by David Blixt
“The deaths have all occurred,” said the cripple through his near-impenetrable accent.
Taking the lead of the interview, Tharwat was glacial. “And with the lady Katerina dead, you are in no more danger.”
Girolamo shook his head. “I understand what you meant. About taking an active part. I should have. I was afraid.”
“Conscience makes cowards of us all,” said the Moor.
They conferred. No one particularly wanted to add this bunch-backed diviner to their midst. But he had saved Detto's life once. And, more importantly, they needed his skill. Accepting him into their party, they immediately demanded that he produce his map and the stone teardrop to ply his art.
The answer was surprising. They immediately changed course, heading towards Venice.
The city where anything could be forgiven, if it was done for love.
♦ ◊ ♦
AS CESCO HAD PREDICTED, support for his faction evaporated on the wind. The nobles of the city acted swiftly to assure their positions. The Anziani – including Castelbarco, Montecchio, Capulletto, Lozzo, Ervari – all did the prudent thing and swore allegiance to the new heir apparent. Antonio da Nogarola appeared in the city to kneel before the Mastiff, pledging himself and his brother, who was absent for obvious reasons. Mastino accepted the oath graciously, with understanding and forgiveness in his voice and face. Of Cesco, Mastino made no comment.
The general consensus was that, having reached manhood and not in accord with his father, Cesco had resorted to patricide. Some whispers said it was over a girl, some over money, some over power. The Abbot of San Zeno was righteous in his vindication, loudly declaiming about pacts with Satan and plans with the infidel.
No mention was made of Cesco's parentage. No need to complicate the story.
Mastino was made joint-captain with his brother. But everyone knew that Alberto's appointment was for show. Mastino held the reins.
As they saw Alberto and Mastino invested, marveling at the past week, the people decided this was for the best. Prince Cesco had been too wild. No telling how far he would go. They had never trusted him anyway. Wasn't Mastino more stable? And handsome, too. Yes, he was a far more fit Capitano than that unpredictable young scoundrel.
The Greyhound was dead.
Long live the Mastiff.
♦ ◊ ♦
ARRIVING LONG AFTER decent men had taken to their beds, Pietro ignored propriety and leapt into a gondola, ordering the driver to take him to the Rialto. Poco joined him, and after alighting they made their way through the streets to the Yellow Crescent. Hammering upon the door Tharwat had described, he made enough noise to be certain it opened at once. Ordering the servant to fetch his master, Pietro saw the man already approaching. Without preamble he said, “Have you seen a young man? Thin, brown hair, green eyes – have you seen him?”
Tubal regarded Pietro by the light of the taper. “I have. I'm afraid I did not have as much money as he requested. My resources aren't enough to cover all of poor Shalakh's debts at once. But I was able to give him enough for his voyage.”
Pietro's heart skipped a beat. “Voyage?”
“Yes. He said he was taking a trip. For his health. I cannot blame him. He didn't look at all well. He said he would be sought, and left this for whomever came looking.”
Tubal placed something in Pietro's hand. It was a letter. Breaking the seal, Pietro read it over. Finished, he lowered the letter to his side. “One more question, then I'll stop imposing on your hospitality. When did he leave?”
♦ ◊ ♦
BY THE TIME PIETRO returned to the Rialto, the others had gathered. Antonia took a step in his direction, saying, “What's-?”
“Girolamo was correct. He came here. We missed him, but only just! If we hurry, we might catch him at the docks!”
Commandeering a gondola, they traveled to where the larger ships were putting out into the Mediterranean. Pietro promised the driver a princely sum if they arrived in time.
Antonia huddled low in the gondola, wrapped in a shawl against the chill wet air of the night. In the light of a passing lamp she glimpsed something held tight in Pietro's hand. “What's that?”
“Cesco's valediction.” He handed it over. She had to wait until they were near enough another lamp to make out the hand she knew so well:
Dante was wrong. Love cannot move the stars. They move on their own, beating us cruelly before them like the whipped curs we are.
But I defy them. I am not theirs to rule. I refuse my fate. I resign. I withdraw. If I do not trouble them, perhaps they will leave me be. Cosa fatta capo ha.
What's done is done.
