A little bit more Lew

 just because I wrote it.  

I couldn't call the dog Szarik, so I settled on the closest...

Chapter 2

 

“I’m going to tell my towarzysze all about you; they can protect you better if they know to ignore that you are a girl,” rumbled Lew.

“Very well,” said Janina. “I actually trust you, which goes against the grain with all my time living on the streets, but ... you feel safe.”

“I’m safe,” said Lew.

Back in the barracks, his huge voice thundered. “Janek! Guslik! Grześ! Get your lazy arses here now!”

Three young men and a large dog thundered into the young officer’s office.

“He caught a minnow,” said one. “Is that your supper, Lew?”

“Allow me to introduce to you Janek Brzeziński and his wife,” said Lew, indicating the blond young man and the hound, which looked to Janina like a wolf.

“Oy!” said Janek.

“My apologies; may I introduce to you Puszysty, whose wife is Janek,” said Lew.

“You have your revenge for me teasing you,” laughed Janek.

“Fluffy? Really? It’s a wolf,” said Janina.

“Half wolf,” said Janek, defensively. “His mother was a tart and found a wild lover.  Sit, Puszysty, and shake hands with the minnow.”

The big dog sat and offered a paw. A little nervously, Janina shook.

“Well, you have more balls than the Pułkownik,” said Janek.

“Which is actually seriously funny because she doesn’t have any at all,” said Lew. “And I’m hiding her from her wicked uncle, but it’ll be easier if you lot know and can help.”

“She’s a little young to be love interest yet,” said Guslik.

“Yes, and that’s why her uncle is wicked,” said Lew. “Oh, for goodness sake! I was going to treat her like a baby brother, and I want you lot to do the same.”

“We will promptly forget that she is a girl and remember only that he is our brother with certain needs for niceties,” said Grześ.

“I knew you’d understand,” beamed Lew.

Janina found herself in a small room with her own commode with a tiny mirror in its lifting top, with ewer, basin and utensil, and a clothes chest where she was rapidly provided with suitable livery to be a pacholik.

She settled in, and slept more deeply than she could remember sleeping since before she was orphaned.

 

OoOoO

 

“My lord king!” Lew roared happily, throwing himself down beside the monarch and offering an arm to arm-wrestle the big Saxon. He took no offence in losing this match, since few had ever wrestled August II successfully. “I need to speak privily,” he said, quietly.

“Follow me into the antechamber then,” said king.

 

Once in private, Lew said,

“I’d like to cut to the chase but you won’t like it.”

“Am I supposed to be surprised about that? More plots in the wind?”

“Against you, sire? Not that I’ve heard. But this is the case of a vile villain who uses the good name of a relative of his, who is dead and can’t do anything about it, to stay in your good graces, while actually the little tick is a child spoiner.”

The king frowned.

“I don’t like being taken for a fool on my loyalties,” he said. “Who is this child-spoiler and what proof do you have?”

“I’ll start with the second, if I may, sire,” said Lew. “I have received testimony that the man has improperly touched, and frightened into running away, his own orphaned niece. I believe the testimony. Children do not make up such things.”

“I fear I may know where this is going, but you tell me who this is.”

“It’s Tobiasz Dąbski, a cousin of Archbishop Dąbski, whose own integrity nobody might question.”

“I was afraid you might be heading that way when you mentioned a runaway niece. He spoke to me about his misguided young relative and how she had bad dreams since being orphaned and acted out drama and downright lies. He made as though he was very sorrowful that she was disturbed.”

“Arsewipe!” said Lew, indignantly.

“When you get an opportunity to kill him, as I assume you want to, do it discreetly,” said the king. “Let this not sully the name of his cousin, hmmm?”

“Thank you, sire,” said Lew.

 

oOoOo

Snippets and a bit of Raven who roared

 well, what I've been working on is a story which suggested itself to me in the light of Mira and Bazyli's intent to train young people in practical skills. So there will be Mira and Bazyli in it after a few chapters but I want to get a bit further ahead of myself before I start posting. 

In the meantime I have odd snippets and chapters, and if you are amenable, I'll post them. I've even got 5 chapters of the next Bess, and 11 of the early de Curtney story which needs a wrap. My editor wants another story about the fledglings, and Lew roared his way into telling me how he met Janina and in light of my recent YouTube viewing I am going to name the members of his lance Janek, Guslik and Grzesz. Janek will have a dog. I love to tribute. 

I have bits of Wojciech goes a Venturing. I had to write one to introduce the blond snot into the wip. Meantime, here's the first chapter of Lew's story. 

