The Spy of Venice

by Benet Brandreth

  Francesco opened his mouth to reply but Isabella spoke over him.

  As graceless as jesting at funerals

  Are words coined at an innocent’s expense.

  Ignoble the man who attacks women

  Thinking women to be without defence.

  He who contends with a noble woman

  That lacks for any fault or spear or shield,

  Well ’tis for certain all the hurt is his

  No matter how cunning the sword he wield.

  His wit wins, he wins the crown of cruelty.

  If vanquished, his is the worse condition

  For having threatened undeserving woman

  All he adds is scorn to his perdition.

  A general growling of approval greeted the finish of Isabella’s verse. She bowed.

  ‘Parried and returned.’ Andrea’s plump hands fluttered in applause.

  ‘She has pierced you twice over, Francesco,’ Faustina pointed at the scowling figure. ‘Once for the verse, and once for showing herself the better poet.’

  Francesco made to make reply. He was again prevented by another speaking.

  ‘We cannot improve on this last,’ Marco Venier said. ‘Let us, therefore, refresh ourselves.’

  He made to clap his hands to summon the servants, but before he could do so the hot-faced Francesco spoke.

  ‘You will forgive me, Marco. I find I have no appetite and so take my leave.’ He gave a curt bow to the company.

  Marco Venier shrugged as the door closed behind Francesco Tiepolo. He glanced down at Isabella.

  ‘It’s no wonder he’s lost his appetite,’ he said. ‘You left him completely stuffed, darling.’

  Isabella said nothing. The sweet sensation of her immediate riposte could not quite take the sour taste of Francesco’s vituperative poem from her mouth. Nor disguise the discomfort of knowing she had made another enemy. Nor hide how, when the blows landed, no guest fought on her behalf. Bar a few, their eyes had shied away from her as if fearing contamination. Only when she had shown herself capable of her own defence had she reappeared to them. These were friends only when the skies were clear and the sailing easy.

  Marco Venier clapped his hands. Servants appeared to proffer yet more delights to those that remained. The guests rose and gathered in knots of conversation.

  For a moment William was left standing alone. He could not take his thoughts from Isabella Lisarro. In all his life he had never seen such speed of wit, such resource of thought, and all so deftly applied. There was a power in that display that William found more seductive than her outward show, for all its glories. At school he had been taught about the gods of Rome. He’d always wondered at the praise of Venus. He understood it. She was the pleasure of the instant. She was the seduction of sweating palms. She was pretty faces and paddling fingers. Venus was nothing next to Minerva, patron of heroes.

  ‘Sir William will know,’ Faustina said as she gathered William into her orbit. ‘What news is there of the Emperor in England?’

  William, brought back from thoughts that had been in ancient Rome, was for a moment at a loss. ‘Forgive me? Which emperor?’ he said.

  Faustina shrieked with laughter. ‘Of course, you English would dismiss him thus,’ she said and patted his arm. ‘I was just telling Marco that there are the most scandalous rumours about the Emperor Rudolf. His – how to put this delicately? His appetites are varied.’

  William could think of nothing to say. Not for the first time he cursed his ignorance of this great world.

  ‘I am afraid I know nothing of such things.’

  ‘Such discretion. Admirable in an embassy.’ Faustina turned to Marco Venier. ‘Dull in a conversation.’

  ‘Hush, Faustina,’ Marco said. ‘Frontal assault is not the way with the English. You must come at them sideways.’

  ‘Now your personal fantasies are intruding on our conversation, Marco,’ admonished Faustina. ‘Perhaps I should be asking you for news of the Holy Roman Emperor. Are you not just returned from Bohemia?’

