by S. D. Sykes
When he smiled at me, a stab of love pierced my heart so deeply that I nearly called out in pain, but just as I went to grasp him in my arms, he faded. “Hugh?” I said, as the sun disappeared below the horizon.
“Hugh! Come back,” I shouted. “Hugh! I’m sorry. Come back.”
But he had gone, and though I hunted in desperation through the marsh I could not find him.
Chapter Thirty-Two
I sat on the bench of the sàndolo in silence until Sandro spoke. “What’s the matter with you?” he asked, as he maneuvered the oar through the water. “Have you seen a ghost?”
How could I tell him the truth? Instead I pretended that I had been disturbed by the lepers.
“So, did you get the name you wanted?” he asked, before smiling at me. His face reminded me instantly of Hugh’s, and suddenly another stab of emotion cut into my chest. This time it was pity, not love. And this poor boy deserved my pity, for he had no mother or father, and lived by his wits in the filthy corners and alleys of Venice. This only evoked guiltier thoughts. My son, Hugh, had also lost his mother, but he might as well have lost his father at the same time, for I had done nothing but wallow in my own, selfish grief. I had run away from England and left him in the care of my sister—a woman who did not even recognize Hugh’s claim to Somershill. I had even vowed never to return.
“Yes. I got the name I wanted,” I told the boy.
Sandro smiled again. “So, what is it?”
“It’s safer if I don’t tell you,” I said.
He shrugged his shoulders. “Don’t you trust me?”
“It’s not that I don’t trust you,” I said. “I just don’t want to put you in danger.”
“But you want to talk to this man, yes?” I nodded. “So somebody must lead you there?”
“I can find him on my own.”
He laughed this time. “Just like you could row a boat on your own.”
I conceded. The boy was right, for I would need his help to find my way about the muddled confusion of Castello. “Very well,” I said. “His name is Gianni Ricci. He lives in the campo next to the church of Sant’Antonio.”
The boy laughed again. The food I’d given him had put some color in his cheeks and some strength into his arms and legs, though he retained the disjointed, unstable gait of a walking carcass. “Gianni Ricci,” he said, as if he was pondering the name. “I wonder if he has curly hair?”
“No. He’s bald,” I said. “And apparently his head is covered in a great birthmark.” For some reason this caused Sandro to laugh so hard that he nearly dropped the oar, and I wondered, in retrospect, if I had mistranslated the word.
The boy’s laughter caused me to smile at first, but then another wave of pity engulfed me. Looking at the thinness of his arms and the ragged clothes on his back, I guessed that nobody cared about him in this city, since he slept in the street and he washed in the lagoon. Once I had departed from Venice with my mother, the doge’s palace would discover his treachery, and then who would protect him?
I cleared my throat. “So, Sandro,” I said, “I have an offer for you.”
He stopped laughing. “Oh yes?”
“I would like you to join my household. I will train you as my squire, and you can live with me and my mother, when we leave Venice.” I decided not to divulge that this departure would be happening in less than two days.
My gesture was not received with the gratitude I might have expected, however. In fact, Sandro’s face fell so greatly that you might think I had offered to buy one of his legs.
“I just want to help you, Sandro. That’s all. I can’t leave you alone in Venice.”
“I was alone before you came here,” he said.
“Don’t you want somebody to care for you?”
The boy tensed, and I knew that my words had struck a small blow. “I don’t know,” he said, after a long pause.
“Will you think about it, at least?”
He nodded solemnly and would not speak to me for the rest of the journey.
It was dark as I knocked at the door of Ca’ Bearpark, to be admitted by Giovanni. Sandro stayed outside in the street and hid in a doorway. I noticed immediately that Giovanni had combed his hair and changed his filthy clothes for a clean tunic and hose, but he still possessed the pale, drawn face of a man who’s just recovered from the sweating sickness.
“Have you found the murderer, Oswald?” he asked me by way of a greeting.
I nodded.
“Do you have him with you?” he said as he looked past my shoulder.