Chapter 1

 

Lew Krasiński strode through the streets of Warszawa, drawing gazes from all he passed. He was an impressive figure, being well over six feet tall, and well built.  His bulk and height were emphasised by his uniform, shining armour and the well-feathered ‘wings’ of the winged hussars. Captain Krasiński was twenty years old, devastatingly handsome, and many Saxon and Polish maidens dreamed of him as their own image of, for the Saxon girls, the young Siegfried; and the Polish maidens, a bohatyr of bohatyri.

He and his father could both wrestle with the king, August the Strong, without being in danger. They eschewed their monarch’s choices of displays of strength, having no interest in blood sports like fox tossing, and failing to see a point in breaking perfectly good horseshoes with the bare hands.

Lew had spent some of his youth in Saxony, when his father had accompanied the king into exile, following the imposition of Stanisław Leszczyński on the throne by Karol of Sweden. Krasińscy always supported their lawful king, whatever they thought of his hobbies. Lew’s own hobbies included rocketry, which was an obsession for most Krasińscy.

He stopped to admire the fireworks being set off above the river, taking a professional interest in their effects. He was not so enthralled that he failed to feel a little hand feeling at the pouch he wore at his belt.

Steel fingers seized the small hand’s wrist, and Lew turned to see what he had caught.

The child was small, pale, with dark, messy-hair, and had the tracks of tears on its none-too-clean face. Lew regarded the face and its delicate features which were drowned by the enormous grey eyes.

“You’re not a very good pickpocket,” said Lew.

“Oh, it isn’t anything like as easy as it looks, I ... I am sorry, but I am so hungry,” said the child.

The voice was cultured. It also replied to him in the Latin he had unconsciously used.

“Queen of Poland! What’s a little szlachcic doing, acting the pickpocket?” demanded Lew. The child quailed. He had absently used his parade-ground voice, and his voice was loud to start off with. The king teased him with being the little lion with wings, a play on his name, Lew, or the Raven who roared, a joke on his familial heraldry, that of the Biały-Kruk, or White Raven.

“P...please, I have not stolen anything from you, so you could let me go,” said his captive, tentatively.

“Little one, if you are hungry, you would do much better to let your captor feed you, and you can pay me with your story. I’m newly back in Warszawa, and catching up with the local gossip.”

“Oh! Where have you been? I thought the war was over?”

“Well, I’ve fought the Swedes as a technical mercenary,” said Lew. “Before you, you see the occasional Englishman, Leon Raven, which was about the best my English compatriots could manage of Lew Krasiński, herbu Biały-Kruk. I’ve been escorting one Stanisław Poniatowski home from Sweden, where he was ambassador, and I still haven’t made up my mind if he’s a traitor or well-meaning. The king is inclined to give him the benefit of the doubt. See? It wasn’t really that interesting.”

“Was that all you were doing?”

“Oho, you think I had another reason?” laughed Lew. “Well, you can continue wondering; there’s a stall down by the river which sells good barszcz in half-loaves, and gives you the scooped out filling too. Come along, little minnow, and I will feed you; and if your story is of sufficient interest to me, I will find you a position in my poczet as a pacholik. How old are you?”

“Fourteen, my lord,” said the subdued captive.

“You look nearer ten,” said Lew. “Still, whatever, I will find you a place and we can decide later whether you want to ride as a martial pocztowy, or if you will improve your education and be a clerk, with or without further larcenous skills in stealing from ulans and the infantry.”

“But why do you steal from other units? Aren’t you all a part of the Rzeczpospolita? Or do you consider them treasonous? Did they support the usurper?”

“Oh! No, nothing like that. Most of it’s for sport; and the rest is because military administration is for shit. Order three hundred snaffles and like as not they’ll send you five hundred boots. So one, ah, scrounges. It’s an art,” said Lew.

“Oh, it sounds fun, if one isn’t dependent on it for food,” said his captive.

“Oh, hell, yes,” said Lew. “So, what shall I call you?”

A quick look was shot his way.

“Did you deliberately not ask my name?”

“Oh, well done, little one.”

“You can call me ... Jan.  Jan Kowalski.”

“We had a lot of John Smiths in the English army too, which means the same,” said Lew, who was quite proud of being able to manage the awkward combination –th. He had practised not to say the English name ‘Rzon Smyś’.

“It’s a good name,” said Jan, defensively.

