by David Blixt
Gratiano was vicious in victory. “I'd say hang yourself, devil, but with what? You don't even have the price of a rope now!”
When Shalakh did not move, he was brought to his knees by the guards as Doge Soranzo stirred himself to speak. “So you might perceive the difference between yourself and a Christian, I pardon you your life. As for your goods, half belong to Signor Ansaldo. The other half due to the state we might reduce to a fine, depending on your behavior.”
Shalakh shook his head. “You take my life if you take my livelihood.”
Baldassare turned to the merchant whose life he had just preserved so magnificently. “What mercy does he deserve, Signor Antonio?”
Ansaldo stood, still bare-chested and drawn, looking down at the Jew. “If it pleases the noble Doge and the court, I am content with half his goods – providing that he renders the other half, upon his death, to his daughter's good Christian husband. And that he goes from this place directly into the Church of San Marco and is baptized a Christian.”
“This he shall do,” said the Doge, smiling, “or I'll recant my pardon of his life.”
Baldassare handed the bond back to the kneeling man. “Are you content, Jew? Has justice been served?”
In a shaken, soft voice, Shalakh said, “I am content.”
Pietro had never seen a man brought so low. The Shalakh Pietro knew would have been bristling, vowing to die rather than give up his faith. But the fight had gone from the old Jew. What his daughter's betrayal had begun, this day had ended. Pietro would have felt pity, had the man not just attempted to commit legal murder before their very eyes.
The Jew had been offered every chance to avoid this humiliation. Surely this was justice. So why did it feel so wrong?
Baldassare turned to the many clerks along the wall. “Someone draw up a deed, giving all his goods at his death to his daughter's husband. He shall sign it now.”
“Please,” said Shalakh, “let me leave. I am not well. Send the deed after me, and I will sign it.”
“Go,” said Doge Soranzo, “but see you do. Guards, escort him to the Church.”
Shalakh rose shakily to his feet and turned to go, only to find his path blocked by Gratiano. “Had I been your judge, you would be on your way to the gallows, not the baptismal font.”
Shalakh said nothing in return. It was a sour note to end such a triumph. Ansaldo was embraced by his friends, and the Doge invited the young lawyer to dine with him.
The youth begged off. “I am expected in Padua this night, and must depart at once.”
“A pity,” said Soranzo, though from the look of him food had not passed his lips for some time. “Signor Ansaldo, gratify this gentleman. You are deeply in his debt.”
As Ansaldo, Bassanio, and the others crowded around the young lawyer, Pietro considered following Shalakh and asking again for information pertaining to the name Amabilio. But he could not bring himself to do it. The man had no reason to be forthcoming, not today. Perhaps not ever.
Dandolo pressed Pietro's arm. “I must attend the Doge. Should I send men to hunt our friend the cripple?”
Pietro shook his head. “I believe he has accepted an offer to study with Tharwat al-Dhaamin, to learn more of their mutual arts.”
Dandolo sighed in measured relief. “That is good to know. Though what an unholy sight those two will be together. Forgive me for saying so, but I cannot imagine the court that would admit them for anything other than grotesque amusement.”
“Until they have sampled their arts.”
“True. But I tell you, soon Venice will have little time for the stars.”
As Dandolo departed, Pietro found himself wishing the same were true of Verona.
From the clump of men surrounding the Roman lawyer, Pietro heard a stern tone originating from, of all men, Ansaldo, who had cause to be joyful. “Bassanio, let him have the ring. He has earned it. Weigh my love against your promise to your wife, and value them by the scales.”
“I'll buy the dearest ring in Venice and give it gladly,” Bassanio was saying to Baldassare, who had apparently demanded the ring as payment.
Baldassare seemed amused, not put out. “I see. Liberal in offers, conservative in practice. First you teach me to beg, then school me how to answer a beggar.”
“Good signor, this ring was given to me by my wife, whose love I only just won. When she gave it to me she made me vow to neither sell, nor give, nor lose it.”
