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Atto put a brotherly arm around my shoulders and tried with patient words to persuade me not to give in to despair. What mattered above all was that we should repeat the cleverly staged scene whereby we had hidden Pellegrino's illness from the men of the Bargello. To reveal the presence of one infected with the pestilence—and this time a real case—would certainly lead to closer and more frequent inspections; we would perhaps be deported to an improvised pest-house in a less populous quarter, perhaps the San Borromeo island where the hospital for the sick had been set up during the great visitation some thirty years before. We two could always attempt the escape route under the ground which we had discovered only the night before. To evade one's pursuers would always be difficult—that he did not conceal—but it would remain a practicable solution, if our plight should worsen. When I had almost recovered my calm, the abbot went over the situation, point by point: if Mourai had been poisoned, and if Pellegrino's pre­sumed buboes were only the spotted fever or, even better, two simple bruises, the one and only certain case of the plague was Bedfordi.

Someone knocked at Atto's door: Cristofano was calling everyone to a meeting in the chambers on the ground floor. He said that he had an urgent announcement to make to us. In the hall, we found all the guests gathered at the foot of the stairs; although, after the latest events, they maintained a prudent distance from one another. Devize, in an alcove, sweetened the grave moment with the notes of his splendid and disquieting
rondeau.

"Perhaps the young Englishman has expired?" ventured Brenozzi, without leaving off from plucking at his celery.

The physician shook his head and invited us to take our seats. Cristofano's frown stifled the last note under the musician's fingers.

I went into the kitchen, where I began to busy myself around the pots and pans and the stove, in order to prepare the next meal.

When all were seated, the doctor opened his bag and took out a handkerchief, with which he carefully wiped the perspiration from his brow (as was his wont before making a speech) and, finally, cleared his throat.

"Most honourable gentlemen, I beg your pardon for having de­serted your company a while ago. It was, however, necessary for me to reflect upon our present plight, and I have concluded," he declared, while all fell silent, "... and I have concluded..." repeated Cristo­fano, with one hand making a ball of his handkerchief, "that if we do not wish to die, we must bury ourselves alive."

The time had come, he explained, for us to cease once and for all wandering around the Donzello as though all was well. No longer would we be able to converse amiably with one another, in despite of the recommendations which he had been imparting to us for several days now. Hitherto, destiny had been all too kind to us, and the mis­adventures which had befallen Monsieur de Mourai and Pellegrino had proven to have no connection with any infection; but now, mat­ters had taken a turn for the worse, and the plague, which had previ­ously been evoked misleadingly, had truly struck at the Donzello. There was no point in counting how many minutes this or that guest had spent in the company of poor Bedfordi: that would serve only to nourish suspicion. Our one remaining hope of salvation was voluntary segregation, each in his own apartment, so as to avoid inhaling others' humours or coming into contact with the clothing of other guests, etc. etc. We were all to anoint and massage our bodies regularly with purifying oils and balsams which the physician would prepare, and we were to meet only on the occasion of the men-at-arms' roll-calls, the next of which was due on the morrow.

"Lord Jesus," baulked Padre Robleda, "are we to await death crouching on a corner of the floor, next to our own dejecta? If I may be permitted," he continued, softening his tone, "I have heard tell that my honourable brother Don Guzman de Zamora carried out a remarkable work of preservation for himself and his fellow Jesuit mis­sionaries during the Plague of Perpignan in the Kingdom of Catalonia with a
remedium
that was quite pleasant to the palate: excellent white wine to be consumed freely, in which had been dissolved one drachm of couperose and half a drachm of
Dictamnus albus.
He had everyone anointed with Oil of Scorpions and made them all eat well. And none fell ill. Would it not be advisable to try that, before immuring our­selves alive?"

