Rupert Thomson - Secrecy

As I prepared to set out for the apothecary I was filled with an agitation that verged on panic. I felt paralysed by even the smallest decisions — what coat to wear, which route to take. I hurried down Via de’ Serragli and over the nearest bridge. The moon that hung above the Grand Duke’s granary was red and swollen, almost close enough to touch; it looked as if it might burst at any moment, soaking the streets of Santo Spirito in blood. On Porta Rossa, I came across two men locked in such a struggle that they had become a single, staggering beast. Edging past, I saw an arm break loose and land a fierce blow. The creature, having harmed itself, let out a bellow. A nearby puddle shivered.

By the time I reached Via Lontanmorti, it was after eleven. At the end of the street, in a high recess in the wall, was a statue of the Virgin, illuminated by a single candle. That was all the light there was. I didn’t want to wake Faustina’s uncle, nor could I afford to draw any attention to myself. Remembering the passageway she had told me about, I moved beyond the apothecary, passed beneath a low, grimy archway and turned left into a cul-de-sac. She had said the entrance was halfway along. I ran my hands over the wall until I located it. No wider than my shoulders, it had the dimensions of a small door. I entered, inching forwards, one step at a time. The ground sloped downwards, beneath the building, then disappeared. I had reached the ditch or drain that she had spoken of. I stopped and looked behind me. A ghostly grey rectangle shimmered in the blackness. The alley. It didn’t seem as if I had been followed.

I faced back into the dark. A cold, sour smell rose out of the drain. Far below, I thought I could hear running water. Bracing one hand against each wall, I reached out with my right foot. I judged the gap to be about the length of one long stride. My left foot placed at the very edge of the drop, I stepped back with my right and then sprang forwards, into nothing. When I landed on the other side, I felt I had crossed a bottomless pit filled with the predatory, the unwitting — the dead. It was peculiar to think that Machiavelli might have done the same.

I turned right. In complete darkness, I groped my way forwards, hands outstretched. The atmosphere was damp, and oddly thick. Whenever I paused, I was deafened by my own breathing. I turned left, then left again. At last, I emerged into the yard Faustina had described. I tipped my head back and gulped fresh air from the sky, then began to explore the back wall of the building. When I had found the piece of wire, I followed it downwards until my hand closed around a key.

I had heard it said that if you want to know what paradise smells like, you only have to visit an apothecary. Alone, at night, this seemed more true than ever. As I crept through the back room, all kinds of scents and perfumes made themselves known to me. Rose petals one moment, mustard seeds the next. Then ginger. Molasses. Sage. I found the stairs, began to climb. In the silence, my heart sounded noisy, clumsy, like someone running down a street in heavy boots.

I stepped out on to the third floor and was about to reach for Faustina’s door handle when the door opened, and her face appeared. She jumped when she saw me. I slipped past her, into the room. She closed the door, then moved towards me.

‘What are you doing here?’

‘I’m sorry. I wanted to come earlier —’

‘Not so loud. My uncle’s only one floor down.’

I told her about the theft of the drawing.

The small space between her eyebrows darkened, as if it had been shaded in. ‘You think it means they’re interested in me?’

‘That’s what I’m afraid of,’ I said.

‘I hope they don’t know. About who my mother is, I mean.’

‘How could they?’

She shrugged.

I asked if she had noticed anything unusual recently.

‘Like what?’ she said.

‘I don’t know. Has anyone been watching you?’

‘I don’t think so.’

‘We’ll have to be careful from now on,’ I said. ‘Even more careful.’

We made love silently, furtively, as though we, too, were thieves, and pleasure was something it took two people to steal.

Every now and then, we stopped to listen, thinking we had heard her uncle’s bedroom door or voices in the yard below.

When she came, I put my hand over her mouth.

Halfway across the Ponte Rubaconte, a cold wind gusted, and I was glad of the English coat the Grand Duke had given me earlier that year. I wore it buttoned to the neck and kept my head lowered. My third winter in Florence.

The day before, I had called on Pampolini and asked if I could have a word with Earhole. Pampolini said he hadn’t seen the boy all week. His mother had lost her job at the slaughterhouse, and she was drinking heavily. They lived on Via delle Poverine, near the Campo della Morte. He gave me directions and told me to watch out I wasn’t robbed.

Ever since the break-in, I had been trying to come up with strategies. I didn’t think I had much chance of talking Stufa round. He had told me I was a dead man, and I doubted he had it in him to relent; the best I could expect was to delay or deflect his animosity. That said, it didn’t seem a bad idea to acquire some ammunition of my own. As yet I had nothing except a few rumours spread by an out-of-work French jester. I was going to need more than that. In the meantime, I had to hope that Stufa’s life was going well. You should always wish success on your enemies. If they’re happy and fulfilled — if they feel blessed — they’ll be far less likely to turn on you.

Bassetti presented a different problem. On the face of it, he had always been agreeable. If I had twinges of uneasiness, it was because I suspected he had registered the fact that the Grand Duke and I had grown closer. Whenever he saw us together, he would assume an indulgent look, as if we were wayward but harmless children, but I knew he would not take kindly to being upstaged or excluded, and once or twice, while the Grand Duke and I were discussing some aspect of the secret commission, Bassetti had entered the room unexpectedly, and we had broken off in the middle of a sentence, an abrupt, artificial silence that a man of Bassetti’s social sophistication could hardly have failed to notice. He must have realized that something was being kept from him, and I was always bracing myself for a confrontation. It never came. Was I imagining tension where none existed? Was it possible that Bassetti actually approved of my role as the Grand Duke’s confidant? It was one of my strengths that I saw things other people didn’t see. Was I now seeing things that weren’t there at all? I had written Bassetti a note, asking for an appointment. I wanted to convince him of the fundamental innocence of my relationship with the Grand Duke. I had to be certain he was on my side.

Via delle Poverine was aptly named. There were no paving stones, only potholes. Palaces had given way to shacks and sheds, their walls patched with rotten wood, loose stones and handfuls of river clay. Looming above the rooftops, sheer and forbidding, was the tower of San Niccolò. Nearby, huddled on a mud embankment, were half a dozen grubby children. As I drew level, the sun broke through a veil of cloud and turned the puddles silver. The leader of the group was a boy of about thirteen. His hair hugged his skull like fur.

‘Nice coat.’

He bounced a pebble on his palm. In place of eyebrows he had two slightly swollen ridges of bone.

I said I was looking for Nuto.

‘Nuto?’

‘He’s about your age. He’s only got one ear.’

The boy tilted his head, playing deaf. ‘What’s that?’

His cronies sniggered.

They knew who I meant, but weren’t about to help.