Saint-Germain 19: States of Grace: A Novel of the Count Saint-Germain Read online

  From his place at the dice-table, Padre Egidio Duradante looked up, and motioned to Leoncio to join him, his smile a smug one. “I warn you, Signor’ Sen, the Saints have been touching my dice today. I have already won over a hundred ducats, and hope to gain more.” He was wearing standard priestly garb, but his lucchino was made of rich, dark-gray silk over a camisa of fine, bleached linen, all of which made him look more like an advocate than a priest.

  “That’s because you have the Pope’s confidence residing in you—not even the dice dare to oppose you,” said Leoncio as he perched on a stool across the table from Padre Duradante, and next to a brocadeclad trader from France; from his glum demeanor, he had been losing to Padre Duradante for a while.

  “How can you bother with talking?” the Frenchman demanded in dreadful Italian.

  “It is pleasant to talk,” said Padre Duradante in excellent French, making no effort to diminish his gloating or to offer simulated sympathy for his success. “It makes losing money much more enjoyable.”

  “You’re not losing,” said the Frenchman, and shoved another three ducats onto the painted table.

  Padre Duradante smiled and shook the dice in their leather cup, tossing them almost negligently onto the table, watching them roll with an avidity that showed his nonchalance to be sham.

  “Tell me,” said the Frenchman as the dice settled with a two, a three, and a six showing, “do you know the dice are proper?”

  “Are you saying they have loaded dice at this casetta?” Padre Duradante was affronted now, and he stood up very straight. “Sanson! Sanson!” he called out, indignation raising his voice by four notes.

  Sanson Micheletta sauntered over to the table, his dissolute features now a mask of good-will. “Padre—you have a problem?”

  “No. Had I a problem, I would not continue to come through your door. This man has one, however,” he said, pointing to the Frenchman. “Because he is losing, he thinks the dice are inaccurate.”

  “Does he?” The owner of the casetta reached down and picked up the dice one by one. “They are carved from ivory, as you see, and the faces are painted. All the edges are beveled to the same degree. How could these be weighted?” He held them out to the Frenchman. “You may want to examine them for yourself.”

  The man took them and rolled them experimentally between his flattened palms, testing their weight and shape. Reluctantly he handed them back to Sanson Micheletta. “They seem true enough,” he conceded.

  “But perhaps you would prefer a new trio to play with? One that has never been used before?” Sanson asked, and snapped his fingers; instantly a page appeared at his side. “A new trio of dice for this table. See these are put aside. Signor’ Hautecrete is not pleased with them.”

  The page took the dice and vanished, and in a very short while, new dice were brought to the table by a lovely young woman with fine Greek features and an enchanting accent, rigged out in clinging silks from Antioch, the lengthened bodice of the new fashions showing off her slender waist. “For Signor’ Hautecrete,” she said, offering him a unimpaired view of her elevated breasts framed by a corsage of golden lace studded with pearls.

  Guillaume Hautecrete took the dice and did his best to ignore Apollonia, who was leaning into his arm. “Padre, you had best hope that France does not go the way of England, and others, as well. You cannot forget that Ferdinand is Charles’ brother, and a Hapsburg before he is anything else.”

  Padre Durandante recognized this ploy for what it was, and offered a sour smile. “If Frenchmen will give up their salvation as readily as the English have, and all for a King’s harlot, then perhaps God is preparing for Judgment Day, after all, and no one will emerge unscathed, let the Holy Roman Emperor do as he will. Not that a roll of the dice will change either England or France or any German state.” He took the dice from Hautecrete, and remarked quietly, “I would like to resume play—would you?”

  “I suppose I will,” said Hautecrete, and moved another two ducats from his depleted pile onto a painted oblong on the table. “There.”

  Matching the amount, Padre Duradante shook his dice and threw them. This time only two of the dice were winning, and so Hautecrete received one of his ducats back, seizing it and hanging on to it as if he feared it would escape through his fingers. He laughed harshly and looked from Padre Duradante to Leoncio Sen. “If you play with him, know you are dealing with the Devil.”