The rest was an answer to the final lines of Paradiso:
Now my will and my desire, like wheels revolving
with an even motion, were turning with
the Love that moves the sun and all the other stars.
Cesco himself had chosen those words to end the epic. It would have been ironic, had it not been tragic.
Though the gondola driver strained his pole, they reached the dock too late. Upon inquiring, an obliging seaman with an itching palm pointed to a ship just disappearing. Girolamo had his pendulum out, and it almost tore itself from his finger as it swung again and again in that ship's direction.
The sun was just rising behind Pietro and he had to strain his eyes into the darkness before him to see the triple sail. Try as he might, he could find no hirable ship capable of catching it, and without knowing its destination, the ship was impossible to track. Even the pendulum could not predict its course. For the ship was heading into an uncharted sea. It had no foreknowledge.
It only followed the stars.
Epilogue
THE CAPTAIN APPROACHED the young knight who stood by the taffrail, watching the water slide by. “Your friend, he is below,” said the captain, tugging his forelock. Gold made him uncommonly deferential. “He's unwell.”
“He's never been properly to sea.” Though wan from some recent illness, the knight showed no sign of sea-sickness. “Neither have I, for that matter. It's – remarkable.”
“You bear it well.” Long hair streaming across his face, the young knight made no reply. “Have you decided on a destination, master?”
“Wherever we can lose ourselves. What's your favourite port?”
“Brindisi,” was the captain's ready answer. “Crusaders and pilgrims use it as their portal to the East. It's a short trip to Greece, or you can go down to Africa, or around to Spain. All the world is open in Brindisi,” he finished, repeating a common claim.
“As you please. Just see that the men are recompensed for their trouble.”
“I will, master, and they will pray for you. What name should I give them?”
The knight shook his head. “No name.”
The captain strode off, leaving the young knight leaning on the rail, eyes upon the water. For once his mind was locked, unable to see possibilities, only the doors closed on his past – a past he now saw had been nothing but lies. He carried nothing, owed no one, served no one. Only his body and his brain were left to him. Not even a name. No possessions, no family – just Detto, faithful Detto. A far better man than I am.
That doesn't answer the question. Where am I going? How do I survive?
His words to Benedick floated back to him. It is a wide world. A witty man with a quick blade can always find amusing employment. Even one without a name.
Unasked, a poem, penned anonymously, flitted through his mind:
I will go, but not in exile.
In your guise you will accompany me so I feel safe,
Hoping to go and return whole.
I am certain to not go badly,
But in many places I will be stopped:
I will pray for those who have prayed for me,
Until I arrive at the Fountain of Learning, your sovereign Lady.
I don't know if I'll be gone a week or a month
Or if my path shall be contested:
I will go for your pleasure near and far;
But I would love to already be there
Because I would commend you to Love…
Damn poetry. Damn it to Hell.
Thoughts of Hell naturally led to Dante. On the subject of exile, the master poet had once written, 'In whatever corner of the world I find myself, can I not look at the sun and the stars?'
A cool tapping on his chest reminded him that he was not entirely without possessions. In addition to the sword at his hip, he wore the silver coin on the thong about his throat. Reaching for it, he began rubbing the worn Roman disc between forefinger and thumb.
No name? Nay. That's not so.
Slowly, his lips curved into a lop-sided smile as they formed the single word.
“Mercutio.”
FIN
Afterword
Historical Apologies and Addendums
At long last, the moment of crisis. Cangrande is dead. There is a new Prince of Verona. Our hero has fled Italy, taking a new name as he steps onto a wider, wilder stage.
Like him, we are finally departing Verona's walls. As I mentioned in the notes of FORTUNE'S FOOL, this volume is the conclusion to a story I started writing 12 years ago, part three in a single narrative of Cesco's life in Verona. To me, VOICE OF THE FALCONER, FORTUNE'S FOOL, and THE PRINCE'S DOOM are all one book, simply titled IL FALCO. (THE MASTER OF VERONA is mentally dubbed IL VELTRO. To me, these novels have Italian animal names).
