City of Secrets (23 page)

Ayesha had almost reached the point of giving up and going home when something inexplicable happened. She was in the garden, drinking beer and feeling sorry for herself when suddenly a man seemed to appear out of nowhere in front of her. He was very handsome and in fancy dress but not like a Hallowe'en figure. He wore a ruffled white silk shirt, black velvet trousers and an embroidered purple satin waistcoat. In fact, he looked like a New Romantic, with priceless jewels on his fingers.

And he was clearly terrified. He looked at Ayesha and the other party guests, the skeletons and ghouls and witches dancing round the bonfire, as if he were in a madhouse and expected the occupants to attack him.

‘Hello,' she said, feeling sure that this apparition had something to do with Matt.

But the man was incapable of saying anything. And then she saw what he was holding.

‘What are you doing with Matt's book?' she asked sharply. She moved to take it from him, forgetting that she was wearing long, pointed false black nails. The man flinched. Then her spiderweb necklace swung forward and the man's eyes rolled up inside his head leaving just the whites showing, briefly, before he vanished, still holding the book.

Luciano rode straight home from Filippo's palazzo and found the three other Stravaganti waiting for him with Cesare. He quickly told them what had happened.

‘Enrico's still watching Filippo's place,' he said. ‘But we've got to get Matt out of there. I saw Rinaldo's coach in the stables and you know what happened when he kidnapped me.'

He was very pale, reliving his own agony of more than two years ago. He didn't know what would happen to Matt if he was unable to stravagate home but he wasn't prepared to take any chances, after what had happened to him. And Matt had gone to the palazzo on his behalf.

‘I wish I'd never agreed to the substitution plan,' he said, furiously tugging his hair.

Rodolfo came and laid a hand on his shoulder.

‘We must plan his rescue carefully,' he said. ‘We must save not only Matt but his talisman or he won't be able to get home.'

*

Rinaldo was kneeling over the prostrate Filippo and the servant, appalled by what he had done, dashed out of the door, leaving it open behind him. Matt saw his chance and took it.

His arms were bound to the chair behind him but his legs were free and he stood up and stumbled out of the room. Down one flight of stairs, fearing any minute that he would trip and tumble to the bottom, he heaved himself round and smashed the spindly chair to firewood against the banister. The rope fell in coils round his feet but his wrists were still bound. And he could hear Rinaldo shouting from the floor above, raising the alarm.

I've got to get out, he thought, shaking drops of blood and wine off his face. They'll kill me if they catch me.

It was easier getting down the rest of the stairs now that he wasn't encumbered by the chair but it was still difficult to keep his balance with his wrists bound. He could hear footsteps running up the stairs towards him, so pushed at doors along the corridor until he found one that yielded when he barged it.

It was a bed-chamber, not large by di Chimici standards but still three times the size of Matt's own room at home. He had no idea whose room it was but he had three aims: to stay hidden, to untie his wrists and to find some clothes before he was arrested for indecent exposure.

He could hear his pursuers going up the stairs to the top floor amid lots of shouting. He decided that it was safe to explore the room. The bed was high and elaborate, with brass knobs at the corners. With great effort and after lots of tries, Matt managed to lower his wrists over the bedpost and work the rope until the knots gave way. It was excruciatingly painful, since the bonds were quite tight.

Just the freedom of getting out of his bonds filled him with relief, even though he was still inside the di Chimici palace, with no clothes, his talisman taken and with his face throbbing and bloody. A search of the bedroom showed it held no clothes; it didn't seem to be currently occupied.

Cautiously, Matt opened the door, whose flimsy lock he had broken, and peered down the corridor. Now that he had the use of his hands, he could turn doorknobs and soon found an even grander bed-chamber.

Result! he thought. This room was obviously being used. There were no wardrobes – Talians didn't seem to go in for them – but there was a deep wooden chest, which proved to be full of clothes. Matt found breeches and a shirt, ridiculously ruffled and embroidered. No shoes or hat and he drew the line at what looked like a pair of men's tights, but at least he was decent now, even if the sixteenth-century clothes were a bit tight on his twenty-first century frame.

Again he peered out. He heard Rinaldo's high voice ordering the servants to search every room of the palazzo.

‘And one of you go straight to the stables, in case he's already got there. He won't be able to ride, though – his arms are tied.'

Sorry, Cara, thought Matt. You'll have to be collected later. He waited behind the door until the footsteps of the man deputed to go to the stables had passed him on the stairs, rubbing his wrists and feeling his face stiffen. He would soon be a mass of bruises.

Then he ran down the stairs as lightly as he could, every sense alert for the sound of pursuit but the servants were obviously searching the rooms on the floor above. He got within sight of the front door before spotting the footman who had remained on duty there. It was the same one who had been snooty to Luciano but Matt didn't know that. He just hated him for being there between him and the door. Matt froze on the stairs and hid behind the thick newel post at the bottom.

It would not be long before the searchers reached this floor. Not stopping to think, Matt waited till the man was looking away, then reached him in three strides and caught him round the throat from behind. He put his other hand over the man's mouth to stop him from calling out, turned him round and, saying, ‘Sorry, mate,' hit him hard.

