The Palace (35 page)

Gathering what little was left of his dignity, Araldo unlocked the gate and
held it for the older man. "I didn't know," he muttered as a kind of excuse. "We
must be cautious."

"Good. There's reason to be cautious. Now, where's your master?" Gasparo was
ready to expand his argument. He stood squarely in front of Araldo, hands on his
hips, his badger-gray hair brushed by the wind that smelled of harvest.

Araldo began to explain why it was that Ragoczy could not see him when the
door to the house opened and Ruggiero stepped out into the courtyard. He wore a
houseman's gown, but over it had tied a long apron with many pockets, and in one
hand he carried a ring of keys.

"Ah! Ruggiero!" Gasparo waved and trod across the mosaic tiles to Ragoczy's
manservant. "I've got to see il Conte. Immediately."

Ruggiero met Gasparo and touched cheeks with him. "I will be pleased to lead
you to him." Ruggiero was wholly unperturbed by Gaspare's sudden appearance and
his insistent demands.

"Then tell that young upstart that," Gasparo demanded, his temper still
ruffled. "He tried to keep me out. As if he could."

Ruggiero regarded Araldo a moment. "Is that true?" he asked the young man.

"I didn't…" Araldo flushed to the roots of his light brown hair. "With all
the trouble and the theft and… And he's only a builder."

Gasparo took instant exception to that. "I am a member of my Arte, and proud
of it. And my father was before me. He was one of those who raised the dome of
Santa Maria del Fiore. Who are you, a houseman without an Arte, to cast
aspersions on me? And if," he went on, not giving Araldo time to reply, "you
think that working for a foreign noble grants you the right to act as if your
blood were the same as your master's, then you're mistaken. There's no man in
Fiorenza who is as fine or as good or as… knightly as your master. Learn from
him, if you want to know how to treat others." He turned on his heel and stalked
across the courtyard.

As Araldo twisted the lock in the gate, he said to Ruggiero in a fierce
undervoice, "Why did you let him talk to me that way? I had the right to keep
him out. Ragoczy said so."

"He said, in fact, that you were to be cautious in whom you admitted. But he
didn't tell you to refuse our friends. We must cherish our friends, Araldo;
there are so few of them."

On the other side of the courtyard, Gasparo called to Ruggiero and gestured
his impatience. "Where is il Conte?"

Ruggiero had left Ragoczy and Demetrice in the hidden rooms behind the
stairs, rooms that Gasparo had helped build. "He is at his studies," Ruggiero
said cautiously.

"Ah! Good. I know where to find him. You needn't lead me." The old builder
stepped through the door into the hallway. He paused to give the building his
critical consideration. He could not approve of all the oddities of design, but
on the whole it was very nice. The workmanship, he congratulated himself, was
superb, and anyone who saw it would never know that the palazzo had been built
in little more than a year, roughly a quarter of the time that was usually
needed for a building of this size. But he refused to linger. With one last
proud nod, he entered the loggia and moved toward the stair. It had been a while
since he had been there, and it took him a few moments and a false start to find
the hidden latch amid the complicated wood carving. Then he found the bough of
fruit with the apples that were guarded by a dragon, and he knew which one to
turn.

The first of the three rooms behind the stair was empty and almost dark. One
solitary candle burned on a huge wooden chest that had several bands of iron
around it.

Gasparo blinked and stumbled as his foot struck a low bench. He shouted as he
tried to move away from the obstacle, and was tripped by another wooden form,
probably a stool, because it turned over with a dreadful clatter.

In the next moment there was light in the door, and Ragoczy, a lantern in his
right hand, a sword in his left, stepped into the room. At that moment his neat,
stocky body seemed huge, and there was something sinister, forbidding about him.

"Eccellenza!" Gasparo cried out from where he had fallen. "It's Tucchio. I
must talk with you."

Immediately the menace was gone, and Ragoczy, his sword cast aside, had come
across the room, his hand extended to his friend. "Gasparo," he said as he
pulled Gasparo to his feet. "Buon' amico. Whatever possessed you to do that? If
you had tried to come into the laboratory, you would have been killed."

"Killed?" Gasparo was brushing himself off, but this stopped him. "How,
killed?"

