The Cusanus Game

  “You mean that Majorcan’s art of creating knowledge by means of a little mechanism—click, clack—without exerting the mind and calculating—from one to two to three—the wisdom of God’s Creation?”

  “If I may, Your Eminence, it might, I think, be the true future of all philosophizing: counting, measuring, weighing, calculating. Not the errors, superior attitudes, and disputes over authorities of the past and present. Computing! The little witch writes it at one point: You will one day be credited with having advanced this very thing.”

  “Me? That is as bold as it is incredible, Geistleben. True, I have—it was a long time ago, I think it was in the year ’26, when I was still Giordano Orsini’s secretary—examined the work of Raymundus Lullus. While rummaging around here in Cologne, I found it among many other writings. The cardinal pointed out to me that there was an extensive, almost entirely unexplored library here. He had a nose for such things.”

  “I too discovered it here. It intrigued me.”

  “I made excerpts back then, but I never found time to devote myself seriously to that Ars Magna, as its creator so vainly called it. Only I have reservations about ceding the practice of philosophy to the mechanics and clockmakers. Although … Well, indeed, at the Camaldolese monastery Val di Castro, after a dispute with Toscanelli, I wrote down a few thoughts on weighing, which … I will delve deeper into it, when time permits … But no, how would that woman…”

  “Does anyone know what the future will bring, Your Eminence? Besides God, perhaps the devil … and a little witch now and then?”

  “Moor the vessel!” the ferryman shouted to the oarsmen.

  On the riverside two young men had hastened over and caught the lines that were thrown to them. Horses were harnessed, a dozen or more, to tow the heavy vessel upstream to the upper dock, for the leeway was surely three thousand feet. The breath of the animals steamed in the cool morning air. Up on the bank Jewish children stood in the wet grass. Wrapped in rags—barefoot. They followed the horses at a proper distance, for the towing men swung their whips widely. A pale sun rose between cloud banks and turned animals and people into gold-enveloped silhouettes.

  “I hope to be in Rome again by summer, Geistleben,” said the cardinal. “If your wanderlust should lead you there, you would be a welcome guest.”

  “You are too kind, Your Eminence. I am honored by your offer.”

  “You would then have to tell me about the Lullian art, if it has been taught to you in Paris.”

  “It will be my pleasure, Your Eminence.”

  The groom led the animals by the reins up the dock, held the stirrup, and helped the Cusan mount. The cardinal held up the tied-up scroll with the letters.

  “Thank you!” he called to the scholar, who had shouldered his knapsack. “God bless you.”

  “Farewell, Your Eminence.”

  “We set off,” the cardinal commanded, taking the reins. “I want to be in Heisterbach with the Cistercians for sext and in Andernach for vespers. The day is short, and I hate journeying in the dark.”

  The groom nodded, leaped into the saddle, and fastened together the reins of the pack animals. Then they rode off, leaving behind the voices of the children ringing out in the cool morning air.

  A couple of geese flew low over the reeds along the river. The heavy, rhythmic beat of their wings sounded like the lusty moans of two lovers. The groom turned his face away and grinned.

  * * *

  “OH MY! I beg your pardon, Your Eminence. We were not expecting you. We thought you were still staying in Cologne. Oh God, I was planning to go to the market tomorrow morning to buy some things to which you are partial, as I know from the past. Oh, Your Eminence. What am I doing standing here before you? Please…”

  “But Katrin! Are you seriously going to sink to your knees before me? Stand up and let me embrace you. And don’t call me ‘Your Eminence’! What did you always call me when I was still dean at St. Florin?”

  “I wouldn’t dare.”

  “Nico, you called me, and you were like a mother to me. Let us stick with that, Katrin.”

  “But you have become such an exalted man. You come right after the Holy Father, says Helwicus.”

  “Well, isn’t it so?” the dean broke in. “It is said that Pope Nicholas is your friend and values your advice.”

  “Indeed, we see eye to eye in many respects.”

