Murder at Midnight (2 page)

“It’s only what I’ve heard and seen. When you are a homeless orphan — as I was — the teachers God provides are one’s own eyes and ears.”

“True enough,” murmured Mangus.

After they had walked awhile, Fabrizio said, “Master, are you in danger?”

“As I told you, King Claudio is terribly superstitious. He believes in magic and devils. His son, Prince Cosimo, holds to the same nonsense. Be advised: Fear most those who are fearful.

“But, while the heir to the throne is Cosimo, the real power in the kingdom belongs to Count Scarazoni. It’s said he’s not superstitious. But the gossip is that the prince and the count are rivals.”

“During your performance you spoke kindly of the king.”

“Fabrizio,” Mangus cautioned, “a prudent man speaks differently inside and outside.”

“Master, why don’t you use your magic to make the unpleasant people … vanish?”

Mangus halted. “Fabrizio, once and for all, put magic
out of your head! It’s not just folly, it’s dangerous! And if you paid attention to the real world, you would have noticed that we’ve arrived home.”

“Forgive me, Master,” said Fabrizio, rushing forward to open the door of the old, two-story, timbered house.

As soon as Mangus was inside, Fabrizio bolted the door behind them.

An hour later, Fabrizio lay on his straw pallet in his small loft space thinking about his master’s performance. How thrilling it had been! How he wished he could do such magic! He recalled Mistress Sophia’s words: “Make Master Mangus love you as much as I do.”

But what can I do when Master doesn’t even like me?

Then Fabrizio thought about the warning that had come from the black robe. If Master was in danger, perhaps he could protect him. Surely Master would love him then. He almost hoped that danger would come.

T
WO DAYS LATER, THE MORNING PROVED COLD.
F
ABRIZIO,
eager to be at his reading lesson before Mangus reached the study, raced through the household tasks. He warmed his master’s room, brought in wood, lit the fire, swept the hall steps and street, emptied the slop bucket, dumped the refuse, brought in water from the street fountain, and sprinkled new rushes on the floors. Then he dashed around the corner to Signor Loti’s store to purchase olive oil, which he placed in the back kitchen. Finally, he burst into Mangus’s study.

“You’re late,” said Mangus without lifting his eyes from his reading.

The old man, seated at his table, wore a multilayered woolen robe and old slippers. Half gloves left his fingers unencumbered, the better to turn the pages of his book. A cap covered his head.

“Forgive me, Master,” said Fabrizio, standing by the doorway, breath misting in the chilly air. “Since Mistress is gone I’ve taken on a few of her tasks.”

Mangus nodded but said nothing.

Frustrated, Fabrizio went to the lectern and stared at his reading task for the week: a page from the poet Dante. During the past two days he had managed to read only six lines.

Fabrizio blew on his fingertips to warm them. As far as he was concerned, the letters on the page — each one written by hand — were as heavy as stones. He would have to lift them one by one.

He gazed at the first word of the seventh line. His heart sank. It was not a word he knew. He rubbed his eyes, twisted his fingers, and shifted his feet. Wishing help, he stole a glance at Mangus. His master was absorbed in his book. The skull lamp beside him seemed to glare at Fabrizio.

Fabrizio turned back to the page and made himself sound out each letter over and over again — “De … De … ath. Death!” When he finally grasped the word’s meaning, he was exhausted.

He looked about. There had to be more words in that room than in the rest of the world combined. It was as if he were at the bottom of a well of words. Glancing at his
master, he wished for the millionth time he would teach him not reading but magic.

Shifting so his back was to Mangus, Fabrizio took a few small
pezollas
from his pocket. He passed them back and forth under the lectern, practicing making them vanish from view.

“Fabrizio!” called Mangus. “Attend to your reading!”

Hastily putting away the coins, Fabrizio whispered, “With permission, Master, may I speak?”

“If a fool speaks,” the magician growled while continuing to read from his book, “fools will be found who listen.”

Fabrizio tried to think of something that might engage Mangus. “Master, I’ve heard it said that reading deadens the soul.”

