Order Of Darkness - Fools' Gold Part 9

The merchant smiled. 'He would prefer Venice not to know his business,' he said. 'You will find me discreet, just as you asked me to be.'

'When will you get them?' Luca asked.

No one but Luca would have noticed the swift, almost invisible glance that went from the money changer towards the street-gambling girl's father, who was helping her pack up her game, quite unaware of the money changers. But Luca was watching the Jew as closely as he had watched Jacinta playing the cups and ball game.

'By tomorrow,' the man said. 'Or the next day.'

'Very good,' Luca said pleasantly. 'I'll come again tomorrow. Perhaps I'll have news of my s.h.i.+p then.'

'I hope so.' The merchant rose from his stool and bowed to the three men. 'And please, do not speak of your s.h.i.+p with others till we have concluded our business.'

They crossed the square together and got into the gondola, Freize throwing a casual smile and salute to Jacinta as they went by. The gondolier steered out into the middle of the ca.n.a.l, as Freize said quietly: 'Put me down on the far side. I'll stick to the merchant like glue and come home to report later.'

'Take care you're not seen,' Luca cautioned him.

'Carnival!' Freize said. 'I'll buy a mask and a cape.'

'Just follow him,' Luca said. 'Don't try to be a hero. Just follow and watch and then come home. I don't expect us to solve the mystery in one step. Things might not be as they appear.'

'This is Venice,' Brother Peter said miserably. 'Nothing is as it appears.'

As the two men set off for home in the gondola, Freize strolled back to the Rialto Bridge, pausing only to buy a handsome dark red cloak, a matching elaborate mask and a gloriously big red hat in one of the many stalls that lined the bridge. He put them on at once and went down the steep steps of the bridge into the Campo San Giacomo. Jacinta and her father had already finished for the day, and gone away. As Freize looked around he saw the money changer picking up his papers, locking them in his box and gesturing to his young guard to carry box and table away. He himself carried the two little stools.

With the enormous red hat bobbing gently on his head, and the mask completely obscuring his face, Freize was confident that he would not be recognised, but realised that he was rather noticeable even among the flamboyant carnival costumes, as he watched the money changer weave quietly through the crowds around the Rialto Bridge and make his way inland.

'Now then,' Freize admonished himself, pulling the hat off his head and crus.h.i.+ng the bobbing peak down into the brim and snapping off three overarching plumes, to make an altogether smaller and more modest confection. 'I think I made the mistaking of buying a hat out of vanity and not from discretion. But if I fold it like so . . .' He paused to admire the reduced shape. 'That's better, that's surely better now.'

Freize followed the money changer and his lad at a safe distance, ready to step into a doorway if the man looked round, but the old man went steadily onward and his page boy led the way, never looking back. They went down one dark street after another, twisting and turning around little alleyways to find the way to little wooden bridges, some of which had to be lowered by the young man for the merchant to cross, and then raised up again so that the water traffic was not delayed. At the larger ca.n.a.ls the pair had to wait at the steps leading down to the water for a flat-bottomed boat to ferry them across for the price of a piccoli. Freize stood behind them, shrinking into the shadows, waiting for them to cross and go on their way, before he whistled the boat back to ferry him over. He had to fall back and was afraid then that he had lost them, but he heard their footsteps echoing on the stone quayside as they went under a bridge, following the ca.n.a.l, and he could hurry after them, guided by the sound. It was a long and rather eerie walk, through the quiet dark back streets of the city with every path running alongside a dark silent ca.n.a.l, and the constant sound of the splash of water against weedy stone steps.

Freize was glad to arrive at a corner, just in time to see them knocking on the side door to a house on the very edge of the Venice ghetto, where the air was smoky and dark and the ca.n.a.ls were cloudy with the soil of the tanneries and stained with dye from cloth. All the dirty work of the city was done in this area, and the Jews of the city were confined here at night behind the ghetto walls and a bolted gate. Freize peered around a corner and saw the door of the house open, and in the candlelight that spilled out he saw the pretty young woman, Jacinta, admit the two men into the house.

'The gambling girl,' Freize remarked to himself. 'Now that's a little odd. There's no great fortune to be made taking small coins from playing cups and ball, and yet that's a pretty big house. And the money changer has come here as his first call when he wants a lot of gold n.o.bles.'