“Never said it wasn’t,” agreed Lew. “Here.” They had reached the stall he had spoken of. He handed over money to the vendor  for a generous portion of barszcz in bread, paying for a wooden spoon as well, and watched his small captive eat it with a daintiness which was sufficiently trained in to overcome any desire to gobble.

“Now, little one,” said Lew, “Since small boys are never dainty about food, even if born princes, so you can tell me the true story without having to lie about being a girl. And I’d believe a girl of fourteen for that matter. I’m not asking for your name, and I won’t ask more than you feel able to tell me, but I want to know the bones of the matter about why a little szlachcianka is running about Warszawa on her own, associating with dangerous and notorious people like winged hussars.”

“I ...I ran away from my uncle,” said ‘Jan’. “My name’s Janina, so Jan is close enough. I was orphaned a year or so ago, and went to live with my Uncle Tobiasz. And I thought at first he was very nice, and kind, and if I felt a little too old for cuddles and bedtime stories, well, he has no children, and I figured that he was doing his best. Only he started getting into bed with me to tell stories and insisting that I cuddle up to him, and it made me uncomfortable. And a few times there was a damp place in my bed where he had been, and at first I thought that because he’s really old, at least forty, that he had bladder problems. And then my maid asked if he was a good lay, and said she didn’t think that a young girl would fancy him. And she explained ... explained what the wet places were. And he had just started caressing me as he told me stories, and the stories were getting ... well, I didn’t like them. So as my maid was supportive, I sent her to buy me boys’ clothes, and ... and when I was out riding with Uncle Tobiasz, I had the boy’s clothes underneath, and ... and I jumped the mare over a tall hedge, a real rasper, and slipped out of the saddle as she was coming down, and hit the ground rolling. I left my hat there and pulled off the jacket and skirt, and bundled them up and ran along the hedge until I found a hole through it.  I found a boy scaring birds, and said I’d help him, and I hid my clothes under some earth, and ran about throwing stones.”

“What about your hair?” asked Lew.

“Oh, I’d already cut that and pinned the braid in my hat,” said Janina. “I took the braid with my clothes so he did not guess what I had done, and  I bribed the boy more than my uncle would have given him to tell. He never even asked either of us whether we had seen a girl. And it was awfully difficult not to shy a stone at him.”

“Hell, yes, I wager,” said Lew. “What a thoroughgoing bastard! Why didn’t you lay a deposition against him?”

Janina gave a cynical laugh.

“My family name is Dąbski,” she said. “My uncle is a nephew of the late kingmaker Archbishop, Stanisław Dąbski. The king has no idea what vile relatives his late supporter has, and would never believe it. So I’m on the run from someone who can bring powerful forces to bear. Do you still want to hide me?”

“Oh, yes,” said Lew. “People like that offend me.  And if the king knew, he would not condone it.  I might just see if I can get more evidence against him, and build enough of a case to at least challenge him to a duel, and seek forgiveness after killing him, which is easier to do than getting permission to kill him, and moreover, it’s a little hard to unkill someone.  You are resourceful! What did you do with the clothes and hair?”

“I sold them,” said Janina. “I had limited money, but I took the clothes to a secondhand dealer and said my mistress had taken a toss and could not be bothered to clean and mend the habit; and the hair I sold as belonging to a supposed sister.”

“Well, you are a resourceful child,” said Lew.

“I’ve been living on the streets about eight months now, but my money ran out, and there are only so many errands I can do,” confessed Janina. “But much as I’d like to have somewhere for the winter, and steady food, how can I be your pacholik?”

“Well, little girl, I wasn’t planning on introducing you as anyone but Jan Kowalski. But if you want to tell the world you are Janina Dąbska, it seems a bit daft to me.”

“Oh! You ... you think I can do it?”

“I don’t see why not,” said Lew. “I’ll cut your hair a bit better, and put you in livery. It’ll never be questioned, especially as you are educated and know Latin. Nobody would expect a szlachcianka to be a pacholik. Though having said that, my grandsire met his second wife outside Vienna dressed as a janissary.”

“Oh, my!” said Janina.

“Yes, very bold,” said Lew.  “Well, if you think you’re up to being my pacholik, I won’t expect you to help me dress or bath, which I might have done if I hadn’t been able to see further through a brick wall than most people. I don’t have a valet at the moment, he was poached from me by some redboots with a more glamorous lifestyle.”

“What do you then call the colour of your boots, my lord?” asked Janina, cheekily.

“Why, red; but I’m a man who wears red boots because they are pretty not because I’m a magnate who needs them to validate my existence. I am equally beautiful, capable and awesome whatever colour boots I am wearing or even if not wearing boots at all.”

