Thirteenth Night (16 page)

What about him as Malvolio? Certainly the steward I knew could have been proficient as a soldier. He lacked neither courage nor strength, and in all the confusion of the combined forces of the last Crusade he could easily have winnowed his way into the Duke's service undetected as his former self. The position provided the perfect excuse for watching Bobo. He watched everyone, and who was to say if his focus had narrowed?

Isaac seemed to be a better choice. The beard, hair, and garments made for a more efficacious disguise, and his position placed him in the Duke's inner circle. At the same time, take away the beard, hair, and garments and an ordinary clean-shaven man could skulk unremarked in the shadows and alleyways of the town. I wondered how he would respond if I addressed him in Hebrew. But Malvolio may have known Hebrew. And I doubted that I could get close enough to the man while he was pissing to see if he was circumcised.

And yet I preferred the Bishop. The least suspected man in town, and privy to all families, unlike Perun and Isaac. Given the run of the Church, he would have easy access to the catacombs that ran deep underneath the town. But would Malvolio risk possible exposure by another papal emissary? It may not be much of a risk—once dispatched, Rome's missionaries are rarely followed with any zeal, and by the time anyone may have checked up on the man, their memories of his appearance would have changed.

As had mine, I realized. It had been fifteen years since I set eyes on the scoundrel, and I couldn't summon up a picture sufficiently precise to allow me to recognize the man. And who knew how Time had affected him? The strongest impression I had of him was of his voice, but a voice could change or be disguised.

Maybe it was none of these but Bobo's mystery lodger who no longer lodged nearby. I was tired of waiting for the man to make his move. I was ready to make one of my own.

I found a paper-seller and purchased a sheet of a darkly decorated hue. To trim a gift, I informed him, but the setting of the sun spurred me back to my lodgings. I pulled my jester's bag down from its hiding place. No indication of tampering, a good sign. I pulled a small lantern and several small candles from it. I cut pieces of paper to fit three sides of the lantern and had myself a ready-made thief's lamp. I dashed downstairs, dined briefly, and had but one glass of wine to the astonishment and financial disappointment of my host.

I then nipped back to my room, lit a candle, placed it into the lamp, and concealed it under my cloak. The back stairway led me by the stables. Zeus whinnied at me, and I shushed him. He whinnied at me again, perverse beast. I passed through the gate and veered behind the unfinished cathedral, pulling my hood up. No one was following.

I measured the time by reciting an old story that I knew from experience took an hour to tell, then slipped behind the old church, waited for one of Perun's patrols to pass, and scampered across to the alleyway behind the steward's offices.

I didn't see Bobo. There were no torches to light the way and little moon. I was about to risk using the lamp when a dark heap by a pile of refuse shifted and rose. I nearly dropped dead on the spot.

“What took you?” whispered Bobo, raising the hood that concealed his whiteface. I leaned against the wall, catching my breath, while he took a small broom he had brought with him and brushed my tracks clear. “Don't want the patrols getting curious,” he said. “That's the door.”

I opened it slowly and stepped inside. Bobo followed and closed it gently behind him. I removed the lantern from under my cloak. We were in a small room containing a table with a washbasin and several small plates and bowls on it.

We held still for a while, listening. The wind howled outside, the building's timbers shifted and creaked, but we heard no sound from a human inside. I pulled out the lantern and peered through the doorway. We were underneath the stairway.

“Go check the shutters,” I whispered. “I don't want anyone in the square seeing the light.” He nodded and crept into the room.

“Wedged tight,” he pronounced. “If the building tipped sideways into the sea, it would float.”

I followed him in, shielding the lamp with my cloak. Isaac's ledger sat on his desk, an enormous sheaf of paper bound in black leather. I sat quickly behind the desk, placed the lamp so it illuminated the book, unbuckled the hasp, and opened it. The first page was blank. So was the second.

“Odd,” I muttered while Bobo came to peer over my shoulder. I kept turning pages until I arrived at one that was filled. Bobo laughed softly. The ledger was written in Hebrew.

