"The Sad Tale of the Brothers Grossbart" - читать интересную книгу автора (Bullington Jesse)

XIX. Like the Beginning, the End of Winter Is Difficult to Gauge in the South

Al-Gassur received his payments on time, but that pittance was appropriately supplemented by the food brought to him from the house and the birds he caught in the garden. Fate’s wheel had spun him into the yard of one of Venezia’s only estates to boast even a tiny plot of land allowed to run so riot. Better still, on the rare days when the Brothers left the manse to Grossbart upon the town he could creep out and spend an honest day begging without the worry of being absent when sought. Confident his employers would not notice the discrepancy, he periodically unbound one leg and wrapped the other, lest his limb atrophy from lack of use and truly become lost. A veteran of a vague crusade inspired more charity in the populace than a simple Arab come to the city by Providence and his own two legs.

A sneak by nature as well as trade, Al-Gassur eventually overheard enough from the kitchen windows and the guards to ascertain the destination of the Grossbarts. The years of rotten food, alcoholism, and exposure had not dulled his wits but sharpened them, the mendicant well aware such an opportunity came to a man only once in his existence. Knowing his ruse could not last forever, he struggled to tame his forgetful tongue, scouring the streets in vain for another Arab to teach him what everyone assumed he knew.

One sun-broiled Mediterranean morning several months after the arrival of the Grossbarts the twins found themselves again wandering the ill-kept gardens when they noticed Al-Gassur perched in the boughs of a lime tree. The fellow had shimmied out along a high branch that stretched over the top of the garden’s wall, and here he sat conversing, presumably, with someone on the other side of the wall. Cat-paw quiet, the Grossbarts crept underneath him to better eavesdrop but upon hearing the incomprehensible tongue of Italia they resolved with a glance how to handle the situation. Hegel dropped to a knee and Manfried sprang from his brother’s shoulder, seizing the Arab by his good leg and bringing them both crashing to the ground.

Hearing hurried footsteps fleeing over cobblestones on the other side of the wall confirmed their suspicions as to the duplicitous nature of their servant, and Manfried held the stunned cripple while Hegel drew his knife.

“Time you’s clean a spirit,” said Hegel, showing Al-Gassur his own terrified expression reflected on the blade.

“Please! What?! No no no, let me explain!”

“Explain away, traitor,” said Manfried, tightening his grip around the Arab’s pinned arms.

“Traitor? Never!” Al-Gassur did not struggle, the panic leaving his face as he met his own reflection.

“Own up and we’ll make it quick for you,” said Manfried. “You was tellin your heathenish relations bout our plans, wasn’t you?”

“Givin’em time to ready for our arrival,” Hegel clucked. “And after all we done for you. Shameful.”

“I would sooner cut the tongue from my own mouth and feed it to that Rodrigo before I would slander my benefactors!” Al-Gassur said. “I merely sought to find the reason, for your mutual benefits, as to why the two of you, and by extension myself, have been forbidden to leave the grounds these last weeks.”

“Forbidden?” Hegel laughed. “We ain’t forbidden from nuthin!”

“Bide, bide,” said Manfried, recalling the alcoholic distractions and bathy diversions placed before them whenever they had intended an outing over the previous month.

“Bide what?” asked Hegel in their twinspeak. “He was talkin foreign!”

“True enough,” Manfried replied in kind. “But sounded right Italia-talk to me, not that Arab gibberish. Implies he mightn’t be fibbin this once, least not completely. Hear’em out, and if I gives you the nod gut’em then.”

“Fair’s fair,” Hegel said, reverting to the common language. “Tell us quick and true who you was talkin to, and spare no details if you want spared.”

“And every other applicable item to boot,” said Manfried, “bout what you been doin since we showed up and put your mecky Infidel ass honest in this house.”

“Yes! Please! At once! Honest and without hesitation!” Al-Gassur may have carried on like this for some time had Hegel not wiggled his knife at the Arab. “From the beginning then, and if I may presume to suppose you might be willing to sully your nobly forested mouths with a bottle that my own corroded lips have blemished, I would be elated to share my unworthy beverage as well as my tale.”

“Huh?” said Hegel.

“Ifing Master Manfried sees fit to release me, I would like to share my bottle of wine,” Al-Gassur clarified.

“See, our company’s makin you more honest by the moment,” said Manfried, giving the man a final squeeze before letting him go.

Finding the bottle unbroken in his bag, Al-Gassur fished it out and took a swig before offering it to the Brothers.

“While the gutter has served as residence and employer for most of my time in Venezia, I have occasionally stooped to labor in more, as you say, honest ventures. An especially upstanding and chivalrous youth of noble standing spied me in a crowd and perceived I possessed all the graces required to be an ideal servant, and so I served in one of this fair city’s most highly houses.”

Al-Gassur spoke a variety of truth, for the young man in question indeed found the Arab to possess certain graces-said graces being an appearance and demeanor assured to raise the rancor of the youth’s father. While Al-Gassur was never caught in the act of embezzling his master’s sugar and pepper, the lad had tragically been slain in a duel with an equally shallow coxcomb and that very afternoon Al-Gassur found himself discharged.

