A Death in the Venetian Quarter

by Alan Gordon

  “Did you hear about the body in the Cistern of the Columns?” I asked him.

  “As a matter of fact, that little tidbit was just brought to me,” he said. “A member of the Vigla patrols the cistern every night around midnight. Usually he comes across amorous couples.”

  “Well, this fellow didn’t lose his head over a woman,” I said. “He lost it while he was talking to me. It was Ranieri who was killed, and a Varangian axe that did it.”

  “What makes you think that?” he asked, leaning back in his chair.

  “The only Varangians I know of who are capable of both that kind of stealth and that deadly efficiency are Will and Phil,” I said. “No one else in the Varangian Guard could have pulled this one off. You’ve been having them tail me. But they struck too soon. I was just about to get some answers out of him.”

  He looked at me with disdain.

  “Feste,” he said. “It is one thing to play a fool, but quite another to become one. Perhaps you’ve been playing the role for too long.”

  “Your meaning, Eunuch?” I asked.

  “Will and Phil never got out of Galata,” he said. “They are presumed to be dead, not being the types who would let themselves be captured. But they haven’t been seen since the battle at the tower.”

  I looked at him, and he returned my gaze through hooded eyes. I couldn’t tell if he was lying or not. He always looked like he was lying, even when he told the truth, so his present shifty demeanor gave me no clue.

  “I appreciate your efforts,” he continued, “but you are wasting my time. This is the second cockeyed story that you’ve brought before me, and I am beginning to wonder if my faith in your abilities was misplaced.”

  “Someone did kill Ranieri,” I said.

  “Someone did,” he agreed. “Apparently with an axe. But there are many axes in this great city of ours, and even Varangian blades may be obtained from the right source. God only knows how many of the guard lose them dicing in back alleyways.”

  “Maybe that was it,” I said dubiously.

  “At least you’ve stirred something up,” he said thoughtfully. “They must be close to some course of action if they were willing to risk this. Have you talked to our mutual friend in Chalke yet?”

  “No,” I said. “I wanted to wait until the time was ripe.”

  There was a sudden crash, and the room shook slightly, sending an inkpot at the edge of the desk crashing to the floor.

  “If you wait any longer, we will be beyond ripe and into rot,” said Philoxenites. “Get going, Fool.”

  The stones that were launched from the Kosmidion were directed at the wall in front of Blachernae, but enough sailed over it into the palace to keep the residents clustered in the interior. The Greeks returned the barrage, but the invaders had the higher ground to their vantage, and their machines kept up the attack in complete safety. The stones mostly damaged other stones and bricks, but one caught a pair of Imperial Guards patrolling the Blachernae wall. Their bodies were retrieved sixty feet away, flattened in their armor.

  I strode briskly down the Mese to Chalke Prison. As I crossed the Augustaion, I saw a woman in mourning stop and stare at me. She raised her veil, and I recognized her as Bastiani’s lady. Her expression was complicated to read. I could not blame her for despising me for spying on her in her grief, but there was something akin to sympathy mixed with it.

  “You survived,” she said quietly.

  “Yes, milady,” I said, bowing.

  “I am glad for your wife’s sake,” she said.

  “Thank you, milady.”

  She lowered her veil.

  “Take care of her,” she whispered. “If you do not, then my curse will be on you.”

  I watched her walk away until she was out of sight.

  There was a stall where one could get ale near the entrance gates to Chalke, and I decided to avail myself of some fortification. As I paid for my drink, I was hailed from a couple of benches nearby. I turned and saw Tullio, the carpenter, and his mate, John Aprenos.

  “It’s the fool!” cried Tullio. “Come and sit with us until your cup is empty, and then we shall refill it.”

  “Alas, I can only promise the first,” I said, joining them. “As much as I hate to say it, I have no time for a second today. How are things with you, friend Carpenter?”

  He shrugged.

  “Business is wanting,” he said. “I have tools and skills, but no more wood on which to wield them. I have become just as useless as my friend John.”

