Must see you at once. My rooms.
Carchedonius
That’s not his real name, of course. Before he came to the Studium he was Liutprand Thiostulfsen. It cost me twelve angels to find that out, and I never could think of a good way of using it against him. Just knowing it made me feel better, though.
I should explain about Carchedonius. He’s a fine scholar. He’s painstaking, insightful, clear-headed, occasionally brilliant, always worth listening to. His work on the manuscript tradition of Thraso’s Dialogues was what started me on the road to my finest hour, the deciphering of the Sunao Codex. Between us, we know everything there is to know about Aeneas, and Essecuivo. All in all, it’s a shame we hate each other the way we do.
But that can’t be helped, anymore than you can get an injunction to stop the winter. The stupid thing is, neither of us can account for it. I’ve never done him any real harm, though not for want of trying, and all his wild schemes to encompass my downfall have failed or backfired on him. Apparently he has some kind of grudge based on some relative of his losing a lot of money when the Company went under. If that’s really the case, he must’ve nursed it like a shepherd’s wife with an orphan lamb. I think I hate him so much because he hates me, though I’m not sure I didn’t hate him first. In any case, it’s been going on since we were both seventeen-year-old freshmen. I guess it’s an interest for both of us; cheaper than collecting pre-Mannerist miniatures, slightly more exciting than watching the donkey-cart races.
Must see you in my rooms at once presumably meant the latest in a long line of labored, over-elaborate stratagems; presumably it hadn’t occurred to him that I might simply decide not to turn up. He’d make a lousy spider; the patience and dedication to spin a good web, but not a clue about luring flies. His idea of subtlety would be a big notice; WEB THIS WAY. He’d starve.
I nearly didn’t go. Nearly. If I was a fly, I’d be dead by now.
Here I go, rattling on about myself and my own inconsequential history. I’m ashamed of myself, as a historian. My part in the sequence of events is significant but limited. I shouldn’t have talked about myself or even acknowledged my own existence for at least another ten pages.
The Company; the Eastern Ocean Company; actually, the correct name is the College of Merchant Adventurers for the Promotion and Regulation of Trade with the Nations of the Eastern Ocean. It was founded, coincidentally, in the year of my birth—here I am, intruding again—by three clockmakers and a goldsmith, affluent men with a taste for abstruse literature who’d been brought up on secondary accounts of Aeneas Peregrinus, and who could afford to indulge their scientific pretensions by chartering and outfitting a small ship (the Squirrel, 90 tons) to look for Essecuivo. That was all. But, being businessmen, they thought it would be common sense to spread the risk a little. Accordingly, they issued a prospectus, which they hired a couple of layabouts to give away free in the tea-houses around the Golden Carp.
The year I was born was also the year of the great gold strike in Eroine. For the first time in centuries, the City was awash with money; newly coined gold angels, tumbling like raindrops, looking for channels, gutters and conduits to drain off the flood. Men who’d been wise enough to take an early stake at Eroine and then sell before the strike worked out were looking around for the next good thing; preferably something a bit more substantial than gold-mining, up and down like a peacock’s tail, as my father used to say. Essecuivo was exactly the sort of thing they were after; a solid, long-term venture yielding rich dividends for ever and ever. In a matter of days, copies of the free prospectus (the clockmakers had only printed two hundred) were changing hands for an angel each.
At this point, something strange and wonderful happened. The clockmakers, in order to keep track of who was investing what, had some more papers printed; not prospectuses this time, but shares. It wasn’t a brand new idea, but it had never really caught on before. That all changed. The first subscription, at one angel a share, sold out in a week. The second subscription, three angels, went in a single morning; meanwhile, in the tea-houses, the disappointed investors who’d missed out on the subscriptions were cheerfully paying six angels apiece for second-hand shares. Twelve subscriptions later, Company stock stood at a hundred and six, and only the clockmakers had any idea how many shares were in circulation. At this point, they quietly sold out their own interests and retired to vast country estates in the Naquite, leaving the Company in the hands of its newly elected Board, one member of which was my poor father.