“After I had done all I could for him, my original benefactor, and, dare I say, friend,” Al-Gassur continued, “I found cause to advance myself. We are aware, are we not, that any worthwhile city, like any worthwhile pudding, holds a thick layer of fat atop it?”

Hegel nodded at this while Manfried futilely tried to think of a way of applying the analogy to graveyards that was not distasteful to his delicate sensibilities.

“So I found employment with our mutual and dearly departed friend and confidant, Ennio, in this very house,” Al-Gassur said, omitting the detail that Ennio had hired him primarily to irritate his brother Rodrigo; a trend that, once established by his first master, served Al-Gassur all the days of his pragmatic life. “The barn is therefore familiar to me upon this, my second tenure in the House of Barousse. The matter of a missing cake from the kitchen’s windowsill undid my previous employment, despite the obvious, blatant, and irrefutable proof that the guards set me up. Nestore, God bless and keep him, has found work for me to perform down these days whenever I am not actively serving you.”

Nestore, the cook’s husband and supplier of groceries, had taken to Al-Gassur at once, their mutual dislike of honest labor surpassed only by their affection for excessive drinking. Ennio and Nestore were the only ones who had stuck up for Al-Gassur when he was found munching the cake intended for Barousse’s board. The first night the Arab spent back in the barn Nestore and he had celebrated with the exquisite schnapps Al-Gassur had stolen from Hegel’s cask during the Grossbarts’ first, stormy discourse with Rodrigo before being admitted to the grounds. The schnapps was supplemented with Nestore’s cheese, sausage, and, of course, cake.

“Fascinatin,” Manfried yawned. “Much as I’d love nuthin more than to hear your whole fuckin life told from when you crawled out your desert womb down to the present, with every time you copped a hot squat laid out in detail, time’s an essence where savin lives is concerned.”

“Saving lives?” Al-Gassur blinked.

“Yours,” said Hegel. “You get on with who you was talkin to just now or you get cut, you loquacious piece a shit.”

“Naturally, of course, without pause! My advantageous placement in society allows me to catch the random rumor, the occasional whisper, and a nightsoilman I keep company with often gathers gossip along with the excrement he dumps in the canals. A consequence of our long-standing friendship is that he, on occasion, will pause underneath our esteemed host’s wall when he sees a rock balanced on the ledge, as he did today. I have known, as all with wits who dwell in this city do, that the doge harbors a strong disdain for Captain Barousse, although precisely why is all merely conjecture, and so I thought to enquire of him particular details, details which may explain why Barousse feels the need to keep his beloved Grossbarts safe behind these walls.”

“Right,” said Manfried. “We’s finally fuckin gettin somewhere. You been consortin with shit-takers, which is fittin in light a your shitty nature. Could a said that in one word.”

“Now brother,” said Hegel, “no call in runnin down nightsoilmen, we wouldn’t a gotten out a Bucharest without that sound fellow lettin us hide in his cart.”

“Thanks for remindin me bout another one a your blessed schemes,” said Manfried. “Buried alive in devil-dirt ain’t exactly the fondest memory I got, and might not a been the only way out that situation. Now stow the reminiscences long enough to see if we got to kill us an Arab.”

As the Brothers had not switched to their private dialect, Al-Gassur wasted no time in relaying the rest of his information. “According to my friend, the most immediate defamation goes like this: a certain merchant of certain repute harbors certain wanted brigands who reputedly sacked a certain village to the north, the same village a certain mistress of a certain prominent official hails from. That both her parents burned to death in the ensuing fire is no less certain. Worse still, her only brother and several of his friends were found murdered in the river shortly after.”

This tale the nightsoilman had told gelled with the doge’s emissary paying a visit to Barousse several days before, only to leave red-faced and cursing a short time later. Further confirmation came at once from the Grossbarts, who grinned at each other.

“Called us certain brigands, did he?” said Manfried. “Tomorrow you’s puttin a stone out for your friend, then me and my brother can endeavor to impress on his certain ass the utility a usin proper language stead a slanderous terminology.”

“Not his words, I assure you, but the words of the rumor!” said Al-Gassur. “He also says a new wrinkle has been revealed, namely that the, ah, accused brigands are in fact the leaders of a certain heretical sect calling themselves the Road Popes, and these blasphemous bandits have stolen much coin and spilled much blood which might have otherwise gone to Venezia, prior to this most recent and heinous and by no means proven crime of arson and murder.”

The refutation of this rumor came to Al-Gassur in the form of a sound beating from the Brothers, who were more than happy to blame the messenger.

“Your life’s spared for bein honest,” said Manfried as he boxed the wailing Arab’s ear. “That skin a yours’ a different matter, phrasin them lies like we’s them fuckin popes!”

“Easy on,” said Hegel, jumping back rather than delivering the intended kick to the prostrate servant. “I just got me a touch a the chill.”

