'M'lord, I didn't blame you--I was thinking maybe somebody's been leaning on you. If I was you, reckon I'd swap a kid for Maria, if I had to--hard choice, but--that's the way I'd be doing it.' Benito kept his eyes on Aldanto, and thought he saw a thoughtful gleam there.
'So--hey, I thought, you didn't have Marco, you might use me to get to Marco. So I let you have it where it could count, so as I could scat.'
'I'm afraid, boy,' Caesare said quietly, 'that this once you were wrong.'
Benito preferred not to think about what that peculiarly phrased sentence might mean if he examined it too closely.
'Look, m'lord, I told you--you got a hard choice to make, you make the best one you can. Happens I was wrong this time--but I'm sorry, hey? Now--' Benito got down to business. 'I think my brother cost you more than you could afford, no? I've got eyes--and I know what Giaccomo's rates are--'
Aldanto's own eyes narrowed speculatively, but he said nothing.
'M'lord Caesare, I used to figure there was one person worth spending all I had to keep alive, and that was my brother. Now, I figure there's two--'
He felt, more than heard, Maria come in behind him. That was all right; nothing he was going to say now that he didn't want Maria to hear. 'Well, maybe three, except Maria back there can take care of herself, I reckon. But the other one's you. We owe you, m'lord.'
Aldanto turned to face him fully. 'I may be able to salvage something from Marco's poetry,' he said dryly. 'I wish he'd told me about it earlier.' He shifted his weight to one foot. 'But what is the point of telling me something I know?'
'It's this, m'lord--Marco, he's good, ye know? I'm not good--I'm trouble. I don't know how, but the Dell'este--my grandfather--always knew that, even when I was a kid. 'You take care of Marco,' he told me. 'The good ones need us bad ones to keep them safe.' '
Aldanto's right eyebrow rose markedly. 'I'm not exactly popular with the Duke of Ferrara, boy. How do you think he'd feel about the company you're keeping now?'
Benito shrugged. 'That's not my problem. He just told me I was to take care of Marco.'
Aldanto looked pensive, but he said nothing. Benito continued, nervously, but determined. 'M'lord, I--' he waved his hands helplessly '--I guess what I want to say is this. You got into this mess because of us. It cost you. You didn't have to do it. Well I'm guessing. But I figure you might need help. Well, from now on, you say, and I'll do. Whatever. However. For as long as you like. And there's some things I'm not too shabby at.'
The eyebrow stayed up. Caesare made no pretence that he didn't understand what Benito was talking about. 'And if I say--no noise?'
Benito remembered a certain window, and a certain escapade that no longer seemed so clever, and the shadowy men on the canalside walkways--and shuddered. 'Then it'll be quiet, m'lord. Real quiet. Babies wouldn't wake up.'
'And how long can I expect this sudden fit of virtue to last?' Caesare asked with heavy irony.
'It'll last, m'lord, long as you got use for me. Though, I reckon--' Benito grinned suddenly, engagingly, 'you'll have to crack me over the ear, now and again. Claudia used to--about once a week.'
Caesare's eyes narrowed a little as he studied Benito. The boy held steady beneath that merciless gaze, neither dropping his own eyes, nor shifting so much as an inch. Finally Aldanto nodded in apparent satisfaction.
'You'll do as I say? Exactly as I say? No arguments?'
'Yes m'lord. No arguments, m'lord. I can spot a professional when I see one, m'lord. Happen you could teach me more than a bit, no? I learn quick, even Valentina says so. One other thing, though--Marco, he went an' spent all the rent money on your medicine, and both of us had to leave work to help out here, so there's nothing saved.' Benito was not averse to rubbing that in, just to remind Aldanto that they'd already bankrupted themselves for him, and that debt could work both ways.
He got a bit of satisfaction when this time he definitely saw Caesare wince. 'Money's a bit tight.'
Benito shrugged. 'I understand. Giaccomo's boys don't come cheap. But we're broke. So we either got to stay here, or hit the attics again. Happens the attics are no bad notion; you've got to get over the roofs to get in them-- hard for folks to sneak up on you.'
Aldanto shook his head, closing his eyes for a moment.
