by S. W. Perry
Rose has decided that Lord Lumley is her only hope. Until last summer she had never been in close proximity to a lord, let alone served one his roast mutton pie and discussed the state of the beans and lettuces in his kitchen garden. But a year ago, when the plague was still rife in London and Mistress Bianca was recovering from the injuries she had sustained in the destruction of the Jackdaw, Lord Lumley had generously agreed to Master Nicholas’s plea that they all decamp to the relative safety of his magnificent palace in the Surrey countryside. And thus Rose had discovered – though she was sure the example was not universal – that Baron Lumley of Lumley Castle in Northumberland was a thoroughly decent man with a generous and kindly heart, even if he did have the long, grey outward appearance of a rainy week in January.
To her immense relief, when she reaches Lumley’s town house – a fine oak-timbered place barely a stone’s throw from the old city walls below Aldgate – she finds him in the orchard garden.
‘Why, God give you good morrow, young Mistress Monkton,’ Lumley says with a smile, turning from his pruning at the sound of her discreet cough. ‘I have informed the lawyer I asked to make young Ned’s defence that he will have no more instructions from me. Apparently, on the day, he thought it beneath him to defend a common man. I trust the judge ordered an acquittal?’
Several minutes later Rose has regained a measure of composure. A small mound of sodden kerchiefs lies on the ground beside Lumley’s pruning knife. She takes a noisy gulp from the glass of warm hippocras he has ordered brought to her. He can barely bring himself to look into her eyes. The agony there is too much for him to bear.
‘When is he to hang, Rose?’ Lumley asks. ‘I assume we have very little time.’
‘The magistrate said something about sending the case to the Privy Council, to put Ned to the hard press. I fear they mean to rack him before they ’ang him.’ The tears begin to well in her eyes again. ‘There must be something you can do, m’lord. I ’ave no hope in the world but you.’
‘I will do what I can, of course. But I don’t want to give you false cause for hope. It will require a considerable amount of luck. It is a shame there was no immediate family to offer a financial settlement, in return for a plea to the magistrate for clemency. I would have paid that for you in an instant. And I will make an immediate appeal to Chief Justice Popham and Attorney General Coke to overturn the judgement.’
Lumley tries to sound positive, but his great fear is that Coke and Popham, knowing of his Catholic faith, will disregard his plea out of spite. He cannot bring himself to tell Rose that. He raises his hands to his bearded face, almost as though he would shut out the look of grief in her eyes. He is a thoughtful man, prone to melancholy, and her presence at Nonsuch brought a welcome brightness to the days he spends amongst the books in his formidable library. He wishes now that he had found a more practical knowledge there, something that might bring comfort to this frightened young woman.
‘You Caporetti women have always been rumoured to be notorious poisoners, Cousin Bianca,’ Bruno Barrani says with only half a smile, laying aside his book of Boccaccio poetry and looking up from the divan that Luca and Alonso have set in a shady corner of the courtyard for their master’s relaxation. ‘I have no intention of putting it to the test. I accede to your wish.’
It is the first time Bianca has heard her mother’s maiden name spoken since she was a child. But she has always been aware of the rumours: that it was a Caporetti who mixed the poison Agrippina used to murder Claudius, and that the women of the line have been skilled in lethal distillations ever since. She smiles wanly at her cousin’s little joke.
‘I’m not asking much, Bruno – only that you deny Hella a welcome in this house, at least while Nicholas and I are here.’
Bruno shrugs in acquiescence. ‘Very well, Cousin. As you wish. But I cannot prevent her from visiting Signor Galileo and Matteo Fedele. Young Matteo seems greatly enamoured by her. And her quickness in mathematics is clear. The Arte dei Astronomi has need of her. Signor Galileo is too much in demand at the Palazzo Bo, and too easily distracted when he’s at home.’
‘Then let her trouble them with her gloomy talk. I ask only that she is kept from my sight, and away from my husband.’
‘If it pleases you, Cousin,’ Bruno says, admitting defeat with a spreading of his palms. He goes back to his book of Boccaccio.