Abbot Melani, whose inquiries would be severely hampered by such seclusion, nodded vigorously in support of Robleda's words: "I too know that white wine of the best quality is regarded as an excel­lent ingredient against the plague and putrid fevers," said he, force­fully, "and even better are spirits and Malmsey wine. In Pistoia, we have the renowned water which Master Anselmo Ricci adopted with great success to preserve the Pistoiesi from the infection. My father told me and my brothers that all the bishops who had succeeded one another in the pastoral administration consumed this liberally, and not only as a cure. The recipe consisted of five pounds of spirits aromatised with medicinal herbs, to be laid down in the cathedral for twenty-four hours in a hermetically sealed jar. After that, six pounds of the best Malmsey were added. This gave an excellent liquor of which Monsignor the Bishop of Pistoia drank two ounces every morn­ing, with one ounce of honey."

The Jesuit clicked his tongue meaningfully, while Cristofano shook his head sceptically and endeavoured in vain to resume speaking.

"It seems to me undeniable that such remedies gladden the spir­its," warned Dulcibeni, "but I doubt whether they can produce other, more important effects. I, too, know of a delicious electuary formu­lated by Ludovico Giglio of Cremona during the pestilence in Lom- bardy. It consisted of an excellent condiment of which four drachms were to be spread on toasted bread every morning before breaking one's fast: honey with rose water and a little vinegary syrup made into a paste with agarics, scammony, turbiths and saffron. But every­one died and Giglio avoided being killed only because the survivors were too few and too weak." Thus concluded the aged gentleman from the Marches, leaving it to be understood that, in his opinion, our chances of salvation were indeed few.

"Ah, yes," resumed Cristofano, "like the much-acclaimed cordial and stomach medicine of Tiberio Giarotto of Faenza. A master con­fectioner's folly: rose-water sugar, aromatised spirits, cinnamon, saf­fron, sandalwood and red coral, mixed with four ounces of citron juice and left to marinate for fourteen hours. The whole was then mixed with boiling skimmed honey. And to that he added as much musk as was needed to perfume it. He, however, was torn to pieces by the populace. Have trust in me, our only hope is to do as I have said; indeed..."

But Devize would not allow him to complete his sentence. "Mon­sieur Pompeo and our chirurgeon are right: Jean Gutierrez, physician to Charles II of France, likewise held that what pleases the palate cannot purify the humours. Nevertheless, Gutierrez did prepare an electuary which it might well be worth trying. Bear in mind that the King was so seized with the virtues of this preparation that he gave

Gutierrez a very great living in the Duchy of Lorraine. Now, in his electuary, that physician incorporated sweetmeats such as cooked and skimmed honey, twenty walnuts and fifteen figs, also a great quantity of rue, wormwood,
terrasigillata
and gemmated salt. He pre­scribed this to be taken morning and evening, two ounces at a time, to be followed soon after by an ounce of very strong white vinegar, to augment the disgust."

There followed a most heated discussion between those, led by Robleda, who favoured remedies pleasing to the palate and those who saw disgust as providing the best therapy. I followed the discussion in a state approaching amusement (despite the gravity of the moment) at the fact that every single one of our guests seemed always to have been carrying in his pocket a remedy against the infection.

Only Cristofano continued to shake his head: "If you so desire, try all these remedies, but do not come looking for my help when next the distemper strikes!"

"Could we not opt for partial segregation?" proposed Brenozzi shyly. "It is well known that there was an analogous case in Venice during the Plague of 1556: one was allowed to circulate freely in the city's alleyways only if one held in one's hand certain odoriferous balls prepared by the philosopher and poet Girolamo Ruscelli. Unlike the stomach, the nose enjoys perfumes, but may be contaminated by stinks: musk from the Levant, calami, carnations, cloves, nut­meg, spikenard and oil of liquid
amber orientalis,
kneaded into paste. The philosopher made balls the size of walnuts from this and these balls were to be held in both hands at all times, day and night, for as many months as the infection lasted. They were infallible, but only for whoever did not let go of them one single moment, and I do not know how many those were."