“Someone’s raisin a ruckus out front,” said Manfried, his uncropped ear cocked to the side. “You’s square enough for masonry now, Arab, make sure you keep yourself that way.”

A breathless Father Martyn argued through the gate with the guards until Rodrigo and the Grossbarts arrived simultaneously, admitting him and leading the nervous fellow inside moments before several of the doge’s guardsmen arrived. Barousse’s guards were equally surly to the pikemen, who left after issuing several oaths and proclamations for the neighbors’ benefit. To the observant Al-Gassur-who had slunk back to the barn to watch-trouble hovered over the Barousse household like the nightsoilman’s swarm of flies.

“Heretics,” Martyn panted as he sat down at Barousse’s table.

The captain, perpetually distracted of late, picked idly at a fish bone, but the Grossbarts took interest in Martyn’s return, his bruised face, and his vague proclamations regarding blasphemers of a yet-unnamed stripe.

“You ain’t talkin bout us again,” Manfried informed him.

“Or is you?” demanded Hegel.

“What?” Martyn rubbed his swollen cheeks. “No, no, no. Lord no. I mean the Church.”

“That’s better.” Hegel reclined in his chair.

“Which church?” Only Rodrigo appeared dismayed by this.

“The Church.” Martyn sipped more wine. “The only Church. The worm of corruption has been unearthed but I cannot exorcise it alone. How long? How long! Back to Formosus, certainly, but farther still I fear. Longer than my order has professed to battle heresy, certainly, certainly. Who remains untouched? Aquinas? Augustine?”

“Those weren’t priests chasing you, they were guardsmen. Why?” Rodrigo pumped Martyn with all the subtlety of a burly child priming a spigot.

“Hounds, nothing more!” The priest swigged at their mention. “I bore their scorn before, for the name of God and man, but no more! Roquetaillade was right, rotting in prison for speaking the truth! End Times are upon us!”

“Calm yourself,” said Rodrigo.

“Cease thy blathering!” said Martyn. “Nothing can be done for it! The Antichrist strides among us, gentlemen, he breathes and stalks and spreads ruin! Prophecy which they called heresy! They must have known, but feared martyring him lest he too rise. Saint Roquetaillade!”

Seeing his brother’s confusion, Manfried clarified. “To get sainted you gotta die someways awful. Catch the wisdom?”

“Evil clever.” Hegel nodded. “Didn’t reckon the clergy might be so underhanded-like.”

“That’s just it,” said Martyn, unswallowed wine spilling from his mouth. “Always, always! I offered to bring you before them to validate my tale but they would have none of it! Accused me of harboring a demon, me! Meanwhile the Great Mortality has not returned over spring nor summer in any part of the continent! Any! We smote it from the Earth, and yet we are deemed wicked, we are deemed guilty of blasphemy! We who put our lot with the lowly and craven, we who suffer alongside serf and cow, through winters without turnips and summers without wheat!”

Manfried scowled. “Seein how we’s not yet royalty, I’s a touch curious as to your choice a phrasin it we we we.”

“They would not let me see him! I thought this Gomorrah ’s ill relations with our Mother Church would facilitate my immediate departure but alas, they are again close as brothers! I meant to stay only a night before journeying weeks, all to sit patiently for months seeking an audience in Avignon while hordes rally at our gates, that old Serpent never absent, our second fall!” Martyn babbled, then calmed, a rain-drunk creek of words. “I have not left the city since I left you, Grossbarts, seasons have passed and I have abided, imprisoned and tortured like the last Cathar to wither and die! That’s what they did to the surviving Albigensians, you know, not a quick death for them! They sent for an inquisitor to bring me to the Holy Office, I heard them! Escaped in time, through His Will! Delivered back to you despite pursuit! His Will!”

“What’s he on bout?” Hegel asked his brother.

“Parrently implicatin our good name in some fresh shit.” Manfried was on his feet. “What in Hell’s wrong with you?!”

“Demonslayers, are you not? What worthier devil than the Archfiend, our nemesis! Of course I brought the title Grossbart into the field! Humble though you now seem, I know of your greatness, and would be remiss not to draw you into my company, lying as you do somewhere between laity and clergy. Even Saint Roquetaillade and Saint Roch quail before your sanctity! I have dreams, Grossbarts, and in them He has commanded me to do what is just! I thought that meant informing his so-called Holiness of the situation we endured, only to be undone! Not even exiled but imprisoned under his orders; his orders that the inquisitor pry the truth from my lips like some recalcitrant Judas!”

“You’s mixin up tales, you drunken sod.” Manfried shook his head, abandoning his efforts to decipher the ravings.

“Nah, keep talkin like that,” Hegel insisted. “Whatever he’s sayin sounds good to me. You’s always speakin on how corrupt them priests and abbots and all is, and here’s your proof!”

“He was proof enough fore he went incomprehensible.” Manfried lowered his voice. “Seen how he looked at her.”

“How he looked at who?” the captain unexpectedly joined the discourse.