The original version started with the fake death of Cangrande, and ended with his actual death. There is something very appealing to that structure. Hence my statement that these three novels are one story, told in installments. On their own, they're rollicking good tales. Together, they are something more. It isn't just the rise of Mercutio. It's the fall of Cangrande. So much promise, cut off. Imagine if Julius Caesar had never reached 40. No Gallic war, no Civil war, no Pharsalus, no Cleopatra, no Ides of March, no Augustus, no Empire. That's what, to me, the death of Cangrande was – the cutting off of possibility. A tragedy that changed the course of history.
But then, the same can be said of every living being cut off in their prime. And as this is a tale inspired by Shakespeare's play wherein an entire generation of Verona's youth is cut down, it seems a fitting theme to explore.
♦ ◊ ♦
These major sources are worth citing again: A.M. Allen's A HISTORY OF VERONA; PADUA UNDER THE CARRARA by Benjamin J. Kohl; Emanuele Carli's DANTE E GLI ALLIGHIERI A VERONA; GLI SCALIGERI, edited by Arnaldo Mondadori; DANTE: THE POET, THE POLITICAL THINKER, THE MAN by Barbara Reynolds; Frances Stonor Saunders' THE DEVIL'S BROKER. As always, the Dante verses come from the translation by Bob and Jean Hollander.
I was blessed to be gifted with even more books from my Veronese friends, including IL LATINO DEI PRIMI SECOLI E L'ETRUSCO by Giovanni Rapelli, L'IPOGEO DI SANTA MARIA IN STELLE by Luigi Antolini, and IL CORPO DEL PRINCIPE, edited by Ettore Napione.
The Friar's history is borrowed from THE YELLOW CROSS by René Weis. Verona's roots in Etruscan culture I got from talking to Giovanni Rapelli, whose book IL LATINO DEI PRIMI SECOLI E L'ETRUSCO is now well-thumbed by me.
I have used a couple dirty poems directly from the translation of THE FABLIAUX by Nathaniel E. Dubin. The Catullus I cobbled together from other translations, and for the other Latin I nod my head to Professor John Lobur.
Most of my songs are Shakespearean, not Italian, taken from SHAKESPEARE'S SONGBOOK by Ross W. Duffin. Yet the song Manuel sings for Pietro at the wedding feast is clearly Italian, but of unknown origin. Thus I am more than happy to attribute it to Manuello Giudeo, already famous for his song about Verona, to say nothing of his own love poems. Though I do, in fact, give the lyrics to Cangrande himself, as a gesture of genuine affection for a much-wronged knight.
It is also my own gesture to the man who should have been so much more, had he not been saddled with expectations of mythic proportions. Cangrande is a man much maligned by me – countless Veronese are dismayed by my portrayal of him. I can honestly say it came from a place of too much admiration – I found myself in awe of him, and decided to give him feet of clay. If my readers find his end is as tragic as it is ignominious, I will consider myself successful.
♦ ◊ ♦
Several short notes:
The tale of Veronese soldiers aiding the rebellion of William Wallace is a fiction, but a not-impossible one. There are certainly examples of English soldiers working as mercenaries in Italy (John Hawkwood being the most famous). So why not the reverse?
There is in fact such a thing as an Italian-Scots, though their emigration is far more recent than 1300. Most Scots of Italian-descent arrived in the 19th Century, escaping a famine in their homeland.
Goose pulls were, alas, real, practiced all the way up through the 19th Century. Appalling, I know. But the job of the historical fiction writer is not to impose modern values upon their subjects. Animal rights awareness is a very recent sea-change. For hundreds, nay, thousands of years, animal sports were considered great entertainment. The persistence of dog-fighting and cock-fighting today says that humanity has still not entirely transcended this particular barbarity. And for young men in a time before Playstations, testing one's prowess against nature was a valued part of entering manhood.
Just as I am adamant about not putting blatant modern values in historical figures' heads, I am certain there were men and women who abhorred such practices. I give those feelings to Antonia, and to Detto, who of course has an affinity for animals.
A note about Pietro d'Abano, the late 13th Century doctor and philosopher who studied blood-loss. Morsicato is technically incorrect, he wasn't executed by the Inquisition. He died while he was on trial. But he was convicted posthumously, unearthed, and his corpse was burned. So in essence, rather than strict fact, Morsicato got it right.
The ship called La Alisceote was quite real. There's a record of it sailing into Dartmouth in 1315 and 1316. Since there were no records for the year 1314, I have appropriated it, deciding that the 1315 date was its return from a voyage to Italy.