Am I being honest? Bianca wonders as she walks away. Is it Nicholas’s tranquillity I am concerned for, or my own?
Her menses are now well overdue. If she is with child it is a prospect that should, by rights, fill her with unbounded joy. And it would do so, had Hella Maas not uttered those cruel words in Reims and on the road below Mouthier-Haut-Pierre. They alone should qualify Hella as a beneficiary of the Caporettis’ art. And it would not be so very hard to do, Bianca thinks. It would be an easy thing to purchase a little hemlock or wolfsbane, masking the taste with something sweet. Her mother might be in her grave, but there are still apothecaries in Padua who would help. Some might even remember her. She recalls now what she had said to Nicholas on Bankside when he told her about the denunciation. In jest – and before the true danger of the slander had dawned on her – she replied: There can be but one poisoner in our union, Nicholas. You’re the healer, I’m the poisoner, remember?
Yes, she thinks, for Bruno’s sake I will forbear. But if that woman dares to show she has any further designs upon my husband, then it might well be time to consider taking up the old trade once more. After all, what can be more honourable than maintaining a family tradition?
The next morning Matteo Fedele leads Hella Maas across the stone bridge by the Ponte Portello. A rain shower has left the white stone busts of Padua’s nobility gleaming like polished marble, and the brickwork of the storehouses along the grassy riverbank the colour of overcooked mutton. Proudly brandishing a heavy iron key, he does battle with the lock on the side-door of the storehouse.
‘Tell me, sweet Matteo,’ she says, ‘are you sure Signor Barrani said nothing more about why I was not to go to the house in the Borgo dei Argentieri again?’
He gives her a look of regret. He does not care to disappoint a maid whose humility, both in dress and demeanour, he admires. She is a revelation to him. Where in all Italy could he find a maid whose eyes don’t glaze over when he speaks of Euclid, Pythagoras, Plato and Aristotle? She can almost match him in discourse – and in a language that is not even her own. And there is an intriguing beauty hidden away beneath all that severity. She is a catch, and no mistake. Indeed, the mask of piety she wears will make the chase all the more exciting.
Not that Matteo Fedele is thinking of anything serious. She clearly has no dowry, and his father would cut him off without a scudo to his name if he so much as suggested marriage to her. Time enough, he thinks, for marriage when he’s an established figure in the Arte dei Astronomi.
‘He said only that it was improper for an unmarried maid to visit the house of a man who would be Master of the Spheres for His Serenity the doge,’ Matteo answers. He tries not to smile. Such an explanation might hold water if the doge’s Master of the Spheres was any man but Bruno Barrani.
‘I hope Signor Barrani’s sense of decency will not prevent me from assisting you and Signor Galileo? God did not give me the gift of understanding such things only for it to rot away like windfall.’
Matteo grins. Is she playing an opening gambit? he wonders. Is there fire under the ice?
‘I fear that Signor Galileo’s house is a lot more disreputable than Signor Barrani’s.’
She gives one of her chilly smiles. ‘Our Saviour did not walk only amongst the pure, Signor Matteo. Quite the opposite.’
Inside the storehouse all is silent. The forge in the corner is cold. Tiny flecks of dust turn gently in the air, glinting in the shafts of light streaming in from the high windows. The wooden cradle of the sphere stands in the centre, like some giant antediluvian sea creature lying dead on its back after the flood has receded. A sing
le brass meridian ring hoops towards the roof, twice the height of a man. Around the base lie the innards of the beast: the segments of rings etched with signs of the zodiac; the discs of varying diameters; the cogs, wheels, brass globes to represent the planets… Matteo watches as Hella circles the neat stacks of metal and gilded wood. She has a curious look on her face. She seems intrigued, but appears to be frowning. For just an instant he has the extraordinary impression of a predator circling a disembowelled carcass. She looks across at him from the other side of the cradle. The frown has gone from her face, but it still lingers in her eyes.
‘This is only a small fraction of the whole,’ Matteo says defensively. ‘It will take many months to fabricate everything.’
The maid circles the cradle in silence until she is standing beside him again. Then she says, ‘Do you think it is wise for mankind to build a machine that mimics God’s works?’
