The Folding Knife Part 26

The Patriarch mentioned a name. Ba.s.so managed not to react. "And he would have been the chief intermediary," he said. "Between yourself and the person behind the attack."

"One of several," the Patriarch replied. "Do you want all the names?"

Ba.s.so shook his head. "I'm not interested," he said. "You know as well as I do that I'm not going to take any action, not unless I have to."

"Indeed." The Patriarch's face didn't change, but Ba.s.so noticed that the hand gripping the arm of the patriarchal chair had tightened its grip. "That was our a.s.sumption," he said. "I must ask your forgiveness. It was very wrong and foolish-"

But Ba.s.so held up his hand. "Not official action, at any rate," he replied. "Unofficially, there's a great deal I'm minded to do, if I can be bothered. I've got twelve distinguished theologians going through every word you've written over the last forty years, for instance. I'm rather looking forward to reading their report, though I don't suppose it'll make a great deal of sense to me. Still, I'm not the one they need to convince. Of course, it depends how patient I can bring myself to be. Not one of my outstanding virtues, I'm afraid." He stood up and walked over to the table in the corner, on which a number of fine crystal decanters were arranged. "May I?" he said, and poured himself a small brandy. "Would you like anything?"

The Patriarch was looking at the decanter in Ba.s.so's hand, and at his other hand, poised over the decanter's neck, forefinger and thumb pinched tight togeher. It was a somewhat melodramatic gesture, but Ba.s.so had no great opinion of the Patriarch's capacity for subtlety. "Of course, you could employ a taster," Ba.s.so said. "Probably a wise precaution, in fact, though you may have a little difficulty explaining to your colleagues. Though personally, I don't put much stock in food-tasters. A lot of poisons work slowly, they tell me, not that I'm any sort of expert. Same goes for bodyguards and all that sort of thing. You can't rely on them, believe me. You're protected to a certain extent from the lone maniac with a knife, and that's about it." He put the decanter down, and rolled the brandy round the bottom of the gla.s.s. "I've come to the conclusion that the only reliable way to keep from getting murdered is not to have any enemies. What do you think? Is that a realistic objective?"

The Patriarch had flattened himself against the back of his chair, like a man about to have a tooth pulled. "I can think of only one person who could truly be described as your enemy," he said. "Otherwise, I don't believe you have much to worry about."

Ba.s.so smiled. "Thank you," he said. "You've set my mind at rest." He put the gla.s.s down, and the Patriarch couldn't help noticing he hadn't drunk any of it. "Do take care of yourself," he said. "Like I said just now, I think you're doing a wonderful job. I can't really think of anybody who could do it nearly as well."

The doctor was an Auxentine, though it was fairly obvious he hadn't been home in quite a while. His clothes were expensive and colourful, his shoes perhaps the most impressive objects Ba.s.so had ever seen (though perhaps the jewelled rood screen in the Studium temple equalled them, in value of materials if not in aesthetic excellence). Ba.s.so was surprised to find that he was quite young. He looked like a child who's been in the dressing-up box.

"I've found a cure for the plague," the doctor said.

"Is that right?" Ba.s.so let his eyes feast on the shoes one more time, then sat down. "That's quite an accomplishment," he said.

"Yes," the doctor replied. Then he shrugged. "You don't believe me, naturally."

"I didn't say that," Ba.s.so replied. "And I'm prepared to accept that other people believe you. I don't suppose you could afford to dress like that if you made your living setting bones and lancing boils."

The doctor shrugged. "The King of Scleria believes me," he said. "And the Emperor is very interested. So far, though, I've only advised private individuals, in Scleria mostly. They had a bad outbreak the year before last, as I'm sure you know."

Ba.s.so nodded. "Different symptoms, though."

The doctor smiled. "I can see you're an intelligent man, First Citizen. You'd be surprised how many people take the view that plague is plague, and the symptoms don't really matter. In fact," he went on, "I was greatly impressed by the scientific approach you adopted during the recent outbreak. Partly, that's why I'm here."

"Partly," Ba.s.so repeated. "Well, for your information, we got it completely wrong. Everything we did was useless. We might as well not have bothered. But of course, you must know that."