“I have weaknesses!” Martyn shouted, the indignity of being talked about as though he were absent intolerable after months of such treatment. “I have passed every test, though, every one! Oh Elise, poor poor Elise, I tried, I tried so hard but I was weak! But not a woman have I touched sinfully since I accepted my mantle so long ago! In this forgotten time it matters not, for all that should go have gone and all that remain until the End are those now twice-damned and twice-fallen! And still I abstain from temptation, still and forever!” He gulped a final gulp and pitched forward, moaning on the table.

“Shit,” Rodrigo said after a brief silence.

“Nuthin so sweet,” said Manfried.

“So what’d he say?” asked Hegel.

“You heard, same as us.” Manfried poured more wine.

“Yeah, but what’s he mean?” Hegel pressed.

“He means we’re in more trouble than just harboring the both of you,” Rodrigo sighed, “unless we turn him over.”

“To who?” asked Hegel.

“The Church, the doge’s guard, whoever. He’s wanted, same as the two of you.”

“What’s this bout us beein wanted?” Manfried’s interest renewed at the prospect of an honest Arab.

“Murder, arson, and some other crimes less polite. Don’t think we’ve asked you to stay within the grounds this past month for the pleasure of your company.” Rodrigo kept glancing at Barousse for support but the captain stared at the wall, his face vacant.

“Wondered bout that.” Hegel took the bottle his brother offered. “But no mistake, had we more shoppin or carousin to do we would a been gone like a goose in winter and come back if and when we wanted. But the end’s what? We ain’t turnin’em over to them heretics.”

“So that I’m not misunderstanding, by heretics you mean the Church?” Rodrigo spoke slowly.

“Yeah, thems what think wearin fineries and havin precious baubles is intrinsic to their devotion. You know, heretics,” said Hegel.

“We would all be burned if your feelings were known,” Rodrigo hissed.

“Mind the lip, lad,” Manfried belched. “That priest is the best we’s seen in our time, and less he proves otherwise anyone callin him out on heresy is workin for Old Scratch themself.”

“We’re dead!” Rodrigo jumped up, knocking Hegel’s feet off the table and spilling wine on the dozing Martyn. “Denying them you is difficult, but his presence will make it impossible! Even now they will be preparing an assault, and if not that, a siege! An inquisitor has been sent, and we hold the object of his summons! Dead and damned!”

“Sit down,” Barousse said wearily. “Shouting like that soused church mouse’ll do nothing for any of us. You want to cut your ties and float on your own, I won’t stop you.”

The quivering Rodrigo did not sit, but nor did he leave or interrupt.

“Grossbarts vouch for him, good enough for us,” Barousse continued. “Besides, the Church is nothing to fear. True Venetians will never cower before a pope. They threatened excommunication when your dad and I were trading with the Saracens all those years back. Never stopped him cold, nor me neither.”

“But you were never caught.” Rodrigo crumbled.

“Who’s saying we’re caught now?” Barousse demanded. “They can suspect all they want, but won’t heave that one on us until they’re sure. And they won’t be sure until they break in the gate. It’s late now, so the soonest they’ll come for us is tomorrow morn.”

“Exactly!” Rodrigo began shaking again. “We can’t fight them all, and the ship isn’t nearly ready!”

“Your dad should of named you Tommaso!” Barousse stood, shaking even more fiercely than Rodrigo. “Don’t trust your captain no more? Doubting me always? Think I’ve gotten so chair-softened I’d let some pikeman or prelate slit my throat? Think I’d turn over my loyal men rather than fight it out?”

“Captain, I-” Rodrigo stared at the floor.

“Out, Grossbarts, and take the priest!” Barousse shouted, but when they reached the door he added, “Come armed to my room around Vespers, we’ll work on our stratagem then. For now, I have a mutiny to quell.” He turned back to Rodrigo but to the young man’s relief the captain’s fury had dissipated, leaving a mischievous grin in its wake.

The Grossbarts could easily have carried Martyn but instead each held an arm and let his legs drag-all the better to upend several small tables. He frothed and groaned the entire way up the stairs and, lacking a third unlocked room to dump him in, they slung him onto Hegel’s floor. Shouting until the servant girl Marguerite arrived, they enlisted her help in the transfer of Hegel’s bed into Manfried’s room rather than share the room with Martyn. Only by mutilating the frame, tearing the mat, and impressing four of Barousse’s hired muscle were they able to perform the task.

Tramping through the dark tunnel beneath the house to carry out the captain’s orders, Rodrigo again turned his thoughts to his deceased brother Ennio. With all the madness the Grossbarts had added to his life he had been left little time to reflect on his own affairs instead of Barousse’s, but with this newest catastrophic twist he again reflected on what impact the Brothers Grossbart might have had on the passing of his last living kin, and how he might have averted it had he accompanied Ennio instead of remaining behind. He resolved to visit a chapel as soon as this business was past, a single tear escaping his eye. Had he known what chaos approached he would have wept more.

