Diane Stuckart - A Bolt from the Blue

Though the greater misfortune obviously had been the conte’s, that had not stopped me from cursing my own bad luck in finding him. . That was, until later. Unsettling as the discovery had been, in the long run it had proved oddly fortuitous for me. Had someone else of the court discovered the dead man, I would never have become the Master’s confidante while we investigated together in an attempt to expose a brutal killer and prevent another murder.

Still, I suppressed a small shiver at the memory. In trying to stop that assassination, I had almost become a victim myself. One dark night soon after, I had confronted another knife-wielding assailant in this same garden in hopes of preserving an old man’s life.

Foiled in one attempt, that would-be killer had decided I should instead be the one to join the luckless conte in death. I had escaped that most dire fate because of the Master’s timely intervention. With such a history, I told myself, the garden should surely seem to me a place of dread and horror.

Instead, the place wrapped me in an embrace of unexpected tranquillity. The breath I had been holding as I followed after the Master slipped from me in a relieved sigh. Truly, there was nothing frightening at all about the garden, I told myself as I gazed about.

Above me and clinging to the rough stone walls were the same twisted olive trees in whose limbs Tommaso and I had hidden that memorable night, watching for the assassin. No longer draped in shadows, they bent quite benignly over the garden, gaps in their branches allowing a cheerful dappling of sunlight to brighten the ground beneath. Nearby was the familiar pair of turf seats, cleverly formed from packed dirt and covered by a velvety layer of grass to create a bench where people could take their ease. Spreading palms swayed in all four corners, while a series of informal flower beds made for bright isles of blooms amid the lush green sea of grass.

I paused at the tiny reflecting pool, a low stone trough filled with pink and yellow water lilies into which trickled a steady stream from a hidden pipe. Not far from it in the lawn protruded the flat boulder where a mysterious figure had rested that same dark night that Tommaso and I had stood guard. Now, however, Leonardo had opened his leather sack upon the granite’s smooth surface and was neatly arranging what appeared to be a dozen or so wood dowels as long as my arm.

He gestured me to join him. “Come, Dino; set the craft here while I arrange our test area.”

In a matter of moments, he had fastened the dowels together to form two poles a little taller than he. With my father’s assistance, they settled both into the ground so that they stood half the width of the garden apart from each other. Between them he strung a tight wire. Then, retrieving the model from its wrappings, he tied one end of a long leather cord to that small craft and looped the other end around the wire. The result was that the flying machine dangled at about chest height from the line.

“Come; we shall begin our tests.”

With those words, Leonardo took up another dowel almost as thick as my finger. Using it as a crank, he manipulated the wooden figure atop the model so that its legs moved in a pumping motion, causing the craft’s wings to move up and down. Even that small demonstration left me impressed, so that I was eager to see more.

For the next hour, he and my father took turns with the model. One would run alongside it while cranking away at the wooden man, so that the craft made wobbly progress along its prescribed path; the other would call out observations. While the resulting motion appeared more like that of a startled bat abandoned to the daylight than an eagle’s smooth glide, after a few adjustments the model did undeniably fly!

Of course, they were not content with this performance. Each time the machine moved back and forth along the line, the men continued to tweak its angles and pitch. Sometimes, the Master would pause to grab up his notebook and make a note or a sketch. For my part, I stood to one side, handing either man the tools they needed and generally staying out of the way. But, watching their progress, my certainty increased that a functional, man-sized version of the craft was possible.

Half of the morning had passed before the garden-again and perhaps inexorably-became a scene of a new tragedy. The disturbance began outside its crumbling walls, however. So intent were all of us on our work that it took a moment for the cries to register upon our ears.

“Master, Master!” a frantic voice was calling, the words faint yet growing louder with every repetition.

My heart gave a lurch at the sound. Surely it must be one of my fellow apprentices crying for help, I told myself, or the shout would have been a summons for Signor Leonardo, instead.

Leonardo dropped his notebook and, my father and I on his heels, rushed to the barred gate. He unfastened the catch with haste and threw it open. No one stood outside it, however. Frantically, we abandoned that tack and scanned the garden, looking for the source of that frightened sound.

“There!” I cried, my attention caught by a movement atop the wall.

It was at the very spot where Tommaso and I had scaled the stone barrier to hide within the olive trees’ twisted branches. The climb had been slow and more than a bit painful, the rough stones scraping bare flesh and tearing at trunk hose and tunic. Still, anyone agile enough-certainly, any of the apprentices-could make the ascent.

I glimpsed a familiar brown tunic over green trunk hose as a youth scaled the wall and balanced atop it. I could not make out his face for the tangle of branches blocking my view, but it was certainly one of my fellows. He stood unmoving for an instant; then, with a sharp cry of pain, his body jerked.

I gave an answering cry as I watched him sway there for what seemed a lifetime, though it would have been but the space of a few heartbeats. Finally, with an uncertain flapping of his arms that uncannily resembled the motion of the flying machine, the youth tumbled from the wall to land in a heap at the foot of the olive tree.

As one, we rushed toward him.

Leonardo reached him first, carefully gathering him into his arms. As he did so, I saw that a bloody stain was rapidly spreading down the back of the youth’s tunic. And, to my horror, I glimpsed something that resembled a small arrow lodged between his shoulder blades. The youth stirred restlessly in Leonardo’s arms, and I heard a final breathless gasp.

“Master,” he managed once more, and sagged into stillness.

His head lolled toward me, so that I had my first glimpse of his face. At the sight, I dropped to my knees as if struck, frantically wishing I could scrub the image from my mind but unable to tear my gaze from the waxen features of my friend.

Vaguely, I was aware of my father kneeling beside me and placing one hand protectively upon my shoulder. Softly, he asked, “Do you know this boy?”

“Y-yes,” I choked out, the word rough with tears that I did not bother to hide. “He is our senior apprentice, Constantin.”

I stared down at Constantin’s white face, his half-open eyes staring sightlessly over my shoulder, and did not need to ask if he was dead. Still, disbelief filled my heart. How could he be alive one moment and his life cruelly snuffed in the next? Surely it was not possible!

Leonardo was the fi rst to stir from the momentary paralysis that gripped us.

“Quickly, we must run the assailant to ground. The murder weapon was a crossbow, which means the killer likely was near the garden wall when he shot Constantin. There is still a chance we may catch him fleeing his crime!”

Barely had the words left Leonardo’s lips than my father was sprinting toward the open gate with a speed I never knew he possessed. I scrambled to my feet and rushed after him, my own feet hardly touching the ground in my haste.