‘Tell me, sweet Matteo,’ she says, ‘are you sure Signor Barrani said nothing more about why I was not to go to the house in the Borgo dei Argentieri again?’
He gives her a look of regret. He does not care to disappoint a maid whose humility, both in dress and demeanour, he admires. She is a revelation to him. Where in all Italy could he find a maid whose eyes don’t glaze over when he speaks of Euclid, Pythagoras, Plato and Aristotle? She can almost match him in discourse – and in a language that is not even her own. And there is an intriguing beauty hidden away beneath all that severity. She is a catch, and no mistake. Indeed, the mask of piety she wears will make the chase all the more exciting.
Not that Matteo Fedele is thinking of anything serious. She clearly has no dowry, and his father would cut him off without a scudo to his name if he so much as suggested marriage to her. Time enough, he thinks, for marriage when he’s an established figure in the Arte dei Astronomi.
‘He said only that it was improper for an unmarried maid to visit the house of a man who would be Master of the Spheres for His Serenity the doge,’ Matteo answers. He tries not to smile. Such an explanation might hold water if the doge’s Master of the Spheres was any man but Bruno Barrani.
‘I hope Signor Barrani’s sense of decency will not prevent me from assisting you and Signor Galileo? God did not give me the gift of understanding such things only for it to rot away like windfall.’
Matteo grins. Is she playing an opening gambit? he wonders. Is there fire under the ice?
‘I fear that Signor Galileo’s house is a lot more disreputable than Signor Barrani’s.’
She gives one of her chilly smiles. ‘Our Saviour did not walk only amongst the pure, Signor Matteo. Quite the opposite.’
Inside the storehouse all is silent. The forge in the corner is cold. Tiny flecks of dust turn gently in the air, glinting in the shafts of light streaming in from the high windows. The wooden cradle of the sphere stands in the centre, like some giant antediluvian sea creature lying dead on its back after the flood has receded. A single brass meridian ring hoops towards the roof, twice the height of a man. Around the base lie the innards of the beast: the segments of rings etched with signs of the zodiac; the discs of varying diameters; the cogs, wheels, brass globes to represent the planets… Matteo watches as Hella circles the neat stacks of metal and gilded wood. She has a curious look on her face. She seems intrigued, but appears to be frowning. For just an instant he has the extraordinary impression of a predator circling a disembowelled carcass. She looks across at him from the other side of the cradle. The frown has gone from her face, but it still lingers in her eyes.
‘This is only a small fraction of the whole,’ Matteo says defensively. ‘It will take many months to fabricate everything.’
The maid circles the cradle in silence until she is standing beside him again. Then she says, ‘Do you think it is wise for mankind to build a machine that mimics God’s works?’
This surprises Matteo, because until now he has assumed the maid wholeheartedly approves of the new learning, of enquiry and experimentation, of seeking the limits of what may be known. Now she sounds almost censorious.
‘But how else may we understand those works, if not through science?’ he replies. ‘By this engine, we will be able to see the cosmos as it will be in days, even years, ahead – if Maestro Galileo and I can contrive the movement of the mechanism correctly.’
The maid’s gaze drops from his, as though she doesn’t want him to see into her thoughts. ‘I have seen a representation of the future, Signor Matteo,’ she says, so softly he barely hears, ‘in Brabant. It does not end well.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘It ends in death.’
‘Of course it does. But then there is resurrection and eternal life. Surely you believe that? You’re not a heretic, are you?’
She looks up, as though the words she has just spoken were someone else’s. ‘How could a Beguine be a heretic, Matteo? I am God’s child as much as you.’
‘Then there is nothing to fear by seeking to look into the future, is there?’
A change seems to come over her. Something in her eyes makes Matteo think of a child who has woken from a nightmare and fears the return of sleep.
‘Tell me, Matteo,’ she says, ‘if you could make the sphere turn enough times, do you think it might one day replicate the positions of the planets and the zodiacs on the last day?’
Now it is Matteo’s turn to frown. ‘What do you mean, “the last day”?’
The stare she gives him lances into his mind like a bolt fired from a crossbow.
‘Judgement Day, Matteo. The last day.’
For a moment he doesn’t know what to say. Her intensity unnerves him. ‘I… I suppose it might be contrived. But only a man like Maestro Galileo could imagine the calculations required to achieve it. It would be beyond my skill. And I wouldn’t dare do it, anyway. It would be blasphemy.’
‘But it could be done?’
‘In theory, I suppose it might.’
‘What would it look like?’
Matteo is beginning to feel uncomfortable. ‘How would I know? Perhaps if one could turn the sphere through enough cycles until the planets and the stars were all constrained in alignment, or were no longer visible from your chosen latitude – that might indicate an empty cosmos. But if the Holy Office of the Faith knew the sphere was capable of such a calculation–’ He breaks off, shuddering as he imagines the flames beginning to lap around his legs as the Inquisition has him burned in the middle of the Piazza dei Signori. ‘But I cannot imagine why anyone would want to know such a thing. I think it would be best to speak of any other matter but that.’
‘I’ve had her banished, Nicholas,’ Bianca says proudly. ‘It’s the best thing all round, don’t you think?’
She has just this moment met her husband in the university botanical gardens. Nicholas has been attending another of Professor Fabrici’s lectures.
‘Banished? You sound like Queen Elizabeth or Catherine de’ Medici,’ he says, trying not to smile. Bianca has a familiar glint in her eye, the one that’s often there after she’s had Ned Monkton eject a quarrelsome customer from the Jackdaw.
‘Well, it’s a compromise. Bruno has some silly notion Hella can be of use to the Arte dei Astronomi. Fine, let her haunt Signor Galileo’s house then. I think it was Matteo Fedele’s idea. The lazy rascal wants to make use of her ability at mathematics, so that he can put his feet up while Hella does all the work for him. They’ll soon grow tired of her, when she starts telling Signor Galileo he’s going to spend eternity being crushed in a wine-press for living a life of debauchery.’
They find a place by the canal bank to sit awhile in the sunshine. Bianca leans forward over her knees, watching the brown water slide eastwards on its journey to the Venetian lagoon.
‘I thought when I came here that we would find peace, Nicholas. At least for a while,’ she says. ‘But that woman is like some cold, dead hand on my shoulder that I cannot shake off.’
‘This isn’t like you, Bianca,’ he says, taking her hand, his face troubled. ‘You’ve never let a soul cower your spirit: not Robert Cecil, not Cat Vaesy, Tyrell, Gault… None of them could match you, when it came down to it. Even the pestilence took one look at you and thought better of it.’