Directly above Rodrigo, Al-Gassur spied on the artisans laboring in the garden. For several weeks the men had arrived at dawn and left at dusk, felling fruit trees, shaving them down, and lashing them together. Gauging by the massive boulder delivered and harnessed to one end of the contraption it neared completion, and now the men patted each other’s backs after a successful trial of winching up the stone and letting it drop again. Stranger still, the captain himself made an appearance, the cook brought out food and drink, and her husband Nestore brought oil lamps, with the clear purpose of persuading the men to work through the night. Had Al-Gassur actually seen the combat in which he claimed to have lost his leg he might have recognized the device.

Leaving Martyn to recover, the Grossbarts went to the captain’s bedchamber for the first time in the many months they had spent under his roof. It lay across the foyer from their quarters, the entire opposite wing a single chamber. Knocking on the door they received no answer but then he suddenly appeared behind them on the stairs, head high and jagged teeth shining in the light of the setting sun filtering through the windows. Unlocking the brass door, he beckoned them in.

They found themselves encaged, thick iron bars stretching from floor to ceiling in a wide box around the door. Only when Barousse had locked the door behind him did he produce another key and open the door of the cage. His room dwarfed most buildings they had entered, with a huge tub set into the right side of the floor stretching from one end of the room to the other. Stepping over the shallow aqueduct that led from the bath into the opposite wall they noticed the massive bed and table, ornate clothes strewn everywhere but inside the pool. Both recognized the shimmer of stray coins underneath the flotsam of loose clothing, and even the briny odor of the bath added to the majesty of the place.

“Can never be cautious enough,” Barousse explained, locking the cage behind them.

“Right opulent,” said Hegel.

“Yeah,” agreed Manfried, the tub immediately capturing his attention. A shadow flitted under the water without raising a ripple and he held his breath, but she did not appear.

“Fancy it, do you?” Barousse stepped in front of Manfried, obstructing his view.

“What’s that?” Manfried blinked.

“My property.” The good-natured Barousse of the doorway had vanished, replaced by his moody doppelganger.

“Course,” Manfried said, holding Barousse’s gaze. “Anyone but a fool’ll preciate what you got.”

“Appreciate or covet?” Barousse’s fiery eyebrows wedged against each other.

“Preciate, verily,” Hegel interjected. “We’s here by your grace, don’t forget.”

“Yeah, captain.” Manfried shook his head to clear it. “What warrants our presence at Vespers when we oughta be prayin like decent folk?”

“Pray with me, Grossbarts.” Barousse’s voice cracked and he fell to his knees before a large shrine set in an alcove, snatching their shoulders and pulling them down with him. His beard bunched up around his neck as he whispered in another unknown language, water leaking from his squinting eyes. The Grossbarts grumbled in their own tongue to the life-sized statue of Mary for patience, strength, and inspiration. And lots of gold.

Then Barousse’s tone hardened, his words entered the vernacular they understood, and they began punctuating his rapid prayers with amens:

“And grant us the will of arm and spirit to destroy those in our way, we who are kings amongst yeomen, we who have served the lot of Job, survived the trials of Abraham, all without respite or mercy. We will not let them slander us and the good Lord through us, and we will not surrender to those blasphemous idolaters who control the Church and the city. We will be His Sword and His Vengeance on the betrayers of man and God!”

Barousse’s voice rose to a roar, and he bruised their shoulders under his fierce clutch. “We will be the horsemen returned, the Scythe of the Lord! We will hack our way to the deserts despoiled by the Infidel! We will hurl their souls to Judgment, and those of their bastard families with them! We will take what they have stolen! We will kill as He kills until there are none but we left in the Holy Land! Every loss we have suffered will be avenged upon His enemies ten thousandfold!”

Hegel nodded and amened, but Manfried’s attention drifted to the pool beside him, and then he saw her for the first time since they arrived. Without making a sound she had emerged from the water and bridged her arms on the rim of the tub, her pointy chin resting atop her hands. She blinked her almond eyes, her face and hair slick and dripping onto her tub-obscured chest. Then she smiled and disappeared silently under the surface before Manfried could get a proper gaze at her. He realized she must be nude, and nervously glanced at Barousse and Hegel, who were both shouting now.

“And blood and fire from Mary!” Hegel hollered.

“And the moon will plummet, raising the tides to swallow the flourishing Sodoms! Avignon and Roma, Paris and Praha! München and London and Jerusalem and Cairo and Constantinople! The heathen East and the heretical West alike! Damn them all!”

“Damn them all!”

“Damn.” Manfried swallowed, then, seeing the statue of the Virgin jump toward them, “Damn!”

“Enlightenment is upon you, Grossbarts!” bellowed Barousse, holding them tighter lest they flee or attack the moving statue. He need not have worried, for the draft tickling their beards told the truth. The seasoned Grossbarts snatched hold of Mary and pulled her farther out, allowing the winded Rodrigo to emerge from the passage. He stank of fish and mold but his frigid countenance warmed at the embrace Barousse delivered upon him.

“Success, my son?” Barousse squeezed Rodrigo.

