The Secret of the Glass (33 page)

“Are you ready to return to the fete?” he asked, his voice a low, pleased growl.

“Am I?” Sophia answered with a dreamy whisper. His scent surrounded her, that of spices and brandy wine and a sharpness, like the burning alder wood. She cleared her throat, glancing away as she tried to clear her head of him, but it was a hopeless endeavor.

Teodoro laughed his velvet laugh and Sophia felt a shiver of delight quiver up the back of her neck.

He took her hand and began to lead her along the murky lane. A few steps forward and he stopped, turning toward her, lips bowing down into a small frown.

“Sophia, I—”

“Don’t.” She silenced him with a hand to his mouth. “Say nothing, please. What can there be said? There can be no promises made, no vows offered, and I have need of none. Let us have…this. Let us keep it, just as it is and not spoil it with what cannot be.”

His yearning smile answered her. He leaned down wordlessly, pressing his lips to her cheek, inhaling deeply as if to capture her scent.

Sophia closed her eyes to his touch, then followed along, her step heavy as they returned to the palace.

Twenty-five

T
eodoro stopped at the edge of the
piazzetta
. Side by side they stood motionless, hands entwined, watching the sparse crowd mill about the shadow-filled courtyard. From behind them flowed the insistent lapping of the lagoon waves as they met the shore and the fine mist that accompanied them.

“Go, Sophia. I’ll stay and return in a few moments.”

Teodoro launched her forward with a tug of his arm, unable or unwilling to look at her, his mouth set firm in a grim line.

“We should not go back together, not the way we look.”

Sophia’s hand rose to her bruised and swollen lips. One glance at the man beside her and she saw he suffered a similar fate. Despite his best efforts, she could feel the errant strands of hair that hung upon her neck in disarray. She stepped before him, smoothing his silky doublet, putting to memory the feel of his hard chest against her hand. She raised her face, rose onto tiptoes, and kissed him. She left without another word.

The click of her heels marked her retreat, each footstep that took her away from him; the sharp sound echoing and repeating eerily back as if scorning her. She gathered the voluminous, heavy folds of her pink gown and strode up the
Scala dei Giganti
, her mind spinning with thoughts of Teodoro and what they had done, the thrill of it. His intense scrutiny followed her. At the top of the stairs she stopped, compelled to look back.

His russet, feathered hair danced forward onto his face, lifted by the breeze off the ocean. His features appeared muted in the faint torchlight, yet she saw him clearly. His sadness became like her own and yet filled her with joy.

The musicians played a spirited tarantella, laughter and conversation fighting to rise above it as the dancers twirled and spun about the floor, the converging noise heavy in the air. Sophia reentered the
Salla del Maggior Consiglio
as inconspicuously as possible, rushing to skip behind a large and opulently dressed
nobildonna
, the woman’s deep purple skirt ballooning upon its circular farthingale as she strode regally beside her tall thin escort. The appetizing aromas of roasting beef and savory red gravy were powerful, though not strong enough to overcome the growing odor of so many bodies in the crowded chamber.

Sophia ambled around the room, navigating the maze of the crowd, searching about for Pasquale. Fear and guilt mingled in her belly; her jaw clenched tight with anxiety. Irrational fears nagged at her, worry that he’d searched for her, that she’d be forced to devise an explanation for her absence. Frightening thoughts skittered through her mind as her vision skipped over the hundreds of faces in the vast room. She spotted him at the very back corner of the room, far against the wall, huddled together with a group of richly attired men. Their hands gesticulated wildly, their mouths worked incessantly, clearly engrossed in a heated conversation.

Donning an insouciant smile, nodding to people she did not know but who seemed vaguely familiar, Sophia approached the group, picking up a glass from the row of filled goblets and a sugar-covered treat from the credenza beside them. She set her path to cross in front of Pasquale, making sure to catch his attention. She needed him to see her, needed to see his face as he did.

For a sharp instant, Sophia felt like the hunter’s prey as Pasquale’s small narrow eyes found her. No livid spots of angry color appeared upon his ashy facial skin, no sweat broke out on his balding pate. For an inconsequential moment he hesitated, his mouth faltered, and he looked at her. There was nothing but mild annoyance in his consideration. With a placidly affable smile, Sophia stood beside Pasquale and his associates, and sipped at the white, effervescent liquid she found in her glass.

