A Death in the Venetian Quarter Read online

  Choniates was an exception to the rule, however. A smart man, he took his duties seriously. I figured that as Logothete, he would take more than a passing interest in these events, especially given his nominal responsibility for the Venetian quarter. And, most of all, he was one of the finest gossips I had ever known. Gossiping is a skill, truly an art, and to have an ear to events in the largest city the Christian world had ever known was a gift indeed. During my time here, we had become sharers of information, both for its usefulness and for the sheer indulgence of it.

  I passed by the Hippodrome and cut through the Augustaion, the great square by the Hagia Sophia. The Senate House was at the east side of the square, an enormous structure with huge marble columns, a magnificent arch over the entrance, friezes running rampant along the top, the whole thing some 150 feet wide. They say the current building dated to the time of the Emperor Justinian, who rebuilt it on the same site as the one originally put there by Constantine himself. Amazing how a useless institution can endure for so long. It gives me hope for the survival of the Fools’ Guild.

  The senators were all scurrying back after their own noon meals, or their noon assignations with their mistresses. I mingled with the crowd, imitating the gaits of some of them to the quiet amusement of their servants, until I saw Choniates.

  “Nik!” I shouted.

  He turned and marked me.

  “Feste,” he exclaimed in surprise. “I thought we were having lunch next week.”

  “I want to talk to you. Something’s come up.”

  “I did notice the invasion,” he said dryly.

  “Something local. When are you free?”

  He frowned. “Not right now. We’re debating whether we should urge the Emperor to fight the invaders or to reconcile with them. We have to decide if our advice will drive him to do the exact opposite and what it is we really want. What about lunch tomorrow?”

  “Fine. I’ll meet you by the Pillar of the Blind.”

  He waved and hurried off.

  The Great Horologion in the square indicated that it was one o’clock, which meant that I had gone close to thirty hours without sleep. I decided that was long enough and headed home for a nap.

  I woke in time for dinner, staggering in to the derisive applause of my companions.

  “We were debating whether or not to rouse you,” said Rico. “Much depended on the quality of the food and if we wanted to share it with you. Fortunately, Plossus did the cooking tonight, so there’s plenty to go around.”

  “It’s heartbreaking when one’s sincere efforts are rejected so cruelly,” sighed Plossus. “They did not teach us cooking at the Guild.”

  “That is sadly apparent,” said Aglaia. “You’ll have to get Rico to give you some lessons. Good morning, my love. Have something.”

  “Thanks,” I said. “What’s the word from Blachernae?”

  “The fleet is harbored at Chalcedon, across the Bosporos,” said Rico. “They’ve occupied the Emperor’s palace there and are raiding the area for provisions. The Greeks are following them from the opposite shore but, lacking fins and gills, are confined to standing at the edge of the straits and yelling rude things across the waters. Had I known that was all it took to be a soldier, I could have been a general myself.”

  “The Emperor?”

  “Still here, but he rides tomorrow.”

  “Well, unless his horse can swim, I doubt that we’ll see any battle then,” I said.

  “We will if Euphy finds out Alexios is planning to ride himself,” said Aglaia. “She still needs him alive right now.”

  “Isn’t marriage wonderful?” mused Plossus.

  “Enough of the wars,” she said. “What’s going on with your investigation?”

  I filled them in on what Plossus and I had seen and learned. The other two listened with interest.

  “You say that this Ranieri had to exert himself to push these crates?” asked Aglaia. “Even using a dolly?”

  “So that every sinew was taut and defined,” I said. “You would have enjoyed watching him, my dear.”

  “That aside, it occurs to me that silk, even in bales, is still light.”

  “That occurred to me as well,” I said. “Something else was in those crates.”

  “Do you know whose storeroom they came from?” asked Rico.

  “Not yet,” I said. “But I’ll find out. Would you all be up for some burglary, perhaps tomorrow night?”

  “All of us?” said Aglaia delightedly. “What fun!”

  “Two for performing to distract the crowd, and two to break in. I was thinking Rico and myself for the criminal part of the affair. I spotted some serious padlocks on the doors, and he’s the best lock-picker of all of us.”

  “Then, milady, I shall have the honor of escorting you tomorrow,” said Plossus with a deep bow. She returned it, smiling.

  “There’s still the matter of the woman,” I said. “Anybody know anything from the description?”

  “No,” said Aglaia. “But I’ll gossip with the ladies tomorrow and see what I can find out. You know, you still haven’t said how you thought Bastiani was killed.”

  “Poison, I assume,” I said.

  “But if it was poison, when was it given to him?” she asked.

  “I don’t know yet,” I said. “There was no sign that he had eaten or drunk anything in his room, so I figure that he had been given it before he came home.”

  “I don’t agree with that,” she said.

  “Why not?”

  “A poison that takes that long to take effect? Yet it caused no other symptoms? No vomiting, no headaches apparent to others? Name me one that does that.”

  “I can’t right now,” I confessed.

  “Me, neither,” said Rico. “And I’m pretty good with them.”

  “You must teach me more about that subject,” said Plossus.

