In fact they were discussing something he’d love to have stayed to listen to. Venice was buzzing with rumors about “magical murders” and “demon killings.” If he heard the horrified talk aright, there’d just been another. And this time it sounded as if someone had actually caught sight of whoever—or whatever—had committed the deed. No wonder the Schiopettieri were in having a drink so early.
As Benito wormed his way across to the side door that would give him access to an alley with some easy-to-climb beams, he picked up snatches of the conversation.
“—suckers like an octopus—”
“—blood everywhere—”
“—poor priest was shaking so much he could hardly speak—”
And then he was out, heading upwards to the rooftops. Later he walked along to work as usual. Which was fine until one of the older Ventuccio came and asked him if he knew why Marco wasn’t coming in.
After that, it was torture. Waiting in worry and uncertainty always is. Where the hell was Marco?
* * *
Marco alighted from a barge-load of chickens at the Fondamenta Zattere ai Gesuati. To his relief, there were no watching Schiopettieri. Now it was just a short cut across the Accademia, take a traghetto across the Grand Canal, and off to Ricci’s. He was already trying to think of a good excuse to use at Ventuccio when he realized he was being followed. Or thought he was, anyway, he wasn’t sure. Someone big, in a black cloak.
This was even more frightening than Schiopettieri. Marco paused and looked back surreptitiously. He couldn’t see the big man in the black cloak any more. Maybe it had all been a figment of his imagination.
Then again—maybe not. If he was being followed by an agent of the Montagnards, it would be someone good enough not to be easily spotted. The Montagnard and Metropolitan factions had plenty of skilled spies—and assassins. His mother had been a Montagnard spy herself, far more skilled than Marco at maneuvering in these murky waters. But that hadn’t prevented them from killing her, had it? Had she, too, once been followed like this?
His panic was rising rapidly. A Montagnard agent. One of his mother’s killers, now following him.
Marco rounded the corner into Calle Pompea and started running. The street was crowded at this time of day. Dodging between the pedestrians and the porters, the students heading for classes, and the barrows of vegetables, Marco made fearful time around the corner, doubling back toward the docks, and down into an alley.
He looked back. And he ran smack into someone who was coming the other way. He dropped the precious parcel. The other person dropped a variety of things including a folding easel and at least a dozen brushes. As they both bent to retrieve their possessions they looked at each other . . . with mutual recognition.
Rafael de Tomaso!
He and Marco had struck a kindred note in each other from the first words they’d exchanged. Marco still remembered de Tomaso coming in to Mama’s place, the first time, looking for plants for pigments. Rafael had been grinding and preparing his own paints already then. They’d struck up a conversation with the ease of two boys—unaware of the difference in politics or background. They’d met up again later, one evening at Barducci’s and it was . . . once again an immediate encounter with a kindred spirit. It was as if the intervening years hadn’t passed.
“Marco!” Rafael smiled.
“Rafael . . . can you hide me? Someone is after me. At least—I think so. Maybe.”
Rafael didn’t hesitate. “Licia’s—my lodging—it’s only a door away. Will that do?”
Marco looked around nervously and nodded. In a few moments he was upstairs in a dingy room long on artist’s supplies and short on space or comfort. “What are they after you for?” asked Rafael curiously.
Now that Marco felt relatively secure, his fears were ebbing. In fact, he was starting to feel embarrassed. There were a lot of big men in Venice, after all, plenty of them wearing black cloaks. He was beginning to think he’d just imagined the whole thing.
“Well . . . I might have been wrong. Maybe there wasn’t anybody. But if there was—” He held up the package clutched in his hand. “They’d want this parcel. I’m supposed to deliver it to Ricci’s.”