“Success,” Rodrigo squeaked, the tears on his cheeks more from the captain’s choice of words than his ferocious hug. “Here he is.”

Barousse released the young man and turned to the fellow the Grossbarts stared at. The sinewy man blinked and pushed back the wisps of hair in his pale eyes, the Grossbarts recognizing him for a beast of pure muscle and vigor despite his years. The captain and the man sized each other up, a faint smile playing at Barousse’s beard.

“Captain,” the man clipped, bowing his head, and then Barousse hoisted him up and spun him around, laughing.

“Angelino!” Barousse said when he managed to quell his joy and set his friend down. “Too long, too long!”

“No fault of mine, Captain.” Angelino winked.

“Alexi, always Alexi to you!”

“And that’ll be Captain Angelino to you, from what the boy says.” The new arrival grinned.

“Well, well, well.” Barousse feigned amazement. “Captain, eh? Fair enough, though I would have had you my mate again on the old haunt if time would permit.”

“The trappings may seem lesser, and the title as well, but if we indeed have a day’s notice a few of the old bones can be unearthed and dried out enough to join us. According to his nephew here Sergio won’t be putting in for another few weeks, which is doubly ill for he kept a bit better watch than I on where the crew’s drifted over the lonely-”Angelino peered over Barousse’s shoulder and blanched, then slapped his friend in the face.

Only with the barrage of Italian Angelino emitted did the Brothers notice they had spoken in German before. Barousse’s entire face turned the color of his reddening cheek and he swelled up to smite the smaller man, who shouted and shook an accusatory finger in Barousse’s face. Rodrigo recognized the dire turn and, seizing Angelino, dragged him back. Hegel knew better than to touch the trembling captain, instead stepping in his line of sight and offering him a bottle.

“Nuthin a drink won’t fix,” Hegel announced. “Why’s it you two was talkin proper and switched to Papal, eh?”

Barousse let out the breath he had bottled since being hit and focused on Hegel, snatching the wine from him. Angelino had thrown off Rodrigo and now dressed down the younger fellow, punctuating his rant with gestures at Hegel and the captain. Barousse guzzled the entire bottle, red spilling down his beard onto his boots. Then he dropped the wine, pushed aside Hegel, then Rodrigo, and threw his arms around Angelino, crying like a fresh orphan. Rodrigo hurried over to Hegel and walked him to the narrow window overlooking the garden, which they both found intensely interesting while Barousse blubbered and snotted all over Angelino’s shoulder, the older man’s fury gone as quickly as the captain’s.

Hegel peered down at the lamp-lit garden and the reflecting pool where he and his brother had clandestinely practiced swimming when all in the house slept. Looking back around the room, he saw Manfried lurking at the edge of the bath. Containing his own rage, he succeeded in crossing the room without arousing Barousse’s or Angelino’s attention, the two now exchanging whispered oaths.

“What’re you doin?” Hegel snarled, noting the silhouette ghosting about under the water.

“Just lookin.” Manfried would not meet his brother’s eye, clumsily stowing something in his bag.

“Keep away from there,” Angelino called to them, and all three hurried back to the altar.

“My word, my word,” Barousse mumbled, having sat on a chest.

“Course, sir.” Angelino nodded. “These lads’ll come with me now, then?”

The Grossbarts looked to the captain, who nodded but did not return their gaze. “I’ll need them back fore dawn.”

“That the chest, then?” Angelino smiled.

“Yes.” Barousse wearily stood and clapped Angelino on the arm, his good spirits returning. “It is, it is. And remember, sparse at best. Less mouths to feed.”

“On that end I’ll fit us with water and supplies and what few can be trusted for such a jaunt.”

“Angelino,” Barousse swallowed, “I intend to avenge myself on the doge, meaning we’ll be hunted if ever we return with less than an army behind us. Still in league?”

“No question,” Angelino said. “Now let’s see what you got here.”

The chest contained gold bars. Hegel and Manfried saw Mary’s Mercy shining up at them and silently gave thanks. Then they began stuffing them into the leather satchels provided by Barousse until not a speck of gold dust glittered in the empty box. Rodrigo and Angelino could not carry as much, which suited the Grossbarts perfectly. Leaving the captain to prepare, they followed Rodrigo into the chute behind the Virgin, clambering down iron bars set into the wall.

The rungs were mossy and the satchels heavy, and twice Rodrigo almost slipped but caught himself. The bath’s aqueduct emptied into the shaft, the stink of mold a familiar tonic to the Grossbarts. Angelino’s boots rained filth down on Manfried, prompting him to hurry and thus increasing the muck he dislodged upon his brother.

The sound of running water rose up around them, and then Hegel went weak in the knees when his feet found slick stones instead of a rung. Rodrigo flicked his flint, burning their eyes. Not until Manfried and Angelino reached the bottom did the wick catch, illuminating the pit.