What nobody realized at that moment was that just under a third of the entire value of the Republic was now invested in the Company; whose assets, apart from money, consisted of a fine neo-Archaic mansion house in Widegate, a fair collection of maps and books put together by the clockmakers, four remaining years of a six-year charter of the Squirrel and some second-hand barrels. I think it was this that led my father to decide that someone really ought to find Essecuivo as quickly as possible.
I walked in and he didn’t look up. “Tea?” he asked.
"Yes, why not?” I looked around. I hadn’t been in his rooms for some time. Mind you, nothing had changed; the same heaps of junk everywhere. I decided to assume that the offer of tea implied an invitation to sit down, so I moved a stack of books and perched on a chair. He swung the kettle arm over the fire and peered back at me over his shoulder.
"I saw that thing you did in the Proceedings,” he said.
"Did you now.”
"Very good.” He pawed the lid off the tea caddy and measured out three spoonfuls. Black tea, the cheap sort. I could smell the bergamot oil they use to mask the poor flavor. “I think you’re right about Psammetichus. It makes sense of the western tradition, and it fits in with Hiero in the Summary.”
"Thank you.”
"Of course, you were wrong about Arcea,” he went on, with his back to me. “The foundation date is fixed by the Lelantine War.”
I frowned. He had a point. “That’s a terminus post quem.”
He shook his head. “Hiero lists Arceus among the dead at Limma,” he said. “If he died at Limma, he couldn’t have founded Arcea the year after, could he?”
Six months of agonizingly hard work gone up in smoke. I could have cried. Instead, I said, “If you’re prepared to follow Hiero.”
"You were,” he replied. “Can’t have it both ways.” He turned round, holding a teapot and two small wooden cups. He loves to make a show of poverty, although his family owns half the Neada valley. “Lemon?”
I shook my head. “That’s what you wanted to see me about.”
"No.” He sat down, not bothering to shift the books first; he sort of settled in beside and on top of them, like cement. “No, I’ve already written a note for the Review.” He smiled. “Sorry.”
I made a show of shrugging. “Just as well you spotted my careless oversight,” I said. “The human race should be properly grateful.”
He leaned forward to pour the tea. “Oh, the hell with that,” he said. “I never could be doing with slipshod scholarship, is all.” He frowned. “Did you say you wanted lemon?”
"Not for me, no.”
He sipped his tea and pulled a face. “No,” he went on (he starts most of his sentences with no), “it was something quite other. How are things with you, by the way? It’s been a while since we had a chance for a civilized conversation. How’s your father getting on?”
"He died,” I said. “Last spring.”
"That’s a shame, I’m sorry. He can’t have been out for long.”
"Six months.”
He shook his head. “Well,” he said, “at least he didn’t die in prison. That must be a terrible thing, don’t you think?”
Sometimes, the best way of fighting is not to fight. I sat still and quiet. He drank his tea.
"No,” he said eventually, “what I wanted to see you about was—” He stopped, put his cup down and folded his hands neatly in his lap. “You heard that Count Dorcellus is dead.”
"No, actually.”
He nodded. “The family’s deep in debt, so they had to sell up. The whole place, including the library.”
In spite of myself, I was mildly interested. The Dorcelli are one of those old families who used to be everywhere a few hundred years ago, and haven’t done a damn thing since. Also, they were always notoriously mean-minded about allowing scholars to use their library. As a result, nobody had any idea what they’d got in there.
"It just so happens,” he went on, looking over my shoulder, “that my uncle bought a few cases of books at the sale.” He grinned, still not looking at me. “When I say cases, that’s quite accurate. He bought four large crates, sight unseen. He’s a clown, my uncle. Still.”
I had a feeling of being taken on a guided tour of the torture chamber. They do that, apparently, to make people confess. This is the wrack, that’s the iron maiden, and over here we have the thumbscrews. “Anything interesting?” I asked.
