Freize could not bring himself to touch it, but he pulled the cap from his head and laid it down. The little thing took a bold leap and landed in the cap like a fish in a net. Freize shook his head in horror and bafflement. ‘What am I to do with you?’ he whispered.
He heard the breath of a whispered reply: ‘The canal.’
The guardsmen had kicked out the old wooden hatch that closed off the quay and now they saw Ishraq’s pale frightened face in the opening.
‘There’s a girl here!’ someone shouted. ‘Get her!’
One man bent down and tried to climb through the opening as Freize made a mighty dive, hands first, getting in before him, blocking the gap with his shoulders. ‘Ishraq!’ he yelled, and thrust the cap towards her.
She caught the cap in her hands. ‘What?’ she recoiled at the little being, curled up inside. ‘What’s this? My God Freize! What is it?’
The soldiers fell on Freize’s legs and dragged him backwards from the hatch. ‘Get it in the river!’ Freize shouted to her. ‘Get it in the water.’ Someone trod on his outstretched hands in their haste to get through the hatch to capture Ishraq. ‘Let it go!’ Freize yelled. ‘Set it free! And get away yourself!’
He saw her duck away from the hatch towards the canal, but then someone kicked him in the head and something fell beside him with a loud clatter, and then everything was dark.
Wet and dripping, Ishraq approached the garden gate of the palazzo on the Grand Canal, and tried the latch. It yielded and she stepped into the garden. It was dusk, and the waning spring moon was rising over the shadow of the wall. She was still wet, and her hair was in rats’ tails down her back, her expensive costume torn into strips and tied out of the way. She stepped warily into the enclosed space and looked up at the house.
Everything seemed quiet. Ishraq tiptoed barefoot to one of the windows and listened. There was silence; she cupped her hand over her eyes and peered in. The room was empty. Carefully, Ishraq went under the shade of the portico to the garden door and pushed it open. There was a slight creak but in a moment she was in the stone-flagged back hall, and then, picking up her damp skirts, she crossed the hall and mounted the stairs, past the main room and up to the floor that she shared with Isolde.
The door to their rooms was locked. Ishraq tapped the rhythm that they had used from childhood
and at once the door opened and Isolde pulled her in.
‘I have been waiting and waiting for you. You’re freezing! Are you safe? You’re soaked! Did you get to them in time?’
Isolde ran to her room and fetched a linen sheet and started to towel Ishraq’s hair, while the girl pulled off her wet torn clothes.
‘I got to them before the Doge’s men came, and they got away. Their equipment was broken and I think they captured Freize.’
‘No! We must tell Luca!’
Ishraq took a blanket and wrapped it around her bare shoulders. ‘Has the guard all gone?’
‘They left only one man behind, at the watergate. That’s why I stayed locked in, up here, though they have gone. They didn’t see you go, so they think you’re locked in here with me. Change your clothes and nobody will ever know you were out of the house. There’s nothing to connect us with the alchemists. Hurry – we have to tell Luca and Brother Peter about Freize.’
Ishraq rubbed her hair dry, pulled on a dress and tied her hair back in a knot. ‘Let’s go,’ she said.
The two young women hurried down the stairs and into the main room. Brother Peter and Luca were at the window, looking down to the darkening canal, as the door behind them opened and they turned around and saw Ishraq.
‘Thank God you’re safe!’ Luca exclaimed. ‘What a dive you made! Ishraq, what a risk you took!’ He crossed the room and hugged her to him. ‘You’re still wet!’ he said.
Brother Peter was shaking his head. ‘I suppose you went to warn them,’ he said. ‘Were you seen?’
‘Worse,’ Ishraq said briefly. ‘I am sorry, Brother Peter. They saw me, but I got away; and they caught Freize.’
‘Freize!’
‘We rowed there together. We went in by their watergate. We could hear the Doge’s men at the front door. The alchemist and Jacinta were trying to get their things, the books and the manuscripts and some herbs and things from their work room. They got into our boat . . .’ Ishraq broke off at the memory of the horror of the young woman with the old, old face and straggling white hair who had rushed past her to get into the boat. ‘Anyway. They got away in our boat. But the men charged in; and they got Freize. I swam for it.’
