The Alchemist's Pursuit

26

Jacopo did get a surprise, but not quite in the way I expected. I was surprised, too, although I should have been forewarned by the witless expressions on the faces of the twins, Corrado and Christoforo, who were lurking in the salone outside the atelier door.

To start with, Nostradamus was on the wrong side of the fireplace, sitting very upright in one of the green chairs. Secondly, he was socializing in a most atypical manner with the person beside him in the other, but even he cannot avoid being charmed by Violetta when she exerts herself. I had passed on his instructions that she was to wear something provocative and the result had the impact of a Jovian thunderbolt. The square-cut neckline on her gown of crimson and silver silk extended halfway to her bellybutton and the lace bodice under it was a cover in name only. The skirts were as sheer as a dawn mist. She rose and curtseyed to Jacopo when I introduced him. His eyes bulged as if he had a severe case of goiter.

I had my hand on my sword hilt. If she blurted out that they had met before, back when he called himself Zorzi, he might attack her or try to flee. She did not, though, and the moment of danger passed. He bowed to her.

I saw him settled in the red chair and went to the desk to record the match, which ought to be a walkover. The odds were terrible. He had a clear view of Violetta and if he could keep his mind on the Maestro's questions at the same time, then he was not the hot-blooded adolescent he was supposed to be. Violetta was not there just to distract him, although that might be a useful side benefit.

Yes, primarily she had been brought in to identify Zorzi, in case that was Jacopo's real name. With that possibility now disposed of, Nostradamus still had a second string to his bow, which is quite typical of the way his mind works. Violetta was being set up as bait for Honeycat. Did she know? I did not comment, but nor did I bother to hide my anger when I caught the Maestro's eye. He ignored it, waiting while I organized paper and pens. When I dipped my quill, he began.

"I hope you do not object to signorina Violetta's presence here, signor Fauro. She has an interest in this investigation."

Jacopo laughed. "Who could possibly object to the presence of such a goddess? I shall drag out this meeting for as long as I possibly can. And I must say that I am deeply honored to meet a man whose fame has spread all over Europe." He was holding his own so far.

I wrote it all down-not with my normal penmanship, and much abbreviated, but within my powers to turn into an accurate transcription.

"Donna Alina retained me to investigate the death of your honored father, and I was already looking into the death of Lucia da Bergamo for signorina Violetta."

"Poor Lucia was a friend of mine," Violetta explained sadly.

They were overdoing it. The message they wanted to convey was that Violetta was a courtesan, and Jacopo would have to be a babe in arms not to know that just from her dress.

"I regret that I was not familiar with the lady," he said blandly.

"Lucia," said the Maestro, "was one of at least four courtesans recently murdered in the city. It appears that all of these deaths are related."

"You think Zorzi has returned to Venice and is murdering more people?"

The Maestro stretched his lips in what he thinks of as a smile. "That would be the implication if I believed that your brother committed the first murder, but I don't. What exactly is your position in the Michiel household, signor Fauro?"

"Galley slave."

Violetta grinned encouragingly.

The Maestro said, "Be more explicit."

"Kennel boy, then. I have been page, drudge, and gardener. When my beard grew in, they were all ready to give me a couple of ducats and throw me out into the world to seek my fortune, but at the last minute the harridan decided she needed a cavaliere servente. I am much more servente than cavaliere, and there is no romantic aspect to my duties, but I put up with her, which nobody else can."

"When did that happen?"

"Two weeks before Christmas."

"And your responsibilities?"

He shrugged. "Fetch and carry, write letters, read to her, cut her toenails, count the ornaments-she is convinced the servants are stealing from her all the time-shop for her, listen to the same stories a hundred times, dust the tops of the pictures… Very exciting. It wouldn't be so bad if she went out once in a while, to the theater or dinner parties, but she never does."

I set aside a sheet, reached for another, and numbered it. The Maestro paused to make sure I was keeping up.

Then, "You are no relation of hers."

"No, Doctor."

"She pays you well."

"So she should. Galley slaves at least get fresh air and exercise."

"To excess," the Maestro agreed. "Do you recognize this book?" He had been hiding it behind him in the chair.

Leaning back, Jacopo crossed his legs. Then he folded his arms, which is another defensive gesture. If I noticed it, the Maestro surely did. The knife was drawing closer to the quick.

"It looks like donna Alina's diary. She went looking for it this morning and it had disappeared."

"Tell us about that," the Maestro said with another snaky smile. "When Alfeo arrived this morning, his letter was brought to you?"

