Veritas (Atto Melani) (61 page)

“Look, there’s Populescu over there!” I said, suddenly spotting the imposing bulk of the Romanian.

“Where?” asked Simonis, stepping in front of me to have a look himself.

When he moved, Populescu was no longer there.

“Damn it, we’ve lost sight of him,” I groaned.

“Signor Master, let me look for him. I’ll do a tour and report back to you.”

He was right. With my short stature I could hardly see anything: I certainly could not compete with his bird’s-eye view. I crouched down on a step descending to the cellar and waited for
the Greek to get back to me after he had found his companions.

“Most harmful to the health of us students,” the speech continued, “is perpetual sedentariness, which clogs the veins and arteries, squeezes the bowels so that they emit too
much bile, makes the body grow sour, forms stones in the kidneys and turns the face yellow and black.”

“It is extremely beneficial to bathe and dive in the beautiful rivers of this blessed city,” Jan concluded, “to smoke tobacco, and to drink wine and beer. It is not so harmful
to health, if not indulged in to excess. You can drink as many as three times: the first as a toast to health, the second to friendship and the third to favour sleep.”

His final words aroused even heartier applause than his earlier ones, accompanied by shouts of approval, whistles and even a few belches.

At the end of his speech Opalinksi climbed down from the table that had served as a platform and came towards us.

“You’ve come to see if your old Jan is busying himself with the Golden Apple, haven’t you?” he said. “Don’t worry, I’ve not forgotten you. In fact I
have important news.”

“And what’s that?” said Simonis with interest.

“I’ve discovered who the forty thousand martyrs of Kasim are, the ones poor Dànilo mentioned before giving up his spirit to Our Lord God.”

When Sultan Suleiman moved to attack Vienna and was defeated, Janitzki narrated, just two hours later there fell a famous nobleman named Kasim Beg. He was from Voivodina, a land near Hungary,
but, like many rebels from over there, he had found no better way to vent his hatred against the Empire than by adopting the religion of Allah. Kasim had been given the task of distracting the
Christian army, which was pursuing the Sultan. Suleiman’s order to him was to ravage all the territories across the Danube, exterminating and setting fire to every village. The trick
succeeded. In order to defend the lives of at least the women and children, whom Kasim’s soldiers were slicing up like sausages, the Christian troops lost sight of Suleiman, who thus managed
to escape with the rest of the army. Kasim, instead, paid dearly for his crimes. Together with his forty thousand men he was massacred by the Christian soldiers, enraged by his cruel treatment of
the helpless. Ever since then the Muslims have considered Kasim’s forty thousand as martyrs for the faith.

“It is said that on Friday nights on the site of the battle one can still hear their war cry: ‘Woe to you! Allah! Allah!’ ” concluded Opalinski. “Even today you can
still see the remains of statues representing young soldiers, erected to commemorate the forty thousand martyrs.”

“And so Dànilo Danilovitsch’s last words refer to this story,” I said with disappointment.

“Yes,” said Opalinski. “I’m afraid our poor companion was repeating in his agony what he had just learned: Kasim, Eyyub and so on. Nothing secret, at least apparently
not. But my investigation isn’t over, quite the contrary –”

“No, Jan, thank you very much,” I cut him short. “Leave off. This story of the Golden Apple is becoming too dangerous.”

“Dangerous?” he repeated, with a vaguely sceptical air.

And so I told him about the dervish’s disturbing transactions, but the Pole did not seem troubled.

“Here’s some money as a reward for your services,” I said, handing him a little bag. “I want to warn the others as soon as possible,” I concluded. “Do you
know where I can find them?”

“Koloman was serving as a waiter here this evening, but I don’t know which room he’s working in,” answered Opalinski, weighing the bag with satisfaction. “Dragomir
went off almost immediately.”

“And the Pennal?” asked Simonis.

“Haven’t seen him.”

We had no choice but to go and find Populescu, at the
Andacht
on the Kalvarienberg, where he had told us he was to meet his brunette. Then we would look for Koloman
Szupán.

Simonis and I took leave of one another. We agreed that we would meet up at nine o’clock in a place to be agreed on. The Greek would let me know where: he had to find Penicek, so that we
could go there in his cart.

Even in the excitement of the last few hours, I had not stopped thinking of the events of the day. Images of the flight over Vienna on board the Flying Ship rolled ceaselessly through my mind.
And Cloridia’s idea kept buzzing in my head even more insistently: to try and exploit the powers of the winged boat. If we could learn how to steer the ship, we could turn it into an
invincible instrument in our favour. We could spy on the Turks through the windows of the palace where they were lodging on the Leopoldine Island, as my combative wife had proposed, but we could
also fly over the Hofburg, where the Emperor was lying ill, victim of some obscure plot, and, who knows, maybe even descend to look through the windows . . . No, no, I told myself, my imagination
was running away with itself.

But it would do no harm to find out a little more about this whole matter. And so I decided to take advantage of the authority that Simonis had over the Pennal, and asked that he be entrusted
with a small mission: to gather information about the history of attempts at human flight as fast as he could.

However, we would not be able to give the Bohemian student any reason for this task: if we told anyone what had happened in the Place with No Name, we would be taken for madmen.