  “No need,” said Rico. “You want to poison anyone, just cook them dinner.”

  “So, he must have been poisoned in his room,” she persisted. “Which means that the poisoner must have been in there, and cleared up the evidence afterward.”

  “But no one saw anyone go in with him, or come out later,” I said.

  “You only spoke with three people so far,” she said.

  “True enough. But you’d think they would have noticed our mystery woman.”

  “Maybe she just vanished into smoke,” suggested Plossus. “She’s a witch, isn’t she?”

  “Witchcraft?” she scoffed. “A woman acts oddly and everyone immediately leaps to the conclusion that she’s a witch. They could say the same about me.”

  “And we do,” said Rico. Then he ducked as an apple sailed over his head. Even dwarves have to duck sometimes.

  “And you’re assuming something else that may not be correct,” she said.

  “Which is?”

  “That the woman at the funeral and the woman visitor are one and the same. Maybe the mistress of the mansion is merely a loved one and the prostitute from the forum is a separate visitor.”

  “That could be,” I said. “I think that Plossus and I are going to have to insinuate ourselves into the community a little more. I fear that Philoxenites is right in worrying about an insurrection coming out of that quarter. The sermon this morning was almost a call to take the cross.”

  “It would be suicide, don’t you think?” said Plossus. “They wouldn’t even have to wait for the Varangians to knock them off. All the Venetians need to do is give someone an excuse to wipe them out, and the Pisans and the Genoese will be over the walls in a heartbeat.”

  “I didn’t think the Pisans and the Genoese got along that well,” said Aglaia.

  “When it comes to stomping Venetians, they are in complete agreement,” I said. “They’re the best allies the Greeks have right now. All right, we’ll meet back here for dinner tomorrow and plan the evening’s burglary. Good night, gentlemen.”

  “But you’ve only just gotten up,” protested Plossus.
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  “Lad, let me explain to you once again about married people and their peculiar behavior,” said Rico, tugging at his sleeve.

  They left. We cleared the table and went to bed.

  Later, as we held each other, she brought up the poisoning again.

  “Always the romantic,” I said. “That’s what I love about you.”

  “I just think that if we could figure out the how, it would help us figure out the who,” she said. “You say that he turned pink?”

  “Yes. Perhaps it was done with cosmetics.”

  “You’re not taking me seriously,” she muttered.

  “I’m a jester,” I reminded her.

  “When we’re alone, you’re my husband,” she reminded me. “You can stop performing. At least, in that manner.”

  I propped my chin up on my hands and looked into her eyes.

  “When we’re alone, I shall perform however you wish me to,” I said. “And I was wrong about one other thing.”

  “What was that?” she said, smiling as I gathered her to me.

  “I know one woman who is truly magical.”

  And now, my fellow fools, I shall turn this narrative over to my good wife.

  FIVE

  Most adept at prognosticating the future, she knew how to manage the present according to her own will and pleasure, and in everything else she was a monstrous evil.

  ——NIKETAS CHONIATES, ON THE EMPRESS EUPHROSYNE

  And about time, too. Dear God, it’s hard enough trying to get a word in edgewise with this man when he’s speaking, but just try wresting a pen away from him!

  But even Feste cannot be everywhere at once. Yes, fellow fools, I call him Feste here, even though I should be using his Guild name. I cannot bring myself to do that. He was Feste when I first met him, and Feste when we fell in love, and even though he’s Theophilos to the Guild, Feste is what springs to my lips, whether in passion or in scolding, and there’s been plenty of both. I know his true name, too. He gave it when we took our wedding vows, possibly the first time in thirty-odd years that he had uttered it. There have been other names as well, both for him and for me, but for the telling of this tale, it shall be Feste and Aglaia.

  I’m used to courts. I grew up in one, married into another, raised my first two children there, to the extent that I was allowed. My fortunes took an interesting turn when I married my second husband. Most women marry a fool for love first, then get practical on the next husband, but I did it the other way around. With a disposition like that, it is small wonder that I became a fool myself.

  And, oddly enough, becoming a fool gained me access to the greatest court in the world, something that being a mere local duchess never would have done. But, as the Empress’s Fool, I came and went in Blachernae unchallenged, while mere kings and generals were made to wait at the front gate, staring as I strolled by in my motley and whiteface.

  At the time of the Venetian invasion (I will not call it a Crusade! The noble names that men attach to their murdering!), Euphy, as we called her in private, was around sixty, although she would claim forty, and that only when her grown daughters were in the room to refute anything less. She had set a fashion years ago by appearing unveiled in public. Now, when a veil might have had a more than favorable effect on her appearance, she wore makeup to create the illusion of beauty. So much makeup that you could peel it off in one piece and use it as a mold of her face.

  She had been much abused in life, had Euphy, victimized by circumstances, the machinations of the court, the jealousies (rightful ones, I might add) of her husband, and, worst of all, the absence at this stage of her existence of jealousies of her husband. But where others so buffeted will accept their fates philosophically, Euphy fought back. She fought back from exile, from forcible tonsuring, from the beheading of her lover, she fought back. Where others would have gone mad, she … well, she went mad, there’s no denying that, but with the madness came a fierce cunning. She mastered the grand Byzantine traditions of spying, manipulation and murder, and practiced them with ruthless joy.