  William was glad the attention had turned from him. Until awakened by Faustina’s question he had near forgotten that he was here as an impostor. There had been little to remind him. His fellow guests’ clothes were finer but their manners little different from the worthies of Stratford. Certainly they did not differ in their love of gossip. William sat quietly and listened to Faustina and Marco Venier talk of the powers in Europe. Whether out of deference to his presence or not, they spoke of England little. William gauged England was for them a strange place, a touch barbarous. It sat on the edge of events seeming too small to count. Yet persistently and unexpectedly England would thrust itself back into the centre of affairs. When Marco spoke of the Siege of Antwerp and how rumour had it that the Dutch were on the verge of surrender to the Spanish army, William was reminded of Sir Henry’s fear that when Antwerp fell the Spanish would turn their warlike aim on England. Then all would rest on the few English ships that stood between his home and Philip of Spain, unless England could find an ally.

  William’s thoughts of England were interrupted.

  ‘How is London?’ Iseppo da Nicosia asked.

  William was astonished to hear the Byzantine address him in English. It must have showed.

  ‘I have had much commerce with your English merchants on Cyprus and elsewhere. I greet you. Iseppo da Nicosia, merchant.’ Iseppo bowed his head before continuing. ‘I have also been to London once, many years ago. To trade. I much admired the great Inns of Court in the City.’

  ‘You speak English without flaw,’ William said. He was curious. ‘Though I wonder if you are mistook, sir. The Inns are not in the City but at its edge. Near to the Temple Bar.’

  The swarthy man snapped his fingers. ‘You have the right of it. I meant to speak, I think, of the Mercer’s Hall on Cheapside, where I had business. It has been some years. I remember chiefly its magnificent edifice.’

  ‘You seek to flatter, sir,’ said William. ‘We have buildings in London that we think rare, knowing no better. You, I judge, have seen more of this world than I. In praising London, here in Venice, I think you mean to do me more honour than my city.’

  Iseppo smiled. ‘I am transparent. Let me then be direct in my flattery. I thought your poem brave and good. It pleases me that the Ambassador of England’s man is not all counting and scheming.’

  ‘Oh I assure you,’ said William, ‘there’s no scheming in me at all and I only count the feet in a line.’

  Iseppo’s look turned sad. ‘I hope that is not so, Sir William. Or we will not long have the pleasure of your company. One wants a balance. If one is to survive in Venice one needs to scheme, at least a little. Let us take the matter of the names.’

  ‘The names?’

  Iseppo reached up to finger the chain about his neck. Hung upon it was a medallion engraved with the winged lion of St Mark, the symbol of Venice.

  ‘Yes. The names of the papal agents in Venice that you propose to exchange with us.’

  William said nothing. Their speech had taken a strange turn and he was lost. Iseppo took his silence for caution.

  ‘You prefer not to discuss this now. Perfectly safe I assure you. None here can hear us.’

  William’s mind was running with hare’s feet. He recalled Sir Henry’s strange words as he lay dying. Words William had ascribed to pain and the delusions of a man with one foot across death’s bourne. Sir Henry had spoken of names, now he heard them spoken of again. That there was a connection was obvious. What reply he should make to Iseppo da Nicosia was far from being so.

  Iseppo still took his silence for discretion. ‘Very well, we shall arrange to meet in quieter company. You are at the House of the White Lion. I shall send for you there.’

  Iseppo turned from his strange remarks to greet Isabella Lisarro as she approached.

  ‘My dear friend, Isabella, we were just praising the institutions of Venice,’ Iseppo said in his thick Latin.

  ‘William and I have
spoken of this before.’ Isabella smiled at William.

  He blushed to remember the failure of his promised visit to the Chiesa di San Rocco. It was a day for blushing, he reflected.

  ‘I have not forgotten your advice, lady. Only lacked the time to take advantage of it,’ he said.

  ‘I am glad to hear it. I only hope you take advantage soon,’ Isabella said to William, whose face turned redder still at her words.

  ‘When you can be spared, Iseppo, come and join Marco and me on the balcony,’ she said. ‘Marco wishes to discuss preparations for the coronation celebrations of the new doge.’

  William started. ‘There has been a choice?’

  Isabella smiled. ‘Not yet, not yet. The Signoria have but begun their deliberations and such things take time. Yet there will be a new doge and it would not do to be unprepared when he is finally chosen.’