Baldassare shrugged. “If she's not a mad-woman, she would understand. If she is, best you discover it now. But peace be with you.” Motioning to his clerk, the lawyer started for the door.
As Ansaldo continued to harangue his friend to give the ring in question to the lawyer who had saved his life, Pietro fell into step beside the young Roman. “Allow me to add my voice to the praise. I stand in awe of Bellario's method of reading the law. It is indeed all in the language.”
“Or in the omissions,” agreed Baldassare as they traversed the hallway. “Sometimes they are not sins, but blessings.”
“I confess, I was concerned,” said Pietro. “You understood my message, I trust. I am glad now you did not follow my advice.”
Baldassare said nothing for a moment, then took a breath. “I did not think it would benefit either the victim or his friends. And if it were known, it might provoke jealousy.”
Pietro was surprised by that. “Jealousy? In whom?”
“In Bassanio's wife, for one. She would need a sign that her husband preferred her to his friend.”
“Well, she has it,” said Pietro. “Is that why you demanded the ring? To test his love?”
Baldassare was grinning again, complete with dimples. “It was a whim. But Antonio offered to die for his love. I wanted to see if Bassanio was swayed by such devotion.” He turned to Nerio, trailing along behind. “Go to the Jew's house and see the deed signed. I'll order the horses.”
Nerio gave his master a baleful look, and Pietro wondered if the young clerk disliked horses. What, did he prefer to travel by carriage?
“You're heading back to give Bellario the news of your triumph? I'm off for Vicenza tonight, then on to Verona. I'd be happy to ride with you as far as Padua.”
Baldassare looked startled, but recovered. “That is very kind, but we would only slow you down. We are not accustomed to the saddle.”
“Not all knights are devils in the stirrups,” laughed Pietro. “Come, I'd love to discuss the laws of Rome.”
Baldassare pursed his lips. “Very well. Of course, we would be happy for the company. Nerio, go see that signed and—”
“Master Baldassare!” came an urgent cry from behind them. The loud fellow Gratiano was racing across the marble floor to reach them. “I'm glad I caught you. Lord Bassanio has reconsidered, at Antonio's urging. Here is the ring you craved. And he invites you to stay to dinner.”
Baldassare gazed at the ring pressed into his small hand with a wounded expression on his youthful face. “It cannot be.” Then he started and said, more pleasantly, “I must leave at once. But I accept his gift with all my heart. Now, will you guide my clerk to Shalakh's house.”
“Gladly,” said Gratiano.
The lawyer and clerk stepped aside for a private conference, then Nerio left in the company of Gratiano while Baldassare fell into step again with Pietro.
“Did he pass your test, or fail it?” asked Pietro lightly.
Baldassare continued to stare at the ring, a flush rising in his youthful cheek. “Who am I to judge?”
“You knew it was an impossible request,” chided Pietro. “Either way he was bound to break faith.”
“Yes,” said the young lawyer, placing the ring on his finger. It fit perfectly. “But now I see whose love was stronger.”
As they exited the palace into the open air of the Piazza San Marco, Pietro clapped the young fellow on the shoulder. “Just hope his wife never finds out!”
♦ ◊ ♦
IT WAS GROWING LATE when the Rakehells depart
ed the Benedictine commune, having performed labour in return for their genial entertainment. Cesco snuck into the abbot's cell, and there deposited a bag of gold.
Back in their borrowed cart, Benedick complimented Cesco's generosity. “They'll make good use of it.”
“I'm sure,” said Cesco. “Though I find myself utterly shattered in my delusions. I did not believe there were men alive who actually practiced what Christ taught. In a venal world, it is easier to believe all men are cads. Especially men of the cloth. Finding good ones do exist is quite disillusioning.”
The sky had finally broken open, releasing the pent up snow that frosted their clothes, their beards, their eyelashes. They reached their horses and, paying the hire of the cart, remounted for their return to Illasi. Just as they did, they heard an inhuman cry carried on the wind of the evening air. It was joined by another, until it was a chorus of bloodcurdling song.
“Wolves,” said Yuri.