“Nonsense,” snapped Mangus. “If you are not well read, you might as well
be
dead.”

“But, Master, some suggest that too much reading causes blindness.”

Mangus looked up. “The wise person knows that reading books is the best way to see the world.”

“I give thanks, then,” said Fabrizio, “that you have all
the books in the world. As soon as I get through yours, I’ll never have to read another.”

“There can never be enough books,” said Mangus. “The pity is it takes years to create each one.”

“Is that true?” said the surprised boy.

“Fabrizio, a book must first be written. To do so, the writer exchanges days for words, months for paragraphs, and years for chapters — time turned into books. There’s your magic.

“Then,” Mangus continued, “that book must be copied with a fair hand. The result? No two are ever alike. That’s why books are full of mistakes. Visit a scriptorium. You’ll see how many men and months it takes to copy one volume.

“Even so, the book, once copied, must be illustrated. And bound. In short, it takes vast work and time to make a single tome. Indeed, a book can take as long to be copied as to be written. Wherefore so few volumes. If you are ever fortunate enough to go to school, you’ll have to copy your own texts.”

In his head Fabrizio vowed never to go to such a ghastly place. But all he said was, “No wonder reading is so hard.”

“In your case it’s merely your hard head that makes reading difficult.”

“Then why insist I learn, Master?”

“Would you like the world to be one color?”

“I suppose not. Everything would be like mud.”

“The same for thought and speech,” said Mangus. “Reading provides you with words — like the colors of God’s rainbow — to paint your ideas, to give beauty and variety to thought. Be advised,” the old man said sternly, “I’ll keep no ignorant servants in my house.”

“Master,” Fabrizio whispered. “I’d rather learn magic.”

“Your learning to read will be magic enough.”

“I’m trying to learn one trick,” offered Fabrizio. “How to make coins vanish.”

“Every boy who eats knows that trick.” Mangus touched the books around him with affection. “Here is Plato. Aristotle. Petrarch. Boccaccio. The sublime Dante sits before you. Fabrizio, these are the world’s true magicians. Learn to read them and all mysteries shall be revealed.” Curbing his enthusiasm, the magician said, “Enough! Attend to your reading.”

Fabrizio sighed. “Perhaps Signori Benito and Giuseppe need me.”

“They went off to the market. Now, in the name of heaven, Fabrizio, let me read! And you —”

Thudding erupted on the front door.

“Shall I see who’s there, Master?” Fabrizio had already sprung away from the lectern and was heading for the door.

“Stop! I don’t wish to see anyone. Send whoever it is away.”

“Yes, Master.”

Fabrizio ran down the hallway and unbolted the door. Before him stood a very stout man. His face was round, with moist, cowlike eyes, a bulbous nose with hairy nostrils, soft, puffy cheeks, and a grizzled chin. He was wheezing, and the stench of garlic spewed from his loose, thick-lipped mouth. But his bright blue robe — trimmed with white rabbit fur — proclaimed him as a lofty member of the legal profession. Moreover, behind him stood a blue-coated law-court soldier with a sharp pike in hand.

Fabrizio made a bow. “May I be of service, Signore?”

“I,” the man bellowed while waving his hands around
like an excited windmill, “am Signor Brutus Lucian DeLaBina, Primo Magistrato of Pergamontio! In charge of all law in our glorious kingdom. I’m here to speak to Mangus the Magician. Take me to him.” His strenuous gestures were such that he pulled out a large green handkerchief to mop sweat from his face.

“Signore,” said Fabrizio, “with permission, he’s reading a book and can’t be bothered.”

“I assure you,” proclaimed the magistrato, shaping his words with his hands, “I am more important than any book! Tell your master if he wishes to remain alive, he will see me — now!”

Startled, Fabrizio said, “Of course, Signore! Let me announce you.” He raced back down the hallway and stuck his head into Mangus’s study.

“Master,” he whispered, “a large, loud, and pompous signore in a blue robe demands to see you.”

Mangus kept reading. “The last person I want to see is a lawyer.”

“Yes, Master. But … this man said you will see him if you wish to remain alive.”