"No. Last night sier Bernardo decreed that only he or sier Domenico would have any dealings with you or your apprentice. This morning he was out, so the letter went to Dom. He came to ask me what it meant-ask both of us, because I was with the hag in her reception room, writing up her rent books. She rushed into her bedroom and looked in the casket where she keeps the book and it wasn't there. She went into screaming convulsions."

"You mean that literally?"

"Literally, she threw a tantrum."

"Hysteria?" the Maestro said sadly.

"I am not familiar with the word."

"Extreme emotional agitation caused by a disorder of the uterus. This is Tuesday. I have good reason to believe that the diary was removed on Sunday. She cannot be a very keen diarist."

Jacopo uncrossed his legs uneasily. "I have never seen her write in it. Her fingers are so swollen now… I've never seen inside it. She called it her diary, that's all I know. And if that is what you are holding, then you are in possession of stolen property, Doctor Nostradamus."

"Not necessarily. I was given it as a gift, by Sister Lucretzia."

I almost jumped out of my chair. Why had he revealed that? It was a shocking breach of faith.

Jacopo frowned suspiciously. "I don't believe it! Why would my sister do a thing like that?"

"I don't know why."

"I tried to get into the convent to ask her," Violetta volunteered. "But I was turned away. I wrote a letter, but so far she has not replied." She sighed. "The abbess may have intercepted it, of course."

"She stole it!" Jacopo insisted, still staring at the book. "Her mother would never have given it to her, or even let her look at it."

The Maestro flashed a glance at me to see if I was keeping track of lies. I nodded. "Who else in the Palazzo Michiel keeps a diary?" he demanded.

"I think Bernardo does, just political stuff I think. No one else."

"Do you get much time off, signor Fauro?"

"Me?" Jacopo laughed. "If I ever do get an evening to myself, may I call on you, donna Violetta?"

She gave him a smile that promised all the pleasures of the Sultan's harem. "I would love that, but my evenings are mostly spoken for well in advance."

"I am told," the Maestro said quickly, before the conversation could slip away from his control, "that you are a ladies' man."

"Far from it," Jacopo said. "I am not quite a virgin, but kitchen maids are the extent of my experience, and few of them."

The Maestro sighed. "Alfeo? How many have you detected so far?"

"I have lost count, master. According to Domenico, 'He sows enough wild oats to feed the Cossack cavalry.' Donna Alina's hands look extremely healthy and she moves them naturally. Signor Jacopo says that she never goes out, but she spoke to me of furniture she had seen in friends' houses. He claims ignorance of the book's contents, yet he says it was not suitable for his sister the nun. He says he was a gardener, but he knows enough of the Greek Classics to refer to the maenads. He told me he is a partner in the family business, but he eats in the kitchen and the rest of the family call him a servant. I don't know if anything he ever says is true."

"Jacopo," the Maestro said, demoting him to servant status, "this book contains the names of many courtesans, including all four who were murdered in the last month."

The cords in Jacopo's neck tightened. "They were not murdered by me!"

That was certainly true of the last victim, Marina Bortholuzzi, because the killer I had tackled on the grass of the Campo San Zanipolo had not been Jacopo Michiel.

"You dress like an Ascension Day parade," Nostradamus said contemptuously. "Are you suggesting that donna Alina Orio showers gold on you just for reading to her and cutting her toenails?"

Jacopo seemed to swell, making me think of a young bull being tormented by a scrawny old rooster.

"Yes! Yes! I'm the only one who cares for her at all. Her own children keep her locked away and ignore her. I'm all she has, and I think she likes to make believe that I'm Zorzi come back to her. I'm about the age he was when it happened. What if she is deluded? It's her own money and if she wants to spend it on me so I can dress up like a young nobleman, what crime is that? Did you drag me here just to accuse me of dressing well?"

The Maestro ignored the outburst. "The first time Alfeo called at Palazzo Michiel to speak with sier Bernardo, he was kept waiting more than two hours. When he was shown the door, you were waiting outside for him. How did you know who he was and that Bernardo was not going to receive him?"

Jacopo unfolded his arms, spread his palms. "One of the footmen pointed him out to me. That was Alfeo Zeno, he said, helper to the great clairvoyant Nostradamus…"

"So you went and told donna Alina?"

"I was on my way to her already. Yes, I told her. I remarked that it seemed very strange that sier Bernardo would snub him so."

"You did not think to ask Bernardo why?"

