Niccolo Rising - Dorothy Dunnett [95]
The dim light of the Acciajuoli porch showed the reproach on Claes’ features. Claes said, “Now I can’t read the list.”
The doctor snapped. “What list?” Then of course, he remembered.
Claes was already undoing his purse. Silver glinted inside. Tobie said, still snapping, “You were playing for money?”
“It makes it more interesting,” Claes said. “They would have let me win, anyway.” He had a list in his hand. “Second column …”
“Second column from the left, third name down,” said Tobie. “Or that was last night, wasn’t it? In any case, don’t let me keep you. I’m going back to the inn.”
“Well, so am I,” said Claes. “But not yet. You can’t talk there. Third name down. It’s an apothecary’s shop near St Maria della Scala. Round the corner.”
“I don’t need to talk,” said Tobie. “I can tell you without moving a step that I’m having nothing to do with it.”
Relief spread over Claes’ face. “That’s what I hoped,” he said. “I’ve nothing against your uncle, but I’ve explained that I don’t need a partner. All we have to do now is think how to get you out.”
“I’m not in,” said Tobie, for the second time.
“Of course you’re not,” said Claes. “We just have to decide how to convince people. It won’t take five minutes, and then you needn’t think about the alum again.”
The alum. Well, it was worth five minutes to get this nonsense out of the way.
The apothecary’s was, of course, shuttered and dark. Tobie stood stiffly back while Claes delivered a few gentle tappings and finally, after a great rattling and scraping of bolts, the door opened a trifle. The man who let them in carried a candle. He seemed to be alone. At the back of the room was a truckle bed with a sag in it where he had been sitting, and a trestle table with a hunk of bread and some olives. At night, a lot of shops used an apprentice as guard-dog.
This was a bigger place than it seemed. Near the door was the apothecary’s selling-table, with the scales on it and a counting board and bags of counters and bowls. The drugs and spices most often used were on the shelves behind that, in jars of glass and pewter and earthenware. A dirty mortar stood on a stool.
The smell was a choking mixture of medicated syrups and brimstone and salammoniac and ointment and turpentine mixed with pepper and ginger, cinnamon, anise and nutmegs, cloves and cummin and saffron. Tobie could smell comfits and paint, wax and perfume, vinegar and raisins. There was mustard somewhere, and oil of wormwood, and soap. Tobie sneezed.
“May God bless you,” said Claes. The man with the candle was leading them towards the back of the shop. They passed more shelves, and a cabinet, and some bales. Tobie sneezed again.
“May God bless you,” said Claes. “Is it asthma? Your uncle was treating the Duchess for asthma, he was telling me. And the Pope for his gout. He says the Pope is sitting this minute with a pipe of warm water trained on top of his head. Maybe that’s what you should have. He says the Pope has never been the same since he had that bad time in Scotland, and his feet froze and his teeth began to fall out. May God bless you. But not his hair. Long, golden curly hair. The Pope kept his hair a long time. May God bless you. You haven’t paid a visit to Scotland, Meester Tobie?”
They were entering a low door at the back of the shop. The strong scent got stronger. The ceiling was hanging with objects. Tobie brushed a bundle of herbs with his scalp, dodged, and was fetched a light blow by a pestle. Through the door he caught sight of a bed, a hanging curtain, and another bed. He turned on his heel.
Claes’ hand slipped inside his arm and wheeled him round again. Claes said, “There’s no one here. We have half an hour before anyone comes. They don’t understand Flemish.”
He drew Tobie into the room and shut the door behind the apothecary’s man. The bed and a low cushioned chest with a candle