"Some bits and pieces.” He frowned again, then lifted his head and looked at me. “Oh, before I forget. They sent me your latest on Aeneas Peregrinus. They want to know if it’s any good.”
I felt cold all over. They, in this context, meant the faculty board, to whom I had submitted an outline of my researches in the hope of getting funding for another five years. Through ignorance or malice they’d given it to Carchedonius for peer review. I swallowed. “What did you think?”
"Splendid.”
Oh, but you can’t tell, really you can’t. He always says splendid or excellent, just before he wields the knife. I waited. He made the moment last.
"No,” he said, “I went through it all very carefully, and I’m forced to admit, I do believe you’re right. And I’ve been wrong all these years. You convinced me. Congratulations.”
Still I waited. These are the red-hot irons, that cage thing over there is for bending your arms backwards until your elbows burst. “And?”
"And nothing.” The smile faded. “You know I can’t stand you,” he went on. “You’re arrogant, sloppy, careless and full of shit, and the way you carry on with married women is a disgrace to the Studium. But, on this occasion, you’ve produced a piece of work of real quality. And put me in my place in the process.” He picked up his teacup and put it down again, his fingertips still surrounding the rim. “I know now that you were right about the latitude of Essecuivo, and I was wrong. I’m trying to be graceful about it, but I’m probably not succeeding. It’s not really in my nature.”
It suddenly occurred to me to be glad I hadn’t touched the tea he’d poured for me. Bergamot oil would mask any number of unusual flavors. “Well—” I said.
"Anyway.” He stood up, crossed to the fireplace and gave the logs a sharp poke. Little red stars got up, like flies off a turd. “I’ve written to the faculty recommending that you get your money. I had no choice,” he said. “After all, we’re scholars, aren’t we?”
I took a deep breath. “Is that what you—?”
"No.”
I looked at him. People have mistaken us for each other. We’re both tall and skinny, with very similar long faces and straight noses. Two scholars. “Fine,” I said. “So?”
He sat down again, this time carefully moving the books, like miners clearing the fallen rocks behind which their friends are trapped, until he unearthed a long brass tube. He laid this across his knees and covered it with his forearms. “One small point in your work that I’d take issue with. Very small,” he added quickly. “It hadn’t occurred to me either until very recently. It’s about the manuscript of the Discovery.”
(The Discovery of Essecuivo, by Aeneas Peregrinus. Of course there was no manuscript.)
"You and I,” he went on, “have both spent a large part of our adult lives trying to figure out what became of the manuscript when Aeneas died. Both of us assumed that it would have been inherited by his son. We traced every living descendant, we sorted through indices and cartularies wherever there’s a library that might have received papers or books from Dives Peregrinus or his heirs. It’s all been—” He grinned. “A complete waste of time. Oh, we’ve found books and papers. Just not the one we were looking for. Agreed?”
I nodded.
"We assumed,” he went on, “that, because Dives inherited the land and the money and the house, he’d have had the papers too. After all, Aeneas was planning on going back. He died suddenly. The papers would have been with the rest of his property.”
He seemed to want me to say something. “Yes,” I said.
"Naturally enough. It was a fair assumption. But what—” He stopped, as though he’d walked into an invisible door. “What if Aeneas and his son quarreled about something, and Aeneas gave the papers to somebody else? The land and the money; well, he didn’t really have a choice, people didn’t just disinherit their only sons back then, so Dives got them all. But the papers—”
A hot, bright light inside my head. “The niece,” I said.
He gave me a beautiful smile. “Precisely,” he said. “His sister’s daughter, whose name we don’t even know. What if she got the papers, while he was still alive?”
I was ashamed. I really, really should have thought of it before. But I was too excited to let that get in the way just then. “The niece—”
"Married into the Dorcelli family,” he said quietly. “Who, being at that time wealthy enough not to need to sully their hands with trade and commerce, filed the papers safely away in the archives of their beautiful library at Touchevre and forgot all about them. Probably never bothered to look to see what was in them. Meanwhile Dives, having ransacked his father’s house searching for the old fool’s last book and failed to find it, concluded that it must have been destroyed, and told people so. Naturally, they believed him. He was, after all, Aeneas’ son.”