She stopped again. Somewhere in the water, not far from her as she had dived off the quay, had been the little thing, something like a baby, something like a lizard, something like a frog. She had held the cap towards the water’s edge and seen it jump into the water, seen it dive, the soft skin of its back gleaming palely as it went deep down into the canal.
‘What happened?’ Isolde asked, seeing the expression of blank horror on her friend’s face.
Ishraq shook her head. ‘I don’t know what they were doing there,’ she said. ‘I don’t know what they had done. I don’t know what they had made, in that bell jar of theirs. I don’t know what sort of thing it was.’
‘What sort of thing?’ Luca repeated, taking her hand.
She met his honest brown eyes with a deep sense of relief, as if Luca was the only person that she would be able to tell.
‘Luca,’ she whispered. ‘I want to tell you.’ She hesitated. ‘But I am afraid to even speak. It was horrific – and pitiful. I want to tell you. I can’t.’
Without thinking, he put his arm around her shoulders and walked her away from the other two. When their heads were close together and his arm was tight around her waist, he felt her lean towards him and relax against him, as if he were warm, as if he were safety for her.
‘You can tell me,’ he said. ‘Whatever it was.’
She turned her face to his neck and then raised her mouth to whisper in his ear. She could smell the light clean scent of his hair; he smelled of the real world, of normality, of a young man. She felt desire as if it were the only real thing in a dangerous world filled with mysteries. It was as if the only thing that was real, the only thing that she could trust, was Luca. ‘I think they had made a homunculus,’ she breathed.
He froze at the word and turned to face her. ‘Would that be what they meant by saying they were making life?’
Her eyes dark with fear, she nodded. ‘Perhaps. I don’t know.’
‘What was it like?’
‘Like a tiny man, like a horrible tiny man. I thought it was a lizard but it was a person, a tiny, tiny person. It was in the bell jar. I think they had made it in the jar. Jacinta was trying to get it away, but when the bell jar broke, Freize took it up and passed it through the hatch to me.’
‘Why? Why did Freize save it?’
A ghost of a smile touched her lips. ‘Because that’s what he’s like; because he’s Freize,’ she said. ‘If it called out to him, he would have to answer. It wanted to be in the canal. Freize had put it in his cap. I held the cap to the edge of the canal and it jumped out.’ She shivered. ‘I didn’t throw it in,’ she said quickly. ‘I wasn’t trying to drown it. He told me to set it free. It jumped in and then it dived down, like a fish, and then it was gone.’ She gave a deep shudder.
‘What?’ Luca asked.
‘Luca, it wasn’t like a fish, it was just like a child. I saw its face as it bobbed in the canal. It took a breath and then dived down. I saw its rump and the soles of its little feet as it went down. Like a child but tiny, as small as a rat, but swimming like a man. Horrible.’ She gave a shuddering sob. ‘It was horrible.’
He held her closer as she trembled. ‘And then?’
She raised her head and spoke so that the others could hear her. ‘I dived into the water and I swam round to the side canal beside the Nacari house. I waited in the water. I kept down low. I saw the Doge’s guards bring Freize out in manacles.
He was walking all right, he was not hurt; but he looked dazed. They put him into their galley, the guards’ galley with a wooden prison at the back, and I ducked down below the water to let them go past me into the Grand Canal, then I swam out too. I swam for a long time until a fisherman picked me up and brought me back here.’
She turned her face to Luca’s shoulder. ‘It was terrible,’ she said with a little moan of fear. ‘It was really terrible, Luca, being in the water and knowing that the little thing was in the water too. I was afraid it would come on the fishing boat with me. I was watching the oars in case it climbed on board. I was afraid it would follow me home.’
She gave a shaky sob. ‘I kept waiting for the touch of its little hand in my hair,’ she whispered. ‘I thought it would hold on to me and make me bring it home.’
He tightened his grip on her. He held her close, her face against his neck, so that she could not see the horror on his own face, the fear of the unknown, the ancient fear of the creature which is not of earth or air, which is not beast, fish or fowl.