Ragoczy gave him a rueful, charming smile. "Since the palazzo was broken
into, I have taken certain… precautions. There is a notched crossbow rigged to
the door. Be grateful that you fell, Gasparo." He took the builder by his
shoulders and touched cheeks with him. "It must be very important, whatever
brought you here." He motioned Gasparo to go past him into the laboratory.

"Well, it is," Gasparo said defensively, then found himself in a brightly lit
room filled with strange glass flasks and many instruments he had never seen.

Most puzzling of all were the two brick structures in the middle of the
laboratory. Each sat in a large box of sand, and each looked like a brick
beehive with a thick iron door in its side. At the moment, Donna Demetrice
Volandrai was bending over one of them, making some minor adjustment in the
rounded top. Without turning from this delicate task, she said, "San Germano,
close the door. I can't keep the heat even if you don't."

Obediently Ragoczy closed the door behind Gasparo. "Accept my apologies,
magistra."

Still Demetrice did not turn. "It's all very well for you to tease me," she
said with asperity that was belied by a slight smile, "but if we get dross
instead of gold, what then?" She made a last-minute shift of the bricks, then
stood back, putting one hand to her rosy forehead. When she turned, she was
startled to see Gasparo.

"We have a visitor," Ragoczy explained, mischief in his dark eyes. "Don't be
worried: Gasparo was one of the four who built these rooms. He has sworn a Blood
Oath not to reveal what is here."

Demetrice sank onto one of the nearer chairs. "I didn't doubt your wisdom or
your choice," she said, but there was still no real rebuke in her tone. "It will
be another two hours before the crucible can be moved again. I'm going to ask
Amadeo to make me a meal. What time of day is it?" she asked as she pulled the
linen cap from her head.

"Roughly midafternoon. Never mind whether this is prandium or comestio. Get
something to eat." He had crossed the room to her side and gently touched her
shoulder with one small hand. "You're wearing pourself out, amica mia."

She made an effort to shake off her fatigue. "No. I've been too lazy the past
few months and I'm paying for my sloth now." She got to her feet. "I will leave
you to talk with this builder." She nodded to Gasparo. "May I bring you anything
when I come back? Amadeo has some very good preserves just now. I could bring
some served over cheese."

Ragoczy said with some amusement, "Bring whatever you think would please
Signore Tucchio. But in good quantity." He stood aside to let her pass, and as
she got to the door, he added, "Mille grazie, Demetrice."

"Niente," she responded, and went out of the room.

"An excellent woman. Superb. Delightful," Gasparo said, letting his
enthusiasm grow. "You are a fortunate man, and if she does not have your
devotion, you are a fool, Eccellenza." When Ragoczy said nothing, he went on. "I
know, since that foolish Domenicano has taken the reins of Fiorenza, we're not
supposed to have pleasure of the flesh. We can't wear fine clothes, we can't eat
good foods, we can't sing anything but hymns, we can't go anywhere but to
church. And we must not touch women but for their fecundity. Fools! Asses!" He
glared at the foreigner in black. "That's not why I came."

"I didn't think it was." Ragoczy motioned Gasparo to a chair of bent wood and
tooled leather. "Sit down, Gasparo, and tell me what the trouble is."

Gasparo approached the chair cautiously, then dropped into it as if he was
afraid it would bolt from under him. "I have had word, Eccellenza."

"From whom? About what?" Ragoczy had put down his lantern and busied himself
with one of several stands of candles. A slight breeze from the high, hidden
windows moved the flames and carried the warm scent of harvesttime into the
room.

"From a builder I know who now lives in Francia. He writes to me
occasionally. He's a good man. He sent me an earlier message, but the man
carrying it was killed by brigands on the road to Genova. He didn't learn until
June that I hadn't got the message, and he sent me another as quickly as
possible." Now that he had got to Ragoczy, Gasparo was finding it difficult to
tell him the news, for he feared Ragoczy would vent his anger on him. And
Gasparo would not find it in his heart to blame him if he did.

"I'm sorry to hear about the messenger, but that isn't what brought you here,
is it?"

Apparently Gasparo didn't hear him. "But what can you expect with the
Franchese king coming into Italia, bringing men-at-arms? The brigands used to be
soldiers. What else do they know but killing and pillage?" He leaned back in the
chair and sighed.

"Come, Gasparo, whatever you have to say cannot be that horrible. We'll agree
that the roads are becoming more dangerous than ever, and that someone should do
something about the brigands, though, of course, neither of us can. And I'll be
glad to assure you that you speak to me in confidence." Ragoczy had brought
another chair into the center of the room, and now he sat near Gasparo. "What
has Lodovico done?"