Suddenly I could scarcely breathe. “Your uncle.”
He smiled. “Bought four large crates, sight unseen. Including—” He pointed the brass tube at me, like a weapon. “This.”
He held on to the tube. I unscrewed the cap. I could see the end of a roll of parchment. My hand was frozen solid. I couldn’t move.
"Allow me.” He pinched the parchment between forefinger and thumb and drew it out. It was stiff and brown. It looked like a stick. “Now, then,” he said. “You’re the greatest living expert on Essecuivo. You’ve just proved that, to my satisfaction. Would you care to take a look?”
My enemy, my one and only true enemy, holding in his hand the one and only manuscript. Would I care to take a look? I nodded. He leaned across, took my hand, opened the cramped fingers and pushed the scroll in between them. “Take your time,” he said. “I’m in no hurry.”
You know the story of Saint Aguellinus; how, every morning since he was nine years old, he climbed the mountain just before dawn and prayed to be allowed to look into the face of the Invincible Sun. For ninety years he prayed; then, one day, his prayer was granted. The Sun, rising above the Techenis mountains, burst upon him as he prayed and spoke to him, saying, Follow me. Whereupon Aguellinus, his prayers answered, was consumed by the fire that leaves no ash and ascended bodily into Heaven—
Me, I’m not religious. I can see the Sun any time I like. But this—
"Go on,” he said. (I’ll never forget how he said it.) “It won’t bite you.”
I unrolled it. The parchment creaked; I was suddenly terrified in case it snapped or crumbled into dust before I could read it. But it rolled out, smooth and springy, the surface hard under my fingernails. It was hand-written, of course, and of course I recognized the handwriting. I’d spent hours poring over the nine authentic surviving letters written by Aeneas Peregrinus—to his land agent, his son, the sheriff of his shire concerning the window tax.
Concerning the True Discovery of Essecuivo, being a faithful account—
"Go on,” he said gently. “Read it.”
I thought; if only my father was still alive. He died, as Carchedonius so thoughtfully reminded me, only a short while ago, after ten ye
ars in prison. He’d done nothing wrong; at least, not the things he was accused of doing. But when the bubble burst and millions of angels were wiped out overnight, as suddenly and irrecoverably as snow melting, someone had to take the blame. My father, who’d done nothing wrong and therefore saw no need to leave the country with a small valise filled with precious stones, put up a strong case at his trial. He always was a good speaker, and he couldn’t resist arguing the toss, even when it was clearly not the smart thing to do. I can imagine (I wasn’t there) him arguing with Death, scoring five or six good solid debating points; the last thing he’d have seen before his eyes closed for ever was the panoramic view you get from the moral high ground.
But if he’d lived just a little longer, and seen this—
He’d have scolded me for not finding it earlier. The niece, he’d have said, shaking his head in that insufferable way of his, any idiot would’ve thought to investigate the niece. And he wouldn’t have said you failed me, you always were a bitter disappointment to me, because he wouldn’t have had to.
I read the manuscript. I could have written it myself.
That was the extraordinary thing. All my life I’d been speculating about Essecuivo, making educated guesses, extrapolating castles from grains of sand. From a tiny handful of dubious fragments of recollections in old age by men who’d heard their grandfathers talking when they were children; from observations based on ancient artifacts that may possibly have been copied more or less faithfully from things that may or may not have been smuggled back by Aeneas’ men in their sea-chests; half the time I was pretty much making it up, on the balance of probabilities, and the rest of the time I was working from evidence you wouldn’t rely on to convict a fox of killing chickens. The thing was, though, I was right. Uncannily so; even my wildest reaches and most vertiginous leaps to conclusions were borne out by the tall, thin, looped brown letters on the page. It was enough to make you weep. I hadn’t needed the manuscript, except as proof. I knew it all already.
The Best Science Fiction and Fantasy of the Year, Volume 7 Page 57
