Martin Seay - The Mirror Thief

You aren’t coming with me?

Narkis shakes his head with grim impatience. Walk through, he says, and then unbolt the door to the street. Go back to your inn, collect your possessions, and go to the senator’s house.

Where will I be when I come out?

In the Campiello del Sale. Do you know where that is?

Of course. Where are you going to go? You can’t stay here.

Narkis doesn’t answer. With some effort, he throws the bolt and casts the large door open. The storefront is lit through its slatted shutters by the lantern of the locanda next door. For an instant, Crivano can see Narkis’s face: haggard with anguish, his eyes brightened by tears. Then Narkis shoves him through, and the door slams behind him.

Loud voices from above, and rapid steps: soft at first, then, after a pause, boot-shod. Crivano vaults the counter, crosses the room, unbolts the door. He peeks through the crack — the campiello looks clear — and slips out. But the moment his feet touch the flagstones, a pair of sbirri enter from the north, on the very street he’d planned to take; he turns left, makes the corner before they spot him. Something different about these two. Walking together. Both wearing sidearms. Hunting, not following.

He’s soon in the Campo San Aponal again — a group of young nobles is gathered before the church, grousing about the lack of linkboys — and from there he takes a back route to the White Eagle over the Slaughterhouse Bridge Canal. Along the way, he passes a pair of watchmen from the Ministry of Night, drinking cups of wine in a casino with its shutters still open. They don’t seem intent on resuming their rounds anytime soon. Tonight they’ve ceded their streets to the sbirri.

He expects cloaked swordsmen at the locanda’s door, or in the parlor, but there’s no one to be seen aside from one of the Friulian girls, who scurries away in evident terror as soon as Crivano appears. He pays her no mind, rushes upstairs, bursts into his room, bolts the door. Then he turns to survey the damage done to his things.

His things are gone. The sbirri must have confiscated them. The message pinned to the curtain is gone, too. Who found it first?

He nearly collides with Anzolo on his way to the street. Dottore! Anzolo hisses, and shoves him backward, down a corridor, into the kitchen, out of sight. They’re out there now, Anzolo says. It’s very bad, dottore. They’re everywhere, and they’re all armed. Wait here until the street clears, then go to the Contarini house at once.

Did the boy find you?

Yes, dottore. He did.

And the gondolier, did you find him?

I did. I gave him your message. Let me check the street for you. I’ll tell you when it’s safe.

Yes. Thank you, Anzolo. Oh — my items: my box and my trunk. Do you know where they took them?

Anzolo stops in the doorframe. Where who took them, dottore?

The sbirri. Didn’t the sbirri seize them?

Bafflement settles on Anzolo’s face. I thought you took them, he says. I thought you had them sent to the Contarini house.

But I’ve just now come for them. I didn’t send for them. Who took them away?

I–I wasn’t here at the time. I was on the Riva del Fabbriche, seeking out your gondolier. Agnesina was here. Agnesina!

He calls the girl’s name several times, but she does not appear. They find her in a storeroom, hidden behind a stack of boxes: the one who fled when Crivano arrived.

Agnesina! What’s the matter? What’s come over you?

Young woman, Crivano says, what became of my trunk, and my box?

The girl recoils into the corner, making an elaborate gesture with her hands. The gesture is familiar, though Crivano can’t place it. Her eyes are vast and terrified. Hairs bristle on Crivano’s neck.

Agnesina! Anzolo thunders. Answer the dottore! Who took his things?

When she finally speaks, her voice quakes as if she’s freezing. It was him, she says. He took them himself.

Her unsteady finger is aimed at Crivano’s chest.

Agnesina, Anzolo says, that is not possible. He is here now to collect them. The man who came earlier: what did he look like? How many were with him?

No one was with him, she says. No one.

Are you sure? The dottore’s trunk is far too heavy for a single man to move.

What did he look like? Crivano says. His voice seems to come from outside himself.

You , she says, weeping now. Like you. But also not. And with different — garments. Garments like — a doctor — like during—

Leave her be, Crivano says. It doesn’t matter. Leave her be.

He waits in the corridor, listening through the door as Anzolo alternately upbraids and consoles the girl. His heart thuds in his chest like a separate creature, like it knows of terrors as yet unsuspected by the rest of his body. In a moment, Anzolo emerges from the room, but he won’t meet Crivano’s eyes. You should hurry, he says. I’ll check the street.

What was that gesture that the girl made?

It’s nothing, dottore. She’s very excited, with all the sbirri. I’ll talk to her when she’s calm, and we’ll make arrangements for your things.

Anzolo, Crivano says. What was the gesture?

Nothing. As I said. Something superstitious peasants do.

Why? Why do they do it?

I don’t know, dottore. I’m a city man, myself.

Anzolo attempts a smile, but can’t sustain it. Crivano fixes him with a flat stare.

They do it to ward off evil, I suppose, Anzolo says. Evil spirits.

Evil spirits? Crivano says. Are you sure?

For a long time Anzolo says nothing. He stands in the corridor with one hand on the wall, facing the door to the street. He’s shivering too; Crivano can see that now.

The plague, he answers at last. They do it to protect themselves from the plague.

Crivano takes a deep breath, releases it slowly. His lungs fill and empty; blood thickens in his brain. He can feel parts of himself awakening that have been dormant for years, while everything within him that has been awake now seems to grow dull and indifferent: pale worms in winter mud.

Yes, he says. I thought that might be the case. Thank you, Anzolo.

A pair of sbirri passes, Anzolo gives the signal, and Crivano steps from the White Eagle’s door. It closes behind him with a quiet brush of wood on wood: a final sound. He is alone. He has always been alone — since the Lark died, at least — but his isolation can no longer be hidden. Like a splinter of steel lodged in a muscle, he is no longer part of what he moves among.

He turns right to return the way he came, but immediately spots two more sbirri at the casino down the street; they’ve stopped to argue with the nightwatchmen he saw earlier. Crivano detours into a dark doorway and waits for them to move on. Instead, one of them enters the casino— I’ll chase this heretic dog down with ease, I promise you, once I’ve taken a nice shit —and leaves the other behind. Crivano recognizes the remaining sbirro as the feckless youth who watched his room all afternoon. The boy puffs out his chest, fingers the pommel of his rapier like it’s a new toy. Crivano counts his pulse, giving the young sbirro’s partner time enough to reach the privy and pull down his hose. Then he hurries along the street — stepping from shadow to shadow — and clubs the boy in the face with the iron head of his walkingstick.

The young sbirro shrieks, drops to the packed dirt. The watchmen rise in half-crouches, looking at Crivano, looking at each other. Crivano raises his stick again, and they both sink to their seats. The sbirro moans, clutching his wrecked face, retching blood and mucus. Crivano keeps steady eyes on the seated watchmen as he relieves the wounded boy of his sword and scabbard.