Stone and earth bled together along the walls with only the narrow shelf they stood on evidencing the channel’s man-made nature. In the dim light the waters were black as the walls and ceiling, the path obvious as the shelf broke off a few feet downstream. Rodrigo led them along the mildew-rank outcropping, their pace sluggish to avoid slipping over the edge. Across from them smaller channels intermittently joined the main flow, fell breezes wafting along the streams.

A narrow canal emerged from the wall in front of them, dirty water pouring over their shelf. Rodrigo knelt and shone the candle up the passage, and with a sigh stepped into the stream. The rushing water came up to his knees, and he plodded up this new channel with the others following. The ceiling sank lower until all four were hunched over like flagellants, the frigid canal deepening to their waists. Those reproachable Grossbarts naturally felt at ease, and wished they had learned of this part of the city earlier.

“I do not know if our captain had these built or if they were already here,” Rodrigo explained as they moved away from the roaring main flow. “Have to mind sudden storms; a shower above will fill these in an instant.”

“Figured all a them canals might lead to a place like this.” Hegel nodded. “But what’s it for?”

“It is for nothing,” said Rodrigo, “save for us.”

“Why’s it you and the captain speak proper to one another?” Manfried asked Angelino.

“Custom,” Angelino said, ducking under some dangling rot. “Many here and more abroad don’t speak it so we got in the habit of that. Less worry of your words being stolen if they’re not understood.”

“Sound,” Manfried agreed.

“Easy on,” Hegel growled, his brother having walked into him.

“Quiet,” Rodrigo whispered, blowing out his candle.

All eyes picked up on a faint oval of yellow ahead of them in the black. Rodrigo did not advance to the canal’s mouth, however, but crept forward only a few feet, brushing the clammy ceiling with his free hand. Tripping after him in the current, Hegel saw him stop and then stand erect, his head and shoulders vanishing into the ceiling. Rodrigo began climbing, and stepping after him Hegel saw a hole open above and, groping for rungs, followed him up.

This shaft widened as they climbed the short distance to the surface, the odor of rotting fish overpowering their senses. Rodrigo stopped so they all stopped, and he awkwardly reached up and fiddled with something. With a metallic squeak he freed his quarry, and several pounds of putrid fish and crustaceans cascaded down on them. Rodrigo crawled up and out of sight, then Hegel went through, and he turned to help his brother and Angelino.

Thick iron bars covered the mouth of the pit, but Rodrigo had freed one and rolled it aside. Their eyes watered from the heap of decomposing sea fruits choking most of the grate, generations of interlocking bones and scales preventing the mass from slipping down to its intended grave. With the others shaking the filth off, Rodrigo gave the dark alley another glance before kneeling and refitting the dislodged bar.

The pack of stray dogs they had frightened off with their unexpected appearance slunk back, growling at the interlopers. Before Hegel could brain the closest beast Rodrigo reminded them of the necessity of secrecy, and that making the pack howl with pain and bark with fury would not be in their interest. They circumvented the animals, who returned to gorging themselves on the freshest and rolling in the oldest of the refuse. The candles remained unlit but after the sunken avenues the waning moon served well enough, Angelino replacing Rodrigo as guide.

As the older man led them through the labyrinthine passages Hegel sometimes felt eyes watching from side avenues and black windows, but they met no one on the streets. Small bridges were delicately trod, the report of boot on wood breaking the stillness that earthen streets afforded them. The sound of the sea grew, feeding the Grossbarts’ unease. Having avoided the city’s pageantries as strictly as they abstained from fasting during Lent, the Grossbarts’ only indications of the Venetian people’s character came from the dour men skulking in the streets and rowing through the canals when the Brothers had vainly quested for a landlocked cemetery. The tomb-burglars assumed they might be sold out for half a ducat by any and all witnesses to their nocturnal sojourn.

Angelino stopped once and drew them all into a crack between two moldering buildings, and they heard footfalls approach, then depart, along a nearby alley. Even in this dismal quarter the edifices towered over them, blotting out the sky. Returning to the road, they went only a few more blocks before Angelino ducked under an arch and rapped softly on a small door.

From within came a knocking in response, to which Angelino softly whistled. The door swung open, and Angelino stepped into the dark interior. Rodrigo followed, then Hegel, with Manfried nervously gripping the pommel of his mace in one hand and holding the satchel of gold closer with the other. In the blackness someone closed the door behind him, and just before Manfried could draw his weapon a second door opened ahead of them, scalding their sensitive eyes with light.

The small tavern had tables made of driftwood and a bar consisting of a dozen oars lashed together. Behind this stood a gnarled stump of a man whose curdled-yellow eyes bespoke blindness. A gargantuan man closed the second door behind them, the only other occupant a short, black-haired fellow drinking by the hearth. Angelino led them to his table and the barkeep brought ales, the ox looming over them. Manfried exchanged hateful glares with the muscle while Angelino and the short one carried on a hurried conversation in Italian, which Rodrigo unsuccessfully tried to join.

Just when Manfried had resolved to call his adversary out Angelino turned to the Brothers and addressed them in German:

“And this priest Barousse says you bring, is he to be trusted?”

“More than most, but that ain’t sayin a whole lot.” Manfried slurped his ale.