“Yes, I’ve asked him to wait outside.”
Giovanni gasped. “Really?”
“Of course not, Giovanni! I need to speak to Bearpark straight away.”
The young Venetian frowned, a little offended at my joke. “I think my master is sleeping.”
“I don’t care,” I said, pushing past him. “I will see him now.”
Bearpark wasn’t sleeping, though his eyes remained shut at my entrance. “What do you want, de Lacy?” he mumbled as I approached the bed. “Why are you disturbing me in the middle of the night?”
“I need you to provide me with a male servant,” I said. “Somebody who’s strong and able to make an arrest.”
The old man opened his eyes. “So, you’ve found him then, have you?” he said. “Who is it?”
“You were right, Bearpark. The murderer was Enrico’s lover.”
He fell back against his bolster with a long groan. “I told you to look for him, didn’t I? You should have followed my instructions in the first place.” He struggled to sit up and Giovanni had to run to his aid. “So, what’s his name then?”
I hesitated. “Just provide me with a man and let me bring the murderer to you.” I cleared my throat. “When you’ve released Filomena to me, then you can have him.”
Bearpark huffed at this. “Indeed?”
“Those are my terms,” I said.
“Oh very well, very well.” Bearpark waved his hand impatiently at Giovanni. “Find de Lacy a man from the household.”
“There are no men left,” whispered Giovanni.
“What’s that?” said Bearpark, holding a hand to his ear. “Speak up. Speak up!”
“There are no men left in the household,” boomed Giovanni.
Bearpark frowned. “What do you mean?” he snapped. “What happened to them all?”
“They’ve all gone to other houses, master. There are no servants left here apart from myself and the old woman.”
Bearpark wiped his lips on the sheet, taking a moment to absorb this piece of information. “I see,” he said, before clearing his throat with some determination. “Then de Lacy may have one of the guards at my wife’s cell.” He looked to Giovanni. “They’re still here, I take it?”
Giovanni nodded.
Bearpark then turned to me. “I’ll send the man to your inn at dawn.”
“No. I want to go now,” I told him.
Bearpark puffed his lips. “Impossible. The man will want more money for wandering about Venice in the pitch-black, and I’m already paying him and the other fellow enough, just to sit outside a woman’s door.”
“The murderer might escape if we delay.”
“Then go and catch him yourself tonight,” said Bearpark. “I’m not stopping you.”
“You know that I can’t.”
“Then wait until dawn.” He closed his eyes again. “Now leave an old man to sleep.”
When Sandro and I finally returned to the Fondaco, we both crept up the back stairs, even though the guards from the doge’s palace were nowhere to be seen. I suggested that the boy join us in the bedchamber to sleep, but Sandro refused to step inside the room, and equally Mother refused to let such a dirty urchin past the threshold. In the end it was agreed that Sandro would sleep at the top of the servants’ stairwell, so I gave him some of my supper and then retired to my own bed. The day had drained my spirit of any remaining energy, and I thought I might close my eyes a
nd sleep for days. I fell into a contented slumber, and, for the first time in many months, I dreamed of Mary.
This contentment was false comfort, however. It was nothing more than a temporary truce before the true battle began.
Chapter Thirty-Three
After Mary’s death, I took great trouble in commissioning her tomb. She would have a stone sarcophagus that would stand in its own alcove at one end of our family chapel. It would be raised upon a tall plinth decorated with acanthus and vine leaves, and accompanied by an array of carved mourners at her feet. Its lid would bear an effigy of Mary as she looked upon our wedding day. Beautiful and serene. In addition, I would also design a tomb for myself, and upon my own death we would lie, side by side, like the kings and queens of England.
Mother thought the whole exercise was a foolish waste of money, and didn’t keep her feelings to herself. She joined me at the chapel the day that the tomb arrived. It had been hastily carved, and I was not satisfied with the standard of workmanship, so Mother did not catch me in the best of moods.