Cesco clapped his gloved hands. “Sport! This day won't be a complete waste. Cangrande once slew several wolves as a lad, or so the bragging goes. I've a mind to return with pelts that will put his best furs to shame. Come, let's see what they're hunting, and turn the hunters into prey! Hya!” With a snap of the reins, he had Abastor racing at a gallop, the rest of the Rakehells in his wake.
♦ ◊ ♦
THE TWO ROMANS did indeed ride slowly, as if they had no experience on horseback. Pietro had to keep his horse in check, and as the sun disappeared over the horizon he began thinking of houses in Padua where he could stay. “I might join you at Bellario's,” he said. “You could avoid seeming immodest and allow me tell him the tale of your victory. If you don't mind my company.”
Nerio shot Baldassare a baleful glance, and the lawyer again looked uncomfortable. “It is not for me to invite you to another man's house.”
Pietro sensed the Roman's reluctance. “He invited me to call whenever I was in Padua. But I don't want to intrude on your friendship.”
Baldassare took a breath. “More than friendship, actually. I did not want to say it before, Ser Alaghieri, but Bellario is my cousin.”
“Truly? He didn't mention any relations in Rome. In fact, the only cousin he talked of was a female, a woman in Bellamonte who had as good a head for law as—”
It was like lightning. Bassanio had married a woman of Bellamonte. Bellario. The ring. The shape of this youth, outlined in shadow. Pietro breathed out a hiss, then started to laugh.
Discovered, the lady laughed as well. “Well, Nerissa, we're rumbled. I'm stunned we pulled it off for as long as we did.”
“At least we can now stop pretending,” said the clerk, pulling her cap from her head and releasing a tumble of hair. “O, how I wish we had side-saddles!”
Pietro was still laughing. “May I ask your name, Madonna?”
“I am called after Brutus' second wife, the lady who swallowed fire.”
“Fitting.” Pietro's grin broadened as he bowed his head to her. “A pleasure to meet you, Lady Portia.”
Talk was much more relaxed after that. The women returned their voices to their usual trebles, and Pietro asked how they had invented their scheme. The only awkwardness was when Pietro remembered the test of the ring. Or rings, as it seemed Nerissa, married to that lout Gratiano, had gotten her own ring back from him as well.
“I am sorry, lady, that I spoke at all,” said Pietro honestly.
Portia waved it off. “It is a new marriage, against an old friendship. I see I have my work cut out for me. Trust me, it is not an error Bassanio will make a second time.”
They were nearing a divide in the road when they saw torches and heard human cries and animal yelps. Pietro saw several men on horseback driving off a pack of wolves that had been feeding on a carcass in the snowy field beside the road.
A single cry rose above the rest, a sound Pietro had heard only once before. “Stay here,” he commanded, and set his horse into a gallop to the spot where the torches lit the landscape, reflecting off the silent falling snow.
Spying a familiar red-head among the crowd, Pietro called out. Faces turned. Young Petruchio and Hortensio were there, looking angry and grave. Their hands dropped to their swords until he identified himself.
It was the red-headed Paduan who came up at a run. “He was attacked,” said Benedick. “Caltrops in the road to lame his horse. It's dead, and he was stabbed and left to die in the snow. The wolves found him…”
“Who?” demanded Pietro, swinging from his saddle and racing towards the clump of men, surrounding the dead horse and the rider who had been cut from its saddle. “Who?”
Cesco was kneeling by the figure's head. It had been his cry that had brought Pietro racing, a howl of despair and rage that Cesco had made on the night Pietro's father had died. Now it came again, and Pietro was terrified to see what had dragged it forth.
The figure on the ground belonged to Detto. The snow all around him was now longer white, but steeped in the crimson of his blood.
Beside him were the marks of footsteps. One of the footprints dragged a course through the snow, as if made by a cripple.
ACT III
Strive With Things Impossible
Nineteen
ANIMAL MAGIC HAD preserved Detto from the wolves. It was the only explanation. They had chosen to feed on the dead form of Vegliantino, the fine animal given by Cangrande to the young knight just three weeks earlier.