“I see,” said Janina, gravely. “Or even wearing red-heeled, ruby red brocade slippers for dancing at court?”

“Whelp,” said Lew. “I never wear girls’ clothes at court, only good Sarmatian garb.  I dance in my hussar boots, and I wager I’m lighter on my feet than bewigged, powdered mountebanks in their silk stockings and fancy embroidered Ludwik Quartorze shoes, and my heels are almost as high, but you don’t see me mincing about like I have tacks through my toes and a stick up my arse.”

“Now tell me, my lord, what you really think of western fashion,” said Janina.

He laughed.

“Well, I should apologise for my language, but if I stop swearing, people will think I’m ill and they’ll wonder why my page is tender. So you’ll have to learn to live with it.”

“I am sure I can manage, my lord. And as my tender years are very tender, if you say something I don’t understand, I will ask you in a clear and carrying treble what it means, because small children have no tact,” said Janina.

“Oh, I do like you,” said Lew, warmly. “And because small children are overlooked, if you’re up for it, I’ll be using you as a pair of ears,” he added.

“So you were spying in Sweden.”

“Direct, aren’t you?” said Lew. “The king prefers, ‘seeking intelligence by non-direct methods’, but I say it’s spying, and you agree. Yes, I was checking that Karol Waza was really most sincerely dead, and not likely to surface somewhere. It’s a mystery, though, even in two years since he died, whether he was killed by his own, or by his foes, no-one knows.”

“He must have been hated if it’s to be considered.”

“He broke Sweden by being too greedy,” said Lew. “And he got a lot of Swedes killed by not knowing when to give up.”

“Do you do a lot of spying?” asked Janina.

“Off and on,” shrugged Lew.  “It’s been a little busy over the last few years, but it’s settling down. I’m so big that people discount me and assume I’m stupid.”

“They haven’t looked at the way your eyes laugh all the time and what a rogue you look,” said Janina, admiring the tall, golden figure of her new lord, who wore his hair long and flowing in a silver-gilt mane to match his name, and whose moustache was full and long, but beautifully groomed so it did not impede or hide a pair of humorous lips as it flowed into his short, well-tamed beard.

Part of her which was growing up found his lips most intriguing.

Most of her was glad that he was big and intimidating and yet somehow ... safe.

 and yes, I am going to skip a few years before he notices her in any way romantically.

felicia: silver threads amonst the ... lead

 

Silver threads among the….lead.

 

When your client drops dead during the time that he is resting from having a sitting it is extremely disconcerting to say the least.

Signor d’Agnolo was a nice old man who had asked for a painting of himself for posterity since his silversmithing business had done extremely well; he provided threads of silver to the Arte della Seta, the guild of silkworkers to weave them, as they do gold threads, in their brocades and tissues, and for the Arte della Lana, the guild of woollen manufacturers who used such threads in cloth-of-silver, often woven in with threads dyed that richest of blues, Alessandrine to produce an effect like moonlight on a lake at night.

My master and I had been glad to do the portrait because we were low on funds – my master had but recently been maintaining a very expensive mistress whom I disliked more than usual – and having the chance to live in at Signor d’Agnolo’s country villa meant we did not have to pay the bills for day to day living.  He set a good table too, so we were eating better than we did even when we were in funds, and though my master teases me for my fondness for my food, he should recall that I am growing and must needs fuel the growth.

We were told of the death when Signor d’Agnolo’s man, Bartolomeo, came howling through the house like the angel of death himself, tearing at his clothes and hair.

My master reached surreptitiously for a pen-cil and I stood on his foot.  The poor fellow did not deserve to turn up in a painting as one of the afflicted whose devils were cast into the Gaderine swine. 

“Censorious little shrew,” said my master without rancour.

Perhaps it would be a good point at which to describe the other members of Signor d’Agnolo’s household.

The Signora d’Agnolo was a recent acquisition and I use the term advisedly.  Tancia d’Agnolo was definitely of the class of fogattini, the small-hatted ones which is to say the insignificant; being the child of a shoemaker.  Her husband had not only waived a dowry to possess such a beautiful, if not very clever, bride as his second wife, but had settled a considerable sum on her father.  Tancia was happy enough with the bargain, which being so there is not a shoemaker in the land who would not jump at such a suggestion, for everyone knows that shoemakers are always having to live on credit, since nobody ever pays his shoemaker unless he has to. 

I will say that it is one of the more attractive things about my master that he pays in advance and in full any sum owed to our shoemaker who considers my master little short of the angel he would resemble if one did not take the aquiline nose into account.

