Niccolo Rising (33 page)

“And what,” said Tobie, “if your godfather launches his Crusade, and it takes Constantinople back from the Turks?”

Messer da Castro looked surprised. “Then I may return to my trading there if it suits me. And Messer Bartolomeo will be able to continue without Turkish taxes. A happy outcome.”

“If he survives,” Tobie said. “What does he trade in? Is he a dyer as well?”

Again, the pause. Again, Laudomia Acciajuoli supplied the answer. She said, “Bartolomeo is from Venice. You may think it hard to justify a kinsman who cleaves to the heathen. But the Sultan favours Venetian traders. The Sultan permits them their own customs and worship, and in return they pay highly. Bartolomeo buys raw silk from the East, and sells or exchanges it in Constantinople for woven silk from dealers like Messer Marco here. He is also much concerned with alum.”

“
Alum?
” said Tobie, He cleared his throat.

Laudomia Acciajuoli looked at him. She said, “I thought his brother possibly told you. Bartolomeo controls the alum mines of Phocoea for the Sultan.”

Claes, you bastard, thought Tobie. And dear uncle Giammatteo over there, studying the roof-beams. What am I in? What do they think I’m in? What do I do? Continue as if nothing had happened. Tobie said, “I can see why you must be hoping for a crusade.”

“Or another source of alum,” said Monna Laudomia. “That is your great dream, is it not, Messer Giovanni? That the Pontiff your godfather will allow you the means to prospect for minerals in his territory? Think what it would mean if alum were found!”

The Pope’s godson rose. He said, “It is, I am afraid, a remote chance at the moment. Monna Laudomia, Messer Agnolo, I must take my leave.”

Tobie was not surprised. He played his part in the leave-taking and stood absently watching his host escort the Pope’s godson from the room. His uncle, smiling in a way he did not like, made a business of seating himself again, and after a moment, Tobie did so as well. Claes, when he shot a killing glance at him, was seated between Marco Parenti and his wife, and they were all talking Italian.

The cardplaying Frenchman had taken a stool next to Tobie’s uncle. Tobie’s uncle leaned over and said, “Tobias. You haven’t met M. Gaston du Lyon.”

“On the contrary,” said M. Gaston du Lyon. “M. Tobias and I had a snowy encounter some days ago, and he is asking himself why I was travelling with Englishmen.”

At the moment, Tobie didn’t want to think what the answer might be. He said, “I hope you were none the worse for the soaking.”

“I was not harmed in the slightest. No, I was merely riding with my
lord of Worcester for safety. He was under the impression, I think, that I was a loyal citizen of King Charles of France making my devout way to Rome.”

“But Claes knew who you were?” said Tobie.

“I should be annoyed if he did. No, he did not. He has been, if not penitential, at least polite on learning my identity.”

“Which is?” Tobie said.

“Oh, I am French,” said M. Gaston. “But I serve not the French king but his exiled son the Dauphin. I am chamberlain to the Dauphin Louis, and am come on leave to Milan for the jousting in February. I live for jousting. It is my great joy.”

“It isn’t mine. I spend too much time repairing the victims,” said Tobie. He thought of the avalanche. He thought of Claes, so obligingly patching up pumps, and picking up all the Savoy gossip. Whatever the naive M. Gaston might think, Tobie for one was sure that Claes had known exactly whom M. Gaston represented. Before the avalanche, too.

Tobie felt agitated: even trapped. The conversation between Claes and the pretty girl and her husband had broken up. Suddenly Claes was standing between each and calling him over. “Master Tobias! You met Messer Marco and his wife. Do you know who she is? She is Lorenzo’s sister!”

“Lorenzo?” said Tobie.

“Lorenzo Strozzi! From the House of Strozzi in Bruges? They’ve just had a bereavement – a brother – and there are letters from Lorenzo for Monna Caterina and her mother this very moment in my satchel at the inn. She’ll have them tomorrow.” In deference to the bereavement, Claes’ face registered a sort of happy sympathy. He turned to the girl. “Lorenzo misses you so much. We cheer him up, but he needs to come back to Italy.”

“It is what I have always said,” said the girl. “My brother pines, Marco. He longs to have his own business.”

Claes looked interested. Messer Marco Parenti looked annoyed. Tobie, bent on extricating himself, heard the girl speak again, and Messer Marco muttering, “Not here. Not now,” in a husbandly way.