She walked about the chest, running her finger along the scrolled margin and then stopping to scrutinize the carved face that stared up at the vaulted wooden ceiling of the chapel with its painted eyes. Both Mother and I knew that this effigy looked nothing like Mary. We exchanged a glance, but she thought better of saying anything.
She tapped the chest and then stepped back. “Very good, Oswald. Very good. A fine tomb for your wife.”
“Thank you, Mother. I’m certainly pleased with it,” I lied.
She cleared her throat. “And when do you hope to move Mary’s body here?”
“I don’t know,” I said, feeling my heart begin to thump. “I haven’t decided yet.”
“Well, you should get on with it. Having gone to all this expense. There’s no point leaving her in the graveyard.”
My chest tightened, as the sadness once again threatened to incapacitate me.
Mother must have sensed an imminent attack of grief, for she suddenly clapped loudly. “Very good, Oswald. Will you bring Hugh to the ceremony?”
Once again I found it difficult to speak.
“The boy should see his own mother interred in this”—she waved her hand over the chest—“this sarcophagus.”
“I don’t know. He’s just a newly born infant. He wouldn’t understand what’s happening.”
“Even so. I think the boy should come,” she said. I went to argue, but she interrupted with a great sigh. “You really should pay Hugh more attention, Oswald. He is your son, after all.”
“He’s well enough, isn’t he? You’ve employed a nursemaid for him.”
“Yes, but he still needs the attention of his father.”
I gazed back at Mary’s tomb. How could I admit it? That I blamed this child for Mary’s death. “I’ve been too busy, Mother. This memorial has taken up all of my time.”
Something in this statement riled her. “You know. I really don’t believe that Mary would have wanted all this fuss, Oswald. I’m sure a brass plate upon the floor would have satisfied her tastes.”
“I don’t think so,” I said, turning upon her sharply. “It would not have sufficed at all.”
She frowned. “Come along, Oswald. This great tomb is for your own benefit, not Mary’s. She would have laughed at such nonsense.”
“That’s not true.”
“Yes it is,” said Mother. “The girl was never fond of artifice and display. I had a hard enough job getting her to brush her hair when she was a child, let alone adorn it with pins and ribbons. And do you remember how she refused to wear my turquoise necklace at your wedding?”
I leaned against the stone of the chest and tried not to be provoked by these misjudged reminiscences. “The necklace was too heavy for her.”
Mother made another of her small huffs, indicating that she found my last statement to be ridiculous. “I find the necklace light enough, and I am a very delicate creature.”
She was provoking my anger. “Why don’t you go back to the house, Mother?”
“Not unless you come with me.” She gave an exaggerated shudder. “It’s too cold in this chapel. You will catch a chill in here. Or worse.”
“I don’t care.”
She fixed me with a stare. “Well, you should care. What is the point of inviting illness? Your wife is dead already, Oswald. For goodness sake, don’t follow her into the grave.”
“Leave me alone, Mother.”
“I will not! You spend far too much time in here. Lamenting the dead.”
“It brings me comfort.”
“There are better memorials to your dead wife than this,” she said.
“Such as?”
She threw up her hands in despair. “Your son, Oswald! Your living, breathing son.”
That night Mother brought the baby to me, wrapped tightly in his linen bands. The child’s nursemaid trailed behind, keeping her eyes to the floor, shuffling like a penitent. I looked up to see that Hugh wore a bonnet edged with lace and embroidered with the letters H, D and C—Henry de Caburn. The bonnet had once belonged to Clemence’s son, and must have been a passed-down gift from my sister. This pricked at my heart, for Hugh should have been wearing his own cap, embroidered with his own initials.
Mother held the small package toward me. “Come on, Oswald. Hold Hugh. He’s just been fed.” His nurse dithered by the door, unable to leave. Though she kept perfectly still, I could feel her anxiety radiating across the room.
I turned away. “I’m tired. I’ll do it tomorrow.”
