Kasser was very ill by then—very ill, said Korin — and spent most of the day in bed, rising only to join the others for the evening meal, but nobody knew what sort of disease was eating him because the only symptom he exhibited was extreme chilclass="underline" no fever, no coughing, no pain of any sort, but a cold that continually shook his whole body, his arms and legs, everything trembling all the time, however they stoked the fire up, the two slaves allotted to the task continually feeding the flames, until the place was so hot that perspiration ran off them in rivers, all in vain, for nothing helped Kasser, and he continued to freeze while the doctor from Corstopitum examined him, as did physicians from Eboracum, prescribing various herbal teas, feeding him the flesh of serpents, and in general trying everything they could think of without any of it making the slightest difference, and his three guests, the three agents of the Frumentarius with their all-comprehending web of informants, headed by Mastemann, made him visibly worse, and were, in fact, a decisive factor in his deteriorating condition, so that after the visit of the Praefactus Fabrium he no longer rose to take his evening meal but had it brought to him by the others, and even then they couldn’t really talk to him because he was either trembling so violently under the blankets and pelts that he was incapable of even contemplating conversation, or they found him lost in such a deep well of silence they didn’t feel it worthwhile trying to rouse him from it; in other words the evenings—the nights, said Korin — passed with few words or in general silence, as did the days, the early and midmornings, in silence or with just a few bare words, Bengazza, Falke and Toót spending the time in composing their reports on the Vallum, and going to the baths in the afternoon, so that they might return to the peace of the villa by dusk, and that was how time passed on the surface, said Korin, or genuinely seemed to, with Kasser inside, shivering in his bed, and the rest writing their reports or enjoying the waters of the baths, though in actual fact they were all cultivating the peculiar art of not mentioning Mastemann, not even pronouncing his name, although the very air was heavy with his presence, with his physical form and history, a history they could glean in detail from the accounts given by the three visitors and one that weighed on their thoughts, so that after another week it had become obvious to them that they were not only keeping silent about him but that they were waiting for him, counting on him to act, and were convinced that as the Magistere of the cursus publicus of Britannia he would seek them out, said Korin, the manuscript being obsessed with the necessity of reminding the reader how they kept watching the events outside the villa, how they trembled when the servants announced the arrival of a guest, but Mastemann did not come to seek them out—he was not coming, said Korin — for that was not to happen until the next chapter, when, on the evening of his arrival, he announced himself as the special representative of the Dominante of Genoa and, wafting a cloud of subtle perfume around him, requested a place at their table which being granted he gave a curt nod, sat down, briefly examined their faces, then, before they could reveal who they were, set out on an encomium of King John as if he already knew who it was he was dealing with, telling them that in his eyes and in the eyes of Genoa, the king of Portugal was the future, the spirit of the age, Nuova Europa, in other words the perfect ruler whose dictates were based not on emotion, interest, or the vagaries of his fate, but on the reason that governed emotions, interest and fate, then having said so, turned his attention to discussion of the Great Tidings, to Colombo whom he referred to now as Signor Colombo and now as “our Cristoforo,” and to their utter astonishment, talked of the expedition as of something successfully completed, then ordered some heavy Malaga wine from the landlady for everyone and announced the beginning of a new world—a new world coming, said Korin — in which not only Admiral Colombo but the very spirit of Genoa would triumph, and what was more, he raised both his glass and his voice, the all pervasive, all conquering spirit of Genoa, the spirit that, judging by the looks that followed Mastemann’s least gesture, Korin explained to the woman, aroused in the lodgers of the Albergueria nothing but intense and the most wholesale hatred.
Should we die, the mechanics of life would go on without us, and that is what people feel most terribly disturbed by, Korin interrupted himself, bowed his head, thought for a while, then pulled an agonized expression and started slowly swiveling his head, though it is only the very fact that it goes on that enables us properly to understand that there is no mechanism.
The whores’ fit of madness, he continued, could only be explained by the appearance of Signor Mastemann, though no one was clear about the reasons for it at the time because they all missed the most important thing, that Mastemann’s presence produced a kind of magnetic field, the power appearing to emanate from his entire being, and it can’t have been anything else, for as soon as Mastemann arrived and settled in on an upper level, the Albergueria changed: the ground floor fell silent as never before, silent, until he came down that first evening of his stay and sat down at an impromptu choice of table — that of Kasser’s companions as it happened — at which point everything changed, for though life went on nothing was as it had been, so that tailors, cobblers, interpreters and sailors, though they continued where they had left off, all kept an eye on Mastemann, waiting to see what he would do, though what could he have done? — Korin spread his hands — since he simply sat down opposite Kasser’s companions, talked, filled his glass with wine, touched his glass to theirs, leaned back and in other words did nothing to suggest that this universal stillness—this general rigor, said Korin — might have its origins in him, though one had to admit that it was enough to look at him in order to feel the terror he inspired with his frighteningly pale and immobile blue eyes, his pockmarked skin, his huge nose, his sharp chin and long, delicate, graceful fingers, his cloak black as ebony, especially when its scarlet lining flashed from beneath it, when the words froze in everyone’s mouth: hate and fear, hate and fear being what he inspired in the tailors, cobblers, interpreters and sailors on the ground floor; though all this was nothing as to the effect he had on the prostitutes, for they not merely trembled before him but were completely beside themselves whenever he appeared, wherever they came across him, the nearest and loveliest girls of Algiers and