already fled from the Republic. I went back down again. No lonely housewives or knife-bearing husbands detained me.

  When we returned to Ca’ Barbolano, the Maestro had already retired for his midday nap, having skipped or just forgotten dinner, as he often does. I carried an armful of books into the dining room, where Mama delivered enough food to feed a galley crew after a long day: marinated anchovies in caper sauce, rice with peas, and tuna with polenta. Then she asked what dolce I wanted.

  “I cannot possibly eat all this,” I complained. “I had that pidocchi earlier, remember?”

  “Eat it! You are too skinny!” Compared to her, everyone is too skinny.

  “I am not as skinny as Giorgio.”

  “Bah!” she said. “Forty years I have lived in this parish and never a fat gondolier have I seen.”

  “He doesn’t get enough sleep.”

  She shook her fist at me and waddled out, chuckling. I ate alone, reading everything known about digitalis.

  I went to my room, bolted the door, and changed into shabbier clothes that I did not mind dirtying. My room is not the largest or grandest I could have, but I enjoy the view from its three big windows, which look out across a forest of chimneypots towards San Marco. Most houses are two or three stories high, so the churches, bell towers, and palaces stand up like islands in a stormy sea of red tile roofs. More particularly, my windows overlook the roof terrace of Number 96, and that scenery becomes spectacular on warm days, when the residents sun themselves there. They wear hats with wide brims and no crowns, spreading their hair out to bleach it without browning their faces. That day the terrace was deserted, except for some laundry drying.

  The calle between the two buildings is very narrow and little used because it is a roundabout way of reaching the campo, while the wider one on the far side of 96 is straight and also leads to a bridge. Although my windows are about fifty feet above the ground, they are secured by stout iron bars. I opened the center one and peered out, provoking an explosion of pigeons. Three of its bars can be removed just by lifting them out of their sockets and leaning them against the sill-inside the room, of course, so they cannot fall out and drop like iron javelins to impale passing citizens. I wriggled through the gap and set my feet on a hand-width ledge just below, while keeping a firm grip on the bar that does not move. Then I made one long, death-defying stride to the steep tiles opposite, where I could sprawl forward and grab the rail around the altana to stop myself sliding off and making a nasty stain on the ground.

  Yes, I could have gone downstairs, out the watergate of Ca’ Barbolano and in the watergate of 96-there is no real pedestrian fondamenta flanking the Rio San Remo, but there are ledges along both buildings just above high water and the manoeuver is not difficult for an agile person. I prefer my secret route, though, and like to think I am deceiving the Ten’s spies. Besides, a man must keep up his reputation.

  I unlocked the trapdoor and trotted down several flights of stairs without meeting a soul. Number 96 is owned jointly by four ladies, although many more live and work there. Violetta occupies the best suite, in the southwest corner, and I have a key to its servants’ door. Peering into the kitchen, I found Milana struggling to iron a bulky brocade gown that probably weighed nearly as much as she did. Milana is small and has a twisted back, but she is fiercely loyal to her mistress and I have never seen her unhappy.

  She jumped. “Alfeo! You startled me.”

  “I do it just to see your smile. Is she up yet?” Courtesans go to bed at dawn, like the gentry. I also wanted to know if she was alone, of course, but that went without saying.

  With a doubtful frown, Milana said, “Just a moment and I’ll see,” and disappeared. In a moment she returned, smiling again. “No, it’s all right. I told her you were here.”

  I thanked her and went through to Violetta’s chamber, entering just in time to catch a tantalizing glimpse of bare breasts as she pulled the sheet up-her sense of timing would be the envy of any high-wire sword juggler. Her room is vast and luxurious, decorated with silk and crystal and ankle-deep rugs, plus gilt-framed mirrors and erotic art.

  Other nations denounce Venice as the most sinful, vice-ridden city in all Christendom, claiming that we have more prostitutes than gondolas. Such talk is sheer envy. We are just less hypocritical about our follies, that’s all. Noble ladies see nothing wrong with a young blood squiring a courtesan to a ball or banquet-they would much rather he flaunt his current plaything in public than debauch their daughters in secret. Many noblemen never marry at all, supposedly to protect the family fortune from being divided between too many heirs, or else just to avoid the fuss and bother.

  Harlots to suit every purse are available at Number 96. Violetta is not one of them. She is witty, highly educated, a superb dancer and singer. The stage lost a great actress in her, and it is tragic that Titian did not live long enough to immortalize her beauty. She is not available by the hour or the day, rarely even by the week. She accepts no money, only gifts-an emerald necklace here, a dozen ball gowns there-and the state treasury itself would not buy her favors for a man she did not fancy. Violetta dresses as well as any dogaressa or senator’s wife, and owns more jewels than the Basilica San Marco.

  I am not and never have been one of her patrons, but we are friends. We are frequently close friends, especially during siesta, when we both have time to ourselves. Love was not what I had come for that day and I saw at once that it was not immediately available, for she was Medea, teeth and claws, green eyes smoldering. In truth her eyes were not, and never are, green. They are all colors and no color. They change all the time, but at that moment they had a greenish tinge, which is a danger sign. I seated myself on the end of the bed, safely out of reach, and smiled stupidly at her glare.