"Rugs do not question feet."

"But then?" Nostradamus said. "Then, after Alfeo had been received by donna Alina, and you were showing him out, you said… Alfeo?"

"He told me," I said, "and I quote, 'Your mention of the Honeycat name was tactfully done. We were all terrified that you would tell the old bag about the murdered courtesans and make her convulse.' "

Jacopo had twisted around to look at me. He turned back to snap at the Maestro. "That was last week! You expect me to remember the exact words we were speaking?"

"Alfeo does, and I recall him telling them to me, because they made little sense then and less now. Either you are lying about the footman or you were conspiring with Bernardo and possibly Domenico. Which was it?"

"I don't remember trivia," Jacopo said sulkily. "I'm not your precious Alfeo."

"No. I think you are getting very tangled. Try telling the truth for a little while."

"I did tell you the truth. I just tidied it up a little in order to be tactful. If you want the raw facts, I was helping Domenico when Bernardo received your letter and came to show it to him. They agreed that you were an interfering busybody charlatan, that you were probably hoping to blackmail us, and that your gutter-feeding barnabotto messenger boy was a disgrace to his ancestry and did not deserve an answer. And they ordered me to have nothing to do with him, either."

Nostradamus beamed. "Splendid! See how refreshing it is? Keep it up. So you went and told donna Alina?"

"Of course. She's been driven crazy by a lifetime in captivity. She told me to intercept him outside. It made her day."

"What changed in December?"

"December?"

"Why did donna Alina suddenly decide she needed a cavaliere servente two weeks before Christmas? She had lived eight years a widow without one?"

Jacopo shrugged his heavy shoulders. "Yes. I don't know. She took pity on me, maybe. I told you they were going to throw me out at the end of the month."

"You don't know? Her decision saved you at the very edge of the precipice and you didn't make it your business to find out why? You snoop and sneak and eavesdrop. You spy and pry and lie. What changed in December?"

"Nothing I know of except I got a job."

"Who killed Gentile?"

"Zorzi."

"Rubbish! He would never have used a family heirloom as a weapon. According to what you told Alfeo, it was you who informed the Ten that the khanjar dagger was missing-not the Ten directly, perhaps, but you blabbed it out in front of witnesses. What witnesses? Why were you present? Who put you up to it?"

"Oh, this is ridiculous!" Jacopo said. "I don't remember. I was twelve years old and had just lost my father. The family was being brutal because he was no longer around to protect me. The servants were sneering that I would be sent away. I'm told that I told someone, but I don't remember doing so. I was only a kid."

"You knew that someone in the family had killed your father with that dagger. Obviously it was his wife, because she was never allowed out and had to use the only weapon she could find. Zorzi fled into exile to protect her."

Silence.

"Why don't you answer?"

"You didn't ask a question. If she killed him, why has she hired you to prove that Zorzi didn't?"

"I can explain that, but I won't. First, do you know what an accomplice is, Jacopo? Or what a conspiracy is?"

"I'm not a lawyer."

"Nor am I. But someone in that house is showering you with money so you can bull your way around the flophouses of Venice, hunting for certain women. Their names come out of this book. Once you have found them, they die. Once might be coincidence. Four times means you are as guilty as the killer. You are an accomplice both before and after the fact. Your head will roll on the Piazzetta. Where were you last Saturday night?"

"In a flophouse. With two girls and Zaneto, our chief boatman. The bed was quite crowded at times."

I assumed that the truth had just changed again, but keeping up with the recording was taking too much of my attention to leave me time for analyzing.

"The women are kitchen maids by day, I suppose," Nostradamus said acidly. "You arranged an alibi for each one of the murders, I am sure. Don't waste your breath denying it. Possibly everyone in the family does, because the actual murders are committed by a hired killer. Do you know his name?"

Jacopo stood up. "You are pigheaded stupid, old man."

"Are they all in it, or just one of them?"

Silence.

"You see, Jacopo," the Maestro said, "nobody wants Zorzi back. Domenico and Bernardo would have to share the fraterna; their mother would get beheaded for murder, and you would be out of a job. That's why the women are dying-because Zorzi was with one of them that night and she can give him an alibi. Without that he dare not return."

This was very much what I had suggested the previous day and been mocked for. Jacopo was not the only one spinning yarns.

"You asked why donna Alina hired me to expose the real killer. Because to clear Zorzi's name, I must find the woman who can give him an alibi. Remember that Alina insisted that my contract be changed-you yourself wrote in the change. She wants to be the first one I inform of that woman's identity. Then the witness will be exterminated before the Ten's sbirri can get to her. Understand?"