  She offered him her hand. ‘Till later, Sir William.’

  They watched her walk away. Iseppo saw William’s covetous eye.

  ‘Be careful, Sir William,’ Iseppo said.

  ‘I would do nothing that might harm the lady,’ William protested the Byzantine’s warning tone.

  ‘It is not her safety I am worried about,’ Iseppo replied.

  As if, with Circe, she would change my shape!

  Oldcastle was in no better mood on William’s return. Worse, in truth, for having been confined to his room all day so as to avoid a succession of visitors calling on the English Ambassador. Salarino expressed his deep concern for the old man’s health and proffered a cordial that he swore was a proven Venetian remedy for all ailments. A cordial that Oldcastle, with much ceremony, poured from the balcony into the canal the moment the little man left the room.

  William could offer him no cure of his own by way of an imminent departure. The system whereby the Venetians chose their new doge was as layered and intricate as their women’s clothing. William’s questioning of Marco Venier had revealed that despite the passage of a week they had, thus far, only chosen the membership of the company who would in turn meet to choose the doge.

  Oldcastle responded to news of this delay with a lengthy genealogical discussion concerned with whether all Venetians were but the bastard children of the over-cunning Ulysses and one of the witch Circe’s pigs. A line of heirs brought forth on a dark night when Ulysses despaired of ever finding home, trapped as he was in the labyrinthine lagoon of Venice. Then incestuously perpetuated and varied only by adulteration of the perfidious Turk. Oldcastle’s conclusion to his own argument was then quite shortly summed in language more ribald than rhetorical.

  Then William told Oldcastle of Iseppo’s strange message at the feast. Such a groaning rose from Oldcastle that William at first feared his friend was having a fit.

  ‘What “names” are these?’ said Oldcastle.

  ‘I do not know,’ William replied. ‘Iseppo spoke of an offer to exchange the names of papal agents. From us the ones in Venice and I presume from them those in England.’

  ‘Do we know these names?’

  ‘Not unless you do.’

  ‘Oh, dead. Dead. We are dead men.’

  ‘Oldcastle, calm yourself.’

  ‘How is it you are calm?’ Oldcastle paused in the midst of tugging at his beard to point an accusing finger. ‘We might have kept hidden, delivered these three-times damned letters and been gone. Now spies accost us and demand intelligence we do not have.’

  ‘This is no fault of mine.’

  ‘We should have fled Venice the moment we were free of the Count of Genoa’s company.’

  ‘We must deliver the letters.’

  ‘Damn the letters,’ roared Oldcastle. ‘Wait, wait. The letters, they must have the names within.’

  ‘They’re sealed, Nick.’

  ‘Slit them open, let us know.’

  ‘And how then to deliver them to the Signoria? Besides, Sir Henry spoke of the letters and the names as separate things.’

  Oldcastle sat heavily down in the chair by the balcony and stared out over the canal.

  ‘You patch up excuses, Will. Some witchcraft has caught you and keeps you here.’

  ‘There’s no magic to these Venetian islands, Nick,’ said William. ‘Save that the beauty of a city wreathed in water and light may make.’

  ‘So sure?’ said Oldcastle from deep within the chair where he sat slumped. ‘Listen to yourself. We sit here in a strange city, far from home and friends. Enemies about us hidden. Our own position false and if discovered so, why, death follows. The course of reason is to fly. Yet you, you . . . you stay. Wander the streets, paddle the canals, pen sonnets for strange beauties. As if we did not walk the edge of a knife. Do not be so sure there is no enchantment on you, no charm, no conjuration. Do not be so sure that there is no Circe here among us.’

  William said nothing to his unhappy friend in return. He had no argument. Venice had affected them both.