  And did it as a woman would, not as some pale imitation of a man. While other women would say, Oh, he’s treated her very badly, what can we do? with Euphy, it would be, Oh, he’s treated her very badly, should I have him killed?

  Women, in those rare occasions when we gain control over the world, can easily surpass men in the exercise of cruelty. I think this may be why men are afraid to let us have control over the world.

  I realize, in writing this, that I am betraying a certain admiration for the woman, mad and murderous as she was. Yet do I not, as a fool, wear an excessive amount of makeup? Have I not, as a fool, killed my share of men? I have lived too much with the mockery of others to place my conduct above theirs, no matter how piously the Guild paints its stated goals. We use many of the same tactics that have given the Byzantine Empire its reputation, justifying the means by the ends. But in the end, I sometimes think that we are no better than anyone else.

  On the morning after the merchant’s funeral, I entered the Empress’s chambers to find it in more of an uproar than usual. Her three daughters were there, engaged in a bout of competitive wailing, each on a different pitch, each on a different topic, while Euphy looked down from her throne with an exasperated expression.

  “They can’t make him fight,” cried Irene. “He’s not well. He can’t help it if his injury flares up. He can’t even get out of bed.”

  “He can’t because he won’t,” screamed Anna. “Which means my husband has to fling himself into the middle of battle just to keep the family honor intact, all because your husband’s a coward!”

  “At least you have husbands,” sniffed Evdokia. “I’ll never find one in the midst of all this. It isn’t fair!”

  I am giving you the gist of their plaints. The actual oratory went on and on until Euphrosyne stood up. The motion was so sudden that everyone in the room stopped to watch her, except for the three daughters, who were building to a shrieking shrewfight and not paying attention.

  One should always pay attention to one’s mother, especially when she is powerful and insane. Fortunately, all she did this time was walk up to them and slap each in turn, Evdokia hard enough to send her sprawling.

  “Why do you always hit me the hardest?” sniveled Evdokia from the floor.

  “Because you need the most sense knocked into you,” I answered before Euphy could say anything.

  The Empress turned and stared at me, and I wondered for a moment if I had overstepped my bounds, but then she broke into a broad smile.

  “The fool speaks wisely, daughter,” she said to Evdokia. “As usual. Good morning, Aglaia. How are you today?”

  “Well, Your Grace, and thank you for asking,” I replied, then I gave that statement the lie by rushing out of the chamber to spill the contents of my stomach into a rather ancient urn.

  I returned as soon as I was able to find Euphy back on the throne.

  “Come here, woman,” she ordered, and I walked up the three steps a bit unsteadily to stand on the platform next to her.

  She took my head between her hands and peered closely into my eyes.

  “You’re with child!” she exclaimed.

  I nodded.

  “My apologies, Your Grace,” I said. “The morning sickness caught me unawares.”

  “Perfectly acceptable,” she said. “Is this your first?”

  “Yes,” I said, lying again. There was no need for her to know my background. There were two children from my first marriage, but they were being raised by a regent since the death of my first husband.

  “Well, you must come to me for advice,” she pronounced proudly. “I know everything there is about raising children.”

  There were looks of disbelief on three of the faces in the room, but they prudently refused to challenge this assertion.

  “As for Your Petty Lownesses,” she continued, addressing her daughters, “I want you to start putting some iron in your spines. We show a united fron
t to the people, no matter what the truth is. One of you will be Empress after me, but only if you deserve it. Most likely Anna, I think. She’s the only one who married a real man.”

  “I married a fine man,” protested Irene.

  “He was fine enough when you married him,” said Euphy. “That’s why I picked him for you. Marry your daughters to generals, keep the stock strong, that was my thinking. Too bad he had the accident. Even worse that he survived it, if you ask me. If he had died right away, we could have found you someone better by now.”

  “You didn’t find me any great prize,” muttered Evdokia, her cheek still reddened from the blow it received.

  “That was your father’s doing, not mine,” said the Empress. “What did you expect? You’re the youngest, your only value was for the alliance, and a fat lot of good you did for us there.”

  “He was a brute,” protested Evdokia.

  “And you cheated on him,” said the Empress. “You have always had the morals of a cat in heat. He threw you out, you came slinking back here, and you’ve turned down several perfectly acceptable matches I’ve arranged for you. Why should I listen to you complain now?”

  Anna’s maid came in and whispered something to her mistress. Her face fell, and she stood and bowed to her mother.

  “I must go bid my husband farewell,” she said.

  “God be with him,” said the Empress. “And remind him.”

  “Of what, mother?”

  “If he loses, he doesn’t get to be Emperor. I will see you at lunch, dear.”

  “Yes, mother.”

  Anna left, and Euphy turned her attention back to her other daughters.

  “Go attend your invalid,” she commanded Irene, and the woman slunk away, her shoulders bowed.