Pietro knelt close. Detto's face was pale and serene. There was no breath steaming from his lips, and his fingers were cold. But Pietro spied a small flutter under the skin of his neck. Life was still tethered to this body, if only by the slenderest thread. “He's alive!”
“Of course he's alive,” said Cesco in a constricted tone. He was rubbing Detto's right hand to restore circulation. “He hasn't finished being my conscience. Have you, Detto? Have you!”
There was no answer. Pietro saw that someone had bound Detto's wound. The work was so rude, everyone else assumed Detto had done it himself. But Pietro had a suspicion – a hope, really. He did not want to think that the cripple was behind this attack. It made no sense. None at all.
They quickly constructed a litter to drag Detto's unmoving form the rest of the way to Padua, where Salvatore had already been dispatched to wake all the doctors in the city.
“Here,” said Yuri, reading the traces on the snowy ground. “Most of the attackers rode east, but one headed north.”
“We'll follow the larger party,” said Fabio, mounting swiftly. “We'll send word if we find the bastards.”
“I'll join you,” said Benedick.
“What about the lone man?” asked Pietro.
“We'll trace him,” said Barto, signaling to his brother. Young Petruchio and his twin joined both Scaligeri bastards as they tore off to the north.
The Paduans returned en force, Marsilio da Carrara in the lead, for this deed imperiled the new peace. Cangrande's nephew had been attacked within the Padovana. There would be no rest until the malefactors were hunted down.
Carrara greeted Pietro, who explained as much as he had been able to discern. “It was an ambush, set up in advance by several men. They wanted it to look like a robbery – Detto's sword, gold, and spurs are all gone.”
“You don't believe it,” said Carrara.
“No more than you. Robbers would not have murdered the horse. Someone has gone to a lot of trouble to attack Ser Nogarola.”
“Yet they did not make sure of his death. Where do the tracks lead?”
“To Venice,” said Pietro. “We've sent men.”
“Did you trace their origin? We might learn something.”
Pietro said they had not enough people for that, and Carrara sent off a pack of soldiers at once. Then he eyed Pietro's companions, women whose clothes looked peculiarly masculine under their cloaks. “And these are?”
“Two ladies I was escorting back to Padua. This lady here is the cousin of Dottore Bellario. Can I entrust them to your care? I'd
prefer to stay here.”
“I'll see them safely returned,” said Carrara.
Pietro took his leave of Portia and Nerissa, then wondered what there was to do. He could think of so many things. But until they traced the malefactors, there was very little that was productive.
“What was Detto doing in Venice at all?” he asked Cesco, not for the first time.
But there were no answers to be had from that corner, or at least no real ones. “Buying passage out of this benighted land. But thankfully Charon asks too much coin.”
“Cesco, if we knew why he was there—”
Though his eyes were red, the pupils for once looked almost clear. “How should I know? I am not his keeper.”
Pietro tried another tack. “Cesco, if you know who did this—”
“I can think of two just offhand. No, three.”
“Tell us, then, and we'll investigate.”
“Let me know if you find anything. But you won't. I'll take care of it.” And he had actually shoved Pietro out of his path.
Cesco was wrong – the knowledge that the cripple Girolamo was there was a good lead. One that Pietro had not yet shared with another soul.
Carrara's soldiers returned just as they were transporting Detto slowly towards the gates of Padua. “The tracks lead to Correzzola, my lord.”
“Our tracks those are, idiot,” snapped Rupert, anger making his Germanic mind rearrange his words.
“No, prince,” said the soldier. “Begging your pardon, but we saw your traces as well as theirs. They left earlier in the day, just as the snow started to fall.”
“The party that left,” said Cesco, eyes narrowed.
“What?”
“The party that left. That told Salvatore about the whorehouse. It was them.”
“Did they think they were laying a trap for us?” asked Salvatore, confused.
“No,” said Cesco. “They were hired to attack Detto when he came to join us. I mentioned I'd sent him word.”
Sitting in his saddle before the walls of Padua, Pietro felt several unwelcome suspicions. “Hired by whom?”