“Sui signori
,
signore e gentiluomini
,” the call of a powerful baritone voice rose above the pandemonium.

The music ceased with fading, discordant notes and the crowd’s patter tumbled off into quiet murmurs. From the smaller back entrance, four armored halberdiers marched into the room, coming to a halt with a resounding rap of their weapons upon the floor. Behind them, two
trombettière
entered the chamber and stopped by the door. Lifting their long instruments, decorative banners blazoned with the winged lion unfurling, they put mouths to tips, and the trumpets blared.

“Give your attention to the most honorable Doge Donato.”

The herald bowed, one hand to his waist, the other thrust out in introduction toward the head of the room.

Resplendent in his finest red and fur-trimmed vestments, the stately Donato stepped onto the dais and stood before his large chair.

“Good people of the Most Honorable Republic of Venice, welcome.” The Doge bowed deep from the waist, long arms thrust out wide in benevolent greeting. “We are here tonight for one reason, and one reason alone, to honor one of Venice’s greatest sons and thank him for his loyalty and gifts to our land. I give you, Galileo Galilei.”

Thunderous applause found the humble, bowed scientist standing to the Doge’s right, just off the platform. At Donato’s gesture, Galileo stepped before him, his small stature more pronounced as he took his place at the feet of the elevated ruler.

“Dear sir,”
Il Serenissimo
’s forceful voice carried to the smallest corners of the room, to the ears of the hundreds of people gathered to pay their homage. “With your gift you have given Venice a key to the future, a device that may guide our sailors home safely when they are lost upon the stormy sea, fetch our land reverence and esteem, and show our children the beauty of God’s heavens.”

Donato smiled jovially down at Galileo who stood with hands clasped across his bulbous belly, upturned eyes wide and moist. His full, coarse-haired beard quivered upon his chest and Sophia felt her own emotions well up. In this very moment, a man’s dreams came true and the import of it was not lost on her.

The Doge beckoned a hand to a chamberlain who jumped forward, placing a gold-capped, red-tasseled scroll in Donato’s hand.

“With our sincerest gratitude, please accept our gifts.” Donato offered the tube to the man before him. “Inside you will find our decree awarding you with a lifetime professorship at the University of Padua, and a guaranteed salary of one thousand gold pieces…every year…for the rest of your life.”

Gasps collided with cheers and cries of jubilance, as the room reverberated with celebration. Galileo reached for the parchment with shaking hands, staggering back a step, drop-jawed and stunned. He looked at the scroll in his hand and back up to the Doge in clear disbelief. Donato smiled serenely, nodding his head in silent affirmation as the deafening cheers thundered around them.

Pasquale whistled from between his teeth, the sharp sound wrenching at Sophia’s ears. One of the men standing beside him banged his cane on the floor while the others clapped and cheered like sailors at a rowdy tavern. For the briefest of moments, Sophia caught Pasquale’s eye and in that instant they found a common ground.

Donato grabbed Galileo’s hand and lugged the astounded man up onto the dais beside him. Galileo faced the crowd, his eyes glistening, and the crowd yelled louder. His chest rose and quivered as he struggled for air, as he struggled to regain a semblance of composure.

“Dearest people of Venice,” Galileo’s voice broke and he cleared his throat, heaving a deep breath as the assemblage quieted to hear his words. “I have known times of great despair, when I was forced to leave university without a single degree, my father no longer able to afford my tuition. When my discoveries and theories garnered great attention, but no one would employ me. When I lived like a vagabond with barely enough money to eat, begging for a position, any position.”

Galileo squeezed the scroll he held with adoration in his shaking hands.

“Your bequest today will dispel the nightmares of those days, horrible specters that have always haunted me. It will feed all those who depend upon me so greatly. With one graceful flick of your hand, you have changed not only my life, but that of many. I thank the forward-thinking, open-minded people of
La Serenissima,
the first Republic in all the land to allow for public algebra lessons.”