The doctor nodded. "Since you raise the subject, yes," he said. "Your methodology was sound, but your conclusions were false. Understandably," he added; "after all, you were trying to figure out a cure while an outbreak was actually in progress. Hardly ideal conditions."

Ba.s.so shrugged. "Oh, I don't know," he said. "What better time to study something than when it's actually happening? But now we've got you," he said, "so all our problems are over. Yes?"

The doctor looked away, as though mildly offended. "What you call the plague," he said, "isn't just one disease. As far as I can tell from my researches, there are at least two quite separate diseases, both of which tend to get lumped together under the one description."

"Ah," Ba.s.so said. "Which one have you cured?"

The doctor looked at him. "Actually," he said, "it's more a matter of prevention."

"That's not what you said just now."

"True." The doctor dipped his head in formal acknowledgement. "But I had to make you listen to me."

Ba.s.so shrugged. "You shouldn't have done that. All you've achieved is to make me rather more sceptical than I would've been if you'd told the truth. Still, no great harm done. Tell me about it."

The doctor frowned. "Forgive me," he said. "There's the question of remuneration. If I tell you what I've found out..."

"I see." Ba.s.so sighed, then raised his right hand, mock-solemn. "If what you've got to say has any value, I'll see to it you get paid. If not, not. If you don't like the terms, go and advise somebody else."

He didn't like that, but Ba.s.so didn't care. "Very well," the doctor said. "Now, then. As I said just now, there are two different diseases. One of them, which I prefer to think of as the real plague, is spread by fleas."

"Fleas," Ba.s.so repeated.

"That's right."

"In that case, we're screwed," Ba.s.so said. "Nothing anybody can do about fleas. They're everywhere."

"A specific variety of fleas," the doctor said.

"There's more than one kind?"

"Hundreds," the doctor said. "And only one kind spreads the plague. The fleas live on the backs of rats and mice; they can survive for a short period on a cat or a dog, and on humans, though we aren't their host of choice. They spread the plague that gives you boils and swellings, and death follows in about a fortnight. The plague you had here recently was the other kind."

Ba.s.so nodded. "Quicker," he said, "and no boils."

"Exactly. That's the other sort. Basically, it's a strain of cattle sickness. The early symptoms-fever and so forth-are common to both diseases, but the sort you had kills you in a matter of days. You catch it by contact with infected animals or infected people, or from eating tainted meat."

Ba.s.so held up his hand for silence; then he winced. "Auxentine salt beef," he said.

The doctor nodded eagerly. "Exactly," he said. "Because of the sharp, early winter last year in Auxentia, they killed off substantially more cattle at the end of autumn, salted the beef and sold it cheap. I've read your doctors' report, and spoken to some of your leading merchants. Just before the outbreak, the market was flooded with cheap Auxentine salt beef. That's what caused the disease."

Ba.s.so stared at him. "So the s.h.i.+ps..."

"Coincidence," the doctor said, smiling. "I managed to see a copy of the s.h.i.+ps' inventory. They were carrying barrels of Auxentine beef as part of their provisions. They started exhibiting symptoms a day or so earlier than the people here simply because they'd started eating the poisoned meat earlier. If you like, they were the first victims, but not the cause."

Ba.s.so nodded slowly. "So the steps we took..."

"Actually," the doctor said, "you almost certainly saved thousands of lives. You herded large numbers of people together, away from their homes, and fed them mostly bread, with some cheese and dried fish; no beef. I'm prepared to bet that the ones who died were the ones who had the foresight to take food with them from their homes when they were evacuated. Of course," he went on, "once the disease was well established, there was a certain amount of cross-infection; it's mildly contagious, as far as I can tell, though there has to be substantial contact. Being in the same room or breathing the same air won't do it."

Ba.s.so rubbed his face with his hands. "This is just a theory," he said. "We had theories of our own. At the time, they seemed to make perfect sense."

"Excuse me." This time, he'd definitely given offence. "My theory, as you call it, has been proved by extensive research and controlled experiment. In Scleria, I fed Auxentine salt beef, from a batch I had excellent reason to believe to be tainted, to condemned debtors in a town prison. Eight out of twelve of them developed symptoms; five of them died. I repeated the experiment with Hus prisoners of war in Auxentia, with comparable results. My researches in Auxentia-"

"Just a moment," Ba.s.so said. "You took perfectly healthy people and you gave them the plague."