“You started from the wrong end,” he pointed out.

“I am quite aware of that,” I said, and flipped the ledger over and began from the right side. “A good way to frustrate prying eyes. Let's hope that he at least had the courtesy to use our calendar. I can never figure out the Jewish one.”

And he had, as it turned out. His hand was meticulous and neat, fortunately, and the two sets of entries were matched in a very model of clarity.

“Damn,” I said. “He's also using some sort of code. I can't make any sense of these words.”

Bobo cleared his throat. “Excuse me, but do not the Hebrews use their letters as numbers? That might account for it, especially as I see none of our numbers there.”

I stared at him for a moment. “You have this very annoying habit of being right all the time,” I said.

“I apologize,” he said, shrugging. That mystery solved, I skimmed over accounts of olives shipped out, Egyptian cotton shipped in, so much contributed by various consortia, so much paid to sundry ships, until I arrived at April.

“The Venetian traffic picked up in the spring,” I pointed out. “Quite a bit of activity. Looks like the locals did quite well this year. Wait a second.”

“What is it?”

“I think I found the minuscule error.” He glanced at where I was pointing and whistled softly.

“If that's minuscule, I'd like to know what they consider real money.”

The Duke, the Countess, and the rest of the major families of the town were in a consortium for investing in trade. Most of Isaac's ledger was dominated by this group's activities, which ranged inland, up and down the coast, across to Venice and Florence, and to Beyond-the-Sea. A sum of money that would have fed the town for a year had been withdrawn in April and paid …

“… to ‘Aleph,'” I said, pointing to the single Hebrew character.

“And who is Aleph when he's at home?” wondered Bobo.

I read on. There was no further mention of Aleph until I reached the day when I was last in the office. An identical sum was repaid to the consortium.

“Well, then it all balances out,” said Bobo. “Nothing lost, nothing gained.”

“Maybe Isaac and Claudius were speculating with someone else's money,” I conjectured.

“And maybe you're speculating now,” snapped Bobo. I looked up in surprise. “Forgive me,” he continued in unrepentant tones, “but exactly what does this have to do with Malvolio?”

“If Isaac is Malvolio…”

“Then he is conniving with Claudius to steal from him, then return the money after he kills him? With all due respect, Herr Octavius…” Never had the phrase sounded more disrespectful. “That's ludicrous.”

“Maybe the speculation was profitable, and only the original stake was returned to the consortium. As for the connection … Well, I fail to see it, unless it was part of the whole general revenge.”

“Revenge is never about money,” he argued. “And who knows if that money was even returned? This is just a book with words and numbers in it. Just because it said money was returned doesn't mean it was. Accountancy is the new father of lies in this world. What we have here is embezzlement, pure and simple, and furthermore it suggests to me that these two would have ample motive to kill Orsino without any need for Malvolio at all.”

“But the message to me at the Guildhall…”

“Meaningless. Someone merely wanted to tell you about the Duke's death as a courtesy, but the message was garbled in transit or the messenger was less than reliable. Nevertheless, you immediately leap to the worst possible conclusion and gallop off into a murder investigation. And because of that, I miss my first opportunity to attend the Feast at the Guildhall in years and have to play second fiddle to a fool who's a few hairs short of a bow and a few sheets to the wind, besides.”

“Excuse me?”

“In time I may, but right now I'm wondering what we're doing here.”

“Investigating suspects,” I replied. “Let's continue upstairs.”

I closed the ledger and buckled the hasp, then ascended the steps to Claudius's private sanctum.

It would have been charitable to call it a simple room. It would have been accurate to call it a bare one, an undecorated space encumbered only by a single chair and table. The last supported a slim wooden box about a foot high and eight inches wide. It opened from the front, a divided lid with hinges on either side. I sat down and opened it to reveal the only treasure in the room.

It was an icon, one such as travelers would carry. The center was a beautifully wrought mosaic of Our Savior, blessing the fortunate onlooker who has released him from this dark prison. The two side panels were painted with miniature scenes from two lives. On the left, a maiden was converted by Saint Paul, saved miraculously from death at the stake, saved again from death at the fearsome jaws of lions and bears. On the right, a scantily clad girl dances before soldiers, then is apparently converted and spends her life in a cave.

