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It looked very much like an obscene allusion. I held my tongue and felt discouraged.

"But we shall speak of that another time; if you wish to, of course," she concluded with a smile which seemed ambiguous to me.

I took my leave of her, promptly completing my round of the apartments to collect the dishes in which I had served dinner. What­ever had Cloridia meant by that strange gesture? Was it perhaps a lascivious invitation or, worse, a mercenary one? I was not that stu­pid: I knew that, given my humble condition, it was ridiculous to expect that she might ever think of me as anything other than a poor servant; but, had she not understood that I had not a penny to my name? Did she perhaps hope that, for her, I might take some money from my master? I dismissed the thought with horror. Cloridia had referred to a wrong which had been suffered, in connection with her return to Rome. No, she cannot have been alluding to meretricious traffic at so grave a moment. I must have misunderstood.

I was delighted to see the guests of the inn visibly satisfied with their meal. When I knocked at his door, Dulcibeni was still sipping his soup, which was cold by now, and greedily sucking it between tongue and palate.

"Do take a seat, dear boy. Pardon me, but today my appetite was slow to come."

I obeyed silently, waiting for him to finish his meal. My attention wandered to the objects scattered across the chest of drawers next to his armchair, and stopped at three small volumes with vermilion cov­ers and gilt lettering. They were very beautiful, I thought: but where had I seen them before?

Dulcibeni looked at me curiously: he had finished his soup and was holding out the dish for me. I took it with the most ingenuous of smiles and went out with lowered eyes.

Hardly was I out of the apartment than, instead of descending to the kitchen, I rushed up to the second floor. When I knocked breath­lessly on Atto Melani's door, my arms were still laden with crockery.

"Pompeo Dulcibeni?" exclaimed the abbot incredulously, as I terminated my report.

The day before, I had in fact visited Dulcibeni's chamber in order to give him a massage and, during the treatment he had wanted to take a little snuff. He had, then, opened the chest in search of his snuff-box of inlaid cherry-wood and, in order to tidy the drawer a little, he had taken from it a few little books with a rather fine ver­milion binding and gilt lettering. Now, in Tiracorda's library, I had noticed a number of identical books: an edition of the works of Ga­len in seven volumes from which, however, three were missing. And precisely these three I had just seen in Dulcibeni's chamber. On the spine of each was inscribed
Galeni Opera
and they belonged without the shadow of a doubt to the same set of the complete works of Ga­len in seven volumes as the four books in the house of Tiracorda.

"Of course," the abbot reasoned, "it is always possible that Dulci­beni and Tiracorda last met before the quarantine began. And it was perhaps then that Tiracorda lent those books to Dulcibeni."

Nevertheless, he objected, both he and I were witnesses to the fact that the
Archiater
had received a guest in the middle of the night: a most curious hour for a visit! Nor was that all: he and his visitor had made an appointment for the following day at the same hour. There­fore, Tiracorda's mysterious guest was wont to wander around the city at the same hours in which we were able to leave the Donzello unseen. That guest must be Dulcibeni himself.

"How is it that Tiracorda and Dulcibeni know one another?"

"You are asking that question," Atto replied, "because you are unaware of one factor: Tiracorda is a Marchigiano."

"Like Dulcibeni!"

"What is more, Dulcibeni is a native of the Marches of Fermo, and 1 seem to remember that Tiracorda too comes from Fermo."

"So they are fellow citizens."

"Just so. Rome has always been home to many illustrious physi­cians coming from that ancient and noble city: Romolo Spezioli, for instance, the personal physician to Queen Christina of Sweden, the chief court physician Giovan Battista Benci and even Cesare Macchiati, if my memory does not betray me, who like Tiracorda was physician to the conclave. Almost all the citizens of Fermo live in this quarter, around the church of San Salvatore in Lauro, where their High Confraternity meets."

"Tiracorda, however, lives a few yards away from the Donzello," I objected, "and he surely knows that we are in quarantine. Does he not fear to be infected by Dulcibeni?"

"Obviously not. Perhaps he has repeated Cristofano's original view that this was not the pestilence, passing over Bedfordi's illness and the strange accident that befell your master."

"Then it is Dulcibeni who stole my master's keys. He, who seems so severe!"

"Never trust to appearances. He will probably have been instruct­ed by Pellegrino in the use of the subterranean passageways."

"While I knew nothing of them. It seems incredible..."