  “Who was that slut I saw you with on the Lido two nights ago?”

  “I wasn’t there,” I said. “It was some other man. I was masked, so you couldn’t have recognized me. And she is not a slut. Michelina Angeli. Her mother asked me if I would take her there as a treat for her fifteenth birthday. She will be betrothed soon and wanted to see Carnival on the Lido.”

  “A virgin?” Medea asked with disbelief like a blast of Greek fire.

  “I didn’t ask her. If she isn’t, then it won’t look like me. Besides,” I added, “how did you recognize me?” I had certainly not noticed her among the hundreds of masked revelers.

  “I would know those gorgeous calves anywhere.” She laughed and melted before my eyes, becoming Helen. Helen of Troy, that is. Violetta does not play roles, as an actress does. She truly is several different people by turns. She says she cannot control her changes, they just happen, but I have rarely seen the wrong persona appear for any given situation. Medea’s voice is hard and metallic, Helen’s low and husky. Even her face is softer, more rounded. As Helen, she is the most beautiful, desirable, and skilled lover in the
world. As Medea she is as dangerous in bed as she is anywhere else.

  Helen held out her arms to me. The sheet dropped, of course. Encrusted in her finery, Violetta can be the cynosure of a ducal ball. I cannot begin to describe her appeal when she is still warm and drowsy and flushed from bed, still smelling of sleep, wearing nothing under a silken sheet. Her natural hair is middle-brown, but she bleaches it to a reddish gold. For formal affairs she dresses it in two upstanding horns, but then it hung tumbled loose in thick waves. I wanted to plunge into those waves and drown.

  “Please!” I begged. “Business first.”

  “You are not business, Alfeo Zeno! Don’t you dare be business! You are strictly pleasure. Every wife in the city has a cavaliere servente . Cannot I?” Her eyes were dark with promises of unimaginable delights.

  I needed digitalis to soothe a raging heart. “Very soon, beloved, you will have the finest lover in the Republic all over you, but I do need some serious talk first. Noble Bertucci Orseolo died, did you hear?”

  “And people are whispering that he was poisoned by your master to fulfill his own prophecy. I sent him a note yesterday. Didn’t he tell you?”

  “Not directly. I was out shopping.”

  “It’s absurd! An old man drops dead and everyone suspects poison.”

  “It was poison.”

  Helen sighed. Reluctantly she pulled the sheet up and straightened her legs. Her face and voice changed again. She become thinner, and I recognized the one I call Minerva, after the Roman goddess of wisdom. The Greeks knew her as “Owl-eyed” or “Gray-eyed” Athena. Violetta’s eyes were gray and the mind behind them blazed. “That is terrible news. Can I help?”

  “We think the venom was in his wine.”

  “A poisoned glass substituted for his?” Typically, she had worked that out faster than I had. Minerva may be even smarter than the Maestro.

  “It would have to be done that way, we think. I know you can take one glance at a ballroom and describe every gown to the last stitch. Can you tell me who stood next to Orseolo at the book table?”

  She did not deny my exaggeration. “Let’s see…I came in on Pasqual’s arm. Don’t pull faces. You know how I earn my living. We were on our way to the Lido, but his father was going to be buying old books. Pasqual wanted to make sure the old man wasn’t blowing away the family fortune, he said. We stayed a few minutes and then left.

  “As we came in, the viewers at the table all had their backs to us; your master was opposite, facing us. On my left…a footman was refilling glasses for the procurator and his companion, or offering to. Of course he was the one who collapsed later, Orseolo. Then that awful English couple-”

  “Ah! The ones who spoke in French? Do you know their names?

  Stars twinkled in her heavenly eyes. “I do know their names, Alfeo, but Parisians would not know their French. He is sier Bellamy Feather. Her name is Hyacinth. They have rented an apartment in Ca’ della Naves over in San Marcuola. Protestant heretics, probably spies.”

  That was bad news. If even Violetta thought they might be spies, the Ten’s informers would be crawling around them like flies on a dung heap.

  “Next to them was the swarthy Turk…and an old man wearing senatorial scarlet. He had a big nose. Next to him there was a gap and then Pasqual’s father. We went to the gap, of course, and Pasqual asked if he was going to buy Cleopatra’s diary.” She smiled knowingly. “I pretended not to recognize the nose on my left. He kept his eyes on the books and ignored me.”

  “Then he’s older than I thought.” In fact, having access to Pietro Moro’s medical files, I knew that he still engaged in sex, although not as often as he would like. Doge or apprentice, some problems are universal.

  “You knew Nasone was there?” Violetta asked.

  “The Maestro told me. It is a complication. Have you ever seen him skulking around incognito before?” She had been to a thousand balls and banquets for every one I had.

  “Never.”

  I tucked that piece of information away to deal with when I was less distracted by shadows through silk. “The Turk you mentioned was probably the book seller, a Greek named Alexius Karagounis. You did not know Procurator Orseolo, so you did not know the lady with him?”