  “Nay,” said Aprenos. “I am the more useless one. I will not cede the title.”

  “I see you found your whore,” said Tullio.

  “Excuse me?” I said.

  “Bastiani’s whore,” said Tullio, gesturing with his cup toward the north end of the square. “That’s the woman you were looking for, wasn’t it?”

  “I wasn’t looking for her, exactly,” I said. “And she’s not a whore, she’s a lady.”

  “Comes to the same thing,” commented Aprenos. “Just a matter of degree in what you pay them.”

  “You are quite the philosopher,” I said.

  “Plenty of time to think when the gates are shut,” said the huntsman, raising his cup.

  “So, what brings the two of you here?” I asked.

  “Visiting a mate of ours who got himself locked up,” said Tullio. “Made sure he’s got a bottle or two to last him in case things get hot around here. And yourself?”

  “On my way to do the same,” I said, and I drained my cup and tossed it back to the vendor. “Good luck, gentlemen. We’ll have another when the war’s over. On me.”

  “We accept,” called Tullio as I left.

  I entered Chalke without difficulty. With so much idle time forced upon the city, many of its people were doing the things they could not otherwise do, and that included visiting prisoners. The aisles between the cells were milling with people, and the tone of the place was strangely buoyant, almost raucous. I gathered that Tullio and Aprenos were not the only ones to bring in some wine.

  The former emperor, as befit his rank, had the largest and most luxuriously appointed cell in the prison. It was the last one on the right, and was one of the few to have an actual bed, rather than a pile of moldy hay or damp ticking. He shared it with a few other political prisoners who acted as an informal bodyguard, a situation winked at by the warden and probably by Emperor Alexios as well. The current emperor was a sentimental man in surprising ways. Having deposed, blinded, and imprisoned his brother, he wished no further harm upon him. A more pragmatic man would have simply had him killed.

  I announced my approach with a low whistle, a salute that had long become familiar to Isaakios. He was sitting on the edge of his bed while one of his fellows read to him, but he stood immediately and strode firmly toward me, stopping just short of the bars.

  He had been a strong man in his prime, but living in sightless confinement for so many years had by this point worn away much of his frame. His clothes, tattered remnants of rich, embroidered silks, hung loosely on his limbs, and his hair and beard, once a glorious red, were gray and matted.

  Yet he still had dignity, even command in his carriage, and this gave me hope that we might actually pull this off.

  “Is that you, Fool?” he whispered eagerly.

  “Sire, it is I,” I replied, kneeling.

  He motioned me to my feet.

  “Don’t waste time on ceremony,” he said impatiently. “Tell me what has happened.”

  “The invaders have rebuilt the stone bridge and have encamped on the Kosmidion.”

  “Interesting,” he murmured. “They must think that section of the wall to be the most vulnerable to attack. My predecessors should have done a better job building it. But they would be foolish to attempt it, nevertheless. They can’t possibly sustain the losses they would have in taking it.”

  “Normally, I would agree with you,” I said. “But these are not normal times.”

  “How so
, my friend?”

  “Your brother has mismanaged the armies and lost the confidence of the people. He may be content to sit in the palace and wait out the siege, but the city won’t have it.”

  “Won’t they?” he chuckled. “About time they came to their senses. So, you think they will rise against my brother?”

  “I think it possible,” I said. “Which leaves the city wide open to being taken by the Crusaders.”

  “Unbelievable,” he said, shaking his head. “Things would never have come to this state if I had remained emperor.”

  “There are those who agree with you,” I said, and he nodded at the compliment. “And there are those who would have you Emperor again.”

  He would have stared had he still possessed eyes.

  “What are you saying?” he asked softly.

  “I have been asked to inquire of your willingness to assume the great burden of rulership again.”

  “A burden,” he said. “Aye, it is that. Does not God have the burden of the world on His shoulders? When it fell upon me to lead this empire, I did so willingly, even though it cost me much care and woe. I am still that man, Fool. I would accept the burden gladly, and bear it lightly. But we are talking of fancies, are we not?”

