Part 15 (1/2)
The mention of Ugolini's household brought back the pain of that parting from Sophia. He pictured again that dizzying moment when he almost possessed her, remembered how he had poured out all his secrets to her. He saw again her tears and remembered his own, that he had shed after she ran from him. The memory made him feel like weeping now.
Hoping to sound casual, Simon said, ”The cardinal's niece--I believe her name is Sophia. Did you see her before you left Orvieto?”
Sordello's discolored eyes met Simon's. ”No, Your Signory. I have seen little of her since the night of the Filippeschi uprising.”
_d.a.m.n this gap-toothed brigand!_
Simon continued to pretend to be casual. He stood up and yawned. The wine made him feel less in control of his feelings than he liked.
”Let us go and see this s.h.i.+p you have found for us.”
”Your Signory, you have not told me whether you will take me back into your service.”
Simon shook his head, as if tormented by gnats. ”After we see the s.h.i.+p.”
Sordello sighed and led the way out of the inn. They crossed the cobble-paved roadway that led along Livorno's waterfront, Simon breathing deeply of the salt-smelling air to clear his head.
Sordello pointed. ”There it is.”
He was pointing toward the same big, ungainly buss that Simon had visited earlier, whose captain had refused Simon.
”But he said he was going to Cyprus!”
”He lied to you,” said Sordello. ”I know the man. Guibert was s.h.i.+pmaster for a boatload of us mercenaries in the last war between Pisa and Genoa.
He feared that if you were to travel on his s.h.i.+p, you might find him out.”
”Find out what?”
”He is one of those Languedoc heretics who hate the Church and the French n.o.bility, a follower of the Waldensian heresy. He was imprisoned once and sentenced to death in Montpellier. He recanted his heresy and was released after signing over all that he possessed to the Church. But then he came to Italy, made a new start, and backslid to Waldensianism.
If the Inquisition got him now, he would go to the stake even if he recanted a thousand times.”
”Then why has he agreed to carry us?” To think, the man had seen Simon as an enemy. Simon, who had inherited his Languedoc parents' loathing of the persecution of heretics.
”I told him that if he did not take us where we wanted to go, I would tell the officers of the Inquisition here in Livorno about him,” said Sordello blandly.
”What!” Simon was outraged.
Sordello looked hurt. ”Surely, Your Signory does not see any wrong in forcing a heretic to do a good turn for the pope and the king.
Especially when it means he gets to go unpunished. So we do our duty, but with a leavening of charity.”
For Simon to say more would reveal too much about himself and his family. Fuming, he bit his lip. But another objection came to him.
”We will have to take turns standing guard the whole voyage,” he said.
”That captain will want to slit our throats to make sure his secret is safe.”
”We would have to stand guard anyway, Your Signory. A sea captain knows no law but his own greed as soon as he puts out from sh.o.r.e. If you can pay him seventy-five florins, that tells him you must be carrying a great deal more money. But I have insured our safety another way. I have told him that an old friend of mine here in Livorno knows his secret, and if that friend does not receive a message from me in due course a.s.suring him of our safety, he will report Guibert to the Inquisition.