He pulled his big hat down over his mask and waited, leaning back in a darkened doorway. After nearly an hour the Jewish money changer came out, followed by his lad, and the two of them went through the narrow gate into the ghetto. Freize did not dare to follow, knowing that he would be conspicuous among all the dark-suited men who wore the round yellow badge. But he waited outside the gate and watched as the money changer and his boy turned sharply right, into a tall thin house that overlooked the dark ca.n.a.l. Over the doorway swung the three b.a.l.l.s, the ancient insignia of the money changer and lender.

'Hi, lad, tell me, who lives in there?' Freize asked a pa.s.sing errand boy, who was clattering along the street with some newly forged metal rings for barrels, slung like hoops over his shoulder.

Freize pointed at the house behind the ghetto gate, and the boy glanced back over his shoulder. 'Israel the moneylender,' he said shortly. 'He has a stall in the Campo San Giacomo, every day, or you can tap on the door and borrow money any time, night or day. They say he never sleeps. And if he ever did, his wealth is guarded by a golem.'

'A golem? What's that?'

'A monster made from dust, obedient to his every word. That's why n.o.body ever burgles his house. The golem is waiting for them. It has the strength of ten men, and he controls it by the word on its forehead. If he changes a letter of the word the golem crumbles to dust. But if the golem attacks you it goes on and on forever, until you are dead.'

'Inconvenient,' Freize commented, believing none of this. He fell into step beside the young man as they crossed the wider square outside the ghetto. 'And do you know who lives in that house?' He pointed to Jacinta's house, where the moneylender had visited for an hour.

The boy broke into a trot. 'I can't stop, I have to get these to the cooper by this afternoon.'

'But who lives there?'

'The alchemist!' the boy called back. 'Nacari, the alchemist, and the pretty girl that he says is his daughter.'

'Are they guarded by a golem?' Freize shouted after him in jest.

'Who knows?' the boy called back. 'Who knows what goes on in there? Only G.o.d, and He is far, far away from here!'

'And you are certain that they didn't see you?' Luca demanded. Freize was proudly reporting on his work as the group ate dinner together, the doors closed against eavesdroppers. Freize's plate was piled high: his reward to himself for good work well done.

'They did not, for I didn't go near the Nacari house. And I am certain that the money changer did not see me, nor his page boy.'

Luca looked at Brother Peter. 'And the boy on the street called Nacari an alchemist?'

Brother Peter shrugged. 'Why not? He's a street gambler, we know that for sure. He could equally be a magician or a trickster? A bloodletter, an unqualified physician, perhaps a dentist? A trader in old ma.n.u.scripts and in love potions? Who knows what he does? Certainly nothing known and certified with a proper licence from the Church.'

There was a silence. It was Isolde who said what everyone was thinking. 'And perhaps Drago Nacari is a coiner as well as everything else. Perhaps he's a forger.'

'We tested the coins ourselves,' Luca reminded her.

'That only proves that some of them are good.'

'But why would they make English gold n.o.bles?' Ishraq asked. 'Wouldn't he do better to make gold bars?'

'Not necessarily,' Brother Peter said. 'If you forged gold bars then most of your customers would buy them to have them worked at once, into gold goods or jewellery. That's when you'd be in danger of them discovering the base metal inside the bar. But if you forge perfect-looking coins, especially some with a persuasive story behind them English n.o.bles made in the Calais mint to pay the English soldiers it all makes sense, and you can release the coins onto the market. We know that they are traded against Venetian ducats at two to one. And the money changer said they were rising in price.'

'But we tested them,' Luca reminded him. 'Others must test them and find them good.'

'Perhaps they are very good forgeries,' Brother Peter said suspiciously. 'At any rate, no one says anything against them.'

'They're still rising in price,' Ishraq confirmed. 'I looked today. They're up again.'

Isolde shot her a quick smile. 'You are a trader,' she whispered.

'But what would such a man buy instead?' Luca wondered aloud. 'If you sell your forged gold coins? What do you buy with the profit? How do you take the profit?'

'Jewels,' Isolde guessed. 'Small things that you can easily take away if you get caught.'

'Books,' Ishraq volunteered. 'Alchemy books so that you can practice your art. Old ma.n.u.scripts, as we know he has. Precious ingredients for your craft.'

'Horses,' Freize said. 'So you can get away.'

Luca exchanged an affectionate glance with his friend. 'And because you'd always buy horses.'

Freize nodded. 'What would you buy?' he asked Brother Peter curiously.

