And the while he stole a glance at Vergil’s pouch.
But of what he thought might be in it, and of what he knew was certainly in it, of this he said no word.
Then he addressed himself to the meats upon the table. By and by, his mouth only partly filled, he said, “This a very rich city.”
“Indeed, Magnate.”
“It been richer.”
“Indeed, Master?”
“Could be richer, could richer be, than ever was. But how?”
“Indeed. Magnate.”
Magnate Boso poured into his goblet a draft of something thick and dark, poured on top of that something thin and light, swirled the goblet, once, twice, raised, and in an instant drained it, set it down. “Rich. Richer. Very rich. Riches.” Barely he paused, he looked at Vergil from beneath his hedge-thick eyebrows. “Interested?”
The possibility of gaining, and gaining swift and soon, the means of supplying all he ever had desired to supply for that place, as yet set no place, which his dreams termed home, lit up Vergil’s mind. And in the light, like the brief and fitful shimmer of a sheet of heat-lighting, something else he saw there illuminated as well.
At the Secret Sacred School, filing past Putto, the obscenely fat, who stood with a large and sagging sack in each swollen paw. Every student, by instruction (and one did not dally in obeying instruction; this was already the eighteenth lesson. . or. . it might prove to be; one did not always know. . till after) and without looking, peering, peeping, groping, fumbling, was to place one hand into each sack and withdraw one, only one. . whatever. The student ahead of Vergil was an Illyrian named Lustus, one with a clever way of seeming not the least clever, of lurching into one of his fellows, if not always (though often) to his own profit, then to the other’s loss, and similar tricks of which one could hardly or not decently complain. Lustus had taken hold of. . whatever. . with each hand; perhaps Lustus did not like the feel of what he had hold of by his left hand, clearly Vergil saw the wrist-tendons move, knew that Lustus was — Lustus, slightly, feigned a stagger, murmured apology — was letting go of. . whatever. . and taking hold of another. Lustus gave a short, sick, and sickening grunt. Lustus drew up his hand as though it was afire. Vergil could not clearly (thank the gods!) make out what it was that clung to the left hand of Lustus, it was too large for an insect and had too many limbs for an animal or reptile, and it writhed, writhed, and Lustus screamed, screamed -
— two of the proctors swiftly seized him, one from each side -
— if Lustus was still screaming or if what rang in Vergil’s ears was an echo, Vergil did not know; he knew that Lustus was no longer in front of him -
“In with them. Draw.” Said Putto, the obscenely fat.
Vergil without hesitation obeyed. The things did not feel, really, pleasant, but nothing seemed about to bite or burn or writhe; sweating, not looking, Vergil passed along. By and by they stood, the students, in front of the elaboratory tables. “Set ‘em down. Down.” Another voice, but no strange one; whence? Not moving his head and only slightly rolling up his eyes, Vergil got a glimpse of Calimicho, the gaunt, the gray, the grim, looking down from a gallery; it was not that Vergil would have sworn there had been no gallery there a moment before, he would have sworn — although he saw it — that no gallery was there now.
But that was not the lesson.
“Look at ‘em.” All looked. Before each was a fungus from the two bags. Two. Slightly cool, one; slightly warm, one; slightly moist. . or dry. . here or there upon it. . them…. Having not been forbidden to do so, swiftly Vergil raked his eyes from left to right; mostly all the students were doing the same. No two fungi, he was sure, were quite alike. What — “Looked at ‘em? You’ve studied Theophrastus, you’ve studied Dioscorides, Hippocrates, Galen, you’ve talked with the simples-women and you’ve walked with the witches of the woods. You may — when I give you leave — look some more, you may poke and pare and peer and smell and taste. Don’t touch!. . yet …” He held between thumb and forefinger the smallest of sandglasses, such as the frugal housewife uses to time the boiling of a pigeon’s egg. “When you’ve made up your mind. If it’s medicine, throw it before you, off the table. If it’s poison, throw it well behind you. If it is neither, but just fit for the pot, leave it where it is. Prepare.” He turned the tiny glass, set it down on the railing (who failed to hear that tiny click?). “Now.”
Seldom had Vergil passed oh-so-short a moment, yet ah such a busied one before there came that second slight click: “Stop.” The last word was not emphasized, but no hand moved more.
“That one which now remains in front of you. Pick it up. Eat.”
Later he heard that same Northishman, he whose father was an earl, ask, “Ser Proctor, was it needful that those who erred did die?”
Said the proctor, “Their clients will not die.”
Even as the vision of what this intimated share of richnesses might secure for him was fading quite away, Vergil heard himself reply, “I have no doubt, Magnate, that the Very Rich City will deal with me generously. In wares and merchandise, I myself do not deal.”
Boso’s brows, like unpruned shrubbery, came together, paused, parted. “Wise one, we shall meet again. Aysh. Aysh.” Fire. Fire.
G. Rufus Rano was, clearly, nervous. He had a singular lack of any personal charm, but his clear and evident nervousness was almost sufficient to make that overlooked. He began to say things, stopped with the things unsaid. He looked at Vergil, from Vergil he looked away, and from looking away, again he turned and looked at Vergil. The most complete thing he said was what might have been a suggestion that the two of them should meet in Rano’s warehouse; on the other hand, it might have been an apology that they could not meet there, or a ban on their meeting there at all. Now and then, as his eyes fled here and there, and his wide mouth stumbled on this word and that, he looked sometimes at his wife, as though perhaps for help; perhaps, for something not the least to do with help; she, in any event, sat silently spinning her wool. The silence became at last infectious, and feeling that perhaps it might become permanent, the visitor suggested that he would, if welcome, return another time.
Disappointment, irresolution, relief mingled. Relief won. Rano arose, Vergil arose, the matron remained as she was. “Again. Again. Master. Yes.”
It had not been precisely a fruitful meeting, but it had been a long one, and by the time that Vergil arrived at the house of the last-named on the list in the Ganymede tablets, Magnate Brosa Brosa (and a mental note not to confuse same with Magnate Boso), he found Magnate Brosa Brosa at dinner. Or perhaps it was not precisely dinner, but there were precisely about it anyway some of the niceties of the rest of the world. Vergil was at once gestured to a place, and at once there was placed before him an excellent soup of cock and veal with leeks and small dried plums, followed by lampreys cooked in blood and wine, followed by songbirds in grape leaves, followed by Magnate Brosa Brosa giving several absolutely enormous eructations. And there was another simulated skeleton, which Vergil was, however, not asked to make dance, which followed finger bowls scented far more strongly than was elsewhere considered in good taste.
But few places elsewhere had to contend with the airs, the sweet breezes of Averno.