‘What if it’s a golem?’ she breathed.
He composed himself and faced her. ‘There is no such thing,’ he said staunchly. ‘It’s not like you to frighten yourself with imaginary fears, Ishraq! It was a lizard, or a plucked bird, or something like that. It won’t come after you. It can’t have swum. It will have drowned in the canal. It’s nothing. You’re safe.’
He turned from her, as if the matter was closed, and to Brother Peter he said: ‘We’ll have to go and get Freize out. We’ll probably have to say who we are to clear our names. We’ll have to take our papers from Milord. Will you come with me?’
Brother Peter nodded, appalled at the whole situation. ‘I’ll get my cape. The young ladies should go to their rooms, and stay there.’ He looked severely at them both. ‘If anyone comes at all don’t admit them. Don’t say anything, and don’t show yourselves. The Doge’s guard will stay at the watergate but don’t speak to him.’ He scowled at Ishraq. ‘Don’t you go diving out of the window,’ he said crossly. ‘Just wait here till we get back, and try not to cause more trouble.’
The guard at the watergate had been reinforced by a second man and they had clearly been ordered to allow anyone from the household to go to the city magistrates.
‘Do you think they were waiting for us to confess?’ Luca asked Brother Peter quietly, as the two guardsmen took their seats in the gondola at prow and stern.
‘Yes,’ Brother Peter replied shortly.
‘They were waiting for us to ask to go to the palace?’
‘They would perhaps have ordered us to attend later, after midnight. They mostly work at night. They usually arrest people at night.’
Luca nodded, hiding his growing fear. ‘Do you think that they didn’t believe Isolde is the Lady of Lucretili?’
‘They believed her. But they would still want to question us if they know you have been working with the forgers.’
‘They can’t know that,’ Luca argued, denying his own doubt.
‘They probably do,’ Brother Peter said dourly.
There was no sound for a moment but the slap of water against the gondola’s single oar, and another boatman crying: “Gondola gondola gondola!” as he made a blind turn into a small tributary canal.
‘They will release Freize to us, won’t they?’ Luca confirmed.
‘It depends on three things,’ Brother Peter said drily. ‘It depends on what he has done. It depends on what they think he has done. It depends on what they think that we have done.’
Giuseppe rowed the gondola just a little way up the Grand Canal and then drew up between the forest of black mooring poles in the canal at the imposing white carved front of the Doge’s Palace.
‘What’s that?’ Giuseppe suddenly demanded, startled, looking down at the glassy waters of the canal.
‘What?’ Brother Peter asked irritably.
He shook his head. ‘I thought I saw something,’ he said. ‘Something like a white frog, swimming beside us. Odd.’
‘Help me out,’ Brother Peter said crossly. ‘I have no time for this.’
Flanked by the guardsmen, Luca and Brother Peter went up the shallow steps to the quay, where the waves were slapping like a gabble of denunciations, and then the two men and the guards waited before the great palace doors, where a row of burning torches showed their pale faces to the sentries.
‘I need to consult the Council of Ten,’ Luca said with more confidence than he felt. ‘We are on business for the Pope.’
Boyishly, he feared that the man would simply ignore him, but the sentry saluted and pushed open a low door cut inside the great ceremonial gate, and Luca and Brother Peter ducked their heads and went through.
At once they caught their breaths. They were in a massive courtyard, big enough to house an army, as broad and wide as a square of the city: the heart of the Doge’s Palace. On their left was a great wall of red brick pierced by white windows, new-built and all but completed. Ahead of them was a white stone façade and behind that the towering bulk of the Doge’s own chapel, the massive church of San Marco. On their right was a wall as high as a white cliff, studded with windows. It was the Doge’s Palace, the heart of government, and all the offices. Most of the windows showed a light – the Republic never slept, business was always pressing; and spying and justice were done best at night. The whole courtyard was ringed by a square colonnade studded with huge white towers. Above the colonnade rose a series of narrow windows, placed one set on top of the other in the three tall storeys. It was as if all four walls of the palace were staring down at them with blank accusing eyes.