'I'd buy ma.s.ses for my soul,' Brother Peter answered. 'What matters more?'

There was a brief respectful silence. 'Well, they don't look like wealthy people,' Freize said. 'There's the daughter working every morning in the street for handfuls of silver, and she's not wearing gold bracelets. She said she would gamble with me for a silk dress. She answered the door as if they didn't have a maid. But they have that big house. It doesn't add up.'

'How can we find out more?' Luca puzzled aloud. 'How can we find out what they're doing?'

'We could break in,' Ishraq volunteered. 'We know that they are out every morning, gambling at the Rialto. The father is always there with her, isn't he? And Freize thinks they have no maid.'

'They've been there every morning that we've seen so far,' Freize said cautiously. 'And he is coming here this afternoon. They have a ma.n.u.script to show Luca.'

'They asked me if I would look at it. I said you might be able to read it, if it is in Arabic,' Luca said to Ishraq.

'Is it about alchemy?'

'He said it was a mystery to him. But obviously it is something strange. He does not want to take it to the university nor to the Church.'

'Well, I can try to read it with you this afternoon. And tomorrow morning why don't you go to the square and gamble with them, keep them there, while I go to the house and break in?'

'You can't go alone,' Isolde said. 'I'll come with you.'

'No, that would be to walk straight into danger.' Luca was instantly against the idea.

'And immodest to go wandering round the streets of Venice in carnival time,' Brother Peter said crossly. 'We have already agreed that it shouldn't be done. The young women must stay indoors like Venetian ladies.'

'Carnival time is the very thing that makes it possible,' Ishraq replied. 'We can go disguised. I can dress as a young man and Freize can come with me as my servant. You and Brother Peter go and gamble, and since they have never seen Isolde, she can go separately from both of us and act as lookout. If they pack up early or start to come home, she gets ahead of them, runs ahead of them, and brings us warning at their house so we can get out and away.'

'You'll just go in, have a look round, and come away again,' Luca ruled.

She nodded. 'I'll get in through a window and open the door for Freize.'

Luca hesitated. 'Can you do that? Can you climb up a house wall and get in through a window?'

Isolde smiled. 'She's climbs like a cat,' she said. 'She was always getting in and out of the castle without the sentries knowing.'

Luca glanced uncertainly at Brother Peter, whose face was dark with disapproval.

'We are to go gambling in the square while a woman in our care is breaking into a house?' Brother Peter demanded. 'And no doubt thieving? While a young lady, a n.o.blewoman, the Lady Isolde of Lucretili, acts as a lookout? Like some kind of gang of thieves?'

'So that we can write Milord's report,' Luca reminded him. 'He told us we were to find out where the English gold n.o.bles were coming from. We're on the way to discovering the source.'

Brother Peter shook his head sadly. 'It's hard for me to countenance sin,' he said. 'Even for a great cause. Milord is our commander and the Order of Darkness is pledged to understand the rise of heresy, the signs of darkness, and the coming of the end of the world. Often, in this work I have had to study terrible sin. But never before have I had to be a party to it.'

'It's hardly terrible sin, you're only gambling for piccoli,' Freize said cheerfully. 'We might have to do far worse. And anyway look on the bright side you might win.'

The five of them waited in their grand palace for the arrival of the alchemist and his daughter. Isolde was confined upstairs and so she peered down the great marble staircase, hoping to glimpse the stranger when he came up the steps from the watergate. Ishraq was waiting on the first floor in the dining room, which they had equipped as a study, with paper and pens laid out on the dining table. Freize, dressed in a dark suit and looking like a servant, was ready to greet the alchemist as his boat came into the private quay, and to usher him upstairs. Brother Peter had shut himself in his room to write the report to Milord, and Luca was holding his chip of gla.s.s up to the light, and idly measuring and drawing half arcs of rainbows while gazing out over the Grand Ca.n.a.l.

'I think that's him,' he said to Ishraq as a small gondola detached itself from the seething traffic of the Grand Ca.n.a.l and turned towards the watergate of the palazzo. Luca crossed to the door with three swift steps. 'Freize!'

'Ready!' came the shout from the lowest level of the house. Luca turned and looked upwards to the second floor and caught a glimpse of Isolde's smile before she stepped back, out of sight. It was as if she had sent him a message of encouragement, or blown him a kiss; the smile was for him alone, as if she was saying that she had faith in him.

He heard Freize greet the man and, looking down, saw him leading the dark-robed figure up the stairs to the first floor. Luca went forward to greet him with his hand held out.