The doctor frowned. "I think I mentioned that the subjects were prisoners," he said. "And besides, if we can prevent plague in future, we'll save thousands of lives; quite possibly millions. If you have reservations about the morality of the experiments, you might care to consider the ethics of sending soldiers to fight in a war."

Ba.s.so shook his head. "I don't want to talk about ethics," he said. "I just find it hard to believe a human being could do something like that. I've always had this idea that death is on one side and the human race is on another, and you don't do deals with the enemy. But," he went on, before the doctor could interrupt, "your point about soldiers is trite but basically valid, so we won't go there. I guess that so long as you haven't actually murdered anyone in Vesani territory, it's none of my business."

The doctor wasn't even trying not to scowl at him. No matter. "I have extensive notes," the doctor said, "and observations verified by independent witnesses. My theory is proven fact. Accordingly, I can prevent further outbreaks of the disease."

Ba.s.so sighed. All he wanted to do was get rid of the man as quickly as possible. "Tainted meat," he said. "So how do we know if it's tainted?"

"By testing," the doctor said. "And quarantine. Samples of all preserved beef brought into the country should be fed to prisoners. Should no symptoms occur within seven days, the meat is safe and can be released for sale. Follow this simple precaution, and you will effectively eliminate the threat. Of course, there's still a danger from smuggled beef, so you may care to step up your border and customs controls. Generally, though, it should be self-regulating. Once people know that smuggled meat may kill them, the appet.i.te for it should diminish, or at least restrict itself to the lower orders of society."

Ba.s.so nodded slowly. "And the other sort of plague," he said. "The one spread by fleas. What do you suggest we do about that?"

The doctor shrugged. "That's up to you," he said. "I would recommend setting up a facility on one of your offsh.o.r.e islands where all incoming s.h.i.+ps must wait for twenty-eight days before being allowed to dock in the main harbour. I don't suppose you'd find that acceptable, politically or commercially."

Ba.s.so smiled at him. "Not really," he said.

"In that case, I suggest you keep your streets swept, and offer a bounty of a florin a dozen for rats' tails. It may help. It'll almost certainly win you votes."

Ba.s.so's smile widened, to reveal all his teeth. "I might just do that," he said. "Jobs for poor people, and it may even be useful. I think we'll just have to take our chances with the beef imports. If we get another outbreak, at least we'll know what to tell people."

The doctor looked at him, then shrugged. "My fee," he said, "is one million nomismata."

Ba.s.so shook his head sadly. "Five thousand," he said. "Buy yourself another pair of shoes. Oh, and you have forty-eight hours to leave the city. If you're still here after that, I'll have you arrested for murder."

("But he was right," Melsuntha said later. "You should have paid him properly. Not a million, perhaps, but more than five thousand. Think of the lives that could be saved."

"I know," Ba.s.so replied. "And I couldn't think of an answer when he said I was as bad as him, because I send soldiers out to die for the greater good. So I was rude to him, and I underpaid him, and I told him to get out of town; I was just being spiteful, because he's disgusting and he's right." Ba.s.so spread his fingers wide. "Or at least, I couldn't show he was wrong, which really annoyed me."

"That's life," Melsuntha said. "Sometimes bad people are right, and sometimes good people are wrong. I'd have thought by now-"

"It's why Ba.s.sano has to be First Citizen," Ba.s.so said. "When he faces something like this, he'll know what to do. All I could manage was to act like a child.") A messenger brought him a book: Cya.n.u.s' Dialogues, not the sort of thing Ba.s.so went in for. No name; his benefactor wished to remain anonymous.

Ba.s.so sent for Captain Tralles, a long, skinny Cazar recently a.s.signed by General Aelius to be his personal security adviser. So far, Captain Tralles had spent his time wandering about the house, examining the windows and muttering about angles of fire. It was about time he did something useful.

"Someone sent me this," Ba.s.so said.

Tralles looked at the book, lying on a desk in the cartulary annex, as though it was some rare variety of venomous reptile. "I see," he said. "Do you know who sent it?"

Ba.s.so shook his head. "I heard something once about a book with poisoned pages," he said. "For all I know, it could just be an extended metaphor, but I thought..."