The footman crumpled and Matt felt really bad. He knew just exactly how much that had hurt. Then he noticed that the man had quite big feet. Quickly he slipped off the footman's shoes and buckled them on to his own feet; they weren't too bad a fit.

Then he wrenched open the door and raced towards the cathedral square.

*

‘There now,' said Rinaldo. ‘You'll be all right in a minute. Have some wine. You were only unconscious for a few seconds.'

Filippo struggled into a sitting position, supported by the Cardinal's arm. He looked wildly into his cousin's face.

‘I did it,' he said. ‘I went there.'

‘You're delirious,' said Rinaldo. ‘You didn't go anywhere. You were knocked out and only for a few moments, as I said.'

‘You don't understand,' said Filippo impatiently, holding out the book. ‘There was a beautiful witch. Beautiful, but terrible. She was draped in spiders.'

Rinaldo shook his head. Filippo was babbling, clearly having had a nightmare in the brief period for which he had been knocked out.

‘It was the other world, I tell you,' said Filippo. ‘And it is a dreadful place, full of spirits and magicians.'

‘A dream, Filippo,' said Rinaldo. ‘That's all it was. That stupid servant of yours . . .'

‘Where's the boy?' asked Filippo, trying to stand.

‘I'm afraid he got out,' said Rinaldo. ‘But don't worry. The palazzo is being searched. We'll soon have him again.'

‘It was the other world,' insisted Filippo, feeling dizzy. ‘The world of the Stravaganti. The beautiful sorceress recognised the book. She asked me why I had it. “Matt's book”, she called it.'

‘Really?' said Rinaldo, excited now. ‘You think you have found the secret? How did you do it?'

‘I don't know,' said Filippo, trying to shake the fuzziness out of his head. ‘Perhaps you have to hold a book while someone hits you?'

The Cardinal felt so frustrated he would have been happy to oblige any time.

Chapter 21

The Day of the Dead

Matt's arrival at Silvia's house caused a sensation. He found four Stravaganti and Cesare planning his rescue but their conference broke up abruptly when they saw him.

‘Matt!' cried Luciano. ‘Your face! What have those bastards done to you?'

‘Given me a pretty thorough working over,' said Matt, grimacing. It hurt to talk. His lips were swollen and bleeding and both eyes beginning to close up. He was going to have the most almighty pair of shiners by the end of the day and he just hoped they wouldn't be visible in his own world. If he could even get to his world.

‘I didn't tell them anything,' he said, trying hard not to let his voice crack. ‘But they've got the talisman.'

Rodolfo sent Alfredo to bring warm water and cloths to bathe Matt's wounds.

‘How did you get away?' asked Luciano.

‘The servant who was beating me up missed and knocked Filippo out,' said Matt. It made him want to smile but he couldn't without his face hurting. ‘So I legged it out of there. Had to steal some clothes, though. And I . . . I had to hit the footman to get out the front door.'

‘Good,' said Luciano, clenching his fists. ‘I felt like hitting him myself, the stuck-up sod.'

‘But how am I going to get back?' said Matt. ‘It must be the middle of the night by now and my parents will know I didn't come back from the party. And if they ask anyone who was there, they'll know I never went to it.' Panic was rising in his throat. ‘And if they go into my room, won't they find me unconscious?'

‘Nay, ladde,' said Dethridge, putting his hand on Matt's arm. ‘Lette us deal first with the first thinges. Alfred here moste bathe thy woundes. Thenne truste us thatte we shall get ye home.'

Matt didn't know how they would do it. But for the first time since he had been captured, he suddenly felt sure that they would.

As it happened, Matt's parents were not worrying about him. While his body lay apparently sleeping on top of his bed in his underwear, Jan had gone to bed assuming that he was at the party as planned and that she just hadn't heard him call out goodbye. When Andy got in from the opera house and had his usual late night meal and drank pints of mineral water and orange juice, he had found a note from Jan saying, ‘Don't lock up, Matt at Hallowe'en party.'

So he had left the front door unbolted and gone to bed.

Ayesha was quite another matter. She knew what she had seen at the party and was desperate to find out what it meant. As soon as Filippo had vanished, she looked desperately round the figures flickering in the firelight, looking for the ones she knew to be Stravaganti.

Alice was not best pleased when she found them.

‘Can't we have one night out without talking about stravagation and Talia and . . . and weird stuff?' she protested when Ayesha dragged Sky, Nick and Georgia off to the kitchen, outside the immediate range of the loudspeakers. There was still a heavy thudding underlining Ayesha's frantic attempts to explain what she had seen.

‘Who could it have been?' Georgia asked Nick, ignoring Alice.

Ayesha stared at Nick. ‘He didn't look totally unlike you,' she said. ‘Older, early twenties, I'd say. But he had the same sort of nose and cheekbones. Only he was wearing fancy clothes.' She lowered her voice. ‘A bit like, you know, that Lucien when he came here.'

‘Definitely Talian then,' said Sky.