A hand gripped Tobie’s arm, and drew him aside. “Now,” said Tobie’s eminent uncle cordially in his ear, “do you not perceive the value of well-placed acquaintances? They have taken measure, in their own way, of the youth. I find him of interest. I congratulate you on your sponsorship. I have been able to tell Monna Laudomia that you, as my nephew, are the most reliable man they could find.”

“Could find for what?” said Tobie. “
Sponsorship?
I’ve nothing to do with Claes. What do they want him for?”

His uncle looked surprised. “His gifts,” he said. “You must know how much he was in demand when he left Bruges?” He paused. “And he really does know much more than he should do.”

Tobie thought of Quilico, and then decided that his uncle couldn’t possibly know about Quilico, who was so familiar with what grew by the Phocoea alum mines. And who was apt, in his cups, to talk about other, undiscovered alum mines to sick, cunning youths and their doctors. Then he realised that the professor might know all about Quilico if Claes had told him. But why would Claes tell him? “You will have to explain,” said Tobie carefully.

“Is this a physician who speaks?” said his uncle. “Diagnosis, my boy! You saw the cardplay. The youth absorbs languages, can manipulate numbers. What will such a man make of a private courier service?”

From pure relief, Tobie found himself smiling. So that was it. The courier service. He should have guessed as much. Tobie thought of the satchel Loppe carried everywhere on the journey, and the handsome letters with their threads and their seals. A person who carved intricate puzzles had a touch fine enough for a thief or a forger. And the cunning to disentangle other men’s writings. The men who created the ciphers in the ducal Chancery, in the Medici offices, were of this sort exactly.

Tobie said, smiling still, “They’re buying him off, or employing him? Or pretending to do both, while slipping something fatal into his winecup?”

“I expect they thought of that,” said his uncle mildly. “But not when they found he was a friend of my nephew. That was when they brought me in to advise them. I was, I am, happy to help.”

“A friend of mine?” Tobie said. “Thank you, but that lump is a dyer’s apprentice.”

“Well, you saved his life. Or so I’m told,” said his uncle. “And followed him to Milan. And showed an intelligent interest in a piece of information you picked up in Bruges. Or haven’t you even got the sense, turd, to realise what this is all about?”

The smile left Tobie’s face. He would never make assumptions again. They were not, after all, talking of nothing but a courier service. They were talking of alum, and they knew – even his uncle knew – a lot more than he did. And they were trying to implicate him. A profitable bargain with Claes was one thing. Being manipulated by the entire Acciajuoli clan (including possibly Claes) was another. Tobie said, “I see. Well, if they ask me, I’m having nothing to do with it.”

“Afraid?” said his uncle. “He’s not afraid, your young Niccolò.”

“He’s nothing to lose,” Tobie said.

“You have a point,” said his uncle. “But it hardly matters. You’re involved. You can’t get out anyway.”

“Allow me to differ,” said Tobie.

Tobie tried to leave twice after that, and was restrained twice by his uncle. Nobody asked him anything or offered him anything except food and drink and innocuous conversation, which maddened him further.
Denied a chance to explain, rebut or refuse, he contented himself with ignoring Claes wherever possible. It was an outrage that, when he finally managed to get away, his uncle should foist Claes upon him. They were returning to the same inn, Giammatteo pointed out. It was safer, after dark, for his nephew and the young man to walk there together. Messer Agnolo would lend them both a lantern.

Claes carried the lantern. Fuming, Tobie walked down the stairs ahead of him and crossed the courtyard. Claes jiggled the lantern. Tobie’s shadow leapfrogged from pillar to pillar and stalked grotesquely over walls, its chin in the air. When they got out into the street, Tobie swore aloud and, turning, stopped the youth by gripping his wrist. Then he pulled the lantern towards him and extinguished it.

The dim light of the Acciajuoli porch showed the reproach on Claes’ features. Claes said, “Now I can’t read the list.”

The doctor snapped. “What list?” Then of course, he remembered.

Claes was already undoing his purse. Silver glinted inside. Tobie said, still snapping, “You were playing for
money
?”

“It makes it more interesting,” Claes said. “They would have let me win, anyway.” He had a list in his hand. “Second column …”

“Second column from the left, third name down,” said Tobie. “Or that was last night, wasn’t it? In any case, don’t let me keep you. I’m going back to the inn.”

“Well, so am I,” said Claes. “But not yet. You can’t talk there. Third name down. It’s an apothecary’s shop near St Maria della Scala. Round the corner.”