  “What am I doing here?” the old housekeeper lamented, spreading her arms. “Completely unprepared. I can offer a chicken, roasted in butter and rosemary, but cold. The bread is fresh.”

  “I’m not hungry. We did not set off from Andernach until after lunch today. In the morning I had to dictate an urgent letter to the chapter of St. John’s in Osnabrück. But I’m thirsty. I could certainly do with a glass of wine.”

  “Wine from home?”

  “Yes. Do you have some from my father’s vineyards?”

  “Indeed, we do. Every year your brother Johannes sends us a tun down the Moselle. It is the best wine far and wide.”

  “Then bring me a flagon of that, Katrin, so that I may at least taste a mouthful of home.”

  “You mean, you’re not going to ride up to Kues?” asked the dean.

  “I would be delighted to, but I don’t have the time, Helwicus. I’m expected in Frankfurt. And next month I shall be in Brixen once again. I would have liked to ride up to Kues to check on things and see how far the plans for the foundation have come to fruition, but I have trustworthy people under my brother’s supervision who are advancing my cause and managing it well.”

  “I heard the same.”

  “Did you also hear about the witch they plan to bring to trial in Cologne?”

  “Yes, but only vaguely. There are many rumors going around in Cologne. I think it will turn out the same way as in the year ’46 with that sorceress. The city council had her banished. A lenient sentence for the woman.”

  “This time, perhaps not, the way things stand.”

  “Maybe so. I heard a conflict broke out between the archbishop and the council. Tilman told me about it; he is on hand as an adviser to him. Now they are waiting for a commission from Rome to attend to the case.”

  “This woman wrote me letters.”

  “Did I hear you correctly? She wrote you letters?”

  “Yes, look! Now I will finally take some time to read them,” said the cardinal, tossing the tied-up scroll onto the large table. “They are copies. One of the archbishop’s scribes gave them to me. Geistleben is his name. He and I crossed to Deutz on the same ferry.”

  The cardinal took a penknife and cut the strings, filled the goblet that had been set down before him with wine, and drank from it in small, sampling sips.

  “The wine is good,” he said, nodding appreciatively; then he began to read.

  Later Katrin brought him a candle. And when it had burned down, she lit a second one for him and placed additional candles nearby.

  And Nicolaus Cusanus read and read.

  * * *

  “YOU HAVE NOT even touched the chicken, my lord. I knew that it was not to your taste.”

  “No, Katrin,” the cardinal said, lost in thought. “That is, yes.” He turned away. “East of Cattenom the land is black, deep into Bohemian and Polish regions,” he murmured, “as can be seen from orbit.”

  “I will bring you warm milk.”

  “Is Helwicus up yet?”

  “Yes. Shall I summon him?”

  “Please do.”

  “Do you know where Cattenom is, Helwicus?” he asked the dean.

  “Oh, I believe there is a hamlet by that name up at the top of the Moselle, in Lotharingia, not far from Metz. I’m not certain, but Adrien, the fisherman who brings us his catch every Thursday evening, comes from that area. I will ask him.”

  “In Lotharingia?” the cardinal repeated reflectively. “East of Cattenom the land is black…”

  “I don’t understand.”

  The cardinal stuck a fingernail under the h
ardened wax of the burned-down candle and detached it from the table.

  “Mysterious, all this,” he murmured.

  “What the little witch has written to you?”

  “This is no witch. It is a strange woman. Mad, perhaps, but knowledgeable and acutely perceptive. She foresees a future we cannot even imagine.”

  The cardinal looked exhausted after staying awake all night. He turned to the window and rubbed his chin. Day had come, but dense mist veiled the river, so that the opposite bank could not be seen.

  “‘East of Cattenom the land is black,’ she writes, ‘deep into Bohemian and Polish regions, as can be seen from orbit.’ — What does she mean by ‘orbit’? The circle of the Earth? A circle above the Earth? It would have to be a bird that could soar as high as the sphere of the moon in order to see that far. An angel…?”