Mangus looked up. “Who is this absurd person?”

“Primo Magistrato Brutus Lucian DeLaBina.”

“DeLaBina?” Mangus cried, his face turning gray. “Here?” He covered the book he was reading with a sheet of parchment.

“Master, is he trouble?”

“He’s Pergamontio’s chief prosecutor,” said Mangus in an agitated voice, “in charge of all laws and licenses. He presides over the Hall of Justice like a hunting dog, sniffing out whatever
he
deems evil and chewing it up without mercy.”

“Master, is this what you were warned about two nights ago?”

“Let’s hope not!”

“Shall I send him away?”

“Fabrizio! If the primo magistrato comes to my door, I’ve no choice but to see him. Lead him in. Quickly! The greater the pomposity, the less the patience.”

“Yes, Master,” said an alarmed Fabrizio, tearing back to the front door.

W
ITH FABRIZIO RIGHT BEHIND HIM, A WHEEZING
DeLaBina stomped loudly into the magician’s room. The moment he appeared, Mangus, cap in hand, stood up and bowed.

“Signor Magistrato, you honor me greatly.”

“Silence!” proclaimed DeLaBina. He held up a fat hand as if testing the wind.

Fabrizio, surprised to see his master so deferential, edged around the table to be near. Simultaneously, he kept his eyes on DeLaBina, who was looking about the room as if in search of something.

“Signor Magician, you keep a disorderly place.”

“It will do for the likes of me, Signor Magistrato.”

“It will do for
hiding
things,” DeLaBina sneered. “Are all these papers and books about black magic?”

“Signore,” said Mangus, “you will search in vain for even one book of black magic. My books were written by great philosophers. To be sure, you will find a few books that teach magic
tricks,
the illusions I perform as a way of
earning bread for my household. Children’s entertainment, you might say. For the ignorant.”

Fabrizio, sensing his master’s increasing distress, was becoming upset.

“So you claim,” said DeLaBina, waving away such notions with a sweep of his hand. “But the world knows magic as the work of the devil. Indeed, Mangus” — he wagged a finger — “I have heard rumors that you are engaged in
that
kind of magic. Be aware! King Claudio insists that all magic be suppressed. The penalty for practicing it is death.”

A trembling Mangus bowed. “Signore, I can assure you, my sole interests are truth and logic, which is to say, reason.”

“Just know,” retorted DeLaBina, “I have
reasons
to keep my eyes on you, because …”

Fabrizio waited for DeLaBina to conclude the sentence. But it was Mangus who said, “Signore, I beg you, be kind enough to tell me why you’ve graced me with a visit.”

“Be seated,” commanded DeLaBina.

“Fabrizio!” called Mangus. “A chair!”

Fabrizio darted forward to bring the chair. The magistrato all but fell into it, drew up his bulk to Mangus’s table, and then leaned over it as if to take possession. Noticing the lit skull, he backed away.

Fabrizio hurriedly returned to his master’s side.

DeLaBina reached into his blue robe and slowly drew out a sheet of paper. Fabrizio could see it had bold writing on it.

“Be so good as to examine this,” said the magistrato. As he offered the paper to Mangus, DeLaBina fixed his eyes on the old man’s face, as if reading it.

Mangus took the paper into his hands. “It’s in Italian, not Latin.”

“Vulgar tongue, Italian,” scoffed DeLaBina. “Go on, read it out loud.”

Mangus did so:

“God protect us!” cried Mangus. He dropped the paper as if it were on fire. “Treason!”

“All change is treason,” proclaimed DeLaBina, slapping the table to make his point. “Indeed, whispers of wicked plots to overthrow the king fly about the city like a confetti storm.”

“Are they true?” said Mangus.

The magistrato puffed a blast of garlic breath. “That you, Signor Mangus, who consider yourself a man of knowledge, should be deaf to these rumors — which everyone else has heard — says much about the value of your so-called reasoning.” He leaned forward. “May I suggest that to always have your nose in a book is no different from having your foot in the grave.” He poked a fat finger onto the paper. “Note the last phrase, ‘Do not fear a change!’ means someone wishes to depose King Claudio and take the crown!”