“I don’t need to talk,” said Tobie. “I can tell you without moving a step that I’m having nothing to do with it.”

Relief spread over Claes’ face. “That’s what I hoped,” he said. “I’ve nothing against your uncle, but I’ve explained that I don’t need a partner. All we have to do now is think how to get you out.”

“I’m not in,” said Tobie, for the second time.

“Of course you’re not,” said Claes. “We just have to decide how to convince people. It won’t take five minutes, and then you needn’t think about the alum again.”

The alum. Well, it was worth five minutes to get this nonsense out of the way.

The apothecary’s was, of course, shuttered and dark. Tobie stood stiffly back while Claes delivered a few gentle tappings and finally, after a great rattling and scraping of bolts, the door opened a trifle. The man who let them in carried a candle. He seemed to be alone. At the back of the room was a truckle bed with a sag in it where he had been sitting, and a trestle table with a hunk of bread and some olives. At night, a lot of shops used an apprentice as guard-dog.

This was a bigger place than it seemed. Near the door was the apothecary’s selling-table, with the scales on it and a counting board and bags of counters and bowls. The drugs and spices most often used were
on the shelves behind that, in jars of glass and pewter and earthenware. A dirty mortar stood on a stool.

The smell was a choking mixture of medicated syrups and brimstone and salammoniac and ointment and turpentine mixed with pepper and ginger, cinnamon, anise and nutmegs, cloves and cummin and saffron. Tobie could smell comfits and paint, wax and perfume, vinegar and raisins. There was mustard somewhere, and oil of wormwood, and soap. Tobie sneezed.

“May God bless you,” said Claes. The man with the candle was leading them towards the back of the shop. They passed more shelves, and a cabinet, and some bales. Tobie sneezed again.

“May God bless you,” said Claes. “Is it asthma? Your uncle was treating the Duchess for asthma, he was telling me. And the Pope for his gout. He says the Pope is sitting this minute with a pipe of warm water trained on top of his head. Maybe that’s what you should have. He says the Pope has never been the same since he had that bad time in Scotland, and his feet froze and his teeth began to fall out. May God bless you. But not his hair. Long, golden curly hair. The Pope kept his hair a long time. May God bless you. You haven’t paid a visit to Scotland, Meester Tobie?”

They were entering a low door at the back of the shop. The strong scent got stronger. The ceiling was hanging with objects. Tobie brushed a bundle of herbs with his scalp, dodged, and was fetched a light blow by a pestle. Through the door he caught sight of a bed, a hanging curtain, and another bed. He turned on his heel.

Claes’ hand slipped inside his arm and wheeled him round again. Claes said, “There’s no one here. We have half an hour before anyone comes. They don’t understand Flemish.”

He drew Tobie into the room and shut the door behind the apothecary’s man. The bed and a low cushioned chest with a candle beside it were the only articles on this side of the curtain. Claes sat on the chest with his knees together. Tobie remained on his feet.

Tobie said, “Before we talk about how I get out, I want to talk about how I got in. Who brought my uncle into it?”

The youth’s large gaze was pacific. He said, “I expect it was the Greek with the wooden leg. When I didn’t take the post with the Venetian commander. He would write to his cousins the Acciajuoli and tell them all about you.”

“Why?” said Tobie. He sneezed, with passion.

“Because you were questioning Quilico. You remember. The galley doctor who’d worked in the Levant. He thought Quilico would make me interested in the colonies. He didn’t realise that he’d brought together a dyer and a doctor and an alum company man, and that we might make deductions. I expect he was quite worried,” said Claes. “I expect I should have had a little accident if he hadn’t found out who you were. Your uncle is a great man, isn’t he?”

“Never mind my uncle,” said Tobie. Without thinking, he sat on the bed. He said, “The Greek with the wooden leg. Did you know his brother had the Phocoea alum concession?”

“Not then,” said Claes. “I think Anselm Adorne did.”

“Adorne?” said Tobie. He retrieved Adorne from his memory. The fine-looking burgher in Bruges with the Jerusalem church and the kinsmen who were Doges of Genoa.

“Well, yes,” said Claes. “The Genoese have been running their Levantine trading posts for two hundred years. The Zaccharia, the Doria, the da Castro, the Camulio. Adorno has been one of the great names on Chios for nearly as long. If you’d been interested, you should have got to meet Prosper de Camulio, here in Milan. He knows as much about alum as anybody.”