Two guards came towards them and guided them to the building on their right, and led the way up the stone staircase. Luca found he was growing more and more apprehensive with every step he took. At the top of the stairs, the guard tapped on the huge wooden door, and a smaller door swung open. A man dressed in the black robes of a clerk, seated on a small plain chair at a wooden desk, beckoned them in.
‘I am Brother Peter, I serve the Order of Darkness under the command of the Holy Father. We are ordered to inquire into the end of days and all heresies and signs of the end of the world. This is Luca Vero, one of the Inquirers.’ Brother Peter was breathless by the end of his introduction, it made him sound nervous and guilty.
‘I know who you are,’ the clerk said shortly. To the guards before and behind them, he said simply: ‘Take them to the magistrates. They’re expected.’
One guard led the way through the narrow passage, the other followed behind. Luca was certain that they were being observed, that the lattice work in the wood panelling in the walls served as a window for another room and that an inquisitor was watching them walk by, and judging their anxious faces. Luca tried to smile and stride confidently, but then thought he must appear as if he were playing a part, as if he had something to hide.
The corridor twisted round and round; clearly they were threading between secret rooms, their footsteps muffled on the uneven wooden floors. As they walked, dozens of half wild cats scattered before them, as if these tunnels were their home. They stopped before a great door, where a silent sentry stood. The man nodded and stood aside, opened the door only to reveal a second closed door behind. He tapped, it swung open, and Luca and Brother Peter went into the room where three magistrates, wearing dark robes, were seated behind a great polished table. To the side, four clerks were seated around a smaller table. There was a fire in the fireplace for the comfort of the magistrates but it did not heat the room, which was miserably cold.
The double doors swung shut, first the inner one with a sharp bang, then the outer door with a dull thud, making the room soundproof, almost airtight. Luca and Brother Peter stood before the table in complete silence.
At last, the magistrate in the central seat looked up at them. ‘Can I help you, my lords?’ he asked politely. ‘You want to give evidence to us?’
Luca swallowed. ‘I am Luca Vero, an Inquirer for the Ord
er of Darkness, sanctioned by the Holy Father himself to investigate the rise of heresy, the danger of the infidel, and the threats to Christendom. This is my clerk and advisor, Brother Peter.’
Blandly, the three regarded Luca. Moving as one, they turned their heads to look at Brother Peter, and then back again.
‘My servant was in the course of making an inquiry for me at the house of an alchemist, Drago Nacari,’ Luca went on. ‘He was arrested by the Venice guard. He has done nothing wrong. I have come to request his release.’
The magistrate glanced at his two colleagues. ‘We were expecting you,’ he said ominously. ‘We have been watching you for some days.’
Luca and Brother Peter exchanged one aghast look, but said nothing.
‘Your papers? To prove your identity?’ One of the clerks rose up from the table and held out his hand.
Brother Peter produced the papers from his satchel and the clerk glanced at them. ‘All in order,’ he said briefly to the silent men at the table. He offered to pass them over the table but they waved them away. Clearly, they were too important to bother with letters of authority.
‘Authorised by the Holy Father himself,’ Brother Peter repeated.
The clerk nodded, unimpressed by the status of the Church. Uniquely in all of Christendom, all the administrators of Venice were laymen. They had not been recruited and trained by the Church; they served the Republic before they served Rome. Luca and Brother Peter had the misfortune of being in the only city in Europe where their papers would not command immediate respect and help.
‘So you are not, as you claimed, servants in the household of the Lady Isolde of Lucretili,’ the clerk observed.
‘No,’ Luca said shortly.
The clerk made a small note as if to record Isolde’s lie.
‘And what was your business with Drago Nacari, the counterfeiter?’ the magistrate seated in the centre of the table asked quietly.
‘We didn’t know that he was a counterfeiter at first,’ Luca said honestly. ‘As you see from our instructions, we were on a mission to find the source of the gold nobles. The lord of our Order had told us to come here, to pass as merchant traders, to find whether the nobles were good or fake, and if they were fake, where they had come from.’
Order of Darkness Page 65