Here, Cristofano grew impatient and, rising to his feet, proclaimed with the gravest and most vibrant accents that he cared little whether or not we desired to be secluded in our apartments: this was, how­ever, the last possible remedy and, if we did not consent to it, then he personally would lock himself into his own chamber, begging me to bring him food, nor would he leave it until he knew that all the others were dead—and that would not take long.

There followed a sepulchral silence. Cristofano then continued, announcing that—if we were finally willing to follow his prescriptions— he alone, as our physician, would move freely through the hostelry to assist the sick and regularly to visit the other guests; at the same time, he would need an assistant, whose duty would be to take care of the guests' food and hygiene, as well as to anoint all and to ensure the correct penetration of the balms with which to preserve us from the distemper. Now, he dared not ask any one of us to incur such risks. We could, however, count ourselves fortunate in our misfortune, in that we had in our midst one who—and here, he glanced at me as I moved about the kitchen—according to his long medical experience, was certainly of a fibre well able to resist diseases. All looks turned towards me: the physician had appointed me to assist him.

"The particular condition of this little prentice," continued the chirurgeon from Siena, "renders him, and all those like him, almost immune to the infection."

And, while the listeners' faces all showed signs of astonishment, Cristofano began to enumerate the cases of absolute immunity in times of pestilence recorded by the greatest authors. The
mirabilia
succeeded one another in ascending order, and proved that one like myself could even drink the pus from buboes (as, it seemed, had actually happened during the Black Death three centuries earlier) without suffering anything worse than a little heartburn.

"Fortunius Licetus compares their astounding properties to those of the monopods, the baboons, the Satyrs, the Cyclops, the Tritons and the Sirens. According to the classifications of Father Caspar Schott, the better proportioned their members, the greater is their immunity to infection with the pestilence," concluded Cristofano. "Very well, we can all see that this lad is, as his type goes, rather well formed: solid shoulders, straight legs, a regular visage and healthy teeth. He is fortunate enough to be one of the
mediocres
of his race, and not one of the more unfortunate
minores
or, God forbid, one of the wretched
minimi.
So we may rest in all tranquillity. According to Nierembergius, those like him are born with the teeth, hair and organs of generation of an adult. By the age of seven, they already have a beard, at ten, they have the strength of giants and can gen­erate children. Johannes Eusebius tells of having seen one who at four years of age already had the most elegant locks and a beard. Not to mention the legendary Popobawa who assails and, with his enormous attributes, sodomises in their sleep the robust men of an island in Africa; while they, in their vain struggles, also suffer bruises and fractures."

The first to side with the physician, who sat trembling and again covered in perspiration, was Padre Robleda. The absence of other solutions, together with the fear of being abandoned by Cristofano led the others meekly to resign themselves to claustration. Abbot Melani uttered not a word.

While all were rising to make their way to the upper storeys, the physician said that they could make a halt in the kitchen, where I would distribute a hot meal and toasted bread. He warned me to serve wine only after watering it well down, so that it should pass the more easily through the stomach.

I was all too well aware of the relief which our unhappy guests would have obtained from the culinary assistance of Signor Pellegrino. Instead, the entire administration of the inn now lay upon my shoul­ders and, despite the fact that I gave my all, I found myself reduced to serving up meals prepared from marinated seeds and whatever else I could find in the old wooden sideboard, while taking practically nothing from the well-stocked pantry in the cellar. I usually added to this some fruit or green vegetables and some of the bread which had been left to us, together with the goatskins of water. Thus, I consoled myself, I was at least saving my master's provisions, already exposed to Cristofano's continual plundering for his electuaries, balsams, oils, lozenges, elixirs and curative balls.

That evening, however, in order to comfort the guests in their misfortune, I made a special effort and prepared a little broth with eggs poached in
bain-marie
, together with vetchlings; to which I added an accompaniment of croquettes of soft bread and a few salt pilchards minced together with herbs and raisins; and, to complete the meal, chicory roots, boiled with cooked must and vinegar. The whole I sprinkled with a pinch of cinnamon; the precious spice of the wealthy would surprise the palates and refresh the spirits.