Tancia was not of course held in high regard by Signor d’Agnolo’s two sons, Giovanni and Leonardo.  They were twins whose birth together with the third son who had died had cost the life of their mother, and each as different to the other as two beings could be, belying the idea that twins were always as alike in personality as in looks.  Giovanni was apparently the older by some half an hour, and was the good looking one, with smouldering eyes that a lot of girls found irresistible.  I thought he looked sulky myself but then I am not really old enough to get stupid about young men. He liked being wealthy and spent the allowance his father made him as soon as it was in his hands; and he was not so good a worker in his father’s workshops that he was like to earn a bonus ever either; though his flights of imagination in the matter of making decorative beads and spangles for clothing pleased his father mightily.  Leonardo on the other hand was a hard working young man, diligent and patient and without a single spark of originality or imagination in his body.  He put in twice as much effort in the workshop as Giovanni and gave his father all that he could.  Both youths were seventeen and might expect to have their papers of release from apprenticeship within the next year when they might choose to leave their father to set up on their own or seek work with another master.

 

oOoOo

 

Naturally we had not stayed frozen, bar my master’s desire to sketch, when Bartolomeo spread the news of his master’s sudden death.  We ran to Signor d’Agnolo’s room where he lay in horrid evidence of the truth.

Some servants are prone to exaggeration after all.

Signor d’Agnolo had voided himself and vomited horribly and his eyes started from his head in an expression of seeming horror, but more likely from the efforts of his extreme purging.  The little red spots in his eyes and on his face spoke of how he had gasped frantically for breath.  I had seen this before on a drowning victim whose body my master had managed to acquire.

It is not legal but how is an artist to understand anatomy if we have not studied how the body works at first hand?  Bribing a sexton is one of the little expenses one has to accept.

Tancia set up a screech which was hardly surprising for her husband of but a few weeks was a rather horrid sight.

“Dear God!” cried Leonardo “It must be lead poisoning – see his pewter goblet!  Have I not warned him often and often that the acid in wine will leach out the lead into his drink?”

“Funny,” said my master “I saw no signs of memory loss or headache, and he has not complained once of stomach ache when we have dined here.”

“What do you mean?” demanded Giovanni quickly “You know about poisoning, Signor Robertini?”

“Of course I do,” said my master.  “I use poisons as a matter of course; many of my pigments are poison, and I have been refreshing my mind as I teach Felicia to prepare them safely.  Salt of Saturn  I use every day, the soluble form of lead.”

It is part of his secret formula that permits his paints to dry more quickly than those of many other artists but of course he would not mention that.

I went forward to the pewter goblet; it stood still on the table and had not been upset and a good third remained in it.

I sipped cautiously.

“Felicia!” my master paled.  He does care for my wellbeing.

“It is bitter master; there is no sweetness at all,” I said.  “The name most people give to Salt of Saturn is Sugar of Lead because it makes things taste sweet.  This wine has something horrid in the bottom of it.”

“Permit me to enlighten you my child,” said my master grimly “With so sudden and violent a death with just these symptoms.  They are similar to death by lead poisoning but I have never heard of lead poisoning coming on so fast.  It is a slower death than – arsenic.  Which tastes bitter.”

I pulled a face; I could not help it.

“With so little amount you will take no harm, child, but you should not have taken the risk!” my master chided me. “But it is clear that this is no case of accidental lead poisoning but deliberate murder.”

“Who would murder our father?” demanded Giovanni.

“You for one, brother,” said Leonardo “Were you not in trouble for being in debt yet again?  And is it not a fact that you watch Tancia with lustful eyes that dwell on her perfect face and white globes that you long to touch with your lewd fingers?”

Giovanni gave an angry bark of laughter.

“Not I, brother; she is not fiery enough for me.  I should prefer the artist maid when she is old enough to have a figure as well as a temper.  See?” he added as I bit my thumb at him.  “Delightful!”

“Oh my poor husband!” wailed Tancia “Who will care for me now he is gone? Will my step sons see that I have a handsome dowry to remarry?”

“Pretty Tancia, to get rid of you to another as foolish as our father, anything,” said Giovanni “But only if you stop this screeching.  I would listen to the Artist and his brown shrew.”

“Who carried the wine to him?” I asked. I looked to Signor d’Agnolo’s man Bartolomeo for an answer.  He had his own hysterics under control and was weeping.

“The maid Lucia,” said Bartolomeo.  “She is my lady’s maid but she said that she would carry it to the master.”