Gasparo jumped visibly. "Santa Chiara, how did you know?"

Ragoczy shook his head. "Who else would perturb you this much? We know that
Carlo is happily settled, and Giuseppe is doing very well for himself. And
Lodovico had said he was going into Francia. Tell me: did you ask your friend
there to seek out Lodovico, or what?"

Shamefacedly Gasparo said, "Yes. Here I am, an honorable Fiorenzeno, and I
ask a Franchese—a Franchese, Eccellenza—to find a Fiorenzeno for me. To spy on
him." His big hands locked together in his distress. "Do I think Lodovico is
capable of betraying his oath? Why else would I ask Alain to seek him out?"

"You arranged it because it is you, Gasparo, who are a man of honor, and it
is your honor alone that keeps you from condemning Lodovico now." Ragoczy leaned
forward and his compelling eyes fixed on Gasparo's. "You are bound by your oath,
and you want to keep it. That's a trust worthy of a Pope. But you are loyal to
your friend, and it pains you to have these suspicions. Am I right?"

Gasparo nodded. "Yes. You're right. How could I have been so mistaken about
Lodovico? You understand, Eccellenza," he went on, coming to grips with his news
at last, "Alain found Lodovico, and spent a few nights drinking with him. And
then Lodovico departed. He said he was coming back to Fiorenza. He said he knew
of a rich man who had many secrets in his palazzo, and that it would be an easy
matter to steal them. He said he was tired of living in foreign lands and being
scorned for the convenience of a man who was not even a Fiorenzeno, let alone
Italiano. Alain tried to find out more, and in his letter he tells me that
Lodovico wants gold, a lot of gold, so that he can at last have the pleasures
and happiness that rich men know." Gasparo scrambled out of the chair and paced
the length of the room. "He means to come here, Eccellenza. He means to rob you,
or worse."

"Yes. I realize that." There was something in Ragoczy's calm that angered
Gasparo.

"Is that all you have to say? Does it mean nothing to you that a man is going
to try to rob you, perhaps try to kill you?"

Ragoczy paused to reach out and pinch a guttering candle. "Yes, it means a
great deal to me. It means much more that you warned me. I am very much touched
that you were able to keep faith with me. If you had not been able to, I
couldn't blame you."

Gasparo snorted. "I took a Blood Oath." To emphasize this he slammed his
broad hands down on the nearest table, and the candles jumped at the blow.

Slowly Ragoczy rose from his chair. "Blood Oaths are broken every day, amico
mio, in a thousand ways. Think of the Commandments we all break out of habit.
Your loyalty is rare, and I treasure it as much as I treasure…"—his smile was
tinged with a kind of self-mockery—"my soul."

With a deep sniff which he managed to turn into a cough, Gasparo faced
Ragoczy. "Well?"

But Ragoczy was busying himself with the opalescent contents of an oddly
shaped glass flask hung over a low-burning lantern. He gave Gasparo a quizzical
look. "Well what?"

Gasparo straightened his shoulders. "I'm ready. Whatever your punishment is,
mete it out. I deserve it. I should not have chosen Lodovico, and we both know
it."

As he took the flask and moved it gently so that the strange liquid swirled
in it, Ragoczy said, "Of course we know it. But I thought I made it clear that I
don't hold you responsible. I'm very grateful. You've done all that anyone could
or would do. That's enough. I'd be a fool to ask more. And often I've had much
less."

"You mean there is no punishment?" Gasparo said, incredulous. He had seen
even the fairest of masters whip a man for much less.

"No. Why should there be? Would it change anything?" At last he set the flask
aside and turned his full attention to Gasparo. "If you hear any more, I would
like to know of it, and as soon as possible. I suppose it's too much to hope
that Lodovico will contact you, but if, perhaps, he does, find out what you
can."

"Of course, Eccellenza." Gasparo nodded vigorously before he started toward
the door.

"And if you learn through the other builders, oh, anything that bothers you,
tell me that as well. It's inconvenient that Lodovico chose this time to come
back, but I suppose it was inevitable." He came across the room to Gasparo and
put an arm across the builder's burly shoulders. "I am very much in your debt.
If there is any way I might be of service to you, tell me, and you have my word
that it will be done."