Hella says to Bruno, in Italian, ‘You are generous, Signor Barrani. God likes generosity, especially to a stranger. Will you permit me to help your servants prepare the meal? It would be an honour for me to recompense your kindness.’
‘Can you cook, Signorina?’ Bruno says, flattered.
‘Well enough.’
Matteo Fedele chips in. ‘That’s not all she can do.’ He points to the rolls of paper on the table. ‘We’ve been having a discussion about the calculations I’ve made for the gearing for the orbit of Mars. She has a rare grasp of mathematics – for a maid.’
‘Then you are doubly welcome, Signorina,’ Bruno says. ‘Do you plan to stay long in Padua? We could well put your skills to use, in the Arte dei Astronomi. Poor Matteo is a slow fellow unless the whip is applied liberally, or so Signor Galileo tells me.’
Bianca opens her mouth to protest. But Bruno and Matteo, engaged in an impromptu bout of mock-sparring, are too distracted to notice. She drops her shoulders and shakes her head in slow despair.
‘Bruno is a fool where women are concerned, even ones dressed in plain kersey and brimful of dubious piety,’ she says softly to Nicholas. ‘Hella’s up to something. I know it. And I have a very bad feeling that you are at the centre of it.’
The supper, taken in the warm afternoon air, is a torture. For Nicholas and Bianca, it is like being the only two people at a revel who have realized how the illusions are performed, or who know that the singers are out of key and the dancers clumsy. They eat unenthusiastically, while Bruno and Matteo take turns to fawn over the new arrival. Both men seem entranced by Hella’s ability to converse on matters mathematical, though Bianca suspects most of it is lost on her cousin, who is only pretending in order not to look less able than Galileo’s pupil.
It is the first time in all the weeks since leaving Den Bosch that they have seen Hella in the company of men other than priests. She displays a worldliness that neither is expecting. She speaks when not actively invited to do so, does not lower her gaze submissively when either man declaims. She takes the conversation where she chooses, rather than following. If Bianca did not know any better, she would admire it. What is certain to her is that this is not the character of a maid who has given herself up to prayer and humility in the service of God. When Matteo and Bruno boast of the great sphere they are building for his Serene Highness the doge, there is no stern lecture on the folly of seeking knowledge, no hectoring about curiosity opening the door to the Devil’s designs. Instead Hella appears to have adopted the technical mind of a student of astronomy.
‘How will the retrograde motions of the planets be depicted?’ she asks. Then, when the answer has been given to her satisfaction by a beaming Matteo, ‘How have you calculated the representative distance between their orbits?’ And when this has been explained, ‘How far into the future will you show the precession of the equinoxes?’
Bianca chews noisily on a piece of octopus and tries to stop herself pulling a face. What game Hella is playing she cannot determine. But there is no question in her mind that a game is exactly what it is. Nor is there any question about the meaning of those not-so-discreet glances she keeps throwing at Nicholas.
‘Forgive me for sounding harsh, Cousin, but I cannot remain here in this house if that woman is to be your guest.’
The supper is over. Alonso and Matteo Fedele are accompanying Hella back to the Beguinage. She has left them as the latest addition to the Arte dei Astronomi, proposed by Matteo and unreservedly approved by Bruno. ‘If they had a crown, they’d have anointed her queen,’ Bianca whispered angrily to Nicholas after she’d departed.
‘Did Signorina Maas’s offer of reconciliation not move you?’ Bruno asks.
Bianca’s amber eyes blaze dangerously. Nicholas can see she has that set to her jaw that those who know her well recognize as a warning to tread carefully.
‘It was not hers to make.’
‘Surely it could have been no more than a minor falling-out, Cousin,’ Bruno says. ‘She would not have taken the trouble to seek you out otherwise. I see no poison in her.’
‘If there isn’t – there ought to be. You weren’t there, Bruno.’
But Bruno is nothing if not a conciliator. ‘Come, it is a warm evening and we have had good company. This is not the time to harbour ill will.’
‘I wish to say no more on the matter. If you would prefer that we sought lodgings elsewhere–’
Bruno looks hurt. ‘Of course not. You are kin. I would not think of it.’ Then, with the merest hint of an astute smile, he turns to Nicholas. ‘Is it perhaps that Signorina Hella is in need of a cure that has nothing to do with medicine? A cure that only you can provide?’
Nicholas opens his mouth to deny it, but Bianca breaks in. ‘Please, Cousin, if you bear any love for Nicholas and me, keep that woman away from us.’
And with that, she kisses Bruno demurely on the cheek, thanks him kindly for the meal and sets off for the chamber she and Nicholas share, as though it has all been nothing but a foolish misunderstanding. Though from the tautness in her stride, Nicholas knows that inside she is screaming.
‘Was Bruno right? Are you frightened I’ll let Hella lead me by the hand to adultery? Why would you even think that?’
Nicholas has asked because Bianca has started to cry. She is crying only softly, and were it not for the slight movement in her shoulders he would never know it. It is something he has seen her do only rarely, and never when they are lying together in a tangle of sheets, the fire of lovemaking cooling on their bodies. The window shutters are thrown open to air the chamber. It is almost night. Outside in the Borgo dei Argentieri comes the sound of young gallants singing praise to wine, women or honour.
Bianca does not answer him.
‘Is it what she said in Reims, about a dead child? Is that still preying on your mind?’ He runs a soothing hand through her hair.
Still no answer.
‘Listen to me, Bianca. When she spoke those words, yes, I admit it, they brought back old memories I thought I had buried. But only for a while. I have had plenty of time on the road since then to consider their effect. I have made peace with my past. I have let Eleanor’s memory go. You must, too.’
Bianca draws a slow, steadying breath. She thinks: what can I say to you? What can I confess that will not cause my fear to burst free from its chains? Like a ghost whispering in a graveyard, the words Hella had spoken on the road outside Mouthier-Haut-Pierre insinuate themselves into her mind: It will break his heart when the child you are carrying is stillborn… No, she thinks, I cannot tell you what I truly fear. Because to do so will mean acknowledging the utterly unacceptable truth, which is that Hella isn’t the street-huckster I thought she was, a charlatan peddling tricks to turn a husband away from his wife. It means considering the possibility that she has somehow cursed me. That she knows what the future holds for a body that isn’t hers – my body. Which means she has control over my happiness. Our happiness. And that I will never do. Especially now that my menses are overdue and – according to Bruno, who seems to be the only one of us who has noticed – I am apparently blooming.