  “Milord, stranger things have happened,” I said. “For years, you have lived in terror that soldiers would come through these bars in the dead of night to carry you to your doom. Now, I ask that you listen for these soldiers with hope.”

  “I swear, Fool, that if you prophesy correctly, you shall live with all that an emperor’s generosity may provide,” he said.

  “I am but a messenger, milord,” I said.

  “As was the Archangel Gabriel,” he said. “Tell them that when the time comes, Isaakios will be ready.”

  “Then, sire, I will take my leave of you.”

  I noticed, as I left, that a dark form was stepping away from the front of the cell next to the former emperor’s. No doubt he had heard our conversation. I hoped that he was not a lackey of the current emperor.

  Then, as a small group of people walked in my direction, I heard a lute playing. I stared dumbfounded as my wife walked blithely between the cells as if she was a strolling entertainer at a garden party.

  She marked me as she came to the cell next to Isaakios’s. She smiled, her fingers never hesitating.

  “My nanny always said I would end up with a man in prison,” she drawled.

  “Fancy meeting you here,” I said. “Quite the romantic setting.”

  “Isn’t it?” she agreed, nodding toward Evdokia, who was preening in front of her beau.

  I had seen him before on my visits to Isaakios but had never paid him much mind. I pulled out my flute and joined my wife’s music. The additional instrument startled the lovers slightly. Evdokia smiled with delight when she saw me.

  “What a surprise!” she squealed. “You didn’t tell me that your husband would be joining us, Aglaia.”

  “I thought that music from one loving couple would be most appropriate for another,” said my wife with a straight face.

  “How sweet,” said Evdokia. “Thank you, good Feste, for taking these pains.”

  “No pains, mistress,” I said, winking at Aglaia. “I take pleasure in playing, mistress.”

  Alexios Doukas was watching me with a curious expression, his brows furrowed, almost meeting in the middle.

  “These two fools are married, my dove?” he asked, his voice rasping as though he did not use it much.

  “Yes. Isn’t it wonderful?” she said. “Just as we shall be.”

  He took her hand between his and patted it.

  “Soon,” he whispered fervently. “It will happen soon. I can feel it in my bones, and I know it in my heart.”

  And they dropped into a frenzy of whispering. I couldn’t make out their conversation, so I gave myself over to the exquisite pleasures of making music with my wife.

  It carried through the prison. Quite well, in fact. The acoustics of the one-time church lent themselves to our duet as they had once done to the preaching of the Word. The myriad conversations going on around us faded, and prisoner and visitor alike turned to hear us.

  And when it comes down to it, more than anything a fool loves to perform. The setting doesn’t matter. The size of the crowd, the level of wit shared among them, the type of coin flying out of their hands into our caps—none of these things matter. Let us but have a reason to perform, and we are happy.

  I watched my beloved, her white skin gleaming in the torchlight, the music transmuting her into some rare and lovely sprite, and I thought, this is all that I need. This is all that I want. I thought of her desire to find a place where we could just be fools together and nothing else. Maybe. I had done more than most for the Guild, risked life and damaged limb on many an occasion. Maybe it was time to quit gallivanting about and become a fixed fool in an out-of-the-way county somewhere, trotting myself out for feasts and state occasions, entertaining the children. Especially my own child. We could watch her grow and learn all that we could teach her.

  Well, Theo, live through this little escapade first. Then we shall see.

  There was a lull in the war for a few days, a calm before the oncoming storm. Broken by the intermittent squalls of sorties by the Greeks, more to harass the Crusaders’ flanks and keep them from foraging too far than to actually confront them in combat. However, this meant that the invaders’ provisions would be running low. The Greeks were forcing the issue rather than settling down and waiting for attrition to do the job for them.

  After Ranieri’s death, I had no more leads. I watched the embolum to no avail. Like much of the city, I spent a fair amount of my time on the roof, looking at the Crusaders digging into the hill and constructing earthen fortifications that baked hard under the relentless summer sun.