  At a loss, the cardinal shook his head. “The black blade that had pierced the heart of the continent.” The plague? A conflagration? A festering wound of the earth itself?

  The Cusan looked out over the meadows around the mouth of the Moselle. They stretched almost down to Andernach, a vast wetland from which myriad mosquitoes swarmed up in the summer. A nuisance for man and beast, as he recalled. What a carefree time that had been, when he had still performed his duty as a dean here at St. Florin!

  Mist rose like smoke from extinguished fires. An army camp of ghosts, which had moved on through time. The cardinal hunched his shoulders as if a chill had seized him.

  “Todi,” he murmured.

  “I beg your pardon?” the dean asked in confusion.

  “She writes: ‘Beware of Todi.’ What is supposed to await me there? What does she mean by that?”

  He turned around decisively.

  “Frankfurt will have to wait. I will send a messenger to say that I will be coming three or four days later. Today I will ride back to Cologne. I have to speak with this woman. It should not be judges questioning her, but scholars. It ought to be determined where she comes from and with whom she has studied. She must come from a part of the world of which we know nothing, but whose wise men certainly have knowledge of us. This case is too important to be left to the council of the Cologne citizenry or Dietrich von Moers. I have to talk to the archbishop, have to urge him not to do anything overhasty. This case must be decided in Rome.”

  “Very well, Your Eminence,” said the dean.

  “Katrin, summon the archbishop’s groom for me, who rode with me yesterday. He is to saddle the horses and accompany me back to Cologne.”

  V

  Nanos Machinulis

  The living world is dying; the natural economy is crumbling beneath our busy feet. We have been too self-absorbed to foresee the long-term consequences of our actions, and we will suffer a terrible loss unless we shake off our delusions and move quickly to a solution. Science and technology led us into this bottleneck. Now science and technology must help us find our way through and out.

  EDWARD O. WILSON

  “There are still a lot of tourists here,” I said.

  “But not half as many as there used to be. Only about twenty percent of the applications are granted,” Frans replied.

  “Why don’t they close off Venice entirely, as long as it’s a construction site?”

  “What would the people who still reside here live off?” He spread his arms. “There are only fifty thousand of them anyhow. It used to be four times as many. It would mean decline. The social structure would break down. The city must live on.”

  “But it’s sick.”

  “All the more reason we have to make sure it lives on. Certainly, it could be turned into a museum, but that wouldn’t be Venice anymore, but rather a sort of Disneyland that is opened in the morning and in which the lights are turned out in the evening.”

  We walked to the Rialto and took the vaporetto. The sun was shining, but it was low in the southwest, and the air on the water was damp and cold. Some of the palazzi along the Canal Grande looked as if they had been hoisted off their foundations, those had been replaced with new ones, and the buildings had then been put back on them. The stone steps and piers looked new; the grime and the slippery growth of algae had disappeared. Those that had not yet undergone nanotechnological renewal now looked all the worse.

  At San Stae we got off and walked along the salizzada, bearing right where the street opened onto a jumble of little bridges crisscrossing a system of branching canals. Frans suddenly stopped and looked around. Then he walked down to the water and scrutinized the walls just above the surface. On the damp brick facade of the house on the small square someone had sprayed graffiti: a green buglike or crustacean monster with a snake head, from whose mouth a forked tongue darted out between sharp, bloody fangs. The eyes glowed malevolently in bright red. Above it were the words NO NANOS! and below it ITALIA NOSTRA. I climbed down to Frans, who was crouching on a step just over the water.

  “Do you see that?” he asked.

  “What’s that?” I asked, disgusted. “Looks like pus.”

  He raised a finger. “Those are several billion dead nanos.”

  “Several billion?”

  I looked around in the indistinct glow of twilight and saw that all along the waterline between the stones of the houses’ foundations poured slime the yellow of broom flowers, as if the old walls were suppurating.