Mother tried again, this time dropping the child into my lap, and then quickly stepping back before I had a chance to object. At this very moment, the nurse stepped forward, ready to leap to the child’s aid, should I fail to hold him. Their movements were like the opposing steps of a dance.
I grasped the boy and rested his head in the crook of my arm. “I can see you will give me no peace,” I said.
Mother smiled. “There you are. See. You might enjoy spending a few moments with him.”
I looked up at their expectant faces, and my irritation melted a little. They were a meddlesome pair, but there was no malice in their actions. “You can leave me now,” I said.
This caused both women to stiffen. “Are you sure?” said Mother, exchanging a glance with the nursemaid. “Hugh may start to cry again.”
“I thought he’d just been fed?”
She opened her mouth to say something, but the words faded to a short cough. “Very well, Oswald. We will be in the solar. Call us immediately, if you need help. And keep the child’s hat upon his head. And don’t hold him too close to the fire.”
The nursemaid then tried to whisper something into Mother’s ear, but she dismissed her with a wave, and when the woman appeared reluctant to leave the room, Mother gave her a forceful shove in the back.
I was left alone with my son. This tiny piece of creation that I had cut from Mary’s womb. A fragment of sleeping humanity.
I wanted to care for him.
I wanted to love him.
But then I mustered the courage to look down upon his face. I pulled back the lace at the side of his bonnet, and I did not see the face of a sleeping baby. Instead two limpid eyes stared back at me from within their sockets of wrinkled skin. The nostrils were large and flat to the face, and the mouth was wide and lipless within a whiskered muzzle.
When I screamed, the thing screamed back at me, unsealing its jaws to reveal a vast array of teeth that were punctuated on either side by two fangs. I would have thrown it into the fire, but Mother raced in and grabbed the bundle from me.
“What are you doing, Oswald?” she yelled at me. “Why are you screaming like that at your own child?”
“It’s not a child. Can’t you see it?” I said. “It has the face of a monkey.”
Chapter Thirty-Four
Bearpark sent the guard to our inn at first light, as promised—a tall, strongly built man who appeared to bear me a grudge, though w
e had only just met. I ignored this mysterious hostility and told him to wait by the door as I raised Sandro from his improvised bed at the top of the servants’ stairwell.
We then used the back staircase again to leave the Fondaco, before making our way across the city toward the sestiere of Castello. It was no longer raining at least, but a thick mist had descended on the city, bleaching the color from the houses and obscuring our path. It was now that I was most grateful for Sandro’s knowledge of Venice, though the boy was a little sullen and uncommunicative that morning. He led us quietly through the alleys and alongside the canals, and I felt completely lost until the great granite Columns of Justice rose up through the vapors like a forgotten temple.
After leaving the open space of the Piazzetta, we were soon in the warren of Castello, negotiating our way past mules, handcarts, and women with baskets of fish. I did not look down to see what we were treading upon, though its rank perfume soon reached my nostrils. The guard followed us in silence, until we reached the church of Sant’Antonio, and I began to wonder how we might find one man in this morass of people, but once again Sandro came to my assistance. He asked me for a small coin and then waved it discreetly in the air, making a gesture that meant something to somebody, though I would hardly have noticed it. Soon another, equally thin and ragged boy appeared from a narrow gap between the tall buildings. He tried to grasp the coin from Sandro’s hand, but my small friend was quicker and stronger, and held on to his prize with determination. This new boy would have to earn the money.
They held their heads together in conversation. A conversation that was punctuated with pointing and shoving, but which ended cordially enough with a handshake and the passing over of the precious coin.
Sandro then whispered to me. “He’s told me where to find Ricci. Come with me.” The guard and I then followed him along alleys so thin that the red dust from the brick rubbed off onto our cloaks, then through courtyards full of chickens and pigs, and small, shoeless children, and across bridges that were nothing more than lengths of decaying wood balanced over a ditch. Even my mute and hostile friend, the guard, decided to complain at this point, muttering that he would demand extra payment from Bearpark to compensate for the filthy nature of this assignment.