  “I have suspected as much,” Leoncio rejoined with a smirk. He set down his bet and waited for Padre Duradante to roll the dice again.

  “This is too rich for me,” said Hautecrete, who gathered up his few remaining coins and stalked out of the parlor, bound for the tavern at the rear of the casetta. After a moment, Apollonia followed after him.

  “Safer to gamble,” said Padre Duradante as he watched her go.

  “At least dice will not give you the pox,” agreed Leoncio.

  “But if one must have pox, she would make the infection memorable,” said Padre Duradante; he tossed the dice and smiled as he won again. “I apologize for any hardship I may impose upon you.”

  “Your forgiveness, Padre, but I doubt it,” said Leoncio, handing over his money. “You like to win too much.”

  “You are quite ingenious, Signor’ Sen; you say just enough,” Padre Duradante told him, accepting his slight for a compliment, as he gathered up the dice for another throw.

  Over the next hour, the trio of dice went back and forth between Padre Duradante and Leoncio Sen, and their stacks of ducats rose and fell on a swift tide of fortune, with neither pulling so far ahead of the other that they were forced to stop their game, or their play turned rancorous. Finally Padre Duradante dropped the dice back in their cup and announced, “I’m hungry, and I can smell aromas from the kitchen. Let us go to the dining room.”

  “Of course,” said Leoncio, scooping up his bounty and shoving it into his wallet; all in all he was down about twelve ducats on the night—not a vast sum as gaming went, but enough that his uncle would complain of it when he heard.

  “This is a very elegant casetta, this Santa Perpetua,” Padre Duradante remarked as he led the way toward the dining room. “I hope it continues successful, though in times like these, relying on chance is precarious.”

  “No doubt Sanson shares your feelings,” said Leoncio, smiling at his own wit. “He is a very canny man, is Sanson.”

  “So I have heard, and from many sources,” Padre Duradante said as they passed through the doors opened for them by Moorish slaves.

  A waiter came up to them, bowing and asking, “What would you like to eat, Signori?”

  “I am told you have a fish cooked in a bread that is said to be excellent tonight,” said Padre Duradante. “Some of that, I think, and then, perhaps, a duck in red wine would be good. Not too tough, or fishy—if the duck is from the land, so much the better.”

  “The Padre has a fine palate,” the waiter approved obsequiously, and clapped his hands to summon a page to seat them at one of the small round tables. “Our ducks come in from Padova twice a week, and those we cook now arrived this morning. If that is satisfactory?”

  “Are they brought by barge, alive, in cages, to be killed here?” Padre Duradante pursued.

  “Yes. We killed and hung half the order this morning. The rest we’ll do over the next two days.” The waiter pursed his lips.

  “We’ll chance it, then,” said the Padre as the waiter left them in the care of the young African page.

  “You could order pigs’ feet and cured cabbage and he’d fawn just as much,” Leoncio observed as the waiter vanished through the kitchen door.

  “But why should I have an inferior meal because the waiter is supercilious?” Padre Duradante asked,

  Leoncio laughed aloud. “No reason.” He pulled a chair out for the Padre and then took one himself.

  “Perhaps you will tell me what has you so gratified,” Padre Duradante asked as another waiter approached their table.

  “What w
ine may I bring you, Padre?” asked the waiter.

  “The Toscan Montecello, and fine glasses for such a wine,” said Padre Duradante with an air of satisfaction. As the waiter went away, he studied Leoncio for a short while. “So, if you will, tell me what has happened to give you that unctuous air.”

  “I had a bit of luck earlier today—not with dice or cards, but in another matter.” He smiled. “I believe I have the key to gaining two things I seek with a single stroke.”

  “A most fortunate turn,” said Padre Duradante. “I should hope that you are not trading on that stroke quite yet.”

  “Why should I not? The matter is all but settled.” Leoncio refused to frown, although the Padre’s warning robbed him of some of his satisfaction.

  “All but is still subject to the fluctuations of fortune.” Padre Duradante contemplated Leoncio for a short while, then said, “I assume part of your plan includes that unscrupulous Signor’ Emerenzio. I also assume you must know he is purloining funds from the accounts he holds in trust in order to pay his gambling debts?”

