Part 7 (1/2)
I DREW DREW V VITALE WITH ME OUT OF THE SICKROOM AND into the pa.s.sage. into the pa.s.sage.
”Your friend is is being poisoned and the poison is deadly. You feed that caviar to a mongrel dog and you'll see him die before your eyes.” being poisoned and the poison is deadly. You feed that caviar to a mongrel dog and you'll see him die before your eyes.”
”But who would do this?”
”I fear to tell you: the man's own brother. But you cannot confront him. It won't be believed. This is what you must do. Instantly insist that the patient be given milk and plenty of it. Say that only white food will restore his spirits. Nothing but white food in which nothing dark has been intermixed.”
”You think this will work?”
”I know it will work. The poison comes from a tree in the orangery below. It's black. It stains everything it touches black. It's the black seed of a purple flower.”
”Oooh, I know this poison!” he said. ”It comes from Brazil. They call it the Purple Death. I've only read of it in my manuals, and in Hebrew. I don't think it's known to the Latin doctors. I've never seen it.”
”Well, I've seen it and I tell you that there is a great quant.i.ty of it growing on the tree downstairs. It's so poisonous I can't collect it without these gloves and I need a leather pouch in which to put it.”
Quickly he removed a pouch from one of the pockets of his tunic, took the gold out, put this in his purse and gave me the pouch. ”Here, can you safely collect it now? Will the guilty person know it when you do it?”
”Not if you keep him very busy. Call Signore Antonio. Call Lodovico. Insist they both hear you out. Say that you suspect the caviar has not helped the patient. Say that he must take milk. Say that the milk will line the stomach and absorb what evil elements are tormenting Niccol. Say that a woman's milk is the best of all. But cow's milk will do, and goat's milk, and cheese, pure white cheese of the finest quality. The more of this you get into the patient the better. And meantime I shall take care of the poison.”
”But how shall I say I came by this knowledge?”
”Say you have prayed, and you have pondered, and you have considered what has happened since the caviar was first given.”
”That I have, there's no lie in that.”
”Insist that the milk be tried. The loving father will see no harm in milk. No one will see harm in it. Meanwhile, I'll return to the orangery and I'll harvest as much of the poison as I can. But there's no telling how much the poisoner has already harvested himself for his purposes. I suspect not much. It's too lethal. He's been taking only the smallest doses as he needs them.”
Vitale's face darkened. He shook his head. ”You're telling me Lodovico has done this thing.”
”I believe that he has. But what's important now is that you get the milk to your patient.”
I hurried down to the small courtyard. The gates were locked. I tried to force them very gently, but it was impossible. Nothing would have done for it but smas.h.i.+ng the lock altogether and that I could ill afford to do.
One of the innumerable servants came up to me, a withered being whose garments appeared more like wrappings than clothes. He asked softly if he might be of help.
”Where is Signore Lodovico?” I asked, to indicate only that I'd been looking for him.
”With his father and with the priests.”
”The priests?”
”Let me give you a warning,” whispered this thin toothless being. ”Get out of this house now while you can.”
I gave him a searching look, but all he did was shake his head and walk off muttering to himself, leaving me at the locked courtyard gates. Deep inside the courtyard, I could see the bright purple flowers I had sought to harvest. I knew now there was no time for such a plan. And possibly it had not been the best plan.
As I reached Niccol's bedchamber again, I saw approaching me Signore Antonio with two elderly priests in long black soutanes with gleaming crucifixes on their chests, and Lodovico, holding his father's arm. He was weeping again, but when he saw me, he shot me a glance as sharp as a blade.
There was no pretense of cordiality. Indeed, there was a look very like triumph on his face. And the others eyed me with obvious suspicion, though Signore Antonio himself seemed deeply troubled.
From within, I could hear Vitale ordering someone to take the caviar out. This person was arguing with him, and so was Niccol, but I couldn't make out all that was being said.
”Young man,” said Signore Antonio to me, ”come in here with me now.”
Two other men came behind him, and I saw that they were armed guards. They had visible daggers in their belts, and one wore a sword.
I went into the room first. It was Pico who'd been arguing with Vitale, and the caviar remained where it had been.
Niccol lay there with his eyes half shut, and his lips dry and cracked. He sighed uneasily.
I prayed that it was not too late.
The guards slipped against the wall behind the chair where I'd been playing the lute earlier. We gathered around the bed.
Signore Antonio eyed me for a long moment and then he stared at Vitale. As for Lodovico, he had given way to tears again, very convincingly, as before.
”Wake up, my son,” said Signore Antonio. ”Wake up, and hear the truth from your brother's lips. I fear it can no longer be avoided, and only in the telling of it can the disaster be averted.”
”What is this, Father?” asked the patient. He seemed weaker than ever, though the caviar sat still where we had left it.
”Speak,” said Signore Antonio to Lodovico.
The young man faltered, wiped at his tears with a silk handkerchief and then said, ”I have no choice but to reveal that Vitale, our trusted friend, our confidant, our companion, has in fact bewitched my brother!”
Niccol sat up with more strength than I'd ever witnessed.
”How dare you say such a thing? You know my friend is incapable of this. Bewitched me how and to what purpose?”
Lodovico gave way to a fresh shower of tears and appealed to his father with open arms.
”Unbeknownst to me, my son,” said Antonio, ”this man has craved to keep the house in which he lives, the house in which I let him live while you were ill, the house which I had chosen to bestow on you and your bride. He has summoned the evil spirit there to do his bidding, and it is by means of this evil spirit that he has made you gravely ill, and hopes that you will die so that the house may be his. He has prayed for this to his G.o.d. He has prayed for this, and Lodovico has heard his prayers.”
”This is a lie. I prayed for no such thing,” said Vitale. ”I live in the house at your pleasure, and seek to put the old library in order, at your pleasure, and to find what Hebrew ma.n.u.scripts were left behind years ago by the man who left the house to you. But I have never prayed for an evil spirit to aid me in any way, and would never have such evil designs upon my closest friend.”
He stared at Signore Antonio in disbelief. ”How can you accuse me of this? You think that in hopes of a palazzo I can well afford to buy I would sacrifice the life of my closest friend in all the world? Signore, you wound me as if with a knife.”
Signore Antonio listened to this, as if his mind was not made up.
”Do you not have a synagogue within this house?” demanded the taller of the two priests, who was obviously the elder. He was a man of dark gray hair and sharpened features. But his face was not cruel. ”Do you not have the Scrolls of your Torah in that synagogue set into an Ark?”
”These things are there, yes,” said Vitale. ”They were there when I took the house. It's general knowledge that a Jew lived there, and he has left these things, and for twenty years they've been layered in dust.”
At this Signore Antonio seemed particularly affected. But he didn't speak.
”You've never used these things in your evil prayers?” demanded the second priest, a more timid man, but one who was now trembling with ill-concealed excitement.
”Well, I must confess in all truth I have not used them in my prayers,” said Vitale. ”I must confess I'm more the humanist, the poet, the physician, than I am the pious Jew. Forgive me, but I have not used them. I've gone to the synagogue of my friends for my Sabbath prayers, and you know those men, you know them well, they're respected by all of you.”
”Ah,” said the tall priest. ”So you admit you uttered no holy or pious prayers to these strange books, and yet we are to a.s.sume they are your sacred books and not some strange and foreign books of secrets and enchantments?”