“Saint Thecla, I recognize,” said Bobo. “Who's the holy dancing girl?”

“Saint Pelagia, I think. Strange choices. This must have come from Constantinople. Look how long the noses are, that's Byzantine.”

“I agree. So what? We know he's religious. He takes time from making money to come up here and pray. It's private, and it's not a Roman church. He's a Greek, or a Syrian, or even a converted Turk. It doesn't have anything to do with anything.”

I was looking at the icon while he rattled on. It was thick, thicker than one would expect for holding a tiled image of Jesus. I ran my fingers carefully over the frame. There was a faint click, and Jesus divided himself neatly down the middle as the two halves of the mosaic swung outwards. I held the lantern close and peered inside the revealed cavity. I saw myself looking back. The hidden compartment contained a mirror. No more, no less.

“What do you see?” whispered Bobo eagerly, and I stood to let him have a turn. He peered in, started, then laughed softly. “I see a fool,” he said, looking at me. “What did you see?”

“An old man,” I answered. “Let's get out of here.”

*   *   *

I dreamt that night, an odd dream that disturbed my waking thoughts the next day. I was running through a forest on a moonless night as a low, evil laugh echoed around me. Branches caught at my clothes and tore my skin. I stumbled over exposed roots, cut my feet on jagged stones. Finally, I came upon a clearing, a round, flat circle in the very center of the forest. The laughter came from one direction, then another, but I could never make out the man who was its origin.

Suddenly, something came flying out of the woods in my direction. I caught it and looked at it. It was a juggling club. I hurled it back, but another came flying from a different point on the circle. This too I returned, but more clubs came from all directions. I spun like a whirligig, catching and tossing, faster and faster. I knew that sooner or later I would drop one.

T
EN

“I have cap and bells,” he pondered,
“I will send them to her and die.…”

W. B. YEATS,
“
THE CAP AND BELLS
”

 

I awoke near midday once again, shivering with cold. Or with fear, or with too much drink, or not enough. The damn beard was driving my chin to complete distraction. I was weary despite the late morning, having slept only fitfully since I had that nightmare. I wish I had dreamt longer. Perhaps the forest would have revealed someone.

It was the last day of the year, and I decided I would enter the new year a clean man. The one major building added to the town besides the cathedral in progress was a public bath, located upriver from the wharves. I saddled up Zeus and took him for a much brisker ride than I truly wanted, but he had been cooped up too long and wanted the workout.

While the cathedral drew its gothic grandeur from the north, the bath clearly was modeled on some eastern design. Some Seljuk builders must have been recruited by Orsino while he was out playing Christian soldier. A low square building led to an octagonal one, surmounted by a simple dome. Wisps of steam escaped from vents in the walls, a welcoming sign. I left Zeus at the bath's stables, entered the disrobing room, and stripped off my clothing. I left my linens to be laundered, purchased a clean towel from a stall in the corner, and padded across the marble floor to the passageway to the tepidarium.

A few other men were already stretched out on slabs, getting massages from muscular young men while allowing their bodies to adjust to the heat. Steam poured in from the other end of the room, and there were roaring fires on both sides. I climbed onto a free slab and allowed myself to be pummeled and whacked unmercifully with rushes until every inch of my body was begging for relief. I tipped the lad and staggered into the last room.

There was a circular pool about thirty feet in diameter, filled with naked men recovering from their sins, their woes, or their massages. It was heated from below. I could commiserate with the teams of servants maintaining the fire in the hypocaust, especially in weather this cold, but the water was glorious. I sank beneath the surface and stayed until I could hold my breath no longer, then floated on my back and gazed at the dome, which was cleverly decorated with a map of the heavens, the gilt of the stars reflecting the torchlight. Pretty, but I had lain on my back on many a summer night looking at the real thing, and there is not enough gilt in the world to capture it.