Christian Cameron - Tom Swan and the Head of St. George Part Four - Rome

Swan nodded. ‘I can try. I imagine his weak point would be in passing communications to his Turkish friends.’

Bessarion shrugged. ‘It could be someone right here in Rome,’ he said. ‘Ah — here is a list of my plantations on Lesvos — please collect the rents if you have a chance.’

Swan wished that he had a five-fold wax tablet book. ‘I’m to go with the knights, fight for them if I must, watch for a traitor, buy antiquities for sale, and, if possible, collect your rents from Lesvos. Anything else?’

Bessarion laughed. ‘I have some shirts that need washing,’ he said. He raised his hand and blessed Swan, who knelt and kissed his episcopal ring. ‘I also have some letters for you to deliver. Come and collect them this evening. Now go and see Di Brachio.’

Di Brachio was conscious, and had Master Claudio with him.

‘Ah — you will all be my testimonials when I apply for a professorship at Padua,’ the doctor said. ‘Let me look at that eye — don’t go getting killed before I’m done with you. This is a salve — try it on the abrasion. The abrasion, fool.’ Claudio put salve on Swan’s cheek with his thumb.

Di Brachio’s skin was waxy and his face was pale so that his unshaven cheek seemed to be bruised. He coughed too much. Each cough clearly pained him.

‘Fever?’ asked Swan, whispering, which was pointless, because the close room was absolutely silent.

The doctor shook his head. ‘Not yet,’ he said. ‘I don’t think the blade cut his guts. If it did?’ He shrugged. The shrug was a death sentence.

‘I can hear every word,’ Di Brachio muttered. ‘By the crucified Christ — talk to me, Englishman. I’m so bored I might die.’

Swan pushed into the room and leaned over the bed.

‘Jesus, you look like hell,’ Di Brachio said. ‘Don’t tell me that Violetta did that to you.’

‘An Orsini bastard with a chair,’ Swan said.

‘And you killed him?’ Di Brachio asked softly.

‘No,’ said Swan.

‘What? Are you getting soft?’ Di Brachio murmured. ‘Listen, the doctor tells me you are taking the mission to Chios.’

Swan paused. ‘To Rhodos and Cos,’ he said.

‘He didn’t tell you more than that?’ Di Brachio said. ‘Did you make him angry?’

‘Not particularly,’ Swan said. He was shocked by how bad his friend looked. ‘I’m going to be made a Donat of the order.’

Di Brachio raised his hand, where a red stone burned like an eye in a small gold ring. He muttered something, and Swan leaned close.

‘He’s tired. You need to let him sleep,’ the doctor said.

‘I am a Donat of the order,’ Di Brachio said. ‘I was going to go … on crusade. For my … sins.’

‘I’ll do enough for both of us,’ Swan said, trying to keep the conversation light.

‘I thought you were supposed to keep me from getting killed — eh, English?’ Di Brachio made a clawing motion with his hand. ‘Heh — stay safe, boy.’

Swan kissed the Venetian on the cheek. ‘Live!’ he said.

‘Heh — I plan to. Hell is waiting for me,’ Di Brachio said. ‘I just keep asking myself …’

‘What?’ Swan asked.

‘How I let that cocksucker get his blade under my guard,’ Di Brachio said.

Swan changed into his new velvet doublet and silk hose and walked to the Priory of Rome with a dozen of Bessarion’s swordsmen as his retinue. The Frenchman was one of them, looking a little less polished.

The prior was a young man — as young as Swan himself. He kissed the Pope’s order reverently, and read through Swan’s genealogy, nodding. ‘Your grandfather was the King of England?’ he asked. He was obviously impressed, and trying to hide it.

Swan bowed. ‘No, my lord. My great-grandfather. My grandfather was the Duke of Lancaster.’

The prior nodded. ‘You are the child of two generations of bastardy,’ he said.

Swan thought of a number of replies, and swallowed them. ‘Yes, my lord,’ he said.

‘But the Pope’s grant only deals with one of them,’ said the prior. His eyes burned with fanaticism and suppressed jealousy. ‘Only the most holy, most pious men are fit to lead our great crusade,’ he said.

Swan wondered whether the prior was quite sane. But years of dealing with his mother’s customers had left him some resources, and he bowed, and said in his most respectful voice, ‘I believe that His Holiness has made his desires plain enough, but I would be delighted to serve your lordship by going back to His Holiness and explaining your position.’

The prior reread the Pope’s document and frowned. ‘I suppose …’ he said.

Swan took his oaths from an older knight, and the man — clad in a black gown with the eight-pointed star and wearing a black knitted cap so old that the black was fading to grey-blue — had iron-hard hands and a steady grip on Swan’s shoulder, and Swan liked him immediately. He took Swan into the chapel of the priory, made him kneel, and left him there for an hour.

Swan knelt. He assumed it was a test.

The elderly knight came back and lit candles — seven candles. For each one he prayed a string of prayers, and then he came and knelt by Swan.

‘I make all the rich bastards kneel, to make sure they have an inkling of what this is about,’ he said. ‘See the candles? My friends. All killed facing the foe.’

‘The Turks?’ Swan whispered.

The old man shook his head. ‘Jean-Baptiste died fighting. The rest — plague, leprosy, the cough, the black fever — it’s the hospital that kills us. No armour against disease.’

Swan crossed himself. ‘I see,’ he said carefully.

The old knight helped him to his feet, and he could scarcely walk. ‘You are going to a galley, I gather,’ he said.

‘Yes, my lord.’

‘Call me brother. Or sir. Welcome to the order, boy. Do us no disgrace.’ The old man led him to a podium desk, where he signed a document and sealed it. ‘Take this to our bursar and have it countersigned. And then go and get yourself a ring.’ He smiled. ‘Do you love God?’

Swan hesitated.

‘Good for you, boy. Tell the truth. But have a go — see if you come to love him while you wash some beggar’s feet and feed some poor women with leprosy. Or sweat in your armour on a pitching deck while the red-hot sand is flung at you by infidels. See what follows.’ He nodded. ‘You’re a bastard?’

‘I am,’ Swan admitted.

The old knight laughed. ‘Welcome to the club,’ he said.

Swan wandered into the Jewish ghetto as if directed by his feet. But here he met no ill-will, and after several attempts he found a pawn shop that specialised in religious rings. He saw magnificent episcopal rings, and small profession rings, and one massive thumb ring that might have graced a cardinal.

The shopkeeper brought them out willingly enough. ‘What are you looking for, young gentleman?’ he asked.

Swan lifted a ring that had to be three hundred years old and admired it. ‘I’m looking for a profession ring for a Donat of the Order of St John,’ he said.

The owner’s eyebrows fluttered. ‘Oh — oh,’ he said as he picked up a tray, placed it back in a wooden clothes press, and pulled out another. ‘Oh — oh,’ he said again. ‘I have one — my wife, you know — I’m sure I have one. Oh — oh.’

Swan opened a manuscript on the main counter and found that it was an illuminated Torah. He was annoyed at how little Hebrew he remembered. He turned a page, and the owner snatched it from under his hands.

He didn’t say anything. He merely looked at Swan with something very like hate.

Swan took a step back and spread his hands. ‘I meant no harm,’ he said. ‘I-’

‘Go,’ said the man. ‘I won’t sell to you.’