“All right, Signor Master,” Simonis finally agreed. “I won’t tell him anything, and I’ll order him to bring the results tomorrow morning.”

We separated. There was another matter that required my urgent attention.

Trumpet blasts and drum rolls filled the vault of the Caesarean chapel, while the bass voice intoned melodious lines:

Camilla de’ Rossi was conducting the orchestra with a grave face, absorbed in countless cares. I was attending the rehearsal of
Sant’ Alessio
seated in my
usual place, and already the events of the last few hours were skittering about in my heart and in my mind: the nocturnal excursion on the trail of Populescu, the touching account that Simonis had
given me of the death of Maximilian, the incredible journey on board the Flying Ship...

But I had no time to meditate any further. This brief restorative interval was interrupted as Abbot Melani came up, resting on Cloridia’s arm, and hovered over me.

I glared at my wife, and she responded by rolling her eyes to heaven, as if to say, “There was nothing I could do.”

Since Cloridia had started looking after him, Atto had become as fretful and capricious as a little boy. Instead of staying at the convent of Porta Coeli in the company of poor Domenico, who was
still ill, he had demanded and had been allowed to attend the rehearsal of the oratorio. I could imagine his real motive: after my outburst the previous evening, he wanted to talk to me at all
costs. As usual, the old castrato was going to come up with some cock-and-bull story to counter my accusations and dismiss them. I was all too familiar with this procedure. It had always happened
like this in the past: on every occasion he had managed to allay my justifiable suspicions, playing with me like a puppet and fooling me completely. It would be interesting to see the expression on
his face if he found out that I had witnessed his dealings with the Armenian! And that I had met Ugonio! What absurd story would he invent to justify himself?

He was a Siren, wily old Abbot Melani, and I was Ulysses. And so this time I would not listen to a single one of his beguiling words. That was the only way I could be sure of not getting snagged
again on the hook of his lies like a simpleton.

“After all, Signor Abbot is a musician,” said Cloridia, to justify their arrival, referring to Atto Melani’s former career as a singer.

With a skilful manoeuvre, Abbot Melani somehow managed to get past Cloridia and sit down beside me.

“Over the last few days I’ve lost a lot of blood from the piles,” Atto whispered to me, sounding like a victim.

I did not turn round.

“A few years ago in Paris,” he added, “the change in the weather and the thaw caused a great turmoil in the humours of my body. In the morning I had gone to pay my respects to
the Lord Marquis of Torcy and I was obliged to go straight back home without seeing him.”

I remained impassive.

“You know, I’m used to it by now, and it doesn’t bother me too much. And I always wear this little ring here on my finger, which they say is good for piles. The Grand Duke of
Tuscany sent it to me.”

Atto waved the ring that he wore on his little finger in front of my nose.

“But after a bleeding, when I have a bowel movement it hurts, and these are the worst pains. They torture and weaken one.”

He wanted to stir my compassion. I continued to pretend not to hear.

“I’ve suffered a great deal,” he insisted. “It was five months since my piles last bled. And then I applied leaves of Juno, which softened the varicose veins and, thank
God, finally caused them to break. To stop the bleeding I used powder of thalictrum.”

The bass, against a background of brass and percussion, continued his rumblings:

“Signor Atto, you’re disturbing the rehearsal,” I whispered in annoyance into his ear, terrified at the thought of drawing the attention of any of the
musicians.

“Unfortunately I’ve run out of it now,” Melani went on imperturbably. “The French called it
argentine
. Do you think you could get some for me? I need it
urgently, alas: as soon as I sit on the seat for a bowel movement, the piles come flushing out in clusters, two or three at a time, like cherries, I don’t know if you can picture
them.”

The contrast between Atto Melani’s anatomical descriptions and the sweetness of Camilla de’ Rossi’s music was unbearable. Luckily at that moment there came the
break. I took advantage of it to get up and escape from the Abbot’s company. He tried to stand up as well. I ordered him, with a sharp glance at Cloridia also, not to move from his seat. And
then I moved away quickly.

Almost at once I ran into Gaetano Orsini, who greeted me with his usual joviality.

“How are things, my dear friend? Is your family well? I’m glad to hear it.”

“My compliments to you,” I said deferentially.

“A friend of mine is having problems with his chimney. Can I promise him you’ll drop by one of these days?”

“Of course, I’m at your service, and his as well. Would it be one of my fellow workers who didn’t do his job properly?”

“Who can say? From what I’ve heard, every time he came he was as drunk as a lord – he doesn’t remember anything either, ha ha ha!” chortled Orsini.

He gave me the address, a small palace near the Coppersmiths’ Slope. I promised that I would see to it as soon as possible.

“Do your best,” he urged me. “My friend was a gentleman of the chamber of the late Cardinal Collonitz, the hero of the siege of Vienna.”

“Hero?”

“Yes, in 1683, during the final battle against the Turks, Collonitz always managed to find money to provide food for the people and to pay the soldiers. How he did it, no one knows. And he
was always in the front line, saving souls and rescuing orphans. He was made a cardinal in 1686 for his heroism. He died four years ago.”