“Send for her,” said my master.

It is wonderful how he can take charge by sheer personality; we had of course no standing in the household at all but Bartolomeo obeyed without question.

 

oOoOo

 

The little maid came and gasped in horror at the sight of her dead master.

“Dear God!” she cried “Surely this is a nightmare!” she turned to look at the brothers “The powder cannot have done this!”

Leonardo let out a howl.

“You have murdered my father on the orders of your lover, my brother!” he cried “I will kill you and him!” and he launched himself towards her drawing his knife as he did so.

My master’s own knife was out of the scabbard before anyone could blink, blocking and parrying the blade and in one smooth movement wrenching it from Leonardo’s hand.

“I would prefer to hear about this powder you know,” he said calmly, kicking Leonardo’s feet from under him.

“It was Signor Leonardo who gave it to you, wasn’t it?” I said to the girl.

“Yes Signorina!” she said “He said it would enhance the master’s performance to please my mistress the more!”

“Madness!” howled Leonardo from the floor “Why would I kill my father?”

“Yes, why would he?” asked Giovanni “He is the good boy not the wastrel.”

“Because,,” I said, “However good he was, however hard he worked, he could never please your father as well as you.  You were the one with brilliance and flair who pleased your father with your designs even though you vexed him with your spendthrift habits.  He knew you would settle down in time.  Perhaps he was wild as a youth himself.  But Signor Leonardo was jealous that for all his diligence you were favoured – even as Cain was favoured over Abel by their father.  Abel was a fraudster but your brother decided to go further.  Moreover from the way he speaks of the fair Signora Tancia d’Agnolo, it is he who lusts for his stepmother and perhaps hoped to possess her if your father were out of the way.”

“It is a SIN!” cried Tancia.

I knew she was not very clever but if she had not noticed that murder was more of a sin than technical incest then she was dimmer even than I thought.

Giovanni nodded.

“I see,” he said shortly.  “Thank you Signor Robertini, Signorina Felicia.  You will present your arguments to the Gonfalonier?”

We acquiesced of course.

Giovanni had grown up and laid aside that wild youth in the shock of the death of his father. A hard way to have to come fully to manhood’s estate.

 

oOoOo

 

“So what started you suspecting Leonardo?” asked my master.

“It was he who was keen to suggest accidental death and to insist that he had warned his father about the dangers of drinking from a pewter goblet,” I said “And then when he saw that he could not pass it off as such with our testimony to the contrary he was ready to lay it onto Giovanni.  And to kill the girl before she could speak.”

My master nodded.

“Your reasoning as ever is good,” he said.  “Well, at least we are to get paid to finish the painting from our sketches for Giovanni; and then we shall eat well, hmmm?”

“Until you spend all our funds on something frivolous,” I said tartly.

He laughed and cuffed me lightly.

He does at least acknowledge his many faults.

 

 

 

 

 

Niccola de Piccolo's missing bill of exchange

 

Niccola di Piccolo’s missing bill of exchange

 

It would be neither  kind nor accurate to say that my master virtually lived in Signor di Piccolo’s library, but it would not be unfair to say that he spent a very great deal of time there.  Naturally he took me, his apprentice, with him.

There were those books I was not permitted to peruse – Master Robin is oft times strict over what he considers suitable for the eyes of a young girl – but I managed to get a glimpse of most of them in any wise, since once my master is absorbed in reading, he might as well be as remote as the moon for all the notice he takes of what is going on around him.

Signor di Piccolo has quite fifty books, an awe-inspiring collection, and he is pleased that they are enjoyed by another scholar. Though the initial acquaintance was professional, when my master was painting Signor de Piccolo’s portrait, a friendship sprang up, and Signor di Piccolo stands our patron, and my master’s friend, benefiting from Master Robin’s polymathy.

This means that my master is generally the life and soul of gatherings of other scholars, and I get the privilege of fetching and carrying food and drink for a selection of drunken philosophers.  Which is educational enough most of the time, for most of them are willing to debate with anyone who can hold a good debate, and often I am permitted to join in.  I learn much, too, in just listening, so I do not mind fetching and carrying, and making them comfortable if they should fall into bibulous slumber. 

I do not clear up vomit.  Signor di Piccolo has servants to do that sort of thing and there are only so many things I will do unpaid.