Fabrizio’s eyes grew wide.

“Great heaven!” cried Mangus. “When did this paper appear?”

“Yesterday,” said DeLaBina.

“Dreadful,” muttered Mangus.

“Indeed,” said DeLaBina. “The words inscribed on that paper
are
vile. But, much more important” — the magistrato spoke as if to divulge a secret — “please tell me, Signor Mangus, what do you make of the
hand
that wrote those words?” Looking smug, the magistrato sat back in his chair and swabbed his spittled chin with his handkerchief.

“The
hand
?” said Mangus.

“The
way
it was written!” roared DeLaBina.

Wincing, Mangus darted a baffled look at the man, but drew the skull lantern closer to examine the paper under better light.

Fabrizio edged closer, too.

“It’s the work of an inept scribe,” Mangus began momentarily. “The hook on the
e
here — and here — is smudged. The descender on the letter
p
has a weak serif. As for the ball on the letter
y
, it’s anything but round.”

“Which is to say,” said DeLaBina, his voice as careful as a hunter setting a trap, “the writing has, shall we agree, a
distinctive
hand?”

“Distinctive of a kind,” agreed Mangus, still gazing at the paper. “Rather rough. Not artistic. Indeed, inept. A hand that wrote in haste, perhaps.” He looked up. “Happily, not an inscription likely to be repeated.”

“Then what,” pounced DeLaBina, “do you make of
this
?” He drew out another sheet of paper and flung it at the magician.

Mangus studied the new paper while Fabrizio leaned over to see, too. To his eyes the second paper seemed much like the first.

“Magistrato,” said Mangus, “unless my eyes have grown weak, this second sheet appears to contain the same errors of penmanship as the first.”

“Indeed. Now consider
these
!” DeLaBina tossed a whole sheaf of papers onto the table.

A startled Mangus spread out the papers and examined them in silence. So did Fabrizio. The sole sound in the room was DeLaBina’s spittled and labored breathing.

The magician looked up. “Signore, they are
remarkably
the same. In fact, I should say they are
precisely
the same.”

DeLaBina nodded smugly. “Therefore, my question to
you must be, how can such handwriting — on so
many different
sheets of paper — all be
precisely
the same?”

Fabrizio looked to Mangus for his answer.

The old man scratched his beard and pulled his right ear. “I confess I’ve no idea. Every scribe has his own personality. His quirks. But for so many hands to make the same exact mistakes is … uncanny. I can’t make sense of it.”

“Signor Mangus,” cried DeLaBina, pumping the air with a fist, “Pergamontio has been flooded with these treasonous sheets!”

“Flooded?”

“Hundreds! Bad enough that they exist. Dreadful for what they say. Far, far worse is the fact that they are all
precisely the same
!”

“It is astonishing,” murmured Mangus.

“More than astonishing!” shouted DeLaBina, banging his fist on the table so that the skull — and Fabrizio — jumped. “Such identical replication is impossible for human hands! Not even God — in all his greatness — makes two things alike.”

Mangus sat back and shook his head. “Signore, how can it be explained?”

“
I
can explain it!” shouted DeLaBina.

“Then, Magistrato,” said an increasingly tense Mangus, “enlighten my ignorance by telling me how such can be.”

DeLaBina took a deep breath, rather like — Fabrizio thought — a frog about to jump. “Consider that the king, with my unceasing help, has been successful in keeping Pergamontio free of all modern ideas, technologies, and heresies. Consider what is said on these papers — treason! Consider that these papers speak against His Majesty who is king of Pergamontio by nothing less than the choice of God. Consider that these papers exist in extraordinary numbers throughout the city.
Finally,
consider that such inept work repeats itself with magical exactitude.
Diabolical
exactitude! In short, these vile sheets were made … magically. And they were done at the behest of none other than — the devil!”

“The devil?” cried Mangus with astonishment.

“The devil?” echoed Fabrizio.

“Or at the least,” said DeLaBina slyly, “some … devilish person.”