Galileo raised an emphatic finger to the heavens. The crowd laughed at the learned man’s odd delight.

“And I thank God for this honor as well.”

Pasquale looked away from the podium and Sophia followed his regard. Across the room, the elder da Fuligna stood among a group of his own, somber and dour men, upon whose faces shone no smiles, in whose eyes there gleamed nothing but rancor.

“Yes,” Galileo continued over the murmurs thrumming through the room, “some of you may be surprised by my saying so, but I love Him dearly. What we feel and hold dear in our hearts, that which sustains us in our grimmest hour, cannot be torn asunder by facts that may be known to the brain. In truth, the more I learn of science, the genius of God’s creation, the more I am awed by the Lord’s magnificence. Before Him, and you, I am humbled.”

Galileo bowed low, releasing the trapped tears to fall freely from his eyes and down his wrinkled cheeks.

The crowd burst with acclamation, rushing forward as if to congratulate the endearing man all at once.

Sophia held her clasped hands close to her heart, could feel its pounding through the flushed skin of her heaving bosom, the emotion surging from it into her throat. Pasquale and his fellows charged past her, caught up in the horde’s infectious exuberance. She closed her eyes, squeezing her own tears out from between her thick-lashed lids. How she wished her father was here, to share this with her. It was a moment snatched out of time, and it belonged to him as much as anyone else in this room. She wanted him there, to experience this with one she loved so badly it pained her. Choking back a sob, she opened her eyes, and saw him.

Teodoro stood far across the room yet, regardless of the zealous crowd, they found each other with a jolt of collision. His deep eyes smiled at her, his smooth, ecru skin flushed with excitement. Without a word or gesture, they rushed forward, the need to share this moment obliterating any care for discretion. Sophia forgot Pasquale, his family, and the many friends that may see. To mark this moment with Teodoro—someone with whom she shared an affinity of thought and sensibility—would give it immortality, as if written in a book that could never be destroyed. They hurried through the throng, spinning left or right to avoid the milling, still-cheering courtiers, never losing sight of one another.

The shriek burst upon them like a claxon. Sophia clamped a hand upon her right ear; the scream coming from so close to it, it vibrated painfully. For one sickening instant, she thought her own actions had wrought it and her steps shuddered to a stop. She spun toward the guttural sound. A pale, stricken woman pointed to the floor with a shaking hand. Following the portentous gesture, Sophia saw him.

The young man’s body jerked spasmodically, his legs and arms flailing about. The crowd gasped, parting and circling around the fallen man, stricken by the horrific sight. Of a sudden, the body’s seizure ceased and its limbs dropped motionless. In the stunned silence, those huddled around him inched forward. White foam bubbled from his gaping mouth. Two young girls screamed. One woman fainted.

A single brave man tiptoed forward and bent down beside the body. Stretching out an unsteady hand over the distorted face, he held it for a tense moment above the gaping mouth. Swallowing hard, he turned to the crowd and shook his head.

Sophia looked up. The afflicted faces of the spectators resembled nightmarish ghouls; their mouths hung open, dark holes in bloodless skin, their eyes popped from fear-ravaged faces. She felt the same deformation on her own fear-scarred features. The sobbing pulsed through the room, scurrying along with the hiss of frightened whispers.

Sophia’s hands tingled with the numbness of dazed confusion; what her eyes saw, her mind struggled to acknowledge. Pasquale stood near the body, whispering urgently with two other men. The Doge rushed toward the scene, the red-and-blue liveried soldiers of the
Missier Grande
right behind. Teodoro stood a few paces from the door. He started toward her once more but she stilled him with an infinitesimal shake of her head.

A flurry of motion behind him caught her attention, and Sophia jerked toward it. A robed man rushed from the room, his distinctive profile and smug smile clear against the bright, vivid colors of the massive painting on the wall behind him. Recognition jolted her. The air rushed from her lungs, spots appeared before her eyes. It was him; the same man she’d seen hurrying from the door of the
campanile
. Sophia spun round from his retreating figure, back to the body on the floor. Raising her eyes heavenward, she prayed.

“Lord help us.”