Signor di Piccolo is a big man in the Arte della Lana, the woollen guild; and as such has many friends who are wealthy merchants from that guild and the Arte della Seta, the silk guild.  They are good patrons for portraiture and wealthy enough to mostly pay up without a murmur and no need to threaten to paint amusingly obscene trade signs on their doors suggesting that another trade be theirs. It is where an artist has the advantage over other craftsmen, in that he might ridicule bad payers; but the friends of Signor Piccolo were all unquestionably honest men; a fact that will be seen to be of some importance as I come to the meat of my tale.

The merchants of Florence do much business overseas, and this was the root of Signor Piccolo’s problem, for he frequently held Bills of Exchange, which might only be words written on parchment or even paper, but those words might be worth thousands of florins.  The big banking families issue these Bills in exchange for real money, and the Bills may then be exchanged for money again with other branches of that family, or other families with whom there is an understanding, even in other countries.  Signor di Piccolo was guarding one for the guild that was made out in English sovereigns to the value of quite eighty pounds, an immense sum, for the purchase of the finest Florentine woollen cloths, dyed rich colours like pavonazzo,  a wonderful colour with the shimmer of the peacock, between blue and violet and using extravagant dyes to produce it, not merely indigo but even more expensive grain, too, for that violet shimmer.

And Signor di Piccolo had managed to lose his Bill of Exchange.

He certainly had it in the morning. Indeed he had it in his hand when he came into the library, because he was telling my Master how nervous it made him and that he must put it away safely.

He got momentarily sidetracked at that moment because my master was producing his own satirical version  of one of Horace’s odes, the one about how nobody can escape death.  My master had been changing it to a version that swore that no man could escape taxes, addressing it to Niccolo Machiavelli, another of his unsavoury friends.  When I tell you that it began ‘Eheu, fugaces, Niccole, Niccole’ and spoke not of wrinkled brows but of purses wrinkled for hanging empty you will get the general gist.  My master had made enough the previous year to have had to pay a large tax to the city and it had irked him, and he was now wrestling with the phrase about Sisyphus and his eternal toil to change the sense to suggest that he represented all Florentines.

It was a pointless exercise, but then when are men not given to pointless exercise in their leisure hours?

Signor di Piccolo came to argue over the wording, and they sat together, his neat dark head bobbing in thought beside my master’s golden one.  Until Signor Piccolo’s man Giovanni came to find us to tell his master that the noon meal was served.

About time too in my opinion, and probably had been ready for a while since while Giovanni tracked down the errant master of the house.

We were staying for the afternoon, having a small commission to repair a fresco, and then for an evening gathering of convivial men.  You must not get me wrongly; my master is in general above painting and repairing frescos, that pay only a florin a foot, but this was a favour to a friend.  And free meals while we were there too.

The repair work went well, and the evening passed well, until one of the other guild members who was there asked Signor di Piccolo about the Bill of Exchange; and he went to get it.

The first we knew of its disappearance was when Signor di Piccolo, white of face, asked my master and me to step into his library.

Then he broke down and admitted the loss.

“I know that Felicia is said to be good at finding things” he said “And I wondered…. You see, I cannot but think that it has been stolen; and I will not suspect any of my servants, all of whom have been with me for many years; but I do not wish to suspect the guests either!”

I quite saw his problem.

I enumerated the guests.

“Piero Mancini, whom you say is the one who asked for the Bill of Exchange; high in the guild, beyond suspicion.  Of course to ask you where it is might be an easy way to divert suspicion from himself if he had seen it and been tempted, for his daughter Agnesa is to be married, and the dowries regarded as proper here in Florence can be crippling to produce” I said.  It is true; many families can only afford for one of their daughters to wed, for the competition in giving ever greater dowries.  I think it sheer foolishness myself; and younger daughters so often sent into nunneries in childhood, where the dowry as a Bride of Christ is much less, and where they are taught to make reticella, lace of various kinds, and to sew, and might hope to sell enough of their work to form a dowry before they are old enough to take vows.

“Yes, my brother is concerned about his daughter, who is already eighteen years old and unwed, though it has given him time to save more for when Giuliana should marry” said Signor di Piccolo “But I cannot see that Piero would even feel such temptation as to steal from me, let alone give way to it!”

“Probably not” I said “But it is well to look at all people concerned.   And next we have Andrea Rizzo, who is the bridegroom to Agnesa Mancini.  He is doing quite well in the guild but when a young man marries there are more expenses.  He too might be tempted.”

“That I refuse to believe” said Signor di Piccolo “For has he not reported honestly on flaws in cloth that the inspector missed when it was due to be stamped?”

“If he had said farewell to his mistress I might have been more ready to believe him honest without needing proof” I said tartly “But to my mind there is something dishonest in a man who will take a wife whilst retaining his mistress.”