  Minerva-Violetta shook her head. “A girl. No older than your alleged virgin. Not a courtesan.”

  “A lover or a relative?”

  Violetta would certainly know. The Maestro had not noticed her, but if Orseolo had recently acquired a lover, that would have fulfilled the prophecy in his horoscope. And she would have been close enough to switch glasses.

  “Most likely a granddaughter. If they were lovers, she would have had to work hard.”

  “You are an amazing witness!”

  Minerva was amused by my praise. “People are my business, Alfeo dear. They moved around, though, and I can’t remember all the moves. Our host came in briefly and left again. Orseolo and the girl walked down to the far end to see what was there. And there were the two waiters. Don’t forget them.”

  “I heard there was just one footman in the room.”

  “Now you know that there were two. One was stocky, about your age, with eyebrows almost as sexy as yours, and the other middle twenties, slender, dusky, looked like a Moor. Ah! Yes!” Her eyes grew as bright as they would be when she put belladonna in them that evening. “When we arrived, we were offered a choice of three types of wine. You think the poison was in the retsina?”

  “Probably. But other people drank it, too.”

  Her eyes went out of focus for a moment. “I think…Yes, when they offered refills, the waiters came around with a bottle in each hand. Yes, I’m sure. Two waiters, three wines, four bottles. Does that sound suspicious?”

  “You amaze me. You should be elected to the Council of Ten!”

  Minerva said, “Only if I get to choose the other nine,” with a hint of Helen in her voice. “Alfeo, suppose the Moor is a spy for the sultan and tried to poison the doge?”

  “By the Moor you mean the dusky footman with the un-sexy eyebrows?”

  “His brows were moderately sexy, just not to be mentioned in the same sigh as yours.”

  I had not realized how much my eyebrows contributed to my celebrated good looks. I made a note to examine them some time. “Assassinate the doge and the Great Council will at once elect a replacement.”

  Violetta is the supreme courtesan because she is whatever woman her current companion requires. Mention politics and she is Aspasia. Where Minerva is imperious, brilliant, all-knowing, and tolerates no disagreement, Aspasia is cultured and subtle, her voice infinitely persuasive.

  “The doge does have a significant influence on the conduct of foreign affairs,” Aspasia said, “although the Senate can overrule him. Pietro Moro is respected and has a following. He is standing up well to the saber-rattling from Constantinople, so his successor might be more malleable, but that certainly would not be true if the assassination were exposed. Then the explosion of anger in the Republic would guarantee the corno going to an even harder-liner, and the Sultan will be worse off than before. Of course that might be the purpose-faking a botched attempt on the doge’s life to win support for his policies. I wonder what England’s position is in the current crisis?”

  “That’s too complicated for a simple apprentice boy. Which wine did you drink?”

  “The refosco. An indifferent brand. Pasqual took the retsina.”

  I hoped his share had contained a slower-acting version of the poison. “You have been a great help. I have to speak to everyone who was in that room to find out what they saw, just as I have heard the Maestro’s version and now yours. If the Ten-” I was silenced by an irresistible need to yawn.

  “Too much Carnival?” Aspasia asked sympathetically. “How much sleep last night?”

  “Very little,” I admitted.

  “Reclassifying your virgin, I suppose? Hard work.”

  “No! I kept dreaming of you and waking up weeping that you were no
t there at my side.”

  She hoisted a skeptical eyebrow. “Iuppoter ex alto periuria ridet amantum.”

  “Ovid. ‘Jupiter laughs on high at the perjuries of lovers.’”

  “Not bad! When do you ever get the time to read Ovid?”

  “Never. You quoted that to me the first time we met.”

  “Oh, of course!” Her smile was Helen’s. “I was bleaching my hair on the altana and a madman came leaping across the calle. Before I could even scream for help he vaulted the rail and knelt at my feet to offer me a rose.”

  “And told you that you were the most beautiful thing he had ever seen.”

  “He was young and quite beautiful himself.”

  “He swore to love you forever. And he has not touched lips to any other woman since.”

  She was pleased, not convinced. “None?”

  “Not seriously. I had to fight off a lust-maddened virgin two nights ago, but I thought of you and lost interest. Jupiter has stopped laughing. He weeps for me.”

  I waited breathlessly to see who would respond to my plea. Minerva is intellect incarnate, sprung from the head of Jupiter, eternal virgin untouchable. I did not feel strong enough to deal with Medea, who is daunting, demanding, and deadly. Aspasia would either talk me out of it or cooperate for her own purposes while despising my animal lusts.

  “What nonsense! Go home. This is siesta and you need to rest.”

  “I have urgent work to do,” I agreed, but my feet were already kicking off my shoes, because that had been Helen’s voice.

  “I will waken you.” She threw the sheet aside.

  The rest of my clothes hit the floor in a blizzard and I had her in my arms. When we paused in our kissing to draw breath, I said, “You are very generous, giving charity to a poor apprentice.”

  “Charity? With other men I must serve, but with you I can just be myself and enjoy. I need you to keep reminding me that men can be lovable. You know,” she murmured, turning her lips away as I tried to claim them again, “what I love most about you, Alfeo darling?”