  I was sitting in our room a few days after my talk with Isaakios, moping with a wineskin. Aglaia came in with bread and cheese.

  “You would not believe what I paid for this,” she grumbled, tossing me a loaf.

  “Maybe we should just buy flour and make our own,” I said, cutting myself a piece.

  “I have no time for baking,” she said. “And if you have, then I’m worried about you. You’re drinking more than is usual.”

  I made a show of letting the wineskin fall.

  “Better?” I asked.

  “It might have been had it not already been emptied,” she said. “What’s wrong?”

  “I’m stuck,” I said. “I cannot piece this all together. I can’t find the common thread.”

  “You will,” she said. “I have faith in that warped mind of yours.”

  She sat back, munching away.

  “I’m going to need motley for when I’m huge,” she commented. “Maybe you could sew me one in your free time. I’d like a suit more like yours.”

  “Mine?” I said. “It’s just one piece sewn onto another. There’s no pattern to it. It’s all patch. I doubt that there’s an original piece of cloth left in it.”

  “That’s what I like about it,” she said. “It has character. Oh!”

  “What?”

  “I’ve spotted your keepsake,” she said. “You purloined my yellow handkerchief and added it to your motley. How lovely!”

  “You have found me out, my sweet. Forgive me for stealing from you.”

  “And it’s over your heart, too. I never noticed it in the middle of all of those colors. You’re a sentimental fool, and I forgive you.”

  “Thank you,” I said.

  Her expression changed abruptly. She frowned, thinking hard, her eyes distant, and I wondered if she had changed her mind about the theft.

  “Feste,” she said slowly. “I have a riddle for you.”

  “All right,” I said, puzzled.

  “What’s the difference between motley and a rainbow?” she asked.

  “I don’t know,” I said.

  “The color purple,” she concluded, and she stood and capered a
bout the room.

  “Not your best effort, I think,” I said, baffled.

  “Don’t you see?” she asked. “You’ve no purple in your motley. I’ve found the common thread, and it’s made of silk!”

  “What on earth are you talking about?”

  She grabbed the wicker box that I had retrieved from Ranieri’s body.

  “Tell me, Fool,” she said, plucking the cocoon from it. “What garment could you weave from this?”

  “From that?” I laughed. “Not even the pinky of a child’s glove.”

  “Wrong, Fool!” she crowed. “You could get thirty gowns from this, a hundred robes, a thousand tapestries!”

  “You must be a wondrous fine weaver, Arachne,” I said. “How do you do that?”

  “What color was the handkerchief that Bastiani’s lady placed in his coffin?”

  “It was purple,” I said.

  “Why have you no purple in your motley?” she demanded.

  “Well, it’s not easy to come by,” I said, then I realized what she was talking about.

  “‘I may not be to the purple born,’” she said, imitating Euphrosyne perfectly. “Purple silk, Feste. The rarest of dyes, the finest of weaves, so valued that its manufacture …”

  “Is reserved exclusively for the Emperor,” I finished.

  “Exactly,” she said. “Ranieri wasn’t smuggling silk. He was smuggling silkworms. He was going to set up a rival manufacturer. And Bastiani was in on it. He gave his lover that purple handkerchief as a keepsake. He told her that he was expecting to make his fortune shortly.”

  “But you need more than just the silkworms,” I countered. “They have a special diet.”

  “Mulberry trees,” she said. “A particular kind like the ones growing at Zeuxippos. They must be smuggling those as well.”

  “Wait a second,” I remembered. “When Rico hid in that crate during our burglary, he said that it had some kind of ornamental bush in it. It didn’t occur to me at the time, but that’s an odd thing to find taking up valuable space in a silk embolum.”

  “I’ll bet it was mulberry,” she said.

  “But is this really something worth killing for?”

  “Silk of that quality is worth its weight in gold,” she said. “And gold is always worth killing for.”