Not siam tre donzellette semplicette semplicette, oh, oh, senza fallo...*

He teased me, striking up a comic pose and chanting with his little voice. "Wake up, my boy! Remember: secrets are made to be sold. Originally, Pellegrino must have opened up the secret passage for him in return for payment. However, at the beginning of the quar­antine, your master became comatose. Dulcibeni must then have had to borrow the bunch of keys in order to have a copy of the key to the closet made by an artisan in the Via dei Chiavari, the road where (as Ugonio puts it) Komarek impresses."

"And what has Komarek to do with it?"

"Nothing whatever. I have already explained that to you, do you not remember? A pure coincidence; one which misled us."

"Ah yes," I replied, worried by my incapacity to keep pace with the congeries of discoveries, refutations, intuitions and false trails of the past few days. "But why did Pellegrino not give Dulcibeni a copy of the key?"

"Perhaps your master, as I said, takes payment every time a client wishes to use the underground passages; meaning that no keys are provided."

"Why, then, does Stilone Priaso have his own copy?"

"Do not forget that the last time that he sojourned at the Donzel­lo was in the days of the late Signora Luigia: he will have asked her for one, or purloined it."

"That does not explain why Dulcibeni should have stolen my lit­tle pearls, since he seems to be anything but poor."

"And I have a question which is even more difficult to resolve: if he is indeed the mysterious thief whom we have taken such pains to follow, how is it that, on every single occasion, he has proven to be a hundred times faster than we, and has always given us the slip?"

"Perhaps he knows the galleries better than we do. However, now that I come to think of it, he cannot possibly move so fast: only two

*
Three little maids are we / Simple, oh so simple / Oh, oh with not a fault. In Italian, the last word "fallo" may
be a double-entendre,
since it also means "phallus". (Translator's note).

days ago, he suffered an attack of sciatica. And Cristofano told him that it would last for several days."

"All the more reason. Add to that the fact that Dulcibeni is no longer a youngster and is somewhat corpulent, and whenever he speaks for any length of time, he becomes breathless: how the deuce does he manage to crawl every night up the hole which leads to the trapdoor?" concluded Atto with a hint of sourness, he who perspired and panted every time that we climbed through that narrow place.

I then told Atto all that I had recently learned concerning Pompeo Dulcibeni. I mentioned to him that, according to Padre Robleda, the elderly Marchigiano belonged to the sect of the Jansenists. I also told him of the harsh judgement which Dulcibeni had pronounced against the activities of the Jesuits in the sphere of espionage and of his fiery soliloquy against the consanguineous marriages which had for centuries been taking place among the royal families of Europe. The gentleman from Fermo was, I insisted, so scandalised by that practice and had become so heated as to exclaim in a loud voice—in an imaginary conversation with a woman, held before a mirror—that he longed for a Turkish victory at Vienna; thus, he hoped, a little fresh and uncorrupted blood would come to the thrones of our continent.

"A discourse, or should I say, a soliloquy worthy of a true Jansenist. At least, in part," commented Abbot Melani frowning pensively. "And yet, why desire a Turkish invasion in Europe, only out of pique against the Bourbons and the Habsburgs? That does seem to me somewhat excessive even for the most fanatical follower of Jansenius."

Be that as it may, Atto concluded, my discovery compelled us to return to the house of Tiracorda. As we had heard last night, Dulci­beni would be returning there too.

*

As usual, we waited until all the guests, including Cristofano, seemed finally to have retired, before descending the well which led to the labyrinth beneath the hostelry.

We covered the distance to our meeting point with Ugonio and Ciacconio under the Piazza Navona without any unforeseen occurrences. When, however, we met the
corpisantari
, Atto Melani found himself faced with a number of demands and an animated argument.

The two strange beings complained that, because of the ad­ventures in which we had involved them, they had been unable to dedicate themselves freely to their activities. They claimed, moreover, that I had damaged some of the precious bones which they had carefully stacked, and which had collapsed upon me when we first met. The claim was scarcely credible, but Ciacconio had begun to wave under the nose of Abbot Melani an enormous, nau- seatingly evil-smelling bone, with still some flesh attached to it, which, the
corpisantaro
pretended, had been harmed during that in­cident. If only to be rid of that filthy, stinking fetish, Atto preferred to give in.

"Very well, so be it. But I insist that you will cease henceforth to bother me with your problems."

He drew forth from his pocket a handful of coins and offered them to Ciacconio. In a lightning movement, the
corpisantaro
grasped the money in his hooked fingers, almost clawing Abbot Melani's hands.

"I cannot bear them, those two," murmured Atto under his breath, massaging his palm disgustedly.

"Gfrrrlubh, gfrrrlubh, gfrrrlubh..." Ciacconio began to grunt qui­etly, passing the coins from one hand to the other.