  He activated his ICom. “I’m here on Campo San Boldo. Someone released something here. Yes, it looks to me like quite a lot. It could spread during the flooding tonight through the western canals. I think you should send a few rush-troopers here right away.”

  “Rush…?”

  “R.U.S.H. That’s the NNTR’s rapid response team,” he explained, turning to me. “The name comes from their rucksack helicopters.” Frans bent over, scratched with his fingernail at the sticky secretion, and sniffed it. He screwed up his face.

  “Chloroacetamide,” he said. “The usual. Probably forty, fifty liters.”

  He looked up at the facade.

  “Parrocchia San Giacomo da l’Orio. Yes, you can land here. The square is big enough. Pozzo in the center. No problem. Over.”

  He wiped his finger with a tissue.

  “Those idiots use this to kill off the nanos that are supposed to stabilize the wood of the pylons,” he explained. “It takes a great deal of effort to develop those tiny biotechnicians. Each one is a specialist in a very particular species of wood. It responds to very specific genetic structures. They give it the signal that activates its programming. And that tells it what it has to do.”

  “The genes of holly oaks and larches?”

  “Theoretically, yes. But there are deviations, depending on where the wood comes from, where it grew. In addition, at times of intense construction activity those wood species were very expensive. So many master builders secretly mixed other types of wood with them. That’s what makes the reconstruction so difficult.”

  “How do you know all this?” I asked him.

  “I’ve been with the organization for six years.”

  “But you’re not a nanotechnician.”

  “No. Nor a lignologist. Unfortunately. More a sort of traveler.”

  “Dealing in wood?”

  “Something like that.”

  “I thought you were an architectural historian. So you claimed, at least.”

  “The two are not mutually exclusive, are they?”

  “You’re making fun of me.”

  “No, Domenica. I…”

  “Listen, Frans. We really don’t have to deceive each other. I don’t know what this is about. I’ve signed a contract as a botanist to participate in an environmental project. Okay? But for more than a month we, my fellow students and I, have been confronted with nothing but strange secretiveness. That’s frustrating. We’re kept in the dark, put off, fed half-truths, presumably even lied to at times…”

  “No, Domenica. To make it clear between us once and for all: There are no half-truths here and definitely no lies. Has it ever
crossed your mind that all this might be part of your training?”

  “A test of our patience?”

  “Something like that. In any case, the selection process is not yet complete. The reason for the strict secrecy is that there’s a great deal of extremely sensitive data in connection with the Rinascita Project, which is not intended for public consumption. It must under no circumstances reach the media or be made public, because it would change our world from the ground up.”

  That sounded somehow familiar to me. I remembered the strange call from Bernd in Rome. Had some sort of conspiracy of silence been established? But something like that could not be sustained. In the long run, it was impossible. Unless … I suddenly had the sensation that I could no longer think clearly.

  “That all sounds pretty dramatic. Don’t you think?” I said.

  “It is dramatic, Domenica, and could be really dangerous in its ramifications. Besides, it’s not my job to brief you on your mission. Professor Ishida reserves that for himself alone. But he will do so only after your conditioning is complete.”

  “You mean our brainwashing?”

  “God, no! I said ‘conditioning.’ It’s in all our interest that as few people as possible know about our missions. It’s a responsibility that sometimes demands everything from us.”

  “Diving and scraping wood samples from the foundations of the buildings?”

  Frans looked at me uncomprehendingly, then laughed out loud and put his arm around me. Why did that touch seem so familiar to me?

  Suddenly I heard a soft whirring above us and saw four figures in yellow protective suits approaching from the east with gleaming rotors strapped to their backs. Two unmanned aircraft with equipment followed. They landed between the houses.

  “Let’s get something to eat,” said Frans.

  We had strolled down narrow streets and stepped out onto the large Campo San Giacomo. We crossed the square, heading toward a trattoria: Capitan Uncino. The sign displayed a musketeer who had with a lunge speared three fish on his sword; his raised left arm was adorned with a golden hook, which had replaced the severed hand.