This surprises Matteo, because until now he has assumed the maid wholeheartedly approves of the new learning, of enquiry and experimentation, of seeking the limits of what may be known. Now she sounds almost censorious.
‘But how else may we understand those works, if not through science?’ he replies. ‘By this engine, we will be able to see the cosmos as it will be in days, even years, ahead – if Maestro Galileo and I can contrive the movement of the mechanism correctly.’
The maid’s gaze drops from his, as though she doesn’t want him to see into her thoughts. ‘I have seen a representation of the future, Signor Matteo,’ she says, so softly he barely hears, ‘in Brabant. It does not end well.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘It ends in death.’
‘Of course it does. But then there is resurrection and eternal life. Surely you believe that? You’re not a heretic, are you?’
She looks up, as though the words she has just spoken were someone else’s. ‘How could a Beguine be a heretic, Matteo? I am God’s child as much as you.’
‘Then there is nothing to fear by seeking to look into the future, is there?’
A change seems to come over her. Something in her eyes makes Matteo think of a child who has woken from a nightmare and fears the return of sleep.
‘Tell me, Matteo,’ she says, ‘if you could make the sphere turn enough times, do you think it might one day replicate the positions of the planets and the zodiacs on the last day?’
Now it is Matteo’s turn to frown. ‘What do you mean, “the last day”?’
The stare she gives him lances into his mind like a bolt fired from a crossbow.
‘Judgement Day, Matteo. The last day.’
For a moment he doesn’t know what to say. Her intensity unnerves him. ‘I… I suppose it might be contrived. But only a man like Maestro Galileo could imagine the calculations required to achieve it. It would be beyond my skill. And I wouldn’t dare do it, anyway. It would be blasphemy.’
‘But it could be done?’
‘In theory, I suppose it might.’
‘What would it look like?’
Matteo is beginning to feel uncomfortable. ‘How would I know? Perhaps if one could turn the sphere through enough cycles until the planets and the stars were all constrained in alignment, or were no longer visible from your chosen latitude – that might indicate an empty cosmos. But if the Holy Office of the Faith knew the sphere was capable of such a calculation—’ He breaks off, shuddering as he imagines the flames beginning to lap around his legs as the Inquisition has him burned in the middle of the Piazza dei Signori. ‘But I cannot imagine why anyone would want to know such a thing. I think it would be best to speak of any other matter but that.’
‘I’ve had her banished, Nicholas,’ Bianca says proudly. ‘It’s the best thing all round, don’t you think?’
She has just this moment met her husband in the university botanical gardens. Nicholas has been attending another of Professor Fabrici’s lectures.
‘Banished? You sound like Queen Elizabeth or Catherine de’ Medici,’ he says, trying not to smile. Bianca has a familiar glint in her eye, the one that’s often there after she’s had Ned Monkton eject a quarrelsome customer from the Jackdaw.
‘Well, it’s a compromise. Bruno has some silly notion Hella can be of use to the Arte dei Astronomi. Fine, let her haunt Signor Galileo’s house then. I think it was Matteo Fedele’s idea. The lazy rascal wants to make use of her ability at mathematics, so that he can put his feet up while Hella does all the work for him. They’ll soon grow tired of her, when she starts telling Signor Galileo he’s going to spend eternity being crushed in a wine-press for living a life of debauchery.’
They find a place by the canal bank to sit awhile in the sunshine. Bianca leans forward over her knees, watching the brown water slide eastwards on its journey to the Venetian lagoon.
‘I thought when I came here that we would find peace, Nicholas. At least for a while,’ she says. ‘But that woman is like some cold, dead hand on my shoulder that I cannot shake off.’
‘This isn’t like you, Bianca,’ he says, taking her hand, his face troubled. ‘You’ve never let a soul cower your spirit: not Robert Cecil, not Cat Vaesy, Tyrell, Gault… None of them could match you, when it came down to it. Even the pestilence took one look at you and thought better of it.’
She gives a half-hearted laugh at his attempt to console her. ‘This is different. I don’t know why, but I feel it in my bones.’