  Advantage feeds him fat, while men delay

  William enjoyed another comfortless night on the truckle bed and was up and about at dawn the following day. This time his sleep had been troubled by the question of Iseppo da Nicosia and the names of the papal agents. There had been much expectation in Iseppo’s speech and in Sir Henry’s dying words that told of plans, made long ago. If William and Oldcastle could not match those plans would they not be exposed as the false facers that they were? Yet how to obtain the names of papal agents in Venice? William had not tried to gull Oldcastle, he did not think the names were in the letters. Sir Henry had spoken of them as destined for the Doge of Venice. The names went elsewhere. William feared the names had died with Sir Henry and no earthly power would pull them from him now. Oldcastle was right. They should flee Venice.

  Instead, William decided to venture deeper into the city. He dressed quietly, taking a care not to rouse the slumbering Oldcastle for the heaving man had subsided only as hot Etna does, cooled but still spitting forth threatening smoke and rumbles. William was determined that the morning should hold more profit in it than the night before.

  ‘My lord, my lord.’

  William paused with one hand on the door to the street. Salarino caught up with him. A certain puckering of his lips left William in no doubt that Salarino found his refusal to use a gondola distasteful. William ignored his judging look.

  ‘My lord, a message for you.’

  ‘The ambassador is still abed. Fetch it to him.’

  ‘No, my lord, the message was for you.’

  William took the small fold of paper from Salarino. It was sealed with an imprint of the winged lion of St Mark. William turned it over in his hands, fearing its contents. When he realised that Salarino still hovered nearby on wings of curiosity he tucked the letter into his doublet and took his leave of the little man.

  He waited until he had left the House of the White Lion hidden behind him before he reached for the letter.

  Let us conclude our private business.

  The Basilica dei Frari at noon.

  Iseppo da Nicosia

  A passing man shied back at William’s loud curse and walked hurriedly on, muttering. William had hoped this message would not follow so quickly on.

  His first thought was to ignore the message. A foolish notion; the Signoria could not be dismissed as if a pestering child. He and Oldcastle might flee Venice, yet that could not be done before nightfall. More than that, his business in Venice was not ended. There were things he must attend to before he could depart. He would have to find some way to create delay. He racked his brain.

  What bargain had been made by Sir Henry? Names for names alone? He had none to give. William did not think that Sir Henry would make so simple an exchange. His talk had been of the importance of Venice as an ally to England. Surely this was part of that grander bargain. If so, might he not put off the exchange until after the doge’s election?

  He groaned to think of the meeting with Iseppo. His refusal to give the names would surely enrage the man. It was the only way
William could see to create delay. His plan made, he set off with speed. Feared things are best done swiftly, his mother was wont to say. Delays allow fears to grow past action.

  William took a gondola to the Basilica dei Frari, which stood not far off to the south of the Canal Grande in the sestiere of San Polo. It struck him as a strange place in which to arrange a secret meeting. The great brick church whose bell tower soared above the city did not seem very private. William arrived as the bells rang noon.

  As he approached the doors of the basilica opened and a crowd came forth as the service within ended. The first flood spilled away and William entered. The basilica was still crowded with people. He walked the edge of it looking for Iseppo. He found him at the front. William came and stood by him and joined him in looking up at the great painting that hung above the altar.

  ‘The Assumption of Mary,’ said Iseppo.

  ‘A false doctrine we are told,’ replied William.

  Iseppo turned and smiled at him. ‘But a great painting, as you see.’

  William nodded. The painting was a wonder of colour and the figures within it had such a quality of movement that William feared they might step forth to join them. His mind was not on such matters at that moment. He thought of the argument to come.

  ‘The work of Titian,’ continued Iseppo. ‘The greatest artist of Venice, though I dare not say so in Tintoretto’s presence. Have you met Tintoretto yet?’

  ‘Good Iseppo, you have called me here to speak of an exchange of names. I have come to tell you that the time is not yet right for such a bargain. We must know who is to be the new doge. We must know the whole bargain.’

  William finished his speech. He had composed it on the way to the basilica. It sounded forced to his ear, the crudeness with which it had burst out after Iseppo’s question, childish. Iseppo’s smile did not waver.

  ‘You are not what I expected, Master Fallow. Your master, Sir Henry, even less so.’

  Iseppo took William’s arm, an oddly familiar gesture. ‘We must discuss these matters further.’