"He is totalising the pecuniary valorisation," said Ugonio in my ear, with an ugly, knowing grin. "He is economiserly."

"Gfrrrlubh," commented Ciacconio at last, with satisfaction, let­ting the money slide into a grimy, greasy sack where it fell jingling onto what must be a sizeable heap of coin.

"Nevertheless, the two monsters are invaluable to us," said Abbot Melani to me later, while Ugonio and Ciacconio moved into the darkness. "That revolting thing which Ciacconio held under my nose was some butcher's refuse, anything but a relic. But at times it is better not to be too tight-fisted and to pay up; otherwise, we should risk making enemies of them. Remember, in Rome one must always win, but never crushingly so. This holy city reveres the powerful but takes pleasure in their ruin."

After obtaining their reward, the
corpisantari
had delivered to Atto what we needed: a copy of the key to Tiracorda's coach-house and kitchen. Once we had emerged from the trap into the physician's lit­tle stables, entering the house was a matter of no difficulty. The late hour made it reasonable to suppose that only the old court physician would still be up and about, awaiting his guest.

We crossed the kitchen and entered the chamber with the old four-poster bed, then the lobby. We moved in the dark, finding our way only by memory and with the help of the faint moonlight. Thus, we climbed the spiral staircase: here we found the welcoming light of the large candles higher up the stairs, which Atto had had to extin­guish the evening before in order to safeguard our retreat. We passed the first parlour halfway up the stairs in which were displayed the fine objects which we had so admired on our previous inspection. We then came to the first floor which, as on the night before, was plunged in darkness. This time, however, the door giving access to the chambers was open. All lay silent. The abbot and I exchanged glances of complicity: we were about to cross that almost fateful threshold and I felt myself strong with a courage as unusual as it was misplaced. The night before, all had gone well, so I thought, and we could again succeed this time.

Suddenly, three loud knocks coming from the lobby sent our hearts to our mouths. Almost instantaneously, we took refuge on the stairs from the first to the second floor, outside the other little room which housed the library.

We heard a stirring above our heads and then, down below, the shuffling of distant footsteps. Once again, we were caught between two fires. Atto was on the point of again blowing out the candles (which this time would certainly have aroused the suspicions of the master and mistress of the house) when Tiracorda's voice came clear­ly to our ears.

"I shall go, Paradisa, I shall go."

We heard him descend the stairs, cross the hall and utter an exclamation of happy surprise. The visitor entered without a word.

"Enter dumb into here," said Tiracorda joyfully, closing the door. "Number to dine: three."

"Pardon me, Giovanni, I am in no mood for laughter this evening. I must have been followed, and so I preferred to take another pas­sage."

"Come in, my friend, my dearest friend."

Atto and I held our breath, glued like two snails to the wall of the staircase. The brief dialogue had been sufficient for us to recognise the voice of Pompeo Dulcibeni.

Tiracorda led his guest to the first floor. We heard the pair move away, and at length a door closed. As soon as we were alone, we descended from our hiding place and looked into the large vestibule on the first floor. I would have liked to ask Abbot Melani a thousand questions and to obtain his comments on as many matters, but silence was our only hope of salvation.

We entered a spacious chamber where, in the semi-darkness, we could descry two four-poster beds and a number of other pieces of furniture. By some miracle, I avoided tripping over a low coffer. When, however, my pupils grew accustomed to the darkness, I sud­denly realised that two icy, frowning faces lay silently in ambush in the darkness.

Frozen with terror, I needed several seconds to realise that these were two busts, one of stone, the other of bronze, placed at my height upon two pedestals. Beside them I could now see a plaster Flercules and a gladiator.

Turning to the left, we passed into an ante-chamber along the walls of which stood a long row of chairs. Thence, we moved to a second more spacious ante-chamber, immersed in gloom. From a neighbouring room came the voices of Tiracorda and his fellow- townsman. With great circumspection, we approached the crack of the door, which was not completely closed. There, transfixed by the fine blade of light that issued from within, we overheard the strangest conversation.

"Enter dumb into here... Number to dine: three," intoned Tiracorda, as when he had welcomed his guest at the front door.

"Number to dine: three... three..." repeated Dulcibeni.

"And so, consider calmly now; did you not perhaps come for this?"

The physician stood up and off he trotted to the left, out of our field of vision. Dulcibeni remained seated with his back to us.