  Leoncio frowned. “Yes, that is a part of my—”

  “—scheme?” Padre Duradante finished for him. “I thought as much. You want to suborn him, don’t you? Bind him to your service so unequivocally that any deviation from your intentions may expose him to calumny and worse.”

  “Hardly calumny, considering what he has done: rather it would bring him to justice,” said Leoncio firmly.

  “As you say,” the Padre remarked with a shrug. “It would make him reluctant to oppose you in any way.”

  “Yes. And a man in his position can reveal much useful information with the proper persuasion.”

  “But whipped dogs bite more cruelly than well-treated ones,” Padre Duradante reminded him.

  “A strange observation for the Pope’s man to make, if you will excuse my saying so,” Leoncio observed.

  “Matters of faith are different than worldly considerations; a whipped dog is not a soul in danger of dogmatic equivocation,” said Padre Duradante. “To chastize in the Name of God is nothing like mundane coercion—it is the duty entrusted to us as the servants of God, and the means by which we secure our salvation.” He smiled as the waiter returned with a bottle of wine. “Very good,” he said as the cork was withdrawn from the neck and the first, rich aroma of the wine emerged like a demon from a jewel-case.

  The waiter brought glasses for the two men and poured the deep-red liquid. “Is there anything else?”

  “Not just now,” said Padre Duradante, waving the waiter away. “I think you’ll like this vintage,” he said in a tone that indicated serious conversation was at an end for the duration of their meal.

  Leoncio raised his glass. “May God send you good health, Padre.”

  “And good fortune,” Padre Duradante added, a cynical amusement in his eyes.

  For the duration of their meal they exchanged gossip and engaged in the kind of verbal jousting that both men enjoyed. When they finished with their fish, Sanson sent two of his most beautiful women to join them—one blond, one dark—although he knew neither Padre Duradante nor Leoncio would be particularly interested in their talents; most serious gamblers were not readily distracted.

  “Not tonight,” said Padre Duradante, stroking the exposed arm of the fair-haired woman beside him.

  “Perhaps another time, then?” she purred.

  “Perhaps,” he agreed, and kissed his fingers at her as she and her companion went away, remarking to Leoncio as a bowl of sweetbreads and crab in cream with garlic was brought to them, “With such women as those, Sanson must know every secret in Venezia. Who could hold anything back from one of them?”

  Leoncio laughed because it was expected of him.

  It was almost two hours later when they rose from their table and returned to the dice-room where they found a heavy-eyed Gennaro Emerenzio at the central table, his camisa deeply wrinkled, the inner, turned-back sleeves of his dogaline stained with sweat, the dice-cup in his hands, a determined expression on his face. He glanced up as he saw Padre Duradante and Leoncio Sen approaching, and his eyes darted away from them.

  “Buona sera,” said Leoncio with spurious geniality. “I thought you might be here, Signor’ Emerenzio.”

  “I came to try my luck, just as you have,” said Emerenzio, as if the words were pulled out of him.

  “Yes; my point exactly,” said Leoncio, reaching into his wallet for a dozen ducats. “You won’t mind if I join the game, will you?”

  Short of insulting Leoncio, Emerenzio could not deny him the right to a game, so he hitched his shoulders and said, “It would be my pleasure.”

  “Very sporting of you,” said Padre Duradante, drawing up a stool and putting down ten ducats. “A small amount to begin, in case the Saints have put their sights elsewhere.”

  “But you are—”

  “—needed at Il Redentor? Not until the Angelus, which gives me an hour or so for our entertainment.” The Padre braced his elbows on the table. “You were going to throw against the house, were you not? Well, now you will have a better chance of winning something.”

  Emerenzio sighed and drooped like a windless sail. Then he visibly restored his resolve, improved his attitude, setting the seal on his fate by shaking the leather cup. “Why not?” He looked at the two men flanking him. “Put down your money, Signori,” he said, preparing to toss.