'Drago Nacari,' he said. 'Thank you for coming.'

'Luca Vero,' the man replied formally. 'Thank you for inviting me to your home.'

They entered the room and Ishraq rose up from her seat behind the table. She was wearing her Moorish dress: tunic and pantaloons, her scarf covering her hair and half veiling her face. She bowed to Drago Nacari and he took off his hat and swept a bow to her.

'This is my sister's companion, Mistress Ishraq,' Luca introduced her. 'I thought she might be able to help us with your ma.n.u.script. She speaks Arabic and Spanish and she is a scholar.'

'Of course,' the man said. 'I am honoured to meet you.'

'Did you not bring your daughter with you?' Ishraq asked.

'No,' he said. 'She is studying at home.'

The three of them sat at the great table, Drago at the head, and Luca and Ishraq on either side of him. He was carrying a satchel and he put it on the table, unfastened the ties and slid out a sheet of parchment painted with beautiful symbols and plants, and closely written with a clerk's well-wrought handwriting.

'Where did you study?' he asked Ishraq politely. 'Do you recognise any of this?'

'I was in the service of the Lord of Lucretili,' she said. 'He was a great crusader lord and he took an interest in the people and the learning of the Moors. He took me to Spain to study with the philosophers at the universities. I was allowed to study geography and astronomy, some medicine and languages. It was a great privilege.'

He bowed his head. 'I have studied in Egypt,' he said. 'I read Arabic but I cannot understand this. It is definitely an alchemy text. I know that much for certain. So we may expect certain things.'

'What things?' Luca said.

'A mixture of symbols and numbers and words,' the man answered. 'Alchemists have symbols, special signs for many elements, and for many processes.' He pointed to one symbol. 'That means to heat gently, for instance, any alchemist would recognise it.'

'Do you think this is a recipe?' Luca asked. 'An alchemy recipe?'

Drago spread his hands. A small gold ring on his finger caught the light. 'That, I don't know,' he said. 'I hope so, of course. I hope it is a recipe for the one thing, the greatest thing, the thing we all seek.'

'And what is that?' Luca asked. He was scanning the first page of the ma.n.u.script trying to see what words stood out. Nothing was recognisable, he could not even see a pattern.

'Of course, we all seek the stone,' the man said quietly. 'The philosophers' stone.'

'What is that?' Luca asked.

Drago glanced at Ishraq to see how much she knew of the stone.

'It is the stone which changes base material to gold,' she said quietly. 'And water thrown on the stone when it is hot, becomes the elixir of life, it can prolong life perhaps forever, it can make the old young, it can make the sick well. It is the one thing that all alchemists hope to make. It would solve all the troubles of the world.'

'And you trust me to translate this with you?' Luca asked Drago Nacari. 'If we could understand it, this doc.u.ment might mean the end to death and the beginning of limitless wealth for any one of us, for all of us.' For a moment he thought what he would do if he had the stone and could command a fortune, an unstoppable fortune. He thought he would buy the freedom of his parents, of all slaves. Then he would buy the castle of Lucretili and give it to Isolde. Then he would ask her to marry him, he would be a man so rich that he could propose marriage to her. He broke off from his dream with a short laugh. 'Already I am dreaming what I would do if I had the stone, and could make gold,' he said. 'Why would you trust us strangers with this?'

'This is only one page of many,' Drago said. 'And it's not a recipe for stewing oysters, it's not easy. Even if you were to read every word you still would be far from making the stone. To make the stone you would need to study for years. You need to purify yourself and everything you touch. I have been working for decades and only now am I starting to be ready. You may be very clever Jacinta says that you have quick eyes and a good ear, and, of course, she dreamed of you but you have not studied for years, as I have done.'

Ishraq smiled. 'And also there is the question of desire,' she said.

'Desire?' Luca repeated the single inviting word.

Drago Nacari nodded. 'You are learned then,' he confirmed to Ishraq.

'If you desire wealth, if you are bound to the world by greed, then you cannot find the stone for you are not pure in heart,' Ishraq explained. 'The only man or woman who can find such a thing would be he or she who wanted it for others. Someone who did not want it for themselves. It is the purest thing in the world, it cannot be discovered by someone with dirty hands, it cannot be s.n.a.t.c.hed in a greedy grasp.'

Luca nodded. 'I think I understand. So let's have a look at it.'