‘And probably a di Chimici,' said Georgia. ‘You're sure it was Matt's book he was holding?'

‘Absolutely,' said Ayesha. ‘I couldn't mistake it.'

‘Of course it was a di Chimici,' said Nick. ‘Who else but a member of my family would steal someone's talisman and try to use it to get here? It must have been one of my cousins. Or maybe my brother Fabrizio.'

‘The thing is,' said Ayesha. ‘Whoever it might be, it looks as if he succeeded, at least for a few moments.'

‘And whoever it is has got Matt's talisman,' said Georgia. ‘That means he can't get back.'

Nick looked stricken. ‘We've got to help him,' he said.

‘But how can we?' asked Sky. ‘My talisman and Nick's take us to Giglia,' he explained to Ayesha. ‘And Georgia's takes her to Remora. We couldn't get to Padavia and back before nightfall.'

Ayesha looked blank.

‘He means daybreak,' said Georgia. ‘Night and day are reversed between there and here.'

‘So there's nothing we can do?' said Ayesha in despair.

‘I'm sure the Stravaganti in Padavia are all working to get him back,' said Georgia.

‘And there
is
something we can do,' said Nick. ‘We can go round to his and look after that end of things.'

‘Don't be daft,' said Sky. ‘How can we get in? His parents will be in bed and, even if they aren't, how can we just show up and say, “I think your son might be lying comatose in his room and we'd like to look after him till he regains consciousness”? They'd go spare.'

‘I've got a key,' said Ayesha, taking her key-ring out of her black sequinned bag.

Enrico eyed Matt's face with an almost professional air.

‘You look horrible,' he said.

‘You're no oil painting yourself!' said Matt, wincing. ‘At least I've been beaten up.'

Alfredo had done his best with hot water, warm cloths and a tincture of arnica. But if anything, Matt looked worse: the arnica turned a sort of orangey-purple on his skin, mottling his face with a second layer of bruises.

Enrico had followed him back from Filippo's, guessing correctly that Luciano wouldn't need him to stay there any more.

As soon as Alfredo had finished ministering to Matt, he busied himself providing lunch for everyone, never happier than when the house was full of unexpected guests.

An argument was raging among the Stravaganti about how to get Matt home.

‘I must go and get him another talisman,' said Constantin, white-lipped. ‘One from his world.'

‘But it will be the middle of the night there,' said Luciano. ‘You'd be completely disoriented. And what are you going to find as a talisman at that hour? A takeaway kebab? Let me go. I know people there. There are three Stravaganti who would give me something, let alone my parents.'

‘And I'll goe with ye,' said Dethridge. ‘I am tired of staying here, keping out of the waye of daungere.'

‘I wouldn't say you were doing that,' said Constantin. ‘No Stravagante is beyond danger in this city, at this time.'

‘You are all forgetting something,' said Rodolfo. ‘This is not a case like Luciano's where a new talisman from the other world can take Matt back. His body is still in both worlds. He can't get back without the spell-book.'

There was a horrified silence. It was broken by Enrico.

‘Then I'm your man,' he said cheerfully. ‘I'll steal it for you.'

He held up a hand to still the chorus of protests.

‘Which of you here has ever stolen anything?' he asked.

There was silence.

‘I thought not. Look, I know Rinaldo di Chimici; he'd let me into his place and I bet Filippo would too if the Cardinal's still there.'

‘Let me help,' said Cesare. ‘I can't stravagate but I can do anything that would help at this end.'

Rodolfo was looking hard at Enrico. ‘I don't know how it is that that you have gained Luciano's confidence,' he said. ‘But I don't forget that you tried to kill my wife. Why should we trust you?'

‘But I didn't, did I?' said Enrico. ‘It was
my
wife I killed – at least the woman who was going to be my wife. And I got rid of the Duke. Where would the young Cavaliere be today if I hadn't switched the foils?'

No one felt very comfortable with this view of the situation. Both Cesare and Luciano had been captured by this man and most of them knew what he was capable of.

‘I'm not claiming to be a reformed character,' said Enrico, looking round at them. ‘As I told the Cavaliere, it's just that I don't want to work for the di Chimici any more. That's when my troubles began, spying for that Rinaldo. His Eminence, as he is now.'

‘I think perhaps we have to trust him,' said Constantin. ‘He's our only chance of getting the talisman back.'

‘Agreed,' said Rodolfo reluctantly. He turned to Enrico. ‘But if you betray us, I shall search you out wherever you are and you will regret it.'

Alice had gone home in disgust. Sky was torn in two but, in the end, he put her into a taxi outside his house and paid the driver in advance. Then he put a note through the door to let his mother know he'd be staying over at Matt's. The other three texted home with the same message. Then set out for Matt's house.

‘This is crazy,' said Sky. ‘Even with your key, how can so many of us get in without their hearing us?'

‘It'll be all right, as long as we get into his room,' said Ayesha. ‘We can say in the morning that he let us crash after the party.'

‘Well, that will work if he wakes up,' said Georgia.

Still, it was a tense time, unlocking the front door and crowding into the entrance hall.