Jacopo folded his arms, but he towered over the Maestro and Violetta in their chairs, and I dropped my pen, bracing myself to leap to their defense if necessary.

"This is sewage, pure sewage!" he said. "You are crazy. How can you possibly find a particular whore, not just on the morning after but eight years after?"

"I have found her. The last companion named in this book," the Maestro continued, "is 'Tonina Q.' Zorzi spent the night before the murder with Tonina, but she is mentioned many times before that, and I have established that he did, in fact, visit her the following night also. That fact was not recorded in the book, doubtless because of the tragic event that occurred then. Tonina was married and not a courtesan, but her first name really was Tonina, Tonina Civran."

"It's not as glamorous as 'Violetta Vitale,' " Violetta said.

I realized my jaw had fallen open, and closed it. Fortunately she was looking down at her hands, not at me. "I was very young and very poor, so I was married off to a man very old and very rich. Then I met Zorzi, who showed me what I lacked. We were so in love… I simply cannot describe the difference he made to my life. It was spring after winter, it was daybreak. After his father's murder, he insisted I must not come forward to testify, but I was terrified that he might be accused of the killing. I went to my husband and told him what had happened. I said that I would have to report this to the Ten. He ordered me out of his house-but by then Zorzi had already fled to the mainland. After that I needed to earn a living, and I knew only one way I could do it." She gave Jacopo a wistful smile.

He made a skeptical noise, which I was hard put not to echo. "And just how did Doctor Nostradamus find you?"

"I found him. I live next door in Number Ninety-six. Alfeo and I are friends. When my friend Lucia was murdered, I asked the doctor to hunt down the killer for me, and that murder turned out to be related to Gentile Michiel's. Venice is not so enormous that such things cannot happen." Smile again, sadder than before.

I did not believe a word. She had never been Tonina Civran. The Maestro had put her up to this; it was worse than merely using her as bait. It was human sacrifice.

"So she will clear your brother's name," the Maestro said. "Alfeo, when will you have the report ready for the Ten?"

"Not long, master," I said, not knowing what answer he wanted.

"Good. Go and tell your mistress, Jacopo, that I shall send Alfeo over with my report this evening. If she wants to catch the next traghetto across to Mestre first, that is her privilege, but I shall claim my fee."

Jacopo took a step closer, young and big and angry. I gathered my feet under me, ready to leap if he made a hostile move.

"You're a wrinkled old fraud," he told the Maestro. "That Basilica was swarming with priests and nuns. I have two other siblings who could have taken that dagger, and at least one of them was in the Basilica that night." He turned and strode over to the door.

"Wait! Jacopo, do you know the meaning of the word 'entailed'?"

He turned, glowering. "Tell me."

"It refers to property that can only change hands by inheritance. Donna Alina inherited her wealth when her brothers died in the plague. No matter what she may have promised you, those lands and buildings must pass to her own children when she dies. Any documents she may have given you regarding them are worthless."

He did not change color, for anger had already made him pale, but the blow hurt. "What do you know of it? You're lying!"

"No, I am not the one who is lying. Ask your brothers if you don't believe me. Jacopo, you are very naive compared to them. They let your mother squander wealth on you, but they can put a stop to that whenever they want, and they can drop you like an anchor whenever they want. You still have time to go to the chiefs of the Ten and tell them what you have done. Alfeo will go with you and deliver the book as evidence. I am sure Their Excellencies will be merciful if you go now, before they send the sbirri for you."

Jacopo spun around and threw the door open. I sprang up and followed him out. The twins were still there, still hoping for a glimpse of Violetta when she left, and a long, lingering stare would be even nicer.

I told them, "Tell your father we need… Never mind." Giorgio was already hurrying along the hall. I bowed to our departing guest. He had been entertaining, if not enlightening. "Giorgio will see you home, lustrissimo. Hopefully we shall meet again this evening." I opened the front door.

"Don't count on being let in," he said.

"Signor Fauro?" Violetta called, emerging from the atelier. "You won't mind if the doctor's boatman drops me off at my door?" Awkward on her pillar shoes, she reached for his arm, and of course he offered it. She rewarded him with a smile that made the twins sigh audibly and almost made me choke.

I wanted to hurl him down the stairs rather than let her touch him. I wanted to scream at her to be careful, because she had been chained to the rock like Andromeda, fodder for the monster.