“But —”

“Mangus,” cried the magistrato, “did you not make magic the other evening at the Sign of the Crown? Did you not inform the crowd that you could, I quote, ‘create something from nothing’? And, ‘from that something, make many’? And did you not
do
all that —
magically
?”

Fabrizio was amazed the magistrato knew what had occurred.

“How many faces of our king did you make appear —
magically
— in your empty hand?
Five!
” DeLaBina bellowed, answering his own question. “Then, what did you do with our beloved king? You had the intent — one might even say the
treasonous
design — of making him … magically …
vanish
! As if … as if he were — overthrown!”

Mangus opened his mouth. No sound came out.

“Magician,” shouted DeLaBina, “admit it! You made multiple copies from nothing —
magically!
And
these
papers appeared
magically
throughout the city the very next
day
after
your performance in
precisely
the same fashion!
Magically!
”

“But …” said a bewildered Mangus.

Abruptly, DeLaBina pointed at Fabrizio. “You, boy! Were you with your master that night?”

Taken aback to be addressed, Fabrizio said, “Y … yes, Signore, I was.”

“Did or did not Mangus
make
magic?”

Fabrizio looked to his master.

“Speak the truth, Fabrizio!”

Fabrizio turned back to DeLaBina and stammered, “Y … yes, Signore. My master … made magic.”

“And,” prompted DeLaBina, “did he not create
many
images of our king? Something … from nothing?”

Fabrizio swallowed twice and whispered, “Yes, Signore, but —”

“Yes!” cried DeLaBina with triumph, thrusting a fat finger toward Mangus as if to pierce him with a sword. “Signor Magician, I have
compelled
your servant to confess the truth. Which is to say that you, Signor Magician, made many exact copies from nothing —
magically
!”

“Signore —”

“I sum up: Nobody else in Pergamontio can make magic but you. These papers were made magically.
Ergo,
no one else but you could have made these papers.”

“But it’s not true,” protested Mangus.

“It
is
true,” declared DeLaBina. “But,” his voice softened, “I can see no reason why such a lowly person — such as you — would want to depose King Claudio. It has to be that you made these papers, foolishly, at the request of some devilish … person.

“As punishment for such an act,” DeLaBina roared on, “I, the primary law officer of this glorious kingdom, have decreed that
you
shall reveal the malefactor behind this vile conspiracy to depose the king. In short,
you,
Master Magician, shall have the honor of saving … the king!”

“But, Magistrato, the notion that I could —”

“Master Mangus,” said DeLaBina, heaving himself to his feet so that to Fabrizio’s eyes he seemed to fill the room, “I suppose even
you
can see the logic and reason of my words.”

Fabrizio watched with dismay as Mangus slumped down, defeated.

DeLaBina gathered his robe around him with a showy swirl. Then he held up his hand and counted upon his fat fingers. “Signor Mangus, you are hereby commanded to do three things.

“One: Rid the city of these treasonous papers.

“Two: Reveal the devilish person who asked you to make these papers magically in order to depose King Claudio.

“Three: Inform me who that person is, so I may inform the king, who will, no doubt, burn this person at the stake.”

“Me?” stammered Mangus. “Do … all … that?”

“Do those three things and you will preserve your life.
Fail
to do them and I, Signor Brutus Lucian DeLaBina, Primo Magistrato of Pergamontio, will be forced to conclude that
you,
Master Mangus,
are the sole traitor
!”

“But, Magistrato,” said Mangus, struggling to his feet, “my performance consisted of … of illusions. Nothing at all to do with these papers.”

“Signore,” pleaded Fabrizio, “my master is innocent.”

“Innocent?” roared DeLaBina. “You already confessed he made magic!”

Fabrizio was horrified.

“Master Magician,” said DeLaBina, “I repeat, if you do
not
reveal the traitor behind this wicked plot, the kingdom of Pergamontio shall require the
illusion
of justice. In other words, I shall find
someone
to burn for this treason! And that person shall be you. Do I make myself perfectly clear?”

“Signore,” whispered Mangus as he slumped back into his chair, “I fear you have.”