“But shown much earlier,” said the Maestro, “by Abu Yusuf Ya’qub ibn Is-haq ibn as-Sabbah ibn ’omran ibn Ismail al-Kindi. Ninth century, in fact. Come over here and make yourself useful. You, too, Vizio.”
We rose and went like good little schoolboys.
“Every one of the sheets,” the Maestro said, “has ten five-letter words in a row, and no more than thirty-two rows on a page. This may be steganography, where the text is hidden in full view. You may have to take the first letter of the fourth word and the third of the one below and so on, or it may even require a Cardan grille to identify the meaningful letters. Let us hope that the original was copied exactly. But it wouldn’t be, of course. The spacing between lines varies, see? And we can’t tell whether it did in the original or not. I want you each to take a pen and a sheet of paper and invent a page just like these, 320 nonsense words in 10 columns. Go to it.”
Vasco was frowning, but I suppose it seemed a better alternative than total boredom, so he accepted a pen and an inkwell, and went over to work on the slate-topped table with the crystal ball. I sat at my side of the desk and rapidly discovered that the job was not as easy as it seemed. When we turned in our assignments, the Maestro studied them while we peered over his shoulders.
Then he chuckled. “You have disproved your own hypothesis, Alfeo! You see where you both went wrong?”
Fortunately I did. “We weren’t repeating ourselves,” I said. “I never wrote a double letter, but the originals have lots of them. There’s even three K ’s in a row there. I never began a word with the same letter I’d used to start the one before. And we never wrote a real word. Algol has a MOLO and even PASTA if you ignore the space in the middle.”
“And so on,” the Maestro said sourly, annoyed that I had spoiled his revelation. “You were too random! Your lack of order is a sort of order in itself. That means that these originals were not made by someone just writing random letters. There is meaning in them. Now all we have to do is pull it out.”
“How can you do that if you don’t know what language it is?” Vasco demanded.
“Not many languages are likely-Tuscan, Latin, Spanish, Veneziano, Arabic, Turkish, French. They use Old Persian in the Porte sometimes. I can read most of those and recognize the rest. But perhaps I can find another way. Take this trash away, Vizio.” The old man heaved himself to his feet, I handed him his staff, and he hobbled over to the crystal. “You can both get some sleep. I’ll lock up, Alfeo.”
I doused the other lamps and shooed Vasco out of the atelier ahead of me.
I did not offer to share my bed with him, but I did find him a blanket and a pillow. He stretched out on a couch in the salone.
The last thing I did before going to bed was to consult my tarot. It gave me an assortment of the minor arcana, all low numbers without a single court card or trump. I had not seen such a disgusting heap since before I was toilet trained. Deciding I must be overtired, I fell into bed.
10
I awoke at dawn as always. Remembering the work I had to do, I growled myself upright, groaned myself into my clothes, and grouched out into the salone in my stocking soles. The vizio ’s blanket lay unoccupied beside the couch, so he had presumably gone to recharge the canal, and I had a chance to reach the atelier without attracting his unwelcome attention.
The atelier door is both locked and warded at night. The Maestro might have omitted setting the wards if he was exhausted after his clairvoyance, but I played safe and cast the counter-spell before using my key. As soon as I had let daylight in, I went to inspect the slate-topped table.
What I found was ominous. It began in the usual barely legible scrawclass="underline"
When the cat is in the trap, the mouse…
But that was followed by mere chalk scribbles, snail tracks bearing no resemblance to writing at all. I have known the Maestro to prophecy in such appalling cacography that neither of us could read half of it, but I could recall no occasion when he had failed to produce a reasonable attempt at a quatrain.
And my tarot had failed me.
The door closed behind me and I spun around angrily. It was not, as I had expected, Filiberto Vasco snooping. It was Danese Dolfin, obviously released from his kennel and apparently not snooping, because he came striding straight over to me, his manner all but shooting lightning bolts. He had given up wearing his sling.
“Why is the vizio here?” he demanded.
“I can’t tell you.”
“You don’t know?”
“I know, but I can’t tell you.”
That stopped him. I was tempted to suggest he ask around his new family, but even that hint would violate my oath.
“Does sier Alvise Barbolano know he’s here?”
“No,” I said, “and I strongly advise you not to tell him.” Then I remembered old Luigi, whose mouth is larger than the Adriatic. The news would be out the moment Luigi could find a listener.
More wary now, Danese said, “Is he going to stay long?”
There were witty retorts I could have made to that, but I wasn’t feeling witty. “Several days.”
“It’s intolerable!” Danese shouted, turning on his heel.
“Yes,” I said softly as he disappeared. Life holds many trials we can do nothing about, but with luck Vasco would rid us of one of them.
I followed Danese out, locked the atelier, and went in search of shaving water. Halfway along my trek to the kitchen stood Vasco, folding his blanket with the satchel strap over his shoulder like a tippet, as if he had worn it all night. We greeted each other with cold nods, acknowledging that our enforced cooperation was only temporary and battle would resume at the first opportunity.
The kitchen was redolent with ambrosial scents of fresh bread and the khave Mama Angeli was just preparing. Giorgio and four sons sat gobbling at the big table-the older girls would still be dressing small fry. We exchanged blessings and they waited hopefully for me to explain the additional houseguest. I just asked them to keep down the noise outside the Maestro’s room.
In stalked the vizio wearing sword and satchel, closely followed by Danese wearing his lute. They both looked rumpled and unshaven-Danese less so, because he was blond and had not had to sleep in his clothes-and their joint arrival seemed so staged that I half expected them to burst into song.
Vasco asked me, “When will Nostradamus want to see these papers again?”
“Probably not for a couple of hours.”
“May I ask your gondolier to take me home to fetch some clothes? I won’t be long.” He couldn’t resist adding, “Just promise me you’ll keep the door locked while I’m gone.”
“Should I wear my sword?”
“You’re probably safer without it.”
“Very true,” I said, “I hate inquests.” I glanced inquiringly at Giorgio and he nodded, of course. “He will be happy to oblige you, lustrissimo.” I was sorely tempted to add, “But don’t tip him too generously; he isn’t used to it.” I didn’t say that, though, and the self-restraint required must have made all the angels in Heaven cheer.
Danese said nothing, but when gondolier and vizio departed, he went with them. I looked across the table at the amused stare of a descending line of dark eyes-Christoforo, Corrado, Archangelo, and little Piero.
“It’s a good job I like your father,” I said. “Or I’d be praying for sharks to sink his gondola. Chris, go and bolt the front door behind them.”
Eight eyes widened. “Why?” chorused one bass, one baritone, one tenor, and one alto.