"Well-known technique in the Eastern Empire," Tralles said. "Several well-doc.u.mented cases." He leaned over the book, taking great care not to let any part of his clothing brush against it, and sniffed. He had an enormous nose. Ba.s.so wondered whether he'd had it cut off someone else and sewn on, specially.

"None of the commoner poisons," Tralles said. "Could be wormsbane or ceraunus oil; they don't have a smell. But in that case, I'd expect some slight discoloration of the pages." He drew a long, slim dagger and carefully flipped open the front cover with its point. "Someone's written something here, look," he said. "Does it mean anything to you?"

Ba.s.so peered over his shoulder, then laughed. "It's all right," he said. "That's my nephew's writing. Thanks anyway, but I've wasted your time."

Tralles didn't look at all convinced, but Ba.s.so shooed him away. Then he read the message again.

I need to see you. This evening, the House?

No way of replying. He tried to put it out of his mind for the rest of the day. Normally, there would have been enough work on his desk to keep him fully occupied, but as luck would have it, the world was maliciously quiet, and he was reduced to reading diplomatic dispatches from the Republic's man in Scleria-a waste of time, since the Sclerians never told anybody anything. He found a mildly entertaining account of the election of a new cardinal, to replace Magnentius IX, who'd finally died at the monstrous age of ninety-six. Apparently, the college of electors had been unable to reach a decision. They'd been in continuous conclave for three months, and the King, after dropping increasingly heavy hints, had tried to concentrate their minds by having the tiles stripped off the roof of the chapter house-quite an incentive, in the middle of a Sclerian winter. But even that hadn't been enough, and so the King had brought matters to a head by proposing his own compromise candidate: his nephew, a boy of nineteen, whose only known talent was the ability to swallow pickled eggs whole. The boy was not, of course, a priest, but that was by no means an insuperable obstacle. He was, the report said, ordained on the first of the month, made a deacon the next day, and elected abbot of a monastery by the end of the week. The compromise would have worked, the report went on, had it not been for one Const.i.tuatus, abbot of Barcy, an outsider in the pre-compromise race; when the King's nephew had been duly elected and was in the process of being invested with the symbols of office, Const.i.tuatus s.n.a.t.c.hed the sacred cope, mitre and mantle from the attendants, wriggled into the mantle, jammed the mitre on his head, planted himself firmly on the episcopal throne and declared himself to be cardinal Magnentius X, equal of the apostles, vice-regent of the Invincible Sun. In his haste he'd put the mantle on the wrong way round and hadn't even tried to a.s.sume the cope, but when they tried to drag him out of the throne he clung to the arms and bit the attendant's hands; since he weighed a good twenty stone and had started life as a stevedore in the dockyards, it proved impossible to dislodge him. After he'd been there forty-eight hours, the King gave in and ratified his election, on the grounds that if he wanted the job that much, he might as well have it. The royal nephew's reaction had not been made public, but was a.s.sumed to be one of profound relief.

Ba.s.so wrote a polite note to the new cardinal, congratulating him on his election and expressing the wish that the excellent relations between the Sclerian Curia and the Vesani Studium would continue to flourish. He resisted the temptation to append a gift of the justly famous Vesani birch-syrup toffee (sure to be appreciated by a man with strong jaws), sending instead a richly illuminated copy of Xenophanes' commentary on the Western Psaltery (Const.i.tuatus, according to the dispatches, couldn't read and had to sign his name with a stencil) and a large box of candied figs.

Then, quite suddenly, there was a clerk standing in the doorway, telling him that his nephew was there to see him. Ba.s.so jumped up, knocking papers off his desk. The clerk stood there, waiting for something. Ba.s.so remembered he'd been asked a question.

"I'll see him in the treaty room," he said. "Get a fire lit, and fetch some brandy."

Not that Ba.s.sano drank brandy any more. The clerk went out; Ba.s.so hesitated, though he wasn't sure why. He pulled himself together, put the letters he'd written on the table by the door, to be collected in the morning, and went slowly down the stairs.

Ba.s.sano was sitting by the fire, looking cold; he had his coat on and his collar up. He felt the cold more than anybody Ba.s.so had ever known, apart from his sister.

"You walked," Ba.s.so said.