The chamber was lit by two large candles of gilded wax, standing on the table at which the two were seated. The pomp of the furnish­ings, such as I had never seen before, left me both surprised and filled with admiration. Next to the candles stood a silver basket over­flowing with wax fruit; the place was also illuminated by two large candelabra, one standing upon a little sandalwood table, the other on an ebony writing desk decorated with black mouldings and gilded bronze coats of arms. The walls were covered with rich crimson sat­in; everywhere hung fine pictures with varied and delightful figures: looking around, I recognised paintings of landscapes, animals, flowers and figurines: a Madonna and Child, a Pieta, an Annunciation, a Saint Sebastian and perhaps an Ecce Homo.

But dominating the room, in the middle of the longest wall, immediately opposite us, hung an imposing portrait of Our Lord Innocent XI, with a great gilt frame, carved with arabesques adorned with cut-glass foliage and garlands. Under this, on a pedestal, I espied an octagonal reliquary in silvered and gilt bronze which I imagined to be full of holy relics. More to the left, I could see a bed and a commode covered in red brocade. This last particular seemed revealing to me: we were in all probability in Tiracorda's study, where he received his patients.

We heard the doctor returning to the middle of the room, after opening and closing a door.

"How silly of me, I put it on the other side."

He turned to the right and went to the wall on which, immense and imposing, hung the portrait of His Holiness. To our surprise, in the wall before us, there opened up another door: there were two invisible panels, covered in the same crimson satin as the walls. The secret doorway concealed a dark closet in which were stored the in­struments of his art. I could distinguish pincers, forceps and lancets, vases of officinal herbs and a number of books and piles of paper; these were perhaps notes on medical consultations.

"Are they still in there?" asked Dulcibeni.

"They are here and they are well," said Tiracorda busying himself in the little room. "But I am just looking for a couple of pleasant little things which I had set aside for the two of us. Ah, here we are."

He came out from the cupboard triumphantly waving a half-crum­pled piece of paper, closed the secret door and sat down, preparing to read.

"Now, listen to this: if a father has seven daughters..."

At that precise moment, Atto Melani shocked me by clamping his hand sharply over his mouth. His eyes closed and he stood on tiptoe, his chest suddenly swelling, then doubled up desperately, with his face tucked into his armpit. I was seized by panic: I could not under­stand whether this was a fit of pain, hilarity or anger.

His anguished and impotent look made me understand that Atto was on the point of sneezing.

I have already drawn attention to how, in those days, Abbot Mel­ani suffered from brief but uncontrollable fits of sneezing. This was, fortunately, one of the rare occasions when he succeeded in contain­ing one of these loud outbursts. For a moment, I feared that he might lose his balance and fall against the half-open door. He leaned against the wall and, miraculously, the danger passed.

Thus, however, although only for a few instants, we were distracted from listening to Tiracorda and Dulcibeni. The first scrap of conversation which I managed to follow, as soon as Atto had recovered his composure, was as incomprehensible as what had gone before.

"Fourteen?" Dulcibeni was asking in a bored voice.

"Eight. And do you know why? One brother is brother to all the girls. Ha, ha, ha, ha! Ha, ha, haaaaa!'

Tiracorda had abandoned himself to unbridled asthmatic laugh­ter, in which he was not joined by his guest. Hardly had the doctor calmed down than Dulcibeni endeavoured to change the subject.

"So, how did you find him today?"

"Ah, he fares not so well. If he does not cease fretting, there will be no improvement, and he knows it. Perhaps we shall have to forget about the leeches and try some other mode of intervention," said Tiracorda, pulling on his nose and drying his tears of laughter with a handkerchief.

"Really? I thought..."

"I, too, would have continued by the usual means," replied the physician, pointing towards the secret door behind him, "but now I myself am no longer quite so sure..."

"Permit me to say, Giovanni," Dulcibeni interrupted, "although I do not belong to your art: to each remedy, due time must be al­lowed."

"I know, I know, we shall see how we proceed..." the other re­sponded absently. "Unfortunately, Monsignor Santucci is in a poor state of health and can no longer care for his patient as in the good old days. It was proposed to me that I should replace him, but I am too old. Fortunately, there are several persons who can one day take our place; like young Lanucci, whom I have done all in my power to help."

"He too is from the iMarches, if I am not mistaken?"

"No, he was born here in Rome. But I have adopted him, so to speak. First, he was a pupil of our colleague from the Marches, then I made him my assistant at the Archispedale of Santo Spirito in Sassia."

"So, you will change the treatment?"

"We shall see, we shall see. Perhaps a little country air will suffice to obtain an improvement. Talking of which," said he, reading again from the crumpled paper, "On a farm..."

"Giovanni, listen to me," interrupted Dolcibeni with some warmth. "You know how much I enjoy our meetings, but..."

"Have you dreamed again of your daughter?" asked the other. "It is not your fault, I have told you that a thousand times."