“Art a prude, thou shrewling” said my master. “Many a man keeps a wife and a mistress.”

“But it is impolite to both to take a wife whilst keeping a mistress” I said. “You would not, master.”

He had the grace to look uncomfortable.  His habits might be free but his eccentric moral code is quite firm  even though he be as much a fornicator and drunkard as he is a genius and polymath.

“Well that is my own personal ethic” he said. “Let it stand that you dislike the practice but than most see nothing dishonest in it.”

I bowed my head in acquiescence. 

“Very well, master” I said.  “Giovanni Trovato is the only other person here directly connected to the wool trade.”

Trovato means foundling; and Giovanni the foundling had been reared in the Ospedale degli Innocenti, the orphan hospital maintained by the Wool Guild.  He had attracted much notice for his intelligence and had been serving for the past four years as one of the inspectors for the guild.

“He is a good boy” said Signor Piccolo “It is a responsible task to oversee the quality of goods; his integrity is, and must be, unimpeachable!”

“Quid custodiet ipsos custodies” I murmured.  My master cuffed me gently across the back of the head.

“Leave Juvenal out of this” he said. “Besides, the phrase ‘who watches the watchmen’ was in his satire referring to the corrupting influence of women; not what I’d be expecting from your partisan lips!”

“But master, every apprentice in the city knows that Giovanni Trovato has a secret mistress!” I declared. “And he visits her early in the mornings not late at night to try to avoid prying eyes – but ‘tis when we apprentices be out running errands!”

“Great God!” said Signor di Piccolo “I never knew that!”

“Oh trust an apprentice to know all” said my master.  “They are worse gossips than old women and fishwives.”

He beamed at me complacently for his little victory of barbed comment.

In front of Signor di Piccolo I could scarcely put my tongue out to him, that would be worth getting his slipper across my backside for.

I went on,

“Iacopo Brunello the goldsmith seems prosperous enough but his wife is ailing.  Who knows what medicines he might need for her?  And Antonio de Luca is a tailor of no great wealth. And finally Bartolo Moretti is said to have received some severe reverses in the investments he has made in foreign trade, for he put much into the sugar trade and now the plantations on Cyprus and Sicily are failing; and his fortunes with them, for he failed to trust in the newer plantations on Madeira.”

I could not feel much sympathy for Signor Moretti; since mine own looks suggest African ancestors I have compassion for the poor slaves who work the plantations and it has ever seemed unfair that others should grow wealthy on unpaid toil.

“But how hard it is to question the honesty of any of them, however great the temptations!” cried Signor di Piccolo.  “How can I ask any of them such questions as would impugn their honour?”

“I think it would be well to see if any might have opportunity” I said “When we were called to eat, I presume you placed the Bill of Exchange in your strongroom?”

He looked at me with a curious expression on his face.

“Why – I cannot say I recall” he said.  “Though where else might I have put it?”

I snorted.  He is an old enough friend that he permits such a liberty.

“Signor, my experience of scholars tells me that you may have wandered in to dine with it in your hand and used it to wipe your fingers on between dishes; or left it with the napery; or taken it to the jakes with you, and either left it, or proceeded to use it” I said dryly.

He went ashen.  Using a Bill of Exchange in such a fashion would be a rather extravagant way to cleanse one’s person.

Then I started chuckling as the answer came to me.

“Fear not, Signor de Piccolo!” I cried “Though I fancy that the Bill of Exchange has indeed drifted to nether regions, such nether regions are no worse than to follow the winding River Cocytus into the realms of Hades.”

“Felicia, what are you talking about? Have you run even more whimsical than usual?” Signor di Piccolo does not stand on ceremony with me either.

“I believe I catch her meaning” said my master “But let the little shrew have her victory and show how she has found the prize.  Fetch it down from the shelf, shrewling.”

I took down the second volume of Horace’s ‘Odes’ and there, gently laid next to the fourteenth ode, was the missing Bill of Exchange.

Signor di Piccolo cried out in joy and embraced me, kissing me on both cheeks.

When dealing with scholars such little problems are amazingly easy.  Assume that they have no mind outside their current interest and leave everything else in the last book they were reading.

When this is a Bill of Exchange its discovery is a fortunate business, but less salubrious when a shred of smallage is left decaying gently between the leaves to mark a place.

My Master had the grace to look slightly guilty before suggesting heartily that we rejoin the others.

I decided to be nice and make no issue of the matter.  After all, he’s not such a bad master, really.