  Padre Duradante was quick to comply, Leoncio marginally less so, but prompt enough to have three ducats down by the time the dice left the cup. “Dio mio,” the priest muttered as one die bounced and rolled off the end of the table.

  With a burst of loud laughter, Emerenzio gathered up the other two and went to retrieve the third. “I’ll have to roll again.”

  Leoncio put his hand on Emerenzio’s upper arm. “Let me have a look at the dice, if you would, Gennaro.”

  Emerenzio held out the leather cup, his indifference at this challenge obviously forced. “Go ahead and look. You’ll find nothing amiss.”

  “No, probably not; even you are not such a fool as to foist false dice onto a gaming house,” said Padre Duradante, taking the cup and rolling the dice between his hands. “But you cannot know if the fall damaged the bevel.” He closed his eyes, concentrating on the three ivory cubes. Finally he opened his eyes. “They seem right enough, but, do you know, I think we would all play more happily with a fresh trio.”

  Emerenzio nodded, his face blank. “As you say, Padre Duradante.”

  Padre Duradante’s smile was as wide as it was false. “I know we shall all be more comfortable with the results.” He clapped his hands for a page, and handed over the dice. “One fell, and may have lost true.”

  “Very good, Padre,” said the page, and bore the dice away.

  “There. You see?” Padre Duradante said consolingly, “Now none of us can have reason to be suspicious.”

  This reassurance was clearly cold comfort to Emerenzio, who shook his head and declared that he could not imagine why such an exchange was necessary. “But, as you say, there can be no suspicions this way.”

  Leoncio bowed to the table-top. “Your field of honor awaits. Shall you enter the lists? We’re waiting.” To make his point, he put four ducats on one of the painted squares and watched as Padre Duradante placed his bet, thinking as he did that Padre Duradante had the coffers of the Church to draw upon if play went against him, while he had to appeal to his uncle.

  “I have done all I can,” said the priest with an air of saintliness that absolved him of all disappointments.

  Emerenzio stared at the new dice, reaching for them as if he feared they were red-hot, dropped them into the cup, rattled them well, and tossed, letting out a stifled yelp as the dice came to rest.

  “You will do better next throw,” said Leoncio, claiming his ducats and the dice-cup from Emerenzio before placing his next bet. This, he told himself, was going to be a wonderful night.

  Text of a letter from Onfroi van Amsteljaxter in Heide
lberg to his sister Erneste van Amsteljaxter in Amsterdam, carried by academic courier and delivered nineteen days after it was written.

  To my dear sister Erneste, the affectionate greetings of your brother Onfroi, presently in Heidelberg, at the Inn of the Six Red Feathers, where many scholars stay during their brief time here. Until I know what my situation may be, you will be able to reach me here.

  Yes, I am safe, and for the moment my resources are such that I need not draw upon you for my living, but I have found that the Landsmacht—you know of whom I speak—has written to the university here, complaining of my Godlessness and advising against my employment, so I may once again be cast upon the world without means to make a living, or the safety of being permitted to teach. For the time being, I am tutoring a Bohemian scholar in reading Frankish Latin in exchange for meals, and I have earned a few small commissions writing letters for merchants and other travelers, and translating those they have received. I never thought our peripatetic existence in youth would prove valuable now, but so it is: my knowledge of Latin, Austrian, Bohemian, Bavarian, Venezian, Fiorenzen, Provencal, French, Spanish, Gascon, and Flemish may not be profound, but it is workable enough to earn my keep. I have also begun to read broadsheets to the foreign scholars here at the Six Red Feathers, and they often buy me tankards of beer and wine for my trouble; thus I am able to keep my room paid for, at least for now.

  I am pleased to hear that your little book has been doing well—quite an unexpected development, I should say. No doubt this eases your concern for me, as it gives me hope that my need will not cast you into penury: perhaps it will also make it possible for you and our aunt to remain in Amsterdam, so you may avoid the present unrest in Antwerp. I hope that, as you say, your publisher may consider doing another text for you. That would be a most excellent development for you, and for me, should I have to impose upon you. At present I am in need of little more than four or five ducats to last until August, for my summer earnings will be less while many of the students are away.