Benjamin Montagu is a fictional character, though his brother breathed the true air. And there is a real Ben Montague living today, a gifted actor, writer, film-maker, musician, and friend. Ben, Breon Bliss, my wife Jan and I were the cofounders of A Crew Of Patches Theatre Company, a repertory Shakespeare troupe in Chicago. We all acted, directed, and produced, and I have no idea how many times we've performed together. The character of Benjamin is very much based on the real Ben, right down to those cute little ears. You'll see him again someday, where I hope to give him more to do. But of all people, Ben would understand being a plot-point.
Scott Aiello is real as well. Now a Julliard acting grad and Audible star, when I met him he was part of the same circle of actors doing Shakespeare for little money and less respect, and he was the most cheerfully belligerent, scenery-chewing fellow in the bunch. I cast him as Friar Lawrence, as Peter Quince, and as Mark Antony, and while the performances were great, the stories that came out of those rehearsals were even greater. He and Ben are friends, and it was a delight to pit them against each other, if only for my own amusement.
Yet another friend, Brian Amidei, is descended from the Amidei mentioned in Paradiso. So I decided to toss in a mention, with an eye towards both the past and the future.
The by-now-obligatory Shakespearean anagrams are here, though I've changed it up a little. One is for William Shakespeare, but the other now belongs to the feuding families. Happy hunting.
♦ ◊ ♦
When I started this series, I could not find a death-date for Katerina della Scala. I've found it since – it was around 1305, long before my story began. Records say that in 1306, Bailardino da Nogarola married the Countess da Fogliano, sister to the woman who would marry Cangrande's brother, Alboino, and aunt to Mastino, Alberto, Verde, and the rest.
Had I been armed with this information at the outset, doubtless I would have changed my story. But Katerina i
s so much at the heart of the tale, I cannot regret keeping her alive. So I have doubled-down on the choice I made then – I have given Bail's wife to his brother Alberto. That keeps the Countess in the family, though only as a minor player, and allows us to hold on to dear Katerina until 1329, when it seems her world was coming to an end.
That is hardly my only historical inaccuracy. With Don Laurito, I am anticipating history by about 150 years. In the late 15th century, Naples came under the influence of the kingdom of Aragon, which led Shakespeare to address Proteus' father as Don rather than Signor – anyone from Naples was called Don, because of the heavy Spanish influence. Of course, in the 1320s there was no direct bond between Aragon and Napoli, just the regular links of trade. But to lay the groundwork for Two Gentlemen Of Verona portion of the tale, I bring them all together.
Had Shakespeare given Proteus' sire a name other than Antonio, I would not have needed to twist myself into this tortuous knot. Nor, had I been thinking fourteen years ago, would I have given that name to Lord Capulet. As one of Shakespeare's favourite go-to names, there are far too many Antonios in his plays to keep track of – 2 Gents (Proteus' father), Twelfth Night (Antonio the pirate), Merchant of Venice (the titular merchant), Shrew (Petruchio's late father), All's Well (the Duke's eldest son, mentioned in passing), and The Tempest (Prospero's usurping brother). And that's without invoking Mark Antony, who has two plays. Presented with the chance to give Lord Capulet a first name, what on earth possessed me to use that one? (It was actually a nod to Luigi da Porto, who wrote the first story with lovers named Romeo and Giulietta. He gave the girl's father the name Antonio). Four novels on, I am thoroughly stuck with it, and so must do whatever I can to differentiate one Antonio from another. Hence Don Laurito, when it should be Don Antonio.
By the bye, it is worth noting that, while I touch on many of Shakespeare's Italian plays, it has never been my intention to retell them. That will change when we reach the ultimate volume in this series, but thus far I am wary of attempting to recreate Shakespeare's plots. However, I take great delight in linking certain scenes from the plays to these books. In MOV, it was the tailor scene from Shrew. In FALCONER, we get a retelling of Borachio's ill-fated love affair – one that he will someday duplicate to cause a rift between the lovers Claudio and Hero the night before their wedding. In FOOL, I presented the first Antonio/Shylock scene, and it was the hunt for Shylock's wayward daughter that saved Cesco's life.