Ba.s.sano nodded awkwardly; he was s.h.i.+vering. "Habit I picked up at fencing school," he said. "Exercise. It's funny, I always hated exercise, and now I do some every day. Can't seem not to, if you see what I mean."

Ba.s.so poured him a small brandy, which he gobbled down. It stopped him s.h.i.+vering. "Well?" he said.

"My mother." Ba.s.sano was flexing his fingers. "She says that unless I promise never to speak to you again, she'll have you charged with killing my father."

"That's right," Ba.s.so said calmly. He was pleased with himself for that. "She came to see me. First time in a long time."

"Well?"

Ba.s.so shrugged. "I told her to go ahead. I said she'd be doing me a favour."

"Maybe you'd care to explain that."

Ba.s.so explained. When he'd finished, Ba.s.sano sat up straight in his chair and said, "Is that true?"

"Yes," Ba.s.so replied. "If she were to go ahead, I'm not sure yet how I'd play it. Killing the charges would be the safest way, but I'd be tempted to let it go to trial. Show the people that the First Citizen doesn't consider himself to be above the law."

"And you're sure you'd be acquitted. You're sure."

"Yes," Ba.s.so said. "For a start, I'd take a few simple precautions, like choosing my own jury. Say, two newly enfranchised foreigners, two Bank employees, a couple of clerks from the House and someone who owes me money-a truly representative cross-section of society, when you think about it. Also, for what it's worth, I'm innocent. And I can prove it, even without suborning false witnesses, which of course I'd do anyway. Also, I'd retain the best lawyers in the City for my defence, and hire all the other half-competent lawyers on other matters, so they wouldn't be available to act for your mother. Apart from that, and a few well-chosen words to the judge beforehand, I'd be happy to let justice take its course."

Ba.s.sano frowned, then laughed. "I guess I didn't really think it through," he said. "I was scared. She sounded so convincing."

Ba.s.so smiled. "She thinks I'd be afraid of the scandal," he replied. "But the killing's been common knowledge for twenty years, and apart from the daily patter of jokes and sly comments, it's never done me any harm. Getting it out in the open would probably do more good than harm. No, what she's relying on is that you'll believe there's a serious threat. I think it may be hard for me to forgive her for that, but I'll try."

"Well, then." Ba.s.sano stretched like a cat. "In that case, three cheers for our legal system."

"Best in the world," Ba.s.so replied gravely. "Did you know she tried to have me killed?"

There was a silence so brittle that a sound would have splintered the world. "Do you mean that?"

Ba.s.so nodded. "Ask Aelius if you don't believe me. She arranged it through the Studium, which is really high-cla.s.s; I dread to think how much it cost her, and she's comfortable, but not exactly rich, by social-register standards." He shook his head. "They shot at me with an artillery piece, of all things. Came this close." He held his hands about eight inches apart. "Not bad shooting, at two hundred and fifty yards."

Ba.s.sano looked at him. "Why?"

"I don't think she likes me," Ba.s.so replied. "Also, my guess is, she knows as well as we both do that her grand threat isn't going to work. Frustration, I suppose, at losing to me yet again. She always did have a nasty temper when she couldn't get her own way."

Ba.s.sano was sitting very still. "What are you going to do?" he said.

"Nothing," Ba.s.so replied. "Well, I'm hardly going to hang my own sister, and if I take it out on the hired hands, one of them's bound to try and drag her into it. Better to let the whole thing slide and blame it on the Mavortines." He paused. "I wasn't going to tell you," he went on, "and probably I shouldn't have done. It doesn't change anything, and you'll think I'm being spiteful, turning you against her. I'm sorry."

"No," Ba.s.sano said, his voice a little shaky. "No, you had to tell me."

"I had to tell someone," Ba.s.so replied. "Couldn't tell Aelius, he'd be livid, try and make me do something. Antigonus is dead. Melsuntha would probably arrange to have your mother poisoned; she's rather protective of me, which is sweet, but not appropriate in this instance. So that just leaves you. Like I said, I'm sorry." He took a deep breath, then went on, "Please, if you can, don't hold it against her. She's quite right that I ruined her life. I'd let her have her precious revenge if I wasn't quite so selfish. Also," he added, "I've got you to think about, though that probably comes under the heading of my selfishness. Anyway, try and forget about it."