“But he traveled with you and that thing you returned to him?” Angelino insisted.

“Thing?” Manfried narrowed his eyes.

“That slant-eyed slattern,” the short man said in broken German.

Sensing his brother tense up, Hegel quickly interjected. “Yeah, the priest was with us most a the trip.”

“And,” Angelino frowned, “did anything unnatural befall you, either before or after he joined with you? Water-related, I mean; drownings, floods, that sort?”

“Yeah, before-” Hegel winced as Manfried kicked him under the table, but he kicked back and continued. “Yeah, fore he come one a Barousse’s men drowned in a pool no deeper than a turnshoe-top, and my own brother here almost went the same.”

“Told you, I was sleep-wanderin,” Manfried said, cheeks flushing under his beard.

“And after he came with you?” Angelino pressed.

“After, I don’t recollect nuthin cept-” Manfried viciously thumped Hegel behind the knee. “-cept my brother here almost drowned again in a river.” Hegel scowled at Manfried.

“And where was the priest then?” the short one asked.

“Oh, he’d just been shot for the second time.” Manfried glared at Hegel.

The two Italians reverted to their tongue, prattling back and forth while the Grossbarts had their own private discussion on the importance of clarity of meaning as related to physical interactions. Rodrigo saw his brother in the bottom of his mug, and strengthened his resolve to have a solid pray on Ennio’s passing. The men turned back to the Grossbarts, who had likewise reached a consensus, welts and bruises rising on the thighs and calves of both.

“Glad as I am to again serve my friend and captain,” Angelino addressed them, “that thing he keeps is no good to any man, and I won’t suffer to be in its presence any longer than I must. I tell you now as I told him, when the time comes for us and it to part company over the side it goes, no matter what he says. You two are his inspiration to finally be rid of it, and return to Arab lands besides, so we must all be agreed before we set out. I am the captain of my vessel, not he, and as long as you are on my ship and I am taking you to your goal you will obey my orders, not his. Agreed?”

“See here-” Rodrigo started.

“Do not mistake my tone for hostile, boy,” Angelino shot at Rodrigo. “I served the captain for more years than you’ve lived, and toiled beside your departed pa and absent uncle. I was one of the few who was with him on the boat he brought it back to, and I’m the only one of those present still drawing breath stead of brine, so I know of what I speak. One thing’s more important than coin, and that’s being alive to snatch more.”

“We’s agreed,” said Hegel, nodding at the wisdom.

“And you?” the short one asked Manfried.

“Didn’t take your name,” Manfried drawled.

“Giuseppe,” the diminutive fellow replied.

“Well, Seppe,” Manfried began, even Hegel anticipatorily holding his breath, “I’s inclined to take my brother’s position. You and Angelino’s in our service to get us to Gyptland, with the arrangement bein we’ll do everythin in our power to keep us on course. Not bein familiar with such matters, we’ll defer to your judgment as we would a hired wagon driver.”

Giuseppe’s already beady eyes tapered further but he held his tongue and turned to his employer. After looking from Grossbart to Grossbart Angelino’s face lightened and he raised his mug:

“A sound agreement. Now which one of you is Heigel?”

“That’s Hegel,” Manfried said, pointing to his brother.

“And he’s Manfried,” said Hegel.

“Good, good. I’m Angelino, as you already know. The one behind you is Merli, and he’ll be taking that gold off your shoulders.”

“The Hell he will.” Manfried stood up.

“Grossbarts.” Rodrigo stood as well. “These men would sooner steal from the Pope than the captain. Give them his property.”

“That don’t mean nuthin at all,” Manfried retorted, “just said, honest-like, bein alive’s more important than anythin else, includin friendship.”

“If you don’t give it to him,” Rodrigo growled, “you can’t very well carry more when we come back.”

“Suppose there’s a hint a wisdom in that,” Hegel allowed, setting his satchel on the table. “So we leave yous to put this on the boat, then fetch the captain and come back?”

“We sail tomorrow,” Angelino said firmly. “Captain might have no future here, and maybe I don’t either, but I’d just as soon not attract any more attention by leaving at night. At dawn I’ll fix it so my girl’s waiting at the dock right out that door.” He motioned to the latched front door none had entered through. “I’ll have Merli wait here so anytime after dawn you all come here and we push out. Course she’s a wee brim compared to Barousse’s, so we’ll have to hug the coast a little tighter, add a few days or weeks to the passage, but I’m staking my life alongside yours she’ll do us good, if a little cramped. So we’re straight on who’s coming, yeah?”

Rodrigo nodded. “The captain’s contingent and you and yours.”

“Good, good. We’ll load the gold, then, and make ready to depart. Well met, Grossbarts.” Angelino added something in Italian to Rodrigo, which he smiled faintly at before turning his satchel over to the men. To the Grossbarts it felt like dumping their war chest into a bottomless chasm but they had little choice. Escorting them to the back door, Angelino again embraced Rodrigo, shook the Grossbarts’ hands, and let them out.