‘Is this to do with what passed between you and Hella on the Via Francigena? You still haven’t really told me what happened.’
‘I can’t,’ she says, tears welling in her eyes.
‘Why not? How bad could it be?’
‘It would make it real. Words are like stones, Nicholas. Once made, they are indestructible.’
He holds her close, knowing that to press her further will only add to her distress.
‘There are people on Bankside who believe I have second sight,’ she says, wanting his embrace, yet afraid it might feel like the embrace of a stranger. ‘Do you believe it?’
‘I wouldn’t put it past you, Bianca Merton.’
‘And do you believe Hella can see into the future, the way she claims?’
‘I think she has suffered greatly in the past, and blames herself for it. I think she looked too deeply into grief and found patterns there, when there were no real patterns to be found.’
‘You’re defending her?’
He lets go of her and stands. Bianca follows, watching him as he chooses the right words.
‘I’m a physician. I know that maladies are not confined to the body alone. The mind and the soul can sicken, too. Professor Fabrici can dissect all the cadavers he wants, but he cannot see inside a single human thought.’
‘Are you going to try to heal her, if she comes to you?’
Nicholas takes her in his arms again, running a hand through the thick, dark waves of her hair, brushing away a strand that has fallen wilfully over one eye. ‘I cannot turn away someone who is sick. It is not in my nature. You must trust me to know what is right.’
‘I thought that is what you would say.’
She sinks into his chest, laying her face alongside his neck. On the gravel path behind them, two white-haired men in professorial gowns walk past, casting scowls of disapproval at the show of intimacy. Neither Nicholas nor Bianca notices them.
‘Nicholas,’ she says after a while, ‘I believe I am pregnant.’
Releasing her, he holds her at arm’s length as though he’s inspecting something he has long coveted, but can only now afford. Then he steps back, throws his arms wide and makes three joyous circles on the path, hopping from one foot to the other as he turns, silently, though his grin is wide enough for all the words in the world to spill out.
Bianca watches him. She wants so much to sense the swell of joy in her own heart. To match his unbridled happiness. But all she can feel at this moment is fear.
32
At the house in the Borgo dei Argentieri, Bruno has ordered a feast
in celebration of Bianca’s news. Alonso and Luca are dispatched at the double, returning laden with gleaming hams, vegetables bright enough to dazzle the eyes and glistening sardele and orata, which they swear on their lives arrived on ice from the Venetian lagoon this very dawn. Bruno’s collection of best plate is carried ceremoniously from his chamber, where it is kept in a locked chest on account of his servants’ propensity to forget about the rules of ownership.
‘A black bean or white bean?’ asks Bruno, grinning like a carnival mask.
Nicholas looks perplexed.
‘It’s the way the city used to record births,’ Bianca explains, sounding oddly subdued to Nicholas. ‘Beans placed in a box: black for a boy, white for a girl.’ Then, to Bruno, ‘It will be a white bean.’
‘Or a black bean,’ says Nicholas, smiling.
And then Bianca says, with a harshness that makes him glance at her in surprise, ‘White or black, as long as it’s a bean and not a poison berry.’
That evening, in their chamber, he says, ‘You have to tell me what’s wrong. You are beginning to trouble me – deeply.’
‘Do you believe in curses, Nicholas?’ she asks, in an absentminded way. ‘I suppose not. Your vaunted new learning will tell you to believe only what you can see… touch… measure.’
‘Is that what this ill humour is about? Has Hella Maas laid a curse upon you?’ he asks, astonished.
But Bianca does not answer. She turns away from him, and he can tell by the way her shoulders are tightly hunched that she is on the verge of either tears or an explosion of anger. He is unsure which he fears most.
In the dormitory of Padua’s Beguinage, the Sisters dream their pious dreams. The squat, stripped-down villa just outside the walls of the Seminary Maggiore is home to some twenty of them, the youngest seventeen, the oldest eighty-six. Being neither nuns nor wholly secular, they are a constant worry to the seminary’s praeceptor and a source of endless speculation by his young male students. If they are not exactly brides of Christ, he tells them, you may at least regard them as loosely betrothed.