Secretum

Buvat and I looked at one another with vacant, tired eyes: we had not the slightest idea how.

'And did they make no attempt to enter your chamber?' I asked Atto.

'No. Perhaps because I, instead of going to pothouses,' said he emphatically, casting a meaningful look at us, 'stayed wide awake and worked.'

'But did you hear nothing?'

'Nothing whatever. And that is the strangest thing. Of course, I had bolted the door communicating with Buvat's little room. Whoever did it must have been a real magician.'

'Perhaps Sfasciamonti will not yet have returned, but the other catchpolls of the villa will surely have seen…' said I.

'The catchpolls, the catchpolls…' he chanted excitedly. 'They know only how to drink and to enrich the brothels. They'll have let in some strumpet who, after taking care of the guards, helped the thieves. We know how these things are done.'

'How very strange,' I observed; 'and all this only a few hours after the horrible assault on the bookbinder. Could the two things be connected?'

'Good heavens, I really do hope not!' exclaimed Buvat with a start, for he had no wish to be, however indirectly, the cause of someone's death.

'Of course, they were looking for something which could be in the hands of one or other of you,' replied Atto. 'The proof is that, among all the apartments in the great house, they wormed their way in only here. I put a few discreet questions to the servants, but it all meant nothing to them. No one had disturbed them.'

'We must advise Don Paschatio Melchiorri at once,' I exclaimed.

'Never,' Atto cut me off. 'At least, not until we have clearer ideas about this affair.'

'But someone has got into the great house! We could all be in danger! And it is my duty to inform Cardinal Spada, my master…'

'Yes… And thus you'd cause a general alarm, the guests would protest at the villa's lack of protection and they would all leave. So, adieu to the nuptial celebrations. Is that what you want?'

Abbot Melani was so accustomed to having a dirty conscience that in murky cases like this it mattered not that he himself was the victim; he feared nevertheless that he might have something to hide and invariably opted for secrecy. I was, however, bound to admit that his objections were far from unfounded: I dared not so much as to consider that I might have risked ruining the nuptials of Cardinal Fabrizio's nephew. So I resigned myself to seconding the Abbot.

'But what were they looking for?' said I, changing the subject.

'If you do not know, I too have no idea. The thieves' objective concerns me, obviously, as I am the only one who knows both of you. Now, however…'

'Yes?'

'I must think, and think deeply. Let us take things in order. There are other knots to be untied first, and who knows if, once that has done, we may not find our way to this? You, my boy, will now accompany me.'

'Where?'

'On board, as I promised you.'

After a quick visit to the kitchens to pick up something on which to lunch, we left the Villa Spada in the greatest secrecy; we cut across the vineyard while avoiding the main avenue and surreptitiously gained the entrance gate. While we were taking that irregular route and dirtying our shoes with the soil of the vineyard, Atto must have sensed on the back of his neck the warm breath of my curiosity.

'Very well, this is what we are about,' he exclaimed, going straight to the point. 'Your master must board something in the company of Spinola di San Cesareo and a certain A.'

'I remember perfectly.'

'So the first problem, contrary to what you might imagine, is not the place of the meeting, but who will be taking part in it.'

'You mean, who A is.'

'Exactly. Because only once we know the state and the prerogatives of the participants to a secret meeting shall we be able to discover the place where it is to be held. If it is a prince meeting with two ordinary burghers, it will take place on the prince's estates, for he certainly will not discommode himself for the sake of two inferiors; if it is between two thieves and an honest man, it will surely be in a place chosen by the thieves, who are used to plotting at secret meetings, and so on.'

'Fine, I understand what you are telling me,' said I with a hint of impatience, while we made our way painfully through the mud.

'Right. We have two cardinals. One warns the other and tells him that he will personally contact a third party. The latter will certainly be one of their peers, otherwise your master would have used other terms in his message, for instance: 'Let us meet on board tomorrow. A too will be present,' to stress the fact that this third person is not of their rank. However, what he did say was: 'I shall advise A.' Is that not so?'

'Yes, that is so,' I confirmed as we crept out from the gate of the villa.

'How can I put it? This time, I shall advise him, don't you worry about it. In other words, that message makes me think that all three are involved and there may be frequent, familiar and customary relations between them.'

'Agreed. So?'

'So, it is a third cardinal.'

'Are you sure of that?'

'By no means; but it is the only clue we have to work on. Now, look at this.'

Fortunately, we were far enough from the gates of the villa not to be descried by its inhabitants. With a rapid gesture, he drew from a pocket a half-crumpled sheet of paper, folded down the middle. I opened it.

'Well, I ask you, how many cardinals' names begin with the letter A'?'

'Signor Atto, what are you showing me?' I asked, troubled by that strange document. Was Atto perhaps involving me in some sort of espionage?'

'Just read. These are the cardinals who will elect the next pontiff. Which ones begin with A'?'

'Acciaoli, Albani, Altieri, Archinto and Astalli,' I read from the first lines.

He folded the paper at once and at once replaced it in the pocket from which it has come, while we continued on our way.

We were now right in front of the San Pancrazio Gate from which one leaves the city to the east, by the Via Aurelia. I watched Atto for an instant darting glances all around us, for he too did not desire to arouse too much attention. To be surprised while in possession of such a document might give rise to accusations of espionage, with dreadful consequences.

'Let us see then,' said he with a great easy smile, as though we were speaking of any trivial matter. I realised that he was relaxing the muscles of his face for our imminent meeting with the guards at the San Pancrazio Gate, through which we were about to continue his chosen itinerary, the destination of which he had not as yet revealed.

'Astalli is Papal Legate to Ferrara, he is not in Rome at this moment and he will come, if he does come, only for the conclave. Archinto is in Milan, too far off to come to your master's festivities. Acciaioli, the first on the list, is not as far as I know a good friend of the Spada family.'

'So there remain only Altieri and Albani.'

'Exactly. Altieri fits in very well with our hypothesis, for, like Spada, he is one of the cardinals created by Pope Clement X of blessed memory. But Albani fits even better for reasons of political equilibrium.'

'What do you mean?'

'Simple: a secret meeting between three cardinals only makes sense if it is a meeting of the representatives of as many different factions. Well, Spinola is regarded as the favourite of the Empire. Spada, however, being Secretary of State to a Neapolitan Pope, thus belongs to a Spanish fief, and may therefore be regarded as close to Spain. Albani, on the other hand, is regarded by many as being a friend of France. So we have here a little synod meeting in preparation for the conclave. That is why your master is so uneasy at this time: that lecture to the Major-Domo, that nervous, worried air..'

'A milkmaid mentioned that Cardinal Spada is forever moving back and forth between an ambassador and a cardinal, about matters relating to a papal breve,' I recalled, surprised that I too possessed interesting information